The chieftain smiled compa.s.sionately upon me, as on a representative of the sons of little men. 'Why, strong venison soup,' said he, 'and potted ptarmigans; or, if we were a hunting, a roasted salmon:--hunters are not nice, you know.'

As soon as we rose from table, Charlotte went to resume her office of housekeeper, which had, in her absence, been most zealously filled by one of her innumerable cousins. To a.s.sociate me in this employment was one of the friendly arts by which Charlotte contrived to domesticate me at Eredine; and household affairs furnished some little occupation for us both, although the establishment at the Castle was then smaller than it had ever been from time immemorial.

Feudal habits were extinct; and the days were long since gone, when bands of kinsmen, united in one great family, repaid hospitality and protection with more than filial veneration and love. Eredine had outlived three elder sisters, who for the greater part of a century had resided under the roof where they were born; and two younger brothers, who, after expiating, by thirty years of exile, their adherence to their hereditary sovereign, had returned to lay their ashes with those of their fathers. His eldest son had, a few months before, fallen a sacrifice to a West Indian climate; his second was banished from home by circ.u.mstances which I have already mentioned. The family, therefore, consisted of Eredine, his daughter, and myself; four men and seven women servants; Charlotte's nurse; a blind woman, who, being fit for nothing else, was stocking-knitter-general to the family, and served, moreover, as a humble subst.i.tute for the bard of other times; two little girls, one humpbacked, the other sickly; and three boys, two of whom were maintained because they were orphans, and the third because his grandmother had been the laird's favourite, some sixty years before; and, finally, Roban Gorach, Cecil's deserted lover; who, as the humour served, tended Henry's old white pony, or wandered to all the sacraments administered within sixty miles round, or sat by his torn oak from morn to night unquestioned.

But these were by no means the only persons who daily shared in the good cheer of Castle Eredine. Besides several superannuated people of both s.e.xes, who, for this very purpose, had been provided with cottages adjacent to the castle, we had stable-boys, and errand-boys, and cow-herds, and goose-herds; beggars and travellers by dozens; besides maintaining, for the day, every tradesman who executed the most trivial order for the family without doors or within. How was I surprised to learn, that this establishment was supported by an estate of little more than a thousand pounds a year!

This family party was, for the present, reinforced by visiters of all ranks, who came to congratulate Charlotte's return. Among the earliest of these was my old friend Cecil, who recognized me with tears of joy.

Recovering herself, she began to applaud her own skill in prophecy. 'I told you,' cried she, 'that ye knew not where a blessing might light; and there, ye see, ye're in Castle Eredine. And now Mr Henry will be gathered to you, and that will be seen.'

In answer to my enquiries into her own situation, she informed me that her husband had returned home, having been disabled by sickness, and discharged from his regiment as unfit for service. She talked of his illness, however, without any alarm; for she had travelled on foot to Breadalbane to bring water from a certain consecrated spring[24], on which she fully relied for his cure. 'What grieves us the most,' said she to me apart, 'is that he's no' fit to help at the laird's shearing this year; as he had a good right, as well as the rest. And ye see, I cannot speak to Miss Graham upon that to make his excuse, for she might think we were _reflecting_, because he got's trouble tending Mr Kenneth.'

The next day brought the harvest party of which Cecil had spoken. About four o'clock in the morning, I was awakened by the shrieking and groaning of a bagpipe under my window; and starting out of bed to ascertain the occasion of this annoyance, saw about a couple of hundred men and women collected near the house. These I found were the tenantry of Glen Eredine, a.s.sembled to cut down the landlord's corn; a service which they were bound to perform without hire. Yet never, in scenes professedly devoted to amus.e.m.e.nt, had I witnessed such animating hilarity as cheered this unrewarded labour. The work was carried on all day, in measured time to the sound of the bagpipe, yet without causing any interruption to the jests of the young or the legends of the old. Mr Graham himself frequently joined in both, without incurring the slightest danger of forfeiting respect by condescension. Dinner for the whole party was, of course, despatched from the castle. Fortunately, the cookery was not very complex, for the old nurse and the blind stocking-knitter were the only persons left at home to a.s.sist Charlotte and myself in the preparation.

It was customary for the festivities of the day to conclude with a ball on the old bowling-green; and promising myself some amus.e.m.e.nt from the novelty, I repaired to the spot soon after the time when the dancers had been accustomed to a.s.semble. But no dancers were there. Not a person was to be seen, except one sickly emaciated creature, wearing a faded regimental coat over his tartan waistcoat and philibeg, who stood leaning against a tree with an aspect of hopeless dejection.

Supposing that I had mistaken the place, I enquired of this person whither I must go to seek the dancers. 'Think ye, lady,' said the man, with a look somewhat indignant, 'that they would dance here this night?

I hope they're no' so ill-mannered. It would be a fine story for them to be dancing, and the best blood in Eredine not well cold i' the grave yet!'

I perceived that he alluded to the recent death of Kenneth Graham; and, struck with such an instance of delicacy in persons whom I considered as little better than savages, I was going to enter into further conversation with the man, when seeing Charlotte at a distance, I hastened to meet her. I could not prevail upon her to express the slightest surprise at the sensibility of her countrymen. 'It is just as I expected,' said she; and she proceeded to inform me, that the person whom I had quitted was the husband of my old friend Cecil, and the foster-brother of Kenneth Graham. 'Poor James!' said she; 'I believe it would have broken his heart if that bowling-green had been profaned with the sounds of merriment. He visits it every evening at the same hour when he was wont to come five-and-twenty years ago to play with my brothers. That poor fellow has given the strongest proofs of the attachment to a superior which you think so uncommon. As soon as he heard that my brother was ordered abroad, he left his wife and children, and explored his way on foot to the south of Ireland, where the regiment was already embarked. He enlisted; watched his master in the dreadful disease which few could be found daring enough even to relieve; followed the remains of his foster-brother to the grave, when sickness had made him unable to return from the spot; and lay all night on the earth which covered the head he loved best. Alas! alas! it lies among stranger-dust, far from us all.'

Although, ever since we had been on confidential habits, Charlotte had spoken of her dead brother almost as much as of the living one, these were the only words of lamentation which I ever heard her utter.

On the contrary, the a.s.sociations with which the remembrance of the dead was joined seemed to be pleasurable. She appeared to sympathise in the delight with which Lady Eredine and her son would meet; speaking of them exactly as she would of living persons possessed of all the sentiments and functions of mortality.

From these themes the transition was easy to the subject of Henry Graham,--a subject in which I took almost as much interest as she did herself; for what girl of one-and-twenty could be uninterested in an unknown lover? a lover described as handsome, brave, generous, good! and who had besides fallen in love at first sight; a compliment which, by the value some ladies put upon it, I suppose is estimated more by its rarity than its worth. Now, all this my imagination found in Henry Graham; for I was in the land of imagination. I was more than half persuaded of my conquest. There was no other way of accounting for his a.s.siduous good offices; his flattering yet minute description of my appearance. But Charlotte never directly admitted this explanation of his conduct, and I durst not venture to show her how far vanity could lead me in conjecture; though curiosity often made me come as near to the subject as I dared. 'After all,' I would say to myself, 'what can it signify to me? I shall never like the man; and I would far rather earn my bread by labour than by marriage.'

In the mean time, I was as much domesticated at Eredine as if I had already been a daughter of the family. My kind friend soon found means to make me consider it as for the present my permanent abode. She knew me too well to expect, that this could ever take place so long as I felt myself a useless dependent; and this was, I am persuaded the real cause which inspired her with an enthusiastic desire to excel in music. There was no danger that this plea for my detention should soon be exhausted; for Charlotte's skill hitherto went no farther than jingling a strathspey upon an excruciating harpsichord. Precisely at the lucky moment, however, arrived a splendid harp, a present from her considerate brother; and our labours began with much zeal and some success.

In return, she exerted surprising patience in a.s.sisting my study of her native tongue; and the whole family, myself included, were delighted with my progress. We make rapid advances in a dialect which is the only medium of communication with three fourths of the persons around us; and, in justice to Highland politeness, I must a.s.sert, that there is no language which may be attempted with more perfect security from ridicule. This acquisition, together with my performance of some Gaelic songs, brought me into high estimation with my venerable host. He declared, 'that I could turn Chro challin or Oran gaoil almost as well as his mother,--_white be the place of her soul!_' and only regretted, that instead of 'that unhandy thing of a harp, which made trews where trews should not be, I had not the light lady-like Clarsach, that the d----d Hanoverians burnt when they ransacked Glen Eredine.'

There might have been danger that my favourite recreation, to which long abstinence gave all the charm of novelty, should make unreasonable encroachment on my time. But almost the earliest work of my renovated judgment had been to impress me with a solemn conviction of the value of time; and when I recollected that, of the few allotted years of man, seventeen had already been worse than squandered; that of the uncertain remainder, a third must be devoted to the harmless enjoyments, a part rifled by the idle fooleries of others,--an unknown portion laid waste of joy and usefulness, by sickness, by sorrow, or by that overpowering languor which palsies at times even the most active spirit;--when I remembered, that the whole is fugitive in its nature as the colours of the morning sky, irreversible in its consequence as the fixed decree of Heaven, I could no longer waste the treasure on the sports of children, or suffer the jewel to slip from the nerveless grasp of an idiot. I had formed a plan for the distribution of my time; to which I adhered so steadily, that I seldom spent an hour altogether unprofitably; that is, I seldom spent an hour of which the employment had no tendency to produce rational, benevolent, or devout habits in myself or in others.

Let it not, therefore, be imagined that my whole life and conversation were as solemn, and as wise, and as tiresome as possible. The flowers of the moral world were doubtless intended to scatter cheerfulness and pleasure there; and the woman who contributes nothing to the innocent amus.e.m.e.nt of mankind has renounced one purpose of her being. I am persuaded, that a happier party, or at times a merrier never met, than a.s.sembled round our fireside at Eredine.

Nor was it always confined to the members of our own family. Our neighbours--and all within twenty miles were our neighbours--often came with half-a-dozen of their sons and daughters, two or three servants, and a few horses, to spend some days at Castle Eredine. Uninvited and unexpected, they were always welcome. No preparation could be made; no bustle ensued. The guests were for the time members of the household, and partook in its business, its enjoyments, and its privations. The morning amus.e.m.e.nts of the gentlemen furnished us with game; those of the ladies, with lighter dainties; and our evenings were enlivened by music, more abundant, it must be confessed, than excellent.

But, though my hours were neither dull nor solitary, I must own, that my heart leaped light with the hope of something new, when, one morning, Charlotte, running into the room breathless with delight, exclaimed, 'He is coming, dearest Ellen! he is coming! He will give up all his habits,--his pursuits,--he will give back their trash,--he will return to his father,--to us all!'

'Henry! When, dear Charlotte?'

'Now! Soon! In a week! Oh, if that week were past!'

Charlotte was restless with joy. She left me almost immediately; and I followed her to her father. The good old man folded us both to his breast. 'G.o.d grant I live this week,' said he, 'and then----' He paused a little, half ashamed of his emotion; 'I doubt,' said he, with a smile, 'my eyes are not so strong as they have been.' Then disengaging himself from us, he hurried out upon the road which led to Edinburgh, as if he had already hoped to meet his son; and repeated the same walk full twenty times that day. Next, he would count every stage of Henry's journey, and fix the very hour of his arrival, and order an infinity of preparations for his reception; and, when he had quite exhausted himself, he sunk into his great oak-chair ruminating, while a delighted smile at times crossed his face. 'The little curly-pated dog was his mother's darling,' cried he; 'and yet I never could find out how that happened, for there never was a Southron blood-drop in him. He was always a Graham to the heart's core.'

Had I before been wholly uninterested in Henry's arrival,--had I owed no obligation to him as the bestower of a secure though humble independence,--had all the suggestions of vanity been silenced, I must have sympathised in the joy expressed in every face I saw, in every voice I heard. The house-maids all claimed the honour of arranging his apartment; and as the division of labour, and all the distinctions between cook and chamber-maid, were quite unknown in Glen Eredine, the honour was bestowed according to seniority. The spinners celebrated their young master's return in the extemporary songs, so common among their countrywomen. The men brought home for him as many rocs, black-c.o.c.k, and ptarmigan, as would have satiated[25] courteous King Jamie's ravenous visiter. Charlotte's nurse told me endless anecdotes of his childhood; and I heard the blind knitter cry out in a tone of triumph, 'He led me up the loan with's _oun_ hand, sirs; and that's what he never did to one o' ye all. And shame fa' me, if ever a man lead me by the right hand again, an it be no Eredine himsel'; and that's not to be thought.'

The only one who took no share in the cheerful bustle was poor Roban Gorach; yet he too could in his way, testify affection for his young master. I had strolled out; and taking my favourite station on a ledge of rock which overhung the lake, I had suffered my thoughts to shape, I know not what romantic dream, of Henry Graham, and friendship, and Charlotte, and Maitland, and Castle Eredine, and castles in the air; when I was roused by the approach of poor Roban, attended by the old white pony, which followed him like a dog. He accosted me with an earnest look, lowering his voice to a confidential tone. 'They say you're ordained for him,' said he; 'so blessings on your face! take him peaceably.'

Since I had become a favourite in Glen Eredine, so many dreams and prophecies had announced me its future mistress, that I had no difficulty in apprehending his meaning. 'Oh! you must let me refuse a little at first for decency-sake, Robert,' said I, laughing.

'Mysel' would fain you do's bidding before you be hindered,' said he; laying his fingers pleadingly upon my arm. 'What if he _would_ see you going down the loan there, and through the wood, with another man's boy in bosom?'--he raised his arm, tracing as he spoke the path towards Cecil's dwelling; then letting it drop unconsciously, he proceeded in his native tongue, as if he had forgotten my presence. 'He would care no more for his fine golden watch, and all the parks and _towns_ of Eredine, than for the wind when _she_ flies by him.'--'But, Robert,'

said I, interrupting his mournful reverie, 'how should you all like to have a Saxon mistress in the Castle?'--'If it were so ordered,' answered Robert, 'who could say against?--and we might be very well, though it were so. Just you forget that you're a stepmother, with your leave; and we'll all forget it too.'

When I returned to the house, I learnt, what I had indeed inferred from Roban's language, that Cecil had been there. She came to ask medicine and advice for her dying husband; but when told the good news of the day, she retired without suffering Miss Graham's joy to be interrupted by her melancholy errand. Though, after having lived three months in Glen Eredine, I could no longer be surprised at this delicacy, it can never cease to please; and I immediately requested Charlotte to direct our evening walk toward Cecil's cottage.

We were received at the door by Cecil, who loaded us both with congratulations; and invited us, as she was accustomed to do, into her chamber of state, or as she phrased it, 'ben a house.' This apartment was at that time no unfavourable specimen of Glen Eredine parlours. It had to be sure an earthen floor not levelled with much nicety, but it was tolerably clean; it was ceiled with whitened boards, lighted by a sashed window, furnished with plane-tree chairs and tables, and ornamented with an open corner cupboard filled with gaudy stone-bowls, and jugs enriched with humble anacreontics. This was not, however, the family room; and, finding that poor James inhabited the other end of the building, we insisted upon adjourning thither.

The humbler apartment was separated from the other by a panelled closet or rather box, which served the double purpose of bed and part.i.tion. The remaining walls were imperfectly plastered with clay; and the rude frame-work of the roof was visible, where light enough to make it so was admitted by the aperture which served for a chimney, and by a window of four panes, one of which was boarded, and another stuffed with rags.

Beneath the above-mentioned aperture, the bounds of the fire-place were marked only by a narrow piece of pavement, upon which a turf-fire smouldered unconfined against the wall. The smoke, thus left at large, had dyed the rafters of an ebon hue; and, mixing with the condensed vapour, distilled in inky drops from the roof. The floor was strewed with water-pails, iron-pots, wooden-ware, and broken crockery. Cecil's eldest child, a boy of about four years old, tartaned and capped as martially as any 'gallant Graham' of them all, sprawled contentedly in the middle of the litter, sharing his supper of barley-bread with an overgrown pet lamb; and the youngest attired with rather less ceremony, crouched by the side of a black pot, contesting with the c.o.c.k the remains of a mess of oatmeal pottage.

From these postures of ease, however, Cecil instantly s.n.a.t.c.hed them both. 'Up, ill manners!' cried she; 'think it your credit to stand when the gentles come to see you.' This maxim she enforced by example, for no entreaties could prevail upon her to be seated in our presence.

The sallow, haggard countenance of poor James appeared through the open panel of the bed; and Miss Graham approaching, enquired 'how he felt himself?'

'Ye're good that asks,' said Cecil, answering for him; 'but he'll never be better, and he has no worse to be.'

'These people are savages, after all!' thought I. 'Would any humanised being have p.r.o.nounced such a sentence in the sick man's hearing?' I stole a glance towards the bed, half fearing to witness the effect of her barbarity.

'Trouble must have its time,' said the man cheerfully; 'but we must just hope it'll no be long now.'

This was so little like fear, that I was obliged to convert the words of encouragement into those of congratulation; and after Miss Graham had made some more particular enquiries, I expressed my satisfaction in observing such apparent resignation.

'Deed, ma'am,' said James, 'I cannot say but that I am willing enough to depart; I'm whiles feared, indeed; but then I'm whiles newfangled.'

'I'm sure, lady,' said Cecil, tears now streaming down her cheeks, 'he has no reason to be feared; for he's been a well-living Christian all's days, and a good husband he's been;--and he shall have no reason to reflect that he has no' as decent a burial as ever the ground was broken for in Eredine. And for that we're partly much beholden to you, Miss Percy,--a blessing on you for that,--and a decent departure might you have therefor! And thankful may we be, Jamie, that ye'll no lie in unkent ground, among strangers, and heathens, and all the offscourings of the earth!'

'No!' said Miss Graham; 'among strangers you shall not lie. You shall be laid by the place where your foster-brother should have lain; and your head-stone shall be my memorial of him, and of what you did for him.'

A flash of joy brightened the face of the dying man. He looked at Miss Graham as if he would fain have thanked her; but though his lips moved, they uttered no sound. Cecil was voluble in her thanks; and I verily believe was half reconciled to the prospect of her misfortune, by the honour which it was to procure for her husband.

'When you see my dear brother,' proceeded Miss Graham, 'tell him, James, that my only regret now is, that I should show neither love nor honour to his remains; and that they must rest so far from mine!'[26]

At this moment a casual change of posture made me observe, through the window, a human figure, partially hid by an old ash tree which grew within a few feet of the cottage wall. The figure advanced a step; and I perceived through the dusk of the evening that it was Roban Gorach. He was leaning against the tree, with his eyes fixed on the window; his head and arms hanging listlessly down, with that undefinable singularity of mien which betokens the wandering of the mind.

I was going to call Miss Graham's attention to the circ.u.mstance, when our strange conversation was interrupted by a scream from the youngest child, whom Cecil had hastily caught up in her arms. The scream was certainly the shriek of pain, perhaps partly of surprise; yet Cecil apologising for her child's temper, began to soothe him with the sounds which nurses apply to mere frowardness, mixing them at times with the hum of a song. Her remonstrances to the child were given in Gaelic, interrupted by apologies in English to Miss Graham and myself. More than once she p.r.o.nounced the word[27] which signifies 'Go,' 'begone!' with strong emphasis; holding the child from her as if threatening to forsake him. He still continued to cry, and she to hush him with a song, which was at first irregular and indistinct; but which, by degrees, formed itself into regular rhythm, p.r.o.nounced with such precision, that even my slender knowledge of her language was sufficient to render it intelligible to me; while its occasional interruptions gave me time to fix the meaning at least in my memory. Of the plaintive simplicity of the original,--of the effect it derived from the wild and touching air to which it was sung,--my feeble translation can convey no idea; but I give the literal English of the whole[28]

Go to thy rest, oh beloved; My soul is pained with thy wailing; The wrath of a father is kindled by thy complaining: Go to thy rest.

Choice of my heart thou hast been, But now I lay thee from my bosom That it may receive my betrothed: Go to thy rest.

Oh cease thy lamentation; Disquiet me no more.

Till the long night bring morning of pleasant meetings: Go to thy rest.

Though I, having seen that Roban Gorach was one of Cecil's auditors, was at no loss to perceive the double meaning of the song, neither poor James nor Miss Graham could observe any thing peculiar in it. Cecil never appeared to cast a glance towards the real object of her address; and at every pause in the air she conversed with an appearance of perfect unconcern.

I own my esteem for my first Highland friend was far from being improved by this specimen of her dexterity in intrigue. As soon as Charlotte and I had taken our leave, I told her what I had observed; but, unwilling to express a harsh opinion, I waited for her comments. The incident, however, made no unfavourable impression upon her. 'I know,' said she, 'that Cecil has a great deal of discretion and presence of mind.'

'Presence of mind, I allow; but really it seems to me, that if her husband had witnessed this piece of management, he would have been very pardonable for doubting her discretion.'