I felt this very trite but melancholy truth in all its force the
other day, when a packet with a black seal arrived, containing a
letter addressed to me by my late excellent friend Mrs. Martha
Bethune Baliol, and marked with the fatal indorsation, "To be
delivered according to address, after I shall be no more."  A
letter from her executors accompanied the packet, mentioning that
they had found in her will a bequest to me of a painting of some
value, which she stated would just fit the space above my
cupboard, and fifty guineas to buy a ring.  And thus I separated,
with all the kindness which we had maintained for many years,
from a friend, who, though old enough to have been the companion
of my mother, was yet, in gaiety of spirits and admirable
sweetness of temper, capable of being agreeable, and even
animating society, for those who write themselves in the vaward
of youth, an advantage which I have lost for these five-and-
thirty years.  The contents of the packet I had no difficulty in
guessing, and have partly hinted at them in the last chapter.
But to instruct the reader in the particulars, and at the same
time to indulge myself with recalling the virtues and agreeable
qualities of my late friend, I will give a short sketch of her
manners and habits.

Mrs. Martha Bethune Baliol was a person of quality and fortune,
as these are esteemed in Scotland.  Her family was ancient, and
her connections honourable.  She was not fond of specially
indicating her exact age, but her juvenile recollections
stretched backwards till before the eventful year 1745, and she
remembered the Highland clans being in possession of the Scottish
capital, though probably only as an indistinct vision.  Her
fortune, independent by her father's bequest, was rendered
opulent by the death of more than one brave brother, who fell
successively in the service of their country, so that the family
estates became vested in the only surviving child of the ancient
house of Bethune Baliol.  My intimacy was formed with the
excellent lady after this event, and when she was already
something advanced in age.

She inhabited, when in Edinburgh, where she regularly spent the
winter season, one of those old hotels which, till of late, were
to be found in the neighbourhood of the Canongate and of the
Palace of Holyrood House, and which, separated from the street,
now dirty and vulgar, by paved courts and gardens of some extent,
made amends for an indifferent access, by showing something of
aristocratic state and seclusion when you were once admitted
within their precincts.  They have pulled her house down; for,
indeed, betwixt building and burning, every ancient monument of
the Scottish capital is now likely to be utterly demolished.  I
pause on the recollections of the place, however; and since
nature has denied a pencil when she placed a pen in my hand, I
will endeavour to make words answer the purpose of delineation.

Baliol's Lodging, so was the mansion named, reared its high stack
of chimneys, among which were seen a turret or two, and one of
those small projecting platforms called bartizans, above the mean
and modern buildings which line the south side of the Canongate,
towards the lower end of that street, and not distant from the
Palace.  A PORTE COCHERE, having a wicket for foot passengers,
was, upon due occasion, unfolded by a lame old man, tall, grave,
and thin, who tenanted a hovel beside the gate, and acted as
porter.  To this office he had been promoted by my friend's
charitable feelings for an old soldier, and partly by an idea
that his head, which was a very fine one, bore some resemblance
to that of Garrick in the character of Lusignan.  He was a man
saturnine, silent, and slow in his proceedings, and would never
open the PORTE COCHERE to a hackney coach, indicating the wicket
with his finger as the proper passage for all who came in that
obscure vehicle, which was not permitted to degrade with its
ticketed presence the dignity of Baliol's Lodging.  I do not
think this peculiarity would have met with his lady's
approbation, any more than the occasional partiality of Lusignan,
or, as mortals called him, Archie Macready, to a dram.  But Mrs.
Martha Bethune Baliol, conscious that, in case of conviction, she
could never have prevailed upon herself to dethrone the King of
Palestine from the stone bench on which he sat for hours knitting
his stocking, refused, by accrediting the intelligence, even to
put him upon his trial, well judging that he would observe more
wholesome caution if he conceived his character unsuspected, than
if he were detected, and suffered to pass unpunished.  For after
all, she said, it would be cruel to dismiss an old Highland
soldier for a peccadillo so appropriate to his country and
profession.

The stately gate for carriages, or the humble accommodation for
foot-passengers, admitted into a narrow and short passage running
between two rows of lime-trees, whose green foliage during the
spring contrasted strangely with the swart complexion of the two
walls by the side of which they grew.  This access led to the
front of the house, which was formed by two gable ends, notched,
and having their windows adorned with heavy architectural
ornaments.  They joined each other at right angles; and a half
circular tower, which contained the entrance and the staircase,
occupied the point of junction, and rounded the acute angle.  One
of other two sides of the little court, in which there was just
sufficient room to turn a carriage, was occupied by some low
buildings answering the purpose of offices; the other, by a
parapet surrounded by a highly-ornamented iron railing, twined
round with honeysuckle and other parasitical shrubs, which
permitted the eye to peep into a pretty suburban garden,
extending down to the road called the South Back of the
Canongate, and boasting a number of old trees, many flowers, and
even some fruit.  We must not forget to state that the extreme
cleanliness of the courtyard was such as intimated that mop and
pail had done their utmost in that favoured spot to atone for the
general dirt and dinginess of the quarter where the premises were
situated.

Over the doorway were the arms of Bethune and Baliol, with
various other devices, carved in stone.  The door itself was
studded with iron nails, and formed of black oak; an iron rasp,
as it was called, was placed on it, instead of a knocker, for the
purpose of summoning the attendants.  [See Note 3.--Iron Rasp.]
He who usually appeared at the summons was a smart lad, in a
handsome livery, the son of Mrs. Martha's gardener at Mount
Baliol.  Now and then a servant girl, nicely but plainly dressed,
and fully accoutred with stockings and shoes, would perform this
duty; and twice or thrice I remember being admitted by Beauffet
himself, whose exterior looked as much like that of a clergyman
of rank as the butler of a gentleman's family.  He had been
valet-de-chambre to the last Sir Richard Bethune Baliol, and was,
a person highly trusted by the present lady.  A full stand, as it
is called in Scotland, of garments of a dark colour, gold buckles
in his shoes and at the knees of his breeches, with his hair
regularly dressed and powdered, announced him to be a domestic of
trust and importance.  His mistress used to say of him,--

                     "He is sad and civil,
   And suits well for a servant with my fortunes."

As no one can escape scandal, some said that Beauffet made a
rather better thing of the place than the modesty of his old-
fashioned wages would, unassisted, have amounted to.  But the man
was always very civil to me.  He had been long in the family, had
enjoyed legacies, and lain by a something of his own, upon which
he now enjoys ease with dignity, in as far as his newly-married
wife, Tibbie Shortacres, will permit him.

The Lodging--dearest reader, if you are tired, pray pass over the
next four or five pages--was not by any means so large as its
external appearance led people to conjecture.  The interior
accommodation was much cut up by cross walls and long passages,
and that neglect of economizing space which characterizes old
Scottish architecture.  But there was far more room than my old
friend required, even when she had, as was often the case, four
or five young cousins under her protection; and I believe much of
the house was unoccupied.  Mrs. Bethune Baliol never, in my
presence, showed herself so much offended as once with a meddling
person who advised her to have the windows of these supernumerary
apartments built up to save the tax.  She said in ire that, while
she lived, the light of God should visit the house of her
fathers; and while she had a penny, king and country should have
their due.  Indeed, she was punctiliously loyal, even in that
most staggering test of loyalty, the payment of imposts.  Mr.
Beauffet told me he was ordered to offer a glass of wine to the
person who collected the income tax, and that the poor man was so
overcome by a reception so unwontedly generous, that he had well-
nigh fainted on the spot.

You entered by a matted anteroom into the eating-parlour, filled
with old-fashioned furniture, and hung with family portraits,
which, excepting one of Sir Bernard Bethune, in James the Sixth's
time, said to be by Jameson, were exceedingly frightful.  A
saloon, as it was called, a long, narrow chamber, led out of the
dining-parlour, and served for a drawing-room.  It was a pleasant
apartment, looking out upon the south flank of Holyrood House,
the gigantic slope of Arthur's Seat, and the girdle of lofty
rocks called Salisbury Crags; objects so rudely wild, that the
mind can hardly conceive them to exist in the vicinage of a
populous metropolis.  [The Rev. Mr. Bowles derives the name of
these crags, as of the Episcopal city in the west of England,
from the same root, both, in his opinion, which he very ably
defends and illustrates, having been the sites of Druidical
temples.]  The paintings of the saloon came from abroad, and had
some of them much merit.  To see the best of them, however, you
must be admitted into the very PENETRALIA of the temple, and
allowed to draw the tapestry at the upper end of the saloon, and
enter Mrs. Martha's own special dressing-room.  This was a
charming apartment, of which it would be difficult to describe
the form, it had so many recesses which were filled up with
shelves of ebony and cabinets of japan and ormolu--some for
holding books, of which Mrs. Martha had an admirable collection,
some for a display of ornamental china, others for shells and
similar curiosities.  In a little niche, half screened by a
curtain of crimson silk, was disposed a suit of tilting armour of
bright steel inlaid with silver, which had been worn on some
memorable occasion by Sir Bernard Bethune, already mentioned;
while over the canopy of the niche hung the broadsword with which
her father had attempted to change the fortunes of Britain in
1715, and the spontoon which her elder brother bore when he was
leading on a company of the Black Watch at Fontenoy.  [The well-
known original designation of the gallant 42nd Regiment.  Being
the first corps raised for the royal service in the Highlands,
and allowed to retain their national garb, they were thus named
from the contrast which their dark tartans furnished to the
scarlet and white of the other regiments.]

There were some Italian and Flemish pictures of admitted
authenticity, a few genuine bronzes, and other objects of
curiosity, which her brothers or herself had picked up while
abroad.  In short, it was a place where the idle were tempted to
become studious, the studious to grow idle where the grave might
find matter to make them gay, and the gay subjects for gravity.

That it might maintain some title to its name, I must not forget
to say that the lady's dressing-room exhibited a superb mirror,
framed in silver filigree work; a beautiful toilette, the cover
of which was of Flanders lace; and a set of boxes corresponding
in materials and work to the frame of the mirror.

This dressing apparatus, however, was mere matter of parade.
Mrs. Martha Bethune Baliol always went through the actual duties
of the toilette in an inner apartment, which corresponded with
her sleeping-room by a small detached staircase.  There were, I
believe, more than one of those TURNPIKE STAIRS, as they were
called, about the house, by which the public rooms, all of which
entered through each other, were accommodated with separate and
independent modes of access.  In the little boudoir we have
described, Mrs. Martha Baliol had her choicest meetings.  She
kept early hours; and if you went in the morning, you must not
reckon that space of day as extending beyond three o'clock, or
four at the utmost.  These vigilant habits were attended with
some restraint on her visitors, but they were indemnified by your
always finding the best society and the best information which
were to be had for the day in the Scottish capital.  Without at
all affecting the blue stocking, she liked books.  They amused
her; and if the authors were persons of character, she thought
she owed them a debt of civility, which she loved to discharge by
personal kindness.  When she gave a dinner to a small party,
which she did now and then, she had the good nature to look for,
and the good luck to discover, what sort of people suited each
other best, and chose her company as Duke Theseus did his
hounds,--

  "Matched in mouth like bells,
   Each under each,"
         [Shakespeare's Midsummer Night's Dream, Act IV. Sc. I.]

so that every guest could take his part in the cry, instead of
one mighty Tom of a fellow, like Dr. Johnson, silencing all
besides by the tremendous depth of his diapason.  On such
occasions she afforded CHERE EXQUISE; and every now and then
there was some dish of French, or even Scottish derivation,
which, as well as the numerous assortment of VINS
EXTRAORDINAIRES produced by Mr. Beauffet, gave a sort of antique
and foreign air to the entertainment, which rendered it more
interesting.

It was a great thing to be asked to such parties; and not less so
to be invited to the early CONVERSAZIONE, which, in spite of
fashion, by dint of the best coffee, the finest tea, and CHASSE
CAFE that would have called the dead to life, she contrived now
and then to assemble in her saloon already mentioned, at the
unnatural hour of eight in the evening.  At such time the
cheerful old lady seemed to enjoy herself so much in the
happiness of her guests that they exerted themselves in turn to
prolong her amusement and their own; and a certain charm was
excited around, seldom to be met with in parties of pleasure, and
which was founded on the general desire of every one present to
contribute something to the common amusement.

But although it was a great privilege to be admitted to wait on
my excellent friend in the morning, or be invited to her dinner
or evening parties, I prized still higher the right which I had
acquired, by old acquaintance, of visiting Baliol's Lodging upon
the chance of finding its venerable inhabitant preparing for tea,
just about six o'clock in the evening.  It was only to two or
three old friends that she permitted this freedom; nor was this
sort of chance-party ever allowed to extend itself beyond five in
number.  The answer to those who came later announced that the
company was filled up for the evening, which had the double
effect of making those who waited on Mrs. Bethune Baliol in this
unceremonious manner punctual in observing her hour, and of
adding the zest of a little difficulty to the enjoyment of the
party.

It more frequently happened that only one or two persons partook
of this refreshment on the same evening; or, supposing the case
of a single gentleman, Mrs. Martha, though she did not hesitate
to admit him to her boudoir, after the privilege of the French
and the old Scottish school, took care, as she used to say, to
prescribe all possible propriety, by commanding the attendance of
her principal female attendant, Mrs. Alice Lambskin, who might,
from the gravity and dignity of her appearance, have sufficed to
matronize a whole boarding-school, instead of one maiden lady of
eighty and upwards.  As the weather permitted, Mrs. Alice sat
duly remote from the company in a FAUTEUIL behind the projecting
chimney-piece, or in the embrasure of a window, and prosecuted in
Carthusian silence, with indefatigable zeal, a piece of
embroidery, which seemed no bad emblem of eternity.

But I have neglected all this while to introduce my friend
herself to the reader--at least so far as words can convey the
peculiarities by which her appearance and conversation were
distinguished.

A little woman, with ordinary features and an ordinary form, and
hair which in youth had no decided colour, we may believe Mrs.
Martha when she said of herself that she was never remarkable for
personal charms; a modest admission, which was readily confirmed
by certain old ladies, her contemporaries, who, whatever might
have been the youthful advantages which they more than hinted had
been formerly their own share, were now in personal appearance,
as well as in everything else, far inferior to my accomplished
friend.  Mrs. Martha's features had been of a kind which might be
said to wear well; their irregularity was now of little
consequence, animated, as they were, by the vivacity of her
conversation.  Her teeth were excellent, and her eyes, although
inclining to grey, were lively, laughing, and undimmed by time.
A slight shade of complexion, more brilliant than her years
promised, subjected my friend amongst strangers to the suspicion
of having stretched her foreign habits as far as the prudent
touch of the rouge.  But it was a calumny; for when telling or
listening to an interesting and affecting story, I have seen her
colour come and go as if it played on the cheek of eighteen.

Her hair, whatever its former deficiencies was now the most
beautiful white that time could bleach, and was disposed with
some degree of pretension, though in the simplest manner
possible, so as to appear neatly smoothed under a cap of Flanders
lace, of an old-fashioned but, as I thought, of a very handsome
form, which undoubtedly has a name, and I would endeavour to
recur to it, if I thought it would make my description a bit more
intelligible.  I think I have heard her say these favourite caps
had been her mother's, and had come in fashion with a peculiar
kind of wig used by the gentlemen about the time of the battle of
Ramillies.  The rest of her dress was always rather costly and
distinguished, especially in the evening.  A silk or satin gown
of some colour becoming her age, and of a form which, though
complying to a certain degree with the present fashion, had
always a reference to some more distant period, was garnished
with triple ruffles.  Her shoes had diamond buckles, and were
raised a little at heel, an advantage which, possessed in her
youth, she alleged her size would not permit her to forego in her
old age.  She always wore rings, bracelets, and other ornaments
of value, either for the materials or the workmanship; nay,
perhaps she was a little profuse in this species of display.  But
she wore them as subordinate matters, to which the habits of
being constantly in high life rendered her indifferent; she wore
them because her rank required it, and thought no more of them as
articles of finery than a gentleman dressed for dinner thinks of
his clean linen and well-brushed coat, the consciousness of which
embarrasses the rustic beau on a Sunday.

Now and then, however, if a gem or ornament chanced to be noticed
for its beauty or singularity, the observation usually led the
way to an entertaining account of the manner in which it had been
acquired, or the person from whom it had descended to its present
possessor.  On such and similar occasions my old friend spoke
willingly, which is not uncommon; but she also, which is more
rare, spoke remarkably well, and had in her little narratives
concerning foreign parts or former days, which formed an
interesting part of her conversation, the singular art of
dismissing all the usual protracted tautology respecting time,
place, and circumstances which is apt to settle like a mist upon
the cold and languid tales of age, and at the same time of
bringing forward, dwelling upon, and illustrating those incidents
and characters which give point and interest to the story.

She had, as we have hinted, travelled a good deal in foreign
countries; for a brother, to whom she was much attached, had been
sent upon various missions of national importance to the
Continent, and she had more than once embraced the opportunity of
accompanying him.  This furnished a great addition to the
information which she could supply, especially during the last
war, when the Continent was for so many years hermetically sealed
against the English nation.  But, besides, Mrs. Bethune Baliol
visited different countries, not in the modern fashion, when
English travel in caravans together, and see in France and Italy
little besides the same society which they might have enjoyed at
home.  On the contrary, she mingled when abroad with the natives
of those countries she visited, and enjoyed at once the advantage
of their society, and the pleasure of comparing it with that of
Britain.

In the course of her becoming habituated with foreign manners,
Mrs. Bethune Baliol had, perhaps, acquired some slight tincture
of them herself.  Yet I was always persuaded that the peculiar
vivacity of look and manner--the pointed and appropriate action
with which she accompanied what she said--the use of the gold and
gemmed TABATIERE, or rather, I should say, BONBONNIERE (for she
took no snuff, and the little box contained only a few pieces of
candled angelica, or some such ladylike sweetmeat), were of real
old-fashioned Scottish growth, and such as might have graced the
tea-table of Susannah, Countess of Eglinton, the patroness of
Allan Ramsay [See Note 4.--Countess of Eglinton.],  or of the
Hon. Mrs. Colonel Ogilvy, who was another mirror by whom the
Maidens of Auld Reekie were required to dress themselves.
Although well acquainted with the customs of other countries, her
manners had been chiefly formed in her own, at a time when great
folk lived within little space and when the distinguished names
of the highest society gave to Edinburgh the ECLAT which we now
endeavour to derive from the unbounded expense and extended
circle of our pleasures.

I was more confirmed in this opinion by the peculiarity of the
dialect which Mrs. Baliol used.  It was Scottish--decidedly
Scottish--often containing phrases and words little used in the
present day.  But then her tone and mode of pronunciation were as
different from the usual accent of the ordinary Scotch PATOIS, as
the accent of St. James's is from that of Billingsgate.  The
vowels were not pronounced much broader than in the Italian
language, and there was none of the disagreeable drawl which is
so offensive to southern ears.  In short, it seemed to be the
Scottish as spoken by the ancient Court of Scotland, to which no
idea of vulgarity could be attached; and the lively manners and
gestures with which it was accompanied were so completely in
accord with the sound of the voice and the style of talking, that
I cannot assign them a different origin.  In long derivation,
perhaps the manner of the Scottish court might have been
originally formed on that of France, to which it had certainly
some affinity; but I will live and die in the belief that those
of Mrs. Baliol, as pleasing as they were peculiar, came to her by
direct descent from the high dames who anciently adorned with
their presence the royal halls of Holyrood.



CHAPTER VII.

MRS. BALIOL ASSISTS MR. CROFTANGRY IN HIS LITERARY SPECULATIONS.

Such as I have described Mrs. Bethune Baliol, the reader will
easily believe that, when I thought of the miscellaneous nature
of my work, I rested upon the information she possessed, and her
communicative disposition, as one of the principal supports of my
enterprise.  Indeed, she by no means disapproved of my proposed
publication, though expressing herself very doubtful how far she
could personally assist it--a doubt which might be, perhaps, set
down to a little ladylike coquetry, which required to be sued for
the boon she was not unwilling to grant.  Or, perhaps, the good
old lady, conscious that her unusual term of years must soon draw
to a close, preferred bequeathing the materials in the shape of a
legacy, to subjecting them to the judgment of a critical public
during her lifetime.

Many a time I used, in our conversations of the Canongate, to
resume my request of assistance, from a sense that my friend was
the most valuable depository of Scottish traditions that was
probably now to be found.  This was a subject on which my mind
was so much made up that, when I heard her carry her description
of manners so far back beyond her own time, and describe how
Fletcher of Salton spoke, how Graham of Claverhouse danced, what
were the jewels worn by the famous Duchess of Lauderdale, and how
she came by them, I could not help telling her I thought her some
fairy, who cheated us by retaining the appearance of a mortal of
our own day, when, in fact, she had witnessed the revolutions of
centuries.  She was much diverted when I required her to take
some solemn oath that she had not danced at the balls given by
Mary of Este, when her unhappy husband occupied Holyrood in a
species of honourable banishment; [The Duke of York afterwards
James II., frequently resided in Holyrood House when his religion
rendered him an object of suspicion to the English Parliament.]
or asked whether she could not recollect Charles the Second when
he came to Scotland in 1650, and did not possess some slight
recollections of the bold usurper who drove him beyond the Forth.

"BEAU COUSIN," she said, laughing, "none of these do I remember
personally, but you must know there has been wonderfully little
change on my natural temper from youth to age.  From which it
follows, cousin, that, being even now something too young in
spirit for the years which Time has marked me in his calendar, I
was, when a girl, a little too old for those of my own standing,
and as much inclined at that period to keep the society of elder
persons, as I am now disposed to admit the company of gay young
fellows of fifty or sixty like yourself, rather than collect
about me all the octogenarians.  Now, although I do not actually
come from Elfland, and therefore cannot boast any personal
knowledge of the great personages you enquire about, yet I have
seen and heard those who knew them well, and who have given me as
distinct an account of them as I could give you myself of the
Empress Queen, or Frederick of Prussia; and I will frankly add,"
said she, laughing and offering her BONBONNIERE, "that I HAVE
heard so much of the years which immediately succeeded the
Revolution, that I sometimes am apt to confuse the vivid
descriptions fixed on my memory by the frequent and animated
recitation of others, for things which I myself have actually
witnessed.  I caught myself but yesterday describing to Lord M--
the riding of the last Scottish Parliament, with as much
minuteness as if I had seen it, as my mother did, from the
balcony in front of Lord Moray's Lodging in the Canongate."

"I am sure you must have given Lord M-- a high treat."

"I treated him to a hearty laugh, I believe," she replied; "but
it is you, you vile seducer of youth, who lead me into such
follies.  But I will be on my guard against my own weakness.  I
do not well know if the Wandering Jew is supposed to have a wife,
but I should be sorry a decent middle-aged Scottish gentlewoman
should be suspected of identity with such a supernatural person."

"For all that, I must torture you a little more, MA BELLE
COUSINE, with my interrogatories; for how shall I ever turn
author unless on the strength of the information which you have
so often procured me on the ancient state of manners?"

"Stay, I cannot allow you to give your points of enquiry a name
so very venerable, if I am expected to answer them.  Ancient is a
term for antediluvians.  You may catechise me about the battle of
Flodden, or ask particulars about Bruce and Wallace, under
pretext of curiosity after ancient manners; and that last subject
would wake my Baliol blood, you know."

"Well, but, Mrs. Baliol, suppose we settle our era:  you do not
call the accession of James the Sixth to the kingdom of Britain
very ancient?"

"Umph!  no, cousin; I think I could tell you more of that than
folk nowadays remember.  For instance, that as James was trooping
towards England, bag and baggage, his journey was stopped near
Cockenzie by meeting the funeral of the Earl of Winton, the old
and faithful servant and follower of his ill-fated mother, poor
Mary!  It was an ill omen for the INFARE, and so was seen of it,
cousin."  [See Note 5.--Earl of Winton.]

I did not choose to prosecute this subject, well knowing Mrs.
Bethune Baliol did not like to be much pressed on the subject of
the Stewarts, whose misfortunes she pitied, the rather that her
father had espoused their cause.  And yet her attachment to the
present dynasty being very sincere, and even ardent, more
especially as her family had served his late Majesty both in
peace and war, she experienced a little embarrassment in
reconciling her opinions respecting the exiled family with those
she entertained for the present.  In fact, like many an old
Jacobite, she was contented to be somewhat inconsistent on the
subject, comforting herself that NOW everything stood as it ought
to do, and that there was no use in looking back narrowly on the
right or wrong of the matter half a century ago.

"The Highlands," I suggested, "should furnish you with ample
subjects of recollection.  You have witnessed the complete change
of that primeval country, and have seen a race not far removed
from the earliest period of society melted down into the great
mass of civilization; and that could not happen without incidents
striking in themselves, and curious as chapters in the history of
the human race."

"It is very true," said Mrs. Baliol; "one would think it should
have struck the observers greatly, and yet it scarcely did so.
For me, I was no Highlander myself, and the Highland chiefs of
old, of whom I certainly knew several, had little in their
manners to distinguish them from the Lowland gentry, when they
mixed in society in Edinburgh, and assumed the Lowland dress.
Their peculiar character was for the clansmen at home; and you
must not imagine that they swaggered about in plaids and
broadswords at the Cross, or came to the Assembly Rooms in
bonnets and kilts."

"I remember," said I, "that Swift, in his Journal, tells Stella
he had dined in the house of a Scots nobleman, with two Highland
chiefs, whom he had found as well-bred men as he had ever met
with."  [Extract of Journal to Stella.--"I dined to-day (12th
March 1712) with Lord Treasurer and two gentlemen of the
Highlands of Scotland, yet very polite men."  SWIFT'S WORKS, VOL.
III. p.7. EDIN. 1824.]

"Very likely," said my friend.  "The extremes of society approach
much more closely to each other than perhaps the Dean of Saint
Patrick's expected.  The savage is always to a certain degree
polite.  Besides, going always armed, and having a very
punctilious idea of their own gentility and consequence, they
usually behaved to each other and to the Lowlanders with a good
deal of formal politeness, which sometimes even procured them the
character of insincerity."

"Falsehood belongs to an early period of society, as well as the
deferential forms which we style politeness," I replied.  "A
child does not see the least moral beauty in truth until he has
been flogged half a dozen times.  It is so easy, and apparently
so natural, to deny what you cannot be easily convicted of, that
a savage as well as a child lies to excuse himself almost as
instinctively as he raises his hand to protect his head.  The old
saying, 'Confess and be hanged,' carries much argument in it.  I
observed a remark the other day in old Birrel.  He mentions that
M'Gregor of Glenstrae and some of his people had surrendered
themselves to one of the Earls of Argyle, upon the express
condition that they should be conveyed safe into England.  The
Maccallum Mhor of the day kept the word of promise, but it was
only to the ear.  He indeed sent his captives to Berwick, where
they had an airing on the other side of the Tweed; but it was
under the custody of a strong guard, by whom they were brought
back to Edinburgh, and delivered to the executioner.  This,
Birrel calls keeping a Highlandman's promise."  [See Note 6.--
M'Gregor of Glenstrae.]

"Well," replied Mrs. Baliol, "I might add that many of the
Highland chiefs whom I knew in former days had been brought up in
France, which might improve their politeness, though perhaps it
did not amend their sincerity.  But considering that, belonging
to the depressed and defeated faction in the state, they were
compelled sometimes to use dissimulation, you must set their
uniform fidelity to their friends; against their occasional
falsehood to their enemies, and then you will not judge poor John
Highlandman too severely.  They were in a state of society where
bright lights are strongly contrasted with deep shadows."

"It is to that point I would bring you, MA BELLE COUSINE; and
therefore they are most proper subjects for composition."

"And you want to turn composer, my good friend, and set my old
tales to some popular tune?  But there have been too many
composers, if that be the word, in the field before.  The
Highlands WERE indeed a rich mine; but they have, I think, been
fairly wrought out, as a good tune is grinded into vulgarity when
it descends to the hurdy-gurdy and the barrel-organ."

"If it be really tune," I replied, "it will recover its better
qualities when it gets into the hands of better artists."

"Umph!"  said Mrs. Baliol, tapping her box, "we are happy in our
own good opinion this evening, Mr. Croftangry.  And so you think
you can restore the gloss to the tartan which it has lost by
being dragged through so many fingers?"

"With your assistance to procure materials, my dear lady, much, I
think, may be done."

"Well, I must do my best, I suppose, though all I know about the
Gael is but of little consequence.  Indeed, I gathered it chiefly
from Donald MacLeish."

"And who might Donald MacLeish be?"

"Neither bard nor sennachie, I assure you, nor monk nor hermit,
the approved authorities for old traditions.  Donald was as good
a postilion as ever drove a chaise and pair between Glencroe and
Inverary.  I assure you, when I give you my Highland anecdotes,
you will hear much of Donald MacLeish.  He was Alice Lambskin's
beau and mine through a long Highland tour."

"But when am I to possess these anecdotes?  you answer me as
Harley did poor Prior--

  'Let that be done which Mat doth say--
   Yea, quoth the Earl, but not to-day.'"

"Well, MON BEAU COUSIN, if you begin to remind me of my cruelty,
I must remind you it has struck nine on the Abbey clock, and it
is time you were going home to Little Croftangry.  For my promise
to assist your antiquarian researches, be assured I will one day
keep it to the utmost extent.  It shall not be a Highlandman's
promise, as your old citizen calls it."

I by this time suspected the purpose of my friend's
procrastination; and it saddened my heart to reflect that I was
not to get the information which I desired, excepting in the
shape of a legacy.  I found accordingly, in the packet
transmitted to me after the excellent lady's death, several
anecdotes respecting the Highlands, from which I have selected
that which follows, chiefly on account of its possessing great
power over the feelings of my critical housekeeper, Janet M'Evoy,
who wept most bitterly when I read it to her.

It is, however, but a very simple tale, and may have no interest
for persons beyond Janet's rank of life or understanding.


*


THE HIGHLAND WIDOW



CHAPTER I.

  It wound as near as near could be,
  But what it is she cannot tell;
  On the other side it seemed to be
  Of the huge broad-breasted old oak-tree.    COLERIDGE.

Mrs. Bethune Baliol's memorandum begins thus:--

It is five-and-thirty, or perhaps nearer forty years ago, since,
to relieve the dejection of spirits occasioned by a great family
loss sustained two or three months before, I undertook what was
called the short Highland tour.  This had become in some degree
fashionable; but though the military roads were excellent, yet
the accommodation was so indifferent that it was reckoned a
little adventure to accomplish it.  Besides, the Highlands,
though now as peaceable as any part of King George's dominions,
was a sound which still carried terror, while so many survived
who had witnessed the insurrection of 1745; and a vague idea of
fear was impressed on many as they looked from the towers of
Stirling northward to the huge chain of mountains, which rises
like a dusky rampart to conceal in its recesses a people whose
dress, manners, and language differed still very much from those
of their Lowland countrymen.  For my part, I come of a race not
greatly subject to apprehensions arising from imagination only.
I had some Highland relatives; know several of their families of
distinction; and though only having the company of my bower-
maiden, Mrs. Alice Lambskin, I went on my journey fearless.

But then I had a guide and cicerone, almost equal to Greatheart
in the Pilgrim's Progress, in no less a person than Donald
MacLeish, the postilion whom I hired at Stirling, with a pair of
able-bodied horses, as steady as Donald himself, to drag my
carriage, my duenna, and myself, wheresoever it was my pleasure
to go.

Donald MacLeish was one of a race of post-boys whom, I suppose,
mail-coaches and steamboats have put out of fashion.  They were
to be found chiefly at Perth, Stirling, or Glasgow, where they
and their horses were usually hired by travellers, or tourists,
to accomplish such journeys of business or pleasure as they might
have to perform in the land of the Gael.  This class of persons
approached to the character of what is called abroad a
CONDUCTEUR; or might be compared to the sailing-master on board a
British ship of war, who follows out after his own manner the
course which the captain commands him to observe.  You explained
to your postilion the length of your tour, and the objects you
were desirous it should embrace; and you found him perfectly
competent to fix the places of rest or refreshment, with due
attention that those should be chosen with reference to your
convenience, and to any points of interest which you might desire
to visit.

The qualifications of such a person were necessarily much
superior to those of the "first ready," who gallops thrice-a-day
over the same ten miles.  Donald MacLeish, besides being quite
alert at repairing all ordinary accidents to his horses and
carriage, and in making shift to support them, where forage was
scarce, with such substitutes as bannocks and cakes, was likewise
a man of intellectual resources.  He had acquired a general
knowledge of the traditional stories of the country which he had
traversed so often; and if encouraged (for Donald was a man of
the most decorous reserve), he would willingly point out to you
the site of the principal clan-battles, and recount the most
remarkable legends by which the road, and the objects which
occurred in travelling it, had been distinguished.  There was
some originality in the man's habits of thinking and expressing
himself, his turn for legendary lore strangely contrasting with a
portion of the knowing shrewdness belonging to his actual
occupation, which made his conversation amuse the way well
enough.

Add to this, Donald knew all his peculiar duties in the country
which he traversed so frequently.  He could tell, to a day, when
they would "be killing" lamb at Tyndrum or Glenuilt; so that the
stranger would have some chance of being fed like a Christian;
and knew to a mile the last village where it was possible to
procure a wheaten loaf for the guidance of those who were little
familiar with the Land of Cakes.  He was acquainted with the road
every mile, and could tell to an inch which side of a Highland
bridge was passable, which decidedly dangerous.  [This is, or was
at least, a necessary accomplishment.  In one of the most
beautiful districts of the Highlands was, not many years since, a
bridge bearing this startling caution, "Keep to the right side,
the left being dangerous."]  In short, Donald MacLeish was not
only our faithful attendant and steady servant, but our humble
and obliging friend; and though I have known the half-classical
cicerone of Italy, the talkative French valet-de-place, and even
the muleteer of Spain, who piques himself on being a maize-eater,
and whose honour is not to be questioned without danger, I do not
think I have ever had so sensible and intelligent a guide.

Our motions were of course under Donald's direction; and it
frequently happened, when the weather was serene, that we
preferred halting to rest his horses even where there was no
established stage, and taking our refreshment under a crag, from
which leaped a waterfall, or beside the verge of a fountain,
enamelled with verdant turf and wild-flowers.  Donald had an eye
for such spots, and though he had, I dare say, never read Gil
Blas or Don Quixote, yet he chose such halting-places as Le Sage
or Cervantes would have described.  Very often, as he observed
the pleasure I took in conversing with the country people, he
would manage to fix our place of rest near a cottage, where there
was some old Gael whose broadsword had blazed at Falkirk or
Preston, and who seemed the frail yet faithful record of times
which had passed away.  Or he would contrive to quarter us, as
far as a cup of tea went, upon the hospitality of some parish
minister of worth and intelligence, or some country family of the
better class, who mingled with the wild simplicity of their
original manners, and their ready and hospitable welcome, a sort
of courtesy belonging to a people, the lowest of whom are
accustomed to consider themselves as being, according to the
Spanish phrase, "as good gentlemen as the king, only not quite so
rich."

To all such persons Donald MacLeish was well known, and his
introduction passed as current as if we had brought letters from
some high chief of the country.

Sometimes it happened that the Highland hospitality, which
welcomed us with all the variety of mountain fare, preparations
of milk and eggs, and girdle-cakes of various kinds, as well as
more substantial dainties, according to the inhabitant's means of
regaling the passenger, descended rather too exuberantly on
Donald MacLeish in the shape of mountain dew.  Poor Donald!  he
was on such occasions like Gideon's fleece--moist with the noble
element, which, of course, fell not on us.  But it was his only
fault, and when pressed to drink DOCH-AN-DORROCH to my ladyship's
good health, it would have been ill taken to have refused the
pledge; nor was he willing to do such discourtesy.  It was, I
repeat, his only fault.  Nor had we any great right to complain;
for if it rendered him a little more talkative, it augmented his
ordinary share of punctilious civility, and he only drove slower,
and talked longer and more pompously, than when he had not come
by a drop of usquebaugh.  It was, we remarked, only on such
occasions that Donald talked with an air of importance of the
family of MacLeish; and we had no title to be scrupulous in
censuring a foible, the consequences of which were confined
within such innocent limits.

We became so much accustomed to Donald's mode of managing us,
that we observed with some interest the art which he used to
produce a little agreeable surprise, by concealing from us the
spot where he proposed our halt to be made, when it was of an
unusual and interesting character.  This was so much his wont
that, when he made apologies at setting off for being obliged to
stop in some strange, solitary place till the horses should eat
the corn which he brought on with them for that purpose, our
imagination used to be on the stretch to guess what romantic
retreat he had secretly fixed upon for our noontide baiting-
place.

We had spent the greater part of the morning at the delightful
village of Dalmally, and had gone upon the lake under the
guidance of the excellent clergyman who was then incumbent at
Glenorquhy, [This venerable and hospitable gentleman's name was
MacIntyre.] and had heard a hundred legends of the stern chiefs
of Loch Awe, Duncan with the thrum bonnet, and the other lords of
the now mouldering towers of Kilchurn.  [See Note 7.--Loch Awe.]
Thus it was later than usual when we set out on our journey,
after a hint or two from Donald concerning the length of the way
to the next stage, as there was no good halting-place between
Dalmally and Oban.

Having bid adieu to our venerable and kind cicerone, we proceeded
on our tour, winding round the tremendous mountain called
Cruachan Ben, which rushes down in all its majesty of rocks and
wilderness on the lake, leaving only a pass, in which,
notwithstanding its extreme strength, the warlike clan of
MacDougal of Lorn were almost destroyed by the sagacious Robert
Bruce.  That King, the Wellington of his day, had accomplished,
by a forced march, the unexpected manoeuvre of forcing a body of
troops round the other side of the mountain, and thus placed them
in the flank and in the rear of the men of Lorn, whom at the same
time, he attacked in front.  The great number of cairns yet
visible as you descend the pass on the westward side shows the
extent of the vengeance which Bruce exhausted on his inveterate
and personal enemies.  I am, you know, the sister of soldiers,
and it has since struck me forcibly that the manoeuvre which
Donald described, resembled those of Wellington or of Bonaparte.
He was a great man Robert Bruce, even a Baliol must admit that;
although it begins now to be allowed that his title to the crown
was scarce so good as that of the unfortunate family with whom he
contended.  But let that pass.  The slaughter had been the
greater, as the deep and rapid river Awe is disgorged from the
lake just in the rear of the fugitives, and encircles the base of
the tremendous mountain; so that the retreat of the unfortunate
fleers was intercepted on all sides by the inaccessible character
of the country, which had seemed to promise them defence and
protection.  [See Note 8.--Battle betwixt the armies of the Bruce
and MacDougal of Lorn.]

Musing, like the Irish lady in the song, "upon things which are
long enough a-gone," [This is a line from a very pathetic ballad
which I heard sung by one of the young ladies of Edgeworthstown
in 1825.  I do not know that it has been printed.]  we felt no
impatience at the slow and almost creeping pace with which our
conductor proceeded along General Wade's military road, which
never or rarely condescends to turn aside from the steepest
ascent, but proceeds right up and down hill, with the
indifference to height and hollow, steep or level, indicated by
the old Roman engineers.  Still, however, the substantial
excellence of these great works--for such are the military
highways in the Highlands--deserved the compliment of the poet,
who, whether he came from our sister kingdom, and spoke in his
own dialect, or whether he supposed those whom he addressed might
have some national pretension to the second sight, produced the
celebrated couplet,--

  "Had you but seen these roads BEFORE they were made,
   You would hold up your hands and bless General Wade."

Nothing, indeed, can be more wonderful than to see these
wildernesses penetrated and pervious in every quarter by broad
accesses of the best possible construction, and so superior to
what the country could have demanded for many centuries for any
pacific purpose of commercial intercourse.  Thus the traces of
war are sometimes happily accommodated to the purposes of peace.
The victories of Bonaparte have been without results but his road
over the Simplon will long be the communication betwixt peaceful
countries, who will apply to the ends of commerce and friendly
intercourse that gigantic work, which was formed for the
ambitious purpose of warlike invasion.

While we were thus stealing along, we gradually turned round the
shoulder of Ben Cruachan, and descending the course of the
foaming and rapid Awe, left behind us the expanse of the majestic
lake which gives birth to that impetuous river.  The rocks and
precipices which stooped down perpendicularly on our path on the
right hand exhibited a few remains of the wood which once clothed
them, but which had in later times been felled to supply, Donald
MacLeish informed us, the iron foundries at the Bunawe.  This
made us fix our eyes with interest on one large oak, which grew
on the left hand towards the river.  It seemed a tree of
extraordinary magnitude and picturesque beauty, and stood just
where there appeared to be a few roods of open ground lying among
huge stones, which had rolled down from the mountain.  To add to
the romance of the situation, the spot of clear ground extended
round the foot of a proud-browed rock, from the summit of which
leaped a mountain stream in a fall of sixty feet, in which it was
dissolved into foam and dew.  At the bottom of the fall the
rivulet with difficulty collected, like a routed general, its
dispersed forces, and, as if tamed by its descent, found a
noiseless passage through the heath to join the Awe.

I was much struck with the tree and waterfall, and wished myself
nearer them; not that I thought of sketch-book or portfolio--for
in my younger days misses were not accustomed to black-lead
pencils, unless they could use them to some good purpose--but
merely to indulge myself with a closer view.  Donald immediately
opened the chaise door, but observed it was rough walking down
the brae, and that I would see the tree better by keeping the
road for a hundred yards farther, when it passed closer to the
spot, for which he seemed, however, to have no predilection.  "He
knew," he said, "a far bigger tree than that nearer Bunawe, and
it was a place where there was flat ground for the carriage to
stand, which it could jimply do on these braes; but just as my
leddyship liked."