CHAPTER III.

BONNY DUNDEE.

"Yon is the Tay rolled down from Highland hills, That rests his waves, after so rude a race, In the fair plains of Gowrie--further westward Proud Stirling rises--yonder to the east, Dundee, the gift of God." MACDUFF'S CROSS.

In that age of cold iron (for indeed we cannot call it a golden age), when the potent and valiant knight, Sir James Scrimegeour, of Dudhope and Glastre, Hereditary Bearer of the Royal Standard, was Constable and Provost of the Scottish Geneva, the unexpected appearance of Sir Andrew Wood's two stately caravels created no small commotion within the burgh. No sooner was notice given from the Castle of Broughty that the Laird of Largo's ships had been seen off the Inchcape, and were now standing up the Tay, than it spread from mouth to mouth, and passed through the town like wildfire.

Though now the shapeless façade of many a huge linen factory, and the tall outline of many a smoky chimney, overshadow the ground that was covered by green fields and waving coppice in the days I write of, "Bonny Dundee" still merits the name given it of old by the northern clansmen--_Ail-lec_--the pleasant and the beautiful.

Spread along the sandy margin of one of our noblest rivers, and nestling under the brow of a green and conical mountain, it was without walls in the year 1488; but at each end had a strongly embattled gate, which defended it on the east and west, while its castle, of the eleventh century, which stood on an immense mass of steep rock that overlooked the Tay, gave it additional strength, and added a military character to the naval importance which the burgh was acquiring by the shipping that usually crowded its harbour. This castle is now removed, and a broad street has been hewn through the heart of the rock which it crowned.

Its quaint thoroughfares contained then many beautiful chapels, convents, and monasteries; and the stately hotel of many a noble family, with turrets and turnpike-stair, embattled porch, and armorial bearings. These towered above the timber-fronted and arcaded houses of the Fluckergaitt, the Overgaitt, and other venerable streets, whose appearance was more picturesque than their names would import. There our kings had a mansion named the Whitehall, the vaults of which are yet remaining; as also had the Lords Drummond, the Scrimegeours of Dudhope, the Barons of Strathmartine, the powerful Earls of Angus, and the great Earl of Crawford, who, for his valour at Blackness, in the recent struggle between the king and nobility, had been created Duke of Montrose, and Lord High Chamberlain of Scotland. Many great barons of the Carse of Gowrie also resided in Dundee, where Parliaments and Conventions have been held; and which could then boast of the Mint of King Robert I., and the palace of St. Margaret, the Queen of Malcolm III.; but its proudest objects were that broad river, which from the hills of Strathfillan and Glendochart rolls its mighty current to the German Sea; and its ample harbour, crowded by the high-pooped and gaudily-painted ships of France and Norway, Sweden and Flanders.

On the afternoon of this bright Beltane day, the return of the great naval hero from the shores of Flanders caused an unusual commotion and satisfaction in Dundee. The whole inhabitants were "on tiptoe," and a joyous murmur spread along the Mole when the well-known caravels of Wood were seen to enter the river; for now, though the admiral was a knight and baron of Parliament, who fought under the king's pennon, he still dabbled a little in merchandise, which gave him additional value in the estimation of the thrifty burgesses and merchant traders of the town. Thus, every ship in the harbour, from the great argosie that traded with the Levant, down to those little crayers or low-built smacks which are still peculiar to the Scottish firths, hoisted her colours. The bells in the vast tower of St. Mary rang a merry peal; groups of old weather-beaten tars, wearing broad blue bonnets, gaberdines of Galloway white, and enormous boots of rough skin, assembled on the rock of St. Nicholas, and on the Mole, which then lay to the westward thereof, to observe, and exercise their nautical criticism on the aspect of the tall ships which, before a gentle eastern breeze, were slowly coming abreast of the town. There are bluff old fellows of this kind--half man and half fish--who, in all ages, have haunted the piers of seaport towns, and are great, pugnacious, and, moreover obstinate authorities, in all matters appertaining unto salt water.

Amid all the dense population so interested in the arrival of the admiral, there were none who bent their eyes more eagerly on the coming ships than five fair young girls who were seated on the bartizan of a large mansion, which (after surviving nearly all its baronial cotemporaries) still stands at the corner of Fish-street, and the Flesher-row, which were then, as they are yet, the busiest part of all Dundee, and contained some of the finest examples of old Scottish street architecture.

This mansion is large and square, like a great bastel-house; and at three of its corners has broad round towers, which are strong enough to turn cannon balls. The whole superstructure rests on an arcade composed of finely-moulded elliptical arches, that spring from fluted pilasters.* Its arcade is partly sunk into the earth, and it is further diminished of its original height by a slate roof sloping down upon the walls, which of old were surmounted by a bartizan, from whence a view could be obtained of the river to the south, and that quaint old thoroughfare to the west, where, two hundred years before, the schoolboy _William Wallace_, slew the son of Selby, the English governor; but to the north the lofty mansions of the Nethergaitt shut out the view.

* In 1808, two hundred silver coins of James VI. were found imbedded in the wall of this fabric, which is now named King James's Custom House, from the use to which it was last applied.

In the time of our history, this stately mansion, the stone panels of which were covered by coats-of-arms bearing a Sleuth-hound and shield, with three bars _wavy_, was the town residence of one of Scotland's most powerful peers, John, Lord Drummond, of Stobhall and that ilk, who was Baron of Concraig, Steward of Strathearn, Privy Councillor, and had been Ambassador of James III. to England, three years before, concerning the marriage of James, the young Duke of Rothesay, to a princess of that kingdom; an embassy on which he mysteriously failed.

The five fair girls who were watching the ships' approach on this bright summer evening, were his daughters, now left entirely to their own control; for Lord Drummond was with the king at Scone, and their mother, Elizabeth Lindesay, of the princely House of Crawford, had been dead three years, and lay entombed in Dunblane.

Euphemia was twenty years of age; her sisters, Sybilla and Margaret, were respectively nineteen and eighteen; but Elizabeth and Beatrix were little girls, and of them cotemporary history has recorded little more than the names.

Lady Euphemia was a very handsome girl, with fine hazel eyes, and glossy dark brown hair, which was entirely confined in one of those cauls of gold net by which the Scottish ladies had gladly superseded the fontanges of the preceding reign. Over this floated a white kerchief of the finest texture, edged with gold fringe. Her nose was straight; her well-defined eyebrows expressed decision; her complexion was clear, but pale; her bust and figure were unexceptionable, and the very elegant costume of the court of James III.--an ermined jacquette of black velvet, with spangled skirtle and yellow mantle, displayed them to the best advantage. She wore scarlet gloves from Perth, and shoes of crimson tissue. Her whole appearance was gaudy and brilliant; while her air was lofty and reserved, for it was an age when pride of birth and station were carried to an absurd extent; but in her beauty there was something noble and majestic; and her dark hair imparted to her skin a pure and transparent whiteness that was very striking, even in a land of fair women.

Sybilla was just a second edition of Euphemia, but with a slight rose tinge in her cheek, and a stature somewhat less. Perhaps the most charming of the three was Margaret, who was then barely eighteen, and had soft blue eyes, a pure and delicate complexion, a profusion of that beautiful and brightly-coloured hair for which our Scottish Mary was so famous; and her face (though less regular than her elder sisters) had the sweetest expression that ever Raffaelle conjured up in the happiest moments of his artistic inspiration. There was a dash of thought or sadness (which you will) in Margaret's winning smile that fascinated all, and she was the favourite of the proud and ambitious old lord, her father.

Lizzie and Beatie were both fair-haired and happy little girls, who inherited from their mother the blue eyes and dazzling complexions of the Lindesays of Crawford.

The three elder ladies occupied tabourettes; their two younger sisters alternately romped round the bartizan with a wiry otter terrier, or nestled among the embroidered skirts of Euphemia and Sybilla.

The rich attire of these five girls, the abundance of satin, velvet, jewels, and embroidery which they had about them, betokened wealth; while by their air, the carriage of their heads, the chastened expression of their eyes, and above all by the beautiful form and whiteness of their hands, any one might easily perceive their birth was noble; yet their father (although the heir of a long line of chieftains) was the first of his race who had worn a coronet.

"Oh, look at the caravels!" exclaimed little Lizzie to her sisters, who had been doing little else for the last hour; "look, sister Margaret," she continued, clapping her pretty hands, "see how one gay flag runs up after another! Dost thou see Captain Barton yet, sister Euphemia?--or thou, Sir David Falconer, Sybilla?"

"How should we, if thou dost not?" asked Euphemia, with some asperity.

"Because you are older and bigger than me, and should of course see farther."

"Hush, child," replied Lady Euphemia, who had frequently found little Lizzie's powers of observation somewhat provoking; "but I _do_ think," she added, turning to Sybilla, "that I can distinguish Falconer and Barton on the poop."

"At this distance!" said she, shading her fine hazel eyes by a small white hand.

"Dost see a white feather waving there?"

"Euphemia, Falconer always wears a red feather in his casquetel," replied Lady Sybilla.

"We shall have good Father Zuill, the chaplain, visiting us ere long," said little Sybilla, "to read us some of his wonderful stories out of that great book, in which he writes down the miracles of St. Clement, the mariner's patron."

Be it known, that though these charming girls could write, not one of them ever read a book in her life; for the simple reason, that there was not then a printed book in all the realm of Scotland, where the noble art of printing was unknown till twenty-two years later--being fourteen years after it was known in England.

Here little Lizzie, after terrifying her sisters by a large wasp, which she thrust before them on her fan of feathers, threw it over the bartizan.

"'Tis the first wasp I have seen this year," said Euphemia; "thou shouldst have killed it, child, for that would have freed us from foes till the end of December."

"Father Zuill told us not to believe in that superstition," said Margaret, gently.

"Yet he believes in beads that cure blindness," said Sybilla.

"And burning-glasses that will consume a fleet at the horizon and further," added Euphemia; "but lo you, now, the ships are about to anchor!"

The sun was now in the westward, and a bright flood of light was poured along the broad and beautiful river, the green banks of which lay steeped in purple haze. The _Yellow Frigate_ and her consort, towering above all other craft in the harbour, were now abreast of the mansion from whence the five daughters of the Steward of Strathearn were observing them; and being distant only a bow-shot, the words of command issued through the trumpet on board of both could be distinctly heard.

There was a light wind, thus the vessels were under a press of canvas, and formed, indeed, a noble sight, with their snow-white sails shining above the mirror-like water, and their many-coloured pennons streaming in the sunny air. They elicited frequent bursts of nautical rapture from the old Tritons who were clustered on the craig of St. Nicholas, a sea-beaten rock, that took its name from a small chapel dedicated to that saint, which crowned its summit.

"To your quarters, yeomen of the sheets and braces!" cried a clear and distinct voice from the poop of the frigate.

"This is _his_ voice--that is the voice of Barton!" exclaimed Euphemia, a glow of joy replacing the paleness of her fine face to hear again the familiar accents of her lover--even in the hoarse words of command.

A moment after the courses were hauled up, and the light breeze swept through the rigging; boats were now putting off from the shore, and the high gunnels (or _gun-walls_) of the caravels were crowded with glad faces, and hurried but hearty recognitions of friends were interchanged. The seamen, clad in their grey gaberdines (each with St. Andrew's cross sewn on the breast thereof), and their flat blue bonnets, were seen swarming up the shrouds like bees, and displaying themselves upon the sharply braced yards; and then, as if by the wave of a wizard's wand, the great canvas sails disappeared, landsmen scarcely knew how, as they were neatly and compactly handed and laid in, revealing the taut black rigging and ponderous top-castles of the frigate--nor was Sir Alexander Mathieson, in the _Queen Margaret_, an instant behind the admiral in his manoeuvres.

"Stand by the anchor, lads!" shouted Barton, with a voice like a trumpet.

"All clear--yare, yare, my hearts!" replied the boatswain, Archy O'Anster from the forecastle, while as the frigate rounded her to, great blue ensign flapped in the wind.

"Then let go!"

A rushing sound, as the thick rope cable swept through the hawseholes, and a heavy plunge, as the ponderous iron anchor disappeared into the calm flow of the river, announced that the admiral's ship swung at her moorings in the harbour of Dundee, from whence, four months before, she had sailed for the coast of Flanders, as we have already mentioned, anent King James's dispute with the merchants of the Sluice and Dam.

At that time no man was so popular in Scotland as Sir Andrew Wood, unless we except Sir Andrew Barton; but now he was gone to his long home, and the people looked to his old messmate to avenge him. Three loud cheers were given from the shore as the frigates came to anchor; and from aloft and alow their crews responded, with the deep and hearty shout that can only come from the throats of those who are incessantly combating with the waves and winds.

"See, dear Lizzie," said Margaret, who, though usually silent and languid, had partaken of the excitement and bustle caused by the admiral's arrival, "a barge is leaving the side of the _Yellow Frigate_."

"Oh, the bonny little barge!" exclaimed Beatrix, dancing about her, and comparing the sixteen-oared boat to the towering caravel.

"Two gentlemen, clad in grey doublets, are in it."

"Margaret, 'tis Barton and Falconer--thou seest his red feather now, Sybilla," said Euphemia, as she flushed again with pleasure.

"They will bring us pretty, pretty presents, will they not?" said the younger girls, clapping their hands.

"Father Zuill promised you each a box of sweetmeats," said Margaret, with one of her sad kind smiles.

"Captain Barton promised me a silver collar from Bruges," said little Elizabeth.

"And David Falconer promised _me_ a carcanet of pearls, with a hood and veil," added Beatrix, who was a year younger.

"Thou--child?" said Euphemia; "and what would _you_ do with a carcanet, a hood and veil?"

"Wear them at mass, and in the Highgaitt, to be sure," retorted the little dame, testily; "no one fell in love with you, sister Euphemia, till you exchanged the coif for a hood and veil."

"Nor with Sybilla, either," added Beatrix, making common cause against the elders; "and as for poor sister Margaret, no one has loved her yet."

Lady Margaret grew ghastly pale, and turned away. Sybilla, who did not perceive this emotion, laughed; but Euphemia, who had now the place of mother over them all, said gravely,

"You are overforward, imps. Eight years hence it will be time enough for Lizzie, and for you, Beatie, to think of lovers, and talk of hoods and veils. Marry come up! child, thou canst not spin yet! But see--Barton's boat hath reached the Rock of St. Nicholas."

"Alas!" said Margaret, sadly, "what evil tidings we have to give him of his father's fate."

As the two friends sprang ashore, the old seamen who were clustered by the chapel wall, all doffed their bonnets, and murmured a hearty welcome.

The rock was the ancient landing-place, and lay to the westward of the old harbour. It was there that David, Crown Prince of Scotland, landed on his return from the Crusades; and there, that two hundred years after, the good Sir James Douglas embarked for Jerusalem, with the heart of Robert Bruce; for "bonnie Dundee" is a place of many old and many stirring memories.

"They are coming this way," said Sybilla, in a flutter; "we must hasten to receive them."

"But, lo!--what scurvy companion do they bring with them?" added the haughty Euphemia.

"Sir Hew Borthwick," said Lizzie, "who cheated our butler at dice, and stole the gateward's bugle."

"_Sir!_--how can you thus pollute the title of knighthood?" asked the eldest sister.

"But do not the people call him so?" said Margaret.

"He is a mansworn priest," continued Euphemia, "and I marvel that the Lord Bishop of Dunblane permits him to be at liberty. Was not Father Arbuckle built up in the gable of Gilston kirk for the same crime--abandoning his cloister?"

"Oh, frightful!" said the gentle Margaret, with a shudder; "'tis so unlike _you_, dear Effie, to urge such an expiation; moreover, I do not believe it."

"Not believe!" repeated Euphemia, as they all descended from the bartizan by a turret stair; "has not our father told us that he saw it done--yea, and guarded the kirk with the lances of the stewardry for ten days; and there, in the wall, the bones of the friar, poor man! are yet remaining. But, hark! there are our visitors."

At that moment Sir David Falconer blew the copper horn which hung at the tirling-pin of the house door.