Part 9

The matter appeared to Mungo to be settled without any consent of his, asked or obtained; so, knowing somewhat of the character and habits of this wandering and peculiar race, he was compelled to make a virtue of necessity, and, raising his pack again on his shoulders, to descend with them into the very lowest depths of the linns of Balachun. Even at noonday, on the 23d of June, the Pass, as it is called, is dreary, dark, and dreadful; but now, under the cover of night, and with no other guidance than a small lantern, which scarcely made darkness visible, Mungo hesitated ere he would commit himself to the crossing of a fearful gully, and the walking along the face of a rock, or scaur, scarcely eight inches wide, and overhanging a fearful pool, well known by the terrible appellation of "Hell's Caldron." The party at last arrived at a small grassy plot, encircled on the one side by the roaring stream called Clauchry Burn, and on the other by an amphitheatre of steep, high, and overhanging rocks, fringed and darkened in with brushwood and furze, and guarded, at the upper and lower extremities, by the rocks, which, after receding a little to make room for this grassy retreat, closed in again upon the current, and prevented all _easy_ entrance or escape. Soon after Mungo's arrival, he discovered a large kettle, boiling and bubbling, in a crevice of the cliff, suspended from a transverse beam; and beheld around it, now that a parcel of sticks and dry leaves were kindled, a most picturesque and motley group--women, children, men, boys, and lasses, of all hues, aspects, and sizes, were scattered about in profusion; and, as the flame flashed back from the red sandstone of the linn, their faces glared on Mungo with a demoniac expression. It seemed the very picture of Pandemonium; and yet the hearty laugh, the bold oath, and the occasional inquiry, bespoke the inhabitants to be at least one remove from devils. Mungo was desired to rest him and his load on the apron of the rock, and compelled, without a nay-say, to unstrap his pack, and expose his goods, not (seemingly) for sale, but for plunder. This was not the way, assuredly, to turn the penny to advantage, but what can one say, "_durum telum necessitas?_"--there was no avoiding the spoliation. To be sure, the king, or leader of the gipsy tribe--amounting probably to not less than forty or fifty persons--hinted in his ear that he should not be a loser at last; but, in the meantime, to his no small mortification, he saw his shawls, napkins, stockings, and waistcoat-pieces, making the round of the company without ceremony, and forgetting, like the dove from the ark, to return whence they had fled. The pack having been thus ransacked, and the pot having given audible intimation for some time of its preparatory doings, the king--for such he was--the notorious Donald Faa, with his three sons, Duncan, Cuthbert, and _Donnert_ Davie, together with the king's fair daughter, Helen Yetholm Faa, squatted down on the grass, and without the help of forks, made a hearty meal on hares, chickens, turkeys, geese, and half-a-dozen brace of partridges, which might have rejoiced the heart even of a Dominie Sampson. The other members of the community seemed to acknowledge the deputed authority of a young man of good features, and an athletic and genteel appearance, who went by the name of the Squire. After _eating_ had had its fair share of devoted and unremitted attention, a barrel, of considerable dimensions, began to make its way downward from amidst the recesses of this water-worn and excavated rock; and a tub being hurled sideways into the service, boiling water was procured, and sugar in no ordinary quantity commingled; and, by the help of a ladle and several chopin decanters, the whole mass of Egyptian humanity was stirred up into song, laugh, scream, inebriety, quarrel, battle, stupor, and insensibility. Our friend Mungo had no objections whatever to the feast, or to the means by which it was prolonged. He was afterwards notorious for his drinking habits, insomuch that his observation on this occasion is still repeated in the neighbourhood of the place of his nativity. When questioned by the king respecting the size of his native village, Penpont, his reply was--"It is an exceeding great city." This being questioned, his proof was equally ingenious, and descriptive of his habits--"Why, Nineveh took Jonah three days to travel through it, whereas Penpont generally takes me _seven_." He referred manifestly to his habit of stopping and drinking at every petty inn and public-house in the village! The jest told exceedingly in his favour. Mungo, however, in spite of his losses and crosses, had a noble night of it, as he afterwards said, with the gipsies, and awakened next morning from his grassy couch to cool his aching temples in the stream, and restore his stomach by a hair of the dog that had bit him. He then observed that the two sons, Duncan and Cuthbert, but not Davie (yclept Donnert, from his peculiarity of mental constitution), were absent, and that their father not only exhibited no surprise respecting his sons' absence, but refused to give any account to his guest of the cause of it. Meanwhile, Mungo had an opportunity of marking the appearances of the various objects around him somewhat more distinctly than he had been able to do on the preceding evening. Blankets, supported by forked poles, old clothes and rags of every description, formed a kind of nightly shelter for the common herd; whilst the royal head reposed in the midst of his male progeny, on the lap of a projecting rock, with a few hare-skins for his pillow, and a corn-sack for his coverlet. His fair daughter's bedchamber was somewhat more removed beyond a projecting corner of the winding linn, and she was protected from observation by the branches of the overhanging trees being drawn closely down over her, and by what had once, in all probability, been a soldier's tent, but which was now miserably rent, and unweather-worthy. It was manifest that this child was the darling and care of a fond father; for she was not only provided in a superior manner, but, by the position of his own sleeping apartment, she was protected from all intercourse with the other members of the tribe. Honest nature! thou art too many, even for a gipsy life; and even here parental affection hallowed and refined what was unseemly and revolting. I say revolting; for, in an obscure corner, and under the shelter of a hazel-bush, lay a figure, emaciated with disease, and probably with dissipation and crime, groaning in agony, and regarded with no more sympathy by the great mass of the tribe than if he had been a strangled hare or a mangled horse. There was something indeed terrible in this sight. True, Helen Faa did all that she was permitted, but that was but little, to alleviate his sufferings; but death was in his eye and in his throat--he made one great effort to rise, grasped a branch convulsively, and ceased to live. Mungo would willingly have retired, even with the losses he had sustained, but he was not permitted--probably because old Donald conjectured that information would be immediately lodged against him, and he would be compelled to relinquish one of his strongest holds in the south of Scotland. Meantime, Mungo had an opportunity of beholding more closely the female portion of this society; and was exceedingly struck--for he was yet a young man and unmarried--with the really handsome faces and well-formed persons which characterised the whole; but far and away above all the rest shone Miss Helen Yetholm Faa--for thus was she designated by the clan--in the pride of health, youth, and black, or rather brown, eyes--those weapons of female onset which are sharper than a two-edged sword, as Mungo used to sing or say afterwards, in a song which he composed on the occasion:--

"They were jet, jet black, and like a hawk, And wadna let a body be."

All this seemed to be fully appreciated by the Squire, who evidently paid the young princess particular attention, and seemed, at the same time, sufficiently jealous of any foreign interference with the object of his attention. Donnert Davie was a stout, ill-made, squint-eyed being, who stammered in his speech, and seemed particularly useful in carrying on the culinary operations, under the direction of Helen, in the retreat. He felled wood for the fire, carried water to the kettle, heated cow and sheep horns in the flame; brought round about and close to the operator old pots, pans, and trenchers, which had been obtained to be clouted, clasped, and mended. He was, in short, a kind of gipsy factotum; and when "the house affairs did not call him thence," he would associate with the stranger, stammering out such incoherent inquiries as--"Whare been?--What do?--What do?--Mother dead?--Mother dead?-- Yes--yes--yes--true--true--true"--muttering to himself, and repeating the same monosyllable half-a-dozen times. His sister Helen was manifestly kind to him, and would not permit any of the company to insult or ill-use him.

Night arrived, but with it not Duncan or Cuthbert; and it was not till late on the following evening that they made their appearance, and with them came silver and gold in abundance: consequently Mungo Clark's claims were satisfied; and he was informed that, next morning, as they were all about to decamp, he might pursue his journey homewards; but about the following dawn, an authoritative voice from the top of the precipice summoned the whole party to a surrender. One figure stood prominently forward, looking over the rock; and Donnert Davie, whose blunderbuss always lay charged beside him, immediately fired, and the figure came tumbling down headlong, and sunk in the yawning abyss of boiling water. In a word, the whole party, after a most determined resistance, were taken prisoners by a military party obtained from Dumfries; and it being proved against Duncan and Donald Faa that they had stolen some cattle from Dalswinton Mains, and sold them on the sands of Dumfries--as also against Donnert Davie, that he had shot the serjeant who commanded on the occasion--the whole three brothers were tried, condemned, and sentenced to be executed, _in terrorem_, near the spot where their depredations had been committed. As there were three persons to execute, and the famous tree already referred to had three branches, they appeared to the sheriff to be destined for each other; and accordingly all the three were hung at the same time on the same tree, which has ever since retained the appellation of "The Three Brethren."

Old Donald, his fair daughter, Mungo Clark, Squire Cockburn, and the rest, were set at liberty; but the gipsies were conveyed by a military escort across the Borders; and I have been given to understand that the Squire, who was the young laird of Glenae, after considerable opposition from the old father, was married to fair Helen Yetholm Faa; and that he was the happy husband of the fair dame who used afterwards to go about the country in disguise, attending in gipsy garb at weddings, kirns, and merry-meetings, and giving origin to the well-known reel--"Auld Glenae."

THE MISTAKE RECTIFIED.

"Now," said the traveller, as he wandered up one of those retired Highland glens, which characterise and beautify the Grampian range, "I shall once more visit my dear father and mother; and my sister, now woman grown; and, what is more, my sweet Helen M'Donald, who used to gather the mountain berries along with me, and pursue the little kids and lambs. Ah, Helen was only about thirteen years old when I left; she will now be eighteen; a full-grown beautiful woman, I have no doubt. I wonder if old Andrew, her grandfather, be still living; he used to tell me such tales of Prince Charlie, and Prestonpans, and Culloden, that my hair yet almost stands erect at the recollection of them. And then there was Euphemia M'Gregor, his son's wife, the mother of my dear Helen; and Oscar and Fingal, my father's faithful attendants and servants: and we had such fun during the long winter nights, when the sheep were in a place of safety, and the door was barred, and the peat-fire was burning clear, and the very cat and kitten enjoyed the cheery fireside--such questions and commands, such guessing and forfeiting, and riding round the fire on a besom, and holding one's mouth full of water to discharge on the person's face who should first laugh at our grotesque gestures and looks: but night is approaching whilst I linger by the way--my whole heart heaves to behold once more the sweet home of my youth and innocence."

Thus said, or thought aloud, a young man, seemingly about twenty-two years of age, as he ascended Glen----and approached the thatched shieling which stood on the margin of a small mountain stream, which wended its mazes along the tortuous glen. He had been five years, come the time, absent from his mountain home, and had, during that period, endured and encountered a variety of fortune. He sung as he went along--

"A light heart and thin pair of breeches, Goes through the world, brave boys!"

switching the bent and heather-bells with his cane, and treading with a step as elastic as was his bosom. At last, just as the sun was tinging with his departing ray the top of the highest mountain in the neighbourhood, he turned the corner of a projecting rock, and came at once into full and distinct view of his home. It was then grey twilight, and objects began to assume an indistinct appearance. Walking by the side of the stream, as if meditating, there appeared a figure wrapped up in a Highland plaid. It immediately struck the young sailor that this was his sister; and in order to give her what is called an agreeable surprise, he stepped aside unperceived by her, and stood concealed behind a projecting cliff, which the stream had stripped bare of soil in its passing current. The figure came nearer and nearer, and then, sighing deeply, uttered some sound, which his ear could not catch. At last, tears and sobs followed, and he heard the words most distinctly pronounced--"Alas, I can never truly love him! I shall be the most wretched of women! But he whom I loved as angels love--oh, he, my own dear William M'Pherson, is dead and gone, and I can never see him more."

"But you can though, my own dear Helen;" and in an instant he held her lifeless and motionless in his arms. She had uttered just one awful scream, which was re-echoed by the surrounding cliffs, and had ceased to feel or know anything connected with the living world. Alas! she was dead, and he was distracted. He ran to the house, calling aloud for help; but every one of its inmates, even the mother who bore him, fled from his presence, uttering ejaculations, intimating the greatest terror at his presence. In vain did he protest with tears--I am your son and no other--I am Willie M'Pherson, your lost boy! His words bore no conviction along with him. Avaunt, foul fiend! Avaunt, in the name of God and the Holy Trinity--trouble me not--trouble me not; my dear child is in heaven; and thou, foul spirit, art permitted for a time to assume his shape. His sister, too, was equally incredulous, and his father had not yet returned from the hill. What was to be done? Helen M'Donald was in all probability dead, or dying, helpless and alone, and yet no one would come to her assistance. At last, Oscar and Fingal made their appearance in advance of his father; and though they barked at first upon his naming them, they immediately ran up to him, and jumped upon his back, his neck, his head, his whole person. They seemed in as much danger of expressing joy as poor Helen had been of dying of fearful surprise.

"Stand back," said the delighted and believing father to his wife, who absolutely clung to his knees to prevent his advance--"stand back, woman; d'ye think Fingal and Oscar would caress the foul fiend in that manner? Na--na--na. Ha! ha! ha!" And he fell upon his son's shoulders, weeping and crying convulsively.

"My father--my dear, dear father."

"My son--my lost, my only, my restored son," was the response.

But Helen, in an instant, brought the whole party, consisting of father, mother, sister, and son, to her aid: a light was procured and held over her face; her bosom was bared, and rubbed; her forehead had water plentifully poured upon it from the stream; and, at last, symptoms of returning life appeared. Oscar and Fingal, in the meantime, had licked Helen's face, and neck, and shoulders, all over; and whether from any virtue in the peculiar touch of their tongues, or from the natural expiry of the trance, Helen breathed heavily--her bosom heaved; William looked on her cheeks, and they were flushed with red. In a moment he had her in his arms. Helen, for some time, suffered exquisite bodily torture; but was at last capable of having the truth made gradually known to her. She said surely she had been dreaming, as she had often done, and that she was still surely asleep, and that she would waken at last, as she had done before, to a dreadful perception of the reality. William M'Pherson still continued to clasp and assure Helen of his personal identity. But, even when convinced of the reality of William's presence, Helen did not evince that degree of happiness which might have been expected; she sat stupified and passive, and seemingly insensible to everything around her; her mind was evidently wandering to a disagreeable subject. However, she was prevailed upon to return with the family into the house, and, worn out and fatigued, she was soon after put to rest in an adjoining apartment.

In the meantime, the young sailor was questioned minutely respecting the reason of his reappearance, after he had been so long reported, and believed by everybody, to be dead.

Without repeating his answer in his own words, which were interlarded with sea phrases, we may state, in general, that it was to the following purpose:--He had gone to Dundee, with the view of making some small purchases for the household, when he accidentally fell in with a recruiting party, who were beating up for marines for the fleet, then just returned from the capture of the Danish fleet at Copenhagen. Inexperienced as he was, he was enticed into a public-house on the shore, and awakened, after a stupor of some hours, on board a British man-of-war. In a few hours, he was conveyed out to sea, along with several others, and was conveyed immediately to Spithead. Having it ultimately put to his choice whether he would stand by a gun, or handle a musket and a sabre, he chose the former, and was regularly entered as an ablebodied seaman on board His Majesty's ship the Victory. In her, along with Admiral Nelson, he sailed for the West Indies, and then crossed the Atlantic, back to the shores of France. The enemy still eluding the eagle-eye of Lord Nelson, he sailed for the Mediterranean, and, after various landings and inquiries, came upon the French fleet, moored closely inland on the coast of Egypt, at the mouth of the Nile. He was in the dreadful battle of the Nile, and assisted in rescuing several who were blown up, but not killed, in the L'Orient. After the battle, he had promotion, and ultimately prize-money, on account of his brave and humane conduct, and sailed again for Naples, and latterly in quest of the Spanish fleet on the coast of Spain. He was close by Nelson when he was shot by a rifleman from the mast of the ship with which he had grappled, and saw the fellow who did the deed drop on the deck, being shot through the heart by a marine on board of Lord Nelson's ship. After the battle, he was returned to Plymouth, having been wounded in the leg--a musket-ball had passed through the flesh, and somewhat, but not greatly, injured the bone. He spent some months in the hospital, and was then despatched to the coast of France on board the Spitfire. There he had distinguished himself in cutting out and burning several of the enemy's craft at Havre; and being again wounded, though slightly, in the arm, he was put upon the pension list, and allowed to dispose of himself till his country should again require his services. In these circumstances, he began to think of his home; and, with some hundreds of pounds in the bank, and a pension order of about two shillings and sixpence a-day in his pocket, he arrived at Dundee in a sailing vessel, and was on his way to his _native glen_ when the reader first became acquainted with him. When this narrative was finished, his father retired for an instant, and then appeared with some papers, which he had extracted from his private depositories. He first read a letter which purported to come from a king's officer, who signed himself William Wilson, and who informed his afflicted father that his son had been induced to go on board a king's ship, to see the arrangements which it exhibited; but that, in passing from the small boat to the deck, he had missed a foot, and been drowned. The letter was dated on board the Spitfire; and mentioned, likewise, that the ship was under sailing orders for the general rendezvous at Spithead. The poor distracted parent had come to Dundee, but could obtain no information of his son--only, about three months after, he heard that a dead body, severely mutilated, had been thrown out upon the sands of St Andrews; and, on account of the state of its decomposition, had immediately been interred in Christian burial-ground. A second pilgrimage to St Andrews was undertaken by the father and daughter; but nothing satisfactory was discovered, except that the corpse exhibited marks of having been dressed in a blue-and-white striped waistcoat, which answered to that in which he had left Denhead, his home in the Highlands. After this last discovery, all further inquiry ceased, and the afflicted family fulfilled the period of their sincere mourning, and things returned nearly to their usual bearing. But, when father, and mother, and sister had seemingly got over the worst of their grief, Helen M'Donald still pined in silence over the recollections of her early companion; and as she expanded into womanhood, her grief seemed to grow "with her growth;" and her father became extremely anxious to have Helen properly and creditably disposed of in marriage.

The son of a small proprietor in the neighbourhood had lately become laird himself; and, though far exceeding Helen in years, having had frequent opportunities of seeing her, particularly at church on Sabbath, he had become enamoured of so much beauty and innocence. Proposals had been made to the father, which were immediately accepted; and the young lady had been dealt with, as young ladies in such situations generally are, by arguments of interest, and worldly comfort, and even grandeur. First impressions are deep (oh, how deep!); and Helen could not yet entirely exclude the image of her beloved William from her recollection. Laird M'Wharry was urgent in his suit--her father, whom she affectionately loved, was troubled and anxious--her mother, too, pressed home upon her attention prudential considerations--so, after long delays and many internal struggles, Helen at last consented to become, but not till some months afterwards, Mrs or Lady M'Wharry, as the peasantry styled the laird's wife. It was during her visit (previous to her marriage) to M'Wharry that the incident took place which thus connects our narrative, and brings us up to the point of time when William M'Pherson arrived at Denhead.