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+*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 59202 ***
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+                               LEGENDARY
+                        TALES OF THE HIGHLANDS.
+
+                              A SEQUEL TO
+                           HIGHLAND RAMBLES.
+
+
+                                   BY
+                     Sir THOMAS DICK LAUDER, Bart.
+
+            AUTHOR OF "LOCHANDHU," "THE WOLFE OF BADENOCH,"
+                        "THE MORAY FLOODS," ETC.
+
+
+                           IN THREE VOLUMES.
+
+                              VOLUME III.
+
+
+                                LONDON:
+                       HENRY COLBURN, PUBLISHER,
+                       GREAT MARLBOROUGH STREET.
+                              M.DCCC.XLI.
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+CONTENTS OF THE THIRD VOLUME.
+
+
+                                                           PAGE
+
+    THE LEGEND OF SERJEANT JOHN SMITH'S ADVENTURES,           1
+
+    COMFORTS OF A LONDON CLUB-HOUSE,                         67
+
+    THE LEGEND, &c.--Continued,                              73
+
+    CRUELTY OF THE DUKE OF CUMBERLAND AFTER THE BATTLE
+    OF CULLODEN,                                            189
+
+    ALISTER SHAW OF INCHRORY,                               193
+
+    DRUM-HEAD COURT-MARTIAL AND SENTENCE ON INCHRORY,       210
+
+    THE LEGEND OF THE VISION OF CAMPBELL OF INVERAWE,       212
+
+
+
+ILLUSTRATIONS.
+
+
+    JOHN SMITH EXHIBITS MILITARY GENIUS IN DEFENCE OF
+    THE KILLOGIE,                                            46
+
+    JOHN SMITH UNDER THE TURF,                              145
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+HIGHLAND RAMBLES.
+
+THE LEGEND OF SERJEANT JOHN SMITH'S ADVENTURES.
+
+
+To understand my story the better, gentlemen, you must yemaygine
+to yourselves a snug well-doing Nairnshire farmer's onstead, [1]
+situated in the parish of Auldearn, with a comfortable dwelling-house,
+of two low stories, accurately put down, so as mathematically
+to face the twelve o'clock line,--with its crow-steppit gables,
+small windows, little out-shot low addition behind, tall chimneys,
+and grey-slated roof--just such a house, to wit, as a man of his
+condition required in the middle of the last century--with two lines
+of strange-looking thatched or sod-covered stables, byres, barns,
+and other out-houses, projecting from its sides at right angles to
+its front, with divers out-riders, and isolated straggling edifices,
+of similar architecture and materials, dropped down here and there, as
+the hand of chance might have sown them--the smoke coming furth from
+some of their lumm-heads, and partly also from their low door-ways,
+proving to you, almost against your conviction, that they actually
+are the dwelling-places of human beings.--Fancy the whole grouped
+(as Mr. Grant, the long painter lad of Grantown, would have said)
+with sundry goodly rows of peat and turf stacks, a number of corn
+ricks wonderfully formed, and bulging and hanging out of the centre
+of gravity, each in a different direction, like a parcel of drunken
+Dutch dancers;--in the midst of all a large midden--(query whether the
+word midden may not be a mere corruption of the words middle-in,--the
+midden being always in the middle of all rural premises in Scotland? so
+that unlucky visitors not unfrequently walk up to the middle into the
+middle of it.)--Then picture to yourselves, behind the biggins, sundry
+kail-yards, with a few very ancient ash trees, sycamores, and rowan
+trees, rising from among their bourtree fences, or from the sides of
+their dilapidated dry-stone dikes. At a little distance below, a bog,
+with its attendant pools of dark moss-water, which shine amidst the
+black chaotic mass around them, and look blue by their reflection of
+the sky--with a half-ruined and roofless killogie, or kiln for drying
+corn and malt, standing on a sloping bank at no great distance from
+them. Then people all this with the farmer himself, a stout, hale,
+healthy-looking man, going bustling about from door to door among
+his folk, his muck-carts, and his horses, with a hodden-grey coat
+upon his back, a broad blue bonnet on his head, a hazle staff in his
+hand, and a colley and one or two rough terriers and greyhounds at his
+heels, shouting every now and then in Gaelic to his man, John Smith,
+a tall, handsome, strong-built Highlander, whilst the gudeman's wife,
+a very good-looking, round-formed, trigly-dressed Englishwoman,
+is seen appearing and disappearing from under the wooden porch,
+over which some attempts have been made to trail a plant or two of
+rose and honeysuckle, but which attempts have been rendered abortive
+by the epicurean taste of the browsing animals of the farm--her south
+country tongue sounding quick and sharp in the ears of Morag, or Mary,
+a clever, well-made, bare-footed, and short-gowned Highland lass,
+with pleasing countenance, largish cheek bones, black snooded hair,
+sparkling eyes, arched eyebrows, and rosy cheeks, busied in washing
+out her milk cogues, with her coats kilted up to her knees. To which
+add the herd of cows, oxen, queys, stirks, and calves of all sorts and
+sizes, with a due mixture of sheep and lambs, and pownys, sprinkled all
+about, feeding among the whinny pasture-hillocks and baulks, dividing
+the queer-shaped patches of the surrounding arable land.--Above all,
+I would have you particularly to remark a vurra large sow-beast,
+with a numerous litter of pigs, grubbing up the ground about the old
+killogie, amid the ruins of which her progeny first saw the light. In
+addition thereto, fancy, in the words of our own Scottish pastoral
+poet, Allan Ramsay, that
+
+
+    "Hens on the midden, ducks in dubbs are seen,"
+
+
+and you will be in full possession of the first scene of my tale,
+as well as acquainted with some of its more important dramatis personæ.
+
+Mr. MacArthur, the farmer, though a Highlander, was a stanch Whig,
+which made him, as you may well suppose, gentlemen, rather a
+
+
+    "Rara avis in terris, nigroque simillima cygno"
+
+
+among his brother Celts. He had acquired his principles during his
+residence in England, where he had fallen in with and married his wife,
+who was a woman of good condition for her rank of life, and of superior
+yeddication. She was attached to the Hanoverian royal family, both
+by principle and interest. Her brother was an officer in the Royal
+Regiment; and as everything connected with England was dear to her,
+because it was her country, so every thing connected with the English
+army was especially dear to her on her brother's account.
+
+During the year 1745, when the recruiting for the army of the Prince
+of the Stuarts was going on, many of Mr. MacArthur's servants, and
+John Smith in particular, manifested a strong disposition to enlist
+under his banners. But so powerful were the influence and eloquence of
+this English lady, that she succeeded in dissuading them, one by one,
+from following out the bent of their inclinations. This her zealous and
+active opposition to the Prince's cause, soon began to attract public
+attention, in a district where it was so generally favoured. She became
+a marked object of dislike to the Jacobites, and this all the more so,
+perhaps, that she was an Englishwoman. Oftener than once it happened,
+that, whilst they spared some of her neighbours, whose politics were
+dubious, and therefore obnoxious in their eyes, they plundered her
+goodman's farm on her especial account. But these depredations were
+comparatively trifling, and protected as she was by her husband's
+fortitude, she bore these little evils with the magnanimity of a
+martyr; nay, she even ventured to talk of them with contempt, and there
+were many people who believed that she actually gloried in them. As
+Mr. MacArthur was a Highlander, and spoke the Gaelic language fluently,
+he might perhaps have been able, by modest behaviour, kind treatment,
+and smooth words, in some degree to have mitigated the prejudice which
+his countrymen had against his wife as a Pensassenach, or English wife,
+as she was uniformly called by way of reproach. But husbands cannot
+always restrain the political enthusiasm of their ladies--and so it
+was with Mr. MacArthur. With or without his approbation she scrupled
+not, at times, when a good opportunity offered, to set the Jacobites
+at defiance, to give them all manner of opprobrious epithets, and,
+with all a woman's rashness, but with more than feminine intrepidity,
+she dared them to do their worst.
+
+It was after sunset on the evening of the 13th of April, 1745, that
+the Pensassenach was seated in her elbow chair, by the fire in her
+little parlour. She was alone, for her husband had been called away
+from home, for some days, on very urgent business, and as she felt
+herself slightly indisposed, she was prepared to take particular care
+of herself for that night. A small tall-shaped chased silver vessel of
+mulled elderberry wine, with a close top to it to keep its contents
+warm, together with a very tiny silver cup, were placed beside her
+on a little round walnut-tree table, supported on a single spiral
+pillar with three claws. She was about to pour out a little of this
+medicinal fluid, to be taken preparatory to retiring to bed for the
+night, when she was startled by a noise in the kitchen, and immediately
+afterwards she was alarmed by the abrupt entrance of her maid Morag.
+
+"Mem!--Mem!" cried the girl, breathless with the importance of her
+intelligence, "tare's Wully Tallas, ta packman in ta kitchen!--He's
+come a' ta way frae Speymouth sin yesterday. Ta Englishers are a'
+comin' upon us horse and futs!--horse and futs an' mockell cannons,
+an' we'll be a' mordered, an' waur!--fat wull we do?"
+
+"What say you, girl?" exclaimed the Pensassenach, starting from her
+chair, and overturning all her meditated comforts in her hurry. "But
+get out of my way, you senseless fool, I'll speak to the man
+myself. Dallas! Will Dallas!" cried she, throwing her voice shrilly
+along the passage, towards the kitchen. "Come this way, Will Dallas,
+and let me hear your news from your own mouth!"
+
+"Comin' mem!" cried the travelling merchant, as he appeared limping
+along the passage, by no means sorry to be thus called on to unbuckle
+his budget of news, which he was always ready to dispose of at a much
+cheaper rate than he generally sold his goods.
+
+"Where have you come from, Will Dallas?" cried the Pensassenach;
+"and what news have ye got?"
+
+"Weel, ye see, mem, I hae come straught frae Speymooth, as fast as my
+heavy pack and this happity lamiter leg o' mine wad let me," replied
+Dallas. "And my pack's very heavy yee noo, for I've got a grand new
+stock o' gudes in't."
+
+"Well, well! never mind your goods at present!" cried the impatient
+Pensassenach; "quick! quick! what news have you?"
+
+"Od, mem, it wad at no rate do for me no to mind my goods at a' times
+and at a' saisins," said Dallas. "But touching the news, mem,--the
+Duke, mem--that is, the Duke o' Cummerland, I mean, crossed the Spey
+yesterday wi' a' his airmy."
+
+"Is it possible?" cried the Pensassenach, her eyes sparkling with
+delight.
+
+"It's quite true, mem, for I seed the whole tott o' them yefeck the
+passage wi' my ain een," said Dallas.
+
+"Ha! tell me, good Dallas, how did they cross?" demanded the lady.
+
+"They just fuirded through the Spey, mem, in three grand deveesions,
+at three different pairts, just for a' the warld as gin ye had been
+rollin' aff three different pieces o' red ribban, like, at yae time,"
+replied Dallas.
+
+"A glorious sight!" cried the Pensassenach.
+
+"Aye, truly, ye wad hae said sae had ye seen't, mem," said Dallas;
+"gin ye had seen them wi' the sun glancin' on their airms, and on
+the flashin' faem o' the Spey! Every bone o' them got safe across,
+exceppin yae dragoon that had taen a wee thoughty ower muckle liquor,
+and fell fae his horse,--and four weemen fouk, wha were whamled out o'
+a bit cairty, and wha were a' carried down, and a' drooned outright."
+
+"Poor wretches!" said the Pensassenach. "But it was well they were
+not men: their lives were comparatively but little worth."
+
+"I daur swear that you're right there, mem," said Dallas; "little
+worth followers of the camp they were, nae doot;--and yet the hizzies
+were weel pit on. I followed the bodies as they soomed down the water,
+and cleekit ane o' them ashore, and although her mutch was gane, she
+had a gude goon and a daycent rocklay on, and ither things forbye;
+but they ware a' sae spiled wi' the water, that I selt them till a
+woman in Elgin for an auld sang. But I'll tell ye what it is, mem,
+weemen--that is, daycent weemen--have nae business----"
+
+"You have no business with the women, Mr. Dallas," interrupted the
+Pensassenach impatiently--"it is of the men--of the troops, and
+of their noble and gallant leader that I would hear. All across,
+said you? and what became of the other Duke?" continued she, in
+a contemptuous tone. "I mean the rebel Duke--the Duke of Perth,
+I mean? Where was he, and where were his heroes, that they did not
+arrest the progress of the Royal army?"
+
+"Troth, mem, the Duke o' Perth and his men just came on their ways
+wast the country, and left the English airmy to cross at their ain
+wull," replied Willy.
+
+"Bravo! bravo!" shouted the lady, waving her hand around her head. "The
+false knaves dared not to face them! Well, any more news, Dallas?"
+
+"I ken nae mair that I hae to tell ye," said Dallas, "exceppin'
+that I was in the English camp yestreen mysel', and that I selled
+a wheen caumrick pocket-napkins, and three yairds o' black ribban,
+till yere brither, Captain John, and I promised to ca' in by this
+way aince eerant to tell ye that he was weel, and to drink his health."
+
+"Thank ye, thank ye, good Bill Dallas!" cried the lady, clapping her
+hands in an ecstasy of joy; "you shall not fail to do that; but why
+did you not tell me this joyful news before? Stay, my good man--here
+is for your happy tidings!" and, running to a corner cupboard, she
+brought out a bottle of brandy, and filled him a tasse, that made
+his eyes dance in his head after he had tossed it off.
+
+"My certy, that's prime stuff indeed," said Dallas, panting with the
+very strength of it. "And noo, mem, will ye look at my pack.--I hae
+some o' the grandest jewels, rings, chains, watches, and brooches--the
+gayest ribbans--and, aboon a', the bonniest lace,--ye never saw
+siccan lace. The captain said he was quite sure it wad tak your ee,
+for that you had siccan a fine taste. Troth, says I till him, you're
+no far wrang there, captain; Mistress MacArthur has the best taste and
+joodgement in lace o' a' my customers, north or sooth--north or sooth,
+said I. It's quite beautifou lace, mem, as ye'll say when ye see't;
+and sae cheap, too! Od, I'm sellin' it for half nothin'. Shall I
+bring the pack ben here, mem?--ye'll hae mair light here."
+
+"No--no--no!--not at present, Will," cried the Pensassenach, her
+patience quite exhausted with his prolixity. "Another time Will--but
+I have other fish to fry at present. Morag!--Morag, girl! run! call
+out all the men! My stars, how unfortunate it is that MacArthur is
+from home! How he would rejoice! Call all the men, I say!"
+
+"Fat vas she cryin' aboot?" said Morag, hurrying to answer her call.
+
+"Run and call all the men, I tell you, girl!" cried the Pensassenach,
+bustling about, all life and activity, and her indisposition entirely
+forgotten. "Call all the men I say; and John Smith in particular. I
+want John Smith here immediately. What glorious news! There wont
+be a rascally rebel knave of them left in the whole country. And my
+brother John coming too! Who knows but we may have the honour of being
+presented to his Royal Highness the Duke of Cumberland in person! How
+provoking it is that MacArthur is from home!"
+
+"Fat wad ta leddy be wantin' wi' her?" said John Smith, at that
+moment putting his head into the room, his Kilmarnock cowl, and the
+disordered state of the covering of so much of the upper part of his
+person as was visible, sufficiently indicating that he had been roused
+from his bed. "Fat wad ta leddy be wantin'? We wus a' beddit."
+
+"Run, John!" cried the impatient lady, "run and make all the people
+get out of their beds directly! collect every one, man and woman,
+about the farm. Make them yoke all the carts, and drive a whole
+peat-stack to the head of the knoll, and build up a large bonfire,
+and see that you mix your layers of peats with layers of moss-fir,
+and dry furze-bushes. I'll have a blaze that shall be seen from Forres
+to Inverness. Have we any tar-barrels left?"
+
+"Ou aye!" replied John; "a tar barrels tat was ower mockell fan we
+last tar ta sheeps."
+
+"Then put the whole tar-barrel in the midst of all," cried the
+Pensassenach. "Come, John, why do you stand staring so? run, man,
+and do as I bid you, without a moment's delay."
+
+"Ou aye, aye, she's runnin' fast," replied John, slowly moving
+away. "Fod, but she's thinks tat ta Pensassenach be gaen taft
+awtagedder."
+
+"Morag! bring a basket here directly," cried the Pensassenach,
+as she hurried down stairs with the large key of the cellar in her
+hand. "Now," said she, putting a number of bottles into the basket,
+"take care of these; and make haste, and bring a cheese, and some
+loaves of bread, and follow me quickly out to the knoll with the
+basket."
+
+In a very little time, an enormous pile of fuel was built up on
+the summit of the knoll, with the tar-barrel in the centre of it,
+to which an opening was at first left from the external air, which
+was afterwards partially filled with dry furze-bushes dipped in tar,
+so as to afford the flame a ready communication inwards. When every
+thing was prepared, the Pensassenach seized a lighted candle from a
+lantern, and, as Dryden hath it, she
+
+
+    "Like another Helen, fired another Troy!"
+
+
+that is to say, she set fire, not to a city, indeed, but to the
+whin-bushes, and the flame running inwards, to the tar-barrel, the
+whole mighty fabric of fuel was instantaneously in such a blaze, that
+any one might have thought that it was Troy itself that was burning.
+
+"Now," said the Pensassenach, "draw me one of those stone bottles of
+brandy, and fill me a tasse of it. I drink to those to whom I have
+dedicated this bonfire--I drink, in the first place, to the health
+of my brother John, captain in the Royal Regiment, whom I hope soon
+to see here!" and, putting the cuach to her lips, she sipped a modest
+lady's share of the contents.
+
+"Come, Bill Dallas," continued she, addressing the travelling merchant,
+who, tired as he was with his long tramp, had yet sneaked out to
+secure his share of the liquor, as well as of the fun. "Come, Bill,
+you must drink next; you have the best right to do so, as the bearer
+of the good news."
+
+"Weel, here's to Captain John, and wussin' him health, and muckle
+happiness, and a gude wife till him, wi' plenty o' siller," said the
+packman, tossing off the full contents of the tasse. "I'm sure there's
+no a bonnier man, nor a better man, nor a gallanter sodger--eh,
+beg his honor's pardon, I meant offisher--in the hail land o' the
+British Isles, be the ither wha he may."
+
+"Well spoken, Bill," cried the lady. "Now, John Smith, come it is
+your turn next."
+
+"Here's helss, an' mokel o't, to her broder Captain Shon, and mokel
+gude wifes and gude sillers!" cried John Smith, draining the cuach
+to the last drop.--"Oich, but she's goot trinks!" added he.
+
+The cup and the toast went round a large and encreasing party; for the
+bonfire, sending up sharp pointed flames, as if it meditated piercing
+the very clouds, spread wonder and speculation all over the country
+far and wide, and brought all manner of idlers, like flies and moths,
+about it. A considerable space of time, as well as a tolerable quantity
+of brandy, was expended, before the health had been drank by every one.
+
+"Now," said the Pensassenach, filling the cuach again to the brim, "I
+drink health and success to his Royal Highness the Duke of Cumberland,
+and confusion to all his enemies!"--and, kissing the cup merely,
+she handed it to the packman.
+
+"Weel, mem, here's wussin' that same wi' a' my heart!" cried
+Mr. Dallas, and off went every drop of his brimmer.
+
+"Now, John," said the Pensassenach, filling the cuach again to the lip,
+"now, John Smith, it is your turn. Come, man, drink the toast--health
+and success to the Duke and his brave fellows."
+
+"Na!" said John, turning away as if the cup had contained vinegar or
+verjuice--"na!--Teel be on her an she do!"
+
+"What do you mean, John?" demanded the Pensassenach in a mingled tone
+of surprise and displeasure. "Will you refuse to drink my toast?"
+
+"Hoot, man, dinna refuse to drink the leddy's toast," said the
+packman. "That gude brandy wad wash down ony toast ava, let alane
+siccan' a grand man, and a hero, like the Duke o' Cummerland.--Od,
+man, an ye had seen him as I hae seen him, ridin' at the head o'
+his men, wi' as muckle gold lace and reyal Genowa velvet aboot him
+as might serve to cover a papish pupit wi', ye wad say he was the
+grandest man that ever ye seed.--Come, man, drink success till him,
+and confusion till a' his yennemies!"
+
+"Surely you will not refuse to drink success to that brave army in
+which my brother John serves?" said the Pensassenach,--"and to that
+noble and gallant Prince who commands it?"
+
+"She'll no grudge to trink hail bottals till ta helts o' Captain Shon,
+because she's her broder," said Smith in a positive manner.--"But
+fint ae drops wull she tak' to wuss ony helts to ta titter man an'
+his fouks!"
+
+"Tuts, nonsense man," said the packman; "ye're just a reyal guse.--Come
+awa! drink the Duke's health--the brandy's just parteeklar gude."
+
+"Why should you hesitate?" said his mistress.--"Come, drink the
+Duke's health."
+
+"Tamm hersell an' she do ony siccan' a sing!" said John Smith doggedly,
+and with powerful emphasis and action.--"She'll as soon eat ta cuach!"
+
+"What! are you a loyal subject, and refuse to drink the health of
+the Duke of Cumberland!--the King's own brother!" exclaimed the
+Pensassenach energetically.
+
+"Ou troth--ou aye,--she be loyals eneugh till her ain Kings," said
+John, "an' she'll no grudge to trink gallons till her. But for ta
+titter mans, fod but she's wussin' her nasins ava but a goot clink
+on ta croon," and with that John walked off, with a countenance
+so expressive of dissatisfaction and determination, as rendered it
+evident that it would be quite hopeless to call him back.
+
+"He is an obstinate disloyal mule!" cried the Pensassenach, giving
+full way to her anger.
+
+"A reyal dour ass as I ever cam' across," said the packman; "an'
+siccan' reyal fine speerits too. The cheild thought naething
+o' hammerin' awa' and keepin' a' huss loyal fouk frae our drap
+drink.--It's weel that he's awa. My certy, I rauken that there's nae
+ither body here that'll be sae dooms foolish as to refuse that gude
+brandy, let what toast there may be soomin' on the tap o' the brimmer."
+
+"I trust that that fellow is the only disloyal man about the place,"
+said the Pensassenach.--"If it be otherwise I'll have all such Jacobite
+knaves turned off this farm. We shall have none other but good loyal
+subjects here, I promise you, now that the Duke and his gallant army
+are coming among us."
+
+This hint was not lost on the rest of the company; for whatever
+their private political opinions might have been, they preferred
+swallowing the good brandy in peace, let the tasse be prefaced by
+whatsoever toast the Pensassenach pleased, rather than be martyrs,
+like John Smith, and risk the loss of the liquor and their places,
+by any heroic and straightforward declaration of their sentiments. We
+sometimes see such folk in common life, even at the present time,
+gentlemen. Many, then, were the toasts of the same character that went
+round.--Liberally did the Pensassenach make her enlivening eau-de-vie
+to circulate. The huge bonfire was again and again supplied by the
+willing revellers. They were wise enough to see that the endurance
+of the joviality of the night must, in all probability, be measured
+by that of the fire, and so they laboured and sweated like horses to
+keep it going. Loud were the shouts, and many were the antic tricks
+performed around its blazing circle, all of which were to be attributed
+to the mirth-inspiring spirit. The packman was particularly joyous
+and hilarious, and his loquacity increased as he became elevated with
+the liquor. At last the Pensassenach, wishing gradually to wind up
+the festivities of the night, proposed another toast.
+
+"Now, come," said she, filling the cuach, "Let us drink confusion to
+the rebels!"
+
+"Hurrah! a capital toast!" cried the packman, whilst his cheer was
+blindly echoed by the more than half-intoxicated crowd around him.
+
+"Then here I drink it as my most cordial wish," said the Pensassenach,
+sipping a little of the liquor in token of her earnestness and
+sincerity.
+
+"Tamm! but she'll rue tat wuss!" cried a hoarse voice, which came
+from the shadow beyond the circle of the revellers.
+
+"Who spoke?" demanded the Pensassenach, in vain endeavouring to dart
+her eyes into the impenetrable darkness, by which the bright field
+of light was surrounded.
+
+"Tamm her, but she'll ken tat soon enough!" replied the same voice;
+but the Pensassenach could see nothing but a pair of eyes, that,
+for the fraction of an instant, caught a strong reflection of the red
+light from the bonfire, glared fearfully at her, and then were gone.
+
+"Lord hae a care o' huss! I wuss that I had had naething ado wi'
+this matter," exclaimed Mr. Dallas, very much fear-stricken.
+
+"Seize that man, whoever he may be!" cried the Pensassenach. But he
+was nowhere to be found. All the feeble and unsteady attempts of the
+drunken people to catch him were thrown away. The Pensassenach was
+vexed and mortified. The voice was sterner than John Smith's. But
+she could by no means banish the idea that it was his. She inquired
+and found that he was no where about the place, and she retired home
+to her chamber, filled with doubt regarding him, or rather more than
+half convinced that she nourished a traitor in her house.
+
+Appearances on the following morning were by no means such as to
+overcome these suspicions.
+
+"Is that you, Morag?" demanded the Pensassenach, as awakened at a later
+hour than usual by her maid, she started up from that profound sleep,
+which the extraordinary fatigue and excitement of the previous evening
+had thrown her into, and began to huddle on such parts of her clothes
+as lay nearest at hand.
+
+"Aye, Memm, it's me," replied Morag, "Fat wull she be doin' for
+mulks? Shon Smiss has driven awa a' ta wholl kye lang or it was
+skreichs o' tay."
+
+"What said you?" demanded the Pensassenach. "John Smith has driven
+away all our cows! Traitorous thief and robber that he is, I thought
+as much!"
+
+"Toot na! Shon's nae fiefs nor rubbers neither," replied Morag,
+in anything but a pleased tone.
+
+"He is a thief and a traitor to boot," cried the enraged Pensassenach.
+
+"He is no fiefs!" rejoined Morag, with great energy, both of voice
+and of action. "Not a bonn o' him but is as honest as yoursel'."
+
+"I tell you he is a thief, and a traitor; and, for aught I know,
+an assassin too!" replied the Pensassenach; "and you are an impudent
+baggage for daring to contradict me."
+
+"She canna stand and hear Shon Smiss misca'ed," exclaimed Morag,
+bursting into tears of mingled grief and rage, excited by the
+unextinguishable love for John, which had long secretly possessed
+her; "an' war she no the mistress," continued Morag, with very
+violent action, "war she no the mistress, Fod, but she wad pu'
+tat cockernony aff her head for saying as mockell! But och mercy be
+aboot huss a'!" cried the girl, darting a look out at the window,
+and then hurrying away as she spoke; "mercy be aboot huss a'! yonder
+comes Shon himsel', rinnin' like ony rae-buck!"
+
+"God be merciful to me, can the traitor mean murder!" cried the
+Pensassenach, hastily shutting, locking, and bolting the chamber
+door, and, with great exertion moving a chest of drawers against it,
+whilst her very heart almost ceased to beat, from the terror that
+fell upon her.
+
+"Far is she, Morag? Is she oot o' her bed? cried John, in a loud and
+hurried voice, as he came flying up the stair, and began thundering
+like a madman at the lady's bed-chamber door. "Come, come, let her
+in direckly!"
+
+"No one can come here," said the lady trembling; "I am not half
+dressed."
+
+"Dress be tamm!" cried John, furiously; "Come away fast--open ta toor
+or she be killed!"
+
+"You shall find no entrance here, you murdering blood-thirsty villain,
+whilst I have power to defend my life," cried the Pensassenach, driven
+to desperation, and as, with immense labour, she was dragging a heavy
+trunk of napery across the floor, which she reared on end against the
+chest of drawers. "Oh, why did MacArthur leave me thus to be murdered?"
+
+"Let her in, or she see her sure murdered," cried John, in a voice
+of thunder, and kicking terribly at the door.
+
+"God help me, I'm gone!" muttered the Pensassenach, in an agony of
+fear. "Oh, why did my husband leave me? The door never can stand such
+kicks as these. I see it yielding. Murder! murder! murder!"
+
+"Tamm her nane sel', but she has no more time for nonsense!" cried
+John, in a voice that seemed to betoken the climax of fury, and
+with that he drove the whole weight of his body, with the force of
+a battering-ram, against the door, forcing it out from its hinges,
+and tumbling it, and the chest of drawers, and the huge trunk, into
+the very middle of the room, with a violence that burst them open,
+and scattered their contents in all directions.
+
+"Villain!" cried the Pensassenach, now suddenly excited to an unnatural
+boldness by despair of life, and standing with her back to the farther
+wall, armed with her husband's broad-sword, which she had snatched
+from the bed-head, and drawn in her own defence, and which she now
+flourished with great activity and determined resolution, altogether
+regardless of the imperfect state of her attire. "Villain that you
+are, come but one step nearer to me, and this sword shall drink your
+life's blood from your heart."
+
+"Ou fye! ou fye!" cried John, standing considerably abashed at this
+spectacle; "far got she tat terrible swoord?"
+
+"Villain, you tremble!" cried the Pensassenach, roused still more,
+and, advancing towards John Smith, step by step, as she spoke;
+"fly villain, or I will put you to instant death!"
+
+"Fye, fye!" said John; "but Fod she mauna mind it noo; tere's nae
+mair time for ceremonies. She maun e'en tak her as she is."
+
+"Attack me as I am!" cried the Pensassenach; "if you do, death,
+instant death, shall be your portion."
+
+"We sall see tat," said John, lifting his hazle rung; "we sall soon
+see tat," and springing suddenly over the obstructing obstacles,
+John, with one blow of his stick, sent the sword spinning from the
+feeble grasp of the delicate hand that held it.
+
+"Oh, mercy, mercy!" cried the Pensassenach, throwing herself on her
+knees before him, with the horrible dread of impending death upon
+her. "You would not murder your mistress, John, and all for asking
+you to drink an idle toast? Oh, spare me! spare me! Do not murder me
+in cold blood!"
+
+"Shon Smiss murder!" cried he, with horror and astonishment on
+his countenance. "Foo! foo! fat could gars her sinks tat o' Shon
+Smiss?--Shon wad fichts to ta last trop o' her blots for her, futher
+she be King Charles's man, or futher she be ta titter bid body o'
+a sham king's man. Foo! foo!--hoo could she sinks tat Shon Smiss wad
+do ony ill to ta Pensassenach tat has aye been sae kind till her, aye,
+and to Morag an a'," and the poor fellow began blubbering and crying.
+
+"God be praised that I am safe, then!" cried the lady, immeasurably
+relieved. "But what is the meaning of all this violence, John? Are
+you mad?"
+
+"Na," cried John, starting from the melting fit into which he had been
+thrown. "She no mad a bit. But ta Hillantmens comin'!--Swarrants ta
+Hillantmens no liket ta bonfires!"
+
+"The Highlanders!" cried the Pensassenach. "Heaven defend me, what
+shall I do without the protection of my husband? What!--what shall I
+do?" and she burst into a flood of tears, from the nervous excitement
+to which she had been subjected.
+
+"Troth, she be sinkin' tat its as weel tat ta master's no at hame,"
+said he. "But fat need she fear as lang as Shon Smiss be here?"
+
+"Will you protect me?" cried the Pensassenach, eagerly. "Will you
+really be true to me?"
+
+"Fat has Shon Smiss toon to mak ta Pensassenach sink tat she'll no
+be true till her ain mistress?" cried Smith, in a whimpering tone,
+betokening vexation, so sincere, as, in a great measure, to restore
+the lady's confidence in him.
+
+"Why did you drive away the cattle this morning, and what have you
+done with them?" demanded she.
+
+"Trots she was dootin', a' nicht, tat ta Hillantmen wad come after a'
+yon mockel fires," replied John, "an' sae she just trave tem, coos,
+cattal, sheeps, an' staigs, an' awtegitter, a' awa' ower to ta glen,
+whaur she's sinking tat tey'll no be gettin' tem at 'tis turn."
+
+"Faithful creature, after all, then!" cried the Pensassenach. "How
+can I sufficiently thank you?"
+
+"Did she no tell her tat Shon Smiss was nae feefs nor rubbers neither,"
+said Morag, entering triumphantly at that moment. "Is she no a prave
+ponny man? But uve, uve, memm, fat way is tat to be stannin'? Fye,
+Shon Smiss! hoo could ye stand glowerin' tere?--get oot, man, till
+she gets ta leddy dressed."
+
+"Fod, she has nae time, noo!" cried John. "Fod, but she hears ta
+pipes 'tis blesset moment. Hoot, toot!--Hurry, hurry!--Fod, but
+ta Hillantmens comin' noo!" and snatching a blanket from the bed,
+he threw it over his mistress, and whipping her up in his arms ere
+she wist, he strode down stairs with her in a moment.
+
+"Where are you carrying me? Where are you carrying me to, John
+Smith?" cried the Pensassenach, much alarmed.
+
+"Dis she no hear ta pipes?" cried John. "She be carrying her to hide
+her in ta auld killogie to be sure. Dinna be fear. She mak' her safe
+eneugh, she swarrants her o' tat."
+
+John accordingly ran with the Pensassenach to the old kiln, as fast
+as his legs could carry him and his burden. He found it already
+occupied by the great sow and her numerous progeny, who, from their
+unwillingness to quit it, seemed to consider it, both by birthright,
+and by long possession, as their own particular castle, from which no
+one could lawfully remove them. John Smith used no great ceremony with
+them, but serving them all with an instantaneous process of ejectment,
+delivered by divers rapid and severe blows of his hazle cudgel, he
+forthwith dislodged them from the pend, or fire-place of the kiln,
+where they were used to find a dry and snug lair, and from which both
+mother and children retreated with manifest dissatisfaction, and with
+all manner of sounds and signs of extreme ire. To these John Smith gave
+but small heed, but, shoving the Pensassenach, blanket and all, with
+as much tenderness and delicacy as he could, into this their vacant
+bed-chamber, he concealed her as much as possible by covering her
+up with straw, and he had hardly accomplished all this, and made his
+retreat good from the killogie, when a large body of armed Highlanders,
+under the command of a certain Captain M'Taggart, appeared filing over
+the neighbouring brow, and with what intent might easily be guessed,
+from the numerous horses they brought with them, some harnessed
+in rude carts, and some fitted with panniers or crooked saddles,
+for carrying off plunder. The men themselves displayed infuriated
+countenances, and ceased not, as they drew nearer, to give vent to
+the most horrible denunciations of vengeance against the Pensassenach.
+
+"Ta Pensassenach! ta Pensassenach!" cried the same stern voice that had
+spoken from amid the darkness that surrounded the blazing bonfire of
+the preceding night. "She sall soon ken fat it is to trink confusion
+to ta reypells! Far be ta Pensassenach?--ta Englis wife?"
+
+"Ta Pensassenach!--ta Pensassenach!--ta heart's blott o' ta
+Pensassenach!--hang her!--purn her!--troon her!--far is she?--her
+heart's blott!--her heart's blott!" vociferated some thirty or forty
+rough and raging voices, coming from men that thirsted revengefully
+for her blood.
+
+The poor woman's heart almost died within her through fear, as these
+murderous sounds reached her, where she lay half suffocated under the
+straw in the killogie. Most active and particular was the search which
+the Highlanders then commenced. First of all, the captain and some
+of them proceeded to examine the dwelling-house, and there they were
+met at the very door by Mr. Dallas the packman. This worthy having
+been altogether overpowered by his last night's debauch, had thrown
+himself down in his clothes on the bed hospitably provided for him
+by his hostess in the room, contained in the little out-shot behind,
+and there he had slept, with his pack as usual under his head, until
+awaked by the noise made by John Smith and the Pensassenach. He had
+then witnessed enough to make him aware of the place where the lady
+was secreted. Seeing that the Highlanders came so suddenly upon them
+as to make it quite hopeless for him to attempt a retreat, with his
+lame leg, he hurried away out to the kail-yard and hid his pack under
+a goosberry bush, an operation which John Smith, as he was flying
+with his mistress on his back, chanced, with the tail of his eye, to
+observe him performing. After having done this, Mr. Dallas returned
+into the house, and, making a virtue of necessity, he stepped boldly
+forth to meet the leader, when the party came to the door.
+
+"Muckle prosperity till you and your cause, noble captain," said he,
+making his reverence. "There's a bonny mornin'."
+
+"Who the devil are you, sir?" said Captain M'Taggart, sharply.
+
+"Troth, captain, I'm a poor travellin' chapman," replied Dallas. "I
+chanced to come here last night, and the gudewife gied me ludgings
+for charity's sake."
+
+"Where's your pack, sir?" demanded Captain M'Taggart.
+
+"Troth, I left it yesterday at Inverness to get some fresh gudes pit
+intil't," replied Dallas.
+
+"You are rather a suspicious character, methinks,"  said the
+captain. "See that you search every corner of the main house for
+this woman," continued he, turning to his men, "and if you find this
+fellow's pack bring it forth to me."
+
+"There's nae pack o' mine there, captain, an' that's as fack as death,"
+said Dallas. "But ye need hae nae jealousy o' me, for I'm a reyal
+true and loyal subject o' the Prince."
+
+"Ta Prince!" cried the same man who had watched the last night's
+proceedings at the bonfire. "Ta Prince!--ta Teevil;--tat is ta
+vera chield tat wanted to mak' honest Shon Smiss trink ta helss o'
+tat teevil ta Tuke o' Cummerlant. He's a reyal and blotty whugg,
+and weel deserves till hae his craig raxit."
+
+"Hang up the villain directly, then," cried M'Taggart, carelessly.
+
+"Oh! spare my life, good captain, and I'll tell ye whaur the
+P--p--p----." Pensassenach is hid, were the words that the villain
+would have uttered, but they were arrested by the ready hand of John
+Smith, who sprang upon him with the pounce of an eagle, and clutched
+him up as that noble bird might clutch up a rat, his left arm being
+half round his middle, and his right hand griping his throat, in such
+a manner as to stop all utterance, and nearly to choke him.
+
+"Ta tamm scounrel would fain puy her life for tellin' her fare her
+pack is," said John, laughing heartily. "But she need na mak' nae
+siccan pargains wi' her, for her nane sell saw her hide it under
+a perry-puss in ta kail-yaird, and a rich pack it is, she kens tat
+weel eneugh. See, captain, tats ta way till ta yaird, an' Shon Smiss
+'ill tak cair o' tis chiel, and pit her past tooin' ony mair harms,
+she'll swarrants tat."
+
+Off went the captain and those about him, greedy upon the scent of
+the pack, and caring little what became of its owner. John called to
+Morag to bring him a sack and some bits of rope, and he had no sooner
+got them under one arm than he ran off with the sprawling Mr. Dallas
+under the other, who, having his wind-pipe still tightened by the
+fearful grasp of him who bore him, was now kicking in the agonies
+of death. John dived through among some peat-stalks, and so managed
+to get clear off without observation, to the side of a deep pond or
+pool, in a retired spot, where the Pensassenach was wont to steep
+her flax.--There laying his, by this time, semianimate burden at
+length upon the brink, he put some heavy stones into the bottom of
+the sack, and then began to draw it on, like an under-garment, over
+the limbs of the unfortunate Mr. Dallas, inserting his arms therein,
+and tying the mouth of it tight round his neck, just as if he had been
+preparing him for running in a sack race, though it must be premised,
+that for such a purpose the heavy stones might have been well eneugh
+left out of the bottom of the sack.
+
+"Hae mercy on my sowl, Maister Smith,--ye're no gawin' till droon
+me!" groaned out Mr. Dallas, in a faint, hollow, and semi-suffocated
+voice. "Oh, mercy! mercy! what a horrible death! I'm no fit till dee,
+Maister Smith. I've been a horrible sinner. God forgee me for cheating
+the puir fowk! Oh, hae mercy, Maister Smith--mercy!--mercy!--for I'm
+no fit till dee."
+
+"She no be gawn till mak' her dee," said John, coolly, "though she
+wad pe weel wordy o't. But she only be gawn ta hide her in ta watter
+tat ta Hillantmen mayna hangit her."
+
+"Hide me in the water? and is na that droonin'?" cried the terrified
+wretch. "Oh, mercy! mercy!"
+
+"Foots, na, man!" said John. "Hidin's no troonin' ava, ava. She'll
+come back an tak' her oot again fan a' is dune, an' she'll no be a
+hair ta waur o't. But she maun stop her gab frae speakin' about ta
+Pensassenach; an' trots an' she had been hangit or droonit either,
+aye, or baith tagedder, she had been weel wordy o't a', for fat she
+was gaein' to hae tell't on ta puir Pensassenach."
+
+By this time John had prepared an effectual gag for his patient's
+mouth, which he made him gape and receive between his jaws, and then
+he secured it firmly by tying it behind his neck. He then lifted him
+up bodily, and whilst the poor man "aw awed" and "yaw yawed," from the
+dreadful fear that still possessed him that John's intention, after
+all, was certainly to drown him, he gradually let down Mr. Dallas's
+feet into a part of the water, the exact depth of which he perfectly
+knew would just admit of his immersion up to the neck, he left him,
+with his head resting safely against the bank on the side of the pool,
+with some dry rushes and sedges and flax scattered carelessly both over
+the bank and the water where he was, so as perfectly to conceal him.
+
+Great as was the time that all this occupied, John found, on his
+return to the farm-house, that it had not been more than sufficient
+to satisfy Captain M'Taggart and his friends, in their examination
+of Mr. Dallas's pack, and in the division of the rich booty it
+contained. Meanwhile, the search for the Pensassenach was going on
+keenly and most unremittingly, and John was relieved to find that
+it was so, since he was thereby satisfied that, as yet at least,
+her place of concealment had not been discovered. They opened
+every door, and looked into every corner, for the unfortunate lady,
+still swearing all the time the bloodiest oaths of vengeance against
+her. Not a house upon the premises, not a hole nor crevice about the
+whole place did they pass unexamined, save and except only the eye of
+the ruined killogie itself, where the object of their search was in
+reality concealed. Frequently, to the almost complete annihilation of
+the action of the pulses of her heart, did she hear the footsteps of
+some of them passing close beside the place where she lay, as well as
+their curses, as they went. But so completely were they deceived by
+the ruined appearance of the roofless killogie, that they never once
+thought of the possibility of any one being concealed there. Wearied
+at length with their ineffectual search, and believing that the
+Pensassenach had fled, they began to wreak their rage, and to glut
+their rapacity, by plundering her effects. Meal, butter, cheese, beef,
+and bacon, were crammed indiscriminately into sacks, with articles
+of wearing apparel, and the blankets, and the webs of cloth and linen
+which the thrifty housewife had prepared for her household. Articles
+of silver plate were not forgotten, as well as all other valuables
+upon which they could lay their rapacious hands. The cellar was broken
+open and ransacked, and its contents, as well as many other pieces
+of plunder of a bulky nature, were stowed away to be carried off in
+the carts belonging to the farm. A general assault then commenced
+upon the live-stock. John Smith's zealous precaution had secured the
+greater part of the larger animals from their clutches, but the attack
+on the poultry was simultaneous and terrific. Loud was the cackling,
+gobbling, and quacking of the fowls, turkeys, ducks, and geese, as
+they were caught, one after another; and fearful was it to hear their
+music suddenly silenced, by their necks being drawn, and melancholy to
+behold their exanimate bodies thrown into the hampers that hung on the
+crook-saddled horses. The good Morag's heart was rent, as she beheld
+these ruthless murders committed upon the innocent creatures whom
+she had delighted to rear. But honest John Smith comforted himself
+with the reflection, that he had saved all the weightier and more
+valuable stock, and therefore he witnessed all these ravages among the
+feathered folk with tolerable composure, until a circumstance occurred
+which renewed all his apprehensions for the safety of his mistress,
+and again excited him to the full exertion of all his energies.
+
+War had not been long commenced against the poultry, when the large
+sow, alarmed by the murders she beheld going on around her, and
+terrified by the loud hurrahs of the plunderers, as well as scared
+by the sudden striking up of the bagpipes, took to flight in good
+time, and made straight for the eye of the killogie, at the head of
+her troop. The quick-sighted John Smith at once perceived the risk
+which his mistress, the Pensassenach, ran, of being discovered, by
+the animals making this attempt to find shelter there. Off he flew
+like the wind to intercept them; and cutting in before them with great
+adroitness, he turned them right away towards the fragment of meadow,
+which lay in the close vicinity of the black bog. John played his part
+so well, that this manoeuvre of his had all the appearance as if he
+had been merely making a dash at them for the purpose of catching some
+of them, and that the creatures had for the present foiled him. There
+they were accordingly left at peace for a time, during which John's
+mind also remained in some degree tranquil and at ease.
+
+But the sow and her inviting family were not long in being descried
+by the Highlanders, after every other living thing had been sacked by
+them, and a most eventful, hazardous, and very ludicrous chase after
+them immediately took place. Full of the most anxious apprehensions
+as to the result, John planted himself in front of the killogie, and
+between it and the scene of action; and as all the old sow's efforts
+were directed towards her stronghold in the kiln, it was with the
+greatest difficulty that he repeatedly succeeded in driving her from
+the dangerous post. At length, by one exertion, greater than the rest,
+he had the good fortune to force the sow once more fairly a-field
+again, with all her grunting young ones running scattering after her,
+whilst the Highlanders, deceived by his shouting to them in Gaelic,
+and encouraging them to the pursuit, believed that he had no other
+object in view than honestly to aid them in catching her. To blind
+them still more, he now started off full tilt at the head of them,
+and soon outran the swiftest of them. With amazing dexterity, he first
+clutched up one pig, and then another, until he had one in each hand,
+swinging by the tail, and squeaking so fearfully, as to excite the
+maternal anxiety and rage of the sow mother, to so great an extent,
+that she followed him, fast and furiously grunting, wheresoever he
+turned. John inwardly chuckled at the thought of having thus got
+so easily and so perfectly the command of her motions. But a sudden
+onset from the Highlanders speedily dispersed the remainder of her
+progeny; and the pursuers naturally scattered themselves to follow
+after individual grunters, so that the race was seen to rage over all
+parts of the field. This distracted the attention of the old sow, and
+she went cantering about, hither and thither, like a frantic creature,
+until, by degrees, she found herself at the very farthest end of
+the bog. There, seized by a panic, she suddenly turned, and bolted
+desperately back again, with her snout pointed directly towards the
+kiln. Winged by terror, she pushed wildly on at a bickering pace,
+and running her head right between John's legs, ere ever he wist,
+she carried him off for several yards, horsed upon her back, with his
+face to the tail; and in the blindness of her alarm, she ran headlong
+with him into a great peat-pot, where he was instantly launched all
+his length among the black chaotic fluid which it contained. John
+scrambled out of the hole with some difficulty, and, starting to his
+legs, and shaking his ears like a water-spaniel, and clearing the dirt
+from his eyes, he, to his great horror, beheld the sow scouring away
+as hard as she could gallop, in a direct course for that chamber in
+the killogie, which prescriptive right had so long made her believe to
+be her own. John saw her hurrying thither, pursued by one or two of
+the Highlanders. It was evident that she must soon reach it; and he
+felt certain that she would instantly dart in among the straw where
+the Pensassenach was lying, and that so the lady must be exposed to
+certain discovery, and consequently to instant death. What was to
+be done? Not a moment was to be lost. Taking advantage of a double
+which the sow was compelled to make, in consequence of some one having
+headed her course, and which forced her to swerve considerably from
+the straight line of the chase, John seized a gun from the hand of a
+Highlander near him, and aiming at the animal as she thus presented
+her great broadside to him, he fired at her, and rolled her over and
+over, by a bullet that passed through her very heart. There she lay
+dead before her pursuers, within some thirty or forty yards of her
+perilous place of refuge. A shout of applause at so wonderful a shot
+arose from all who witnessed it.
+
+"Tat's ta learn her, mockel fusome beast tat she is, for tummelin
+Shon Smiss inta ta peat-hole!" cried John, infinitely relieved from
+all his terrors.
+
+The pigs were now very speedily secured in detail, and the great sow
+was dragged up to the farm-house, and quietly deposited, with her
+slaughtered family, in one of the carts.
+
+"My brave fellow!" said Captain M'Taggart, the leader of the party,
+now advancing towards John, and shaking him heartily by the hand,
+"you must come along with us. A young man, so handsome, so active,
+so spirited, and so soldierly-looking,--and, above all, so capital a
+shot as you are,--was never intended by nature to hold the stilts of a
+plough, or to fill dung-carts. You were born to be an officer at the
+very least, and, for aught I know, to be a colonel or a general. We
+are already aware that you are stanch to the righteous cause of the
+true Prince. Now is the time for you to raise yourself in the world,
+by joining his royal standard. Come, then, and lend us your powerful
+aid in placing our lawful King upon the throne of his ancestors!--Come
+along with us, and I shall forthwith introduce you to Prince Charles,
+who may yet make a lord of you before you die."
+
+John Smith was, in truth, all that M'Taggart had called him,
+being a handsome, good looking man, as brave as a lion, and not
+altogether devoid of a certain natural ambition. But he was ignorant,
+thoughtless, and credulous, owing to his having been, up to that
+day, entirely without experience. He had never before seen anything
+like military array, and irregular and deficient, in many respects,
+as that was which he now beheld, still it was enough to captivate
+his unpractised eye. John had a strong attachment to his master and
+mistress, who had always been very kind to him. But his devotion
+to the Prince, whom he had never seen, was of a higher and holier
+order. Bestowing a few moments of reflection on the ceaseless and
+profitless plodding, and slavish drudgery of his present duties,
+all, in themselves, absolutely repugnant to the very nature of a
+Highlander, and comparing them with the ideal picture he had drawn to
+himself, of the gallant, gentlemanlike service of the Prince, whose
+soldiers, he believed, had not only daily opportunities of enriching
+themselves with honourable plunder,--a small specimen of which he
+had just witnessed--but who had the prospect opened to them of one
+day becoming great men, the contrast was by far too flattering in
+favour of the latter not to dazzle him. But if it had not had that
+effect, the promise which M'Taggart made him of introducing him to
+Prince Charles, the son of the true and legitimate King of Scotland,
+was enough of itself to have gained John's consent in a moment.
+
+"Ou, troth, she'll no be lang o' gangin' wi' her," said John,
+"an she'll but stop till she clean hersel' a wee frae ta durt o' ta
+fulthy bog, tat ta soo beast pat her intill,--and syne bids fereweel
+to ta leddy."
+
+"Whoo!" exclaimed M'Taggart.--"The lady! What, then, the Pensassenach
+is somewhere about the place after all, and you know where she
+is?--By holy St. Mary, but I will burn every house here, and force
+the rancorous whig she-devil to unkennel out of her hiding place!"
+
+"Teel purn her nane sell's fooliss tongue for namin' ta leddy ava
+ava!" said John bitterly. "But she may e'en purn ta hale toon gin
+she likes--fint a bit o' ta leddy can she purn."
+
+"Ha, my good fellow," said M'Taggart, "since you have the secret
+knowledge of her place of concealment locked up in your bosom, what
+is to hinder me to use a thumbikin as a key to unlock it.--I have a
+great mind to try."
+
+"She may e'en puts ta toomkin on her nanesell's neck, and she'll no
+tell after a'," said John resolutely. "And ponny pounties tat wad be
+surely for Shon Smiss to serve ta Prince."
+
+"Nay, my good fellow, I was only joking," said M'Taggart, afraid to
+lose so good a volunteer; "trust me I meant you no harm."
+
+"Gin she purns ta toon, or gin she do ony mair ill aboot ta place,
+fouk wull be sayin' tat Shon Smiss bid her do it," continued John--"an
+tat wad be doin' Shon mockell harm. Teevil ae stap wull Shon be gangin'
+wi' her at a' at a', an she do ony mair bad sings here."
+
+"Well well," said M'Taggart, soothing him, "go in and dress yourself,
+and make your mind easy; and the sooner we are away from here the
+better."
+
+John thought so too. He ran to the stable for his breachcan; [2]
+put on his best coat, kilt, and hose; tied up his only two shirts,
+and a spare pair of hose, in a napkin, and placed the bundle into the
+fold of his plaid; and then seizing a trusty old broad-sword, he put on
+his new Sunday's bonnet, smartly cocked up,--and he strode so erectly
+forth to M'Taggart, and with so martial an air, that, added to the
+wonderful change created in his personal appearance by his dress, made
+the captain hesitate for a moment in believing him to be the same man.
+
+"She be ready noo," said John; "put fare be ta rest o' ta men,
+Captain!"
+
+"They are hunting the Pensassenach," replied M'Taggart with a
+careless laugh.
+
+"She pe verra idle loons tan," said John, "for gin she wad seek a'
+tay she wad na' find her." And then, by way of diverting the Captain's
+attention from the search by a joke, he pointed to Morag, who stood
+at the door, weeping bitterly at the prospect of his departure,
+and added,--"see, tat pe ta Pensassenach."
+
+"That the Pensassenach!" said M'Taggart.--"That's a good joke truly. I
+know well enough that's not the Pensassenach that we are after."
+
+"She pe a verra ponny Pensassenach," said John, going up to Morag,
+and hastily delivering to her, in a Gaelic whisper, directions how
+and when she should relieve her mistress from her confinement, and
+also where she was to look for the packman, that she might get him
+taken out of the water.
+
+"That Pensassenach seems to be a favourite of yours, John," said
+the Captain.
+
+"She wunna say put she is," replied John, his heart filling a
+little with sympathy for Morag's tears, and at the prospect of
+leaving her.--"Petter tak tiss Pensassenach wi' huss,"--and then,
+rather as a parting word of kindness than anything else, he added,
+"will she go, Morag?"
+
+This was too much for poor Morag. Her heart was too full for her to
+command words to reply. She rushed forward, and threw her arms around
+John. She fixed her hands into the folds of that breachcan, in which,
+in their days of herding, when she was but a lassie, and he but a boy,
+she had been so often wrapped by her lover as a shelter from the stormy
+elements, and she gave way to a burst of grief that at length enabled
+her to find utterance for her feelings. She implored him, in all the
+anguish of despair, not to leave her. John's heart was softened by
+her words, and her tears, and he blubbered like a child. M'Taggart,
+fearing that the martial influence in John's soul might be overpowered
+and extinguished by that of love, and setting a much greater value on
+him as a recruit, than on the capture of the Pensassenach, he thought
+it advisable to put an end to this tender interview as speedily as
+might be. He ordered the piper to play up therefore, and the men,
+abandoning their fruitless search after the English wife, were speedily
+gathered around him. The train of carts and horses, with the plunder,
+were driven on--the order of march was formed. John, after a severe
+struggle with his heart, rent himself away from the arms of Morag,
+and followed M'Taggart, without daring to speak, or to look behind him;
+whilst the poor girl, bereft of her support, fell upon the green--where
+she lay beating her breast and tearing her hair in utter despair,
+till the sound of the distant pipe died away, and the presence of
+some of her fellow-servants brought her back to her reason.
+
+Morag was no sooner sufficiently calm and collected, than she hastened
+to execute John Smith's last injunctions. The poor Pensassenach was
+taken from the killogie more dead than alive. Morag would have had
+her to go to bed, but, having recovered herself a little, she became
+too much excited to rest; and, having arranged her dress, she began to
+bustle about her affairs, and to take a full note of her loss. It was,
+indeed, severe. But she felt that she endured it for a glorious cause,
+and that reflection made her bear it with wonderful philosophy. She
+was grieved, and even angry to learn that John Smith had enlisted
+with the Prince's men, but she felt deeply grateful to him for having
+saved her life; and especially so, when she heard from Morag the story
+of the packman's treachery, and John's ingenuity in defeating it,
+as well as of the whole of his exertions for her preservation.
+
+"Where has John bestowed the villain?" demanded the Pensassenach.
+
+"Toon in ta lint pot, memm," replied Morag; "I maun gang toon an get
+him oot o' ta holl noo."
+
+"I'll go with you, Morag," said the Pensassenach; and so mistress and
+maid proceeded together towards the pond. "What noise is that?" cried
+the Pensassenach, as they drew near to it.
+
+"Aw--yaw!--yaw--aw!" cried the packman from the pool.
+
+"Where are you, wretched man?" cried the Pensassenach.
+
+"Yaw--aw!--yaw--aw!" replied Mr. Dallas.
+
+"Why don't you speak distinctly?" demanded the lady.
+
+"Aw--aw!--yaw--aw!" replied Dallas again.
+
+"The sound would seem to come from under that loose heap of rushes
+at the margin of the pool yonder," said the Pensassenach.
+
+"Oich aye, she's here memm," cried Morag, removing the covering from
+the packman's head.
+
+"Ya--aw!--aw--aw!" cried Dallas, raising his eyes with an expression
+of intense agony.
+
+"Ah, I see how it is," said the Pensassenach; "John has gagged him,
+to prevent his vile tongue from betraying me. Loosen that string,
+Morag, and take out the gag."
+
+"Oh, Heeven be praised that I hae fand freends at last," cried the
+packman in a hoarse voice. "Hech, my jaws are stiff, stiff, and sair,
+sair, wi' that plaguit bit o' a rung that John Smith pat into my
+mooth. Hech me! kind souls that ye are, pu' me oot, pu' me oot o'
+this, or I maun e'en drap awthegither owerhead into the pool, for
+I haena mair poor to stand on this ae leg o' mine, and I canna rest
+ony at a' on the short ane, mind ye, without sinkin' my mooth below
+the water. Och, memm, pu' me out!"
+
+"How can you ask me to assist you, base wretch that you are?" cried
+the Pensassenach; "you who would have sold my life to have saved your
+own. I shall push you as gently under the water as I can, but drowned
+you must be."
+
+"Oh, for the love o' Heeven hae mair charity!" cried the packman
+most piteously. "I'm a sad sinner, nae doot. But I'm a puir, wake,
+nervish craytur,--and fan that deevil incarnate, Captain M'Taggart,
+spak o' hangin' me, my brains whurled sae i' my head, that I didna
+ken what I was sayin'. But I'm sure I never thocht o' doin' harm till
+you or ony o' your hoose. Pu' me oot, memm; pu' me oot for the love o'
+Heeven, or the very life'll leave my legs wi' cauld."
+
+"Pull you out," exclaimed the Pensassenach; "pull you out,--you
+who would have helped the Highlanders to my murder: pull you out,
+who wilfully spoke treason, to aid, abet, and comfort the rebel
+Captain. My loyalty to my King and my country forbids me to assist
+you, and compels me to make a sacrifice of you immediately. So,
+prepare for instant death."
+
+"Och, hae mercy on my puir sowl," cried the packman in despair;
+"surely, surely, ye're no gawin' till droon me?"
+
+"What can you say in exculpation of your treason?" demanded the
+Pensassenach, laying hold of the upper part of the sack with both
+her hands, and giving Mr. Dallas a gentle shake.
+
+"Och, naething--naething ava," cried Mr. Dallas. "Oh, I'm a dead man--a
+dead man: hae mercy--hae mercy upon me. I'm a great sinner--a wicked,
+and hardened sinner."
+
+"Perhaps it were well to allow you a few moments, wretch that you are,
+to confess your sins and repent, before you are sent into the other
+world," said the Pensassenach. "So make haste--lose not the fleeting
+space of time which I thus mercifully grant to you, and lighten your
+soul of as much load as you can."
+
+"Oh, hae mercy--hae mercy on me!" cried Dallas.
+
+"I'll have no mercy on you, more than this," cried the Pensassenach,
+in a terrible voice. "If you will not confess yourself, your last
+moment is at hand;" and so saying, she ducked Mr. Dallas's head under
+the water.
+
+"O! O! O! Oh!--hech! ech!" cried Mr. Dallas, panting for breath;
+"I'm a dead man! I'm a dead man! Oh, Lord forgie me for sellin'
+pastes for precious stanes."
+
+"Come! is that all?" cried the Pensassenach, shaking him again.
+
+"Hae mercy on me for sellin' rock crystal for diamunts," cried Dallas.
+
+"Come! out with it all!" said the Pensassenach.
+
+"Oh! Och! Forgie me for sellin' bits o' ayster shells for pearls,"
+cried Dallas again, "and pinchbeck for gold; and watches wi' worn
+out auld warks for new anes."
+
+"Come! nothing else to confess?" said the Pensassenach.
+
+"Oh, yes. Heaven help me, and hae mercy on me, for keepin' fause
+weights and a fause ell-wand," cried Dallas.
+
+"Are these all your sins, villain?" exclaimed the Pensassenach.
+
+"Oh, hey, aye, aye," said Dallas piteously, "and ower muckle,
+gude kens."
+
+"Well, then," said the Pensassenach, taking a more determined grasp
+of the sack; "now, that you have duly confessed, here goes."
+
+"Oh, stop, stop!" cried Dallas, in great fear. "Stop, stop! no yet! no
+yet! I hae mair to tell o' yet. I hae noo an' than picked up an odd
+silver spoon, or sae, or ony siccan wee article whan it cam in my way,
+just tempin' me like, in ony o' the hooses whaur I had quarters. But
+I never was a great fief--no, no."
+
+"'Twas you belike who stole my silver punch-ladle," said the
+Pensassenach. "I missed it immediately after you were last here."
+
+"I canna just charge my memory wi' the punch-ladle," said Mr. Dallas,
+unwilling to admit that he had in any way wronged the Pensassenach.
+
+"Nay, then, your thefts must have been too numerous for you to note
+such a trifling item as that," said the Pensassenach; "but it is
+clear you did steal my punch-ladle, so now you shall die for not
+confessing. Now!"
+
+"Oh, stop, stop, for mercy's sake!" cried Dallas, in livid
+apprehension. "I mind noo! I mind noo! I did tak' it--I did tak'
+the ladle! It shined sae tempin' through the glass door o' the bit
+corner cupboard, and the door was open, sae that I may amaist say
+that the deevil himsel' handed it oot till me, and pat it intil my
+very pack. But I'll never wrang you ony mair."
+
+"I'll take good care you shall not," said the lady; "you shall never
+wrong me, nor any one else more. So now, prepare, for this is your
+last moment."
+
+"Oh, mercy, mercy," cried the packman again. "I hae mair yet to
+confess! Oh, dinna droun me just yet!"
+
+"Well, be quick," said the Pensassenach; "what more have ye to tell?"
+
+"Oh, mercy, mercy!" cried Dallas. "That woman that I telled ye o'
+yestreen; that woman that I clippit out o' the Spey, was na just
+awthegither dead--"
+
+"What!" exclaimed the Pensassenach, in horror; "wretch that you are,
+did you murder the woman?"
+
+"Eh, na, na!" cried Dallas; "ill as I am, I didna do that. I just
+took her roklay and her gown, an some ither wee things aperteenin'
+till her, and syne I gade aff wi' mysel', leaving her to come roond
+to life at her nain leisure and convenience."
+
+"Leaving her to die without help you mean, you murdering thief!" said
+the Pensassenach, shrinking back with horror from the very touch
+of him. "Wretch, you are unworthy of life! But I shall not be your
+executioner. You will grace a gallows yet, I'll warrant you. I shall
+now leave Morag to pull you out of the water. But hark ye, Mr. Dallas,
+before I leave you, I may as well tell you, that though I have spared
+your life, as indeed I never had the least intention of taking it,
+I advise you never to darken my door again; for, if you do, I promise
+you that you shall have another and a deeper taste of this lint-pot."
+
+"Oh, bless you, memm!" cried Mr. Dallas, with an earnestness which
+showed how much he was relieved by her words; "I'll never come
+within five miles o' your farm. Noo, Morag, my dawty," continued he,
+addressing the maid after the mistress was gone; "gudesake, woman, be
+quick an' pu' me oot; or, as sure as death, I'll dee o't awthegither."
+
+"Fawse loons tat she is," said Morag, looking terribly at him. "She
+will no pu' her oot; she wull pit her toon in ta holl, an' troon
+her! She is a wicked vullian--she wull pit her toon in ta holl an'
+troon her wissout nae mercy at a' at a'."
+
+"Oh!" cried the terrified Dallas, with his eye-balls again starting
+from his head with apprehension. "Oh, dinna droon me, noo that your
+mistress has spared me! I wus ragin' fu' wi' brandy last nicht, and
+I didna ken what I wus doin'; and maybe I wus a wee unceevil till ye,
+or the like. But oh, hae mercy, hae mercy on me!"
+
+"She'll no be ta waur o' a gude tooky tan," said Morag, seizing
+the sack, and plunging the gasping Mr. Dallas two or three times
+successively under the water; "tat'll cool ta hot speerits in her
+stamick, or she pe far mistane."
+
+"Oh! O! O! Och! hech! och! oh!--O!" cried Dallas, gasping and
+panting. "O, mercy, mercy! an' I hadna drucken a' yon oceans o' brandy
+yester nicht, I had assuredly been a dead man this day, just frae very
+cauld itsel'. But the brandy o' yestreen has saved me frae a' the water
+that my body has imbibit frae this nasty lint-pot, by actuwully makin'
+a kind o' wake punch o' me. Oh, gude lassie that ye are, pu' me oot,
+pu me oot!"
+
+"Its mair nor she's weel deservan'," said Morag, now putting forth all
+her strength to pull the sack and its contents up out of the water;
+"but Morag canna let a man be trooned an she can help it, pad man so
+she pe."
+
+Having hauled up the sack, she laid it upon the grass, undid the
+fastenings of its mouth, and, with some difficulty, extricated
+Mr. Dallas from its durance vile. The worthy packman arose to his feet,
+and, shaking himself heartily, and stretching out first his short,
+and then his long leg, two or three times alternately, to relieve
+that killing cold cramp which possessed them, he hobbled off without
+uttering a word of thanks, and shivering so, that his teeth were
+rattling in his head, as if his jaws had contained a corps of drummers,
+beating the rogue's march. Morag looked after him with a hearty laugh,
+and then picking up the wet sack, she hastened to join her mistress.
+
+Let us now follow the march of John Smith.
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+COMFORTS OF A LONDON CLUB-HOUSE.
+
+
+Author.--Pray, stop for one moment, Mr. Macpherson, if you please. Let
+me throw a few more peats on the fire. With the rain still beating
+thus without, and the picture of the half-drowned shivering chapman
+brought so vividly before our mind's eyes by your description,
+we shall have our teeth rattling in our jaws from very sympathy,
+if we don't keep up the caloric we have already generated.
+
+Grant.--It is right not to allow it to be too much reduced,
+certainly. But I declare I am as comfortable here in Inchrory, as if
+I were in my club-house in London.
+
+Clifford.--Much more so, my good fellow, take my word for it. Where
+is the London club-house in which we could have been so quiet as we
+are here, especially in such weather as this. Think of the noise in
+the streets; think, I say, of the eternal thunder of the carriages of
+all kinds, the hackney-coaches, stage-coaches, omnibusses, and cabs,
+with the Cherokee yelling, and whooping of the drivers, uttering
+strange and horrible oaths; and, to complete the instrumental part of
+this mechanical concert, to have it grounded with the grating double
+bass of the huge carts, drays, and waggons. The mellow roar of the
+Aven is like the soft music of a flute, compared to so terrific a
+combination of ear-rending sounds. Then think of the crowd of dull
+and damp fellows, dry to talk to, but wet enough to the touch, who are
+continually coming in and going out, restless and unhappy--miserable
+when condemned to the house, and yet more wretched when out in the
+rain--giving you hopes of enjoying a glimpse of the fire at one moment,
+and then shutting you out entirely from it at the next, with persons
+so steeped, as to make the very evaporation from their bodies, by the
+heat, fill the room with clouds of steam,--talking, and chattering,
+and recognizing each other--disputing about politics, or the merits
+of the last opera, or opera singer, or ballet, or dancer. In vain
+you try to have some rational talk with some sensible man, or to
+listen to something of the greatest possible interest, which he has
+to tell you--for you have hardly begun so to do, when up comes some
+fool of a fellow, who, at some unfortunate time or another, has sworn
+eternal friendship to you, and who now, to your great discomfiture,
+as well as to the imminent peril of your good temper and manners,
+breaks boisterously in upon your tête-a-tête, to prove to you how
+well he keeps his oath, by nearly shaking your hand off, or perhaps
+dislocating your shoulder, by loudly protesting how rejoiced he is
+to see you, and by most heroically sacrificing himself, and his own
+valuable time, in kindly bestowing his fullest tediousness upon you,
+that he may give you the whole history of his life since he last saw
+you. Then, suppose you sit down to read some important speech, or
+leading article, in your favourite newspaper, or something which you
+wish to devour out of some much-talked-of pamphlet or review of the
+day, it is ten to one but you experience a similar interruption from
+some such kind and much attached friend. But the height of your misery
+is only attained, when you come to take refuge in the writing-room,
+in order to write a letter of more than ordinary importance, and
+requiring great care in the arrangement of its subject, as well
+as in the choice of its expressions. Then it is, that among those
+employed at the different tables, you are certain to find some two
+or more idle scribblers, who go not there really to write, but who,
+notwithstanding, waste more of the writing materials belonging to
+the club, than all the rest of its members put together, in order
+to give themselves importance, by an affectation of much business,
+and high correspondence. Amongst these there is probably one, who,
+after allowing you to get down to the bottom of your first page, and
+fairly into your subject, suddenly, and as if accidentally descries
+you, and rushing across to salute you, rivets himself on the floor
+close to your chair, and goes on ear-wigging you with his important
+secrets, whilst he is all the time curiously drinking in your's,
+from your half-written letter, which lies open before him. Or, if you
+should have the good fortune to escape from such a jackal as this,
+then you will find the other men of his kidney, who may be sitting
+at the different tables with the affectation of writing, carrying
+on such a battery of loud talk across the room, as altogether to
+distract your attention. In vain do you try to control your thoughts
+within their proper current. They are continually jostled aside by
+some half-caught sentence, which sets your mind working in some wrong
+direction, merely to have it again driven off at a tangent into some
+other, which is equally foreign to that subject to which you would
+confine it. In vain do you rub your brow, cover your eyes, and gnaw
+your pen; every thought but the right thought is forced upon you,
+until at last, in utter despair, you start to your feet, snatch up
+your blotted and often corrected letter, tear it into shreds, commit
+it to the flames, and, seizing your hat, you abruptly hurry homewards,
+duly execrating, as you go, all club-houses, and those many men of
+annoyance with which clubs are so universally afflicted.
+
+Grant.--Your picture is a lively one, Clifford, and in its general
+features most just. Though our London clubs have many advantages, this
+lonely house of Inchrory is certainly better for our present purpose.
+
+Author.--Gentlemen, unless you mean to enact here the part of some
+of those London club-annoyance-givers, which you, Clifford, have
+so well described, I think you had better drop your conversation,
+and allow Mr. Macpherson to proceed with his story.
+
+Clifford.--I stand corrected;--then allow me to light a fresh cigar;
+and now, Mr. Macpherson, pray go on with Serjeant John Smith.
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+THE LEGEND OF SERJEANT JOHN SMITH'S ADVENTURES CONTINUED.
+
+
+You will remember, gentlemen, that when I was interrupted, I was about
+to follow John Smith on his march with Captain M'Taggart. Well, you
+see, Prince Charles Edward chanced to be at this time at Kilravock
+Castle, the ancient seat of the Roses. Thither the sagacious captain
+thought it good policy to present himself, with the motley company,
+the greater number of the individuals of which he had himself
+collected. There he received his due meed of praise for his zeal,
+with large promises of future preferment for his energetic exertions
+in the Prince's cause. But although the Captain thus took especial
+care to serve himself in the first place, he made a point of strictly
+keeping his own promise to John Smith, for he did present him to
+the Prince, along with some five or six other recruits, whom he had
+cajoled to follow him, somewhat in the way he had cajoled John. But
+this their presentation was more with a view of enhancing the value
+of his own zeal and services, for his own private ends, than for the
+purpose, or with the hope of benefiting them in any way. The Prince
+came out to the lawn with M'Taggart, and some of his own immediate
+attendants. The men were presented to him by name; and John Smith was
+especially noticed by him. He spoke to each of them in succession;
+and then, clapping John familiarly on the shoulder,--
+
+"My brave fellows," said he, "you have a glorious career before
+you. The enemy advances into our very hands. I trust we shall soon
+have an opportunity of fighting together, side by side. Meanwhile, go,
+join the gallant army which I have so lately left at Culloden, eagerly
+waiting the approach of our foes. I shall see you very soon, and I
+shall not forget you." So saying, he took off his Highland bonnet;
+and, whilst a gentle zephyr sported and played with his fair curls,
+he bowed gracefully to the men, and then retired into the house.
+
+"She's fichts to ta last trap o' her bluids for ta ponny
+Princey!" cried John, with an enthusiasm which was cordially responded
+to by shouts from all present.
+
+M'Taggart then gave the word, and the party wheeled off on their
+march in the direction of Inverness, in the vicinity of which town
+the Prince's army was encamped. Their way lay down through the parish
+of Petty, and past Castle-Stuart. As they moved on, they were every
+where loudly cheered by the populace--men, women, and children, who
+turned out to meet them, and showered praises and blessings upon them;
+and this friendly welcome seemed to await them all along their route,
+till they joined the main body of their forces, which lay about and
+above the mansion house of Culloden.
+
+John Smith would have much preferred to have placed himself under the
+standard of the Mackintosh, whom the Smiths or Gowe, the descendants of
+the celebrated Gowin Cromb, who fought on the Inch of Perth, held to be
+their chief, as head of the Clan-Chattan. But M'Taggart was unwilling
+to lose the personal support of so promising a soldier. Perhaps
+also he began to feel a certain interest in the young man; and he
+accordingly advised him to stick close to him at all times.
+
+"Stick you by me, John," said he--"stick close by my side; I shall
+then be able to see what you do, as well as to give a fair and
+honest, and I trust not unfavourable report of the gallant deeds
+which your brave spirit may prompt you to perform. Depend upon it,
+with my frequent opportunities of obtaining access to the Prince,
+I can do as much good for you, at least, as any Mackintosh."
+
+On the night of the 14th of April then, John Smith lay with M'Taggart
+and his company, among the whin and juniper bushes in the wood of
+Culloden, where the greater part of the Jacobite army that night
+disposed of themselves. Whatever might have been the ill-provided
+state of the other portions of the Prince's troops, that with which
+John was now consorted, had no reason to complain of any want of those
+refreshments which human nature requires, and which are so important
+to soldiers. Large fires were speedily kindled; and the Pensassenach's
+great sow, with all her little pigs, and the poor woman's poultry
+of all kinds, together with some few similar delicacies which had
+elsewhere been picked up here and there, were soon divided, and
+prepared to undergo such rude cookery as each individual could command;
+and these, with the bread and cheese, and other such provisions,
+which they had carried off from the Pensassenach, as well as from
+some other houses, enabled them to spread for themselves what might
+be called a vurra liberal table in the wilderness. But the savoury
+odour which their culinary operations diffused around, brought hungry
+Highlanders from every quarter of the wood, like wolves upon them,
+so that each man of their party was fain to gobble up as much as
+he could swallow in haste, lest he should fail to secure to himself
+enough to satisfy his hunger, ere the whole feast should disappear
+under the active jaws of those intruders. The liquor was more under
+their own control. The flask was allowed to circulate through the
+hands of those only to whom it most properly belonged by the right of
+capture. John, for his part, had a good tasse of the Pensassenach's
+brandy; and the smack did not seem to savour the worse within his lips,
+because it was prefaced with the toast of--"Success to the Prince,
+and confusion to the Duke of Cumberland!"
+
+After this their refreshment, the men and officers disposed themselves
+to sleep around the fires of their bivouac, each in a natural bed
+of his own selection, John Smith, being a pious young man, retired
+under the shelter of a large juniper bush, and having there offered
+up his evening prayer to God, he wrapped himself up in his plaid,
+and consigned himself to sleep. How long he had slept he knew not;
+when, as he turned in his lair to change his position, his eye caught
+a dim human figure, which floated, as it were, in the air, stiff
+and erect, immediately under the high projecting limb of a great fir
+tree, that grew at some twenty paces distant from the spot where he
+lay. The figure seemed to have a preternatural power of supporting
+itself; and as the breeze wailed and moaned through the boughs,
+it appeared alternately to advance and to recede again with a slow
+tremulous motion. John's heart, stout as it was against every thing
+of earthly mould, began to beat quick, and finally to thump against
+his very ribs, with all manner of superstitious fears. He gazed and
+trembled, without the power of rising, which he would have fain done,
+not for the purpose of investigating the mystery, but to take the
+wiser course of looking out for some other place of repose, where
+he might hope to escape from the appalling contemplation of this
+strange and most unaccountable apparition. He lay staring then at it
+in a cold sweat of fright, whilst the faint glimmering light from the
+nearest fire, as it rose or fell, now made it somewhat more visible,
+and now again somewhat more dim. At length, an accidental fall of
+some of the half burnt fuel, sent up a transient gleam that fully
+illuminated the ghastly countenance of the spectre, when, to John's
+horror, he recognised the pale and corpse-like features of Mr. William
+Dallas, the packman, whom he had left so ingeniously inserted into
+the sack, and deposited in the Pensassenach's lint-pot. Though the
+gag was gone, the mouth was wide open, and the large, protruded,
+and glazed eye-balls, glared fearfully upon him. Though the light
+was not sufficient to display the figure correctly, John's fancy
+made him vividly behold the sack. He would have spoken if he could;
+but he felt that the apparition of a murdered man was floating before
+him. His throat grew dry of a sudden. He gasped--but could not utter a
+word. He doubted not that the packman had been forgotten by Morag, and
+that, having fallen down into the water through cold and exhaustion,
+the wretch had at last miserably perished; and he came very naturally
+to the conclusion, that he who had put the unfortunate man there, was
+now doomed to be henceforth continually haunted by his ghost. Fain
+would he have shut out this horrible sight, by closing his eyes, or
+by drawing his plaid over them; but this he was afraid to do, lest
+the object of his dread should swim towards him through the air, and
+congeal his very life's-blood by its freezing touch. Much as he loved
+Morag, he had some difficulty in refraining from inwardly cursing
+her, for her supposed neglect of his express injunctions to relieve
+the packman from the pool. As he stared on this dreadful apparition,
+the flickering gleam from the faggot sunk again, and the countenance
+again grew dim; but John seemed still to see it in all its intensity
+of illumination. No more rest had he that night. Still, as he gazed
+on the figure, he again and again fancied that he saw it gradually
+and silently gliding nearer and nearer to him. The only relief he had
+was in fervent and earnest prayers, which he confusedly murmured,
+from time to time, in Gaelic. He eagerly petitioned for daylight,
+hoping that the morning air might remove all such unrealities from
+the earth. At length, the eastern horizon began to give forth the
+partial glimmer of dawn; but John was somewhat surprised to find,
+that, instead of the apparition fading away before it, the outlines
+of its horrible figure became gradually more and more distinct as it
+advanced, until even the features were by degrees rendered visible. But
+although John, by this time, began to discover that his fancy had
+supplied the sack, he now perceived something which he had not been
+able to see before, and that was, a thin rope which hung down from the
+horizontal limb of the fir tree, and suspended, by its lower extremity,
+the body of the poor packman by the neck. John was much shocked by
+this discovery. But he could not help thanking God that he was thus
+acquitted of the wretched man's death; and after the misery that he
+had suffered from the supposed presence of the apparition of a man who
+had been drowned through his means, however innocently, the relief
+he now experienced was immense. He called up some of his comrades
+to explain the mystery; and from them he learned, that Mr. Dallas
+had been caught in the early part of the night, in the very act of
+attempting to carry off Captain M'Taggart's horse from its piquet,
+and that he had been instantly tucked up to the bough of the fir tree,
+without even the ceremony of a trial.
+
+The young Prince Charley was in the field by an early hour on the
+morning of the 15th, and being all alive to the critical nature of
+his circumstances, and by no means certain as yet how near the enemy
+might by this time be to him, he judged it important to collect,
+and to draw up his army on the most favourable ground he could find
+in the neighbourhood. He therefore marched them up the high, partly
+flattish, and partly sloping ridge, which, though commonly called
+Culloden Moor, from its being situated immediately above the house and
+grounds of that place, has in reality the name of Drummossie. He led
+them to a part of this ground, a little to the south eastward of their
+previous position in the wood of Culloden, and there he drew them up
+in order of battle. There they were most injudiciously kept lying on
+their arms the whole day, and if Captain M'Taggart's men had feasted
+tolerably well the previous night, their commons were any thing but
+plentiful during the time they occupied that position. It was not in
+the nature of things, that subordination could be so strictly preserved
+in the Prince's army, as it was in that of the Duke of Cumberland. I,
+who am well practeesed in the discipline of boys, gentlemen, know
+very well that it would be impossible to bring a regiment of them
+under immediate command, if the individuals composing it were to
+be collected together all at once, raw and untaught, from different
+parts of the district. It is only by bringing one or two at a time,
+into the already great disciplined mass, that either a schoolmaster,
+or a field-marischal can promise to have his troops always well
+under control. By the time evening came, the officers, as well as
+the men of the Prince's army, began to suffer under the resistless
+orders of a commander to whom no human being can say nay. Hunger,
+I may say, was rugging at their vurra hearts, and as they all saw,
+or supposed that they saw, reason to believe that there was no chance
+of the enemy coming upon them that night, many of them went off to
+Inverness and elsewhere, in search of food. M'Taggart himself could
+not resist those internal admonitions, which his stomach was so
+urgently giving him from time to time, and accordingly, John Smith
+conceived he was guilty of no great dereliction of duty, in strictly
+following the first order which his captain had given him, viz., to
+"stick by his side," which he at once resolved to do, as he saw him
+go off to look for something to support nature.
+
+But the captain and his man had hardly got a quarter of a mile on
+the road to Inverness, when they, with other stragglers, were called
+back by a mounted officer, who was sent, with all speed, after them,
+to tell them that they must return, in order to march immediately. The
+object of their march was that ill-conceived, worse managed, and most
+unlucky expedition for a night attack on the Duke of Cumberland's
+camp at Nairn, which had that evening been so hastily planned. Hungry
+as they were they had no choice but to obey, and accordingly they
+hurried to their standards. The word was given, and after having been
+harassed by marching all night, without food or refreshment of any
+kind, they at last got only near enough to Nairn just to enable them
+to discover that day must infallibly break before they could reach
+the enemy's camp, and that consequently no surprise could possibly
+take place. Disheartened by this failure, they were led back to their
+ground, where they arrived in so very faint and jaded a condition,
+that even to go in search of food was beyond their strength, so that
+they sank down in irregular groups over the field, and fell asleep for
+a time. Awakened by hunger after a very brief slumber, they arose to
+forage. M'Taggart, and some of his party, and John Smith amongst the
+rest, went prowling across the river Nairn, which ran to the south of
+their position, and there they caught and killed a sheep. They soon
+managed to kindle a fire, and to subdivide the animal into fragments,
+but ere each man had time to broil his morsel, an alarm was given
+from their camp. Like ravenous savages they tore up and devoured
+as much of the half raw flesh as haste would allow them to swallow,
+and hurrying back, they reached their post about eight o'clock in the
+morning, when they found that the Duke of Cumberland was approaching
+with his army in full march.
+
+The position chosen by the Prince as that where he was to make his
+stand on that memorable day, the 16th of April, was by no means very
+wisely or very well selected. It was a little way to the westward
+of that which his army had occupied on the previous day. Somewhat
+in advance, and to the right of his ground, there stood the walls
+of an enclosure, which the experienced eye of Lord George Murray
+soon enabled him to perceive, and he was at once so convinced that
+they presented too advantageous a cover to the assailing enemy,
+to be neglected by them, that he would fain have moved forward with
+a party to have broken them down, had time remained to have enabled
+him to have effected his purpose. But the Duke of Cumberland's army
+was already in sight, advancing in three columns, steadily over the
+heath, from Dalcross Castle, the tower of which was seen rising
+towards its eastern extremity. The Highlanders were at this time
+dwindled to a mere handful, and some of the best friends of the cause
+of the Stewarts who were present, and perhaps even the young Prince
+himself, began to believe that he had been traitorously deserted. But
+the alarm had no sooner been fully spread by the clang of the pipes,
+and the shrill notes of the bugles, than small and irregular streams
+of armed men, in various coloured tartans, were seen rushing towards
+their common position, like mountain rills towards some Highland lake,
+and filling up the vacant ranks with all manner of expedition. Many a
+brave fellow, who had gone to look for something to satisfy the craving
+of an empty stomach, came hurrying back with as great a void as he had
+carried away with him, because he preferred fighting for him whom he
+conscientiously believed to be his king, to remaining ingloriously
+to subdue that hunger which was absolutely consuming him. No one
+was wilfully absent who could possibly contrive to be present, but
+yet the urgent demands of the demon of starvation, to which many of
+them had yielded, had very considerably thinned their numbers, and,
+in addition to this source of weakness, there was another obvious one,
+arising from the physical strength of those who were present being
+wofully diminished by the want they had endured, and the fatigue they
+had undergone. But with all these disadvantages the heroic souls of
+those who were on the field remained firm and resolute.
+
+John Smith's military knowledge was then too small to allow him to form
+any judgment of the state of affairs, far less to enable him to carry
+off, or to describe, any thing like the general arrangement of the
+order of battle on both sides. He could not even tell very well what
+regiments his corps was posted with: he only knew this, that according
+to the order he had received he stuck close to Captain M'Taggart. He
+always remembered with enthusiasm, indeed, that the Prince rode through
+the ranks with his attendants, doing all that he could to encourage
+his men, and that when he passed by where John himself stood, he
+smiled on him like an angel, and bid him do his duty like a man.
+
+"Och, hoch!" cried John, with an exultation, which arose from the
+circumstance of his not being in the least aware that every individual
+near him had, like him, flattered himself that he was the person
+so distinguished.--"Fa wad hae soughts tat ta ponny Princey wad hae
+mindit on poor Shon Smiss? Fod, but she wad fichts for her till she
+was cut to collops!"
+
+But John had little opportunity of fighting, though he appears to have
+borne plenty of the brunt of the battle. There were two cannons placed
+in each space between the battalions composing the first line of the
+Duke of Cumberland's army, and these were so well served as to create a
+fearful carnage among the Highland ranks. To this dreadful discharge
+John Smith stood exposed, with men falling by dozens around him,
+mutilated and mashed, and exhibiting death in all his most horrible
+forms, till, to use his own very expressive words,--"She was bitin'
+her ain lips for angher tat she could not get at tem." But before John
+could get at them, the English dragoons, who, under cover of the walls
+of the enclosure I have mentioned, had advanced by the right of the
+Highland army, finally broke through the fence, and getting in behind
+their first line, came cutting and slashing on their backs, whilst
+the Campbells were attacking them in front, and mowing them down like
+grass. Then, indeed, did the melée become desperate, and then was it
+that John began to bestir himself in earnest. Throwing away his plaid,
+and the little bundle that it contained, he dealt deadly blows with
+his broad-sword, everywhere around him. He fought with the bravery
+and the perseverance of a hero. At length his bonnet was knocked from
+his head, and although he was still possessed with the most anxious
+desire to obey Captain M'Taggart's order to stick to his side, he was
+surprised on looking about him to find that there was no M'Taggart,
+no, nor any one else left near him to stick to but enemies.
+
+John Smith's spirit was undaunted, so that, seeing he had no one else
+to stick to, he now resolved to stick to his foes, to the last drop
+of life's blood that was within him. Furiously and fatally did he cut
+and thrust, and turn and cut and thrust again, at all who opposed him;
+but he was so overwhelmed by opponents, that in the midst of the blood,
+and wounds, and death which he was thus dealing in all directions, he
+received a desperate sabre cut, which, descending on him from above,
+entirely across the crown of his bared head, felled him instantaneously
+to the ground, and stretched him senseless among the heather, whilst
+a deluge of blood poured from the wound over both his eyes.
+
+When John began partially to recover, he rubbed the half-congealed
+blood from his eyelids with the back of his left hand, and looking up
+and seeing that the ground was somewhat clear around him, he griped his
+claymore firmly with his right hand, and raising himself to his feet,
+he began to run as fast as his weak state would allow him. He thought
+that he ran in the direction of Strath Nairn, and he ran whilst he had
+the least strength to run, or the least power remaining in him. But
+his ideas soon became confused, and the blood from the terrible
+gash athwart his head trickled so fast into his eyes, that it was
+continually obscuring his vision. At length he came to a large, deep
+irregular hollow hag, or ditch, in a piece of moss ground, which had
+been cut out for peats, and there, his brain beginning to spin round,
+he sank down into the moist bottom of it to die, and as the tide of
+life flowed fast from him, he was soon lost to all consciousness of
+the things or events of this world.
+
+Whilst John was lying in this senseless state, he was recognised by one
+of the fugitives, who, in making his own escape, chanced to pass by
+the edge of the ditch in the moss where the poor man lay. This was a
+certain Donald Murdoch, who had long burned with a hopeless flame for
+black-eyed Morag. With a satisfaction that seemed to make him forget
+his present jeopardy in the contemplation of the death of his rival,
+he looked down from the edge of the peat hag upon the pale and bloody
+corpse, and grinned with a fiendish joy.
+
+"Ha! there you lie!" cried he in bitter Gaelic soliloquy.--"The
+fiend a bit sorry am I to see you so. You'll fling or dance no more,
+else I'm mistaken.--Stay!--is not that the bit of blue ribbon that
+Morag tied round his neck, the last time that we had a dance in the
+barn? I'll secure that, it may be of some use to me;" and so saying
+he let himself down into the peat hag, hastily undid the piece of
+ribbon,--and then continued his flight with all manner of expedition.
+
+Following the downward course of the river Nairn, running at one time,
+and ducking and diving into bushes, and behind walls at another, to
+avoid the stragglers who were in pursuit, he by degrees gained some
+miles of distance from the fatal field, and coming to a little brook,
+he ventured to halt for a moment, to quench his raging thirst. As he
+lay gulping down the crystal fluid, he was startled by hearing his
+own name, and by being addressed in Gaelic.
+
+"Donald Murdoch!--Oh, Donald Murdoch, can you tell me is John Smith
+safe? Oh, those fearful cannons how they thundered!--Oh, tell me,
+is John Smith safe?--Oh, tell me! tell me!"
+
+"Morag!" cried Donald, much surprised, but very much relieved
+to find that it was no one whom he had any cause to be afraid
+of,--"Morag!--What brought you so far from home on such a day as this?"
+
+"Oh Donald!" replied Morag, "I came to look after John Smith;--oh,
+grant that he be safe!"
+
+"Safe enough, Morag," replied Donald, galled by jealousy. "I'll
+warrant nothing in this world will harm him now."
+
+"What say you?" cried Morag. "Oh, tell me! tell me truly if he
+be safe?"
+
+"I saw John Smith lying dead in a moss hole, his skull cleft by a
+dragoon's sword," replied Donald with malicious coolness.
+
+"What?" cried Morag, wringing her hands, "John Smith dead! But no! it
+is impossible!--and you are a lying loon, that would try to deceive me,
+by telling me what I well enough know you would wish to be true. God
+forgive you, Donald, for such cruel knavery!"
+
+"Thanks to ye, Morag, for your civility," replied Donald Murdoch
+calmly; "but if you wont believe me, believe that bit of ribbon--see,
+the very bit of blue ribbon you tied round John Smith's neck, the
+night you last so slighted me at the dance in the barn. See, it is
+partly died red in his life's blood."
+
+"It is the ribbon!" cried Morag, snatching it from his hand with
+excessive agitation, and kissing it over and over again, and then
+bursting into tears. "Alas! alas! it must be too true! What will become
+of poor Morag!--why did I not go with him! What is this world to poor
+desolate Morag now?--And yet--he may be but wounded after all. It
+must be so--he cannot be killed. Where did you leave him?--quick,
+tell me!--oh, tell me, Donald. Why do we tarry here? let us forward
+and seek him!--there may be life in him yet, and whilst there is life
+there is hope. Let me pass, Donald; I will fly to seek him!"
+
+"I love you too well to let you pass on so foolish and dangerous an
+errand," said Donald, endeavouring to detain her. "I tell you that
+John Smith is dead; but you know, Morag, you will always find a friend
+and a lover in me. So think no more----"
+
+"I will pass, Donald," cried Morag, interrupting him, and making a
+determined attempt to rush past him.
+
+"That you shall not," replied Donald, catching her in his arms.
+
+"Help, help!" cried Morag, struggling with all her might, and with
+great vigour too, against his exertions to hold her.
+
+At this moment the trampling of a horse was heard, and a mounted
+dragoon came cantering down into the hollow. His sabre gleamed in the
+air--and Donald Murdoch fell headlong down the bank into the little
+rill, his skull nearly cleft in two, and perfectly bereft of life.
+
+"A plague on the lousy Scot!" said the trooper, scanning the corpse
+of his victim with a searching eye. "His life was not worth the
+taking, had it not been, that the more of the rascally race that
+are put out of this world, the better for the honest men that are
+to remain in it, and therefore it was in the way of my duty to cut
+him down. There is nought on his beggarly carcase to benefit any one
+but the crows.--And so the knave would have kissed thee against thy
+will, my bonny black-eyed wench. Well, 'tis no wonder thou shouldst
+have scorned that carotty-pated fellow; you showed your taste in so
+doing, my dear: and now you shall be rewarded by having a somewhat
+better sweetheart.--Come!" continued he, alighting from his charger,
+and approaching the agitated and panting girl--"Come, a kiss from
+the lips of beauty is the best reward for brave deeds; and no one
+deserves this reward better than I do, for brave deeds have I this
+day performed. Why do you not speak, my dear? Have you no Christian
+language to give me? Can it be possible that these pretty pouting
+lips have no language but that of the savages of this country?--Come,
+then, we must try the kissing language; I have always found that to
+be well understood in all parts of the world."
+
+"Petter tak' Tonald's pig puss o' money first," said Morag, pointing
+down to the corpse in the hollow.
+
+"Ha! money saidst thou, my gay girl?" cried the trooper. "Who would
+have thought of a purse of money being in the pouch of such a miserable
+rascally savage as that? But the best apple may sometimes have the
+coarsest and most unpromising rhind; and so that fellow, unseemly and
+wretched as he appears, may perchance have a well-lined purse after
+all. If it be so, girl, I shall say that thy language is like the talk
+of an angel. Then do you hold the rein of this bridle, do you see,
+till I make sure of the coin in the first place--best secure that,
+for no one can say what mischance may come; or whether some comrade
+may not appear with a claim to go snacks with me. So lay hold of the
+bridle, do you hear, and dont be afraid of old Canterbury, for the
+brute is as quiet as a lamb."
+
+Morag took the bridle. The trooper descended the bank, and he had
+scarcely stooped over the body to commence his search for the dead
+man's supposed purse, when the active girl, well accustomed to ride
+horses in all manner of ways, vaulted into the saddle, and kicking
+her heels into Canterbury's side, she was out of the hollow in a
+moment. Looking over her shoulder, after she had gone some distance,
+she beheld the raging dragoon puffing, storming, and swearing, and
+striding after her, with, what might be called, that dignified sort
+of agility, to which he was enforced by the weighty thraldom of his
+immense jack-boots. Bewildered by the terror and the anxiety of her
+escape, she flew over the country, for some time, without knowing
+which way she fled. At length she began to recover her recollection,
+so far as to enable her to recur to the object which had prompted her
+to leave home. On the summit of a knoll she checked her steed--surveyed
+the country,--and the whole tide of her feelings returning upon her;
+she urged the animal furiously forward in the direction of the fatal
+field of Culloden.
+
+She had not proceeded far, when, on coming suddenly to the edge of a
+rough little stoney ravine, she discovered five troopers refreshing
+themselves and their horses from the little brook that had its course
+through the bottom. She reined back her horse, with the intention of
+stealing round to some other point of passage; but as she did so, a
+shout arose from the hollow of the dell.--She had been perceived. In
+an instant the mounted riders rushed, one after another, out of the
+ravine, and she had no chance of escape left her, but to ride as
+hard as the beast that carried her could fly, in the very opposite
+direction to that which she had hitherto pursued, for there was no
+other course of flight left open to her.
+
+The five troopers were now in full chase after Morag, shouting out as
+they rode, and urging on their horses to the top of their speed. The
+ground, though rough, stony, and furzy, was for the most part firm
+enough, and the poor girl, now driven from that purpose to which her
+strong attachment to John Smith had so powerfully impelled her, and
+being distracted by her griefs and her fears, spared not the animal
+she rode, but forced him, by every means she could employ, either by
+hands, limbs, or voice, to the utmost exertion of every muscle.
+
+"Lord, how she does ride!" said one trooper to the others; "I wish
+that she beant some of them witches, as, they say, be bred in this
+here uncanny country of Scotland."
+
+"Bless you no, man," said another; "them devils as you speak of ride
+on broomsticks. Now, I'se much mistaken an' that be not Tom Dickenson's
+horse Canterbury."
+
+"Zounds, I believe you are right, Hall," said another man; "but that
+beant no proof that she aint a witch, for nothing but a she-devil,
+wot can ride on a broom, could ride ould Canterbury in that 'ere
+fashion, I say."
+
+"Witch or devil, my boys, let us ketch her if we can," shouted
+another.--"Hurrah! hurrah!"
+
+"Hurrah! hurrah! hurrah!" re-echoed the others, burying their spurs
+in their horses' sides, and bending forward, and grinning with very
+eagerness.
+
+For several miles Morag kept the full distance she had at first
+gained on her pursuers, but having got into a road, fenced by a
+rough stone wall upon one side, and a broad and very deep ditch on
+the other, the troopers, if possible, doubled their speed, in the
+full conviction that they must now very soon come up with her, and
+capture her. Still Morag flew,--but as she every moment cast her eyes
+over one or other of her shoulders, she was terrified to see that the
+troopers were visibly gaining upon her. The road before her turned
+suddenly at an angle,--and she had no sooner doubled it, than, there,
+to her unspeakable horror--in the very midst of the way--stood Tom
+Dickenson, the dismounted dragoon from whom she had taken the very
+charger, called Canterbury, which she then rode. The time of the
+action of what followed was very brief. For an instant she reined up
+her horse till he was thrown back on his haunches.--Tom Dickenson's
+sword-blade glittered in the sun.
+
+"By the god of war, but I have you now!" cried he in a fury.
+
+The triumphant shouts of Morag's pursuers increased, as they neared
+her, and beheld the position in which she was now placed. No weapon
+had she, but the large pair of scissors that hung dangling from her
+side, in company with her pincushion. In desperation she grasped the
+sharp-pointed implement dagger fashion, and directed old Canterbury's
+head towards the ditch. Dickenson saw her intention, and wishing
+to counteract it, he rushed to the edge of the ditch. The hand of
+Morag which held the scissors descended on the flank of the horse,
+and in defiance of his master, who stood in his way, and the gleaming
+weapon with which he threatened him, old Canterbury, goaded by the
+pain of the sharp wound inflicted on him, sprang towards the leap
+with a wild energy, and despite of the cut, which deprived him of an
+ear, and sheared a large slice of the skin off one side of his neck,
+he plunged the unlucky Tom Dickenson backwards, swash into the water,
+and carried his burden fairly over the ditch.
+
+Morag tarried not to look behind her, until she had scoured across
+a piece of moorish pasture land, and then casting her eyes over one
+shoulder, she perceived that only two of the troopers had cleared
+the ditch, and that the others had either failed in doing so, or
+were engaged in hauling their half-drowned comrade out of it. The
+two men who had taken the leap, however, were again hard after her,
+shouting as before, and evidently gaining upon her. The moment she
+perceived this, she dashed into a wide piece of mossy, boggy ground,
+a description of soil with which she was well acquainted. There the
+chase became intricate and complicated. Now her pursuers were so near
+to her, as to believe that they were on the very point of seizing her,
+and again some impassable obstacle would throw them quite out, and give
+her the advantage of them. Various were the slips and plunges which
+the horses made; but ere she had threaded through three-fourths of the
+snares which she met with, she had the satisfaction of beholding one
+of the riders who followed her, fairly unhorsed, and hauling at the
+bridle of his beast, the head and neck of which alone appeared from
+the slough, in which the rest of the poor animal was engulfed. The
+man called loudly to his comrade, but he was too keenly intent on the
+pursuit, to give heed to him. The hard ground was near at hand, and
+he pushed on after Morag, who was now making towards it. She reached
+it, and again she plied the points of her scissors on the heaving
+flanks of old Canterbury. But she became sensible that his pace was
+fast flagging,--and that the trooper was rapidly gaining on her. In
+despair she made towards a small patch of natural wood.--She was
+already within a short distance of it. But the blowing and snorting
+of the horse behind her, and the blaspheming of his rider, came
+every instant more distinctly upon her ear. Some fifty or an hundred
+yards only now lay between her and the wood. Again, in desperation,
+she gave the point of the scissors to her steed--when, all at once
+he stopped--staggered--and, faint with fatigue and loss of blood,
+old Canterbury fell forward headlong on the grass.
+
+"Hurrah!" cried the trooper, who was close at his heels, "witch or
+no witch, I think I'll grapple with thee now."
+
+He threw himself from his heaving horse, and rushed towards Morag. But
+she was already on her legs, and scouring away like a hare for the
+covert. Jack-booted, and otherwise encumbered as he was, the bulky
+trooper strode after her like a second Goliah of Gath, devouring the
+way with as much expedition as he could possibly use. But Morag's
+speed was like that of the wind, and he beheld her dive in among the
+underwood before he had covered half the distance.
+
+"A very witch in rayal arnest!" exclaimed the trooper, slackening
+his pace in dismay and disappointment. And then turning towards
+his comrade, who, having by this time succeeded in extricating his
+horse from the slough, was now coming cantering towards him, "Hollo,
+Bill!" shouted he, "I've run the blasted witch home here.--Come away,
+man, do; for if so be that she dont arth like a badger, or furnish
+herself with a new horse to her own fancy out of one of 'em 'ere
+broom bushes, this covert aint so large but we must sartinly find
+her. So come along, man, and be active."
+
+But we must now return to poor John Smith, whom we have too long
+left for dead in the bottom of a peat-hag. The cold and astringent
+moss-water flowing about his head, by degrees checked the effusion
+of his blood, and at length he began to revive.
+
+When his senses returned to him, he gathered himself up, and leaning
+his back against the perpendicular face of the peat bank above him,
+he drank a little water from the hollow of his hand, and then washed
+away the clotted blood from his eyes. The first object that broke upon
+his newly recovered vision was an English trooper riding furiously
+up to him, with his brandished sword. John was immediately persuaded
+that he was a doomed man, for he felt that, in his case, resistance
+was altogether out of the question. He threw himself on his back in
+the bottom of the broad deep cut in the peat-hag. The trooper came
+up, and having no time to dismount, he stooped from his saddle and
+made one or two ineffectual cuts at the poor man. The horse shyed at
+John's bloody head as it was raised in terror from the peat-hag, and
+then the animal reared back as he felt the soft mossy ground sinking
+under him. The trooper was determined,--got angry, and spurred the
+beast forward, but the horse became obstinate and restive. At length
+the trooper succeeded in bringing him up again to the edge of the
+peat-hag; but just as he was craning his neck over its brink, John,
+roused by desperation, pricked the creature's nose with the point of
+his claymore. It so happened that he accidentally did this, at the
+very instant that the irascible trooper was giving his horse a dig
+with his spurs, and the consequence of these double, though antagonist
+stimulis, was, that the brute made a desperate spring, and carried
+himself and his rider clean over the hag-ditch, John Smith and all,
+and then he ran off with his master through the broken moss-ground,
+scattering the heaps of drying peats to right and left, until horse
+and man were rolled over and over into the plashy bog.
+
+Uninjured, except as to his gay clothes and accoutrements, which were
+speedily dyed of a rich chocolate hue, the trooper arose in a rage,
+and could he have by any means safely left his horse so as to have
+secured his not running away, he would have charged the dying man on
+foot, and so he would have very speedily sacrificed him; but dreading
+to lose his charger if he should abandon him, he mounted him again,
+and was in the act of returning to the attack, with the determination
+of putting John to death, at all hazards, either by steel or by lead,
+when he was arrested by the voice of his officer, who was then passing
+along a road tract, at some little distance, with a few of his troop,
+and who called out to him in a loud authoritative tone, "Come away
+you, Jem Barnard! Why dont you follow the living? Why waste time by
+cutting at the dying or dead?"
+
+On hearing this command, the trooper uttered a half-smothered curse,
+and unwillingly turned to ride after his comrades, throwing back bitter
+execrations on John Smith as he went. John's tongue was otherwise
+employed. He used it for the better purpose of returning thanks to
+that Almighty Providence who had thus so wonderfully protected him.
+
+After this pious mental exercise, John thought that he felt himself
+somewhat better. He made a feeble effort to rise, but it was altogether
+abortive. The blood still continued to flow from his head--he began
+to feel very faint, and a raging thirst attacked him. Turning himself
+round in the peat-hag, he contrived to lap up a considerable quantity
+of the moss water, which, however muddy and distasteful it might be,
+refreshed him so much as to give him strength sufficient to raise
+himself up a little, so as to enable him to extend the circuit of his
+view. He had now a moment's leisure to look about him, and to consider,
+as well as the confusion of his ideas would allow him, what he had
+best to do. But what was his surprise and dismay to see, that although
+many were yet flying in all directions, and many more pursuing after
+them, whole battalions of the enemy still remained unbroken in the
+vicinity of the field of battle, and that some were marching up, in
+close order, both to the right and left of him. There was but little
+time left him for farther consideration, as one of these battalions
+was so near to him, that he saw, from the course it was holding, that
+it must soon march directly over the spot where he was. The first
+thought that struck him was that his best plan would be to lie down
+and feign that he was dead. But it immediately afterwards occurred to
+him that a thrust from some curious or malicious person, who might be
+the bearer of one of those bayonets, which already glittered in his
+eyes, might do his business even more effectually than the sword of
+the trooper might have done. He became convinced that he had nothing
+left for it but to run. But although he was now somewhat revived, and
+that the dread of death gave new strength to exhausted nature, he felt
+persuaded of the truth, that if his wound should continue to bleed,
+as it had already again began to do, his race could not be a long one
+in any sense of the word, even if he should have the wonderful luck
+to escape the chance of its being shortened by the sword, bayonet,
+or bullet of an enemy. To give himself some small chance of life,
+John, though he was no surgeon, would have fain tried some means of
+stanching the blood, but he lacked all manner of materials for any such
+operation, and he could only try to cover the wound very ineffectually
+with both hands, whilst the red stream continued to run down through
+his fingers. At length, necessity, that great mother of invention,
+and wisest of all teachers, enabled him to hit off in a moment,
+a remedy, which, as it was the best he could have possibly adopted in
+his present difficult and distressing situation, might perhaps, even on
+an occasion where no such embarrassment exists, be found as valuable
+and effective as any other which the most favourable circumstances
+could afford, or the most consummate skill devise. Stooping down,
+he picked up a large mass of peaty turf, of nearly a foot square,
+and two or three inches thick. This had been regularly cut by the
+peat-diggers, but having tumbled by chance into the bottom of the
+peat-hag, it had been there lying soaking till the soft unctuous matter
+of which it was composed was completely saturated with water like a
+sponge. John proceeded upon no certain ratio medicandi, except this,
+that as his life's blood was manifestly welling fast away from him,
+he thought that the wet peat would stop the flow of it, and as his
+head was in a burning fever, every fibre of his scalp seemed to call
+out for the immediate application of its cold and moist surface. John
+seized it then with avidity, and clapping it instantly on his head,
+with the black soft oleaginous side of it next to the wound, and
+the heathery top of it outwards, he pressed it down with great care
+all over his skull, and then quickly secured it fast, by tying a
+coarse red handkerchief over it, the ends of which he fastened very
+carefully under his chin. The outward appearance of this strange
+uncouth head-gear may be easily imagined, with the heather-bush rising
+everywhere around his head over the red tier that bound it on, and
+surmounting a countenance so rueful and bloody; but the effect within
+was so wonderfully refreshing and invigorating, that he felt himself
+almost immediately restored to comparative strength. He started to
+his feet; and, being yet uncertain as to which way he should run,
+he raised his head slowly over the peat-hag to reconnoitre.
+
+Now, it happened, that, at this very moment, a couple of English
+foot soldiers came straggling along, thirsting for more slaughter,
+and prowling about for prey and plunder. Ere John was aware of their
+proximity to him, they were within a few yards of the peat-hag. As
+he raised his head, he beheld them approaching with their muskets
+and their bayonets reeking with gore. Believing himself to be now
+utterly lost, a deep groan of despair escaped from him. The soldiers
+had halted suddenly on beholding the bloody face and neck of what
+scarcely seemed to be a human being, with a huge overgrown forest of
+heather on the head instead of hair, appearing, as it were by magic,
+out of the very earth. They started back, and stood for an instant
+transfixed to the spot by superstitious fear.
+
+"Waunds, Gilbert, wot is that?" cried one, his eyes staring at John
+with horror.
+
+Seeing, that as he was now discovered, his only chance lay in working
+upon that dread which he saw that he had already excited, John first
+gradually drew down his head below the bank, and then again raised
+it slowly and portentously, and uttered another groan more deep and
+ghostly and prolonged than the first. The effect was instantaneous.
+
+"Oh Lord! oh Lord! one of them Highland warlocks of the bog, wot
+dewours men, women, and children!" cried Gilbert. "Fly--fly, Warner,
+for dear life!"
+
+Off he ran, and his comrade staid not to question farther, but darted
+away after him, and John had the satisfaction to see the two heroes,
+from whom he had looked for nothing but sudden death, scouring away
+over the field, and hardly daring to look behind them.
+
+John Smith was considerably emboldened by the discovery that his
+appearance was so formidable to his foes. He again applied himself
+to the consideration of the question as to which way it was best for
+him to fly. He cast his eyes all over the field of action around him;
+and, much to his satisfaction, he perceived that the officer at the
+head of the red regiment of Englishmen, which had previously given
+him so much alarm, had been so very obliging as to determine this
+difficult question for him. Some movement of the flying clans, who
+had retreated on Strath Nairn, had induced the officer to alter his
+line of march; and, in a very short time, John had the happiness of
+seeing himself very much in the rear of the red battalion, instead of
+being immediately in its front, as he had formerly been. Looking to
+the north-eastward, he perceived that all was comparatively clear and
+quiet, so far as he could see. There were now no longer any regular
+masses of men on the field, neither were there any signs of flight or
+pursuit in that direction. A few stragglers were to be seen, it is
+true, moving about, like evil spirits among the killed, and perhaps
+performing the office of messengers of death to the wounded. Strange,
+indeed, was the change that had taken place, upon that which had
+been so lately a scene of stormy and desperate conflict. A few large
+birds of prey were soaring high in air, in eager contemplation of that
+banquet which had been so liberally spread for them on the plain by
+ferocious man. But, in the immediate neighbourhood of the spot where
+John Smith was, the terrified pewit had already settled down again
+with confidence on her nest, the robin had again begun to chirp,
+and to direct his sharp eye towards the earth in search of worms;
+and the lark was again heaving herself up into the sky, giving forth
+her innocent song as she rose,--all apparently utterly unconscious
+that any such terrible and bloody turmoil had taken place between
+different sections of the human race. John therefore made up his mind
+at once; and, scrambling out of the peat-hag, he darted away over
+the moor, and flying like a ghost across the very middle of the field
+of battle, through the heaps of dead and dying, to the utter terror
+and discomfiture of those wolves and hyenas in the shape of men--aye,
+and of women too--who were preying, as well upon those who had life,
+as upon those who were lifeless, he scattered them to right and left
+in terror at his appalling appearance, and dived amid the thick woods
+of Culloden.
+
+Having once found shelter among the trees, John stopped to breathe
+awhile, and then he again set forward to unravel his way. It so
+happened, that, as he proceeded, he chanced to come upon the very spot
+where he had feasted with MacTaggart and his comrades on his mistress
+the Pensassenach's sow, and the other good things which the Highlanders
+had taken from her. The gnawing demon of hunger that possessed him,
+inserted his fell fangs more furiously into his stomach, from very
+association with the scene. What would he not have now given for
+the smallest morsel of that goodly beast, the long and ample side of
+which arose upon his mind's eyes, as he had beheld her carcase hanging
+from the bough of a tree, previous to the rapid subdivision which it
+underwent. Alas! the very thought of it was now an unreal mockery. Yet
+he could not help looking anxiously around, though in vain, among the
+extinguished remains of the fires of the bivouacs; and he figured to
+himself the joy and comfort and refreshment he would have experienced,
+if his eyes could have lighted even on a half-broiled fragment of one
+of the pettitoes, which he might have picked at as he fled. John's eyes
+were so intently turned to the ground, that he saw not the unfortunate
+Mr. Dallas, who still dangled from the bough of the fir tree above him.
+
+Whilst John was poking about in this manner, earnestly turning over the
+ashes, and looking amongst them as if he had been in search of a pin,
+he suddenly heard the tramp of horses at some little distance. The
+sound was evidently coming towards him; and he could distinguish
+men's voices. He cast his eyes eagerly around him, to discover
+some ready place of concealment; and now, for the first time, he
+caught sight of the wasted figure of Mr. Dallas, swinging at some
+distance above him, with the dull glassy eyeballs apparently fixed
+upon him. His heart sank within him; for the corpse of the wretched
+man seemed to typify his own immediate fate. He was paralyzed for a
+moment. But the sound drew nearer; and, spying a holly-tree with a
+reasonably tall stem, and a very thick and bushy head, which happened
+to grow most fortunately near him, he ran towards it, reached up his
+hands, seized hold of its lower branches, and, weak though he was,
+the energy of self-preservation enabled him very quickly to coil
+himself up amongst its dense foliage, where he sat as still as death,
+and scarcely allowing himself to breathe. The holly-tree stood by the
+side of a horse-track that led through the wood, and which crossed the
+small open space where most of the fires of Captain M'Taggart's bivouac
+had been kindled. Two troopers came riding leisurely up through the
+wood along it, their horses considerably jaded by the work of the day.
+
+"Ha!" said one of them to the other, reining up his steed as he spoke,
+just on entering the open space,--"What have we here, Jack?"
+
+"I should not wonder now if 'em 'ere should be the remains of the
+fires of some of them rebel rascals," said Jack, with wonderful
+acuteness. "Them is a proper set of waggabones, to be sure. How we
+did lick the rascals! Didn't we, Bob?"
+
+"To be sure we did, Jack," replied Bob.
+
+"But you and I aint made much on it, arter all. I wish the captain
+at the devil--so I do--for sendin' us a unting arter that officer he
+was a wanting to ketch."
+
+"Aye," said Jack; "so do I, from the bottom of my soul. But if we
+had ketcht him, I think we should 'a gained a prize, seeing that he
+wur walued at twenty golden pieces by his Highness the Duke. Whoy,
+who the plague could he be? Not the chap they calls Prince Charles
+Stuart himself surelye? I should think that his carcase would fetch
+a deal more money."
+
+"A deal more money indeed!" said Bob.
+
+"Lord bless thee, I would not sell my share of him for an underd. But
+why may we not ketch him yet, Jack? Look sharp; do--and see if you
+can spy ere an oak in this wood, with a head so royal as to hide this
+Prince Charles Stuart in it, as that 'ere one did King Charley the
+Second arter the great battle of Worcester. Zounds! what a fortin
+you and I should make, an' we could only ketch him!"
+
+"Pooh!" replied Jack, moving so close to the little holly, that his
+head and that of John Smith were within two yards of each other--"Pooh
+man! there beant no oaks bigger than this here holly, in all this
+blasted, cold, and wretched country." And, at the same time, he gave
+its bushy head a thwack with the flat of his sword that set every
+leaf of it in motion, and John's heart, body, muscles, and nerves,
+shaking in sympathy with them.
+
+"Beg your pardon," said Bob. "I was in a great big wood yesterday--that
+same, I mean, that spreads abroad all over the country, above that
+'ere ould castle wot they calls Cawdor Castle. And sitch oak trees
+as I seed there! My heyes, some on 'em had heads as would cover half
+a troop! But, hark ye, Jack! Is there no tree, think ye, fit to have
+a man in't but an oak? Dost not think that a good stout fir-tree now
+might support a man?"
+
+"Oh," replied Jack, "surelye, surelye. This here holly, for instance,
+might hide a man in its head;"--and, as he said so, he gave the holly
+another thwack, that, for a few moments, banished every drop of blood
+from the heart of John Smith. "But your oak is your only tree for
+concealing your King or your Prince; for, as the old rhyme has it,
+
+
+    'The royal oak is not a joke.'
+
+
+As for your firs, they may be well enough for affording a refuge to
+your men of smaller mark."
+
+"Then you don't think that 'ere feller, wot hangs from yonder fir
+tree, can be a King or a Prince, do you, Jack?" demanded Bob, laughing
+heartily at his own joke.
+
+"My heyes!" exclaimed Jack, rubbing his optics, and looking
+earnestly for some time at the corpse of Mr. Dallas; "sure I cannot
+be mistaken? As I'm a soldier, that 'ere is the very face, figure,
+clothes, and, above all, short leg and queer shoe, of the identical
+feller wot sould me an ould watch, wot was of no use, because you know
+it never went, and therefore it stands to reason that it could only
+tell the hour twice in the twenty-four. I say surelye, surelye, that
+'ere is the very feller as sould me this here ould useless watch,
+for a bran new great goer. Well, if it be'ant some satisfaction to
+see the feller hanging there, my name aint Jack Blunt!"
+
+"Them rascally rebels has robbed and murdered the poor wretch,"
+said Bob.
+
+"Well," replied Jack, "I am a right soft arted Christine; and therefore
+most surelye do I forgive 'em for that same hact, if they'd never ha'
+done no worse. But come Bob, my boy; an' we would be ketching kings
+or princes, I doubt we mun be stirrin'."
+
+"Aye, aye, that's true--let's be joggin'," replied Bob.
+
+You may believe, gentlemen, that it was with no small satisfaction
+that John Smith beheld them apply their spurs to the sides of their
+weary animals. He listened to their departing footsteps until they
+were beyond the reach of his hearing; and then, conscious as he felt
+himself, that he was in much too weak a state to have maintained
+an unequal combat against two fresh and vigorous men, with the
+most distant chance of success, he put up a fervent ejaculation of
+thankfulness for their departure, and his own safety.
+
+He was in the act of preparing himself to drop from the tree, that
+he might continue his flight, and was just putting down his legs from
+amid the thick foliage, when he met with a new alarm, that compelled
+him to draw them up again with great expedition. Some one on foot
+now came singing along up the path, and John had hardly more than
+time to conceal himself again, when he beheld the person enter upon
+the open space, near the holly tree where he was perched. And a very
+remarkable and striking personage he was. He wore an old, soiled,
+torn, and tarnished regimental coat, which, though now divested of
+every shred of the lace that had once adorned it, seemed to have once
+belonged to an English officer; and this was put on over a tattered
+Highland kilt, from beneath which his raw-boned limbs and long horny
+feet appeared uncased by any covering. A dirty canvas shirt was all
+that showed itself where a waistcoat should have been, and that was
+all loose at the collar, fully exhibiting a thin, long, scraggy neck,
+that supported a head of extraordinary dimensions, and of the strangest
+malconformation, having a countenance, in which the appearance of the
+goggle eyes alone, would have been enough to have satisfied the most
+transient observer of the insanity of the individual to whom they
+belonged. An old worn-out drummer's cap completed his costume. He
+came dancing along, with a large piece of cheese held up before him
+with both hands, and he went on, singing, hoarsely and vehemently,--
+
+
+   "Troll de roll loll--troll de loll lay;
+    If I could catch a reybell, I would him flay--
+    Troll de roll lay--troll de roll lum--
+    And out of his skin I wud make a big drum.
+
+
+Ho! ho; ho; that wud be foine. But stay; I mun halt here, and sit
+doon, and munch up mye cheese that I took so cleverly from that ould
+woman.--Ho! ho! ho! ho!--How nice it is to follow the sodgers! Take
+what we like--take what we like!--Ho! ho!--This is livin' like
+a man! They ca'ed me daft Jock in the streets o' Perth; but our
+sarjeant says as hoo that I'm to be made a captain noo.--Ho! ho!--A
+captain! and to have a lang swurd by my side!--Ho! ho! ho!--I'll
+be grand, very grand--and I'll fecht, and cut off the heads o' the
+reybel loons!--Ho! ho! ho!
+
+
+    Troll de roll loll--troll de roll lay--
+    If I could catch a reybell I wud him----"
+
+
+"Hoch!"--roared out John Smith, his patience being now quite
+exhausted, by the thought that his chance of escaping with life was
+thus to be rendered doubly precarious, by the provoking delay of this
+idiot.--"Hoch!" roared he again, in a yet more tremendous voice, whilst
+at the same time he thrust his head--and nothing but his turf-covered
+head--with his bloody countenance, partially streaked with the tiny
+streams of the inky liquid that had oozed from the peat, and run down
+here and there over his face;--this horrible head, I say, John thrust
+forth from the foliage, and glared fearfully at the appalled songster,
+who stopped dead in the midst of his stave.
+
+"Ah--a-ach--ha--a-ah--ha!" cried the poor idiot, in a prolonged scream
+of terror that echoed through the wood, and off he flew, and was out
+of sight in a moment.
+
+John Smith lost not another instant of time. Dropping down from the
+tree, he hastily picked up a small fragment of the cheese which
+the idiot had let fall in his terror and confusion, and this he
+devoured with inconceivable rapacity. But although this refreshed
+him a little, it stirred up his hunger to a most agonizing degree,
+so that if he had had no other cause for running, he would have run
+from the very internal torment he was enduring. Dashing down through
+the thickest of the brakes of the wood, so as to avoid observation
+as much as possible, he at last traversed the whole extent of it in
+a north-easterly direction, and gained the low open country beyond
+it, whence he urged on his way, until he fell into that very line of
+road, in the parish of Petty, which he had so lately marched over in
+an opposite direction, and under circumstances so different, with
+Captain M'Taggart and his company, on the afternoon of the 14th,
+just two days before.
+
+Remembering the whole particulars of that march, and the cheers
+and the benedictions with which they had been every where greeted,
+John Smith flattered himself that he had now got into a country of
+friends, and that he had only to show himself at any of their doors,
+wounded, weary, an' hungered and athirst, as he was, to ensure the
+most charitable, compassionate, and hospitable reception. But, in so
+calculating, John was ignorant of the versatility and worthlessness
+of popular applause. He forgot that when he was passing to Culloden,
+with the bold Captain M'Taggart and his company, they had been looked
+upon as heroes marching to conquest; whilst he was now to be viewed
+as a wretched runaway from a lost field. But he still more forgot,
+that the same bloody, haggard countenance, and horrible head-gear,
+which had been already so great a protection to him by terrifying
+his enemies, could not have much chance of favourably recommending
+him to his friends.
+
+John stumped on along the road, therefore, with comparative
+cheerfulness, arising from the prospect which he now had of speedy
+relief. At some little distance before him, he observed a nice,
+trig-looking country girl, trudging away barefoot, in the same
+direction he was travelling. He hurried on to overtake her, in order
+to learn from her where he was most likely to have his raging hunger
+relieved. The girl heard his footstep coming up behind her, whilst
+she was yet some twenty paces a-head of him;--she turned suddenly
+round to see who the person was that was about to join her, and
+beholding the terrible spectre-looking figure which John presented,
+she uttered a piercing shriek, and darted off along the highway, with
+a speed that nothing but intense dread could have produced. Altogether
+forgetful of the probable cause of her alarm, John imagined that it
+must proceed from fear of the Duke of Cumberland's men, and, with
+this idea in his head, he ran after her as fast as his weak state
+of body would allow him, earnestly vociferating to her to stop. But
+the more he ran, and the more he shouted, just so much the more ran
+and screamed the terrified young woman. Another girl was seated,
+with a boy, on the grassy slope of a broomy hillock, immediately
+over the road, tending three cows and a few sheep. Seeing the first
+girl running in the way she was doing, they hurried to the road side
+to enquire the cause of her alarm, but ere they had time to ask, or
+she to answer, she shot past them, and the hideous figure of John
+Smith appeared. Horror-struck, and so bewildered that they hardly
+knew what they were doing, both girl and boy leaped into the road,
+and fled along it. A little farther on, two labourers were engaged
+digging a ditch, in a mossy hollow below the road. Curiosity to know
+what was the cause of all this shrieking and running, induced these
+men to hasten up to the road-side. But ere they had half reached
+it, they beheld John coming, and turning with sudden dismay, they
+scampered off across the fields, never stopping to draw breath till
+they reached their own homes. John minded them not,--but fancying
+that he was gaining on the three fugitives before him, and perceiving
+a small hamlet of cottages a little way on, he redoubled his exertions.
+
+Some dozen of persons, men, women, and children, were assembled about
+a well, at what we in Scotland would call the town-end. They were
+talking earnestly over the many, and most contradictory rumours, that
+had reached them of the events of that day's battle, their rustic and
+unwarlike souls having been so sunk, with the trepidation occasioned
+by the distant sound of the heavy cannonade, that they as yet hardly
+dared to speak but in whispers. Suddenly the shrieking of the three
+young persons came upon their ears. They pricked them up in alarm,
+and turned every eye along the road. The shrieking increased, and
+the two girls and the boy appeared, with the formidable figure of
+John Smith in pursuit of them.
+
+"The Duke's men! the Duke's men! with the devil at their head!" cried
+the wise man of the hamlet in Gaelic. "Run! or we're all dead and
+murdered!"
+
+In an instant every human head of them had disappeared, each having
+burrowed under its own proper earthen hovel, with as much expedition
+as would be displayed by the rabbits of a warren, when scared by a
+Highland terrier. So instantaneously, and so securely, was every
+little door fastened, that it was with some difficulty that the
+three fugitives found places of shelter, and that too, not until
+their shrieks had been multiplied ten-fold. When John Smith came up,
+panting and blowing like a stranded porpus, all was snug, and the
+little hamlet so silent, that if he had not caught a glimpse of the
+people alive, he might have supposed that they were all dead.
+
+John knocked at the first door he came to.--Not a sound was returned
+but the angry barking of a cur. He tried the next--and the next--and
+the next--all with like success;--at last he knocked at one, whence
+came a low, tremulous voice, more of ejaculation than intended for
+the ear of any one without, and speaking in Gaelic.
+
+"Lord be about us!--Defend us from Satan, and from all his evil
+spirits and works!"
+
+"Give me a morsel of bread, and a cup of water, for mercy's sake!" said
+John, poking his head close against a small pane of dirty glass in
+the mud wall, that served for a window.
+
+"Avoid thee, evil spirit!" said the same voice.--"Avoid thee, Satan!--O
+deliver us from Satan!--Deliver us from the Prince of Darkness and
+all his wicked angels!"
+
+"Have mercy upon me, and give me but a bit of bread, and a drop of
+water, for the sake of Christ your Saviour!" cried John earnestly
+again.
+
+"Avoid, I say, blasphemer!" replied the voice, with more energy than
+before. "Name not vainly the name of my Saviour, enemy as thou art
+to him and his. Begone, and tempt us not!"
+
+John Smith was preparing to answer and to explain, and to defend
+himself from these absurd and unjust imputations against him, when
+he heard the sound of a bolt drawn in the hovel immediately behind
+him. Full of hope that some good and charitable Christian within,
+melted by his pitiful petitions, had come to the resolution of opening
+his door to relieve him, he turned hastily round. But what was his
+mortification, when, instead of seeing the door opened, he beheld
+the small wooden shutter of an unglazed hole in the wall, slowly and
+silently pushed outwards on its hinges, until it fell aside, and then
+the muzzle of a rusty fowling-piece was gradually projected, levelled,
+and pointed at him. John waited not to allow him who held it to perfect
+his aim. He sprang instantly aside towards the wall, and fortunately,
+the tardy performance of the old and ill constructed lock enabled him
+to do so, just in time to clear the way for the shower of swan-shot
+which the gun discharged in a diagonal line across the way. Luckily
+for John, he had thus no opportunity of judging of the weight of the
+charge in his own person, but he was made sufficiently aware that it
+was quite potent enough, by its effects on an unfortunate sheep-dog,
+that happened to be at that moment lying peaceably gnawing a bone on
+the top of a dunghill, some fifty yards down the road, on the opposite
+side of the way to that where the hovel stood from which the shot had
+been fired. The poor animal sprang up, and gave a loud and sharp yelp,
+when he received the shot, and then followed a long and dismal howl,
+after which he rolled over on his back and died. After such a hint as
+this, John staid not to make farther experiments on the hospitality
+of the little place, but, getting out at the farther end of its street
+with all manner of expedition, he slowly proceeded on his way, weary,
+faint, and heart-sunken.
+
+Just as sunset was approaching, he came to the door of a small single
+cottage, hard by the way-side. There he knocked gently, without saying
+a word.
+
+"Who is there?" asked a soft woman's voice in Gaelic, from within.
+
+"A poor man like to die with hunger and thirst," replied John in
+the same language. "For the love of God give me a piece of bread,
+and a drink of water."
+
+"You shant want that," said the good Samaritan woman within, who
+promptly came to undo the door.
+
+"Heaven reward you!" said John fervently, as she was fumbling with the
+key in the key-hole, and with an astonishing rapidity of movement in
+his ideas, he felt, by anticipation, as if he was already devouring
+the food he had asked for.
+
+"Preserve us, what's that?" cried the woman, the moment the half-opened
+door had enabled her to catch a glimpse of his fearful head and
+bloody features.
+
+The door was shut and locked in an instant; and whether it was that
+the poor young lonely widow, for such she was, had fainted or not, or
+whether she had felt so frightened for herself and her young child,
+that she dared not to speak, all John's farther attempts to procure
+an answer from her were fruitless. It was probably from the cruel
+and unexpected disappointment that he here had met with, just at the
+time when his hopes of relief had been highest, that his faintness
+came more overpoweringly upon him. He tottered away from the widow's
+door, with his head swimming strangely round, and he had not proceeded
+above two or three dozen of steps, when he sank down on a green bank
+by the side of the road, where he lay almost unconscious as to what
+had befallen him.
+
+He had not lain long there, when the tender hearted widow, who
+had reconnoitred him well through a single pane of glass in the
+gable end of her house, began to have her fears overcome by her
+compassion. Seeing that he was now at some distance from her dwelling,
+she ventured again to open her door, and perceiving that he did not
+stir, she retired for a minute, and then reappeared with a bottle
+of milk and two barley cakes, with which she crept timorously, and
+therefore slowly and cautiously, along the road. Her step became
+slower and slower, as, with fear and trembling, she drew near to
+John. At last, when within three or four yards of him, she halted,
+and, looking back, as if to measure the distance that divided her
+from her own door, she turned towards him, and ventured to address him.
+
+"Here, poor man," said she, setting down the cakes and the bottle of
+milk on the bank. "Here is some refreshment for you."
+
+John Smith raised his eyes languidly as her words reached him, and
+spying the food she had brought him, he started up and proceeded to
+seize upon it with an energy which no one could have believed was
+yet left in him; and, as the benevolent widow was flying back with a
+beating heart to her cottage, she heard his thanks and benedictions
+coming thickly and loudly after her. John devoured the barley cakes,
+and drank the milk, and felt wonderfully refreshed, and then, placing
+the bottle on the bank in view of the cottage, he knelt down and
+offered up his thanks to God for his mercy, and prayed for blessings
+on the head of her who had relieved him. He then arose, and having
+waved his hand two or three times towards the cottage in token of his
+gratitude, he proceeded with some degree of spirit on his journey. I
+may here remark, gentlemen, that however those worthies who denied
+John admittance to their houses may have passed the night, I may
+venture to pronounce, and that with some probability of truth too,
+that the sleep of that virtuous young widow, with her innocent child
+in her arms, was as sweet and refreshing as the purity and balminess
+of her previous reflections could make it.
+
+John Smith had not gone far on his way till the sun went down;
+but, as the moon was up, and he knew his road sufficiently well,
+he continued to trudge on without fear, until he approached the
+old walls of an ancient church, the burying yard of which had an
+ugly reputation for being haunted, and then he began to walk with
+somewhat more circumspection. As he drew nearer to it, he halted
+under the shadow of a bank, and stood for a time somewhat aghast,
+for, in the open part of the grave-yard, between the church and the
+high-road, he beheld three figures standing in the moonlight which
+then prevailed. At first John quaked with fear, lest they should
+prove to be some of the uncanny spirits which were said to frequent
+the place. But he soon became reassured, by observing enough of them
+and of their motions to convince him that they were men of flesh and
+blood, yea, and Highlanders too, like himself.
+
+As John Smith had no fear of mortal man, he would have at once
+advanced. But there was something so suspicious in the manner in which
+the three fellows hung over the wall, as if they were watching the
+public road, that he became at once convinced that they were lying
+in wait for a prey; and although he had nothing to lose, he did not
+feel quite assured as to the manner in which they might be disposed
+to accost him; and in his present weak state, he felt prudence to be
+the better part of valour. Availing himself of the concealment of the
+bank, therefore, until he had entered a small opening in the churchyard
+wall, he crept quietly across a dark part of the churchyard itself,
+by which means he got into the deep shadow that fell with great
+breadth all along the church wall, between the moon and the three
+figures who were watching the road, and who consequently had their
+backs to the old building. Having succeeded in accomplishing this,
+John was stealing slowly and silently along the wall, with the hope of
+passing by them, altogether unnoticed, when, as ill luck would have it,
+one of them chanced to turn round, so as dimly to descry his figure.
+
+"What the devil is that gliding along yonder?" cried the man, in
+Gaelic, and in a voice that betrayed considerable fear.
+
+"Halt you there!" cried another, who was somewhat bolder. "Halt,
+I say, and give an account of yourself."
+
+John saw that there was now no mode of escaping the danger but by
+boldly bearding it. He halted therefore, but still keeping deep within
+the shade, he drew out his claymore, and placed his back to the church
+wall to prepare for defence.
+
+"Ha! steel!" cried the third fellow; "I heard it clash on the
+stones of the wall, and I saw it bring a flash of fire out of them
+too. Come, come, goodman, whoever you are--come out here, and give
+us your claymore."
+
+"He that will have it, must come and take it by the point," said John,
+in Gaelic, and in a stern, hoarse, hollow voice; "and he had better
+have iron gloves on, or he will find it too hot for his palms."
+
+"What the devil does he mean?" said the first.
+
+"We'll detain you as a runaway rebel," said the third.
+
+"The boldest of men could not detain me," replied John, now recognising
+the last speaker, by the moonlight on his face, as well as by his
+voice. "But for a base traitor like you, Neil MacCallum, better were
+it for you to be lying dead, like your brave brother, among the slain
+on Drummosie Moor, than to encounter me here in this churchyard,
+at such an hour as this!"
+
+"In the name of wonder, how knows he my name?" exclaimed MacCallum
+in a voice that quavered considerably.
+
+"Oh, Neil! Neil!" cried the first speaker, in great dismay, "it is
+no man! it is something most uncanny: For the love of God, parley
+with it no farther!"
+
+"Pshaw--nonsense!" exclaimed the second speaker. "Its a man, and
+nothing else. Let us all rush upon him at once. Surely, if he were
+the devil himself, three of us ought to be a match for him."
+
+"I am the devil himself!" cried John Smith in a terrible voice, and at
+the same time stalking slowly forth from the shadow, with the bloody
+blade of his claymore before him, he strode into the moonlight, which
+at once fully disclosed his hideous head-gear and ghastly features,
+to which at the same time it gave a tenfold effect of horror.
+
+"Oh, the devil!--the devil!--the devil!" cried the fellows, the moment
+they thus beheld him; and, overpowered by their terror, they rushed
+forward towards the churchyard wall, and threw themselves over it
+pell-mell, tumbling higgledy-piggledy into the road, and scampering
+out of sight and out of hearing in a moment, leaving John Smith sole
+master of the field.
+
+In the midst of all his miseries, John could not help laughing
+heartily at the suddenness of their retreat. But gravity of mood came
+quickly over him again, when he heard his laugh re-echoed--he knew not
+how, as it were in a tone of mockery, from the old church walls. He
+began to recollect where he was, and he half repented that he had so
+indiscreetly used the name of Satan in the manner he had done.
+
+"The Lord be about us!" ejaculated John most fervently, whilst his
+knees smote against each other violently, and his jaws were stretched
+to a fearful extent.
+
+He felt that the shorter time he tarried in that uncanny place the
+better it would be for his comfort; and, accordingly, he began to
+move forward as quickly as he could towards a wicket gate, which he
+well knew gave exit to the footpath at the other end of the churchyard.
+
+John, now proceeding at what might rather be called an anxious
+pace than a quick one, had very nearly reached the wicket, when his
+eye caught a tall white figure, standing within a few yards of it,
+and posted close by the path which he must necessarily pursue. The
+moonshine enabled him to see a terrible face, with a huge mouth; and,
+so far as his recollection of his own natural physiognomy went, derived
+as it was from his shavings on Saturday nights ever since his chin had
+required a razor, he felt persuaded that the countenance before him
+was a fac-simile of his own. It was, moreover, very ghastly, and very
+bloody. His eyes fixed themselves upon it with unconquerable dismay,
+and he shook throughout every nerve, like the trembling poplar. But
+that which most astonished and terrified him, as he gazed on this
+apparition, was, the strange circumstance, that he could distinctly
+perceive, that it had already assumed a head-gear precisely similar
+to the very remarkable one which he had been so recently compelled
+from necessity to adopt. On the summit of its crown appeared a huge
+sod, with all its native plants upon it, and these waved to and fro
+before him with something like portentous omen. John felt as if he
+had only fled from the battle-field of Culloden to meet both death
+and burial in this most unchancy churchyard, and if his knees smote
+each other before, they now increased their reciprocal antagonist
+action in a degree that was tenfold more striking. John felt persuaded
+beyond a doubt, that the devil had been permitted thus to assume his
+own appearance, and to come thus personally to reprove him for the
+indiscreet use which he had made of his name. Sudden death seemed to
+be about to fall on him. The grave appeared to be about to open to
+receive his wounded and worn-out body. But these were evils which,
+at that dreadful moment, John hardly recognized, for the jaws of the
+Evil Spirit himself seemed to him to be slowly and terribly expanding
+themselves to swallow up his sinful soul. Fain would John have fled,
+but he was rivetted to the spot. No way suggested itself to his
+distracted mind by which he could escape, and he well knew that he had
+no way that led homewards to that spot where he looked for concealment
+and safety, save that which went directly by the dreaded object before
+him. For some time he stood trembling and staring, in a cold sweat,
+until at length, overpowered by his feelings, he dropped upon his
+knees, and began putting up such snatches of prayer to Heaven, for
+help against the powers of darkness, as his fears allowed him to utter.
+
+As John thus sat on his knees, praying and quaking, his animal courage
+so far returned to him as to permit him to observe that the object
+of his terror remained unchanged and immovable. At length his mind
+recovered itself to such an extent, as to enable him to revert to that
+night of misery which he had so recently experienced, in beholding
+that which he had believed to be the spirit of Dallas the packman,
+and remembering how that matter had been cleared up by the appearance
+of daylight, he began to reason with himself as to the possibility of
+this being a somewhat similar case. Having thus so far reduced his
+fears within the control of his reason, he summoned up resolution
+to raise himself from his knees, and to advance one step nearer to
+the phantom which had so long triumphed over the courage that was
+within him. And, seeing that, notwithstanding this movement of his,
+it still maintained its position, and uttered no sound, he ventured
+to take a second step--and then a third step, until the truth, and
+the whole truth, began gradually to dawn upon his eyes and his mind,
+and then, at last, he discovered, to his very great relief, that the
+horrible and much-dreaded demon whose appearance had so disturbed
+and discomposed his nervous system, was no other than a tall old
+tombstone, with a head so fearfully chisselled on the top of it, as
+might have left it a very doubtful matter, even in the day-time, for
+any one, however learned in such pieces of art, to have determined
+whether the rustic sculptor had intended it for a death's-head or
+a cherubim. Some idle artist of the brush, in passing by that way
+with a pot full of red paint, prepared for giving a temporary glory
+to a new cart about to be turned out from a neighbouring wright's
+shop, had paused as he passed by, and exhausted the full extent of
+his small talents in communicating to the countenance that bloody
+appearance, the effect of which had so much appalled John Smith,
+and some waggish schoolboy had finished the figure, by tearing up a
+sod covered with plants of various kinds, and clapping it on its top,
+so as thereby very much to augment its artificial terrors. John Smith
+drew a long breath of inconceivable relief on making this discovery,
+and then darting through the wicket, he pursued his journey with as
+much expedition as his weakness and fatigue permitted him to use.
+
+John walked on for some hour or twain with very determined resolution,
+but at length the great loss of blood he had experienced, brought on so
+unconquerable a drowsiness, that he felt he must have a little rest,
+were it but for a few minutes, even if his taking it should be at
+the risk of his life. John was never wont to be very particular as
+to the place where he made his bed, but on the present occasion it
+happened, probably from the blood-vessels of his body having been
+so much drained, that he had a most unpleasant chill upon him. He
+felt as if ice itself was shooting and crystallizing through every
+vein and artery within him. Then the night had become somewhat raw,
+and he had left his plaid, which is a Highlander's second house,
+on the fatal field of battle. Under all these circumstances, John
+was seized with a resistless desire to enjoy the luxury of sleep for
+a short time, under the shelter of a roof, and in the vicinity of a
+good peat fire. Calling to mind that there was an humble turf-built
+cottage in a hollow a little way farther on, by the side of a small
+rushy, mossy stream, he made the best of his way towards it.
+
+The house consisted of three small apartments, one in the middle
+of it, opposite to the outer door, and one at either end, which had
+their entrances from that in the centre. When John came to the brow
+of the bank that looked down upon this humble dwelling, he was by no
+means sorry to perceive that the middle apartment had a good blazing
+fire in it, as he could easily see through the window and outer door,
+which last chanced to be invitingly open. John, altogether forgetful
+of his uncouth and terrific appearance, lost not a moment in availing
+himself of this lucky circumstance. But he had no sooner presented
+his awful spectral form and visage within the threshold, than he
+spread instantaneous terror over the group assembled within.
+
+"Oh, a ghost! a ghost!" cried out in Gaelic a pale-faced girl of some
+eight or nine years of age, as she dropped on her knees, shaken by
+terror in every limb and feature.
+
+"Oh, the devil! the devil!" roared an old man and woman, who also
+sank down before John, bellowing out like frightened cattle. "Och,
+och! we shall all be swallowed up quick by the Evil One!"
+
+"Fear nothing," said John Smith, in a mild tone, and in the same
+tongue. "I am but a poor wounded and wearied man. I only want to lie
+down and rest me a little, if you will be so charitable as to grant
+me leave."
+
+"Wounded!" said the old man, rising from his knees, somewhat reassured;
+"where were you wounded?"
+
+"In the head here," said John, with a stare that again somewhat
+disconcerted the old man; "and if it had not been for this peat that
+I clapped on my skull, I believe my very brains would have been all
+out of me."
+
+"Mercy on us, where got ye such a mischance as that?" exclaimed the
+old woman.
+
+"At Culloden, I'll be sworn," said the old man.
+
+"Aye, aye, it was at Culloden," replied John. "But, if ye be
+Christians, give me a drink of warm milk and water, to put away this
+shivering thirst that is on me, and let me lie down in a warm bed
+for half an hour."
+
+"Och aye, poor man, ye shall not want a drop of warm milk and water,
+and such a bed as we can give you," said the old woman, moving about
+to prepare the drink for him.
+
+"Thank ye--thank ye!" said John, much refreshed and comforted by
+swallowing the thin but hot potation. And then following the old
+man into the inner apartment on the right hand, he sank down in a
+darksome nook of it, on a pallet among straw, and covering himself up,
+turf, nightcap and all, under a coarse blanket, he was sound asleep
+before the old man had withdrawn the light, and shut the door of his
+clay chamber.
+
+"Oh that our boys were back again safe and sound!" cried the old woman,
+wringing her hands.
+
+"Safe and sound I fear we cannot expect them to be, Janet," replied
+the old man. "But oh that we had them back again, though it was to
+see them wounded as badly as that poor fellow! Much do I fear that
+they are both corpses on Drummossie Moor."
+
+"What will become of us!" cried the old woman, weeping bitterly; "what
+will become of this poor motherless lassie now, if her father be gone?"
+
+But, leaving this aged couple to complain, and John Smith to enjoy his
+repose, we must now return to poor Morag, whom, as you may recollect,
+gentlemen, we left hunted into covert by the two dragoons who had so
+closely pursued her. The patch of natural wood into which she dived
+was not large. It chiefly consisted of oaks and birches, which, though
+they had grown to a considerable size in certain parts, so that their
+wide-spreading heads had kept the knolls on which their stems stood,
+altogether free from the incumbrance of any kind of brushwood,--had
+yet in most places risen up thinner and smaller, leaving ample room
+and air around them to support thickets of the tallest broom and
+juniper bushes.
+
+It chanced that Morag was not altogether unacquainted with the
+nature of the place, having at one time, in earlier life, been hired
+to tend the cows of a farmer at no great distance from it. She was
+well aware that a rill, which had its origin in the higher grounds
+at some distance, came wimpling into the upper part of the wood, and
+thence, during its descent over the sloping surface of the ground,
+from its having met with certain obstructions, or from some other
+cause, it had worn itself a channel through the soft soil, to the
+depth of some six feet or so, but which was yet so narrow, that the
+ferns and bushes growing out of the undermined sods that fringed the
+edges of it, almost entirely covered it with one continued tangled
+and matted arch. Towards this rill Morag endeavoured to make her
+way through the tall broom, and, as she was doing so, she heard the
+dismounted trooper, who had by this time entered the wood after her,
+calling to his comrade, who sat mounted outside:
+
+"Bill! do you padderowl round the wood, and keep a sharp look out that
+she don't bolt without your seeing her. I'll follow arter her here,
+and try if I can't lay my hands on her; and if I do but chance to
+light on her, be she witch or devil, I'll drag her out of her covert
+by the scruff of the neck."
+
+Morag heard no more than this.--She pressed forward towards the bed of
+the rill, and having reached it, she stopped, like a chased doe, one
+moment to listen, and hearing that the curses, as well as the crashing
+of the jack-boots of her pursuer, as yet indicated that he was still at
+some distance behind her, and evidently much entangled in his progress,
+she carefully shed the pendulous plants of the ferns asunder, and then
+slid herself gently down into the hollow channel. There finding her
+feet safely planted on the bottom, she cautiously and silently groped
+her way along the downward course of the rill, through the dark and
+confined passage which it had worn out for its tiny stream. In this
+way she soon came to the lower edge of the wood, where the hollow
+channel became deeper, and where it assumed more of the character
+of a ravine, but where it was still skirted with occasional oaks,
+mingled with thickets of birches, hazels, and furze bushes.
+
+Morag was about to emerge from the obscurity of this subterranean
+arch, into the more open light, when, as she looked out, she beheld
+the mounted trooper standing on his stirrups on the top of the bank,
+eagerly gazing around him in all directions. The furze there grew too
+thick and high for him to be able to force his way down to the bottom
+of the ravine, even if he had accidently observed her. But his eyes
+were directed to higher and more distant objects, and seeing that she
+had been as yet unperceived, she instantly drew so far back, as to be
+beyond all reach of his observation,--whilst she could perfectly well
+watch him, so long as he maintained his present position. She listened
+for the crashing strides of him who was engaged in searching the wood
+for her. For a time they came faint and distant to her ear, but, by
+degrees, they began to come nearer,--and then again the sound would
+alternately diminish and increase, as he turned away in some other
+direction, fighting through the opposing boughs, and then came beating
+his way back again, in the same manner, with many a round oath. At
+length she heard him raging forward in the direction of the rill, at
+some forty yards above the place where she was, blaspheming as he went.
+
+"Ten thousand devils!" cried he; "such a place as this I never se'ed
+in all my life afore. If my heyes beant nearly whipt out of my head
+with them 'ere blasted broom shafts, my name aint Tom Wetherby! Dang
+it, there again! that whip has peeled the very skin off my cheek, and
+made both my heyes run over with water like mill-sluices--I wonder
+at all where this she-devil can be hidden? Curse her! Do you think,
+Bill, that she can raaly have ridden off through the hair, as they
+do say they do? But for a matter of that, she may be here somewhere
+after all, for my heyes be so dimmed, that, dang me an' I could see
+her if she were to rise up afore my very face. How they do smart
+with pain! Oh! Lord, where am I going?" cried he, as he went smack
+down through the ferns and brush into the concealed bed of the rill,
+and was laid prostrate on his back in the narrow clayey bottom of it,
+in such a position that it defied him to rise.
+
+"Hollo Bill!" cried he, from the bowels of the earth, in a voice which
+reached his comrade as if he had spoken with a pillow on his mouth,
+but which rang with terrible distinctness down the hollow natural
+tube to the spot where Morag was concealed. "Hollo!--help!--help!"
+
+"What a murrain is the matter with ye?" cried Bill, very much
+astonished.
+
+"I've fallen plump into the witches' den!--into the very bottomless
+pit!--Hollo!--hollo! Help!--help!" cried the fallen trooper from
+the abyss.
+
+"How the plague am I to get to ye if so be the pit be
+bottomless?" cried Bill, in a drawling tone, that did not argue
+much promise of any zealous exertion of effective aid on the part of
+the speaker.
+
+"Curse ye, come along quickly, or I shall be smothered in this here
+infernal, dark, outlandish place," cried Tom Wetherby.
+
+"Well,--well," replied Bill, with the same long-drawn tone of
+philosophic indifference, "I'm a coming--I'm a coming. But you must
+keep chaunting out from the bottom of that bottomless pit of yours, do
+you hear, Tom, else I shall never find you in that 'ere wilderness. And
+how the devil I am to get into it is more than I know."
+
+The dragoon turned his horse very leisurely away, to look for some
+place where he could best quit his saddle, in order to make good his
+entrance on foot into the thicket. The moment the quick eyes of Morag
+perceived that he had disappeared from his station on the brow of the
+bank, she crept forth from her concealment, and keeping her way down
+through the shallow stream, that her footsteps might leave no prints
+behind them, she stole off, until she was beyond all hearing of the
+two dragoons. Then it was that Morag began to ply her utmost speed,
+and, after following the ravine until it expanded into a small and
+partially wooded glen, she hurried on through it, until at length she
+found herself emerging on the lower and more open country. Afraid of
+being seen, she made a long circuitous sweep through some rough broomy
+waste ground of considerable extent, towards a distant hummock, with
+the shape of which she was familiar, and having thus gained a part of
+the country with which she was acquainted, though it was still very
+distant from her present home, she hailed the descent of the shades
+of night with great satisfaction.
+
+Under their protection she proceeded on her way with great alacrity,
+and without apprehension, though with a torn heart, that made her
+every now and then stop to give full vent to her grief for John
+Smith, of whose death she had so little reason to doubt, from all the
+circumstances she had heard. At length, fatigue came so powerfully upon
+her, that she was not sorry to perceive, as she was about to descend
+into a hollow, the light of a cheerful fire, that blazed through the
+window of a turf-built cottage, and was reflected on the surface of
+a rushy stream, that ran lazily through the bottom near to it. The
+door was shut, but Morag descended the path that led towards it,
+and knocked without scruple.
+
+An old man and woman came immediately to open it, and looked out
+eagerly, as if for some one whose coming they had expected, and
+disappointment seemed to cloud their brows, when they found only her
+who was a stranger to them. Morag, addressing them in Gaelic, entreated
+for leave to rest herself for half an hour by their fireside. She was
+admitted, after some hesitation and whispering between them, after
+which she craved a morsel of oaten cake, and a draught of water. A
+little girl, of some eight or nine years old, waited not to know her
+granny's will, but ran to a cupboard for the cake; and brought it
+to her, and then hastened to fill a bowl with water from a pitcher
+that stood in a corner. The old couple would have fain pumped out
+of Morag something of her history, and they put many questions to
+her for that purpose. But she was too shrewd for them, and all they
+could gather from her was, that she had been away seeing her friends
+a long way off, and that she had first rode, and then walked so far,
+that she was glad of a little rest, and a morsel to allay her hunger,
+after which she would be enabled to continue her journey, with many
+thanks to them for their hospitality.
+
+Morag had not sat there for many minutes, when there came a rap to
+the door. The old man sprang up to open it, and immediately three
+Highlanders appeared, full armed with claymores and dirks, but very
+much jaded and soiled with travel. Morag retired into a corner.
+
+"Och, Ian! Ian!"--"Och, Hamish! Hamish!" cried the old couple,
+embracing two of them, who appeared to be their sons; and, "Oh,
+father! father!" cried the little girl, springing into Ian's arms.
+
+"Tuts, don't be foolish, Kirstock!" cried Ian, in a surly tone, as
+he shook off the little girl; "What's the use of all this nonsense,
+father?--Better for you to be getting something for us and our comrade
+MacCallum here to drink. We are almost famished for want;" and with
+that he threw himself into the old man's wooden arm-chair.
+
+"Aye, aye, father," said Hamish, occupying the seat where his mother
+had sat, and motioning to MacCallum to take that which Morag had just
+left; "we have had a sad tramp away from the battle. Would we had
+never gone near it! Aye, and we got such a fright into the bargain."
+
+"Fright!" cried the old man much excited; "Surely, surely, my sons
+are not cowards!--Much as I love you, boys, I would rather that you
+had both died than run away."
+
+"Oh!" said MacCallum, now joining in the conversation, "we all three
+fought like lions in the battle. But it requires nerves harder than
+steel to look upon the Devil, and if ever he was seen on earth,
+we saw him this precious night."
+
+"Preserve us all!" said the old woman; "what was he like?"
+
+"Never mind what he was like, mother," said Ian gruffly; "let us have
+some of your bread and cheese, and a drop of Uisge-beatha to put some
+heart in us."
+
+"You shall have all that I have to give you, boys," said the old
+man; "but that is not much. I would have fain given a sup out of the
+bottle to the poor wounded man that came in here, a little time ago;
+but I bethought me that you might want it all, and so we sent him to
+his bed with a cup of warm milk and water."
+
+"Bed, did you say?" cried Ian. "What! one of Prince Charley's men?"
+
+"Surely, surely!" said the old man. "Troth, I should have been any
+thing but fond of letting in any one else but a man who had fought
+on the same side with yourselves."
+
+"Don't speak of our having fought on Charley's side, father," said
+Ian; "that's not to be boasted of now. The fruits of fighting for
+him have been nothing but danger and starvation, so far as we have
+gathered them; and now we have no prospect before us but the risk of
+hanging. Methinks you would have shewn more wisdom if you had sent
+this fellow away from your door. To have us three hunted men here,
+is enough to make the place too hot, without bringing in another to
+add to the fire."
+
+"Never mind, Ian," said MacCallum; "why may we not make our own of
+him? You know very well that John MacAllister told us that he could
+make our peace, and save our lives, if we could only prove our loyalty
+to the King, by bringing in a rebel or two."
+
+"Very true," said Hamish; "and an excellent advice it was."
+
+"Most excellent," said Ian; "and if we act wisely, and as I advise,
+this fellow shall be our first peace-offering."
+
+"Oh, boys, boys!" cried the old man; "would you buy your own lives
+by treachery of so black a die?"
+
+"Oh, life is sweet!" cried the old woman--"and the lives of my
+bairns----"
+
+"Hold your foolish tongue, woman!" interrupted the old man. "No, no,
+boys! I'll never consent to it."
+
+"Oh life is sweet! life is sweet!" cried the old woman again; "and
+the lives of both my bonny boys--the life of Ian, the father of this
+poor lassie!----"
+
+"Oh, my father's life!" whimpered the little girl.
+
+"This is no place to talk of such things," said the old man, leading
+the way into the apartment at the opposite end of the house, to that
+where John Smith was sleeping, and followed by all but Morag, who,
+having slipped towards the door, to listen after he had closed it,
+heard him say, "What made you speak that way before the stranger lass?"
+
+"Who and what is she at all?" demanded Ian.
+
+"A poor tired lass, weary with the long way she has been to see her
+friends," said the old woman; "but she'll be gone very soon."
+
+"If she does not go of her own accord, we must take strong measures
+with her too," said Ian.
+
+"God forgive you, boys, what would you do?" said the old man. "Let
+not the Devil tempt you thus. Would you bring foul treason upon
+this humble, but hitherto spotless shed of mine, by violating the
+sacred rights of hospitality to a woman, and by giving up a man to an
+ignominious death, who, upon the faith of it, is now soundly sleeping
+under my roof, in the other end of the house? Fye, fye, boys! I tell
+you plainly I will be a party to no such wickedness."
+
+"So you would rather be a party to assist in hanging Hamish and me,
+your own flesh and blood?" said Ian. "But you need be no party to
+either; for we shall take all the guilt of this fellow's death upon
+ourselves."
+
+"You shall never do this foul treason, if I can prevent it," said
+the old man, with determination.
+
+"Poof!" said Ian, "how could you prevent us?"
+
+"By rousing the man to defend himself," said the father rather
+unguardedly.
+
+"Ha! say you so?" cried Ian. "What! would you rouse up an armed man
+to fight against your own children? Then must we take means to prevent
+your so doing."
+
+"Oh, Ian!" cried the old woman. "Oh, Hamish! Oh, boys! boys!"
+
+"What! what! what boys!" cried the old man with great excitement,
+whilst there was a sound of feet as of a struggle. "Would you lay
+your impious hands upon your own father?"
+
+"Oh, don't hurt poor granny!" cried the little girl, in the bitterest
+tone of grief.
+
+"Be quiet, I tell you, Kirstock!" cried Ian, in an angry tone. "Hold
+out of my way, mother! We'll do him no harm! we are only going to
+bind him that he may not interfere."
+
+"Boys, boys!" cried the old man; "you have been tempted by the
+Devil! There is no wonder that you should have seen him once to-night;
+and I should not wonder if he was to appear to you again, for you
+seem resolved to be his children, and not mine."
+
+"Sit down--sit down quietly in this chair," said Ian; "sit down, I
+say quietly, and let MacCallum put the rope about you. By the great
+oath you had better!"
+
+"Oh, boys!" cried the old woman; "Och, Hamish! Och, Ian."
+
+Morag hardly waited to hear so much of this dialogue as I have given,
+when she resolved to be the means, if possible, of saving the life
+of the poor wounded man, whom the wretches had thus determined
+so traitorously to give up to the tender mercies of the Duke of
+Cumberland. She had her hand upon the door of the chamber where he
+slept, in order to go in and rouse him, when she remembered that,
+in this way, her own safety was almost certain to be compromised. She
+therefore immediately adopted a plan, which she considered might be
+equally effectual for her purpose as regarded the stranger, whilst
+it would leave to herself some chance of escape. Slipping on tiptoe
+to the outer door, she quietly opened it, and, letting herself out,
+she moved quickly round the house, towards a little window belonging
+to the room at that end of it, where she knew the wounded man was
+lying. It consisted of two small panes of glass, placed in a frame
+that moved inwards upon hinges. She put her ear to it, but no sound
+reached her save that of deep snoring. Morag pushed gently against
+the frame, and it yielded to the pressure. Having inserted her head,
+and looked eagerly about, in the hope of descrying the sleeper, by
+the partial stream of moonlight that was admitted into the place,
+she could discover nothing but the heap of straw in the bedstead in
+a dark corner, where, wrapped in a blanket, he lay so buried as to be
+altogether invisible. She called to him, at first in a low voice, and
+afterwards in a somewhat louder tone, till at length she awaked him.
+
+"Who is there?" demanded he in Gaelic.
+
+"Rise! rise, and escape!" said she, in a low but distinct voice,
+and in the same language; "Your liberty! your life is in danger! Up,
+up, and fly from this house!" Having said this, she retreated her
+head a little from the window, to watch the effect of her warning,
+so that the moon shone brightly upon her countenance, and completely
+illuminated every feature of it.
+
+There was a quick rustling noise among the straw, and then she heard
+the slow heavy step of the man within. Suddenly a head was thrust
+out of the window, and the moonbeam falling fully upon it, disclosed
+to the terrified eyes of Morag, the features of John Smith--pale,
+bloody, and death-like, with all the fearful appendages which he bore,
+the whole combination being such as to leave not a doubt in her mind
+that she beheld his ghost. With one shrill scream, which she could
+not control, she vanished in a moment from before the window. John
+Smith, filled in his turn with superstitious awe, as well as with
+the strangeness of the manner in which he had been roused from the
+deep sleep into which he had been plunged,--and struck by the well
+known though hollow voice in which he had been addressed--the solemn
+warning which he had received, and, above all, the distinct, though
+most unaccountable appearance of Morag, with whose features he was
+so perfectly acquainted--together with the wild and sudden manner in
+which the vision had departed--all tended to convince him that the
+whole was a supernatural visitation. For some moments his powers of
+action were suspended; but steps and voices in the outer apartment
+speedily recalled his presence of mind. He drew his claymore, summoned
+up his resolution, and banging up the door with one kick of his foot,
+he took a single stride into the middle of the floor. The fire was
+still blazing, and it threw on his terrible figure the full benefit of
+its light. The three villains having tied the old man into his chair,
+and locked him and his wife and grandchild into the place where their
+conference was held, had been at that moment preparing to steal in
+upon the sleeping stranger. Suddenly they beheld the same apparition
+which they had seen in the churchyard, burst from the very room which
+they were about to enter. The threatening words of the old man recurred
+to them all.
+
+"Oh, the devil! the devil! the devil!" cried the terrified group,
+and bearing back upon one another, they tripped, and, in one moment,
+all their heels were dancing the strangest possible figures in the
+air, to the music of their own mingled screams and yells. You will
+easily believe, gentlemen, that John Smith tarried not a moment
+to inquire after their bruises, but pushing up the outer door, and
+slapping it to after him, he again pursued his way towards the farm
+of the Pensassenach.
+
+Winged by her fears, and in dreadful apprehension that the ghost
+of John Smith was still following her, Morag flew with an unnatural
+swiftness and impetus. She was quite unconscious of noticing any of
+the familiar objects by the way; yet, by a species of instinct, she
+reached home, in so short a time, that she could hardly believe her
+own senses. But still in dreadful fear of the ghost, she thundered
+at the door, and roared out to her mistress for admittance. The
+kind-hearted Pensassenach had been sitting up in a state of the
+cruellest anxiety regarding Morag, of whose intended expedition she
+had received no inkling, nor had she been informed of her departure,
+until long after she was gone. She no sooner heard her voice, and
+her knock, than she hastened to admit her.
+
+"Foolish girl that you are!" said she, "I am thankful to see you
+alive. My stars and garters, what a draggled figure you are!--But
+come away into this room here, and let me hear all you have to tell me
+about the battle. The rebels were defeated, were they not?--eh?--Why,
+what is the matter with the girl? she pants as if she was dying. Sit
+down, sit down, child, and compose yourself; you look for all the
+world as if you had seen a ghost."
+
+"Och, och, memm!--och, hoch!" replied the girl very much appalled,
+that her mistress should thus, as she thought, so immediately see
+the truth written in her very face. "Och, hoch! an' a ghaist Morag
+has surely seen. Has ta ghaist put her mark upon her face?--Och,
+hoch! she'll ne'er won ower wi't!"
+
+"The poor girl's head has been turned by the horrible scenes of
+carnage she has witnessed," said the Pensassenach.
+
+"Och, hoch!" said Morag, with her hands on her knees, and rocking to
+and fro with nervous agitation; "terrible sights! terrible sights,
+surely, surely!"
+
+"Here, my poor Morag," said the Pensassenach, after she had dropped
+into a cup a small quantity of some liquid nostrum of her own, from
+a phial, hastily taken from a little medicine chest, and added some
+water to it, "drink this, my good girl!"
+
+"Och, hoch!" said Morag, after she had swallowed it; "she thinks she
+sees ta ghaist yet."
+
+"What ghost did you see?" demanded the Pensassenach.
+
+"Och, hoch! Och, hoch, memm!" replied Morag, trembling more than ever;
+"Shon Smiss ghaist; Shon Smiss, as sure as Morag is in life, an'
+ta leddy stannin' in ta body tare afore her e'en."
+
+"John Smith's ghost!" cried the Pensassenach. "Pooh, nonsense! But
+again I ask you, how went the battle? The rumour is, that the rebels
+have been signally defeated, and all cut to pieces."
+
+"Och, hoch! is tat true?" said Morag, weeping. "Och, hoch, poor
+Shon Smiss!"
+
+"Did you not see the rout?" demanded the Pensassenach. "Did you not
+witness the battle, and behold the glorious triumph of the royal army?"
+
+"Och, hoch, no!" replied the girl. "Morag saw nae pattals, nor naesin'
+but hearin' terrible shots o' guns, an' twa or sree red cotted sodgers
+tat pursued her for her life."
+
+"Well, well!" replied the Pensassenach; "Come now! tell me your
+whole history."
+
+Morag's nerves being now somewhat composed, she gave her mistress
+as clear an outline as she could, of all that had befallen her. The
+Pensassenach dropped some tears, to mingle with those which Morag
+shed, when she recounted the evidence of John Smith's death, which
+she felt to be but too probably true. But when she came to talk of
+the ghost, she did all she could to laugh the girl out of her fears,
+insisting with her that she had been deceived by terror and weakness,
+and seeing how much the poor girl was worn out, she desired her to
+take some refreshment, and to go to bed directly; and she had no
+sooner retired, than the Pensassenach prepared to follow her example.
+
+Morag, overcome with the immense fatigue she had undergone, had not
+strength left to undo much more than half her dress, when she dropped
+down on her bed, and fell over into a slumber. She had been lying
+in this state for fully half an hour or more, during part of which
+she had been dreaming of John Smith, mixed up with many a strange
+incident, with all of which his slaughter, and his pale countenance
+and bloody figure were invariably connected, when she was awaked by
+a tapping at the window of her apartment, which was upon the ground
+floor. She looked up and stared, but the moon was by this time gone
+down, and all without was dark as pitch.
+
+"Morag! Morag!" cried John Smith, who knowing well where she slept,
+went naturally to her window to get her to come round and give him
+admission to the house, and yet at the same time half doubting,
+after the strange visitation which he had had, from what he
+believed to be her wraith, that he could hardly expect to find her
+alive. "Morag! Morag!" cried he again in his faint hollow voice.
+
+"Och, Lord have mercy upon me, there it is!" cried Morag, in her native
+tongue, and shaking from head to foot with terror. "Who is there?"
+
+"Its me, your own Ian," cried John, in a tender tone. "Let me in,
+Morag, for the love of God!"
+
+"Och, Ian, Ian!" cried Morag. "Och, Ian, my darling dear Ian! are you
+sure that it is really yourself in real flesh and blood?--for I have
+got such a fright already this night. But if it really and truly be
+you, go round to the door and I'll be with you in a minute. Och, och,
+the Lord be praised, if it really be him after all!"
+
+Trembling, and agitated with the numerous contrary emotions of hope,
+fear, and joy, by which she was assailed, Morag sprang out of bed,
+lighted her lamp, hurried on just enough of her clothes as might make
+her decent in the eyes of her lover, and with her bosom heaving, and
+her heart beating, as if it would have burst through her side, she
+ran to unlock the outer door. Her lamp flashed on the fearful figure
+without. She again beheld the horrible spectre which had so recently
+terrified her, and believing that it was John Smith's ghost which
+she saw, and that it had followed her home to corroborate the fatal
+tidings she had heard regarding his death, which had been already so
+much strengthened by her dreams, she uttered a piercing shriek, and
+fainted away on the floor. The shriek alarmed the Pensassenach, who
+was not yet in bed. Hastily throwing a wrapper over her deshabille,
+she seized her candle, and proceeded down stairs with all speed, and
+was led by John's voice of lamentation to the kitchen, whither he had
+carried Morag in his arms, and where the lady found him tearing his
+hair, or rather the heathery turf which then appeared to be doing
+duty for it, in the very extremity of mental agony. It is strange
+how the same things, seen under different aspects and circumstances,
+will produce the most opposite effects. There being nothing now
+about John Smith, or his actions, that did not savour of humanity,
+but his extraordinary head-dress, the Pensassenach had no doubt that
+it was the real bodily man that she saw before her, she perceived
+nothing but what was powerfully ludicrous in his strange costume,
+the absurdity of which was heightened by his agonizing motions and
+attitudes, and exclamations of intense anxiety about Morag, whose
+fainting-fit gave no uneasiness to a woman of her experience. The
+Pensassenach laughed heartily, and then hurried away for a bunch
+of feathers to burn under Morag's nose, by which means she quickly
+brought her out of her swoon, and by a little explanation she speedily
+restored her to the full possession of her reason. This accomplished,
+the Pensassenach entirely forgot John Smith's wretched appearance, in
+the eagerness of her inquiries regarding the result of the engagement.
+
+"How went the battle, John?" demanded she. "We heard the guns,
+but the cannonade did not last long. The victory was soon gained,
+and it was with the right cause, was it not?"
+
+"Woe, woe! Oich, oich!" cried John, in a melancholy tone, and shaking
+his head in utter despair. "Oich, oich, her head is sore, sore."
+
+"Very true, very true!" cried the compassionate Pensassenach. "I had
+forgotten you altogether, shame on me! Ah! poor fellow, how bloody
+you are about the face! You must be grievously wounded."
+
+"Troth she be tat," said John Smith. "She has gotten a wicked slash
+on ta croon, tat maist spleeted her skull. An' she wad hae peen dead
+lang or noo an it had na peen for tiss ponny peat plaister tat she
+putten tilt. Morag tak' her awa' noo, for she has toon her turn,
+and somesing lighter may serve."
+
+"Och, hoch, hoch, tat is fearsome," said Morag, after she had removed
+the clod from John's head. "She mak's Morag sick ta vera sight o't."
+
+"Oich, but tat be easy noo," said John. "Hech, she was joost like an
+if she had been carryin' a' ta hill o' Lethen Bar on her head."
+
+"Poor fellow, poor fellow!" cried the Pensassenach, "that is a fearful
+cut indeed. But I don't think the skull is fractured. How and where
+did you get this fearful wound?"
+
+"Fare mony a petter man's got more," replied John, yielding up his
+head into the affectionate hands of Morag, who was now so far recovered
+as to be able to look more narrowly at it.
+
+"Oich, oich, fat a head!" cried the affectionate and feeling girl,
+shuddering and growing pale, and then bursting into an agony of tears,
+as she looked upon his gaping wound. "Oich, oich, she'll never do
+good more! She canna leeve ava, ava!"
+
+"Tut, tut!" cried John, with a ghastly smile, that was meant to
+reassure Morag. "Fat nonsense, tat Morag pe speak! An' she pe traivel
+a' ta way hame so far, fat for wad she pe deein' noo tat she is
+at hame?"
+
+"Alas, poor fellow!" said the Pensassenach, as she was directing
+Morag to bind up his head, "I wish I may be able to make this your
+home. After all our losses and sufferings for our loyalty by those
+marauding rascals, three days ago, we shall next run the risk of
+being punished for harbouring a rebel. But no matter. Happen what may,
+you have large claims upon me, John, and as long as Morag can conceal
+you here you shall be safe. You have been so short a time away that
+few people can be aware of it, and still fewer can know the cause of
+your absence."
+
+What the Pensassenach said was true, for as most of her people had run
+away when the Highland party appeared, there were few who certainly
+knew the cause of John Smith's absence, and those few who did know
+were not very likely to tell any thing about it. Trusting to this,
+she gave out that she had sent him after the rebels, to keep an eye on
+her husband's horses, and to endeavour to recover them if he could,
+and that, in making this attempt, he had received his wound. To give
+the better colour to this story, she called her people together, and
+offered a handsome reward to such of them as would go immediately and
+try to find and bring back the horses, telling them that John Smith
+could describe to them whereabouts they were most likely to fall in
+with them, he having, at one time, actually got possession of most of
+them, but that they had escaped from him, having been scared away by
+the thundering of the artillery. But not a man of them would venture
+upon such a search among the gibbets, where, as they were told,
+so many of their murdered countrymen were still hanging, and where,
+without much inquiry or ceremony, any one who might go on such an
+errand might be tucked up to swing in company with them. Every hour
+increased this terror, by bringing accounts of fresh executions, and
+indeed the fears of the Pensassenach's men turned out to be by no means
+groundless, for it is a truth but too well known, that many innocent
+servants who were sent to seek their master's horses never returned.
+
+The Pensassenach did not suffer for her kindness in thus protecting
+John Smith; and she and her husband were ultimately no losers from the
+havoc which the Highlanders committed on their farm. Their damage was
+reported to the Duke of Cumberland, and the lady's conduct having been
+highly extolled, as that of a very loyal Englishwoman, who had been
+thus persecuted for the open expression of her sentiments, the most
+ample remuneration was assigned to her by the government.
+
+John Smith, nursed as he was by Morag, soon recovered. After he was
+quite restored to health, he only waited until he could scrape a little
+money together to enable him to furnish a cottage, ere he should make
+her his wife. The penetration of the Pensassenach soon enabled her
+to discover how matters stood between them, and she found means to
+make all smooth for them in the manner which was most flattering to
+John, that is, by presenting him with a very handsome purse of money,
+as a reward for the eminent services he had rendered her. John was
+so proud of the purse that he did not know whether most to value
+it or the gold pieces it contained, and much as he loved Morag,
+and eager as he was for their union, he had some doubt whether he
+could ever bring himself to part, even with one of those pretty
+pieces which he so respected for the Pensassenach's sake. And,
+alas, as it so happened, he was never called upon to spend them as
+it was intended they should have been spent. Fain would I have made
+my story end happily, gentlemen; but, as I am narrating a piece of
+actual history, I must be verawcious. John had made all preparation
+for their marriage, when, alas, Morag was seized with some acute
+complaint about the region of the heart and lungs, which all the
+medical attendants that the Pensassenach could command could not
+fathom or relieve. John watched her with the tenderest and most
+unremitting solicitude. But it pleased God that his unwearied care
+of her, should not be blessed with the same happy result, which hers
+had been with regard to him, for after a long and lingering illness,
+poor Morag died on the very day she should have been his bride. The
+probability was, that the unheard of fatigue of body, and agitation
+of mind, which she underwent during her heroic expedition in search
+of her lover, had produced some fatal organic change within her.
+
+John Smith was inconsolable for the loss of Morag. For some time he
+was more like a walking clod than a man. Even the kind attempts of
+his master and mistress to rouse him were unavailing. When at length
+he was able to go about his usual duties on the farm, to do which his
+honest regard for his employer's interest stimulated him, he suffered
+so much mental agony from the painful recollections which every object
+around him suggested to his mind, that he felt he could no longer go
+rationally about his master's affairs. Being at last convinced that he
+was in danger of falling into utter and hopeless despair, he came to
+the resolution of enlisting in the army, and having once formed this
+determination, he went through a very touching scene of parting with
+the kind Pensassenach and her husband, and shouldering his small kitt,
+he went and joined the gallant Forty-Second, then the Black Watch. He
+served with distinguished approbation in all the actions in which that
+brave corps was in his time engaged. He was made a serjeant at Bunker's
+Hill; and after time had in some degree assuaged his affliction, he
+married a very active, intelligent, and economical woman, with whose
+aid he undertook to keep the regimental mess. John could neither read
+nor write, and he always spoke English imperfectly. But his clever wife
+enabled him to carry on the business for so many years, with so much
+credit to himself, and so successfully, that he ultimately retired with
+her at an advanced period of life, with the enjoyment of his pension,
+and such an accumulation of fortune as made him perfectly comfortable.
+
+I knew John well. He was a warm-hearted man, and always remarkable
+for his uprightness and integrity, and especially for a strict
+determination to keep his word, whatever it might cost him so to do. As
+an instance of this, I may mention, that having on one occasion had
+a serious illness, in which he was given up by the doctor, he made
+a will, in which he left many small legacies to poor people. John
+recovered, but he thought it his duty to keep his word, and he paid
+the legacies. To me, and to my brother, who lived in one of his
+houses while we were at the school of Nairn, he acted the part of a
+kind friend and guardian. He was perhaps too kind and indulgent to
+us, indeed. No one dared to him to impute a fault to us, even when
+we were guilty. I remember that he had a large garden, well stocked
+with fruit trees, and gooseberry bushes. Often has the good old man
+sent me into it, to steal fruit for myself and brother, whilst he
+watched at the door, lest his wife might surprise and detect me. Many
+is the time that I have listened to him, with boyish wonder, as, with
+lightning in his eye, he fought over again his battles of Culloden,
+Bunker's Hill, and Ticonderoga.
+
+As John had no children, his intended heir was a nephew. His greatest
+desire in life was to marry him to a grand-daughter of his old
+departed benefactress, the Pensassenach. He offered to settle his
+whole fortune, which was not small, on the young lady, if she would
+only marry his nephew; and John's wife did all in her power to back
+up the proposal. But although the nephew was a good, well-doing lad,
+he was not the man to take the young woman's fancy; and so the match
+never took place.
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+CRUELTY OF THE DUKE OF CUMBERLAND AFTER THE BATTLE OF CULLODEN.
+
+
+Clifford.--Is it possible that the Duke of Cumberland could have
+authorized such atrocities, as the hanging up innocent servants in
+the way you describe, Mr. Macpherson?
+
+Dominie.--I am afraid that what I have asserted is but too true, sir.
+
+Author.--I am sorry to say, that I am in possession of a document
+which but too satisfactorily proves, that he did give most cruel
+orders. It is an orderly book of the thirty-seventh regiment, which
+was called Cholmondeley's Regiment; and in that I find, in the
+general orders, dated "The Camp at Enwerness, Aprill 17th, 1746,"
+the following entry:--"A captain and fifty foot to march directly,
+and vizt all the cothidges in the naberhod of the field of batall,
+and to search for rebbels, the officers and men will take notiss,
+that the pubilick orders of the rabells yesterday was to give us no
+quarters." This, I think, was a pretty broad hint to the men and the
+officer commanding them, what it was that the Duke expected of them.
+
+Grant.--Very distinct, indeed.
+
+Author.--Not to be mistaken, I think.
+
+Clifford.--Is there anything existing to establish that any such
+order was given by the Prince, previous to the battle, as that to
+which the Duke here alludes?
+
+Author.--Not a vestige of any thing that I am aware of. But if
+such orders had been given by the Prince, that circumstance would
+have afforded no apology for him to have issued the order I have
+now repeated to you, after the battle was over, and the enemy so
+effectually cut to pieces in the field. Nothing, I think, could more
+mark a sanguinary temper than his thus letting loose a body of men,
+to visit all the neighbouring cottages, and to put to death, in cold
+blood, all whom his ignorant and bloodthirsty myrmidons might choose
+to consider as rebels. The slaughter in this way, of the innocent as
+well as of the guilty, was said to have been immense.
+
+Clifford.--The picture is horrible!
+
+Grant.--It is horrible to think of it, even at this great distance
+of time, seated comfortably, as I am at this moment, in this great
+oaken arm-chair.
+
+Serjeant.--And a comfortable arm-chair that is, sir; and many a good
+day and queer night has it seen. If I am not mistaken, that was old
+Alister Shaw of Inchrory's very chair.
+
+Author.--Ay--who was Alister Shaw, Archy?
+
+Serjeant.--Faith, sir, he was a queer tough little fellow,
+Inchrory--for by that name he was always best known in the country--as
+proud as a bantam cock on his own midden-head. The body cared not
+for the King. I have two or three curious little anecdotes about him,
+which I can tell you and the gentlemen, if you have no objections.
+
+Clifford.--Objections, Mr Serjeant! I, the secretary, desire that
+you shall tell them, without another moment's delay.
+
+Serjeant.--Aweel, aweel, sir! I'll do that at your bidding. I'm not
+accustomed to disobey the adjutant.
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+ALISTER SHAW OF INCHRORY.
+
+
+It happened one day, gentlemen, that the Earl of Fife was travelling
+up this glen, on his way over to his house of Mar Lodge, in Braemar,
+and having stopped at Caochan-Seirceag over by yonder, he sent one
+of his people across the meadow here, to tell Inchrory that he meant
+to honour him with a visit. The gentleman knocked at the door, was
+admitted by the goodwife, and ushered into Inchrory's presence. He
+found him seated in his arm-chair, in the position which he always
+occupied, that is, on the most comfortable side of the fire.
+
+"Good day to you, Inchrory," said the gentleman, bowing.
+
+"The same to you sir," said Inchrory, bowing his head very grandly
+and ceremoniously, but without stirring.
+
+"My Lord the Earl of Fife, who is halting at Caochan-Seirceag, on his
+road to Braemar, has sent me over to tell you, that he means to step
+aside from his way to visit you," said the gentleman.
+
+"Well, sir," said Inchrory, proudly, "what of that? Tell him he
+is welcome."
+
+The gentleman, astonished with his reception, bowed and retired,
+as an ambassador might have done from a royal presence.
+
+"Well, sir," said Lord Fife to him, after he had rejoined him,
+"is Inchrory at home?"
+
+"He is at home, my Lord," replied the gentleman; "but he is the
+surliest churl I ever came across."
+
+"As how?" demanded the Earl.
+
+"Why, my Lord, the little wretch never rose from his chair," replied
+the gentleman; and then he repeated the conversation he had had with
+Inchrory. "If your Lordship would take my council, you would e'en
+continue your journey, and leave the bear to suck his own paws in
+his own den."
+
+"Why do you not flit [3] that insolent fellow," said Lord Fife to
+James MacGrigor of Pitiveach, his factor, who happened to be with him;
+"you are tacksman of this farm, and so you have it in your power to
+turn him out."
+
+"Why, my Lord," replied MacGrigor, "he and his forebears [4] have been
+there for generations; and, though he certainly is a great original,
+he is no bad fellow for all that."
+
+"So, so," replied the Earl, laughing, "the fellow is an original,
+is he? Then I must see him. It is something to discover so great a
+potentate, holding his undisputed reign in wilds like these, so many
+miles from any other human dwelling. I must visit him directly."
+
+The fact was, that the Earl had but recently become possessed of
+these Highland estates, and Inchrory looked upon him as a new man--a
+Lowlander--whom it was his duty, as it was very much his inclination,
+to despise; whilst the Earl, for his part, knowing that such was a
+feeling which naturally enough pervaded the minds of the Highlanders,
+even on his own newly acquired lands, was determined to do it away,
+by using all manner of courtesy to every one with whom he might come
+into contact. Above all things, he felt that the opportunity which he
+now had of overcoming the prejudice of such a man as Inchrory, was by
+no means to be lost. To Inchrory, therefore, he went without a moment's
+delay, was admitted into the house, and ushered into the presence.
+
+"Good day to you, Inchrory," said the Earl, bowing.
+
+"Good day to you, Lord Fife," replied Inchrory, bowing with the
+same formality as formerly, but still keeping his seat. "Sit down,
+my Lord--sit down. Here is a chair beside me; for I always keep the
+benmost [5] seat in my own house."
+
+"Very right, Inchrory," said the Earl, smiling, and seating himself
+accordingly beside his host; "and a very comfortable seat it seems
+to be."
+
+"Very comfortable," said Inchrory, setting himself more firmly into it;
+"and I hope that one is easy for your Lordship."
+
+"Very easy indeed," said Lord Fife; "a long ride, such as I have had,
+would make a hard stone feel easy, and much more this chair beneath
+your hospitable roof of Inchrory, and before your good fire, in this
+bitter cold day."
+
+"Well, well, my Lord," replied Inchrory, for the first time shaking
+the Earl heartily by the hand, and very much pleased with the
+familiar manner in which his visitor had so unexpectedly comported
+himself,--"Well, all I can say is, that you are heartily welcome
+to it.--Here, gudewife! Bring out the bottle. Lord Fife must taste
+Inchrory's bottle; and bestir yourself, do you hear, and see what
+you can give his Lordship to eat."
+
+The whisky bottle was brought, and Inchrory drank the Earl's health,
+who, without any ceremony, hobernobbed with him in turn. Mutton, ham,
+cheese, broiled kipper salmon, bannocks and butter, were produced,
+and put down promiscuously. The Earl ate like a hill farmer, and
+partook moderately of the whisky, which Inchrory swallowed in large
+and repeated bumpers to his Lordship's good health. He talked loud and
+joyously, and the Earl familiarly humoured him to his full bent. They
+were the greatest friends in the world. The Earl particularly delighted
+Inchrory by praising, caressing, and feeding a great rough deer-hound,
+which, roused from his lair in front of the fire by the entrance of the
+eatables, put his long snout and cold nose into his Lordship's hand,
+and craved his attention. But this dog had very nearly ruined all;
+for the Earl was so much taken with the animal, that having left the
+house after a very warm parting with Inchrory, he sent back his factor
+to him, to offer to purchase the animal at any price.
+
+"What!" cried Inchrory, drawing himself up in his chair, and looking
+thunderbolts,--"What! does Lord Fife take me for a dog-dealer? I would
+not sell my dog to any Lord in the land. I would not sell my dog to
+the King on the throne. Tell his Lordship, I would as soon sell him
+my wife!"
+
+"What a stupid fellow I am, Inchrory!" said the factor. "Did I say that
+it was the Earl that sent me? If I did, I was quite wrong. No! no! his
+Lordship did no such thing. He only admired the dog so much, that
+he could speak of nothing else as he crossed the meadow to join his
+people. It was my mistake altogether. Hearing him admire your dog so
+much, I thought it would be a kind act from me to you, my old friend,
+just to ride back quietly, and give you a hint of it. 'I thought I
+had the best dogs in all Scotland,' said the Earl, 'but that dog of
+Inchrory's beats them all clean. He is worth them all put together. He
+is a prince among dogs, as his master is a prince among men. Where
+could you find a master worthy of such a dog but Inchrory himself--the
+best fellow I have met with in all this country.'"
+
+"Did the Earl of Fife say that?" cried Inchrory. "Here, bring me a
+leash. Now," added he after having fastened it about the hound's neck,
+"take hold of that, and lead the dog with you to the Earl, and tell
+him that Inchrory begs he will accept of him as a present."
+
+The Earl was delighted with the dog, as well as with the able conduct
+of his ambassador who brought him; and he was no sooner fairly
+established in his own house at Mar Lodge, than he sent an especial
+messenger over the hill to Inchrory, with a letter from himself,
+thanking him for his noble present, and requesting him to come and
+pay him a visit. Inchrory most graciously accepted the invitation;
+and the Earl took care to be prepared to give him a proper reception.
+
+Inchrory, dressed in his best Highland costume, accoutred with sword,
+dirk, and pistols complete, mounted his long tailed garron, and
+rode over to Mar Lodge. When he arrived at the door, two grooms of
+the Earl's were ready, one to hold his horse's head, and the other
+his stirrup whilst he dismounted, and he was ushered into the house
+by the house-steward, and through an alley of footmen, all richly
+attired in the Earl's livery, till he was shewn into the room where
+his Lordship was seated. Inchrory had never seen anything the least
+like this before. But he was too proud to manifest the smallest
+surprise--and holding up his head, he strode in with a dignified air,
+and took all this pomp as if it had belonged to him of course. The
+Earl was seated, amidst all his magnificence, in a great arm-chair
+next the fire, with an empty one placed at his left hand.
+
+"Good day to you, Inchrory," said the Earl to him as he entered,
+and at the same time nodding his head familiarly as he spoke, but
+without rising from his seat.
+
+"Good day to you, my Lord," said Inchrory, strutting forward like a
+turkey cock.
+
+"Come away, and sit down beside me here, Inchrory," said the Earl,
+"for I always keep the benmost seat in my own house."
+
+"Right!--right, my Lord!" said Inchrory, seating himself beside
+the Earl, and taking his hand and shaking it heartily, without any
+sort of ceremony; "you are quite right, my Lord; that is exactly my
+rule. Every man should have the benmost seat in his own house."
+
+"You see that Luath hath not forgotten you," said the Earl, as the
+great dog was manifesting his joy at seeing his old master.
+
+"By my faith you have him in good quarters here!" said Inchrory,
+observing that a quadruple fold of carpet had been spread for the
+animal close in front of the fire.
+
+"The best I can give him, Inchrory," said the Earl; "as, next to
+his late master, he deserves the best at my hands. Here, bring the
+bottle! Inchrory must taste the Earl of Fife's bottle! And, do you
+hear, bring something for Inchrory to stay his hunger with after his
+long ride!"
+
+Immediately, as if by magic, several footmen entered with a table
+covered with the richest viands and wines, which was placed close to
+Inchrory's chair and that of the Earl. By especial order a bottle of
+whisky appeared among the other liquors.
+
+"Here's to ye, Inchrory!" said the Earl, after filling himself a
+glass of whisky, and drinking to his guest with a hearty shake of
+his hand. And,--
+
+"Here's to you, my Lord," cried Inchrory, following his example in
+a bumper of the same liquor.
+
+Inchrory had no reason to complain of his entertainment during the
+time he was at Mar Lodge. The Earl gave orders that every thing
+should be done to please him; and the little man was highly pleased,
+and as proud as a peacock. Amongst other things, hunting parties
+were made in all directions through the neighbouring forests; and
+although these were by no means expressly got up for him, yet he was
+always brought so prominently forward on all such occasions, that,
+in his pride, he believed, like the fly on the pillar, that the very
+world was moving for him, and for him alone.
+
+It happened that a Tenchil, or a driving of the woods for game of all
+kinds, was one day held at Alnac. Inchrory was posted in a pass with
+Farquharson of Allargue and Grant of Burnside in Cromdale, who was
+one of Lord Fife's factors. This last mentioned gentleman, having
+only arrived at Mar Lodge that morning, knew nothing of Inchrory
+personally, though Inchrory knew something of him. So that, whilst
+Farquharson, who was by this time well acquainted with Inchrory
+and all his peculiarities, was treating him with all that respect,
+which was at all times paid him by a universal agreement among Lord
+Fife's friends then assembled as his guests, the little man was left
+quite unnoticed by Burnside, and treated by him as nobody. Inchrory
+was severely nettled at this apparently marked neglect on the part
+of Burnside towards him. As usual on such occasions, the people who
+had surrounded a large portion of the forest, gradually contracted
+their circle, and their shouts increasing, and the dogs beginning to
+range through the coverts, and to give tongue, game of all kinds came
+popping singly out through the different passes where the hunters were
+stationed. A short-legged, long-bodied, rough, cabbage-worm-looking
+terrier, of the true Highland breed, came yelping along towards the
+point where Burnside, Allargue, and Inchrory were posted near to
+each other. All was anxiety and eager anticipation. A hart of the
+first head was the least thing that was looked for. When,--lo, and
+behold, out came an enormous wild-cat, the very tigger of our Highland
+woods. Burnside had a capital chance of him, but fired at him, and
+missed him. Inchrory immediately levelled his piece, and shot him dead.
+
+"There's at you, clowns of Cromdale!" cried Inchrory, leering most
+triumphantly and provokingly over his shoulder at Burnside.
+
+"What do you mean by that, you rascal?" cried Burnside, firing up at
+this insult, and at the same time striding towards Inchrory with every
+possible demonstration of active hostility. "What do you mean by that,
+you little shrimp?"
+
+"Sir," said Inchrory, standing his ground boldly and proudly, "what
+do you mean? I know nothing of you; and, it appears by your insolent
+manners, that you know nothing of me."
+
+"Stop, stop, gentlemen!" cried Allargue, running in between them;
+"the fault is mine for having neglected to introduce you to each
+other. Burnside, this is Inchrory, the particular friend of the Earl
+of Fife;--and, Inchrory, this is Burnside, also a particular friend
+of your friend, the Earl. This, I hope, is enough to put a stop to
+any thing unpleasant between you."
+
+"Oh!" said Burnside, who had caught the intelligent wink of the eye
+which Allargue had secretly conveyed to him, whilst going through this
+pompous introduction, and who had heard enough of Inchrory to enable
+him to guess at the case and the character of the animal he had to
+deal with, as well as to pick up his cue as to the proper way in which
+he should treat him. "Oh, that is altogether another affair! Had I
+only known the person in whose company I had the good fortune to be,
+I should not have presumed to have fired a shot before him. But if I
+have said any thing amiss, I am sure Inchrory will have the magnanimity
+to forgive me, seeing that I have been already sufficiently punished
+by the exhibition of bad gunning which I have unwittingly ventured
+to make in presence of him, who is by all acknowledged to be the best
+marksman in Scotland."
+
+"Sir," said Inchrory, rising full a couple of inches higher in his
+brogues, and coming forward to Burnside with extended palm, and with
+a manner full of dignified condescension. "You are a gentleman of the
+first water! I beg you will forget and forgive any expression which
+in my ignorance I may have let fall, that may by chance have given
+you offence."
+
+"Sir, I am proud to shake hands with you," said Burnside, advancing
+to give him a cordial squeeze.
+
+"Sir," said Inchrory with a proud air, but at the same time shaking
+him heartily by the hand, "any friend of my friend the Earl of Fife,
+is my friend. Henceforth, sir, I am your sworn friend."
+
+I daresay, gentlemen, I have given you enough of Inchrory to make you
+sufficiently well acquainted with his character. But I have yet one
+more anecdote of him, which I think brings it out more than all the
+others. His wife, Ealsach, was one morning occupied in tending the
+cattle at the shieling of Altanarroch. Lonely as you already know this
+place of Inchrory to be, its loneliness was nothing when compared to
+that of the shieling of Altanarroch, where even the cattle themselves
+could only exist for a month or two during the finest part of the
+year. Now, it happened that Ealsach, being in the family way, became
+extremely anxious and unhappy as her time of confinement approached,
+and her anxiety went on increasing daily, till at last she began
+to think it very expedient to go home to Inchrory. The distance was
+considerable, and the way rough enough in all conscience. But, having
+the spirit of a Highland woman within her, she set out boldly on foot,
+and arrived at Inchrory at an early hour in the morning. Her husband
+met her at the door of the house, where she looked for a kind welcome
+from him, and modestly signified the cause of her coming.
+
+"Ha!" exclaimed he proudly, and with anger in his eye. "How is this
+that you come on foot? How dared you to come home till I sent a horse
+for you, that you might travel as Inchrory's wife ought to do?"
+
+"No one saw how I came," replied his wife meekly. "I met nothing but
+the moor-cocks and the pease-weeps on the hill."
+
+"No matter," said Inchrory, "even the moor-cocks and the pease-weeps
+should not have it to say, that they saw the wife of Inchrory tramping
+home a-foot through the heather. Get thee back this moment every foot
+of the way to Altanarroch, that I may send for thee as Inchrory's
+wife ought to be sent for."
+
+The poor woman knew that argument with him was useless. Without
+entering the house, therefore, she was compelled to turn her weary
+steps back to Altanarroch; and she was no sooner there, than a servant
+appeared, leading by the bridle a horse, having a saddle on its back
+covered with a green cloth, on which she was compelled to mount
+forthwith, in order to ride home over the barren and desert moors
+and mosses, in such style, as might satisfy the moor-cocks and the
+pease-weeps, that she was the wife of Inchrory.
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+DRUM-HEAD COURT-MARTIAL AND SENTENCE ON INCHRORY.
+
+
+Dominie.--What a vain windy-wallets of a body the creature must have
+been! My humble opinion is, that he would have been much benefited
+by a gentle tasting of my tawse.
+
+Clifford.--Or the drummer's cat-o-nine-tails, Mr. Macpherson. But come,
+gentlemen, who tells the next tale? I have nothing now on my book but
+Old Stachcan, and Turfearabrad, both, as I understand, adjourned to
+time and place more fitting. Come, I must beat up for a volunteer.
+
+Author.--The circumstance of Mr. Macpherson having incidentally
+mentioned Ticonderoga, towards the end of his account of the adventures
+of Serjeant John Smith, has brought to my mind a legend of the family
+of Campbell of Inverawe, which I had from a friend of mine, the story
+of which is intimately connected with that most disastrous affair. If
+you like I shall be happy to give it to you.
+
+Clifford.--Andiamo dunque, Signore mio!--let's have it without
+more delay.
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+THE LEGEND OF THE VISION OF CAMPBELL OF INVERAWE.
+
+
+Perhaps you are all acquainted with the history of the Black Watch,
+which, as Mr. Macpherson has already told you, was afterwards
+formed into that gallant corps now immortalized by its actions as the
+Forty-Second Highlanders? General Stewart of Garth, in his interesting
+account of the Highland Regiments, tells us that it was originally
+composed of independent companies, which were raised about 1725 or
+1730. These were stationed in small bodies in different parts of the
+country, in order to preserve the peace of the Highlands. It was,
+in some sort, a great National Guard, and it was considered so great
+an honour to belong to it, that most of the privates were the sons of
+gentlemen or tenants. Most of them generally rode on horseback, and
+had gillies to carry their arms at all times, except when they were
+on parade or on duty. They were called Freiceadan Dubh, or the Black
+Watch, from the dark colour of their well-known regimental tartan,
+in opposition to the Seider-Deargg, or Red Soldiers, who were so
+named from the colour of their coats. You may probably remember the
+circumstance of their having been most unfairly marched to London,
+under the pretence that they were to be reviewed by the King,--of
+their having been ordered abroad,--of their refusal to go,--of their
+having been moved, as if by one impulse pervading every indignant bosom
+among them, to make that most extraordinary and interesting march of
+retreat which they effected to Northampton,--of their having been
+ultimately brought under subjection,--and, finally, of their brave
+conduct in Flanders, from which country they returned in October 1745.
+
+After their return to Great Britain, the Black Watch were ordered
+into Kent, instead of being sent into Scotland with the other
+troops under General Hawley, to act against those who had risen
+for Prince Charles. This arrangement probably arose entirely from
+great consideration and delicacy on the part of the government,
+who, fully aware of the high honour of the individuals of the corps,
+never entertained the smallest doubt of their loyalty, but who felt
+the cruelty of exposing men to the dreadful alternative of fighting
+against their friends and relatives, many of whom were necessarily to
+be found in the ranks of the insurgents. There were, however, three
+additional companies raised in the Highlands, a little time before
+the return of the regiment from abroad. These were kept in Scotland,
+and however distressing to their feelings the duty was which they were
+called upon to perform, on the side for which they were enlisted,
+they did that duty most honourably. One of these was recruited and
+commanded by Duncan Campbell, laird of Inverawe.
+
+After various services in their own country during the period that
+the rest of the corps was abroad for the second time, these three
+companies were ordered to embark, in March 1748, to join the regiment
+in Flanders. But the preliminaries of peace having been soon afterwards
+signed, the order was countermanded, and they were reduced.
+
+During the time that Campbell of Inverawe's company was occupied in the
+unpleasant duty to which I have alluded, he had been on one occasion
+compelled to march into the district of Lorn, and to burn and destroy
+the houses and effects of a few small gentlemen, who were of that
+resolute description that they would have sacrificed all they had,
+and even life itself, rather than yield to what they held to be the
+government of an usurper. Having been thus led to pursue his route,
+in a certain direction, for many a mile, he happened, on his return,
+to be detained behind his men by some accidental circumstance, and
+having lost his way after night-fall, he wandered about alone for
+several hours, until he became considerably oppressed with hunger and
+fatigue. With the expectation of gathering some better knowledge of
+his way, he left the lower grounds, where the darkness of night had
+settled more deeply and decidedly down, and he climbed the side of a
+hill with the hope of benefiting, in some degree, by the half twilight
+which lingers longer upon these elevations, continuing to rest upon
+them sometimes for hours after it has altogether deserted their lower
+regions. With the dogged perseverance of one who labours on because he
+has no other alternative, he blindly pursued his hap-hazard course in
+a diagonal line along the abrupt face, always rising as he proceeded,
+until his way became every moment more and more difficult. The side
+of the hill became steeper and steeper at every step, until he began
+to be satisfied that he had no chance of reaching its brow, except
+by retracing his steps, in order to discover some other means of
+ascending to it. To any such alternative as this he could by no means
+make up his mind. He cursed his own folly for allowing his company to
+march on without him. He uttered many a wish that he was with them. He
+felt sufficiently convinced that he had acted imprudently in having
+thus exposed himself alone, in the midst of a district which was
+yet reeking with the vengeance which his duty had compelled him so
+unwillingly to pour out upon it. But his courage was indomitable, and
+his way lay onwards, and onwards he without hesitation resolved to go.
+
+He had not proceeded far, until high cliffs began to rear themselves
+over his head, whilst, from his very feet, perpendicular precipices
+shot down into the deep night that prevailed below. The goat or deer
+track that he followed became every moment more and more blocked
+up with stony fragments, until at length it offered one continuous
+series of dangerous steps, requiring his utmost care and attention
+to preserve him from a slip or fall that might have been fatal.
+
+Whilst he was thus proceeding, with his whole attention occupied in
+self-preservation, he was suddenly challenged in Gaelic by a rough
+voice in his front.
+
+"Who comes there?"
+
+"A friend," replied Inverawe, in the same language in which he was
+addressed.
+
+"I am not sure of that," said the same voice hoarsely and bitterly. "Is
+he alone?"
+
+"He is alone," said a voice a little way behind Inverawe; "We are
+quite safe."
+
+"Come on then, sir," said the voice in front, "you have nothing
+to fear."
+
+"Fear!" cried Inverawe, in a tone which implied that any such feeling
+had ever been a stranger to him; "I fear nothing."
+
+"I know you to be a brave man, Inverawe!" said the man who now appeared
+in front of him. "Come on then without apprehension. You need not put
+your hand into the guard of your claymore, for no one here will harm
+you. But what strange chance has brought you here?"
+
+"The loss of my way," replied Inverawe. "But how do you come to know
+me so well?"
+
+"It is no matter how I know you," replied the other. "It is sufficient
+that I do know you, and know you to be a brave man, to whom, as such,
+I am prepared to do what kindness I can. What are your wants then,
+and what can I do for you?"
+
+"My wants are, simply to find my lost way, and then to procure some
+food, of which I stand much in need," replied Inverawe.
+
+"Be at ease then, for I shall help you to both," replied the person
+with whom he was conversing; "but methinks your last want requires
+to be first attended to, as the most urgent; so follow me, and look
+sharply to your footing." Then, speaking in a louder tone to some
+individuals, who, though unseen, were posted somewhere in the obscurity
+to the rear of Inverawe, he said, "Look well to your post, lads, I
+shall be with you by and bye." And then again turning to Inverawe,
+he added--"Come on, sir, you must climb up this way; the ascent is
+steep, and you will require to use hands as well as feet. Goats were
+wont to be the only travellers here, and even they must have been
+hardy ones. But troublous times will often people the desert cliffs
+themselves with human beings, and scare the very eagle from her aerie,
+that she may yield her lodging to weary man."
+
+Inverawe now began to clamber after his guide up a steep, tortuous,
+and dangerous ascent, where in some places they were compelled to pull
+up their bodies by the strength of their hands and arms. It lasted
+for some time; and he of the Black Watch, albeit well accustomed to
+such work, was beginning to be very weary of it, when at length they
+landed on a tolerably wide natural ledge, where Inverawe perceived that
+the cliffs that arose from the inner angle of it so overhung their
+base as to render it self-evident that all farther ascent in this
+direction was cut off by them. Rounding a huge fallen mass of rock,
+which lay poised on the very edge of the precipice, they came suddenly
+on a ravine, or rift, in the face of the cliff above, on climbing a
+few paces up which, they discovered the low, arched mouth of a cave,
+whence issued a faint gleam of light, and an odour of smoke. His
+guide stooped under the projection of the cliff that hung over it, and
+let himself down through the narrow entrance. Inverawe followed his
+example without fear, and found himself in a cavern of an irregular
+form, from ten to twenty feet in diameter. This he discovered partly
+by the light of a fire of peats that smouldered near the entrance,
+and partially filled the place with smoke, but more perfectly by a
+torch of bog-fir which his guide immediately lighted. But he felt no
+curiosity about this, in comparison with that which he experienced
+in regard to the figure and features of his guide, with which he was
+intensely anxious to make himself acquainted.
+
+He was a tall and remarkably fine looking man, considerably below
+middle age. He was dressed in a grey plaid and kilt, betokening
+disguise, but with the full complement of Highland armour about
+him. His hair hung in long black curls around his head. His face was
+very handsome, his nose aquiline, his mouth small and well formed,
+having its upper lip graced by a dark and well-trimmed moustache. His
+eyes, and his whole general expression, were extremely benignant. After
+scanning his face with great attention, Inverawe was satisfied
+that he never had seen him before, and he had ample opportunity of
+ascertaining the reverse, if it had been otherwise, for the man stood
+with the bog-fir torch blazing in his hand, as if he wished to give
+his guest the fullest advantage of it in his scrutiny of him, and then,
+as if guessing the conclusion to which that scrutiny had brought him,
+he at last began to speak.
+
+"Aye," said he calmly, "you are right, Inverawe. Your eyes have
+never beheld me until this moment. But I have seen you to my cost. I
+was looking on all the while that you and your men were burning and
+destroying my house, goods, and gear, this blessed morning, and I
+can never forget you."
+
+"I know you not, that is certain," replied Inverawe; "and the cruel
+duty we were on to-day was so extensive in its operation, that I
+cannot even guess whom you are."
+
+"You shall never know it from me, Inverawe," replied the other.
+
+"And why not?" demanded Inverawe.
+
+"From no fear for myself," replied the stranger; "but because I would
+not add to that remorse, which you must feel, from being compelled
+to execute deeds which are as unworthy of you, as I know they are
+contrary to your generous and kindly nature. I have suffered from
+you deeply--deeply indeed have I suffered. But I look upon you but
+as an involuntary minister of the vengeance of a cruel Government,
+and perhaps as an agent in the hand of a just God, who would punish me
+for those sins and frailties which are inherent in my human nature. I
+blame not you, and I can have no feeling of anger against you, far
+less of revenge. Give me, then, the right hand of fellowship."
+
+"Willingly, most willingly!" said Inverawe, cordially shaking hands
+with him. "You are a noble high-minded man; for certainly I can
+imagine what your feelings might have very naturally been against me,
+and I know that I am now in your power."
+
+"All I ask, Inverawe, is this," continued the stranger; "that as I
+have been, and will continue to be honourable towards you, you will
+be the same to me; and in asking that, I know that I am asking what
+is sure to be granted. The confidence in your honour which I have
+shown by bringing you here, will not be betrayed."
+
+"Never!" said Inverawe, with energy. "Never while I have life!"
+
+"I know I can rely upon you," said the stranger; "and now let me
+hasten to give you such refreshment as I possess. Sit down, I pray
+you, as near to the ground as possible, you will find that the smoke
+will annoy you less."
+
+Inverawe did as his host had recommended, and, seating himself on some
+heather which lay on the floor of the place, the stranger opened a
+wicker pannier that stood in a low recess, and speedily produced from
+it various articles of food, of no mean description, together with a
+bottle of French wine, and, spreading the viands before his guest, he
+seated himself by him, and they ate and drank together. They had little
+conversation; and the stranger no sooner saw that Inverawe's hunger
+was satisfied, than he arose, and proposed that he should now guide
+him on his journey. Creeping from the hole, therefore, they descended
+the crags together, with all that care which the steepness of the
+declivity rendered necessary, until they came to the spot where they
+had first encountered each other, and then the stranger began to guide
+Inverawe onwards in the same direction he had been formerly pursuing.
+
+They had not proceeded far, until they were challenged by voices among
+the rocks, showing that his host's place of retreat was protected
+by sentinels in all quarters. His guide answered the challenge, and
+they then went on without molestation. After about an hour's walk
+over very rugged ground, during which they wound over the mountain,
+and threaded their way through various bogs and woods, that completely
+bewildered Inverawe, his guide suddenly brought him out upon a road
+which he well knew, and then shaking hands with him, and bidding him
+farewell, he dived again into the wood, and disappeared.
+
+Inverawe rejoined his company at their night's quarters. They had
+spent an anxious time, regarding him, during his absence, and they
+were clamorous in their enquiries as to what had become of him. He
+gave them an account of the circumstance of his losing his way; but he
+told them not a syllable of his adventure with the stranger, resolving
+that it should be for ever buried in his own bosom. There, however,
+it produced many a thought; and often did he earnestly hope, that
+chance might again bring him into contact with the man who had taken
+so noble a revenge of him--to whom he felt as an honest bankrupt might
+do towards his generous and forgiving creditor; and whose person and
+features he had engraven so deeply on his recollection, to be embalmed
+there amidst the warmest and kindliest affections of his heart.
+
+It was soon after the disbanding of his company, that Campbell of
+Inverawe returned to his own romantic territory, and to his ancient
+castle, standing in the midst of beautiful natural lawns, surrounded
+by wooded banks and knolls, lying at the north-western base of the
+mighty Ben-Cruachan. Speaking in a general way, the country around
+was thickly covered with oak and birch woods, giving double value,
+both in point of beauty and utility, to the rich, glady pastures,
+which were seen to spread their verdant surface to the sun, along
+the course of the river Awe. Behind the grey towers of the building,
+broken rocks arose here and there, in bare masses, in the direction of
+the mountain,--whilst the blue expanse of Loch Etive stretched away
+from the eye towards the north-east, as well as to the west. To the
+south-west, the groves, and grassy slopes, were abruptly broken off
+by the perpendicular crags of the romantic ravine through which the
+river makes its way, to pour itself across the open haughs of Bunawe,
+and into Loch Etive. To sketch out the remainder of the neighbourhood,
+so that you may be fully aware of the nature of the country, which was
+the scene, where one of the most important circumstances of my tale
+took place, I may add, that about a mile above the ravine, the river
+has its origin from a long narrow arm of Loch Awe, which presents one
+of the most romantic ranges of scenery in Scotland. The lake in the
+bottom, is there every where about eighty or an hundred yards wide
+only; and whilst a bare, rocky mountain front, furrowed by many a
+misty cataract, rises sheer up out of the water on its western side,
+the steep, lofty, and rugged face of Cruachan shuts it in on the
+eastern side, forming the grand and wild pass of Brandera. Here the
+mountain exhibits every variety of picturesque form,--of prominent
+crag, and half-concealed hollow, among which the grey mists are
+continually playing and producing magical effects; together with
+deep torrent beds, and innumerable waterfalls, thundering downwards
+unseen, save in glimpses, amid the thick copse which, generation
+after generation, has sprung from the stools of those giant oaks,
+which were once permitted to rear their spreading heads, and to throw
+their bold arms freely abroad, athwart the rocky steeps that rear
+themselves so high up above, as to be softened by distance and air,
+till they almost melt from human vision.
+
+Having thus put you in possession of the scenery, I shall now proceed
+to tell you, that Campbell of Inverawe, after his long absence from
+home on military duty, felt all the luxury of enjoyment which these
+his own quiet scenes could bestow, and his mind expanding to all
+his old friendships, he largely exercised all the hospitalities of
+life. Frequently did he fill the hall of his fathers with gay and
+merry feasters, and his own hilarious disposition, always made him
+the very soul of the mirth that prevailed among them.
+
+On one occasion, it happened that he had congregated a large party
+together. The wine circulated freely. The fire bickered on the hearth,
+and threw a cheerful blaze over the walls of the hall, reddening the
+very roof, and gleaming on the warlike weapons that hung around. The
+wine was good,--the jests were merry,--and the conversation sparkling,
+so that the guests were as loath to depart as their kind host was
+unwilling to let them go. His lady had retired to her chamber--but
+still they sat on, making the old building ring again with their jocund
+laughter. But all things must have an end. The parting cup, to their
+host's rooftree, was proposed by a certain young man called George
+Campbell, and it was filled to the brim. But as all were on their
+legs to drain it, with heart and good will, to the bottom,--a rattling
+peal of thunder rolled directly over their heads. There was not a man
+of them that did not feel that the omen was appalling. Some hardy
+ones tried to laugh it off, as a salvo from heaven in homologation
+of their good wishes to the house of Inverawe. But the pleasantry
+went ill down with the rest. Servants were called for,--horses were
+ordered, and out poured their owners to mount them,--when they were
+all surprised to see the heavens quite serene and tranquil. But not
+a word of remark was ventured by any one on this so very strange a
+circumstance. Their hospitable entertainer saw every man of them take
+his stirrup cup; and they galloped away, one after the other.
+
+After they were all gone, Inverawe paced about in the court-yard for
+some time, in sombre thought, which stole involuntarily upon him. He
+then sought his way up stairs, and lifting an oaken chair towards
+the great hearth, where the billets had by this time begun to burn
+red, and without flame, he sat down in it for a while, listlessly to
+ponder over the events of the evening. The weary servants had gladly
+stolen away to bed, and the whole castle was soon as silent as the
+grave. Not a sound was to be heard within the walls, but the dull,
+drowsy buzzing of a large fly, which the flickering light of a solitary
+lamp, left on the table, had prevented from retiring to some cranny of
+repose. The master of the mansion smiled for a moment, as the whimsical
+idea crossed him, that this tiny insect was perhaps the only thing
+of life, which, at that time, kept watch with him within the castle.
+
+Inverawe's thoughts reverted to the last toast which had been given by
+his young friend Campbell, and the strange circumstances by which it
+had been accompanied. He had an only son, called Donald, a promising
+young man, who was the prop of his house, and to whose future career
+in life he looked forward with all a father's anxiety. He had been
+long accustomed to weave a silken tissue of anticipated happiness,
+and honours, for the young man, and to view him, in his mind's eye, as
+the father of many generations to come. The youth was at that time from
+home; and this was the very first moment of his life that the notion
+of there being any chance of his being one day left childless, had ever
+occurred to him. He tried to shake off these gloomy presentiments, but
+still they returned, and clung to him, with a force and pertinacity
+that no reason could conquer. He would fain have risen to go to his
+chamber, but he felt as if some powerful, though unseen hand, had
+held him down to his chair,--and he continued to sit on, absorbed in
+contemplative musings on these gloomy and painful dreams, till the
+billets on the hearth had consumed themselves to their red embers.
+
+Suddenly all such thoughts were put to flight from his mind. He
+distinctly heard the great outer door of the castle creak upon its
+hinges. He remembered, that although he had not locked it, he had shut
+it behind him when he came in. It now banged against its doorway, and
+sent a hollow sound echoing up the long turnpike stair. Faint, quick,
+and stealthy footsteps, were then heard ascending. One or two other
+doors were moved in succession. The footsteps approached with cautious
+expedition. And as Inverawe listened with breathless attention,
+the door of the hall was thrust open,--a human countenance appeared
+for an instant in the dusky aperture--and then a man, with a naked
+dirk in his hand,--his clothes dripping wet--his long hair hanging
+streaming over his shoulders, and half veiling his glaring eyes, and
+pale and haggard countenance, rushed in, and made straight up to him.
+
+Inverawe started to his feet, drew his dirk, and prepared to defend
+himself from this unlooked for attempt at assassination. But ere he
+had well plucked it forth from its sheath, the intruder assumed the
+attitude of a suppliant.
+
+"For mercy's sake pardon my unceremonious entrance, Inverawe!" said
+the stranger, in a hollow, husky, and exhausted voice. "And be
+not alarmed, for I come with no hostile intention against you or
+yours. I am an unfortunate wretch, who, in a sudden quarrel, have
+shed the blood of a fellow-creature. He was a man of Lorn. I have been
+hotly pursued by his friends, and though I have thrown those who are
+after me considerably out, during the long chase they have kept up,
+yet they are still pressing like blood-hounds on my track. To baffle
+them, if possible, I threw myself into the river, and swam across it,
+and I now claim that protection, and that hospitality, which no one
+ever failed to find within the house of Inverawe."
+
+"By Cruachan!" cried Inverawe, sheathing his dirk, and slapping it
+smartly with the open palm of his hand. "By Cruachan, I swear that
+you shall have both!"
+
+Now, I must tell you, that this was considered as the most solemn
+pledge that a Campbell of Inverawe could give. Their war-cry was,
+"Coar-a-Cruachan," that is, "Help from Cruachan." And this expression
+had a double meaning, inasmuch as the word Cruachan had reference both
+to the mountain of that name, and to the hip where the dirk hung. To
+swear by Cruachan, therefore, and to strengthen the oath by slapping
+the dirk with the open palm, was to utter an oath, which must, under
+all circumstances, be for ever held inviolable.
+
+"But tell me," said Inverawe, "how happened this unlucky affair?"
+
+"We were all met to make merry at a wedding," replied the stranger,
+"when, as I was dancing with---- But hold!--I hear voices! They
+approach the castle! I am lost if you do not hide me immediately."
+
+"This way," said Inverawe, leading him to a certain obscure part of
+the hall. "Aid me to lift this trap.--Now, down with ye and crouch
+there.--They come."
+
+Inverawe had barely time to drop the trap-door into its place,
+to resume his seat at the fire, and to affect to be in a deep
+sleep, when the voices and the sound of human footsteps were
+heard ascending the stairs. Three men entered the hall in reeking
+haste--claymores in hand. They rushed towards the fire-place, where
+he was sitting. Inverawe started up as if just awaked by the noise
+they made, and drew his dirk, as if to defend himself from their
+meditated attack.
+
+"Ha!" cried he, with well-feigned surprise. "Assassins: Then must I
+sell my life as dearly as I can."
+
+"Not assassins!" cried they. "We are not assassins, Inverawe. We
+crave your pardon for this apparently rude intrusion, but we are in
+pursuit of an assassin. We come to look for a man who has murdered
+another. Have we your permission to search for him?"
+
+"Certainly," said Inverawe, "wherever you please."
+
+"He cannot be here," said one of the men. "I told you that he could
+not be here. Don't you see plainly that he could not have come in
+here without awaking Inverawe. We lose time here. We had better on
+after our friends."
+
+"Depend on't he has run up Loch Etive side," said another of them.
+
+"What are all these wet foot-steps on the floor?" said the first
+of them that spoke. "He might have been here without Inverawe's
+knowledge."
+
+"Don't you see that Inverawe has had a feast, and that wine, and water,
+and whisky too, have been flowing in gallons in all directions?" said
+the second man. "See there is a large pool of lost liquor. I verily
+believe that some of these footsteps are my own, made this moment,
+by walking accidentally through it. I tell you he never could have
+come here."
+
+"It is true that I have had a feast," said Inverawe, carelessly,
+"as you may see from the wrecks of it that still remain on the table."
+
+"I told you so," said the second man. "We only lose time here. If
+you had only been guided by my counsel we might have been hard at
+his heels by this time, as well as the rest."
+
+"Haste, then, let us go!" said the first man.
+
+"Away! away!" cried his companions, and, without waiting for farther
+parley, they rushed out of the hall, and Inverawe heard with some
+satisfaction, their footsteps hurrying down stairs, and the shouts
+which they yelled forth after their companions, growing fainter
+and fainter, until they were altogether lost in the direction of
+Loch Etive.
+
+Inverawe was no sooner certain that they were fairly gone, without
+all risk of returning, than he proceeded, in the first place, to
+secure the outer door of the castle, and then returning to the hall,
+he went to the trap-door, and calling softly to the man concealed
+below it, he desired him to aid him in raising it, by applying his
+strength to force it upwards, and thus their united strength enabled
+them speedily to open it, and to lift it up.
+
+"Come forth now, unfortunate man," said Inverawe; "your pursuers
+are gone."
+
+"I come," said the stranger, in his husky hoarse voice, and as he
+raised himself from the trap-door, his haggard countenance, and his
+blood-shot eyes, that glared with the horror of his situation, half
+seen as they were through his long moist locks, chilled Inverawe's
+very heart as he looked upon him.
+
+"Now, sir," said Inverawe, "you are safe for the present, your pursuers
+have passed on."
+
+"Thanks! thanks!" replied the man; "I know not how sufficiently to
+thank you."
+
+"Aye--all is so far well for you," said Inverawe; "but concealment for
+you here is impossible. You must remove into a place of more certain
+safety, and no time is to be lost. At present you may remove without
+observation or suspicion; but no one can say how soon the search for
+you hereabouts may be renewed. Here," continued he, setting before
+him some of the remains of the feast, which the tired servants had
+not removed from the sideboard; "take what refreshment circumstances
+may allow, whilst I go for a basket, in which to carry food enough
+to last you during to-morrow. We must go to Ben-Cruachan, with as
+much secrecy and expedition as we can."
+
+The stranger, thus left for a few minutes by himself, hastily devoured
+some of the viands, of which he had so much need, and having swallowed
+a full cup of wine, he was rejoined by Inverawe with a basket, into
+which he hastily packed some provisions, and, without a moment's
+delay, they quietly and stealthily quitted the hall, and the castle,
+and the moment they found themselves in the open air, Inverawe led
+the way diagonally up the slope, on the western side of Ben-Cruachan.
+
+Their way was long, and their path rough, and they moved on through
+woods, and over rocks, without uttering a word. Many a half expressed
+exclamation, indeed, burst involuntarily from the stranger, betraying
+a mind ill at ease with itself, and many a start did he give, as
+if he apprehended surprise from some lurking pursuer; and Inverawe
+shuddered to think, that the haggard appearance of the man, and
+these his guilty-like apprehensions, were more in accordance with the
+accusation of murder, or unfair slaughter, which seemed to have been
+made against him, by the expressions of some of those who had come
+into the hall in search of him, than with the chance-medley killing
+of a man in an affray, which was the complexion he had himself wished
+to put on the matter. Be this as it might, however, his most solemn
+pledge had been given for his security, and accordingly he determined
+honourably to fulfil it, at all hazards to himself. His reflections,
+as he went with this man, were of any thing but a pleasing nature.
+
+After a long and painful walk, or rather race, for their pace had
+been more like that, than walking, Inverawe began to climb up the
+abrupt face of Cruachan, till he came to that part of it which hangs
+over the northern entrance of the Pass of Brandera, where the river
+Awe breaks away from the end of the narrow branch of the lake, and
+there, after some scrambling, he led the stranger high up the face of
+the mountain, to a cave that yawned in the perpendicular cliff. The
+concealment here was perfect, for its mouth was masked in front by a
+cairn of large stones, which might have been accidentally accumulated
+by falling during successive ages from the rocks above, or perhaps
+artificially piled up there in memory of some person or event long
+since forgotten. It was moreover surrounded by trees of all sorts
+of growth; indeed, the universal wooding which prevailed over the
+surrounding features of nature, of itself rendered any object on the
+ground of the mountain side difficult to be discovered by any creature
+that did not, like an eagle, mount into the sky. In addition to this,
+the great elevation of the position, added to the security of the
+place, and the ravine-seamed front of the perpendicular mountain of
+rock that guarded the western side of the pass, immediately opposite
+to the face of Cruachan, precluded all chance of observation from
+that quarter.
+
+"This is not exactly the place where Campbell of Inverawe would
+wish to exercise his hospitality, to any one who deigns to ask for
+his protection," said the Laird, whilst he was engaged in striking
+a light; "but in your circumstances it is the best retreat in which
+I can extend it towards you. Here is a lamp; and I will leave this
+tinder-box, and this flask of oil with you. The cave is dry enough,
+and there is abundance of heather to be had around you. Use your lamp
+only when you may find it absolutely necessary so to do; for its light
+might betray you; and take care to show yourself as little as possible
+during the daylight of to-morrow. I have promised you protection by
+Cruachan, and by Cruachan you shall have it. You must be contented
+with this my assurance for the present, for your safety demands that
+I shall not see you again, until I can do so without observation,
+under the veil of to-morrow-night's darkness. Till then, you must
+e'en do with such provisions as this basket contains, and you may
+reckon on my bringing a fresh supply with me when I return. Farewell,
+for I must hurry back, so as to escape discovery."
+
+"Thanks! thanks! kind Inverawe!" said the man, in a state of extreme
+agitation and excitement,--"a thousand thanks! But, must you--must you
+leave me thus alone? Alone, for a whole night, on this wild mountain
+side, with that yawning hole for my place of rest, and with nothing
+but the roar of these eternal cataracts, mingled with the wild howl of
+the wind through the pass to lull me to repose! That cairn, too!--may
+not that be a cairn which marks the spot where--where--where some
+murder has been done? Can you assure me that no ghosts ever haunt
+this wild place?"
+
+"The soul that is free from all consciousness of guilt may hold
+patient, solitary, and fearless converse with ghost or goblin,
+even on such a wild mountain side as this," said Inverawe, somewhat
+impatiently. "But surely you cannot expect that my hospitality to
+you should require my sharing this mountain concealment with you? If
+you do, I must tell you, what common prudence ought to teach you,
+that if I were disposed to do so, nothing could be more unwise,
+as nothing could more certainly lead to your detection. My absence
+from home would create so much surprise and anxiety, that the whole
+country would turn out to seek for me, and their search for me, could
+not fail to produce your discovery. Even now, I may be risking it by
+thus delaying to return."
+
+"True, true, Inverawe!" said the stranger, in a desponding tone, and
+apparently making a strong effort to command his feelings. "There
+is too much truth in what you say. I must steel myself up to this
+night. My safety, as you say, demands it. Yet, 'tis a terrible
+trial! Would that the dawn were come! Is it far from day?"
+
+"I hope it is, indeed," replied Inverawe, "else might my absence and
+all be discovered. It cannot, as yet, as I suppose, be much after
+midnight; but even that is late enough for me. I must borrow the
+swiftness of the roebuck to carry me back. So again I say farewell
+till to-morrow-night."
+
+Inverawe tarried not for an answer, but, darting off through the wood,
+he rapidly descended among the rocks, and then bounded over all the
+obstacles in his way, with a swiftness almost rivaling that of the
+animal he had alluded to; and so he reached his own door, in a space
+of time so short, as to be almost incredible. The fire in the hall
+had now sunk into white ashes. The lamp, which he had left burning,
+was now flickering in its last expiring efforts. He swallowed a single
+draught of wine to restore his exhausted strength, and then he stole to
+his chamber, and crept into bed, happy in the conviction that his lady,
+who was in a deep sleep, had never discovered that he had been absent.
+
+The sleep that immediately fell upon Inverawe himself was that of the
+most perfect unconsciousness of existence. He knew not, of course,
+how long it had lasted, nor was he, in the least degree, sensible of
+the cause or manner of its interruption. But he did awake, somehow
+or other; and then it was that he discovered, to his great wonder and
+astonishment, that the chamber which, on going to bed, he had left as
+dark as the most impenetrable night could make it, was now illuminated
+with a lambent light, of a bluish cast, which shone through the very
+curtains of his bed. A certain feeling of awe crept chillingly over
+him; for he was at once convinced that the light was something very
+different from the dawn of morning. It became gradually more and
+more intense, till, through the thick drapery that surrounded him,
+he distinctly beheld the shadow of a human figure approaching his
+bed. He was a brave man; but he felt that every nerve and muscle of
+his frame was paralysed, he knew not how. He watched the slow advance
+of the figure with motionless awe. The shadowy arm was extended, and
+the curtain was slowly and silently raised. The bluish light that so
+miraculously pervaded the chamber, then suddenly arose to a degree
+of splendour, that was dazzling to his sight, and clearly defined
+the appalling object that now presented itself to his eyes. The face
+and figure were those of the very man who had formerly entertained
+him in the hole in the cliff on the mountain side, in Lorn. He was
+wrapped in the same grey plaid, too. But those handsome features,
+which had made so deep an impression on the recollection of Inverawe,
+were now pale and fixed, as if all the pulses of life had ceased, and
+the raven locks, which hung curling around them, and the moustaches
+which once gave so much expression to his upper lip, now only served
+to increase the ghastliness of the hue of death that overspread his
+countenance, as well as that of the glaze of those immoveable eyes,
+which had then exhibited so much generous intelligence. Inverawe lay
+petrified, his expanded orbs devouring the spectacle before them. With
+noiseless action, the figure dropped one corner of the shadowy plaid
+in which it was enveloped, and displayed a gaping wound in its bosom,
+which appeared to pour out rivers of blood. Its lips moved not;
+yet it spoke--slowly, and in a hollow and sepulchral tone.
+
+"Inverawe!--blood must flow for blood! Shield not the murderer!"
+
+Slowly did the spectre drop the curtain; and its shadow, seen through
+it, gradually faded away in the waning light, ere Inverawe could
+well gather together his routed faculties to his aid. He rubbed his
+eyes, started up in bed, leaned on his pillow, and brushed the curtain
+hastily aside. All was again dark and silent. Again he rubbed his eyes,
+and looked; but again he looked into impenetrable night.
+
+"It was a dream," thought, rather than said, Inverawe; "a horrible
+dream--but nevertheless it was a dream--curious in its coincidences,
+but not unnatural. Nay, it was most natural, that the strangest
+adventure of my past life, should be recalled by the yet stranger
+occurrences of this night, and that both should thus link themselves
+confusedly and irrationally together during sleep. Pshaw! It is
+absurd for a rational man to think of this illusion more. I'll to
+sleep again."
+
+But sleep is one of those blessed conditions of human nature, which
+cannot be controlled or commanded by the mere will. On the contrary,
+the very resolution to command it, is almost certain to put it to
+flight. The vision, or whatever else it might have been, haunted his
+imagination, and kept his thoughts so busily occupied, that he could
+not sleep. When his lady awaked in the morning, she found him lying
+fevered, restless, and unrefreshed. Her inquiries were anxious and
+affectionate; but, by carelessly attributing his indisposition to the
+prolonged revelry of the previous evening, he at last succeeded in
+ridding himself of farther question, and springing from his couch, he
+tried to banish all thought of the unpleasant dilemma into which he had
+been brought, by occupying himself actively in the business of the day.
+
+He was so far successful for a time; but, as night approached, his
+uncomfortable reflections and anticipations began again to crowd
+into his mind. He must fulfil his promise of visiting his guest
+of the cave, a guest whom he now could not help looking upon with
+horror as a foul murderer; and yet, if he disbelieved the reality of
+the previous night's visitation, there was no reason that he should
+so regard him more now, than he had done before. The difficulty of
+contriving the means of managing his visit, so that it should escape
+observation or suspicion on the part of his lady, or his domestics,
+was very considerable. His lady was that evening more than ordinarily
+solicitous about him, from the conviction that pressed upon her,
+that he had had little or no sleep the previous night, and remarking
+his jaded appearance, she eagerly urged him to retire to bed at an
+early hour.
+
+"My dearest," said he affectionately, "I shall; but before I can do so,
+I have some otter-traps to set. Perhaps I had better go and finish
+that business now, while there is yet some twilight. Go you to your
+chamber, and retire to rest. I shall sleep all the sounder by and bye,
+after breathing the fresh air of this balmy evening for an hour or so."
+
+The lady yielded to his persuasion, and she had no sooner left
+him, than he took an opportunity of filling his basket, with such
+provisions as he could appropriate for the stranger, with the least
+possible chance of detection; and putting a few of his otter-traps
+over all, by way of a blind, he sallied forth in the direction of
+the river. There he first most conscientiously made good his word,
+by planting his traps, and then, as it was by that time dark, he
+turned his steps up the side of Ben-Cruachan, and made the best of his
+way towards the cliffs where the cave was situated. As he drew near
+to its mouth, he was, in some degree, alarmed by observing a light
+proceeding from it. He approached it with caution, and, on entering
+it, he beheld the stranger sitting in the farthest corner of it, on
+the bed of heather, with his figure drawn up and compressed together,
+and his features painfully distorted, whilst his eyes were intently
+fixed on vacancy. For a moment Inverawe doubted whether some fit had
+not seized upon him; but he started at the noise made by the entrance
+of his protector, and sprang up to meet him.
+
+"Oh, Inverawe," said he, "what a relief it is to behold you! Oh what
+a wretched weary time I have passed since you left me!"
+
+"I have brought you something to comfort you," said Inverawe, so
+shocked with his haggard appearance, and conscience-worn countenance,
+as almost to recoil from him. "You know that I could not come
+sooner. You seem to be exhausted with watching. You had better take
+some of this wine."
+
+"Oh, yes, yes, give me wine--a large cup of wine!" cried the stranger,
+wildly seizing the vessel which Inverawe had filled, and swallowing
+its contents with avidity. "Oh, such a time as I have spent!"
+
+"This place is quite secure," said Inverawe. "You have no cause
+for such anxiety, if you will only be prudent. But why do you keep
+this light burning? Did I not tell you it was most dangerous to do
+so. Some wandering or belated shepherd or huntsman might be guided
+hither by it, and if your retreat should be once discovered, your
+certain destruction must follow."
+
+"I could not remain in darkness," replied the stranger, with a cold
+shudder; "it was agonizing to do so! Horrid shapes continually haunted
+me,--horrid, horrid shapes!--Even the shutting of my eyes could not
+exclude them. Oh, such a night as last! never have I before endured
+any thing so horrible."
+
+"You must take your own way then," said Inverawe, as he spread out the
+contents of the basket before him; "I am sorry that I can do nothing
+better for you, but this is the best fare I could provide for you,
+without exciting suspicion in my own house. Stay--here is a blanket
+to help to make your bed somewhat more comfortable. And now, I must
+hurry away.--Yet, before I go, let me once more caution you about
+the light. Perhaps I had better make all secure, by taking the lamp
+with me."
+
+"Oh no! no! no! no!" cried the stranger, his eyes glaring like those
+of a maniac, whilst he rushed towards the lamp and seized it up, and
+clasped it within his arms. "No, nothing shall rend it from me! I
+will sacrifice my life to preserve it. What! would you leave me to
+another long, long, and dreadful night? Would you leave me to utter
+darkness and despair?"
+
+"Leave you I must," replied Inverawe; "and if you will keep the lamp,
+you must do so at your own risk. But your thoughts must be dreadful
+thoughts indeed, so to disturb you. If conscious guilt be the cause
+of them, I can only advise you to confess yourself humbly to your
+Creator, and to pray for his forgiveness."
+
+Without waiting for a reply, Inverawe left the cave, and made the best
+of his way home. On reaching his apartment, he found his lady awake.
+
+"You have been a long time absent, Inverawe," said she anxiously.
+
+"I have, my love," replied he carelessly; "the delicious air of this
+night induced me to stay out longer than I had intended; but I hope
+I shall sleep all the better for it."
+
+Exhausted as he was by fatigue of body and mind, as well as worn out
+by want of rest, Inverawe did fall asleep immediately, and his sleep
+was sound and deep. For aught he knew, it might have lasted for some
+hours, when again, as on the previous night, he was awaked, he could
+not tell how. The curtains of his bed were drawn close, but the same
+uncouth blue light which pervaded the apartment on the former night,
+now again rendered them quite transparent. To convince himself that
+he was awake, Inverawe looked round upon his wife. Even at this early
+stage, the light was sufficiently bright to enable him distinctly to
+see his lady's features as her head lay in calm repose on the pillow
+beside him. He turned again towards the side of the bed, and his eyes
+were dazzled by the sudden increase of light, produced by the curtain
+being raised as before, by the extended hand of the spectre. The same
+well remembered features were there, pale, fixed, and corpse-like,
+but the expression of the brow, and bloodless lips, was more stern
+than it was on the previous night. Again the spectre dropped the fold
+of the filmy plaid that covered the bosom, and displayed the yawning
+gash, which continued to pour out rivers of blood. The spectacle was
+horrible, and Inverawe's very arteries were frozen up. Again it spoke
+in a deep hollow tone, whilst its lips moved not.
+
+"Inverawe! My first visit has been fruitless!--Once more I come
+to warn you that blood must flow for blood. No longer shield the
+murderer! Force me not to appear again, when all warning will be vain!"
+
+Inverawe made an effort to question it. His parched mouth, and dried
+and stiffened tongue, refused to do their office. The curtain fell,
+and the light in the room, as well as the shadow of the figure,
+began to wane away. He struggled to spring out of bed, but his nerves
+and muscles refused to obey his will, until it was gone, and all was
+again darkness. The moment that his powers returned to him, he dashed
+back the curtain, threw himself from the bed, and searched through
+the room, with outstretched arms, yet, bold and desperate as he was,
+he almost feared that they might embrace the cold and bloody figure
+which he had beheld. His search, however, was vain, and, utterly
+confused and confounded, he returned to bed with his very heart as
+cold as ice. Fortunately, his lady had lain perfectly undisturbed, and
+amidst his own horror, and amidst all his own agonizing agitation of
+thought, he felt thankful that she had escaped sharing in the terrors
+to which he had been subjected. As on the former night, he tried to
+persuade himself that all that had passed was nothing more than a
+dream,--but all the reasoning powers he possessed were ineffectual
+in removing from his mind the conviction that now laid hold of it,
+that it really was a spirit that had appeared to him. Sleep was
+banished from his eyelids for the remainder of the night; and never
+before had he so anxiously longed for day-break. It came at last;
+and soon afterwards his lady awaked.
+
+"Inverawe," said she, tenderly and anxiously addressing him, "you are
+ill--very ill. What, in the name of all goodness, is the matter with
+you? Your worn out looks tell me that something terrible has occurred
+to you. Your late excursion of last night has something mysterious
+about it. You were not wont thus to have concealment from me--from
+me your affectionate wife!--What is it that preys upon your mind?--I
+must know it."
+
+"Promise me, upon the honour of Inverawe's wife," said he, now seeing
+that concealment from her was no longer practicable; "promise me
+on that honour which is pure and unsullied as the snow, that you
+will not divulge what I have to tell you, and your curiosity shall
+be satisfied."
+
+With a look of intense and apprehensive interest, the lady
+promised what he desired, and then Inverawe communicated to her
+every circumstance that had occurred to him. She was struck dumb and
+petrified by the narration; but she had no sooner gathered sufficient
+nerve to speak, than she earnestly entreated him to have nothing to
+do in concealing the guilty stranger.
+
+"Let not this awful warning, now given you for the second time,
+be neglected," said she. "Send for the officers of justice without
+delay, and give up the murderer to be tried by the offended laws
+of his country. You know not what curse may fall upon you, for thus
+trying to arrest Heaven's judgment on the guilty man. Oh, Inverawe,
+it is dreadful to think of it!"
+
+"All this earnestness on your part, my love, is natural," said Inverawe
+calmly. "But think of the solemn oath I have sworn;--you would not
+have Inverawe--you would not have your husband--break a pledge so
+solemnly given? Whatever may befal me here, I cannot so dishonour
+myself. Besides," added he, "whilst, on the one hand, I know that
+he to whom I am so pledged is like myself, a man of flesh and blood,
+who, for anything I know to the contrary, may, after all, be really
+less guilty than unfortunate; I cannot even yet say with certainty,
+that I have not been the sport of dreams, naturally enough arising
+out of the strange circumstances to which I have been exposed. But
+were it otherwise, and that, contrary to all our accustomed rational
+belief, I have indeed been visited by a spirit, what proof have I
+that it is a spirit of health? What proof have I that it may not be a
+spirit wickedly commissioned by the Father of lies to take this form,
+in order to seduce me into that breach of my pledge, which would for
+ever blacken the high name of Campbell of Inverawe, and doom myself
+to ceaseless remorse during the rest of my days?--No, no, lady!--I
+must keep my solemn vow, whatever may befal me."
+
+The lady was silenced by these words from her husband, but her
+anxiety was not thereby allayed. It increased as night approached; and
+especially when Inverawe told her that he must again visit the man in
+the cave. During that day, various rumours had reached him, of people
+being afoot in search of a murderer, who was supposed to have found a
+place of concealment somewhere in that neighbourhood; and it was with
+some difficulty that he could suppress a hope that unconsciously arose
+within him, that he might be relieved from his pledge, and from his
+present most distressing and embarrassing position, by the accidental
+capture of him for whom they were searching. The duty of visiting the
+wretched man had now become oppressively painful to Inverawe,--and the
+painfulness of it was not decreased by the additional risk which he
+now ran of being detected. But Inverawe was not a man to abandon any
+duty for any such reasons. Having again privately made up his basket
+of provisions therefore, and put his otter-traps over its contents,
+as formerly, he left the castle as twilight came on, and making
+his circuit by the river side with yet more care and caution than
+before, he climbed along the side of Cruachan, and in due course of
+time reached the mouth of the cave. The light was burning as before,
+and on entering the place, its inmate was sitting with a countenance
+and expression if possible more haggard and terrific than he had
+exhibited on the previous night.
+
+"Welcome!--welcome!" cried he, starting wildly up, and speaking
+in a frantic tone, as he rushed forward to seize Inverawe's cold
+hand in both of his, that felt like heated iron,--"welcome, my
+guardian angel! All other good angels have fled from me now!--And the
+bad!--Oh!--But you will not leave me to-night?--Oh, say that you will
+not leave me to-night!"
+
+"I grieve to say, that, for your own sake, I cannot gratify you,"
+replied Inverawe, withdrawing his hand involuntarily from the
+contamination of his touch, and shrinking back with horror from
+the glare of his phrenzied and blood-shot eyes, though with a heart
+almost moved to pity for the wretch before him, whose very manhood
+seemed to have abandoned him. "It is vain to ask me to stay with you,
+as I have already frequently explained to you; but much more so now,
+that I have learned that there are men out searching for you in
+this neighbourhood, brought hither by the strong conviction that
+you are concealed somewhere hereabouts. This circumstance renders
+it imperatively necessary that you should no longer persevere in
+the perilous practice of burning your lamp, which exposes you to
+tenfold danger."
+
+"Talk not to me of danger!" exclaimed the man, in a dreadful
+state of excitement, and in a tone and words that seemed more like
+those of a raving madman than anything else--"I must have light--I
+should go distracted if I had not light. Darkness would drive me to
+self-destruction! I tell you it is filled with horrible shapes. Even
+when I shut my eyes the horrible spectre appears. Have pity!--have
+mercy on me, and stay with me but this one single night!--for even
+the light of the lamp itself cannot always banish the terrific spectre
+from before me!"
+
+"Spectre!" cried Inverawe, shuddering with horror,--"what spectre?"
+
+"Aye, the horrible spectre," replied the man. And then suddenly
+starting back, with his hands stretched forth, as if to keep off some
+terrific shape that had instantaneously risen before him, and with his
+eye-balls glaring towards the dark opening of the cave, he shrieked
+out--"Hell and torments! 'tis there again,--there--there--see there!"
+
+"I see nothing," said Inverawe, with some difficulty retaining a proper
+command of himself. "But this is madness--absolute insanity. See,
+here is your food;--I must leave you immediately."
+
+"Oh, do not go!" said the stranger, following Inverawe for a few steps
+towards the mouth of the cave, and entreating him in a subdued and
+abject tone. And then, just as his protector was about to make his
+exit, he again started back, and stood as if he had been transfixed,
+whilst, with his hands stretched out before him, and his eyes fearfully
+staring on the vacancy of the darkness that was beyond the cavern's
+mouth, he again yelled out--"There! there!--see there!"
+
+It must be honestly confessed, that it was with no very imperturbed
+state of nerves, that Inverawe committed himself to the obscurity of
+that night, to hurry homewards, and though no spectre appeared before
+his visual orbs, yet the harrowing spectacle which the guilty man had
+exhibited, and the allusion which he had made to the supposed spectre
+which he had seen in his imagination, kept that which he had himself
+beheld constantly floating before his mind's eye, during the whole
+of his way home; and he was not sorry, when he reached his own hall,
+to find his lady sitting by the fire waiting for his return. She was
+lonely, and cheerless, and full of anxious thoughts regarding him;
+but her eye brightened up at his entrance, and she filled him a goblet
+of wine. Inverawe swallowed it greedily down,--gave her a brief and
+bare account of his evening's expedition,--and then they retired to
+their chamber.
+
+On this occasion Inverawe silently took the precaution of bolting the
+door of the apartment; and, on going to bed, the lady, with great
+resolution of mind, determined within herself to keep off sleep,
+and to watch, so that she too might behold whatever apparition might
+appear; hoping that if the spectre which had so disturbed Inverawe,
+should, after all, prove to be nothing but a dream, she might be able,
+from her own observation, to disabuse him of his phantasy. But it
+so happened, that, notwithstanding all her precautions, and all her
+mental exertions to prevent it, she fell immediately into a most
+unaccountably deep sleep; and Inverawe himself, in spite of all
+his harassing and distressing thoughts, was speedily plunged into a
+similar state of utter unconsciousness.
+
+Again, for this the third night, he was awaked by the same light
+streaming through the apartment, and rendering the curtain of his
+bed transparent by its wonderful illumination.--Again he looked round
+on his wife, and beheld every feature of her face clearly displayed
+by its influence. She lay in the soundest and sweetest repose. His
+first impulse was to awake her,--but he instantly checked himself, and
+felt grateful that she was thus to be saved from the contemplation of
+the terrific spectral appearance, the shadow of which he now observed
+gliding slowly towards the bed. The curtain was again raised.--The same
+well-remembered figure and face appeared under the usual increased
+intensity of light. Again the filmy plaid was partially dropped, and
+the fearful gash in the bosom was exposed, as before, pouring out
+blood. Again the deep, hollow voice came from the motionless lips,
+but it was accompanied by a yet sterner expression of the eyes,
+and of the pale countenance.
+
+"Inverawe!--My warnings have been vain.--The time is now past.--Yet
+blood must flow for blood!--The blood of the murderer might have
+been offered up--now your blood must flow for his!--We meet once more
+at Ticonderoga!"
+
+This last visitation of the apparition, accompanied as it was by a
+denunciation so terrible, had a yet more overwhelming effect upon
+Inverawe than either of those that preceded it. Bereft of all power
+over himself, he lay, conscious of existence it is true, but utterly
+incapable of commanding thought, much less of exercising action. Ere
+he could rally his intellect, or his nervous energy, the spectre was
+gone; and the apartment was dark. When his thoughts began to arise
+within him, they were of a more agonizing character than any which
+he had formerly experienced--"Your blood must flow for his."--These
+dreadful words still sounded in his ears, in the same deep, sepulchral
+tone in which they had been uttered. Do not suppose that one thought
+of himself ever crossed his mind. He thought of his son--that son,
+for whose welfare every desire of his life was concentrated,--that
+was his blood, against which he conceived this dread prophecy to
+be directed--that was his blood which he dreaded might flow. He
+shivered at the very thought. He recalled the strange circumstances
+which had attended the drinking of the toast to his roof-tree. His
+anxiety about his son was raised to a pitch, that converted his bed,
+for that night at least, into a bed of thorns. He slept not,--yet all
+his tossings failed to awaken his lady, who slept as if she had been
+drenched with some soporiferous drug. The sun had no sooner darted his
+first rays through the casement, however, than she awaked as if from
+a most refreshing sleep. She looked round upon her husband--observed
+his haggard and tortured expression--and the whole recollection of
+what she previously knew having come upon her at once, she began
+vehemently to upbraid herself.
+
+"I have slept," said she, in a tone of vexed self-reprehension.--"After
+all my determination to the contrary, I have slept throughout the
+whole night; and you have been again disturbed.--Say!--what has
+happened? Have you seen him again?"
+
+"I have seen him," replied Inverawe in a subdued tone and manner--"I
+have seen him, and his appearance was terrible."
+
+"Say--tell me!--what passed?" exclaimed the lady earnestly. "Inverawe,
+I must know all."
+
+Inverawe would have fain eaten in his words. He would have especially
+wished to have left his wife in ignorance of the denunciation to
+which the apparition had given utterance. But he had not as yet
+recovered sufficient mastery over himself, to enable him to baffle
+the questioning of an acute woman. In a short time the whole truth
+was extracted from him; and now the lady, in a state of agitation
+that very much exceeded his, began to press upon him the necessity of
+giving up the criminal to justice. Her argument was long and energetic;
+and during the time that it occupied, he gradually resumed the full
+possession of himself.
+
+"I have heard you, my love," replied he calmly; "yet you have urged,
+and you can urge nothing which can persuade me to break my solemn
+pledge. The hitherto spotless honour of Inverawe shall never be
+tarnished in my person. Dreadful as is the curse which has been
+denounced upon me, I am still resolved to act as an honourable man. Yet
+I will do this much. I will again visit the man in the cave, and insist
+with him that he shall seek some other place of refuge. I have done
+enough for him. I have suffered enough on his account. He must go
+elsewhere. Perhaps I should have come to this resolve yesterday--the
+time, alas! may now be past. But, come what come may, I am determined
+that the visit of this night shall be the last that I shall pay to
+him. He must go elsewhere. Even his own safety requires that he shall
+do so--and mine! But no matter, he must seek some other asylum."
+
+Even this resolve--late though it might be, was, for the time, some
+consolation to the afflicted mind of his wife. Nay, it was in some
+degree matter of alleviation to his own sufferings. The broad sunlight
+of Heaven, and the bustling action of the creatures of this world while
+all creation is awake, produces a wonderful effect upon the human mind,
+in relieving it from all those phantoms of anticipated evil which the
+silent shades of night are so apt to conjure up within it. Inverawe
+and his lady were less oppressed with gloomy thoughts during that
+day than might have been supposed possible. It is true, that he often
+secretly repeated over the denunciation of the apparition, but even
+yet he would have fain persuaded himself, as he tried to persuade
+his wife, that he had been the sport of dreams, resulting from some
+morbid state of his system.
+
+"Ticonderoga!" said he, "where is Ticonderoga? I know of no such
+place; nay, I never heard of any such place; and, in truth, I do
+not believe that any such place really exists on the face of this
+earth. Ticonderoga! A name so utterly unknown to me, and so strangely
+uncouth in itself, would lead me to believe that it is the coinage
+of my own distempered brain; and, if so, then the whole must have
+been an illusion. Yet it is altogether unaccountable and inexplicable."
+
+Thus it was that Inverawe reasoned during that day; but as night
+again approached, it brought all its phantoms of the imagination
+along with it.
+
+Inverawe, however, wound himself up to go through with that which he
+now considered as his last trial. Having filled his basket as before,
+he set off on his wonted circuitous route to the cave. As he went
+thither, he endeavoured to steel up his mind to assume that resolute
+tone with the stranger which he now felt to be absolutely necessary
+to rid himself of so troublesome and distressing a charge. Much as it
+did violence to his innate feelings of hospitality to come to any such
+determination, he resolved to insist on his departure from the cave
+that very night, and he had no difficulty in persuading himself that
+his doing this would be the best line of safety he could prescribe
+for the stranger, seeing that, by the active use of his limbs during
+the remaining portion of it, he might well enough reach some distant
+place of concealment before day-break. Full of such ideas, he pressed
+on towards the cave, that he might get him off with as little delay
+as possible. The light which had shone from its mouth upon former
+occasions was now absent, and Inverawe hailed the circumstance as
+a proof that the wretched man had at last become more rational. He
+approached the orifice in the cliff, and gently called him. His
+own voice alone was returned to him from the hollow bowels of the
+rock. All was so mysteriously silent, that an involuntary chill fell
+upon Inverawe. He repeated his call in a louder voice, but still there
+was no reply--no stir from within. A cold shudder crept over him,
+and for a moment he half expected to see issue from the black void
+before him, that appalling apparition which had now three several times
+appeared by his bedside. A little thought enabled him to get rid of
+this temporary weakness. He recalled the last words of the spectre,
+and the strange uncouth name of Ticonderoga. If such a place had
+existence at all, it was there, and there only, that he could expect
+to behold him again. He became reassured, and all his wonted manliness
+returned to him. He struck a light, and crept into the cave. A short
+survey of its interior satisfied him that the stranger was gone. The
+blanket, the extinguished lamp, and some other things lay there, but
+no other vestige of its recent inmate was to be seen. Inverawe felt
+relieved; he was saved from even the semblance of inhospitality. But
+the recollection of the apparition's last words recurred to him,
+and then every thing around him seemed to whisper him that indeed
+the time might now be past. He began, most inconsistently, to wish
+that the stranger had still been there--nay, he almost hoped that he
+might yet be lingering about the neighbouring rocks or thickets. He
+sallied forth from the cave, and abandoning all his former caution,
+he shouted twice or thrice in succession, at the very top of his
+voice, but without obtaining any response, except that which came
+from the echoes of the cliffs, muffled as they were by the roar of
+the numerous cataracts of the mountain side, and the howling blast
+that swept downward through the pass far below. For a moment he felt
+that if the stranger had been still in his power, he could have given
+him up to justice, to be dealt with as a murderer; but reason made him
+blush, by bringing back to him his high and chivalric sense of honour
+in its fullest force, so that he turned to go homewards possessed
+with a very different train of thought. When his lady met him, she
+was eager in her enquiries, and deeply depressed when she learned
+that Inverawe had now lost all chance of delivering up the murderer.
+
+"Alas!" said she, in an agony of tears, "the time is now past."
+
+"Do not allow this matter to distress you so, my love," said Inverawe,
+endeavouring to sooth her into a calm, which he could by no means
+command for himself. "The more I think of it, the more I am persuaded
+that the whole has been a phantasm of the brain. Let us have a cup of
+wine, and laugh all such foolish fancies away ere we go to bed. This
+perplexing and distressing adventure has now passed by, and this
+night I hope to shake off all such vapours of the imagination."
+
+Inverawe had little sleep that night, but he was undisturbed by
+any re-appearance of the apparition. Unknown to his wife, he made a
+circuitous excursion next day to Ben-Cruachan, where a more accurate
+examination of the cave and its environs satisfied him that the
+stranger was indeed gone. And he was gone for ever, for Inverawe
+never afterwards saw him,--nor, indeed, did he ever again hear the
+slightest intelligence regarding him.
+
+Days, weeks, and months rolled away, and by degrees the gloom which
+these extraordinary and portentous events had brought upon Inverawe,
+as well as upon his lady, began to be in a great degree dissipated. His
+son had long since returned home in full health and vigour, and things
+fell gradually into their natural and usual course.
+
+Inverawe was one night sitting in social converse with his wife and
+his son, and their friend, young George Campbell--the same individual
+who, as you may remember, was the giver of the toast of the roof-tree
+of Inverawe--when a packet of letters was brought in, and handed to
+the laird.
+
+"What is all this?" exclaimed he, quickly breaking the seal, and
+hastily examining the contents. "Ha! the old Black Watch again! this
+is news indeed!"
+
+"What?--What is it?" cried his lady.
+
+"Glorious news!" cried Inverawe, rubbing his hands. "I am appointed to
+the majority of the Highlanders; and here is an ensign's commission
+for you, young gentleman," said he, addressing George Campbell. "And
+my friend Grant, who writes to me, tells me that he has got the
+lieutenant-colonelcy. What can be more delightful than the prospect
+of serving in such a corps, under the command of so old a friend?"
+
+"Glorious!--glorious!" cried young George Campbell, jumping from his
+chair, and dancing through the room with joy.
+
+"A bumper to the gallant Highlanders, and their brave commander!" cried
+Inverawe, filling the cups.
+
+The toast was quaffed with enthusiasm. Young Inverawe alone seemed
+to feel that there was no joy in the cup for him.
+
+"Would I had a commission too!" said he, in a tone of extreme vexation.
+
+"Boy," said Inverawe, gravely, "Your time is coming. It will be well
+for you to stay at home to look after your mother. One of us two is
+enough in the field at once."
+
+"Am I then to be doomed to sloth and idleness at home?" said Donald,
+pettishly; "better put petticoats on me at once, and give me a distaff
+to wield."
+
+"Speak not so, Donald," said his mother, in a trembling voice. "You
+are hardly old enough for such warlike undertakings; and, indeed,
+your father says what is but too true--for what could I do, were both
+of you to be torn from me?"
+
+Donald said no more. The cup circulated. George Campbell was in high
+spirits, and full of happy anticipations.
+
+"I hope we may soon be sent on service," said he, exultingly.
+
+"You may have service sooner than you dream of," said Inverawe, going
+on to gather the remainder of the contents of his packet. "Grant writes
+me here, that in consequence of the turn which matters are taking
+in America, he hopes every day for the arrival of an order for the
+regiment to embark. George, you and I must lose no time in making up
+our kitts, for we must join the corps with all manner of expedition."
+
+The parting between Inverawe and his lady was tender and
+touching. Donald bid his father farewell with less appearance of
+regret than his known affection for him would have led any one
+to have anticipated. There was even a certain smile of triumph on
+his countenance as he saw them depart. But his mother was too much
+overwhelmed by her own feelings, to notice any thing regarding those
+of her son.
+
+The meeting between Inverawe and his old brother officers was naturally
+a joyous one, and nothing could be more delightful than the warmth of
+the reception he met with from his long-tried friend Colonel Grant,
+now the commanding-officer of the corps.
+
+"My dear fellow, Inverawe!" said he, cordially shaking him by the hand,
+"This happy circumstance of having got you amongst us again, is even
+more gratifying to me than my own promotion, and yet, let me tell you,
+the peculiar circumstances attending that were gratifying enough."
+
+"I need not assure you that the news of it were most gratifying to
+me," replied Inverawe. "It doubled the happiness I felt, in getting
+the majority, to find that I was to serve under so old and so much
+valued a friend. But to what particular circumstances do you allude?"
+
+"When the step was opened to me, by the promotion of Colonel Campbell
+to the command of the fifty-fourth regiment," replied Colonel Grant,
+in a trembling voice, and with the tears beginning to swell in his
+eyes, "I was not a little surprised, and, as you will readily believe,
+pleased also, to be waited on by a deputation from the non-commissioned
+officers and privates of the corps, to make offer to me of a purse
+containing the sum necessary to purchase the lieutenant-colonelcy,
+which they had subscribed among themselves, and proposed to present
+to me, with the selfish view, as the noble fellows declared to me,
+of securing to themselves as commanding-officer a man whom they all
+so much loved and respected! Campbell!--Inverawe!" continued he, with
+his voice faultering still more from the swelling of his emotions,
+"I can never forget this, were I to live to the age of Methuselah--I
+can never deserve it all--but--but--phsaw! my heart is too full to
+give utterance to my feelings--and I must e'en play the woman."
+
+"Noble fellows indeed!" cried Inverawe, fully sympathizing with him
+in all he felt; "but by my faith they looked at the matter in its
+true light, when moved by selfish considerations, they were led so
+to act--for they well knew that you would be as a father to them."
+
+"I shall ever be as a father to them whilst it pleases God to spare
+me," said the Colonel warmly, "and if ever I desert them while life
+remains, may I be blown from the mouth of a cannon!"
+
+"What was the result of this matter then?" demanded Inverawe.
+
+"Why, as it happened," replied the Colonel, "the promotion went in
+the regiment without purchase, so that I enjoyed all the pleasure of
+receiving this kind demonstration from my children, without taxing
+their pockets, or laying myself under an unpleasant pecuniary
+obligation to them, which might at times have had a tendency in
+some degree to paralyze me in the wholesome exercise of strict
+discipline. And we shall require to stick the more rigidly to that now,
+seeing that we are going on service."
+
+"We are going on service then?" said Inverawe.
+
+"We have this very evening received our orders for America," replied
+Colonel Grant; "and never did commanding-officer go on service with
+more confidence in his men and officers than I do."
+
+"And I may safely say that never did officers or men go on service
+with greater confidence in their commander than we shall do," replied
+Inverawe, again shaking the Colonel heartily by the hand.
+
+George Campbell was introduced by Inverawe to the particular notice
+of Colonel Grant, and by him to the rest of the officers, among whom
+he soon found himself at his ease. The time for their embarkation
+approached, and all was bustle and preparation amongst them. George
+had much to do, and it was with some difficulty, but with great inward
+delight, that he at last found himself complete in all his arms,
+trappings, and necessaries. The night previous to their going on board
+of the ships appointed to convey them to their place of destination,
+was a busy one for him, and he was still occupied, at a late hour,
+in his quarters, when he was surprised by a knock at his door.
+
+"Come in!" cried George Campbell.
+
+The door opened, and a young man entered, whose fatigued and soiled
+appearance showed that he had come off a long journey.
+
+"Donald Campbell of Inverawe!" cried George, in utter astonishment;
+and the young men were instantly in one another's arms. "My dear
+fellow, what strange chance has brought you hither?"
+
+"I come to throw myself on your honour," said Donald. "I come to throw
+myself on the honour of him whom I have ever held to be my dearest
+friend;--on the honour of one who has never failed me hitherto,
+and who, if I mistake not, will not fail me now. Give me your solemn
+promise that you will keep my counsel, and do your best to assist me
+in my present undertaking."
+
+"Methinks you need hardly ask for my solemn promise," replied George
+Campbell; "for you might safely count on my best exertions to oblige
+you at all times. But what can I do for you? It would need to be
+something that may be quickly and immediately gone about, else cannot
+I stay to effect it. We embark to-morrow morning."
+
+"You will not require to stay behind the rest, in order to do what
+I require of you," said Donald of Inverawe.
+
+"I could not if I would," replied George Campbell.
+
+"Do you go in the same ship with my father?" demanded young Inverawe.
+
+"I wish I did," replied George Campbell; "but I regret to say that
+I go in a different vessel."
+
+"So much the better for my purpose," replied young Inverawe
+eagerly. "You will be the better able to take me with you without my
+being discovered."
+
+"Take you with me!" cried George Campbell, in great astonishment. "What
+in the name of wonder would you propose?"
+
+"That which is perfectly reasonable," replied young Inverawe. "Do you
+think that I could sit quietly at home, whilst my father, and you,
+and so many of my friends, are earning honour and glory abroad? Ask
+yourself, George, what would you have done under my circumstances?"
+
+"I have never thought as to how I might have acted, had I been so
+placed," replied George Campbell, much perplexed. "But I have no relish
+for having any hand in aiding you to oppose the will of your father."
+
+"No matter now, George, whether you have any relish for it or not,"
+replied young Inverawe, smiling. "You have given me your promise
+that you will aid me, and you must now make the best of it. So come
+away. Let me see how you can best manage to get me aboard. I must
+not be seen by my father till we land in America, and then I shall
+enter as a volunteer."
+
+"What will your father say then?" demanded George Campbell.
+
+"Why, that the blood of Inverawe was too strong in me to be
+restrained," replied Donald. "Why man, it is just what he would have
+done himself. He will be too proud of the spirit inherent in his
+house, which has impelled me to this act, ever to think of blaming
+me for it. Come, come, you have given me your word."
+
+"I have given you my word," said George Campbell; "and I must honestly
+tell you that I wish I had been less precipitate. But having given it,
+I must in truth abide by it. It may be as you say, that your father
+will have more pride than pain in this matter, when he comes to know
+it. And then, as for myself, I shall be too happy to have you as my
+companion in so long a voyage. But come, let us have some refreshment,
+and then we can talk over the matter, and consider how your scheme
+may be best carried into effect."
+
+The thing was easily enough arranged. Many of the privates of the corps
+were gentlemen who had attendants of their own. There was nothing
+extraordinary, therefore, in an officer being so provided. A slight
+disguise was employed to alter Donald's appearance, so that he might
+escape detection from any one who had seen him before. Next morning he
+went on board in charge of some of Ensign George Campbell's baggage,
+and there he remained snugly, until the expedition sailed.
+
+The Highland regiment embarked full of enthusiasm, and it
+was ultimately landed at New York in the highest health and
+spirits. Colonel Stewart of Garth, in his interesting work, tells
+us, that they were caressed by all ranks and orders of men, but more
+particularly by the Indians. Those inhabitants of the wilds flocked
+from all quarters to see the strangers, as they were on their march to
+Albany, and the resemblance which they discovered between the Celtic
+dress and their own, inclining them to believe that they were of the
+same extraction as themselves, they hailed them as brothers. Orders
+were issued to treat the Indians kindly; but, although these were
+most generally and most cheerfully obeyed, instances did occur, where
+gross acts of impropriety and harshness were exhibited towards them,
+and one of these I shall now mention.
+
+A young Indian, of tall and handsome proportions, with that conscious
+air of equality which they all possess, came up to a group of the
+Highlanders who were resting themselves round a fire. An ignorant and
+mischievous fellow of the party, who much more merited the name of
+savage than him of the woods, having heated the end of the stalk of
+a tobacco-pipe, handed it, full of tobacco, with much mock solemnity,
+to the young Indian,--who, in ignorance of the trick, was just about
+to take it into his hand, and to apply the heated end of it to his
+lips, when a young Highlander who was present, dashed it to the
+ground. The Indian started--looked tomahawks at the Highland youth,
+and might have used one too, had not he, with his glove on, taken up
+a portion of the broken pipe-stalk, and signing to the Indian to feel
+it, made him sensible of the kind and friendly service he had rendered
+him. The ferocious rage that lightened in the eye of the Red Man was
+at once extinguished. A mild and benignant sunshine succeeded it. He
+took the hand of the young Highlander, and pressed it to his heart;
+and then, darting a look of dignified contempt upon the poor creature
+who had been the author of this base and childish piece of knavery
+against him, he slowly, solemnly, and silently withdrew.
+
+Whilst Major Campbell of Inverawe was on the march, his noble
+appearance seemed to make a strong impression on their Indian
+followers. For his part, he was peculiarly struck with the fine figure
+and graceful mien of a heroic-looking young warrior of the woods,
+who seemed to keep near to him, as if earnestly intent on holding
+intercourse with him. He encouraged his approach; and, conversing
+with him, as well as the young man's imperfect knowledge of English
+permitted him to do, he invited him, when they halted for refreshment,
+to partake of his hasty meal. The young Eagle Eye--for such was the
+Indian's name in his own tribe--carried a rifle; and Major Campbell
+having put some questions to him as to his skill in using it, his
+curiosity was so excited by all that the red man said of himself,
+that he resolved to put it to the proof. Having loaded his own piece,
+therefore, he proposed to his new Indian ally, to take a short circuit,
+to look for game, during the brief time that the men were allowed for
+rest, and one or two of the officers arose to accompany them. The Eagle
+Eye moved on before them with that silence, and with that dignified
+air, which marked the confidence which he had in his own powers. A walk
+of a few hundred yards from their line of march, brought them into a
+small open space of grassy ground, surrounded by thickets. Inverawe
+stopped by chance to adjust the buckle of his bandoleer, when the Eagle
+Eye, who happened at that moment to be some paces to the right of him,
+sprang on him like a falcon, and threw him to the ground. As he was
+in the very act of doing so, an arrow from the thicket in front of
+them pierced the Indian's shoulder, whilst he, almost at the same
+moment, levelled his rifle, fired it in the direction from whence
+the arrow came, and, rushing forward with a yell, plunged among the
+bushes. The whole of these circumstances passed so instantaneously,
+that Major Campbell's brother officers were confounded. But having
+assisted him to rise from the ground, they congratulated him on his
+escape from a danger which neither he nor they could as yet very well
+comprehend or explain. They were not long left in suspense however,
+for the Eagle Eye soon reappeared, dragging from the thicket the
+body of an Indian belonging to a hostile tribe. In an instant, the
+Eagle Eye exercised his scalping-knife, and possessed himself of the
+bloody trophy of his enemy. On examination, the ball from his rifle
+was discovered to have perforated the brain through the forehead
+of his victim. The mystery was explained. The young Eagle Eye had
+suddenly descried the lurking foe, deeply nestled among the bushes,
+and in the act of taking a deliberate aim at Inverawe. He had saved
+the Major's life at the imminent risk of his own, and that quick
+sight from which he had his name, had enabled his ready hand to take
+prompt and deadly vengeance for the wound he had received in doing
+so. The grateful Inverawe felt beggared in expressions of thanks to
+his Indian preserver. He and his friends extracted the arrow from the
+shoulder of the hero, poured spirits into the wound, and bound it up;
+and then, as they hastened back to join the troops, he entreated the
+Eagle Eye to tell him how he could recompense him.
+
+"It is enough for me," replied the young Indian warrior, with dignified
+gravity of manner, mingled with becoming modesty, and in his broken
+language, the imperfections of which I shall not attempt to give you,
+though I shall endeavour to preserve the finer peculiarities of its
+poetical conceptions,--"it is enough for my youth to be suffered to
+live within the shadow of a chief, broad as that which the great rock
+spreads over the grassy surface of the Prairie. A chief among those
+who have come over the waters of the great salt lake, in number like
+that of the beavers of the mohawk, whose fathers were the brethren of
+our fathers, though their hunting grounds are now so far apart. The
+tribe of the Eagle Eye has been broken. The pride of the foes of the
+Eagle Eye is swelled by a thousand scalps of his kindred. He is like a
+solitary tree that has escaped from the whirlwind that has levelled the
+forest. The Eagle Eye has no father--he is alone--make him thy son."
+
+"You shall be as a son to me!" said Inverawe, deeply affected by the
+many tender recollections of home which this appeal had awakened
+in his mind. "You shall never want such fatherly protection as I
+can give you. But I would fain have you ask some more instant and
+direct recompense from me, for having thus so nobly saved my life at
+the peril of your own. Is there nothing immediate that I can do for
+you? Gratify me by asking something."
+
+"The Eagle Eye will obey his father," replied the Indian, calmly. "One
+of your pale-faced tribe has deeply insulted your red son."
+
+"Ha!" exclaimed Inverawe, "find him out for me, and you shall forthwith
+see him punished to your heart's content."
+
+"The cunning and cowardly kite is beneath the vengeance of the Eagle,"
+replied the Indian. "But there was a youth among your pale faces,
+who stood the red man's friend. Him would I hold as my brother. Him
+would I bring with me beneath the shelter of my father, the great
+chief, that he may grow green and lofty under his protection."
+
+"You shall search me out that youth," replied Inverawe, "and be
+assured he shall find a friend in me for your sake."
+
+The Eagle Eye, with great dignity, took the right hand of Inverawe
+between both of his, and pressed it forcibly to his heart. When they
+reached the ground where the men were halting, the major despatched a
+non-commissioned officer with the Indian, to find out the young man,
+and to bring him immediately before him. They soon reappeared with
+him; and what was Inverawe's astonishment, when he lifted up his eyes,
+and beheld--his son!
+
+It was exactly as Donald had himself prognosticated. Inverawe's
+heart was so filled with joy, in thus so unexpectedly beholding and
+embracing his boy, at the very moment when he had been dreaming that he
+was so far from him; and with pride in thinking of that brave spirit
+which had impelled him to follow him to America; as well as with deep
+gratification at the kind-hearted act which had thus caused him to be
+so strangely brought before him, that no room was left within it for
+those gloomy thoughts which might have otherwise arisen there. He
+clasped him again and again to his bosom, whilst the Indian stood
+by as a calm spectator of the scene, his countenance unmoved by the
+feelings of sympathy that were working within him. Their first emotions
+were no sooner over, than Inverawe hurried Donald away to introduce
+him to the commanding-officer, and he was speedily admitted into the
+corps as a gentleman volunteer, with the promise of the first vacant
+ensigncy. It will easily be believed, that the strict ties which
+were thus formed between the Campbells of Inverawe and the noble
+Eagle Eye, were destined to increase every day. Under the direction
+of his European friends, his wound was treated with the most tender
+care, and he was soon perfectly cured. The Eagle Eye deeply felt the
+kindness of his Highland father and brother; but, whether in happiness
+or in pain, in joy or in grief, his lofty countenance never betrayed
+those feelings which are so readily yielded to in civilized life. It
+was in vain that they tried to induce him to adopt European habits,
+or to domesticate him so far as to make him regularly participate
+in those comforts, which are the fruits of civilization. He adhered
+with pertinacity to his own customs, and looked down with barbarian
+dignity upon those of his hosts, which so widely differed from them;
+and when at any time he was induced to partake of them, it was with
+a lofty native politeness, which seemed to indicate that he did so
+more in compliment to those with whom he was associated, than from
+any gratification he received in his own person.
+
+Circumstances, with which they or their commanding-officer had nothing
+to do, had kept the Highlanders altogether out of action during the
+campaign of 1757, which had done so little for the glory of the British
+arms. But in the autumn of this year, Lord Loudon was recalled, and
+Lieutenant-General Abercromby succeeded to the command of the army. By
+this time, the Highlanders had received an accession of strength,
+by the arrival of seven hundred recruits from their native mountains;
+and the corps now numbered no less than thirteen hundred men, of size,
+figure, strength, and courage, not easily to be matched. The British
+army in America now consisted altogether of above twenty-two thousand
+regulars, and thirty thousand provincial troops, which last could
+not be classed under that character. The hopes of all were high,
+therefore, and active operations were immediately contemplated.
+
+It was some little time before this, that Inverawe was spending an
+evening, tête-a-tête, with his friend, Colonel Grant. The bottle was
+passing slowly but regularly between them, when, by some unaccountable
+change in their conversation, the subject of supernatural appearances
+came to be introduced. Colonel Grant protested against all belief
+in them. The recollection of the apparition which had three several
+times visited Inverawe, came back upon his mind, in form and colours
+so strong and forcible, that his cheeks grew pale, and a deep gloom
+overspread his brow; so much so, indeed, that it did not escape the
+observation of his friend. Colonel Grant rallied him, and asked him,
+jocularly, if he had ever seen a ghost.
+
+"I declare I could almost fancy that you saw some spectre at this
+moment, Inverawe," said he.
+
+"Where?--how?--what?" cried Inverawe, darting his eyes into every
+corner of the room, with a degree of perturbation which the Colonel
+had never seen him display before.
+
+"Nay," said the Colonel, surprised into sudden gravity, "I cannot say
+either where or what; but I must confess that you seem to me as much
+disturbed at present as if you saw a spectre."
+
+"I cannot see him here," said Inverawe, with an abstracted solemnity of
+tone and manner, that greatly increased his friend's astonishment--"I
+cannot see him here. This is not the place where I am fated to
+behold him."
+
+"Him!" exclaimed Colonel Grant, with growing anxiety--"him!--whom,
+I pray you? For heaven's sake, tell me whom it is that you are fated
+to behold!"
+
+"Pardon me," replied Inverawe, at length in some degree collecting his
+ideas, but speaking in a solemn tone. "An intense remembrance which
+came suddenly upon me, regarding strange circumstances which happened
+to myself, has betrayed me to talk of that which I would have rather
+avoided, and--and which cannot interest you, incredulous as you have
+declared yourself to be regarding all such supernatural visitations."
+
+"Nay, you will pardon me, if you please," said the Colonel, eagerly;
+"for you have so wonderfully excited my curiosity, that I must e'en
+entreat you to satisfy me. What were these circumstances that happened
+to you?--tell me, I conjure you."
+
+"It is with great pain," said Inverawe gravely, "that I enter upon
+them at all; for, although they still remain as fresh upon my mind as
+if they had happened yesterday, I would fain bury them, not only from
+all mankind, but from myself. And yet, perhaps, it may be as well that
+you should know them,--for strange as they are in themselves, they
+would yet be stranger in their fulfilment. Listen then attentively,
+and I shall tell you every thing, even to the very minutest thought
+that possessed me." And so he proceeded to narrate all that I have
+already told.
+
+"Strange!" said the Colonel, after devouring the narrative with
+breathless attention--"wonderfully strange indeed! But these are airy
+phantoms of the brain, which we must not--nay, cannot allow to weigh
+with us, or to dwell upon our minds--else might we be bereft of reason
+itself, by permitting them to get mastery over us, and so might we
+unwittingly aid them in working out their own accomplishment. Help
+yourself to another cup of wine, Inverawe, and then let us change
+the subject for something of a more cheerful nature."
+
+But all cheerfulness had fled from Inverawe for that night, and the
+friends soon afterwards separated, to seek a repose, which he at
+least in vain tried to court to his pillow for many hours; and when
+sleep did come at last, the figure of the murdered man floated to
+and fro in his dreams. But it did so, only the more to convince him
+of the wonderful difference between such faint visions of slumber,
+and that vivid spectral appearance, which had formerly so terribly and
+deeply impressed itself upon his waking senses, in his own bed-chamber
+at Inverawe.
+
+The conversation I have just repeated, together with Inverawe's
+narrative, remained strongly engraven upon the recollection of
+Colonel Grant. The whole circumstances adhered to him so powerfully,
+that he almost felt as if he too had seen the apparition, and heard
+him utter his fatal words. He could not divest himself of a most
+intense solicitude about his friend's future fate, which he could
+in no manner of way explain to his own rational satisfaction. But
+the active and bustling duties which now called for his attention,
+in consequence of the approaching campaign, very speedily banished
+all such thoughts from his mind.
+
+It was not long after this, that Colonel Grant was summoned by General
+Abercromby to meet the other commanding-officers of corps in a council
+of war. The council lasted for many hours, and when the Colonel came
+forth from it after it had broken up, he was observed to have a cloud
+upon his brow, and a certain air of serious anxiety about him, which
+was very much augmented by his meeting with his friend Inverawe.
+
+"Well," said Inverawe cheerfully to him, as Colonel Grant joined him
+and his other officers at mess. "I hope you have good news for us,
+Colonel, and that at last you can tell us that we are to march out
+of quarters on some piece of active service."
+
+"We are to march to-morrow," replied the Colonel, with unusual gravity.
+
+"Whither?" cried Inverawe eagerly. "Whither, if I may be permitted
+to ask?"
+
+"We march to Lake George," replied the Colonel, with a very manifest
+disposition to taciturnity.
+
+"Pardon me," said Inverawe; "perhaps I push my questions
+indiscreetly,--if so, forgive me."
+
+"No," replied the Colonel, with assumed carelessness. "I have nothing
+which the good of the service requires me to conceal from you,
+Inverawe, nor, indeed, from any one here present. We march for Lake
+George, as I have already said; and there we are to be embarked in
+boats to proceed up the lake. Our object," added he, in a deeper and
+somewhat melancholy tone,--"our object is to attack Fort Defiance."
+
+"What sort of a place is it?" demanded one of the officers.
+
+"A strong place, as I understand from the engineer who reconnoitred
+it," replied the Colonel. "But these American fastnesses are so beset
+with forests, that no one can well judge of them till he is fairly
+within their entrenchments."
+
+"Then let us pledge this cup to our speedy possession of
+them!" exclaimed Inverawe joyously.
+
+"With all my heart," said the Colonel, filling his to the brim,--but
+with a solemnity of countenance that sorted but ill with the cheerful
+shouts of mutual interchange of congratulation, that arose around
+the table. "With all my heart, I drink the toast, and may we all be
+there alive to drink a cup of thanks for our success."
+
+"Father," cried young Inverawe, in his keenness overlooking the
+Colonel's ominous addition to the toast; "now father, these Frenchmen
+shall see what stuff Highlanders are made of!"
+
+"They shall, my boy," replied Inverawe.--"Come, then, as I am master
+of the revels to-night, I call on you all to fill a brimmer.--I give
+you Highlanders shoulder to shoulder!"
+
+"Hurrah!--hurrah!--hurrah!" vociferated the whole officers present.
+
+This was but the commencement of an evening of more than usual
+jollity. The spirits of all were up,--and of all, none were so
+high in glee as those of Inverawe and his son. There was something,
+indeed, which might have been almost said to have been strangely wild
+in the unwonted revelry of the father. Colonel Grant was the only
+individual present, who did not seem to keep pace with the rest. The
+flask circulated with more than ordinary rapidity and frequency,--but
+as the mirth which it created rose higher and higher, and especially
+with Inverawe and young Donald, Colonel Grant's thoughts seemed to sink
+deeper and deeper into gloomy speculation. If any one chanced so far
+to forget his own hilarity for a moment, as to observe this strange
+anomaly in his commanding-officer, it is probable that he attributed
+it to those cares, which must necessarily arise in the mind of one,
+with whom so much of the responsibility of the approaching contest
+must rest. He retired from the festive board at an early hour, leaving
+the others, who kept up their night's enjoyment as long as they could
+do so with decency. Inverawe and his son sat with them to the last;
+and all agreed, at parting, that they had been the life and soul of
+that evening's revel.
+
+The next morning, the officers of the Highlanders were early astir,
+to get their men into order of march. Major Campbell of Inverawe was
+the most active man among them. General Abercromby's force upon this
+occasion consisted of about six thousand regulars, and nine thousand
+provincial troops, together with a small train of artillery. Before
+they moved off, the General rode along the line of troops, giving his
+directions to the field officers of each battalion in succession. When
+he came up to the Highlanders, he courteously accosted Colonel Grant
+and Major Campbell.
+
+"Gentlemen," said he, "we shall have toughish work of it; for though
+the enemy have not had time to complete their defences, yet, I am
+told, that, even in its present state, there are few places which
+are naturally likely to be of more troublesome entrance than we
+shall find----"
+
+"Than we shall find Fort Defiance," somewhat strangely interrupted
+Colonel Grant, with an emphasis which not a little surprised Inverawe,
+as coming from a man usually so polite.--"Aye, I have heard, indeed,
+that Fort Defiance is naturally a strong place, General. But what
+will not Highlanders accomplish!--You may rely on it you shall have
+no cause to complain of the Black Watch!"
+
+"I have no fear that I shall," replied the General, betraying
+no symptom of having taken offence at the Colonel's apparently
+unaccountable interruption. "I know that both you and your men will
+do your duty against Fort Defiance, or any other fort in America."
+
+"Fort Defiance is a bold name, General," said Major Campbell, laughing.
+
+"It is a bold name," said the Colonel gravely.
+
+"It is a vaunting name enough," replied the General.--"Yet I
+hope to meet you both alive and merry as conquerors within its
+works. Meanwhile, gentlemen, pray get your Highlanders under march
+for the boats with as little delay as possible."
+
+Not another word but the necessary words of command were now
+uttered. The regiment moved off steadily, and the embarkation on Lake
+George was speedily effected, with the most perfect regularity and
+order, on the 5th of July, 1758.
+
+It must have been a beautiful sight indeed, to have beheld that
+immense flotilla of boats moving over the pellucid surface of that
+lovely sheet of water--not a sound proceeding from them save that of
+the oars,--the unruffled bosom of the lake every where reflecting the
+serene sky of a July evening, together with all the charms of its bold
+and varied shores, and its romantic islands;--its stillness affording
+a strange prelude to that tempest of mortal contest which was about
+to ensue. Its breadth is about two miles--so that the boats nearly
+covered it from side to side. As they moved on, they were occasionally
+lost to the eyes of those who looked upon them from the shores, as they
+disappeared into the numerous channels formed by its islands, or were
+again discovered, as they emerged from these narrow straits. There were
+snatches of scenery, and many little circumstances in the features
+of nature around them, that called up the remembrance of their own
+Loch Awe to both the Laird of Inverawe and young Donald, as the sun
+went down; and the pensiveness arising from these home recollections,
+at such a time, kept both of them silent. At length, after a safe,
+and easy, and, on the part of the enemy, an unobserved navigation,
+the boats reached the northern end of the lake early on the ensuing
+morning; and the landing having been effected without opposition,
+the troops were formed by General Abercromby into two parallel columns.
+
+The order was given to advance; and the troops speedily came to an
+outpost of the enemy, which was abandoned without a shot. But as they
+proceeded, the nature of the ground, encumbered as it was with trees,
+rendered the march of both lines uncertain and wavering, so that the
+columns soon began to interfere with each other; and great confusion
+ensued. Whilst endeavouring to extend themselves, the right column,
+composed of the Highlanders, and the Fifty-fifth Regiment, under
+the command of Lord Howe, fell in with a detachment of the enemy,
+which had got bewildered in the wood, just as they themselves
+had done. The British attacked them briskly, and a sharp contest
+followed. The enemy behaved gallantly; and the Highlanders especially
+distinguished themselves. Young Donald of Inverawe, his bosom bounding
+with excitement, from the shouts of those engaged in the skirmish,
+rushed into the thickest part of the irregular melée, and performed
+such feats of prowess with his maiden claymore, that they might have
+done honour to an old and well-tried soldier. Excited yet more by
+his success, he became rash and unguarded, and being too forward in
+the pursuit among the trees--which had already broken the troops on
+both sides into small handfulls--he found himself suddenly engaged
+with three enemies at once. As he was just about to be overpowered
+by their united pressure upon him, a ball from a rifle stretched
+one of them lifeless before him, and in an instant afterwards, the
+Eagle Eye, whose accurate aim had directed it to its deadly errand,
+was flourishing his tomahawk over the head of another of his foes. It
+fell upon him--the skull was split open--the man rolled down on the
+ground a ghastly corpse; and the third, that was left opposed to young
+Inverawe, began to give way in terror before him. Urging fiercely upon
+this last foe, however, the youth ran him through with one tremendous
+thrust, and he too dropped dead.
+
+Flushed with success, Donald Campbell was now about to continue the
+pursuit, after some fugitives of the enemy, who came rushing past him,
+when, turning to call on his red brother and preserver, the Eagle Eye,
+to follow him, he beheld him stooping over one of his dead foes, in
+the act of scalping him. At that very moment, he saw a French soldier
+approaching his Indian brother unperceived, with sword uplifted, and
+with the fell intent of hewing him down. Springing before the Eagle
+Eye, the young Inverawe prepared himself to receive the meditated
+stroke--warded it skilfully off,--and then following in on his foe
+with a thrust, he penetrated him right through the breast, with
+a wound that was instantaneously mortal. The Eagle Eye was now as
+sensible that he owed his life to young Donald, as Donald could have
+been that his had been preserved by the Indian warrior. They stood
+for a moment gazing at each other,--and then they embraced, with
+an affection, which the stern Eagle Eye had difficulty in veiling,
+and which young Inverawe could not conceal.
+
+By this time the enemy were all cut to pieces, or put to flight. The
+joy of this unexpected victory was turned into mourning, by the death
+of Lord Howe, who had been unfortunately killed in the early part of
+this random engagement. His loss, at such a time, was greater than
+anything they had gained by this partial overthrow of the enemy. And
+you will easily understand this, when I tell you, that it was said of
+this young nobleman, that he particularly distinguished himself by his
+courage, activity, and rigid observance of military discipline; and
+that he had so acquired the esteem and affection of the soldiers, by
+his generosity, sweetness of manners, and engaging address, that they
+assembled in groups around the hurried grave to which his venerated
+remains were consigned, and wept over it in deep and silent grief.
+
+The troops having been much harassed by this engagement, as well
+as by the troublesome nature of their march, General Abercromby,
+in consideration of the lateness of the hour, deemed it prudent, to
+deliver them from the embarrassment of the woods, to march them back to
+the landing-place; which they reached early in the morning. They were
+then allowed the whole of the ensuing day and night for repose. But
+on the morning of the 8th of July, he rode up to the lines of the
+Highlanders, and saluting Colonel Grant and Major Campbell of Inverawe,
+
+"Gentlemen," said he, "I have just obtained information from some of
+the prisoners, that General Levi is advancing with three thousand men
+to reinforce, or succour,--a--a--a--to succour, I say,--the garrison
+I wish to attack."
+
+"What!" exclaimed Colonel Grant,--"to succour Fort Defiance,
+General? Then I presume you will move on directly, to strike the blow
+before they can arrive."
+
+"That is exactly my intention," replied General Abercromby. "And now
+I must tell you, confidentially, Gentlemen, that the present garrison
+consists of fully five thousand men, of whom the greater part are said
+to be French troops of the line; who, as I am informed, are stationed
+behind the traverses, with large trees lying every where felled in
+front of them. But I have sent forward an engineer to reconnoitre
+more strictly, and I trust I shall have his report before we shall
+have advanced as far as--as--"
+
+"As Fort Defiance," interrupted Colonel Grant. "Well, General, are
+we to be in the advance?"
+
+"No," replied the General. "As you and the Fifty-fifth have had all
+the fighting that has as yet fallen to our lot, I mean that you shall
+be in the reserve upon this occasion. The picquets will commence the
+assault, and they will be followed by the grenadiers,--which will be
+in their turn supported by the battalions of the reserve.--Nay, do
+not look mortified, Colonel;--you and your men will have a bellyfull
+of it before all is done, I promise you."
+
+With these words the General left them, and the columns moved
+on through the wood, in the order he had signified to them. They
+had now possessed themselves of better guides, and they were thus
+enabled to make their march more direct, and as they had already
+cleared their front of enemies, the leading troops were soon up at the
+entrenchments. Here they were surprised to find a regular breast work,
+nine or ten feet high, strongly defended with wall-pieces, and having
+a very impregnable chevaux de frise, whilst the whole ground in front
+was every where strewed thickly over with huge newly felled oak trees,
+for the distance of about a cannon-shot from the walls. From behind
+the chevaux de frise, the enemy, in strong force, commenced a most
+galling and destructive fire upon the assailants, so as to render the
+works almost unapproachable, without certain destruction, especially
+without the artillery, which, from some accident, had not as yet
+been brought up. But the very danger they had to encounter seemed
+to give the British troops a more than human courage. Regardless of
+the hail-storm of bullets discharged on them, with deliberate aim,
+from behind the abattis, whilst they were fighting their laborious
+and painful way through the labyrinth of fallen trunks and branches
+that opposed their passage, they continued, column after column,
+to advance, dropping and thinning fearfully as they went.
+
+The Highlanders beheld this slaughter that the enemy was making of
+their friends--their blood boiled within them. In vain Colonel Grant
+and Major Campbell galloped backwards and forwards, along the line,
+using every command and every argument that official authority or
+reason could employ to restrain and to sooth them, till their time for
+action should arrive. With one tremendous shout, they rushed forward
+from the reserve, and cutting their way through the trees with their
+claymores, they were soon shewing their plumed crests among the very
+foremost ranks of the assailants. But so murderous was the fire that
+fell upon them, that their black tufted bonnets were seen dropping in
+all directions, never to be again raised by the brave heads that bore
+them. Their loss, before they gained the outward defences of the fort,
+was fearful; but the onset of those who survived was so overwhelming,
+that it drove the enemy from these outworks, and compelled them to
+retreat within the body of the fort itself.
+
+Now came the most dreadful part of this work of death. The garrison,
+protected by the works of the fort, mowed down the ranks of the
+besiegers with a yet more certain and unerring aim. Under the false
+report that these works were as yet incomplete, scaling ladders had
+been considered as unnecessary. The Highlanders, gnashing their teeth
+like raging tigers caught in the toils, endeavoured to clamber up
+the front of them, by rearing themselves on each other's shoulders,
+and by digging holes with their swords and bayonets in the face of the
+intrenchments. Some few succeeded, by such means, in gaining a footing
+on the top. But it was only to make themselves more conspicuous, and
+more certain marks for destruction; and they were no sooner seen, than
+their lifeless bodies, perforated by showers of bullets, were swept
+down upon their struggling comrades below. By repeated and multiplied
+exertions of this kind, Captain John Campbell succeeded in forcing
+his way entirely over the breastwork, at the head of a handful of men;
+but they also were instantly despatched by the multitude of bayonets by
+which they were assailed. Four hours did these gallant men persevere
+in the repetition of such daring attempts as I have described--all,
+alas! with equal want of success, and with increasing slaughter, till
+General Abercromby ordered the retreat to be sounded. To this call,
+however, the Highlanders were deaf; and it was not until Colonel Grant,
+after receiving three successive orders from the General, which he had
+failed in enforcing, threw himself among them, and literally drove
+them back from the works with his sword, that he could collect and
+bring away the small moiety that yet remained alive, of that splendid
+regiment with which he had marched to the attack. More than one-half
+of the men, and two-thirds of the officers, were lying killed or
+wounded on that bloody field.
+
+Colonel Grant had hardly gathered this remnant of his men together,
+when he hastened back over the ground where the contest had raged,
+to search eagerly for some of those whom he most dearly loved, and
+for the cause of whose absence from this hasty muster he trembled
+to inquire or investigate. The enemy, though victorious, had been
+too roughly handled to be tempted to a sally, for the mere purpose of
+annoying those who were peacefully engaged in the sad duty of carrying
+off their wounded or dying comrades. The Colonel was therefore enabled
+to make his way over the encumbered field without molestation, and
+with no other interruption than that which was presented to him by
+the prostrate trees, which, however, seemed to him to offer greater
+obstruction to his present impatience, than they had done during
+his advance with his corps to the attack. The scene was strangely
+terrible! It might have been imagined by any one who looked upon
+that field, that all Nature, even the elements themselves, had been
+at strife. Slaughtered, and mutilated, and dying men lay in confused
+heaps, or scattered singly among the overthrown giants of the forest,
+those enormous trees which had been so recently rooted in the primeval
+soil, where they had stood for ages. Colonel Grant looked everywhere
+anxiously around him. Many were the familiar faces that he recognized,
+but their features were now so fixed by the last agonizing pang of
+a violent death, as cruelly, yet certainly, to assure him, that they
+could never again in this world recognize him. The last spirited words
+of high and courageous hope, so recently uttered by many of them to
+him in their anticipation of triumph, still rang in his recollection,
+and as he tore his eyes away from them, the tears would burst over his
+manly cheeks as the thought arose in his mind, that words of theirs
+would never again reach his ears. He moved hurriedly on, endeavouring
+to suppress his feelings, but every now and then compelled to give way
+to them, till his attention was absorbingly attracted by descrying
+the dark form of an Indian, who was seated on his hams, beneath the
+arched trunk and boughs of a huge felled oak. It was the Eagle Eye.
+
+He sat motionless as a bronze statue, with the drapery of his blanket,
+hanging in deep folds from his shoulders. His features were grave
+and still, and apparently devoid of feeling; but his eyes were
+turned downward, and they were immovably fixed on the countenance
+of a young man, who lay stretched out a corpse before him. His head
+was supported between the knees of the red man, whilst the cold and
+stiffened fingers of him who was dead, were firmly clasped between
+both his hands. The body was that of young Donald Campbell of Inverawe.
+
+"God help me!" cried the Colonel, clasping his hands, and weeping
+bitterly. "God help me, what a spectacle!"
+
+"Why should you weep, old man?" said the Eagle Eye, with imperturbable
+calmness. "My young brother has gone to the Great Spirit, like a great
+warrior as he was. Who among his tribe shall be ashamed of him? Who
+among warriors shall call him a woman? I could weep for him too,
+did I not know that the Great Spirit has taken him to happiness,
+from which it were wicked in me to wish to have detained him for my
+own miserable gratification. But he is happy! He has gone to those
+fair, boundless, and plentiful hunting-grounds that lie beyond the
+great lake, where he will never know want, and where we, if our deeds
+be like his, will surely follow him. But till then, the sunshine of
+the Eagle Eye has departed, and night must surround his footsteps,
+since the light of his pale-faced brother has departed!"
+
+"This is too much!" said the Colonel, quite overwhelmed by his
+feelings. "Help him to bear off the body. It must not be left here."
+
+The Eagle Eye arose in silence, and gravely and solemnly assisted
+the Highlander, who attended the Colonel, to lift and bear away
+the body, and they had not thus proceeded more than a few paces in
+their retreat from the works, when the weeping eyes of the Highland
+commanding-officer, and the eagle gaze of the red warrior, were equally
+arrested, at the same moment, by one and the same object. This was
+the manly and heroic form of Major Campbell of Inverawe. He sat on the
+ground, desperately wounded, with his back partially supported against
+the body of his horse, which had been killed under him. His eye-balls
+were stretched from their sockets, and fixed upon vacancy, with an
+expression of terror, greater than that with which death himself,
+riding triumphant as he was over that field of the slain, could have
+filled those of so brave a man. Colonel Grant was so overcome, that
+he could not utter a word. He was convulsed by his emotions. The
+Eagle Eye laid down the body of Donald opposite to his father, and
+silently resumed his former position, with the youth's head between
+his knees. The father's eyes caught the motionless features of his son,
+and he started from his strange state of abstraction.
+
+"My son!" murmured the wounded Inverawe. "So, it is as I supposed,--he
+is gone! But I shall soon be with you, boy. God in his mercy help
+and protect your poor mother!"
+
+"Speak not thus, my dearest friend!" said Colonel Grant, making an
+effort to command himself, and hastening to support and comfort the
+wounded man; "trust me you will yet do well. You must live for your
+poor wife's sake."
+
+"No!" replied Inverawe, with deep solemnity. "My hour is come. In vain
+was it that your kind friendship, and that of the brave Abercromby,
+succeeded in deceiving me,--for I have seen him--I have seen him
+terribly,--and this is Ticonderoga!"
+
+"Pardon me, my dear Inverawe, for a deception which was so well
+intended," said the Colonel, much agitated. "It is indeed Ticonderoga
+as you say, but--but--believe me,--that which now disturbs you was
+only some phantom of your brain, arising from loss of blood and
+weakness. Cheer up!--Come, man!--Come!--Inverawe!--Merciful Heaven,
+he is gone!"
+
+
+
+                          END OF VOLUME THIRD.
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+NOTES
+
+[1] A Scottish farmer's house and offices.
+
+[2] Plaid.
+
+[3] Remove.
+
+[4] Ancestors.
+
+[5] Innermost.
+
+
+
+
+
+
+End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Legendary Tales of the Highlands
+(Volume 3 of 3), by Thomas Dick Lauder
+
+*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 59202 ***