THE BRIDE OF LAMMERMOOR

by Sir Walter Scott




INTRODUCTION TO THE BRIDE OF LAMMERMOOR


THE Author, on a former occasion, declined giving the real source
from which he drew the tragic subject of this history, because, though
occurring at a distant period, it might possibly be unpleasing to the
feelings of the descendants of the parties. But as he finds an account
of the circumstances given in the Notes to Law's Memorials, by his
ingenious friend, Charles Kirkpatrick Sharpe, Esq., and also indicated
in his reprint of the Rev. Mr. Symson's poems appended to the Large
Description of Galloway, as the original of the Bride of Lammermoor, the
Author feels himself now at liberty to tell the tale as he had it from
connexions of his own, who lived very near the period, and were closely
related to the family of the bride.

It is well known that the family of Dalrymple, which has produced,
within the space of two centuries, as many men of talent, civil and
military, and of literary, political, and professional eminence, as any
house in Scotland, first rose into distinction in the person of James
Dalrymple, one of the most eminent lawyers that ever lived, though the
labours of his powerful mind were unhappily exercised on a subject so
limited as Scottish jurisprudence, on which he has composed an admirable
work.

He married Margaret, daughter to Ross of Balneel, with whom he obtained
a considerable estate. She was an able, politic, and high-minded woman,
so successful in what she undertook, that the vulgar, no way partial to
her husband or her family, imputed her success to necromancy. According
to the popular belief, this Dame Margaret purchased the temporal
prosperity of her family from the Master whom she served under a
singular condition, which is thus narrated by the historian of her
grandson, the great Earl of Stair: "She lived to a great age, and at
her death desired that she might not be put under ground, but that her
coffin should stand upright on one end of it, promising that while she
remained in that situation the Dalrymples should continue to flourish.
What was the old lady's motive for the request, or whether she really
made such a promise, I shall not take upon me to determine; but
it's certain her coffin stands upright in the isle of the church of
Kirklistown, the burial-place belonging to the family." The talents
of this accomplished race were sufficient to have accounted for
the dignities which many members of the family attained, without any
supernatural assistance. But their extraordinary prosperity was attended
by some equally singular family misfortunes, of which that which befell
their eldest daughter was at once unaccountable and melancholy.

Miss Janet Dalrymple, daughter of the first Lord Stair and Dame Margaret
Ross, had engaged herself without the knowledge of her parents to the
Lord Rutherford, who was not acceptable to them either on account of his
political principles or his want of fortune. The young couple broke
a piece of gold together, and pledged their troth in the most solemn
manner; and it is said the young lady imprecated dreadful evils on
herself should she break her plighted faith. Shortly after, a suitor
who was favoured by Lord Stair, and still more so by his lady, paid his
addresses to Miss Dalrymple. The young lady refused the proposal, and
being pressed on the subject, confessed her secret engagement. Lady
Stair, a woman accustomed to universal submission, for even her husband
did not dare to contradict her, treated this objection as a trifle, and
insisted upon her daughter yielding her consent to marry the new suitor,
David Dunbar, son and heir to David Dunbar of Baldoon, in Wigtonshire.
The first lover, a man of very high spirit, then interfered by letter,
and insisted on the right he had acquired by his troth plighted with the
young lady. Lady Stair sent him for answer, that her daughter, sensible
of her undutiful behaviour in entering into a contract unsanctioned by
her parents, had retracted her unlawful vow, and now refused to fulfil
her engagement with him.

The lover, in return, declined positively to receive such an answer from
any one but his mistress in person; and as she had to deal with a man
who was both of a most determined character and of too high condition
to be trifled with, Lady Stair was obliged to consent to an interview
between Lord Rutherford and her daughter. But she took care to be
present in person, and argued the point with the disappointed and
incensed lover with pertinacity equal to his own. She particularly
insisted on the Levitical law, which declares that a woman shall be
free of a vow which her parents dissent from. This is the passage of
Scripture she founded on:

"If a man vow a vow unto the Lord, or swear an oath to bind his soul
with a bond; he shall not break his word, he shall do according to all
that proceedeth out of his mouth.

"If a woman also vow a vow unto the Lord, and bind herself by a bond,
being in her father's house in her youth; And her father hear her vow,
and her bond wherewith she hath bound her soul, and her father shall
hold his peace at her: then all her vows shall stand, and every bond
wherewith she hath bound her soul shall stand.

"But if her father disallow her in the day that he heareth; not any
of her vows, or of her bonds wherewith she hath bound her soul, shall
stand: and the Lord shall forgive her, because her father disallowed
her."--Numbers xxx. 2-5.

While the mother insisted on these topics, the lover in vain conjured
the daughter to declare her own opinion and feelings. She remained
totally overwhelmed, as it seemed--mute, pale, and motionless as a
statue. Only at her mother's command, sternly uttered, she summoned
strength enough to restore to her plighted suitor the piece of broken
gold which was the emblem of her troth. On this he burst forth into a
tremendous passion, took leave of the mother with maledictions, and as
he left the apartment, turned back to say to his weak, if not fickle,
mistresss: "For you, madam, you will be a world's wonder"; a phrase by
which some remarkable degree of calamity is usually implied. He went
abroad, and returned not again. If the last Lord Rutherford was the
unfortunate party, he must have been the third who bore that title, and
who died in 1685.

The marriage betwixt Janet Dalrymple and David Dunbar of Baldoon now
went forward, the bride showing no repugnance, but being absolutely
passive in everything her mother commanded or advised. On the day of the
marriage, which, as was then usual, was celebrated by a great assemblage
of friends and relations, she was the same--sad, silent, and resigned,
as it seemed, to her destiny. A lady, very nearly connected with the
family, told the Author that she had conversed on the subject with one
of the brothers of the bride, a mere lad at the time, who had ridden
before his sister to church. He said her hand, which lay on his as she
held her arm around his waist, was as cold and damp as marble. But,
full of his new dress and the part he acted in the procession, the
circumstance, which he long afterwards remembered with bitter sorrow and
compunction, made no impression on him at the time.

The bridal feast was followed by dancing. The bride and bridegroom
retired as usual, when of a sudden the most wild and piercing cries were
heard from the nuptial chamber. It was then the custom, to prevent any
coarse pleasantry which old times perhaps admitted, that the key of
the nuptial chamber should be entrusted to the bridesman. He was called
upon, but refused at first to give it up, till the shrieks became so
hideous that he was compelled to hasten with others to learn the
cause. On opening the door, they found the bridegroom lying across the
threshold, dreadfully wounded, and streaming with blood. The bride
was then sought for. She was found in the corner of the large chimney,
having no covering save her shift, and that dabbled in gore. There she
sat grinning at them, mopping and mowing, as I heard the expression
used; in a word, absolutely insane. The only words she spoke were, "Tak
up your bonny bridegroom." She survived this horrible scene little more
than a fortnight, having been married on the 24th of August, and dying
on the 12th of September 1669.

The unfortunate Baldoon recovered from his wounds, but sternly
prohibited all inquiries respecting the manner in which he had received
them. "If a lady," he said, "asked him any question upon the subject,
he would neither answer her nor speak to her again while he lived; if
a gentleman, he would consider it as a mortal affront, and demand
satisfaction as having received such." He did not very long survive the
dreadful catastrophe, having met with a fatal injury by a fall from his
horse, as he rode between Leith and Holyrood House, of which he died the
next day, 28th March 1682. Thus a few years removed all the principal
actors in this frightful tragedy.

Various reports went abroad on this mysterious affair, many of them very
inaccurate, though they could hardly be said to be exaggerated. It
was difficult at that time to become acquainted with the history of a
Scottish family above the lower rank; and strange things sometimes took
place there, into which even the law did not scrupulously inquire.

The credulous Mr. Law says, generally, that the Lord President Stair had
a daughter, who, "being married, the night she was bride in, was taken
from her bridegroom and harled through the house (by spirits, we are
given to understand) and afterward died. Another daughter," he says,
"was supposed to be possessed with an evil spirit."

My friend, Mr. Sharpe, gives another edition of the tale. According
to his information, ti was the bridegroom who wounded the bride. The
marriage, according to this account, had been against her mother's
inclination, who had given her consent in these ominous words: "Weel,
you may marry him, but sair shall you repent it."

I find still another account darkly insinuated in some highly scurrilous
and abusive verses, of which I have an original copy. They are docketed
as being written "Upon the late Viscount Stair and his family, by Sir
William Hamilton of Whitelaw. The marginals by William Dunlop, writer in
Edinburgh, a son of the Laird of Househill, and nephew to the said Sir
William Hamilton." There was a bitter and personal quarrel and rivalry
betwixt the author of this libel, a name which it richly deserves, and
Lord President Stair; and the lampoon, which is written with much more
malice than art, bears the following motto:

Stair's neck, mind, wife, songs, grandson, and the rest, Are wry, false,
witch, pests, parricide, possessed.

This malignant satirist, who calls up all the misfortunes of the family,
does not forget the fatal bridal of Baldoon. He seems, though his verses
are as obscure as unpoetical, to intimate that the violence done to the
bridegroom was by the intervention of the foul fiend, to whom the young
lady had resigned herself, in case she should break her contract with
her first lover. His hypothesis is inconsistent with the account given
in the note upon Law's Memorials, but easily reconcilable to the family
tradition.

     In all Stair's offspring we no difference know,
     They do the females as the males bestow;
     So he of one of his daughters' marriages gave the ward,
     Like a true vassal, to Glenluce's Laird;
     He knew what she did to her master plight,
     If she her faith to Rutherfurd should slight,
     Which, like his own, for greed he broke outright.
     Nick did Baldoon's posterior right deride,
     And, as first substitute, did seize the bride;
     Whate'er he to his mistress did or said,
     He threw the bridegroom from the nuptial bed,
     Into the chimney did so his rival maul,
     His bruised bones ne'er were cured but by the fall.

One of the marginal notes ascribed to William Dunlop applies to the
above lines. "She had betrothed herself to Lord Rutherfoord under horrid
imprecations, and afterwards married Baldoon, his nevoy, and her mother
was the cause of her breach of faith."

The same tragedy is alluded to in the following couplet and note:

What train of curses that base brood pursues, When the young nephew weds
old uncle's spouse.

The note on the word "uncle" explains it as meaning "Rutherfoord, who
should have married the Lady Baldoon, was Baldoon's uncle." The poetry
of this satire on Lord Stair and his family was, as already noticed,
written by Sir William Hamilton of Whitelaw, a rival of Lord Stair
for the situation of President of the Court of Session; a person much
inferior to that great lawyer in talents, and equally ill-treated by the
calumny or just satire of his contemporaries as an unjust and partial
judge. Some of the notes are by that curious and laborious antiquary,
Robert Milne, who, as a virulent Jacobite, willingly lent a hand to
blacken the family of Stair.

Another poet of the period, with a very different purpose, has left
an elegy, in which he darkly hints at and bemoans the fate of the
ill-starred young person, whose very uncommon calamity Whitelaw, Dunlop,
and Milne thought a fitting subject for buffoonery and ribaldry. This
bard of milder mood was Andrew Symson, before the Revolution minister
of Kirkinner, in Galloway, and after his expulsion as an Episcopalian
following the humble occupation of a printer in Edinburgh. He furnished
the family of Baldoon, with which he appears to have been intimate, with
an elegy on the tragic event in their family. In this piece he treats
the mournful occasion of the bride's death with mysterious solemnity.

The verses bear this title, "On the unexpected death of the virtuous
Lady Mrs. Janet Dalrymple, Lady Baldoon, younger," and afford us the
precise dates of the catastrophe, which could not otherwise have been
easily ascertained. "Nupta August 12. Domum Ducta August 24. Obiit
September 12. Sepult. September 30, 1669." The form of the elegy is
a dialogue betwixt a passenger and a domestic servant. The first,
recollecting that he had passed that way lately, and seen all around
enlivened by the appearances of mirth and festivity, is desirous to know
what had changed so gay a scene into mourning. We preserve the reply of
the servant as a specimen of Mr. Symson's verses, which are not of the
first quality:

     Sir, 'tis truth you've told.
     We did enjoy great mirth; but now, ah me!
     Our joyful song's turn'd to an elegie.
     A virtuous lady, not long since a bride,
     Was to a hopeful plant by marriage tied,
     And brought home hither.  We did all rejoice,
     Even for her sake.  But presently our voice
     Was turn'd to mourning for that little time
     That she'd enjoy: she waned in her prime,
     For Atropus, with her impartial knife,
     Soon cut her thread, and therewithal her life;
     And for the time we may it well remember,
     It being in unfortunate September;                   .
     Where we must leave her till the resurrection.
     'Tis then the Saints enjoy their full perfection.

Mr. Symson also poured forth his elegiac strains upon the fate of
the widowed bridegroom, on which subject, after a long and querulous
effusion, the poet arrives at the sound conclusion, that if Baldoon had
walked on foot, which it seems was his general custom, he would have
escaped perishing by a fall from horseback. As the work in which it
occurs is so scarce as almost to be unique, and as it gives us the most
full account of one of the actors in this tragic tale which we have
rehearsed, we will, at the risk of being tedious, insert some short
specimens of Mr. Symson's composition. It is entitled:

"A Funeral Elegie, occasioned by the sad and much lamented death of that
worthily respected, and very much accomplished gentleman, David Dunbar,
younger, of Baldoon, only son and apparent heir to the right worshipful
Sir David Dunbar of Baldoon, Knight Baronet. He departed this life on
March 28, 1682, having received a bruise by a fall, as he was riding
the day preceding betwixt Leith and Holyrood House; and was honourably
interred in the Abbey Church of Holyrood House, on April 4, 1682."

     Men might, and very justly too, conclude
     Me guilty of the worst ingratitude,
     Should I be silent, or should I forbear
     At this sad accident to shed a tear;
     A tear! said I? ah! that's a petit thing,
     A very lean, slight, slender offering,
     Too mean, I'm sure, for me, wherewith t'attend
     The unexpected funeral of my friend:
     A glass of briny tears charged up to th' brim.
     Would be too few for me to shed for him.

The poet proceeds to state his intimacy with the deceased, and the
constancy of the young man's attendance on public worship, which
was regular, and had such effect upon two or three other that were
influenced by his example:

     So that my Muse 'gainst Priscian avers,
     He, only he, WERE my parishioners;
     Yea, and my only hearers.

He then describes the deceased in person and manners, from which it
appears that more accomplishments were expected in the composition of a
fine gentleman in ancient than modern times:

     His body, though not very large or tall,
     Was sprightly, active, yea and strong withal.
     His constitution was, if right I've guess'd,
     Blood mixt with choler, said to be the best.
     In's gesture, converse, speech, discourse, attire,
     He practis'd that which wise men still admire,
     Commend, and recommend.  What's that? you'll say.
     'Tis this: he ever choos'd the middle way
     'Twixt both th' extremes.  Amost in ev'ry thing
     He did the like, 'tis worth our noticing:
     Sparing, yet not a niggard; liberal,
     And yet not lavish or a prodigal,
     As knowing when to spend and when to spare;
     And that's a lesson which not many are
     Acquainted with.  He bashful was, yet daring
     When he saw cause, and yet therein not sparing;
     Familiar, yet not common, for he knew
     To condescend, and keep his distance too.
     He us'd, and that most commonly, to go
     On foot; I wish that he had still done so.
     Th' affairs of court were unto him well known;
     And yet meanwhile he slighted not his own.
     He knew full well how to behave at court,
     And yet but seldom did thereto resort;
     But lov'd the country life, choos'd to inure
     Himself to past'rage and agriculture;
     Proving, improving, ditching, trenching, draining,
     Viewing, reviewing, and by those means gaining;
     Planting, transplanting, levelling, erecting
     Walls, chambers, houses, terraces; projecting
     Now this, now that device, this draught, that measure,
     That might advance his profit with his pleasure.
     Quick in his bargains, honest in commerce,
     Just in his dealings, being much adverse
     From quirks of law, still ready to refer
     His cause t' an honest country arbiter.
     He was acquainted with cosmography,
     Arithmetic, and modern history;
     With architecture and such arts as these,
     Which I may call specifick sciences
     Fit for a gentleman; and surely he
     That knows them not, at least in some degree,
     May brook the title, but he wants the thing,
     Is but a shadow scarce worth noticing.
     He learned the French, be't spoken to his praise,
     In very little more than fourty days.

Then comes the full burst of woe, in which, instead of saying much
himself, the poet informs us what the ancients would have said on such
an occasion:

     A heathen poet, at the news, no doubt,
     Would have exclaimed, and furiously cry'd out
     Against the fates, the destinies and starrs,
     What! this the effect of planetarie warrs!
     We might have seen him rage and rave, yea worse,
     'Tis very like we might have heard him curse
     The year, the month, the day, the hour, the place,
     The company, the wager, and the race;
     Decry all recreations, with the names
     Of Isthmian, Pythian, and Olympick games;
     Exclaim against them all both old and new,
     Both the Nemaean and the Lethaean too:
     Adjudge all persons, under highest pain,
     Always to walk on foot, and then again
     Order all horses to be hough'd, that we
     Might never more the like adventure see.

Supposing our readers have had enough of Mr. Symson's woe, and finding
nothing more in his poem worthy of transcription, we return to the
tragic story.

It is needless to point out to the intelligent reader that the
witchcraft of the mother consisted only in the ascendency of a powerful
mind over a weak and melancholy one, and that the harshness with which
she exercised her superiority in a case of delicacy had driven her
daughter first to despair, then to frenzy. Accordingly, the Author
has endeavoured to explain the tragic tale on this principle. Whatever
resemblance Lady Ashton may be supposed to possess to the celebrated
Dame Margaret Ross, the reader must not suppose that there was any idea
of tracing the portrait of the first Lord Viscount Stair in the tricky
and mean-spirited Sir William Ashton. Lord Stair, whatever might be his
moral qualities, was certainly one of the first statesmen and lawyers of
his age.

The imaginary castle of Wolf's Crag has been identified by some lover of
locality with that of Fast Castle. The Author is not competent to judge
of the resemblance betwixt the real and imaginary scenes, having never
seen Fast Castle except from the sea. But fortalices of this description
are found occupying, like ospreys' nests, projecting rocks, or
promontories, in many parts of the eastern coast of Scotland, and the
position of Fast Castle seems certainly to resemble that of Wolf's
Crag as much as any other, while its vicinity to the mountain ridge of
Lammermoor renders the assimilation a probable one.

We have only to add, that the death of the unfortunate bridegroom by
a fall from horseback has been in the novel transferred to the no less
unfortunate lover.



CHAPTER I

     By Cauk and keel to win your bread,
     Wi' whigmaleeries for them wha need,
     Whilk is a gentle trade indeed
     To carry the gaberlunzie on.

     Old Song.

FEW have been in my secret while I was compiling these narratives, nor
is it probable that they will ever become public during the life of
their author. Even were that event to happen, I am not ambitious of the
honoured distinction, digito monstrari. I confess that, were it safe to
cherish such dreams at all, I should more enjoy the thought of remaining
behind the curtain unseen, like the ingenious manager of Punch and his
wife Joan, and enjoying the astonishment and conjectures of my audience.
Then might I, perchance, hear the productions of the obscure Peter
Pattieson praised by the judicious and admired by the feeling,
engrossing the young and attracting even the old; while the critic
traced their fame up to some name of literary celebrity, and the
question when, and by whom, these tales were written filled up the pause
of conversation in a hundred circles and coteries. This I may never
enjoy during my lifetime; but farther than this, I am certain, my vanity
should never induce me to aspire.

I am too stubborn in habits, and too little polished in manners, to envy
or aspire to the honours assigned to my literary contemporaries. I could
not think a whit more highly of myself were I found worthy to "come in
place as a lion" for a winter in the great metropolis. I could not rise,
turn round, and show all my honours, from the shaggy mane to the tufted
tail, "roar you an't were any nightingale," and so lie down again like a
well-behaved beast of show, and all at the cheap and easy rate of a
cup of coffee and a slice of bread and butter as thin as a wafer. And
I could ill stomach the fulsome flattery with which the lady of the
evening indulges her show-monsters on such occasions, as she crams her
parrots with sugar-plums, in order to make them talk before company. I
cannot be tempted to "come aloft" for these marks of distinction, and,
like imprisoned Samson, I would rather remain--if such must be the
alternative--all my life in the mill-house, grinding for my very bread,
than be brought forth to make sport for the Philistine lords and ladies.
This proceeds from no dislike, real or affected, to the aristocracy of
these realms. But they have their place, and I have mine; and, like
the iron and earthen vessels in the old fable, we can scarce come
into collision without my being the sufferer in every sense. It may be
otherwise with the sheets which I am now writing. These may be opened
and laid aside at pleasure; by amusing themselves with the perusal, the
great will excite no false hopes; by neglecting or condemning them, they
will inflict no pain; and how seldom can they converse with those whose
minds have toiled for their delight without doing either the one or the
other.

In the better and wiser tone of feeling with Ovid only expresses in one
line to retract in that which follows, I can address these quires--

Parve, nec invideo, sine me, liber, ibis in urbem.

Nor do I join the regret of the illustrious exile, that he himself could
not in person accompany the volume, which he sent forth to the mart
of literature, pleasure, and luxury. Were there not a hundred similar
instances on record, the rate of my poor friend and school-fellow, Dick
Tinto, would be sufficient to warn me against seeking happiness in the
celebrity which attaches itself to a successful cultivator of the fine
arts.

Dick Tinto, when he wrote himself artist, was wont to derive his origin
from the ancient family of Tinto, of that ilk, in Lanarkshire, and
occasionally hinted that he had somewhat derogated from his gentle blood
in using the pencil for his principal means of support. But if Dick's
pedigree was correct, some of his ancestors must have suffered a more
heavy declension, since the good man his father executed the necessary,
and, I trust, the honest, but certainly not very distinguished,
employment of tailor in ordinary to the village of Langdirdum in the
west.. Under his humble roof was Richard born, and to his father's
humble trade was Richard, greatly contrary to his inclination, early
indentured. Old Mr. Tinto had, however, no reason to congratulate
himself upon having compelled the youthful genius of his son to forsake
its natural bent. He fared like the school-boy who attempts to stop with
his finger the spout of a water cistern, while the stream, exasperated
at this compression, escapes by a thousand uncalculated spurts, and wets
him all over for his pains. Even so fared the senior Tinto, when his
hopeful apprentice not only exhausted all the chalk in making sketches
upon the shopboard, but even executed several caricatures of his
father's best customers, who began loudly to murmur, that it was too
hard to have their persons deformed by the vestments of the father, and
to be at the same time turned into ridicule by the pencil of the son.
This led to discredit and loss of practice, until the old tailor,
yielding to destiny and to the entreaties of his son, permitted him to
attempt his fortune in a line for which he was better qualified.

There was about this time, in the village of Langdirdum, a peripatetic
brother of the brush, who exercised his vocation sub Jove frigido, the
object of admiration of all the boys of the village, but especially
to Dick Tinto. The age had not yet adopted, amongst other unworthy
retrenchments, that illiberal measure of economy which, supplying by
written characters the lack of symbolical representation, closes one
open and easily accessible avenue of instruction and emolument against
the students of the fine arts. It was not yet permitted to write upon
the plastered doorway of an alehouse, or the suspended sign of an
inn, "The Old Magpie," or "The Saracen's Head," substituting that cold
description for the lively effigies of the plumed chatterer, or the
turban'd frown of the terrific soldan. That early and more simple age
considered alike the necessities of all ranks, and depicted the symbols
of good cheer so as to be obvious to all capacities; well judging that a
man who could not read a syllable might nevertheless love a pot of good
ale as well as his better-educated neighbours, or even as the parson
himself. Acting upon this liberal principle, publicans as yet hung forth
the painted emblems of their calling, and sign-painters, if they seldom
feasted, did not at least absolutely starve.

To a worthy of this decayed profession, as we have already intimated,
Dick Tinto became an assistant; and thus, as is not unusual among
heaven-born geniuses in this department of the fine arts, began to paint
before he had any notion of drawing.

His talent for observing nature soon induced him to rectify the errors,
and soar above the instructions, of his teacher. He particularly
shone in painting horses, that being a favourite sign in the Scottish
villages; and, in tracing his progress, it is beautiful to observe how
by degrees he learned to shorten the backs and prolong the legs of these
noble animals, until they came to look less like crocodiles, and
more like nags. Detraction, which always pursues merit with strides
proportioned to its advancement, has indeed alleged that Dick once upon
a time painted a horse with five legs, instead of four. I might have
rested his defence upon the license allowed to that branch of his
profession, which, as it permits all sorts of singular and irregular
combinations, may be allowed to extend itself so far as to bestow a limb
supernumerary on a favourite subject. But the cause of a deceased friend
is sacred; and I disdain to bottom it so superficially. I have visited
the sign in question, which yet swings exalted in the village of
Langdirdum; and I am ready to depone upon the oath that what has been
idly mistaken or misrepresented as being the fifth leg of the horse, is,
in fact, the tail of that quadruped, and, considered with reference to
the posture in which he is delineated, forms a circumstance introduced
and managed with great and successful, though daring, art. The nag
being represented in a rampant or rearing posture, the tail, which is
prolonged till it touches the ground, appears to form a point d'appui,
and gives the firmness of a tripod to the figure, without which it would
be difficult to conceive, placed as the feet are, how the courser could
maintain his ground without tumbling backwards. This bold conception has
fortunately fallen into the custody of one by whom it is duly valued;
for, when Dick, in his more advanced state of proficiency, became
dubious of the propriety of so daring a deviation to execute a picture
of the publican himself in exchange for this juvenile production,
the courteous offer was declined by his judicious employer, who
had observed, it seems, that when his ale failed to do its duty in
conciliating his guests, one glance at his sign was sure to put them in
good humour.

It would be foreign to my present purpose to trace the steps by which
Dick Tinto improved his touch, and corrected, by the rules of art, the
luxuriance of a fervid imagination. The scales fell from his eyes on
viewing the sketches of a contemporary, the Scottish Teniers, as
Wilkie has been deservedly styled. He threw down the brush took up
the crayons, and, amid hunger and toil, and suspense and uncertainty,
pursued the path of his profession under better auspices than those of
his original master. Still the first rude emanations of his genius, like
the nursery rhymes of Pope, could these be recovered, will be dear to
the companions of Dick Tinto's youth. There is a tankard and gridiron
painted over the door of an obscure change-house in the Back Wynd of
Gandercleugh----But I feel I must tear myself from the subject, or dwell
on it too long.

Amid his wants and struggles, Dick Tinto had recourse, like his
brethren, to levying that tax upon the vanity of mankind which he could
not extract from their taste and liberality--on a word, he painted
portraits. It was in this more advanced state of proficiency, when Dick
had soared above his original line of business, and highly disdained any
allusion to it, that, after having been estranged for several years,
we again met in the village of Gandercleugh, I holding my present
situation, and Dick painting copies of the human face divine at a guinea
per head. This was a small premium, yet, in the first burst of business,
it more than sufficed for all Dick's moderate wants; so that he occupied
an apartment at the Wallace Inn, cracked his jest with impunity even
upon mine host himself, and lived in respect and observance with the
chambermaid, hostler, and waiter.

Those halcyon days were too serene to last long. When his honour the
Laird of Gandercleugh, with his wife and three daughters, the minister,
the gauger, mine esteemed patron Mr. Jedediah Cleishbotham, and some
round dozen of the feuars and farmers, had been consigned to immortality
by Tinto's brush, custom began to slacken, and it was impossible to
wring more than crowns and half-crowns from the hard hands of the
peasants whose ambition led them to Dick's painting-room.

Still, though the horizon was overclouded, no storm for some time
ensued. Mine host had Christian faith with a lodger who had been a
good paymaster as long as he had the means. And from a portrait of our
landlord himself, grouped with his wife and daughters, in the style of
Rubens, which suddenly appeared in the best parlour, it was evident that
Dick had found some mode of bartering art for the necessaries of life.

Nothing, however, is more precarious than resources of this nature. It
was observed that Dick became in his turn the whetstone of mine host's
wit, without venturing either at defence or retaliation; that his easel
was transferred to a garret-room, in which there was scarce space for
it to stand upright; and that he no longer ventured to join the weekly
club, of which he had been once the life and soul. In short, Dick
Tinto's friends feared that he had acted like the animal called the
sloth, which, heaving eaten up the last green leaf upon the tree where
it has established itself, ends by tumbling down from the top, and
dying of inanition. I ventured to hint this to Dick, recommended his
transferring the exercise of his inestimable talent to some other
sphere, and forsaking the common which he might be said to have eaten
bare.

"There is an obstacle to my change of residence," said my friend,
grasping my hand with a look of solemnity.

"A bill due to my landlord, I am afraid?" replied I, with heartfelt
sympathy; "if any part of my slender means can assist in this
emergence----"

"No, by the soul of Sir Joshua!" answered the generous youth, "I will
never involve a friend in the consequences of my own misfortune. There
is a mode by which I can regain my liberty; and to creep even through a
common sewer is better than to remain in prison."

I did not perfectly understand what my friend meant. The muse of
painting appeared to have failed him, and what other goddess he could
invoke in his distress was a mystery to me. We parted, however, without
further explanation, and I did not see him until three days after, when
he summoned me to partake of the "foy" with which his landlord proposed
to regale him ere his departure for Edinburgh.

I found Dick in high spirits, whistling while he buckled the small
knapsack which contained his colours, brushes, pallets, and clean shirt.
That he parted on the best terms with mine host was obvious from the
cold beef set forth in the low parlour, flanked by two mugs of admirable
brown stout; and I own my curiosity was excited concerning the means
through which the face of my friend's affairs had been so suddenly
improved. I did not suspect Dick of dealing with the devil, and by what
earthly means he had extricated himself thus happily I was at a total
loss to conjecture.

He perceived my curiosity, and took me by the hand. "My friend," he
said, "fain would I conceal, even from you, the degradation to which
it has been necessary to submit, in order to accomplish an honourable
retreat from Gandercleaugh. But what avails attempting to conceal that
which must needs betray itself even by its superior excellence? All
the village--all the parish--all the world--will soon discover to what
poverty has reduced Richard Tinto."

A sudden thought here struck me. I had observed that our landlord wore,
on that memorable morning, a pair of bran new velveteens instead of his
ancient thicksets.

"What," said I, drawing my right hand, with the forefinger and thumb
pressed together, nimbly from my right haunch to my left shoulder, "you
have condescended to resume the paternal arts to which you were first
bred--long stitches, ha, Dick?"

He repelled this unlucky conjecture with a frown and a pshaw, indicative
of indignant contempt, and leading me into another room, showed me,
resting against the wall, the majestic head of Sir William Wallace, grim
as when severed from the trunk by the orders of the Edward.

The painting was executed on boards of a substantial thickness, and
the top decorated with irons, for suspending the honoured effigy upon a
signpost.

"There," he said, "my friend, stands the honour of Scotland, and my
shame; yet not so--rather the shame of those who, instead of encouraging
art in its proper sphere, reduce it to these unbecoming and unworthy
extremities."

I endeavoured to smooth the ruffled feelings of my misused and indignant
friend. I reminded him that he ought not, like the stag in the fable, to
despise the quality which had extricated him from difficulties, in
which his talents, as a portrait or landscape painter, had been found
unavailing. Above all, I praised the execution, as well as conception,
of his painting, and reminded him that, far from feeling dishonoured by
so superb a specimen of his talents being exposed to the general view
of the public, he ought rather to congratulate himself upon the
augmentation of his celebrity to which its public exhibition must
necessarily give rise.

"You are right, my friend--you are right," replied poor Dick, his eye
kindling with enthusiasm; "why should I shun the name of an--an--(he
hesitated for a phrase)--an out-of-doors artist? Hogarth has introduced
himself in that character in one of his best engravings; Domenichino,
or somebody else, in ancient times, Morland in our own, have exercised
their talents in this manner. And wherefore limit to the rich and
higher classes alone the delight which the exhibition of works of art is
calculated to inspire into all classes? Statues are placed in the
open air, why should Painting be more niggardly in displaying her
masterpieces than her sister Sculpture? And yet, my friend, we must part
suddenly; the carpenter is coming in an hour to put up the--the emblem;
and truly, with all my philosophy, and your consolatory encouragement
to boot, I would rather wish to leave Gandercleugh before that operation
commences."

We partook of our genial host's parting banquet, and I escorted Dick on
his walk to Edinburgh. We parted about a mile from the village, just as
we heard the distant cheer of the boys which accompanied the mounting
of the new symbol of the Wallace Head. Dick Tinto mended his pace to get
out of hearing, so little had either early practice or recent philosophy
reconciled him to the character of a sign-painter.

In Edinburgh, Dick's talents were discovered and appreciated, and he
received dinners and hints from several distinguished judges of the fine
arts. But these gentlemen dispensed their criticism more willingly than
their cash, and Dick thought he needed cash more than criticism. He
therefore sought London, the universal mart of talent, and where, as is
usual in general marts of most descriptions, much more of each commodity
is exposed to sale than can ever find purchasers.

Dick, who, in serious earnest, was supposed to have considerable natural
talents for his profession, and whose vain and sanguine disposition
never permitted him to doubt for a moment of ultimate success, threw
himself headlong into the crowd which jostled and struggled for notice
and preferment. He elbowed others, and was elbowed himself; and finally,
by dint of intrepidity, fought his way into some notice, painted for
the prize at the Institution, had pictures at the exhibition at Somerset
House, and damned the hanging committee. But poor Dick was doomed to
lose the field he fought so gallantly. In the fine arts, there is scarce
an alternative betwixt distinguished success and absolute failure; and
as Dick's zeal and industry were unable to ensure the first, he
fell into the distresses which, in his condition, were the natural
consequences of the latter alternative. He was for a time patronised
by one or two of those judicious persons who make a virtue of being
singular, and of pitching their own opinions against those of the world
in matters of taste and criticism. But they soon tired of poor Tinto,
and laid him down as a load, upon the principle on which a spoilt child
throws away its plaything. Misery, I fear, took him up, and accompanied
him to a premature grave, to which he was carried from an obscure
lodging in Swallow Street, where he had been dunned by his landlady
within doors, and watched by bailiffs without, until death came to
his relief. A corner of the Morning Post noticed his death, generously
adding, that his manner displayed considerable genius, though his style
was rather sketchy; and referred to an advertisement, which announced
that Mr. Varnish, a well-known printseller, had still on hand a very
few drawings and painings by Richard Tinto, Esquire, which those of
the nobility and gentry who might wish to complete their collections of
modern art were invited to visit without delay. So ended Dick Tinto! a
lamentable proof of the great truth, that in the fine arts mediocrity
is not permitted, and that he who cannot ascend to the very top of the
ladder will do well not to put his foot upon it at all.

The memory of Tinto is dear to me, from the recollection of the many
conversations which we have had together, most of them turning upon
my present task. He was delighted with my progress, and talked of an
ornamented and illustrated edition, with heads, vignettes, and culs de
lampe, all to be designed by his own patriotic and friendly pencil.
He prevailed upon an old sergeant of invalids to sit to him in the
character of Bothwell, the lifeguard's-man of Charles the Second, and
the bellman of Gandercleugh in that of David Deans. But while he thus
proposed to unite his own powers with mine for the illustration of
these narratives, he mixed many a dose of salutary criticism with the
panegyrics which my composition was at times so fortunate as to call
forth.

"Your characters," he said, "my dear Pattieson, make too much use of
the gob box; they patter too much (an elegant phraseology which Dick had
learned while painting the scenes of an itinerant company of players);
there is nothing in whole pages but mere chat and dialogue."

"The ancient philosopher," said I in reply, "was wont to say, 'Speak,
that I may know thee'; and how is it possible for an author to introduce
his personae dramatis to his readers in a more interesting and effectual
manner than by the dialogue in which each is represented as supporting
his own appropriate character?"

"It is a false conclusion," said Tinto; "I hate it, Peter, as I hate
an unfilled can. I grant you, indeed, that speech is a faculty of some
value in the intercourse of human affairs, and I will not even insist on
the doctrine of that Pythagorean toper, who was of opinion that over
a bottle speaking spoiled conversation. But I will not allow that a
professor of the fine arts has occasion to embody the idea of his scene
in language, in order to impress upon the reader its reality and its
effect. On the contrary, I will be judged by most of your readers,
Peter, should these tales ever become public, whether you have not
given us a page of talk for every single idea which two words might have
communicated, while the posture, and manner, and incident, accurately
drawn, and brougth out by appropriate colouring, would have preserved
all that was worthy of preservation, and saved these everlasting 'said
he's' and 'said she's,' with which it has been your pleasure to encumber
your pages."

I replied, "That he confounded the operations of the pencil and the pen;
that the serene and silent art, as painting has been called by one of
our first living poets, necessarily appealed to the eye, because it had
not the organs for addressing the ear; whereas poetry, or that species
of composition which approached to it, lay under the necessity of doing
absolutely the reverse, and addressed itself to the ear, for the purpose
of exciting that interest which it could not attain through the medium
of the eye."

Dick was not a whit staggered by my argument, which he contended was
founded on misrepresentation. "Description," he said, "was to the author
of a romance exactly what drawing and tinting were to a painter: words
were his colours, and, if properly employed, they could not fail to
place the scene which he wished to conjure up as effectually before the
mind's eye as the tablet or canvas presents it to the bodily organ.
The same rules," he contended, "applied to both, and an exuberance
of dialogue, in the former case, was a verbose and laborious mode
of composition which went to confound the proper art of fictitious
narrative with that of the drama, a widely different species of
composition, of which dialogue was the very essence, because all,
excepting the language to be made use of, was presented to the eye by
the dresses, and persons, and actions of the performers upon the stage.
But as nothing," said Dick, "can be more dull than a long narrative
written upon the plan of a drama, so where you have approached most near
to that species of composition, by indulging in prolonged scenes of mere
conversation, the course of your story has become chill and constrained,
and you have lost the power of arresting the attention and exciting
the imagination, in which upon other occasions you may be considered as
having succeeded tolerably well."

I made my bow in requital of the compliment, which was probably thrown
in by way of placebo, and expressed myself willing at least to make one
trial of a more straightforward style of composition, in which my actors
should do more, and say less, than in my former attempts of this kind.
Dick gave me a patronising and approving nod, and observed that, finding
me so docile, he would communicate, for the benefit of my muse, a
subject which he had studied with a view to his own art.

"The story," he said, "was, by tradition, affirmed to be truth,
although, as upwards of a hundred years had passed away since the events
took place, some doubts upon the accuracy of all the particulars might
be reasonably entertained."

When Dick Tinto had thus spoken, he rummaged his portfolio for the
sketch from which he proposed one day to execute a picture of fourteen
feet by eight. The sketch, which was cleverly executed, to use the
appropriate phrase, represented an ancient hall, fitted up and furnished
in what we now call the taste of Queen Elizabeth's age. The light,
admitted from the upper part of a high casement, fell upon a female
figure of exquisite beauty, who, in an attitude of speechless terror,
appeared to watch the issue of a debate betwixt two other persons. The
one was a young man, in the Vandyke dress common to the time of Charles
I., who, with an air of indignant pride, testified by the manner in
which he raised his head and extended his arm, seemed to be urging a
claim of right, rather than of favour, to a lady whose age, and some
resemblance in their features, pointed her out as the mother of the
younger female, and who appeared to listen with a mixture of displeasure
and impatience.

Tinto produced his sketch with an air of mysterious triumph, and gazed
on it as a fond parent looks upon a hopeful child, while he anticipates
the future figure he is to make in the world, and the height to which
he will raise the honour of his family. He held it at arm's length
from me--he helt it closer--he placed it upon the top of a chest of
drawers--closed the lower shutters of the casement, to adjust a downward
and favourable light--fell back to the due distance, dragging me
after him--shaded his face with his hand, as if to exclude all but the
favourite object--and ended by spoiling a child's copy-book, which he
rolled up so as to serve for the darkened tube of an amateur. I fancy my
expressions of enthusiasm had not been in proportion to his own, for he
presently exclaimed with vehemence: "Mr. Pattieson, I used to think you
had an eye in your head."

I vindicated my claim to the usual allowance of visual organs.

"Yet, on my honour," said Dick, "I would swear you had been born blind,
since you have failed at the first glance to discover the subject and
meaning of that sketch. I do not mean to praise my own performance, I
leave these arts to others; I am sensible of my deficiencies, conscious
that my drawing and colouring may be improved by the time I intend
to dedicate to the art. But the conception--the expression--the
positions--these tell the story to every one who looks at the sketch;
and if I can finish the picture without diminution of the original
conception, the name of Tinto shall no more be smothered by the mists of
envy and intrigue."

I replied: "That I admired the sketch exceedingly; but that to
understand its full merit, I felt it absolutely necessary to be informed
of the subject."

"That is the very thing I complain of," answered Tinto; "you have
accustomed yourself so much to these creeping twilight details of yours,
that you are become incapable of receiving that instant and vivid
flash of conviction which darts on the mind from seeing the happy and
expressive combinations of a single scene, and which gathers from the
position, attitude, and countenance of the moment, not only the history
of the past lives of the personages represented, and the nature of the
business on which they are immediately engaged, but lifts even the veil
of futurity, and affords a shrewd guess at their future fortunes."