CHAPTER VI.

Inter utramque viam, lethi discrimine parvo, Ni teneant cursus.

VIRGIL, _Æneid III_.

Sæpe dolis, interit ista: Time!

C. WEIGELIUS, NORIMBERGÆ.

The fugitives had now proceeded upon a long and wearisome journey after their departure from the cavern, which had so opportunely afforded them shelter and protection. Lonely, depressed, and overpowered by overwhelming grief, self-accusation, and great bodily exertion, solitary stood the noble, but unhappy Bruce, on the desolate shores of his native land; while close stationed by him stood his brave and faithful preserver, his sturdy and affectionate foster-brother, the intrepid, the honest, the disinterested Malcolm.

It was night,--an autumnal storm loudly raged, the clouds darkly were drifted onward with increased rapidity through a perturbed sky; the roaring waves of a tumultuous sea mounted upwards in alpine altitude and curvature, as they dashed and foamed along; whose mournful, sullen scream, responded not to mortal voice, although the sad measure seemed to partake both of sorrow and of woe; if indeed that human suffering and mortal woe could be supposed as associated with that treacherous and tempestuous element.

In the distance distinctly were heard the report of various musket shots, discharged by the hackbutteers,[15] but at intervals only they were heard. Whether these explosions were intended as a military tribute of a faithful clan over the body of a fallen chieftain, or whether they were intended as an excitement to pursuit, (probably the latter,) could not with any positive certainty be ascertained. However, the continued clangor of pursuing cavalry, and the loud, incessant tramping of foot soldiers, who had proceeded with precipitance over crags and rocks, and still unwearied in their pursuit, were audibly heard to approach. It was too evident that all this loud uproar and wild halloo which had prevailed, arose from the violent voice and shout of those who pertinaciously pursued, and who were still pressing upon the flight of the unhappy fugitive.

[Footnote 15: Harquebuss, in the ancient statutes, is called also Arquebuse, Haquebut, or Hagbut; it is a _hand-gun_, or a fire-arm of a proper length to be borne in the arm. The word is formed of the French _arquebuse_, and that from the Italian, _arcobusio_, or _arco abuso_, of _arco_ a bow, and _busio_, a hole; on account of the touch-hole in which the powder is put to prime it; and it is likewise so called because it succeeded the bows of the ancients.

The _harquebuss_ is properly a fire-arm, of the ordinary length of a musket or fowling-piece, cocked usually with a wheel. Its length is forty calibers; and the weight of its ball one ounce seven-eighths; its charge of powder as much.

There is also a larger kind, called _harquebuss a croc_, used in war for the defence of places. The first time these instruments were seen was in the imperial army of Bourbon, when Bonnivet was driven out of the state of Milan. They are heavy and cumbersome.]

However, in another direction came on, yet with silent, cautious tread, several faithful adherents, armed with dirk, targe, and claymore, who advanced to the beach, not as blood-hounds to pursue, but as friends to assist; not basely to track the steps of the noble fugitive, but with might and with main to protect him, and cover his flight. This faithful, small, but boldly determined clan, bore lanterns to assist the projects which they had planned, which dimly flung a flickering reddish light around.

This gallant band came on fully resolved to save their chieftain--to rescue him from surrounding perils, or to die! Sir David looked wildly and inquisitively at them; but by no interrogatory he dared to break the more than mortal silence which seemed to seal their lips. No, he shrunk back in despair, fearing to question them; he too justly dreaded _that to be_, which he would have forfeited his own life _not to have been_! Dread despair palsied his voice, and held him back from what he fain would ask--"Was his brother among the dead or the living?" The dreadful response that might be returned, made him forego his purpose. He could not--would not--dared not to inquire; it was not to be attempted; and his brain seemed maddened when he thought thereon. His heart was chilled, and his blood slowly pulsated; his lip quivered, and his tongue was silent. However with a silent, but inquisitive gaze and gesture, he sought that fearful information which he dared not--could not ask; these, however, were appeals that could be neither mistaken nor misunderstood. He sought the fearful answer from the plaided clan, whose tall and commanding figures, although dimly and indistinctly seen beneath the pale moon-beams of a stormy sky, and whatever illumination their lanterns afforded, yet observed the earnest appeal: and he is answered as he sought it, in awful silence and impressive dumb show, each of the clan slowly folding around him his plaid, and then one and all in the same moment joining in united action of a mournful and impressive motion of the head. When all rapidly dashing aside their plaids, with fierce and impressive energy they point their out-stretched hands to the foaming waves, intimating thereby that there alone safety was to be found.

Now near, and still more near, too audibly are heard the renewed sounds of advancing foes; the breeze wafting on the appalling and yelling shouts of pursuit; and next followed the loud and deafening tramps of the pursuers. No time--not a moment--was to be lost---- death or immediate flight was the alternative!--Some bold, decisive act, was now to be dared, and on the instant done!

The stormy clouds, which in rapid succession hitherto had thrown their dark floating shadows over the disk of an autumnal moon, at this instant favourably dispersed, and the "pale queen of night" burst forth in pearly radiance, glancing her friendly beams upon a fishing bark which lay at anchor beneath an indented shelve of rocks, close by to where the fugitives stood; and at no remote distance a small cottage stood close to the beach, to the owner of which, in all probability, the boat belonged. This seemed most likely to be the fact, from their observation of the fishing-nets, gear, and tackle, all elucidatory of a fisherman's pursuits, which lay outspread upon the shore, clearly designating the uncertain and perilous occupation of the lonely proprietor of this humble dwelling. Upon this discovery the vassals proposed to their chieftain to knock at the door of the cottage, and awake the fisherman. But to this suggestion the generous Bruce would not hearken; he would not endanger the life of a poor and innocent man, probably the sole supporter of his family, in the dread and desperate fortunes of a fugitive--and alas, more than too probably a fratricide!

Thus having impetuously and decisively spoken, David Bruce having flung his purse into a broken aperture of the lattice window, sprung manfully into the fishing bark, and the faithful Malcolm instantly sprang in after his master. Next with fatal, feudal attachment, the vassals advanced, and crowded into the boat, regardless of all remonstrance and reproof, and seemingly insensible of the peril occasioned by thus overloading the fishing skiff.

The storm had for the present abated; which cessation, however, was but of temporary duration. The pursuers meanwhile advanced, with loud and appalling screams, and formed their ranks in martial array upon the beach, the war-pipes loudly pealing forth a pibroch; they next proceeded, having piled their arms, to light their torches from lanterns which, with due precaution, they had borne with them; and soon their ignited torches were applied, which after some little delay, occasioned by the moisture of the storm, the ignition took effect, when brilliantly blazed forth, in crackling flames, the extended ridges of furze, fern, bent-grass, &c., that crowned the lofty links which girdled the undulating summits of the shore. The different plants had been dried up by a summer sun, and parched and ripened by the autumnal blast; and the ignition soon extended along the entire line of the coast. The central part of the conflagration flamed in the distance like to some lofty castle on fire, and flanked, as the deception would represent, by two large towers, which were in effect two large flaming masses of furze and other various shrubs, which, now with a flaming--now with a flickering corruscation, actually seemed like two bale-fires blazing on the headlands. The whole mass having become one continued conflagration, assumed an awfully grand appearance; the ruddy sky brilliantly flamed above, the waves returned the fiery flash below, as the waves undulated to and fro. The fugitives but too distinctly saw the weapons raised in their offence boldly brandishing on the shore, and vengefully flashing forth their quivering gleams, accompanied with loud, fierce, and appalling shouts of vengeance from the bold, determined band, who occupied the shore.

Meanwhile these threatening tones of discord and defiance were resolutely answered by a long continuous scream of triumph from the fugitives, who fled from premeditated treachery, and whose parting shouts were deeply chorussed by the symphony of their accompanying oars that wafted them onward in safety.

Now verging toward the distant horizon, the retreating boat was distinctly seen slowly cutting its watery course, overladen although it might be with an extra weight of living cargo. Availing themselves of the breeze, they raised their little sail, and soon expedited their course, wafted onward by the wild and dreary blast.

The moon occasionally at intervals, as the stormy night-clouds cleared away, streamed her radiance on the rippling bosom of the undulating wave, which threw a brilliant line of light across the heaving billows; and showed to those who might wish to observe the progress of the fugitives, that in sooth they made but little way; which was not to be wondered at, considering how incautiously crowded the boat had been through the obstinacy of the too inconsiderate followers. Another danger, superadded to the former, it but too fully appeared to the crew arose from the frailty of the bark itself, that had soon to contend with the approach, or rather with the return, of the tempest.

The impressive scene that we have attempted to describe, was, it must be allowed, altogether out of the usual course of ordinary events, and partook of a high and extraordinary degree of interest. To behold a wild, desolate, and romantic shore, lined and occupied as it had been, at such an hour, by a military band of pursuers, and illuminated by the blazing fires, which broadly glanced on spear, axe, target, and claymore; whose ruddy contrasting light served but to cause that the dark impending rocks above, and the indented caverns below, should appear more savage, and their dense darkness the more visible! Meanwhile, to witness the dumb, but expressive gesticulation of the heads and hands, and indignant and angry step, of the enraged vassals on the beach, appearing to the distant beholder all of a deep, glaring, fiery red, fierce as the impetuous motives which led them onward to the bloody track. Rage, and all the varied manifestations of the fierce passions of wrath and revenge, were but too visible, from the broad and brilliant glare of light that flashed upon them. It was such a scene as would have charmed the creative imagination of Michael Angelo to have dwelt upon and portrayed, and might have even given additional sketches of horror for his "Day of Judgment." And, oh! how would the poetic pencil of the solitary Salvator Rosa have managed this scene!--how his pencil would have sported with it, and his genius have rejoiced!--here he might have conjured up and enlivened his landscape with a bold, determined, band of pirates, soldiers, or banditti, surrounded by dark and frowning precipices. For such was the wild and savage scene so lately before the reader's eye. Rocks frowning in deep darkness, indented with frequent hollow caverns below, the midnight retreat of the otter and porpoise; while from the higher caverned cliffs above, awakened and aroused from their quarry, sprung forth the osprey, the vulture, and cormorant, all loudly screaming, and joining in one continued dissonant chorus, deeming that the returning morn had arrived!

The fishing bark having been found no longer sea-worthy, the fugitives were compelled to seek the shore; in which act the boat heaved against a rock, but it did no material injury to the bark. Strange to say, however, the shock awakened within the little cabin (if cabin it could be called) of the stern, an inmate, that until that moment the trusty followers did not know, nor even suspect, that such an individual they had on board. This fellow was a tall, athletic figure, whether fisherman or smuggler was doubtful, who must have been, consequently, hitherto profoundly asleep, deeply fatigued, it was supposed, by having been out all the previous night at sea, either fishing or plundering, possibly occupied in one or other--probably in both of these perilous pursuits.

This desperate and daring mariner, rapidly bouncing on deck, said, or rather screamed forth, with denouncing haste and rage: "Ye a' maun perish, a' are tint! and ken ye weel a Johnstone had his revenge!"

Then, with face and the fury of a maniac, and a horrific laugh, he instantly sprang into the waves, plunging like a water-fowl; he sunk, but soon arose again. Malcolm was prepared for this, having previously seized a carabine from one of the Bruce's followers; and soon as the ruffian again arose, Malcolm took determined aim, his carabine exploded its contents, having duly hit the destined mark. The victim of his just revenge loudly screamed, plunged, floundered, and sunk,--but he rose no more!

The crew of the fishing boat meanwhile, or those who acted in that capacity, had timely and providentially discovered and frustrated the treacherous fate which seemed so certainly to await them, and which was so darkly hinted at by this desperate partisan of the Johnstone clan. The pumps were set instantly and incessantly at work, while the leak was timeously stopped, and every precaution adopted to insure and make "surety doubly sure."

It would appear that this desperate follower of the Johnstones had somehow discovered, or overheard, from the followers of the Bruce, the fatal scene that had taken place at Turnberry Castle, the tragical compotation, the bloody fray, between the Maxwells and the Johnstones, and of the fatal death of Sir Robert Bruce. And hence, therefore, it was concluded, that he had come to the desperate determination of destroying, by one daring, decisive act, the number of the enemies of his clan who occupied the bark; and with this fixed resolution, it would appear he had sprung a leak, thinking thereby at once to send so many souls to a watery grave. In which base and treacherous attempt he had been nearly too successful, but for the prompt and active aid that was given by all hands on board; and it was with great difficulty that with unabated effort and energy they ultimately happily succeeded in accomplishing their safety.

The boat was not far distant from the shore, when several of Bruce's followers, at length made sensible of their impropriety and obstinacy in overloading the vessel, which caused such as could best swim soon to spring from the bark, and swim for the shore, having had previously affixed a cable to the prow, which they succeeded in safely towing the extreme end of the rope, and landing it on the beach, where "with a long and a strong pull, and a pull altogether," they hauled the leaky and fragile bark to shore, and landed their noble chieftain in perfect safety.

Upon debarking they fortunately encountered some of David's followers, who were in anxious search of him, and had long been on the look out, expecting his approach. They met him with his horse ready caparisoned for a journey, his arms and accoutrements all duly arranged; besides a horse with a small valise, containing clothes and linen, and holsters containing long barrelled pistols, according to the fashion of the age, &c. &c. From these attendants Bruce obtained information that "The William Wallace" was about to sail from the port of Ayr. Sir David and Malcolm, promptly mounting their gallant steeds, proceeded in full gallop for the port of Ayr.

The pursuers had retired from the beach, and immediately all around the point of debarkation it was pitchy darkness, save that in the distant horizon the flickering blaze of the late conflagration about to expire, flashed a ruddy tinge upon the passing clouds. Long since the voice of vengeance had died on the ear, and the loud tramping of the pursuer was heard no more in the breeze.

Bruce determined, while in his flight to Ayr, upon changing his name, and assumed that of Colonel Davidson, Brandenburgh Hussars.

The travellers having proceeded with the utmost speed, soon reached the port of Ayr before curfew-time, but much overpowered by mental feelings, and overcome by great bodily exertion.

The perilous result and shipwreck of the ill-fated "William Wallace of Ayr," has been already fully detailed in the first chapter of the first volume of this work, which doubtless is still fresh in the reader's recollection.

But it is full time to return to Tyrconnel Castle, and revisit the noble inmates, overcome by grief and dismay at the sudden, unexpected, and unaccountable departure of the noble, generous, but unhappy Bruce. To fulfil which intent we proceed onward to the next chapter.