take us, that's true.  But they'll have arranged for our coming

from the east and here we are upon their west."



"Ay," says Alan, "I wish we were in some force, and this was a

battle, we would have bonnily out-manoeuvred them!  But it isnae,

Davit; and the way it is, is a wee thing less inspiring to Alan

Breck.  I swither, Davie."



"Time flies, Alan," said I.



"I ken that," said Alan.  "I ken naething else, as the French folk

say.  But this is a dreidful case of heids or tails.  O! if I could

but ken where your gentry were!"



"Alan," said I, "this is no like you.  It's got to be now or

never."





"This is no me, quo' he,"





sang Alan, with a queer face betwixt shame and drollery.





"Neither you nor me, quo' he, neither you nor me.

Wow, na, Johnnie man! neither you nor me."





And then of a sudden he stood straight up where he was, and with a

handkerchief flying in his right hand, marched down upon the beach.

I stood up myself, but lingered behind him, scanning the sand-hills

to the east.  His appearance was at first unremarked:  Scougal not

expecting him so early, and MY GENTRY watching on the other side.

Then they awoke on board the Thistle, and it seemed they had all in

readiness, for there was scarce a second's bustle on the deck

before we saw a skiff put round her stern and begin to pull lively

for the coast.  Almost at the same moment of time, and perhaps half

a mile away towards Gillane Ness, the figure of a man appeared for

a blink upon a sandhill, waving with his arms; and though he was

gone again in the same flash, the gulls in that part continued a

little longer to fly wild.



Alan had not seen this, looking straight to seaward at the ship and

skiff.



"It maun be as it will!" said he, when I had told him, "Weel may

yon boatie row, or my craig'll have to thole a raxing."



That part of the beach was long and flat, and excellent walking

when the tide was down; a little cressy burn flowed over it in one

place to the sea; and the sandhills ran along the head of it like

the rampart of a town.  No eye of ours could spy what was passing

behind there in the bents, no hurry of ours could mend the speed of

the boat's coming:  time stood still with us through that uncanny

period of waiting.



"There is one thing I would like to ken," say Alan.  "I would like

to ken these gentry's orders.  We're worth four hunner pound the

pair of us:  how if they took the guns to us, Davie!  They would

get a bonny shot from the top of that lang sandy bank."



"Morally impossible," said I.  "The point is that they can have no

guns.  This thing has been gone about too secret; pistols they may

have, but never guns."



"I believe ye'll be in the right," says Alan.  "For all which I am

wearing a good deal for yon boat."



And he snapped his fingers and whistled to it like a dog.



It was now perhaps a third of the way in, and we ourselves already

hard on the margin of the sea, so that the soft sand rose over my

shoes.  There was no more to do whatever but to wait, to look as

much as we were able at the creeping nearer of the boat, and as

little as we could manage at the long impenetrable front of the

sandhills, over which the gulls twinkled and behind which our

enemies were doubtless marshalling.



"This is a fine, bright, caller place to get shot in," says Alan

suddenly; "and, man, I wish that I had your courage!"



"Alan!" I cried, "what kind of talk is this of it!  You're just

made of courage; it's the character of the man, as I could prove

myself if there was nobody else."



"And you would be the more mistaken," said he.  "What makes the

differ with me is just my great penetration and knowledge of

affairs.  But for auld, cauld, dour, deadly courage, I am not fit

to hold a candle to yourself.  Look at us two here upon the sands.

Here am I, fair hotching to be off; here's you (for all that I ken)

in two minds of it whether you'll no stop.  Do you think that I

could do that, or would?  No me!  Firstly, because I havenae got

the courage and wouldnae daur; and secondly, because I am a man of

so much penetration and would see ye damned first."



"It's there ye're coming, is it?" I cried.  "Ah, man Alan, you can

wile your old wives, but you never can wile me."



Remembrance of my temptation in the wood made me strong as iron.



"I have a tryst to keep," I continued.  "I am trysted with your

cousin Charlie; I have passed my word."



"Braw trysts that you'll can keep," said Alan.  "Ye'll just

mistryst aince and for a' with the gentry in the bents.  And what

for?" he went on with an extreme threatening gravity.  "Just tell

me that, my mannie!  Are ye to be speerited away like Lady Grange?

Are they to drive a dirk in your inside and bury ye in the bents?

Or is it to be the other way, and are they to bring ye in with

James?  Are they folk to be trustit?  Would ye stick your head in

the mouth of Sim Fraser and the ither Whigs?" he added with

extraordinary bitterness.



"Alan," cried I, "they're all rogues and liars, and I'm with ye

there.  The more reason there should be one decent man in such a

land of thieves!  My word in passed, and I'll stick to it.  I said

long syne to your kinswoman that I would stumble at no risk.  Do ye

mind of that?--the night Red Colin fell, it was.  No more I will,

then.  Here I stop.  Prestongrange promised me my life:  if he's to

be mansworn, here I'll have to die."



"Aweel aweel," said Alan.



All this time we had seen or heard no more of our pursuers.  In

truth we had caught them unawares; their whole party (as I was to

learn afterwards) had not yet reached the scene; what there was of

them was spread among the bents towards Gillane.  It was quite an

affair to call them in and bring them over, and the boat was making

speed.  They were besides but cowardly fellows:  a mere leash of

Highland cattle-thieves, of several clans, no gentleman there to be

the captain and the more they looked at Alan and me upon the beach,

the less (I must suppose) they liked the look of us.



Whoever had betrayed Alan it was not the captain:  he was in the

skiff himself, steering and stirring up his oarsmen, like a man

with his heart in his employ.  Already he was near in, and the boat

securing--already Alan's face had flamed crimson with the

excitement of his deliverance, when our friends in the bents,

either in their despair to see their prey escape them or with some

hope of scaring Andie, raised suddenly a shrill cry of several

voices.



This sound, arising from what appeared to be a quite deserted

coast, was really very daunting, and the men in the boat held water

instantly.



"What's this of it?" sings out the captain, for he was come within

an easy hail.



"Freens o'mine," says Alan, and began immediately to wade forth in

the shallow water towards the boat.  "Davie," he said, pausing,

"Davie, are ye no coming?  I am swier to leave ye."



"Not a hair of me," said I.



"He stood part of a second where he was to his knees in the salt

water, hesitating.



"He that will to Cupar, maun to Cupar," said he, and swashing in

deeper than his waist, was hauled into the skiff, which was

immediately directed for the ship.



I stood where he had left me, with my hands behind my back; Alan

sat with his head turned watching me; and the boat drew smoothly

away.  Of a sudden I came the nearest hand to shedding tears, and

seemed to myself the most deserted solitary lad in Scotland.  With

that I turned my back upon the sea and faced the sandhills.  There

was no sight or sound of man; the sun shone on the wet sand and the

dry, the wind blew in the bents, the gulls made a dreary piping.

As I passed higher up the beach, the sand-lice were hopping nimbly

about the stranded tangles.  The devil any other sight or sound in

that unchancy place.  And yet I knew there were folk there,

observing me, upon some secret purpose.  They were no soldiers, or

they would have fallen on and taken us ere now; doubtless they were

some common rogues hired for my undoing, perhaps to kidnap, perhaps

to murder me outright.  From the position of those engaged, the

first was the more likely; from what I knew of their character and

ardency in this business, I thought the second very possible; and

the blood ran cold about my heart.



I had a mad idea to loosen my sword in the scabbard; for though I

was very unfit to stand up like a gentleman blade to blade, I

thought I could do some scathe in a random combat.  But I perceived

in time the folly of resistance.  This was no doubt the joint

"expedient" on which Prestongrange and Fraser were agreed.  The

first, I was very sure, had done something to secure my life; the

second was pretty likely to have slipped in some contrary hints

into the ears of Neil and his companions; and it I were to show

bare steel I might play straight into the hands of my worst enemy

and seal my own doom.



These thoughts brought me to the head of the beach.  I cast a look

behind, the boat was nearing the brig, and Alan flew his

handkerchief for a farewell, which I replied to with the waving of

my hand.  But Alan himself was shrunk to a small thing in my view,

alongside of this pass that lay in front of me.  I set my hat hard

on my head, clenched my teeth, and went right before me up the face

of the sand-wreath.  It made a hard climb, being steep, and the

sand like water underfoot.  But I caught hold at last by the long

bent-grass on the brae-top, and pulled myself to a good footing.

The same moment men stirred and stood up here and there, six or

seven of them, ragged-like knaves, each with a dagger in his hand.

The fair truth is, I shut my eyes and prayed.  When I opened them

again, the rogues were crept the least thing nearer without speech

or hurry.  Every eye was upon mine, which struck me with a strange

sensation of their brightness, and of the fear with which they

continued to approach me.  I held out my hands empty; whereupon one

asked, with a strong Highland brogue, if I surrendered.



"Under protest," said I, "if ye ken what that means, which I

misdoubt."



At that word, they came all in upon me like a flight of birds upon

a carrion, seized me, took my sword, and all the money from my

pockets, bound me hand and foot with some strong line, and cast me

on a tussock of bent.  There they sat about their captive in a part

of a circle and gazed upon him silently like something dangerous,

perhaps a lion or a tiger on the spring.  Presently this attention

was relaxed.  They drew nearer together, fell to speech in the

Gaelic, and very cynically divided my property before my eyes.  It

was my diversion in this time that I could watch from my place the

progress of my friend's escape.  I saw the boat come to the brig

and be hoisted in, the sails fill, and the ship pass out seaward

behind the isles and by North Berwick.



In the course of two hours or so, more and more ragged Highlandmen

kept collecting.  Neil among the first, until the party must have

numbered near a score.  With each new arrival there was a fresh

bout of talk, that sounded like complaints and explanations; but I

observed one thing, none of those who came late had any share in

the division of my spoils.  The last discussion was very violent

and eager, so that once I thought they would have quarrelled; on

the heels of which their company parted, the bulk of them returning

westward in a troop, and only three, Neil and two others, remaining

sentries on the prisoner.



"I could name one who would be very ill pleased with your day's

work, Neil Duncanson," said I, when the rest had moved away.



He assured me in answer I should be tenderly used, for he knew he

was "acquent wi' the leddy."



This was all our talk, nor did any other son of man appear upon

that portion of the coast until the sun had gone down among the

Highland mountains, and the gloaming was beginning to grow dark.

At which hour I was aware of a long, lean, bony-like Lothian man of

a very swarthy countenance, that came towards us among the bents on

a farm horse.



"Lads," cried he, "has ye a paper like this?" and held up one in

his hand.  Neil produced a second, which the newcomer studied

through a pair of horn spectacles, and saying all was right and we

were the folk he was seeking, immediately dismounted.  I was then

set in his place, my feet tied under the horse's belly, and we set

forth under the guidance of the Lowlander.  His path must have been

very well chosen, for we met but one pair--a pair of lovers--the

whole way, and these, perhaps taking us to be free-traders, fled on

our approach.  We were at one time close at the foot of Berwick Law

on the south side; at another, as we passed over some open hills, I

spied the lights of a clachan and the old tower of a church among

some trees not far off, but too far to cry for help, if I had

dreamed of it.  At last we came again within sound of the sea.

There was moonlight, though not much; and by this I could see the

three huge towers and broken battlements of Tantallon, that old

chief place of the Red Douglases.  The horse was picketed in the

bottom of the ditch to graze, and I was led within, and forth into

the court, and thence into the tumble-down stone hall.  Here my

conductors built a brisk fire in the midst of the pavement, for

there was a chill in the night.  My hands were loosed, I was set by

the wall in the inner end, and (the Lowlander having produced

provisions) I was given oatmeal bread and a pitcher of French

brandy.  This done, I was left once more alone with my three

Highlandmen.  They sat close by the fire drinking and talking; the

wind blew in by the breaches, cast about the smoke and flames, and

sang in the tops of the towers; I could hear the sea under the

cliffs, and, my mind being reassured as to my life, and my body and

spirits wearied with the day's employment, I turned upon one side

and slumbered.



I had no means of guessing at what hour I was wakened, only the

moon was down and the fire was low.  My feet were now loosed, and I

was carried through the ruins and down the cliff-side by a

precipitous path to where I found a fisher's boat in a haven of the

rocks.  This I was had on board of, and we began to put forth from

the shore in a fine starlight







CHAPTER XIV--THE BASS







I had no thought where they were taking me; only looked here and

there for the appearance of a ship; and there ran the while in my

head a word of Ransome's--the TWENTY-POUNDERS.  If I were to be

exposed a second time to that same former danger of the

plantations, I judged it must turn ill with me; there was no second

Alan; and no second shipwreck and spare yard to be expected now;

and I saw myself hoe tobacco under the whip's lash.  The thought

chilled me; the air was sharp upon the water, the stretchers of the

boat drenched with a cold dew:  and I shivered in my place beside

the steersman.  This was the dark man whom I have called hitherto

the Lowlander; his name was Dale, ordinarily called Black Andie.

Feeling the thrill of my shiver, he very kindly handed me a rough

jacket full of fish-scales, with which I was glad to cover myself.



"I thank you for this kindness," said I, "and will make so free as

to repay it with a warning.  You take a high responsibility in this

affair.  You are not like these ignorant, barbarous Highlanders,

but know what the law is and the risks of those that break it."



"I am no just exactly what ye would ca' an extremist for the law,"

says he, "at the best of times; but in this business I act with a

good warranty."



"What are you going to do with me?" I asked.



"Nae harm," said he, "nae harm ava'.  Ye'll have strong freens, I'm

thinking.  Ye'll be richt eneuch yet."



There began to fall a greyness on the face of the sea; little dabs

of pink and red, like coals of slow fire, came in the east; and at

the same time the geese awakened, and began crying about the top of

the Bass.  It is just the one crag of rock, as everybody knows, but

great enough to carve a city from.  The sea was extremely little,

but there went a hollow plowter round the base of it.  With the

growing of the dawn I could see it clearer and clearer; the

straight crags painted with sea-birds' droppings like a morning

frost, the sloping top of it green with grass, the clan of white

geese that cried about the sides, and the black, broken buildings

of the prison sitting close on the sea's edge.



At the sight the truth came in upon me in a clap.



"It's there you're taking me!" I cried.



"Just to the Bass, mannie," said he:  "Whaur the auld saints were

afore ye, and I misdoubt if ye have come so fairly by your

preeson."



"But none dwells there now," I cried; "the place is long a ruin."



"It'll be the mair pleisand a change for the solan geese, then,"

quoth Andie dryly.



The day coming slowly brighter I observed on the bilge, among the

big stones with which fisherfolk ballast their boats, several kegs

and baskets, and a provision of fuel.  All these were discharged

upon the crag.  Andie, myself, and my three Highlanders (I call

them mine, although it was the other way about), landed along with

them.  The sun was not yet up when the boat moved away again, the

noise of the oars on the thole-pins echoing from the cliffs, and

left us in our singular reclusion:



Andie Dale was the Prefect (as I would jocularly call him) of the

Bass, being at once the shepherd and the gamekeeper of that small

and rich estate.  He had to mind the dozen or so of sheep that fed

and fattened on the grass of the sloping part of it, like beasts

grazing the roof of a cathedral.  He had charge besides of the

solan geese that roosted in the crags; and from these an

extraordinary income is derived.  The young are dainty eating, as

much as two shillings a-piece being a common price, and paid

willingly by epicures; even the grown birds are valuable for their

oil and feathers; and a part of the minister's stipend of North

Berwick is paid to this day in solan geese, which makes it (in some

folks' eyes) a parish to be coveted.  To perform these several

businesses, as well as to protect the geese from poachers, Andie

had frequent occasion to sleep and pass days together on the crag;

and we found the man at home there like a farmer in his steading.

Bidding us all shoulder some of the packages, a matter in which I

made haste to bear a hand, he led us in by a looked gate, which was

the only admission to the island, and through the ruins of the

fortress, to the governor's house.  There we saw by the ashes in

the chimney and a standing bed-place in one corner, that he made

his usual occupation.



This bed he now offered me to use, saying he supposed I would set

up to be gentry.



"My gentrice has nothing to do with where I lie," said I.  "I bless

God I have lain hard ere now, and can do the same again with

thankfulness.  While I am here, Mr. Andie, if that be your name, I

will do my part and take my place beside the rest of you; and I ask

you on the other hand to spare me your mockery, which I own I like

ill."



He grumbled a little at this speech, but seemed upon reflection to

approve it.  Indeed, he was a long-headed, sensible man, and a good

Whig and Presbyterian; read daily in a pocket Bible, and was both

able and eager to converse seriously on religion, leaning more than

a little towards the Cameronian extremes.  His morals were of a

more doubtful colour.  I found he was deep in the free trade, and

used the rains of Tantallon for a magazine of smuggled merchandise.

As for a gauger, I do not believe he valued the life of one at

half-a-farthing.  But that part of the coast of Lothian is to this

day as wild a place, and the commons there as rough a crew, as any

in Scotland.



One incident of my imprisonment is made memorable by a consequence

it had long after.  There was a warship at this time stationed in

the Firth, the Seahorse, Captain Palliser.  It chanced she was

cruising in the month of September, plying between Fife and

Lothian, and sounding for sunk dangers.  Early one fine morning she

was seen about two miles to east of us, where she lowered a boat,

and seemed to examine the Wildfire Rocks and Satan's Bush, famous

dangers of that coast.  And presently after having got her boat

again, she came before the wind and was headed directly for the

Base.  This was very troublesome to Andie and the Highlanders; the

whole business of my sequestration was designed for privacy, and

here, with a navy captain perhaps blundering ashore, it looked to

become public enough, if it were nothing worse.  I was in a

minority of one, I am no Alan to fall upon so many, and I was far

from sure that a warship was the least likely to improve my

condition.  All which considered, I gave Andie my parole of good

behaviour and obedience, and was had briskly to the summit of the

rock, where we all lay down, at the cliff's edge, in different

places of observation and concealment.  The Seahorse came straight

on till I thought she would have struck, and we (looking giddily

down) could see the ship's company at their quarters and hear the

leadsman singing at the lead.  Then she suddenly wore and let fly a

volley of I know not how many great guns.  The rock was shaken with

the thunder of the sound, the smoke flowed over our heads, and the

geese rose in number beyond computation or belief.  To hear their

screaming and to see the twinkling of their wings, made a most

inimitable curiosity; and I suppose it was after this somewhat

childish pleasure that Captain Palliser had come so near the Bass.

He was to pay dear for it in time.  During his approach I had the

opportunity to make a remark upon the rigging of that ship by which

I ever after knew it miles away; and this was a means (under

Providence) of my averting from a friend a great calamity, and

inflicting on Captain Palliser himself a sensible disappointment.



All the time of my stay on the rock we lived well.  We had small

ale and brandy, and oatmeal, of which we made our porridge night

and morning.  At times a boat came from the Castleton and brought

us a quarter of mutton, for the sheep upon the rock we must not

touch, these being specially fed to market.  The geese were

unfortunately out of season, and we let them be.  We fished

ourselves, and yet more often made the geese to fish for us:

observing one when he had made a capture and searing him from his

prey ere he had swallowed it.



The strange nature of this place, and the curiosities with which it

abounded, held me busy and amused.  Escape being impossible, I was

allowed my entire liberty, and continually explored the surface of

the isle wherever it might support the foot of man.  The old garden

of the prison was still to be observed, with flowers and pot-herbs

running wild, and some ripe cherries on a bush.  A little lower

stood a chapel or a hermit's cell; who built or dwelt in it, none

may know, and the thought of its age made a ground of many

meditations.  The prison, too, where I now bivouacked with Highland

cattle-thieves, was a place full of history, both human and divine.

I thought it strange so many saints and martyrs should have gone by

there so recently, and left not so much as a leaf out of their

Bibles, or a name carved upon the wall, while the rough soldier

lads that mounted guard upon the battlements had filled the

neighbourhood with their mementoes--broken tobacco-pipes for the

most part, and that in a surprising plenty, but also metal buttons

from their coats.  There were times when I thought I could have

heard the pious sound of psalms out of the martyr's dungeons, and

seen the soldiers tramp the ramparts with their glinting pipes, and

the dawn rising behind them out of the North Sea.



No doubt it was a good deal Andie and his tales that put these

fancies in my head.  He was extraordinarily well acquainted with

the story of the rock in all particulars, down to the names of

private soldiers, his father having served there in that same

capacity.  He was gifted besides with a natural genius for

narration, so that the people seemed to speak and the things to be

done before your face.  This gift of his and my assiduity to listen

brought us the more close together.  I could not honestly deny but

what I liked him; I soon saw that he liked me; and indeed, from the

first I had set myself out to capture his good-will.  An odd

circumstance (to be told presently) effected this beyond my

expectation; but even in early days we made a friendly pair to be a

prisoner and his gaoler.



I should trifle with my conscience if I pretended my stay upon the

Bass was wholly disagreeable.  It seemed to me a safe place, as

though I was escaped there out of my troubles.  No harm was to be

offered me; a material impossibility, rock and the deep sea,

prevented me from fresh attempts; I felt I had my life safe and my

honour safe, and there were times when I allowed myself to gloat on

them like stolen waters.  At other times my thoughts were very

different, I recalled how strong I had expressed myself both to

Rankeillor and to Stewart; I reflected that my captivity upon the

Bass, in view of a great part of the coasts of Fife and Lothian,

was a thing I should be thought more likely to have invented than

endured; and in the eyes of these two gentlemen, at least, I must

pass for a boaster and a coward.  Now I would take this lightly

enough; tell myself that so long as I stood well with Catriona

Drummond, the opinion of the rest of man was but moonshine and

spilled water; and thence pass off into those meditations of a

lover which are so delightful to himself and must always appear so

surprisingly idle to a reader.  But anon the fear would take me

otherwise; I would be shaken with a perfect panic of self-esteem,

and these supposed hard judgments appear an injustice impossible to

be supported.  With that another train of thought would he

presented, and I had scarce begun to be concerned about men's

judgments of myself, than I was haunted with the remembrance of

James Stewart in his dungeon and the lamentations of his wife.

Then, indeed, passion began to work in me; I could not forgive

myself to sit there idle:  it seemed (if I were a man at all) that

I could fly or swim out of my place of safety; and it was in such

humours and to amuse my self-reproaches that I would set the more

particularly to win the good side of Andie Dale.



At last, when we two were alone on the summit of the rock on a

bright morning, I put in some hint about a bribe.  He looked at me,

cast back his head, and laughed out loud.



"Ay, you're funny, Mr. Dale," said I, "but perhaps if you'll glance

an eye upon that paper you may change your note."



The stupid Highlanders had taken from me at the time of my seizure

nothing but hard money, and the paper I now showed Andie was an

acknowledgment from the British Linen Company for a considerable

sum.



He read it.  "Troth, and ye're nane sae ill aff," said he.



"I thought that would maybe vary your opinions," said I.



"Hout!" said he.  "It shows me ye can bribe; but I'm no to be

bribit."



"We'll see about that yet a while," says I.  "And first, I'll show

you that I know what I am talking.  You have orders to detain me

here till after Thursday, 21st September."



"Ye're no a'thegether wrong either," says Andie.  "I'm to let you

gang, bar orders contrair, on Saturday, the 23rd."



I could not but feel there was something extremely insidious in

this arrangement.  That I was to re-appear precisely in time to be

too late would cast the more discredit on my tale, if I were minded

to tell one; and this screwed me to fighting point.



"Now then, Andie, you that kens the world, listen to me, and think

while ye listen," said I.  "I know there are great folks in the

business, and I make no doubt you have their names to go upon.  I

have seen some of them myself since this affair began, and said my

say into their faces too.  But what kind of a crime would this be

that I had committed? or what kind of a process is this that I am

fallen under?  To be apprehended by some ragged John-Hielandman on

August 30th, carried to a rickle of old stones that is now neither

fort nor gaol (whatever it once was) but just the gamekeeper's

lodge of the Bass Rock, and set free again, September 23rd, as

secretly as I was first arrested--does that sound like law to you?

or does it sound like justice? or does it not sound honestly like a

piece of some low dirty intrigue, of which the very folk that

meddle with it are ashamed?"



"I canna gainsay ye, Shaws.  It looks unco underhand," says Andie.

"And werenae the folk guid sound Whigs and true-blue Presbyterians

I would has seen them ayont Jordan and Jeroozlem or I would have

set hand to it."



"The Master of Lovat'll be a braw Whig," says I, "and a grand

Presbyterian."



"I ken naething by him," said he.  "I hae nae trokings wi' Lovats."



"No, it'll be Prestongrange that you'll be dealing with," said I.



"Ah, but I'll no tell ye that," said Andie.



"Little need when I ken," was my retort.



"There's just the ae thing ye can be fairly sure of, Shaws," says

Andie.  "And that is that (try as ye please) I'm no dealing wi'

yoursel'; nor yet I amnae goin' to," he added.



"Well, Andie, I see I'll have to be speak out plain with you," I

replied.  And told him so much as I thought needful of the facts.



He heard me out with some serious interest, and when I had done,

seemed to consider a little with himself.



"Shaws," said he at last, "I'll deal with the naked hand.  It's a

queer tale, and no very creditable, the way you tell it; and I'm

far frae minting that is other than the way that ye believe it.  As

for yoursel', ye seem to me rather a dacent-like young man.  But

me, that's aulder and mair judeecious, see perhaps a wee bit

further forrit in the job than what ye can dae.  And here the

maitter clear and plain to ye.  There'll be nae skaith to yoursel'

if I keep ye here; far free that, I think ye'll be a hantle better

by it.  There'll be nae skaith to the kintry--just ae mair

Hielantman hangit--Gude kens, a guid riddance!  On the ither hand,

it would be considerable skaith to me if I would let you free.

Sae, speakin' as a guid Whig, an honest freen' to you, and an

anxious freen' to my ainsel', the plain fact is that I think ye'll

just have to bide here wi' Andie an' the solans."



"Andie," said I, laying my hand upon his knee, "this Hielantman's

innocent."



"Ay, it's a peety about that," said he.  "But ye see, in this

warld, the way God made it, we cannae just get a'thing that we

want."







CHAPTER XV--BLACK ANDIE'S TALE OF TOD LAPRAIK







I have yet said little of the Highlanders.  They were all three of

the followers of James More, which bound the accusation very tight

about their master's neck.  All understood a word or two of

English, but Neil was the only one who judged he had enough of it

for general converse, in which (when once he got embarked) his

company was often tempted to the contrary opinion.  They were

tractable, simple creatures; showed much more courtesy than might

have been expected from their raggedness and their uncouth

appearance, and fell spontaneously to be like three servants for

Andie and myself.



Dwelling in that isolated place, in the old falling ruins of a

prison, and among endless strange sounds of the sea and the sea-

birds, I thought I perceived in them early the effects of

superstitious fear.  When there was nothing doing they would either

lie and sleep, for which their appetite appeared insatiable, or

Neil would entertain the others with stories which seemed always of

a terrifying strain.  If neither of these delights were within

reach--if perhaps two were sleeping and the third could find no

means to follow their example--I would see him sit and listen and

look about him in a progression of uneasiness, starting, his face

blenching, his hands clutched, a man strung like a bow.  The nature

of these fears I had never an occasion to find out, but the sight

of them was catching, and the nature of the place that we were in

favourable to alarms.  I can find no word for it in the English,

but Andie had an expression for it in the Scots from which he never

varied.



"Ay," he would say, "ITS AN UNCO PLACE, THE BASS."



It is so I always think of it.  It was an unco place by night, unco

by day; and these were unco sounds, of the calling of the solans,

and the plash of the sea and the rock echoes, that hung continually

in our ears.  It was chiefly so in moderate weather.  When the

waves were anyway great they roared about the rock like thunder and

the drums of armies, dreadful but merry to hear; and it was in the

calm days that a man could daunt himself with listening--not a

Highlandman only, as I several times experimented on myself, so

many still, hollow noises haunted and reverberated in the porches

of the rock.



This brings me to a story I heard, and a scene I took part in,

which quite changed our terms of living, and had a great effect on

my departure.  It chanced one night I fell in a muse beside the

fire and (that little air of Alan's coming back to my memory) began

to whistle.  A hand was laid upon my arm, and the voice of Neil

bade me to stop, for it was not "canny musics."



"Not canny?" I asked.  "How can that be?"



"Na," said he; "it will be made by a bogle and her wanting ta heid

upon his body." {13}



"Well," said I, "there can be no bogles here, Neil; for it's not

likely they would fash themselves to frighten geese."



"Ay?" says Andie, "is that what ye think of it!  But I'll can tell

ye there's been waur nor bogles here."



"What's waur than bogles, Andie?" said I.



"Warlocks," said he.  "Or a warlock at the least of it.  And that's

a queer tale, too," he added.  "And if ye would like, I'll tell it

ye."



To be sure we were all of the one mind, and even the Highlander

that had the least English of the three set himself to listen with

all his might.





THE TALE OF TOD LAPRAIK





MY faither, Tam Dale, peace to his banes, was a wild, sploring lad

in his young days, wi' little wisdom and little grace.  He was fond

of a lass and fond of a glass, and fond of a ran-dan; but I could

never hear tell that he was muckle use for honest employment.  Frae

ae thing to anither, he listed at last for a sodger and was in the

garrison of this fort, which was the first way that ony of the

Dales cam to set foot upon the Bass.  Sorrow upon that service!

The governor brewed his ain ale; it seems it was the warst

conceivable.  The rock was proveesioned free the shore with vivers,

the thing was ill-guided, and there were whiles when they but to

fish and shoot solans for their diet.  To crown a', thir was the

Days of the Persecution.  The perishin' cauld chalmers were all

occupeed wi' sants and martyrs, the saut of the yearth, of which it

wasnae worthy.  And though Tam Dale carried a firelock there, a

single sodger, and liked a lass and a glass, as I was sayin,' the

mind of the man was mair just than set with his position.  He had

glints of the glory of the kirk; there were whiles when his dander

rase to see the Lord's sants misguided, and shame covered him that

he should be haulding a can'le (or carrying a firelock) in so black

a business.  There were nights of it when he was here on sentry,

the place a' wheesht, the frosts o' winter maybe riving in the

wa's, and he would hear ane o' the prisoners strike up a psalm, and

the rest join in, and the blessed sounds rising from the different

chalmers--or dungeons, I would raither say--so that this auld craig

in the sea was like a pairt of Heev'n.  Black shame was on his

saul; his sins hove up before him muckle as the Bass, and above a',

that chief sin, that he should have a hand in hagging and hashing

at Christ's Kirk.  But the truth is that he resisted the spirit.

Day cam, there were the rousing compainions, and his guid resolves

depairtit.



In thir days, dwalled upon the Bass a man of God, Peden the Prophet

was his name.  Ye'll have heard tell of Prophet Peden.  There was

never the wale of him sinsyne, and it's a question wi' mony if

there ever was his like afore.  He was wild's a peat-hag, fearsome

to look at, fearsome to hear, his face like the day of judgment.

The voice of him was like a solan's and dinnle'd in folks' lugs,

and the words of him like coals of fire.



Now there was a lass on the rock, and I think she had little to do,

for it was nae place far decent weemen; but it seems she was bonny,

and her and Tam Dale were very well agreed.  It befell that Peden

was in the gairden his lane at the praying when Tam and the lass

cam by; and what should the lassie do but mock with laughter at the

sant's devotions?  He rose and lookit at the twa o' them, and Tam's

knees knoitered thegether at the look of him.  But whan he spak, it

was mair in sorrow than in anger.  'Poor thing, poor thing!" says

he, and it was the lass he lookit at, "I hear you skirl and laugh,"

he says, "but the Lord has a deid shot prepared for you, and at

that surprising judgment ye shall skirl but the ae time!"  Shortly

thereafter she was daundering on the craigs wi' twa-three sodgers,

and it was a blawy day.  There cam a gowst of wind, claught her by

the coats, and awa' wi' her bag and baggage.  And it was remarked

by the sodgers that she gied but the ae skirl.



Nae doubt this judgment had some weicht upon Tam Dale; but it

passed again and him none the better.  Ae day he was flyting wi'

anither sodger-lad.  "Deil hae me!" quo' Tam, for he was a profane

swearer.  And there was Peden glowering at him, gash an' waefu';

Peden wi' his lang chafts an' luntin' een, the maud happed about

his kist, and the hand of him held out wi' the black nails upon the

finger-nebs--for he had nae care of the body.  "Fy, fy, poor man!"

cries he, "the poor fool man!  DEIL HAE ME, quo' he; an' I see the

deil at his oxter."  The conviction of guilt and grace cam in on

Tam like the deep sea; he flang doun the pike that was in his

hands--"I will nae mair lift arms against the cause o' Christ!"

says he, and was as gude's word.  There was a sair fyke in the

beginning, but the governor, seeing him resolved, gied him his

discharge, and he went and dwallt and merried in North Berwick, and

had aye a gude name with honest folk free that day on.



It was in the year seeventeen hunner and sax that the Bass cam in

the hands o' the Da'rymples, and there was twa men soucht the

chairge of it.  Baith were weel qualified, for they had baith been

sodgers in the garrison, and kent the gate to handle solans, and

the seasons and values of them.  Forby that they were baith--or

they baith seemed--earnest professors and men of comely

conversation.  The first of them was just Tam Dale, my faither.

The second was ane Lapraik, whom the folk ca'd Tod Lapraik maistly,

but whether for his name or his nature I could never hear tell.

Weel, Tam gaed to see Lapraik upon this business, and took me, that

was a toddlin' laddie, by the hand.  Tod had his dwallin' in the

lang loan benorth the kirkyaird.  It's a dark uncanny loan, forby

that the kirk has aye had an ill name since the days o' James the

Saxt and the deevil's cantrips played therein when the Queen was on

the seas; and as for Tod's house, it was in the mirkest end, and

was little liked by some that kenned the best.  The door was on the

sneck that day, and me and my faither gaed straucht in.  Tod was a

wabster to his trade; his loom stood in the but.  There he sat, a

muckle fat, white hash of a man like creish, wi' a kind of a holy

smile that gart me scunner.  The hand of him aye cawed the shuttle,

but his een was steeked.  We cried to him by his name, we skirted

in the deid lug of him, we shook him by the shou'ther.  Nae mainner

o' service!  There he sat on his dowp, an' cawed the shuttle and

smiled like creish.



"God be guid to us," says Tam Dale, "this is no canny?"



He had jimp said the word, when Tod Lapraik cam to himsel'.



"Is this you, Tam?" says he.  "Haith, man!  I'm blythe to see ye.

I whiles fa' into a bit dwam like this," he says; "its frae the

stamach."



Weel, they began to crack about the Bass and which of them twa was

to get the warding o't, and little by little cam to very ill words,

and twined in anger.  I mind weel that as my faither and me gaed

hame again, he cam ower and ower the same expression, how little he

likit Tod Lapraik and his dwams.



"Dwam!" says he.  "I think folk hae brunt for dwams like yon."



Aweel, my faither got the Bass and Tod had to go wantin'.  It was

remembered sinsyne what way he had ta'en the thing.  "Tam," says

he, "ye hae gotten the better o' me aince mair, and I hope," says

he, "ye'll find at least a' that ye expeckit at the Bass."  Which

have since been thought remarkable expressions.  At last the time

came for Tam Dale to take young solans.  This was a business he was

weel used wi', he had been a craigsman frae a laddie, and trustit

nane but himsel'.  So there was he hingin' by a line an' speldering

on the craig face, whaur its hieest and steighest.  Fower tenty

lads were on the tap, hauldin' the line and mindin' for his

signals.  But whaur Tam hung there was naething but the craig, and

the sea belaw, and the solans skirlin and flying.  It was a braw

spring morn, and Tam whustled as he claught in the young geese.

Mony's the time I've heard him tell of this experience, and aye the

swat ran upon the man.



It chanced, ye see, that Tam keeked up, and he was awaur of a

muckle solan, and the solan pyking at the line.  He thocht this by-

ordinar and outside the creature's habits.  He minded that ropes

was unco saft things, and the solan's neb and the Bass Rock unco

hard, and that twa hunner feet were raither mair than he would care

to fa'.



"Shoo!" says Tam.  "Awa', bird!  Shoo, awa' wi' ye!" says he.



The solan keekit doon into Tam's face, and there was something unco

in the creature's ee.  Just the ae keek it gied, and back to the

rope.  But now it wroucht and warstl't like a thing dementit.

There never was the solan made that wroucht as that solan wroucht;

and it seemed to understand its employ brawly, birzing the saft

rope between the neb of it and a crunkled jag o' stane.



There gaed a cauld stend o' fear into Tam's heart.  "This thing is

nae bird," thinks he.  His een turnt backward in his heid and the

day gaed black aboot him.  "If I get a dwam here," he toucht, "it's

by wi' Tam Dale."  And he signalled for the lads to pu' him up.



And it seemed the solan understood about signals.  For nae sooner

was the signal made than he let be the rope, spried his wings,

squawked out loud, took a turn flying, and dashed straucht at Tam

Dale's een.  Tam had a knife, he gart the cauld steel glitter.  And

it seemed the solan understood about knives, for nae suner did the

steel glint in the sun than he gied the ae squawk, but laighter,

like a body disappointit, and flegged aff about the roundness of

the craig, and Tam saw him nae mair.  And as sune as that thing was

gane, Tam's heid drapt upon his shouther, and they pu'd him up like

a deid corp, dadding on the craig.



A dram of brandy (which he went never without) broucht him to his

mind, or what was left of it.  Up he sat.



"Rin, Geordie, rin to the boat, mak' sure of the boat, man--rin!"

he cries, "or yon solan'll have it awa'," says he.



The fower lads stared at ither, an' tried to whilly-wha him to be

quiet.  But naething would satisfy Tam Dale, till ane o' them had

startit on aheid to stand sentry on the boat.  The ithers askit if

he was for down again.



"Na," says he, "and niether you nor me," says he, "and as sune as I

can win to stand on my twa feet we'll be aff frae this craig o'

Sawtan."



Sure eneuch, nae time was lost, and that was ower muckle; for

before they won to North Berwick Tam was in a crying fever.  He lay

a' the simmer; and wha was sae kind as come speiring for him, but

Tod Lapraik!  Folk thocht afterwards that ilka time Tod cam near

the house the fever had worsened.  I kenna for that; but what I ken

the best, that was the end of it.



It was about this time o' the year; my grandfaither was out at the

white fishing; and like a bairn, I but to gang wi' him.  We had a

grand take, I mind, and the way that the fish lay broucht us near

in by the Bass, whaur we foregaithered wi' anither boat that

belanged to a man Sandie Fletcher in Castleton.  He's no lang deid

neither, or ye could speir at himsel'.  Weel, Sandie hailed.



"What's yon on the Bass?" says he.



"On the Bass?" says grandfaither.



"Ay," says Sandie, "on the green side o't."



"Whatten kind of a thing?" says grandfaither.  "There cannae be

naething on the Bass but just the sheep."



"It looks unco like a body," quo' Sandie, who was nearer in.



"A body!" says we, and we none of us likit that.  For there was nae

boat that could have brought a man, and the key o' the prison yett

hung ower my faither's at hame in the press bed.



We keept the twa boats close for company, and crap in nearer hand.

Grandfaither had a gless, for he had been a sailor, and the captain

of a smack, and had lost her on the sands of Tay.  And when we took

the glass to it, sure eneuch there was a man.  He was in a crunkle

o' green brae, a wee below the chaipel, a' by his lee lane, and

lowped and flang and danced like a daft quean at a waddin'.



"It's Tod," says grandfather, and passed the gless to Sandie.



"Ay, it's him," says Sandie.



"Or ane in the likeness o' him," says grandfaither.



"Sma' is the differ," quo' Sandie.  "De'il or warlock, I'll try the

gun at him," quo' he, and broucht up a fowling-piece that he aye

carried, for Sandie was a notable famous shot in all that country.



"Haud your hand, Sandie," says grandfaither; "we maun see clearer

first," says he, "or this may be a dear day's wark to the baith of

us."



"Hout!" says Sandie, "this is the Lord's judgment surely, and be

damned to it," says he.



"Maybe ay, and maybe no," says my grandfaither, worthy man!  "But

have you a mind of the Procurator Fiscal, that I think ye'll have

foregaithered wi' before," says he.



This was ower true, and Sandie was a wee thing set ajee.  "Aweel,

Edie," says he, "and what would be your way of it?"



"Ou, just this," says grandfaither.  "Let me that has the fastest

boat gang back to North Berwick, and let you bide here and keep an

eye on Thon.  If I cannae find Lapraik, I'll join ye and the twa of

us'll have a crack wi' him.  But if Lapraik's at hame, I'll rin up

the flag at the harbour, and ye can try Thon Thing wi' the gun."



Aweel, so it was agreed between them twa.  I was just a bairn, an'

clum in Sandie's boat, whaur I thoucht I would see the best of the

employ.  My grandsire gied Sandie a siller tester to pit in his gun

wi' the leid draps, bein mair deidly again bogles.  And then the as

boat set aff for North Berwick, an' the tither lay whaur it was and

watched the wanchancy thing on the brae-side.



A' the time we lay there it lowped and flang and capered and span

like a teetotum, and whiles we could hear it skelloch as it span.

I hae seen lassies, the daft queans, that would lowp and dance a

winter's nicht, and still be lowping and dancing when the winter's

day cam in.  But there would be fowk there to hauld them company,

and the lads to egg them on; and this thing was its lee-lane.  And

there would be a fiddler diddling his elbock in the chimney-side;

and this thing had nae music but the skirling of the solans.  And

the lassies were bits o' young things wi' the reid life dinnling

and stending in their members; and this was a muckle, fat, creishy

man, and him fa'n in the vale o' years.  Say what ye like, I maun

say what I believe.  It was joy was in the creature's heart, the

joy o' hell, I daursay:  joy whatever.  Mony a time I have askit

mysel' why witches and warlocks should sell their sauls (whilk are

their maist dear possessions) and be auld, duddy, wrunkl't wives or

auld, feckless, doddered men; and then I mind upon Tod Lapraik

dancing a' the hours by his lane in the black glory of his heart.

Nae doubt they burn for it muckle in hell, but they have a grand

time here of it, whatever!--and the Lord forgie us!



Weel, at the hinder end, we saw the wee flag yirk up to the mast-

heid upon the harbour rocks.  That was a' Sandie waited for.  He up

wi' the gun, took a deleeberate aim, an' pu'd the trigger.  There

cam' a bang and then ae waefu' skirl frae the Bass.  And there were

we rubbin' our een and lookin' at ither like daft folk.  For wi'

the bang and the skirl the thing had clean disappeared.  The sun

glintit, the wund blew, and there was the bare yaird whaur the

Wonder had been lowping and flinging but ae second syne.



The hale way hame I roared and grat wi' the terror o' that

dispensation.  The grawn folk were nane sae muckle better; there

was little said in Sandie's boat but just the name of God; and when

we won in by the pier, the harbour rocks were fair black wi' the

folk waitin' us.  It seems they had fund Lapraik in ane of his

dwams, cawing the shuttle and smiling.  Ae lad they sent to hoist

the flag, and the rest abode there in the wabster's house.  You may

be sure they liked it little; but it was a means of grace to

severals that stood there praying in to themsel's (for nane cared

to pray out loud) and looking on thon awesome thing as it cawed the