CHAPTER XII.
"Now dame," quoth he, "Je vous dis sans doute, Had I nought of a capon but the liver, And of your white bread nought but a shiver, And after that a roasted pigge's head (But I ne wold for me no beast were dead), Then had I with you homely sufferaunce."
CHAUCER, Summer's Tale.
IT was not without some secret misgivings that Caleb set out uponhis exploratory expedition. In fact, it was attended with a trebledifficulty. He dared not tell his mast the offence which he had thatmorning given to Bucklaw, just for the honour of the family; he darednot acknowledge he had been too hasty in refusing the purse; and,thirdly, he was somewhat apprehensive of unpleasant consequences uponhis meeting Hayston under the impression of an affront, and probably bythis time under the influence also of no small quantity of brandy.
Caleb, to do him justice, was as bold as any lion where the honour ofthe family of Ravenswood was concerned; but his was that consideratevalour which does not delight in unnecessary risks. This, however, was asecondary consideration the main point was to veil the indigence ofthe housekeeping at the castle, and to make good his vaunt of the cheerwhich his resources could procure, without Lockhard's assistance, andwithout supplies from his master. This was as prime a point of honourwith him as with the generous elephant with whom we have alreadycompared him, who, being overtasked, broke his skull through thedesperate exertions which he made to discharge his duty, when heperceived they were bringing up another to his assistance.
The village which they now approached had frequently afforded thedistressed butler resources upon similar emergencies; but his relationswith it had been of late much altered.
It was a little hamlet which straggled along the side of a creek formedby the discharge of a small brook into the sea, and was hidden fromthe castle, to which it had been in former times an appendage, by theintervention of the shoulder of a hill forming a projecting headland.It was called Wolf's Hope (i.e. Wolf's Haven), and the few inhabitantsgained a precarious subsistence by manning two or three fishing-boatsin the herring season, and smuggling gin and brandy during thewinter months. They paid a kind of hereditary respect to the Lordsof Ravenswood; but, in the difficulties of the family, most of theinhabitants of Wolf's Hope had contrived to get feu-rights to theirlittle possessions, their huts, kail-yards, and rights of commonty, sothat they were emancipated from the chains of feudal dependence,and free from the various exactions with which, under every possiblepretext, or without any pretext at all, the Scottish landlords of theperiod, themselves in great poverty, were wont to harass their stillpoorer tenants at will. They might be, on the whole, termed independent,a circumstance peculiarly galling to Caleb, who had been wont toexercise over them the same sweeping authority in levying contributionswhich was exercised in former times in England, when "the royalpurveyors, sallying forth from under the Gothic portcullis to purchaseprovisions with power and prerogative, instead of money, brought homethe plunder of an hundred markets, and all that could be seized froma flying and hiding country, and deposited their spoil in an hundredcaverns."
Caleb loved the memory and resented the downfall of that authority,which mimicked, on a petty scale, the grand contributions exacted bythe feudal sovereigns. And as he fondly flattered himself that the awfulrule and right supremacy, which assigned to the Barons of Ravenswood thefirst and most effective interest in all productions of nature withinfive miles of their castle, only slumbered, and was not departedfor ever, he used every now and then to give the recollection of theinhabitants a little jog by some petty exaction. These were at firstsubmitted to, with more or less readiness, by the inhabitants of thehamlet; for they had been so long used to consider the wants of theBaron and his family as having a title to be preferred to their own,that their actual independence did not convey to them an immediate senseof freedom. They resembled a man that has been long fettered, who,even at liberty, feels in imagination the grasp of the handcuffs stillbinding his wrists. But the exercise of freedom is quickly followed withthe natural consciousness of its immunities, as the enlarged prisoner,by the free use of his limbs, soon dispels the cramped feeling they hadacquired when bound.
The inhabitants of Wolf's Hope began to grumble, to resist, and atlength positively to refuse compliance with the exactions of CalebBalderstone. It was in vain he reminded them, that when the eleventhLord Ravenswood, called the Skipper, from his delight in naval matters,had encouraged the trade of their port by building the pier (a bulwarkof stones rudely piled together), which protected the fishing-boats fromthe weather, it had been matter of understanding that he was to havethe first stone of butter after the calving of every cow within thebarony, and the first egg, thence called the Monday's egg, laid by everyhen on every Monday in the year.
The feuars heard and scratched their heads, coughed, sneezed, and beingpressed for answer, rejoined with one voice, "They could not say"--theuniversal refuge of a Scottish peasant when pressed to admit a claimwhich his conscience owns, or perhaps his feelings, and his interestinclines him to deny.
Caleb, however, furnished the notables of Wolf's Hope with a note ofthe requisition of butter and eggs, which he claimed as arrears of theaforesaid subsidy, or kindly aid, payable as above mentioned; and havingintimated that he would not be averse to compound the same for goods ormoney, if it was inconvenient to them to pay in kind, left them, as hehoped, to debate the mode of assessing themselves for that purpose.On the contrary, they met with a determined purpose of resisting theexaction, and were only undecided as to the mode of groundingtheir opposition, when the cooper, a very important person on afishing-station, and one of the conscript fathers of the village,observed, "That their hens had caickled mony a day for the Lords ofRavenswood, and it was time they suld caickle for those that gavethem roosts and barley." An unanimous grin intimated the assent of theassembly. "And," continued the orator, "if it's your wull, I'll just taka step as far as Dunse for Davie Dingwall, the writer, that's come fraethe North to settle amang us, and he'll pit this job to rights, I'sewarrant him."
A day was accordingly fixed for holding a grand palaver at Wolf's Hopeon the subject of Caleb's requisitions, and he was invited to attend atthe hamlet for that purpose.
He went with open hands and empty stomach, trusting to fill the one onhis master's account and the other on his own score, at the expense ofthe feuars of Wolf's Hope. But, death to his hopes! as he entered theeastern end of the straggling village, the awful form of Davie Dingwall,a sly, dry, hard-fisted, shrewd country attorney, who had already actedagainst the family of Ravenswood, and was a principal agent of SirWilliam Ashton, trotted in at the western extremity, bestriding aleathern portmanteau stuffed with the feu-charters of the hamlet, andhoping he had not kept Mr. Balderstone waiting, "as he was instructedand fully empowered to pay or receive, compound or compensate, and,in fine, to age as accords respecting all mutual and unsettled claimswhatsoever, belonging or competent to the Honourable Edgar Ravenswood,commonly called the Master of Ravenswood----"
"The RIGHT Honourable Edgar LORD RAVENSWOOD," said Caleb, with greatemphasis; for, though conscious he had little chance of advantage in theconflict to ensue, he was resolved not to sacrifice one jot of honour.
"Lord Ravenswood, then," said the man of business--"we shall not quarrelwith you about titles of courtesy--commonly called Lord Ravenswood, orMaster of Ravenswood, heritable proprietor of the lands and barony ofWolf's Crag, on othe ne part, and to John Whitefish and others, feuarsin the town of Wolf's Hope, within the barony aforesaid, on the otherpart."
Caleb was conscious, from sad experience, that he would wage a verydifferent strife with this mercenary champion than with the individualfeuars themselves, upon whose old recollections, predilections,and habits of thinking he might have wrought by an hundred indirectarguments, to which their deputy-representative was totally insensible.The issue of the debate proved the reality of his apprehensions. It wasin vain he strained his eloquence and ingenuity, and collected into onemass all argumen
ts arising from antique custom and hereditary respect,from the good deeds done by the Lords of Ravenswood to the community ofWolf's Hope in former days, and from what might be expected from them infuture. The writer stuck to the contents of his feu-charters; he couldnot see it: 'twas not in the bond. And when Caleb, determined to trywhat a little spirit would do, deprecated the consequences of LordRavenswood's withdrawing his protection from the burgh, and even hintedin his using active measures of resentment, the man of law sneered inhis face.
"His clients," he said, "had determined to do the best they could fortheir own town, and he thought Lord Ravenswood, since he was a lord,might have enough to do to look after his own castle. As to any threatsof stouthrief oppression, by rule of thumb, or via facti, as the lawtermed it, he would have Mr. Balderstone recollect, that new times werenot as old times; that they lived on the south of the Forth, and farfrom the Highlands; that his clients thought they were able to protectthemselves; but should they find themselves mistaken, they would applyto the government for the protection of a corporal and four red-coats,who," said Mr. Dingwall, with a grin, "would be perfectly able to securethem against Lord Ravenswood, and all that he or his followers could doby the strong hand."
If Caleb could have concentrated all the lightnings of aristocracy inhis eye, to have struck dead this contemner of allegiance and privilege,he would have launched them at his head, without respect to theconsequences. As it was, he was compelled to turn his course backwardto the castle; and there he remained for full half a day invisible andinaccessible even to Mysie, sequestered in his own peculiar dungeon,where he sat burnishing a single pewter plate and whistling "MaggieLauder" six hours without intermission.
The issue of this unfortunate requisition had shut against Caleb allresources which could be derived from Wolf's Hope and its purlieus, theEl Dorado, or Peru, from which, in all former cases of exigence, he hadbeen able to extract some assistance. He had, indeed, in a manner vowedthat the deil should have him, if ever he put the print of his footwithin its causeway again. He had hitherto kept his word; and, strangeto tell, this secession had, as he intended, in some degree, the effectof a punishment upon the refractory feuars. Mr. Balderstone had been aperson in their eyes connected with a superior order of beings, whosepresence used to grace their little festivities, whose advice they founduseful on many occasions, and whose communications gave a sort of creditto their village. The place, they acknowledged, "didna look as it usedto do, and should do, since Mr. Caleb keepit the castle sae closely;but doubtless, touching the eggs and butter, it was a most unreasonabledemand, as Mr. Dingwall had justly made manifest."
Thus stood matters betwixt the parties, when the old butler, though itwas gall and wormwood to him, found himself obliged either to ackowledgebefore a strange man of quality, and, what was much worse, before thatstranger's servant, the total inability of Wolf's Crag to produce adinner, or he must trust to the compassion of the feuars of Wofl's Hope.It was a dreadful degradation but necessity was equally imperious andlawless. With these feelings he entered the street of the village.
Willing to shake himself from his companion as soon as possible, hedirected Mr. Lockhard to Luckie Sma-trash's change-house, where a din,proceeding from the revels of Bucklaw, Craigengelt, and their party,sounded half-way down the street, while the red glare from the windowoverpowered the grey twilight which was now settling down, and glimmeredagainst a parcel of old tubs, kegs, and barrels, piled up in thecooper's yard, on the other side of the way.
"If you, Mr. Lockhard," said the old butler to his companion, "will bepleased to step to the change-house where that light comes from, andwhere, as I judge, they are now singing 'Cauld Kail in Aberdeen,' yemay do your master's errand about the venison, and I will do mine aboutBucklaw's bed, as I return frae getting the rest of the vivers. It's nothat the venison is actually needfu'," he added, detaining his colleagueby the button, "to make up the dinner; but as a compliment to thehunters, ye ken; and, Mr. Lockhard, if they offer ye a drink o' yill, ora cup o' wine, or a glass o' brandy, ye'll be a wise man to take it,in case the thunner should hae soured ours at the castle, whilk is owermuckle to be dreaded."
He then permitted Lockhard to depart; and with foot heavy as lead, andyet far lighter than his heart, stepped on through the unequal streetof the straggling village, meditating on whom he ought to make hisfirst attack. It was necessary he should find some one with whom oldacknowledged greatness should weigh more than recent independence, andto whom his application might appear an act of high dignity, relentingat once and soothing. But he could not recollect an inhabitant of a mindso constructed. "Our kail is like to be cauld eneugh too," he reflected,as the chorus of "Cauld Kail in Aberdeen" again reached his ears. Theminister--he had got his presentation from the late lord, but they hadquarrelled about teinds; the brewster's wife--she had trusted long, andthe bill was aye scored up, and unless the dignity of the family shouldactually require it, it would be a sin to distress a widow woman.None was so able--but, on the other hand, none was likely to be lesswilling--to stand his friend upon the present occasion, than GibbieGirder, the man of tubs and barrels already mentioned, who had headedthe insurrection in the matter of the egg and butter subsidy. "Buta' comes o' taking folk on the right side, I trow," quoted Caleb tohimself; "and I had ance the ill hap to say he was but a Johnny New-comein our town, and the carle bore the family an ill-will ever since.But he married a bonny young quean, Jean Lightbody, auld Lightbody'sdaughter, him that was in the steading of Loup-the-Dyke; and auldLightbody was married himsell to Marion, that was about my lady inthe family forty years syne. I hae had mony a day's daffing wi' Jean'smither, and they say she bides on wi' them. The carle has Jacobuses andGeorgiuses baith, an ane could get at them; and sure I am, it's doinghim an honour him or his never deserved at our hand, the ungracioussumph; and if he loses by us a'thegither, he is e'en cheap o't: he canspare it brawly." Shaking off irresolution, therefore, and turning atonce upon his heel, Caleb walked hastily back to the cooper's house,lifted the latch withotu ceremony, and, in a moment, found himselfbehind the "hallan," or partition, from which position he could, himselfunseen, reconnoitre the interior of the "but," or kitchen apartment, ofthe mansion.
Reverse of the sad menage at the Castle of Wolf's Crag, a bickeringfire roared up the cooper's chimney. His wife, on the one side, inher pearlings and pudding-sleeves, put the last finishing touch toher holiday's apparel, while she contemplated a very handsome andgood-humoured face in a broken mirror, raised upon the "bink" (theshelves on which the plates are disposed) for her special accommodation.Her mother, old Luckie Loup-the-Dyke, "a canty carline" as was withintwenty miles of her, according to the unanimous report of the "cummers,"or gossips, sat by the fire in the full glory of a grogram gown, lammerbeads, and a clean cockernony, whiffing a snug pipe of tobacco, andsuperintending the affairs of the kitchen; for--sight more interestingto the anxious heart and craving entrails of the desponding seneschalthan either buxom dame or canty cummer--there bubbled on the aforesaidbickering fire a huge pot, or rather cauldron, steaming with beef andbrewis; while before it revolved two spits, turned each by one of thecooper's apprentices, seated in the opposite corners of the chimney, theone loaded with a quarter of mutton, while the other was graced with afat goose and a brace of wild ducks. The sight and scent of such aland of plenty almost wholly overcame the drooping spirits of Caleb. Heturned, for a moment's space to reconnoitre the "ben," or parlour endof the house, and there saw a sight scarce less affecting to hisfeelings--a large round table, covered for ten or twelve persons,decored (according to his own favourite terms) with napery as white assnow, grand flagons of pewter, intermixed with one or two silver cups,containing, as was probable, something worthy the brilliancy of theiroutward appearance, clean trenchers, cutty spoons, knives and forks,sharp, burnished, and prompt for action, which lay all displayed as foran especial festival.
"The devil's in the peddling tub-coopering carl!" muttered Caleb, in allthe envy of astonishment; "it's a shame to see t
he like o' them gustingtheir gabs at sic a rate. But if some o' that gude cheer does not findits way to Wolf's Crag this night, my name is not Caleb Balderstone."
So resolving, he entered the apartment, and, in all courteous greeting,saluted both the mother and the daughter. Wolf's Crag was the court ofthe barony, Caleb prime minister at Wolf's Crag; and it has ever beenremarked that, though the masculine subject who pays the taxes sometimesgrowls at the courtiers by whom they are imposed, the said courtierscontinue, nevertheless, welcome to the fair sex, to whom they furnishthe newest small-talk and the earliest fashions. Both the dames were,therefore, at once about old Caleb's neck, setting up their throatstogether by way of welcome.
"Ay, sirs, Mr. Balderstone, and is this you? A sight of you is gude forsair een. Sit down--sit down; the gudeman will be blythe to see you--yenar saw him sae cadgy in your life; but we are to christen our bit weanthe night, as ye will hae heard, and doubtless ye will stay and see theordinance. We hae killed a wether, and ane o' our lads has been out wi'his gun at the moss; ye used to like wild-fowl."
"Na, na, gudewife," said Caleb; "I just keekit in to wish ye joy, and Iwad be glad to hae spoken wi' the gudeman, but----" moving, as if to goaway.
"The ne'er a fit ye's gang," said the elder dame, laughing and holdinghim fast, with a freedom which belonged to their old acquaintance;"wha kens what ill it may bring to the bairn, if ye owerlook it in thatgate?"
"But I'm in a preceese hurry, gudewife," said the butler, sufferinghimself to be dragged to a seat without much resistance; "and as toeating," for he observed the mistress of the dwelling bustling about toplace a trencher for him--"as for eating--lack-a-day, we are just killedup yonder wi' eating frae morning to night! It's shamefu' epicurism; butthat's what we hae gotten frae the English pock-puddings." "Hout,never mind the English pock-puddings," said Luckie Lightbody; "try ourpuddings, Mr. Balderstone; there is black pudding and white-hass; trywhilk ye like best."
"Baith gude--baith excellent--canna be better; but the very smell iseneugh for me that hae dined sae lately (the faithful wretch had fastedsince daybreak). But I wadna affront your housewifeskep, gudewife; and,with your permission, I'se e'en pit them in my napkin, and eat them tomy supper at e'en, for I am wearied of Mysie's pastry and nonsense; yeken landward dainties aye pleased me best, Marion, and landward lassestoo (looking at the cooper's wife). Ne'er a bit but she looks far betterthan when she married Gilbert, and then she was the bonniest lass in ourparochine and the neist till't. But gawsie cow, goodly calf."
The women smiled at the compliment each to herself, and they smiledagain to each other as Caleb wrapt up the puddings in a towel which hehad brought with him, as a dragoon carries his foraging bag to receivewhat my fall in his way.
"And what news at the castle?" quo' the gudewife.
"News! The bravest news ye ever heard--the Lord Keeper's up yonder wi'his fair daughter, just ready to fling her at my lord's head, if hewinna tak her out o' his arms; and I'se warrant he'll stitch our auldlands of Ravenswood to her petticoat tail."
"Eh! sirs--ay!--and will hae her? and is she weel-favoured? and what'sthe colour o' her hair? and does she wear a habit or a railly?" were thequestions which the females showered upon the butler.
"Hout tout! it wad tak a man a day to answer a' your questions, and Ihae hardly a minute. Where's the gudeman?"
"Awa' to fetch the minister," said Mrs. Girder, "precious Mr. PeterBide-the-Bent, frae the Mosshead; the honest man has the rheumatism wi'lying in the hills in the persecution."
"Ay! Whig and a mountain-man, nae less!" said Caleb, with a peevishnesshe could not suppress. "I hae seen the day, Luckie, when worthy Mr.Cuffcushion and the service-book would hae served your turn (to theelder dame), or ony honest woman in like circumstances."
"And that's true too," said Mrs. Lightbody, "but what can a body do?Jean maun baith sing her psalms and busk her cockernony the gate thegudeman likes, and nae ither gate; for he's maister and mair at hame, Ican tell ye, Mr. Balderstone."
"Ay, ay, and does he guide the gear too?" said Caleb, to whose projectsmasculine rule boded little good. "Ilka penny on't; but he'll dress heras dink as a daisy, as ye see; sae she has little reason to complain:where there's ane better aff there's ten waur."
"Aweel, gudewife," said Caleb, crestfallen, but not beaten off, "thatwasna the way ye guided your gudeman; bt ilka land has its ain lauch.I maun be ganging. I just wanted to round in the gudeman's lug, that Iheard them say up-bye yonder that Peter Puncheon, that was cooper to theQueen's stores at the Timmer Burse at Leith, is dead; sae I though thatmaybe a word frae my lord to the Lord Keeper might hae served Gilbert;but since he's frae hame----"
"O, but ye maun stay his hame-coming," said the dame. "I aye telledthe gudeman ye meant weel to him; but he taks the tout at every bitlippening word."
"Aweel, I'll stay the last minute I can."
"And so," said the handsome young spouse of Mr. Girder, "ye think thisMiss Ashton is weel-favoured? Troth, and sae should she, to set up forour young lord, with a face and a hand, and a seat on his horse, thatmight become a king's son. D'ye ken that he aye glowers up at my window,Mr. Balderstone, when he chaunces to ride thro' the town? Sae I hae aright to ken what like he is, as weel as ony body."
"I ken that brawly," said Caleb, "for I hae heard his lordship say thecooper's wife had the blackest ee in the barony; and I said, 'Weel maythat be, my lord, for it was her mither's afore her, as I ken to mycost.' Eh, Marion? Ha, ha, ha! Ah! these were merry days!"
"Hout awa', auld carle," said the old dame, "to speak sic daffing toyoung folk. But, Jean--fie, woman, dinna ye hear the bairn greet? I'sewarrant it's that dreary weid has come ower't again."
Up got mother and grandmother, and scoured away, jostling each other asthey ran, into some remote corner of the tenement, where the young heroof the evening was deposited. When Caleb saw the coast fairly clear,he took an invigorating pinch of snuff, to sharpen and confirm hisresolution.
"Cauld be my cast," thought he, "if either Bide-the-Bent or Girder tastethat broach of wild-fowl this evening"; and then addressing the eldestturnspit, a boy of about eleven years old, and putting a penny into hishand, he said, "Here is twal pennies, my man; carry that ower to Mrs.Sma'trash, and bid her fill my mill wi' snishing, and I'll turn thebroche for ye in the mean time; and she will gie ye a ginge-bread snapfor your pains."
No sooner was the elder boy departed on this mission than Caleb, lookingthe remaining turnspit gravely and steadily in the face, removed fromthe fire the spit bearing the wild-fowl of which he had undertaken thecharge, clapped his hat on his head, and fairly marched off with it,he stopped at the door of the change-house only to say, in a few briefwords, that Mr. Hayston of Bucklaw was not to expect a bed that eveningin the castle.
If this message was too briefly delivered by Caleb, it became absoluterudeness when conveyed through the medium of a suburb landlady; andBucklaw was, as a more calm and temperate man might have been, highlyincensed. Captain Craigengelt proposed, with the unanimous applause ofall present, that they should course the old fox (meaning Caleb) ere hegot to cover, and toss him in a blanket. But Lockhard intimated tohis master's servants and those of Lord Bittlebrains, in a tone ofauthority, that the slightest impertinence to the Master of Ravenswood'sdomestic would give Sir William Ashton the highest offence. And havingso said, in a manner sufficient to prevent any aggression on their part,he left the public-house, taking along with him two servants loaded withsuch provisions as he had been able to procure, and overtook Caleb justwhen he had cleared the village.