"Do they pay both?" cried I.

"Ay, David, both," says he.

"What! two rents?" I repeated.

"Ay, David," said he. "I told a different tale to yon captain man; but
this is the truth of it. And it's wonderful to me how little pressure
is needed. But that's the handiwork of my good kinsman and my father's
friend, James of the Glens: James Stewart, that is: Ardshiel's
half-brother. He it is that gets the money in, and does the management."

This was the first time I heard the name of that James Stewart, who was
afterwards so famous at the time of his hanging. But I took little heed
at the moment, for all my mind was occupied with the generosity of these
poor Highlanders.

"I call it noble," I cried. "I'm a Whig, or little better; but I call it
noble."

"Ay" said he, "ye're a Whig, but ye're a gentleman; and that's what does
it. Now, if ye were one of the cursed race of Campbell, ye would gnash
your teeth to hear tell of it. If ye were the Red Fox..." And at that
name, his teeth shut together, and he ceased speaking. I have seen many
a grim face, but never a grimmer than Alan's when he had named the Red
Fox.

"And who is the Red Fox?" I asked, daunted, but still curious.

"Who is he?" cried Alan. "Well, and I'll tell you that. When the men of
the clans were broken at Culloden, and the good cause went down, and the
horses rode over the fetlocks in the best blood of the north, Ardshiel
had to flee like a poor deer upon the mountains--he and his lady and his
bairns. A sair job we had of it before we got him shipped; and while he
still lay in the heather, the English rogues, that couldnae come at his
life, were striking at his rights. They stripped him of his powers; they
stripped him of his lands; they plucked the weapons from the hands of
his clansmen, that had borne arms for thirty centuries; ay, and the very
clothes off their backs--so that it's now a sin to wear a tartan plaid,
and a man may be cast into a gaol if he has but a kilt about his legs.
One thing they couldnae kill. That was the love the clansmen bore their
chief. These guineas are the proof of it. And now, in there steps a man,
a Campbell, red-headed Colin of Glenure----"

"Is that him you call the Red Fox?" said I.

"Will ye bring me his brush?" cries Alan, fiercely. "Ay, that's the man.
In he steps, and gets papers from King George, to be so-called King's
factor on the lands of Appin. And at first he sings small, and is
hail-fellow-well-met with Sheamus--that's James of the Glens, my
chieftain's agent. But by-and-by, that came to his ears that I have just
told you; how the poor commons of Appin, the farmers and the crofters
and the boumen, were wringing their very plaids to get a second rent,
and send it over-seas for Ardshiel and his poor bairns. What was it ye
called it, when I told ye?"

"I called it noble, Alan," said I.

"And you little better than a common Whig!" cries Alan. "But when it
came to Colin Roy, the black Campbell blood in him ran wild. He sat
gnashing his teeth at the wine table. What! should a Stewart get a bite
of bread, and him not be able to prevent it? Ah! Red Fox, if ever I
hold you at a gun's end, the Lord have pity upon ye!" (Alan stopped to
swallow down his anger.) "Well, David, what does he do? He declares all
the farms to let. And, thinks he, in his black heart, 'I'll soon get
other tenants that'll overbid these Stewarts, and Maccolls, and Macrobs'
(for these are all names in my clan, David); 'and then,' thinks he,
'Ardshiel will have to hold his bonnet on a French roadside.'"

"Well," said I, "what followed?"

Alan laid down his pipe, which he had long since suffered to go out, and
set his two hands upon his knees.

"Ay," said he, "ye'll never guess that! For these same Stewarts, and
Maccolls, and Macrobs (that had two rents to pay, one to King George
by stark force, and one to Ardshiel by natural kindness) offered him a
better price than any Campbell in all broad Scotland; and far he
sent seeking them--as far as to the sides of Clyde and the cross of
Edinburgh--seeking, and fleeching, and begging them to come, where there
was a Stewart to be starved and a red-headed hound of a Campbell to be
pleasured!"

"Well, Alan," said I, "that is a strange story, and a fine one, too. And
Whig as I may be, I am glad the man was beaten."

"Him beaten?" echoed Alan. "It's little ye ken of Campbells, and less
of the Red Fox. Him beaten? No: nor will be, till his blood's on the
hillside! But if the day comes, David man, that I can find time and
leisure for a bit of hunting, there grows not enough heather in all
Scotland to hide him from my vengeance!"

"Man Alan," said I, "ye are neither very wise nor very Christian to
blow off so many words of anger. They will do the man ye call the Fox no
harm, and yourself no good. Tell me your tale plainly out. What did he
next?"

"And that's a good observe, David," said Alan. "Troth and indeed,
they will do him no harm; the more's the pity! And barring that about
Christianity (of which my opinion is quite otherwise, or I would be nae
Christian), I am much of your mind."

"Opinion here or opinion there," said I, "it's a kent thing that
Christianity forbids revenge."

"Ay" said he, "it's well seen it was a Campbell taught ye! It would be
a convenient world for them and their sort, if there was no such a thing
as a lad and a gun behind a heather bush! But that's nothing to the
point. This is what he did."

"Ay" said I, "come to that."

"Well, David," said he, "since he couldnae be rid of the loyal commons
by fair means, he swore he would be rid of them by foul. Ardshiel was to
starve: that was the thing he aimed at. And since them that fed him in
his exile wouldnae be bought out--right or wrong, he would drive them
out. Therefore he sent for lawyers, and papers, and red-coats to stand
at his back. And the kindly folk of that country must all pack and
tramp, every father's son out of his father's house, and out of the
place where he was bred and fed, and played when he was a callant. And
who are to succeed them? Bare-leggit beggars! King George is to whistle
for his rents; he maun dow with less; he can spread his butter thinner:
what cares Red Colin? If he can hurt Ardshiel, he has his wish; if he
can pluck the meat from my chieftain's table, and the bit toys out of
his children's hands, he will gang hame singing to Glenure!"

"Let me have a word," said I. "Be sure, if they take less rents, be
sure Government has a finger in the pie. It's not this Campbell's fault,
man--it's his orders. And if ye killed this Colin to-morrow, what better
would ye be? There would be another factor in his shoes, as fast as spur
can drive."

"Ye're a good lad in a fight," said Alan; "but, man! ye have Whig blood
in ye!"

He spoke kindly enough, but there was so much anger under his contempt
that I thought it was wise to change the conversation. I expressed my
wonder how, with the Highlands covered with troops, and guarded like
a city in a siege, a man in his situation could come and go without
arrest.

"It's easier than ye would think," said Alan. "A bare hillside (ye see)
is like all one road; if there's a sentry at one place, ye just go by
another. And then the heather's a great help. And everywhere there are
friends' houses and friends' byres and haystacks. And besides, when folk
talk of a country covered with troops, it's but a kind of a byword at
the best. A soldier covers nae mair of it than his boot-soles. I have
fished a water with a sentry on the other side of the brae, and killed a
fine trout; and I have sat in a heather bush within six feet of another,
and learned a real bonny tune from his whistling. This was it," said he,
and whistled me the air.

"And then, besides," he continued, "it's no sae bad now as it was in
forty-six. The Hielands are what they call pacified. Small wonder, with
never a gun or a sword left from Cantyre to Cape Wrath, but what tenty*
folk have hidden in their thatch! But what I would like to ken, David,
is just how long? Not long, ye would think, with men like Ardshiel in
exile and men like the Red Fox sitting birling the wine and oppressing
the poor at home. But it's a kittle thing to decide what folk'll bear,
and what they will not. Or why would Red Colin be riding his horse all
over my poor country of Appin, and never a pretty lad to put a bullet in
him?"

     * Careful.

And with this Alan fell into a muse, and for a long time sate very sad
and silent.

I will add the rest of what I have to say about my friend, that he
was skilled in all kinds of music, but principally pipe-music; was a
well-considered poet in his own tongue; had read several books both in
French and English; was a dead shot, a good angler, and an excellent
fencer with the small sword as well as with his own particular weapon.
For his faults, they were on his face, and I now knew them all. But
the worst of them, his childish propensity to take offence and to pick
quarrels, he greatly laid aside in my case, out of regard for the battle
of the round-house. But whether it was because I had done well myself,
or because I had been a witness of his own much greater prowess, is more
than I can tell. For though he had a great taste for courage in other
men, yet he admired it most in Alan Breck.




CHAPTER XIII

THE LOSS OF THE BRIG

It was already late at night, and as dark as it ever would be at that
season of the year (and that is to say, it was still pretty bright),
when Hoseason clapped his head into the round-house door.

"Here," said he, "come out and see if ye can pilot."

"Is this one of your tricks?" asked Alan.

"Do I look like tricks?" cries the captain. "I have other things to
think of--my brig's in danger!"

By the concerned look of his face, and, above all, by the sharp tones in
which he spoke of his brig, it was plain to both of us he was in deadly
earnest; and so Alan and I, with no great fear of treachery, stepped on
deck.

The sky was clear; it blew hard, and was bitter cold; a great deal of
daylight lingered; and the moon, which was nearly full, shone brightly.
The brig was close hauled, so as to round the southwest corner of the
Island of Mull, the hills of which (and Ben More above them all, with a
wisp of mist upon the top of it) lay full upon the lar-board bow. Though
it was no good point of sailing for the Covenant, she tore through
the seas at a great rate, pitching and straining, and pursued by the
westerly swell.

Altogether it was no such ill night to keep the seas in; and I had begun
to wonder what it was that sat so heavily upon the captain, when the
brig rising suddenly on the top of a high swell, he pointed and cried to
us to look. Away on the lee bow, a thing like a fountain rose out of the
moonlit sea, and immediately after we heard a low sound of roaring.

"What do ye call that?" asked the captain, gloomily.

"The sea breaking on a reef," said Alan. "And now ye ken where it is;
and what better would ye have?"

"Ay," said Hoseason, "if it was the only one."

And sure enough, just as he spoke there came a second fountain farther
to the south.

"There!" said Hoseason. "Ye see for yourself. If I had kent of these
reefs, if I had had a chart, or if Shuan had been spared, it's not sixty
guineas, no, nor six hundred, would have made me risk my brig in sic a
stoneyard! But you, sir, that was to pilot us, have ye never a word?"

"I'm thinking," said Alan, "these'll be what they call the Torran
Rocks."

"Are there many of them?" says the captain.

"Truly, sir, I am nae pilot," said Alan; "but it sticks in my mind there
are ten miles of them."

Mr. Riach and the captain looked at each other.

"There's a way through them, I suppose?" said the captain.

"Doubtless," said Alan, "but where? But it somehow runs in my mind once
more that it is clearer under the land."

"So?" said Hoseason. "We'll have to haul our wind then, Mr. Riach; we'll
have to come as near in about the end of Mull as we can take her, sir;
and even then we'll have the land to kep the wind off us, and that
stoneyard on our lee. Well, we're in for it now, and may as well crack
on."

With that he gave an order to the steersman, and sent Riach to the
foretop. There were only five men on deck, counting the officers; these
being all that were fit (or, at least, both fit and willing) for their
work. So, as I say, it fell to Mr. Riach to go aloft, and he sat there
looking out and hailing the deck with news of all he saw.

"The sea to the south is thick," he cried; and then, after a while, "it
does seem clearer in by the land."

"Well, sir," said Hoseason to Alan, "we'll try your way of it. But I
think I might as well trust to a blind fiddler. Pray God you're right."

"Pray God I am!" says Alan to me. "But where did I hear it? Well, well,
it will be as it must."

As we got nearer to the turn of the land the reefs began to be sown here
and there on our very path; and Mr. Riach sometimes cried down to us to
change the course. Sometimes, indeed, none too soon; for one reef was
so close on the brig's weather board that when a sea burst upon it the
lighter sprays fell upon her deck and wetted us like rain.

The brightness of the night showed us these perils as clearly as by day,
which was, perhaps, the more alarming. It showed me, too, the face of
the captain as he stood by the steersman, now on one foot, now on the
other, and sometimes blowing in his hands, but still listening and
looking and as steady as steel. Neither he nor Mr. Riach had shown
well in the fighting; but I saw they were brave in their own trade, and
admired them all the more because I found Alan very white.

"Ochone, David," says he, "this is no the kind of death I fancy!"

"What, Alan!" I cried, "you're not afraid?"

"No," said he, wetting his lips, "but you'll allow, yourself, it's a
cold ending."

By this time, now and then sheering to one side or the other to avoid a
reef, but still hugging the wind and the land, we had got round Iona and
begun to come alongside Mull. The tide at the tail of the land ran very
strong, and threw the brig about. Two hands were put to the helm, and
Hoseason himself would sometimes lend a help; and it was strange to
see three strong men throw their weight upon the tiller, and it (like a
living thing) struggle against and drive them back. This would have
been the greater danger had not the sea been for some while free of
obstacles. Mr. Riach, besides, announced from the top that he saw clear
water ahead.

"Ye were right," said Hoseason to Alan. "Ye have saved the brig, sir.
I'll mind that when we come to clear accounts." And I believe he not
only meant what he said, but would have done it; so high a place did the
Covenant hold in his affections.

But this is matter only for conjecture, things having gone otherwise
than he forecast.

"Keep her away a point," sings out Mr. Riach. "Reef to windward!"

And just at the same time the tide caught the brig, and threw the wind
out of her sails. She came round into the wind like a top, and the next
moment struck the reef with such a dunch as threw us all flat upon the
deck, and came near to shake Mr. Riach from his place upon the mast.

I was on my feet in a minute. The reef on which we had struck was close
in under the southwest end of Mull, off a little isle they call Earraid,
which lay low and black upon the larboard. Sometimes the swell broke
clean over us; sometimes it only ground the poor brig upon the reef, so
that we could hear her beat herself to pieces; and what with the great
noise of the sails, and the singing of the wind, and the flying of the
spray in the moonlight, and the sense of danger, I think my head must
have been partly turned, for I could scarcely understand the things I
saw.

Presently I observed Mr. Riach and the seamen busy round the skiff, and,
still in the same blank, ran over to assist them; and as soon as I set
my hand to work, my mind came clear again. It was no very easy task, for
the skiff lay amidships and was full of hamper, and the breaking of the
heavier seas continually forced us to give over and hold on; but we all
wrought like horses while we could.

Meanwhile such of the wounded as could move came clambering out of the
fore-scuttle and began to help; while the rest that lay helpless in
their bunks harrowed me with screaming and begging to be saved.

The captain took no part. It seemed he was struck stupid. He stood
holding by the shrouds, talking to himself and groaning out aloud
whenever the ship hammered on the rock. His brig was like wife and
child to him; he had looked on, day by day, at the mishandling of poor
Ransome; but when it came to the brig, he seemed to suffer along with
her.

All the time of our working at the boat, I remember only one other
thing: that I asked Alan, looking across at the shore, what country it
was; and he answered, it was the worst possible for him, for it was a
land of the Campbells.

We had one of the wounded men told off to keep a watch upon the seas and
cry us warning. Well, we had the boat about ready to be launched, when
this man sang out pretty shrill: "For God's sake, hold on!" We knew
by his tone that it was something more than ordinary; and sure enough,
there followed a sea so huge that it lifted the brig right up and canted
her over on her beam. Whether the cry came too late, or my hold was too
weak, I know not; but at the sudden tilting of the ship I was cast clean
over the bulwarks into the sea.

I went down, and drank my fill, and then came up, and got a blink of the
moon, and then down again. They say a man sinks a third time for good. I
cannot be made like other folk, then; for I would not like to write how
often I went down, or how often I came up again. All the while, I was
being hurled along, and beaten upon and choked, and then swallowed
whole; and the thing was so distracting to my wits, that I was neither
sorry nor afraid.

Presently, I found I was holding to a spar, which helped me somewhat.
And then all of a sudden I was in quiet water, and began to come to
myself.

It was the spare yard I had got hold of, and I was amazed to see how far
I had travelled from the brig. I hailed her, indeed; but it was plain
she was already out of cry. She was still holding together; but whether
or not they had yet launched the boat, I was too far off and too low
down to see.

While I was hailing the brig, I spied a tract of water lying between
us where no great waves came, but which yet boiled white all over and
bristled in the moon with rings and bubbles. Sometimes the whole tract
swung to one side, like the tail of a live serpent; sometimes, for a
glimpse, it would all disappear and then boil up again. What it was I
had no guess, which for the time increased my fear of it; but I now know
it must have been the roost or tide race, which had carried me away so
fast and tumbled me about so cruelly, and at last, as if tired of that
play, had flung out me and the spare yard upon its landward margin.

I now lay quite becalmed, and began to feel that a man can die of cold
as well as of drowning. The shores of Earraid were close in; I could see
in the moonlight the dots of heather and the sparkling of the mica in
the rocks.

"Well," thought I to myself, "if I cannot get as far as that, it's
strange!"

I had no skill of swimming, Essen Water being small in our
neighbourhood; but when I laid hold upon the yard with both arms, and
kicked out with both feet, I soon begun to find that I was moving. Hard
work it was, and mortally slow; but in about an hour of kicking
and splashing, I had got well in between the points of a sandy bay
surrounded by low hills.

The sea was here quite quiet; there was no sound of any surf; the moon
shone clear; and I thought in my heart I had never seen a place so
desert and desolate. But it was dry land; and when at last it grew so
shallow that I could leave the yard and wade ashore upon my feet, I
cannot tell if I was more tired or more grateful. Both, at least, I was:
tired as I never was before that night; and grateful to God as I trust I
have been often, though never with more cause.




CHAPTER XIV

THE ISLET

With my stepping ashore I began the most unhappy part of my adventures.
It was half-past twelve in the morning, and though the wind was broken
by the land, it was a cold night. I dared not sit down (for I thought
I should have frozen), but took off my shoes and walked to and fro upon
the sand, bare-foot, and beating my breast with infinite weariness.
There was no sound of man or cattle; not a cock crew, though it was
about the hour of their first waking; only the surf broke outside in the
distance, which put me in mind of my perils and those of my friend.
To walk by the sea at that hour of the morning, and in a place so
desert-like and lonesome, struck me with a kind of fear.

As soon as the day began to break I put on my shoes and climbed a
hill--the ruggedest scramble I ever undertook--falling, the whole way,
between big blocks of granite, or leaping from one to another. When I
got to the top the dawn was come. There was no sign of the brig, which
must have lifted from the reef and sunk. The boat, too, was nowhere to
be seen. There was never a sail upon the ocean; and in what I could see
of the land was neither house nor man.

I was afraid to think what had befallen my shipmates, and afraid to look
longer at so empty a scene. What with my wet clothes and weariness, and
my belly that now began to ache with hunger, I had enough to trouble
me without that. So I set off eastward along the south coast, hoping to
find a house where I might warm myself, and perhaps get news of those I
had lost. And at the worst, I considered the sun would soon rise and dry
my clothes.

After a little, my way was stopped by a creek or inlet of the sea, which
seemed to run pretty deep into the land; and as I had no means to get
across, I must needs change my direction to go about the end of it. It
was still the roughest kind of walking; indeed the whole, not only of
Earraid, but of the neighbouring part of Mull (which they call the Ross)
is nothing but a jumble of granite rocks with heather in among. At first
the creek kept narrowing as I had looked to see; but presently to my
surprise it began to widen out again. At this I scratched my head,
but had still no notion of the truth: until at last I came to a rising
ground, and it burst upon me all in a moment that I was cast upon a
little barren isle, and cut off on every side by the salt seas.

Instead of the sun rising to dry me, it came on to rain, with a thick
mist; so that my case was lamentable.

I stood in the rain, and shivered, and wondered what to do, till it
occurred to me that perhaps the creek was fordable. Back I went to the
narrowest point and waded in. But not three yards from shore, I plumped
in head over ears; and if ever I was heard of more, it was rather by
God's grace than my own prudence. I was no wetter (for that could hardly
be), but I was all the colder for this mishap; and having lost another
hope was the more unhappy.

And now, all at once, the yard came in my head. What had carried me
through the roost would surely serve me to cross this little quiet creek
in safety. With that I set off, undaunted, across the top of the isle,
to fetch and carry it back. It was a weary tramp in all ways, and if
hope had not buoyed me up, I must have cast myself down and given up.
Whether with the sea salt, or because I was growing fevered, I was
distressed with thirst, and had to stop, as I went, and drink the peaty
water out of the hags.

I came to the bay at last, more dead than alive; and at the first
glance, I thought the yard was something farther out than when I left
it. In I went, for the third time, into the sea. The sand was smooth
and firm, and shelved gradually down, so that I could wade out till the
water was almost to my neck and the little waves splashed into my face.
But at that depth my feet began to leave me, and I durst venture in no
farther. As for the yard, I saw it bobbing very quietly some twenty feet
beyond.

I had borne up well until this last disappointment; but at that I came
ashore, and flung myself down upon the sands and wept.

The time I spent upon the island is still so horrible a thought to me,
that I must pass it lightly over. In all the books I have read of people
cast away, they had either their pockets full of tools, or a chest of
things would be thrown upon the beach along with them, as if on purpose.
My case was very different. I had nothing in my pockets but money and
Alan's silver button; and being inland bred, I was as much short of
knowledge as of means.

I knew indeed that shell-fish were counted good to eat; and among the
rocks of the isle I found a great plenty of limpets, which at first I
could scarcely strike from their places, not knowing quickness to be
needful. There were, besides, some of the little shells that we call
buckies; I think periwinkle is the English name. Of these two I made my
whole diet, devouring them cold and raw as I found them; and so hungry
was I, that at first they seemed to me delicious.

Perhaps they were out of season, or perhaps there was something wrong
in the sea about my island. But at least I had no sooner eaten my first
meal than I was seized with giddiness and retching, and lay for a long
time no better than dead. A second trial of the same food (indeed I had
no other) did better with me, and revived my strength. But as long as
I was on the island, I never knew what to expect when I had eaten;
sometimes all was well, and sometimes I was thrown into a miserable
sickness; nor could I ever distinguish what particular fish it was that
hurt me.

All day it streamed rain; the island ran like a sop, there was no dry
spot to be found; and when I lay down that night, between two boulders
that made a kind of roof, my feet were in a bog.

The second day I crossed the island to all sides. There was no one part
of it better than another; it was all desolate and rocky; nothing living
on it but game birds which I lacked the means to kill, and the gulls
which haunted the outlying rocks in a prodigious number. But the creek,
or strait, that cut off the isle from the main-land of the Ross, opened
out on the north into a bay, and the bay again opened into the Sound of
Iona; and it was the neighbourhood of this place that I chose to be my
home; though if I had thought upon the very name of home in such a spot,
I must have burst out weeping.

I had good reasons for my choice. There was in this part of the isle a
little hut of a house like a pig's hut, where fishers used to sleep when
they came there upon their business; but the turf roof of it had fallen
entirely in; so that the hut was of no use to me, and gave me less
shelter than my rocks. What was more important, the shell-fish on which
I lived grew there in great plenty; when the tide was out I could gather
a peck at a time: and this was doubtless a convenience. But the other
reason went deeper. I had become in no way used to the horrid solitude
of the isle, but still looked round me on all sides (like a man that
was hunted), between fear and hope that I might see some human creature
coming. Now, from a little up the hillside over the bay, I could catch a
sight of the great, ancient church and the roofs of the people's houses
in Iona. And on the other hand, over the low country of the Ross, I saw
smoke go up, morning and evening, as if from a homestead in a hollow of
the land.

I used to watch this smoke, when I was wet and cold, and had my head
half turned with loneliness; and think of the fireside and the
company, till my heart burned. It was the same with the roofs of Iona.
Altogether, this sight I had of men's homes and comfortable lives,
although it put a point on my own sufferings, yet it kept hope alive,
and helped me to eat my raw shell-fish (which had soon grown to be a
disgust), and saved me from the sense of horror I had whenever I was
quite alone with dead rocks, and fowls, and the rain, and the cold sea.

I say it kept hope alive; and indeed it seemed impossible that I should
be left to die on the shores of my own country, and within view of a
church-tower and the smoke of men's houses. But the second day passed;
and though as long as the light lasted I kept a bright look-out for
boats on the Sound or men passing on the Ross, no help came near me. It
still rained, and I turned in to sleep, as wet as ever, and with a cruel
sore throat, but a little comforted, perhaps, by having said good-night
to my next neighbours, the people of Iona.

Charles the Second declared a man could stay outdoors more days in the
year in the climate of England than in any other. This was very like a
king, with a palace at his back and changes of dry clothes. But he must
have had better luck on his flight from Worcester than I had on that
miserable isle. It was the height of the summer; yet it rained for more
than twenty-four hours, and did not clear until the afternoon of the
third day.

This was the day of incidents. In the morning I saw a red deer, a buck
with a fine spread of antlers, standing in the rain on the top of the
island; but he had scarce seen me rise from under my rock, before
he trotted off upon the other side. I supposed he must have swum the
strait; though what should bring any creature to Earraid, was more than
I could fancy.

A little after, as I was jumping about after my limpets, I was startled
by a guinea-piece, which fell upon a rock in front of me and glanced off
into the sea. When the sailors gave me my money again, they kept back
not only about a third of the whole sum, but my father's leather purse;
so that from that day out, I carried my gold loose in a pocket with a
button. I now saw there must be a hole, and clapped my hand to the place
in a great hurry. But this was to lock the stable door after the steed
was stolen. I had left the shore at Queensferry with near on fifty
pounds; now I found no more than two guinea-pieces and a silver
shilling.

It is true I picked up a third guinea a little after, where it lay
shining on a piece of turf. That made a fortune of three pounds and four
shillings, English money, for a lad, the rightful heir of an estate, and
now starving on an isle at the extreme end of the wild Highlands.

This state of my affairs dashed me still further; and, indeed my plight
on that third morning was truly pitiful. My clothes were beginning to
rot; my stockings in particular were quite worn through, so that my
shanks went naked; my hands had grown quite soft with the continual
soaking; my throat was very sore, my strength had much abated, and my
heart so turned against the horrid stuff I was condemned to eat, that
the very sight of it came near to sicken me.

And yet the worst was not yet come.

There is a pretty high rock on the northwest of Earraid, which (because
it had a flat top and overlooked the Sound) I was much in the habit of
frequenting; not that ever I stayed in one place, save when asleep, my
misery giving me no rest. Indeed, I wore myself down with continual and
aimless goings and comings in the rain.

As soon, however, as the sun came out, I lay down on the top of that
rock to dry myself. The comfort of the sunshine is a thing I cannot
tell. It set me thinking hopefully of my deliverance, of which I had
begun to despair; and I scanned the sea and the Ross with a fresh
interest. On the south of my rock, a part of the island jutted out and
hid the open ocean, so that a boat could thus come quite near me upon
that side, and I be none the wiser.

Well, all of a sudden, a coble with a brown sail and a pair of fishers
aboard of it, came flying round that corner of the isle, bound for Iona.
I shouted out, and then fell on my knees on the rock and reached up my
hands and prayed to them. They were near enough to hear--I could even
see the colour of their hair; and there was no doubt but they observed
me, for they cried out in the Gaelic tongue, and laughed. But the boat
never turned aside, and flew on, right before my eyes, for Iona.

I could not believe such wickedness, and ran along the shore from rock
to rock, crying on them piteously even after they were out of reach
of my voice, I still cried and waved to them; and when they were quite
gone, I thought my heart would have burst. All the time of my troubles
I wept only twice. Once, when I could not reach the yard, and now, the
second time, when these fishers turned a deaf ear to my cries. But this
time I wept and roared like a wicked child, tearing up the turf with
my nails, and grinding my face in the earth. If a wish would kill men,
those two fishers would never have seen morning, and I should likely
have died upon my island.

When I was a little over my anger, I must eat again, but with such
loathing of the mess as I could now scarce control. Sure enough, I
should have done as well to fast, for my fishes poisoned me again. I had
all my first pains; my throat was so sore I could scarce swallow; I had
a fit of strong shuddering, which clucked my teeth together; and there
came on me that dreadful sense of illness, which we have no name for
either in Scotch or English. I thought I should have died, and made my
peace with God, forgiving all men, even my uncle and the fishers; and as
soon as I had thus made up my mind to the worst, clearness came upon me;
I observed the night was falling dry; my clothes were dried a good deal;
truly, I was in a better case than ever before, since I had landed on
the isle; and so I got to sleep at last, with a thought of gratitude.

The next day (which was the fourth of this horrible life of mine) I
found my bodily strength run very low. But the sun shone, the air was
sweet, and what I managed to eat of the shell-fish agreed well with me
and revived my courage.

I was scarce back on my rock (where I went always the first thing after
I had eaten) before I observed a boat coming down the Sound, and with
her head, as I thought, in my direction.

I began at once to hope and fear exceedingly; for I thought these men
might have thought better of their cruelty and be coming back to my
assistance. But another disappointment, such as yesterday's, was more
than I could bear. I turned my back, accordingly, upon the sea, and
did not look again till I had counted many hundreds. The boat was still
heading for the island. The next time I counted the full thousand, as
slowly as I could, my heart beating so as to hurt me. And then it was
out of all question. She was coming straight to Earraid!

I could no longer hold myself back, but ran to the seaside and out,
from one rock to another, as far as I could go. It is a marvel I was not
drowned; for when I was brought to a stand at last, my legs shook under
me, and my mouth was so dry, I must wet it with the sea-water before I
was able to shout.

All this time the boat was coming on; and now I was able to perceive
it was the same boat and the same two men as yesterday. This I knew by
their hair, which the one had of a bright yellow and the other black.
But now there was a third man along with them, who looked to be of a
better class.

As soon as they were come within easy speech, they let down their sail
and lay quiet. In spite of my supplications, they drew no nearer in, and
what frightened me most of all, the new man tee-hee'd with laughter as
he talked and looked at me.

Then he stood up in the boat and addressed me a long while, speaking
fast and with many wavings of his hand. I told him I had no Gaelic; and
at this he became very angry, and I began to suspect he thought he was
talking English. Listening very close, I caught the word "whateffer"
several times; but all the rest was Gaelic and might have been Greek and
Hebrew for me.

"Whatever," said I, to show him I had caught a word.

"Yes, yes--yes, yes," says he, and then he looked at the other men, as
much as to say, "I told you I spoke English," and began again as hard as
ever in the Gaelic.

This time I picked out another word, "tide." Then I had a flash of hope.
I remembered he was always waving his hand towards the mainland of the
Ross.

"Do you mean when the tide is out--?" I cried, and could not finish.

"Yes, yes," said he. "Tide."

At that I turned tail upon their boat (where my adviser had once more
begun to tee-hee with laughter), leaped back the way I had come, from
one stone to another, and set off running across the isle as I had never
run before. In about half an hour I came out upon the shores of the
creek; and, sure enough, it was shrunk into a little trickle of water,
through which I dashed, not above my knees, and landed with a shout on
the main island.

A sea-bred boy would not have stayed a day on Earraid; which is only
what they call a tidal islet, and except in the bottom of the neaps, can
be entered and left twice in every twenty-four hours, either dry-shod,
or at the most by wading. Even I, who had the tide going out and in
before me in the bay, and even watched for the ebbs, the better to get
my shellfish--even I (I say) if I had sat down to think, instead of
raging at my fate, must have soon guessed the secret, and got free. It
was no wonder the fishers had not understood me. The wonder was rather
that they had ever guessed my pitiful illusion, and taken the trouble to
come back. I had starved with cold and hunger on that island for close
upon one hundred hours. But for the fishers, I might have left my bones
there, in pure folly. And even as it was, I had paid for it pretty dear,
not only in past sufferings, but in my present case; being clothed like
a beggar-man, scarce able to walk, and in great pain of my sore throat.

I have seen wicked men and fools, a great many of both; and I believe
they both get paid in the end; but the fools first.




CHAPTER XV

THE LAD WITH THE SILVER BUTTON: THROUGH THE ISLE OF MULL

The Ross of Mull, which I had now got upon, was rugged and trackless,
like the isle I had just left; being all bog, and brier, and big stone.
There may be roads for them that know that country well; but for my part
I had no better guide than my own nose, and no other landmark than Ben
More.

I aimed as well as I could for the smoke I had seen so often from the
island; and with all my great weariness and the difficulty of the way
came upon the house in the bottom of a little hollow about five or
six at night. It was low and longish, roofed with turf and built of
unmortared stones; and on a mound in front of it, an old gentleman sat
smoking his pipe in the sun.

With what little English he had, he gave me to understand that my
shipmates had got safe ashore, and had broken bread in that very house
on the day after.

"Was there one," I asked, "dressed like a gentleman?"

He said they all wore rough great-coats; but to be sure, the first of
them, the one that came alone, wore breeches and stockings, while the
rest had sailors' trousers.

"Ah," said I, "and he would have a feathered hat?"

He told me, no, that he was bareheaded like myself.

At first I thought Alan might have lost his hat; and then the rain came
in my mind, and I judged it more likely he had it out of harm's way
under his great-coat. This set me smiling, partly because my friend was
safe, partly to think of his vanity in dress.

And then the old gentleman clapped his hand to his brow, and cried out
that I must be the lad with the silver button.

"Why, yes!" said I, in some wonder.

"Well, then," said the old gentleman, "I have a word for you, that you
are to follow your friend to his country, by Torosay."

He then asked me how I had fared, and I told him my tale. A
south-country man would certainly have laughed; but this old gentleman
(I call him so because of his manners, for his clothes were dropping off
his back) heard me all through with nothing but gravity and pity. When I
had done, he took me by the hand, led me into his hut (it was no better)
and presented me before his wife, as if she had been the Queen and I a
duke.

The good woman set oat-bread before me and a cold grouse, patting my
shoulder and smiling to me all the time, for she had no English; and the
old gentleman (not to be behind) brewed me a strong punch out of their
country spirit. All the while I was eating, and after that when I was
drinking the punch, I could scarce come to believe in my good fortune;
and the house, though it was thick with the peat-smoke and as full of
holes as a colander, seemed like a palace.

The punch threw me in a strong sweat and a deep slumber; the good people
let me lie; and it was near noon of the next day before I took the road,
my throat already easier and my spirits quite restored by good fare and
good news. The old gentleman, although I pressed him hard, would take no
money, and gave me an old bonnet for my head; though I am free to own I
was no sooner out of view of the house than I very jealously washed this
gift of his in a wayside fountain.

Thought I to myself: "If these are the wild Highlanders, I could wish my
own folk wilder."

I not only started late, but I must have wandered nearly half the time.
True, I met plenty of people, grubbing in little miserable fields that
would not keep a cat, or herding little kine about the bigness of asses.
The Highland dress being forbidden by law since the rebellion, and the
people condemned to the Lowland habit, which they much disliked, it was
strange to see the variety of their array. Some went bare, only for a
hanging cloak or great-coat, and carried their trousers on their backs
like a useless burthen: some had made an imitation of the tartan with
little parti-coloured stripes patched together like an old wife's quilt;
others, again, still wore the Highland philabeg, but by putting a few
stitches between the legs transformed it into a pair of trousers like
a Dutchman's. All those makeshifts were condemned and punished, for the
law was harshly applied, in hopes to break up the clan spirit; but in
that out-of-the-way, sea-bound isle, there were few to make remarks and
fewer to tell tales.

They seemed in great poverty; which was no doubt natural, now that
rapine was put down, and the chiefs kept no longer an open house;
and the roads (even such a wandering, country by--track as the one
I followed) were infested with beggars. And here again I marked
a difference from my own part of the country. For our Lowland
beggars--even the gownsmen themselves, who beg by patent--had a louting,
flattering way with them, and if you gave them a plaek and asked change,
would very civilly return you a boddle. But these Highland beggars stood
on their dignity, asked alms only to buy snuff (by their account) and
would give no change.

To be sure, this was no concern of mine, except in so far as it
entertained me by the way. What was much more to the purpose, few had
any English, and these few (unless they were of the brotherhood of
beggars) not very anxious to place it at my service. I knew Torosay
to be my destination, and repeated the name to them and pointed; but
instead of simply pointing in reply, they would give me a screed of the
Gaelic that set me foolish; so it was small wonder if I went out of my
road as often as I stayed in it.

At last, about eight at night, and already very weary, I came to a lone
house, where I asked admittance, and was refused, until I bethought
me of the power of money in so poor a country, and held up one of my
guineas in my finger and thumb. Thereupon, the man of the house, who had
hitherto pretended to have no English, and driven me from his door by
signals, suddenly began to speak as clearly as was needful, and agreed
for five shillings to give me a night's lodging and guide me the next
day to Torosay.

I slept uneasily that night, fearing I should be robbed; but I might
have spared myself the pain; for my host was no robber, only miserably
poor and a great cheat. He was not alone in his poverty; for the next
morning, we must go five miles about to the house of what he called a
rich man to have one of my guineas changed. This was perhaps a rich man
for Mull; he would have scarce been thought so in the south; for it
took all he had--the whole house was turned upside down, and a neighbour
brought under contribution, before he could scrape together twenty
shillings in silver. The odd shilling he kept for himself, protesting he
could ill afford to have so great a sum of money lying "locked up." For
all that he was very courteous and well spoken, made us both sit down
with his family to dinner, and brewed punch in a fine china bowl, over
which my rascal guide grew so merry that he refused to start.

I was for getting angry, and appealed to the rich man (Hector Maclean
was his name), who had been a witness to our bargain and to my payment
of the five shillings. But Maclean had taken his share of the punch,
and vowed that no gentleman should leave his table after the bowl was
brewed; so there was nothing for it but to sit and hear Jacobite toasts
and Gaelic songs, till all were tipsy and staggered off to the bed or
the barn for their night's rest.

Next day (the fourth of my travels) we were up before five upon the
clock; but my rascal guide got to the bottle at once, and it was three
hours before I had him clear of the house, and then (as you shall hear)
only for a worse disappointment.

As long as we went down a heathery valley that lay before Mr. Maclean's
house, all went well; only my guide looked constantly over his shoulder,
and when I asked him the cause, only grinned at me. No sooner, however,
had we crossed the back of a hill, and got out of sight of the house
windows, than he told me Torosay lay right in front, and that a hill-top
(which he pointed out) was my best landmark.

"I care very little for that," said I, "since you are going with me."

The impudent cheat answered me in the Gaelic that he had no English.

"My fine fellow," I said, "I know very well your English comes and goes.
Tell me what will bring it back? Is it more money you wish?"

"Five shillings mair," said he, "and hersel' will bring ye there."

I reflected awhile and then offered him two, which he accepted greedily,
and insisted on having in his hands at once "for luck," as he said, but
I think it was rather for my misfortune.

The two shillings carried him not quite as many miles; at the end of
which distance, he sat down upon the wayside and took off his brogues
from his feet, like a man about to rest.

I was now red-hot. "Ha!" said I, "have you no more English?"

He said impudently, "No."

At that I boiled over, and lifted my hand to strike him; and he, drawing
a knife from his rags, squatted back and grinned at me like a wildcat.
At that, forgetting everything but my anger, I ran in upon him, put
aside his knife with my left, and struck him in the mouth with the
right. I was a strong lad and very angry, and he but a little man; and
he went down before me heavily. By good luck, his knife flew out of his
hand as he fell.

I picked up both that and his brogues, wished him a good morning, and
set off upon my way, leaving him barefoot and disarmed. I chuckled to
myself as I went, being sure I was done with that rogue, for a variety
of reasons. First, he knew he could have no more of my money; next, the
brogues were worth in that country only a few pence; and, lastly, the
knife, which was really a dagger, it was against the law for him to
carry.

In about half an hour of walk, I overtook a great, ragged man, moving
pretty fast but feeling before him with a staff. He was quite blind, and
told me he was a catechist, which should have put me at my ease. But
his face went against me; it seemed dark and dangerous and secret; and
presently, as we began to go on alongside, I saw the steel butt of a
pistol sticking from under the flap of his coat-pocket. To carry such a
thing meant a fine of fifteen pounds sterling upon a first offence, and
transportation to the colonies upon a second. Nor could I quite see why
a religious teacher should go armed, or what a blind man could be doing
with a pistol.

I told him about my guide, for I was proud of what I had done, and my
vanity for once got the heels of my prudence. At the mention of the
five shillings he cried out so loud that I made up my mind I should say
nothing of the other two, and was glad he could not see my blushes.

"Was it too much?" I asked, a little faltering.

"Too much!" cries he. "Why, I will guide you to Torosay myself for a
dram of brandy. And give you the great pleasure of my company (me that
is a man of some learning) in the bargain."

I said I did not see how a blind man could be a guide; but at that he
laughed aloud, and said his stick was eyes enough for an eagle.

"In the Isle of Mull, at least," says he, "where I know every stone and
heather-bush by mark of head. See, now," he said, striking right and
left, as if to make sure, "down there a burn is running; and at the head
of it there stands a bit of a small hill with a stone cocked upon the
top of that; and it's hard at the foot of the hill, that the way runs by
to Torosay; and the way here, being for droves, is plainly trodden, and
will show grassy through the heather."

I had to own he was right in every feature, and told my wonder.

"Ha!" says he, "that's nothing. Would ye believe me now, that before
the Act came out, and when there were weepons in this country, I could
shoot? Ay, could I!" cries he, and then with a leer: "If ye had such a
thing as a pistol here to try with, I would show ye how it's done."

I told him I had nothing of the sort, and gave him a wider berth. If
he had known, his pistol stuck at that time quite plainly out of his
pocket, and I could see the sun twinkle on the steel of the butt. But
by the better luck for me, he knew nothing, thought all was covered, and
lied on in the dark.

He then began to question me cunningly, where I came from, whether I
was rich, whether I could change a five-shilling piece for him (which
he declared he had that moment in his sporran), and all the time he kept
edging up to me and I avoiding him. We were now upon a sort of green
cattle-track which crossed the hills towards Torosay, and we kept
changing sides upon that like ancers in a reel. I had so plainly the
upper-hand that my spirits rose, and indeed I took a pleasure in this
game of blindman's buff; but the catechist grew angrier and angrier,
and at last began to swear in Gaelic and to strike for my legs with his
staff.