Chapter II: Part 2

At sight of our heroine, most of these gallants stood still in admiration, and one of them, with the trained assurance of a rake, observing her to be beautiful, a stranger, and not too well protected, accosted her in a strain of language which caused her at once to blush and tremble. Richard’s brow reddened with anger, as he hesitated not a moment in stepping up and telling the offender to leave the lady alone, on pain of certain consequences which might not prove agreeable. “And who are you, my brave fellow?” said the youth, with bold assurance. “Sirrah!” exclaimed Richard, so indignant as to forget himself, “I am that lady’s husband—her servant, I mean;” and here he stopped short in some confusion. “Admirable!” exclaimed the other. “Ha! ha! ha! ha! Here, Sirs, is a lady lacquey, who does not know whether he is his mistress’s servant or her husband. Let us give him up to the town-guard to see whether the black-hole will make him remember the real state of the case.” So saying, he attempted to push Richard aside, and take hold of the lady. But he had not time to touch her garments with so much as a finger, before her protector had a rapier flourishing in his eyes, and threatened him with instant death, unless he desisted from his profane purpose. At sight of the bright steel, he stepped back one or two paces, drew his own sword, and was preparing to fight, when one of his more grave associates called out, “For shame, Rollo!—with a lady’s lacquey, too, and in the presence of the duke and duchess! I see their royal highnesses, already alarmed, are inquiring the cause of the disturbance.” It was even as this gentleman said, and presently came up to the scene of contention some of the most distinguished personages in the crowd, one of whom demanded from the parties an explanation of so disgraceful an occurrence. “Why, here is a fellow, my lord,” answered Rollo, “who says he is the husband of a lady whom he attends as a livery-man, and a lady, too, the bonniest, I dare say, that has been seen in Scotland since the days of Queen Magdalen!” “And what matters it to you,” said the inquirer, who seemed to be a Judge of the Session, “in what relation this man stands to his lady? Let the parties both come forward, and tell their ain tale. May it please your royal highness,” he continued, addressing a very grave dignitary who sat on horseback behind him, as stiff and formal as a sign-post, “to hear the _declaratur_ of thir twa strange incomers. But see—see—what is the matter with Lord Wigton?” he added, pointing to an aged personage on horseback, who had just pushed forward, and seemed about to faint, and fall from his horse. The person alluded to, at sight of his daughter in this unexpected place, was in reality confounded, and it was some time before he mastered voice enough to ejaculate, “O, Jean, Jean! what’s this ye’ve been about? or what has brocht you to Edinburgh?” “And Lord have a care o’ us!” exclaimed at this juncture another venerable peer, who had just come up, “what has brocht my sonsie son, Ritchie Livingstone, to Edinburgh, when he should have been fechtin’ the Dutch by this time in Pennsylvania?” The two lovers, thus recognised by their respective parents, stood with downcast looks, and perfectly silent, while all was buzz and confusion in the brilliant circle around them; for the parties concerned were not more surprised at the aspect of their affairs, than were all the rest at the beauty of the far-famed but hitherto unseen Lady Jean Fleming. The Earl of Linlithgow, Richard’s father, was the first to speak aloud, after the general astonishment had for some time subsided; and this he did in a laconic though important query, which he couched in the simple words, “Are you married, bairns?” “Yes, dearest father,” said his son, gathering courage, and coming close up to his saddle-bow; “and I beseech you to extricate Lady Jean and me from this crowd, and I shall tell you all when we are alone.” “A pretty man ye are, truly,” said the old man, who never took any thing very seriously to heart, “to be staying at hame, and getting yourself married, all the time you should have been abroad, winning honour and wealth, as your gallant grand-uncle did wi’ Gustavus i’ the thretties! Hooever, since better mayna be, I maun try and console my Lord Wigton, who, I doot, has the worst o’ the bargain, ye ne’er-do-weel!” He then went up to Lady Jean’s father, shook him by the hand, and said, “that though they had been made relations against their wills, he hoped they would continue good friends. The young people,” he observed, “are no that ill matched; and it is not the first time that the Flemings and the Livingstones have melled together, as witness the blithe marriage of the Queen’s Marie to Lord Fleming, in the feifteen saxty-five. At any rate, my lord, let us put a good face on the matter, afore they glowering gentles and whipper-snapper duchesses. I’ll get horses for the two, and they’ll join the ridin’ down the street; and deil hae me if Lady Jean disna outshine them, the hale o’ them!” “My Lord Linlithgow,” responded the graver and more implacable Earl of Wigton, “it may set you to take this matter blithely; but, let me tell you, it’s a muckle mair serious affair for me. What think ye am I to do wi’ Kate and Grizzy noo?” “Hoot, toot, my lord,” said Linlithgow, with a sly smile, “their chance is as gude as ever it was, I assure you, and sae will every body think that kens them. I _maun_ ca’ horses though, or the young folk will be ridden ower, afore ever they do mair gude, by thae rampaugin’ young men.” So saying, and taking Lord Wigton’s moody silence for assent, he proceeded to cry to his servants for the best pair of horses they could get; and these being speedily procured, Lord Richard and his bride were requested to mount; after which, they were formally introduced to the gracious notice of the Duke and Duchess of York, and the Princess Anne, who happened to attend Parliament on this the last day of its session, when it was customary for all the members to ride both to and from the house in an orderly cavalcade. The order was now given to proceed, and the lovers were soon relieved, in a great measure, from the embarrassing notice of the crowd, by assuming a particular place in the procession, and finding themselves confounded with more than three hundred equally splendid figures. As the pageant, however, moved down the High Street, in a continuous and open line, it was impossible not to distinguish the singular loveliness of Lady Jean, and the gallant carriage of her husband, from all the rest. Accordingly, the very trained bands and city-guard, who lined the street, and who were, in general, quite as insensible to the splendours of _the Riding_, as are the musicians in a modern orchestra to the wonders of a melo-drama in its fortieth night—even _they_ perceived and admired the graces of the young couple, whom they could not help gazing after with a stupid and lingering delight. From the windows, too, and the _stair-heads_, their beauty was well observed, and amply conjectured and commented on; while many a young cavalier endeavoured, by all sorts of pretences, to find occasion to break the order of the cavalcade, and get himself haply placed nearer to the exquisite figure of which he had got just one killing glance in the square. Slowly and majestically the brilliant train paced down the great street of Edinburgh, the acclamations of the multitude ceaselessly expressing the delight which the people of Scotland felt in this sensible type and emblem of their ancient independence. At length they reached the court-yard of Holyrood-house, where the duke and duchess invited the whole assemblage to a ball, which they designed to give that evening in the hall of the palace; after which, all departed to their respective residences throughout the town, Lords Wigton and Linlithgow taking their young friends under their immediate protection, and seeking the residence of the former nobleman, a little way up the Canongate. In riding thither, the lovers had leisure to explain to their parents the singular circumstances of their union, and address enough to obtain unqualified forgiveness for their imprudence. On alighting at Lord Wigton’s house, Lady Jean found her sisters confined to their rooms with headaches, or some such serious indisposition, and in the utmost dejection on account of having been thereby withheld from the riding of the Parliament. Their spirits, as may be supposed, were not much elevated, when, on coming forth in dishabille to welcome their sister, they found she had had the good fortune to be married before them. Their ill luck was, however, irremediable; and so, making a merit of submitting to it, they condescended to be rather agreeable during the dinner and the afternoon. It was not long before all parties were perfectly reconciled to what had taken place; and by the time it was necessary to dress for the ball, the elder young ladies declared themselves so much recovered as to be able to accompany their happy sister. The Earl of Linlithgow and his son then sent a servant for proper dresses, and prepared themselves for the occasion without leaving the house. When all were ready, a number of chairs were called to transport their dainty persons down the street. The news of Lady Jean’s arrival, and of her marriage, having now spread abroad, the court in front of the house, the alley, and even the open street, were crowded with people of all ranks, anxious to catch a passing glimpse of the heroine of so strange a tale. As her chair was carried along, a buzz of admiration from all who were so happy as to be near it, marked its progress. Happy, too, was the gentleman who had the good luck to be near her chair as it was set down at the palace gate, and assist her in stepping from it upon the lighted pavement. From the outer gate, along the piazza of the inner court, and all the way up the broad staircase to the illuminated hall, two rows of noblemen and gentlemen formed a brilliant avenue as she passed along, while a hundred plumed caps were doffed in honour of so much beauty, and as many youthful eyes glanced bright with satisfaction at beholding it. The object of all this attention tripped modestly along in the hand of the Earl of Linlithgow, acknowledging, with many a graceful flexure and undulation of person, the compliments of the spectators. At length the company entered the spacious and splendid room in which the ball was to be held. At the extremity opposite to the entry, upon an elevated platform, sat the three royal personages, all of whom, on Lady Jean’s introduction, rose and came forward to welcome her and her husband to the entertainments of Holyrood, and to hope that her ladyship would often adorn their circle. In a short time the dancing commenced; and amidst all the ladies who exhibited their charms and their magnificent attire in that captivating exercise, who was, either in person or dress, half so brilliant as Lady Jean?

FALLACIES OF THE YOUNG.

“FATHERS HAVE FLINTY HEARTS.”

I only quote this popular expression from a very popular play, in order to warn my juvenile friends against being too much impressed by it. It is a fatal error running through nearly the whole mass of our fictitious literature, that parents are represented as invariably adverse, through their own cruel and selfish views, to the inclinations of their children: either the glowing ambition and high spirit of the boy is repressed by the cold calculations of his father, who wishes him to become a mere creature of the counting-room and shop like himself; or the romantic attachment of the girl to some elegant Orlando, procures her a confinement to her chamber, with no other alternative than that of marrying a detestable suitor, whom her father prefers to all others on account of his wealth. Then, the boy always runs away from his father’s house, and, by following his own inclinations, acquires fortune and fame; while the girl as invariably leaps a three-pair-of-stairs window, and is happy for life with the man of her choice. The same dangerous system pervades the stage, where, I am sorry to remark, every vicious habit of society, and every impropriety in manners and speech, is always sure to be latest abandoned.

I warn my juvenile readers most emphatically against the fallacy and delusion which prevails upon this subject. Fathers, as a class, have not flinty hearts, nor is it their wish or interest, in general, to impose a cruel restraint upon their children. Young people would do well to examine the circumstances in which they stand in regard to their parents and guardians, before believing in the reality of that schism which popular literature would represent as invariably existing between their own class and that of their natural protectors. The greater part, I am sure, of my young friends, must have observed, that, so long as they can remember, they have been indebted for every comfort, and for a thousand acts of kindness and marks of affection, to those endeared beings—_their father and mother_. The very dawning light of existence must have found them in the enjoyment of many blessings procured to them solely by those two individuals. From them must have been derived the food they ate, the bed they lay on, the learning at school which enabled their minds to appreciate all the transactions and all the wisdom of past times, and, greatest blessing of all, the habits of devotional exercise which admitted them to commune with their almighty Creator. Surely it is not to be supposed that, at a certain time, the kindness and friendship of these two amiable persons is all at once converted into a malignant contrariety to the interests of their children. Is it not far more likely, my dear young friends, that they continue, as ever, to be your well-wishers and benefactors: and that the opposition which they seem to set up so ungraciously against your inclinations, is only caused by their sense of the dangers which threaten you in the event of your being indulged? It may appear to you that no such danger exists: that your parents are actuated by narrower and meaner views than your own, or that they do not allow for the feelings of youth. But they are in reality deeply concerned for the difference of _your_ feelings from _theirs_; they sympathise with them in secret, from a recollection of what were their own at your period of life; but know, from that very experience of your feelings, and of their result, that it is not good for you that they should be indulged. You are, then, called upon—and I do so now in the name of your best feelings, and as you would wish for present or future happiness—to trust in the reality of that parental tenderness which has never, heretofore, known interruption, and in the superiority of that wisdom with which years and acquaintance with the world have invested your parents.

Perhaps, my young friends, you may have perceived, even in the midst of your childish frolics and careless happiness, that your parents were obliged to deny themselves many indulgences, and toil hard in their respective duties, in order to obtain for you the comforts which you enjoy. You may have perceived that your father, after he had returned home from his daily employment, could hardly be prevailed upon to enter, as you wished, into your sports, or to assist you with your lessons, but would sit, in silent and abstracted reflection, with a deep shade of care upon his brow. On these occasions, perhaps, your amiable and kind protector is considering how difficult it is, even with all his industry, and all his denial of indulgences to himself, to procure for you an exemption from that wretchedness in which you see thousands of other children every day involved. But though many are the cares which your parents experience, in the duty of rearing you to manhood, there is none so severe or so acute as that which comes upon them at the period of your entering into life. Heretofore, you were simple little children, with hardly a thought beyond the family scene in which you have enjoyed so many comforts. Heretofore, with the exception of occasional rebukes from your parents, and trifling quarrels with your brothers and sisters, you have all been one family of love, eating at the same board, kneeling in one common prayer, loving one another, as the dearest of all friends. But now the scene becomes very different. You begin to feel, within yourselves, separate interests, and each thinks himself best qualified to judge for himself. At that moment, my young friends, the anxiety of your parents is a thousand times greater than it ever was before. Your father, probably, is a man of formed habits and character; he occupies a certain respectable station in the world; he has all his life been governed by certain principles, which he found to be conducive to his comfort and dignity. But though he has been able to conduct himself through the world in this satisfactory manner, he is sensible, from the various and perhaps altogether opposite characters which nature has implanted in you, that you may go far wide of what have been his favourite objects, and perhaps be the means of impairing that respectability which he, as a single individual, has hitherto maintained. It is often observed in life, that children who have been reared by poor but virtuous parents, as if their minds had received in youth a horror for every attribute of poverty, exert themselves with such vigorous and consistent fortitude, as to end with fortune and dignity; while the children, perhaps, of these individuals, being brought up without the same acquaintance with want and hardship, are slothful through life, and soon bring back the family to its original condition. If you then have been reared in easy circumstances, you may believe what I now tell you, that your approach to manhood or womanhood will produce a degree of anxiety in the breasts of your parents, such as would, if you knew it, make your very heart bleed for their distress, and cause you to appear as monsters to yourselves if you were to act in any great degree differently from what they wished.

How much, then, is it your duty, my young friends, to treat the advices and wishes of your parents, at this period of life, with respect, knowing, as you do, that the future happiness of those dear and kind beings depends almost solely upon your conducting yourselves properly in your first steps into life! Should you be so unfortunate as to be beguiled into bad company, or to contract a disposition to indulgences which are the very bane of existence, and the ruin of reputation, what must be the agony of those individuals who have hitherto loved and cherished you, and indulged, perhaps, in very different anticipations! On the contrary, should you yield respect, as far as it is in your nature, to the maxims which your father has endeavoured to impress, with what delight does he look forward to your future success—with what happy confidence does he rely upon your virtuous principles! And may there be no happiness to _you_, in contemplating the happiness which you have given to _him_? Yes, much, I am sure, and of a purer kind than almost any which earthly things can confer upon you here below.

I have one word to add, and it is addressed to the female part of my juvenile readers. Exactly as parents feel a concern for the first appearance of their sons in the business of life, so do they experience many anxious and fearful thoughts respecting the disposal of their daughters in matrimony. Wedded life, I may inform them, is not the simple matter which it appears prospectively in early and single life. As it involves many serious duties and responsibilities, it must be entered upon with a due regard to the means—above all things, the pecuniary means—of discharging these in a style of respectability, such as may be sufficient to support the dignity of the various connexions of the parties. It is, therefore, necessary that no person of tender years (this is most frequently the lot of the female) should contract the obligations of matrimony, without, if possible, the entire sanction of parents or other protectors. The people of this country happen to entertain, upon this subject, notions of not so strict a kind as are prevalent in most other nations. In almost all continental and all eastern countries, the female is reared by her friends as the destined bride of a particular individual, and till her marriage she is allowed no opportunity of bestowing her affections upon any other. The custom is so ancient and so invariable, that it is submitted to without any feeling of hardship; and as prudence is the governing principle of the relations, the matches are generally as happy as if they were more free. Perhaps such a custom is inapplicable to this country, on account of our different system of domestic life; but I may instance it, to prove to my fair young readers, that the control of parents over their choice of a husband ought to be looked upon as a more tolerable and advantageous thing, than their inclinations might be disposed to allow, or our popular literature represents it to be.

BRUNTFIELD,

A TALE OF THE SIXTEENTH CENTURY.

The war carried on in Scotland, by the friends and enemies of Queen Mary, after her departure into England, was productive of an almost complete dissolution of order, and laid the foundation of many feuds which were kept up by private families and individuals long after all political cause of hostility had ceased. Among the most remarkable quarrels which history or tradition has recorded as arising out of that civil broil, I know of none so deeply cherished, or accompanied by so many romantic and peculiar circumstances, as one which took place between two old families of gentry in the neighbourhood of Edinburgh. Stephen Bruntfield, laird of Craighouse, had been a zealous and disinterested partisan of the queen. Robert Moubray of Barnbougle was the friend successively of Murray and Morton, and distinguished himself very highly in their cause. During the year 1572, when Edinburgh castle was maintained by Kirkaldy of Grange in behalf of the queen, Stephen Bruntfield held out Craighouse in the same interest, and suffered a siege from a detachment of the forces of the regent, commanded by the laird of Barnbougle. This latter baron, a man of fierce and brutal nature, entered life as a younger brother, and at an early period chose to cast his fate among the Protestant leaders, with a view of improving his fortunes. The death of his elder brother in rebellion at Langside, enabled the Regent Murray to reward his services with a grant of the patrimonial estate, of which he did not scruple to take possession by the strong hand, to the exclusion of his infant niece, the daughter of the late proprietor. Some incidents which occurred in the course of the war had inspired a mutual hatred of the most intense character into the breasts of Bruntfield and Moubray; and it was therefore with a feeling of strong personal animosity, as well as of political rancour, that the latter undertook the task of watching the motions of Bruntfield at Craighouse. Bruntfield, after holding out for many months, was obliged, along with his friends in Edinburgh castle, to yield to the party of the regent. Like Kirkaldy and Maitland of Lethington, he surrendered upon a promise of life and estate; but while his two friends perished, one by the hand of the executioner, the other by his own hand, he fell a victim to the sateless spite of his personal enemy, who, in conducting him to Edinburgh as a prisoner, took fire at some bitter expression on the part of the captive, and smote him dead upon the spot.

Bruntfield left a widow and three infant sons. The lady of Craighouse had been an intimate of the unfortunate Mary from her early years; was educated with her in France, in the Catholic faith; and had left her court to become the wife of Bruntfield. It was a time calculated to change the natures of women, as well as of men. The severity with which her religion was treated in Scotland, the wrongs of her royal mistress, and finally the sufferings and death of her husband, acting upon a mind naturally enthusiastic, all conspired to alter the character of Marie Carmichael, and substitute for the rosy hues of her early years, the gloom of the sepulchre and the penitentiary. She continued, after the restoration of peace, to reside in the house of her late husband; but though it was within two miles of the city, she did not for many years re-appear in public. With no society but that of her children, and the persons necessary to attend upon them, she mourned in secret over past events, seldom stirring from a particular apartment, which, in accordance with a fashion by no means uncommon, she had caused to be hung with black, and which was solely illuminated by a lamp. In the most rigorous observances of her faith, she was assisted by a priest, whose occasional visits formed almost the only intercourse which she maintained with the external world. One strong passion gradually acquired a complete sway over her mind—REVENGE—a passion which the practice of the age had invested with a conventional respectability, and which no kind of religious feeling, then known, was able either to check or soften. So entirely was she absorbed by this fatal passion, that her very children, at length, ceased to have interest or merit in her eyes, except in so far as they appeared likely to be the means of gratifying it. One after another, as they reached the age of fourteen, she sent them to France, in order to be educated; but the accomplishment to which they were enjoined to direct their principal attention was that of martial exercises. The eldest, Stephen, returned, at eighteen, a strong and active youth, with a mind of little polish or literary information, but considered a perfect adept at sword-play. As his mother surveyed his noble form, a smile stole into the desert of her wan and widowed face, as a winter sunbeam wanders over a waste of snows. But it was a smile of more than motherly pride: she was estimating the power which that frame would have in contending with the murderous Moubray. She was not alone pleased with the handsome figure of her first-born child; but she thought with a fiercer and faster joy upon the appearance which it would make in the single combat against the slayer of his father. Young Bruntfield, who, having been from his earliest years trained to the purpose now contemplated by his mother, rejoiced in the prospect, now lost no time in preferring before the king a charge of murder against the laird of Barnbougle, whom he at the same time challenged, according to a custom then not altogether abrogated, to prove his innocence in single combat. The king having granted the necessary licence, the fight took place in the royal park, near the palace; and, to the surprise of all assembled, young Bruntfield fell under the powerful sword of his adversary. The intelligence was communicated to his mother at Craighouse, where she was found in her darkened chamber, prostrate before an image of the Virgin. The priest who had been commissioned to break the news, opened his discourse in a tone intended to prepare her for the worst; but she cut him short at the very beginning with a frantic exclamation—“I know what you would tell—the murderer’s sword has prevailed, and there are now but two instead of three, to redress their father’s wrongs!” The melancholy incident, after the first burst of feeling, seemed only to have concentrated and increased that passion by which she had been engrossed for so many years. She appeared to feel that the death of her eldest son only formed an addition to that debt which it was the sole object of her existence to see discharged. “Roger,” she said, “will have the death of his brother, as well as that of his father, to avenge. Animated by such a double object, his arm can hardly fail to be successful.”

Roger returned about two years after, a still handsomer, more athletic, and more accomplished youth than his brother. Instead of being daunted by the fate of Stephen, he burned but the more eagerly to wipe out the injuries of his house with the blood of Moubray. On his application for a licence being presented to the court, it was objected by the crown lawyers, that the case had been already closed by _mal fortune_ of the former challenger. But while this was the subject of their deliberation, the applicant caused so much annoyance and fear in the court circle, by the threats which he gave out against the enemy of his house, that the king, whose inability to procure respect either for himself or for the law is well known, thought it best to decide in favour of his claim. Roger Bruntfield, therefore, was permitted to fight in barras with Moubray; but the same fortune attended him as that which had already deprived the widow of her first child. Slipping his foot in the midst of the combat, he reeled to the ground, embarrassed by his cumbrous armour. Moubray, according to the barbarous practice of the age, immediately sprang upon and despatched him. “Heaven’s will be done!” said the widow, when she heard of the fatal incident; “but _gratias Deo!_ there still remains another chance.”

Henry Bruntfield, the third and last surviving son, had all along been the favourite of his mother. Though apparently cast in a softer mould than his two elder brothers, and bearing all the marks of a gentler and more amiable disposition, he in reality cherished the hope of avenging his father’s death more deeply in the recesses of his heart, and longed more ardently to accomplish that deed than any of his brothers. His mind, naturally susceptible of the softest and tenderest impressions, had contracted the enthusiasm of his mother’s wish in its strongest shape; as the fairest garments are capable of the deepest stain. The intelligence, which reached him in France, of the death of his brothers, instead of bringing to his heart the alarm and horror which might have been expected, only braced him to the adventure which he now knew to be before him. From this period, he forsook the elegant learning which he had heretofore delighted to cultivate. His nights were spent in poring over the memoirs of distinguished knights—his days were consumed in the tilt-yard of the sword-player. In due time he entered the French army, in order to add to mere science that practical hardihood, the want of which he conceived to be the cause of the death of his brothers. Though the sun of chivalry was now declining far in the occident, it was not yet altogether set: Montmorency was but just dead; Bayard was still alive—Bayard, the knight of all others who has merited the motto, “_sans peur et sans reproche_.” Of the lives and actions of such men, Henry Bruntfield was a devout admirer and imitator. No young knight kept a firmer seat upon his horse—none complained less of the severities of campaigning—none cherished lady’s love with a fonder, purer, or more devout sensation. On first being introduced at the court of Henry the Third, he had signalised, as a matter of course, Catherine Moubray, the disinherited niece of his father’s murderer, who had been educated in a French convent by her other relatives, and was now provided for in the household of the queen. The connection of this young lady with the tale of his own family, and the circumstance of her being a sufferer in common with himself by the wickedness of one individual, would have been enough to create a deep interest respecting her in his breast. But when, in addition to these circumstances, we consider that she was beautiful, was highly accomplished, and, in many other respects, qualified to engage his affections, we can scarcely be surprised that _that_ was the result of their acquaintance. Upon one point alone did these two interesting persons ever think differently. Catherine, though inspired by her friends from infancy with an entire hatred of her cruel relative, contemplated, with fear and aversion, the prospect of her lover being placed against him in deadly combat, and did all in her power to dissuade him from his purpose. Love, however, was of little avail against the still more deeply-rooted passion which had previously occupied his breast. Flowers thrown upon a river might have been as effectual in staying its course towards the cataract, as the gentle entreaties of Catherine Moubray in withholding Henry Bruntfield from the enterprise for which his mother had reared him—for which his brothers had died—for which he had all along moved and breathed.

At length, accomplished with all the skill which could then be acquired in arms, glowing with all the earnest feelings of youth, Henry returned to Scotland. On reaching his mother’s dwelling, she clasped him, in a transport of varied feeling, to her breast, and for a long time could only gaze upon his elegant person. “My last and dearest,” she at length said, “and thou too are to be adventured upon this perilous course! Much have I bethought me of the purpose which now remains to be accomplished. I have not been without a sense of dread lest I be only doing that which is to sink my soul in flames at the day of reckoning; but yet there has been that which comforts me also. Only yesternight I dreamed that your father appeared before me. In his hand he held a bow and three goodly shafts—at a distance appeared the fierce and sanguinary Moubray. He desired me to shoot the arrows at that arch traitor, and I gladly obeyed. A first and a second he caught in his hand, broke, and trampled on with contempt. But the third shaft, which was the fairest and goodliest of all, pierced his guilty bosom, and he immediately expired. The revered shade at this gave me an encouraging smile, and withdrew. My Henry, thou art that _third arrow_, which is at length to avail against the shedder of our blood. The dream seems a revelation, given especially that I may have comfort in this enterprise, otherwise so revolting to a mother’s feelings.”

Young Bruntfield saw that his mother’s wishes had only imposed upon her reason; but he made no attempt to break the charm by which she was actuated, being glad, upon any terms, to obtain her sanction for that adventure to which he was himself impelled by feelings considerably different. He therefore began, in the most deliberate manner, to take measures for bringing on the combat with Moubray. The same legal objections which had stood against the second duel were maintained against the third; but public feeling was too favourable to the object to be easily withstood. The laird of Barnbougle, though somewhat past the bloom of life, was still a powerful and active man, and, instead of expressing any fear to meet this third and more redoubted warrior, rather longed for a combat which promised, if successful, to make him one of the most renowned swordsmen of his time. He had also heard of the attachment which subsisted between Bruntfield and his niece; and, in the contemplation of an alliance which might give some force to the claims of that lady upon his estate, found a deeper and more selfish reason for accepting the challenge of his youthful enemy. King James himself protested against stretching the law of the _per duellum_ so far; but, sensible that there would be no peace between either the parties or their adherents till it should be decided in a fair combat, he was fain to grant the required licence.

The fight was appointed to take place on Cramond Inch, a low grassy island in the Frith of Forth, near the castle of Barnbougle. All the preparations were made in the most approved manner by the young Duke of Lennox, who had been the friend of Bruntfield in France. On a level spot, close to the northern beach of the islet, a space was marked off and strongly secured by a paling. The spectators, who were almost exclusively gentlemen (the rabble not being permitted to approach), sat upon a rising ground beside the enclosure, while the space towards the sea was quite clear. At one end, surrounded by his friends, stood the laird of Barnbougle, a huge and ungainly figure, whose features displayed a mixture of ferocity and hypocrisy, in the highest degree unpleasing. At the other, also attended by a host of family allies and friends, stood the gallant Henry Bruntfield, who, if divested of his armour, might have realised the idea of a winged Mercury. A seat was erected close beside the barras for the Duke of Lennox and other courtiers, who were to act as judges; and at a little distance upon the sea lay a small decked vessel, with a single male figure on board. After all the proper ceremonies which attended this strange legal custom had been gone through, the combatants advanced into the centre, and, planting foot to foot, each with his heavy sword in his hand, awaited the command which should let them loose against each other, in a combat which both knew would only be closed with the death of one or other. The word being given, the fight commenced. Moubray, almost at the first pass, gave his adversary a cut in the right limb, from which the blood was seen to flow profusely. But Bruntfield was enabled, by this mishap, to perceive the trick upon which his adversary chiefly depended, and, by taking care to avoid it, put Moubray nearly _hors de combat_. The fight then proceeded for a few minutes, without either gaining the least advantage over the other. Moubray was able to defend himself pretty successfully from the cuts and thrusts of his antagonist, but he could make no impression in return. The question then became one of time. It was evident that, if no lucky stroke should take effect beforehand, he who first became fatigued with the exertion would be the victim. Moubray felt his disadvantage as the elder and bulkier man, and began to fight most desperately, and with less caution. One tremendous blow, for which he seemed to have gathered his last strength, took effect upon Bruntfield, and brought him upon his knee, in a half-stupified state; but the elder combatant had no strength to follow up the effort. He reeled towards his youthful and sinking enemy, and stood for a few moments over him, vainly endeavouring to raise his weapon for another and final blow. Ere he could accomplish his wish, Bruntfield recovered sufficient strength to draw his dagger, and thrust it up to the hilt beneath the breastplate of his exhausted foe. The murderer of his race instantly lay dead beside him, and a shout of joy from the spectators hailed him as the victor. At the same instant, a scream of more than earthly note arose from the vessel anchored near the island: a lady descended from its side into a boat, and, rowing to the land, rushed up to the bloody scene, where she fell upon the neck of the conqueror, and pressed him, with the most frantic eagerness, to her bosom. The widow of Stephen Bruntfield at length found the yearnings of twenty years fulfilled—she saw the murderer of her husband, the slayer of her two sons, dead on the sward before her, while there still survived to her as noble a child as ever blessed a mother’s arms. But the revulsion of feeling produced by the event was too much for her strength; or, rather, Providence, in its righteous judgment, had resolved that so unholy a feeling as that of revenge should not be too signally gratified. She expired in the arms of her son, murmuring “_Nunc dimittis, Domine_,” with her latest breath.

The remainder of the tale of Bruntfield may be easily told. After a decent interval, the young laird of Craighouse married Catherine Moubray; and as the king saw it right to restore that young lady to a property originally forfeited for service to his mother, the happiness of the parties might be considered as complete. A long life of prosperity and peace was granted to them by the kindness of Heaven; and at their death, they had the satisfaction of enjoying that greatest of all earthly blessings, the love and respect of a numerous and virtuous family.

THE PASSING CROWD.

“The Passing Crowd” is a phrase coined in the spirit of indifference. Yet, to a man of what Plato calls “universal sympathies,” and even to the plain ordinary denizens of this world, what can be more interesting than “the passing crowd?” Does not this tide of human beings, which we daily see passing along the ways of this world, consist of persons animated by the same spark of the divine essence, and partaking of the same high destinies with ourselves? Let us stand still but for a moment in the midst of this busy and seemingly careless scene, and consider what they are or may be whom we see around us. In the hurry of the passing show, and of our own sensations, we see but a series of unknown faces; but this is no reason why we should regard them with indifference. Many of these persons, if we knew their histories, would rivet our admiration by the ability, worth, benevolence, or piety, which they have displayed in their various paths through life. Many would excite our warmest interest by their sufferings—sufferings, perhaps, borne meekly and well, and more for the sake of others than themselves. How many tales of human weal and woe, of glory and of humiliation, could be told by those beings, whom, in passing, we regard not! Unvalued as they are by us, how many as good as ourselves repose upon them the affections of bounteous hearts, and would not want them for any earthly compensation! Every one of these persons, in all probability, retains in his bosom the cherished recollections of early happy days, spent in some scene which “they ne’er forget, though there they are forgot,” with friends and fellows who, though now far removed in distance and in fortune, are never to be given up by the heart. Every one of these individuals, in all probability, nurses still deeper in the recesses of feeling, the remembrance of that chapter of romance in the life of every man, an early earnest attachment, conceived in the fervour of youth, unstained by the slightest thought of self, and for a time purifying and elevating the character far above its ordinary standard. Beneath all this gloss of the world—this cold conventional aspect, which all more or less present, and which the business of life renders necessary—there resides for certain a fountain of goodness, pure in its inner depths as the lymph rock-distilled, and ready on every proper occasion to well out in the exercise of the noblest duties. Though all may seem but a hunt after worldly objects, the great majority of these individuals can, at the proper time, cast aside all earthly thoughts, and communicate directly with the Being whom their fathers have taught them to worship, and whose will and attributes have been taught to man immediately by Himself. Perhaps many of these persons are of loftier aspect than ourselves, and belong to a sphere removed above our own. But, nevertheless, if the barrier of mere worldly form were taken out of the way, it is probable that we could interchange sympathies with these persons as freely and cordially as with any of our own class. Perhaps they are of an inferior order; but they are only inferior in certain circumstances, which should never interpose to prevent the flow of feeling for our kind. The great common features of human nature remain; and let us never forget how much respect is due to the very impress of humanity—the type of the divine nature itself! Even where our fellow creatures are degraded by vice and poverty, let us still be gentle in our judging. The various fortunes which we every day see befalling the members of a single family, after they part off in their several paths through life, teach us that it is not to every one that success in the career of existence is destined. Besides, do not the arrangements of society at once necessitate the subjection of an immense multitude to humble toil, and give rise to temptations, before which the weak and uninstructed can scarcely escape falling? But even beneath the soiled face of the poor artizan, there may be aspirations after some vague excellence, which hard fate has denied him the means of attaining, though the very wish to obtain it is itself ennobling. The very mendicant was not always so; he, too, has had his undegraded and happier days, upon the recollection of which, some remnant of better feeling may still repose.

These, I humbly think, are reasons why we should not look with coldness upon any masses of men with whom it may be our lot to mingle. It is the nature of a good man to conclude that others are like himself; and if we take the crowd promiscuously, we can never be far wrong in thinking that there are worthy and well-directed feelings in it as well as in our own bosoms.

A TALE OF THE FORTY-FIVE.

Never, perhaps, did any city, upon the approach of a foreign enemy, betray such symptoms of consternation and disorder, as did Edinburgh, on the 16th of September 1745, when it was understood that Prince Charles Edward, with his army of Highlanders, had reached a village three miles to the westward, unresisted by the civic corps in which the hapless city had placed its last hopes of defence. A regiment of dragoons, which had retreated on the previous day from Stirling, and another which happened to be encamped near Edinburgh, having joined their strengths to that of the town-guard and volunteers, had that forenoon marched boldly out of town, with the determined purpose of opposing the rebels, and saving the town; but after standing very bravely for a few hours at Corstorphine, the spectacle of a single Highlander, who rode up towards them and fired off his pistol, caused the whole of these gallant cavaliers to turn and fly; nor did they stop till they had left Edinburgh itself twenty miles behind. The precipitate flight of regular troops was the worst possible example for a body of raw, undisciplined citizens, who were too much accustomed to the secure comforts of their firesides, to have any relish for the horrors of an out-of-doors war with the unscrupulous mountaineers. The consequence was, that all retreated in confusion back to the city, where their pusillanimity was the subject of triumphant ridicule to the Jacobite party, and of shame and fear to the rest of the inhabitants.

In this dilemma, as band after band poured through the West Port, and filled the ample area of the Grassmarket, the magistrates assembled in their council chamber, for the purpose of “wondering what was to be done.” The result of their deliberations was, that a full meeting of the inhabitants should be held, in order that they might be enabled to shape their course according to the general opinion. Orders were immediately given to this effect, and in the course of an hour, they found a respectable assemblage of citizens, prepared, in one of the churches of St Giles’s, to consider the important question of the defensibility of the town.

The appearance of the city, on this dreadful afternoon, was very remarkable, and such as we hope it will never again exhibit. All the streets to the west of St Giles’s were crowded with citizen volunteers, apparently irresolute whether to lay down their arms or to retain them, and whose anxious and crest-fallen looks communicated only despair to the trembling citizens. The sound of hammers was heard at the opening of every lane, and at the bottoms of all important _turnpike_ stairs, where workmen were busied in mounting strong doors, studded thickly with nails, moving on immense hinges, and bearing bolts and bars of no ordinary strength—the well-known rapacious character of the Highlanders, not less than their present hostile purpose, having suggested this feeble attempt at security. The principal street was encumbered with the large, tall, pavilion-roofed family carriages of people of distinction, judges, and officers of the crown, which, after being hastily crammed with their proper burdens of live stock, and laden atop with as much baggage as they could carry, one after another wheeled off down the High Street, through the Netherbow, and so out of town. A few scattered groups of women, children, and inferior citizens, stood near that old-accustomed meeting place, the Cross, round the tall form of which they seemed to gather, like a Catholic population clinging to a sacred fabric, which they suppose to be endowed with some protecting virtue.

At the ordinary dinner hour, when the streets were as usual in a great measure deserted, and while the assemblage of citizens were still deliberating in the New Church aisle, the people of the High Street were thrown into a state of dreadful agitation, by a circumstance which they witnessed from their windows. The accustomed silence of “the hollow hungry hour” was suddenly broken by the clatter of a horse’s feet upon the pavement; and on running to their windows, they were prodigiously alarmed at the sight of one of their anticipated foes riding boldly up the street. Yet this alarm subsided considerably, when they observed that his purpose seemed pacific, and that he was not followed by any companions. The horseman was a youth apparently about twenty years of age, with a remarkably handsome figure and gallant carriage, which did not fail in their effect upon at least the female part of the beholders. The most robust Highland health was indicated in his fair countenance and athletic form: and, in addition to this, his appearance expressed just enough of polish not to destroy the romantic effect produced by his wild habiliments and striking situation. The tight tartan trews showed well upon a limb, of which the symmetry was never equalled by David Allan, the national painter, so remarkable for his handsome Highland limbs, and of which the effect, instead of being impaired by the clumsy boot, was improved by the neat brogue, fastened as it was to the foot by sparkling silver buckles. He wore a smart round bonnet, adorned with his family cognisance—a bunch of ivy—and from beneath which, a profusion of light brown tresses, tied with dark ribbons, flowed, according to the fashion of the time, about half way down his back. He carried a small white flag in his hand, and bore about his person the full set of Highland arms—broadsword, dirk, and two silver-mounted pistols. Many a warm Jacobite heart, male and female, palpitated at sight of his graceful figure, and a considerable crowd of idle admirers, or wonderers, followed him up the broad noble expanse of the High Street.