'These,' said Pleydell, 'are my tools of trade. A lawyer without
history or literature is a mechanic, a mere working mason; if he
possesses some knowledge of these, he may venture to call himself
an architect.'

But Mannering was chiefly delighted with the view from the
windows, which commanded that incomparable prospect of the ground
between Edinburgh and the sea--the Firth of Forth, with its
islands, the embayment which is terminated by the Law of North
Berwick, and the varied shores of Fife to the northward, indenting
with a hilly outline the clear blue horizon.

When Mr. Pleydell had sufficiently enjoyed the surprise of his
guest, he called his attention to Miss Bertram's affairs. 'I was
in hopes,' he said, 'though but faint, to have discovered some
means of ascertaining her indefeasible right to this property of
Singleside; but my researches have been in vain. The old lady was
certainly absolute fiar, and might dispose of it in full right of
property. All that we have to hope is, that the devil may not have
tempted her to alter this very proper settlement. You must attend
the old girl's funeral to-morrow, to which you will receive an
invitation, for I have acquainted her agent with your being here
on Miss Bertram's part; and I will meet you afterwards at the
house she inhabited, and be present to see fair play at the
opening of the settlement. The old cat had a little girl, the
orphan of some relation, who lived with her as a kind of slavish
companion. I hope she has had the conscience to make her
independent, in consideration of the peine forte et dure to which
she subjected her during her lifetime.'

Three gentlemen now appeared, and were introduced to the stranger.
They were men of good sense, gaiety, and general information, so
that the day passed very pleasantly over; and Colonel Mannering
assisted, about eight o'clock at night, in discussing the
landlord's bottle, which was, of course, a magnum. Upon his return
to the inn he found a card inviting him to the funeral of Miss
Margaret Bertram, late of Singleside, which was to proceed from
her own house to the place of interment in the Greyfriars
churchyard at one o'clock afternoon.

At the appointed hour Mannering went to a small house in the
suburbs to the southward of the city, where he found the place of
mourning indicated, as usual in Scotland, by two rueful figures
with long black cloaks, white crapes and hat-bands, holding in
their hands poles, adorned with melancholy streamers of the same
description. By two other mutes, who, from their visages, seemed
suffering under the pressure of some strange calamity, he was
ushered into the dining-parlour of the defunct, where the company
were assembled for the funeral.

In Scotland the custom, now disused in England, of inviting the
relations of the deceased to the interment is universally
retained. On many occasions this has a singular and striking
effect, but it degenerates into mere empty form and grimace in
cases where the defunct has had the misfortune to live unbeloved
and die unlamented. The English service for the dead, one of the
most beautiful and impressive parts of the ritual of the church,
would have in such cases the effect of fixing the attention, and
uniting the thoughts and feelings of the audience present in an
exercise of devotion so peculiarly adapted to such an occasion.
But according to the Scottish custom, if there be not real feeling
among the assistants, there is nothing to supply the deficiency,
and exalt or rouse the attention; so that a sense of tedious form,
and almost hypocritical restraint, is too apt to pervade the
company assembled for the mournful solemnity. Mrs. Margaret
Bertram was unluckily one of those whose good qualities had
attached no general friendship. She had no near relations who
might have mourned from natural affection, and therefore her
funeral exhibited merely the exterior trappings of sorrow.

Mannering, therefore, stood among this lugubrious company of
cousins in the third, fourth, fifth, and sixth degree, composing
his countenance to the decent solemnity of all who were around
him, and looking as much concerned on Mrs. Margaret Bertram's
account as if the deceased lady of Singleside had been his own
sister or mother. After a deep and awful pause, the company began
to talk aside, under their breaths, however, and as if in the
chamber of a dying person.

'Our poor friend,' said one grave gentleman, scarcely opening his
mouth, for fear of deranging the necessary solemnity of his
features, and sliding his whisper from between his lips, which
were as little unclosed as possible--'our poor friend has died
well to pass in the world.'

'Nae doubt,' answered the person addressed, with half-closed eyes;
'poor Mrs. Margaret was aye careful of the gear.'

'Any news to-day, Colonel Mannering?' said one of the gentlemen
whom he had dined with the day before, but in a tone which might,
for its impressive gravity, have communicated the death of his
whole generation.

'Nothing particular, I believe, sir,' said Mannering, in the
cadence which was, he observed, appropriated to the house of
mourning.

'I understand,' continued the first speaker, emphatically, and
with the air of one who is well informed--'I understand there IS a
settlement.'

'And what does little Jenny Gibson get?'

'A hundred, and the auld repeater.'

'That's but sma' gear, puir thing; she had a sair time o't with
the auld leddy. But it's ill waiting for dead folk's shoon.'

'I am afraid,' said the politician, who was close by Mannering,
'we have not done with your old friend Tippoo Sahib yet, I doubt
he'll give the Company more plague; and I am told, but you'll know
for certain, that East India Stock is not rising.'

'I trust it will, sir, soon.'

'Mrs. Margaret,' said another person, mingling in the
conversation, 'had some India bonds. I know that, for I drew the
interest for her; it would be desirable now for the trustees and
legatees to have the Colonel's advice about the time and mode of
converting them into money. For my part I think--but there's Mr.
Mortcloke to tell us they are gaun to lift.'

Mr. Mortcloke the undertaker did accordingly, with a visage of
professional length and most grievous solemnity, distribute among
the pall-bearers little cards, assigning their respective
situations in attendance upon the coffin. As this precedence is
supposed to be regulated by propinquity to the defunct, the
undertaker, however skilful a master of these lugubrious
ceremonies, did not escape giving some offence. To be related to
Mrs. Bertram was to be of kin to the lands of Singleside, and was
a propinquity of which each relative present at that moment was
particularly jealous. Some murmurs there were on the occasion, and
our friend Dinmont gave more open offence, being unable either to
repress his discontent or to utter it in the key properly
modulated to the solemnity. 'I think ye might hae at least gi'en
me a leg o' her to carry,' he exclaimed, in a voice considerably
louder than propriety admitted. 'God! an it hadna been for the
rigs o' land, I would hae gotten her a' to carry mysell, for as
mony gentles as are here.'

A score of frowning and reproving brows were bent upon the
unappalled yeoman, who, having given vent to his displeasure,
stalked sturdily downstairs with the rest of the company, totally
disregarding the censures of those whom his remarks had
scandalised.

And then the funeral pomp set forth; saulies with their batons and
gumphions of tarnished white crape, in honour of the well-
preserved maiden fame of Mrs. Margaret Bertram. Six starved
horses, themselves the very emblems of mortality, well cloaked and
plumed, lugging along the hearse with its dismal emblazonry, crept
in slow state towards the place of interment, preceded by Jamie
Duff, an idiot, who, with weepers and cravat made of white paper,
attended on every funeral, and followed by six mourning coaches,
filled with the company. Many of these now gave more free loose to
their tongues, and discussed with unrestrained earnestness the
amount of the succession, and the probability of its destination.
The principal expectants, however, kept a prudent silence, indeed
ashamed to express hopes which might prove fallacious; and the
agent or man of business, who alone knew exactly how matters
stood, maintained a countenance of mysterious importance, as if
determined to preserve the full interest of anxiety and suspense.

At length they arrived at the churchyard gates, and from thence,
amid the gaping of two or three dozen of idle women with infants
in their arms, and accompanied by some twenty children, who ran
gambolling and screaming alongside of the sable procession, they
finally arrived at the burial-place of the Singleside family. This
was a square enclosure in the Greyfriars churchyard, guarded on
one side by a veteran angel without a nose, and having only one
wing, who had the merit of having maintained his post for a
century, while his comrade cherub, who had stood sentinel on the
corresponding pedestal, lay a broken trunk among the hemlock,
burdock, and nettles which grew in gigantic luxuriance around the
walls of the mausoleum. A moss-grown and broken inscription
informed the reader that in the year 1650 Captain Andrew Bertram,
first of Singleside, descended of the very ancient and honourable
house of Ellangowan, had caused this monument to be erected for
himself and his descendants. A reasonable number of scythes and
hour-glasses, and death's heads and cross-bones, garnished the
following sprig of sepulchral poetry to the memory of the founder
of the mausoleum:--

     Nathaniel's heart, Bezaleel's hand
        If ever any had,
     These boldly do I say had he,
        Who lieth in this bed.

Here, then, amid the deep black fat loam into which her ancestors
were now resolved, they deposited the body of Mrs. Margaret
Bertram; and, like soldiers returning from a military funeral, the
nearest relations who might be interested in the settlements of
the lady urged the dog-cattle of the hackney coaches to all the
speed of which they were capable, in order to put an end to
farther suspense on that interesting topic.




CHAPTER XXXVIII

     Die and endow a college or a cat.

          POPE.


There is a fable told by Lucian, that while a troop of monkeys,
well drilled by an intelligent manager, were performing a tragedy
with great applause, the decorum of the whole scene was at once
destroyed, and the natural passions of the actors called forth
into very indecent and active emulation, by a wag who threw a
handful of nuts upon the stage. In like manner, the approaching
crisis stirred up among the expectants feelings of a nature very
different from those of which, under the superintendence of Mr.
Mortcloke, they had but now been endeavouring to imitate the
expression. Those eyes which were lately devoutly cast up to
heaven, or with greater humility bent solemnly upon earth, were
now sharply and alertly darting their glances through shuttles,
and trunks, and drawers, and cabinets, and all the odd corners of
an old maiden lady's repositories. Nor was their search without
interest, though they did not find the will of which they were in
quest.

Here was a promissory note for 20 Pounds by the minister of the
nonjuring chapel, interest marked as paid to Martinmas last,
carefully folded up in a new set of words to the old tune of 'Over
the Water to Charlie'; there was a curious love correspondence
between the deceased and a certain Lieutenant O'Kean of a marching
regiment of foot; and tied up with the letters was a document
which at once explained to the relatives why a connexion that
boded them little good had been suddenly broken off, being the
Lieutenant's bond for two hundred pounds, upon which NO interest
whatever appeared to have been paid. Other bills and bonds to a
larger amount, and signed by better names (I mean commercially)
than those of the worthy divine and gallant soldier, also occurred
in the course of their researches, besides a hoard of coins of
every size and denomination, and scraps of broken gold and silver,
old earrings, hinges of cracked, snuff-boxes, mountings of
spectacles, etc. etc. etc. Still no will made its appearance, and
Colonel Mannering began full well to hope that the settlement
which he had obtained from Glossin contained the ultimate
arrangement of the old lady's affairs. But his friend Pleydell,
who now came into the room, cautioned him against entertaining
this belief.

'I am well acquainted with the gentleman,' he said, 'who is
conducting the search, and I guess from his manner that he knows
something more of the matter than any of us.'

Meantime, while the search proceeds, let us take a brief glance at
one or two of the company who seem most interested.

Of Dinmont, who, with his large hunting-whip under his arm, stood
poking his great round face over the shoulder of the homme
d'affaires, it is unnecessary to say anything. That thin-looking
oldish person, in a most correct and gentleman-like suit of
mourning, is Mac-Casquil, formerly of Drumquag, who was ruined by
having a legacy bequeathed to him of two shares in the Ayr bank.
His hopes on the present occasion are founded on a very distant
relationship, upon his sitting in the same pew with the deceased
every Sunday, and upon his playing at cribbage with her regularly
on the Saturday evenings, taking great care never to come off a
winner. That other coarse-looking man, wearing his own greasy hair
tied in a leathern cue more greasy still, is a tobacconist, a
relation of Mrs. Bertram's mother, who, having a good stock in
trade when the colonial war broke out, trebled the price of his
commodity to all the world, Mrs. Bertram alone excepted, whose
tortoise-shell snuff-box was weekly filled with the best rappee at
the old prices, because the maid brought it to the shop with Mrs.
Bertram's respects to her cousin Mr. Quid. That young fellow, who
has not had the decency to put off his boots and buckskins, might
have stood as forward as most of them in the graces of the old
lady, who loved to look upon a comely young man; but it is thought
he has forfeited the moment of fortune by sometimes neglecting her
tea-table when solemnly invited, sometimes appearing there when he
had been dining with blyther company, twice treading upon her
cat's tail, and once affronting her parrot.

To Mannering the most interesting of the group was the poor girl
who had been a sort of humble companion of the deceased, as a
subject upon whom she could at all times expectorate her bad
humour. She was for form's sake dragged into the room by the
deceased's favourite female attendant, where, shrinking into
a>corner as soon as possible, she saw with wonder and affright the
intrusive researches of the strangers amongst those recesses to
which from childhood she had looked with awful veneration. This
girl was regarded with an unfavourable eye by all the competitors,
honest Dinmont only excepted; the rest conceived they should find
in her a formidable competitor, whose claims might at least
encumber and diminish their chance of succession. Yet she was the
only person present who seemed really to feel sorrow for the
deceased. Mrs. Bertram had been her protectress, although from
selfish motives, and her capricious tyranny was forgotten at the
moment, while the tears followed each other fast down the cheeks
of her frightened and friendless dependent. 'There's ower muckle
saut water there, Drumquag,' said the tobacconist to the ex-
proprietor, 'to bode ither folk muckle gude. Folk seldom greet
that gate but they ken what it's for.' Mr. Mac-Casquil only
replied with a nod, feeling the propriety of asserting his
superior gentry in presence of Mr. Pleydell and Colonel Mannering.

'Very queer if there suld be nae will after a', friend,' said
Dinmont, who began to grow impatient, to the man of business.

'A moment's patience, if you please. She was a good and prudent
woman, Mrs. Margaret Bertram--a good and prudent and well-judging
woman, and knew how to choose friends and depositaries; she may
have put her last will and testament, or rather her mortis causa
settlement, as it relates to heritage, into the hands of some safe
friend.'

'I'll bet a rump and dozen,' said Pleydell, whispering to the
Colonel, 'he has got it in his own pocket.' Then addressing the
man of law, 'Come, sir, we'll cut this short, if you please: here
is a settlement of the estate of Singleside, executed several
years ago, in favour of Miss Lucy Bertram of Ellangowan.' The
company stared fearfully wild. 'You, I presume, Mr. Protocol, can
inform us if there is a later deed?'

'Please to favour me, Mr. Pleydell'; and so saying, he took the
deed out of the learned counsel's hand, and glanced his eye over
the contents.

'Too cool,' said Pleydell, 'too cool by half; he has another deed
in his pocket still.'

'Why does he not show it then, and be d-d to him!' said the
military gentleman, whose patience began to wax threadbare.

'Why, how should I know?' answered the barrister; 'why does a cat
not kill a mouse when she takes him? The consciousness of power
and the love of teasing, I suppose. Well, Mr. Protocol, what say
you to that deed?'

'Why, Mr. Pleydell, the deed is a well-drawn deed, properly
authenticated and tested in forms of the statute.'

'But recalled or superseded by another of posterior date in your
possession, eh?' said the Counsellor.

'Something of the sort, I confess, Mr. Pleydell,' rejoined the man
of business, producing a bundle tied with tape, and sealed at each
fold and ligation with black wax. 'That deed, Mr. Pleydell, which
you produce and found upon, is dated 1st June 17-; but this
(breaking the seals and unfolding the document slowly) is dated
the 20th--no, I see it is the 2ist--of April of this present year,
being ten years posterior.'

'Marry, hang her, brock!' said the Counsellor, borrowing an
exclamation from Sir Toby Belch; 'just the month in which
Ellangowan's distresses became generally public. But let us hear
what she has done.'

Mr. Protocol accordingly, having required silence, began to read
the settlement aloud in a slow, steady, business-like tone. The
group around, in whose eyes hope alternately awakened and faded,
and who were straining their apprehensions to get at the drift of
the testator's meaning through the mist of technical language in
which the conveyance had involved it, might have made a study for
Hogarth.

The deed was of an unexpected nature. It set forth with conveying
and disponing all and whole the estate and lands of Singleside and
others, with the lands of Loverless, Liealone, Spinster's Knowe,
and heaven knows what beside, 'to and in favours of (here the
reader softened his voice to a gentle and modest piano) Peter
Protocol, clerk to the signet, having the fullest confidence in
his capacity and integrity--these are the very words which my
worthy deceased friend insisted upon my inserting--but in TRUST
always (here the reader recovered his voice and style, and the
visages of several of the hearers, which had attained a longitude
that Mr. Mortcloke might have envied, were perceptibly shortened)-
-in TRUST always, and for the uses, ends, and purposes hereinafter
mentioned.'

In these 'uses, ends, and purposes' lay the cream of the affair.
The first was introduced by a preamble setting forth that the
testatrix was lineally descended from the ancient house of
Ellangowan, her respected great-grandfather, Andrew Bertram, first
of Singleside, of happy memory, having been second son to Allan
Bertram, fifteenth Baron of Ellangowan. It proceeded to state that
Henry Bertram, son and heir of Godfrey Bertram, now of Ellangowan,
had been stolen from his parents in infancy, but that she, the
testatrix, WAS WELL ASSURED THAT HE WAS YET ALIVE IN FOREIGN
PARTS, AND BY THE PROVIDENCE OF HEAVEN WOULD BE RESTORED TO THE
POSSESSIONS OF HIS ANCESTORS, in which case the said Peter
Protocol was bound and obliged, like as he bound and obliged
himself, by acceptance of these presents, to denude himself of the
said lands of Singleside and others, and of all the other effects
thereby conveyed (excepting always a proper gratification for his
own trouble), to and in favour of the said Henry Bertram, upon his
return to his native country. And during the time of his residing
in foreign parts, or in case of his never again returning to
Scotland, Mr. Peter Protocol, the trustee, was directed to
distribute the rents of the land, and interest of the other funds
(deducting always a proper gratification for his trouble in the
premises), in equal portions, among four charitable establishments
pointed out in the will. The power of management, of letting
leases, of raising and lending out money, in short, the full
authority of a proprietor, was vested in this confidential
trustee, and, in the event of his death, went to certain official
persons named in the deed. There were only two legacies; one of a
hundred pounds to a favourite waiting-maid, another of the like
sum to Janet Gibson (whom the deed stated to have been supported
by the charity of the testatrix), for the purpose of binding her
an apprentice to some honest trade.

A settlement in mortmain is in Scotland termed a mortification,
and in one great borough (Aberdeen, if I remember rightly) there
is a municipal officer who takes care of these public endowments,
and is thence called the Master of Mortifications. One would
almost presume that the term had its origin in the effect which
such settlements usually produce upon the kinsmen of those by whom
they are executed. Heavy at least was the mortification which
befell the audience who, in the late Mrs. Margaret Bertram's
parlour, had listened to this unexpected destination of the lands
of Singleside. There was a profound silence after the deed had
been read over.

Mr. Pleydell was the first to speak. He begged to look at the
deed, and, having satisfied himself that it was correctly drawn
and executed, he returned it without any observation, only saying
aside to Mannering, 'Protocol is not worse than other people, I
believe; but this old lady has determined that, if he do not turn
rogue, it shall not be for want of temptation.'

'I really think,' said Mr. Mac-Casquil of Drumquag, who, having
gulped down one half of his vexation, determined to give vent to
the rest--'I really think this is an extraordinary case! I should
like now to know from Mr. Protocol, who, being sole and unlimited
trustee, must have been consulted upon this occasion--I should
like, I say, to know how Mrs. Bertram could possibly believe in
the existence of a boy that a' the world kens was murdered many a
year since?'

'Really, sir,' said Mr. Protocol, 'I do not conceive it is
possible for me to explain her motives more than she has done
herself. Our excellent deceased friend was a good woman, sir--a
pious woman--and might have grounds for confidence in the boy's
safety which are not accessible to us, sir.'

'Hout,' said the tobacconist, 'I ken very weel what were her
grounds for confidence. There's Mrs. Rebecca (the maid) sitting
there has tell'd me a hundred times in my ain shop, there was nae
kenning how her leddy wad settle her affairs, for an auld gipsy
witch wife at Gilsland had possessed her with a notion that the
callant--Harry Bertram ca's she him?--would come alive again some
day after a'. Ye'll no deny that, Mrs. Rebecca? though I dare to
say ye forgot to put your mistress in mind of what ye promised to
say when I gied ye mony a half-crown. But ye'll no deny what I am
saying now, lass?'

'I ken naething at a' about it,' answered Rebecca, doggedly, and
looking straight forward with the firm countenance of one not
disposed to be compelled to remember more than was agreeable to
her.

'Weel said, Rebecca! ye're satisfied wi' your ain share ony way,'
rejoined the tobacconist.

The buck of the second-head, for a buck of the first-head he was
not, had hitherto been slapping his boots with his switch-whip,
and looking like a spoiled child that has lost its supper. His
murmurs, however, were all vented inwardly, or at most in a
soliloquy such as this--'I am sorry, by G-d, I ever plagued myself
about her. I came here, by G-d, one night to drink tea, and I left
King and the Duke's rider Will Hack. They were toasting a round of
running horses; by G-d, I might have got leave to wear the jacket
as well as other folk if I had carried it on with them; and she
has not so much as left me that hundred!'

'We'll make the payment of the note quite agreeable,' said Mr.
Protocol, who had no wish to increase at that moment the odium
attached to his office. 'And now, gentlemen, I fancy we have no
more to wait for here, and I shall put the settlement of my
excellent and worthy friend on record to-morrow, that every
gentleman may examine the contents, and have free access to take
an extract; and'--he proceeded to lock up the repositories of the
deceased with more speed than he had opened them--'Mrs. Rebecca,
ye'll be so kind as to keep all right here until we can let the
house; I had an offer from a tenant this morning, if such a thing
should be, and if I was to have any management.'

Our friend Dinmont, having had his hopes as well as another, had
hitherto sate sulky enough in the armchair formerly appropriated
to the deceased, and in which she would have been not a little
scandalised to have seen this colossal specimen of the masculine
gender lolling at length. His employment had been rolling up into
the form of a coiled snake the long lash of his horse-whip, and
then by a jerk causing it to unroll itself into the middle of the
floor. The first words he said when he had digested the shock
contained a magnanimous declaration, which he probably was not
conscious of having uttered aloud--'Weel, blude's thicker than
water; she's welcome to the cheeses and the hams just the same.'
But when the trustee had made the above-mentioned motion for the
mourners to depart, and talked of the house being immediately let,
honest Dinmont got upon his feet and stunned the company with this
blunt question, 'And what's to come o' this poor lassie then,
Jenny Gibson? Sae mony o'us as thought oursells sib to the family
when the gear was parting, we may do something for her amang us
surely.'

This proposal seemed to dispose most of the assembly instantly to
evacuate the premises, although upon Mr. Protocol's motion they
had lingered as if around the grave of their disappointed hopes.
Drumquag said, or rather muttered, something of having a family of
his own, and took precedence, in virtue of his gentle blood, to
depart as fast as possible. The tobacconist sturdily stood forward
and scouted the motion--'A little huzzie like that was weel eneugh
provided for already; and Mr. Protocol at ony rate was the proper
person to take direction of her, as he had charge of her legacy';
and after uttering such his opinion in a steady and decisive tone
of voice, he also left the place. The buck made a stupid and
brutal attempt at a jest upon Mrs. Bertram's recommendation that
the poor girl should be taught some honest trade; but encountered
a scowl from Colonel Mannering's darkening eye (to whom, in his
ignorance of the tone of good society, he had looked for applause)
that made him ache to the very backbone. He shuffled downstairs,
therefore, as fast as possible.

Protocol, who was really a good sort of man, next expressed his
intention to take a temporary charge of the young lady, under
protest always that his so doing should be considered as merely
eleemosynary; when Dinmont at length got up, and, having shaken
his huge dreadnought great-coat, as a Newfoundland dog does his
shaggy hide when he comes out of the water, ejaculated, 'Weel,
deil hae me then, if ye hae ony fash wi' her, Mr. Protocol, if she
likes to gang hame wi' me, that is. Ye see, Ailie and me we're
weel to pass, and we would like the lassies to hae a wee bit mair
lair than oursells, and to be neighbour-like, that wad we. And ye
see Jenny canna miss but to ken manners, and the like o' reading
books, and sewing seams, having lived sae lang wi' a grand lady
like Lady Singleside; or, if she disna ken ony thing about it, I'm
jealous that our bairns will like her a' the better. And I'll take
care o' the bits o' claes, and what spending siller she maun hae,
so the hundred pound may rin on in your hands, Mr. Protocol, and
I'll be adding something till't, till she'll maybe get a
Liddesdale joe that wants something to help to buy the hirsel.
What d'ye say to that, hinny? I'll take out a ticket for ye in the
fly to Jethart; od, but ye maun take a powny after that o'er the
Limestane Rig, deil a wheeled carriage ever gaed into Liddesdale.
[Footnote: See Note I.] And I'll be very glad if Mrs. Rebecca
comes wi' you, hinny, and stays a month or twa while ye're
stranger like.'

While Mrs. Rebecca was curtsying, and endeavouring to make the
poor orphan girl curtsy instead of crying, and while Dandie, in
his rough way, was encouraging them both, old Pleydell had
recourse to his snuff-box. 'It's meat and drink to me now,
Colonel,' he said, as he recovered himself, 'to see a clown like
this. I must gratify him in his own way, must assist him to ruin
himself; there's no help for it. Here, you Liddesdale--Dandie--
Charlie's Hope--what do they call you?'

The farmer turned, infinitely gratified even by this sort of
notice; for in his heart, next to his own landlord, he honoured a
lawyer in high practice.

'So you will not be advised against trying that question about
your marches?'

'No, no, sir; naebody likes to lose their right, and to be laughed
at down the haill water. But since your honour's no agreeable, and
is maybe a friend to the other side like, we maun try some other
advocate.'

'There, I told you so, Colonel Mannering! Well, sir, if you must
needs be a fool, the business is to give you the luxury of a
lawsuit at the least possible expense, and to bring you off
conqueror if possible. Let Mr. Protocol send me your papers, and I
will advise him how to conduct your cause. I don't see, after all,
why you should not have your lawsuits too, and your feuds in the
Court of Session, as well as your forefathers had their
manslaughters and fire-raisings.'

'Very natural, to be sure, sir. We wad just take the auld gate as
readily, if it werena for the law. And as the law binds us, the
law should loose us. Besides, a man's aye the better thought o' in
our country for having been afore the Feifteen.'

'Excellently argued, my friend! Away with you, and send your
papers to me. Come, Colonel, we have no more to do here.'

'God, we'll ding Jock o' Dawston Cleugh now after a'!' said
Dinmont, slapping his thigh in great exultation.




CHAPTER XXXIX

          I am going to the parliament;
     You understand this bag. If you have any business
     Depending there be short, and let me hear it,
     And pay your fees.

          Little French Lawyer


'Shall you be able to carry this honest fellow's cause for him?'
said Mannering.

'Why, I don't know; the battle is not to the strong, but he shall
come off triumphant over Jock of Dawston if we can make it out. I
owe him something. It is the pest of our profession that we seldom
see the best side of human nature. People come to us with every
selfish feeling newly pointed and grinded; they turn down the very
caulkers of their animosities and prejudices, as smiths do with
horses' shoes in a white frost. Many a man has come to my garret
yonder that I have at first longed to pitch out at the window, and
yet at length have discovered that he was only doing as I might
have done in his case, being very angry, and of course very
unreasonable. I have now satisfied myself that, if our profession
sees more of human folly and human roguery than others, it is
because we witness them acting in that channel in which they can
most freely vent themselves. In civilised society law is the
chimney through which all that smoke discharges itself that used
to circulate through the whole house, and put every one's eyes
out; no wonder, therefore, that the vent itself should sometimes
get a little sooty. But we will take care our Liddesdale man's
cause is well conducted and well argued, so all unnecessary
expense will be saved: he shall have his pine-apple at wholesale
price.'

'Will you do me the pleasure,' said Mannering, as they parted, 'to
dine with me at my lodgings? My landlord says he has a bit of red-
deer venison and some excellent wine.'

'Venison, eh?' answered the Counsellor alertly, but presently
added--'But no! it's impossible; and I can't ask you home neither.
Monday's a sacred day; so's Tuesday; and Wednesday we are to be
heard in the great teind case in presence, but stay--it's frosty
weather, and if you don't leave town, and that venison would keep
till Thursday--'

'You will dine with me that day?'

'Under certification.'

'Well, then, I will indulge a thought I had of spending a week
here; and if the venison will not keep, why we will see what else
our landlord can do for us.'

'O, the venison will keep,' said Pleydell; 'and now good-bye. Look
at these two or three notes, and deliver them if you like the
addresses. I wrote them for you this morning. Farewell, my clerk
has been waiting this hour to begin a d-d information.' And away
walked Mr. Pleydell with great activity, diving through closes and
ascending covered stairs in order to attain the High Street by an
access which, compared to the common route, was what the Straits
of Magellan are to the more open but circuitous passage round Cape
Horn.

On looking at the notes of introduction which Pleydell had thrust
into his hand, Mannering was gratified with seeing that they were
addressed to some of the first literary characters of Scotland.
'To David Hume, Esq.'

To John Home, Esq.' 'To Dr. Ferguson.' 'To Dr. Black.' 'To Lord
Kaimes.' 'To Mr. Button.' 'To John Clerk, Esq., of Eldin.' 'To
Adam Smith, Esq.' 'To Dr. Robertson.'

'Upon my word, my legal friend has a good selection of
acquaintances; these are names pretty widely blown indeed. An
East-Indian must rub up his facultiesa little, and put his mind in
order, before he enters this sort of society.'

Mannering gladly availed himself of these introductions; and we
regret deeply it is not in our power to give the reader an account
of the pleasure and information which he received in admission to
a circle never closed against strangers of sense and information,
and which has perhaps at no period been equalled, considering the
depth and variety of talent which it embraced and concentrated.

Upon the Thursday appointed Mr. Pleydell made his appearance at
the inn where Colonel Mannering lodged. The venison proved in high
order, the claret excellent, and the learned counsel, a professed
amateur in the affairs of the table, did distinguished honour to
both. I am uncertain, however, if even the good cheer gave him
more satisfaction than the presence of Dominie Sampson, from whom,
in his own juridical style of wit, he contrived to extract great
amusement both for himself and one or two friends whom the Colonel
regaled on the same occasion. The grave and laconic simplicity of
Sampson's answers to the insidious questions of the barrister
placed the bonhomie of his character in a more luminous point of
view than Mannering had yet seen it. Upon the same occasion he
drew forth a strange quantity of miscellaneous and abstruse,
though, generally speaking, useless learning. The lawyer
afterwards compared his mind to the magazine of a pawnbroker,
stowed with goods of every description, but so cumbrously piled
together, and in such total disorganisation, that the owner can
never lay his hands upon any one article at the moment he has
occasion for it.

As for the advocate himself, he afforded at least as much exercise
to Sampson as he extracted amusement from him. When the man of law
began to get into his altitudes, and his wit, naturally shrewd and
dry, became more lively and poignant, the Dominie looked upon him
with that sort of surprise with which we can conceive a tame bear
might regard his future associate, the monkey, on their being
first introduced to each other. It was Mr. Pleydell's delight to
state in grave and serious argument some position which he knew
the Dominie would be inclined to dispute. He then beheld with
exquisite pleasure the internal labour with which the honest man
arranged his ideas for reply, and tasked his inert and sluggish
powers to bring up all the heavy artillery of his learning for
demolishing the schismatic or heretical opinion which had been
stated, when behold, before the ordnance could be discharged, the
foe had quitted the post and appeared in a new position of
annoyance on the Dominie's flank or rear. Often did he exclaim
'Prodigious!' when, marching up to the enemy in full confidence of
victory, he found the field evacuated, and it may be supposed that
it cost him no little labour to attempt a new formation. 'He was
like a native Indian army,' the Colonel said, 'formidable by
numerical strength and size of ordnance, but liable to be thrown
into irreparable confusion by a movement to take them in flank.'
On the whole, however, the Dominie, though somewhat fatigued with
these mental exertions, made at unusual speed and upon the
pressure of the moment, reckoned this one of the white days of his
life, and always mentioned Mr. Pleydell as a very erudite and fa-
ce-ti-ous person.

By degrees the rest of the party dropped off and left these three
gentlemen together. Their conversation turned to Mrs. Bertram's
settlements. 'Now what could drive it into the noddle of that old
harridan,' said Pleydell, 'to disinherit poor Lucy Bertram under
pretence of settling her property on a boy who has been so long
dead and gone? I ask your pardon, Mr. Sampson, I forgot what an
affecting case this was for you; I remember taking your
examination upon it, and I never had so much trouble to make any
one speak three words consecutively. You may talk of your
Pythagoreans or your silent Brahmins, Colonel; go to, I tell you
this learned gentleman beats them all in taciturnity; but the
words of the wise are precious, and not to be thrown away
lightly.'

'Of a surety,' said the Dominie, taking his blue-checqued
handkerchief from his eyes, 'that was a bitter day with me indeed;
ay, and a day of grief hard to be borne; but He giveth strength
who layeth on the load.'

Colonel Mannering took this opportunity to request Mr. Pleydell to
inform him of the particulars attending the loss of the boy; and
the Counsellor, who was fond of talking upon subjects of criminal
jurisprudence, especially when connected with his own experience,
went through the circumstances at full length. 'And what is your
opinion upon the result of the whole?'

'O, that Kennedy was murdered: it's an old case which has occurred
on that coast before now, the case of Smuggler versus Exciseman.'

'What, then, is your conjecture concerning the fate of the child?'

'O, murdered too, doubtless,' answered Pleydell. 'He was old
enough to tell what he had seen, and these ruthless scoundrels
would not scruple committing a second Bethlehem massacre if they
thought their interest required it.'

The Dominie groaned deeply, and ejaculated, 'Enormous!'

'Yet there was mention of gipsies in the business too,
Counsellor,' said Mannering, 'and from what that vulgar-looking
fellow said after the funeral--'

'Mrs. Margaret Bertram's idea that the child was alive was founded
upon the report of a gipsy?' said Pleydell, catching at the half-
spoken hint. 'I envy you the concatenation, Colonel; it is a shame
to me not to have drawn the same conclusion. We'll follow this
business up instantly. Here, hark ye, waiter, go down to Luckie
Wood's in the Cowgate; ye'll find my clerk Driver; he'll be set
down to high jinks by this time--for we and our retainers,
Colonel, are exceedingly regular in our irregularities--tell him
to come here instantly and I will pay his forfeits.'

'He won't appear in character, will he?' said Mannering.

'Ah! "no more of that, Hal, an thou lovest me,"' said Pleydell.
'But we must have some news from the land of Egypt, if possible.
O, if I had but hold of the slightest thread of this complicated
skein, you should see how I would unravel it! I would work the
truth out of your Bohemian, as the French call them, better than a
monitoire or a plainte de Tournelle; I know how to manage a
refractory witness.'

While Mr. Pleydell was thus vaunting his knowledge of his
profession, the waiter reentered with Mr. Driver, his mouth still
greasy with mutton pies, and the froth of the last draught of
twopenny yet unsubsided on his upper lip, with such speed had he
obeyed the commands of his principal. 'Driver, you must go
instantly and find out the woman who was old Mrs. Margaret
Bertram's maid. Inquire for her everywhere, but if you find it
necessary to have recourse to Protocol, Quid the tobacconist, or
any other of these folks, you will take care not to appear
yourself, but send some woman of your acquaintance; I daresay you
know enough that may be so condescending as to oblige you. When
you have found her out, engage her to come to my chambers tomorrow
at eight o'clock precisely.'

'What shall I say to make her forthcoming?' asked the aid-de-camp.

'Anything you choose,' replied the lawyer. 'Is it my business to
make lies for you, do you think? But let her be in praesentia by
eight o'clock, as I have said before.' The clerk grinned, made his
reverence, and exit.

'That's a useful fellow,' said the Counsellor; 'I don't believe
his match ever carried a process. He'll write to my dictating
three nights in the week without sleep, or, what's the same thing,
he writes as well and correctly when he's asleep as when he's
awake. Then he's such a steady fellow; some of them are always
changing their ale-houses, so that they have twenty cadies
sweating after them, like the bare-headed captains traversing the
taverns of Eastcheap in search of Sir John Falstaff. But this is a
complete fixture; he has his winter seat by the fire and his
summer seat by the window in Luckie Wood's, betwixt which seats
are his only migrations; there he's to be found at all times when
he is off duty. It is my opinion he never puts off his clothes or
goes to sleep; sheer ale supports him under everything. It is
meat, drink, and cloth, bed, board, and washing.'

'And is he always fit for duty upon a sudden turnout? I should
distrust it, considering his quarters.'

'O, drink, never disturbs him, Colonel; he can write for hours
after he cannot speak. I remember being called suddenly to draw an
appeal case. I had been dining, and it was Saturday night, and I
had ill will to begin to it; however, they got me down to
Clerihugh's, and there we sat birling till I had a fair tappit hen
[Footnote: See Note 2.] under my belt, and then they persuaded me
to draw the paper. Then we had to seek Driver, and it was all that
two men could do to bear him in, for, when found, he was, as it
happened, both motionless and speechless. But no sooner was his
pen put between his fingers, his paper stretched before him, and
he heard my voice, than he began to write like a scrivener; and,
excepting that we were obliged to have somebody to dip his pen in
the ink, for he could not see the standish, I never saw a thing
scrolled more handsomely.'

'But how did your joint production look the next morning?' said
the Colonel.

'Wheugh! capital! not three words required to be altered:
[Footnote: See Note 3. ] it was sent off by that day's post. But
you'll come and breakfast with me to-morrow, and hear this woman's
examination?'

'Why, your hour is rather early.'

'Can't make it later. If I were not on the boards of the Outer
House precisely as the nine-hours' bell rings, there would be a
report that I had got an apoplexy, and I should feel the effects
of it all the rest of the session.'

'Well, I will make an exertion to wait upon you.'

Here the company broke up for the evening.

In the morning Colonel Mannering appeared at the Counsellor's
chambers, although cursing the raw air of a Scottish morning in
December. Mr. Pleydell had got Mrs. Rebecca installed on one side
of his fire, accommodated her with a cup of chocolate, and was
already deeply engaged in conversation with her. 'O no, I assure
you, Mrs. Rebecca, there is no intention to challenge your
mistress's will; and I give you my word of honour that your legacy
is quite safe. You have deserved it by your conduct to your
mistress, and I wish it had been twice as much.'

'Why, to be sure, sir, it's no right to mention what is said
before ane; ye heard how that dirty body Quid cast up to me the
bits o' compliments he gied me, and tell'd ower again ony loose
cracks I might hae had wi' him; now if ane was talking loosely to
your honour, there's nae saying what might come o't.'

'I assure you, my good Rebecca, my character and your own age and
appearance are your security, if you should talk as loosely as an
amatory poet.'

'Aweel, if your honour thinks I am safe--the story is just this.
Ye see, about a year ago, or no just sae lang, my leddy was
advised to go to Gilsland for a while, for her spirits were
distressing her sair. Ellangowan's troubles began to be spoken o'
publicly, and sair vexed she was; for she was proud o' her family.
For Ellangowan himsell and her, they sometimes 'greed and some
times no; but at last they didna 'gree at a' for twa or three
year, for he was aye wanting to borrow siller, and that was what
she couldna bide at no hand, and she was aye wanting it paid back
again, and that the Laird he liked as little. So at last they were
clean aff thegither. And then some of the company at Gilsland
tells her that the estate was to be sell'd; and ye wad hae thought
she had taen an ill will at Miss Lucy Bertram frae that moment,
for mony a time she cried to me, "O Becky, O Becky, if that
useless peenging thing o' a lassie there at Ellangowan, that canna
keep her ne'er-do-weel father within bounds--if she had been but a
lad-bairn they couldna hae sell'd the auld inheritance for that
fool-body's debts"; and she would rin on that way till I was just
wearied and sick to hear her ban the puir lassie, as if she wadna
hae been a lad-bairn and keepit the land if it had been in her
will to change her sect. And ae day at the spaw-well below the
craig at Gilsland she was seeing a very bonny family o' bairns--
they belanged to ane Mac-Crosky--and she broke out--"Is not it an
odd like thing that ilka waf carle in the country has a son and
heir, and that the house of Ellangowan is without male
succession?" There was a gipsy wife stood ahint and heard her, a
muckle sture fearsome-looking wife she was as ever I set een on.
"Wha is it," says she, "that dare say the house of Ellangowan will
perish without male succession?" My mistress just turned on her;
she was a high-spirited woman, and aye ready wi' an answer to a'
body. "It's me that says it," says she, "that may say it with a
sad heart." Wi' that the gipsy wife gripped till her hand--"I ken
you weel eneugh," says she, "though ye kenna me. But as sure as
that sun's in heaven, and as sure as that water's rinning to the
sea, and as sure as there's an ee that sees and an ear that hears
us baith, Harry Bertram, that was thought to perish at Warroch
Point, never did die there. He was to have a weary weird o't till
his ane-and-twentieth year, that was aye said o' him; but if ye
live and I live, ye'll hear mair o' him this winter before the
snaw lies twa days on the Dun of Singleside. I want nane o' your
siller," she said, "to make ye think I am blearing your ee; fare
ye weel till after Martinmas." And there she left us standing.'

'Was she a very tall woman?' interrupted Mannering.

'Had she black hair, black eyes, and a cut above the brow?' added
the lawyer.

'She was the tallest woman I ever saw, and her hair was as black
as midnight, unless where it was grey, and she had a scar abune
the brow that ye might hae laid the lith of your finger in.
Naebody that's seen her will ever forget her; and I am morally
sure that it was on the ground o' what that gipsy-woman said that
my mistress made her will, having taen a dislike at the young
leddy o' Ellangowan. And she liked her far waur after she was
obliged to send her L20; for she said Miss Bertram, no content wi'
letting the Ellangowan property pass into strange hands, owing to
her being a lass and no a lad, was coming, by her poverty, to be a
burden and a disgrace to Singleside too. But I hope my mistress's
is a good will for a' that, for it would be hard on me to lose the
wee bit legacy; I served for little fee and bountith, weel I wot.'

The Counsellor relieved her fears on this head, then inquired
after Jenny Gibson, and understood she had accepted Mr. Dinmont's
offer. 'And I have done sae mysell too, since he was sae discreet
as to ask me,' said Mrs. Rebecca; 'they are very decent folk the
Dinmonts, though my lady didna dow to hear muckle about the
friends on that side the house. But she liked the Charlie's Hope
hams and the cheeses and the muir-fowl that they were aye sending,
and the lamb's-wool hose and mittens--she liked them weel eneugh.'

Mr. Pleydell now dismissed Mrs. Rebecca. When she was gone, 'I
think I know the gipsy-woman,' said the lawyer.

'I was just going to say the same,' replied Mannering.

'And her name,' said Pleydell--

'Is Meg Merrilies,' answered the Colonel.

'Are you avised of that?' said the Counsellor, looking at his
military friend with a comic expression of surprise.

Mannering answered that he had known such a woman when he was at
Ellangowan upwards of twenty years before; and then made his
learned friend acquainted with all the remarkable particulars of
his first visit there.

Mr. Pleydell listened with great attention, and then replied, 'I
congratulated myself upon having made the acquaintance of a
profound theologian in your chaplain; but I really did not expect
to find a pupil of Albumazar or Messahala in his patron. I have a
notion, however, this gipsy could tell us some more of the matter
than she derives from astrology or second-sight. I had her through
hands once, and could then make little of her, but I must write to
Mac-Morlan to stir heaven and earth to find her out. I will gladly
come to--shire myself to assist at her examination; I am still in
the commission of the peace there, though I have ceased to be
sheriff. I never had anything more at heart in my life than
tracing that murder and the fate of the child. I must write to the
sheriff of Roxburghshire too, and to an active justice of peace in
Cumberland.'