w
WHITE COCKADE
OH,
FAITH AND FORTITUDE,
BY
JAMES GRANT,
AUIHOB 0?
" THE YELLOW FRIGATE," " SECOND TO NONE,"
"THE KING'S OWN BOBDEBEB8," " TITl! ROMANCE OF WAB,"
ETC., ETC.
LONDON :
GEORGE BOUTLEDGE AND SONS,
BEOADWAY, LUDGATE.
NEW YOEK : 416, BECOME STEEET.
1868.
PR
4726
GnvWs
PEE PACE.
IN my former novel, ' The King's Own Borderers,' I endea-
voured, in the characters of Lord and Lady Rohallion, to
depict Jacobitism in its decline, or rather when it had become
identified only with the senility and weakness of enthusiastic
old age ; but in the following story I have sought to pourtray
it in the zenith of its strength, and before it had degenerated
into mere sentimental loyalty to a race of dead monarchs of
all loyalty perhaps the most pure and unselfish.
In the progress of my tale, I have had to introduce several
points of local history, a branch of study which, I am sorry to
say, is now usually the last element thought of in Scottish
popular education.
Scotsmen, and Englishmen too, have long since learned the
value of that treaty, which made them equally subjects of a
vast united empire, on whose flag the sun never sets ; but Sir
Baldred Otterburn will represent a numerous class, who existed
even until after the beginning of the present century, and who
bitterly resented the Act of Union.
' The English adherents of the Stuarts had nothing to say
against it,' says a recent writer ; ' but the Scottish Jacobites
could scarcely find words sufficiently strong to express their
hatred and horror of a measure which, to their excited patriot-
ism, seemed to be the consummation of all ruin and disgrace,
and the utter annihilation of Scotland as a free and indepen-
dent country;'* and singularly enough, a bill for its total
repeal in June, 1713, was only lost by a majority of three in
the House of Lords.
* Dr. Charles Mackay. Preface to 'Jacobite Songs,' &c.
IV PREFACE.
As a proof of how the two countries, by previous animosity,
obstructed each other's progress, the year 1867 has proved that
the revenue of England, since 1707, has increased tenfold, and
that of Scotland more than sixtyfold! (Vide Debate on the
Reform Bill in March.)
The character of Balcraftie is neither a solitary one, nor en-
tirely original, for such a composite rogue, the famous Deacon
Brodie, actually figured among the Town Councillors of Edin-
burgh, in the end of the last century, and expiated his Dcrany
crimes on a gallows, constructed by himself, for the use of the
Criminal Court.
It must be pretty apparent to any student of History, that
had the whole fighting force of the Highlands followed Charles
Edward, we might never have heard of a battle of Culloden ;
and it is somewhat amusing to observe how the thousands who
remained quietly at home, and all their descendants too, have
readily adopted the laurels of the little band in whose faith
and valour they had no share whatever.
In all the military details of my story, I have striven to be
correct, and have consulted the "War Office Records of most of
the regiments engaged at Falkirk and Culloden ; and if, in
entering somewhat into the spirit of the time, I have written
with a little bitterness about the barbarities that followed the
extinction of the Insurrection, it has been simply in the genuine
hatred of all cruelty and tyranny oppression and hypocrisy
for the last expiring wave of Jacobitism has long since broken,
and left not even a ripple upon the shore ; and a poet, or a
reader, may be a Jacobite in literature, without being in the
smallest degree a Jacobite in politics.
June, 1867.
CONTENTS.
CHAPTEtt PAG
I. i'ETOILE HE IA MEB. . ..... 1
II. ATTAINTED . , 5
III. THE YABN OF CAPTAIN SCUPPER M.ua ... 9
IV. FATHER TESTIMONY ...... 16
T. ON SHORE 21
VI. BAILIE REUBEN BALCBAFTIE 26
VII. THET SET FOBTH 33
VIII. AN OLD SCOTTISH CAVALIER . , . 40
ix. DALQUHABN'S MISSION 45
X. THH HOUSE OP AULDHAME , . 50
XI. BBYDfi 9TTERBUBN ....... 53
XII. T1IE WITHr-BAWINO-ROOM 62
XIII. IN VINO VEBIT13 .,.,. v ..',. 68
xiv. BRTDE'S FOUR LOVERS ...... 72
XV. BALCKAFTIE ON THE SCENT ..... 78
XVI. TOUBS ONLY AND EVER! 83
-XVII. MB. EGEBTON PBOPOSE3 ...... 90
XVIII. THE QFABBEL 95
XIX. MYSTERY 99
vi CONTENTS.
CHAPTER PAOft
XX. THE DEIL ! 3 LOAN 105
XXI. THE DEATH SHOT 108
XXII. IN THE TOILS 112
XXIII. THE ABLED BBIDE 116
xxiv. WYVIL'S DEPASTURE ...... 122
XXV.~BBYDB'S ENTEEPEISB 128
XXVI. THE SEQUEL ....... 138
XXVII. THE BLACK LUGGEB 143
XXVni. THE EAVINE 14-8
XXIX. THE VAULT OP TANTALLAtf . . . . .154
XXX. THE PEISONS OB 1 THE BAS8 . . . 161
XXXI. FIRST DAT OP CAPTIVITY 164
xxxn. BETDE'S SOBROW AGAIN 170
XXXIII. SEVENTEEN HUNDRED AND FOBTY-FIVB . . . 173
XXXIV. GLOOM. ........ 177
XXXV. HOPE DEPEEBED 182
XXXVI. A PLOT LAID 190
xxxvn. HOW BBTDE'S GUINEAS WERE SPENT '. . . 195
XXXVIII. THE WHITE BOSS IN BLOOM .... 200
XXXIX. HOPE DAWNS ANEW. . . , . . . 208
XL. THE ATTEMPT 213
XLI. THE WABEANT. ....... 216
3CLII. ON LUFFNESS MUIB 221
XLIII. CAELISLE . .' . 227
XLIV. THE CAVEBN OF THE BASS 233
XLV. DALQUHABN IN EDINBUBGH ..... 238
XLVI. GENEBAL PBESTON ...... 247
XLVII. THE PBOVOST'S SUPPEB . . . . . . 255
XLVni. THE CABINET ....... 262
XLIX. THE PBINCE'S COUBT ...... 266
L. CHAGBIN 271
LT. THE BAID OF DALQUHABN 276
III. A FBIEND 283
LIU. LIEUTENANT LA BOQUB , . 287
COXTENT3. Vii
CHAPTER PAQS
LIV. THE LAIQB COFFEE-HOtTSE 292
'LV. THE DOUBLE DBEAM 99
1YI. THE MABCH 302
LVII. THE NETHEBBY ABMS ...... 808
LVin. LONGTOWN 313
LIX. IN ENGLAND 319
LX. THE EETBEAT FHOM DERBY ..... 323
1X1. THE ABDUCTION 328
LXII. THE VICABAGE OF PENEITH 331
I/XIII. THE EEAE GUABD ATTACKED .... 337
LXIV. A MABBIAGE . . . . . . . .313
LXY. AT THE CALLENDEE ...... 348
LXVI. THE DAY OF THE BATTLE 355
LXVII. THE 17TH OF JANUAEY, 1746 .... 358
LXVIII. COBHAM'S DHAGOONS 353
LXIX. IN THE NOETH 370
IXX. THE GABEELTINZIB ....... 375
LXXI. THE BITEE BITTEN 380
LXXII. HIS EXAMINATION ....... 385
LXXIII. THE NIGHT HAECH TO NAIEN .... 391
LXXIY. SEPAEATED! .....,,. 397
LXXV. THE BATTLE OF CULLODEN ..... 4Q2
IXXVI. THE SEQUEL . ....... 41Q
1XXTU. THE COIEE GAOTH -.... 416
L'ENVOY 423
NOTES. .......
THE WHITE COCKADE,
CHAPTER I.
'l/ETOILB DB LA. MEB.'
' The ship is sailing, the moon is shining ;
Low on a level with the deck.
She swims through the white cloud breakers leaping
About her hull as about a wreck.
'The ship is sailing, my heart is sinking;
Ned, you never knew me thus before :
We're home at last! hut I wish 'twere niorninc
There's something waiting for me ashore.' Good Words, 1866.
ON a bright morning in May, along, low, black lugger was creeping
along the German Sea, about thirty miles off tha mouth of the
Firth of Forth.
Sharply prowed and pinck -built, having a round stern finished
(by a continuation of the bulwarks aft) with a narrow square part
above ; she had two large quadrilateral or four-cornered sails, each
bent to a strong yard, and confined by well-greased parrels to the
slender and taper masts, which were raked well aft. The size of
those long sails suggested that great care was requisite in lowering
and shifting them, which was necessary at every tack, for the lugger
was one of unusual tonnage for her rig, and was decked and armed
with two brass guns, and several puteraroes or swivels along her
gunnel.
Forward and amid-ships, a mixed crew of sixteen Scotsmen and
Dunkirkers, sat smoking or chewing pigtail, with their backs to
the morning breeze. They were all rough, weatherbeatcn, and
bushy whiskered fellows. Their hair, long and dirty, was serred
round with spun-yarn to keep it tidy, or out of their eyes if they
went aloft. All wore coarse pea-jackets and short kilt-like trowsers
of canvas, well japanned with tar. They had long knives, with
shark-skin sheaths in their girdles, and wore broad square metal
buckles on their shoes.
Though few in number, these men were bold and reckless in
aspect and bearing ; for their craft was the ' Etoile de la Mer,' a
notorious contraband vessel of Dunkirk, and they were sailing on
the sea, at a time when smugglers, if taken, had seldom the option
1
2 THE "WHITE COCKADE.
of entering the king's service. In their own phraseology, they
sailed ' with halters round their necks/ and when captured were
usually strung up to the yard-arm.
That his majesty's ship, the ' Fox,' was now on the look-out for
the lugger, in those very waters, was an exciting circumstance of
which some friendly fisherman had duly informed them over night ;
thus a sharp look-out was kept by Captain Scupperplug and his men,
as they crept slowly towards the estuary, being in no hurry to enter
until after sunset, and ere that time, along summer day, they knew,
must intervene, so every sail of any apparent size was carefully
edged away from.
I am doubtful whether the real name of this famous old Scottish
smuggler was ever recorded, as, among seamen, he was always known
as Captain Sanders Scupperplug, or old Puerto-de-la-Plata, having
been one of the five British seamen who took that place by surprise
an event in his life, concerning which, he spun many a tough
yarn, over his can of grog ashore, and in the long watches of the
night at sea.
He was a thick- set, stunted, and truculent, but withal, seamen-
like personage ; he wore a low three-cocked hat, edged with tar-
nished lace ; his thick grizzled hair, of no particular colour, was
crusted with saline particles and queued with spunyarn. He had
a short blue, stiff- skirted and collarless coat, buttoned up to his
throat, and garnished with several rows of gilt buttons on the
wide cuffs and square flapped pockets. A broad leather belt girt
his waist, and sustained a long knife or dagger.
The slash of a cutlass had traversed his right cheek, imparting a
sinister glare to his eyes, by the consequent contraction of the
muscles, and his nose having been carefully slit by the Spaniards,
when he was a prisoner in Hispaniola, made his aspect unusually
repulsive. He looked like a genuine pirate a sea-faring bull dog
on his hind legs ; and had all the bearing of one who had been, as
he sometimes boasted in his cups, a powder-monkey on board the
' Vulture," under Captain William Kidd, who was hanged (for
piracy and levanting with a king's ship) at Execution Dock in the
year 1701, as all the world knew then.
The distant and dim blue wavy ridges that rose on either bow,
from the German Sea, were the hills of Fife and of Eastern Lothian,
and far away towards them, the green billows rolled merrily in the
sunshine of the early morning. The sails which appeared at the
horizon were chiefly coasters, hugging the land as they crept along,
for we were at war with France then, and no vessel of any size or
value, unless a privateer or letter of marque, ventured seaward
without a convoy.
' De vind is veering bore aft,' snivelled the mate, Vander Pier-
boom, who was steering. lie was a short, squat, and ferocious-
looking Hollander, who might very well have passed for the twin
brother of his captain, as has nasal protuberance had been hope-
THE WHITE COCKADE. 3
lessly smashed by a half-spent shot at Puerto-de-la-Plata, and his
cheeks had been spritsail- yarded by an arrow on the coast of Africa.
' More aft,' exclaimed Scupperplug, with one of the dreadful and
useless oaths then in vogue ; ' and it is freshening too ; Mnhoun !
we'll be inside the bay before the middle watch is over, and that
winna suit our plans. Lower the yards ! take in sail ; and, hearkee,
you young limb of Satan, Jule Leroux '
' Yes, sare,' cried a little French mulatto boy, tumbling hurriedly
out of the boat where he had been asleep.
' Shake loose the ensign.'
' Which, monsieur ?'
1 The union, d n it, and you too ! Up with it, chock-a-block.'
From a bundle of bunting, composed of the flags of all nations,
the boy hurriedly and nervously, as if he already felt the captain's
colt across his tawny shoulders, selected one, bearing the red cross
of England, behind the white saltire of Scotland (the emerald isle
had, as yet, no share in that parti-coloured conglomeration of crosses,
the Union Jack), and it was run up to the head of the taper main-
mast, for Captain Scupperplug was prepared to pass himself off as
a trader from Lerwick, Thurso, or the Hans Towns, if questioned
by any one in authority, for ships' logs and papers were not kept so
strictly then as now.
Hitherto the gallant Captain Scupperplug had been sailing under
a most cunningly devised assortment of colours which belonged to
no nation in particular and were only intended to mystify, at a dis-
tance, any king's officer, but more especially Captain Beaver of the
' Fox ' frigate, whom it was now the smuggler's chief object to
avoid, as in addition to a contraband cargo, he had on board two
passengers, who were eminently obnoxious to the British govern-
ment, and after landing whom in safety, a certain authority at Dun-
kirk, was to pay him the sum of fifty louis d'or, over and above all
expenses.
Great Britain was then, I have said, at war -with France. She
had been so since 1744, and also with Spain since 1739 at war,
moreover, for sundry remarkable causes which did not concern the
simple and tax-paying people of these realms a single jot.
The emperor, Charles VI. of Germany, had died in 1740, and the
French caused the Bavarian elector to be crowned in his place,
thus stripping of her inheritance, his daughter, the famous empress
Queen of Hungary. Prussia pounced on Silesia ; France, Saxony,
and Bavaria, attacked the rest of her dominions ; but Britain with
Holland, and soon after, Russia, united in her favour.
We islanders had no apparent cause to meddle in this continental
squabble ; but then the good and well-being of Hanover, and the
security of that petty Electorate, so well beloved at the Court of
St. James', depended upon a nice balance of the hostile interests of
the German Empire. The servile English ministry were willing to
gratify George II. and his hideous mistresses by making an essay
12
4 IDE WHITE COCKADE.
in its favour. A few millions of gold, a few thousand British lives
were nothing when Hanover was menaced ; so to war we went, with
a will, as usual. Our troops soon made a diversion in favour of
Maria Theresa, and the nominal emperor had to fly to Frankfort,
where he lived in obscurity all of which, being history, is perhaps
not new to the reader.
Hanover was preserved, the real object of our interference ; but
still the war went on by sea and land, a state of affairs which made
no difference to the adventurous Captain Scupperplug, who,
favoured by the fog, had stolen out of Dunkirk, end escaping the
fleet of Rear- Admiral Byng, then cruising off the north and east
coasts of Scotland, had arrived safely, aa yet, with a good cargo of
brandy and sherry, almost within sight of the Isle of May.
'If overhauled by a shark of a king's ship, these passengers of
ouw will add muckle to our risk o' being tacked up by the craig,'
remarked the captain, in a growling tone, to his mate ; ' and in
this bit lugger we canna hide them. Mahoun take it ! the cabin
is little better than the sautbacket o' the Crail fisher boat.'
' Hide deni no, unless under de vater, vid a gannon shot at dcro
veet,' suggested the cruel Dutchman ; ' dree time, hab I said, dey
had better valk de plauk, dan add to our beril by dere bresence
aboard!'
' No no, d n it, Vander Pierboom ; think of the fifty louis
d'or ; they are worth that muckle, ye dour Dutch devil.'
' Bud who de Henkers, are dey ? :
' Dinna fash your thumb aneut that, mate. They are some o'
those will turn the world upside doon, I hope ere long, and then,
Mahoun ! we shall have nae ships o' the German Elector poking
their snouts in Scottish waters. The mangy white horse o' Hano-
ver may the devil gie it the glanders ! will have to keep ashore,
or on its ain side o' the German sea.'
' Oho I zee I zee,' said the mate, putting a thick finger to
where his nose once had been ; ' dev are Jagobites vat you call
eh? 1
' Aye, aye, just sac but keep her away, Vander Pierboom,' said
Scupperplug, who had been looking long and intently through an
old battered telescope, well served round with spun-yarn, at a grey
object that was slowly rising from the horizon : ' keep the coast of
East Lothian well aboard, for that is the May already, or I'm a
Dutchman !'
' Bearing about dwendy vive mile off, or so,' said the Hollander,
whose flattened nose sorely impeded his pronunciation.
' Exactly sae keep her away three points more to the south' ard
par los infernos, the mair sea-room we gie our bit barky the
better,' added the captain, whose language was a strange compound
of English and Scotch, interspersed with foreign oaths, picked up
chiefly in the Spanish main ; ' with the hail o' a lang summer day
before us, every hour adds to our danger, so keep a bright look-out,
TEE WHITE COCKADl. 5
lads, or by the Honker's horns, we may never see the auld timmcr
forts o' Dunkirk agaiu! Jule Leroux, are those gentlemen below
stirring yet ?'
'Oui Monsieur le Captaine,' replied the boy, eying the colt, a
piece of knotted rope which hung half out of the skipper's right
hand pocket.
' Then get ready some coffee, dashed with Nantz ; and look sharp,
ye French baboon, or it will be the worse for ye !'
He now took up his heavy pistols (which were barrelled and
mounted with brass) from the binnacle ; after looking carefully to
the flints and priming, he placed them in his broad black leather
girdle, and buttoned his rough pilot coat over them. He then
bellowed something hoarsely down the companion hatch into the
little cabin of the lugger.
Voices responded cheerfully from below, and two gentlemen soon
after hurried on deck ; and, with faces expressive of joy and anima-
tion, bade him and Mynheer Vander Pierboom good morning, all
unaware of the latter' s kind suggestion for dropping them quietly
overboard, each with a cold shot at his heels.
Then they looked eagerly around at the bright green waves danc-
ing merrily past in the summer sunshine, and at the stripe of dis-
tant coast, that rose on either bow, as the lugger, under her reduced
canvas, bore slowly, but steadily on, rolling a little from side to
side, as she was now trimmed before the wind.
CHAPTER II.
ATTAINTED.
' 0, the tod rules owre the Uon,
And the midden's abonn the moon,
80 Scotland maun cower and cringe
To a fause and foreign loon :
weary fa' the piper chiel
Wha sells his breath sae dear ;
And weary fa' the evil time
The Orange Prince cam' here.' Old Song.
Jy stature both these strangers were above the middle height, and
were well built and well knit in figure. One wore his light brown
hair unpowdercd, and simply tied by a white ribband ; he was dark-
blue eyed, and oval-faced, eminently handsome, courtly iu bearing,
and certainly not more than flve-and-twenty years of age.
The other, who wore a Eamillies wig and jack boots, which
seemed to have seen better days, was stouter in form and darker in
complexion, having been bronzed by exposure to the weather in
many a foreign land. His forehead was well marked by the lines
of thought, and his dark eyes wore usually a stern, sharp, and en-
quiring expression, though the form of his mouth signified extreme
6 tnE WHITE COCKADE.
good nature. He was more than twenty years the senior of his
companion, like whom he wore a plain light green frock, without
lace or ornament on the pockets or loose wide cuffs, fastened in
front by a row of silver clasps, and girt at the waist by a plain
black leather girdle, at which hung his sword and a pair of small
silver mounted pistols, from two steel hooks. From the chasings
of these pistols, a coat of arms had been carefully effaced.
Though simply known as Captains Douglas and Mitchell ' Cap-
tain ' as Gibbet has it ' being a good travelling title, and one
that kept waiters and ostlers in order,' the younger was Henry
Douglas, Lord Dalquharn,* of the Holm, in the Stewartry of Kirk-
cudbright, a near kinsman of the gallant Viscount Kinmure, who
perished on the scaffold for the House of Stuart ; and the elder was
Sir John Mitchell, Bart., of Pitreavie, in former times a Captain of
the Scots Grey Dragoons both attainted and outlawed for their
steady adherence to their native line of kings and both now re-
turning to Scotland on a mission fraught with peril to themselves,
for if discovered, the axe and gibbet awaited them.
Each lifted his little low triangular hat with studious politeness
to the squat skipper, and then waved as if in welcome to the dis-
tant coast.
'So land is in sight at last, my old cock of Puerto-de-la-Plata?'
exclaimed Sir John Mitchell.
' The Lammer-Muirs, Captain Douglas, will soon rise on the port
bow ; yonder is the Isle of May, and a point or so further north,
are Fifeness and Kilmcinie Craig : I daresay you'll ken them, Cap-
tain Mitchell/ said the smuggler, good naturedly, for he was too
much of a Scotsman not to sympathise with the expression which
he read in the handsome faces of the returning exiles as they looked
towards the land of their birth and of their dearest hopes.
' Fifeness and Kilmeinie,' repeated Sir John Mitchell, thought-
fully, as he shook his head.
Aye, sir coming from the other side o' the sea running south
frae the Red Head of Angus, or the Inclicape Rock, we've to gie
that long reef the Carr-rocks a wide berth north longitude 56 16',
west latitude 2 34'. Ilech, sirs ! rnony a stout ship as ever sailed
the sea, hath had her timbers torn on those devil's teeth.'
Without hearing the skipper's remarks, the eyes of the elder
passenger were Cxed earnestly on the dim blue stripe of coast.
' For thirty years," said he, in a low voice, ' my eyes have looked
on other lands ; and now now I cannot tell what is coming over
me, but my heart is very full, Dalquharn very full, indeed ! Egad
so many things have happened, and 1 have seen so much of the
busy world, that ages seem to have elapsed since I was out with n:y
Lord the Earl of Mar in the '15, and now I hope we are on the eve
of going out again.'
* Pronounced Dalwharn, in Scotland.
THE WHITE COCKADtf. 7
Lord Dalquharn smiled at this significant phrase, which is always
used in Scotland to express having joined the House of Stuart, just
as in Ireland, to say having been ' up,' signified being engaged in
the affair of '98 ; but Lord JJalquharn's smile was a bitter one, and
his ungloved hand was tightly clenched in the carved steel hilt of
his slender little walking sword, a farewell gift from Prince Charles
Edward.
The late Lord, his father, had first embroiled himself with the
intrigues of the cabinet of St. Germains at the time of the accession
of George II. ; some thirteen years before, he had also in his place
in Parliament as a representative peer, resented too bitterly the
severe and shortsighted proceedings of the ministry in the matter of
the Porteous mob, and used such strong language in his protest
against the removal of the gates and portes of Edinburgh, that he
had to make his escape from London. A summons from the privy
council he treated with disdain, and repairing to St. Germains with
his lady (a Gordon of the House of Keninure) and their son, the
little Master of Dalquharn ; ere long he found his title forfeited,
his name proscribed, and his estates gifted to a truculent whig-
noble, who had been deeply implicated in the Glencoe Massacre and
the Treaty of Union, having sold his vote for the same sum as the
patriotic Lord Chancellor Seafield to wit 490.
Now, his only hope and heir stood a beggar and a fugitive on the
deck of an obscure smuggling lugger, but full of anticipations of
better and more glorious days, when, as his companion whose
hostility to the government was of much older date phrased it,
' King Jamie should cock up his beaver in old Holyrood.'
1 You are very silent, Dalquharn,' said Mitchell ; ' of what are you
thinking ?
' I am thinking of my father and of my mother, who sleep by old
King James's side in the chapel of St. Germain-en-Laye.'
' Loyal still in death !'
' Yea loyal still ! If the dead king were to come forth, he
might hold royal state again, so many true and gallant Scottish and
Irish hearts are mouldering near him that is, if their blessed
spirits do not, as I hope, find eternal rest.'
' Come, come, Gadamercy ! you must not sink into a dolorous
mood, with the land in sight and Byng's fleet we know not where.
Egad ! I can smell the hot coffee of our little yellow friend, Leroux.'
' I have not your elasticity of spirits, my dear Sir John, though
twenty years your junior,' replied the young lord. 'Viewing my
country as I do, through the medium of her past history, with ail
her wrongs and romance, her heroes and their struggles against the
aggressive kings of England through the medium of her poetry
and her music glorying as I do in the name of a Scottish man,
never more tlian when exiled as a loyal cavalier and desperate sol-
dier of fortune, enduring penury, obloquy and affronts, feeding my-
self in foreign camps and cities, with the last relic of my inherit-
8 THE WHITE COCKADE.
mice, my sword, the prince's gift, I now feel swelling np within
me a flood of enthusiasm a crowd of thoughts too deep for utter-
ance, on seeing again those dear old mountains rising from the sea,
though we are returning, it may be, but to find our graves among
them.'
' Thoughtless as you deem me, Dalquharn," said the other, as he
caught something of the young lord's enthusiasm, ' I felt once like
you ; I was a boy then, a gallant and joyous boy, at an age when no
grief could crush hope, and no sneering monitor could quell or damp
the glorious glow of ambition and romance ! Now '
' Well and now ?'
' Matured, saddened and soured by stern experience, and many a
time by grinding poverty, I view the world with very different
eyes ; yet am I hopeful still, otherwise I should not have come in
such doubtful guidance, on this, our desperate errand. But zounds !
e'en now, man, I think I can see Pitreavie, my old ancestral home
in the cosy East Neuk of Fife, embosomed among deep primeval
woods. I can hear the rooks cawing on its Imge square chimneys,
and the creak of the vanes on its turret tops, mingling with a song
my mother used to sing to me long, long ago to me and my three
brave brothers who fell at Sheriffrnuir for King James. Black dool
and woe be on that day, and yet she grudged them not in such a
cause, for she was a Kirkaldy of the House of Grange. The old
Bong is in my ears, and in my heart now,
'" And with it comes a broken fount
Of tears I deemed was dry ;
Auld faces, voices, come as wont,
And will not pass me by 1"
'Yet with (3-od's help and King James's favour, we may all brook
our own lands again, and lie at last in our forefathers' graves, Sir
John.'
' So time will prove, my lord ; I think the cold-blooded massacre
in G-lencoe, the bankruptcy of Darien, when two thousand Scotch-
men perished to gratify Spanish cruelty and English jealousy, the
studied violations of the treaty of union, the restoration of patron-
age, our defeats at Carthagena and elsewhere, have surely given
Scotland a surfeit of Dutch stadtholders and German electors !'
The homely odour of fried ham and eggs, ascending from the lit-
tle cabin of the lugger, coupled with the captain's warning that
breakfast awaited them, now lured the friends below. As they
descended, Yunder Pierboom, who had been watching them atten-
tively as they stood far aft on the pinck built stern, and who had
been endeavouring to follow their conversation, of which, however,
lie could make nothing, now twitched one of the captain's wide
cuffs as lie was about to descend backwards into the cabin.
' Sgiippcrblug,' snivelled the noseless Dutchman, in a whisper
' you are to get fifty Louis ober and above your bassago money for
dese gentilmeiisb. cli ?'
THE WHITE COCEAIiE. 9
1 Yes fifty Louis, and what tlicu ?' growled his commander, im-
patiently.
1 You might get de Louis at Dunkirk, and ebber so ver inoeh
more here, if '
'If what, you infernal Dutch lubber out with it, hand owro
hand.'
' You zold 'em to de government as voreign spiesh dis would
be to gain doubleonsh on both handsh.'
' Nae rnair o' this to me, mate, and whisper but a word o't among
the crew, and I'll make shark's meat o'ye ! Makoun what ? sell
the puir fellows to the Elector's shambles, when within sight o'
their ain peat reek !' he added, with a terrible imprecation upon
his own eyes and limbs. ' Na, na damme ! I done mony a strange
thing in my time in the Spanish main and elsewhere ; but I'll never
be Judas enough to act like a vile Scotch whig, and sell the man
who trusts me. Keep a sharp look out while I'm below, Vander
Pierboom haul out the jib to keep her steady, and keep silence for-
ward, or cuidado del cuchilla as we used to say on the Plate river,
which in plain Scots, means, beware the jagg o' a Kilmaur's whittle !'
With this significant threat, and a very sinister flash in his eye?,
Captain Scupperplug's ugly visage vanished through the companion
hatch.
An angry scowl passed over the flat face of the avaricious Dutch-
man, and he dragged his hat by the fore cock, sullenly over his eyes.
He made no reply as he slunk aft, but he had his own thoughts and
intentions nevertheless.
He seated himself on thetaffrail,lit his huge pipe, and proceeded
to consider how, without involving himself with his captain, of
whom he had a wholesome terror, he could convert the two unsus-
pecting ' bassengcrs,' into the current coin of Great Britain.
CH APT Ell III.
THE YAHN OF CAITAIS SCCPrEBPLFO.
4 Oft liad he shewn, in climes afar,
Each attribute of roving war ;
The sharpened ear, the piercing eye,
The quick resolve in danger nigh ;
The upend, that in the flight or clmse
Outstripped the Charib's rapid race ;
On Arawaca's desert shore,
Or where I. a Plata's billows roar,
AVhen oft the sons of vengeful Spain
Tracked the marauder's steps in vain.' Sokeby.
To avoid all questioning as to their plans or objects in returning
home, the two companions were pursuing a course they had con-
jnnctly adopted during their rapid and hitherto safe voyage from
Dunkirk, by enquiring of Captain Scupperphig the adventures of
Id THE WHITE COCKADE.
bis early life, and thus being generally full of himself and his own
affairs, he was never weary of ' spinning yarns ' of a very savage
nature, certainly, but incident to his voyages in the West Indies and
along the Spanish Main between the Isthmus of Panama and the
Serpent's Mouth.
With these episodes of reckless piracies by sea, of open cities
sacked by land, of vast treasures, plate, jewels, doubloons and pieces
of eight, buried on lonely isles, among the sands of Peru or the
palm forests of Tortuga buried with a murdered Spaniard or Negro,
whose spirit was supposed to haunt and guard the spot : stories of
Adventurous hearts ! who bartered bold
Their English steel for Spanish gold/
lie mingled superstitions, wild, and gloomy, of haxmted ships that
sailed in the wind's eye with all their canvas set, or were manned
by demon crews ; of the Flying Dutchman, and St. Elmo's Light;
of bags of magic wind, sold by ' black and midnight hags,' in the
Scottish Hebrides or Scandinavian Fiords ; and many a tale he told
them, too, of the ferocious Buccaneers with whom he had served in
the Windward Isles ; of the terrible reprisals made on each other
by the English and Spaniards, when no mode of cruelty, of mutila-
tion or torture was deemed too exquisite or terrible ; and of men
marooned on the lonely keys off the mountainous Isle of Hispaniola,
or in the mangrove creeks of Tobago, for transgressing the iron
statutes of the Buccaneers, and there left to perish miserably of
hunger and thirst, or by wild animals.
1 A rare ruffian this !' said Dalquharn, in a whisper to his friend ;
' I would we were on shore, or safe out of his hands.'
His favourite reminiscence, one to which he was never tired of
recurring, was the capture of Puerto de la Plata in South Ameri-
ca ; and on this morning, when after liberally dashing his coffee
with Nantz, he took to imbibing Nantz alone, or very slightly dashed
with water, he was unusually fluent on the subject.
' Ye are to ken, sirs,' said lie, ' that in the year after war was de-
clared against Philip V. of Spain, I had shipped on board the
" Eothesay Castle " a Privateer of Glasgow, Captain John Hall,
master and owner, a stout mariner and near kinsman to the Laird
of Dunglas. She carried eight cai-riage and fourteen swivel guns,
with a crew of forty men, the very flower of the Clyde. By yellow
fever, and the fortune (or rather misfortune) of war, our crew had
dwindled down to only twenty-five hands, when in the spring of the
year, we found ourselves cruising off the mouth of the Plate Eiver;
but we had aboard plenty of ammunition, powder, and shot, which
we took out of a Spanish sloop, that we scuttled with all her hands
in her, off the east end of Hispaniola.'
'What with all her hands on board?' said Lord Dalquharn j
'did they make no resistance?'
' Troth did they ; but a cold pistol barrel applied to ilka man's
THE WHITE COCKADB. 11
ear, and a couple shot down for example, made them mute as her-
rings,' replied the captain, who relinquished much of his local dia-
lect, as he wanned with his subject ; ' so down went the " San An-
tonio de las Animas," with all her crew.'
' The poor creatures would swim, of course ?'
'May be aye, and may be no,' said the other laughing.
'How?' '
' They might have swam for a time, had we not tied them back to
back. Mahoun, sirs ! the loons were only Spaniards, and they sune
droon ye ken. Well then we were off the Puerto de la Plata,
and though we had only twenty-five hands on board, Captain Hall
resolved to capture the town. Yet it had a petty fort, and about a
thousand of a white population.'
' With only twenty -five followers ?' exclaimed Sir John Mitchell,
incredulously.
' He did it with /our, of whom I was one, and Vander Pierbooin
might have been another, but he was our gunner, and was required
aboard. Blazes! we weren't to eat even the Elector's mouldy bis-
cuits, for nothing, and we kenned wcel, sirs, that there was a
mighty mint of treasure, gold, silver, and ingots, to say nothing
of some black-eyed Spanish wenches, to be had in the town, -when
once we had made ourselves masters of the port, that commanded
it, on a bit knowe, uae bigger than Berwick Law.
' The weather was hot so hot that we could scarcely drink our
grojr, for the water became as bilge in the casks, so we mixed it by
the rule of thumb, which gave us three parts of rum to one of
water. We were like parched peas ; our pistol barrels grew hot in
our girdles, and our cutlass blades in their leather sheaths. The
but tor was served out by the purser in pint stoups, and all alive wi'
cockroaches, fireflies, and weevils, so we longed for a day's run
ashore among the wine shops, and our mouths watered, when we
thought of the purple grapes and juicy melons, of bright doubloons,
and brighter Spanish eyes in La Plata.
' Under French colours, the three fleurs-de-lys, we came to anchor
with a spring upon our cable, within cannon shot of the town. We
had our guns double-shotted with round and grape, but kept all the
ports closed, and all the hands, save seven, were sent below, when
Captain Hall quitted the ship (which had all the appearance of a
quiet merchant trader), taking with him in the jolly boat only four
men, of whom, as I have said, I was one.
' We went straight to the Caza de la Villa, which in the Spanish
lingo, means the town house, and there we saw the Alcalde and
Archbishop of La Plata, to whom the captain gave himself out to
be trader from Martinique in the Windward Isles, laden with a
mixed cargo, which he was anxious to sell speedily, to save it from
the rascally British privateers, particularly from the " Rothesay
Castle," of Glasgow, which had done such damage to the Spanish
shipping among the Bahamas, and in the Gulf of Mexico and I
12 THE WHITE COCKADE.
could see, that at the name of our sliip, the Spaniards twisted up
the nioustnohios and ground their teeth.
'The Captain invited the Archbishop and Alcade to come on
board, and, as our boat was small, and would hold only those two,
in addition to ourselves, they were simple enough to come off alorie
with us.
' When seated in the cabin, over a glass of Alicant, Captain Hall
enquired, as if casually, " what manner of man, the governor of tho
fort was and whether they thought he would purchase a portion
of the cargo."
' Suspecting no evil and believing in Captain Hall's French, which,
to say the least of it, was queer enough, the Alcade wrote a letter to
the Senor Gobernador, whom he averred to be a brave and true
Hidalgo from old Spain ; and the moment he pouched it, Captain
Hall blew his whi.-lle ! Then before our two lion Spaniards knew
exactly what had happened, they were both tied back to back, gagged
with ropeyarn, and stowed away in the cable-tier, with their legs
padlocked in the bilboes.
" Taking the letter of introduction, Captain Hall and the four of
us, all armed with our cutlasses and each with two pair of long Scots
iron pistols under our coats, shoved off once more in the jolly boat.
Hound his waist, the Captain wore a British ensign, by way of a sash.
' " Now my lads," said he, " stand by for squalls, when you see this
flying on the fort. Vander Pierboom, have the ports triced up, the
guns run out, and ready to heave shot, shell, crossbar, slugs and
stinkballs into the town, and fear not, shipmates, the place will be
our own, for as long as we want it."
'Though the town had only about a thousand Spanish inhabitants,
they possessed sixty times that number of Tributary Indians ; in the
neighbourhood were many rich mines, and the revenue of the Arch-
bishop was estimated at eighty thousand ducats yearly.
' We had, ilk man of us, a stiff jorum of new England rum under
our belts, sweet with molasses, fiery and strong ! We were in high
spirits and ready to face Mahoun himself, so away we went to the
fort, an old stronghold of the Buccaneers, which the Spanish govern-
ment had rebuilt and strengthened.
' Our captain was introduced to the Spanish commandant, a tall,
sallow fellow, with long black moustachios, solemn eyes, and a
doublet of sad coloured serge slashed with white cotton for coolness.
He carefully read tho letter of the chief magistrate, made the Cap-
tain several low bows, invited him to luncheon, while we kicked our
heels in the verandah without and counted the Spanish guard,
which we found to consist of twenty ill-armed men exactly one for
each pistol shot we could give.
'The moment the Captain and Governor were alone, the former
clapped a pistol to the head of the latter, and swore that he would
blow his braius out, if he made the least sound or resistance.
' The Don sullenly gave up his sword, and permitted his hands
THE W11ITE COCKADE. 13
and his mouth too, to be secured by a few fathoms of line which
the Captain had in his pocket. We then rushed on the soldiers of
the guard, who, never expecting an attack, were smoking drowsily
under the shady verandah. We shot down all who failed to escape ;
closed the gates and hoisted the Union in place of the Red and
Yellow of Castile and Leon. Then we heard a cheer from the
" Rothesay Castle," mingling with a murmur from the people in
the town below.
' " Hurrah, my lads !" cried the Captain, " you'll find this better
work than loading with boucan at Monte Video, and filling the
forehold with hides and horns !"
' The privateer's ports were now instantly triced up and all her
battery brought to bear on the town, while we opened a fire from
the guns of the fort. The inhabitants finding themselves exposed
to a cannonade by sea and hind, and ignorant of the force in possession
of the castle, fled from the place in great numbers, and in less than
ten minutes, our shells and rockets set the town in flames. We then
spiked the guns in the fort, threw all the arms into a deep well, blew
up the magazine, and on being joined by a party of the crew, plun-
dered the town at our leisure, the cowardly Spaniards flying before
us in all directions.
' For twelve hours we were masters of La Plata we twenty-fire
British seamen !
' By shot and shell, we killed more than two hundred persons in
the streets, and spared none who came in our way, for you must
bear in mind, sirs, that those same Spaniards had cut off the noses,
ears and lips of many of our countrymen, and thereafter, hanged,
drowned, or roasted them, for it was the fashion to use English
prisoners so, in that part of the world, and will be so while this war
lasts.
' We got fifty wedges of silver and dollars to the value of 6000
sterling. My own share was but five hundred pistoles, with a gold
cup and some silver crucifixes which I found iu the cathedral ; but
I soon lost all my plunder among the slop-dealers and dickybirds at
home, who in three hours, stripped me of what took as many years
of privateering to gain.
' \Ve brought off a few Spanish girls, but we soon tired of their
company and sent them ashore, some days after, together with the
Alcalde and the Archbishop, as we rounded the Cabo de Santa Maria,
where the old Tower of the Wolves stands ; and then bidding good-
bye to the River of Silver, we hauled up for Britain, and bore away
with every inch of canvas spread, for if taken, after our late prank,
every man of us would have been strung up, or sent in chains to dig
in the mines of San Luis de Potosi.
' After a splendid run of about six weeks we cast anchor in the
Clyde, our pockets well lined with Spanish, and luckily just as the
last allowance of mouldy biscuit and rancid boucan beef was brought
14 THE WHITE COCKADE.
from the storeroom ; so that's my yarn, gentlemen, of how we took
Puerto de la Plata." *
Captain Scupperplng had barely concluded his story of an event
which made a great noise in its time, when the deep bass voice of
the Dutch tnate came hollowly down the companion hatch.
' Below there ?'
' Hilloah !' responded his commander.
' A large square rigged vessel is standing down the river close
hauled wit all her larboard tacks aboard ; and may I never zee de
Keysers Q-raght of Amsterdam, or smoke a bibe at de Haarl Poort
again, if she be not de Vox Vrigate !'
' The Fox frigate !' said Mitchell.
' The devil !' exclaimed Dalquharn.
This startling announcement made Captain Scupperplug and his
two passengers spring on deck, and there sure enough, about ten
miles distant, was a large square rigged ship, exhibiting a great
spread of canvas which shone white as snow in the sunshine against
the blended blue of sea and sky. She was running south-east on
the larboard tack, towards the coast of Haddingtonshire, and did
not display a pennant, but, by the telescope, a broad scarlet ensign
could be discovered at her gaff peak, and ere long her tier of guns,
her three great poop-lanterns, and a colour flying on the jack-stalF,
which all large vessels had then rigged on the bowsprit, just above
the cap or spritsail yard-appurtenances, somewhat too inan-o'-war
like to be pleasant.
This alarming sight created some consternation on board the
lugger ; noon was barely past, and she had been creeping slowly up
the Firth, with her lugsails half-hoisted to gain time, ere night fell.
' On a wind she could never overtake us,' said Scupperplug, who
alone preserved his confidence, for even the faces of Lord Dalquharu
and Sir John Mitchell wore an expression of extreme concern.
1 If she should prove to be the " Fox," and insist on over-hauling
us ?' suggested the latter apprehensively.
' I've nae wish to come within range of her guns, for some of our
hands might be pressed,' the skipper replied in a low voice, ' and
then there is no saying what the devil, or the hope of escape, might
lead them to discover. Bear away towards Tyningham Sands ! By
the horns o' Mahoun, I'll beach the lugger and then blow her up,
rather than surrender !'
' Her boats might pursue you into shoal water,' suggested Lord
Dalquharn, whose thoughts ran chiefly on his being taken prisoner,
and the blasted hopes, the deadly perils that would be sure to
1 * 'If Captain Hall,' says a journalist of the time, when writing of this re-
markable affair, 'could take the town and fort of Porto de la Plata with four men
only, why are not some land forces immediately sent him ? Is there any reason
in the world to doubt, but that such a brave and experienced officer, with a file
or two of musketeers, which might easily be spared off St. James's Guard, would
soon make himself master of all the Spanish dominions in America, and thereby
enable us to command a peact upon our own terms ?' Scots Magazine, 1740.
THE WHITE COCKADE. 15
follow such a catastrophe, for already the castle of Edinburgh
and the Tower of London held in thraldrom several of the sus-
pected.
' Boat or no boat, if yawl or pinnace were to come off wi' marines
and small-arm men, I wadna strike my colours without fighting
d n me if I would !' exclaimed Seupperplug, whose eyes shot fire,
while his face crimsoned with rage, and the sword-cut in his right
cheek grew almost black, for he had all the courage of a bull-dog,
and his spirit seemed to rise in proportion to the danger ; " mast-
head the yards sail trimmers to the tacks and braces ; bring the
sheets more aft, and keep in shore for Tyningham Sands. Cast
loose the guns load wi' a round shot, and a bag of nails and mus-
ket bullets in each ! Quick, Vander Pierboom ; and bring up the
small arms, lads, hatchets and pikes ; we'll be ready anyway, for
we dinna ken what kind o" night-birds may await us in shore, and
for a' we see, we may be running out of the latitude of Hell, into
that of Hecklebirnie a place that is hotter still !'
The great quadrilateral sails of the lugger were fully hoisted now.
and her course was trimmed more southward ; the perpendicular
cliffs of the Isle of May, all whitened by sea-birds, began to grow
fainter on her lee quarter, while the steep green cone of North
Berwick Law, the giant precipices of the Bass Eock, and all the
iron-bound shore that rises between Tyningham Sands and Tan-
tallon, became more defined and dark ahead.
Already the bluff promontory of Dunbar, with the red round
towers of its ancient castle, and the wild waves foaming white
against its rugged rocks, could be discerned, when to the great
relief of all on board of none so much, perhaps, as Lord Dalqu-
harn and his friend, though they were without secret papers or
cyphers of any kind to compromise them save one concealed in
the former's scabbard the headsails of the large ship they were so
anxiously avoiding, were seen to shiver in the wind ; the jib sheet was
let fly ; her tacks and sheets were lifted ; and her yards swung round
in rapid succession, as they were braced on the other tack. She
altered her course, bearing away to the northward ; and long before
the lugger had crept past the promontory, still marked by the old
ruined tower of Scougal, and where, as the old legend avers, St.
Baldred's boat remained fixed as a rock amid the suvf, she was hull
down, and had melted into the evening sea and sky.
16 THE WHITE COCKADE.
CHAPTER IV.
FATHER TESTIMONY.
' Old Linstock, I swear, you are no fnir weather spark,
Your bull-dogs, my bleacher, must bite if they bark,
We soon may fall in with a custom-house shark,
Success to the free trade for ever !
' I've landed the stuff when the tempest howled high,
Not a light on the beach, nor a star in the sky ;
The cruisers ! the lubbers, they're all in my eye,
Good luck to the free trade for everl'
David Vedder.
THE sun had sunk beyond the Lomond hills, and the long, lovely
and undulating line of the Fifeshire coast looked dark and gloomy ;
but the vast expanse of the estuary still reflected the ruddy flush
that lingered in the western sky, when the lugger passed through
the deep channel that lies between the stupendous Bass Rock and
the formidable bluff, which is crowned by an open and roofless ruin,
that in its prouder and earlier days had been a chief stronghold of
the turbulent Douglasses. The wild and rugged precipices here are
of the darkest iron hue, their summit covered by the vast fortress,
'Broad, massive, high and stretching far,
Aud held impregnable in war ;'
their bases, whitened in the foam of the ever restless German Sea.
The lugger had fallen to leeward and lost much way, during the
supposed chase or escape from the suspected war-ship, and she was
now standing up to the Firth of Forth, which there is some twelve
miles broad, before a very faint breeze, for the wind had almost died
away as the sun went down. The coast line was rapidly becoming
dark as indigo against the horizon, but here and there red-lights
twinkled in the windows of the cottages and farm-houses along the
cliffs.
As she stood along the rocky shore, Captain Sanders Scupperplug
and his flat-nosed mate, Mynheer Vander Pierboom, swept it in
vain, again and again with their telescopes, for a certain little red flag
on Scougal point, or on Tantallou ruins, which lie a Scottish mile
further to the westward, and also, as the twilight deepened, for a
lantern which was usually waved in a secret and mysterious manner
at Bainslaw, to indicate that the coast was clear for a safe run of
their cargo into the cavern at Seacliff, and certain other places
better known to the smuggler than to the collectors of His Majesty's
customs. They were now rounding the dangerous sunken rocks of
Greenlesly, and already the lights of the little town of North Ber-
wick were twinkling on their larboard bow.
The total absence of all the expected signals filled the two
worthies with a perplexity which found vent in numerous oaths and
imprecations uttered against themselves, and a personage whom
they designated ' old Father Testimony.'
THE WHITE COCKADE. 17
By the Treaty of Union, Scotland had immediately to cease im-
porting wine, brandy, fruit, and everything else produced by France,
a nation which the Jacobites were fond of boasting, had been her
ally for nearly eight hundred years, or since Charlemagne surrounded
the red lion with its double treasure of lilies. To replace this loss,
there was no remedy save that which the smugglers supplied. A
great branch of her commerce was destroyed ; much bitterness was
consequently excited, and to cheat the English exciseman to any
extent was considered patriotic and perfectly justifiable.
In their hatred of the obnoxious malt tax, which was thrust upon
the Scots in 1724, and in opposition to which, so much blood was
shed in Glasgow and elsewhere, the people saw but little harm in
smuggling a few runlets of French brandy duty free. Every facility
was afforded to the contrabandistas, and some of the very men who,
in open daylight, glorified most in the Protestant succession as by
law established, under cloud of night, while the cargo was being
safely run in some lonely islet or secluded cave on the sea shore,
consoled themselves by the reflection, that they were only cheating
the English who were their ancient enemies, and the Hanoverian
elector, who ruled where he had no right to be.
' Ready the ground tackle, mate !' cried the still perplexed cap-
tain of the lugger, ' bend the cable to the anchor, coilaway warps,
and look out for breaking bulk. We'll have to start and run the
cargo somewhere before daybreak, e'en should we heave it into the
Firth, with the runlets strung to a buoy-rope ! Launch the boat '
' Vor what burbose ?' growled the mate, through his nose, or
rather through what remained of it.
' That ye shall see,' replied Scupperplug, with one of his useless
oaths ; ' stand by the fall-tacklejump in, Leroux, you French,
devil, and clear the falls ! hoist and lower away handsomely a
wee bit bear the boat off the side push off!'
The boat was speedily lowered, and again the mate enquired for
what reason.
' The reason is this, ye Dutch lubber I am pledged to one in
Dunkirk, I wad be fain to please, to land these two gentlemen, our
passengers, safe on Scottish ground, and it shall be done at once.
If we are in dool and danger, I shall keep them out o' both if I can.'
' I thank you, Captain,' said Lord Dalquharn, who overheard the
explanation ; ' I regret to find that you deem yourself in peril, for
sooth to say, the presence of myself and friend on board, can but
add to it.'
1 1 thocht as muckle !' exclaimed Scupperplug, taking the hand
of the young lord in his hard and dingy palm ; ' but ye must have
a glass of grog wi' me ere ye go, gentlemen, to drink success to the
good old cause and the king owre the water ! To Hanover say I,
or to Hecklebirnie (and that is farther den) wi' the Elector, his
excise, and his malt tax too !'
' Why do you apprehend danger ?' asked Sir John Mitchell, who
2
18 THE WHITE COCKADB.
now perceived that the whole crew were completely armed with
cutlasses and with pistols, which they carefully loaded and flinted,
securing all the ramrods with a lanyard, in man-o'-war fashion.
' Nae signal has been made along the shore by one who awaits us,
and who must have seen us dodging about in the Firth since sun-
rise sae we kenna how the night may end,' he added, sullenly.
' I hope you will avoid bloodshed at least while we are in your
hands,' said the baronet, laughing.
' I have nae wish, Captain Mitchell, to slay ony o' God's crea-
tures, if English excisemen can be reckoned as such. But they
shall hae a bluidy lyke-wake wha meddle wi' me ! Since this Tile
incorporating Union, an anker o' brandy on the sea, or a sheep on
a hillside, hae been valued at the price o' a Scottish man's life ;
but a' tilings will be righted when King Jamie comes hame !'
' I hope so,' whispered Lord Dalquharn to his companion ; 'but
I shall thank heaven when we are rid of those repulsive wretches.'
A voice was now heard hailing the lugger, and a boat pulled by
two men, came sheering alongside.
' Lugger, ahoy ! ahoy Sanders Scupperplug !'
' Who hails ?'
' One you may be blithe to see in time, old Puerto-de-la-Plata,'
replied the other, as he dexterously caught the slack of a rope
which was thrown to him, and, after making it fast to a ring-bolt in
the bow of his boat, assisted his companion to scramble on deck.
' By my soul, it's auld Father Testimony himself !' exclaimed the
smuggler, as this man, who was muffled in a dark roquelaure, and
wore a voluminous wig, over which his hat (unflapped evidently for
disguise) was secured by a large, silk handkerchief. ' Why, in the
name of Mahoun,' he added, as they shook hands, ' did ye show us
neither light nor signal ?'
' Because the Philistines are along the whole shore frae Scougal
Point to the Castle Hill Gage, the exciseman, tide-waiters, red-
coats, and all! But we shall weather the murdering gang yet.
Ye maun e'en run for the auld place outside Craigleith, and lie to,
under the lee o' the island.'
' They have a ten-oared boat, with a pateraro in its bow, named
after Jack Gage himself.'
' Yes but the pateraro was spiked, and the boat scuttled, at
Garvy Point last night,' replied the stranger with a chuckling laugh.
' There will be no moon, aud the Lord be thanked for a dark and
gloomy night !'
'And there are red -coats, say you!'
'Even sae, Sanders.'
' A curse upon the English Sorners what seek they here ?' ex- 1
claimed the smuggler, bitterly.
'Our brandy stoups, Sanders, and ourselves, I warrant. But
we'll weather the liirimcrs yet, I say we'll weather them yet!' said
this strange visitor, striking his cane emphatically on the "deck.
THE WHITE COCKADE. 1
' They are levying black mail like sae inony hieland caterans cure
a' the country side, in the shape o' victuals and drink, which neither
they nor their king will ever pay for, I fear.'
' What is the news along shore ?'
' There was a lunar rainbow three nights ago, and that aye fore-
bodes something in these times of ours. 1
' What can it forebode, you daft carle ?'
1 Heaven forefeud, that it bode not a rising o' the clans, a plague
in the lowlands, or something to the Pagan who ruleth in Rome.'
' And so we mustn't haul up for Canty Bay ?'
' No, no.'
' And why?'
' The shore is watched, and the garrison of the Bass are on the
alert. If they saw our lights they might fire on speculation, and
alarm the hail country-side.'
' And the auld cove at Seacliff ?'
' Waur and waur still, Sanders !'
' How so ?'
' It is guarded by Captain Wyvil, with a party of Howard's foot.'
Deep oaths were muttered by the crew at this intelligence, but
he whom they called ' Father Testimony,' said :
' Then Craigleith it must be, or to sink the kegs somewhere wi' a
buoy-rope ; and you maun e'en haul your wind, Sanders heave
and weigh, get out o' this the moment the cargo is run.'
' I fully meant to do so ; but wherefore the warning, Father
Testimony ?'
'The "Fox" man-o'-war was off Fifeness, this morning '
1 Was that sail to windward of us really a king's ship after all ?'
1 Yes ; a hawk o' the Elector's.'
Again a chorus of oaths was uttered by the smugglers, who were
all Jacobites, so far as opposition to the laws went.
' She is heavily armed, and her captain is a Tartar.'
' When she altered her course, as if to overhaul us, my heart
went tick-tack, like old Mother Von Soaken's Dutch clock at the
Haarl Poort. But her crew must either have failed to see, or to
suspect us.'
1 'Twas an escape, for " were ye swifter than eagles, and stronger
than lions," as David said of Saul and Jonathan, she had overtaken
you.'
' Clap a stopper on your preaching tackle, old Testimony,' said
the skipper impatiently.
1 And now, captain, to land de bassenger,' said the Dutch mate,
coming forward.
' Passengers ! passengers !' replied he of the wig and unflapped
hat, in great trepidation, now perceiving, for the first time, the two
travellers, who appeared each with his sword at his side, his pistols
hooked to his girdle, and carrying hia mail, or small portmanteau.
'Wtiere, or how, in the name o' madness, got ye passengers, Sanders?'
20 THE WHITE COCKADE.
' At Dunkirk, Father Testimony at Dunkirk.
' Was it wise or beseeming to liae them on board ?' asked thd
other with great asperity.
' I dinna ken much about the wisdom o' the proceeding, nor do
I care either ; but they are gentlemen, who have behaved and paid
as such paid in good rix-clollars, as ever were picked up in the
Spanish Main.'
' If they land, they may fa' into the hands o' those you would
be loth should question them,' whispered the other, in a low, fierce
Toice. ' Keep them under hatch : knock them on the head do
with them as ye will, but land them not, I say, here, at all events !'
' By the hand o' my body, but you are as bad as the mate,' re-
plied the smuggler ; ' but landed they shall be,' he added, with
one of his terrible oaths, ' and in safety, too !'
' Do you ken the value o' your neck, Sanders Scupperplug ?'
' Troth, do I ! Zounds, man ! before I could seize a breaching
to a ring-bolt or becket a royal, I learned to ken that ; for even as
a biscuit-nibbler, under Captain Kidd, I served wi' a halter round
it. I never kenned a larned lingo, but I can prick off the lugger's
course on the chart ; I can handle the tiller as weel as the cutlass
and what mair is needed by me ?'
'But, Sanders if Gage, the English exciseman '
' Silence, I say !' thundered the other, ' and tempt me not to be
a greater devil than I am. I have a' the danger, and you mair than
an honest man's share o' the doubloons. Farewell, gentlemen,' he
added, turning to Lord Dalquharn and Mitchell, who had over-
heard a portion of this conversation, without in the least compre-
hending it, ' we part here, never to meet again likely but success
to you 1"
Scupperplug presented his right hand to each, and with his left
took off his old battered cocked hat as they descended into the boat.
' Pull quietly in shore, Vander Pierboom,' said he over the side,
' land then near the auld kirk on the rocks the tide is far out now :
' then pull hard for the craig, we'll need every hand when the
hatches are open.'
The time was now close upon the hour of nine in the evening ;
heavy clouds obscured the sky, and a thick vapour from the east
overspread alike the sea and land, most fortunately for the opera-
tions of the smugglers, whose lugger stood, slowly and unseen, past
the little town of North Berwick, and lay to, close by the north side
of Craigleith, one of the four desolate and rocky islets, which are
situated about a mile from the mainland. The others are named
the Ibris, the Fidra, and the Lumbay, and all are the resort of the
puffin or coulternib, the jackdaw and the black rabbit.
There is some fissure known only to themselves, the lugger's crew
resolved to conceal the cargo, while the small boat, pulled by Van-
der Pierboom and little Jules Leroux, landed their two passengers
at the place indicated by the captain, a long flat reef of rocks,
THE WHITE COCKADE. 21
covered by seaweed, which at low tide extends for several hundred
yards seaward, to the east of the old ruined church of North Ber-
wick ; and it was not until they heard the oars dipping in the
water, as the Dutchman and French mulatto boy pulled away into
the mist (the treacherous intentions of the former personage being
baffled in the hurl v burly of running the cargo), that the two forlorn
wanderers felt fully aware that they were at last on terra firma,
after a long and exciting day a day of anxiety, risk and peril be-
yond what they were quite aware of ; and they little knew, more-
over, that their troubles were only beginning.
CHAPTER V.
ON SHOBE.
' I understand you
And wish you happy in your choice ; believe It,
I'll be a careful pilot to direct
Your yet uncertain bark to a port of safety.
Margaret. So Bhall your honour savo two lives, and bind US,
Your slaves for ever !' New Way to fay Old Debts.
1 ON Scottish ground at last!' exclaimed Lord Dalquharn ; 'I was
the first to leap ashore, and so bid you welcome, Sir John Mitchell,
ere long I hope to be again of Pitreavie.'
' And I thank you, my Lord Dalquharn of the Holm,' replied
the other, lifting Ids little feather-bound hat with a politeness
that was not all jest, as he grasped his young friend's hand and
shook it with genuine warmth. ' Gorl bless the dear old land we
tread on the land of our forefathers and our forefathers' graves !
"lis thirty years ago since I stood on a Scottish hill-side or heard
the waves of a Scottish sen, Dalquharn ; but all the dreams of many
a weary day are not yet realized.'
' There are times for all things ; and the time for our long-hoped
for realization will come anon.'
' Ah, Dalquharn, I cannot describe to you, how my heart was
stirred within me, when on the march near Ter Tholen in Zeeland,
I came upon a broom bush, growing by the way-side, with all its
golden bells ! It made my thoughts, my heart rush home to the
green braes and the haunts and hills of my boyhood to many a
place I never more might see. Balmerino and I each plucked a sprig
and stuck them in our hats, and, egad, my lord, I think they gave
us more spirit than a horn of Skiedam, when three days after, wo
found ourselves under the cannon of Bergen-op-Zoom ! But,' lie
added, after a pause, ' we are our own lacqueys, having our cloaks
and mails to carry we are afoot; and now which way tend we,
for this house of Auldhame ?'
' Precisely the matter I was considering; and zounds ! but the
night groweth dark and stormy apace.'
22 THE WHITE COCKADE.
For some hundred yards they had to scramble inland, over great
and rugged masses of red sandstone rock, which the ebb-tide had
left uncovered, and which were slimy and wet, covered by tufts of
seaweed, star-fish, and incrustations of limpets. The lugger had
disappeared in the thick mist which had settled over the sea ; but
through the vapour, as through a curtain of gauze, there flared at
times a gleam from the ancient lighthouse on the Isle of May,
nine Scottish miles distant. There, on the summit of a tower forty
feet in height, a fire of coals was kept constantly burning by night.
This tower had been built by a humane Laird of Barns, in the days
of Charles I. ; but his unfortunate architect, when returning after
the completion of his work, was drowned in a tempest raised by
certain malevolent witches, who expiated the alleged crime at the
stake on Gulane Links.
A little to the right of the impromptu landing-place, between the
two exiles and the gloomy sky, rose the pointed gable of a ruined
church, upon a ridge of steep and insulated rock. This was the
fragment of what is traditionally called 'the Auld Kirk' of North
Berwick, of which the massive porch and the font, are alone re-
maining now. Then it was surrounded by graves, which year by
year the stormy waves of the encroaching German Sea have torn
away. Even the great slab which long marked the resting-place of
the Lauders of the Bass, and under which the good Sir Eobert, the
comrade of Wallace lay, lias lately been swallowed up by the ocean,
and the gothic vault in which lay the stone coffin and leaden seal
of some forgotten knight, ' Willelmi de Douglas,' has gone too.
The white waves were breaking wildly over the beach and amid
the graves of the old church ; the shore beyond looked black, deso-
late, and undefined in outline; but the two friends at last reached
the stripe of land that borders the Eastern Links, (or downs as
they would be called in England) where a high and grassy knoll,
still named the Castle Hill, bears the foundations of a fortress whose
name has long since gone to oblivion. The aroma of the yellow
flowers (crow's-foot and lady's-bed straw) which grow there among
the rushes and purple-heath bells, filled the night air ; the place
was intensely lonely, and no sound broke its stillness, but the white
waves climbing the adjacent rocks, or the pipe of the solitary sand-
rail among the brown sea ware.
' I have been at Auldliame in my boyhood,' said Lord Dalquharn,
' and I think I should know my way there ogain ; we are only
three miles or so from the place, and there, as I have stated to you
often, my father's friend, Sir Baldred Otterburn, a staunch old cava-
lier and true man, will receive us blithely and hospitably.'
'And our path '
' Lies eastward, by the old Temple-house of Rhodes, past tho
Uairlaw, the village of Castleton, and the highway that leads to the
ancient Hold of Tantallon.'
' I am glad you know our whereabouts BO well, my lord j foy
THE WHITE COCKADE. 23
Egad ! on being landed thus, we seemed not unlike two Eobinson
Crusoes, or a couple of those marooned pirates, of whom our late
friend with the euphonious name, told UB so many yarns over hi*
flip can o* nights.'
'Your pistols are loaded, I hope?'
'Yes and yours, my lord?'
1 Are charged carefully and flinted with agates ; they were a pre-
sent from the Count de Saxe at Dunkirk, so I prize them highly.'
' Arms are, unfortunately, necessary, even in our own beloved
land, for we know not what night hawks may be abroad ; but lead
the way, my lord.'
The two friends, each carrying his leathern mail, with his roque-
laure flung over his left shoulder, now struck into the highway,
which was bordered by hedgerows, avoiding the town, which was
sunk in silence, and darkness too, for not a light was visible at any
of its windows ; not a dog barked ; all was still save the dashing of
the waves on the rocks of the little harbour, and even these died
away as the travellers proceeded inland, feeling as they trod on,
with anxious, but yet with happy and hopeful hearts, that this was
but the beginning of a great end, for they were somewhat important
units in the scheme for organising a rising in favour of the House
of Stuart a rising, which Ihey well knew, was to take place in
the north, ere the summer of that year the memorable 1745
was past.
Erelong the road they were pursuing turned to the eastward, and
they found themselves again in sight of the sea, and of the dim and
distant pharos that flared in the night wind upon the summit of
the Isle of May.
They had barely proceeded half a mile in this direction, when a
man, carrying a lantern, appeared suddenly in front.
' Yoho, brothers stand !' he shouted roughly.
' 'Sdeath, but this is passing strange a footpad, and with a
light!' said Dalquharn, as he drew a pistol from his belt ; but Sir
John Mitchell, his superior in years and experience, quickly seized
his arm, for several other men, six at Isast, started from the hedge-
rows, and the blades of their cutlasses, and the butts of their pis-
tols, were seen to glitter in the rays of the lantern.
In short, the two gentlemen found themselves confronted, sur-
rounded and compelled to submit to a very humiliating interroga-
tion, the end of which they could not foresee.
' Who are you, sirs, that we find so close to the sea-shore, and
at this time of night ?' asked he of the lantern in a pure Euglish
accent.
' And harkee, fellow, who the devil are you, that dare to ask a
question so absurd ?' demanded Lord Dalquharn, haughtily.
' We are those who have the right to do so,' replied the other,
firmly and quietly.
' The right we are yet to learn that !' exclaimed the young noble
furiously.
21 THE WHITE COCKADE.
'Surrender we must search those mails you carry; if you are,
as you seem to be, gentlemen, it is strange to find you afoot here,
with your own cloak bags to carry," said the other, who had the
aspect and dress the sun-burned visage, the low cocked hat, the
peajacket, and loose canvas slops of a seafaring man. ' Sur-
render,' he added, placing his cutlass between his teeth, and very
deliberately cocking a large ship-pistol.
' Surrender zounds ! and in whose name ? ' enquired Lord
Dalquliarn.
'The name of the law, which we are sworn to maintain.'
' The law be ' Mitchell was beginning angrily with a hand
on his sword, when the Englishman said,
' In the name of the king, then.'
' Agreed we have nothing either to discover or conceal,' said
Lord Dalquharn ; ' I capitulate, provided you do not disarm ua.'
' Agreed, sirs for we may be under a mistake, after all.'
' "Tis a rascally press-gang, I believe,' said Sir John, as he blew
the priming from his pistol locks.
' We are not, sir,' replied the man with the lantern.
' Then who in the devil's name are you, and of what do you sus-
pect us ?'
' We are custom-house officers, who have all day watched a black
lugger in the offing, and we suspect you of having left her that is
all, my masters,' said a surly fellow, who had hitherto remained
silent.
For a moment the two friends gazed at each other irresolutely.
There was much for them to fear in falling into the hands of any
one in authority, and to resist might be dangerous, though the
Tacksmen of the customs and their officers, being chiefly English-
men, were most unpopular functionaries, and were not unfrequently
destroyed when opportunities offered. There were then no coast-
guard or preventive service, but the shore-masters, tide-waiters, and
other officials, were always well armed ; and those into whose cus-
tody our friends were now taken, had close at hand a few seamen
of the ' Fox' frigate.
At this time, every man who came from abroad, especially from
France, was an object of intense suspicion to the authorities in
England, and still more to those in Scotland, as he was supposed to
be infallibly a secret emissary of the Cabinet of St. Germain, or of
the Pope ; and, moreover, was not unlikely, if a Scotsman, to be
an apostate from, and enemy to that gloomy form of religion, es-
tablished by the hero of Glencoe, and secured by the treaty of
union.
Britain was at war with France, from whence they had just
come; hence Lord Palquharn and his friend found themselves in a
very awkward predicament, when seized by those custom-house
officials, who had been waiting and watching the lugger from about
Canty Bay and Seacliff, where she was usually wont to run her
cargoes.
THE WHITE COCEADB. 25
' I assure you, gentlemen,' said Lord Dalquharn, ' that your de-
tention of us is quite illegal '
' These mails '
1 Are merely our personal baggage a change of linen or so.'
'Then in that case you have nothing to fear from their ex-
amination.'
' Nothing !'
' You have come from abroad, I think ?'
1 We have,' said Dalquharn, with chilling hauteur.
' And were landed hy that lugger of old Puerto de la Plata of
Sanders Scupperplug eh ?'
'Yes "L'Etoilede la Mer," of Dunkirk but we were mere
passengers, lawful travellers.'
' You have papers, no doubt '
'Letters signed and vizzied by the conservator of Scottish
privileges at Carnpvere, and the British Ambassador what the
devil, fellow, would you have more ?'
' Many a pirate sails under false colours, gentlemen, so you must
come along with us. The admission that you have sailed aboard of
Captain Scupperplug, is almost a hanging matter in itself. But
where is that precious lugger now ?'
4 Afloat, I hope, amid yonder mist.'
'Much useful information that is ! But you must come with us
before Mr. Balcraftie."
' Who is he ?'
' The senior magistrate in the Burgh a sanctimonious old
Scotch Put, who will sift you in a fine fashion, so sure as my name
is Jack Gage.'
' Let us lose no further time, but go at once,' said Lord Dalqu-
harn, with increasing irritation, as they surrendered their mails
and roquelaures.
' An infernal scrape !' muttered Sir John Mitchell ; ' 'Sdeath, I
would we were well out of it !'
' And this is our first welcome home to Scotland to be taken
neck and heels, before some priokenred cur a canting, psalm-
singing Bailie !' exclaimed Lord Dalquharn, with irrepressible bit-
terness, as they retraced their steps along the dark road, towards
North Berwick. ' Our first night may be spent as criminals, iu a
Tolbooth by heavens, a Tolbooth, Sir John !'
They had but two things calculated to excite suspicion as to
their character and politics their swords, the blades of which were
inscribed with the words, No Union, and which had in the cut-steel
work of their shells, the letter S., for Stuart, marks by which
Scottish gentlemen of the Jacobite faction were wont to distinguish
each other at once, as readily as if they wore the forbidden badge,
the white cockade of lung James the white rose of York in
their hats.
26 THE \VHITE COCKADB.
CHAPTER VI.
BAILIE EETIBEH BALCBAFTIE,
' Leonato. I must leave you.
'Dogberry. One word, sir: our watch, sir, have, indeed, apprehended two
aspicious persons, aud we would have them this morning examined before your
worship.
Leon. TaVe their examination yourself, and bring it me ; I am now in great
baste, an it may appear unto you.'
Much Ado about Nothing.
PASSING by a wooded and sequestered lane, near the ancient parish
church of St. Andrew, a fane more famous in the annals of dia-
blerie than those of religion, as the reputed rendezvous of the
wizards and witches of the three Lothians, and where, in the days
of James VI., Satan was wont to preach to them from the pulpit,
the Excise officials, with their two prisoners, turned to the right,
nnd soon found themselves in the centre of the little town of North
Berwick, which then consisted simply of two streets, crossing each
other at right angles.
A quaint and quiet little place, its houses were chiefly thatched,
and had outside stairs, and picturesque outshots overhanging the
street on beams of wood and pillars of stone. It had been made a
royal bur-gh by Robert III., a port in the time of his predecessor,
and was once a place of trade, but when no one knows now. It
once possessed a castle, the site of which, as I have said, is only
marked by the green knoll overlooking the East Links.
'Had 1 taken the road by the Blackclyke, instead of the path
along the shore, we had escaped those fellows,' said Lord Dalqu
harn ; ' on what trifles may the fate of a man rest !'
' True, my lord, and of empires too !'
'Yes even of empires ; but for the Molehill the work of the
little man in black velvet who worked underground, a certain white
horse had not stumbled, and the Hero of Giencoe and Darien had
not died before his time.'
Threading their way in the dark among carts, piles of peat and
other fuel which stood in rows before the doors of the street, ere
long they found themselves before the mansion of Bailie Reuben
Balcraftie, a two-storied edifice slated with stone ; still conspicuous
by its round tower and turnpike stair, it stands opposite a building
which was then an inn or change-house, and bore the Otterburn
arms, creaking in the wind from an iron rod.
There were lights in the magistrate's windows. The massive
iron risp on the door was sharply applied to by Gage the excise-
man, and immediately on this a loud and nasal voice was heard at
a distance within the house singing a verse of the fifth psalm, from
Andro Hart's edition in Scottish metre, and quaveringly it came oa
the gusta of wind :
THE WHITE COCKADE. 27
'But let all joy wha trust in thee,
And still make shouting noise ;
For them tliou scent, let all that lore
Thy name in thee rejoice.'
' By George !' exclaimed Mr. Jack Gage impatiently, ' it it
shouting with a vengeance ; the crop-eared Covenanter will keep us
waiting here all night !'
Another querulous voice now gave out a verse of the next psalm,
and again several persons raised their pipes in mingled and dis-
cordant whines :
' I with my groaning weary am,
And all the night my bed
I ca'is-ed for to swim ; with tears
My couch I water-eJ.'
Then the discord of ill-attuned voices was heard for a time, rising
and falling on the wind that coursed through the panelled passages
and stone-paved corridors of the house, and mingling with the
chafing of the now flowing tide, on the rocks that gird the harbour.
A storm of pistol butts now clattered on the door, while the
excisemen and tidewaiters swore with impatience. On this, the
singing ceased ; the shield of an eyelet hole was withdrawn on the
inside ; an eye was seen to vizzy them carefully, while a querulous
and ill-natured female voice demanded
' Wha tirls at the pin ?'
'Open the door, you infernal Scotch witch open open in the
king's name, and say that Mr. Gage of the Customs would speak
with old Squaretoes with Bailie Balcraftie.'
Almost immediately after this, the ponderous bolts and bars were
shot back, the door was opened, and the magistrate himself, in an
accurate suit of black broad cloth, with enormous cut steel button?,
a vast wig, long sleeve ruffles, and huge shoe buckles, appeared
with a candle flaring in each hand. He displayed neither surprise
nor offended dignity at the noisy and untimeous visit to his house ;
but bowed and smirked with considerable obsequiousness and ser-
vility.
' Your servant, Mr. Gage a thousand pardons, sir, and a thou-
sand mair ! I fear you'll liken me to that lord who had charge of
the gate at Samaria, to keep you sae long at the door; but family
worship, ye ken family worship, above all earthly considerations,
must have place ; and, oh, but it is sweet and beseeming, too, so to
close a long day of hard and honest labour !'
' We are in danger,' whispered Mitchell to hia companion j ' this
man is a false villain I know it !'
'How?'
' By the whine of him.'
' But, heyday ! Mr. Gage, what in the name of the world and of
misrule brings you here at this time o' night ?'
' We have here two suspicious characters whom we fear are con-
28 THE WHITE COCKADE.
nected with the lugger we have watched all day. In fact, they
admit to having been landed by that notorious rascal old Scupper-
plug, not two hours since.'
' Suspicious characters smugglers smugglers, said you ? De-
frauders o' the revenue and o" their fellowmen ? Let me have a
look at the chiels bring them ben into the office, and I'll talk to
them, I warrant ! Smugglers, indeed, and at this time o' night !'
continued the magistrate, with growing indignation.
At the first sound of his voice, our two friends started and ex-
changed glances.
' Where have I heard, or where before met this man ?' said Lord
Dalquharn in a whisper.
' Send for the burgh officer and the Gudeman o' the Tolbooth,'
resumed the Bailie. ' We'll have them laid by the heels instanter,
Mr. Gage ; as sure as I am a pardoned sinner.'
' Harkee, sirrah take care what you are about,' said Lord Dal-
quharn, with a loftiness of bearing peculiar alike to his class and
the time ; ' for so sure as there is a heaven above us, I may requite
this, by hanging you at your own market-cross !'
The threat, or the tone in which it was uttered, were not without
a due effect upon the magistrate, who grew deadly pale, and darted
at the speaker a covert glance of wrath and spite. He hastily shut
the door and ushered the whole party into a low-ceiled room, in
the centre of which was a black oak table, littered with docquets,
books, and papers. On the walls, which were panelled with plain
white wood, hung charts, maps, bills of lading, and various printed
documents.
The advertisements of ' a weekly waggon to leave the Grass-
market of Edinburgh for Inverness every Tuesday God willing, but
on Wednesday whether or no ;* the salvage of a sloop wrecked at
the Yellow Craig ; and a cornetcy in Gardiner's Dragoons, ' pre-
sently quartered in the Canongate, and to be had cheap,' showed
the multifarious nature of the Bailie's transactions.
There was a large placard to the effect that ' the Spirit of the
Lord had appointed Reuben Balcraftie to hold forth to the God-
fearing folk of the Burgh, at 5 o'clock that afternoon, and, D.V., he
would do it, at the " Auld Kirk." '
Close by this hung the ' Orders of the Provost, Bailies, and
Council of North Berwick, to be observed by all constables in the
discharge of their duties to arrest all night-walkers, papists, sus-
pected priests, and Egyptians ; all persons, not gentlemen, wearing
pistols or daggers ; all swearers and banners in close and wynd,
and to commit them to ward in the Tolbooth.'
Now, as the magistrate seated himself in a black leather easy
chair, and set down the candles, which were in square stands of
oak, carved, turned, and mounted with brass, Lord Dalquharn and
Sir John Mitchell had an opportunity of examining the face of this
THE WHITE COCKADE. 29
personage tlie senior Bailie, who, in absence of that other poten-
tate, the Provost, was to decide upon their fate.
As Keuben Balcraftie plays a somewhat important part in this
our story, some elaboration is necessary in pourtraying him.
He wore a stiff solid tie wig, (of that fashion introduced by Lord
Bolingbroke), the curls of which appeared as if hardened into
rollers, while the pendant lumps of hair were tied at the end like
horse-tails at a fair. From amid this cumbrous and ugly substi-
tute for hair, his face looked forth, in singular repulsiveness. The
small-pox, a dreadful scourge in those days, the destroyer alike of
life and beauty, in his earlier years, had seamed the rugged visage
of Reuben Balcraftie, rendering him rather more hideous than even
freakish Dame Nature had intended him to be.
Fully past fifty now, his figure was thick set, and he had a con-
siderable stoop in his broad and muscular shoulders ; his eyes, dull,
pale-blue and watery, were always more busy than his thin, cruel
lips ; they usually had a film over them ; quiet, heavy, stealthy and
watchful, they were the eyes of a human vulture, and seemed to
lurk under fierce and shaggy brows of grizzled hair. He was not
exactly a vulgar man, being quiet in his general demeanour, but he
was of low extraction, as his great hairy hands, and huge feet
showed, for his father had been the Gudeman of the Tolbooth, and
his mother a gypsy prisoner a poor wretch, who had her sentence
of drowning in the sea, deferred for a time, that she might bring
him into the world.
He was undoubtedly a sharp man of business, a wonderful
arithmetician, but a noisy and ostentatious holder forth ou religion,
being, moreover, the ruling elder in the Parish Kirk. He was ever
restless in the acquisition of money ; yet his whole household con-
sisted of a half-starved clerk, an old and devoted house-keeper, and
a slip-shod servant girl. He was miserly, miserable, and savage to
the poor : he could drink hard, yet never was known to get tipsy,
and he gloried in, and gloated over the possession of several bonds
and wadsets, over more than one broad estate in the fertile Con-
stabulary of Haddington.
While he opened his oak lettron or desk, fussily spread a sheet
of paper before him, thriftily smoothed back his huge ruffles under
his wide square cuffs to keep them down-, and dipped a great
quill in the inkhoru to take Mr. Gage's deposition, Sir John
Mitchell, who had been eyeing him attentively, drew nearer to
Dalquharn.
' Ah, my lord,' he whispered, ' is the land that is so productive
of such worms of such sanctimonious wretches as this, worth
fighting for, or worth returning to?'
' Under favour, my dear Sir John, hypocrisy is not peculiar to
any country,' urged the young peer.
' But by all the gods, of late years, hypocrisy has thriven on
30 THE WHITE COCKADE.
Scottish earth, like a green bay tree, and seeins likely to do so,
world without end !'
To Gage, a frank, open featured, jolly looking Englishman, with
a ruddy visage and a rough flaxen wig, who stood twirling his hat
upon the forefinger of his left hand, waiting with impatience to
speak, the Bailie, pointing to his religious placard, said
' I saw you not at the preaching o' the word, Mr. Gage, when I
expounded this evening.'
'I had other matters in hand, off Scougal point ; but come, come
Bailie Balcraftie the night wears apace, and I should have been
trussed up in my hammock ere now. Stick to what I've come
about. You won't convert me, and I think my evil ways, as you
call them, are a deuced deal jollier than your sad ones,' said the
Englishman, laughing.
The Bailie raised his watery vulture-like orbs to the ceiling,
slowly saying
' Whatever will become of sic a sinner as you, is clean beyond
my comprehension ; yet a day will arrive, when you may remember
the blessed words o' the scripture, " Thou art my hiding place." '
' I wonder in what creek, cave, islet or other hiding place along
shore, those Scotch and French devils of old Scupperplug stowed
the stuff to-night,' said Gage, polishing his pistol butts, with his
great square cuff ; ' I warrant these gentlemen can tell us, if we
make 'em.'
The Bailie gave him and them a sharp covert scowl, and re-
plied
' Ye are all brands destined for the burning.'
A prospect under which the Englishmen seemed quite easy.
' As for your prisoners, Mr. Gage, they look as little like smug-
glers, as Egyptians or popish priests ; yet wha kens ; the vest-
ments, the trinkets and the cruciformed hammer o' Belzebub, may
be found in their mails. And so, sirs, you actually and unblush-
ingly admit having landed from the craft o' that nefarious loon
the Captain of the 'Etoile de la Mer,' of Dunkirk, for whose sei-
zure and apprehension the Lord Advocate, and the Commissioners
of His Majesty's Customs at Edinburgh, are offering a most
princely reward ?'
' We do, sir,' replied Dalquharn, while an evident change came
over the visage of the questioner.
'And last from Dunkirk ?'
' Yes, sir.'
' I trust ye are not spies of that hellicate King of France, Louis
XV., or,' continued the Bailie, growing more and more serious, ' of
that man of Moab, who calls himself James VIII., and that youth
of Belial, his pretended son ?'
Mitchell laughed aloud at this, as if really amused j but Lord
Dalquharn made a gesture of impatient scorn.
' Sirs, I deal not in words that are idle or unprofitable } neither
THE WHITE COCKADE. 81
do I smile much, and laugh, yea, but rarely,' resumed Balcraftie ;
' but hand me their papers, Mr. Gage,' he acKled to that functionary,
who, after searching the mails of botli prisoners, found only a spe-
cies of passport in each, but no letters or other documents.
These are our papers," said Lord Dalquharn, with a hauteur and
loftiness of bearing, before which the heavy vulture eyes of the
truculent magistrate quailed; 'they are duly signetted by the
British ambassador at the Hague, by the Conservator of our Scot-
tish Privileges at Campverc, and shew sufficiently who and what we
are.'
' By George, I believe the poor fellows are no smugglers or spies
either, but merely exiled Scottish gentlemen," they heard Gage
whisper to his men ; ' I wish we had taken the other road, and not
come athwart their hawse ; for if they be as I suspect, 'Sdeath, but
I wish them God speed!"
' Thou art a worthy fellow, my English friend,' said Lord Dalqu-
harn, as he shook the exciseman's hand ; ' I wish that some of my
countrymen had half thine honesty, thy John Bull courage and
generosity."
' My father was gunner aboard the Duke of York's ship, on
many a day when they were teaching the Dutch lubbers to take off
their hats on the high seas to lower their jacks to us, from Vau
Staten to Cape Finisterre, and I ain't forgotten that, sir I ain't,'
replied the Englishman, with a peculiar glance.
' I ay suspected you o' being a Jacobite in secret, Mr. Gage,' said
the Bailie, ' and now as sure as I'm a pardoned sinner, I ken it.
You two gentlemen are officers of the Scotch-Dutch ?'
' On the half-pay of their High Mightiness, the States General,
and late of the regiment of Brigadier Mackay, son of the Lord
Reay.'
' But how came ye by the way o' Dunkirk, a port now watched
by the British fleet ?'
'A. long explanation may be necessary,' replied Lord Dalquharn,
evasively.
' Your coming here aboard o' Sanders Scupperplug, is a bad end
to a cloudy beginning, sirs ; but whither were ye bound, when ar-
rested by Mr. Gage and his concurrents P*
' For the house of a friend.'
' 'Twouldna be likely, for the house o' a foe j but can ye not
name that friend ?'
' We were on our way to the house of Sir Baldred Otterburn of
Auldhame and SeaclilT.'
Another indescribable change came over the features of the
Baillie, and the friends who knew not how to construe the expres-
sion of his dull, watery, avaricious eyes, felt rather uncomfortable.
He seemed fidgety, and for a time sat pondering, while muttering,
' They may be massraongers, Mr. Gage Jesuits in disguise, for
a' that we ken ; those sons of the Prince of the power of the air
32 THE WHITE COCKADE.
of the crooked and slimy serpent of the roaring lion that goeth
about, seeking whom he may devour, take all manner of shapes.'
' Egad, sir,' said Sir John Mitchell, with a burst of laughter, in
which Gage and his mates joined ; ' I thought I was too old a sol-
dier to be mistaken for a churchman ; and as to my friend, Captain
Henry Douglas here, he does not look much like a Jesuit.'
' Beware, Mr. Balcraftie,' said Lord Dalquharn, whose wrath was
fast increasing.
' And why should I beware, sir I a magistrate a free burgess
and Bailie of North Berwick an elder in the Kirk, too ?'
' It seems to us, that we have all met before.'
The vulture eyes opened and shut, and then opened wider than
before ; a piteous expression of fear, mingled with spite and rage,
passed over the Bailie's face, and, perceiving his advantage instantly,
the young lord turned to Gage and said, with a smile,
' I hope we are not to be compelled to say where the black lugger
is just now, and where her cargo of brandy and sherry is being
landed, in care of Father Testimony ?'
' Undoubtedly not,' said Baillie Balcraftie, with precipitation, as
he rose from his lettron or desk ; ' the laws admit of no compul-
sion. And now, sirs, that I am satisfied that ye are captains o' the
gallant Scotch-Dutch, and bound on a visit to my worthy friend,
Sir Baldred Otterburn, at Auldhame, whither I shall have the high
honour o' conducting you to-morrow. I dismiss the charge, Mr.
Gage. I shall be answerable for our friends, if called upon. For
to-night they shall tarry wi' me, and to-morrow we will set forth
together ; and as a bit of advice to you, Mr. Gage, be not sae ready
to seize on strangers again : remember " thou shalt neither vex a
stranger nor oppress him, for ye were strangers in the land of
Egypt." '
' Egypt be blistered ! never was there, though I've been at old
Gib, and in the Levant with Bear-Admiral Byng,' said the bewil-
dered exciseman, as he and his party were hurriedly bowed out ;
and the Bailie, with a fierce expression in his stealthy eyes, and
something more like a curse than a blessing on his cruel lips, care-
fully bolted his strong and massive door behind them.
After a hasty supper, as the hour was late, the companions, who
were now the honoured guests of Mr. Eeuben Balcraftie, retired to
the chamber he had provided for them a double-bedded one,
having two of those oak-panelled recesses, called box beds, which
are still used in some parts of Scotland.
'Adieu for this night, gentlemen,' said the Bailie, as he deposited
the candles on a dressing-table, whereon were a bible and ' night-
cap,' i.e., a silver tankard of spiced ale ; ' to-morrow we shall set
forth betimes, after a broiled haddie, a rasher o' bacon, and a dish
o' tea, for Auldhame.'
1 Thanks, and a good night to you, most worthy host,' said Dal-
till WHITE COCKADH. 83
quharn, with one of hia quiet smiles ; ' Gad, we live in times of
change !'
' Aye, of a verity, as the preacher saith, " when tlie sun is bright-
est, the stars are darkest ; so the clearer our light, the more gloomy
our life with deeds of darkuess. Former times were like Leah,
blear-eyed but fruitful ; the present like unto Rachel fair but
barren." Aye, truly, we live in sinful and troublesome times.'
The moment he was gone, Sir John Mitchell secured the door
and placed a table against it. He carefully reprimed his pistols,
and placed them below his pillow. With the hilt of his sword, he
sounded all the panels and flooring, to assure himself there was no
secret entrance to the room. He then opened the window, to ex-
amine the means of escape, if necessary, and saw, that from (he
roof of a stable the ground could easily be reached, for a long life
of peril and exile had made him alike suspicious and cautious.
' Wherefore all this care. Sir John ?' i>ked Dalquharu.
' I have an intense distrust of our landlord.'
'And I have more than that a thorough conviction.'
' The canting, prickeared cur ! I can read in his face the lines of
an assassin.'
And I am convinced, or nearly so, that he, and the man in the
unfliipped hat, who boarded the lugger in short, that he and
Father Testimony, are one and the same person !'
* * * # * #
Luckily, only indistinct sounds reached the huge ear of Reuben
Balcraftie, which at that moment was placed against the door of
their chamber. Of their conversation he could make nothing ; but
as he glided away with a cat-like step, a bright but malevolent
gleam was in his cruel eyes, and he rubbed his great coarse hands
together with satisfaction.
'Jacobites,' he muttered, 'returned Jacobites, and bound for
Auldhame too! The work gangs bravely on I'll hae the auld
knight in my toils, and Miss Bryde too my bonnie bride that is
to be !'
CHAPTER VII.
THEY SET FORTH.
' May, sweet May. again has come,
May that freeH the land from gloom ;
She is in the greenwood shade,
Where the nightingale hath made
Every hianch and every tree
Kiiitf wiih her .sneet melody,
Sing J-H. join the chorus gay :
llml this merry mouth <if May.'
From the German.
UKDEH the sun of a lonely forenoon in May, the sea and land wore
their brightest hues, when the Lord Dalqulmrn and his friend set
3
34 THE WHITE COCKADE.
forth for Auldhame, accompanied by Bailie Reuben Balcraftie,
whose society they would rather have been without, and who
although he knew them simplv as Captains Douglas and Mitchell
strongly suspected that they bore a higher rank. They were pre-
ceded by his half-starved clerk, who carried their mails and roquo-
laures.
The shrewd Bailie, who had a secret purpose of his own to servo,
was not ill-pleased to have an excuse for visiting Auldhame, where,
as we shall shew ere long, he was not always a welcome visitor.
Ou this occasion, he proved a decided bore alike to Lord Dalqu-
harii and Sir John Mitchell, neither of whom knew how, in his pre-
sence, to introduce themselves under their plain titles of Captains
Douglas and Mitchell, to Sir Baldred Otterburn.
Noon was well advanced before they quitted the mansion of the
magistrate, who was detained in his office adjudicating on a case of
alleged witchcraft, though that crime had almost disappeared since
the union.
Eight fisher boats had come into the harbour that morning from
the herring ground ; two of these had netted over one hundred
crans of fish, the rest only averaging twelve crans among them. In
consequence of this unequal fortune, an angry scene ensued, and
the house of the pious and upright Bailie was beset by the less
lucky fishermen and their families, who alleged that their rivals had
succeeded by mere witchcraft, through the devilish spells of an old
hag who dwelt at Aldbottle, opposite the Eock of Fidra, and that
she had the power of driving the herrings into the nets of her
friends, by placing in their boats certain little stones which she
found in the ruined chapel of St. Nicholas, on the islet before her
hut,*
A general riot in the high street of the borough was the sequel.
Such doings had not been known in the country side, the sufferers
alleged, since the time when the Wise Woman of Keith, Agnes
Simpson, the Gyre Carlin, or Mother Witch of all Scotland, had
landed witli two hundred of her compatriots in cives and riddles,
and danced on the shore of North Berwick, prior to meeting the
devil in the church of St. Andrew, where they opened the graves
and desecrated the dead, committing many other enormities, all of
which she confessed to King James in the winter of 1590.
The enraged fishermen assaulted the town-officer, broke his hal-
bert and rent his livery, and the case against them having been
aggravated by the circumstance that they had drank some ale at
forbidden hours, they were all punished, some by being chained to
the jouging-rod in the tolbooth, put in the stocks at the town-end,
or whipped through the streets and expelled the burgh ; and it was
against the ale drinkers that our upright Bailie inveighed most bit-
* Similar accusations were made by the fishermen of Ardersier against
'Cluaigh. the Witch of Petty,' in the September of 1866. See Scotsman aud
Dundee Advertiser.
THE WHITE COCKADB. 85
trly, as he drained a good stiff horu of brandy and water, and
assumed his tie-wig, large cocked hat, and walking staff, which he -
termed ' a wand a sma' wand, sirs, such as David had, when he
went forth to warsle wi' Goliath the mighty.'
' Were you not somewhat severe on those poor fellows ?' said
Dixlquharn, who had been reflecting that if ever he found himself
in his place as a peer of the realm, such tyranny as this should be
curbed.
' Severe, Captain Douglas ? ca' you justice severity ?'
' No ; but it may be harshly administered.'
' Sir," replied the other, while shaking out his ruffles, erecting the
forecock of his hat, and planting his cane emphatically on the cause-
way, 'I am a bailie and a justice o' the peace in our constabulary
of Haddington ; it beseems not, that I should be cowed by a vile
mob o' fisher loons, and fear the face o' a feeble human creature, for
the judgment delivered is the Lord's, and no mine. I should res-
pect no persons in judgment, saith Deuteronomy, but hear the
small as well as the great. As a bailie, I must act wi' honest in-
tentions even as one in the sight o' the Omniscient, wjiose eyes
behold me, and whose eyelids try the children of men.'
These quotations he whined in an intoned voice, with his watery
eyes half-closed, and a self-satisfied smirk on his coarse visage, while
at every second step, he struck the pavement firmly with his cane.
' And you actually whipped and banished from the burgh, those
poor fellows, for drinking ale at the " Auldhame Arms ?" ' exclaimed
Sir John Mitchell, with surprise.
' Indubitably, Captain Mitchell ; and what for no, sir, but no
chiefly for that. By our law once, no man durst be found in a
tavern within a burgh, after the nine-hour bell had been rung,
under pain o' the tolbooth ; but that warning was given an hour
later by desire o' the Regent Arran's countess, after whom it was
named " the lady's bell ;" but now people are punished according
to their quality, for public drinking at untimeous hours. A nnble-
man payeth twenty pounds Scots, and sae on, down to a serving-
man, who payeth twenty shillings toties quoties, one half o' ilk fine
to go to the pious purposes o' the parish, and the other half to the
informer.'
1 And the poor toper, who hath spent his last penny on ale, and
cannot pay your fine '
' We punish in their person ; and so, sirs, I whipped those loons
forth the toun, when I might hae nailed their lugs to the cross.'
The appearance of the town piper (every burgh had one then,
with a small allotment of land, still called the 'piper's croft') put
a stop to the Bailie's monotonous talk, as the musician struck up
1 The Braes of Yarrow,' and played before them through the streets
so far as the Well-tower-mill, where he received a largesse from
Dalquharn, and retired bonnet in hand.
There in the bright suushine, was one of those features, which,
32
36 THE WHITE COCKADE.
in those days, and until a very recent period, made every roadside
horrible a malefactors corpse, half reduced to a skeleton, with the
black crows wheeling around and alighting upon it.
' Gad a-mercy !' said Mitchell, ' here is a gibbet, to show that we
are in a civilised land a land where justice, or more probably law.
is sternly administered.'
'A Border Egyptian loon,' said the Bailie, pointing to the corps*
with his cane, ' hanged by the lords of justiciary, for hamesucker
and burning a barn-yard at Dirlton. He asked for a cog of ale be
fore he was turned off the ladder, and drank to the health o" th<
popish pretender, the black devil, and King George.'
' I don't think, egad, that the old country is much changed sine*
I fought at the battle of Sheriff-Muir!'
' You have served, sir ?' began the Bailie, turning shnrply round
' In the Scots' Grey Dragoons,' replied Mitchell, haughtily.
'Aye, sirs, the country is no much changed even since that bluidi
day at Dunblane verily, it is a vale fu' o' slime pits,' whined tin
Bailie, ' even as the vale o' Siddam was, when the Kings of Sodou
and Gomorrah fled !'
The Bailie's voice ascended into a roar, as a beggar, one of tin
king s beadsmen, in his long blue weed, approached them silently
bub bonnet in hand. Sir John Mitchell gave the poor man a snuil
coin ; in doing so, he did not throw it as some might have done
but handed it with politeness.
' This gentleman is in poverty,' thought the quick-witted magis
trate ; ' none but those akin to beggary slip money sae deftly int<
n beggar's palm.'
Perhaps he was right, for the poor are usually the kindest to tin
poor.
Nearly a thousand feet above the road they traversed, rose tin
steep, vast, isolated, and volcanic cone of North Berwick, on whosi
summit many a beacon has glared in the war-like times of old. I
was covered on every side with the richest verdure, and rose amic
spacious fields where the young grain was sprouting, and the bird
were swarming in the thick old hedgerows. The sky was clear, anc
the atmosphere light and balmy. High into mid-air ascended tin
smoke from many a moss-roofed cottage chimney, and many a snu|
farm-house, secluded among ancient timber, in all the leafy glory o
BU miner.
Broad on their left stretched away for leagues, its waters ming
ling with the German Sea, the noble estuary of the Forth, with al
its green and rocky isles, the chief of which, with all its myriad gan
nets wheeling in the sunshine, and whitening its cliffs, towered tin
stupendous cliffs of the ' storm-defying Bass,' the giant fragmeni
of a former world the Bastile of the covenanters with a little rec
standard, just barely discernible, fluttering on its western ramparts
for it was still garrisoned by a liltle party furnished yearly by th<
Scots Foot Guards.
THE WHITE COCKADB. 37
In the offing the ' Fox ' frigate was visible about four miles dis-
.ant, standing across the estuary before a gentle breeze, but with all
icr canvas set, even to her royals, and, like a giant bird, with all its
vhite pinions spread, she shone in a strong relief upon the expanse
>f blue. Farther olf in distance the lug sails of a fleet of fisher-
wilts, marked the faint line where cloud and ocean met.
By referring frequently to the state of affairs on the continent,
inch as the armaments at Dunkirk, the siege of Fribourg, and in-
rcstment of Tournay, the wily Bailie sought to learn the views, in-
:entions, and politics of his companions ; but they seemed on the
ilert, and generally contrived to appear much more interested in
;ho local intelligence he could afford them : such as the Edinburgh
mail-bags having been found in the Tyne at llailes' Castle the
post-boy and his horse having perished when crossing the river at a
treacherous ford ; and then of a herd-laddie at Tyninghame, who
had been sorely tormented by an evil spirit in the shape of a
hoodie-crow, until released therefrom by the pious offices of the
Keverend Mr. Curfullle, the minister of Whitekirk. While the
Bailie gabbled of these things, Sir John Mitchell had become silent
and thoughtful, and solaced nimself by smoking a handsome silver
mounted tobacco pipe, which had been presented to him by His
Grace the Duke of .Berwick, whose aid-de-camp he had the honour
to be till that fatal day when the duke was killed by a cannon-ball
in the trenches at Philipsburg.
' When were you last at Auldhame, Captain Douglas ?' asked the
Bailie, still anxious to gratify his curiosity.
'Not since my boyhood, some years ago; and then but for a
short time. Sir Baldrcd has a son '
'He had:
'You speak in the past tense, Mr. Balcraftic!'
'Sony am i to do sae,' said the Bailie, in an altered voice.
' Dead is the heir of Auldhame dead ?' exclaimed Lord Dal-
quliarn.
' Even sae, sir ; he was shot through the head assassinated,
when riding home from the bank at Edinburgh some years ago. On
that dolefu' night, the spectre drummer was heard and seen in the
avenue of Auldhame by the Kevereud Mr. Curfuflle, as you may
gi-e duly minuted in the records o* the Kirk Session ; for whenever
evil or fate are nigli the line of Otterbum, 'tia said they have their
warn ing in that form.'
' This is most sad I heard not of it, for I was far away in French
Flanders,' said the young lord, in a tone of real sorrow ; ' one stout
hand one gallant heart less in the coming fray, Sir John,' he whis-
pered to his friend.
' lie left a daughter.'
' True, Bailie ; I remember the little girl, Bryde Otterburn a
flaxen haired romp a genuine Scottish lassie, with a wealth, of lint
white locks.'
38 fHE WHITE COCKADE.
' Even eae, sir ; but her locks are something between gold and
chesnut now. She is the apple o' the auld Baronet's eye ; but she
hath sair, sair longings after the leaven o' Prelacy and Episcopacy,
if not, as Mr. Carfuffle fears, after the Babylonian scarlet -woman,
despite a' that I, a usefu' friend o' the house, can say, though a
hopefu' and a pardoned sinner.'
Indeed, this woman in scarlet was the pretended bugbear, the
religious bete-noir of Eeuben Balcraftie's life, as she has been of
many a Scottish saint before and since.
After passing the ruins of Tantallon Castle on the left, they di-
rerged from the bridle path they had hitherto pursued, into a foot-
way through the fields, so narrow that they had, as Sir John said,
'to march in Indian file,' with the Bailie in front.
1 How conies Sir Baldred, a man on whom our friends in exile,
rely so much, to have dealings or acquaintance with such a scurvy
fellow as this !' said Dalquliarn in a low voice.
'Some money difficulty hath doubtless brought it to pass ; the
Bailie has hinted as much pei-haps wadsets to raise the wind, and
lay some devil in the shape of a creditor. Zounds ! I used to have
enough of such things in my time, before I went out in '15. This
fellow with the pale vicious eyes, seems a true blue cropear, as
scurvy a patch, as if he had sold Montrose or King Charles or had
danced ancle deep in human blood at Philiphaugh or Dunavertie.
I warrant him as genuine a Scottish whig as ever shared the com-
pensation gold at the Union ! A rare example of the liberal-minded
Scot of the eighteenth century Cromwell's curse on all such! It
is odd, however, that such as he, should be our first acquaintance
and guide hither, returning as we do, and on such an errand.'
Doubtless had IBailie Bale-raft ie adorned the present century in-
stead of the last, he would have been an active Sabbatarian, a ve-
hement opposer of Sunday trains, of bands, Botanic Gardens, and
all rational amusements, even to walking in the sunny fields on
'the sabbath,' and would have put little boys in the stocks for
daring on that day to whistle in the streets. lie would have en-
forced the tyrannical ' Forbes Mackenzie act,' as rigidly as we have
seen him do the nineteenth act of the first parliament of King
Charles II., held at Edinburgh in 1661 ; he would have foisted up
missions to the heathen ; shone on the rostrum at revivals, and ex-
torted money on all hands for the evangelization of Bokhara and
the South Sea Islands, and been charitable only in printed lists,
when his name appeared in full for the edification of his neighbour
and the glorification of himself.
The fires of a hundred warlike tribes have been quenched in the
gli-'iis ; the Highlands are a wilderness from Lochness to Lochaber j
but the great family of Balcraftie is still the most flourishing of the
Scottish clans !
After a walk of somewhat less than three miles, Lord Dalquharu
recognized the venerable mansion of Auldhamo rising before them
THE -WHITE COCKADB. 39
at tlic end of a long avenue, and situated at the edge of a steep
green bank that sloped downwards to the sea.
On the south, north, and west, a species of barbican wall defended
the house. The large gate in this enclosure was of hammered yet-
lau iron, and the portal in which it hung, was surmounted by a
kind of Palladian entablature with mouldings of t^e time of James
VI. Several oval loopholes for musketry perforated this massive
defence ; but long unused for warlike purposes, they were now
almost hidden by the luxuriant ivy, the clematis, and fragrant
honeysuckle.
The sudden apparition of an infantry soldier, in his red undress
iacket, very leisurely pipe-claying his belts in the sunshine, withiu
the open grating of the iron gate, caused our friends to change
colour visibly, and a deep smile to twinkle in the cunning and
watchful eyes of the Bailie.
' Hey-day what have we here soldiers?' exclaimed Lord Dal-
quharn, starting back.
' Even sae, my gude sir,' replied Balcraftie ; ' a party o' Howard's
Foot are quartered at Auldhame and Tyninghame '
' For what purpose ?' asked Sir John Mitchell, with some aspe-
rity ; and again the eyes of the Bailie twinkled.
' To aid the officers of excise in watching for smugglers, for many
a keg o' brandy and Hollands, that never pay duty to King George,
are hidden whiles, in the caves along shore, and even in that under
the Bass ; so Captain Wyvil and Lieutenant Egerton have been in-
vited by Sir Baldred to reside here, where I warrant they find them-
sels in clover.'
In fact, the appearance of Captain Wyvil's grenadiers of the
Kentish Buffs, marching down an avenue in their Prussian sugar-
loaf cups and Ramillie wigs, a little drummer in front, rattling on
the same drum with which he had beaten the ' Point of War,' a
year or two before, at Detliiigc-ii and Fontenoy, had been a source
of excitement at Auldhame, quite as great, us when my Lady Helen
Hope, the Countess-Dowager of lladdington, came, as she was wont
to do, once yearly, on a state visit, in a gilt coach, like a huge apple-
pie, with six grey horses, with white roses in their ears, a page of
the sirname of Hamilton on each step, Sir John of Trabrown as
her master of the horse, and six armed serving men, all of the name
of Hamilton, with the dexter-hounds on their sleeves, riding round
her.
Among the honeysuckle and ivy, which half shrouded the gate,
could be seen, about five feet from the ground, the jougs,* or iron
collar, in which refractory vassals were wont to be confined, and
above the entrance carved in stone, the arms of the family, three
otter's heads, with a chevron between, and on a chief azure, a cres-
ceut or, the coat-armour of the old Otter burns of Bedhall and Auld-
* From jugvm, a yoke.
40 THE WHITE COCKADE.
hame. To these were added the arms of Nora Scotia, the Scottish
baronetage haying been founded to promote the colonization of that
province.
CHAPTER VIII.
AN OLD SCOTTISH CAVALIEE.
'I saw the Stuart race thrust out nay more,
I saw my country sold for English ore ;
Such desolations in my time have been,
I have the end of all perfection seen 1'
Epitaph at DunMd, 1728.
PATTTFTTI misgivings crossed the mind of Lord Dalqnharn on learn-
ing that government troops were not only cantoned on the barony
of Sir Baldred Otterbnrn, but that their officers were his guests,
and had been, as the Bailie said, for a week past.
Why, or how wo.s this ?
Had Sir Baldred changed his political views and gone over to the
interests of one, whom he had hitherto deemed and stigmatised as a
foreign usurper ; or was it mere kindness and hospitality that led
him to offer Captain Wyvil and Lieutenant Egerton of the Kentish
Buffs, better quarters than the thatched village hostelry could have
afforded them ? t
If otherwise, Dalquharn's mission was a fruitless one, and he
had only lured his friend Sir John Mitchell to his doom. For some
moments a sickening palsy of the heart came over the young Lord.
At Paris they had Lade adieu to Prince Charles Edward Stuart,
who had come thither from Rome, for the purpose of putting him-
self at the head of the Due de Roquefeuille's baffled expedition ;
he was then projecting, and had confided to them, his intended
rising in the north, and they had resolved to precede him as a
species of avant-couriers to certain of the loyal noblesse in the Low-
lands, on whose adherence he could depend ; and on old Sir Bal-
dred Otterburn, a friend of his deceased father, the young Lord
Dalquharn of the Holm, chiefly relied, for assistance and advice.
As for Sir John Mitchell, thirty years of exile had made him
almost a stranger in the land of his birth. Those who were aged
men in 1715, were now in their graves, and the friends and com-
panions of his youth, had ceased to remember him in many instances;
in others, were dead, or changed in thought and action. Apart from
the painful doubts excited by the presence of red coats at AuldhanTe,
Dalquharn remembered the danger, that accrued to himself and his
friend, should the officers suspect, or detect in them, two attainted,
forfeited and outlawed men.
Mr. John Birniebousle, the elderly red-faced butler, who wore a
suit of black broad cloth, with vast cut steel buttons on his sleeves
THE WHITE COCKADE, 4,1
and pocket flaps, and who, like his betters, indulged himself in wear-
ing an old-fashioned bag-wig, received them with many reverential
bows, at the door of the mansion a door that was studded with
huge nails, as if it closed a prison, and was guarded, moreover, by
many locks and bars and loop holes for musketry.
' Sir Baldred was within, and would see them immediately,' Mr.
Birniebousle said, as he conducted them through the paved entrance
hall, which was vaulted with solid stone.
There in an auibre, also formed of carved stone, and chained to
the niche for security, stood an antique silver flagon, of rare and
curious workmanship, from which King James VI., the Scottish
royal pedant, had drunk a pint of burnt sack, when in April, 1603,
he passed by Auldhame gate, on his way to the throne of England ;
and after shaking hands with the then Laird, an aged knight, who
had served his royal mother well and valiantly on the field of Lang-
side, passed on to the castle of Dunglass, the residence of my Lord
Home, with all his retinue of five-hundred horse ; and it is reported
that as the king departed, the old Laird hid his face in hia bonnet
and wept, while repeating the ancient prophecy,
'A French wyfes the sonne will be,
Shall bruik all Britain round by sea.'
for now the time had come, and Scotland's kings were to pass away.
His grandson, the present Baronet, to whom the reader is about
to be introduced, was a fine example of an old Scottish gentleman of
his time, one who lived on his own estate, and farmed his own lands,
drinking beer and eating bread, that had been made under his own
roof; proud of his ancient ancestry because their shield was stain-
less, and they had all been loyal and honourable men ; quiet and
loving to his people, gentle to the poor, and faithful a la mart, to a
race of kings who were in exile, loving them for the heroic valour
and patriotic virtues of their forefathers, rather than their own
merits a cavalier full of old and glorious memories, who loved his
country not for what she was, but what she might have been : a
devout and simple believer in the right divine of monarchs, yet
sorely hopeless of ever seeing that fantasy triumphant.
Born in 1670, when prelacy with its reckless troopers rode rough
shod over ' a broken covenant and persecuted kirk,' as a boy he had
seen Claverhouse's Life Guards flying from Drumclog, and the un-
fortunate and maddened Covenanters plant their flag in vain on
Bothwell Bridge. But even as a boy his sympathies were with the
oppressors rather than the oppressed, who sold their king, for he
had been baptised by Archbishop Sharp, who was slain on Magus
Moor in 1679, and by desire of his father, an old cavalier of the
Montrose wars, lie was named Baldred, after the apostle and patron
saint of East Lothian. In infancy lie had been dandled on the knees
of the ' bloody ' Duke of Lauderdale ; in early years he had been
the friend and fellow-student of Andrew Fletcher of Saltoun : thus
42 THE WHITE COCKADE.
their sentiments were the same, and like the clerical acquaintance of
Sir Walter Scott, who for fifty years was never known to preach a
sermon, without having a ' fling at the vile incorporating union,' it
was a fruitful source of complaint I o our querulous old Scottish tory,
who seldom omitted an opportunity of committing all its promoters
to the infernal gods.
Of the three last Stuart kings, he could not in his heart approve,
but still less could he approve of their foreign successors, and he was
still willing to give the old race a trial again, for the sake of those
who had fallen in many a battle for Scotland, and who lay in their
graves in Dunfermline and Holyrood.
Tradition had rendered him more loyal to dead than to living
royalty, and many have been so in Scotland since. "Tis a wonder
to any one who looks back at the Stuart family, to think how they
kicked their crowns from them,' says the author of ' Esmond ;' ' how
they flung away chances after chances ; what treasures of loyalty
they dissipated, and how fatally they were bent on consummating
their own ruin. If ever men had fidelity, 'twas they ; if ever men,
squandered opportunity, 'twas they ; and of all the enemies they
had, they themselves were the most fatal.'
And most true this is of the Stuart Kings in England, or after
the union of the crowns.
It is Sir Baldred Otterburn of whom we read a quaint anecdote
in Wodrow's ' Analecta.' Chancing to ride through Jedburgh, when,
the whig magistrates were proclaiming the Orange Prince as ' King
William the Second of Scotland and Tuird of England,' at the Market
Cross, they asked him to drink Ids health.
'No, sirs,' replied the Baronet; 'but I will take a glass of wine
with you nevertheless.'
So a little round glass was handed to him, as he sat on horseback,
with his gold stamped gambadoes buckled to his girdle, his holster
pistols before him, and a long rapier hy his side.
' Aa surely, sirs, as this glass will break,' he exclaimed aloud, C I
drink confusion to William of Orange, and hail the restoration of
our lawful King and his son !'
With these words he drained the wine and dashed the glass from
him, but it rolled down the steps of the cross harmlessly and un-
broken !
A bailie picked it up, impressed his seal upon it with wax ; and
as its escape was deemed a great Presbyterian miracle, it was sent,
adds the Reverend Robert Wodrow, ' with ane attested account to
King William.'
Sir Baldred galloped off, followed by the jeers of all 'the prick-
cared curs,' as lie called them. The incident, alike singular and
ominous, added fuel to the fire that burned within him ; he joined
the Lord Viscount Dundee in the Highlands, and served with him
in the victorious, but useless campaign of KillycTankie.
Some there *were who averred, that when the post boy (a boy
THE WHITE COCKADE. 43
by tlie way, in his fiftieth yenr) was attacked on Hedderwick Muir,
on the evening of the 16th August, 1696, by two mounted gentle-
men, in bluck velvet masks, wearing, one a grey silk coat, with brown
buttons, and the other disguised in 'a white English coat, with
wrought silver thread buttons,' and with cocked pistols, carried off
His Majesty's mails, which contained papers of importance for the
Scottish Privy Council, and left the said post boy, tied by the heels
to his own horse some there were, we say, who averred, that
although one was known to be a son of the Viscount Kingston, that
the other was certainly the fiery young baronet of Auldhame.
A leg broken when hunting on Luffness Muir, had luckily pre-
vented him from joining the Earl of Mar in 1715, and so saved his
estate and title ; but since the death of his only son and chief hope,
he had become somewhat of a changed man, and invariably wore
black velvet.
Sir Baldred's heir had been coming from the bank of Scotland, at
Edinburgh, with a large sum in notes, which lie carried in a maro-
quin or scarlet leather case, stamped with the Otterburn arms. He
was accompanied by Bailie Balcraftie, and when riding in the twi-
light ut a lonely part of the road, where it crossed Luffness Muir,
then nn open and desert waste, they were attacked by footpads.
The Biiil'c narrowly escaped a bullet, as a hole in his beaver attested ;
but young Otterburn was pistolled from behind, and dying on the
spot, was robbed of all the money he carried.
The loss compelled Sir Baldred to raise a sum on a wadset (or
bond) from Mr. Balcraftie, and it was a singular circumstance a
very singular one, indeed that lie paid it mostly in the notes of
which the poor young gentleman had been plundered, and all of
which had come into his hands in tite way of business. Hence these
murderous foot -pds were supposed to be in the neighbourhood ;
but no one answering the description given of them by the indefati-
gable magistrate could ever be discovered.
On the night of this foul assassination, his widow, who did
rot Jong survive, declared that she heard the solemn sound of
the spectre's warning drum iu the avenue, while others declared
that the noise was produced by the hollow roaring of the sea upon
the rocks known as the Carr and St. Baldred's Boat.
Funeral expenses were then enormous, and when the heir of
Auldhame wts buried by torchlight in the chapel of St. Baldred,
near the seashore, there was given in the mansion a dredyie, which
lasted a month ; cooks and pastrymen were brought from Edinburgh
to provide for the guests, and all the pipers in the Three Lothians
came and went at their pleasure, drinking claret, ale and usque-
baugh, in such quantities, that John Birniebousle, the thrifty old
butler, danced on his bobwig in sheer despair. On the night of in-
terment, the funeral procession on foot and horseback was a mile in
length. In those days, a chief mourner, who failed almost to ruin
41 THE WHITE COCKADE.
himself, was voted a sorry fellow: for then as now, people lived for
appearances.
And now this good old Scottish gentleman, the sole hope of whose
existence was his charming grand-daughter, the orphan Bryde Otter-
burn, came forth to the door of the chamber-of-dais, holding hack
the old russet and green tapesti-y, out of which the moths were flut-
tering, mid a fine subject for the pencil of Vandyke he would have
formed^ as the visitors saw him, then in his seventy-fifth year, his
grave and handsome face furrowed alike by time and care, though
his dark grey eyes were clear and bright. He wore a dark flowing
cavalier wig; his long doublet and slops were of the days of the
revolution all of black velvet, faced, trimmed, and tied with purple
ribbands, with knots of the same on each shoulder; a white lace
cravat encircled his neck, with the ends drawn through his grand-
father's thumhring.
A broad shoulder scarf of purple and black velvet sustained his
steel-kilted rapier (for he was never unarmed, even at his own fire-
side), and his sturdy old legs were encased in black boots, square-
toed, with high red heels, and furnished with large silver spurs ;
and a fine picture, we say, he formed, as he threw back the arras,
and came forth, making three of those grand old bows peculiar to
his time.
This costume of black velvet and purple satin was his general
dress, though he varied it by wearing a crape scarf and black feather,
on the anniversary of the abdication of King James VII., on which
occasion, with somewhat childish loyalty, he would grind an orange
under his heel, just as his exuberance led him to give a joyous dinner
party, and drink a deep, deep stoup of prime old burgundy on the
10th of June, the birth of the old chevalier.
Sir Baldred bowed, and then held forth his hand, the flowing
curls of his black cavalier wig, which he wore in direct opposition
to the white perukes of the Georgian era, waving gracefully to and
fro as he did so ; and he managed them well, for, as a quaint
writer says, ' how to wear a wig was then part of the education of a
man of the world, and not to be learned in books. Those who know
what witchcraft there is in the handling of a fan, what dexterity in
the nice conduct of a clouded cane, will imagine the wits and gen-
tlemen of old did not suffer the wig to overshadow their temples ;
and many a country squire must have tried in vain to catch the
right toss of the head ; to sport a playful humour in those crisp
curls ; to acquire the lofty carriage of the fore-top, or the significant
trifling with some obtrusive lock ; and felt as awkward in his new
wig as a tailor on horseback, or a fat alderman with a dress-sword
dangling between his legs.'
THE WHITE COCKADE. 45
CHAPTER IX.
DALQTTIIABN'S MISSION.
'Yon rnn, my lord, no hazard.
Your repi'tntion shall still stand ag fair'
In all good men's opinions as now : ,,
For though I did contemn report myself
As a mere souiid, I still will IK- so tender'
Of what concerns yon, in nil points of honour,
That the iinniHCiilate whiteness of your fame
Shall ue'er be sullied witti one taiui or spot.'
A T CM Way to pay old Debts.
SIR BAII>BEI> met them in a corridor hung with portraits. There
might be seen Miss Brjde Otterburn's mamma, a shepherdess in
Sowder, with hooped skirt, a crook with ribbons, and her lambs
isking about her; and near it was a full length of Sir Baldred's
bride by Sir Peter Lely, as Diana with a crescent on her brow, a
short cymar looped at the right knee, a bow bent in her hand, aud
a view of Auldliame and the Bass Rock in the background.
The vulture eyes of the Bailie were now intently watching the
meeting of the baronet and his visitors.
'Twa friends o' yours, most worthy Sir Baldred, whom I have
had the high honour to guide hither," said the Bailie, hat in hand,
while perpetrating a series of obsequious bows that threatened, each
time, to cast his cumbrous tiewig at the feet of the tall old cavalier,
who made rather a chilling response. ' Captain Douglas and Cap-
tain Mitchell of the Scots Brigade in Holland, Sir Baldred.'
' They are welcome," said the other, presenting his hand with
sudden warmth to each : ' right heartily welcome to Auldliame
your humble servant, sirs. But you must have been long absent
from these parts, or have come from a distance surely, to require a
guide.'
'Aye mony ask the road they ken fu' well,' said the Bailie,
rather sarcastically ; but he cowered beneath an angry glance from
Sir Baldred.
' We are from Dunkirk last, where we saw a dear and mutual
friend, who commends himself unto you," said Dalquharn, in a
hurried whisper, as he pressed the hand of Sir Baldred, and they
exchanged a quick glance full of intelligence ; but quick though it
was, it did not escape the vuiture eyes, nor did the whisper elude
the large, attentive aural appendages of Balcraftie, who knew too
well that the mutual friend referred to, could be no other than
Prince Charles Edward Stuart, the heir of these realms.
'We will speak of our friend anon, and when more at leisure,'
said Sir Baldred, casting an unmistakably impatient glance at Bal-
cruftie, who, lingering irresolute, and cringing in aspect, strove to
light up his fold, malignant eyes, with a vapid smile.
' Captain Douglas is, I believe, au auld friend o" yours and o* the
46 THE WHITE COCKADE.
house o' Auldhame,' said he, still sifting and watching. Ifc was a
fine thing, a fact soothing to his malevolent spirit, and promising
future profit, to have two such gallant looking men as the strangers,
and perhaps the proud old cavalier too, who seldom concealed the
scorn he felt, in his power, so he resolved to be wary and watch closely.
' An old friend, Captain Douglas cannot be,' said Sir Baldred,
smiling, ' for lie is but a youth, and I am '
' Like unto Isaac, " being old and full of days." '
' To speak in your own cant, Bailie, the years of my pilgrimage are
verging on seventy-five now,' responded the other sharply.
' Yet, Sir Baldred,' said Dalquharn, in a low and mellow voice,
' I had the honour to be once before under your hospitable roof.'
' When ?'
'At that memorable time when Parliament directed the demoli-
tion of the gates of Edinburgh, after the affair of the Porteous
mob.'
' Just ten years ago come the next eighth o' September,' said the
Bailie, braving another wrathful glare from Sir Baldred.
'in that year I was here with my poor father and mother," said
Dalquharn, lowering his voice.
' And she, Captain Douglas,' said Sir Baldred, ' and she '
1 Was, as you may remember, nearly related to two unfortunate
gentlemen the Earl of Dumbarton and the Viscount Kenmure.'
' Great heaven, my do I ? is it possible ? Excuse me, Captain
Douglas, but I remember me now,' said Sir Baldred hurriedly, and
a sudden flush crossed his grave old visage, as he again took JJal-
quharn's hand a flush of pleasure at the recognition, oddly mingled
with anger, that one whom they dared not trust, stood by observant
of all ' she and your noble father are both dead I know that
much.'
*' Alas yes.'
'You shall be my guests you and your friend : Bailie, will you
oblige me by seeing Mrs. Dorriel, the housekeeper, and also the
butler? they would gladly confer with you anent several wants in
cellar and buttery ; we have other visitors just now, and a few kegs
of French sherry and brandy you understand were welcome
here. See to it at once, I pray you, and join us anon at dinner.'
With a deep smile on his inscrutable face, the Bailie, though he
knew that he had failed to discover who ' Captain Douglas ' really
was, withdrew to dispatch, without delay, his business with Dame
Dorriel Grahame, and Mr. Birniebousle, the butler, while Sir Bald-
red led his visitors into the charuber-of-dais, or great dining-room,
and carefully closed the solid oak door, and draped over it the thick
arras, which represented the slaughter of the famous wild boar of
Gulune.
1 Though young enough to be my grandson, you do me high
honour, my Lord Dalquharn of the Holm, in visiting my poor house
thus/ said the fine old courteous gentleman, as he almost embraced
THE WHITE COCKADB. 47
the young peer. ' Begad ! but thou'st grown a tall and proper fellow
dark and handsome, and like thy father, too ! Welcome, and all
the more welcome, as I guess the errand on -which thou hast come
but 1 fear 'twill be a bootless one. And your friend '
' Sir John Mitchell of Pitreavie and that ilk in Fifeshire ; a baro-
netcy of the same year as your own.'
' Gadso ! Sir John, your humble servant. I knew your good
father well stout old Sir William of Pitreavie, -whilom Chamber-
lain of Fife and Captain of Burutisland. Many a jolly runlet of
claret and sack we have drank together, to the confusion of the
Union and all its abettors, in Hughie Blair's tavern in the Parlia-
ment Close. Many a constable we've bilked there, and many a
tavern bully we've pinked and trounced together ! You were in the
army ?'
'First, under her majesty, the good Queen Anne, of glorious
memory, in the Scots' Greys, then commanded by John Earl of
Stair. You are doubtless aware, Sir Baldred, that on the night after
the battle of Malplacquet, I, when a mere boy in his teens, a cornet,
rashly challenged the Duke of Marlborough to meet me with sword
and pistol for coarsely reflecting on my country, while I delivered
to him a dispatch from Prince Eugene of Savoy. That challenge
wrought my ruin in the service! So my Lord Balmerino and I
went out with the Earl of Mar, in 1715, and since the ill-fated
battle of Sherili'muir, I have been, like too many others, a broken
and a lain! loss man !'
' Landless and homeless,' said Sir Baldred bitterly : 'how many a
noble peer and gentleman of that ilk have been so, since that fatal
time when England first relinquished her unavailing sword, to in-
sert a golden wedge in the foundations of our Scottish throne ?'
The old baronet was now on his hobby, and might have ridden it
for an hour, but Dalquharu said :
' We are, I trust, the heralds of a brighter era. Ere long, Sir
Baldred, his royal highness the Prince of Wales will land in the
Highlands '
' May the blessed God in heaven prosper him !' exclaimed the
old man, while his eyes filled with tears, as he raised Ins trembling
hands upward, and the deep earnest loyalty of those days, when
the sword and the gibbet were its test, gushed up in his true old
Scottish heart.
' In the north we can reckon upon the loyal clans to a man ! Of
the lowlands I am very doubtful. Of England save the border
counties and some friends in London I am totally so.'
' Unless we strike a good blow first on Scottish ground,' said Sir
Baldred, cheerfully.
' The affair of '15 has taught us some wise, but bitter lessons.
Little is committed to writing. We carry on our tongues, and in
our hearts, the instructions we are to communicate to you, the Earl
18 THE WHITE COCKADE.
of Kilmarnook, old Lord Lovat, and all on whom His Majesty King
James and tlie Prince of Wales can rely.'
' Call him Duke of Rothesay, I pray you, my lord.'
' One of the chief objects of tin's earlier mission of Sir John and
myself is to see about the establishment of a cavalry force, France
furnishing the arms, harness, and accoutrements, as we have been
promised commissions in the Life Guards of James VIII., so soon
as it has' been formed by the Lord Elcho.'
'By what fatality, my lord, did our long expected Dunkirk expe-
dition come to pass away ? The accounts given us, in the " Cale-
donian Mercury," were most mengre.'
' Prince Charles Edward left Rome disguised as a courier, for
everywhere the Elector had his hawks and spies abroad. Reaching
Paris undiscovered, he had a long audience with King Louis '
'Long, long have his family been the dupes of France! In all
ages that nation hath deceived them !' exclaimed Sir Baldred, em-
phatically.
'France seemed serious then; fifteen thousand infantry wero
assembled at Dunkirk, under the immediate orders of His Royal
Highness, while the Brest fleet, consisting of twenty-three sail,
manned by more than ten thousand seamen, entered the Channel,
under the flag of Admiral the Due de Roqucfeuille, to take them
on board. Spies soon informed the ministry of these measures, and
when ofi'Dungeness the fleet of Admiral Norris was in sight. Sir
John and I w.'re on board "Le Neptune," of 74 guns, commanded
by the Chef d'Escardre Monsieur de Carnilly, and saw the alarm
and confusion of the French at the superior aspect of the British
fleet.'
'In plain words, my lord, the Due de Roquefeuille turned tail
and fled ?'
' We got under sail at sunset, and stood down the Channel. That
night a dreadful storm came on, and we reached Brest in a sorely
crippled condition, while many of our transports perished witli all
on board. So the scheme of a sudden descent under the superin-
tendence of the Count de Saxe was completely frustrated.'
' All the better, sirs,' said Sir Baldred ; ' I like not this French
intervention in our affairs. If the House of Stuart is ever to be
restored to the British throne, I vow that I should like to see it
done by British hands.'
'And so thinks His Royal Highness !' said Sir John Mitchell;
' the fearless little boy, whom I, myself, have seen pursuing the
cannon balls as they ricochetted past the tent of the Duke of Ber-
wick, and who lately served in the campaign in Flanders, is now a
tall and gallant gentleman, the model of a prince, and fortunately
for those he hopes to govern, his temper and spirit have been
taught moderation by exile, for he has learned many a stern lesson
in adversity.'
' Ere winter be past, he has sworn to be in Holyrood, or in his
THE WHITE COCKADE. 49
grave!' said Dalquharn, in a low but earnest voice; his banner,
like that which Hontroso unfurled at Invercarron, shall hare u
crown and a coffin, as symbols that lie conies to seek one or the
other,"
' Woe is me !' said Sir Baldred ; ' I am old and poor ; I can
neither aid His Majesty's service or purpose by men or with my
sword ; but money he shall have, if that bloated miser Reuben Bal-
craftie hath it to give, even at fifty per cent. A cheque on our
Scottish Treasury, may, one day, repay it all ; if not, there was
mair tint at Sheriffmuir eh, Sir John? 'Tis a hard time for us
this ; I can scarcely get a penny of rent, in consequence of the
terrible cattle plague, which during the last four years hath swept
away all our Irerds. We have empty byres over all the barony,
and in the house a half empty pantry, as Mrs. Dorriel the house-
keeper will tell you. Bowie and Kirn are alike empty in all the
farm-towns, and our poor cottar folk have sore times, sir sore
times ; but the king is coming, and we shall have less taxes and no
more German wars ! Every man owes something to his lawful king
and to the land that bore him ; the talents of some ; the industry,
the gold, and the valour of others ! But as the old song says
'Cock tip your beaver, and cock it fu' spnisli,
^Wll over the Unrders, and gi'e them a brush ;
The Southrons there shall learn better behaviour,
And each true-hearted cavalier cock up bis beaver ('
At that moment the arras was withdrawn, the door opened, and
the Bailie entered, on which the three gentlemen affected to con-
tinue a very animated discussion on the appearance of the weather,
and the prospect of rain, though the May-day sky was without a
cloud.
1 Soho ! here come Bryde and her English cavaliers !' exclaimed
Sir Baldred, looking from a window (which like all the rest in
Auldhame, was secured from intrusion by a basket grating), as a
lovely fair-Inured girl in a blue riding habit, with a white liat and
long ostrich feather, dashed up the long shady avenue, on a splendid
bay, attended by two grooms in the Olterburn livery, and accom-
panied by two officers Captain Wvvil and Lieutenant Egerton of
Howards who, in their liamillie w igsand Kevenkuller hats, square
skirts and crimson sashes, worn in what was called the German
fashion (round the wuist), looked as stiff and odd as infantry officers
usually do, even in the present day, when mounted.
'Ah! they have been so far as Spott. God be good to us! It
seems like yesterday when I rode over to Spott-loan, on an October
evening in the year 1705, with Sir William Mitchell of Pitreavie
and my Lord Kingston, to see half a dozen poor old women burned
in one huge fire a pile of tar- barrels for witchcraft! We have
put dinner back an hour for those loiterers ; but JolmBirniebousle
shall now ring the house-bell.'
To find that his father's venerable friend was still true to 'the
4
50 THE WHITE COCKADE.
good old cause,' though certain redcoats were received as guests at
.Auldhame, bad lifted a great load of suspicion and anxiety from
the heart of the young and enthusiastic Lord Dalquharn.
CHAPTER X.
THE HOUSE or AULDHAME.
'Anldhame! the wall-flower's scented bloom,
Grow* lovely on thy turrets grey,
And. like the rose strewn on a tomb,
A fragrance sheds around decay.
No harps are murmuring in the hall ;
No armour glittering on the wall ;
For gone are knight and seneschal,
The voice of man is dumb I
And nought but ghosts, so gaunt and tall,
At dreary midnight come.' St. Baldred of the Bass,
THE Otterburns of Auldhame were one of the oldest families in the
constabulary of Haddington, though they took their name from a
place which is now merely a farm at Longfbrrnacus in the Merse;
but the race could trace themselves into the remoter ages of Scot-
tish history ; and Sir Baldred was fond of boasting over his flagon
of Burgundy or pint of burnt-sack ; that Allan Otterburn had been
secretary to Murdoch, Duke of Albany, when James I. was crowned
at Scone ; and that, in the time of James II., Nicholas Otterburn
of that ilk was ' Clericus Rotolorum Kegni Nostri ;' and he never
failed to remember Sir Adam Otteiburn of Auldliame, who was one
of the fir-t filteen senators of the College of Justice, and who, in
1544, was Provost of Edinburgh, which he valiantly defended
agninst the English till it was in flames in eight places, repulsing
them at. the cannon's irouth ; for be inherited all the valour of his
father, who fell at Flodilen.*
Overlooking the surrounding pea from its steep green slopes, in
view of picturesque and rugged Dunbar, the towering Bass and
Tantullon on its precipitous cliffs, that rise like ribs of bronze from
waves of snowy foam, Auldhame, though not built for a long
deft-nee, unlike most of our old Scottish mansions, had never been
assailed save once, when General Monk's rannoniers, on their way
to attack the castle of Tanfallon, fired a few twelve-pound shot at
the bnrb can wall, in a spirit of mere mischief: and Sir Baldred had
heard his mother tell, with mingled wrath and fun, 'how the rrop-
eared Puritans of England, in their steep-crowned hats and falling
collar-bunds, calves' leather boots and russet doublets, robbed the
hen-roosts, and drained the cellars, and sung psalms with the
I'tchen wenches ; but they did no more ; for Cromwell's brave fel-
lows like himself behaved very well while in Scotland.
Still more unlike our feudal mansions, the annals of Auldhame
* Vide Haig and Bruntou.
lllE WHITE COCKADE. 51
were darkened by no memorial of violence, treachery, or crime.
The family liad never been wealthy enough, or sufficiently powerful
to lake much share in the great, desperate, and, bloody game of po-
litical parties, which was for ever being played in Scotland, till the
rapid progress of events, and the abolition of their hereditary juris-
dictions, in 1747, saved the land from its chief curse, the intrigues
of a degraded, envious, grasping, venal, and treacherous nobility ;
thus, no feud, or raid, or midnight foray, no deed of blood, except
one in war, cast a shadow on the hospitable hearth of the Otter-
burns of Auldhame.
The family had a death-warning, so local gossips say, in the shape
of a spectre-drummer, who beat round the house, up the long shady
avenue, or along the solitary sea-shore at midnight, ' when fate was
nigh the line of Otterburn ; and this was alleged to have been the
case, ever since Sir Nicholas, who fell at Flodden, slew in cold blood,
three days before the battle, a drummer of the Lord Surrey's army.
The corbelled turrets at the angles of the walls were meant more
for decoration or utility than resistance : yet each had an arrow-hole
iii its window-sill, and the steep roofs of grey slabbed stone were
thickly spotted with green lichens, which gave a tone of venerable
antiquity to the whole edifice.
With its gablets covered with scutcheons and initials, the old
mansion formed a heraldic history of the alliances of its successive
inmates, cut in solid stone, and in several places appeared the fess-
clieque, for Lady Jean Stuart, daughter of John, third Earl of
Athol, the wife of Jolm Otterburn, who carried the king's banner
at Solway Moss.
Many a family festival, kept as such festivals were only kept, in
the hearty rough old times many a Hallow eve, with its tales of
witches and glamour ; many a frosty yule, with its green holly
branches and red berries, and many a new year's feast, when the
snow lay deep on the far stretching Lammermuirs, and the steep
slopes of Dunpender ; many a marriage with its jollity ; many a
birth with all its hopes and tenderness, and many a death, with its
noisy dredgie, and its long funeral torchlight procession, have those
old walls witnessed.
Some little conspiracies too, as when John Otterburn was official
of Lothian in 14-77, and the ambassador of Pope Julius II. came to
wheedle James IV. to send troops to the Italian wars ; and in much
more recent times, all Haddingtonshire knew, that there was a
mighty burnishing up of old holster pistols and snap-lock muskets,
and that many a blunted pikehead and notched broadsword were
put on the whirring grindstone, otf that memorable night in the
March of 1708, when the Chevalier de Fourbin, the Marechal Due
de Matignon, King James VIII., with the gallant Irish brigade and
French troops, to the number of fifteen thousand bayonets, were all
off the Red Head of Angus, and half the money for which Scotland
was sold, lay yet in the Castle of Edinburgh !
42
52 THE WHITE COCKADE.
The quaint old garden, with its formal grass walks and high yew
hedges, stone terraces, and leaden gods and goddesses, were stocked
with herbs by the famous Holyrood seedsman, Millar of Craigan
Tinuie, less because they were of the best Dutch kind, than because
he, worthy Quaker, was hereditary master gardener to the King of
Scotland ; for Sir Baldred was loyal even to the carrots and turnips
which garnished his platter of Bass-fed mutton ; but Miss Bryde's
flower parterres suffered sorely from the cold blasts of the east, or
as the gardener was wont to stigmatise it, " the Hanoverian wind ;"
for Sir Baldred affirmed, that it had blown over the German sea,
more keenly than ever, since the accession of the House of G-uelph .
In defiance of the lord advocate, many engravings of " the king
owre the water," and of his family, with all their royal titles below,
were to be found in the rooms of Auldhame.
Westward of the ancient gate by which Lord Dalquharn and Sir
John Mitchell approached the mansion, there was then a grove of
giant trees, the remnant of one of those old forests wherein our
hardy ancestors hunted, perhaps, before the world was redeemed,
and when its shades formed the home of the Coille-donean or men
of the woods. Now, it was locally known as the Deil's Loan
(Anglice, Devil's-lane), for there his satanic majesty was alleged to
promenade on certain gloomy evenings, when the sky was black and
lowering, and the sea-mews fled inland ; and his terrible presence
was always heralded by loud and angry gusts of wind, so stormy
that they frequently laid flat some of the ancient trees, tore the
thatch from the cottage roofs, rent the cabers from the walls, and
hurled the waves in wild tumult against the ruins of the ' auld
kirk' at North Berwick, at each recession, sucking the dead from
their graves, to strew their bones upon the beach.
Then ' Auld Mahoun,' was known to be at his trysting-place, and
more than one ill-favoured old woman, iu the hamlets of Tyning-
hame and Auldhame, was averred to be waiting to receive him and
to obey his commands to work mischief by land and sea.
The chamber-of-dais, or dining-room, wherein Sir Baldred now
spent many an hour, telescope in hand, watching the passing ships
(chiefly that cruising hawk of the Elector's the ' Fox' frigate), as he
was too old for much out-of-door exercise, and had altogether relin-
quished hunting, was carpeted with rush- work ; the recessed win-
dows had velvet cushions on the stone seats, and these were covered
with pretty needlework by Bryde'e industrious little fingers. A
large iron grate stood on a square stone block, within the wide fire-
place, on each side of which were two cai-yatides of Egyptian aspect,
with quiet, solemn and stupid faces, supporting a great lintel, in-
scribed,
Sanct. 13alBrcB bits ?is
a legend which the Reverend Mr. Aminadab Carfuffle, of White-
kirk, and Baillie Balcraftie, had more than once hinted the cxpe-
THE WHITE COCKJU>E. 53
diency of obliterating, as savouring of popery and the scarlet
woman ; but Sir Baldred had once sworn in his cups, that ' the
loon who defaced a letter of it, should be nailed by the lugs to the
outer gate !'
The ceilings were of that delicate white pargetted plaster work,
so common in Scottish mansions which hare been repaired during
the time of James VI. ; and a cornice of alternate lions and unicorns
passant, can still be traced on the time-worn walls.
There hung the suit of tempered plate armour, with the two-
handed sword and barred helmet of Sir Adam Otterburn, who, as
we have already stated, so stoutly defended the Scottish capital,
when the warlike Earl of Hertford landed with the savage orders
of his master, the Royal Blue-Beard, ' to iitterly raze it, and to
spare no living thing nor woman nor youngling, nor even the
household dogs ;' but who was driven down Leith Wynd, faster
than he came up, leaving nearly all his culverins, sakers and other
brass cannon, behind him ; and though he ultimately burned the
city, these were long after shown in the castle of Edinburgh as
trophies of the war of 1544.
Opposite the armour hung a full length of Sir Baldred, in the
then uniform of the royal company of archers, a tartan coat faced
with white, a white silk scarf, a blue bonnet, with a St. Andrew's
cross above his black cavalier wig ; for he had, in latter years, been
a crack shot among that remarkable body, into which none were
admitted save known adherents of the House of Stuart, as their
real object was to learn openly the use of arms without suspicion,
and hence this chartered company of bowmen, was merely a secret
school to educate officers for the Jacobite cause, though in the
happier reign of Victoria, it figures as ' The Queen's Body Guard
for Scotland. 1
CHAPTEE XL
BRTDE OTTEBBUBN.
' How oft in musing mood ray heart recalls,
From grey-beard father Time's oblivious halls,
The modes and maxims of my early day,
Long in those dark recesses stow'd away;
Drags once more to the cheerful realms of light
Those buckram fashions, long since lost in night,
And makes, like Endor's witch, once more to rise
My gorgeous graiidames to my raptured eyu 1'
Salmagundi.
WHILE the sunset of a bright May evening, streaming over the fer-
tile fields and waving woodlands, came through the toll windows of
Auldhiuue, and lighted up gaily the picturesque old chamber-of-
dais, dinner was served there, and with the last clang of the great
copper bell that dangled from one of the gables without, Sir Bald.-
54 THE WHITE COCKADE.
red and his guests sat down to a sumptuous and varied feast, the
presiding queen and goddess of which was his grand-daughter, Miss
Bryde Otterburn, who had just arrived from a gallop with the two
English visitors, and now appeared with, her natural blooin and
radiance, greatly enhanced by exercise.
When at Auldhame ten years ago, as a mere lad (a time and
visit concerning which the curious Bailie Balcraftie resolved to in-
quire in other quarters), Lord Dalquharn had left Bryde Otter-
burn a little flaxen-haired girl, who nursed a waxen doll, gathered
flowers by the wayside, and shells on the sea-shore. Now he found
her a full-grown belle of twenty. Ten years had made a wonderful
difference in them both !
To please the deceased Lady Dalquharn, who was her mother's
dearest friend, she had been called after St. Bryde, of Kildare, the
ancient patron of the house of Douglas, hence her quaint name ;
and for this trifling circumstance, as well as certain traits of char-
acter, chiefly her gay and happy spirit, poor Bryde was rather
shall we call it ' tabooed ' by the more rigid ladies of East Lothian,
her family having always had rather vague ideas of Presbyterianism,
with decided leanings towards Prelacy.
Her eyes and hair were exactly of the same chesnut hue the
former very soft, but clear and deep : the latter very silky and rip-
ply. Her manner was animated, and though her features were not
regular, she possessed the ' best essence of beauty expression,' for
her clear hazel eyes were full of intelligence, always varying, but
ever gentle, winning, and feminine.
From the colour of her eyes, and their long dark lashes, some
might have called Bryde Otterburn a brown beauty, though she had
a wonderful brilliance and fairness of complexion. Some there were
who thought her laughing, good-humoured mouth a little too large
for the rest of her soft features ; but none could deny the cherry
tint of her beautifully cut lips.
Bryde had been well educated, according to the ideas of the time
in Scotland, having been boarded with Madam Straiton, a fashion-
able ' mistress of manners,' in the Canongate of Edinburgh, whose
house adjoined that of His Grace of Queensberry, where she had
shared the society of the Earl of Haddington's grand-daughters, the
Ladies Rachel and Grizel, afterwards Countess of Stanhope ; and
where, with several other demoiselles of good family, she had been
taught to dance the minuet and other measures, how to carry her
vast hoop and long train, to sing the songs of Mr. Allan Eamsay's
1 Tea Table Miscellany,' to play on the virginals or spinnet, to paint
on satin, to make wax fruits, and filigree work of gilt paper ; in
addition to which accomplishments, she had also been taught spin-
ning and cookery, and how to oversee the pantry and brewhouse,
like the noble duine, her mother, before her.
In fact, it was to his darling grand-daughter Bryde, that the con-
fiding old Laird of Auldhame gave almost the entire charge of his
THE WHITE COCKADE. 55
property in many instances ; certainly the whole control of his
household, the care of his tenants, and of the poor in the hamlet, so
Bryde had her pretty little hands quite full, you may be assured ;
and a lively time she and old Dorriel Grahame, the housekeeper,
had of it, when the kain (or tribute) was collected from the tenants,
such as a score of meadow geese on old Michaelmas day, and as
many fat hens on Eastern's Even, before Shrove Tuesday.
On this day at dinner, Bryde's beautiful soft hair was unpow-
dered, and in all ita natural glory, fell rippling over her shoulder?,
from under one of those tiny lace mob-caps, which were then in
fashion. A blnck satin apron, with a ruche of white ribband round
it and round the pocket-holes, formed an important portion of her
attire ; but even the long stomacher and enormous hoop fardingale
under her blue silk dress (the breast and flounces of which were
covered by innumerable little knots of white ribband) were unable
to spoil the grace and beauty of her form.
Among the men of those days the hoop was objected to, quite as
much as the crinoline of more recent times ; but it also had its
defenders, and among others the gentle Allan Ramsay, who says :
' If Nelly's hoop be twice as wide,
As her two pretty legs can stride ;
What then t will any man of sense
Take umbrage or the least offec.ce?
' Do not the handsome of our city,
The pious, chaste, the kind and witty,
AY ho can afford it, great and small,
Regard a well-shaped fardingale V
A very housewife-like bunch of keys hung at her chatelane, and
with them a silver pomander ball, perforated by small holes to let
out the scent. All her ornaments were chiefly valued because they
had been her mother's : an etui and a little round, embossed gold
watch, a cut-steel set of mosaics, necklet, bracelets, and girdle of the
time of Louis Quatorze.
Sir John, simply known as yet by all save his host and hostess as
Captain Mitchell, handed her to dinner, and sat by her side. Dal-
qulinrn sat near Sir Baldred, and the other seats were occupied by
Bailie Balcraftie and the two English officers, who were both hand-
some, pleasant, and gentlemanly men, though the Jacobite emissaries
could very well have dispensed with their presence.
Captain Mannaduke Wyvil, the senior in years and rank, was the
beau ideal of a suave, polished, and good-humoured English officer,
lie had seen much of the world, and was the eldest son of Squire
AVyvil. of Hurstmonceaux, in the county of Salop. He had a slight
halt in his gait, having been wounded at Foutenoy in the preced-
ing year.
Talbot Egerton, his subaltern, was a Londoner, somewhat etourdi
in his bearing, not liking the Scots much in fact, perhaps, hating
them, like every ' true-born Englishman ' of his time ; but ho was
56 THE WHITE COCKADE.
well enough bred to keep his opinions entirely to himself, moreover
the national acrimony of future years had not been developed by
Wilkes, the North Briton, and the scurrility of Churchill's provin-
cial pastorals.
They wore their uniform (which thtm no military man ever went
without, even when on half- pay), the ample, flowing, and richly
laced coats of the Kentish Buffs, with flap waistcoats, and knee-
breeches, both of buff-coloured silk. Their white and well-pow-
dered wigs were of the regimental pattern ; and to these gentlemen
of the sword, Sir Baldred had simply introduced his secret visitors
as 'Captains Mitchell and Douglas friends of mine, fresh from
Holland, after vanquishing the French and the buxom toasts and
beauties of Haarlem and Amsterdam.'
Captain Wyvil and Sir John soon fraternised as old soldiers, who
had tasted salt water and smelled gunpowder, and they courteously
exchanged snuff-boxes ; but Egerton, who affected to be somewhat
of a beau, or blood, the 'fast man ' of a very slow age, eyed Dalqu-
harn distrustfully and coldly, and doubtless he had good reason.
For the entire past week in Auldhame lie had been the favoured
cavalier of Miss Bryde Otterburn, and had her society all to liim-
self ; but now this stranger in the green frock, with his fair hair
queued back by a blue ribband this Captain Douglas, who had
dropped suddenly among them, as if from the clouds, engrossed all,
or nearly all her attention ; and to make matters worse, they seemed
quite old friends, with ample and mutual recollections of a former
intimacy.
Though the conversation of this little dinner party was general,
the Bailie was reserved and watchful, with his pale watery eyes
usually fixed on Miss Otterburn and Dalquharn, while his host eyed
him grimly, and thought
' Egad ! in my young days, such a carle as Reuben Balcraftie
must have drunk his thin ale out of a pewter stoup below the salt ;
now, sink him ! he drinks claret and sherry out of well cut crystal,
at the same board with his betters.'
Sir Baldred asked a blessing ; he was afraid to let the Bailie (or
' Swivel-eyes,' as Mr. Egerton called him) do so, lest the viands
should be cold, ere he had relieved, by a long out-pouring, his
thankful spirit ; and then the meal proceeded briskly, old Birnie-
bousle, the butler, in his bob wig, and several powdered liverymen,
being in attendance. Mr. Birniebousle, who wore hodden grey in
general, was attired in his holiday suit of black broadcloth.
Sir Walter Scott was quizzed by an English critic, for ' always
feeding his heroes well,' but it must be borne in mind that dinners
a la Russe, and of kickshaws, were unknown a century ago in Scot-
land and in England too.
Before Bryde towered a great pasty of venison stalked in Bin-
ning Wood, and at the lower end, was a gallant grey salmon from
THE WHITE COCKADE. 57
the Tyne : on one side a capon with pease-pottage ; on the other, a
steak pie of dainty mutton, esteemed all the more for being fed on
the Island of the Bass ; then the second course consisted of fried
sweet-breads, a platter of roasted powts, or young muir fowl, a jug-
ged hare and fricasseed rabbits, with custard pies and puddings ;
while sherry, port, claret, and brandy were all going round the
table pell niell : and there was present one small dish which excited
universal comment potatoes a strange root introduced from Ire-
land into East Lothian, only four years before, by Hay, of Aber-
lady, as a garden rarity, and sent as a present from him to Auld-
haine himself!
' Salmon are unco' scarce in the Tyne, Auldhame,' observed the
Bailie.
1 Everything hath been so, since the Union,' said Sir Baldred ;
' but anent the salmon, the seals have been swimming about the
river mouth, and that is the chief reason. "Odsheart ! I know the
Tyne well, and have fished every foot of it, from the Firth up to
Middleton Muir, Bailie, thirty good Scottish miles ; but these days
are over with me now. I've twinges of rheumatism in the leg
which I broke in the year '15, when rushing my horse at a feal-
dvke. "Sdeath ! I protest, I don't think that dour auld carle, An-
drew Brown of Dolphiugton, though a great medicinar in his time,
set that same leg right. He bled me like a sheep, I can remember,
and gave me a powder, pulverised from the moss that grew on a
human skull in his library ! Hia lodging was then opposite the
mint, in the Cowgate, a genteel, but rather busy thoroughfare.
Ugh ! how I wearied of my sojourn there, till I came home by easy
stages in my Lady Uaddington's glass coach. Pass round the wine,
John Captain Wyvil's glass is quite empty.'
While the dinner proceeded, Dalquharn and Bryde were talking
of old times, or rather ll.eir younger days, and of some of his ad-
ventures since, all of which were full of interest to her; so poor
Mr. Egerton found that ho quite failed to attract her by an anec-
dote about ' Sparkish and Sir Timothy Tawdry of ours, who in an
eating-house at Charing Cross, met with two subalterns of Barrel's
regiment, who had just come home after Fontenoy ; that a quarrel
ensued about kissing the barmaid a rosy-cheeked wench, and it all
ended in a game of sharps yes, begad, madam by the rule of
steel, at the back of Montague House, and in both those bucks of
Barrel's, being pinked and taken home on shutters by the watch !
and so forth.
Wyvil and Mitchell were fighting Malplaquet over again, and
snuffing prodigiously over their reminiscences ; so Egerton was re-
duced to endure the conversation of Bailie Balcrai'tie, whom he
only half understood, and wholly detested, and who bored him by
elaborate details of the great rinderpest which was then destroying
the cattle in all parts oi' Britain, and which he called ' a plague
58 THE WHITE COCKADB.
sent by the Lord to carry awa* the bestial of Jew and Gentile
alike.'*
Talbot Egerton, like other young men of his position in society,
had made the ' grand tour,' between the time of leaving Cambridge
and joining the Kentish Buffs in the Balearic Isles; he was fond
of gaiety, and he who had been sick of service in Scotland as sick
as any of Caesar's Legionaries were long ago and who had longed
for London, with its bustle and society, its coffee-houses, Drury
Lane, and Covcnt Garden and the Mall to be beating the watch
and scouring St. Giles with other young bloods of fire and good-
breeding longing, too, for cocking matches at Chelsey, and other
matches at Hocklcy-in-the-Hole, had suddenly become quite recon-
ciled to his country quarters, under the influence of Bryde Otter-
burn's society for a week, and had said much less to Wyvil about
odious mountain scenery, Scotch mists, cheek bones, oat-meal, and
brimstone ; and now to make amends for her inattention, she be-
gan to rally him upon permitting the smugglers to escape last
night.
On this, he proceeded to inform Lord Dalquharn, with consider-
able minuteness, that lie and Captain Wyvil, had undergone great
annoyance, and no small amount of personal peril, when patrolling
the dangerous coast between Tantallon and the rocks known as St.
Baldred's Cradle, amid a dense mist, as a run of smuggled goods
was expected to be made, by a Dunkirk lugger, which Mr. Gage
was unable to board, as all the fisher-boats were at sea, and his own,
with her swivel gun, had been scuttled and destroyed by some of
the smuggler's confederates on shore.
Dalquharn and Mitchell covertly smiled at each other, and the
uneasiness of the Bailie was only too discernible to them both.
' Talking of that affair,' said Captain Wyvil, setting down his
glass of Burgundy, and plaving with his ruffles, ' I vow, Miss Ot-
terburn, that I am almost glad the Sanders Scupperplug (or what-
ever is his name) escaped us.'
' Why, Captain Wyvil ?' asked Bryde, laughing at the odd
name.
' I can forgive the old fellow anything, as one of the five brave
British seamen who took the little fort of Puerto-de-la-Plata, and
burned the town.'
' But from all I have heard, he must have some confederates in
the neighbourhood, and bold ones too, Captain Wyvil. 1
' He has, Miss Otterburn, and I'd give a month's pay to find 'em
out,' exclaimed Mr. Egerton.
' Because you are tired of this secluded place and of us,' sug-
gested Bryde, ' and long to change your quarters.'
* This cattle plagna was equally fatal on the Continent in 1745-6. Tn Sep-
tember of the latter year, the London papers state that 'in Essx Alone, up-
wards of 60(iO cattle died of it before the 1st of June last/ and that 60,000 per-
ished iu Denmark before the middle of December.
THE WHITE COCKADE. 59
'Ah, don't say so, I pray you, madam,' implored Mr. Egerton,
actually blushing nearly as red as his coat, while the Bailie's face
during this little colloquy was an amusing picture to those who, like
Dalquharn and Sir John Mitchell, could read it. They smiled to
each otlier again, and the latter took a pinch of rappee from a Se-
vres box, presented to him by the Duke of Berwick.
1 Scupperplug is no doubt a nom de guerre, and egad, it is a droll
one !' said Egerton, who having made ' the grand tour ' in charge
of a bear-leader (as travelling tutors were named) had picked up a
little French, a language then very properly despised, as Mr.
Wilkes might have told us, by all loyal and true-born Britons, as
being fitted only for frog-eaters, dancing-masters, barbers, and cat-
fut-scrapers, who wore wooden shoes and adhered to the Pope, the
evil, and the Pretender. ' The whole district hereabout,' resumed
the Lieutenant, ' is deeply interested in the smuggling business, so
that I fear we shall have to make short and sharp work with all
who fall into our hands and come to the cold iron, without reference
to riot acts and so forth.'
' Riot acts man alive ! don't talk of them,' exclaimed Sir Bald-
red, with sudden irritation. ' In Scotland, in my time, in the pur-
suit of a lawful feud or family quarrel, we could keep the crown of
the causeway with sword and pistol, if we so wished, against all
coiners sack a farm-town, burn a grange, or blow up a tower;
make a tulzie at kirk or market, on the highway, or in burgh, and
there was no more about it ; but now since the accession of this
House of Hanover, we have had a riot act passed by the united
parliament, expressly to prevent what they termed the disorders,
which might be occasioned by that accession, the proclamation of
which, in Edinburgh, I well remember, for it was made to the
people under the cannon's mouth, every gun in the castle being
double-shotted and turned on the city, while the Lyon King and
his heralds were at the cross! and so, now a Douglas sits down at
the same table with a Hamilton, a Scot with a Kerr, and have no
occasion to leave their swords with the butler or tapster, for they
cut their coats peaceably now according to the English fashion.'
Captain Wyvil laughed good humoureclly at this odd view of
matters taken by the baronet, whose boyhood went back to the days
of King Charles the Second, and certainly of all the many griev-
ances of which he complained, the restrictions of good government
were the most singular ; but after Miss Otterburn had retired amid
the low bows of all present, and after the removal of the cloth, Mr.
Birniebousle brought in long clay pipes for tobacco, and the sooth-
ing Nicotian weed became the order of the evening, while the pretty
heiress of Auldhame sighed alone over her tea-board and its best
equipage in the drawing-room.
^ Fresh decanters and jugs of wine were brought with certain cu-
rious old drinking glasses, massive and dwarfish, each with a small
gold coin of Francis and Mary, King and Queen of France and
60 THE WHITE COCKADE.
Scotland, blown into the stem. The butler also, as a matter of
custom, placed a tankard of pure water at his master's right hand.
' Fill your glasses, gentlemen a bumper to the king !' said Sir
Baldred, passing his glass over the water, and thus, with a clear con-
science and a loyal heart, drinking mentally to his lawful king, who
was in France beyond the sea.
' This loyal toast is the first always drunk at my good father's
table,' said Captain Wyvil, who thought he detected something
doubtful in the mode Dalquharn drank it. ' The old squire was
wont to ride once yearly, from Hurstmonceaux to London, for the
sole purpose of kissing the hand of King William.'
1 Ah the late Prince of Orange,' said Dalquharn.
' He was originally Prince of Orange,' replied Captain Wyvil,
still smiling, for he was quite a man of the world.
' Yes, when he lurked behind a shutter at the Hague, and saw
the assassination of the De Witts, Cornelius, and John the pension-
ary of Holland,' eaid Sir Baldred, with great bitterness, 'and when
he beheld the rascal mob, as the History of the United Provinces*
tells us, " drag their naked bodies to the common gibbet, where they
hung them by the feet and cut off their noses, ears, and fingers,
which were sold in the circumjacent parts. Nay, some of the popu-
lace cut large pieces of their flesh, which they broiled and eat."
When those fine doings went on at the Hague, he was Prince of
Orange; but he was the "pious, glorious, and immortal King Wil-
liam," when he massacred the Clan Donald in cold blood at Glen-
coe, and sent a warrant here, to torture in the steel boots, and nigh
unto death, the poor Englishman, Neville Payne ; and when he
betrayed our Scottish colonists of New Caledonia to the murdering
and merciless Spaniards, he was king assuredly Dei Gratia, and
Defender of the Faith !'
Captain Wyvil, who was used to these little outbursts on the part
of his old host, again smiled with that imperturbable good humour
which is peculiarly English.
1 We shall drop King William,' said Captain Wyvil. ' We En-
glish, less loyal than you Scots, taught the House of Stuart the
bitter lesson, that kings were made for their subjects, not subjects
for their kings ; but I think you must admit that this new war
with France is most just ?' he added, to change the topic.
' Of course,' said his lieutenant ; ' egad, a war with France must
always be so.'
'Especially when waged, like this, in defence of our beloved
Electorate of Hanover," said Lord Dalquharn, unguardedly.
' Nay, Captain Douglas,' replied Wyvil, eying him sharply ; ' I
think His Majesty, King George, was quite right to declare war
after King Louis's notorious breach of all treaties by building the
new forts at Dunkirk, by hostilities committed against our fleets in
the Mediterranean, and that most insolent affront, by receiving at
* London, 1705,
{HE WHITE COCKiDfi. 6i
liis court of Versailles, the son of the Popish Pretender under
favour, gentlemen Scots I shall call him the young chevalier, for I
bear the king's commission, and can say no more,' added the Cap-
tain, on seeing the angry flush that crossed three of the faces pre-
sent, while even the old butler knit his brows and paused, napkin
in hand, looking very much as if he would have liked to punch the
captain's head. ' Then there was the embarkation actually made,
of a body of troops, with the Lords Middleton, Dalquharn, and
other attainted Scots, at that same devilish place, Dunkirk, to fight
for the so-called James VIII. of Scotland, and but zounds ! but I
am getting quite warm on the subject,' said the Englishman, check-
ing himself with a little good-humoured laugh, when he saw how
the colour came and went in the cheek of old Sir Baldred, whom he
was too polite and amiable to offend.
So there was an awkward pause here, which the Bailie sought to
fill up, by stupidly remarking that every day brought fresh tidings
of a projected landing ' among the Highland Ishmaelites, by that
infatuated young gentleman, the Chevalier (he dared not call him
Pretender in the presence of Sir Baldred, and feared to say Prince
in the hearing of two king's officers, so he steered the middle course,
like many equally cautious and better men), but believed that he
would be, like his father, the victim of Jesuit priests, of artful women
and hot-headed Irishmen. And only three days ago, when in Edin-
burgh,' he added, 'I saw Sir Hector Maclean and Mr. Bleau, of
Castlehill, apprehended by the town guard in the Cannongate, and
sent in chains to London in a king's yacht, by order of the Lord
Advocate.'
'And for what?" asked Lord Dalquharn, whose brow lowered
angrily.
' Suspicion of being in the French service,' said the other, slowly,
and watching the effect of his words, ' and of enlisting idle loons for
the Pret Chevalier. Wae is me, that men should meddle wie'
siccan affairs, for " better is he that ruleth his spirit, than he that
taketh a city !" '
''Twill come to the musket erelong, I fear,' said Captain Wyvil,
shaking his head sorrowfully ; ' the Highlands are all unchanged
since that flash in the pan at Sheriff Muir.'
4 Pass the wine, Bailie,' said Sir Baldred, impatiently.
' GJude French claret, this,' said the Bailie, whose bad breeding
appeared pretty often; 'twa shillings the bottle, I suppose thin
bodied, though I'll try the white wine, Sir Baldred. I'se warrant,'
he added, smacking his thin wicked lips, ' ye pay a shilling the
mutchkin for that, John Birniebousle ?'
' Drink, Bailie, and welcome ; what my butler pays, or does not
pay, can matter little to my guests,' said Sir Baldred haughtily.
In the outer hali we've a butt o't on tap, Bailie, ready for all
comers, when sic folks as the Scougals o' that ilk, keep but a barrel
o' twopenny ale,' said the old butler with commendable pride.
62 THE WHITE COCKADE.
'Sneer not at Scougal, John,' said his master angrily; 'he lost
much in that d nable Revolution of '88.'
' And now, sirs,' said Sir Johu Mitchell, rising, ' shall we join Miss
Otterburn at a dish of tea ?'
On this, Lord Dalquharn and Mr. Egerton, whose thoughts had
been in the withdrawing-room, for some time past, rose with equal
alacrity, and hastened towards the door, the arras of which was
withdrawn by the butler, and though heavy drinking was then the
fashion and more so among the Jacobites than the more cautious
whigs I am glad to record that not one of the six gentlemen were
in a state to make pretty Bryde blush, or tremble for the safety of
her tea equipage, though their clothes and periwigs smelt most
odiously of tobacco.
CHAPTER XII.
THE WITHDBA'WING-BOOM.
/Even as I muse, my former life returns,
And youth's first ardour in my bosom burns,
Like music melting in a lover's dream,
I hear the murmuring song of Teviot's stream.
The crisping rays that on the waters He,
Depict a paler moon, a fainter sky ;
While, through the inverted alder boughs below,
The twinkling stars with greener lustre glow.' John Leydtn.
ACQUAINTED by her grandfather, of who Captain Douglas and Captain
Mitchell really were, and of what was their ultimate object in visit-
ing Auldhame, the poor little heart of Bryde Otterburn was sadlj
fluttered. Like nearly all the Scottish ladies of the period, she was
enthusiastically loyal, for the Stuarts had their most active and de-
voted adherents among the fair sex. When Prince Charles was at
Holyrood, four months after this time, so great was the crush oi
fine ladies at his levee in the Gallery of the Kings, that they broke
the staff of the royal standard, which the veterans of his Highland
guard considered a bad omen of the future. So Bryde looked to th<
coming time of battle and peril, with mingled joy and apprehension
The young Lord Dalquharn now filled her thoughts to an extent
that our new acquaintance, Beau Egertou of the Kentish Buffs, coulc
not have suspected or relished.
She remembered him, not as the lord, but the master of Dal
quharn, a handsome boy, when she was but a girl of ten, and prio
to her being boarded with Madame Straiton, that most prim an<
discreet ' mistress of manners.' He it was who had often led he
pony so gallantly along the edge of the beetling cliffs ; who fear
lessly slung himself over them at a rope's-end, to gather the eggs o
the gannet and puffin ; the brave companion with whom she ha<
many a time explored the vast chambers of Tantallan, repeopling it
1HE WHITE COCKADr. 63
lofty towers with grim and mail-clad warriors like Bell- the- cat, and
proud imperious dames, like Agnes, the Black Countess of Dunbar,
who mocked the warlike Salisbury, when he retired 'foiled by a
woman's hand, before a shattered wall.'
And there were the ruins, too, of St. Baldred's chapel, where all
their kindred lay ; and there were the deep recesses of the Druid's
cave at Seacliff ; the woody shades of the Deil's Loan, and many
other places they had explored together, came back with all their
incidents, to memory now, and she still thought with terror of the
day when she must have perished, on a boating expedition to the
Bass, had he not borne her up bravely, and kissed her, and besought
her not to be afraid !
The handsome boy who had trussed and plumed her hawks, and
trained her long-eared and pug-nosed Bologna spaniel to play a
score of pretty tricks ; behind whom she had often ridden on a pil-
lion to hear Mr. Carfuffle preach in Whitekirk, and once to Edin-
burgh to see the Tolbooth, after it had been attacked by the Por-
tcous mob ; and for whom she had wept herself to sleep on the
bosom of old Dame Dorriel, many a night, after he went fur away to
France, beyond the sea, had come to visit them again, a tall, winning,
and she must acknowledge it an extremely well-favoured man,
with a gravity of carriage, a somewhat sad expression of eye, but
with a studious politeness and calm reserve beyond his years ; but
all the result of an early life of peril, of political intrigue, of exile,
and, perhaps, of poverty.
It seemed to her like some of the fairy stories or romances she
had read this unexpected visit. She thought of Amadis de Gaul,
of Glorianna, and of Urganda the Unknown, and the heroes and
heroines of other works, which had been lent to her in secret, by my
Lady Haddington, as they both feared Mr. Carfuffle, who hated a
romance, because the name was nearly akin to Romanism.
Glancing at the mirror (and seldom did it reflect a more winning
face or more lovely figure), she smoothed her bright brown hair,
and shook out her hoop, which, Heaven knows, was ample enough.
She opened and shut her fan impatiently, and arranged and re-
arranged the tiny cups of Dresden china upon the mahogany tea-
board, which stood on a large buhl gueridon, or tripod table. The
water hissed in the silver urn. On one massive silver salver was a
pile of currant ' scones,' or cakes, the work of Bryde's own hands,
and on another rose a pyramid of petits-gatettes-gateavx a species
of short-cake, still called by the Scots, in homely fashion, 'petti-
coat tails.'
And now, as the voices of Sir Baldred and his guests were heard
in the corridor, Bryde gave a last glance round the drawing-room,
the chairs of which were covered with blue Flanders damask, the
walls being tapestried at each end and wainscottd elsewhere ;
the wax-lights in the pale bronze chandelier were burning brightly,
aud all her peculiar domain looked elegant and cheerful, as the
64 tHE WHITE COCKADE.
gentlemen entered, with the usual apologies for lingering over the
bottle ; and a charming picture the little heiress of Otterburn made,
as she sat in an antique chair, her feet in tiny white slippers with
high red heels, resting on a velvet tabourette, and the rich damask
curtains festooned as a background, while she dispensed from the
gueridon table, the beverage called tea, in the smallest of cups and
saucers.
Tea was still somewhat of a rarity in Scotland, and had first been
brought into that country towards the close of the preceding' cen-
tury by Sir Andrew Kennedy, who was Lord Conservator of the
Scottish Privileges at Campvere, and had received a small parcel of
it, as a present from the Dutch East India Company.
' I am assured that Miss Otterburn must have thought us very
ungallant in leaving her so long alone,' said Mr. Egerton, with his
most insinuating smile, as he placed himself at once, by her side.
' But we were talking of politics, Miss Otterburn,' added Dal-
quharn, ' and they grow more interesting every day.'
' Especially to w*,' she replied by an arch glance.
'Yes to us, indeed,' said Dalquharn, with a smile.
' And you were drinking toasts, doubtless, Mr. Egerton, amid
loyal and hickupping cheers oh, I understand."
' No, indeed, we were not,' he replied, earnestly.
' Then I must give you one,' said she, lowering her voice and
stooping towards Egerton, who had humbly seated himself on a
tabourette similar to that on which her little feet were resting.
' You, madam ?'
' Yes-1 ; do you think it droll ?'
'And your toast is, prythee '
' Long live King James VIII.,' whispered the pretty rogue, al-
most into the side curls of Egerton's wig, half-closing her merry
brown eyes, and half-stooping towards him ; and as she held aloft a
little Dresden cup, displaying a round and taper arm of marvellous
whiteness and beauty, bare, save its bracelet, to the dimpled elbow,
which emerged from a short sleeve edged by a long fall of lace of
Malines, she looked beautiful, brilliant and droll ! ' Dost hear me,
sir? Ah that I were a man, and wore a sword and perriwig,
instead of this mob-cap and fardingale ! Long live King James
VIII., the brother of the good Queen Anne !'
' I dare not, Miss Otterburn I protest to you I dare not drink
it, even in this stuff called tea,' urged poor Egerton, colouring, and
glancing nervously towards Captain Wyvil.
' Well, I cry for mercy, sir, and crave pardon.'
' Pardon of me,' said lie, looking quite radiant.
' Yes ; it is wrong and ungenerous of me to think of putting
you in a false position, even in jest.'
' A la sante de la bonne cause /' said Egerton, draining his cup,
and laughing ; ' I think that hath the true ring of the Court of St.
Germains eh ?'
THE WHITE COCKADE. 65
Q-ood Captain Wyvil looked smilingly towards them, and shook
iis large wig, while saying, ' Egad, dou't seek to seduce my subal-
ern from his allegiance, Miss Otterburn, though I fear many a
nore loyal man than he hath figured in St. Giles round-house bo-
ore now. Come, Talbot, though a sprightly spark, don't forget
hat your father was a grave whig, a leading member in tlie Culres'-
icad Club, and figured sword in hand in the famous riot that was
lispersed by the Foot Guards and the King's Musketeers.'
'Another cup of tea my Captain Douglas?' Bryde hesitated
,nd blushed, she had almost addressed him by his title.
' I thank you, yes,' said Dalq^uharn, his sword tilting up, as he
nacle a low bow.
'My my what? her Captain Douglas!' thought Egerton and
he Bailie too, as their eves met by chance.
' A rare and beautiful China this !' observed Dalquharn.
' Oh, sir, 'tis very poor, be assured,' said Bryde, colouring ; ' and
ret it was my mother's marriage gift from the exile Earl Marishal.'
' I have seen a set that looked less beautiful, and for which a
;ing gave a regiment of horse,' said Sir John Mitchell to Captain
tVyvil.
' Yee ; I too have seen it at Dresden, in the Neustadt; it was
;ivcn to the Elector Augustus II., by Frederick I. of Prussia, in
xchange for a regiment of Cuirassiers fully equipped. He was
hen founding the military force of his kingdom, and so was parting
iven with his beloved China.'
And now Bryde, when she saw the two attainted Jacobites and
he two red- coated officers all so blithe and pleasant together, won-
lered if the time would really come, and she trembled for it, when
hey might be cutting each other's throats on the battle-field !
A volume of the ' Orpheus Calcdonius ' of Allan Ramsay, pre-
icnted by him to her mother, and dedicated by the poet to th
Princess of Wales, Wilhilmina Caroline, of Brandenburg-Anspach
!Sir Baldred had torn out that leaf) stood open on the music-
And.
Our simple grandmothers aye, and even our mothers too in
England, but still more in Scotland, knew no other songs than
:hose of their native island ; and had neither the ' snobbery,' nor
;he bad taste to imitate foreign artistes by attempting opera, or to
impose bad German or worse Italian, on an audience which knew,
perhaps, not a word of either. Such high accomplishment, or va-
jaries were all unknown at Madame Straiton's establishment,
opposite His Grace of Queensberry's lodgings in the Canongute ;'
)O now Bryde Otterburn ran her white fingers over the kevs of the
wiry-sounding spinnet (an instrument sorely inferior to one of Col-
lard's grant! tri-cord pianos), and sang the march of the Viscount
Kenmure, just as her mother had taught her she to whom the
handsome cavalier, so young and gay, had waived a farewell with
oifl plumed hat, as he rode forth with his troop of two hundred
5
66 THE WHITE COCKADE.
gallant Galwegian yeomen for England, to return no more, for h
sealed his loyalty with his blood on Tower-hill, after thememorabl
rising of 1715.
' Kenmure is on the awa, Willie,
O Kenmiire is on the awa !
Ami Kemnure's Lord is the bravest Lord,
That ever Galloway saw !'
We are sorry to admit that this song being a national one, woul
only be sung now in the kitchen of Bryde's descendants ; but i
was not so then, and the hearts of the two returned exiles wer
stirred within them, by a deep and earnest emotion, while the lire!
girl sang, and especially at the last verse
' Here's to him that's far awa, Willie,
Here's victory owre his foes;
And here's a flower that I lo'e best,
The Rose, the snow white Boat /'
As she Bang, the Bailie, into whose huge but meanly moulde
brain, the good wines he had imbibed were mounting, hovered nea
the spinnet, with his hands vulgarly thrust under his square, bud
ram-stiffened coat-tails, and with a strange, half-tipsy and hall
gloating expression in his pale, cunning eyes, while he regarded th
bright, laughing girl, who, without waiting either for applause o
invitation, clashed at once into the ' Bonnie briar bush,' anothc
high cavalier song, in which its snowy blossoms are likened to th
white cockades of the loyalists ; and he seemed to see two level
heads, each crowned by a waggish mob-cap, and four white armi
with gemmed hands, running swiftly over the keys.
' Well, Bailie,' said Lord Dalquharn, who had been eyeing hir
narrowly ; ' how like you the song ? think you not that in ou
national music Miss Otterburn excels ?'
' Excels !' repeated the Bailie, somewhat startled by Dalquharn'
cool, but lofty manner ; ' excels O O O !' he exclaimed wit!
one of those prolonged howls, peculiar to a certain class of canter
when quoting Scripture, ' " Many daughters have done virtuously
but thou excellest them all," Bryde Otterburn, and weel may th
words o' the Proverbs be applied to you.'
Bryde, who did not ' see' the application, smiled so proudly an
disdainfully, that the vulture eyes shut and opened, while thei
proprietor drew back a little way.
The lofty bearing of the two passengers, who had come so my;
teriously, and to his great annoyance by the ' Etoile de la mer
puzzled him ; his brain was not in its clearest state at that momen'
but he felt convinced that they were something more than mer
captains in the Dutch service in fact, that they were, according t
the phraseology of the time, ' persons of quality,' gens de marqut
or men of condition. Bryde's glance to Dalquharn at the lin
about ' the snow white rose ' convoyed a volume, a clue if one wei
wanting, and he would follow it up !
THE WHITE COCKADE. 67
' A fearless little Jacobite it is !' said Captain "Wyvil, smiling, as
lie presented liis gold snuff box to Sir Baldred, who sat in his easy
chair, beating time on the hilt of his sword, and a bright expression
lighting up his old wrinkled face.
But now the party was to separate for the night. Dalquharn and
Mitchell both looked weary, and a stirrup cup of mulled port was
ordered, then another and another followed ; and it is with some
shame we have to record that on this night the poor old baronet
got rather disreputably tipsy, proposed ' the health of his sacred
Majesty Charles II., now reigning,' and insisted on singing some
very rebellious songs to Captain Wyvil who laughed, good humoured,
as he and the butler helped him to bed, where he dozed off to sleep,
singing, in a quavering voice
' To wanton me, to wanton me,
Oh, ken ye what roaist would wanton me ?
T<> see King James at Edinburgh Cross,
\Yl" fifty thousand foot and horse ;
Oli, that is what maist would wauton me I*
Dalquharn was not without fears that he and his companion
might be unwittingly betrayed. To drink deep was one of the sins
of that time, when ' a man of fashion (to quote a great writer) often
passed a quarter of his day at cards, and another quarter at drink.
I have known many a pretty fellow, who was a wit too, ready of
reparte, and possessed of a thousand graces, who would be puzzled
if ho had to write more than his own name.'
The two English officers took their swords, and set forth to visit
the village of Auldhame, and ascertain whether their men were all
in quarters, if not abed, and the Bailie took his departure, staff in
hand, to return to North Berwick, a three miles' walk, in the moon-
light.
We have said, that this most wily and watchful personage could
drink without ever getting quite inebriated ; on this occasion, how-
ever, it was apparent to Mr. Birniebousle, as he somewhat contemp-
tuously slammed the iron barbican-gate on ushering him out, that
the magistrate and elder set forth on his pilgrimage, to what he
termed ' his tents and his flesh pots of Egypt,' with his tie perriwig,
very much over his eyes, and that he seemed to be sorely troubled
by the breadth, rather than by the length of the road, for even
saints and patriarchs 'have had their weak moments, long since
Father Noah toppled over after discovering the vine.'
' Gin ye tyne the gate and gae owro Tantullan Craigs into the
sea, 'twere but a sma' misfortune to the country side,' thought the
old Butler with a saturnine grin, as the Bailie, whom he liked as
little as his master, went unsteadily down the avenue, with a mind
full of vague ideas that he had a great Jacobite plot to discover
ideas sharpened by avarice, covetousness, and jealousy.
Yes, strange as it may appear, this earthly worm felt a scorching
5-2
63 THE WHITE COCKADE.
jealonsj
evident
hame !
jealousy alike of Dalquharn and Egerton, -whom he had left, too
evidently as rivals, in possession of the fair fortress at Auld-
CHAPTER XIII.
IN TINO YERITAS.
' Davy. Shame, sir ! He's a soldier, a man of pleasure." A wife would be too
heavy luggage for him to carry about with him.'
Thi Highland Fair, an opera, 1731.
SAPE in the dwelling of a friend, although that dwelling also re-
ceived two persons who might soon be mortal foes, Lord Dalquharn
of the Holm, and Sir John Mitchell, had no need to look to the
charges of their pistols on this night.
Mrs. Dorriel Grahame the housekeeper, with a wax candle in
each hand, conducted his Lordship, whom she did not recognise,
though he remembered her well of old, with her Flemish coif, its
long lappets and black silk band, her grey stuff gown and large
white neckerchief, her motherly kindness, and her quaint garrulity.
He remembered the room perfectly too, with its gilt, leather
hangings, manufactured some fifty years before by the celebrated
Bai.ie Brand of Edinburgh, and its antique pillard oak bed, placed
on three steps and canopied like a tomb, the curtains being, as
Dame Dorriel told him, ' shewit wi' pearling on cramozie by the
bonnie white hands o' her ain doo Miss Bryde,' which no doubt
greatly enhanced their interest in his eyes : ' it was a feather bed,
mairowre, wi' double Scottish blankets, forebye twelve others in the
house,' she added, with laudable pride : ' but uane she feared were
cosy or soft enough, for the twa English captains, deevil byde
them !'
Dalquharn looked earnestly at the old woman, and smiled, as one
in a dream. It seemed but yesterday since he last heard her voice
and beheld her liale old face, which had not one wrinkle more. She
trembled at the idea of ghosts and warlocks, yet wore on one of her
fingers a ring made of a coffin hinge as a spell against cramp, and
had been cured of a tumour by nine strokes of a dead man's hand
at sunrise the hand of the poor wretch who hung in chains at the
town-end of North Berwick ; and had at her bed head a hag-stone,
or perforated pebble, slung on a red thread, to pi-event night-mare
by evil spirits sitting on her stomach.
Sho saw that the stranger was a comely and handsome young
man, and so, surveying him kindly, bade him good night, hoped ho
would sleep sound, and backed out of the chamber with a low, old
fashioned courtesy.
How well Dalquharn remembered this apartment, for it had been
that of his father and mother, with its walls stamped over with
THE WHITE COCEADB. 69
alternate thistles nncl flenrs-de-lys, in heavy gilding, and the deep
sfone fireplace with its elliptical arch and massive Scottish mould-
ings, the keystone being a shield, charged with the three otters'
heads of Otterburn.
In that room, they had slept for months, those beloved parents,
and on those pillows, where his own WAS to lie, their revered heads
had reposed heads lying low enough now, beneath the pavement
of the royal chapel at St. Germain, and as he looked around, their
figures seemed to rise before him. Nothing here was changed save
himself, for many years more than were his, seemed to have passed
since then years of stirring action, hot hate, and passion, deep
intrigue and care years of wandering and hope, battle and
disaster!
' I shall drenm of bright, laughing Bryde Otterburn,' thought he,
as he laid his In-ial on the pillow, ' and think only how lovely my
little friend of other times has grown.'
Meanwhile Bryde, who was reposing in her pretty bed, and think-
ing perhaps of Dalquharn, could little know that she was the sub-
ject of a lively conversation elsewhere.
The new moon waa shining high, sharp and clearlv, in the blue
?ky, its pale light mingling witti the last red flush of the May sun-
set, which still lingered beyond the Fifeshire hills ; for the hour
was not yet ten ; but people were usually early abed in those days,
especially in the country. Captain Wyvil and Lieutenant Egerton
were returning from the village and home-farm of Auldhame (a
quaint, old, picturesque house is tlie latter, and still remarkable for
its square and massive chimneys), after having seeu Colour Sergeant
Tony Teesdale, and found all their gallant Buffs in quarters ; and
now as they proceeded homeward, Captain Wyvil discovered that
his subaltern was a little in liquor, and very much in love.
Egerton had drunk quite enough at dinner, and of the stirrup
cup after, to have his tongue loosed, and his steps made a little
unsteady, on issuing into the open air. At some distance they
passed Bailie Bulcraftie, as he quitted the avenue and stumbled
along the highway towards Castleton, on his way home.
4 There goes old Swivel-eyes,' said Egerton ; ' let us avoid him,
and strike through the fields to reach home. I hate that sly Scot;
and, gad, I feel somehow that he hates me yes, rot him, hates
me ! But to return to what we were saying. Well, Marmaduke
Wyvil, what think you of our little Scots beauty here ?
' How now, what mean you ? Think ?'
' Yes.'
4 1 think she hath smitten you, friend Talbot.'
' Egad, I vow, I protest, that I am quite astonished! Steady-
eyes front!' stammered Egerton, making a lurch against the cap-
tain, and nearly tearing one of his epaulettes off. 'As for the
people of this country, L hate 'ein, as every true-born Englishman
hould.'
tO THB WHITE COCEADS.
' Well ?' said Wyvil, a little impatiently.
' I came here with some of our old English traditions and family
notions in my head. You know that my mother is a grand-daughter
of Sir Anthony Weld, who writ a pleasant book of travels in Scot-
land, which he described to be a wild and mountainous country,
infested, however, " by no monsters, except women ?" Well, wl>sn
I heard that the old " laird of that ilk," as the people here call him
(whatever the devil it may mean), had a pretty granddaughter, I
thought she might solace me during our banishment in this land
of bondage and brimstone, smugglers and psalm-singers. I
fancied her a freckled, red-headed Scots wench, in neat's leather shoes,
and yarn stockings of her own spinning, a linsey-woolsey petticoat,
with a calimanco and high wooded pattens for wet weather ; but,
begad, sir ! surprised I was indeed to find her in laced slippers, with
high French red heels and fine silk socks ; a hoop like Queen Anne's,
some six yards wide at least ; and her hair, at times, done over a
toupee all as fine, forsooth, as any lady of quality in Piccadilly, who
drinks tea and takes snuff " a la Pompadour." '
' Nay, nay, snuffs she none, my friend ; but I repeat that you are
too evidently smitten in that quarter,' said Wyvil, taking the young
fellow's arm to steady him.
' Smitten ? Well, perhaps I am.'
'And with a little Scots girl.'
' What a joke ! I can fancy the dismay at our house in Piccadilly.
My father, mother, and sisters, fancy that we are among cannibals
here ; and yet for fashion and bearing this girl might vie with any
woman in town.'
'So you have surrendered to this Caledonian Sacharissa, this
Lindamira, who bakes, brews, and spins ; who is great in the man-
ufacture of scented waters and elder-flower wine ; who is as gay and
as waggish as any noble shepherdess at the Court of Louis XV. ;
and, by Jove, she looks very like one, when she wears powder !'
' Surrendered ! Not quite yet ; nor have I even brought her to
the point. I have often tried to do so, during the short time we
have been here ; but we have so many disputes on politics, and
then I think she only tolerates me. Tolerates me, forsooth ! And,
egad ! Wyvil, I can't help thinking that if things progress as they
are doing, between Lowlandcr and Highlander, we Englishmen here
may ere long find ourselves between the hawk and the buzzard.
Concerning his nationality, our old friend the Squire of Auldhame
is as mad as a March hare.'
' Not more mad than you are, Egerton. You cannot expect him
to turn Englishman and adopt your views, which are quite as pro-
vincial as his own. You judge of him harshly, too: he is but
a man of the old school, and such a school has existed in all ages.
Perhaps the first Briton who begirt his netherman with a sheep-
skin, and built him a wigwam, was despised as effeminate by some
THB WHITE COCKADE. 71
noble savage of the old school, \vho contented him with a coat of
blue piiint, and a cheap residence in the root of a tree.'
'A queer old cock it is!' continued Egerton, who, being tipsy,
was irate, jealous, and droll by turns. ' He actually swore and was
indignant because I gave vails to his servants, and they were
offended too!'
' And yet we deem these Scots avaricious and poor, though 'tis a
land where all men work and all disdain to beg.'
' Then who is this Captain Douglas ? Some poor devil of a Scot,
with all his income on his back, or in the plated hilt of his hanger.
Gad ! I wonder if he knoweth carte and tierce, and can handle that
same hanger?'
' To judge by the lack of lace on his frock, I fear me that Douglas
is poor,' said Captain Wyvil, gently.
' Poor ! I should think so,' resumed Egerton, waxing more wroth
with the conviction that Bryde on this evening had considerably
slighted himself; 'all his demmed countrymen are; but there is
mischief brewing among them here ; I could see it even in the
brown eyes of that girl to-night. The devil! a proud, prinked-up
baggage it is, and, for all I know, perhaps as slippery in the tail as
handsome !'
' Talbot !' exclaimed Captain Wyvil, ' beware of letting your
jealousy run riot thus.'
1 When I first came here,' continued the ill-used Mr. Egerton,
'I thought to kiss and slop the maids as we do elsewhere ; but,
by Jove, sir, I had my face slapped and a good Kamillie wig torn
by a cheek-boned cockatrice, who threatened me with the minister
and the " Kirk Session," whatever that mny be : and then, when I
said to the Sqirre, " demme, old boy, that maid of Miss Bryde's is
decidedly pretty I rather like her," he reddened like a turkeyi-ock,
and laid a hand on the old-fashioned rapier that is never from his
side I fancy ho sleeps with it iind then begged pardon with a
Frenchified bow, saying, that he should not forget I was his guest.
But Miss Otterburn is charming!' added the Lieutenant, relapsing
into the maudlin state. ' You know, as Defoe says, "we are for-
bidden at Highgate to kiss the maid when we may kiss the mistress ;"
and when I see her hanging about her old grand-dad's neck and
kissing him '
' A very pretty sight. Her filial love quite enchants me,' said
honest Wyvil.
' It doth me too, Marmaduke it doth me too ! but lean tell you
it sets my heart on fire, and I should like to share some of those
filial kisses. Yet, if I do but take her hand, she turns from me
with such a touch-me-not cock of her pretty nose, looks superb,
and sweeps away with her hoop inflated, till she will-nigh shows
her garters.'
' A sight which, I suppose, makes the matter -worse,' said Wyvil,
laughing outright at the aggrieved tone of his friend and brother
72 THE WHITE COCKADB.
officer ; ' but harkee, Beau Egerton take care that our brown-eyed
Scots girl dou't make a Jacobite of tbee.'
'In which case '
'You may lose your head as well as your heart. The best re-
cruiting Serjeants of the Pretender are the fair sex ; every woman
seems to think she hath an order to beat up in his cause, here in Scot-
land at least. Be warned by me. I have been in many a garrison-
town, my friend, in Flanders, and at home in England beyond the
Border, so my heart is not likely to catch fire here in Scotland,'
said Wyvil, with less gallantry than he would hare exhibited in
Bryde's presence. ' Suppose the girl would marry you, could yoti
settle down here ?'
Egerton steadied himself and took a tipsy surrey of the fields
that stretched far away westward in the clear cold moonlight, the
dense woodlands, and the old house, whose quaint turrets rose above
them.
' Here demme, no ! I might hunt my harriers, and lead a kind
of respectable jogtrot life like a turnspit-dog, or a squirrel in a
cage, till the old boy died ; then I should sell off the whole place
house, lands, everything, and invest in England, in Surrey, some-
where near London go into parliament, perhaps who can say
what I might do ; but as for a living death in this region of pride
and hypocrisy, sour-visaged Sabbatarians, oatmeal, and brimstone,
it ain't to be thought of! The very idea of the thing makes me
long for London, with its gaieties, its pretty bar-keepers in the
taverns and chocolate houses at Covent Garden and Whitehall.
Fancy this old tory Put, Sir Baldred, having such a couple of rake-
hells in his house !'
' Talbot, you speak for youi-self,' said Wyvil, seriously.
1 Nay, I speak for you too, slyboots !' exclaimed Egerton, giving
Wyvil a most vigorous poke in the ribs, as they passed through the
barbican gate ; ' but I must bring matters to an issue I shall pro-
pose to my little Scots charmer on the first opportunity by Jove,
I shall!'
CHAPTER XIV.
BIIYDE'S FOXTE LOVEBS.
'Oh, lady, lady! tliat dear place,
Though poor of soil, and scant in space,
Wliei-e she we love, the girl whose grace
Has with sweet bondage blessed the breast
That spot, where she in pomp doth hide,
However mean, o'er all beside,
Empires of power, and lands of pride,
Is sweetest, richest, fairest, best.'
TtnnanCt Potmi.
THE opportunity so coveted by Mr. Talbot Egerton, of the Kentish
Buffs, did not, however, come very readily.
THE WHITE COCK1DB. 73
Tlie acquaintance of Bryde with her early friend Lord Dnlqu*
liarn, now rapidly ripened into friendship, and from friendship it
expanded on both sides to a growing love !
Three days in each other's society sufficed to achieve this, and
already Dalquharn felt that Bryde Otterburn was to be his fate.
Wlien a man of five-and-twenty, good looking, handsome, courage-
ous, and experienced, makes up his mind thus, matters are pretty
sure to progress rapidly.
Yet knowing the deadly game he had to play the perilous ei f -
rand on which he had come, Dalquharn waa not without painful
doubts, fears, and compunction, about revealing his growing passion
to Bryde Otterburn.
There were actually times, when he almost made up his mind to
leave her and Auldhatne, and return no more, until the intended
rising in the North had been decided for weal or for woe, and until
his own destiny was known, for he trembled to involve poor Bryde
and the good old enthusiast, her grandfather, in the ruin which too
surely fell on all who adhered to the unhappy House of Stuart.
Tims, many times did this brave and generous young noble
struggle with his heart and resolve to go, but the charm, the in-
fatuation of his love for Bryde, was too sweet, too powerful ; and a
word, a smile, a touch of her 'fairy hand, dissipated his greatest
resolutions. Daily he said, 'I shall leave her!' and day after day
found him still lingering at Auldhame.
The arrival of the two friends, from abroad, too, was an event of
the first magnitude, in the usually dull life led by Bryde Otterburn.
Books there were few then published in Edinburgh ; dull romances
were imported from England and read in secret ; duller books of
devotion were read in public, a little ostentatiously, perhaps. There
were few journals to give an account of affairs at home or abroad,
and the ' Scots Magazine," under its coarse blue cover, was not very
lively with its ' summary of public affairs proceedings of the
political club and domestic history.' Still less lively were the
columns of that dingy little quarto, the ' Caledonian Mercury,'
which the riding postboy, or the carrier, brought to Auldhame,
every second or third day after its publication, and to which Sir
Baldred adhered faithfully, because it was always in the interest of
the good old cause, and had been so since the restoration.
Unless in exile, France was forbidden ground to the Scottish
gentry now, and a residence at home within the narrow circle of
their mountains and glens, contracted their minds and filled them
with strange, morose and gloomy prejudices, unknown to their
forefathers a few generations back, when the gay ambassadors of
France, Spain, and Austria, had their hotels iu that fashionable
region, the Cowgate of Edinburgh!
Poor Bryde saw only the world at Church, and what a dismal
little world it was ! Yet weekly, it was something to look forward
to the ride to Whitekirk iu all weathers, to hear the Reverend
^4 THE WHITE COCKADE.
Aminadab Carfuffle expound in nasal tones on the glories of Judea,
and the terrors of a certain place with a warmer climate, for two
hours by the pulpit sand glass.
With her grandfather's prelatical instincts, named as he had
been, Baldred, after the patron saint of the district and of his race,
and named as she had been, Bryde, by Dalquharn's mother (who
was a catholic of the House of Kenmure), the gentle girl, though
etunned and bewildered by the harsh and stormy theology of Mr.
Carfuffle, and the expostulations of the Bailie, could never be
thought to think much evil of the ancient creed, as the mass of her
countrymen did, when she remembered how many good and pure,
true and loyal men and women had died in the faith of their
Christian forefathers. In that faith did William Wallace die, and
Robert Bruce bequeath his heart to the Holy Sepulchre.
The family always went mounted to church ; the baronet and
two grooms wearing their swords with holster pistols, while Bryde
rode her favourite pad. She would have disdained alike as too
effeminate, the use either of a sedan, like the Lady Haddington, or
of a glass coach, like the Laird of Newbyth ; and as for her grand-
father, he would as soon have thought of going in a palanquin or
an air baloon (had he ever heard of them) as in either of those
conveyances, while he had a good nag in his stable ; and when she
went thus abroad, as veils were not then worn, Bryde had her
charming face concealed by a little velvet masque.
When she first appeared at church, escorted by Dalquharn, who
looked so handsome and distinguished, lie quite divided the atten-
tion of the congregation, with my Lady Haddington's little blacka-
moor in a Spanish dress, with a silver collar round his neck a
creature she had bought at Glasgow market, to attend her at ser-
vice and in her walks abroad ; to carry her muff, fan, or Bible ; to
feed her marmoset and parrot, and comb out the breed of spaniels
given to her mother by Charles II.
Withal, Bryde was a happy and busy creature, and in working at
her spinning-wheel, in colouring satin, making wax flowers and
embroidery, or tambour-work, in playing on her spinnet (one of
Fenton's best), when she picked up a new song by Mr. Allan
Ramsay, she had always employment enough.
Egerton, who, like most well-bred men of those days, played
pretty fairly upon the violin and flute, frequently accompanied her
at the spinnet ; and with all his secret and ill-concealed dislike of
Scotland and the Scots, he had soon found the impossibility of not
striving to please a beautiful young girl; and, as she knew no other
airs than those of her own country, he was compelled to make,
what he deemed, a merit of necessity, and acquire them, which he
did very readily.
After the arrival of Lord Dalquharn, there was a change in all
this, for save in the evening, and when the iron gates were closed
for the night, the spinnet was rarely opened. Between the brown-
THE WHITE COCKADE. 75
eyed heiress and the young attainted lord, there was a mutual bond
of national and political sympathy, which the young English officer
could not comprehend a secret intelligence of which he could
make nothing, save that it piqued his pride, wounded his somewhat
inordinate self-esteem, and, while it confirmed hia passion for
Brvde, also filled him with a jealous fury.
Egerton presented her with a silver-mounted flageolet, and in
the gallantry of the day, the mouth-piece was obstructed by apiece
of paper, on examining which, she found it contained a copy of
verses addressed, as it were, by the happy instrument to her coral
lips and slender fingers. These had been copied, we are sorry to
say, wholesale by Egerton from the ' London Magazine,' wherein a
poetical strephon had sighed them forth, to his real or imaginary
Chloe or Lindamira. Innocent Bryde never doubted that they
were the rogue's own production, and declared them to be ' vastly
pretty !'
But when Dalquharn presented her with a bronze medal, which
but two months before, he had received from a certain royal hand,
that gift she prized much more, and kissed with the devotion of a
pilgrim, who beholds the reh'ques he has trod a thousand miles to
see.
It bore the effigy of ' Charles Prince of "Wales, 1745,' and on
the reverse, ' AMOR KT SPES," around a figure of Britannia standing
erect, with a fleet in the background.
All the purposes and hopes of the royal exiles, the intentions of
himself and Sir John Mitchell, he had to narrate to her again and
again. He had also to describe the king, the young Prince of
Wales, and his brother Henry, the Duke of York and Albany (they
were studious in giving every title, those sturdy Jacobites), also
Her MBJesty the Queen, Maria-Clementina, whom he had often
seeii, the mother of that'bonnie Prince Charlie," who was yet to
be embalmed in the hearts and the songs of the people, daughter of
Prince James Sobieski, and granddaughter of the Liberator. Their
appearance, their sayings, their eyes, their hair, &c., all he had to
describe and relate, for Bryde was never weary of the theme, and
listened to him with her loyal heart beating high, the colour in her
soft cheek deepened and her brown eyes sparkling ; and all these
things had to be spoken of, when they were alone, or at least when
Wyvil and Egerton were not present, so between the two young
visitors there was now a most decided, though as yet unacknow-
ledged, rivalry.
Tlbot Egerton had become even more than usually careful of
his hitherto scrupulous toilet ; a greater slave to his mirror, to
puffing his regimental wig with powder, to the arrangement of his
rufflt-s, his choice of sleeve-links, kneebucklcs and brooch, his fall
of point-d'Espane ; and nearly drove his valet, a stolid Yorkshire
grenadier, crazy, by the adjustment of his side curls and the black
ilk bag or flash, that hung between bis shoulders j but poor
76 THE WHITE COCKADS.
Egerton arrayed himself in rain for conquest now, as Dalquhara,
in liis somewhat faded green suit, with his own fair hair simply
Juened by a ribband (like the young Prince Charles, whom he was
jnd of thinking he resembled), his soft and tender, but manly
eyes, his bearing so gallant, earnest, and at times pre-oocupied and
ead, seemed to Bryde the beau-ideal of all she had read or heard
Bung, that a hero or prince should be the magnificent young
princes of those dear old fairy tales, which have charmed BO many
generations of boys and girls, and whose authors are scarcely
known.
Egerton's quotations from Ovid, or from the vapid ' Poetical
Essays' of the London Magazine, then published at ' the three
Flower-de-luces, in St. Paul's Churchyard,' or from the poems ol
Mr. Edmund Waller, whose works he greatly admired, were not
always either apt or happy, and his citations from the latter, by
frequently exciting her laughter, greatly annoyed him, for he
deemed the author of ' The Gentle Shepherd' not worthy to tie the
shoe string of him, who sang of Sacharissa.
When Egerton would quote
'While in the park I sing, the listening deer
Attend my passion, and forget to fear;
Wlien to the beeches I report ray flame,
They bow their Imads, as if they felt the same I
To gods appealing, when I reach their bowers,
With loud complaints they answer me in showers.
To the.e a wild and cruel soul is given,
More deaf than trees, and prouder than the heaven 1'
Bryde would laugh merrily at the poor poet being rained on, and
at that overstrained hyperbole, which seemed to the amorous
Lieutenant of the Buffs, a singular combination of grandeur and
tenderness. Then, as no lover likes to be laughed at, he would
leave her in a pet, or by blundering or committing mistakes, by
talking of the Pretender and the rebels (ever a sad error in Scot-
land), he would irritate the girl he was most desirous of pleasing.
'This young gentleman hath served a popgun campaign or so, in
Flanders ; but he will never be a hero," lie once remarked, chiefly
to pique ' Captain Douglas,' who stood near them.
1 A hero, perhaps not," said Bryde, who saw the sudden and
painful flush that crossed the cheek of the attainted lord : ' had he
a heart that knew neither genuine love or honest hatred, he might
be like your adored Prince of O range ; pity nor fear, lie might
equal the greatest of your regicides, Cromwell ; and if he were
without regret or remorse, he might be greater than either ; but
being a brave young gentleman of five-and- twenty, pretending , to
nothing '
' Save as a Catholic to the crown of these Protestant realms, my
dear madam.'
1 Enough, sir ; let us talk no more of this,' Bryde would say,
filled witli sudden anger, planting her high heel on the floor, and
THE WHITB COCKADB. 77
ruffling out her flounces, as she turned away in wrath from the
laughing Englishman, who really cared not a rush for the matter,
till lie saw that he was only widening the breach between them.
' On my honour on my knees, if you prefer it, I crave your
pardon. Miss Otterburn.' the good-natured fellow would exclaim ;
'it is indeed most difficult for an Englishman to speak about any-
thing in Scotland, without giving offence to some one.'
' How so, sir ?'
4 It is a land of such devilish whim-whams.'
1 What hath made it so ?' said Bryde, opening and shutting her
fan vigorously.
' May I die if I can ever tell you.'
' Then I shall your southern interference, open and secret for
centuries, alike with church and state, have split, severed and
divided the people ; but a time shall come anon, when these things
shall be amended,' the fiery little Jacobite would add.
Then witli the air of a tragedy queen, she would give Egerton
her ungloved hand to kiss, and he would bow his head over it, like
a courtly young gentleman, as he certainly was, at times, and for a
little space he would be gay and hopeful again.
A few days passed away thus, quietly, rapidly, and pleasantly at
the secluded old manor house of Auldhame.
Egerton, who was extremely anxious to please, played picquet,
cribbage, back-gammon, and the knightly game of chess with Sir
Baldred, to whom he talked much of the new game of billiards,
which had not as yet crossed the Tweed. He delighted most, how-
ever, in a quiet game of primero, at a little side gueridon, with
Bryde. This was a game of Spanish origin, played by two, one
shilling stake, and three for rest i.e., pool and the cards used
were longer and narrower than those of the present day ; but in
this pleasure he was seldom indulged, and on each occasion had
been interrupted by the appearance of the odious Bailie Balcraftie,
with his stealthy eyes and cat-like step, or by the sour Mr. Car-
fuffle, and had to relinquish the game in h:ste, as both minister
and elder were in duty bound to rebuke such a sinful waste of
time, with a reference to the notorious Colonel Charteris, the
gambler and warlock.
But the reader may imagine with what astonishment and dismay
Bryde, in her simple ideas of propriety, heard Captain Wyvil
mention that he had frequently lost large sums to General Wade,
at cards, in public, at the gaming-tables of the Countesses of Mor-
dington and Cassilis, in London, and that he had been present
wl ifii these noble dames resisted the intrusive peace officers in the
preceding year, claiming the privilege of peerage for doing so, a
claim, however, refused by the House of Lords.
' A Douglas of Mordington a Countess of Cassilis !' exclaimed
Miss Otterburn, in actual dismay, at such a prostitution of rank
and position.
78 THE WHITE COCKADE.
' My dear, wee lassie,' her grandfather said cynically ; ' the wirei
of those who sold their country, may surely add to their ill-gottei
gains, by cheating a little at cards.'
Long absent as he had been from his native land, and accustomet
to the sallow women of France, it was impossible for Sir John Mit
chell to be long insensible to the blooming beaufy of Bryde Otter
burn, or not to be charmed as an enthusiastic Scotsman and true
hearted cavalier by her rebellious abandon, her blunt, open, anc
fearless loyalty, for she claimed all the dangerous privilege of he
sex to say whatever she thought ; and, moreover, it was impossibl
for him not to be stirred by her native songs, which she sang witl
great sweetness and power.
Though more than twice her age, poor Mitchell would soon hav
learned to love her more truly, and tenderly than the thoughtles
Egerton, -whose love, perhaps, began in ennui ; but lie saw that sh
was the secret object of Dalquharn's heart, and strove to crush tli
rising flame, that he might prove the more useful subject and sol
dier to his exiled king.
So Bryde had actually four lovers in. her little household circle
and almost unknown to herself.
CHAPTER XV.
BAICBAFTIE OK THE SCENT.
'The fair Matilda dear lie loved,
A maid of beauty rare ;
Even Margaret on the Scottish throne,
Was never half so fair!
'Lanp had he woo'd, lang she refused,
With seeming scorn and pride;
Yet oft her eyes confessed the love,
Her fearful words denied .'Sir James the Most.
No softer emotions lessened the deep and fervent zeal of Sir Johi
Mitchell. Every horse he passed afield or on the highway, he ex
amined with critical eye, that he might ascertain whether it wa
fitted for mounting cavalry, dragging light artillery, the siege-train
or the heavy baggage, services the owner had never reckoned i
should perform. Every feature of the landscape, and every turn o
the road suggested a position to be attacked or defended.
' Among those green whin bushes,' he would say, ' the line o
skirmishers wouldlurk unseen ; on yonder grassy knolls would b<
the field-pieces, unlimbered and loaded ; along the ridge between
would be the first line of infantry, with colours flying; and in tin
hollow beyond would be the reserve and the cavalry, ready to ad
Vance at a moment's notice ; while yonder bog would cover the
right flank, and the bridge of the Tyne, if blown up, would secur<
the other.'
THE WHITE COCKADE, 79
But Sir Baldred would wince at this suggestion, as he had built,
at bis own expense, the bridge referred to.
Mitchell loved merry Bryde, but her bright, laughing eyes never
lured him to forget, even for a moment, the great mission lie had
come upon. He had already paid several visits to influential Jaco-
bites in Edinburgh and its vicinity, absenting himself studiously
from the spells of the little enchantress at Auldhame, and, as the
sequel proved, happy would it have been for the young Lord Dal-
quharn had he done so too.
Sir John with Sir Baldred's horses freely and frequently rode
more than forty miles a day on the king's service, each time return-
ing to Auldhame with a ruddied cheek, a bright eye, and a brave
heart, that beat gaily and anxiously with loyal hope and joy, for he
had cheerful tidings to communicate.
Archibald Stewart, Lord Provost of Edinburgh, and some of the
magistrates (though they were mounting new cannon on the walls
and increasing the city guard), Lieutenant-General Joshua Guest,
the new English governor of the Castle, sent specially to supersede
old General Preston, because the latter was a Scot, and could not
be trusted (though he proved the true Hanoverian in the end),
some of the officers of his garrison, Lieutenant-General Peregrine
Lascelles" regiment (47th), these and many others in and around
the capital were all, as their future conduct evinced, in the interest
of the House of Stuart, and who could doubt of success ?
Like the Scots of all classes, Sir Baldred grumbled incessantly at
his share of the English taxes, consequent to the union. Prior to
that event, Scotland, though she had borne her share in the wars of
Flanders and the Spanish succession, had no national debt. That
millstone, round the neck of England, dated from a much earlier
period than 1 707. Of the fourteen years of the reign of William of
Orange, ten were years of uninterrupted war, waged chiefly for the
defence of Holland. Of the thirteen years of Anne, twelve were
years of a war that ended only by the disgraceful treaty of Utrecht ;
and next, the house of Hanover led us into disastrous wars on
behalf of that pitiful Electorate. William, a king totally reckless of
posterity, spent more than forty-four millions in war ; ' and after
all the blood and treasure expended, his ambition and revenge re-
mained unsatisfied, and the ostensible object of the war, the curb-
ing the ambition of Louis XIV., unattained.'*
Smollet says of the strife which ended at the treaty of Uyswick,
' Such was the issue of a long and bloody war, which had drained
England of her wealth and people, almost entirely ruined her com-
merce, debauched her morals, by encouraging venality and cor-
ruption, and entailed upon her the curse of foreign connections, as
well as a national debt, which was gradually increasing to an in-
tolerable burthen.'
Sir Baldred abhorred the heavy taxation and restrictions thoie
* The Extraordinary Black Book.
80 THE WHITE COCKADE.
foreign strifes imposed taxation for which the equivalent paid by
England to Scotland at the union was no recompense, when the
total ruin of the east coast trade is considered ; and he looked for.
ward to an imaginary time, when once again, the Otterburns of
Auldhame, and other gentlemen along the sea-border, might import
their own damask, taffeta, and ironwork from Flanders, and their
claret and brandy from France, without the obnoxious interference
of a custom-house officer, or a king's cruiser.
' Sir John,' said he, after a long visit the latter had paid to Edin-
burgh, ' are you equally well assured that London swarms with
those who are true to the good cause ?'
' Yes with Jacobites, known and secret, who wait but the
prince's advance with a Scottish force ; we have them in the navy
the Lord Muskerry for one we can rely on and in the army, some,
'tis said, in all regiments, but chiefly among our Irish and National
corps, the Greys, the Scots Guards, the Fusileers, and Edinburgh
regiment aye, even among Semples canting Camerouians. We
have them among the merchant princes of London, the privy
council, and the officers of state,' continued poor Sir John, for on
such delusive hopes did the few unfortunate loyalists in Scotland
rely, undeterred by the bitter experiences of 1715. ' Here we may
count upon the dukes of Douglas, Athole, and Hamilton I would
to heaven we could add Argyle ; but that may never be ; the feud
between the Campbells and the Stuarts, is too deeply rooted. Let
the prince but land, as his father's regent, and the nation, long
weary of German wars and Hanoverian subsidies, will rise as one
man, and long ere the snows of Yule are on the mountains, the
bells of Holyrood shall have rung for a coronation, and the Elector
with his hideous mistresses, may be smoking the pipe of peace,
over a mug of beer in Herrenhausen.'
' Pray heaven, this may be so, and no tale of a tub,' said Sir
Baldred, earnestly.
' Something is certainly afoot among the people,' said Captain
"Wy vil, one day, soon after this conversation ; ' and I hope it hath
no reference to the rash young gentleman, who aspires so highly.'
' How so, sir mean you the young Chevalier ?' asked Sir Baldred,
wheeling his easy chair half round, and fronting the Englishman,
whose face wore a somewhat grave expression.
' Yes, good Sir Baldred ; Tony Teesdale, my serjeant, was at the
smith's shop in the hamlet, getting the head of his halbert riveted
anew, and there in a corner lie espied what think you ? A goodly
bundle of sword blades, some long Scots pistols, and so forth.'
'In my young days, 'twas nothing uncommon to see the iron
graith of war in a Scot's smithy ; but now, Captain'
' What now ?'
'This vile incorporating union hath taken alike the honey from
the bee, and the sting from the wasp.'
THE WHITt COCKADE. 81
1 1 am a loyal man,' replied Wyvil, 'and cannot help beholding
the indications of the time, with emotions of sadness and alarm.'
' Sir, you are loyal to those who are on the throne, and I think
you not tlie leas a man of honour. I am loyal to the distant and
the dead to kings in exile and kings in the grave, and whilk think
you is the most unselfish loyalty of the two ?'
' Yours, of course,' eaid Wyvil, smiling ; ' but I pray pou, most
worthy friend, to let this matter drop, and '
'We shall have a pint a Scot's pint of claret on the head
of it!'
In his secret heart, or that ingenious piece of mechanism, which
an anatomist would term so Bailie Reuben Balcraftie far from re-
gretted, he even rejoiced that his acquaintance (he presumed not to
term him friend), Sir Baldred, was compromised, as he felt mo-
rally certain he was, by the presence of two Jacobite emissaries in
bis house. Balcraltie liked to have people in his power, no matter
whom or how ; they might be turned to profit in some way, so he
determined to wait and watcli well.
Too old to take the field himself, and unable to send men, Sir
Baldred resolved to raise some money for the prince's service, and
asked the money-lender to accommodate him with five hundred
pounds, a sum equal to thrice its present value, or more.
' Money again, Auldhame ?' said the Bailie, whose curiosity was
at once roused.
' Yes, money.'
' But how iu the name o' misfortune cometh it to pass, that I
find you again like the unthrifty virgins, who had nae oil in their
lamps ? And in what wild Darien scheme, or South Sea bubble are
you proposing to sink the money ?'
1 You ask too many questions, Mr. Balcraftie,' replied Sir Baldred,
sternly. ' You can give me the money, I suppose, or a wadset,
over the land of Halflongbarns ?'
' True,' said the other, twisting his tiewig about ; ' but the sum
is an unco large one and what want you wi* the siller, for sae sure
as I am a pardoned '
' What is it to thee, fellow, if I require the wretched dross, and
pay you a usurious interest for it ?'
'Your son's funeral, puir fellow, cost enough, I mind, to ruin a
barony,' said the Bailie, still ' angling' to discover the baronet's
purpose.
' My son's funeral !' retorted the other, with flashing eyes ; ' what
is that to thee, either, wretch ? Thy lyke wake will cost less, I
warrant. I remember the funeral of Scougal of Whitekirk 5 there
were the Lords of Council and Session, the advocates and clerks to
the Signet, and the raacers with crape-covered maces, all in mourn-
ing, on foot or on horseback, present, and dost think I would give
my murdered boy a lesser cortege than hia ?'
6
82 THE WHITE COCKADE.
The Bailie changed colour, and his cunning eyes quailed beneath
the fiery glance of the old gentleman, yet he ventured to remark,
' This money would outrig a troop of horse.'
'Perhaps,' said the other, drily ; 'but if you have not the money,
I must apply to old Johnny Screwdriver, the clerk to the Signet, in
Craig's Close, and he, I warrant'
' Ye shall hae the money, Auldhame, ye shall hae the money,'
said the other, hastily; 'I've just had that identical sum repaid me
by Colonel Gardiner, of Banktou, that pious and Christian soldier,
who pores daily over that wonderfu' book, "Heaven, taken by
Storm." '
' He must have a lively time of it,' said Sir Baldred, who had a
great contempt for the gallant officer in question.
' False Carle !' thought the Bailie, as he withdrew, ' thy pride
shall hae a sorrowfu' fa', or my name is no Reuben Balcraftie !'
The heavy wadset or bond w'lich he already held over a portion
of the Auldliame estate, and which has already been referred to, as
consequent to the assassination and robbery of Bryde's father, gave
him a certain hold, or influence over the worthy old baronet, other-
wise he, Reuben Balcraftie, though Bailie of North Berwick, and
elder of St. Andrew's church, had never been tolerated beyond the
corridor or housekeeper's room, by the proud Laird of Auldliame,
who was now, somehow, constrained to receive him as an occasional
guest at his own table.
How such a creature as Balcraftie, a man in his fiftieth year at
least, a smuggler, hypocrite, and usurer, a cringing slave to the
rich, a grinding tyrant to the poor ; a canting, whining, coarse, and
burly fellow, with his sleek bearing, his bushy eyebrows, and dull
pale watery eyes, thin lips, huge feet and hands, his massive stooping
shoulders and stealthy gait, could ever hope to win even one favour-
able ghince from such a girl as Bryde Otterburn ; or how he dared
to imagine that she could ever view him otherwise than with simple
aversion, it is difficult to conceive So is it hard to comprehend
the confidence that made him think of putting himself in compe-
tition with two handsome young men like Tulbot Egerton and the
Lord Dalqii 1 arn ; one he knew tn be of a good old English family,
and the other luiving all t.'ie bearing of what he shrewdly suspected
him to be, the scion of some noble Scottish house. Yet those there
are and have been, whose incongi uities or idiosyncrasies of character
have led them to nurse schemes, or visions, as wild and desperate.
Balcraflie's jealous hate alternated between the two : as for Sir
John Alitcheli, he never thought of him as a competitor, as he
seldom saw him in Bryde's society, either at home or 'abroad.
Having heard ' Captain Douglas' state that he had been at Auld-
hame ten years ago, the Bailie had a perilous clue to his identity,
he followed it up like a snake and soon discovered him.
'So, so,' said he, depositing his tie-wig on a wig-block in his
office, and proceeding to polish his bald pate vigorously with a
1KB WHITE COCKADE. 83
yellow bandanna (one of a bale that had come by the ' Etoile de la
Men'), 'Henry Douglas, Master of Dalquharn, was here ten years
syne, wi' the lord and lady his parents, at the very time Jock Por-
teus was hung on the Dyer's tree. Ho, ho, my Lord Dalquharn,
umquhile of the Holme, I have you fast, my brave man, I have you
fast ! I hope, ere long, to see the black hoodie-craws flapping their
wings owre the horse banes and harn-pans o' you and a' sic popish
traitors ilk ane spiked on a yettlan jagg !' he added, grinding his
sharp fangs. Then a smile stole over his coarse visage a leer of
avarice, and something of lasciviousness and he muttered, while
rubbing his huge hands together with nervous glee : ' Tak' patience,
Reuben, " Better is he who ruleth his spirit, than him who taketh
a city." Patience yet a while, and a' shall be thine, their tents and
their flesh-pots, their gold and their spoils, Auldhame main and
farm, lee and woodland and what is better, the bourne bird Bryde
herael' 1*
CHAPTER XVI.
OULY A>'D
'A promise in the oriel won,
To crown my glowing bliss ;
A drooping bead, a circled waist,
And such a binding kiss 1
Ob, happy time I oh, happy time!
It never has its fellow
The one green leaf that hangs among
So many sere and yellow.
THOUGH I have but to tell ' the old, old story ' of a true love, the
course of which was neither so smooth as glass, or so swift as an
express train (for we could never have a story worth telling without
the element of love) the events to be recorded, happened long ago.
and have in them points whicli are decidedly strange and startling.
Bryde and Lord Dalquharn had all their old haunts to revisit ;
she had no mother to director control her actions, and thus they
could steal away by a little postern gate, and pass down the gleu,
towards the sea, unknown to all, even to the jealous Egerton, for
jealous he won becoming decidedly now !
They visited the ewe-bughts, where they had been wont to see
Bryde' s ewes milked for the making of cheese, and those bughts
are the pleasant theme of many a Scottish song. The Deil's Loan.
with its sombre old trees, the avenue with its gloomy story of the
Spectre Drummer, the old tower of Scougal, of which, but a frag-
ment now remains ; St. Baldred's Well near Tautallon, his cradle,
as a deep fissure in the rocks near Whitberry Point is named, and
his boat, now a rock at the mouth of Auldhame Bay, asserted by
tradition to have been once a dangerous obstruction far at sea these
were each and all, visited in turn,
6-2
84 THE WHITE COCKADE.
' The blessed Baldred,' (according to the History of the Caldees",
a hermit who died amid the solitude of the Bass Rock, on the 6th
March, 607, when Ewen IV. was King of the Scots,) ' moved with
pity by the number of wrecks and disasters, occasioned by this
rock, ordered that he should be placed upon it. This being down,
at his nod the rock was immediately lifted up, and like a ship driven
by a favourable breeze, proceeded to the nearest shore, and hence-
forth remained in the same place as a memorial of this miracle,' at
the mouth of Auldhame Bay, where in rough weather, the fanciful
assert still that it is rocked by the waves and winds. These, and
many other legends of East Lothian, well calculated to
'Deepen the murmur of the falling floods,
And shed a browner horror o'er the woods/
were all well known to Bryde Otterburn, and thus beyond even the
charms of her person and manner, Dalquharn found her a delight-
ful companion. Many a volume of poetry they conned together,
as they walked through the ripening fields, where Bryde's quick
eye espied the prettiest wild- flowers, with which she would make
such charming posies, as few others could have done.
Many of these walks had been taken, but deterred by the tram-
mels of his personal and political circumstances, Dalquharn had
not as yet made known his love to Bryde.
She led him to many a fairy ring, long since obliterated by plough
and forgotten, but where divers persons in those days of simplicity
and old belief in the marvellous, averred the little fairies, or gude
neighbours in green, danced on the eve of St. John, while the
murmur of their tiny harps and voices softly attuned, in the silence
of the place and time, mingled sweetly with the gurgle of the
mountain burn, that wound under the leafy gorse and flourishing
broom towards the sea.
At St. Baldred's Well she shewed him the place where Monk's
cannon liad breached the ramparts of Tantallou, and when the most
of his soldiers, who perished in the attack, had fallen.
' Many a poor wounded and dying Englishman must have lain
here on the green brae side, my lord,' said Bryde, as her tender eyes
filled with emotion at the ideas her vivid fancy suggested. ' Ah, I
hope that the golden broom-bells and the wild guelder roses grew
here then, just as they do now !'
' Why, Miss Otterburn ?'
' That their beauty and their sweet perfume, may have soothed
the last hours of those whose spirits passed away.'
'They were sour and morose Puritans, Miss Otterburn,' replied
Dalquharn, ' and doubtless cared but little for such tranquilising
influences in their parting moments.'
A day had been set apart at Dalquharn's earnest wish, for a visit
to the old chapel of St. Baldred, and the very evening of this day,
Egerton had made up his mind to address Miss Otterburn, if he
THE WHITE COCK1DB. 85
had an eligible opportunity, and if none offered, to seek a formal
interview.
She was just quitting her ivory-mounted spinning-wheel, which
usually stood in one of the drawing-room windows, as Egerton
entered, after having made a most careful toilet, and was about to
speak, all unaware that Dalquharn, who had been superintending
the spinning, was half hidden by the drapery of a little oriel.
Bowing low and reverentially, Egerton touched her hand lightly,
and something in the action and the expression of the young man's
face, gave her an intuitive dread of what he was about to say, for
she said hurriedly to her companion :
' Captain Douglas, have you have you forgotten, our proposed
pilgrimage?'
'To the old Chapel? how could I forget it?" replied Dalqu-
harn, suddenly appearing to Talbot Egerton's intense chagrin,
' I have but to get my gloves, fan, and capauchin they are in
the library, and then I shall show you the tomb of him who won
the old chalice of St. Buldred from the fairies,' saidBryde, laughing
and looking very like a bright fairy herself. 'You must know," she
continued with some precipitation and confusion, ' that long, long
ago, a castle stood by the lonely and rugged shore near North Ber-
wick, on the summit of the great green knoll near the mouth of the
mill-burn, and therein, below the ruins, the fishermen allege, that
Anlaf the Dane, who burned and plundered all the country here-
about, stored up his treasure, which was equal in value to the ransom
of three crowned kings.
' The first Otterburn of Auldhame was riding thence homewards
on St John's Eve, after dining with the Goodman of North Berwick,
and in the moonlight he saw a multitude of grotesque little dwarfs,
and beautiful fairies with long golden hair, dancing hand in hand
among the heaps of treasure that were visible through an opening in
the side of the ruined castle hill.
' Being a stout and brave-hearted fellow, he reined in his horse,
and shouted to them lustily. On this there came forth a quaint,
stunted, and bandy-legged little elf, about only eighteen inches in
height. He wore a conical red cap, a short red mantle, and bore a
large silver cup, under the weight of which he seemed to totter.
' " Sir Knight," quoth he, " drink with us a stirrup cup ere ye go ?"
1 Otterburn courageously took the cup ; its weight was ponderous,
for it seemed as if full of molten gold, so dense and thick was the
yellow liquid which gleamed and bubbled within it a liquid but
little to the liking of the horseman. Firmly lie grasped the cup,
and dashing the contents full into the eyes of the fairy man, he
clapped spurs to his horse, and with an invocation of " God and St.
Baldred!" on his lips, galloped away.
1 With what manner of liquor the cup wns filled no man could say,
but the few drops that fell on the knight's horse, burned into the
bone, through flesh and skin. With shrill shouts aud elfish outcries.
86 THE WHITE COCKADE.
all the fairies rushed from a thousand holes in the hillside, in hot
pursuit; but as the fugitive leaped his maddened horse over the
mill-burn, the running water stopped their course, as no evil thing
can cross a flowing stream, and he bore home the cup, which
proved to be the beaker of Anlaf the Rover, and which he gifted
to the chapel of St. Baldred, where it remained to the Refor-
mation. After that event it was brought hither, and is now
chained to the stone ambre in the hall, where you may still see it,
but none have drank from it since King James VI. passed here on
his way to England. I know you don't care much for such stories,
my dear Mr. Egerton ; thus our ramble would have no charm for
you ; but after tea, we shall have some of our usual music shall we
not?'
Egerton gave a sickly smile ard bowed in silence, for it was per-
haps unwise, if not a little provoking in Bryde, to hint thus broadly
that he was not required to accompany them ; but indeed, the
young man had not the slightest intention of offering to do so.
On getting her walking gear, she thrust the masses of her fail
hair between her soft cheek and her black velvet capuchin or little
hood which was lined with pale blue satin ; drew her tight kid
gloves on her small and well-shaped hands, and went forth with a
bow and a bright smile that sank deep in Egevton's heart and filled
him with jealous fury, as the lovers retired together.
He had come to make a declaration of love, and was left as if
turned to stone, without a word having passed his lips, though he
smiled as they left him smiled to cloak the chagrin, the bitterness
and wounded pride that galled him, and the fury that made him
nearly tear the silver knot from his sword hilt.
She was gone, and with another, but her yoice yet lingered in his
ear!
' I may have some chance yet,' thought the infatuated young fel-
low ; ' Douglas and she may not speak of love. He may be, as I
half suspect, a Jacobite plotter, and women, like Jesuits, are ever
the favourite agents of that party ; and then, perhaps, egad, the man
may be married already !'
Thoughts like these, gave him false hopes and delusive courage,
and he became, for a time, a little more composed ; but still re-
solved, that come what might, he would yet have his interview with
Bryde, and from her own lips learn the secret of his fate, not thut
we fear, however, Mr. Egerton's heart would have been broken in
the least by a rejection of his suit.
On this evening, as on a score of others, the secret of his love, was
hovering on the lips of Dalquharn ; but a sentiment of generosity to
Bryde, and a fear lest he might involve her, and perhaps her family,
in his most unmerited poverty and political ruin, sealed them up
and filled his heart with mingled emotions of love for her and bit-
terness at fate ! and yet they spoke of the expected landing of the
Prince, an event which Dalquharn, who shared that vast and vital
THE WHITE COCKADE. 87
secrets knew was drawing nearer and nearer every day. Speaking
of his own present poverty :
'I am rich,' said he, ' only in lore of country and in loyalty to
our rightful king. Deprived of these inspirations and incentives to
a glorious future, I should be poor indeed ! Kut if I fall, I shall do
so without dishonour,' and he continued bitterly, ' at times I feel
so weary even of my young life, that, as a change, I would almost
welcome death !'
1 On Towerhill, where the noble Derwentwater and your kins-
man, the brave Kenmure, died or at the gates of Carlisle ?'
'Nay, on neither place, Miss Otterburu but on the field of
battle/
' Woe is me, my dear friend, talk not thus !'
c Where else,' he eiclmmed proudly, ' should a Douglas die ? I
thrill leave fpw, none perhaps, to lament me, for I am the last of
my race the old line of the Douglasses of the Holm, and as Orlando
says in the play, in departing, 1 shall " do the world no injury, for
in it I have nothing; only in the world I fill up a place, which may
be better supplied, when I have mude it empty !" '
' Then, if you speak thus bitterly, let me add with Rosalind,
" the little strength I have, I would it were with you," that you
might wrestle the better with your fate,' said Bryde, with one of
her loveliest smiles, as she caressingly patted the arm on which she
leaned; 'you see that I have read the book of the great English
dramatist as well as you, my lord.'
As they walked on, Egerton's presence in the house they had
quitted, even his very existence, was forgotten by Bryde atid her
lover. They passed through the shrubberies and close-clipped
hedgerows, and proceeded towards the venerable fane of Auldhame,
which had been built, no man knows when, upon the Seacliff that
overhangs the waves of the Firth, but it was old, even in the days
of the gracious Duncan, who gifted it to God and St. Cuthbert of
Lindisfarne.
Dalquharn was silent, for hia heart and his eyes were full of lore
as he gazed from time to time, on his alluring and confiding com-
panion.
It was an evening of June, and a lovely one! The purity of the
air, the breeze from the far expanse of blue sea that stretched away
towards the dark bluff of St. Abb ; the bright sunshine and tho
odour of the fresh meadows ; the birds that carolled aloft or twit-
tered in the old green hedgerows, and the gay wild flowers that grew
by the wayside, all conduced to soothe the hearts of Dalquharn and
the young girl, and fill them with a sense of joy and lightness.
Within the mined chapel on the Seacliff, they lingered long.
Impressed, perhaps, by the solemnity of the place, they went hand
in hand now, when deeyphering the epitaphs and other inscriptions,
which the stern hand of time, the storms from the sea, and the ham-
mers of the gloomy iconoclasts of 1559 had spared. The walls were
88 TEE WHITE COCKADE.
time-worn, and covered in some places by emerald green moss j in
others by luxuriant masses of ivy.
Though the vaulted roof yet remained, in some parts the pave-
ment beneath it was sunk and irregular, as if the graves below had
fallen in, and the rank grass, the dock and nettle, grew up between
the slabs, which were covered by quaint Saxon letters, and bore in-
cised marks, where shields and crosses of monumental brass had
been torn away by gipsies and peasants for the mere value of the
metal.
Under an arched vault, profusely decorated with otters' heads, lay
the effigy of a knight (with his mailed feet resting on an otter crouch-
ing) since the days of the Eeformation, minus his helmetted head,
clasped hands and sword hilt ; but an inscription, still traceable,
requested the visitor to pray for the soul of ' Sir Nicholas Otterburn,
nmquhile of Auldhame, slayne in battel be ye Inglis, anno 1513,' for
it was he who had brought the calamity of the Spectre Drummer
upon his posterity.
A new rail surrounded this tomb, and Bryde, in a voice which
grew low and tremulous, informed Dalquharn, that therein her
mother and her murdered father lay. Her head drooped sadly on
one side as she spoke, and somehow, the young lord's arm went
caressingly, in sympathy around her, while his heart rose to his lips.
' Miss Otterburn Bryde, dear, dear, Bryde,' said he, ' I have a
solemn thing to say to you, and what place so fitting as this ?' He
paused, and she trembled, for too well she knew what was about to
come. ' I love you I, homeless, houseless, landless and attainted,
am, I know, most guilty in telling you this ; but I do love you ten-
derly, Bryde and and you are the first and only woman, to whom
I have ever said so.'
Bryde was silent, very pale, and trembling violently. A shower
of tears would have been a great relief, but no tears came.
' Speak, Bryde dearest, speak ?' he urged.
' Oh, my lord !' she began, and instead of withdrawing her hand
from his, their clasp seemed to tighten mutually, as if she sought
support.
'Lord me not, Bryde Otterburn call me Henry Douglas, as ten
years ago, in this very place, you were wont to do,' said he, tenderly.
' In in my heart I have long called you so.'
'May I hope that you you love me then!' he exclaimed, in a
transport of joy.
' Hush,' said she, glancing hastily around, as if even the dead
might hear her, and blushing painfully: 'you know that I do
would I have come here with you else and alone ?'
Her voice was barely audible.
One kiss now, and overcome by the excess of long pent-up emotion,
they tottered as if intoxicated, towards a fragment of the ruined
wall, when he seated her beside him. Her face was crimsoned by
one continued blush j but it was hidden in Dalquharn's breast. His
THE wnrra COCKADE. 89
cheek rested on the tresses of her soft brown hair, for her hood had
fallen back, and his strong, sustaining arm was round her.
Then he took her fair head caressingly between his hands, and
again turned the sweet face upwards to his and somehow, their
lips met again, and they trembled in the very excess of their new-
born joy, as they looked into each other's swimming eyes, and it
might be, into each other's hearts too.
They were long silent and bewildered now, for words no longer
came.
The green leaves rustled pleasantly in the midsummer breeze,
that passed through the open mullions and tracery of the ruined
windows ; the merry birds flew in and out, as they sang and twit-
tered among the wild roses and sweet-briar that grew in masses over
all the chancel arch, and where of old the altar stood ; the sound of
the sea was heard as its white waves climbed the volcanic rocks of
the adjacent shore, and the lovers sat long in silence, while time
seemed to pause, though, in reality, with them it went swifter than
ever.
Words come anon, and then confessions were made, and mental
impressions related ; coincidences of thought and wishes coinci-
dences that seemed truly miraculous ! How and why had their
spirits been apart so long ? How long they had sighed for and
thought of each other ! Their strange dreams, their moments of
doubt, of sorrow and of sadness ; their former, almost childish
days of joyous companionship, with all their dim foreshadow-
ings of the present time of ecstacy, were re-called and compared
with all their minutiae, as indicating the hour that had come;
and never were the pure illusions of youthful life and love more
brilliant to the poor attainted loyalist, than at this time, when
Brydo Otterburn, in the full flush of her blooming beauty, her girl-
hood and her passion, reclined her head on his breast, and acknow-
ledged that she loved him, though he had only sorry we are to
confess it his entire estate, a few Louis d'ors in his pocket!
' And now it is, that I tremble for you, my own beloved Bryde,
whose fate is linked with such a man as an attainted Jacobite an
outlaw whom any man may kill, without the commission of a crime.'
' And I tremble for you, dear Henry, and my poor old grandfather,
who lives so completely in the past. Alas, Henry ! you know me to
be loyal loyal unto death ; but is not the cause of the Elector too
strong for King James to subvert it? oh, if you should if you
should ;' she failed to conclude the sentence, for tears choked her
utterance.
' Fear not for me,' said he, with assumed gaiety ; ' I could deny
you nothing, but my loyalty to the king, beloved Bryde Bryde in
name and purpose is it not so ?'
Could poor Kgerton have seen them then!
It was almost sunset (and the June evenings are long) when
they left the ruined chapel and returned towards the house, hand
90 THE WHITE COCKADE,
in hand, in silence and full of happiness, and then Bryde, anxious
for solitude, and to enjoy a qniet flood of tears, rushed away to her
own room.
On her engaged finger she had a strange ring, -which was in-
scribed
Yours only and Ever,
It had been the betrothal ring given by Dalquharu's father to
his mother, blue-eyed Jessie Gordon, of the loyal House of Ken-
mure, and could a Scottish cavalier desire a better golden hoop to
place on the finger of his affianced bride ?
On the morrow, Dalquharn would inform Sir Balclred of what
had occurred, and crave pardon for abusing his hospitality by seek-
ing to rob him of his grand-daughter.
Alas ! he little knew the terrible events which a few short hours
would bring to pass !
CHAPTER XVII.
MB. EGERTOX PROPOSES.
'Chloe! my precious! why so coy 1
Thou dear provoking jewel!
Why wilt thou still Hiispend my joy,
And still continue cruel ?
'Tims armed with snuff-box, cane, and ring,
And twenty pretty fancies,
Glib nonsense from ray tongue shall spring,
In a-la-mode advances.
'However, if these methods fall,
And have no power to win ye,
I'll only turn about my tail.
And think the devil's in ye !'
Scot's Magazine, 1739.
NBTTHEB Captain Wyvil nor Mr. Egerton graced her tea-board by
their presence in the drawing-room on this evening. Mr. John
Gage, the English exciseman, had come hurriedly to Auldliame,
announcing that there were rumours of the black lugger having
been seen outside the Isle of May, and patrols under Sergeant Tees-
dale were required at certain points, as the ' Fox ' frigate had run
up the river to St. Margaret's Hope, for repairs. Sir John Mitchell,
into whose custody Sir Baldred had placed the five hundred pounds
obtained from Balcraftie, was in Edinburgh, on what errand need
scarcely be explained.
Bryde. when tea was over, found that she was left alone. Dalqu-
harn had swiftly stolen one sweet salute and retired to the library,
having to write letters, which he meant, to dispatch in person, at a
quiet post-house, about two miles distant. They were for the Lords
Elcho and Balmeriuo, and were in cypher, the addresses being ' Mr.
THE WHITE COCitADE. 91
David Wemyss ' and ' Captain Arthur Elphinstone,' to the care of
the Conservator of Scottish Privileges at Campvere.
Sir Baldred had fallen asleep in his wide easy chair, with his
black wig and sword-belt hung on the knobs thereof, and he wore a
purple silk cap pulled over his eyes ; so she kissed the good old
man, kindly and tenderly, and igsued into the garden, which, in
the style of those days was a labyrinth of close walks and yew-
hedges ; and which, though it covered but four acres or so, would
have taken a stranger at least two hours to perambulate and ex-
plore.
Her mind and step were buoyant with happiness. Her thoughts
were turned inward, and she mentally rehearsed again and again
the visit to the ruined chapel, with all its delightful details, while-
seated on a stone sofa, with her drooping head resting on her left
hand, her brown hair falling in bright masses over it, all golden in
the light that yet lingered in the west. Her right hand toyed un-
consciously with her fan ; there was a bright smile playing about
her parted lips ; and she was all unconscious that Egerton stood by,
surveying her with admiration and a passion that did not require
wine to inflame it.
He little knew of what had passed, or of what was then in her
heart ; but pique, and the wine, of which he had been partaking
too freely, gave him a false courage, and a bearing that by turns
was jaunty, gay, maudlin, sad, and bitter ; so when he did ultimately
attract Bryde's attention and address her, she had but one idea,
that he bored her.
Poor Egerton had been at Lucky Scougal's change-house in Auld-
hame, where some of the farmers, or yeomen of the Lord Hadding-
ton, would insist on sharing with him more than one bottle of good
wine, as they were jolly fellows, and simply because he was an Eng-
lish soldier.
1 Many people in East Lothian at that time were Jacobites, and
they were most forward to mix with the soldiers,' says Carlyle of
Inveresk, in his co-teinporaneous autobiography. ' The commons
in general, as well as two-thirds of the gentry, had no aversion to
the family of Stuart; and could their religion have been secured,
would have been very glad to see them on the throne again.'
' Drinking smuggled wine ! 'Twos smuggled, no doubt, in a ras-
cally Scot's change-house, when, this very night twelvemonth, I
was at a ridotta in the Haymarket, with more than fifteen hundred
fashionables, after seeing Mr. Pritchard, Mrs. Clive, and Macklin,
at the play. Demnie, how the world wags!' He was muttering
this, when he suddenly came upon the young lady seated in the
garden, and immersed in happy thoughts as she has just been de-
cribed the flush of delight that thrills in the heart of a young and
romantic girl on first being assured that an ardent and handsome
lover is hers, and hers only!
Jealousy, pride, aud confidence, now prompted Egerton to test
92 THE WHITE COCEADE.
his future fate to put all upon the hazard of the die ; so he at
once seated himself by the side of Miss Otterburn, who would gladly
have avoided him at such a time and in such a private place, lest
Dalquharn might come forth in search of her, and suspect her of
coquetry.
' Has Wyvil told you, Miss Otterburn, that that in three days
only, we in all probability march from this, on our return to head-
quarters ?' he asked.
'I have not seen Captain Wyvil all day," she replied, rather
coldly, and in no way moved by the tidings of their approaching
departure, to Egerton's intense chagrin.
'Ah! I forgot; he has been sending three corporals, with patrols,
along the coast, to assist the officers of excise in their search for
smugglers ; but, most probably, in three days, your amiability and
hospitality will be no longer taxed by our presence.'
' Taxed dear Mr. Egerton ? Pray do not talk so. If we have
served in any way to lessen the too evident tedium of Scottish
quarters to you and good Captain Wyvil, we shall only consider
ourselves too happy.'
' Won't you be sorry, though, when we are all gone ?' asked Eger-
ton, adjusting his wig and hat, which, sooth to say, were both some-
what awry, so much so, that Bryde's merry eyes were laughing at
him mischievously over her fan. Though her sweet mouth was
hidden, lie knew that he was the object of her merriment, and said, ;
with pique in his tone,
' Egad, madam, you are very cruel !'
' Cruel ! How so, sir ?'
'Ah ! don't say, sir.'
1 Ydu called me madam.'
' But your expression chills me,' he continued, twirling his sword
knot.
' Well and I am cruel a veritable cockatrice perhaps ; but in
what way ?'
'To dally to trifle thus, with one who you you know too well,
loves you.'
' Sir !' exclaimed Bryde, in an unmistakeable flutter, shutting her
great green fan, and re-opening it.
' Sir, again ! Pray call me friend chum what you will : surely
my words merit some kindness.'
' Well, my friend,' said Bryde, whose recent and much more
momentous interview with Lord Dalquharn had given her more
decision of manner and independence of spirit than she would
otherwise have possessed at such a crisis as this, ' what do you
mean, Mr. Egerton ?'
'Eryde Miss Otterburn, I mean will you pardon me; but,
egad, there is sometliing I must say to you before I go, and and
you shall hear me now.'
Egerton took her left hand between his own, and she was BO
THE WHITE COCKADE. 98
much agitated that she could not withdraw it, though a heavy, yet
stealthy, step was heard on the gravel of an adjacent walk.
' In three days we shall march, as I said, too probably, and I
shall never be here again unless unless '
1 What, sir ? Oh, speak quickly, pray !'
' You should wish me."
' You, Bryde ; for into your hands I commit my heart, my fate,
my future existence! Bryde Otterburn, I am a straightforward
fellow : do you think that you could love could like me well
euough to marry me. There, egad, the words arc out at last !'
Bryde was flushed, breathless, and silent. Egerton mistook these
for symptoms of yielding, and became more vehement while the
eavesdropper drew nearer.
' You have but one word of three little letters to say, Bryde !'
' Oh, Mr. Egerton, I pray I pray '
' Or say you will try to like me or learn to like me, well enough
to be my wife ; or that you would have me wait a little until you
considered it a day, a week if you will j but say something to
give me a little hope, however slender ?'
Stunned and bewildered now, Bryde knew not what to say ; but
j Egerton's disengaged hand was menacing her waist, she started
up and withdrew a pace or two, trembling with agitation ; for it is
not often that a young lady, even one so charming as our Bryde
Otterburn, receives two such offers in one day.
' Pardon me if I give you pain, my dear sir,' said she, looking
down while she spoke : ' but I can never love you can never marry
you, nor, if you knew all, any man who wears a scarlet uniform,'
she added, to take away the sting of rejection on political grounds.
' Of course,' replied Egerton, with a sudden tinge of bitterness
in his manner ; ' the colour is not popular here I know ; yet it was
worn by all your regiments and guards, horse and foot, long before
this Union, which we find a pill so bitter here that I marvel Sawney
ever swallowed it, though that same pill was pretty well gilded by
John Bull for the purpose.'
It was now Bryde's turn to be piqued by this suddenly-assumed
banter.
' Why should an English gentleman wear the colours of the
German-Elector like you?' she asked.
' 'Tis His Majesty's will and pleasure, madam, that the uniform
of the Kentish Buffs be scarlet, laced with silver and faced with
buff,' said Egerton, in whose head the wine mounted at times, and
made him quaint and absurd ; ' but, egad, madam, I am indepen-
dent of the service. My old grandad God bless him ! left me
two thousand a year clear, from good land in Cheshire. I shall re
sign, quit, sell out, to please you, Miss Otterburn. Bryde, dearest
Bryde ! do you hear me ? though I know my mother and sisters
94 THE WHITE COCKADE.
will all take to hysterics and Hungary water on hearing of my mar'
riage with a Scots girl '
' Poor gentlewomen !' said Bryde, laughing, when she had him
half-melted by his earnestness ; ' I should be so sorry to offend
their fine feelings. But you address me in vain, Mr. Egerton ; my
heart is not my own, nor, perhaps, my hand either, if Sir Baldred
is consulted on the subject.'
' Then, I have no hope,' said the blunderer, sadly.
' None ; but yet let us be friends, my dear Mr. Egerton.'
'Friends, oh yes, for ever and whatever may happen,' he ex-
claimed, and raising his hat, he knelt down and kissed her proffered
hand, with great tenderness.
It was at this very juncture, that the steps which had been crash-
ing among the gravel, approached the end of the walk, where the
stone sofa stood between the hedgerows, and then, at an arch cut
through the dense old yews, Bryde saw the mischievous visage of
Bailie Balcraftie appear for a moment.
' Enough,' said she ; 'rise, Mr. Egerton, and let this matter be
recurred to no more.'
She hurriedly withdrew her hand, and with a glance of scorn and
anger at the intruder a glance which Egerton mistook as being
meant for him sailed away, fanning herself vigorously, with her
hooped train sweeping the gravel behind her.
' Aye aye, Mr. Egerton, and you, my fine madam !' muttered
the Bailie, as he slunk away ; ' sets the wind in that quarter? Sae,
sae, it is you TOP, Mr. Egerton, in the king's livery, the red coat
and cocked hat, I maun beware o', and no the sae called Captain
Douglas ! But I'll mar your game, I'll mar your game, or my name
is no Reuben Balcraftie !'
He continued to mutter thus, while striding away, a fierce gleam
passing over his vile visage in the stai-light. His hands were clutch-
ing convulsively the square skirts of his coat unconsciously, as it
were, for jealousy, stung and disappointed, maddened him. '
Between an opening in the walk, Bryde, when just about to enter
the house, could see Egerton still kneeling by the garden seat, like
one bewildered. She sighed and feared that slie might unwittingly .
have pained the poor fellow, who had been such a pleasant inmate
of Auldhame, her friend and companion too, now for several weeks ;
and it was well that she had those gentle thoughts of pity, even for
a moment, as she was fated never again to hear the pleasant voice
of Talbot Egerton.
111E WHITE COCKADE. 95
CHAPTER XVIII.
1HE QUABBEL.
' He is quick!
His poiut and eye do go together! Scare*
You are marked, you're hit ! his sword is part of him/
Grows to his hand, sir, as his hand to his wrist;
The very moment that your weapons touch,
He is here, and there, and in 1 his lounge, a shot
You see not till 'tis home \' Woman's Wit.
THE mistaken glance of Miss Otter-burn roused all Egerton's pique,
pride, and jealousy. He started to his feet, and thrust his silver-laced
Kevenhuller hat firmly down upon his curly regimental wig, nearly
tearing away its upright feather and black cockade in doing so.
'Oh!' he exclaimed in mingled sorrow and anger; "tia very
well, madam, demme! You Scots have the pride of Lucifer!
What has a plain English squire, like Talbot Egerton, to hope for,
when such a spruce Scottish jockey as this Captain Douglas comes
into the field ? He will have a pedigree beyond the flood, no
doubt, for whether a pedlar, with his pack, or a peer of the realm,
every Scot hath that by right of inheritance. But I'd have you to
know. Miss Otterburn, that the Egertons were Lords of Mai pas
and Egerton, when your James I. was twangliug on his ghittern in
the Tower of Windsor, and that was not yesterday ! And she can
treat me so ! Ah, 1 he added after a pause, ' if I had been a great
man with a star on my coat, or a handle of any kind to my name
even a laird of some black rocks and red heather, and " of that
Ilk " (instead of my fertile acres in Cheshire), more than all, if I
were a rebel, a Jacobite, a Jesuit's toady, an outlaw, a Scots cattle
stealing thief, perhaps '
'What on earth means this farrago, Talbot?' asked Captain
Wyril, who, at that moment, came upon his comrade soliloquizing
angrily in the garden : ' is this a comedy you are rehearsing ?'
'A comedy, 'sdeath! no 'tis more like to prove a tragedy,' re-
plied the other, greatly ruffled, especially at having been surprised
in tin's state of irritation.
' Prythee, man, what is the matter you have been taking too
much wine ; is it not so ?' asked the good humoured Wyvil.
' Like Jack Freelove, in the " Spectator," who was " murdered
by Melissa, in her hair," this fair Scottish lass, in her unpowdered
locks, hath fairly murdered me !*
'Come, come, Talbot, rouse thee, man,' eaid the Captain, taking
his arm, for Egerton's steps were now becoming unsteady ; ' don't
be a moonstruck fool. We shall, too soon, I fear, have other work
cut out for us among the misty, Scottish mountains, than falling in
love, and sighing like furnaces ; and other work even than searching
a wild and rocky shore, and by rugged roads in Indian file, for
mugglers' secret haunts and hoards.'
96 *HE WHITE COCKADE.
' Captain Douglas a pretty fellow, no doubt !' muttered Egerton,
talking to himself ; ' I'll have him out to a game of sharps, though,
I'll have him with sword and pistol !'
' Aha, I see how it is," said Wyvil ; ' our new friend from Hol-
land has turned your flank, my poor beau, Egerton.'
The latter replied only by an incoherent expletive.
' Well, Talbot, after being, as I and all our mess have known you
to be, madly in love with sundry queens, princesses, and fairies of
Covent Garden and Old Drury, cai-rjing even their sedans at night,
and after parading Sir Timothy Tawdry and others of ours at the
back of Montagxie House about them, I do marvel that even the
blooming freshness of this Scots heather belle hath dazzled you j
but '
' This way ! down the avenue come with me,' said Egerton,
hurriedly ; 'I'll have it out witli him I tell you, Marmaduke, I'll
have it out with him,' he threatened for the fourth time, as he saw
Dalquharn approaching, with his head bent on his breast, and ap-
parently full of thought. He was walking quickly, being in haste,
to post the letters he had just penned to two of the leading men of
his party.
He was evidently in deep reverie, as one might well be, whose
mind saw in the future, crumbling thrones and the strife of kings,
bloody fields, and all the horrors of a civil war, the flames of
which his own hand was seeking or aiding to kindle. He saw
neither Wyvil nor Egerton, against whom he stumbled, or by whom
he was roughly jostled, for both started and surveyed each other
with considerable irritation.
' You will apologise, Captain Douglas, if Captain Douglas you
are indeed ?' said Egerton, with undisguised hauteur.
' I apologise ! most assuredly not now ; but I demand an amende
honorable from you, Mr. Egerton, for your offensive bearing and
direct insinuation.'
' Good, demme !' said Egerton, fiercely, cocking his hat over his
right eye ; 'you demand satisfaction, do you?'
' This to me ?' Baid Dalquham, greatly ruffled, as he came for-
ward a pace.
' Td you, or any other man !'
' Zounds, sirrah ! '
' Aud I say zounds, my pretty Scot, as the player says, " I shall
tickle your catastrophe !" You are welcome to a tune on your own
Caledonian cremona, and demme, if I don't make you dance to it.
On guard !' cried Egerton, who now seemed mad with fury, and
to become intoxicated by his own words, as he drew his sword, and
smoothed his long lace ruffles back from the wrist of his right
hand.
' Have the goodness to lend me your hanger, Captain Wyvil !'
said Dalquharn, ' I have nothing, as you see, but a riding rod.'
*HB WHITE COCKADE. 67
'Talbot Talbot Egerton, are you mad!' exclaimed Wyvil j 'is
this bearing courteous this rashness seemly?'
' I care not what they are. so that they suit my humour. On
guard, I say ! lend him your sword, Marmaduke, or I'll split him
like a spring chicken.'
' Nerer shall my sword be drawn in quarrels such as this so put
up yours,' said Wyvil, angrily.
It was fortunate that Dalquharn was unarmed, for every vein
tingled, and every nerve quivered with rage.
'Gentlemen, gentlemen,' exclaimed Bailie Balcraftie, now hurry-
ing forward, and no doubt extremely glad to see those men the
two who stood exactly in the path of his intended plans against
Bryde ready to tilt at each other's throats; 'keep the king's
peace ! would ye draw in the avenue o' Auldhame, and close to the
very door o' your friend and host, Sir Baldred ? A bonnie fray it
is, and beseeming, too !'
'As a magistrate, aid me, Mr. Balcraftie you are au alder-
man '
' A Bailie, sir !' said the other, perking up his head and planting
liis cane on the ground.
' Well, Bailie, aid me to keep the peace here,' said Captain Wyvil.
I Beware, ye sirs," said the Bailie, thus urged ; ' for if one person
assaults another wi' a lethal weapon, either in design to slay, or in
heedlessness o' the bluidy result, the act is held as felony and mur-
der by our Scottish law.'
'Chut! out upon your Scots law; what is it to me? I am a
free-born Englishman, and don't value your Scots law a brass far-
thing not even a tester!'
' But the Lord Advocate may teach you to your cost, my gay
spark, what forethocht-felony is,' said the Bailie, slinking his
stick; ' and know ye not, that they who live by the sword, shall
perish by the sword ? Mairoure, it is weel nigh hainesiicken to
draw blades here !'
'I draw mine whenever, and wherever I am insulted,' said Eger-
ton, still standing on his defence.
I 1 have no blade to draw,' said Dalquharn, with growing rage,
' or this hour would be a dear one for thee, mad fool ! However,
my friend Captain Mitchell '
' A Scots rebel like yourself, I doubt not,' thundered Egerton,
injuriously, and still blindly bent on quarrel and bloodshed.
' Is uy, sir a man of the most unspotted honour !'
' Well and your Captain Mitchell !'
' He, on the morrow, shall arrange a fitting time and place for
our meeting. Enough of this, Mr. Egerton. You must see, Cap-
tain Wyvil, that he is quite beside him -elf to-night, and I should
encounter him, even in the starlight, to his decided disadvantage.'
Egcrtou. laughed scornfully.
7
98 THE WHITE COCKADE.
' Be assured that, when next we meet, there shall be none (o
separate us, till one lies stiff on his mother earth !'
With these impressive words, which were regretfully remembered
at another time, Dalquharn lifted his hat, bowed with great lofti-
ness of bearing, and hastily quitted the avenue, while Balcraftie
followed stealthily a few paces, to learn which way he had gone.
Dalquharn's heart was burning with rage, and agitated by alarm,
for a duel or brawl might lead to his discovery, arrest, and the
total destruction of all his hopes, and those of others at this great
political juncture. But he knew that he must fight now, and that
his honour required it.
' If I fall on the morrow,' thought he, ' I shall die as plain
Captain Douglas, and shall compromise no one ; but if I had been
killed to-night, with the letters and cyphers of Elcho and Balme-
rino upon me, how fatal to the cause of the king !'
"Sdeath, and the devil!' exclaimed Egerton ; 'I'll after that fel-
low, and send him home with his ears in his pocket.'
' To-morrow, my rash friend, this matter shall be settled, but in
presence of selected witnesses,' said Captain Wyvil, sternly, ' I for
one, though very opposite to duels ; but one more word of this
matter to-night, Talbot, and you will make me your enemy."
' My old buck, Marmaduke, to-morrow then be it,' replied Eger-
ton, who was now completely sobered, and shook the captain's
hand ; ' I shall then give our Scottish friend a lesson in carte and
tierce, that will serve him for the remainder of his life.'
' A deuced unpleasant thing it is, however, so have a fracas with
Sir Baldred's most favoured guest, and, apparently, his most par-
ticular friend,' said Wyvil, ' and to run that friend through the
body, is but a poor return for the old man's kindness during our
long visit here. What the devil possessed thee to-night, Talbot ?
Other three days had seen us on the march to head-quarters.'
' I am a perfect swordsman '
'Few better in England, as I know well.'
' And I shall kill him and every man who stands between me
and Bryde Otterburn, now that my hand is in for the game !'
' Hush, for heaven's sake, and don't let that cool-headed fellow,
Balcraftie, hear you see, he comes this way,' whispered Wyvil ;
but the Bailie did hear the melo-dramatic threat, which seemed to
confirm the scene he had witnessed at the garden seat, and it made
his craven heart wince, for he both feared and hated the bold and
reckless young Englishman,.who now said hurriedly,
' Good night, Wyvil zounds ! I can't stay here. Why is ifc
that my heart is always strangely stirred, and that my very flesh
creeps, whenever the cold fishy eyes of that canting Scotsman fall
upon me! Good night, friend Marmaduke, and remember to-
morrow.'
'To-morrow !'
Egerton hurried away. Wyril and the Bailie thought that he
IHE WHITE COCKADE. 00
had gone through the garden hedge-rows to the mansion of Auld-
hame; but the acute magistrate soon discovered that he had re-
turned to the change-house of Lucky Scougal, in the hamlet, to
assuage his wrath by one bottle more of her good smuggled Spanish
wine.
When the gardener came a few minutes after, to secure the gar-
den gate, he found one of his best spades missing. It was a new
one, fresh from Edinburgh, by the cart of the Dunbar carrier ; he
searched everywhere among his flower-beds : but a thief had evi-
dently been there, for his new implement of husbandry could no-
where be found.
CHAPTER XIX.
MYSTEBY
'The afternoon grows dark betimes;
Tbe night winds ere the night are blowing;
And cold grey mists from out the sea,
Along the forest moor are going :
And now she paces through the room ;
And " he will come anon," she sayeth ;
And then she stirs the sleeping fire,
Sore marvelling why he thus delay eth.'!TA Huntet't Linn.
NEXT morning, when the little party assembled at breakfast, iu the
chamber-of-dais, or dining-room, Bryde Otterburn was absent, but
sent a message to the effect that her presence must be excused, as
blie found herself too ill on that morning to leave bed, and her dot-
ing grandfather, who became seriously alarmed about the nervous
and hysterical state in which he found her, despatched a servant on
horseback, with a led horse, for the barber-surgeon of North Ber-
wick, who bled, blistered, and drew teeth, as well as shaved, curled
perriwigs, and dressed toupees, as his striped pole and gilt bason
served to inform all who passed through the High Street.
Mr. Biruiebousle officiated at the tea and coffee board ; Captain
Wyvil presided over the ham, fowl, and other edibles : and now it
was found that another seat was vacant that of Mr. Egerton.
Could he be so silly as to sulk, and not to appear purposely ?
thought Wyvil.
The meal proceeded rapidly, but silently ; Bryde with her smil-
ing, brown eyes, quick small hands, and pretty morning dress, with
its frills all plaited (as if by the fingers of the Brownie), was not
{here to shed radiance over all.
Wyvil's idea was soon dissipated by the butler, who announced
with some astonishment, that Mr. Egerton was not in the house,
that he had not been abed, nor had he been seen since last night \
Captain Mitchell had not yet returned rroin Edinburgh. Wyvil
glanced enquiringly at Dalquharn, and was astonished by the
72
100 TUB WHITE COCKADE.
change in his face, and appearance generally, since last night. He
was paler and actually older looking ; his dark blue eyes were blood-
shot, and he seemed to have passed a sleepless night. He di-ank
little and ate less. He was feverish and nervous, and to the ob-
servant eyes of Wyvil, he seemed to have an intense difficulty in
commanding or fixing his ideas. In short, his once strong, but
keen nervous system, seemed completely unstrung, like one who
was recovering from a long and deep debauch.
Can this young man be afraid of Egerton, and of the proposed
hostile meeting ? thought the captain next, and with some contempt
m his tone, he again asked if Captain Mitchell had returned.
Dalquharn, in a voice that was barely audible, replied, that he .
had not. Sir Baldred was fidgety and alarmed, but knew not why.
' Egad,' he muttered, ' I shall have two patients on my hands ap-
parently. Any word of Mr. Egerton yet?' he asked, as the butler
returned from making fresh enquiries.
He had been last seen with Captain Wyvil in the garden and
avenue ; thieves were supposed to have been about last night, as
the gardener had one of his best shovels stolen, and there were
marks of strange feet among the tulip-beds.
Wyvil now became seriously alarmed. He remembered that he
had heard his grandfather (an old colonel of the Ironsides) relate
many a time at Hurstmonceaux, how Cromwell's men in Scotland,
during the first two or three years of their service there, had been
slain like reptiles by the peasantry. His blood boiled up ; ho stuck
his loaded pistols in his girdle, and went forth to urge the scrutiny
in person.
The day passed slowly on ; Mitchell returned in the evening,
and joined in the search with Dalquharn and others ; the sun drew
westward, but still no trace was found of the missing man.
Woodlands and highways, corn-fields and hedgerows, were
searched and examined ; every flight of crows was deemed ominoua
that he was lying in the spot towards which they winged their way.
Could he have fallen over the rocks into the sea, or otherwise have
committed suicide ? Wyvil loudly asserted that he was not the
man to be guilty either of such folly or such wickedness. Had he
been waylaid by Egyptians (as the gipsies are named in Scotland),
by footpads, for the value of his watch and rings, or by revengeful
smugglers, for Scupperplug's sable craft was alleged to have been
seen in the offing ?
Sergeant Tony Teesdale, who, with all the grenadiers of the de-
tachment, made a close and vigorous pursuit, averred that he had
not seen him at Auldhame hamlet ; and Lucky Scougal asserted
that he had quitted her house about half-past nine, or in the early
part of the gloaming, and that he was then not quite sober, but was
flushed with wine and excitement.
Suspicions of the worst kind seemed verified when Sergeant Tees-
dale aud the drummer arrived at the house, about nightfall, with a
TOE WHITE COCEADE. 101
lace sleeve ruffle and golden link, and with the buff-faced cuff of a
uniform coat, having thereon six flat buttons of plain silver. Though
regimental buttons bore no number or device until 1767, it was at
once recognised as Egerton's and seemed to have been rent away
by violence, like the ruffle, which was spotted with blood !
It was taken to Bryde, who shuddered and wept over it, for she
knew the ruffle only too well, by some stitches she had put in it a
day or so past, at the request of the wearer, who was then in a gay
and flirting mood. These relics had been found on the highway,
near the avenue gate, but this might not indicate the scene of
violence, as they seemed to have been blown hither and thither by
the last night's wind.
Their discovery added greatly to the growing excitement; the
search was resumed with greater vigour, and even Bailie Balcraftie,
who arrived with the Esculapian shaver from North Berwick, took
part therein.
' My brave young friend must have been the victim of some foul
treachery,' exclaimed Captain Wyvil ; ' he was one of the best
swordsmen in all London !'
' Alake the day !' moaned the Bailie ; ' I aye feared that English
lad would come to an evil end !'
' Wherefore thought you so, sir ?' asked Captain Wyvil, sternly ;
' there was not a more harmless fellow in the Buffs, or in all the
king's service.'
' May be sae, but I warrant he never knelt to the blessed book,
and as the song says,
'"He downie sing at the Psalm
For spoiling his mini mini mon;
And tlic lips that King na to God
Should never a maiden woo." '
' Excuse me, sir but d n your song !' said Wyvil, fiercely, ns
he adjusted his sleeve ruffles.
' And then he was sorely addicted to card-playing, to twangling
on the vial, to dancing and blowing on the flute vain snares o* the
man o' sin, and in nae way suiting the man o' God.'
Wyvil could not speak ; he only gave the magistrate a withering
glance of silent and profound scorn.
' Gude forgive me, a weak and erring creature, if I misjudge the
youth, Captain,' continued the Bailie ; and then lifting up his face,
and closing his pale and cunning eyes, he crossed his hands meekly
on his walking cane, and whined out, "Oh, judge not, lest ye be
juclg cd " and, " oh cease ye from man, whose breath is in his nos-
trils, for wherein is he to be accounted of?"
Another day passed, and still there came no tidings pf Egerton.
The spinnet stood open in the drawing room, with some leaves of
Scottish music on the stand, and there lay the poor fellow's flute,
with which, but two or three days ago, he had been accompanying
Bryde, and striving hard to please that beaxitiful and wilful young
102 THE WHITE COCKADE.
lady, by attempting a Jacobite air, ' The auld Stuarts back again,'
winch would have cost him his commission, and more perhaps, if
those in authority had heard him. And now Wyvil looked sadly
at the instrument, and at the tiny flageolet, which had been the
player's gift to Miss Otterburn in a happier hour ; and the honest
and true hearted captain sighed, for he loved his young subaltern
sincerely, and in Scotland, Englishmen still felt as if they were
somewhat in a foreign country.
' Can she have loved him after all and what means all this hor-
rible mystery ?' exclaimed the captain, who on hearing that the
young lady was still unwell and abed, craved that he might have
an interview with her for a few moments ; but Mrs. Porriel
Graliame assured him in language, which to Wyvil was barely intel-
ligible, tliat she was far too ill to see any one.
She had been recovered with difficulty from a succession of faint-
ing fits, by burnt feathers being placed under her nostrils, and by
having poured between her lips the distillation known as Hungary
water, being wine flavor ed with rosemary, after the recipe written
about 1659 by Elizabeth, queen of Hungary.
She was now pale, speechless, and did nothing but moan, weep,
ani refuse all food. It may be added, that the ring, which bore the
significant motto,
Yours only and ever,
the ring placed upon her finger in that delicious hour at St.
Baldraal chapel by Dalquharn,was already withdrawn from her hand.
Why was this ?
An inexplicable change had also come over the bearing of Lord
Dalquharn. Was it the result of the unavenged insults and de-
fiances hurled at him on that eventful evening, or was it the anxiety
for the fate of his foe, which caused this too apparent alteration.
He had now a wistful expression of eye and did not exert himself
much in the search, so thought the sharp-sighted and now suspi-
cious Wyvil or he did so in a hopeless and mechanical way, as if
the inquiry would have no result.
To Sir Baldred it always seemed as if there was something which
the young lord wished to say, but lacked the heart or energy to do
so ; or he was always interrupted by the inopportune arrival or
presence of Balcraftie, of Wyvil, and of inquiring country friends,
who poured from all quarters into Auldhame, to eat and drink,
condole, suggest, and speculate upon the mystery.
There were times when Dalquharn thought himself unobserved,
or when Balcraftie was present, and when the cold but vulture-like
eyes of that individual were upon him, that his pallor he was very
pale now increased, when a spasm would pass over his handsome
features, and even an uncontrollable convulsive shudder shake his
frame.
Once he was seen gnawing his lips, with a glare in his blood-shot
eyes j he frequently sighed heavily, and, strange to say, those indi-
THE WHITE COCKADE. 103
cations of violent emotion were also exhibited by Sir John Mitchell
(that usually jovial and equable guest of Sir Baldred), with whom
Lord Dalquharn was now almost hourly in conversation and earnest
consultation, apart from the rest of the household.
By orders from Sir John Cope, the Lieutenant-General com-
manding in Scotland, Captain Wyvil delayed marching his detach-
ment to head quarters, till more stringent inquiries were made con-
cerning the missing officer; but these, like the rest, were all urged
in vain.
Old Dorriel Grahame was never weary now of discanting on the
many good qualities possessed by ' puir Maister Aigerton,' as she
named him, and made Bryde more feverish and wretched by her
noisy lamentations for his supposed death, on which she dilated
witli all the morbid minutite of her class.
' That pawky auld kimmer, Lucky Scougal, should ken something
o' this black business,' said the Bailie, sententiously.
' Why so ?' asked Captain Wyvil.
' She may have cast her evil eye upon the puir lad, for the carliu
hath but a bad repute in the parish.'
Wyvil knew not what this meant ; but it was averred in the
district that the keeper of the change-house Egertou had last quit-
ted, was one of those who practised witchcraft in secret, and who
levied a species of black mail upon the peasantry, in the shape of
meal, barley, and cheese, to shield them from the power of the evil
eye, or, as the phrase is still in the country, to make her een loot
kindly.
' We must seek aid o' the sheriff, the Procurator- Fiscal, and the
Lord Advocate,' said Balcraftie, who was apparently unremitting in.
his efforts, and certainly suffered all the sorrow of a mute at a
funeral.
' Malediction on the Lord Advocate !' said Sir Baldred ; ' I have
seen the loon at Edinburgh cross, flaunting it with an orange cock-
ade in his hat. Woe is me !' he added, sadly ; ' the winter rime of
many years hath whitened my auld pow'r, but never to a guest of
mine did such a calamity as this occur before, and no such hour of
evil, save when my dear and only son died by the hand of a black
and unknown traitor ! 'Tis strange.' continued the old baronet,
musingly, ' that the greatest calamities usually occur between night
and morning, especially if the wind be high.'
According to the superstitions of the good folks in and about
Auldhame, the mystery involving the fate of Talbot Egerton was
heralded or accompanied by as many omens of evil as might have
-presaged the fate of a more important personage, than a heedless
and half-tipsy young subaltern of the Kentish Buffs ; but then, the
Scots of those days doted dearly on the marvellous.
In the gloaming, the bittern, now no longer an inhabitant of the
wilds and marshes of the lonely Lammermuirs, had been heard
' to sound its dram
Booming from the sedgy fallow.'
104 THE WHITE COCKADE.
The Yoice of 'tlie hedge-pig' had been heard at times near the
close-clipped yew fences of the home farm, and been taken for the
moaning of a disturbed spirit; and about midnight there came a
storm of wind, accompanied by such a roaring and bellowing noise
in the Firth, as had not been heard, Sir Baldred affirmed, ' since
the night the union was signed, when more than fifty whales came
up, madly cai-eering and plunging with the tide, which, at its ebb-
ing, left more than thirty of these monsters stranded and rolling on
the flat sands of Kirkaldy and Tyninghame next morning that
morning when not a cock in all Scotland had been heard to crow !'
' The whales were no bad omen of the future, surely ?' said Cap-
tain Wyvil, smiling.
A description of Egerton's personal appearance and dress, fairly
written in round text by Maister Scoutherdoup, parochial school-
master and precentor of St. Andrew's kirk, was displayed at tho
market-cross of North Berwick, besides Bailie Balcrai'tie's notice of
a preachment thereupon ; and, by the voice of tlie town-drummer,
a reward of fifty guineas (to which the Bailie added ten) was offered
for information concerning him, but all in vain ; and his wonderful
disappearance formed the staple subject of a great discourse, deli-
vered with singular fluency by the Bailie on Midsummer eve, to a
great multitude, on the Links, near the sea ; and there he failed
not to inveigh against the scarlet woman of Babylon (who was then
as great a bugbear to the children of Scotland, as tlie Boo-mau and
Napoleon Bonaparte in later times), then came prelacy, episcopacy,
and all the backsiidings of the times, after which he gave thanks
to heaven that he was not as other men are, and the multitude dis-
persed.
In the sweet long evenings of June, at the song-trystes, when
some twenty or thirty lads and lassies met by agreement at some
farm or cot-house, for song-singing and merriment, as was the cus-
tom, and at the milking of the ewes, Egerton's dark tragedy formed
the subject of many a sad ballad and quaint speculation, in which
our old friends the fairies figured, for there were not a few of the
sturdy plough-lads and shepherd-lassies at the ewe bughts of Auld-
hame and Tyninghame, and Whitekirk too, who thought that the
elves might have spirited away the handsome Englishman, as all the
world knows they did our gallant King James, and the great King
Arthur.
But a short time elapsed before the occurrence of other events of
a more startling nature, committed the brief story of Talbot Egcr-
ton to oblivion.
THE WHITE COCKADE, 106
CHAPTER XX.
THE DEIL'S LOAN.
' Is't guilt alone convicted that keeps silenca?
Guilt, saucy guilt, tliat dares to break the law
Of God and man ? Remember you no case
Where innocence accused hath all at once
Been stricken dumb? Appalled to undergo
The charge of sin, that never could endure
The thought of sin?'
' Sheridan Knowlei.
How was it that, crushed in spirit, and subdued in bearing, the
once proud and lofty Dalquharn had now almost a terror of Reuben
Balcraftie, when before he had only disgust and contempt ? Why
was it that he and Bryde were so suddenly changed, and thaf,
although he knew it not, his ring was no longer worn by her ; and
what was the cause or origin of that grievous and mysterious illness
which had so suddenly prostrated her in body and mind, and which
baffled alike the skill of the poor excited barber-surgeon of North
Berwick, and the deeper wit and greater dexterity of the most
learned of the physicians of Edinburgh, whose Royal College was
then situated at the foot of the Fountain Close ?
On the night that Egerton disappeared, Bryde by an appointment
was to meet Dalquharn at the end of the avenue, as he returned
from despatching his letters at the post-house near Castleton.
Luckily for the lovers, all in Auldhame had retired early to rest ;
the gloaming of the June evening was clear and beautiful ; the air
ambient and calm. She tied her capuchin lightly over her soft,
brown hair; locked up her spaniel lest his barking might betray
her ; and issued forth from the private gate, with a flushed cheek,
a sparkling eye, a light step, and a joyous heart ; for never had the
innocent young girl kept a lover's tryste before.
She looked at her tiny gold watch by the light of the clear, cold,
crescent moon, which was now high in the deep blue sky, above the
flood of amber that still steeped the western clouds. She was
almost too late ! Already Dalquharn must be at the trysting-place,
and awaiting her, she thought, and hurriedly she traversed the walk
that led outside the garden wall to the long and dark avenue, an
umbrageous and leafy tunnel, at the western end of which, and ap-
parently at a vast distance (though but a few miles off), the acute
cone of Berwick Law rose in dark and opaque outline against the
lighted sky.
Dalquharn was not at the gate, each pillar whereof was sur-
mounted by a stone otter, the paws of which rested on a quaint,
old-fashioned shield. She looked out upoa the highway; its far
extent, stretching away in dim perspective, between hedge-rows,
showed no sign of any living thing, save, perhups, an occasional
rabbit or hare flitting across from field to field. The summer ni^ht
106 THE TVniTE COCKADE.
was intensely calm and still, and not a sound was heard now, save
an occasional drop of dew, as it fell heavily, from a yielding and
overcharged leaf, on the thick green sward below.
On her left lay the deep, dark shadows of the Deil's Loan. She
turned her back upon it with a kind of tremor, for it had ever pos-
sessed a species of superstitious terror for her since infancy, as
memories of the old Druid days and their rites of blood had come
down in the shape of calcined bones found in strange clay urns
under a mossy cairn, adders'-heads and elf-arrows, with strange
ornaments of bronze and ivory, that told of other races of men and
of other times ; and there too, in rank luxuriance, grew the large
yellow witchgowan, the stalk of which is filled with a pernicious
sap, which, when placed on the eye-lids, was supposed to cause in-
stant blindness.
Again she looked at her watch ; more than half an hour had
elapsed since Dalquharn should have been at the gate, and why did
he not come ? Was it lover-like to tarry ?
She knew that the errand on which he had returned to Scotland
was indeed a perilous one, and that if discovered or betrayed, he
was a lost man ! She also knew that he was brave, proud, and
high-spirited even reckless ; and she now remembered with a
thrill of alarm that he had gone forth without arms, without pistols,
or even his walking sword ; for she had seen him to the door, and
bade him a tender adieu.
Just as this recollection occurred to her, she seemed to hear his
voice on the still air, and it came to her ear in tones of anger.
From whence ? She listened again ; but the quick beating of
her anxious little heart, and the tingling of her ears, though she
drew back her hood and her thick, heavy hah 1 , scarcely permitted
her to hear.
Again his voice, and louder still !
It came too surely it came, from that unhallowed spot the
Deil's Loan ! She remembered that her dress was dark, and that
the moonlight was but faint, and thus, without a moment's hesita-
tion for, though gentle as a lamb, she was a brave and high-
spirited girl she crept along under the shadow of the hawthorn
hedge, till she found herself close to the gloomy and sombre grove
of ancient trees.
She could distinguish figures as well as voices now ; but she felfc
her blood alternately glow in a fever heat, and then become icy
with apprehension, while a nameless horror, a vague and irresistible
perception that something was wrong, grew strong in her heart.
She drew nearer, and shrunk almost down on her knees as she
peeped through the hedge, and saw between her and the pale moon-
light a figure which she knew to be that of Dalquharn, and with
his the form of another man, bearing a third person between them
a person dead a person whom she instantly knew to be Talbot
Egerton, by his sword and sash, and by his costume, particularly
THE WHITE COCKADE. 107
his pale buff waistcoat, which was covered with black stains ; but
his face she could not see, as his head had fallen back, and was
trailed heavily along the grass !
For one moment she remained as if spell-bound, gazing on tlu's
horrible vision. The next beheld her flying along the avenue, over-
come by a terror that gave wings to her speed, and yet caused her
many times to stumble, to fall, and creep breathlessly on her tender
hands and knees.
Had some fierce national quarrel or political duel ensued, or was
it a vile and vulgar murder under cloud of night ?
IIow she reached home, and secured the postern gate, how she
ascended to her own room, and got to bed, she never knew ; for she
was as if in a dream till the winds of a stormy midnight shook
the tall chimneys and turrets of the house, and roared sullenly
among the old woodlands, when a fever seized her, and ere the
stars paled out, and the dawn came in, she was delirious.
Already was the light bubble burst, already was the cup of happi-
ness dashed from her lips, and already was the sunshine of her
young love overclouded in its dawn, and long ere it reached the
maturity of noon !
Bryde's illness was naturally enough coupled by her friends with
Egerton's disappearance, and added to the excitement of that
sequestered locality. My Lady Haddington, in her two-wheeled
Italian chaise, preceded by two outriders ; the Scougals of that ilk,
in their lumbering coach, drawn by four black Flemish mares ; and
Mr. Carfuffle of Whitekirk, on his nag-tailed cob, and many more,
came dutifully to offer their kind aid and advice ; but Bryde obsti-
nately refused to see any one but her old nurse Porriel G-rahaine.
When sense returned, and the fever passed away, she could not
speak of the events of the night without inculpating Lord Dalquharn
and another whom she knew not ; and as her lover could not visit
her room, in the severely decorous ideas of the times, they could
have no mutual explanation of that terrible mystery.
' Could it be a dream ?' she often asked of herself ; but she re-
membered how the wind blew, and how the pale grey dawn replaced
the short twilight of the June night : ' a dream! impossible ; for
I never slept !'
Then Egerton's disappearance was a dreadful corroboration of
the episode she had witnessed. Was there indeed blood on the
hands of her loved Henry Douglas ? and who was that other, by
whom the body of the victim was borne ? He was too short in
stature to be Sir John Mitchell, and too sturdy in figure to be
another dreadful thought ner aged grandfather ; for a duel, the
result of some political dispute, was ever hovering before her.
Three days the poor girl fevered and raved, and at times seemed
on the eve of losing her senses ; and now, leaving her -for a time,
with affectionate old Sir Baldred wringing his withered hands, and
108 THE WHITE COCKADE.
worthy nurse Dorriel weeping over her, let us follow the move-
ments of Lord Dalquharn on the night in question that night so
fruitful in events.
CHAPTER XXI.
THE DEATH SHOT.
'A falcon towering in liis pride of place,
\Vaa by a mousing owl hawked at and killed !'
Macbeth.
IT was, as already related, the twilight of a glorious evening in
June. The lark had gone to its nest in the woodlands, and the
stag was in his lair among the long green feathery ferns in Bin-
ning Wood ; the dew was falling softly, and so gentle was the wind
that it would scarcely have stirred the downy beard of the wild
thistle by the wayside. The stars were coming out clear and
bright, and in the streams the grey salmon and the bull trout were
leaving their deep, dark pools lor the shallower places.
It was indeed an evening for two lovers to meet, and Dalquharn
as he hastened on his secret errand, with those letters which he
could entrust to no other hand, though still ruffled by his recent
angry interview with Egerton, and deeply regretting the hostile
contingency of the morrow, felt his own happiness in the love of
Bryde so much, that he trembled for the perils that might menace
it ; or was this tremor but a dim foreshadowing of the future ?
Perhaps so, for there is no emotion that is BO sensitive as true
affection.
He felt all the luxurious joy of being a successful lover, and
trembled lest he should be wakened roughly from his delicious
dream.
With a prayer almost on his lips for the success of the great
matter in hand, he left the enigmatical letters for the two Jacobite
lords at the post-house, and hurried back to meet Bryde as he ex-
pected, at the gate which had the two heraldic otters' heads.
When passing the skirts of the old thicket known as the Deil's
Loan, the dark trees of which stood up like masses of bronze
against the amber-coloured sky, he suddenly heard a shot, and
almost immediately afterwards, a pistol, as if hurled towards him
by an unseen hand, fell at his feet. He picked it up, and the
barrel was still warm with the recent discharge. It was a rough
weapon, of common aspect, with a brass butt, and seemed to be of
that kind usually called a ship-pistol, as the ramrod was secured to
the stock by a lanyard of tarry twine.
All was still after this, and never did Dnlquharn more deeply
regret the thoughtlessness, which, on this occasion, brought him.
forth unarmed ; but he was naturally too brave to pass on without
ascertaining what was the meaning of a shot fired in such a time
TEE WHITE COCKADE. 100
and place, and clubbing the pistol as a weapon for defence, he
forced a passage through the hedge, and went boldly towards the
spot from whence the report had come.
He had not proceeded twenty yards through the fern, gorse and
thick grass which grew under the old trees, when he came upon the
body of a man, in a scarlet coat, lying on his face, quite dead.
It. was Talbot Egerton, weltering in his blood killed by a shot
through the head !
Horror and astonishment were the first emotions of Dalquharn ;
sorrow and alarm were the next sorrow for the fate, so untimely
and sudden, of this young and gallant Englishman, and alarm lest
he might personally be compromised by the event or its discovery.
He was not left long in doubt as to the latter, for the sound of
footsteps was heard, and Bailie Balcraftie appeared, armed with a
spade.
' In the name of heaven, Mr. Balcraftie,' exclaimed Dalquharu,
' who has done this foul act !'
The other started, raised the spade as if to defend himself, but
recovering from his emotion, whatever it was, he replied very
calmly
' It ill becomes you, sir, to ask sic a question, seeing that you
stand by his side, and armed mairoure by the very weapon that
has cost the puir young gentleman his life, as sure as I'm a par-
doned sinner!'
' Bailie Balcraftie !'
' O, waes me, puir Mr. Egerton ! truly, truly in the midst o' life
we are in death, and as for man, his days, as the blessed Psalmist
saitli, are as grass yea, as a flower o" the field so he perisheth.'
' Canting villain !' exclaimed Dalquharn, hurling the empty
pistol with such violence at the Bailie's head, that had he not
eluded it by adroitly ducking, he had assuredly been stretched by
the side of the dead man ; ' villain, I repeat, dare you attempt to
fix your odious crime on me ?'
' My odious crime !' chuckled the other, with an obnoxious grin ;
1 weel, weel, you are a bold man to say this to me, a merchant o'
substance, a magistrate and elder, senior Bailie, nae less o' the
royal burgh o' North Berwick ! Ken you the worth o' your head,
or the length o' your neck, that you daur to breathe a word o' sic
an aspersion ?'
' Then who has done it ?' said Dalquharn, almost staggered by
the Bailie's self-possession ; ' you heard the shot, I presume ?'
' I am coming through the wood, I hear the explosion o' fire-
arms ; I come further on, and find what, sir ? Mr. Egerton dead,
and the so-called Captain Douglas bending over him wi' a pistol in
his hand! Yea, I beheld him,' whined Balcraftie, lifting up his
eyes and hands, ' as if "I beheld Satan as lightning fa' frae
heaven;" wae's me! and then I bethink me of the bitter and
deadly words uttered in the hearing o' the worthy Captain Wyvil,
110 THE WHITE COCKADE.
no two hours sin syne, that you and Mr. Egerton would " meet
when there would le none to separate you, until one lay stiff on his
mother earth .'" Ye have met, and behold the awful end !'
' Silence, fellow silence, lest I strangle thee !' said Dalquharn,
who felt his flesh creep, while a clamorous fluttering came about
his bold heart, at the apprehension these words and this mysterious
crime aroused.
' Do you daur again to threaten a Bailie a magistrate, an elder
o' the kirk, sir ?'
c Eeuben Balcraftie, there is no greater villain than thee under
the canopy of heaven or the keystone of hell ! What diabolical
motive has induced you to commit this crime, I know not ; but I
can laugh to scorn your wicked attempt to inculpate me with a
deed so dark and bloody. Moreover, sirrah, I know that this is not
the first crime of which you have been guilty."
Dalquharn referred merely to the smuggling and to his appearance
in disguise on board the lugger ; but the poet tells us that
' Many a shaft at random senf/
Finds mark the archer never meant,'
80 these words had a wonderful effect on Balcraftie, whose visage
grew pale and became suffused with beads of perspiration which
almost glittered in the moonlight, as it streamed between the still
and drooping foliage of the wood. His eyes wore a startled ex-
pression of rage and alarm, and he raised the spade, as if he meant
to cleave the speaker down.
' Attempt to strike, at your peril,' said Dalquharn ; ' stand off,
fellow you know not whom you speak to !'
' I ken owre weel, may be,' replied the other, taking off his hat
and making a mock bow, with the most profound insolence ; ' a
cavalier, a Jacobite in disguise, a popish plotter against kirk and
law, as is most likely.'
'Oh, that I had my sword!' exclaimed Dalquharn, in a low
voice of concentrated passion ; and then losing all sense of caution,
' Back, dog !' he thundered out, ' I am Henry Douglas, Lord Dal-
quharn of the Holm !'
'I kenned as muckle three weeks ago,' replied the Bailie,
changing his bearing entirely, relinquishing his sanctimonious
whine, and adopting a bearing which somewhat reminded Dalqu-
harn of that of Scupperplug, or of the Dutch mate, Vander Pier-
boom. 'Noo stand ye there, my Lord Dalquharn o' the Holm, in
the Stewartry of Kirkcudbright, and obey me, lest I denounce ye
obey me, I say !' he added, assuming an air of ferocious autho-
rity, as he tore open his coat, and showed that he had beneath it a
pair of double-barrelled pistols, in a broad leathern girdle. ' It
will be a hard thing for you, I doubt not, if just on the eve o' a
rising whilk you hope may be successful, you lose your head, your
title, and, for a' that I ken, your braw leman at the Loan-end,
Bryde Otterburn, and a' by a word frae my mouth eh ?'
1HE WHITE COCKADE. Ill
Dalquharn clenched his hand and groaned, for he felt himself
more and more in the power or the toils of this human snake. He
stooped over Egerton, and felt his hands and pulse, cold and still ;
poor corpse ! the heart had quite ceased to beat.
' This evening he was in the garden, on his knees before bonnie
Bryde Otterburn ha ! ha! on his knees he is lower noo, and a
bluidy tryste hath it been,' chuckled Balcraftie.
' Her name on your foul lips may drive me mad !' exclaimed the
young lord, furiously, as he remembered the interrupted meeting,
and was about to spring upon his tormentor, when, quick as light-
ning, that personage cocked and levelled one of his double-barrelled
pistols straight at his head.
' The grave to be dug here will haud twa, as well as ane,' said
Balcraftie ; ' but I'm no done wi' you yet, my braw man. You
have been at the Post-house near Castleton ?' he asked, categori-
cally, and keeping his pistol still levelled at the young peer's head ;
' speak !'
' I have but how know you that ?'
' I saw you go, after your last fatal threat to this puir fellow
go to post letters, doubtless, addressed to Captain Elphinstone and
Mr. David Wemyss, in answer to those you received some tliree
days gane by, from the attainted traitors, Balmerino and Elcho
letters o' whilk the duplicates are now in my office, where your an-
swers will be duly inspected to-morrow morning, and a braw sum
the Lord Advocate and the Secretary o' State will pay for your
correspondence. Oh, my gallant Lord Dalquharn, I ken you weel,
but I wouldna like to stand in your lordship's boots.'
' If I must condescend to reply to such a reptile as you, I may
inform you that the letters to which you refer, and to which you
huve had access, by most villainously tampering with the mail-bags,
are worthless ever to you, without the cypher '
' But that I possess, my gay birkie that I possess. 1
' Impossible !'
1 1 have heard o' sic things as secret papers being wrapped round
a sword blade, and so hid in the scabbard.'
Dalquharn started, and felt the blood rush back upon his heart.
'I examined yours, my lord, when you were at breakfast in my
house, and left sword and belt, like an unwary fule, in your bed-
room. The cypher was wrapped round the blade, and could be
left there or drawn forth at pleasure, and on the blade I read the
motto, no union; we a' ken what that means. The cypher I copied
and restored, ere we set out for Auldhame ; and noo I hae in my
grip you and a score o' others, proud, braw, noble and handsome
as ye deem yoursel's, ha! ha! unco galling a' this maun be to
you, nae doubt, nae doubt; but there'll be balm in Gilead, I sup-
pose, balm in Gilead, even for hellicate cavaliers,' he added, with a
touch of his general manner and character, for, as we have shown,
this pillar of ' the kirk and state' had two a public and a private
one.
112 THE WHITE COCKADfi.
CHAPTER XXII.
IS THE TOILS.
"Tis not impossible,
But one, the wicked'st caitiff on the ground,
May seem as shy, as grave, as just, as absolute,
As Angelo; even so may Angelo,
In all his dressings, charactH, titles, forms,
Be an arch-villain : believe it, royal prince,
If he be less, lie's nothing ; but he's more,
Had I more name for baduess.' Measure for Measure.
LOKD DALQTJHABN was, for a time, completely silenced, and filled
by a horror and alarm, which increased every moment, the more he
realised and considered his situation, and the conviction that so
many gallant gentlemen, whose names were in his letters men of
high birth and long descent, of great estates and irreproachable
loyalty were thus compromised, and placed in the power of a
wretch so venal and corrupt as this man, Eeuben Balcraftie.
In his dread of what might be their fate, and the fortune even of
the Prince's intended attempt that summer, he forgot his present
peril, he forgot his tryst with Bryde Otterburn, he forgot all but
the desire for vengeance, and sprang across the dead body of Eger-
ton, intending to close in with his more wary tormentor ; but the
latter, who possessed more strength than his youthful assailant
could have imagined, thrust him furiously back, with the barrels of
his loaded pistols, for he had one in each hand now, and never was
the life of Dalquharn in greater jeopardy than at that moment.
' Stand, I bid you stand off and harken,' said Balcruftie, sternly ;
' outlawed and attainted as you are, even as your father was before
you, for adherence to a popish and perjured tyrant a double-dyed
traitor to the House o' Hanover, I might lay you dead beside him
who lies here, and nae man in a' the land, frae Tweed to Thule,
could ask me why or wherefore. I could, this instant, if I chose,
shoot you dead through the brain-pan, and cast these pistols beside
him and you, and after what passed in the garden, and these awfu'
words uttjred in the hearing o' Captain Wyvil, forby arid attour
other mair moving political causes, would the procurator fiscal, or
ony man in his senses, doubt, when your bodies and weapons were
found, that ye had perished otherwise than in a just and lawfu'
duel ? It's a braw thocht a braw thocht and a tempting one !'
and his eyes shone aud his teeth too, as he grinned a horrible
smile.
' Subtle villain,' exclaimed Dalquharu, with sudden despair in his
gallant heart ; ' fire, if you dare !'
'And lose the price o' your lordship's head, when the time comes
to exchange it for a cheque on the Treasury ; oh, no Heuben Bal-
craftie is a pruclont and a wary man too.!
THE WHITE COCKADE.
113
Dalquharn was almost suffocating : he felt himself to be com-
pletely and utterly in this man's power, for the future, as well as the
present, perhaps ; and for the present he had no resource but to
comply with his orders.
' In the meantime I'll lend you a hand to hide your braw night's
work from the gleds and hoodiecraws,' said Balcraftie, still affecting
to implicate Dalquharn in the commission of that crime, for which
the young lord yet failed to comprehend the motive. ' Suppose
you did it, my lord,' he continued, seeing the start of passion given
by the other, ' I only say suppose, my lord I may gie you a title
here, whar nae human ears can hear us, what matter is it, whether
you killed him here or in the field of battle ? 'Twill come to gun-
powder ere lang, I suppose, and he'll sleep just as weel here in the
Deil's Loan, as if he lay on Penrith Moor, on the braes o' Dum-
blane, or Glenshiel, or wherever else you Jacobites hae crossed steel
with King George's red coats.'
While the Bailie said this he had replaced his pistols in his girdle,
and after compelling his companion to stand some paces distant, he
proceeded adroitly to cut and roll over some large and tough green
sods, keeping apparently one stealthy eye on his work, and the
other on Dalquharn, whose slightest movement he watched, and
every half minute his hands were on the pistols again. The soil was
soft, and he scooped out a grave about a foot deep, scattering each
shovel of earth far and wide, tossing it even over the tree tops,
while Dalquharn looked on as one in a dreadful dream ; but vowing
again and again, that whatever might come of it he would yet
avenge, with his own hand, perhaps, the foul murder of the young
English officer.
' This night he was birling the cogue and drinking the bluid red
wine at untimeous and unlawfu' hours in Lucky Scougal's,' said
Balcraftie, with somewhat of his usual conventional whine ; ' and
noo noo, here stark and stiff in the Deil's Loan ! Truly, man's
days are as grass ; but alake, sir, help me to lift the body ?'
Dalquliarn folded his arms, drew himself up to his full height,
and gave the speaker a frown of hatred and disgust.
Help me to lift the body in here,' said Balcraftie, in a low hiss-
ing voice, while cocking a pistol ; ' or, by heaven and by hell, I lay
you beside him, and leave ye baith, as I threatened, together!'
Thus constrained, Dalquharn, with something like a sob in his
throat a sob of sorrow, rage, and humiliation, turned poor Egerton
on his back, and felt his heart deeply moved at the sight of his pale
face, the fallen jaws, full of coagulated blood, the ice-cold lips, the
glazed and open eyes, which he had last seen sparkle with anima-
tion and fury against himself eyes which he had seen beaming
with frolic and merriment in many an idle hour.
Seizing the dead body brutally by the throat, with his right hand,
Balcraftie now, with a pistol in the left, covered Dalquharn, who
8
114 THE WHITE COCKADB.
toot up Egerton's feet, but, overcome by conflicting emotions, let
them drop upon the grass.
' Hist and harken !' said Balcraftie, starting, and in a fierce
whisper ; ' something stirred by the hedge side !'
In fact, the sound at that moment was caused by Bryde Otter-
burn, who had peeped fearfully through, and then fled, like a
startled fawn, in terror and despair, towards the avenue gate.
Again the threatening pistol was levelled at his head, and once
more compelled to stoop to his odious task, Dalquharn assisted Bal-
craftie to lay Egerton in his scantily scooped grave, over which the
latter carefully deposited the green sods, with the spade, and beat
them down. He then tore a branch from a tree, and brushed all
the grass round for several feet, to remove any traces of footsteps or
blood that might remain, after which, with a caution, which showed
he was no new hand in such nefarious work, he tossed the spade
from him, far among the growing corn of a neighbouring field,
where he knew it would remain undiscovered till the reapers came
in harvest time.
' My Lord Dalquharn, we now ken the terms o' our mutual
silence anent this black night's wark. I shall speak not o' your
secret character, if you venture not to speak o' mine ; but if you
would take heed o* yoursel', quit Auldhame without delay, for the
countryside may soon be owre hot for you ; and now gude night,
my lord, gude night, I am your lordship's maist humble servitor.'
With a species of mock salute, and a cruel glare in his horrid
eyes, Bailie Balcraftie departed for his home, on the way to which
he discovered, with some consternation, that he had dropped his
breeches Bible during his recent occupation dropped it, perhaps,
near the scene of his crime ; and on a fly-leaf of it were his auto-
graph, address, and a short prayer, or invocation, in his own hand-
writing.
*****
How Dalquharn reached his apartment in Auldhame, somewhat
like poor Bryde (from whose misery he was only separated by a
wall), he scarcely knew: but his altered bearing on the morrow has
thus been sufficiently accounted for.
To Sir John Mitchell he related all that had occurred, and long
and earnest were the consultations they held together ; but mutual
dread of the future, and of Balcraftie's great local power and influ-
ence, sealed their lips. To denounce him, to accuse him of the
crime, and say where the body of his victim lay to accuse him, an
active whig magistrate, unwearying in his search after Papists,
Jacobites, and all manner of recusants, a leading elder, and zealous
and rather noisy professor of religion, in whose household every
day began and ended with prayer could but serve to bring the
wrath of an incredulous neighbourhood upon themselves. It might,
moreover, lead to a suspicion that they were the criminals, and not
he ; while, in revenge, he might anticipate the coming catastrophe
THE WHITE COCKADE. 115
by denouncing them and their friends to the Lord Advocate, in-
eluding Sir Baldred, whom they deemed too old, blundering, and
unwary to entrust with the key they possessed to the secret life of
his money-lending acquaintance.
There were times when Dalquharn and Mitchell actually con-
ceived the rash idea of visiting the reptile Balcraftie, and pistolling
him on his own hearthstone, after the fashion of some of the wild
Scottish raiders of the preceding century ; or, to use a more modern
term, to ' lynch him,' as an act of retributive justice, and so end the
game of villainy he was playing, and the terror he gave them.
But cooler reflection showed that little would be gained by an
act so reckless and perilous, while their letters, or the copies of
them and of the cypher, remained among the papers of this man,
who added to his many other perquisites and means of acquiring
money and power, the then lucrative one, of being a Scottish
government spy.
The five hundred pounds borrowed by Sir Baldred, at usurious
interest, over the lands of Half-longbarns, for the Prince's use and
service, were still in Sir John's hands ; but if a portion of this
sum, or even the whole of it (then equal to more than a thousand
pounds in the present day), were offered to Balcraftie as a bribe for
the papers he possessed, they knew he was too wary to give up the
originals, or all the copies he might possess : he would pocket the
money, and betray them still !
With all these anxieties, there was a crowning one he might
already have been in communication with the Government officials
on the subject, and, like the sword of Damocles, the terror of
arrest hung hourly over tlie heads of both.
When Dalquliarn took his friend Mitchell next day to the place
in the thicket where the missing man lay in his lowly bed, he could
scarcely recognize the exact spot, for four reasons : the turfs bad
been very carefully relaid, rain had drenched the ground, after the
wind had swept it, and the strong gusts of midnight had over-
thrown a large tree, the summer foliage, branches, and ruin of
which lay immediately over poor Talbot Egerton's unhallowed
grave; and from the evil reputation which the wood possessed,
there was but little chance of any stroller, gamekeeper, or even
poacher, passing near the place of his last repose.
116 THE WHITE COCKADE.
CHAPTER XXIII.
THE ABI/ED BBIDE.
"No more upon these lips of mine
Shall lover's kiss be pressed ;
No uiore held fast within his arms,
And folded to his breast,
Shall my heart find a hiding place
To nestle down and rest.
And I must check the thoughts as sin,
Which bade my heart rejoice,
Whene'er I heard, like some sweet chord,
The music of his voice.'
THESE lines describe somewhat of the emotions of poor Bryde
Otterburn, after the terrible discovery which she believed she had
made on that eventful night of Egerton's disappearance. Was
Dalquharn actually implicated in th'e deed of slaughter ? It was
impossible to discredit the evidence of her own senses ; and by his
strange employment about the body, he seemed to be at least heart
and part in the affair, and that involves the penalty of death by the
law of Scotland !
Oil, never more should his hand touch hers, for the blood of that
unfortunate English stranger, their household guest, was on it !
But could he actually be guilty of such a deed he so nobly born
and highly bred, so gallant, so gentle, and kind ? She felt that im-
peratively she must love him no more, but thrust his image from
her heart : and if lie was the vile person, appearances made him, it
should not be difficult to do so ; and yet and yet the wrench, the
effort, c-ost her a terrible pang, and many a flood of bitter, bitter,
silent, and unseen tears.
Never more must she listen to his once loved voice ; and Bryde
hoped, when on the seventh or eighth day she left her chamber and
appeared in the drawing-room, that he would be gone ; but it was
not so ; the guests were all there, save Egerton, and now it seemed
that doubt, fear, and wrath hovered in the atmosphere of Auld-
hame, and these emotions were all most visibly to be read by turns
in the grave, expressive faces of Mitchell and Dalquharn.
Bryde quailed beneath the loving and enquiring eye of the latter,
and shuddered when he touched her shrinking hand. She dared
not speak of what she had seen, and she dared not denounce him,
without discovering his real name, rank, and purpose, and thereby
inculpating her dear, doting, old grandfather, and breaking her own
heart.
At the first glance as they met, Dalquharn saw that there was
some other mystery to torture him, for his ring was no longer on
her engaged finger ; her whole manner and appearance were changed
from laughing brightness and espieglerie, to pale, chilling, and
statuesque coldness j arid now a sickening fear came over his soul,
THE WHITE COCEJLDE. 117
that she had, after all, in her secret heart, lored the lost Eger-
ton!
Old Dorriel Grahame believed that her pet-mistress was under
some warlock's evil spell, and insisted on tying round her white
and delicate neck a string of roman-berry heads, and she hung over
the watch-pocket in her bed-curtains, an elf-cup, a most approved
charm against cantrips, being one of those little stones which are
perforated by friction, and were believed to be the workmanship of
the elves, though they are usually found under waterfalls.
These and other charms of equal value and power were placed
around her, but in vain, for Brycle continued to be, after all, pale,
wan, preoccupied, and listless.
Dalquharn, though acting his part in the search for Egerton, was
somewhat in the same condition ; and there were times when, like
a phantasmagoria of the brain, the memory of the terrible episode
of that fatal night came before him so vividly, that he almost im-
agined himself to have had a share in the death of Egerton ; and
to be the custodier of such a secret, would have maddened him,
had lie not made his friend, Sir John Mitchell, a participator of it ;
and like himself, the sturdy baronet longed intensely for the time
when they might with safety denounce and punish Balcraftie, whose
dreaded denunciation of themselves tied up their tongues at present,
and filled them with perpetual alarm.
To be at the mercy of this man, whom they deemed the living
embodiment of all the vilest qualities of the venal, subtle, and cant-
ing Lowland whig of that age false to king, to country, and to
God ready alike to sell all to the highest bidder, even as his party
had sold Montrose, King Charles, and their national name and
fame, was galling, indeed, to such proud and restless spirits as those
of Lord Dalquhara and his compatriot.
He was burning for action for some excitement without, to
counteract the rage and shame, the terror and sorrow, that gnawed
his heart within ; rage and shame for his false position, even in his
own eyes, a terror of Balcraftie's ulterior purpose, and a deep sorrow
for the cold blight that had come upon his once successful love.
A dozen of times at least were the searches close upon the humble
grave of Egerton, but it was passed unnoticed and unheeded, for
the rain and wind of the subsequent night, and the fallen tree, com-
pletely concealed all trace that the sods had been broken. A blood-
hound would soon have solved the mystery : but these dogs were
no longer used in the Lowlands ; and now, puzzled and piqued by
Bryde's unexpected and unexplained coldness, and dreading Bal-
craftie's threats, Dalquharn resolved to take his departure from
Auldhame at an early period, and in some loyal household in the
North, to await the landing of Prince Charles Edward.
He came to this conclusion, as he walked to and fro in the garden,
alone, on the evening of the seventh or eighth unhappy day.
In great sullen masses of unpurpled brown, the clouds were
118 tHE WHITE COCKADE.
gathered in the westward over the hills of Fifeshire, and beneath
thoso masses, the red sun of June glared through bars of fiery
vapour, as its great disc sank slowly behind the darkening ridges.
It shone with crimson sheen on the foam-flecked waters of the
Forth, and the summer wind, which waved the ripening corn,
rustled pleasantly among the heavy foliage of the old copsewood.
As Dalquharn turned into one of those soft and smoothly trim-
med grass-walks which were so common in old Scottish gardens, his
heart leaped, as he came suddenly upon Miss Otterburn, who was
standing sunk in reverie, sadly, and alone, near the pedestal of a
dancing fawn. She was playing with a large moss rose, plucking
it to pieces, leaf by leaf, and apparently unconscious of what she
did, for her eyes were bent on the grass, or rather on vacancy. They
were reddened by recent tears, but they were seldom otherwise now.
How beautiful she looked ! She had no headdress, and on the
summer wind, the masses of her right brown hair rippled and waved
over her shoulders.
The sad preoccupation of her manner told plainly the tenor of
her thoughts ; but Dalquharn jealously construed it after a fashion
of his own.
Henceforth thought poor Bryde must love be dead in her
heart the love of him at least ; but could she live without it, or
ever admit the love of another? So the first passionate dream of
her romantic and girlish heart was passing away ; its joy changed
to sorrow ; its brilliance to blackness and gloom. In the sweet
spring time of life, she already felt the autumn of the heart. Oh
this horrible mystery ! Was Dalquharn guilty ? If not, why was
lie so silent and so reserved ? Why did he not address her as of
old, and seek that explanation of her coldness to which their mutual
relation entitled him ?
As if in echo to her thoughts, at that moment
' Bryde !' said a voice that thrilled tenderly in her ear ; ' Miss
Otterburn, why are you so changed to nie why are we so altered
to each other ? Surely grief for the loss of a a mere friend, can-
not alone, have done this ?'
1 It has not it has not,' said Bryde, after a slight cry of alarm
had escaped her, and then without looking at the speaker, she
covered her face with her handkerchief.
Dalquharn leaned against the pedestal and regarded her with
mournful interest.
' Miss Otterburn Bryde,' said he, putting his lips so near her,
that her hair touched them, as the wind lifted it j ' have you have
yon already ceased to love me ?'
' Oh no oh no but would to heaven that I did !' replied Bryde,
in a voice half stifled by her tears.
'You love me still!'
Her voice was gone now, but her sobs were deeper.
Why this enigma what means this change?' gaid he gently
THE WHITE COCKAD& 119
and tenderly, as he attempted to fold .one of her hands in his ; but
she shrank from him saving, hurriedly, almost angrily
' T)o not, I pray you, touch me!"
She withdrew a pace or two ; the hectic of a moment crossed the
face of Balquharn, and he said with measured calmness
1 Your changed demeanour towards me, fills my heart with the
deepest grief, and believe me, Bryde Otterburn, that if you knew
all all the black sorrows it suffers already, you would, perhaps,
spare it these pangs ; but I do not mean to upbraid you now, or
torment you longer by my presence here, as I leave Auldhame to-
morrow.'
' To-morrow !'
I Yes.'
' And for whence, my Lord ?'
I 1 scarcely know, being, as you are awaro, alike landless and
homeless ; but if the fate of a poor wanderer such as I, can interest
one so fickle, my steps shall be bent northward, for the house of
the loyal and aged Keppoch, or the castle of Mingarry ; though
others change, I change not, and shall wait with patience the arrival
of His Royal Highness the Prince of Wales.'
Brvde's clear and beautiful deep brown eyes were bent earnestly
and enquiringly on his, as if she would search his soul. The eyes
of Dalquharn were full of sadness and of great sweetness too ; and
after a deep sigh which seemed to pain him, for he placed his right
hand within the breast of his coat, the same faded green one in
which he had come from Dunkirk, he said
' If grief for the fate of poor Mr. Egerton, has in any way les-
sened your regard for me, or if the mystery that involves it, has
developed, as I rather suspect it has, some secret passion greater
than you professed for me, and greater than you were aware of pos-
sessing, I shall only do my duty in disclosing 'to you, the secret of
his story ; though by doing so, if your discretion fail me, I shall
perhaps covet my own ruin.'
It was now Bryde's turn to flush for a moment, but only a mo-
ment, for her marble paleness returned, while her enquiring eyes
seemed to dilate with surprise at this remarkable preamble.
' Come this way, and bo seated,' said he, pointing to a bower of
sweet-briar, roses, and ivy : ' permit me to lead you.'J
Still she withheld her hand, on which he lifted his hat, and bow-
ing with studious politeness, placed it under his arm, saying,
' As you will, madame as you will ! I am perhaps not worthy
to touch one so good and pure as you.'
This extreme humility, while it seemed to corroborate her suspi-
cions, grieved and distressed her. She seated herself in the bower,
and looked up at him with earnest and beseeching eyes, her lips half
parted, her chesnnt hair rolling in shining masses over her graceful
shoulders, her white hands folded on her knees to stay their trem-
bling, while her blue satin skirt, being partly lifted by her hoop
120 *HB WHITE COCKADE.
shewed one taper ankle and pretty foot that beat the turf with im
patience.
' As my presence, Miss Otterburn, appears now to excite only re-
pugnance in your breast and impatience in your manner, I shall be
as brief as I can in my narrative, and then, trouble you no more.'
' I too have a secret, which, alas ! may break my poor heart in the
keeping of it, for I have none now, with whom to share my sorrow.'
' Not even me ?'
' Not even you !'
Dalquharn clasped his hands.
' Say on, sir you were about to explain '
' My reason for failing to meet you in the avenue on that unhappy
night. You remember that we were to have met there ?'
' Too well alas, too well !'
Dalquharn stood in the entrance of the bower, and looking down
upon her, with eyes expressive of great love and grief, related the
whole story of his quarrel with Egerton, and the threats exchanged
between them, in the presence of Captain Wyvil and Bailie Bal-
craftie ; he thence passed to his return from the post-house, the shot
he heard in the wood, and the assassination (as he could not doubt
it must have been) by the hand of Balcraftie, whose mischievous face
Bryde now remembered to have seen in the garden walk, at the
moment when Egerton knelt to kiss her hand ; and she recalled,
too, that the very peculiar expression of that coarse visage had star-
tled and impressed her at the time.
She flushed with indignation at that part of the narrative, iu
which, under threats of instant death or future shame, the hypocrite
and dissembler compelled Lord Dalquharn to obey his obnoxious
orders implicitly ; and she shed abundance of silent tears, when he
related the manner of Egerton 's interment, and described the place
where his poor remains lay hidden, unhonoured and unurned.
' At that terrible moment, you heard a sound near the hedge,
did you not ?' she asked.
' Yes and it thoroughly alarmed the watchful villain, whose vic-
tim I am likely to be next.'
' 'Twas I who was there.'
' You you, Bryde ?'
On this, she related rapidly the share she had borne in the adven-
tures of the night, and holding forth her hands to him, added in a
voice, touching and tremulous with emotion
' Forgive my thoughts, Dalquharu forgive me ! my love my
own love, I am not worthy of you, for had I loved you with truth
and tenderness, I could not, even for a moment, have mistrusted
you. Oh, assuredly, it is only perfect love that casteth out all fear !'
And Bryde clung to him sobbing, caressing his face and hair with
her kind little hands, as he knelt down by her side.
1 1 am your arled bride' she added, using a plaintive Scottish
phrase, ' your own betrothed Bryde Otterburn. Kiss me and pet
THE WHITE COCKADE. 121
me, Henry, to show that you forgive me I have been so miserable
80 heart-broken!" and she laid her head upon his shoulder.
' I dread your discretion in keeping this secret, on which our
lives, and even the success of the good cause, in some measure de-
pend,' said he after a time.
' Oh trust me trust me !'
' But Balcraftie '
' Horror ! I shall dissemble, even to him.'
'A canting hypocrite, with the stamp of perdition on his fore-
head !'
' Dead dead poor Mr. Egerton dead !* murmured Bryde, with
a fresh burst of tears ; ' he, so merry and so handsome, to be so
foully slain, and we shall never, never see him more ! And must he
lie in that horrid place '
' Till things are settled and vengeance done, dear Bryde ; and then
my own hands, if heaven spares me amid the dangers that are to
come, shall lay Talbot Egerton in a worthier tomb.'
' And you leave us for the Highlands, you said ?'
1 Not if you wish me to stay.'
' And yet, my own love, Henry, you might be safer there than
here, and from thence, by letter, you could denounce this Reuben
Balcraftie, and say where the body of his victim is hidden.'
1 All of which would be deemed as proofs that I or we, poor
Jack Mitchell and I rebels and outlaws, had murdered a king's
officer, adding thus to our crime of treason, by seeking to fix the
stigma of our guilt upon a wealthy, pious, and irreproachable magis-
trate and stout upholder of kirk and king, as by law established. It
would never do, sweet ladybird Bryde ; besides, my silence is at
present the price of his withholding from government the letters and
papers of which he has surreptitiously possessed himself, and these
concern deeply the safety of many gallant gentlemen, and the suc-
cess of King James's cause. 1
' Oh, that we could, by any means, get those papers from Bal-
craftie !'
' One might as well hope to take a lamb gently from a famished
wolf.'
From that evening Bryde's health and spirit seemed to improve ;
she became content now, and even placid. Old Dorriel Qrahame
was convinced that the roinan-berry necklet and the elf-cup had
wrought the charm, and said so to Sir Baldred, whose affectionate
old heart became joyous again in the sunshine of his grand-daugh-
ter's face ; he took a deeper horn of wine at night, and again en-
' gttged Captain Wyvil in more than one dispute concerning the
merits and demerits ' of the vile, unnatural, and incorporating
Union.'
122 THE WHITE COCKADE.
CHAPTER XXIV.
DEPAKTUBE OP WITH.
'Oh spare the living, judge them leniently,
Exact not all the honour that is due :
The cold exterior and the calm proud eye
Hide many a gnawing, rankling grief from view.
Thou see'st but the outward act and deed,
The motive and the thought thou canst not read ;
Oh, spare the living, judge them leniently!' Thistledown.
1 WOUNDS heal rapidly in a heart of two-and-twenty,' says the
worthy Colonel Esmond ; ' hopes revive daily, and courage rallies in
spite of a man.' Dalquharn was five-and-twenty, and three years
more experience of life had not lessened the natural buoyance of his
spirit. He was now much happier, or at least more resigned to the
course of events, when he knew and felt assured how much Bryde
still loved him; and one morning, after breakfast, he resolved to
have an explanation with Captain Wyvil, whose marked coldness of
manner, and whose bearing, which amounted to ill-concealed aver-
sion and suspicion, galled and fretted the proud and generous spirit
of Lord Dalquharn.
But the time was awkwardly chosen, for the captain and his host
were then engaged in a high dispute high, at least, on the part of
the latter, concerning his great grievance, the Union, and the total
ruin it had brought upon all the cities and towns of the east coast,
the, as yet, non-development of trade on the west ; the desertion ot
the capital, where the grass was growing around the market cross,
and before the porch of Holyrood.
Some satirical remarks and coarse national reflections copied by
the ' Caledonian Mercury,' from an old number of ' Fog's Journal,'
had put the old cavalier on his mettle, and he was enraged to a pitch
that required all the captain's bonhommie and general good humour
to enable him to keep his ground ; and Bryde's playfulness, which
whilom was wont to turn their arguments into laughter, by a verse
of a droll Jacobite song, was no longer in existence. Sir Baldred
was particularly severe on the king and ministry, for permitting the
London press to be constantly reviling, without cause, their Scottish
fellow subjects. He boasted of the time when King James VI. had
sent a Scottish herald to the Duke of Pomerania, demanding the
life of a Pole, who wrote a book against the Scots, and how the duke
immediately hung the audacious scribbler in the city of Dantzig;
there was no such sharp justice now, he added, and on Q-eorge II.
he was bitter to the verge of ferocity.
'But loyalty, my dear sir," urged tho captain, 'loyalty should
prevent you speaking thus, and equity too, for the king cannot con-
trol all the quills in Grub Street.'
' To whom should I be loyal the Elector of Hanover ?'
' To the King oil the throne of Great Britain.'
THE WHITE COCKADE. 123
' Know you not, sir,' said Sir Balclred, adjusting his black wig
angrily with one hand, and striking his cane on the floor with the
other. ' Know you not, sir, that the House of Hanover came to tha
throne of these realms by the mutual treaty of union. Now, every
article of that treaty which was for the good of Scotland, hath been
broken by the overwhelming majorities of the so-called British par-
liament witness the restoration of patronage which hath split the
kirk in twain ; hence the treaty is null ; I say null, for no treaty can
be binding on one party only. Then, where is the right of your
Elector, though he swears by his coronation oath to keep it inviolate?'
' These are dangerous words, sir, especially at such a time, when
the whole air teems with rumours of Jacobite plots and conspiracies,'
said the captain, smiling at the fervour of the old man, for whom he
was really no match on these subjects.
' We were not wont to choose and pick our words in my young
days, Captain.'
' But, my dear Sir Baldred, as brother Britons '
' We are brother Britons when you wish to wheedle us out of
men and money for the wicked wars in Germany, but 'tis all oat-
ineal and brimstone, and beggarly Scots, at other times. I tell you,
sir, " the name of Briton suits Welshmen only we were born Scots,
and Scots we shall remain.' That was the shout of the Union Mobs
on that terrible night, when the High Street of Edinburgh was all
aflame with tarbnrrels and rockets, and when I saved the vile Lord
Chancellor Seafleld, just as the rioters tore him from his coach by
the throat, and would have rent him limb from limb in the face of
all the Grey Dragoons and Foot Guards ; "but I and a few members
of the opposition, with our armed valets, rescued him at sword's
point, yet minus coat and wig, and ho fled for England next morn-
ing, like a craven as he was. But we shall be Scots, Captain Wyvil,
like our forefathers even as our old land charters say, while grass
grows and water runs !'*
And effectually, to prevent the captain making any of his jocular
responses, the old gentleman walked away, punching the floor with
his cane as emphatically as if the Elector and all Grub Street were
under it. It was now that Dalquharn, who took no part in the dis-
cussion, and who had been looking dreamily from a window at the
sea, where some Dutch and Norwegian schooners were beating into
the river against a fresh west wind, came forward, just as Captain
Wyvil was assuming his hat and sword, apparently as if about to
go abroad.
an obscure tavern in the High Street of Edinburgh. So blind were our an<
tors to the advantages of this Union, which saved the Scots from thmselval
124 THE WHITE COCKADE.
' Captain Wyvil may I have a few words with you ?' he asked.
'"Servant, sir servant certainly,' said Wyvil, curtly and
haughtily, while smoothing his upright regimental feather, which
was stuck into the black silk cockade of the house of Hanover.
' Captain Wyvil,' said Dalquharn without heeding his stiff, dry
manner, ' you are I know an English gentleman of good family, and
a man of honour.'
' I trust so, sir ; I have served in the four quarters of the globe
and borne His Majesty's commission these twenty years, without
reproach,' replied the officer bowing still more stiffly ; ' but what
have I done to merit the flattery of so distinguished a person as
as Captain Douglas of excuse me, but I don't quite know the
regiment ?'
' I pass over the too evident sneer in your tone.'
1 'Tis well you do, sir ; but to the point ? I am in haste, my men
parade in the hamlet at eleven, (here the Captain looked at his
watch) and we inarch from this in half an hour after.'
' The knowledge of that, makes me feel that I can no longer de-
lay, and that I must confide in you and cast myself upon your
generosity.'
The Captain coughed dubiously, and again toyed with the feather
in his hat, so Dalquharn added
' I know the fate of your friend Mr. Egerton, and have known it
all this while.'
' Even when assisting us '
' In that mock search yes.'
' I suspected as much death and the devil, sir, I suspected as
much!' said the Captain, sternly, but otherwise quite unmoved.
' Suspected it by what ?'
'Your change of manner since the catastrophe ; your abstraction,
your paleness and so forth. I heard your quarrel and his insulting
defiance; you killed him in a fan- duel I hope, for if so, tell me ?
In the heat of duelling, we cannot always have our wits about us.
Not that I ever fought a duel, nor ever shall, with God's help and
guidance, for like my friend Colonel Gardiner of the Light Dra-
goons, I have religious objections to all such tests of the divine
favour. So you killed him ?'
' We are alone and none can hear us now, so do not misunder-
stand me, sir.'
1 Do you threaten me, egad !' exclaimed the Captain, changing
colour.
' Far from it,' said the other gravely and firmly ! ' but I am about
to trust to your honour and generosity. In me, Captain Wyvil,
you see an attainted peer of Scotland Henry Douglas, the Lord
Dalquharn.'
The Captain started, and then bowed low, saying,
'By my soul I always suspected something of that kind too
that you were one of those luckless gentlemen who adhere so ob-
THE WHITE COCKADB. 125
etinately to a fated cause ; to this unhappy House of Stuart in its
downfall ; but, be assured, my lord, that your secret at least, is
safe with Marmaduke Wyvil safe as if I sheltered you in my
own house at Hurstmonceaux, where, though we are old rumpers
and whigs, more than one cavalier friend hath found safe hiding,
as many a sliding pannel and secret stair, had they tongues, could
testify.'
' And Heaven will reward your hoxise for the succour it gave to
the unfortunate in the hour when treason triumphed.'
'My grandfather defended Wem in old Noll's time, when there
were little else within its walls but women and children as a gar
rison, hence to this day, the milkmaid in Salop sings how
" Tlie women of Wem and a few musketeers,
Beat the Lord Capel and his cavaliers."
But, concerning my poor friend Egerton ?'
' He was most foully murdered !'
' Murdered ?' exclaimed Wyvil in a low and earnest voice, as ho
laid his hand on his sword.
'I say so, with sincere sorrow; I saw him as he lay dead, and
scarcely cold, at my feet.'
' Yours ?'
' Yes."
' And yet you made no effort to succour or defend him ?'
' I was without arms even a walking cane, as you may remem-
ber, on the night in question.'
' True, now that I bethink me j but by whom was he mur-
dered ?'
' To tell you by whom he was shot down in cold blood, or to say
where now he lies, would but serve to imperil my own safety and
liberty even my life, and the lives and liberties, the estates and
titles of many dear friends, which are all at the mercy of him who
slew Egerton.'
"Tis an enigma this, and all High Dutch to me!' said the Cap-
tain in great wrath.
' But if you will trust me so far, Captain Wyvil, as to believe in
me implicitly, I swear to you by my hopes of heaven, by my father's
and mother's bones in their distant graves graves which are now,
alas ! my sole inheritance that in three months' time, I may ex-
plain all this to you, and avenge your countryman openly.'
' Three months,' said Wyvil pausing and pondering ; ' but in
doing this do I not condone a crime, and obstruct the ends of jus-
tice ; hence I know not if I am bound to abide '
' By your word of honour that you would keep my secret ?' urged
Dalquharn, anxiously.
' True odd though this compact is, Zounds, I'll agree to it,' re-
plied the confiding Englishman.
Ere the time stated, Dalquharn hoped that the standard of the
prince the same standard which he had seen sonic fair and royal
126 THE WHITE COCKADE.
fingers embroidering at Versailles would be floating over the palace
of Holyrood, and that the wiles and espionage of Balcraftie would
be futile.
' I could not see you march from here, Captain, viewing me as
you did, with cold and suspicious eyes, without having this expla-
nation ; and, as a pledge of my truth, I have placed my personal
safety in your hands.'
' And you may trust me : I shall be true to you, as this blade to
its hilt,' exclaimed Wy vil presenting his hand. ' Come Egad !
though our good old friend here, will storm and argue with me, be-
cause I cannot see Scottish affairs from his point of view, I have a
kindly feeling at times for your countrymen. When I served in
1741, under Vernon and Wentworth, on that unfortunate expedi-
tion to Carthagena, where, after the battle of St. Lazare, the army
was so reduced by fever, that in two short April days more than
three thousand four hundred and forty men died under canvas, I
too had perished, but for the exertions of a Scots surgeon's mate of
the " Elizabeth/' seventy gun ship, one Tobias Smollet, a native of
Dunbartonshire, who tended me well and kindly ; and with him, I
remember, this same Union was a very sore subject, and when I was
well, he sent me a challenge for d ning it and the Scots, too,
which, in a moment of anger, I had done with all my heart. Then,
as for your Highlanders, I think them fine, manly fellows, for I
served with some of them against the Indians in Carolina and
Georgia, and I shall be truly sorry if there is another rising in the
north for King James. I was on the staff of his Excellency General
Wade in the Highlands in 1727, when we all took to the trade of
making roads and building bridges, and I remember when first his
coach and six came along the highways, the astonishment it excited
among the poor, simple fellows, who all took off their bonnets with
the greatest respect to the coachman but to him only.'
' You will then trust me, sir, until this dark matter is cleared up,
by myself.'
' I shall ; we march for Stirling, and we may be at least four
days en route. There are rumours of expected disturbances north
of the Highland frontier disturbances for which you are, perhaps,
unfortunately too cognisant. I shall be some time, no doubt, in
Stirling Castle, where any letters addressed to Captain Wyvil,
Howard's Foot, or the Old Buffs, will be sure to find me.'
It was long before Dalquharn was able to communicate the truth
to Wyvil, and before they both learned the secret motive which
animated the assassin of Egerton.
Sir Baldred was too hospitable and too warm-hearted to part
without regret from his English antagonist in so many games of
chess and primero, and so many political discussions ; and now he
ordered the butler to broach a runlet of rare old wine that had lain
among cobwebs and dust in a deep, dark binn of the cellar since
1715 erer since His Grace John Duke of Mar (for duke he was
THE WHITE COCKADE. 127
always styled by the Jacobites, as liis patent was signed at St. Ger-
mains) marched to Sheriffmuir ' to hand the "Whigs in order.'
Mitchell was again in Edinburgh ; indeed, the worthy fellow ab-
sented himself as much as possible to avoid the witchery of Bryde's
society ; for, in secret, he loved this gentle and loveable girl, and
dreaded to become the rival of his friend.
Thus, like Orlando, he was feeling how
' Ills passion Imngeth weights upon his tongue,
He cannot speak to her should she urge conferences ;'
And that his friendship for Dalquharn hung weights thereon that
were heavier still.
Home-brewed ale, bread, and bannocks of barley-meal, were
liberally supplied to the soldiers, who filled their canvas havresacks,
and drank to the health of Sir Baldred ' 'towd S quoir,' as most
of them called him with three hearty English cheers for the
'yoong ladie ;' and the old baronet's face lit up with kindness and
enthusiasm as he saw them for the last time ; for with him, at
heart, it was not that he ' loved England less, but Scotland more}
' A long farewell, Miss Otterburn, and God be wi* ye," Wyvil,
said, as he lifted his hat and kissed Bryde's hand. ' Adieu, Cap-
tain Douglas ; may our next meeting be as peaceful as our parting.
Farewell, my brave old cavalier,' he added, waving his hat to Sir
Baldred ; ' with all your antique ways, egad, I can't help liking
you ; and I hope some day to crack a bottle of good old port, or
drain a crown bowl of punch with you, at my old manor of Hurst-
monceaux, and there ret urn -your many hospitalities.'
Sergeant Teesdale advanced his halberd ; the drum and fife
struck up ; and the fine grenadiers of the old BufFa, with their
knapsacks and crossbelts, their square-skirted coats buttoned back
to display their pipe-clayed small clothes, their sugar-loaf caps,
queues, ruffles, and long black gaiters, once more made a brave
show, with their sloped arms and fixed bayonets flashing in the
sun, as they marched down the long shady avenue, and wheeled to
the right upon the highway to Castleton, where the sound of their
drum soon died away in the distance, as they trod to their route
towards the laud of the Gael, leaving, we may presume, the usual
number of soft and sorrowing hearts behind them.
128 fllJJ \VUITE COCKADJS,
CHAPTER XXV.
BEYDE'S ENTEBPEISE.
'Oae tell thy master, frae this arm
Mine answer will I gi'e ;
Remind him of his tyrant deeds,
And bid him answer me.
'Wha was't they slew my father dear;
That bared my castle wa' ?
Wha was't that bade wild ruin hruid
Whar' pipes did glad the ha' ?' Old Ballad.
NOTWITHSTANDING- the full explanation which had taken place be-
tween Bryde and Lord Dalquharn, and between the latter and
Captain Wyvil, even after the departure of that officer and his
grenadiers, a cloud seemed to hover darkly above the little circle at
Auldhame. It was not the secret of an unhallowed grave close by
their baronial gates, or of an unavenged crime alone, that caused
this general gloom, but the incessant doubt and dread lest Bal-
craftie, who had them all at his mercy, might put a climax to his
villainy by betraying Dalquharn, Mitchell, and many others, through
the simple act of placing the intercepted correspondence in the
hands of the authorities, which he was quite likely to do, the mo-
ment that a sum sufficiently tempting was offered him, though the
act would destroy for ever his chances of again setting foot within
the door of Auldhame, in his present capacity at least.
Anticipation of misfortune is often worse than the reality thereof.
' Imaginary evils,' says Dean Swift, ' soon become real ones by
indulging our reflections on them ; as he who, in a melancholy
fancy, sees something like a face on the wall or wainscot, can, by
two or three touches of a lead pencil, make visible, and agreeing
with what he had seen.'
Singular to say, the Bailie still daringly continued his visits to
Auldhame, but at longer intervals. He conceived his terrible
secret was known only to Dalquharn, but he found himself avoided
by all save Sir Baldred, who was totally ignorant of all this under-
plot, and was too old, and had too little discretion, to be trusted
with it. Forced by policy to dissemble the intense repugnance
with which his presence inspired her, Bryde grew pale, stern, and
all but ill, when the Bailie appeared ; and at such times, she ob-
served now, that his cringing smile, his cat-like attempts to gain
her favour, failed him and that even his diabolical courage seemed
quite to die away.
' Why do you wince and shrink from me now, Bailie ?' she once
asked, with her eyes half-closed in disdain, and her head thrown
haughtily back, as if she felt her advantage and power the power
of birth, innocence, and purity, over lowly station, when combined
with black guilt and subtle hypocrisy.
THE WHITE COCKADE. 129
'I dinna ken, Miss Otterburn ; but times there are when
when '
' When what, sir V she asked impatiently, and making her spin-
ning-wheel fly ag she spoke.
' You remind me sorely o' one who hath gane to his place of rest.
O o oh ! blessed are the dead who '
' I remind you of my poor father, you would say ?'
4 Ye' yes puir young man !'
' I am thought to be like him ; for his hair was a light brown,
and his eyes hazel, with black lashes.'
'Even sae, Miss Otterburn,' murmured the Bailie, while smooth-
ing the nap of his huge triangular beaver, and lowering his stealthy
eyes.
' It was an evil night that on which you and he rode homeward
from the Bank of Scotland, Reuben Balcraftie.'
' Evil was it indeed !' he rejoined, cowering still more beneath
the keen flashing glance of her beautiful eyes, in which a strange
light was now shining j ' but Luffness Muir hath the reputation o'
being a fatal spot to the Otterburns of Auldhame, as you ken weel.
To-morrow,' lie added hurriedly, to change the subject, ' I am to
attend a meeting o' the Synod of Lothian and Tweedale, anent that
flagrant violation o' the Treaty of Union the restoration o' kirk
patronage, Sir Baldred.'
The baronet did not care much about that special violation, as it
restored to his family the patronage of the ancient parish church of
St. Buldred, which they had possessed since the Reformation and
plunder of the temporalities, during the regency of Mary of Guise ;
but a reference to the Union was quite sufficient to make him
mount his hobby, and begin an angry dissertation, which the Bailie
evidently preferred to continuing the conversation on that midnight
ride over Luffness Muir.
Bryde had remarked this more than once the Bailie's reluctance
to speak of an episode that would certainly have formed a natural
subject for morbid relish to one so vulgar as he, and it set her
thinking.
The Synod met in Edinburgh ; the Bailie, she expected, would
be absent at least two days from his house in the Burgh-town, and
Bryde resolved to visit it and reconnoitre.
' You take horse for Edinburgh to-morrow, Bailie ?' she asked,
making a violent effort, and addressing him again.
' By eight hours o' the morning, Deo Volente, I shall be going
forth on a pious nnrl righteous errand, Miss Otterburn,' lie replied,
bowing low, while tilting up the ties of his huge wig, and planting
the heels of his square-toed shoes together on the carpet ; ' I shall
tarry at Kam^ay's stables in the Horse Wynd. Can I do nught for
you in the Lawn-market, Miss Otterburn ; though I can but little
anent a la modrs and lutestring-', ponipccis and pjarlings ?'
Evcu while shrinking Irom him with loathing, Brydo smiled at
9
130 THE WHITE COCKADB.
her own thoughts, as she retired to join Dalquharn, who could not
abide the presence of Balcraftie, if he could by any means avoid it ;
and while the latter looked after her retreating figure admiringly,
till the dining-room door closed over it, there came into his pale
eyes an avaricious glitter. Then he turned to the woodlands, and
the yellow fields, which, from the windows, could be seen stretching
far eastward in the sunshine, and he rubbed his hands and mut-
tered,
' The estate shall he mine, mine MINE ! Tower and fortalice,
kirk and doocot, main and farm, bake and brewhouse, outfang thief
and infang thief, sae surely as the field o' Ephrou, which was in
Machpelah, and a' the trees which were in that field, were given
nnto Abraham ! and mair than a', you shall be mine too, madam,
for a hand-fast, a bond-maiden, it may be, for wi* a' your pride,
your scorn and braw airs, Reuben Balcraftie may see you at his
feet yet!'
The attainder of Auldhame (to which he confidently looked for-
ward) on the one hand, his secret services to the government, and
the wadsets he personally held on the other, would ensure him a
strong chance of obtaining possession of the whole, and thus Bryde
would be placed by poverty and humility, completely in his power ;
so, like a coiled-up snake, he bided the time ' to hurl at once his
venom and his strength* bided slowly, surely, greedily and
warily !
About five hours after the Bailie and Mr. Carfuffle, of Whitekirk,
took horse next day at the Otterburn Arms, and set out for Edin-
burgh, Bryde ordered her pad to be saddled, and an armed groom to
accompany her, as she meant to ride a few miles.
Without acquainting her grandfather or Dalquharn of her pur-
pose, she stole away by the private door, holding up the gathered
skirt of her riding habit, which was light blue trimmed with silver,
a white ostrich feather floating from her broad hat behind her, and
her riding switch pressed against her rosy lips, as if she would im-
press silence on herself. There was a flush in her now usually pale
cheek, and a sparkle in her clear brown eye, that made her face,
though an irregr'ar one, full of glorious beauty.
' Praise be blest ! my bonnie lamb my ain cushie-doo, the roses
are coining back to your cheeks again ! ' said Dorriel, as she saw
her setting forth, and whip up her pad to a gallop, as she sped
towards Castleton, followed by a trusty fellow, the butler's oldest
on, Archie, armed with a hanger and pair of holster pistols.
Her purpose, that forenoon, was to visit the house of Balcraftie
in his absence, and endeavour by force, if bribery or stratagem
failed her, to secure those dangerous papers, which might cause
alike the ruin of her lover, her own family, and, perhaps, the prince's
cause.
Where their personal feelings are so keenly, so terribly excited as
those of Bryde were, women, being generally given more to sudden
THE WHITB COCKADE. 131
impulse than to subtle casuistry, are not apt to consider nicely or
maturely, how the law may view their proceedings ; thus, to Bryde
Otterburn's mind, to commit invasion on (he premises ef Bailie
Balcraftie, risking even the charge of hame-sncken and violence, even
to the wrenching open of his most secret places, seemed bxit an act
of fair reprisal, retributive justice and patriotism in King James's
cause.
' Balcraftie is a villain, and worse than a villain ! ' she kept re-
peating, while whipping her horse ; ' then why dally, delay or trifle
with him? Time presses and such an opportunity may not occur again."
She neither armed herself with a loaded pistol or sharp poniard ;
neither was she furnished with a sleeping drug, a dark lantern, or
any of the melo-dramatic accessories usually adopted by ladies of
high enterprise in sensational romance. She was simply resolved
to see what she could do, at all personal risks, to recover those dan-
gerous documents.
Her heart beat painfully with growing excitement, as she ap-
proached the little town, with its ruined church on the rocks beside
the sea ; and checking the pace of her horse, she permitted the
reins to drop on his neck.
The noon of the summer day was bright and beautiful: the
woods tossed on the wind their dense green foliage ; the bearded
grain was yellowing in the sun, and the black crows were cawing
in the quaint belfry of the parish church, whose shadow falls on the
grave of many a martyr and resolute covenanter ; and they were
wheeling in flights above the turrets and walls of the old Cistercian
nunnery, which Malcolm Macdnff, son of Duncan, Earl of Fife,
built and consecrated to the blessed Virgin Mary, when Alexander
II. filled the Scottish throne a shattered ruin, at the altar of
which, three fair young ladies of her house, at different times, had
taken the veil, when their lovers fell in battle for their country at
Sark, at Arkinholrae and Pinkeycleugh ; and Bryde thought of
them sadly, and of their sorrows begun and ended, all so long ago,
when, in this age of utility and desecration, she saw the corn of the
thrifty Presbyterian farmer (who was not troubled by* many poetical
compunctions), growing deepest and richest, where, in the days of
old, the convent graveyard lay.
There was a great bustle in and around the narrow main street of
the quaint little town of North Berwick, and the beating of a hoarse,
ill-braced drum was heard at times. At the market cross thera
stood, by sentence of the Lords of Justiciary, a degraded merchant
burgess, with his hands tied behind his back, which was bared to
the long lash of the public executioner, while a placard on his
breast bore the following in capital letters :
'Convicted of withdrawing His Majesty King George's weight*
and using false ones, in place thereof.' Underneath was written in
the hand of Balcraftie, the text so well known, 'Eeuder unto
Cssar,' ic.
9 o
132 TEE WHITE COCKADE.
The town-drummer beat a roll, and the first of twenty stripes to
be administered drew a yell from the culprit, and a varied murmur
from the crowd ; at the same time it made Bryde gallop on to the
mansion of Balcraftie.
Dismounting and telling the groom to take the horses to the
Otterburn Arms, and await her there, she advanced straight to the
house of her foe, with her heart beating every moment more pain-
fully and rapidly.
With several other gossips, whose presence and observation
Bryde would rather have avoided, the housekeeper of Balcraftie, a
shrivelled and wrinkled crone, whose hooked nose and prominent
chin (under her close crimped curchie, with its black band), met
like nutcrackers, stood on the steps of his door, curiously and mor-
bidly observant of the bustle and punishment at the cross, though
the good folks of those days were treated, at very short periods, to
the sight of hanging, lashing, nailing of ears and boring of tongues,
for various crimes, and drumming of scolding wives through the
streets at a cart-tail.
She received the young lady of Auldhame with a profusion of
smiles and low curtsies.
The Bailie, she said, a little pompously, had just ridden that
morning to Edinburgh, with the worthy Mr. Carfuffle, to attend a
meeting of the Synod, anent the abomination of Patronage, and
would be absent two, may be, three days ; but Jabez Starvieston
(the poor anatomy was well named) his clerk, was at the cross,
reading the sentence on the dealer with false weights a vile
Seceder loon, who upheld the ' Marrow of Modern Divinity ' but
Jabez would be back anon to attend to her ladyship's pleasure.
Annoyed by the fawning manner and repeated curtsies of this
wrinkled crone, Bryde said briefly that she did not require the
clerk, a poor starveling and slave, whose shrunken limbs and cada-
verous aspect she had often pitied, the pittance he received from
his hard task-master, affording but few of the necessaries, and cer-
tainly none of the luxuries of life ; she would write a note for the
Bailie, and with the good dame's permission, would step into his
office and make use of his writing materials.
The old housekeeper, with all the officiousness, loquacity, and
gossip of her class, accompanied Bryde into that celebrated apart-
ment winch the reader may, perhaps, remember, the same in which
Mr. Gage and the armed tidesmen brought Dalquharn and Mitchell
before the Dionysius of North Berwick ; and had the young lady
not dismissed her peremptorily, by remarking that she must be left
alone, and would be some time in writing, she might as well have
tarried in Auldhame, as have hoped to investigate the archives of
Balcraftie without observation or interruption.
The housekeeper hurried back to rejoin the gossips on the steps
outside, their conversation now having 7ie\v food in the discussion
of HissOlterburn's appearance, bearing, and dress; and the iustaut
THE WHITE COCKADE. 183
she was gone, our heroine turned the key in the door, and looked
curiously and anxiously about her.
She remembered tlie room and all its gloomy features but too
well, for she had been in it more than once, when poor Sir Baldred
had come hither in the hard times and dear years, during the cattle
disease, and bad crops, and so forth, to screw money out of the
grasping usurer's ill won hoards.
Its windows were barred like those of a prison, and faced the
wide expanse of sand, the rocky isle of Craigleith, which so closely
resembles a vast lion, with its chin resting on its fore paws ; the
ceiling was low, and discoloured by stains ; the grate was rusty,
and full of wasto paper, carefully torn into very minute bits, and a
damp and earthy odour, like that of a tomb, pervaded the place.
Vague ideas of alarm caine over Bryde, and she shuddered, she
knew not why.
Those documents of such vast consequence to the lives of those
she held most dear, might be nay, must be, Brjde knew within
arm's length of her ; but where, in what drawer, in what coffer, ill
what exact spot ? Could her eyes but pierce those boxes and pan-
nels.
What if Balcraftie had on that day taken the papers with him to
Edinburgh, cither to secure or surrender them ? Even at that
moment he might be in conference with the crown officials concern-
inn; them ; to-morrow the warrants might be out, and the criminal
oflicers and a guard of horse might secure nil the avenues from
Auldhame. There was despair in that thought !
Off her nervous little hands, which seemed so white and babyish,
for the work to be done, she drew her tight and well-fitting riding
gauntlets, and cast them with her switch on the black oak table.
It was littered by books, docquets, and musty papers ; but she
knew too well that those she longed for, would not be lying openly
there.
On the maps and charts by Herman Moll, the bills of wreckage,
salvage, of the weekly waggon, and the Bailie's next preachment
on the links, ' Deo Volente,' and so forth, her eyes wandered
rapidly.
His oak lettron, or desk, massively bound and fenced about with,
brass, was before her ; might the papers be there ?
An old-fashioned bureau, which surmounted a mahogany chest of
drawers, with hanging handles of brass a piece of double furni-
ture still to be seen in remote Scottish country houses stood in an
arched recess, that, somehow, suggested security. She stepped to-
wards it ; the sloping-lid of the bureau was locked, and now a
gound startled her. It was only a mob hooting the culprit at the
market cross.
The drawers of this bureau were all unfastened save one. She
pulled them all open, and shut them in quick succession, not be-
cuuse she expected the paper .to be there, but rather in nervous
13 i THE WTTITE COCKADE.
anxiety to be doing something before the clerk returned. They
were crammed with bundles of old invoices, accounts, bills of lad-
ing, and other written rubbish, tied up with red tape, and seemed
of no value, as they referred to long past transactions.
The lower one was locked ; this excited alike the suspicion and
irritability of Bryde, and she exerted all her strength to pull it
open. The wood was old, worm-eaten, and rotten ; the lock fell
into the drawer, which came suddenly out, and seemed empty.
Bryde was about to shut it, when something caught her eye, which
made her cheek grow pale, and her heart to die away in her breast.
She drew it forth that something, the sight of which almost
suffocated her with emotion.
Covered with the dust of years, and faded in hue, it was a small
maroquin case, or pocket-book, of scarlet leather, which bore the
arms of the Otterburns of Auldhame stamped thereon, in gold. It
was originally wont to be fastened by a curious clnsp of steel, which
she remembered well, but this means of security had been rent com-
pletely away. Trembling in every limb, Bryde opened it, and saw
on the inside the autograph of her father, in whose hands she had
many times seen this case the" identical one of which he had been
robbed, with all its contents, on the night when he was so foully
slain by a shot from behind, on Luffness Muir!
The dark spots upon it his blood, doubtless filled her heart
with emotions of rage and sorrow.
' This pocket-book how came it into Balcraftie's possession ?
How, but with the notes it contained !' she whispered in her heart.
Another black link in the secret life of Balcraftie was here taken
up, and, swift as light, a hundred suspicions now flashed on the
mind of Bryde. She now knew beyond a doubt, that Reuben Bal-
craftie, incited by robbery and avarice, was the author of her
father's assassination, and, by that deed, the breaker of her mother's
heart.
She remembered the long night of suspense and anxiety that
preceded the knowledge of the crime ; the alarm and dismay that
the cold grey morning brought to all their hearts ; her mother, dis-
hevelled and wild with grief, embracing the stiffened corpse, as it
was borne by sorrowing vassals into Auldhame, muffled in a roque-
laure pale, and covered with hideous blood gouts.
Wliat if the author of that foul crime were to return now, and
find her with the proofs of it in her possession I Quick, quick, she
thought, there is no time to lose!
1 Traitor !' she exclaimed, ' corrupt and hypocrite as you are, and
cunning and wary though you be, I shall make you suffer torments
yet, greater than you have ever caused to the hearts of those who
were good, gallant, and true ! "We shall yet be revenged on thee,
wretch!'
She remembered the expression which Balcraftie at times alleged
he bad seen in her face, a something that reminded him of her
THE WHITE COCKADS. 135
father, and winch bewildered and terrified him ; and she remem-
bered too of I lie wadset which hud been principally paid in some of
the same notes of which her father had been robbed. To her it
was all as clear now as sunshine at noon !
There is something mysterious in the persistence of imprestinw.
' There is reason to believe that no idea which ever existed in the
mind can be lost,' says a modern writer ; ' it may seem to ourselves
to be gone, since we have no power to recall it, as is the case with
the vast majority of our thoughts. But numerous facts show that
it needs only some change in our physical or intellectual condition
to restore the long lost impression ;' and in the mind of Bryde, a
flood of past thoughts and suspicious gathered or returned with
fresh intensity.
Nerved thus anew, and thereby with less repugnance than ever,
ho looked about for some lever, wherewith to wrench open the
bureau, and every other lock-fast place in this assassin's den. In
the cautious Scottish fashion of the preceding century, the fire-irons
wero chained to the jambs of the mantle-piece, not so much to pre-
vent their abstraction as the dangerous use of them in any sudden
brawl, so they could not avail her.
She looked anxiously round, for time was most precious and was
passing quickly.
The rusty head of an old halbert (broken in some row or tulzie
in the burgh), witli about three feet of the shaft adhering to it,
lay in a corner, and Bryde found that it would suit her purpose
exactly.
The strong steel head she inserted under the sloping lid of the
bureau for some inches, and then bending upon it with all her
weight, the wood parted from the lock with a great crash, and the
slab of mahogany fell at her feet. A double row of pigeon-holes,
filled with docquets of letters, was now visible, and many bundles
of paper, tied and labelled, lay on the desk of the bureau, and to
these, while her temples throbbed and her hands trembled, she ad-
dressed herself in rapid succession.
The old wadset over a portion of the home-farm of Auldhame
and other places, with the more recent one for money for the
Prince's service, borrowed over the land of Halflongbarns, met her
eye, and these she might have taken and destroyed ; but they were
carefully recorded in the sheriff court book of the Counting of Had-
dirgton, so their destruction would have availed little; besides,
Bryde had other views.
' Jlah what is this?' she exclaimed, as a foolscap document
came to her hand, recently written, at some length and docquetted
thus :
'Information for His Majesty's Advocate for His Majesty's Inter-
est, anent Dalquharn and Mitchell, emissaries of the Popish Pre-
tender and Spies of the French King, with evidence that they cam*
from Dunkirk last, in the " Etoile de la Mer " imuggler, in time of
136 IHE WHITE COCEADB.
war, eluding the fleet of Admiral Byng. Cyphers and intercepted
correspondence between the aforesaid forfeited traitors, and the
Lords Bahnerino, Lovat, Elcho, the Earl of Kilmarnock, and the
(so-called) Duke of Perth and Melfort, numbered from one to
twelve, together with an account of the secret murther of an Eng-
lish officer, Lieutenant Egerton, of Howard's Foot, and the compli-
city of Sir Baldred Otterburn therewith, as the body is now buried
near his mansion of Auldhame, &c.'
This document was dated but yesterday, and the ink was barely
dry ! Tied up with red tape, and ready for transmission to tlie
hands of the Public Prosecutor at Edinburgh, the docquet was
bulky.
Bi-yde had now all she wanted ; she threw her riding skirt over
her left arm to conceal the papers and the recovered pocket-book,
and grasping her riding-switch, as if it was a weapon for defence,
sallied from the house like one in a dream, and reached the inn-
yard, where the armed groom awaited her with the horses.
Ten minutes more beheld her flying homeward with her spoil,
almost at racing speed. The poor girl's heart and head seemed
alike on fire ! She cared not what might be thought of the adven-
ture, which the Bailie's household would soon make known over all
the country ; for all those noble peers, whose names were mentioned
in the correspondence, and some of whose holograph letters were
there, ' numbered from one to twelve,' were saved by her from im-
mediate destruction ; her lover too, the brave and devoted Dalqxi-
harn, Sir John Mitchell too, and, though mentioned last, not least,
her poor old, loving grandfather, whom this man Balcraftie had
robbed and so deeply wronged.
Sir Baldred she resolved not to consult, as yet, on this discovery ;
his impatience and impotent wrath would be too great even for the
occasion, and might seriously affect his health. She enquired for
Lord Dalquharn the moment she reached Auldhame, breathless by
her ride, and alternately flushed by her triumph, and then pallid
at the contemplation of the danger they all escaped, and by her
courage and prudence alone.
Lord Dalquharn was nowhere to be found, though evening was
at hand, and the dinner bell had long since been rung. He had
gone forth with Mr. John G-age, the English custom-house officer,
taking with him his sword and pistols, and had not returned.
' Whither had he gone in what direction ?' she asked. Some
said towards Tantallan ; others said, towards Tyninghame in the
opposite direction ; in short, no one knew with certainty.
The evening drew on, and Bryde's anxiety became, erelong, an
agony, She had gained a great victory ; and he in whose cause the
essay had chiefly been made, was not here to share her triumph or
her secret the new and terrible secret, that she had discovered the
assassin of her father !
To Sir John Mitchell, Bryde related, with all ita details, the
THE WHITE COCKADE. 137
story of her adventure. He read over the ' Information for His
Majesty's Advocate,' -while his brows were knit with rage and fury;
for "they had all been toppling on the brink of a precipice, from
which Bryde's hand had saved them, but he laughed and kissed it,
and could he have dared so great a liberty, he would have pressed
the dear girl to his breast, as she hung with a species of sisterly
regard on his arm, and looked into his kind eyes for approbation of
her courage and conduct, which he praised loudly.
'And now, my dear and gallant Miss Otterburn,' said he, 'as we
never know what a moment may bring forth, these papers must all,
with your permission, be put out of existence.'
1 Before Dalquharn sees them ?'
' Yes, and especially before others might see them. I have not
lived in exile since the battle of Sheriffmuir, without learning
caution, my dear young lady. 1
Procuring a light from the silver tinder box, which., as a habitual
smoker, he always carried for using his pipe, they were speedily
torn to shreds and blazing in the dining-room grate. He and Bryde
stood by watching the conflagration in silence, until the last glowing
spark of redness had flickered out and died away among the black
and impalpable ashes, and then he again caressed Bryde's delicate
hand, tenderly, and bent his lip upon it. Mitchell could do so in
safety then, for the secret that he loved her, with all the affection
of lover, brother, and friend, was known to himself alone.
As the light of the burned papers passed away, the two lookers-
on became aware how far the twilight had advanced, and that Lord
Dalquharn was still unaccounted for.
He had never before been absent so long, without some known
and just excuse, and was so regular in his habits, that the present
affair seemed extraordinary, and rapidly became alarming: for the
night drew on, and still there was no appearance of him. Sir Bal-
dred dispatched a mounted servant to the residence of Mr. Q-agc,
a pretty cottage in the westgate of North Berwick, to make en-
quiries, but that official had not returned either ; however, as his
habits were somewhat erratic and nocturnal, in consequence of his
peculiar avocation, his absence created little alarm in the mind of
his buxom little English wife, who seemed to have no doubt that
' he would turn up somewhere between the night and morning he
always 'ad 'itherto.'
Absent absent, even as Egerton had been he had gone forth
into the darkness of the night, and leaving only wild surmise and
mystery behind ; so thought Bryde, who had a very active imagi-
' nation, with a great aptitude for tormenting herself. Oh, what had
happened now ? Scotland and England, too, were still somewhat
lawless ; there were no regular police, and the roads were often
beset by broken men, gypsies, foot-pads, and sturdy beggars ; and
human life and humau suffering were both of much less account
than they are now.
103 THE WHITE COCKADE.
Why was he absent thus from her who lored him as her own
soul ? Once again her tears were falling fast and bitterly. H
might have heard of danger, Mitchell kindly suggested, and so have
fled somewhere for concealment, ' and in that case,' added the
baronet, 'we shall soon hear of him. for though the post-boys appear
to be strangely tampered with, he would not leave you in suspense,
and me in the lurch.'
It could not be a danger menaced by Balcraftie, as the perilous
papers ne longer existed ; but what business could he have had with
Mr. Gage, an Englishman a government official. It was very
perplexing.
So the night passed away at Auldhame without Lord Dalquharn
appearing ; it was, though a midsummer one, a long long night
of tears and apprehension to Bryde Otterburn, who heard every
hour and half hour, chimed in dreary monotony by the old brass
clock in the chamber-of-dais.
CHAPTER XXVI.
THE SEQUEL.
'Fell spectre of the haggard eye,
Wild gesture and erected hair,
Quick from my presence fly 1
Base ease awhile my heart opprest,
Lest, lost and woebegone, Despair
Should seal me for her own,
And reason banished from her throne,
To madness should resign my tortured breast.'
Ode to Terror.
LATE that night Bailie Balcraftie caine galloping home, and to the
great surprise of his small household, presented himself at an hour,
when he and other members of the Synod of Lothian and Tweedale
were supposed to be sitting round a snug crown bowl of steaming
whiskey punch at Katnsay the vintner's, in St. Mary's Wynd. He
had returned, he said briefly, for some papers of importance ; in
fact, for a right royal sum, he had agreed to place in the hands of
the Lord Advocate (of course an unscrupulous ministerial placeman)
the carefully numbered correspondence, and the precious ' informa-
tion' which Mitchell had, a short time before, quite as carefully
committed to the flames. Thus, the Bailie had preferred a ride in
the dark, even by Q-ulane Links and Luffness Muir, to enjoying a
pipe and bowl, and the society of such men as Home, the author
of 'Douglas,' Blair, who wrote ' The Grave,' the witty Carlyle of
Inveresk, and others among whose society his profound hypocrisy
enabled him to move.
In the hurry of his arrival and in the lust of gratified avarice, and
the triumph of anticipated revenge on IJalquharn, Mitchell, and Sir
Baldred, all of whom he cordially hated in his heart, he failed to
observe at first the pale terror and painful tribulation of Mr. Jabez
THE WHITE COCKADE. 130
, his clerk, a poor, famished, and overtasked creature,
whose services were rewarded by the reversion of the Bailie's ward-
robe, and (lie crumbs that fell from his table, and whose pale watery
eyes and cunning leer gave him a resemblance so close to our enter-
prisir.g magistrate, that a few evil minded persons Tories and
nonjurora were wont to affirm that there was a very near relation-
ship between them, more especially as in babyhood, the starveling
clerk had been found one morning tied in a bundle of rags, to the
handle of the risp Bailie's front door.
This abject creature, who regarded Balcraftie with a strange fear,
and stranger regard, blended with the most abject submission, the
result of long force of habit, after having his intellects brightened
by a smart application from a rattan wielded unsparingly by
Balcraftie, informed him that Miss Otterburn had been there that
day.
'Here Bryde Otterburn, here?' exclaimed Balcraftie, astonished
by a circumstance so unusual.
' Yes in the office, saying she would would would leave a
note, but but '
' But what speak, you gomeral you puir cockle-headed loon !'
Jabez could only gasp like a dying cod-fish, and cower under the
uplifted rattan.
' A licht, Lucky, a licht!' said the Baily, snatching a candle from
his scared housekeeper, and hurrying into his sanctum. He has-
tened instinctively to the bureau ; it was open ; the halberd head
was lying among the littered papers with it, and split in two, the lid
lay on the floor.
A film passed over his eyesight ; a sickness came into lu's avari-
cious heart ; and ho would have sunk down, for his knees gave way
beneath him, but he clung to the bureau.
His precious papers, the double instruments of wealth and tri-
umph were gone gone gone !
And Bryde had taken them ! There was no note, for none had
been written ; it was all a snare, a pretence to take advantage of his
absence, on that expedition to Edinburgh, of which he had so care-
fully informed her ; and there lay her tiny gloves, just where she
had cast them on the table, and forgotten them in the hurry of her
departure. He tore them with his teeth ; he trod them under foot,
in his impotent rage trod them as he would have done her own
lender neck had it been there.
Then came the bitter reflection, that had he but taken the papers
when he went to town that morning, her scheme would have been
baffli-d ; but now she had confounded and defeated him.
' Curses on her!" lie gasped out hoarsely and huskily, as he sank
into his black leather elbow chair, which never felt so uncomfortable
as at, that particular moment ; ' curses on her!" he repeated while
depositing his wig on the wig-block, for his brain seemed on fire ;
' how cauie she to do this, a deed so bauld and tough. she, a delicate
1-10 THE WHITE COCKADB.
woman, barelj past her lassiehood, wi' her saft hazel eyen, and her
a' but a bairn's i'uce ? Curse her .'* he added, more deep and hoarsely,
as he clenched his sharp fangs, and his great coarse and misshapen
hands.
When the first paroxysm of fury was past, Jabez Starvieston, who
wore a scratch wig made of a dog-skin, which did not improve his
lean and hunger-eyed visage, drew timidly nigh, with the whispered
information, that the lugger of Sanders Scupperplug had been seen
in the offing from Scougal Point.
The Bailie groaned, and then said, after a pause
1 Was a lantern hung out in the gloaming, to shew that the coast
was clear, and the pestilent-red coats departed ?'
' Aye, and at Whitberry, and I shewed the red flag on Tantallan
for weel nigh five minutes.'
' Five minutes owre lang, for that English loon, Gage, hath
the eyen o' a lynx ; in this matter you have dune your best ; in the
other you werena to blame. But get me my night gear, and we
shall gae forth; the run will be made mare than three miles frae
this.'
Groaning again, as he recurred to his loss
' She hath been guilty o' rank hamesucken,' said he ; ' and I shall
hae the law o' her the law if it is to be had in braid Scotland !'
There was no family worship, and no psalm sung that night in the
house of Reuben Balcraftie.
*****
The next moining came, but brought with it no tidings of Lord
Dalquharn to Auldhame. Witli the first blush of sunrise, Bryde
left her couch sleepless as when she had lain down upon it. Sh ;
issued into the garden, where the brightness of the summer morn-
ing, the perfume of the opening flowers, and the music of the merry
birds soothed and revived her. She clung to Sir John Mitchell's
idea, that urged by some alarm, Dalquharn had fled somewhere for
concealment ; but she was impatient to despatch another horseman
to the house of Mr. Gage, to learn how and when that person had
seen his Lordship last.
She heard the sound of hoofs upon the distant highway ; a horse
was approaching at a gallop ; her heart bounded more and inoro
with expectation with mingled hope and alarm when the change
of sound distinctly announced that the horse was coming down the
avenue She rushed to the garden gate, and was met face to face by
Bailie Balcraftie !
That personage dismounted from his Galloway cob, and grasping
the reins, stood some six paces distant, surveying her with a daring
glance of hate and spite in his pale and now colourless face. Could
a glance have slain, Bryde had been reduced to tinder on the spot!
Balcraftie had regained much of his external composure, but the tires
of unsatisfied vengeance and of disappointed avarice were yet smoul-
dering in hia heart.
THE WHITE COCKADE. 141
Her becoming morning toilet, a rich negligee ; her slender -waist
and curved bust being charmingly defined by a. long and well-shaped
boddice; her masses of bright brown hair, gathered carelest-ly and
hastily in rippling waves behind, so as to show her delicately-fanned
ears, and the long sparkling pendants, which her great grandmother
had worn at the coronation of King Charles, in Scone ; her paleness
and the alluring character of her beauty for Bryde was beautiful,
though her nose was in the faintest degree retrousse, and the envious
alleged that her mouth was too large all failed to aH'ect the .bailie,
or move his stubborn heart, while her extreme apparent self-posses-
sion infuriated him.
' He dare not assault me, I presume,' thought Bryde, so she con-
fronted him calmly, boldly, and scornfully.
' 'Sdeath, madam,' he hissed through his set teeth. 'You are the
very person I came hither to see.'
' And to what am I indebted for the honour of this early visit
from the worthy and excellent Mr. Balcraftie ?' she asked, carefully
keeping her hand on the lock of the garden gate, ready to close it
in an instant, for she feared this man, and knew not what his pur-
pose might be there at an hour so early, and when so few of the
household were stirring.
1 1 am come to dispel your vapours, madam, as you shall ken ere
long, and your pride too.'
Bryde laughed, though her poor fluttering heart grew sick with
apprehension.
4 You committed an invasion o' my premises yesterday morn,
breaking lockfast places hamesucken, felony and had you com-
mitted slaughter, even as Ishbosheth was slain by felons and hame-
suckers in his ain dwelling, it would barely aggravate the crime, as
we find in second Samuel,' said he in measured and stern tones ; ' but
I'll hae you precognosced before the Fiscal, and I'll try it on the
floor of the Parliament House if he fails me, for I'll hae vengeance
and justice, if they are to be got out o' the wigs o' the fifteen Judges !'
' Begone, sir, or I shall order the keeper to let loose the dogs on
you, and 1 know we have one mastiff at least, whose tusks will not
respect your rank as a bailie, or your position as an elder.'
Balcraftie surveyed her with a terrible expression, but the girl
laughed scornfully and bitterly.
' You would like to strangle me, I know,' said she.
1 Yes,' he said through his grinding teeth ; ' that J should, indeed !'
' Or marry me ? eh, assassin ! Oh, we know each other perfectly,
My dear father's pocket-book, which I found in the lower drawer of
. your bureau yesterday, told me a terrible story.'
At these words, which detailed another abstraction of which he
was before ignorant, the perspiration started in cold drops upon the
brow of Balcraftie. What species of folly or insanity was it. wliich
caused him to omit the destruction of that record of his ariuie?
' Where is that pocket-book ?' he asked hoarsely.
142 J.a.iS WillTB CO UK. AWE.
' Safe in Auldhame house,' said she, closing the gate of iron bars,
for he made a pace towards her with more of menace in his cruel
eyes. ' And now I shall give you my terms of secresy.'
' We understand each other,' said he, pale and tremhling with
suppressed passion, hate, and fear ; ' and your terms '
' Am, the instant release of the two wadsets. which you hold over
the lands of Auldhame each release to be fully and truly written
by a notary-public, and stamped ; and that you quit Scotland for
ever, within a week from, this date.'
1 Otherwise ? '
' I shall hand over that bloodspotted pocket-book to the sheriff at
Haddington, that he may elucidate how it, and the bank notes it
once contained, came into your possession ; and with it shall be
given a statement, signed by Lord Dalquharn and myself, of your
last deed of blood in yonder thicket, for I too was there on that
fatal night, and saw your murderous hands on Mr. Egerton.'
' You you ? ' he exclaimed, in a voice like a scream, for he
knew not how much or how little she knew.
But for the pomander ball which she raised at times from her
chaterlain to her nostrils, the girl must have fainted during this
obnoxious colloquy, yet she bore up bravely.
'Ha ha!' she said; 'so, wretch, the money for which you
hoped to sell us to the Lord Advocate and the Marquis of Tweedale,*
has turned into dried leaves like that of the witches or fairies !
But now begone, and pollute this place no longer by your infamous
presence. You know my terms ! Begone, I say,' she continued,
stamping the ground with her foot, ' or I shall summon the servants,
John Archie, Hob, and the old butler, with whips and dogs. I
should like to see a bailie baited as well as a badger, especially where
the burn is deepest ; and we have more than one man here, who
cares as little for risking his life, as for taking the life of another in
the service of the House of Otterburn especially of such a worm as
thee ! More than all, beware how you come under the hands of
the Lord Dalquharn ! '
'Frae sic hands as his, I, at least, am safe enough/ replied Bal-
craftie, with a glare of malignant triumph in his eye. ' Ken you
where this other gay leman is now ? '
' Would that I could know.'
' Shall I tell you where ? '
Bryde shuddered as he spoke for his bearing chilled and ap-
palled her.
' He is chained like a wild beast in the prisons on the Bass ! '
said he, pointing northward with his left hand.
'It is false!'
' It is true true as that the sun shines owre us.'
' On what charge ? ' she asked, faintly.
1 Charges o' treason and murder ; are they enough for you. I
* Secretary of State for Scotland from 1742 till 1746.
THE WHITE COCKADE. 143
kont your pride would hae a fa', and the hour is come ! ha ! ha ! '
cried Balcraftie, as he mounted and galloped away.
Bryde had acted her part gallantly while face to face with the
foe ; but now that he had gone, and in departing had planted this
Parthian shot in her heart, her spirit broke completely down ; her
sobs and tears refused to come, and she sank fainting and breath-
less 011 the garden walk.
CHAPTER XXVII.
THE BLACK LCGGEB.
" When paltry rogues by stealth, deceit or forca,
Hazard their necks, ambitious of your purse ;
For these the hangman wreathes his trusty gin,
And lets the gallows expiate their sin:
But lo a ruffian whose portentous crimes
Like plagues and earthquakes terrify the times
Triumphs through life, from legal judgment free,
For hell may hatch what law could ne'er foresee ! "Veraet, 1759.
A SHOBT time before Bryde returned with the captured papers,
Dalquharn, as already stated, had taken his sword and pistols (the
same from which he had effaced his crest and coronet, the better to
conceal his name and rank) and gone forth with Mr. John Gage.
That official had come in search of Sir Baldred, who had ridden that
day to Haddington to attend a county meeting, summoned by the
Earl of that name, inconsequence of a communication received from
the Marquis of Tweedale ' anent the dark and nefarious designs of
the Popish Pretender,' though the Earl knew well the secret hopes
of the old Laird of Auldhame, and the latter had no faith in the
Earl, who, baring recently married a beautiful English girl, a
daughter of Rowland Holt of Redgrave Hall, he deemed lost for
ever to his country.
Gage now confided his troubles and doubts to Dalquharn, who
now never passed the boundary walls of Auldhame, without his
arms loaded, aa he knew not what a day, even an hour, might bring
forth.
1 1 am sorry, Captain Douglas, that I have missed Sir Baldred,'
said Gage, ' more especially as Captain WyviFs party have marched ;
I thought the good baronet, who hath, a brave name in these parts,
might assist me.'
4 In what way ? ' asked Dalquharn, who, in accompanying Gage,
walked with him, insensibly towards the coast.
' By getting a few armed men to help me in the King's name,
though the peasantry hereabout are not much to be trusted, when
a poor devil of an English exciseman is in a strait. You must
know, sir, that a red lantern, the signal when a run is to be made
in these parts, waa seen on Scougal Point for a few minutes last
H4 THE WHITE COCKADE.
night. I can have no aid from the ' Fox,' as she is still under re-
pair at St. Margaret's Hope, well nigh thirty miles up the river,
and if old ' Puerto-de-la-Plata' shews fight '
' If, say you ? the old desperado is as certain to shew fight, as an
English bull-dog. How many men have you under your orders ? '
' That I can depend upon ? *
'Yes of course.*
' Tidesmen and boat's crew fourteen in all.'
' Fifteen counting me.'
1 You, sir ? '
'Yes I'll go with you,' said Dalquharn, who was longing for
some active work, and who was not without hope of discovering
somewhat of the antecedents of Bailie Balcraftie or Father Testi-
mony.
' I'm glad your honour don't think the worse of me for that night's
work, when I arrested you and your friend Iwas only doing my duty.'
Mr. Gage pronounced the last word ' dooty,' and touched the
forecock of his hat.
' You introduced us to a precious scoundrel, from whose face I
hope to tear the mask.'
' Bailie Balcraftie you mean ? '
1 Right the same.'
' Well he is a bit of a canter and psalinsinger ; but in these parts
they all take to religion, as they take their grog '
' How is that ? '
' Uncommon strong but I beg pardon, sir I forgot your honour
was a Scotsman.'
' Yes, a Scotsman, but neither a prickeared hypocrite, or a trucu-
lent whig, ready to sell my birthright, as Esau sold his, for a mess
of pottage.'
' Well, sir, these smugglers have some powerful friends along
shore here, for many a valuable run is made between St. Abb's
Head and North Berwick, in defiance of all our care and watching.
If we had only six of Captain Wy vil's grenadiers here they would
alter our chances, for we'll have a brush to-night sure as my name's
Jack Gage, I have laid my plans so well ; but I am short-handed
enough to face such a murdering gang.'
' We shall be almost man to man.'
' True, sir but then we don't fight with halters round our necks ;
while they do,' replied Gage, as he swept the horizon to seaward
with a telescope which lie carried in a case slung over his shoulder :
' but if it is the black lugger, as that ere signal was hung out for
though the waves are beginning to break and shew white in the
offing 'tain't much as her skipper or crew care for a breeze. She
sails like some of those old Scotch witches, as used to go a voyaging
hereabouts in sieves and eggshells, and don't care a dump for wind
or weather.'
' But where, and how, do you expect this run to be made ? '
THE WHITE COCKADE. 14o
' Why you must know, sir, that last voyage when outward bound
for Dunkirk, old Scupperplug and his Dutch mate quarrelled with
one of their men, and after a sound ropes-ending they threw him
overboard in the night, just as if they were cruising off the Spanish
Main, and not off the coast of Fife.'
' Was the man drowned ?' asked Dalquharn, who now began to
have a personal interest in the matter.
' No, for he was a strong swimmer and struck out bravely towards
a vessel that was in sight, about a quarter of a mile off, as he could
judge by the light in the poop lantern ; but she had too much way
on her, or her watch were careless, for instead of heaving to, or
cutting away the life buoy, they hove him an old hencoop, on which
he contrived to ride out the night, and he was picked up by my
boat's crew, who were pretending to be fishing below the May,
though keeping a bright look out for strange craft all the while."
1 Well, and this fellow ?'
' Peached on the whole Jot of 'em 'fore Q-eorge he did, sir !'
What?" asked Dalqunarn to whom some portions of Gage's
phraseology proved unintelligible.
' Split on 'em in revenge, and he says as there is one, Father
Testimony in the secret, to whom the runs are generally consigned.
He is to be with us to-night.'
' Who Testimony ?'
' No the rescued smuggler, and he asserts on his solemn 'davy,
that the next run was to be made in a little bay to the west'ard of
Tantallan, where a long, narrow ravine leads right up to a vault in
the old ruins, known now only to this Father Testimony the con-
signee ; so sir, I never had a better chance since I've been in Scot-
laud, of cutting a dash before the commissioners of the customs, if
I can but capture the lugger and her gang to boot !'
After a pause, during which he had been looking anxiously sea-
ward, from the high ground near the ruins of St. Baldred's
chapel
' See !' exclaimed Gage, ' see, sir ! I was rightly informed ; 'fore
George, yonder is the lugger in the offing about nine miles off, just
clearing the south end of the Isle of May her starboard tacks well
aft, her yards mast headed, and her lug sails spread to catch all tui-
wind she can get for it is falling light now, or comes only in angry
puffs that give hints of a squally night. But we must not be seen
here, for we can't say whose eyes may be watching us even now,
from the ruins of Tantallan, from under those bushes or holes in
the rocks. I have known of more than one look-out man being shot
down like old junk, by a pistol-ball that came from what seemed
but a rabbit hole in the earthen bank.'
They drew near the ruined chapel wall, where the buttresses and
a mass of fallen masonry concealed them. There, adjusting the
telescope, Dalquharn could distinctly see the ' Etoile de la Mer,'
whose black hull and raking musts he remembered so well, standing
10
146 THE WHITE COCKADE.
slowly and cautiously, as on that eventful evening, up the estuary
of the Forth ; and again in fancy he seemed to see the squat, but
powerful forms, and hideously scarred visages, of the skipper uud
his Dutch mate.
The river's broad expanse was all empurpled now by the splen-
dour of the settirg sun, which was sinking amid bright clouds of
crimson and amber; though dun and dark masses were hanking up
to the windward, and the waves were beginning to curl their white-
ning crests beneath a breeze, which, though faintly felt as yet on
the headland, was freshening fast in the offing, and rolling the Ger-
man Sea in foam against the precipitous cliffs of the May.
They Dalquharn and Gage knew that, as on the previous oc-
casion, Captain Scupperplug would allow the evening to be far
advanced before he came within pistol-shot of Scougal Point; and
Gage had arranged, that while lie and four of his men, with their .
new ally, all well armed, each with sword or cutlas and a brace of
double-barrelled pistols, made a dash at the smugglers, when the
cargo was half landed, the remaining ten, all equally well armed,
were to creep in the boat, with muffled oars, alongside the lugger,
and capture her, sword in hand, guided by the seaman whom the
smugglers had so barbarously tossed overboard.
It was rightly conceived that the confusion consequent to the
double attack, would insure success.
As most of the crew would be on shore, the boarding of the
lugger was deemed the least desperate, though the most important
feature in the affair, which Dalquharn now began to perceive, might
prove fraught with more danger to himself than the discovery of
Balcraftie's complicity with these outlaws would reward ; but he
had given his promise to Gage, and could not recede.
' Here she comes on the larboard tack now, bringing the gathering
scud and the squally night with her,' said Gage, rubbing his hands
while his ruddy cheek glowed, and his clear blue eyes sparkled, with
excitement and anticipated triumph ; for he was a bold and fearless
fellow ' the darker the better for his operations, and for ours too.
Gadso ! I hope to pick up sumniut in this scrimmage for my little *.
missus at home.'
' I seek but to unmask Father Testimony,' said Dalquham, look-
ing to the flints in his pistola.
' Them religious codgers are often the deepest knaves, after all,' ]
said Gage. ' When I was a tidesman at Dover, some twelve years
by past, there came one day a long, lean parson wearing an apron
and shovel hat. He had a hearse and four men in sad-coloured
cloaks, with mourning bands and black gumphions rigged aloft or
poles, and stated that he had come, by order of the Archbishop
Canterbury, to receive the body of a lady of high rank who had diet
at Boulogne. It was to be landed by the ' Queen Anne ' packet, whic"
was just entering the harbour. I wasn't frightened by hearing
the Archbishop Lord love you, sir, not I : though he of the shove
tHB WHITE COCKADE. 147
hat and square toes mentioned him a score of times. I had my
suspicions about that ere coffin, I had, and insisted on having it
opened, just to see what the body was like. Our parson stormed gad,
that he did ; threatened me with prosecution for desecration, felony,
and eo forth ; but jumped into his hearse and beat a speedy retreat
when the coffin was opened, and found to be choke full of the finest
French and Flanders lace. My little woman and I were just about
to be spliced then ; so out of that ere coffin I got her on the sly, a
dress that would have graced the Duchess of Devonshire. But,
undeterred by this, what think you, sir, happened in the very next
year ? 'twas '32, the same year when the Act was passed to prevent
the exportation of beaver hats from North America when the
body of the loyal and brave old Bishop Atterbury came from Calais
to England for interment, the High Bailiff of Westminster crammed
into the coffin seven thousand pounds worth of contraband goods,*
which I had the good luck to seize at Dover ; for I suspected the
poor bishop's corpse to be a swindle like 'tother. So I was re-
warded by being promoted and sent north here a change which
my poor little wife, who thinks this a main wild and mountainous
country, thought very ungrateful on the part of the Customs,
though they said handsomely enough that Scotland was just the
placs for so enterprising an officer.'
' Why do you not obtain assistance of a party from the garrison
on the Bass ? Livingstone of Saltcoates, and young Congalton of
that ilk, are in command there.'
' Too late, sir too late !' said Gage, shaking his head.
' Why too late ?'
' Because, no doubt the garrison ou the Bass is preciously well
watched by them night-hawks 'long shore, even now ; and if a
boat-load of the Guards were to come off, by some well-known
signal, the run would be made elsewhere, and we should be bilked.'
While they were speaking, a painful but plaintive bleating was
heard close by ; and among the furze bushes they perceived a young
lamb, on which a huge and ravenous hoodiecrow had pounced, and
was deliberately tearing out its eyes. Gage whooped aloud, and
threw his hat at the foul bird, which instantly soared into the air ;
but, quick as thought, Dalquharn unhooked one of the pistols from
his girdle fired, and the sable marauder came toppling down, with
wings outspread, and a bullet in its body.
' That was rash, sir,' said Gaze, looking hastily round.
1 Bash ! How ?' asked Dalquharn.
' Because we don't know where scouts may be hidden ; and I am
o well known in these parts j but it was 'nation fine practice any-
how.'
' I hope it is an omen of how we shall puniflh another black crow
we wot of.'
* Facts.
10-2
148 THE WHITE COCtADfi.
' Talking of that, captain, 'fore G-eorge, you'll find some practice
for your trigger finger after dark, or my name ain't Jack Gage.'
When the evening closed in, the latter was joined by his four
men, well armed, who announced that their boat, with its armed
crew, and the swivel gun loaded with musket-shot, had gone osten-
sibly up the river, to deceive the people of North Berwick ; but
that, according to Q-age's orders, they would drop quietly down with
the ebb-tide in the twilight, and be off the cove, with muffled oars,
when the lugger crept in with her sweeps.
' The townspeople,' added one who spoke for the rest, ' have
enough to occupy and lament about without minding our affairs ;
for news came this afternoon that one of the largest craft belonging
to them had been taken in the gut of Gibraltar by a rascally Sallee
rover, and that all her crew had been carried into slavery.'
The tidesman muttered some heavy maledictions as he said this ;
for they were all seafaring men 'a fellow feeling makes us won-
drous kind ' and those Algerine rovers were, until recently, the
scourge of European commerce.
CHAPTER XXVIII,
THE BAVIltE.
' " A way my men 1" the captain cried,
" 'Tis just the time to board ;"
Upon her decks we jumped amain
With tomahawk and sword.
The conflict now was sharp and fierce,
For clemency had fled,
And streams of blood marked every blow,
The dying and the dead.' Ballad,
DABKNESS set in unusually fast for a summer evening ; the masses
of dun-coloured vapour that came from the seaward soon mingled
with the bright clouds that had enveloped the setting sun, changing
their hue to dull and sombre grey. The wind was blowing now in
whistling gusts, and a few warm rain-drops plashed heavily on the
grass, as Gage and his five comrades crept close to the eastern end
of the vast ruined fortress of the Douglasses, which was anciently
named Duntallan, and, lying on their faces, peered seaward over the
steep cliffs on which the castle is built.
The whole estuary of the Forth was now shrouded by vapour,
through which, as through a gauze curtain, the foam-tipped crests
of the waves could be seen rising and falling. In vain did Gage
search and sweep that curtain of vapour, and re-arrange the focus
of his glass, 'to pick up the lugger,' as he said ; but unless a red
spark that appeared once or twice and then vanished in the gloom,
indicated her approach, as she crept in between the Bass Rock and
THE WHITE COCKADE. 149
the headland of Tantallan, there was no sign or sound of her where-
abouts.
' Look to your priming, lads,' said he, ' and follow me, if you
please, Captain Douglas," he added, in a more deferential manner ;
' we'll make for the creek now.'
The creek, as he called it, is a deep rocky ravine or glen, into
which the water then entered ; narrow, dark, and steep, it slopes
upwards from the sea shore, towards the front trenches and gates
of Tantallan, in the lower walls of which we can yet see the round
gun-ports of the cannon that once swept it to the westward.
On one side of this ravine, and close to the ruins of the north-
western tower, grew a clump of wild whin bushes, amid which the
six lurkers concealed themselves and lay down flat, and only Justin
time, for the moment they were concealed, two persons could bo
discerned making their way stealthily up the gorge from the sea-
shore. One who was picking his steps cautiously with the aid of a
stout staff, carried what appeared to be a dark lantern, but its light
was carefully concealed.
The watchers could perceive that his costume was dark, that he
wore a voluminous white wig, over which his cocked hat was un-
flapped, for a disguise that was further aided by his having a large
handkerchief tied round it and under his chin, to prevent his entire
headgear being carried away by the blasts of wind that were surg-
ing up and down the hollow. Dalquharn alternately panted with
eagerness, and held his breath with caution, as this personage
passed him, for he remembered ' Father Testimony,' who boarded
the lugger on the night that he and Mitchell landed from Dunkirk.
His companion, who wore a long frieze overcoat, with a deep cape,
and huge double cuffs, a broad lowland bonnet drawn well over his
eyes, seemed a long-legged, lean, and cadaverous creature, for his
wide skirts were wrapped and flapped by the wind about his bony
and shrunken figure. Scrambling silently through an opening in
the ruins, they disappeared, but a red light that flashed fitfully on
the walls at times, as they passed through the deserted and grass-
grown chambers and corridors, showed that now the lantern wag
uncovered.
All was yet still in the ravine below.
The curiosity of Dalquharn was irrepressible, and despite the
warnings of Gage, he clambered up a portion of the fallen wall to
peep into a place from whence a light was now issuing in sudden
and uncertain gleams. The arrow-hole for it was nothing more,
to which he applied his eye perforated a wall of enormous thick-
ness, and opened into a square vault, arched with stone ; it was
then half sunk in gloomy shadow, and half filled with ruddy light
from a torch which was stuck between the stones, and which the
lean, cadaverous fellow he of the bonnet and long frieze coat
was igniting or blowing up, by means of a pluff, a piece of bored
bour-tree, then used in Scotland for kindling up fires ; and, as the
150 TilE \VU1TE COCKADE.
gleams fell on his hollow features, he recognised Jabez Starvieston,
the hunger-eyed clerk of Keuben Balcraftie ; so the plot was
thickening !
It was only one of the numerous vaults and dungeons which
form the substructure of this vast old castle, which was built in
ancient times, by the descendants of Macduff, Earl of Fife ; but
there were already in it a few casks and bales of goods, shewing
that it was one of the places where the smugglers stowed their
contraband cargoes, until the consignee could get them conveyed
inland, and in detail on horseback, or otherwise under cloud of
night, to his customers in various parts of the country.
The figure of the other man in this vault, was between Dalquharn
mid the murky light of the torch ; thus his features could not be
discerned ; and now a sudden stop was put to further scrutiny, by
Starvieston stuffing his broad blue bonnet into the loop-hole, to pre-
vent the light being seen from a distance. But ere this was done,
Dalquharn, who was familiar with the grand old ruins, having many
a time explored them with Bryde Otterburn, marked well the lo-
cality of the place, and knew where the long stair that led to the
secret vault must be.
He had barely time to get back to his place of concealment
among the whins that overhung the ravine, when a voice was
heard to 'hilloah' out of the vapour.
Gage now drew forth the cylindrical case of a rocket, and pro-
ceeded to lash it to a staff, as he intended to use it for the double
purpose of signalling to his boat, and alarming the smugglers.
Amid the excitement of the time, Dalquharn had frequently
thought with great compunction, of the anxiety his unusual and
prolonged absence would certainly cause to Bryde Otterburn ; but
there was now a romance, and mystery in the whole affair, which,
together with its too evident peril, soothed and delighted his ardent
temperament.
High overhead amid rugged wildness, crowning the highest
point of a mass of rough, brown, insulated rock, against the base of
which the German Sea, far down below, was hurling its snow-white
breakers rose the mighty masses of the Douglasses' ruined strong-
hold, the scene of many a great event in Scotland's stirring times,
and of many a raw-head-and-bloody-bone legend now, with its long
frontage of lofty curtain wall, and loftier flanking towers, and its
great central keep, with turrets and battlements, gunports and
loopholes, row on row
' Broad, massive, higli, and stretching far
And lield impregnable in war,
On a projecting ruck tliey rose,
And round three sides the ocean flows ;
The f"Ui ili did battled walls enclose,
And double mound and fosse.'
Great breaches yawned, where Monk's shot and shell, a hundred
years before, had taught its cavalier garrison, that the same walls
THB WHITB COCKADE. 151
which defied the armies of the middle ages were no longer im-
pregnable in the days of ' the villainous saltpetre.'
There was no sound in the air, but the booming of the breakers,
which came upward, from where they rolled against the castled
cliff far down below. A strange and preternatural silence hovered
in and about the colossal masses of Tantallan, which seemed to
blend with the murl-y clouds. Even the cawing of the countless
jackdaws that built their nests therein, and shared its naked cham-
bers with the red-beaked puffin and the snow-white gannet, had died
away.
Amid this silence, it was strange to know and to feel, that infal-
libly, in some five minutes or so, startling events would occur ; that
wounds would be dealt, lives lost and taken, amid all the hurly-
burly of a midnight skirmish, in that grassy ravine, where the Scot-
tish bluebell, the seapink and the wild violets were earliest found
by the wanderer or the truant school boy.
' At last we have 'em steady, lads, steady !' said Gage, as the
sound of oars came upward, together with the noise caused by the
rush of a rope-cable (those of chain were then unknown), through
a hawse hole, and the rattle of the parrels or iron collars which con-
fined the yards to the masts, when the lugsails were hauled down
and all made snug on board the lugger, which was evidently close
iu shore under the lee of the cliff, and was all ready for starting her
cargo.
As yet the watchers could see nothing ; but out of the gloom
below, they could hear old Scupperplug storming and swearing in
Scotch, Dutch and Spanish at his noseless mate, the little French
mulatto, and all his ruffianly crew
' Bear a hand, gude friends,' cried a voice which Dalquharn could
not mistake ; ' cheerily wi' these blessed tubs, which shall never be
degraded by the iron brand o' an English gauger.'
' Meaning me,' said Gage, passing a thumb nail over the edge 01
his flints ; ' but, gadso, you may be mistaken, my friend.'
' Ready, my hearties, ready, and heaven's blessing on your work !'
said the voice again.
' Stow your infernal twaddle, old Testimony, and bear a hand
yourself,' bellowed Scupperplug ; ' I've promised the hands a stoup
o' skiedam when the run is complete, so look sharp. I never liked
this place for sending a cargo ashore ; Seacliff cave, or even Tyning-
hame sands are worth a score of it.'
1 Aye, aye, Sanders, but we canna aye choose for oursel's when the
devils o' gnugers are on the look out.'
Under his breath Balcraftie, as we may name him now, uttered
many a bilter imprecation on the head of Bryde Otterburn ; he was
in a fearful temper, and astonished even his compatriot Scupperplug ;
but from the ferocity that inspired them, his maledictions as they
flew up to heaven, would have no tears dropped on them ' by the
recording angel/
152 THE WHITE COCKADE.
Through the gloom below, figures were soon visible, and it became
evident that the crew were carrying ashore a strong warp, whereon
to run the kegs ; some were seen standing up to their waist, others
who were nearer the shore, to their knees in the water. Several
ascended the ravine, thus forming a chain, which passed upward
from hand to hand the brandy kegs and little sherry runlets, as they
were to use a nautical phrase guyed ashore, along the warp, and
some thirty or forty were thus borne upward, and into the vault,
within a yard or two of the place where Q-age and hia five followers
were concealed.
'Now sir,' he whispered to Dalquharnj 'now, my lads, is our
time !'
'Quick wid de gegs donner and blitzen! anodder dubb an-
odder dubb !' they heard Vander Pierboom say, as if through where
his nose was wont to be; 'quick Jules Leroux, you Vreuuh mite
ob Belzebub, bear along de gegs !'
Gage lit the touch paper and applied it to the rocket. With a
terrible hiss it soared into the sky, describing a fiery arc, revealing
for an instant the fierce, bewhiskcred and weatherbeaten visage* of
the smugglers in the ravine ; the kegs tliat were being passed so
smartly upward from hand to hand ; the towering castle-walls and
gaping windows, from whence the black jackdaws and white gan-
nets flew hither and thither. High into mid-air it soared and burst,
and then, as the shower of sparkles fell downward to the seething
sea below, the entire outline of the Black Lugge, tossing and strain-
ing at her anchor, was visible as she rode with her head to the ebb
tide.
A dreadful imprecation burst from Scupperplug, who was stand-
ing on her gangway to guy the kegs ; but it was drowned in the
cheer set np by Gage and his brave followers.
' Forward, marines and small-arm men boarders away ! Hur-
rah, my fighting Foxes'* he cried in a clear and stentorian voice, as
he sprang with his drawn cutlass in hand, on the straggling line of
men in the ravine, who believed themselves to be attacked by the
crew of the ' Fox.'
The rocket and the ruse were most successful !
Firing their pistols, Dalquharn, Gage and the four tidesmen fell
on, sword in hand, and six of the smugglers were instantly put hors
de combat ; the rest flung themselves into the water to reach the
lugger ; but a cheer rose from her deck, and a fire of pistols, flash-
ing through the gloom along her gunnel, announced that she had
been successfully captured from her starboard side, and was in pos-
session of the enemy. Hemmed in, as they seemed to be, by a cross
fire on botli sides, and ignorant alike of the number and character
of their assailants (whose united force was only equal to their own,)
the smugglers abandoned the cargo and all idea of resistance, seek-
ing only to escape.
'Xwo who were on board the lugger hoisting out the kegs leaped
TITE WHITE COCKADS. 153
into the sea and disappeared under her counter. Those who were
on the land, and were not already cut down, fired their pistols at
random, waking a thousand echoes in the winding shore below, atid
the open ruins above, and also sprang into the sea to reach their
quarter boat. Blind with fury, Scupperplug laid about him witli a
hatchet, and inflicted some terrible wounds on his assailants. Seizing
one of the boarders the same seaman whom he had so barbarously
flung overboard near the Isle of May, and to whose spirit of ven-
geance the victory was chiefly due he wreathed the strong fingers
of his left hand iu the poor fellow's long, queued hair, drew his neck
backwards across the gunnel of the lugger, and slashed off his head
by one tremendous stroke. He then hurled both the head and the
hatchet at the victors, and escaping several pistol shots, leaped over-
board, and was dragged into the stern boat, by six of his men who
had got possession of it, and cast off the painter.
The huze favoured their escape ; they pulled away, no man knew
whither, and vanished into the darkness of the night. Jules Leroux
and five others of the crew were found wounded or dying in the
ravine, when the day broke, and the huge bulky frame of Vander
Pierboom, slashed sorely by cutlasses, was cast ashore in Auldhame
Bay, three days afterwards.
By sunrise the Black Lugger the famous " Etoil da la Mer," was
safely moored in the little harbour of North Berwick, with the king's
colours flying at her foremast head.
Only one of Gage's men was killed, he who fell by the hatchet of
the terrible Scupperplug ; several were severely wounded ; but the
events of the night did not eud with the rout of the smugglers and
the capture of their craft.
Dalquharn'a whole faculties were absorbed in the desire to seize
and unmask Balcraftie. For a time it was impossible to distinguish
him from the rest in the sudden and decisive scuffle ; but, as he
could not escape by sea, and there was no avenue by land, save up
the ravine, the rocks on all sides being precipitous, sheer like a wall,
and very lofty, he caught the eye of Dalquharn now accustomed to
the darkness as he stole cautiously up the same path he had
hitherto pursued with his starveling clerk.
1 Here is our man here is Father Testimony,' he exclaimed ;
' follow me some of you.'
Rapidly the dark figure glided upward on hearing this alarm ; and
disappeared ; but Dalquharn knew or shrewdly suspected where he
had gone, and hastened towards the vault.
More than a hundred steps led, and still lead to it. These were
all arched over and enclosed then, and descended at an angle south-
ward from the north-western tower. The narrow passage is open
now and gaping to the light of day, for the roof has fallen in ; but
the vault itself still remains unchanged, and may easily be found by
the explorer who seeks it.
154 THE WHITE COCKADE,
CHAPTER XXIX,
THE TATTLI OS TANTALUM.
' Good name in man or woman, dear my lord,
la tlia immediate jewel of their souls :
Who steals my purse, steals trash ; 'tis something, nothing;
' I'was mine, 'tis his, and has been slave to thousands ;
But he who pilches from me my good name,
Robs me of that, which not enriches him,
And makes me poor indeed.'
Shakespeare.
DESCENDING the long and damp flight of steps, from the bottom of
which the torchlight shed a wavering gleam, that played upward on
the slimy walls, and stumbling over bales and kegs that had been
suddenly abandoned when the rocket went up, Lord Dalquharn,
closely followed by Gage, reached the vault successfully.
There, by the light of the torch which he was striving to extin-
guish and tread out, they discovered Bailie Reuben Balcraftie,
minus hat and wig, and accompanied by Jules Leroux, the little
mulatto cabin boy, who had fled thither instead of attempting to
reach the lugger, the hopeless scene of his suffering and slavery.
The starved clerk was no longer there. At the first alarm he had
fled vanished like a ghost at cock crow.
' Behold him, Gage,' exclaimed Dalquharn, with fierce derision ;
' we have at last discovered and unmasked the most sanctimonious
villain and hypocrite !'
' Tore George ! who'd have thought it,' said Gage, half breath-
less, and wholly bewildered ; ' but after my Dover parson, I don't
wonder at anything.'
' So, sirrah what have you to say. for yourself eh ?' demanded
Dalquharn.
There was a terrible expression in the pale eyes and livid face of
Balcraftie ; discovered, and at bay, he seemed to be on the verge of
insanity. At that moment, Jules Leroux, maddened by the- paiu
of a sword wound in his chest, and by the terror of an immediate
apprehension, that might lead he knew not to what a terrible
death, or an existence worse than that he had led on board the
' Etoile de la Mer,' levelled a pistol, with which he was armed,
and shot poor Gage ; the bullet pierced his brain, and he fell dead
upon the spot.
At the same instant Dalquharn fired at the tawny imp Leroux,
who missed the shot by darting from the vault in the smoke of his
own weapon, and escaping those who were rather cautiously de-
scending the long flight of steps, he fell in the ravine, exhausted by'
loss of blood, and was found there next day, quite dead.
Beady ia resolve, and quick aa light in the perpetration of
THE WHITE COCKADE. 155
wickedness the long habit of turning all men and things to some
profitable account Balcraftie, who was also armed with pistols,
saw the situation in all its features, and took his plans accordingly.
To shoot Dalquharn (for whom he had other views) was no part of
these ; but at the moment that four or five tidesmen, flushed with
their recent victory, on hearing the explosion of firearms, hurried
into the vault, where Gage's body lay, with the blood oozing from
it, he snatched up the smouldering torch, and pointing to the be-
wildered Dalquharn, exclaimed
' By the soul o' my body, gentlemen, and as sure as I am a par-
doned sinner, there stands the murderer, with his empty pistol and
dumb-foundered look ! There stands the committer o' the deed
the Cain, the skyer o' him who's bluid crieth for vengeance frae
the ground! Awa wi' him, that justice may be done upon him
sevenfold, even as it was done on the first murderer in Eden ! Oh,
waly and wae's me, that I should behold sic a foul deed done on
the body o 1 worthy Maister Gage, wha appointed wi' me to meet
him here to-night a gude and trusty friend to king and country
king and country !'
The custom-house officers, who had heard nothing of the ap-
pointment so artfully indicated to explain the reason of his appear-
ance there, surveyed, with a greatly bewildered and doubtful
expression, their recent comrade Dalquharn, who certainly had a
recently discharged pistol in his hand, and a terrible air of wrath
and disdain in his eyes and bearing.
' Hypocrite and double-dyed villain !' he exclaimed; 'dare you
go thus far with me?'
' Yea, and farther,' shouted the Bailie, whose voice rose almost
to a scream, as an excess of rage and spite, not unmixed with fear,
filled his heart ; ' grip and bind the foul slaughterer ! I denounce
him, as Henry Douglas, umquhile Lord Dalquharn, of the Holm,
an attainted traitor, and the son of an attainted traitor ; a popish
recusant, a spy of the hellicate king o' France, and an emissary of the
vile Pretender ! Gyves to the heels, and hemp to the craig o' him !
Awa wi' him to the Tolbooth o' the Burgh, and in the morning
I'll make a' clear wi' this vile felon, who hath on his hands the
bluid of twa brave and leal English gentlemen. He has been taen
in the act, sirs taen in the act, and by the law of Scotland, being
Red Hand, may be legally strung to the gallows tree within twenty-
four hours o' his crime.'
Struck by th" Bailie's earnestness, his volubility, and apparent
sincerity, the tidesmen began to look at each other in doubt, and
to cock their pistols. Dalquharn might have shot Balcraftie, and
cut short the preceding farrago of words ; but that would only
have served to make his affairs more complicated, and worse than
they now seemed to be.
' Gentlemen/ said lie, with a forced air of coolness, which cost
him a severe effort, ''twas bis own ally and compatriot, Julei
156 THE WHITE COCKADE.
Leroux, a mulatto boy of the lugger, who committed this dastardly
crime. I am, as he has said, the Lord Dalquharn, a peer of the
realm (for I deny the right of any Hanoverian Elector to attaint
the title I inherit from the kings of Scotland), and on my honour
as such, and as a gentleman of the House of Douglas, a name that
should have an echo in Tantallan here, I am totally innocent of all
that he has dared to allege. What motive could I have for the
committal of an act so foul ? The poor fellow was my friend.'
'Friend ha! ha! Motive ha! ha!' yelled Balcraftie, in a
voice which became more shrill, while his eyes shone with a white
gleam in their cavernous sockets ; ' motive enough for arresting
him and his companion, Sir John Mitchell, another attainted and
popish recusant, and bringing baith before me, as some of you gen-
tlemen may i*ecollect.'
'Likely enough I remember now,' said a tidesman to the others,
and their looks became darker and more suspicious.
Dalquharn was choking with conflicting emotion on finding him-
self in this predicament, of which he truly feared he had not yet
seen the end ; and with such a terrible charge against him, with
the apparent proofs of it, his first thoughts were of Bryde gentle,
loving Bryde and of Captain Wyvil. If he heard of it, that
gallant and generous English gentleman to whom he had pledged
his word to unravel the mystery of Egerton's death he must
alike mistrust and disdain him now!
The custom-house officials were conferring together, and lingering
irresolutely, when the sound of footsteps were heard heavily de-
scending in measured tramp the long and winding stair ; arid now,
to increase the hubbub, appeared ten men of the 3rd Foot Guards,
in their long scarlet coats and sugar-loaf caps, having the thistle
and circle of St. Andrew embroidered on the front flips thereof,
and with muskets loaded and bayonets fixed. They had come off
from the Bass Rock (where a party of the regiment was always
stationed), under Ensign Congalton, of that ilk, having been dis-
patched by Livingstone, of Saltooates, the commander, on seeing
the rocket ascend, and the subsequent explosion of firearms in the
ravine, which that officer immediately associated with a sudden
landing of the French, the perpetual bugbear of those and later
times.
To Ensign and Lieutenant Congalton for then, as now, the
Guards had household rank a blase and roue looking young man,
who we are sorry to record it seemed to have imbibed at least
his second bottle, Balcraftie noisily and fussily repeated his version
of the affair, adding, with what he conceived to be a convincing
grandeur of manner, while displaying his gold chain of office
'Ye maun a* ken me, sirs I'm Reuben Balcraftie, a merchant
and magistrate o' the Royal Burgh o' North Berwick, and a jus-
tice o' the peace, for the County o' Haddington ; so arrest that
niL WHIIE cockiDi. 157
traitor loon, I say arrest him in the king's name, or disobey at
the peril o* your necks.'
Ere Dalquhara could speak, the tidesmen closed in upon him
and wrenched away his pistols, on which he drew his sword, and
stood like a lion at bay.
'You have heard, sirs, the Bailie's false charge against me,' he
said, while boiling with rage and fury at his false position, and all
the dangerous features of the affair ; ' but, perhaps, this worthy
magistrate and justice of the peace will say what purpose brought
him here to-night ?'
' Egad, yes very proper very proper,' said Mr. Congalton,
while balancing himself on each leg alternately, and cocking his hat
over the right eye.
' The purpose that brought me here, I shall explain when the
proper time comes for doing sae,' replied Balcraftie, who saw that
intense coolness and assurance only would carry him through this
unpleasant episode ; ' but in the meantime, and in the name of the
king, I charge you, Mr. Congalton, to remove that traitor to ward
in the Tolbooth.'
As he spoke, several soldiers brought their bayonets to the
charge.
' Under these circumstances, my Lord Dalquhara,' said Ensign
Congalton, who, though tipsy, and a king's officer, was too much of
a Scotsman, and, perhaps, a Jacobite at heart, to omit giving his
full title to an attainted peer ; ' I trust you will see the folly of
resistance, and give up your sword to me.'
' No, sir not even to you, though the representative of a family
perhaps older than my own,' replied Dalquharn, in a hoarse voice ;
' this sword was the farewell gift of him, who may one day sit upon
the British throne, and shall never be drawn by other hands than
mine.'
He snapped the blade across his knee, and cast the fragments
from him.
A few minutes more saw the whole party out of the vault, and
quitting the stupendous ruins of Tantallan for the highway. Dal-
quharn, and Gage's dead body, borne by his men, surrounded by
the guardsmen with bayonets fixed ; Balcraftie and the officer
bringing up the rear, engaged in a close and earnest conversation,
which enabled the former to explain everything his own way, hence
the bearing of Congalton, who was the representative of one of the
best and old families in Lothian, became cold, haughty, and dis-
tasteful to his prisoner.
The clouds of night were dispersing now, and the early summer
morning was dawning on the land and sea.
Dalquharn's blood was on fire ! In the blindness of his impotent
wrath and the depth of his unmeritsd shame, he almost forgot his
betrothed love, Bryde, then tossing sleepless on a tear-wetted
pillow ; his heart throbbed wildly, and he frequently placed his
158 THE WHITE COCKADE.
hands upon it, as if a pain was there, for it seemed full to the verga
of bursting. He bared his temples to the cool west wind, and
sought thereby relief in vain. Stormy were the passions at work
within him ; but he could only hope against hope itself, that his
day for vengeance would yet come !
Beautifully the early summer morn came in ; the great green
mountain cone that overhangs the little town, then all silent in
slumber, rose against the blue sky, and the woods that clothe its
eastern slope, waved all their foliage in the gentle breeze. From
many a cottage chimney the faint smoke of the griesoch or gathered
peat of the overnight fire, rose in light puffs skyward. The black
rooks were circling in the clear blue welkin. The broad waters of
the Forth, dotted by the brown sails of a fisher fleet, bound home-
ward for Anster, Crail, or Newhaven, laden with the netted spoil of
the deep, stretched far away in distance ; but clothed in silvery
haze, the Fifeshire coast looked dim and indistinct. Three miles
off, the giant Bass towered to the clouds, and the outline of Tan-
tallan loomed blackly against the golden blaze of the morning sky
to the eastward.
Dalquharn felt the cold shudder of irrepressible disgust pass over
him, as he was marched near the gibbet, where the incendiary hung
in chains at the town-end. The miserable remains were now re-
duced to a mere skeleton, which even the crows had abandoned,
and the head was gone. It had been taken in the night by the
barber-chirurgeon in the main street (the same shaving Sangrado
who had ministered to Bryde in her illness), and after being well
boiled, it ornamented his window, with a tuft of moss surmounting
it, to indicate that he dispensed drugs, for such was the usual and
ghastly sign of an apothecary in Scotland (and, perhaps, in Eng-
land too) until 1750.
'That gallows-tree will be empty just in time, I'm thinking,'
chuckled Balcraftie, with savage significance and glee.
' Silence, sirrah !' said Mr. Congalton, who felt some sympathy
for Dalquharn, whose gentlemanly bearing and nobility of air could
not fail to impress him. ' 'Sblood, Mr. Balcraftie ! the alleged
crime has to be proved yet, and I won't allow any unfortunate gen-
tleman to be insulted in my presence by such a low-born churl as
thee. If he shot your precious gauger, perhaps he had good reason
to do so.'
4 That will be proved in time, sirs proved in time ; but here is
the Tolbooth tirl at the pin, some o' ye, and rouse the gude-
man.'
The Tolbooth was a miserable little vaulted place, with thickly-
grated windows, just below the town-house or council-chamber,
which was a plain, unsightly edifice, having crowstepped gables,
four large casements, a flight of stone steps that led to its entrance,
and was surmounted by a louvre-boarded belfrey and antique
dial.
THE WHITE COCKADE. 159
On the strong and nail-studded Tolbootli door, as he entered,
Dalquliarn saw affixed a placard of Balcraftie, announcing a preach-
ment, (D.V.), on the Links, that same afternoon !
'Farewell, my lord," said Ensign Congalton, lifting his hat and
bowing stiffly ; ' I hope, for your sake, that this dark matter may
be cleared up satisfactorily.'
Pale, and almost speechless with emotion, Dalquharn could only
bow with equal coldness, as the ponderous prison door, clanking
with bolts, bars, and chains, was closed upon him, and he found
himself, for some hours, until the magistrates could assemble, the
companion of several unfortunate wretches, some of whom con-
trived to rob him of all he possessed, his purse containing three
Louis, and a Portugal piece of thirty-six shillings value.
Among these were two gypsies for child-stealing ; three strollers
for 'riot and spulzie,' in ward till they could be handed over to a
recruiting sergeant ; and two fishermen, for absenting themselves
from the church and church ordinances, iu ward at the instance of
Bailie Balcraftie ; a suspected papist, and some sheep-stealers.
By this time, the ' blood-holtered' remains of brave and honest
Jack Gage had been carried to the abode of his poor little English
wife, in the Westgate, who now thought that her worst ideas of
the barbarous Scots were terribly realised ; and instead of listening
to the exhortations of Balcraftie, who quoted much scripture in the
most approved nasal fashion, she called down Heaven's vengeance,
not on the real destroyer of her husband, but on the unfortunate
victim of circumstances, Lord Dalquharn.
Erelong, the tolling of an old cracked bell, that had whilom hung
in the tower of the ruined church beside the sea, announced at an
unusually early hour that the magnates of the burgh were assem-
bled in solemn council, and Dalquharn was brought before them, in
a dingy wainscotted apartment, the windows of which were barred
by crossed iron gratings.
There the Provost, the Bailies, the treasurer and nine councillors
of the little town, were assembled in awful state, attended by two
red-nosed halberdiers, and a drummer, all three in a semi-sober
condition, and fully arrayed in the livery of the burgh ; but Dalqu-
harn, proud, fiery, and now infuriated beyond all endurance, treated
those grave, potent (pious) and reverend seniors, with terrible scorn,
as their recorded minutes attest.
By that august assembly of ' Baxters, Websters, Spurriers,' * and
other merchants, he was voted obdurate as James Grabame of
Montrose ; as hellicate a cavalier as the bloody Claverhouse ; as
false as Cromwell the blaspheming sectary ; as proud as the Paip
his master, and so forth. They remembered well that his father, a
'ioble Scottish patriot, had been fairly hunted out of Scotland (where
true patriotism has long ceased to be known or valued) by the Lord
Isla, who then mismanaged the affairs of that country, under Sir
* Anglici bakers, weavers, and spur makers.
160 SUE WHITE COCKADE.
Robert Walpole ; but the remembrance availed him nothing when
in the hands of these resolute whigs.
Balcraftie loudly asserted that Dalquharn, having been taken
Red-hand, should, by the law of Scotland, be convicted and executed,
within twenty-four hours of the crime, without privilege of peerage,
'he being an attainted rebel at the King's Majesty's horn ;' but the
provost ' douce man,' was fortunately a Douglas, and failed to see
any necessity for this extreme haste and severity ; so he ordained
that the accused should be committed to ward then Balcraftie
successfully urged on the Bass Rock ; as Edinburgh was full of
Jacobites ; the city guard were all Celts, and a rescue might be
made, the unlawful seizure of Sir Hector Maclean and the Laird of
Castlehill, and their transmittal in chains to London, by the servile
Lord Advocate, having set the blood of the people on fire.
Perhaps Provost Douglas might not have been sorry for a rescue ;
but he dared not say so, and in silence signed the warrant which
consigned Dalquharn to the terrible and hopeless prisons of the
Bass.
'Awa' wi* him to the auld Craig!' said Balcraftie, while his
vulture-like eyes glared with their most malignant expression, and
he waved his hand triumphantly ; ' a fitting place it is, that vile
prison, where the sighs o" the Sancts o" God, sighs deep as ever
rose frae the Jews place o' wailing at Jerusalem, hae gone forth owre
the salt sea the last sighs o' many that sleep in the bosom o'
Abrawham and under the shadow o' North Berwick kirk. Awa'
wi" him, I say, and keep him there, as fast as yettan bars and chains
o' steel can gird him, till the red hand o' the deemster is laid on his
iieck, and the rooks flap their wings over his harupan.'
And now, it is recorded, that the tipsy drummer went through
the burgh ' tonkering on ye drum,' to announce to the people the
final dictum of those twelve Magnates Scotise.
But the gentle Provost pitied the fallen cavalier Lord and could
not forget the nobler days of old, when the Red Heart emblem of
that glorious heart which the good Sir James carried at the Moorish
field of Teba waved above Tantallau ; and he secretly ordered a
refreshment of wine and food for his clansman before he was con-
veyed away by boat to the Isle, and to what proved, a long and
weary captivity.
'Again in the toils of this man Balcraftie !'
Oh, it was madness ! Dalquharn staggered like a drunken man ;
he was stunned and sick with rage. The veins of his temples were
swollen, there was a bubbling sound in his ears, a crushing misery,
the panting of futile rage and noble scorn in his heart scorn of the
mean and loathly.
A prisoner in such a place, on such charges, and at the behest of
such a man as Reuben Balcraftie !
He strove to remember the adage that he who loses may part
with anything j but it proved a bitter solace.
THE \V1IITE COCKADE. 161
CHAPTER
THE PEISONS OF THE BASS.
' Near to that place where the sea rock, immense,
Amazing Bass, looks o'er a fertile laud,
if impairing time
Haa'not effaced the image of a place,
Once perfect in my breast, there is a wild
Which lies to westward of that mighty rock,
And seems by nature formed for the camp
Of water-wafted armies, whose chief strength
Lies in firm fo<* uuflauked with warlike h >rse.'
Home's Douglas.
IT was a gloriously beautiful day when Dalquharn, in a swift boat
with an armed escort, left the town, near the ruins of the old
church beside the sea, the identical spot on which he and Mitchell
had been landed in the dusk of that evening in May, and before he
knew that the world contained a being destined to become so dear
to him as Bryde Otterburn was now.
The sea was like crystal and the sky a cloudless blue ; but Dal-
quharn truly felt ' what a mockery there is in the smile of the bright
sun, when it shines on the wretched.' The sturdy boatmen bent to
their oars in silence, as if they little liked the errand, and his escort,
a corporal and three soldiers of the Third or Scots Guards, smoked
in silence too, and without the ceremony of asking his consent ;
and, as the shore they had left receded and lessened, the vast insu-
lated rock named the Bass, became more and more stupendous in
detail and proportions.
It stands in the Firth of Forth, three miles and a half distent
from North Berwick, and is about seven acres in extent. In form
it resembles the base of a sugar loaf, cut across at an angle of forty-
five degrees. A flagstaff and a large piece of cannon as a signal
gun, crowned its apex, which is a sheer cliff four hundred and
twenty feet above the water ; a strong castle, containing a series of
state prisons, frowns above the sea along the lower portion of the
steep slope.
It was the last piece of British soil that surrendered to William
of Orange, and tradition says that it was once a bluff of the main-
land ; but that some mighty throe of nature, or the wand of the
Gyrecarlin, which, (as Cromek tells us) ' like the miraculous rod of
Moses, could convert water into rocks, and sea into solid land,'
achieved the separation, so the Basa is now an island, two miles
distant from the cliffs of Tantallan.
Precipitous and sheer on all sides, the only landing-place is a
little shelf of rock overlooked by the long line of crenelated ram-
parts, where twenty-one pieces of heavy cannon faced and defended
the narrow strait. However calm the weather, a strong surf ia
11
1G2 THE WHITE COCKADE.
always boiling round the Bass, and boatmen have to cling hard to
iron rings and cramps in the rock, when parties land, lest their
craft should be staved and dashed to pieces- Steep and slippery,
the landing-place is only a species of fissure or chasm, and leads to
a plateau of naked and arid red rock, which is always covered by
dead gannets and Norwegian rabbits, in all stages of corruption and
decay ; and these, together with the rank odour of the guano, which
covers all the Isle and literally forms its soil, taint most obnoxi-
ously even the keen sea breeze.
To the left of this perilous landing-place, and guarded by a well
loopholed tower which rises sheer from the sea, are still the remains
of the iron crane used by the garrison for raising their boat to the
outer wall, where two sentinels were always posted.
Three strong gates, a portcullis, and a lofty spur, that projects
southward at a right angle from the main-line of the fortifications,
and has within it a covered gallery, loopholed on both sides for
musketry, to infalade the whole place, are its chief securities. The
castle of the Bass was never taken by storm, and defied a blockade
by sea and land for four years after the battle of Killycrankie.
The British government still retain the right (pertaining of old
to the Scottish) of fortifying the rock in time of war, and a garrison,
furnished in consequence of some old custom, by the Scots Foot
Guards, was always in its castle till after the middle of the last
century, fully more than fifty years after the permanent removal of
the regiment to London. The soldiers of this detachment received
a small addition to their daily pay, the service being literally one of
banishment.
Prisoners have frequently escaped from the Chateau d'lf, from
the Tower of London, and (thanks to the gentle ties of clanship)
more frequently still from the castle of Edinburgh ; but no state
captive ever escaped from the terrible prisons of the Bass, though
at one time, between the years 1673 and 1684, no less than fifty
gentlemen, chiefly clergymen, were incarcerated in its dungeons,
and some of these were resolute fellows, such as James Mitchell, a
Master of Arts, one of the assassins of Archbishop Sharpe, and
young Gordon, of Earlston, whose father was slain when on his way
to join the covenanters at the battle of Bothwell Bridge.
When on the island last year, we found in what had been the
soldiers' garden, many a shrub and flower, particularly the common
daffodil and pale narcissus, and many a potherb growing rank and
wild ; and their seeds having been blown about by the wind, they
flourish in all the nooks and corners of the ruined walls ; and there,
too, in a place almost inaccessible, is lying half embedded in the
guano, a great iron cannon, just where the garrison of 1694 had
hurled it over, prior to their surrender and departure to France.
This ' sea rock immense' has forty fathoms of water all round it ;
thus, its entire height, in a sheer line from the summit to its base
in ocean, averages six hundred feet. A myriad of enow-white gan-
THE \VHITE COCKADE. 163
nets and otber sea birds cover all its sides, and hold a perpetual
jubilee in tbe air around it, giving the Bass somewhat the aspect of
an enchanted island.
' The surface is almost wholly covered during the months of May
and June with nests, eggs, and young birds,' says a quaint old
English naturalist, in 1651, ' so that it is scarcely possible to walk
without treading on them ; and their noise is such, that you cannot
without difficulty hear your next neighbour's voice. If you look
down upon the sea from the top of the precipice, you will see it on
every side covered with infinite numbers of birds of different kinds,
swimming and hunting for their prey. If in sailing round the
island you survey the hanging cliff, you see in every crag and fissure
innumerable birds of various sorts and sizes, more than the stars of
heaven when viewed in a serene night. If from afar you see the
distant flocks, either flying to or from the island, you would imagine
them to be a vast swarm of bees.'
At the eastern end of the ramparts stood that edifice, which was
originally the stronghold of the Lauder family, built by the good
Sir Kobert Lauder, ' great lord of Congalton and the Bass,' as his
epitaph has it, and therein his descendant, the famous ' Maggie,' of
the old song, is said to have first seen the light.
On this tower the union jack was hoisted, and it was flapping
lazily in the wind, as the boat, tossing and heaving on the white
surge, reached the landing-place. Then the faces of the soldiers
appeared at the embrasures beside the cannon, and at the little
grated windows in the rough and massive walls, which the strong
sea breeze and the storms of many centuries have coloured a dark
and sombre brown. The little garrison were all curious to see the
state prisoner, for such an inmate was quite a rarity here, and had
been so since the revolution of 1688.
The boat hooks were inserted in the ring-bolts, which are fastened
in the rocks for that purpose ; eight sturdy rowers held her steady
and close in, while Dalquharn and his escort, the latter slinging
their muskets, scrambled on their hands and knees up to the plateau,
where, at the outer gate, stood Ensign Congleton and Lieutenant
Livingstone, of Saltcoates, a pleasant and rather gentleman-like
officer, clad in a suit of very tarnished uniform ; an old unpowdered
wig, and minus ruffles, buckles, and other finery, such not being so
requisite on the Bass Rock, as they would be if he had to appear in
Pall Mall, or mount guard, at St. James's.
As the corporal handed over his prisoner with the warrant for
his detention, until the instructions of the Scottish Secretary of
State and Lord Advocate were received, Livingston surveyed Dalqu-
harn, (who, after the events of the past night, looked pale, blanched,
and weary,) with some commiseration, and bowing low, said,
' Your servant, my Lord Dalquharn. I am sorry to have your
Lordship's society in this cheerless place, on such grave charges as
these. In treason, which is but a difference in politicg, there is no
112
161 THE WHITE COCKADE.
great disgrace in these days of ours ; but an assassination ! and as
this seems to have been a most cold-blooded one '
' Enough, Mr. Livingstone !' said Dalquharn, haughtily ; ' let it
suffice that I declare myself as innocent of one charge as of the
other. Traitor I am none, but a true and loyal man to my exiled
king and degraded country. That loyalty and truth I am ready to
seal with my blood, even as my kinsman Kenmure did, on the
Tower Hill of London !'
The iron gates jarred heavily, and the grated portcullis went
clanging down in its groves of stone, as he ascended the steep stone
stair that leads to the interior of the cashle ; and then, indeed, did
he feel himself a hopeless and u helpless prisoner.
Above the inner gate were then the royal crest and national
motto of Scotland ; but the well known line from Dante's Inferno,
might with more truth have been carved upon the lintel,
'All hope abandon, ye who enter here :'
and within those walls many a poor nonjuring clergyman, and
many a stern and gallant covenanter, have abandoned hope and life
together.
CHAPTER XXXI.
PIBST DAT OP CAPTIVITY.
'Let to-morrow take care of to-morrow :
Short and dark as our life may appear,
We may make it still darker by sorrow
Still shorter by folly and fear t
Half our troubles are half our inventions,
/ And often from blessings conferred,
Have we shrunk in the wild apprehension
Of evils that never occurred 1'
C. Swain.
TEN years previous to this, Dalquharn had been on the IB dungek,
but under very different auspices. He was then the Mai MitcheUl-
quharn, a brave and thoughtless boy, and the companio Sha^xfryde
Otterburn, then a heedless and joyous girl at home for tln^ holidays
from the bondage of prim Madam Strai ton's educational establish-
ment in the Canongate, and all the details of their boating adven-
ture, in which he saved her life by his strength and courage, came
vividly back to memory.
Dalquharn dined with Lieutenant Livingstone and Ensign Con-
galton, who occupied the best rooms in the castle, those used so
long ago as 1405, by the future James I. They had Bass-fed mut-
ton, which is always a dainty, and in honour of the visitor a
solan goose, a culinary horror he could very well have spared.
'Onions and garlick were dainties, it seems, in Egypt,' says Defoe ;
'horseflesh is so to this day in Tartar j, and much more may a solan
goose be so iu other places,"
TEE WHITE COCK1DB. 165
The little dining-hali was vaulted, and its windows afforded a
view of the estuary and coast that stretched away in distance to
Dunbar. Though the season was summer, the island castle was
damp and cool ; thus a fire of wood and coal was blazing in the
arched chimney which yet remains. The furniture was all of plain-
est and rudest description, dating from days before the Restora-
tion, some of it being taken out of English prizes, when the Laird
of Waughton was captain of the Isle. There was no lack of provi-
sions, and plenty of wine.
The hosts, though both proprietors of the small estates of Salt-
coates and Congalton, in the opposite shire of Haddington, were
deeply dipped in debt, the result of their Guards life in London ;
and they found their temporary service in the castle of the Bass, a
fortunate relief from the importunities of their creditors in Eng-
land, and a mode for recruiting their exchequer by prudence. Liv-
ingstone's family was one of very great antiquity.
In the thirteenth century, nearly all the shire of Haddington was
covered with wood. The whole line of the Peffer (which in Eng-
lish means ' the sluggish river ') from Tyningame Sands to North
Berwick, was covered by wild forest, and large oaks have frequently
been found inhumed in the moss, with their tops lying towards the
south, as if some mighty blast or flood had uprooted them, and in
the bed of the river, there have been discovered great numbers of
stag-horns.
The strath was then a vast morass, and the whole district was in-
fested by wild animals, particularly boars. One of the latter was
the terror and destruction of the district, and created as much con-
sternation as the hideous serpent or worm that was slain by the
Laird of Lairiston, or, as the famous wolf of Languedoc, did in the
last century.
A tract of land, extending all the way from Berwick-law to
Gulane Links, was offered for the head of the monster, and a knight
of courage, named Livingstone, undertook the enterprise. He armed
himself with a strong spear and a gauntlet of peculiar construction.
After a long search in the forest and morass, he roused it from its
lair, near a small stream on the north side of the Peffer, which is
still named Livingstone's Ford, and after a terrible encounter, he
slew and beheaded it. He thus acquired the estate of Saltcoates in
the parish of Dirlton. His spear and gauntlet were preserved as
heirlooms by the Livingstones, until the demise of the Lieutenant
Livingstone (to whom we have just introduced the reader) when
the family became extinct about the middle of the last century.
The knight's helmet hung, till very recently, in the family aisle of
Dirlton church, and a good painting of the conflict is said by the
statistical account to be still preserved by an old retainer of the
family.
Dalquharn was a peer, though an attainted one ; rank still goes
a long way to win favour in democratic Scotland ; but it was almost
166 THE WHITE COCKADE.
worshipped then, and a little homicide, even if he was guilty of it,
was not much of a blot on the Scottish escutcheon in those days.
Though neither of these officers were much to his taste, and his
circumstances were now perfectly desperate, he strove to keep down
the many terrible thoughts that agitated him, and to share, with
some appearance of composure and equanimity, the strong bowl of
brandy punch which Patrick Livingstone proceeded to brew, when
the servants who were Foot-Guards-men removed the cloth.
' A quaint old castle this,' said Dalquharn, looking at the grated
windows, past which the white "solan geese were revolving in noisy
flocks.
' Bah !' said Congalton, as he hung his wig on the knob of his
chair, lit a long clay pipe, and proceeded by the undoing of sundry
buttons to make himself comfortable ; ' my love of antiquity is con-
fined only to wine. Zounds ! I don't care how old the port and
canary are ; but, my lord, I am sick of this place, and begin to
wonder if the Colonel has forgotten me, and if I shall ever again
turn a card at White's, or crack a bottle of red wine at old Hick-
upp's, the vintner, beside Charing Cross.'
' As for me,' said Livingstone, ' I shall certainly quit the Guards
and the service too, and return like Cincinnatus (or who the devil
was it ?), to my paternal acres at Saltcoates.'
' If such be your mood of mind,' observed Dalquharn, with a
sickly smile, ' by permitting me to escape, you might '
' Certainly be shot for so doing,' interrupted the Lieutenant,
sharply ; ' no, no ; harkee, my Lord Dalquharn, and don't mis-
understand me. I am come of an old whig family ; my grand-
father fought against Tom Dalyell at Bullion Green and served at
Both well Brig ; so, I take my stand upon the Revolution Settle-
ment and treaty of Union.'
'D n both, with all my heart, say I,' exclaimed Congalton,
whose family had always been Tories.
' Both are pretty well violated by this time,' said Dalquharn ;
' but to change the subject, how long have you been here, gentle
men ?'
' I came hither on command a year ago,' replied the Laird of
Saltcoates, 'just at the time our first battalion embarked for ser-
vice in Flanders, under my Lord Stair.'
' And I in March last,' said Congalton, with something between
a sigh and a hickup. ' On the night of the 7th, I saw Garrick play
Othello for his benefit, at Drury Lane. He wore a full flowing
Ratnillies wig and suit of the Coldstream uniform, so, with his
blackened face, he looked the jealous Moor to the life! Next
morning saw me under weigh for the Bass Eock, on beard the
' Electress Sophia,' a Leith letter of marque, carrying eight twelve
Sunders, and we had a narrow escape from the French fleet under
. Thurot.'
Though pleasant and jovial enough in their manner, it soon be-
THE WHITE COCKADE. 167
came evident to Dalquharn that both Lieutenant Livingstone and
his Ensign were a couple of reckless roue's, alike cold-hearted and
selfish, so that from them at least, he had nothing to hope for ; and
he sighed as he came to this conclusion.
' By Jove, I hope you are not in love, to add to your troubles ?'
said the Ensign, laughing and winking to his commander.
' Why ?' asked Dalquharn, simply.
' Because every one on this rock, from Patrick Livingstone to the
drumboy, is vowed or condemned to celibacy, like its patron, St.
Baldred of old.'
' Yet, surely, I saw something like petticoats '
' Hush I shall faint at the idea ? We are all priests of Vesta
here, though rather addicted to pipe-clay and black-ball tobacco
and brandy punch.'
' I fear you are a wild dog, Congalton.'
' We certainly thought him so, at the college of St. Andrews,'
said Livingstone as he proceeded to brew another bowl of punch ;
1 1 would the holy well of St. Baldred yielded brandy," he added,
referring to the spring which flows in the upper part of the isle. ' I
remember that Congalton was twice whipped at the Buttery-hatch,
to the great joy of the students.'
1 First, for kissing the Principal's house-maid, on a fast-day '
' And rivalling me as I can remember.'
' Secondly, for repeatedly translating the barbarous Latin word
" quidditas " into classical English, as " whattity ;" but then John
Milton, he of the " Paradise Lost," underwent the same kind of
punishment in a similar place, the Buttery-hatch, I know not for
what reason, so the episode is quite classical. Gadso ! this punch
is nectar, Saltcoates, but lacks another dash of the lime.'
' And so, my lord, you saw petticoats fluttering about our rock,
did you ?' said the Lieutenant, with a waggish smUe of intelligence
to his brother officer.
' Yes at least one fardingale of very approved fashion.'
' Ah our circle of female society is necessarily narrow, on an
island of some seven acres, albeit they are Scottish in extent,' said
the Ensign, whose utterance was becoming a little thick.
' But here luckily, we are almost beyond the reach of the law,'
said Livingstone, laughing loudly.
' Law and morality are certainly dreadful bores,' observed Con-
galton, with a mock sigh j ' the first is suited only for prigs, and
the second for parsons.'
'But, surely, both are excellent things in their ways?' said
Dalquharn, whom the strange humour of these roues rather
amused.
' Perhaps, but I don't affect them, my lord ; and as for marriage,
'tis all very well if I meet witli a blooming heiress, or a well-join-
tured widow, with her arms in a lozenge, on a Spring-garden coach ;
that I may become a willing sacrifice at the altar of mammon. Yet,
1G8 THE WUITE COCKADE.
as Quivedo saya in his ' Visions,' " an unlucky hit with a wife
giveth a man as much right to take rank in the catalogue of mar-
tyrs, as if he had ended his days at the stake." '
' You live in rather a wicked world of your own conceit,' said
Dalquharn.
' Well as some writer has it, "The world will reproduce itself
in a teacup ;" why then, should it not do so on the seven acres of
the Bass Rock ?'
' And you have been living for some time past at Auldhame ?'
asked Livingstone, after a paxise.
' Yes,' replied Dalquharn, curtly, and with some reserve of
manner.
1 There is, we understand, a charmer there '
' Sir ?' exclaimed Dalquharn, hastily.
'A charming young lady, is there not ?' asked Livingstone, quietly
altering his speech on perceiving the change in his prisoner's
manner ; ' but we have seen little of her, for we lead the lives of
hermits here.'
' A couple of veritable St. Baldreds, by Jove ?' said the Ensign,
shaking his head tipsily, for the brandy punch was rapidly pro-
ducing its effects now ; ' his namesake, the old baronet, did not
approve of us, somehow ; sink me ! no so we were never invited.
Perhaps he was afraid that his grand-daughter, this charming Miss
Otterburn '
' I do not understand you, Mr. Congalton,' said Dalquharn, with
an air of unmistakable annoyance, all the greater that he received
on his own shin the warning which the more prudent Livingstone
meant for that of the Ensign.
' Every Eve, who is in her teens, is on the look out for an Adam
'tis human nature. Men have a thousand things to think of: the
woman of fashion, but one marriage, and sometimes, egad, they
think of it all the more when their chances are gone, and the grand
climacteric passed. Then there was Miss Otterburn's friend, Lady
Haddington, in her confounded old-fashioned glass coach a raw-
boned Scotchwoman, who believes that her peculiar mission in this
world is the repression of immorality, and jollity too ; she does not
approve of the two hermits of the Bass, either.'
' Thus, you were not visitors at Auldhame ?'
' No, sirik-me, I fear the venerable put there deemed us what the
Grub Street writers usually term brutal and licentious soldiery.'
Two ladies, whose figures now attracted the attention of Dal-
quharn, as he saw them descending the steep and ladderlike path-
way from the Hermitage, in the upper part of the isle, sufficiently
accounted for the hospitable house of Auldhame being closed
against those two officers of the Guards. The girls were English,
as he could detect by their voices, and were laug.'iing loudly. They
were exceedingly pretty, highly rouged and patched, and with their
tiny niob-caps and gathered skirts, had a kind of Polly Peachum
THE vrnm COCKADE. 160
air about them. Their dresses were rich, bnt excessively tawdry ;
they wore enormous hoops, and while they continued to descend
they purposely displayed to the admiring sentinels on the guu-
platform below, rather more than modesty intended, of their very
handsome and tapered limbs.
They both tapped with their fans on the windows of the dining-
hall, and peered laughingly in with bright and saucy smiles, kissing
their ungloved hands to Livingstone, to Congalton, and especially to
Lord Dalquharn.
' You will think that we lead the lives of Arcadians rather than
saints,' said Livingstone, with a smile, after he had angrily warned
the girls to begone, with something that sounded very like an oath ;
' we are quite pastoral.'
' But prefer our shepherdesses from London to those we might
find on the Lammermuirs," said the Ensign, who was now lurching
about ou his chair, and evidently would soon be under the table.
' If the bailies of North Berwick had sent us another prisoner, we
might have a quiet rubber without the ladies, over a pipe and bottle
to boot ; for I grow deadly sick of playing primero and whist with
double dummy ! '
A few minutes after this, Congalton of that ilk, was fast asleep on
a bench. Livingstone seemed to be, as he elegantly phrased it, ' a
more seasoned cask,' and though flushed, was perfectly sober ; but
then, in this mood, he was always unpleasantly full of zeal, strict
attention to duty, and fussy authority. His appearance on the
gun-battery with wig and waistcoat awry, and his features inflamed,
usually made the sentinels more alert, though environed by steep
cliffs and the deep sea, there was nothing in reality to guard ; and
all who were not on duty sedulously avoided him, for the vile old
Dutch fashion of batooning the soldiers still existed in our service,
and if Livingstone rose from table in an ill humour, some poor
private's shoulders were sure to smart for it.
' I must show you the quarters prepared for yon, my Lord,' said
ho, after they had imbibed a cup of coffee, dashed with & petit verre
of brandy. ' You are to have the Blackadder vault, which has no
less than three windows. They are not very large, certainly ; but
through the bars you will be able to see all the coast of Haddiug-
tonshire, and,' he added with a keen smile, ' even your late resi-
dence, the house of Auldhame.'
As he followed Livingstone towards the western end of the castle,
he saw fully how complete and complicated, by art and nature
combined, were the means of detention and security on that steep
island prison ; that, indeed, it was a vast lock, that barred him in
from aU the outer world.
From the Bass there was no escape save by death alone !
Under the full conviction of this Dalquharu's spirit might have
sunk, but for a lofty sense of his own conscious rectitude, and a keen
one of the foul injustice done him. To these were added the fiery
170 THE WHITE COCKADE.
sentiments of wounded honour, and of devoted loyalty to that hand-
some prince, whose parting smile was still before him, whose gra-
cious farewell yet lingered in his ear, and whose coming and whose
conquest alone could save him now !
And with all this, as he was neither a saint nor a fool, there was
in his mind a considerable longing for just and honest retribution
to bear him up, though ' the desire of revenge for its own sake is
dying away, along with the other heroic virtues ;' and he bore up
bravely, but a heavy sigh, almost a groan, escaped him when left
by Steinie Lockyett, the warder of the garrison, to his own reflec-
tions in the Blackadder vault.
CHAPTER XXXII.
BBYDE'S SOBBOW AGAIN.
1 Onward, then onward, by river and sea/
Wayworn and weary, though oft I may be,
O'er desert by fountain, 'mid dark scenes and gay,
The Pilgrim of Life may not halt on his way :
And well do I know, where'er I may be,
My bright angel guardian keeps watch over me.' Thistledown.
HEAVEN knows with what pure, true, and brotherly tenderness, Sir
John Mitchell (who, in his anxiety concerning his friend's absence,
had also come forth early in the morning), raised the fainting
Bryde Otterburn, chafed her clenched hands, and kissed her cold,
pale cheek, when he found her in the garden walk, prone on her
face, crushed and overwhelmed by the taunts and the tidings of
the venomous Keuben Balcraftie, for his love for Bryde was all the
more deep and tender, that it was completely hidden ; but that love
was the great master secret of his soul.
The intelligence which he gathered from her, amid tears and
sobs, he was almost inclined to disbelieve ; but, ere long, the ser-
vants of the household and the labourers at the home-farm, were
all cognisant of the fray on the beach and in the vault of Tantallan,
together with the capture of the famous Black Lugger, in all their
details, with all the various exaggerations peculiar to the taste of
the commonalty; and the intense distress of Bryde was only
equalled by the honest sorrow and commiseration of Mitchell for
the fate of Dalquharn, with whom, he had no doubt, the measures
of the government and the legal authorities, their paid hirelings in
Scotland, would be sharp and decisive !
But with the stolidity peculiar to age, and more especially to one,
whose earlier years were spent in stirring and dangerous times, Sir
Baldred heard, the news with singular equanimity.
'Shot the English gauger, did he humph!' he muttered ; ' well,
THE WHITE COCKADB. 171
there is one of that brood less in the world ; and I suppose he did
it in self-defence.'
1 But he denies having done so, dearest grandfather ; do you not
hear them all say that he denies it, and accuses a smuggler of the
act ?' exclaimed Bryde, as she clung to his neck ; ' but whatever
was the motive, or whoever the conimitter of the crime, he is now
under ward in the prisons of the Bass, and unless he escape, is a
lost man a lost man, dearest grandfather ; for good Sir John
Mitchell says, that the Marquis of Tweedale will lose no time in
having him transmitted by sea to Berwick, or under an escort of
horse, to the Castle of Carlisle.'
'Escape from the Bass, lassie, and who ever did so, unless in the
shape of a kittiwake ?' said Sir Baldred, while Bryde wrung her
white hands, and mournfully surveyed Dalquharn's betrothal ring,
while she prayed in her heart that he might be detained there until
the landing of Prince Charles turned all things in Scotland topsy-
turvy.
To add to her distress, she was now deprived of another friend
and counsellor, for the arrest of Dalquharn, and the consequent
public discovery of his rank, name and purpose, together with those
of his companion, rendered the residence of the latter at Auldhame
no longer safe. Ere noon, he was compelled to bid Bryde and Sir
Baldred a hasty adieu. He took horse, by his host's desire, select-
ing one of the best in the stables (for future service), and giving
out that he was going to the English borders, turned aside from the
highway, near Whitekirk, and rode straight for the Castle of Cal-
lender, in the Torwood, nearly fifty miles distant, the seat of the
Earl of Kilmarnock, a peer whose loyalty to the House of Stuart
was yet to cost him dear ; and there he remained in safety and
concealment, endeavouring, secretly, to aid his friend through the
influence of the Earl with the Marquis of Tweedale, and it is sup-
posed that, to secret favour, the detention of Dalquharn on the
Bass, instead of his immediate transmission, perhaps to the Tower
of London, a lawless measure which the crown officers frequently
condoned, is due.
The terms offered by Bryde to Balcraftic, viz.: the release of the
wadsets over the Auldhame property, and his voluntary exile from
Scotland, were, of course, not accepted now, as he felt, that though
the intercepted correspondence, which he hoped to turn to such
profit and honour, had gone out of his hands, and was doubtless
destroyed, that fortune had changed in his favour, and that while
Lord Dalquharn was in his power, he yet held a trump card.
Inspired by the hope of freeing her lover, true to her threats
against Balcraftie, and urged by that spirit of revenge, which Lord
Byron has told us, " is sweet, especially to women," Bryde, in a long
and carefully devised letter, written in her pretty Italian hand, ad-
dressed the Lord Advocate, concerning the assassination of Mr.
Egerton, and more especially of her father, and she forwarded to
172 THE WHITE COCKADE.
him the pocket-hook, which was spotted with his Wood, honestly
telling his lordship how it came into her possession. Thrice she
wrote to that official, by the hands of trusty and mounted messen-
gers ; but a Lord Advocate is always the slave of his party, and the
affair made no progress. Perhaps some incoherent scrawls by poor
old Sir Baldred, whose shaky handwriting 'resembled the dying
autograph of a spider that has just escaped from the inkpot,' made
matters worse : he was neither particular in his phraseology, or in
the care of concealing his wild and fiery political sentiments, as he
considered all the authorities in Scotland to be but the paid hire-
lings and truculent tools of an English ministry, and, indeed, he
was, perhaps, not far wrong.
Balcraftie was certainly questioned on the subject ; but denied
all knowledge of the affairs referred to, or that the pocket-book had
ever been in his possession denied it solemnly with upturned eyes
and nasal accents, ' as he beh'eved himself to be a pardoned sinner.'
The Bailie was too firmly fixed in the good opinion of all, as a pious,
upright and worthy (better than all, a wealthy) member of society,
and of a great Christian community, to have his fair fame sullied by
any accusations emanating from the Otterburns of Auldhame, and
he threatened an action for damages, which he took particular good
care should be a threat only, as lawyers frequently elicit unpleasant
facts. He had been through life, as he modestly said, ' a terror to
evil doers, but a praise and a record to those that did well.' The
cavalier principles of Sir Baldred, his well-known laxity on most
matters appertaining to kirks, presbyteries and synods ; his unde-
niable leanings ' to the abomination o' prelacy ;' the residence of
Lord Dalquharn and Sir John Mitchell, attainted and outlawed
rebels, at Auldhame, and the yet unaccounted for disappearance of
Lieutenant Egerton of Howard's Foot, made the authorities cold in
pressing the strong charges preferred against Balcraftie (who was
considered a whig martyr to kirk and king) and suspicious of those
whom they deemed the inventors thereof so suspicious, that the
crown officers at one time, thought of laying up Sir Baldred in the
Castle of Edinburgh, for a term, in mere distrust.
So for a time did these cloudy matters rest.
The delay was fraught with sorrow, irritation and intense anxiety
to Bryde, as she knew not the day or the hour, when tidings might
arrive that Dalquharn had been removed from his islet-prison by
sea or land to England ; and even if he managed to clear himself of
all share in the death of Gage, he would still have the pretended
crime of treason to answer for, and the fate of his kinsman, Viscount
Kenmure, the gallant Derwentwater and others, was fresh in the
memory of all their party.
Old Dorriel Grahame tormented her too ; she was perpetually
seeing shrouds appended to the candles, or coffins jumping out of
the fire ; and she was always hearing in her ears, the sound of the
dead-bells, as that aural tinkling is named by the Scottish peasantry,
THE WHITE COCKADE. 173
who regard it as the secret warning the sure forerunner of a dear
friend's death.
A fortnight of this prolonged anxiety rendered Bryde thin, pale,
and sad-looking. Her grandfather dozed away the days moodily
now, for the old house, where all lived in expectation of something,
they knew not what, was silent and lonely ; he only warmed up
after his bowl of punch or tankard of mulled port after dinner ;
then he and his old butler, John Birniebousle, wove all manner of
strange plans for attacking the castle on the Bass, and rescuing the
prisoner for having a raid on North Berwick, and hanging Bal-
craftie like a thievish cat, on the risp of his own door plans which,
though feasible- enough in the days of the Eevolution, the brave
and lawless old Scottish times of ' rugging and riving,' were some-
what too wild for adoption, since the accession of the House of
Hanover.
Bryde's once happy and joyous nature was completely changed ;
her spirit sunk ; so her kind friend, the old Countess of Hadding-
ton, whose advice and assistance she frequently asked, arrived one
day in her great glass coach, with all its carving and gilding ; its
pages and out-riders, and her Master of the Horse, Sir John
Hamilton, of Trabrown, armed with sword and pistols, galloping in
front ; and leaving old Sir Baldred to the sure care of his faithful and
ancient household, she bore the pretty sufferer away with her, across
the Lammermuirs, to spend a few weeks at the fashionable Spa of
Dunse, which, though now entirely forgotten and neglected, was
then in high repute among the Scottish noblesse, some of whom
had summer lodgings near the bowling-green of that quaint old
border town in 1633, the Campus Martins of the Covenanters.
CHAPTER XXXIII.
SEVENTEEN HTNDBED AND POETY-FIVE.
'Oar thistles flourished fresh and fair,
And bonnie bloomed our roses,
But the whigs came like a frost in June,
And withered a' our posies. ,
' Our Scottish crowd's fa'n in the dust,
Deil blind them with the stour o't ;
And write their names in Hell's black book,
Wha gaed to whigs the power o't I' Jacobite Sony,
THE Scotland of the days of our story would seem almost a foreign
country, when contrasted with the rich, populous, and thriving
Scotland, which yearly welcomes Queen Victoria to her Higliland
home beside the Dee ; and while we leave Dalquharn to brood over
his mishaps on the Bass Eock, and pretty Bryde Otterburn to drink
the waters of the Dunse Spa, a little glance at the state of the
17 i THE WHITE COCKADE.
country may serve to explain or illustrate many points of our nar-
rative to the reader.
Time seemed to stand still in Scotland then ; twenty, thirty, or
forty years made little difference in habits, dress, or customs in
manners or ideas.
London was seven days' journey distant, and foot-pads, pit-falls,
floods, fords, lack of bridges and wretched roads, rendered travelling
arduous and perilous work. The great Duke of Argyle and Green-
wich, when posting north to take command of the troops against
the Earl of Mar, in 1715, was six days and six nights on the way ;
and so small was the intercourse between the two kingdoms, that in
the year of our story, the mail-bag is known to have come from
London with only one letter in it, and that was addressed to the
British Linen Company. In those days there were only eight
officials in the General Post Office at Edinburgh, and it was not
until 1750, that letters were conveyed from stage to stage by regular
relays of fresh horses and post-boys, the greater portion being borne
by the foot-runners, and the cadgers and carriers, in spite of the
laws against them, were secretly entrusted with more letters than
His Majesty's Post Office.
Incessant rumours of French descents upon the coast were then
current, and such continued to startle and harass the people until
1803. The county of the clans was a terra incognito even to Low-
landers, and an English tourist would as soon have thought of ex-
ploring the crater of Vesuvius as venturing through the Highland
passes, for black-mail was still levied, and cattle freely lifted along
the Highland border. Witches and warlocks were still a legitimate
source of hatred and terror, though the iron branks and the piles
of tar barrels were no longer resorted to by the Lords of Justi-
ciary.
The slaughter of Glencoe and the foul treachery at Darien
rankled bitterly in the hearts of our people, and men of all factions
never ceased to inveigh against what they elaborately designated
'the land-ruining, God-provoking, soul-destroying, posterity-en-
snaring, and enslaving union with England.'*
By that event the east coast of Scotland was totally ruined ; many
royal burghs passed completely away, and great depopulation ensueil
along the Borders. This was consequent to the new facilities af-
forded for emigration ; but the stout and warlike burghers of Jed-
burgh pointed with sorrow and rage to the ruins of forty great malt-
barns, which had been full and teeming in 1706, and they muttered
and thought of the days of old, when axes and spears were lifted i
the shout of ' Jetharts here !'
The rumour currently believed in, that the crown and other re-
galia had been stolen to England and destroyed, long added to the
rancorous feelings of the nation ; nor was it fully known until the
* Domestic Annals,
THE WHITE COCKADE. 175
accession of George IV., that those old honours, in defence of which,
from first to last, perhaps a million of Scottish men laid down their
lives in battle, had been lying neglected, but not forgotten, and safe
in the old black chest of James III., in the vaulted crown room of
Edinburgh Castle.
After 1684, when the Duke of Albany and York (to give him
his Scottish title) left Edinburgh with his family, Catholic though
he was, the city sorrowed for him. ' In six years more he was lost
both to her and to Britain, and " a stranger filled the Stuart's
throne" a stranger under whose dynasty poor Scotland pined long
in undeserved reprobation.'
He left, however, religious rancour in full vigour behind him, and
for years no human virtue was recognised, but a sour pharisaical
observance of * the Sabbath,' and the shadow of that spirit lingers
yet in the land.
The great fire which took place in Edinburgh on a Sunday in
1701, was duly announced from the pulpit to be 'a fearful rebuke
of God, as Sabbath breaking so much abounded ;' the Bank of
Scotland was burned, there was no insurance office to repay the
damage done, and when the dearth that followed in the harvest
caused many poor persons to die, it was again alleged that certain
men had once more provoked God by their wickedness and lavish
prodigality ; so there are some points in which, under Her Majesty
Queen Victoria's loving sway, Scotland stands exactly where she did
under William of Orange.
Girt by walls and battled ports, her capital was the same quaint
old city of the middle ages, ' piled deep and massy, close and high,'
unchanged in all its features, since it had seen the little King James
II. escaping on a sumpter horse, packed among his mother's clothes ;
James IV. ride forth with his chivalry to Flodden-field ; Earnley's
shattered corpse borne through the gate of the Dominicans ; and
poor Mary wringing her hands, with dishevelled hair, at the window
of the Black Turnpike. It was unchanged, we say, in its features,
but the union had absorbed the nobles, the grass was growing in
the palace yard and round the market-cross, and sour and gloomy
grew the isolated people.
Except the circulating library kept by Allan Ramsay at the sign
of the Ben Jonson's Head, in the Luckenbooths, there was, we
believe, none in Scotland ; and save when some strollers occasion-
ally performed in the Tailor's Hall, in the Cowgate of Edinburgh,
in all the kindom, from sea to sea, there was not a single theatre or
other place of amusement ; so in the year 1745, the Land of Cakes
could not have been a very lively place of residence. The theatre,
opened by the adventurous author of ' The Gentle Shepherd ' in
1736, was rather roughly shut up by those wise and pious Solon?,
the magistrates of the city. It had been the Signora Violanta's
theatre, at the foot of Carubbers Close, a place since occupied as a
meeting-house by successive tribes of sectaries. The Carfufflea and
176 THE WHITE COCKADE.
Balcrafties of the Presbytery of Edinburgh represented the ' play-
house as the actual temple of the Devil, where he frequently ap-
peared clothed in corporeal substance, and possessed the spectators
whom he held as his worshippers." So the house was closed ; but
in the same year the citizens were regaled by a long procession of
courtesans, having the town drums beaten before them.*
The same spirit of intolerance predominated in Glasgow, where a
theatre erected in 1752, was demolished two years after by a mob
who had heard Whitfield, the Englishman, preach against it.
The clergy never ceased to revile theatricals ; yet the reverend
deputation of the G-eneral Assembly of the Kirk, which went to
London to pay their respects to George I. in 1714, took especial
good care, en route, to see ' Love for Love,' acted at Kendal.
Yet the habits of the people were very simple in the memorable
year of our story. In the pleasant memoirs of Carlyle, the good
old minister of Inveresk, we are told that ' the second tavern in
Haddington, where the Presbytery dined, had knives and forks on
the table ; but ten or twelve years before that time, my father used
to carry a shagreen case, with a knife, fork, and spoon, as, perhaps,
they do still in many parts of the continent.'
Blue bonnets were, of course, worn in lieu of the hideous modern
hat, plaids in lieu of cloaks, and by women of the humbler class at
church and market. Then, as now, mere tradesmen were styled
merchants, to the surprise of Englishmen ; all food was dressed in
the French fashion, and served up by bareheaded and barefooted '
damsels. The cathedrals and abbey churches were in ruins, and God
was worshipped in hideous parochial barns. Yet, strange as it may
seem, there were then Turkish baths, or hummums, at Edinburgh,
a railroad, two miles long, at Port Seton, a penny post, and similar
novelties, which even England knew not, twenty years before the
period we write of.
Literature in the north, like literature in the south, was then
made a truckling slave to peers and patrons of i-ank and wealth, and
scarcely a book ever came forth without some fulsome dedication,
like that which is prefixed to ' Hawthornden's History of the Five
Jameses,' ' Unto the Right Honourable, my very good Lord and
chief, the Earl of Perth,' &c., &c.
The barbarous severities practised after 1715 ; the incessant sneers
and pasquils of Grub Street writers ; the studied policy of English
statesmen to obliterate Scottish nationality ; the cold neglect of the
legislature ; the abuses at home ; the lack of influence in the im-
perial parliament, where, if a Scotsman ventured to speak, his very
accent was greeted with derision ; the total destruction of the east
coast trade, while the west was yet undeveloped ; the restoration of
lay patronage in the church ; local wants ignored ; grants never
given, while taxation was extorted to the uttermost, all led many to
* ' Mercury/ 10th July, 1736.
1'HB WHITE COCKADE. 177
wish a repeal of the union, which would have made matters infinitely
worse, as, from their sectarian views, Scotsmen now could never
govern Scotland. These were all solid grievances, but the most
bitter were the sentimental ones ; and, in the minds of the Scottish
cavaliers, the grand panacea for all things was the restoration of the
House of Stuart, and the expulsion of the Elector of Hanover.
Amid all the popular bigotry of the country in favour of that
personage, it is indeed remarkable that Scotland has NEVEB pro-
duced even ONE song in defence of his rights, or in praise of their
sanguinary upholder, the Duke of Cumberland. In the cause of the
House of Stuart, the whole land burst forth into song and ballad-
sad, or fiercely sarcastic ; and in its ranks have all our poets of the
least note ranged themselves, from the days of James VII. down to
those of Burns, Thomas Campbell, and Edmonston Aytoune. ' With
the Revolution,' says Cromek, ' commences the era of Jacobite song.
The romantic spirit of warrior adventure had begun to leave the
Scotch. It hovered round them like a decaying flame, after the
quenching of those deadly feuds which feasted on the richest blood
of the sister kingdom.'
Scotland, though always possessing more of the sturdy, industrial,
and self-supporting classes, than any country in the world (percent,
of her population), has often been taunted with her poverty; yet
there was more specie to be found in it in the year 1707,* than in
1772, after sixty-five years of political copartnery 5 for Scotland had
to sink, ere she could rise again.
And now, quitting this somewhat dry sketch of the state of
Scotland at the time of our story, we shall return to Lord Dalquharn
in his loneliness.
CHAPTER XXXIV.
GLOOM.
'The earth was BO quiet and the heaven was'so still,
That I heard ilka sound on the wood and'the hill ;
The hameless burds sang with ane doleful moan,
That the deep-wood boweris o' summer were gone ;
And I thought on myself and I mixed with ane sigh,
The mournful murmur of echo's reply ;
But I grat when I thought on the lonely tree,
That flung its last leaf on the wateris free
For I thought 'twas likest my true love and me.'
The Songe of Contlancte.
THE Blackadder vault was a bleak and desolate chamber, the bare
stone walls of which were without wainscoting or even plaster, and
were blackened by smoke from the securely grated fire-place, and
discoloured by the damp sea breeze that whistled through the
equally well-grated windows. Of the latter there were three au
* Diplomats et Xutnlsmatica Scotia.
178 THE WHITE COCKADE.
unusual luxury in the prisons of the Bass very small, however,
and made safe by crossed bars of iron, basket-formed, built into the
massive walls, and coeval with the castle itself.
Sheer down some seventy or eighty feet below, the sea was foam-
ing on the rocks.
An oak bedstead, a stool or two, a little oval mirror, with an old
chest or arnbre, were all the furniture, to which some English prize
of the days of the Commonwealth some unwai-y ship that had
ventured within range of cannon shot had evidently furnished its
quota. A black jack full of water, a hand bell to ring when he re-
quired attendance, and an iron cruise of antique form, filled with
the fetid oil of the solan goose, amid which, a wick that gave a
sickly light, was sputtering, were placed upon the little tripod table
by Steinie Lockyett, the warder, who then withdrew, after a re-
spectful reverence, for he could not forget that Dalquharn was a
lord, and was so far paroled, that he had the whole castle and the
rock itself, to ramble about, whenever he felt disposed to do so.
But another sentinel was now posted at the inner gate, as Living-
stone was resolved to watch well his only prisoner ; and the men
on guard, who had mounted hitherto, with the swords only, then
worn by all private soldiers, now paraded with bayonets fixed, and
muskets loaded.
On the walls he could trace sentences scratched by the hand of
some poor martyr of the oppressed kirk and broken covenant.
' Death is but the period of your life, as the first moment of your
birth is the beginning of your death. Remember the glorious sab-
bath day of Drumclog, and the discomfiture of the godless. lie-
member the 1st of June, 1679.'
Elsewhere was written in a bolder hand
' Dost thou know the value of a day, or even of a minute ?'
' Too well,' thought the poor prisoner, and keenly he felt in his
heart, how English aggression from without, and the foi tlielis-
government of Lauderdale at home, had driven a noble p<a, aiv'to
madness, and to that which never failed their fathers in thtr'end
the sword!
In that same vault, after a long, weary, and unmerited captivity,
for his resistance of episcopacy, and after enduring great bodily
suffering, and all the misery of ' hope deferred,' the Reverend
John Blackadder, minister of Troqueer, died in his seventieth year,
in the cold, bleak winter of 1685, and amid the tears of many sur-
viving sufferers. His poor corpse was lowered by the iron crane
from the gun battery, into a boat, for conveyance to North Berwick
churchyard, where his grave may yet be seen.
And in fancy as the evening darkened, Dalquharn pictured to
himself, that gentle and worthy upholder of religious freedom,
sitting with his infant son upon his knee he, who in future years,
was to lead our Cameronian regiment to many a glorious charge at
Blenheim and at Ramillies teaching him to be a steadfast man,
and true to his country, and never to forget the fifty years war of
the covenant and then came in fancy, too, the hist solemn scene of
all, the aged minister's death, on that quaint old bedstead, with all
his children kneeling round him.
Then Dalquharn shuddered, either by the force of his own ideas,
or because the place was chill and cheerless.
' The Bass,' wrote Blackadder's son, ' was a base, cold, and un-
wholesome prison, all the rooms being ordinarily full of smoke, like
to suffocate and choke us, so that my father and other prisoners
were necessitated many a time to thrust head and shoulders out
of the window to recover breath. They were obliged to drink tho
twopenny ale of the governor's brewing, scarcely worth a halfpenny
the pint, and several times were sorely in want of victuals, for ten
or twelve days together, the boats not daring to venture to them by
reason of the stormy weather.'
The light in the iron cruise sank lower, and the discolorued
patches on the wall seemed to assume stranger forms. At hist the
flame died out, and he was left in total darkness, for even the bright
starlight scarcely found way through the small grated apertures.
He threw himself on his bed, full of gloomy, fierce, and terrible
thoughts.
Past the window gratings, the sea breeze moaned with something
of the JEolian sound we hear in the wires of the telegraph, and iii
his ears it mingled dreamily with the chafing of the sea far down
below.
Like the spirit of the Geni, who was bottled up in a flask under
the seal of Solomon, till netted by the fisherman in the Arabian
Nights, Dalquharn in heart, grew every moment more savage and
gloomy, under an imprisonment so secure, obloquy so false, and
wrongs so foul !
If not removed to England, he had no hope now but to wait the
landing of the prince, and to pray that his career would be a rapid
and a victorious one. But the prince might never land ; storms
and destiny had often ere then, proved hostile to the plans of that
fated royal family ; and if he actually did land, his attempt might
end only in defeat to himself, and destruction to all his followers.
If his march proved one of victory, oh, what agony to Dalquharn,
to be secluded on that island Bock, while all his friends were play-
ing the great historical game of a second Restoration ; but if they
failed, what would be left him, save black despair and a horrible
death!
Dalquharn knew that he was as innocent of rebellion as of the
death of Gage ; but what would that innocence avail him, as the
party in power were then constituted ?
The doom accorded to a traitor was hanging over him ; death,
certainly, but not a death of shame and the hour of his martyrdom
might be very close, indeed ! To-morrow, he might hear a gun
122
180 THE WHITE COCKADE.
from a king's ship, and see her lying off the Bass with shortened
sail, and with an order to receive him on board.
Seated on the knee of his tender and gentle mother, in their once
happy home, far away in pastoral G-alloway, where the black waters
of the Dee roll down through heathy hills ; and afterwards, in the
years of their humble exile in other lands, he had heard her tell,
again and again, while her dark eyes kindled, and her proud lip
quivered with sorrow and indignation, how their kinsman, the dash-
ing Viscount of Kenmure, and the Earl of Derwentwater botli
alike gallant and resolute, gentle and true had died on the scaffold
for their exiled king ; and the oft repeated story filled his boyish
heart with a loathing of then- cold-blooded destroyers, and with
something of dismay too. And now the time had come, when the
same dark fate seemed awaiting him.
London's assembled thousands, hushed in silence and in pity ;
the slow march of the Horse Grenadiers, with their black horses
and sugar-loaf caps ; the Beefeaters, in their quaint costume, with
partisan and sword ; the tolling of the muffled bells ; Tower Hill
with all its past and present terrors ; the scaffold with its sanded
floor ; the bare-armed executioner with axe and knife, all came be-
fore him in fancy now, with the grave's black gulf beyond.
To the unthinking and the stolid, such a fate was horrible ; to be
decapitated and mangled to have head cut off, and heart torn out,
that both might be exposed reeking to the gaping rabble of London,
as the head and heart of a traitor he a Scottish peer, a Douglas,
loyal a la morte, to his king through twenty generations of landed
and noble men yea, loyal as he was to that sweet Bryde, he never
more might see he a traitor, who upheld that right divine, which
God had said was the right of the first-born ?
He, full of youth and strength, of vitality, and high hope at times,
was he quietly to endure all this, and through the success*"! wiles
and machinations of a triumphant human serpent like B? ^ 01 t' 1 ^ ?
To be thrust into a common coffin, and buried, not where' P'/ 1 ) ar ng
line of his proud ancestors lay, in the old fane of St. CiiDb'ert, by
the Dee ; not by the side of his beloved mother in the land of her
exile ; but thrust, perhaps, into a hole in the Tower ditch, beside
the fetid and muddy Thames !
A transport of rage seized him ; he sprang from his pallet ; threw
open one of the little windows and let the cool breeze of the mid-
night sea, play upon his flushed face. In his impotent wrath, he
clutched, wrenched and swung on the rusty bars ; each was thick
as his wrist, and immovable as the foundations of the Bass, in the
ocean, hundreds of feet below.
Then, often, after a sleepless and restless night, such as this, the
morning dawned the bright early summer morning, and, as it
streamed through his prison bars, revealing everything with pro-
voking distinctness, it would find him still nervously awake and
brooding on his wrongs.
THE WHITE COCKADE. 181
Broad, red and glorious, each morning, the summer sun came
upward from the eastern sea ; afar off the long stretch of rocky coast
that joined the fertile Merse, and the curving lines of the Lammer-
muirs were steeped in ruddy light ; and then North Berwick's won-
drous cone seemed a pyramid of flame, while the rugged cliffs and
Tantallan, and all its shattered towers, wore the same glowing tints.
Close at hand were the ever restless seabirds rerolving with their
incessant cry of ' kittiwake ' from which they take their name.
There are few who have not proved or felt when there has been a
great grief or violent wrench of the heart, the slow but sure erasure
of the past existence from the mind ; and that it seems to fade, or
become confused and dim, until the present appears the only one we
seem to have known.
Thus there were times when Dalquharn, as the monotonous days
rolled on, marvelled in his soul if Bryde Otterburn, with her clear
brown eyes and rich brown hair, her bright complexion and ringing
laugh, really existed, and for him ! Their past life, their vows and
love seemed almost doubtful now, and their memory hovered vaguely
in his mind at times, like the recollection of dreams he once had in
sleep ; then it seemed as if the long, narrow and lofty castle of the
Bass, with its towers and gun battery, its rusty iron gratings, and
gloomy dungeons perched on that sea-beat pyramid of rock, formed
the only place he had ever known ; and that those weather-worn
sentinels, in the long blue great-coats and conical Prussian caps,
were the only persons he had ever seen.
Yet, through a telescope lent to him occasionally by Lieutenant
Livingstone, he could see Auldhame with its steep turrets and broad
square chimney rising above its old green woods, and the grey smoko
ascending from the great fire-place of its ancient kitchen. He could
see the windows of Bryde's room, too, and every morning as the sun
rose, their panes were the first that reflected his beams.
Two miles distant, Dalquharn could see plainly the ravine where
the skirmish took place, and the tower of Tantallan, above the vault
where poor Jack Gage had perished by the pistol of the little
mulatto wasp Leroux.
Elsewhere he could see the quaint gable-ended little town of
North Berwick, and occasionally a crowd upon the East Links,
where no doubt the sainted Balcraftie would be preaching in repro-
bation of sin and the backslidings of the times ; and then he would
turn again to the windows of that little turret chamber, in the quaint
old home of the Otterburns windows from which he fondly hoped
a pair of sad and loving eyes were often turned to the isle of hia
captivity.
At night he could see the lights that twinkled there, and thus, to
watch the house was his sole comfort. One night, and for many
more, all the house was sunk in darkness. Why was this ?
Then a terror chilled his heart, lest some misfortune, he knew not
what, had happened !
1S2 THE WHITE COCKADE.
Some writers have said, that there is a mysterious affinity between
the souls of parted lovers, which will not permit one to be ignorant
of anything serious, that may happen to the other.
Be that as it may, Bryde and Dalquharn could only suppose, but
never actually know the misery they both suffered at this wretched
time, with all its complicated private and political accessories,
to enhance alike their mutual fear and sorrow, and their doubt and
terror of the future !
CHAPTER XXXV.
HOPE DEFERRED.
' All my love, my passion-
All myself I give,
True to ancient fashion,
Loving while I live.
'Claiming nought from Alice,
Knowing love is vain :
Wine poured from a chalice
Flows not back again.
' True love is a treasure,
Sacred and divine,
Without stint or measure,
Cast upon a shrine.'
THE resolution of attempting an escape was ever present to the
mind of Dalquharn ; but there was no avenue from the Bass, save
by the three gates and iron portcullis, which were never opened ex-
cept when provisions arrived. Over the walls, or over the rocks,
escape was impossible owing to their vast height and the fearful
depth of the usually restless sea below.
There was the boat at the crane, belonging to this almost un-
approachable rock, which, as the memoirs of the Eeverend John
Blackadder state, a small garrison might hold against ' millions of
men, and is only expugnable by Hunger.' With ulterior views,
Dalquharn had frequently examined this crane, which was an engine
with a wheel and running cable, by which the great eight-oared boat
of the garrison, was hoisted up and lowered down. Its remains are
now at a brink of the rock, the lowest part of which is sixty feet
above high water mark. The slightest surf rendered its use impos-
sible, and whenever the east wind prevailed, the turmoil of the waves
was grandly sublime, as they leaped against the impending rocks,
throwing their snowy spray a hundred feet in height ; and, as they
recoiled, leaving cataracts of foam, pouring downward, through the
rugged grooves, and sweeping away scores of the beautiful white
solan geese from their nests and the ledges on the cliffs.
Even if he could have mastered the two sentinels who were sta-
tioned with loaded muskets near the crane, unaided he could neither
have lowered the heavy boat, or reached it below when afloat.
THE WHITE COCKADE. 1$3
Two soldiers had been sent to Auldhame for Dalquharu's cloak-
bag, and from them he learned that Miss Otterburn was at the Spa
of Dunse. Old Dame Dorriel sent them back laden with wine
and various other good things for the comfort of her imprisoned
favourite ; but ho never received them, all being probably confis-
cated by the needy and reckless fellows in command of the Eock.
The narrow paved gun-platform, the double line of prisons and
barracks on each side of the steep and narrow stair that led to the
portcullis, he always avoided, when he could do so, and preferred to
ramble about the upper part of the rock, where the quaint little
Hermitage and chapel of St. Baldred then used as a powder maga-
zine stand; or at the soldier's garden, which lies in a kind of
valley, sheltered from the north and east wind by high and rough
walls, built without lime or clay : and there a few stunted cherry
trees put forth their meagre leaves, and some potherbs grew amid
the rank guano of the isle.
Higher up still, he would seek the apex of the rock, where a signal
gun and flagstaff stood. Both were used of old for the purpose of
signalling, if hostile ships were in sight, or for alarming the shore if
a prisoner escaped, a circumstance of which no record remained on,
the Bass Eock. Here flows a spring of water, holy by some accounts,
but haunted by others, for
'About this spring, (if ancient fame say true),
The dapper elves their midnight sports pursue ;
Their pigmy king and little fairy queen,
In circling dances gambolled on the green,
While tuneful sprights a merry concert made.
And airy music warbled through the shade.'
From this vast height he could almost look down into the corn
fields of Haddingtonshire, and the green woods, and brown, rough-
looking old burgh-towns of busy Fife. Grey Edinburgh, with its
giant castle, Arthur's verdant cone, and the bare round knob of the
Calton, seemed close at hand, and the white cliffs of the Isle of May
to be but a league distant.
He watched the flight of the sea-birds that swarmed in myriads
round his prison-rock, whitening all its vast cliffs by their numbers.
He saw them spread their snowy pinions, and after soaring upward,
or swooping down in search of fish, anon sweep across the two
miles of dark-green water that lay between Tantallan and the Bass ;
and he sighed that he had not the power to follow them.
He could see the fisher-boats, with their sharp prows and brown
lug sails, that shot past early in the morning or late at eve, beating
against the east wind, or scudding before the west, through tho
narrow strait that divided him from Bryde Otterburn and from
liberty. His eye followed their white wake through the deep green
water with a longing and haggard glance ; and there were times
when some of those tiny craft came close to the cliffs so close that
they seemed to skim past almost beneath his feet ; and then he felt
184 THE WHITE COCKADE.
half-tempted to leap into the sea and risk being picked up ; but
next moment he shrunk aghast from the idea ; for after whizzing
so far down through the air, he would be breathless before he cleft
the surface of that awful profundity of water.
The sound of the drum, thrice daily, at morning, at evening, and
for dinner, echoing into the empty prisons and vaulted dungeons,
seemed alone to break the solitude, after his ear had become insen-
sible to the sound of the waves, and the incessant cry of ' kittiwake'
from the sea-birds : even the soldiers became grave and taciturn,
and their voices were heard but seldom.
Such as they were, he had ' the entire run' of the seven acres of
which this celebrated rock consists, and for which the present Laird
of North Berwick pays annually of feu to Her Majesty the Queen,
the sum of one penny Scots, with a yearly kain or tribute of seven
solan geese to the minister of the parish on the mainland.
In the mists of November, the cold thick mists that come sweep-
ing over the German Sea, and amid the storms of winter, he thought
with a shudder how horrible must be those prisons of the Bass ;
but long ere winter came, he knew that his fate would be decided.
The summer was a lovely one, and day succeeded day of cloud-
less sunshine. But if he was to be confined there, and to go from
thence only to appear as a prisoner before the High Court of Jus-
ticiary at Edinburgh, or if his claim of peerage was allowed
before the House of Lords at London, what was it to him that now
the sun shone so brightly, that the waves rolled in light around his
prison, that summer was in all her glory in the fertile Lothians,
and that the soft and pleasant days of autumn were at hand ?
With him and Bryde all was winter and desolation. His soul
was with her ; his heart was with his exiled king ; and thus it was
but a human automaton that wandered about the bare summit of
that prison isle. So the monotonous days slipped slowly, wearily,
and inexorably away.
In a space so circumscribed, it was impossible for him not to meet
frequently the two ladies already mentioned ; for they took a great
interest in him, as a Jacobite, a captive of rank ; and thus they
frequently by design threw themselves in his way.
Dalquharn was generally popular with every one ; but that was
the result, perhaps, of a constitutional suavity of manner ; an appa-
rently studious, but yet unstudied, courtesy to all j a native polite-
ness, that old travellers allow to have existed among all classes in
Scotland when her intercourse and alliance with France was so
close, and until it was crushed out of successive generations ; but
that sturdy independence consequent to the general diffusion of
education, and the sulky democracy that goes hand in hand with
Calvinism.
A young man handsome and gallant, blue-eyed and fair-haired,
sad-looking and in misfortune, with the bold bearing, too, of one
accustomed to peril from the days of his boyhood, could not fail to
TTIE WHITE COCKADB. 185
interest those English girls, whom we may as well introduce by
name, as Miss Polly Dalton and Miss Patty Maylie (both late of
DruryLane), who were ennuied to death on the Rock, where they
were each almost as much a prisoner as he was, and longed earnestly
not that we suppose they ever prayed much for a return to
London, as they feared, rather than loved, the two tipsy roues
whom they had rashly accompanied, what was then deemed a vast
distance, on this cheerless service.
Dalquharn, every time they addressed him, perceived that he
was an object of considerable solicitude ; ' he was,' as they said, ' a
lord, though only a poor Scots one ;' and Miss Polly Dalton, a very
pretty girl, with bright hazel eyes all the brighter, perhaps, that
she freely rouged and a saucy retrousse nose, appeared to have an
especially tender heart ; but their sympathy could avail him nothing,
and, as it soon appeared, excited the annoyance of both Livingstone
and Congalton. Moreover, as their society was in no way consonant
to his taste, the difficulty of avoiding them was extreme, within a
space so small. It was very much like being on distant terms with
a person on board ship, or in the Eddystone lighthouse ; and Miss
Polly Dalton, in particular, would not be treated with coolness by the
prisoner. The fact was, she was miserably sick of the Bass Bock,
and longing, as she phrased it, ' to be sent ashore ;' so Livingstone
and hisjunior officer soon became sulky, even rude, to Dalquharn
plainly, bluntly, and vulgarly jealous.
The month of July had passed away ; the middle of August had
come : and he was beginning to consider how, and in what fashion,
he might, with the aid of those two poor girls, escape. He had
great faith in women's wit ; but dare he trust those who were false
to themselves? was the next reflection; and now a sort of crisis
came in his affairs.
One day the attention of the garrison was excited by seeing a
large boat put off for the isle, from the little green cove named
Canty Bay. The wind was rather high for the expedition ; but the
boat bore on bravely, with the white foam flying off her glistening
bows on each side ; and as all knew that in fresh weather something
of importance alone could warrant a visit to the Bass, the walls
were lined by the soldiers, who were curious to see the party
arrive.
Dalquharn felt his heart become agitated by no very pleasing emo-
tion, as he feared that this visit directly referred to himself ; and so it
did, but differently from what he foreboded. Dreading he knew
not what, and anxious to avoid observation for the two officers of
the little garrison were surveying him rather malignantly he with-
drew to his room, the same gloomy apartment already described,
and seated himself at the old tripod table, with his face buried in
his hands, to wait the event ; and indeed he was gradually begin-
ning to think that any change must be for the better now.
More than half an hour elapsed before he heard footsteps on the
186 THE WHITE COCKADE.
stone stair, and iu the narrow corridor that led to the Blackadder
vault. Then came Steinie Lockyett's well-known knock on the
door : starting forward, he unclosed it, and Bryde Bryde Otter-
burn stood before him ; paler, thinner, more anxious in expres-
sion ; but the same sweet, winning Bryde as ever, as he could see
at once when she laid aside her velvet mask and silk capuchin.
' The young Lady o'Auldhame, my Lord,' said Steinie, making a
profound reverence with his bonnet ; but Dalquharn heard him not.
Trembling with love and tenderness, he led Bryde in, and closed
the door upon her usher, who immediately retired.
They were clasped in each other's arms, and for a time were
almost unconscious of all around them, so overpowering were the
emotions of joy the sense of pure happiness.
The few sentences they uttered were short and incoherent, and
though inspired by passionate love and tenderness, sounded not
unlike those of sorrow.
jlf an underbred, but honest fellow, like Steinie Lockyctt, had the
good feeling to leave the lovers together, it may ill become us to
intrude upon them ; and yet there are some matters to rehearse
that Bryde alone can explain.
After their first transports subsided, her eyes wandered with a
sad and indignant expression round the desolate chamber, to settle
once more lovingly on her betrothed's face, now flushed and radiant
with new-born joy.
He asked how she had gained admittance to him ?
By virtue of an order, signed by the High Sheriff of Haddington,
John Lord Belhaven, a peer who stood high in favour with the
ruling powers, in whose cause he was the more zealous, as he was
General of the Scottish mint, and a commissioner of the board of
manufacturers, from both of which sinecures, he had the best rea-
sons for intense loyalty two good salaries.
Bryde now informed Dalquharn, while her tears fell fast and she
clung to his neck, that all her efforts to expose and to punish tht,
hypocrite Balcraftie, had proved vain and almost worse than futile ;
that though every interest had been used through whig peers of in-
fluence to delay his own trial at Edinburgh, or his transmission to
London, Lady Haddington had informed her, that the secretary of
state for Scotland, the Marquis of Tweedale, had said that either
course could not long be avoided ; that the times were fraught with
danger; that though the famous Dunkirk expedition under the
Count de Saxe, had proved a failure, the younger chevalier would
not relinquish his hopes of ultimate success ; that a fresh example
a popular victim was wanted to deter his adherents and so forth :
and when my lord marquis, who had been one of the extraordinary
lords of session, a representative peer, keeper of the signet and lord
of the privy council, began to speak in this fashion, it was ominous
of great evil to the crushed and now landless Dalquharn, who said
fjuietly :
THE WHITE COCKADE. 187
' Dearest Bryd, say no more of this ! Why cloud the joy of your
visit by tidings so bitter to us both ?'
' Because you must escape '
'Must?
' Yes yes ; but hushr-we may be overheard.'
' Escape unless I could sail in a sieve or egg-shell like the old
witch carlins of Dunbar and North Berwick ; or unless I could take
the form of a sea bird, I know not how such a feat is to be achie-
ved ; and yet Bryde, darling, I must confess,' he added softly in
her ear, ' that the idea of escaping has never once left my mind ;
but I have been here many, many weeks now, and am no nearer the
attempt than I was on the first dreary day of my captivity, and sor-
rowful separation from you.'
' Oh, Henry, you know not what that separation has cost me !'
said she, ' see how thin my hands have become.'
' My dear Bryde,' said he, kissing them, ' oh that we had each,
one of those magic or magnetic dials of which Strada wrote ! What
a solace to us ! that even when separated by bolts and bars, by sea
and land, we might converse together, and at the same happy mo-
ment !'
' Oh, what are you speaking, Henry ?'
The clear hazel eyes dilated with something of alarm, as if she
thought his mind wandered.
' When I was residing with the conservator of Scottish privileges
at Campvere, I found in his library a strange little book, printed in
1617. It was entitled "Prolusiones Academic Oratorise, &c., by
Fainiani Stradse Komani," a learned Jesuit, who was born in 1572,
and therein he tells us of a correspondence that was maintained by
two friends who were very dear to each other, by mean of a certain
loadstone which had such power, that when it touched two needles
of fine steel, if one of these began to move, the other, however vast
the distance between them, moved at the same time and in the
same manner.'
' I do not understand !' said Bryde, looking up lovingly, but a
little bewildered.
* Strada goes on to say that those friends being each furnished
with a magnetic needle, made for themselves two metal dials, each
of which was inscribed with the twenty-four letters of the alphabet,
and placed their needles on the plates, so that they could traverse
the surface without hindrance from letter to letter.
' On being separated and having to go into distant hinds, the
friends agreed, like lovers, to retire punctually to a quiet place at a
certain hour daily, to converse with each other, which they could do
with ease by means of their magnetic dials. If one had aught to
say to the other, he moved his needle to each letter in quick suc-
cession until the words were formed, and a sentence was complete.
His friend who was hundreds of leagues away, saw at the same
instant his own needle moving on his own dial, by a virtue acquired
188 THE WHITE COCKADE.
from the loadstone, to every letter indicated by the other ; and
thus they could converse, according to the " Prolusiones " of Strada,
though separated by vast mountain ridges, by foaming surges, and
by pathless deserts.'
' Ah, that we had each such a dial, dearest ; but it may not be,
for surely such must have been the work of infernal agency !' said
Bryde, and so in her days would have been deemed even a lueifer
match, and most assuredly the electric telegraph, of which Strada,
the famous author of ' De Bella Belgico ' in the person of Lucre-
tius, thus gives us, strange to say, somewhat of a dim foreshadow-
ing. ' But to assist you in escaping,' said Bryde, returning to the
subject nearest her affectionate heart, ' money is requisite '
'And I have none !'
' Sir Baldred is quite poor just now ; the cattle plague has almost
ruined our farmers, and half rents only have been coming in ; but
I sold well or rather I should say, the ground bailie and the
grieve of the Home Farm, sold for me on Lammas day some sheep
that I had a bell wether and some ewes I am quite a little farmer
you see ; so here are a hundred guineas for you in a silk purse of
my own netting.'
' Oh, Bryde, though the rightful successor to five thousand a
year, I have never possessed so much money as this, and never may
unless I get back my lands of Dalquharn from the whig slave to
whom Lord Isla gave them, and how can I deprive you '
' Not a word,' said Bryde, as she took his face between her soft
little hands, and by an application of her own cherry lips effectually
stopped his from saying more.
Dalquharn's eyes filled with tears as he surveyed her with looks
of love, and again pressed her to his breast.
' I am so glad,' said he, ' that poor Mitchell escaped the fangs of
the elector's beagles ! Have you heard aught of him ?'
' Only that he is still at the castle of Callender with the Boyds,'
replied Bryde in a low and cautious whisper, for she could not be
in a prison without remembering that walls might have ears.
At that moment, Steinie Lockyett knocked again on the door,
and somewhat urgently, to inform his lordship and the young lady
that the waves were whitening fast in the offing, a mist was coming
over the Isle of May, the breeze was freshening and the boatmen
were anxious to return shoreward ; for, if the weather became
rough, their boat might be stove against the rocks, as there were
no human means by which it could be beached upon the Bass.
These tidings imperatively hastened her departure ; she applied
her handkerchief to her eyes to remove all traces of her late emo-
tion, and resumed her capuchin and mask, as the entire population
of the castle turned out to see her re-embark.
Among others, were the two ladies already mentioned, and near
the inner gate stood Lieutenant Livingstone and Ensign Congalton,
THE WHITE COCKADE. 189
both in full uniform, each with his cocked hat under his left arm,
and wiih sword sash, and gorget on.
Both bowed low to their fair visitor ; and, on the sentinels pre-
venting Dalquharn from passing out with her, by simply crossing
their muskets at the gate a movement which made the blood rush
to his temples Livingstone drew off a glove and took Bryde's hand,
saying :
' You must permit me to be your escort now, Miss Otterburn ;
the descent is steep and slippery, and you cannot reach the boat
unassisted.'
She gave a farewell glance to Dalquharn, full of secret intelli-
gence and sorrowful meaning, and was led away by the Laird of
Saltcoates, who, when he chose, could bear himself like a courtly
gentleman. She passed out of the castle and down the perilous
way, that led to the fissure in the rock, where people landed and
embarked.
A few minutes more saw the boat at sea, its sails spread and the
oars out, as it flew before the wind and flowing tide, and Bryde's
figure lessened fast to the loving eyes of him who watched her from
the gun-battery, nor did he cease to wave his handkerchief, or turn
to leave the place, till the boat had disappeared in safety within the
little haven of Canty Bay.
He was then sensible, for the first time, that two persons were
conversing and laughing near him. They proved to be Mr. Congal-
ton and his friend, Miss Polly Dalton, to whom he had been some-
what freely criticising the air and dress of Miss Otterburn, who had
sorely piqued him, by barely honouring him with a glance.
1 1 thought her charming poor thing !' said the girl, with some-
thing of sadness in her tone ; for, perhaps, in her heart, she con-
trasted the correct toilette and pale purity of Bryde, with her own
tawdry costume and rouged cheeks ; ' her dress was quite that of a
woman of fashion. '
' Faugh ! a fig for such fashion, say I ; how could she be aught
but odd, whose mode comes at best from the Lawn-market of Edin-
burgh,' said Congalton, who was what the late Mr. Thackeray
would decidedly have termed a ' Scotch snob,' though such carrion
were scarcer in 1745, than they are in this age of steam and tele-
graphy, and then he began to sing,
' Make your petticoats short, that a hoop, eight yards wide,
May decently shew how your garters are tied ;
' With fringes of knotting, your dicky cabob,
On slippers of velvet, set gold a la daube.
But mount on French heels when you go to a hall,
'Tis the fashion to totter and show you can fall '
c Mr. Congalton !' said Dalquharn, stepping close up to this officer,
and cutting short his ditty ; ' were I not your prisoner, I should
trounce you on the spot compel you to eat your own words j and
190 THE WHITE COCKJLDZ.
a time may come when I shall force you to apologise for this iuso-
lence.'
' I doubt it,' replied the ensign, saucily, and, withal, fiercely, too,
as he cocked his hat over his right eye, and stuck his left hand into
the hilt of his sword ; ' but zounds, 'tis very well, sir, and time,
place and circumstance, suiting, I shall be quite at your service.'
He turned on his heel abruptly and retired, while Dalquharn,
though furious at his bearing, soon forgot it, at least for a time, as
his interview with Bryde had inspired him with fresh love and ten-
derness, and to these, the money she had given, added a hope that
he might yet escape ; for many a castle gate has been opened by a
golden key ; so, anxious for solitude, he left the ramparts, and took
his way up the rock, towards the chapel and little Hermitage, in
which tradition and history record that St. Baldred lived and
died.
CHAPTER XXXVI.
A PLOT LAID.
* Nay, good youth,
Till what I purpose can be put in act,
Do not o'erprize it. Since you've trusted me
With ray soul's nearest, nay its dearest secret,
Best confident, 'tis in a cabinet locked
Treachery shall never open. I have'found you
More zealous in your love and service to me
Than I have been in my rewards.'
Masssinger.
How was he to dispose of the hundred guineas so generously given
to him by his disinterested love? Who was he to tempt who
bribe first? Old Steinie Lockyett or the sentinels, and which of
these, as they were always being changed ? The very means given
thus to assist an escape, added to his perplexity ; for they might
take the money on the one hand, and betray his purpose on the
other ; he had heard and read of such things ; and yet, if they did
so, they would only be acting true to the general selfishness of
human nature, true to their salt, and loyally to the king they
served.
He frequently retired to the greater solitude of the ancient Her-
mitage, to think the more deeply, and to consult with himself, but
could never come to a conclusion, as how or with whom he would
begin.
A few days after the visit of Bryde an episode which made him
an object of greater interest in the eyes of Miss Patty Maylie and
pretty Polly Dalton he found himself followed to his solitude one
evening by the latter young lady, who heedless of lu's cold and
somewhat repelling reception of her, would insist upon seating her-
self near him on some blocks of fallen masonry, where she adjusted
THE WHITE COCKADE. 11
her ample skirts of faded brocade, with the faintest air of coquetry.
Edged with deep falls of lace, her sleeves were short, and revealed
the whiteness and taper form of her finely rounded arms. We may
mention that there were times, when Dalquharn in his simplicity of
character, was doubtful whether or not those fair residenters on the
Bock, were actually wedded to the two men who treated them so
strangely and so harshly ; but if so, they certainly never took other
names than their own ; but that custom was not uncommon in
Scotland, especially in those days, for long after marriage, women
among their friends were familiarly known by their maiden names.
She remarked the beauty of the evening, and the effect of the
setting sun upon the opposite coast of Haddington, the blueness of
the sea and sky, to all of which he assented.
She then said something of the dreary life led by those whose
evil destiny cast them on such a place as this island-rock, to which
he assented also with much cordiality, and then there was a pause,
during which, Miss Dalton, who had been playing with the deep
falling tucker of her boddice, bent her bright eyes smilingly on
Dalquharn's face, and opening and shutting her huge green fan,
which was covered with faded spangles, spoke again, after heaving
something like a stage sigh :
' Heigho ! if I had only accepted the handsome offer of Sir
Timothy Tawdry of the Buffs, I might have been driving along Pic-
cadilly, like a woman of fashion, with a suite of diamonds sparkling
about me, in a gilt coach, with a page on each step and two tall
footmen behind, instead of fretting myself into a frowsy frump on
this nasty Scotch island !'
' Might not Sir Timothy come to the rescue still ?'
' He eloped with Miss Susan Spangles, of Covent Garden, and
they have gone on the grand tour, and so I missed the gilt coach
and being my Lady Tawdry.'
' A gilt coach is that happiness ?' asked Dalquharn, who was
somewhat amused in spite of himself, by the girl's manner, and not
ill-pleased with her roguish beauty.
' Yes, sir I beg pardon, I mean, my lord ; it is one of the- ele-
ments of happiness, and is as necessary to a woman of quality, as
her sedan and link-boys, her pomander ball, etui and appendages ;
or, as the " Guardian" says, " the gilt chariot, the diamond ring, the
gold snuff-box, and brocade sword-knot " are to a fine gentleman."
1 " Provided he casts his eyes on them but once a day," the paper
adds. You see, I know the " Guardian," ' said hia lordship, smil-
ing.
' Oh, I doat on it, and on all Mr. Addison's writings in the
" Spectator." Do you remember a paper of his, in which he hu-
mourously describes a country squire, enquiring anxiously at the
Tower, whether any of the royal lions had fallen sick, on tidings
coming to London, that the city of Perth had been taken, and that
the old Pretender had fled ?'
1<J2 THE WHITE COCKADE.
' He whom you stigmatise as a pretender, madam, I acknowledge
as His Majesty, King James VIII.,' said Dalquharn, with a haughty
smile, as he reverentially lifted his hat, which was sorely worn and
battered now, for the term ' pretender,' even in this year of the
world, jars on the ear of a well-bred Scotsman.
'Pardon me, my lord,' said the girl, colouring 'La! I did but
speak at random, or as those about me do.'
' Let it pass, madam.'
' I thank you, sir my lord, I mean.'
' The idea of the squire you alluded to, arose from an old English
superstition,' said Dalquharn, willing to relieve her momentary em-
barrassment. ' In ancient times, it was customary to name the lions
in the Tower after the reigning kings ; and thus the fate of the
royal animal was thought to be mysteriously connected with His
Majesty of England.'
After a little more conversation, Dalquharn began to discover
that this girl was meant for a better fate than had befallen her in
life, as she seemed to be familiar with the writings of Dryden, Pope
(who had died at Twickenham in the summer of the preceding
year), of worthy Dicky Steele, Tickell, and all the current liteiature
of the tune ; but he also perceived how unwise it was of him, cir-
cumstanced as he was, to be conversing with her so familiarly in
that little secluded ruin.
He hinted something to this purpose with one of his pleasant
smiles, and was moving away, when she laid a hand on his arm a
quick and pretty hand it was and said,
' My lord, you wish, doubtless, to escape from this !'
' It would be folly to conceal from you that I do 5 but it seems a
physical impossibility.'
'It is not.'
' Ah indeed,' said Dalquharn, coldly, as he suspected some snare ;
' but how, madam ?'
' By a plan of mine a very simple one.'
' Woman's wit and sympathy are proverbial, Miss Dalton 5 but
this plan '
' Is that your lordship shall escape disguised as a woman, and I
shall dress you j experience has made me clever enough at the
toilette.'
' You will dress me ?'
' Yes I,' said she, laughing.
1 Gadso, I should be glad to escape in any fashion or costume ; but
my dear girl, I am nearly a foot taller than you, and my appearance
in your fardingale and capuchin would never do ! The Scots Foot-
guards of the Elector are not such asses as you think them.'
' Lord Nithsdale escaped from the Tower in hia lady's hood and
cloak.'
' But he was a li ttle man.'
1 Lockyett, the warder's wife, la as tall as you.'
THE WHITE COCKADE. 193
' A great raw-boned grenadier of a woman well ? '
' To-morrow evening she and I are to go ashore, to make cerf-am
purchases in yonder gloomy little town. I shall endeavour to get
possession of her long grey cloak and the red plaid in which she
muffles her head, as all the lower class of women in this country do
what sound is that ?'
c Nothing or the surges of the sea below.'
' If I can but secure her co-operation ; and if not, her person
under lock and key when the time comes, you shall accompany me
to the boat ; and when once clear of the island, we have nothing to
fear.'
' Unless being missed while within range of those twelve twenty,
four pounders, and so forth, on the gun battery.'
' Surely, I saw a shadow but will you risk it ?'
' 'Tis only that dwarf alder-bush waving,' said Dalquharn, for
close by them grew one of those tiny shrubs, called Dane's blood, as
they are supposed to have sprung from where the invading Vikings
were slaughtered.
' But will you risk it ?' she added.
' Risk it, my dear girl ? To be sure I will ! Set me but onco
again on yonder beach, and I will give you '
' Oh, my lord, I seek nothing.'
' Eighty guineas in gold, to share with the wife of the warder.'
' Eighty guineas !' exclaimed she. 'Had I but ten, I would be-
take me to London, though I should travel all the way by the
waggon !'
' Then we may mutually assist each other !' gaid Dalquharn joy-
ously. ' At what hour to-morrow do you leave this hateful Bock ?'
1 At four in the afternoon.'
' At four, Grod willing, I shall be on the watch then.'
' Where ?'
' On the gun battery, and await a signal from you, as to how I
am to get my disguise."
' Agreed, my lord, agreed how good of you to trust me.'
' Ah, how shall I ever thank you enough, and how pray for you?
for to you, Miss Dalton, I shall owe my life, and more than life
or liberty either an escape from a horrible death!' exclaimed Dal-
quharn, in a tremulous voice, while his eyes filled with an emotion,
of which the poor girl was not insensible, for her soft cheek flushed
with what seemed real and pure pleasure, in being able, perhaps, to
atone for past errors, by the performance of one good action.
1 So, ho,' said a voice. ' You here, sir, and stap my Titals : you
too, Polly eh ?'
And Mr. Congalton, of that Ilk, with hat uncocked, and hair un-
powdered, somewhat flushed and unsteady in step, appeared at the
little arched door of the hermitage.
Miss Dalton grew very pale, and attempted to conceal her sur-
prise, or carry away suspicion by commencing with a pretty saucy
13
191 THE WHITE COCKADE.
air to slug a song, which was rendered famous some twenty years
after, in a comic opera at Co vent Garden
'.Since you prove ungrateful, no farther I'll seek,
But go up to town in the waggon next week;
A service in London in no such disgrace,
And a register office will get me a place.'
' You may go to the devil, so far as I am concerned,' said Con-
galton, surlily j but Miss Dalton sang waggishly on
' Our Blossom went there and soon met with a friend
! Folks say in her silks, she's now standing on end I
Then why should I not the same maxim pursue,
And better my fortune as other girls do?'
' It won't do, madam egad, it won't do ! I can't allow either
you or his precious lordship here, to put your tricks upon me or Pat
Livingstone thus.'
' You are tipsy, Mr. Congalton !' said she, disdainfully.
' Tipsy how, you impudent baggage '
' Ah,' said she, ' there are some very good wine and brandy drank
here, on which the custom-house forgets to put seal or brand.'
From this remark, Dalquharn justly supposed that the officers in
command availed themselves of the facilities the isle afforded for
getting their liquor duty free, for Congalton's face suddenly became
inflamed with passion.
' Silence, you tricky jade or I shall make you ride the wooden
horse, with a couple of firelocks at each ankle by G-eorge, I will !
The escape was very nicely planned, but the performance won't come
off to-morrow evening at four o'clock. Hollo, there corporal of
the guard,' he bellowed, at the top of his voice, to the sentinels on
the gun -platform below. 'Livingstone, my spruce cock, come here
with a file of men !'
Dalquharn drew himself up loftily, and made a step forward, as
if to interpose between the shrinking girl and approaching harm,
for in his cups, Congalton was brutal enough, perhaps, to have
struck her ; and when flushed with just indignation, his lordship
could assume an expression of eye, and a bearing or mien, that
were singularly noble and dignified ; thus even Oongalton, though
a gentleman of good birtli and ancient family, cowered before him,
notwithstanding his usual etourdi character.
THE WHITE COCKADE. 195
CHAPTER XXXVII.
HOW BBYDE'S GUINEAS WEEK SPENT.
'Alas I from the day that we met,
What hope of an end of my woes ?
When I cannot endure to forget
The glance that undid my repose.
Yet time may diminish the pain.
The flower, the shrub, and the tree,
Which I reared for her pleasure in vain,
In time may have comfort for me.'Sfenslone.
IN a very brief space of time, Livingstone was at the door of the
hermitage, with a drawn sword in his hand, accompanied by two
soldiers, with their bayonets fixed ; and, on hearing his ensign's
story, his eyes glared with rage, alternately, at Miss Dalton and his
prisoner, whose entire plan Mr. Congalton was not ashamed to own
lie had overheard from first to hist, and now detailed with some
excitement of manner to his senior officer.
' How now, my lord,' said Livingstone, who, for some time past,
had viewed Dalquharn. with jealous dislike, and he knitted his
brows with a rude air of menace as he spoke. ' Have you possessed
yourself of a devil, or hath a devil possessed itself of you, that you
seek to brave me, by tampering with my garrison ?'
' Aye, 'Sdeath ! and our weuches to boot!' added Congalton,
coarsely.
' And you jade !' exclaimed the Lieutenant.
Miss Dalton's cheeks flushed scarlet, and her dark eyes sparkled
with fire. She was not, perhaps, much given to controlling her
temper; and now she bit her fan, stamped her foot on the ground
with rage, and turning to Congalton, said,
' Fool that I was to follow here, a scurvy patch like thee!'
1 Keep your tragedy airs, my fine madam, till you are once more
on the boards of old Drury, with the float-lights in front, and ad-
miring candle-snuffers behind,' he replied, laughing.
' 'Fore George, if David Garrick could see her now," said Living-
stone, in the same cool tone of banter, ' he would bring her out as
Janie Thomson's " Sophonisba." '
'Oh, Sophonisba! Sophonisba, oA/' exclaimed Congalton; 'I
can hit off the part pretty well. Why, Polly, you would excel
even Mrs. Pritchard or Mrs. Gibber!'
1 Base taunter, I hate you now !' said she, turning from him.
' Bravo ! do it again, my " fair Penitent j" and I shall try to be
Lothario sink me, but I will!'
Dalquharn manifested some proud impatience at this unseemly
scene.
' My lord,' said Livingstone, grimly, and still keeping his sword
unsheathed, 'you are prc-emiueutly dangerous. Not content with
132
196 THE yrniTE COCKADE.
leaguing for the subversion of King George's paternal government
on the mainland for mere practice, I suppose you seek to upset
mine on this renowned rock, and by money too eighty guineas,
no less ! By all the devils ! what have you to say for yourself ?'
' Simply that in either case I have only been doing that which
the laws of human nature suggest and permit. In the last instance,
I was but consulting my personal safety ; in the first, I maintain
that when any form of government becomes destructive of life,
liberty, or happiness, and, more than all, of the national name and
honour, it is the inherent right of the people to alter, subvert, or
renew it, by force of arms.'
' So we thought in 1688,' said Livingstone.
' And when a train of abuses, foreign usurpations, the violation
of solemn treaties, such as the Act of Union, and the systematic
designs of English ministers, seek to denude us of our rights as a
nation, it is just to cast them down, and provide, by the edge ot
the sword, a new and safe guard for the future.'
' Precisely what we thought in 1688,' said Livingstone again,
with provoking nonchalance.
' As for King William,' grumbled Congalton, whose family were
old cavaliers, ' I always considered him to be a vile Dutch souter-
kin, who was as like his own father as an apple is like an oyster,
so d n the '88, say I, with all my heart !'
' I am not here to discuss these matters with you, Congalton, or
with his lordship either,' said Livingstone, sheathing his sword with
an air of solemn dignity and loftiness to which his last glass of
brandy-punch had considerably added. ' I am here simply to obey
orders, and to answer for a state prisoner's safe custody, body for
body, to the king our master : and be assured, my Lord Dalqu-
harn, the utterance of such opinions as yours would make every
king in Europe anxious for your head, as well as our so-called Elec-
tor of Hanover.'
' My head ! and wherefore ?'
' Simply to prevent you from using it to the peril of others.'
' Excuse me, sir,' said Dalquharn, with a haughty smile ; ' but I
feel that my head appears to much greater advantage on my own
shoulders '
1 Than parboiled on a stake, I grant you j but, my Lord, the
crimes of which you are guilty *
'Of which I am accused most falsely and injuriously accused
' Tis all one, I suppose, to His Majesty's government.'
1 Well, sir ?'
1 Render it necessary, after the episode of this evening, that I
must commit you to surer ward than the Blackadder Vault affords.'
' A hard resolution, sir,' said Dalquharn, bitterly. ' I am one
over whose head the axe is hanging ; and to you, sir, as a Scottish
gentleman'
THE WHITE COCKADE. 197
' I can listen to no more from you, my Lord Dalquharn, in pre-
sence of my men especially,' said Livingstone, with growing stiff-
ness and hauteur.
' Sir, I adhere to the race of kings under whom my forefathers
lived and died ; under whom Scotland was true to herself; under
whom all her hard struggles were made, and her battles for freedom
and honour were fought. I adhere to a fallen monarchy, and you
to the rising sun. You gain all, while we risk and lose all it may
be life itself; but never shall we forget our loyalty and faith ! On
our side are high principle and proud enthusiasm ; poetry, truth,
and devotion ! On yours but the spirit of usurpation, of grovelling
fanaticism and cowardly submission to a foreign rule !'
' Don't become melo-dramatic, my Lord : it's devilish stupid to
be so anywhere, and on the Bass Bock especially. Conduct Lord
Dalquharn to the vault at the east end of the castle under the
Governor's house,' added Livingstone to the corporal, and then
passed up the path beyond the hermitage, as if to close the inter-
view ; his ensign followed ; and Miss Dalton was left to fan herself
cool in mind and body.
Conducted down the perilous path towards the lower walls, past
where, then as now, lay more than one coil of stout rope fastened
to a strong cramp-iron, for the use of those who were bold enough
to swing themselves over the rocks to gather the eggs of the sea-
fowl ' dreadful trade!' Dalquharn was led by the corporal, who,
to do him justice, spoke with much kindness and commiseration,
towards the extreme east end of the fortress, with a heart oppressed
more by disgust and anxiety than just anger.
He knew not where they might place him now ; for, when at
Auldhamo, he had heard descriptions given of dreadful dungeons
and cells in the castle of the Bass mere caverns whose entrances
are perhaps forgotten now, where, after coils of rusty chains were
relaxed before doors of solid iron, the prisoner was thrust into a
chamber of stone, some eight feet by twelve in extent, with a small
slit to admit the light and the keen sea-breeze together ; where the
feet plashed ankle-deep in water that oozed from the slimy walls ;
where huge wet moths, germinated among the corruption of the
dead gannets, fluttered about in the chilly atmosphere ; and where
those who entered felt their breath and eyesight alike affected by
the sharp and putrid air.
Such horrors he had heard of ; yet it was into no such place ho
was ushered now ; but simply a dry vault, arched, floored, and
walled with solid stone, having a stone seat, a tiny fire-place, and a
little window, six inches wide, which opened to the east. The
access to this chamber was by a corridor, under that portion of the
castle occupied of old by the Lauder family, and on the keystone of
an arch he saw their crest, grimly significant at such a time a
tower with its portcullis down, and a man's head on the battlement,
the motto being, ' Turri* prudentia cu?tos.'
193 TBE WHITE COCKADE.
On being subjected to the ignominy of a search, dear Bi-yde's
network purse was found, together with her hundred guineas.
These were instantly handed over to the needy Livingstone of Salt-
coates, and never more heard of.
The little oak door of the prison, swinging on its strong iron
hinges, was closed, and Dalquharn was left in the twilight of the
evening, seated on his pallet, and then a gush of ferocity and bitter-
ness welled up in his heart !
A writer remarks, that ' those who act with the most consummate
wisdom in the aflairs of the world, often meditate very silly doings
before their wiser resolutions form themselves.' Thus, Dalquharn,
in the first transports of his fury and indignation, conceived the
idea of overpowering or braining poor Steinie the warder and of
sallying forth in search of Livingstone, that he might strangle that
gallant officer, provided he could escape the bayonets of the senti-
nels. This was only one of many wild projects, which, however,
passed away, as the silent night wore on.
If his position was bad before, in the Blackadder Vault, it was
incomparably worse now ! He was completely unnerved for a time ;
and as he thought over all the present insuperable difficulties, the
future doubts and entire danger of his position, he seemed to have
upon his frame the poisoned shirt of Nessus !
Many days and nights passed away, and he was neither asked to
leave the Lauder Vault or visit the external air, so he began to
surmise how the toads, which are found from time to time in the
hearts of blocks of stone, felt as ages passed over them in darkness
and silence, hunger and thirst.
All night long he heard the surges of the sea, as he had heard
them at Auldhame, only louder, for now they were a hundred feet
below his prison window ; and dear voices that were hushed in
death, or far distant then, and old memories of other days and
years, came with the drowsy murmur in his dreams.
One sunny morning, the sharp boom of a cannon pealing from
the seaward, made the prisoner leap from bed, and hurry to his
little window, or eyelet hole, for it was little more ; and lo ! about a
mile distant from the island, in the direction of Scougal Point, the
spectre of his dreams by night and day appeared, in the form of a
king's frigate, lying to, with her mainyard to the mast, her long
pennant streaming, and her broad scarlet ensign waving in the wind ;
her white canvas and her tier of guns shining in the sunlight ; and
midway between her and the Bass was a boat full of armed marines,
pulling straight for the landing-place, under the spur of the castle.
This alarming sight made the unfortunate young man grow
giddy !
The fatal hour of eternal separation from Bryde Otterburn and
his country the hour of his departure for London ; the scene of
his doom had come at last, but could he be worse than in the seclu-
sion and uncertainty he was enduring ?
THE WHITE COCKADE. 199
The appearance of the marines in the boat, red-coated and cross-
belted, was certainly startling ; all had on their knapsacks, and
each man sat with his musket between his knees. Why should
so many come for one prisoner ? He had always been anticipating
a catastrophe something dreadful, and it had come at last!
The marines were landed, and the boat returned to the ship,
which filled her sails and stood away northwards out of sight ; and
Dalquharn, who experienced an intense relief at her departure, had
barely recovered his equanimity, when Steinie Lockyett informed
him, on leaving his frugal breakfast of coffee and barleymeal ban-
nock, that it was only a reinforcement for the garrison, of fourteen
marines from the Fox frigate, under second Lieutenant Zachariah
Pudge, and nothing more.
Why was the little garrison reinforced what event was expected?
Steinie thrust his broad blue bonnet on one side of his head, and
leisurely scratched the other, with a leer of intense cunning in his
keen grey eyes, but declined to say, and hastily retired.
Dalquharn now resolved to seek Livingstone's clemency, and
asked him to forward a letter to the Lord- Conservator of Scottish
Privileges, at Campvere, who was a personal friend (and had certi-
fied the papers of himself and Sir John Mitchell) , in the desperate
hope that the influence of so distinguished an official might pro-
cure, if not his release, at least some amelioration of his present un-
happy state.
But Livingstone treated every message sent by Dalquharn,
through his only means, the warder, with studied neglect or con-
tempt ; and so the dreary days and the long and weary nights
stole on.
And now that we have again mentioned the Scoto-Dutch official,
whose rank and duties may seem a puzzle to readers, it might be aa
well to state who he was and what they were.
He was always a Scottish gentleman, resident in Zeeland, and
was first appointed Lord- Conservator in May 1444, upon the mar-
riage of the Princess Mary Stuart to Wolfred Van Borselen, Count
de Boucquan, son of the Lord of Campvere. She was sister to that
beautiful and gentle Dauphiness, whom the monstrous Louis XI.
destroyed in her twenty-second year, and of Isabella of Austria,
who translated the romance of ' Ponthus et Sidroyne ' into Ger-
man, for the amusement of her husband, the Archduke Sigismuud
all worthy daughters of the princely James I. of Scotland.
The Lord-Conservator had especial charge of all that related to
the privileges of the Scots in Zeeland, and of the Staple contract,
entered into in 1444, between the city of Campvere and the royal
burghs of Scotland a contract always renewed from time to time.
200 THE WHITE COCKADE.
CHAPTER XXXVIII.
THE WHITE EOSE IN BLOOM.
' There's news frae Moidart cam' yestreen,
Will soon gar mony ferlie ;
For ships o' war hae just come in,
And landed Royal Charlie I
Come thro" the heather, come round him gather,
You're a' the welcomer early;
Come crown your rightful, lawful king,
For wha'll be king but Charlie ?'
Jacobite Smg~,
THE end of August and the beginning of September were bleak
and stormy, so much so, that though only two miles from the Had-
dington shore, for nearly four consecutive weeks there had been no
intercourse by boat between the mainland and the Bass Rock. The
garrison was on short allowance ; all the salt provisions were con-
sumed, and the greasy, rank solan geese, with their eggs, proved
but a very sorry resort, at which Lieutenant Pudge and his marines
especially grumbled.
Steinie, the warder, had always predicted that something remark-
able was about to happen, as the hoopoe, a bird with a beautiful
crest, which it can erect and depress at pleasure, and whose wings
are crossed by bars of black and white, had been seen more than
once upon the Rock. This bird, which breeds in Germany, but
seldom visits our shores, and was always deemed the forerunner of
some dire calamity, as at this hour the Swedes deem its presence a
sign of coming war ; and certainly during the seclusion of our
friends on St. Baldred's Isle, stirring events had been in progress.
A boat arrived one evening deeply laden with provisions, and
soon after Steinie Lockyett hurriedly unfastened the door, and en-
tered the chamber of Dalquharn (who, during the recent stormy
weather, had been allowed occasionally to promenade on the walls)
in a state of great excitement, with his cheek glowing, his eyes
sparkling, and yet they were full of moisture.
' Oh, my lord my lord,' said he, in a husky whisper ; ' allow me
the honour of shaking your hand.'
' Are you mad, Carle ?' asked Dalquharn, haughtily.
' Deil a bit deil a bit ; and yet, wi' joy, I am something like it,
after a' ! He's come he's come he's come at last. Heaven bless
and prosper him !'
' He who, fellow ?'
' The Prince Prince Charlie ; he's come frae the north, wi' a'
the wild Duinewassals at his back ; and now, now he's in auld
Holyrood the house o' his ain forefathers !' And fairly overcome
by excess of emotion, the old man burst into tears, and covered his
THE WHITE COCKADE. 201
face with his round blue bonnet. 'I am ane o' yoursel's, iny lord
a true and lawful subject o' the king owre the water.'
' There is no mistake in all this, Carle Steinie ?' said Dalquharn,
in a low yoice of suppressed emotion, as he grasped the old man's
shoulder, and trembled violently.
' Nane nane, by the hand o' my body !' replied the warder, using
solemnly that old Scoto-scriptural asseveration ; ' He come frae the
far north, wi' thousands of blue bonnets and braid claymores at liia
back ; they are a" wi' him, Tullybardine, Perth, and Athole, Lochiel,
Lovat, and Glengarry auld Glenlucket too, and a' that never
failed king or country, when the English tykes were riving baith.
Read the ' Mercuries' for yourseP, my lord ; another week will see
John Goukstone made o' the Elector and a* his rumpers, English
as weel as Scotch !' As Steinie concluded, in the exuberance of his
joy, he danced upon his bonnet.
Throwing down three sorely tattered and dingy little folio sheets
of paper, which proved to be three ' Caledonian Mercuries,' Steinie,
who seemed to be quite beside himself, rushed out of the vault ;
and soon after, in the height of his joy, got most disreputably
tipsy, and in the face of Livingstone, of Saltcoates, Congalton, of
that Ilk, and the entire detachment of His Majesty's Scots Foot
Guards, and the marines of the ' Fox,' under Lieutenant Pudge, he
repeatedly consigned the Elector of Hanover to a very warm
climate, and was borne off to bed, singiug vociferously, ' The auld
Stuarts back again !'
It was only after consulting the papers left with him, a joyous
task, performed while his head swam and his heart beat high with
awakened hopes of life, liberty, love and gratified ambition, of a
restoration to Bryde and to his title and estates, that Dalquliarn
learned all that had transpired during the last few stormy weeks.
He soon knew that Prince Charles Edward Stuart had landed in
the wilds of Moidart alone, at least with only seven men, (oh, to
have been one of these ! thought lie), in the gallant hope to rally
three kingdoms to his standard. To Highland honour and to Scot-
tish loyalty, he trusted himself and his fortunes ! He came, as he
had lived, innocent of all the political errors alleged against his
grandfather, James VII. ; he came armed only with his own good
sword, and his own hereditary right to recover the throne of his
ancestors. All brave and honest men in Scotland believed in him ;
but the weak, the wary, the corrupt, the servile and the hypo-
critical, proved by far the most numerous, even in the Highlands,
and now there were in Scotland few such chiefs as the fiery Locliiel
and the lion-hearted Keppoch.
Fifty thousand swordsmen were then considered as the fighting
force of the Highlands ; but there came only twelve hundred or so,
to the Prince's standard, when, on the 19th of August, it was un-
furled in the narrow vale of Glenfinnan, at the head of wild Lochiel,
on that spot where the commemorating pillar waa erected by Mac-
202 *HE WHITE COCKADE.
donald, of Glenalladale, in 1815. It is a savage solitude, over-
looked by rugged and lofty mountains, silent, solitary and lone,
where only the flight of an eagle, or the scream of a wild bird,
break the stillness now.
Of blue and scarlet silk, with a white centre, on which fair and
royal hands in Versailles had embroidered the motto, 'TANDEM
TRIUMPHANS,' with those significant emblems, a coffin and a crown,
the banner, guarded on each side by a powerful Highlander, floated
on the mountain breeze ; and then baring his head, William Mur-
ray, the aged Marquis of Tullybardine, who had been an attainted
exile since the war of 1715, held the staff with one hand, while
reading aloud the commission of regency, dated at Rome, and
signed by James VIII. of Scotland and III. of England. The
Prince then made a stirring address in English, which few of the
devoted Celts who were present could understand, but they threw
all their bonnets into the air, where, as an eye-witness has it, they
resembled a dark cloud, and they brandished their broad-sworda,
while wild hurrahs, and the wilder yell of the war-pipe, made the
vale of the Finnan re-echo.
Captain Swettenham, an English officer of the 6th Foot or
Guise's Regiment, was present on this auspicious occasion, together
with Captain Marmaduke Wyvil, of the Buffs, who was on the staff
of Sir John Cope, and both of whom had been captured near Fort
William. They were handsomely entertained in the camp, and set
at liberty by the Prince, who said to them as they departed
' You may go, gentlemen, and tell Sir John what you have seen,
and that we are coming to make war on him.'
The first blow was struck by Major Macdonald Tiendrish, one of
the bravest in a land of brave men ! With a few swordsmen, he
surrounded and captured a company of the Scots Royals, and ano-
ther of the 46th Regiment, under a Captain Scott, who, though
severely wounded, survived to die, long after, a general in the days
of George III.
George II. and his Walmoden, was on one of his protracted
visits to his native Hanover, when these startling events occurred
in the county of the clans. At this time, the entire British army
consisted of only six troops of Horse and Grenadier Guards (in-
cluding the Scotch troops, so spitefully disbanded by the king in
the following year), there were twenty-two regiments of Horse and
Dragoons, eight of which were in Flanders. There were seven bat-
talions of Foot Guards, fifty-four of the Line, and ten of Marines ;
twenty-eight of these were in Flanders, Gibraltar, Minorca and
elsewhere, thus leaving a great force at home to oppose the small
but daring band of Highlanders, of whom the government were in
such terror, that foreign aid was summoned, and in October there
arrived in the Thames three battalions of Herzler's Swiss Regiment,
and the battalions of Holstein, Gottorp, Villetts, Patot and Brack-
THE WHITE COCKAD& 2C$
nell, and the Dutch of La Roque, landed at Berwick, the whole
under Count Maurice, of Nassau.
Thirty thousand pounds, a foul bribe, for an assassination a
murder that, had it taken place, would have made Scotland for ever
infamous in the annals of the world was offered by the Privy
Council, for the Prince's head. Fifty thousand were offered by the
Irish Parliament, and six thousand by the City of Dublin, for the
same amiable purpose; yet those eighty-si* thousand pounds*
proved no bribe to the starving shepherds, who protected their
fugitive prince in the Highland wilderness, on the braes of Glen-
morriston ; after all hope had died for ever on the moor of Cul-
loden.
The troops in Scotland at this juncture consisted of two corps of
Light Dragoons, the 13th and the 14th ; the Scots Eoyals ; the
6th, 21st Scots Fusiliers ; 25th or Edinburgh Regiment ; nine com-
panies of the 42nd, 44th, and 47th, with Laudon's Highlanders,
and the 4fith Foot scattered along the Highland frontier. Lieut.-
General Sir John Cope, K.B., commanded the whole of this force,
which he rapidly collected together ; but he was outflanked by the
Prince, who broke down into the Lowlands with a force that soon
amounted to three thousand men, only half of whom were fully
armed, the rest having only clubs and scythes.
Every day the Prince marched on foot at the head of his men,
with his target on his shoulder ; every river they had to ford, he
was the fin** who plunged in ; he bivouacked with them in the open
field, and slept on the ground in his plaid ; habits which made him
their idol, even as Hontrose and Dundee had been in the preceding
century.
He marched direct for Edinburgh.
The citizens of that place had been apprised by the 8th of Au-
gust, that he had landed, and straightway (as the danger was very
remote) a prodigious bluster and warlike furore ensued, with much
preaching and singing of psalms. Several volunteer corps were em-
bodied, armed and clothed, and many divines of the kirk betook
them to scarlet and pipe-clay, and swaggered about in cross-belts.
The members of these corps were, to a man, animated by intense
religious and political rancour against the House of Stuart, and
were clamorous in their loyalty to the House of Hanover. In
addition to these volunteers, were a body of armed excisemen, the
city guard, two dragoon corps, and some companies of the 47th, in
the castle. The whole city literally bristled with arms. Quiet old
business men, doctors, advocates and solicitors, thrifty and cautious
burgesses, and some dissenters of all denominations, were suddenly
transformed into amateur soldiers ; the marching and drumming in
Close and Wynd, in market-place and street ; the swaying of great
guns up to the town walls ; the digging of ditches and building of
bulwarks were incessant ; and the most noisy and active were the
* Hist, of the Present Rebellion ; London, 1747.
204 1HE WHITE COCKADE.
Seceders, who after flaunting all day in scarlet, usually sung psalms
all night in the Infirmary, to keep their courage warm and their
spirits cheery ; but spirit and courage ebbed together, exactly in
proportion as the Highlanders drew near, and on tidings arriving
that they had crossed the Forth by the deep and dangerous fords of
Frew that they were at Linlithgow at Kirkliston, the terror of
the volunteers could no longer be controlled, and many of those
pious heroes stole ladders, scaled the city walls, and fled in the
night.
In short, the unparalleled cowardice of the entire force in Edin-
burgh covered the city with ridicule and disgrace ; and when the
Prince's advanced guard, consisting of only seven horsemen, under
Sir John Mitchell of Pitreavie, approached Coltleridge, the volun-
teers were seen running about the streets in utter consternation,
bribing every soldier they met with sixpences, to take their muskets
to the castle, ' for Godsake !'*
Something of this consternation would seem to hare affected even
the officers of the 47th, who, at a council of war, proposed to
capitulate, a suggestion, to which Joshua Guest, the new governor,
who was a Jacobite, fully acceded, but was overruled by old General
Preston, whom he had been specially sent to supersede, and who, as
a Scotsman, was deemed unworthy of trust.
Preston, a veteran of King William's wars, undertook the defence
of the castle, and bravely maintained it, though the city, without
firing a shot, surrendered to the Camerons, who marched in through
the Netherbow-porte at daybreak, on the 16th September, nearly
eight hundred strong, with colours flying, led by the gallant Lo-
chiel, their pipers playing ' We'll awa to Sheriffmuir and haud the
whigs in order."
Lochiel, one of the most active and heroic of the Prince's chiefs,
at once disarmed the city guard, seized the arsenal, and ere night-
fall, the whole capital was in possession of the Highlanders, and all
this occurred while the baffled Sir John Cope, who had followed
them by sea, was laboriously disembarking his forces at D unbar.
The Prince approached the palace of Holyrood on foot, passing
along the Duke Walk (of which the trees alone remain now), so
named as the favourite promenade of his luckless and misguided
grandfather. Around him were his Leine Chrios his living shirt
of mail, or kilted body guard, composed of Highland veterans, each
one in his eightieth year, all selected as men who had fought at
Sheriffmuir and Glenshiel, in the revolts of thirty years before ; and
some were there who hsd shed their blood by the side of Dundee,
on the Bi-aes of Killycrankie. All those sturdy warriors marched
bareheaded on this occasion, their white locks mingling with their
silver beards, and all were armed with the terrible tuagh or Lochaber
axe, and in their garish and varied tartans and mountain equipment,
a wild and picturesque aspect they bore.
* Provost Stewart's Trial, &c.
THE WHITE COCKADE. 205
A vast crowd were iu the King's Park ; loud huzzas at times
burst forth, but generally the people were hushed into silence, and
BO deep were the emotions of many especially aged persons that
they knelt down and wept.
The Prince wore a Stuart tartan coat, on the breast of which
sparkled the order of the Thistle. lie had scarlet breeches and long
military boots ; a blue sash was over his shoulder, and he wore a
blue velvet bonnet, in which was the white satin cockade of his
party the white rose of York.
In the present age of cold mistrust and faithlessness, when poetry
(we fear) exists no longer, and when broad fun is studiously made
of everything, it is difficult to realize the deep and heart-felt fervour
with which many who were present viewed their prince the lineal
representative of ' Fergus, father of a hundred kings,' but many
sought to kiss his hands and to touch even his garments.
1 The figure and presence of Charles were not ill-suited to his
lofty pretensions,' says one who was present on this occasion. ' He
was in the prime of youth, the twenty-fifth year of his age, tall,
handsome, and of a fair complexion. He was about five feet ten
inches high. Charles stood some time in the park to shew himself
to the people, and then, though lie was very near the palace,
mounted his horse, either to render himself more conspicuous, or
because he rode well, and looked graceful on horseback.'
At the moment he approached the palace gate, a shot from the
castle struck the tower of James V., and dislodged some of the
masonry. This episode seemed so insulting to the heir of the
Stuarts when standing on the very threshold of their silent and de-
serted palace, that an angry groan a species of roar burst from
the crowd.
And now at that gate where none could precede, there was no
one to receive him, and the fair young prince paused and looked
around witli irresolution. The old Earl Marishal of Scotland, a
broken and attainted man, was far away in the Prussian camp ; the
hereditary keeper was in the ranks of the enemy ; the great cham-
berlain had been abolished, and there was no master of the house-
hold to act as usher now.
Then it was that old Sir Baldred Otterburn, of Auldhame, leaped
from his horse and drew his sword. Lifting his hat, he bowed low
and said,
' Permit me to conduct your Royal Highness to the state apart-
ments.'
Charles bowed gracefully and smiled at the quaint costume of
the old cavalier.
' When I was last in Holyrood, I was but a bairn, a page in
waiting on your royal grandfather, His Highness, the Duke of
Albany and York. Oh, welcome, young prince of the House of
Stuart, to the old regal home of your forefathers ; and truly do I
bless God that lie has spared me to see this day !'
206 THE WHITE COCKADE.
The aged baronet knelt to kiss the prince's hand, but emotion
overcame him, and covering his face with his hands, he let fall his
sword and wept. Many were moved by this sight, for the tears of
age are always sad and stirring.
At the city cross, the Scottish heralds proclaimed Charles 'Prince
of Wales and Duke of Rothesay, Regent of Scotland, England,
France, and Ireland, and of all the dominions thereunto belonging,'
amid great ceremony, while around it were Lochiel and his Came-
rons, with target and claymore, and a guard of noble ladies, all on
horseback, with drawn swords in their hands and white roses in
their hair ; and few among them attracted more attention than
Bryde Otterburn, who rode her favourite pad and showered from
her lap the white cockades among the crowd. The trumpets were
blown, and the people cheered and shouted ' God save the King !'
just as they had shouted and cheered the proclamation of the
Elector, as king of the same realms some thirty years before.
Save that her lover was on the Bass, Bryde was nightly in her
glory now, and leaning on Sir Baldred's arm, shone with great bril-
liance in the Prince's drawing-rooms, one evening at the Duchess of
Perth's rout, next at the Lady Elcho's dinner ; at Lady Strath-
allan'a tea-tables, or Lady Balmerino's gay card parties. (Poor
widowed Lady Balmerino ! Yesterday we stood by the green
mound that covers her grave in Restalrig, and thought sadly over
all that had been, and blessed our stars that we lived in less romantic
and happier times !)
Events progressed rapidly now.
Leith was wantonly bombarded by the 'Ludlow Castle,' and
somewhat savagely set on fire by Captain Beaver, of the ' Fox ' fri-
gate, but fourteen days afterwards, that unfortunate ship was cast
away in a gloomy November night on Tyninghame sands, when all
on board perished. The corpses of her crew covered all the links
of West-barns, where they are buried. Her wreck was long visible
at low water, and not very long ago, some masses of it, with cannon
balls and coils of rope, were cast by a tempest on the sands of
Belhaven.
On the 20th of September ensued the signal defeat of the entire
army of Sir John Cope at Prestonpans, by the half-armed and half-
clad Highlanders, who fought him under incredible disadvantages,
without cannon and without cavalry !
'Follow me, gentlemen,' cried the Prince, as he led them to the
charge, ' and by the assistance of God, I shall this day make you a
free and happy people !'
The Highlanders then pulled off their bonnets, says the ' Scots
Magazine' for that mouth; looked up to heaven, made a short
prayer, and rushed on ! In seven minutes, by the claymore alone,
they swept Cope's well-trained veterans from the field, in hopeless
confusion. Nearly all the infantry were either killed or taken, and
next day the Jacobites of Edinburgh were regaled bj the unusual
IDE WHITE COCKADE. 207
spectacle of the captured cannon, baggage, drums and military chest
(with six thousand sterling, in it), ' the standards of the 13th and
14th Dragoons, the 6th, 44th, 46th, 47th, and Laudon'a Eegiment,
together with fifteen hundred prisoners, eighty of whom were
officers,' who were marched through the streets, with one hundred
pipers in front, their instruments making the lofty stone mansions
of the venerable city literally shake, to the old air of
' The King shall enjoy bis ain again.'
One officer alone distinguished himself prominently on this ill-
fought field of battle. Colonel Gardiner, a sanctimonious zealot,
whom Doddridge's childish memoir has rendered almost ridiculous,
after his regiment, the 13th Light Dragoons, had fled, placed him-
self at the head of a corps of infantry, and fell, mortally wounded,
near the old thorn tree which still survives, and which, in more
primitive times, was traditionally a rallying tryste of the fairies,
and there he expired, within a few yards of his own fireside at
Bankton.
The Prince, the moment the battle was over, dispatched Sir John
Mitchell (who was wounded in the arm by a musket shot), to Edin-
burgh for all the surgeons he could collect, and he forbade all ring-
ing of bells and all demonstrations of joy for the victory, c as it had
been obtained by the effusion of blood, and had involved many un-
fortunate people in great calamity.'
Flinging away their standards, the Dragoons, who used their
spurs more than their sabres, alone escaped in safety from this san-
guinary field, and they halted first at North Berwick, where, under
threats of instant fire and sword, they demanded a ration per man
of food and beer, but they were speedily got rid of by the sagacity
of our former acquaintance, Bailie Balcraftie, who desired Star-
vieston, his clerk, to come running in by the west gate, shouting
that 'the Highlanders were at Gulane!'* on which alarming intel-
ligence the whole brigade, without waiting for bread or beer or
orders, wheeled off to the left by threes at full speed for Dunbar;
and in consequence of having saved some expense to the little
burgh by his tact, the Bailie (who eaid as the troopers departed
' true it is that the wicked fleeth, when no man pursueth') was
forthwith elected Provost, vice Douglas, his predecessor, who had
turned all he possessed into cash 'and joined the rebels.' As for
the valiant Sir John Cope, he never drew bridle till he was beyond
the Scottish borders and safe in England, from whence he never
took the field again.
After this unexpected victory the Prince's little army swelled to
some seven thousand men, the utmost strength it ever attained ; and
ten thousand more Highlanders would have joined, but for the
energy and influence of Duncan Forhess of Culloden, (Lord Presi-
dent of the College of Justice) which were exerted in a thankless
and merciless cause, as the sequel shewed.
* For this episode, see ' Lamp of Lothian.'
208 THE WHITE COCKADE.
CHAPTER XXXIX,
HOPE DAWNS ANEW.
' Struck with amaze, yet still to doubt inclin'd,
He stands suspended and explores his miud,
What shall I do ? Unhappy me ! who knows
But other Gods intend me other woes,
Whoe'er thou art I shall not blindly join
Thy pleaded reason, but consult with mine ;
For scarce in ken appears that distant Isle,
Thy voice fortels me shall conclude my toil.'
Odyssey, Book V.
THE reader may imagine the emotions with which Dalquharn, in
the solitude of his sea-girt prison, heard of this sudden, rapid, and
unexpected career of triumph, and that Charles Edward Stuart,
victorious and Prince Regent of Scotland, was actually holding his
state councils and military levees in the palace of Holyrood~ and
had there received M. de Boyer and the Marquis de Gruilles as am-
bassadors from the king of Trance, with whom ' the Elector of
Hanover' was at war !
It might be supposed that this wonderful turn of the wheel of
fortune, should have caused some change in the mode of treatment
to which Livingstone and Congalton subjected a prisoner whose
friends and cause were so manifestly in the ascendant j but the re-
verse was the case. Old Steinie Lockyett's sudden ebullition of
rebellious loyalty procured his expulsion from the island, and to the
care of a sullen and taciturn English corporal of Pudge's marines,
from whom he had nothing whatever to hope, and to whom the
stern performance of duty seemed a second nature, Lord Dalquharn
was now committed, with very strict orders indeed for his detention
and supervision.
If the power of the Prince was supreme in the adjacent shires,
as Dalquharn (who was ignorant of his strength and the number of
his army) nattered himself, he could not be left to linger in the
prisons of the Bass ; but then the Ludlow Castle and other frigates
of the ill-fated Admiral Byng's fleet, were cruising off the mouth of
the Forth, and in case of any attack, a signal from the summit of
the rock would soon bring them into the narrow strait between the
islet and the mainland.
The captivity of so valuable a follower as Lord Dalquharn was
brought before the Prince's council at Holyrood, by Sir John
Mitchell ; but the island was known by old experience to be im-
pregnable, and the matter stood over for a time, the blockade of
the castle of Edinburgh being the primary object of the Highland
army.
To an enthusiast, and one whose mind and temperament were
naturally stirring and active, to be kept lingering hopelessly in
prison, while battles were being fought and won, and when a Jaco-
bite army was in the field with the Prince at its head, was madden-
THE WHITE COCKADE. 209
ing ! At all hazards even that of death by drowning Dalquharn
resolved on an escape. He had resolved on that nearly three
months ago, and was further from it now than ever.
Often in the silence of the night, when finding sleep impossible,
he thought over all the celebrated escapes of which he had read or
heard ; and the result of his reflections was, that those afforded by
fortune, or unexpected chance, rather than by mature and deliberate
planning, were generally the most successful ; and also, that those
attended by violence and bloodshed, were seldom or never so.
Every night now, he was carefully locked up, after sunset, and
visited each morning by the corporal of the guard. A boat he knew
came with provisions from the shore every Saturday evening ; it was
usually manned by four seamen, and he conceived the idea, that if
he could quit his vault, he might pass himself off as one of those
men in the twilight, or make a rush through the three gates, which
were always open at that time for the admittance of the garrison
stores. In that case, he would have to risk the sentinel's fire, at
less than half-musket range ; but if he could reach the boat and se-
crete himself in her, among the empty casks and sacks with which
she usually returned, or if he could conceal himself under water, or
cling for a time to her keel, he might attempt to swim for the main-
land.
He knew that he was an expert and powerful swimmer, though
confinement had somewhat impaired his strength ; yet he was not
quite a Leander, and the sea, between the island and mainland, was
rougher than the Hellespont.
Something, he felt, must be done, or his brain would turn, and
death in any fashion was better than madness, or the sickening
misery of hope deferred, and being daily menaced with the danger
of a transference to England.
He examined the door which closed his vault ; it was composed
of double planks of solid oak, nearly six inches in thickness, and
studded with iron nails, the flat head of each being larger than a
crown piece. An iron lock of enormous size and strength, and
curious in its intricacy, secured it by two turns of the key, which
shot the steel bolt several inches into the massive stone wall ; so to
an unskilled hand, any hope of picking or removing it was hopeless,
even if he had the requisite tools for doing so.
This door hung upon two iron hooks, which were secured into the
stone wall with lead, and the hinges were two bars of iron, each
fastened by eight square-headed bolts, screwed into the oak. Escape
by that grim barrier seemed hopeless. Then his window was only
six inches broad, and overlooked the vast profundity of wall and
rock, and sea below.
His little fireplace was without a grate, and he could see the flue
ascending far above his head ; a little patch of blue sky at its sum-
mit, gave light eufficient to shew, that at every few feet, it was
14
210 THE WHITE COCKADE.
crossed by iron bars, which were built into the stoue wall, so that
scarcely a sparrow could hare escaped by that avenue.
Up there, however, he concealed the broad blue bonnet which his
warder had left on the floor, and which he thought might prove a
useful head dress, if he had to disguise himself. His beard had
grown to a length now, that excited his own surprise, and some-
times drew a smile from the taciturn corporal, for those were the
days of close shaven chins and flowing perriwigs.
A poker and pair of tongs, each secured by an iron chain to the
jambs of his fireplace, were there ; but the circumstance of their
being guarded thus, rendered them useless either as tools or wea-
pons. On every hand he was baffled ; Dalquharn was in despair,
and after a final examination, sat long with his aching head between
his hands, buried in a tumult of thought.
The vault he occupied had been without a tenant since the last
of the many ' inter-communed ' prisoners, who for conscience sake
had pined there, was liberated ; and this person, the latest of ' the
martyrs of the Bass,' was John Spreul, apothecary in Glasgow, who
was set free on the 12th of May, 1687, after five years of captivity
in that horrible place.
On examining the fire irons, Dalquharn perceived that the chain
which secured the poker to the jamb of the mantlepiece was old,
rusty and in some places decayed. A violent wrench caused it to
part, and he found the poker in his hand with one solitary link ad-
hering to it.
Here then, was a formidable weapon wherewith to beat down, or
disarm, the English corporal ; but Dalquharn's heart, even while
the fierce idea occurred to him, recoiled from the contemplation of
an attack on an unsuspecting man, though the latter never appeared
without a drawn bayonet in his hand.
To what use was this suddenly acquired implement to be turned?
It was fully thirty inches long, and though of great strength and
furnished with a ponderous iron knob, was useless against the gi-
gantic lock of his door. Long and anxiously he pondered over it
and surveyed them both j but at last there flashed upon his mind a
new idea!
He placed the link which adhered to the poker over one of the
square headed nails that secured the hinges of the door. It fitted
exactly, and thus he had a wrench with a leverage which the screws
completely failed to resist. The bolts were rusty, and ages must
have elapsed since they were fixed into the oak planks ; the latter
were decayed and worm-eaten now, for perhaps they were coeval
with the time when Walter, son of Murdoch, Duke of Albany,
tenanted that chamber in 1424, by order of James I., and now, with
every turn of this impromptu implement, Dalquharn drew the first
bolt forth at least an inch.
At last it fell at his feet ; his heart beat wildly and the drops of
perspiration started to his temples. At that time he was without
THE WHITE COCKADE. 2ll
dread of interruption ; breathlessly he resumed his task, and after
meeting with more or less resistance, in the course of half an hour,
he had removed four of the square-headed bolts from each hinge !
At this rate of progression, ere night-fall, the great barrier which
had so long secured him in his cell would be lying at his feet ; but
such speed would only mar the result to which he hopefuly looked
forward.
This occurred on the evening of a Thursday ; the boat by which
alone, he could expect ultimately to escape, would come unless a
storm intervened on Saturday evening. In less than three days
now he would be free free or sleeping among the sea weedy rocks
six hundred feet below !
' Fool that I have been, not to think of some such scheme ere
now !' he exclaimed ; ' I might have been free weeks ago ; I might
have shared in the glories of Preston, and been now the husband of
Bryde Otterburn !'
Enough had been done for one night, however. He replaced the
fire-iron in its place, where it usually stood unnot iced ; but, as no
precaution should be omitted, he contrived to adjust the chain so
that it seemed entire. The four iron bolts he had removed, he
concealed under the palliasse of his bed, and after night-fall, hurled
them, unseen into the sea.
Then a fear seized him that they might be missed, and that the
orifices in the hinges might attract the eye of the corporal, and a
eold tremor passed over him at the contemplation of transference
to a lower, darker and stronger vault, than that he now occupied ;
but his imagination was fertile, or it might be that misfortune and
suffering had sharpened it, for with the first ray of dawn he was up
and had prepared a species of paste, by kneading up the remains of
a candle with a piece of bread, and colouring it by the soot and
lime of his chimney, he made a composition not unlike the rusty
bolts ; and fashioning imitations of the square-heads, placed them
over the holes ! and so well were they done, that they might have
defied detection, unless subjected to a more minute inspection than
the marine corporal was likely to bestow upon them.
That evening four more of the bolts were removed, and quietly
dropped into the sea ; and now but four others, two in each hinge,
remained, and these he was compelled to leave untouched till the
last moment, lest the ponderous door might fall when his visitor,
the corporal, swung it to or fro ; and with intense anxiety now,
Daquharn examined the poker with its solitary link, which had
done him such good service ; for if its strength failed him, even in
the removal of the last bolt, his labour would have been in vain,
and his hoped-for enterprise, a failure !
The morning of Saturday dawned ; it was clear, but grey and
sombre. That was fortunate Dalquharn thought, and portended a
calm day, ensuring the arrival of the boat, and with a hopeful and
a prayerful heart, he looked at the fertile shore, that seemed to
142
312 THE WHITE COCKADE.
vibrate in the rays of the morning sun. When he had been first
brought to the Bass, the corn was waving in ripening ear in the
great square fields and on the sunny slopes of East Lothian. Sep-
tember had come ; and now the golden grain was all cut and housed,
and the country was covered by brown stubble. He had been
brought to the isle in mid-summer, and now the second month of
autumn was passing away.
There the black crows in great companies were wheeling aloft in
the welkin, or sousing down into some ferny hollow, where the
carcase of a dead sheep lay unknown to all save themselves ; the
many tints of autumn, russet, brown, and golden yellow, were ap-
pearing among the once brilliant green of the woods ; the leaves of
the ash trees were turning crimson, and those of the sturdy oaks
were growing crisp and brown, and ere long their pride would be
rustling in the cold November wind, as it swept along the upland
slope, to gather them under the hedgerows, or by the side of the
runnels that gurgled downward to the sea.
Dalquharn could scarcely take food during the whole of this ex-
citing day, but he felt intense thirst, and nearly drained the great
black leather jack of water, which the corporal brought filled every
morning for his use.
He spent the hours in watching the sky and shore, for he trem-
bled lest the former should overcloud, and the latter look dark and
nigh the precursors of a stormy evening ; but the air continued
inUd and soft, while a species of smoky haze floated in the hollows
of East Lothian, and the green hills of Traprain and North Berwick
stood out clear and sharply against the depth of blue beyond.
At an angle of the eastern ramparts a sentinel was leaning on his
musket. He was apparently immersed in thought, for that island
solitude seemed conducive alike to taciturnity and reflection. He
was one of the Foot Guards, who, when on duty there, usually wore
plain Lowland bonnets in lieu of the sugar-loafed grenadier caps,
in which they appeared elsewhere. He hummed a song at times,
and a verse of it came floating upward on the breeze to Dalquharn's
' The morn-wind is sweet 'raang the beds o' new flowers,
The wee birds sing kindlie on hie,
Our gude man leans owre his kailyard dyke,
And a blythe auld bodie is he.
The Book maun be ta'en, when the carle comes hama
Wi' his holie psalmodie ;
And thou maun speak to me of our God, Jeanle,
And I will speak to thee 1'
The soldier was doubtless a native of Galloway, for this was a
scrap of a sweet, sad, old Covenanter's song, peculiar to that pro-
vince, and in thought at that moment his mind, perhaps, was far,
far away from the isle where he sojourned, among the wilds of Glen-
kens, or by the black pouring linns of the Dee. Dalquharn, who
THE WHITE COCKADE. 213
was a native of the same wild country for there lay his forfeited
estates felt his heart stirred within him, and he was superstitious
enough at the time to take the song for an omen of good success.
CHAPTER XL.
THE ATTEMPT.
' Where's then the sancy boat,
VThose weak untimbered sides but even now
Co-rivalled greatness? either to harbour fleJ,
Or made a toast for Neptune. Even so
Doth valour's shew and valour's worth divide
In storms of fortune.' Troilus and Cressida.
SLOWLY passed away the hours of that eventful day, and the mind
of Dalquharn was in such a fever of impatience, that time seemed
to stand still like the old palace clock at Versailles, that had no
mechanism, and only one hand, which was placed at the precise
moment of the death of the last king, and moved not during the
whole reign of his successor.
At last evening drew near, the sun was sinking behind the great
green cone of North Berwick, throwing the purple shadow of the
Bass for miles along a sea that was crimsoned by his rays. Dark
and stern, in sombre masses, the towers and cliffs of Tautallan rose
above the deep.
Ere long the last ruddy rays were lingering on the distant Lam-
mermuirs, and so intently was Dalquharn, from his little window,
watching the approach of evening, that he was all unaware of the
taciturn corporal having paid his farewell visit, bayonet in hand as
usual, and of his having doubly locked the door for the night, until
he heard his departing steps in the paved corridor without.
Then instantly the prisoner, with an audible prayer on his lips,
set about his ultimate preparations. Incoherent and unintelligible,
it was nevertheless a heartfelt prayer which he uttered, and there
was an Ear above that heard and recorded it all.
With a small pair of scissors he clipped close off, the long and
somewhat remarkable beard which he had cultivated and worn for
the last three months ; he then grimed his chin and eyebrows well,
and, as a further disguise, untied his hair, and, in the country
fashion, let it float over his shoulders, from under the flat, round,
blue bonnet, which he drew from its place of concealment. Even
Bryde would not have known him then, so thoroughly was he meta-
morphosed !
With the slender contents of his cloak-bag, he made some judi-
cious alterations in his costume ; and, as the boatmen usually car-
ried the provisions into the garrison without their coats, he resolved
to make his fiual essay in his vest and shirt sleeves.
214 THE WHITE COCKADE.
He eoon removed the four final bolts, and once more addressed
himself to the window to listen. His heart was beating wildly
now!
What, if by some strange chance or evil destiny, the boat failed
to come on this momentous night ? What, if on the way to it, as
was likely enough, he should meet his custodier, the corporal, or
Congalton, or Livingstone, or any soldier who might recognise him ?
He ground his teeth at the idea, and grasped his iron weapon omi-
nously.
Suddenly his quickened ear detected a familiar sound that sent
the life-blood coursing through his veins, and then back into his
heart it was the measured cadence of oars in the rowlocks ; then
he heai-d a shout a voice hailing from the sea, and another re-
sponding from the walls. Anon, amid the chafing of the surge,
he thought he could detect far down below the jarring of the boat
and its side fenders, at the rocky landing-place, but that was merely
the effect of fancy.
The hour yea, the moment had come, when all was to be ven-
tured and won, or all for ever lost !
Luckily for him the sun was completely set now. He knew that
some time must inevitably elapse before the various baskets, casks,
and sacks of provender for the garrison were borne in and emptied;
but the fever of his impatience was too great to be resisted, and at
this critical moment, at the risk of spoiling all, and casting hia
chances for ever away, he lifted the massive door out of its place,
and issued into the corridor, at the end of which there was, he knew,
another barrier, that opened at once upon the steep stair, which de-
scends through the centre of the fortress, directly eastward, under
the porcullis and the three gates that lead towards the sea.
Alas ! this door could be opened only from the outside, where it
was secured by an iron bolt.
His heart died within him, and a cold perspiration suffused his
forehead, while he seemed to live a lifetime in the agony of a mo-
ment. A rapid glance sufficed to show him that it hung upon two
hooks, as the doors in old Scottish castles generally do, and that the
wood work fitted loosely into the stone. Aided by his friendly
lever, even while he could hear the laboured breath and heavy feet
of the laden boatmen and soldiers passing with their stores into
the upper portion of the fortress, where the barracks are, he pro-
ceeded to unhinge the door, by lifting it upward off the hooks, and,
at a third or fourth desperate effort, succeeded in throwing it open ;
then he issued forth !
As, from past experience, he already anticipated, the gates and
the way to the sea stood open ; but close by the inner barrier and
portcullis, was a marine sentinel with his bayonet fixed and musket
shouldered. He was looking outward, with his back towards the
fugitive, who, mechanically, and like one in a dream, approached
him. Dalquharn had sufficient presence of mind, however, to
THE WHITE COCKADE. 215
throw over his shoulder two or three empty sacks that lay in the
way, and to take on his arm a large, empty basket-
In another moment he had passed the outer gate unchallenged ; he
was fairly out of the abhorred castle of the Bass, and descending
the sloping plateau of rock towards the fissure where the boat was
moored.
' Heyday hollo, you sir !' cried a marine from the gate he had
just quitted.
Dalquharn turned and saw the speaker trundling a beer-barrel
after him.
' Ahoy take this with you,' he added, but Dalquharn hastened
on, heedless that the other anathematized him as ' a lazy Scotch
lubber,' for ' English ' and ' Scotch ' were somewhat injurious epi-
thets in those days, and continued to be so for long after.
Dalquharn's first idea, on leaping into the boat, was to conceal
himself under some of the empty lumber which had already been
cast into it. As yet, none of the rowers were there, but he knew
that they would soon come ; and as for perching himself on a ledge
of rock until the night deepened, that was physically impossible,
as the sides of the Bass are everywhere as slippery as those of an
iceberg, and descend straight as a plumb-line into the sea, where
they do not impend.
The united shout of many voices, and the appearance of many
faces looking eagerly through the embrasures of the ramparts in
the twilight, announced to Dalquharu that his escape had been dis-
covered already !
There was not a moment to be lost, though the boat was large
and almost beyond one man's management ; despair endued the
fugitive with double his usual strength, and he cast loose the
painter, and shoved off from that perilous shore, escaping two
musket-shots that were fired at him by the sentinels at each end of
the walls.
A number of soldiers now, Foot Guardsmen and Marines, came
rushing noisily down the rocky ledges to the landing-place, while
on the gun-platform appeared three figures, whom he knew to be
the tyrannical Livingstone, the sneering Congalton and the corpu-
lent little Lieutenant Pudge, who were gesticulating violently and
somewhat barbarously providing themselves with muskets.
Sculling with all his strength from a rowlock in the stern, and
skilfully forcing the oar alternately from side to side, reversing the
blade at each turn, so as to give a motion like that of a fish's tail
an art he had learned when boating on his native Dee Lord Dal-
quharn contrived to get this heavy craft heavy at least for a single
hand to the westward of the castle and so out of the line of any
cannon or musketry they could bring to bear upon him, as the walls
almost entirely face the strait towards Tantallan ; but the tide was
ebbing, and he found to his agony, that he struggled iu vain against
216 THE "WHITE COCKADE.
it. The wind was from the westward, and thus, despite his painful
efforts, the boat was drifted fast towards the fatal Bass.
Three twenty-four pounders belclied forth their flame and smoke,
the noise of their explosion scaring thousands of gulls and gannets
into mid-air, while their triple roar, as it pealed away into distance,
together with the clanging of the great bell of the castle, and the
burning of some blue lights, which shed their unearthly glare from,
the red, old time-worn walls, upon the slimy cliffs and seething
water, with a weird, ghastly and singular effect, announced that a
prisoner had escaped from the Bass, and would, consequently, put
all the people along the shore on the alert to gain, perhaps, the
reward for his recapture.
In a few minutes more, Dalquharn felt all his strength depart
from him, and he sank despairingly on the stern thwarts of the
boat, which was now driven with considerable violence upon the
western side of the cliffs, against which the wind was rolling the
ebb-tide in a high and dangerous surf.
By this time, the great boat of the garrison had been lowered
from the powerful iron crane, and Congalton, with several soldiers
and marines, with loaded arms, had pulled away in pursuit.
Darkness had come on, and the moon had not yet risen ; but they
could see that the fugitive's boat was not, as they supposed, being
sculled towards the shore. Where then was it ? Erelong, they
could discern something tossing about in the white surf, close under
the cliffs on the north-west side of the island, and it proved to be
the boat of Dalquharn, capsized and floating keel uppermost. Near
it in the water were a man's bonnet and some empty baskets.
"Poor devil!" said a soldier, with something of commiseration
in his tone ; " it must be all over with him now.'
" Well zounds ! the sea hath cheated the headsman," was the
coarse response of Congalton j " about with the boat, and pull in
for the landing-place !'
CHAPTER XLI.
THE WABEANT.
'Now your father's doom
Is fixed irrevocably fixed. This night
Thou shalt behold him, while inventive cruelty
Pursues his maimed life through every nerve 1
I scorn all dull delay. This very night
Shall sate my great revenge !' The Grecian's Daughter.
BAXOIHPTIE, whose wadsets over some of the lands of Auldhame,
gave him great interest in the property, and an influence over the
dwellers thereon, learned from some of the latter, that Sir Baldred,
on a certain day, was to return from Holyrood, of which he had
\ jr.
THE WHITE COCKADE. 217
been appointed Lord Keeper by the Prince, since that time when,
in absence of all officials, he had taken upon him the function of
usher. He had now thrown off all the slight disguise he ever
assumed, and had publicly cast his lot with the fallen dynasty, just
as he would have done thirty years before, but for that lucky acci-
dent in hunting, which saved, perhaps, his life, and, no doubt, his
family estates from the ruin and confiscation which fell upon all
who joined the Earl of Mar in 1715.
The knowledge that he was about to return, made Balcraftie at
once conceive one of his daring and dastardly schemes, and he re-
solved that never more should the old baronet cross the threshold
of Auldhame, if he could prevent it.
The Scottish officers of state (almost invariably ministerial tools
and corrupt and venal placemen), the judges of courts, and other
officials, had all fled to England, on the advance of the Highlanders
to Edinburgh ; so Provost Balcraftie procured from the Lord Ad-
vocate, who was then concealed at Berwick, a warrant for the appre-
hension (and conveyance to that place, or to the castle at Carlisle)
of Sir Baldred Otterburn, a traitor and rebel in arms; for though
a chief magistrate and justice of the peace for the constabulary of
Haddington, Eeuben Balcraftie was far too cunning, with his ulterior
views, to put his own name to this document, with which his
staunch henchman, the lean and lanky Jabez Starvieston, returned
by the waggon from Berwick on that very evening, when, ignorant
of all the terrible events that were transpiring at the Bass, it was
arranged by the Prince, that Sir Baldred was to demand the release
of Lord Dalquharn from that place, under a flag of truce, and to
threaten, in the king's name, if he was still detained, that military
execution would be done upon the estates of Saltcoates and Con-
galton, in Lothian.
Balcraftie had made up his mind that, as the reward of his loyalty,
the Lord Advocate would appoint him a species of commissioner or
judicial factor over the Auldhame property, by which means he
would yet have Bryde Otterburn more completely at his mercy ;
and once in temporary possession, he would proceed to " displenish"
the lands, and turn all movable stock and other property, plate, pic-
tures, and so forth, into cash, lest, by a turn in the tide of events,
he might be deprived of all but his precious wadsets ; and if the
Prince proved in the end victorious, he might be shorn even of these,
and all he possessed in the world !
The vault in Tantallan was no longer of use since the discovery
of the passage thereto, and the fatal deatli of Gage, so his seafaring
friends had to find other places of concealment along the shore,
and there is no lack of such in that district. That it should have
remained so long undiscovered by the officers of the customs is not
surprising, when we know that so lately as about the year 1810, the
keep of that great ruin was the resort of a gang of desperate robbers,
headed by an. old Bailor, who had been wrecked on the Fidra, a
213 THE WHITE COCKADE.
rocky islet that lies in the Forth, four miles distant from the Basa.
For a long space of time, larders and roosts were emptied and sheep
carried off; people were attacked and robbed on the highways ; the
manor houses of Seacliff and Scougal, and the home farm of Auld-
hame, were broken into and plundered, none knew by whom.
Mysterious lights were seen from the seaward, to glitter high up in
the ruined castle, exciting the astonishment and fear of the fisher-
men when sailing up the river at night; for there, in the fourth
story of the Douglasse's stronghold, the gang lurked in security,
ascending and descending by a rope ladder, which was drawn up
to their den by day, thus cutting off all communication with the
world below. These lights proved the source of a discovery ; the
robbers were captured and banished from Scotland.
To make more secure of Sir Baldred's capture, and prevent any
rescue by his tenantry, Balcraftie applied for and obtained a subal-
tern's party of La Roque's Dutch Regiment from Berwick ; for, at
this time, all King George's troops in Scotland were shut up in the
Highland forts, in the four great castles of the Lowlands, or were
prisoners in the hands of Charles Edward.
Eighty infantry officers of various ranks, taken in the late battle,
he liberated on their parole of honour within the walls of Edinburgh.
Towards the end of September, he sent them all to Perth, and
marched the non-commissioned officers and privates to Logierait, in
Athole. Many of Laudon's Highlanders enlisted in his army ; but
eighty who declined to do so, got money to take them home, after
swearing that never again would they bear arms against the House
of Stuart.
Nothing was spoken of now but the projected advance into Eng-
land, and a proclamation was issued, warning all farmers within five
miles of the capital, that their horses would be required to convey
the baggage and cannon of the army towards the English border ;
and this movement was to be made, fearless of the forces that were
gathering in the south, and of those that were coming from abroad.
Three battalions of guards, and seven of the line, were recalled from
Flanders, and six thousand Dutch troops, who had been in garrison
at Tournay and Dendermonde, landed in England. Taken by ex-
press capitulation, ' that they should not perform any military func-
tion before the first day of January, 1747,' their appearance in Eng-
land was a violation of the law of arms, but that was a trifle of the
Ministry of George II. ; and well might Prince Charles say in his
proclamation, ' When I hear of Dutch, Danes, Hessians and Swiss,
the Elector of Hanover's allies, being called over to protect his
government, is it not high time for the King, my father, to accept
the assistance of those who are able, and have engaged to support
him?'
Meanwhile, the Lords Elcho and Balmerino, with Sir John Mit-
chell and others, were making rapid progress in the formation of
the corps of Life Guards, and four troops of about fifty men each,
Till: WHITE COCKADE. 219
were enrolled, clothed, and mounted. They joined the camp of the
Prince's troops at Duddingstone, where the white tents covered all
the green slope of Arthur's Seat, to the northward of the old church
of that beautiful little Tillage.
Lord Elcho commanded the first troop. ' Their uniform,' says the
' Caledonian Mercury,' (the Prince's organ), of the 30th September,
' is blue, trimmed with red and laced waistcoats. They are to con-
sist of four squadrons of gentlemen of character.'
' The pay of those devoted gentlemen was only sixpence per diem.
To each on enlisting, was given a shilling, having on the obverse,
' Jacobus VIII., Dei Gratise,' and on the reverse, ' Scot. Ang. Era.
et Hib. Eex. 1716,' a coin that sells for thirty times its original
value now.
In the fond hope that his friend Dalquharn (whose presence, as a
kinsman of Viscount Kenmure, and of the Earl of Dumbarton,
would have great influence at the Prince's court,) should yet be free,
the good Sir John Mitchell was content, as yet, with a very subor-
dinate rank in these Life Guards. The residence of Bryde Otter-
burn at the little court now formed at Holyrood, shed a bright ray
of light over it in his admiring eyes, and when she went abroad,
unattended by Sir Baldred, whom a life of gaiety wearied and ' wor-
ried,' Mitchell had the glory of being her cavalier ; and for his cap-
tive friend's sake he watched over her with the love of father, brother,
and lover, mingled in one ; and for her he would freely have shed
his heart's blood, this gallant and single-hearted gentleman.
In Holyrood, Bryde, to her intense satisfaction, occupied apart-
ments (in the nortli wing), which was used of old by Queen Mary,
whom, with a pardonable weakness, she imagined she resembled, as
nearly every pretty girl in Scotland fancies she does at the present
hour.
Happily, all unaware of the horrors that her lover was about to
encounter, Bryde, on the same evening, was shining as the centre of
attraction at a drum in Lady Balmerino's house at Leith, which was
a great rendezvous for the Jacobite chiefs and officers, as she was as
celebrated for her beauty and winning manner, as her husband was
for his hospitable table and merry conviviality.
After leaving ' my lady's drum,' an hour or two before Dalqxiharn
achieved his escape if escape it was from the prisons of the Bass,
Sir Baldred, accompanied by Bryde, mounted, and attended by one
armed serving man, left Edinburgh by the Watergate and suburban,
village called the Abbeyhill for Auldhame. At the same time
fifteen soldiers of La Eoque's regiment, wearing the yellow Dutch
uniform, arrived at North Berwick by a covered waggon, under the
command of Sub-Lieutenant La Eoque, the Count's son, and were
quartered in the Tol booth by Balcraftie, who had his spies on the
road, and knew well the time when, and the place where, to pounce
upon his victim.
The plans of this enterprising genius were worthy of those he
220 THE WHITE COCKADE.
sprung from ! The antecedents of his parents were detestable. His
father, the torturer of the Privy Council, who last applied c the
question ' in Scotland to Neville Payne, an Englishman, under a
special warrant from the merciful and pious King William, for his
services on that occasion, and the skilful manner in which he crushed
the limbs of that unhappy gentleman, was promoted to be gudeman,
or keeper, of the Tolbooth at North Berwick ; and therein Reuben
Ealcraftie was born his mother being a condemned gipsy, who, like
the guillotined woman in the repulsive romance of Jules Janin, by
an intrigue with her jailor, contrived to add a few months to her
horrible life ; and of all the bargains she ever concluded this was
the most terrible !
'A baron's coronet frae King James !' muttered Balcraftie, allud-
ing, in his reverie, to a rumour that Sir Baldred would be created
Lord Auldhame. ' Let his skull, then, wear it on the towers o*
Carlisle ! Many an affront hath that auld dyvour put upon me ;
and many that proud minx Miss Bryde too ; but ere morning she
shall be in my power hard and fast hard and fast even as her
leman is, on yonder rock, the Bass! Lord Auldhame, forsooth!
a dour and haughty carle who always received me booted and
spurred, as a hint that he was about to take horse, and wished our
interview to be as short as possible. Noo, he has to take horse fox*
Carlisle yetts ha, ha ! ha, ha !'
After sunset the Provost gave the officer of the Dutch soldiers the
warrant, and, accompanied by them, issued from the town to beset
the highway ; but, as they marched past the castle of Dirlton, the
booming of the cannon was heard from the Bass, and on looking
back they saw the sparkling rockets ascending, and the ghastly blue-
lights flaring on the prison walls.
Balcraftie was puzzled what to think of this. No captive had ever
achieved an escape from there, so that idea never occurred to him.
He thought that some party of the Prince's people had assailed the
isle by sea, and if so, he knew that by the four years' defence of
that formidable castle after the Revolution of 1688, it was com-
pletely impregnable, and could be taken from the clouds of heaven
alone. J
Whatever happened his foe was in safe custody.
The Dutchmen marched for some four Scottish miles or so along
the road, yet met no one answering the description of those they
sought ; and when perfect darkness had set in, they were on the
confines of Luffness Muir.
'Strange, unco strange, that it should be on this place!" muttered
Balcraftie, with something of a ahudder, as he glanced fearfully
round him ; for there it was, some eight years ago, that Sir Bal-
dred's only son and heir Bryde's father had fallen by a pistol-
shot, fired through the back of his head.
Lieutenant Ckude La Roque now halted his men, and made
them fix their bayonets, and prime and load, with ball-cartridge.
THE WHITE COCKADE. 22i
CHAPTER XLIL
ON 1UKFNESS MUIB.
'Fii' aughty f-iiumer shoots
0' the forest ha'e I seen,
To the saddle-laps in blutd
I' the battle ha'e I been ;
But I never kenned o' dale
Till I kenned it yestreen
0, that I were layed
Whar' the sods are growing green !'
Lament for Lord Maxwell.
SIB BALDBED rode a strong, clean-limbed old hunter, that had
carried him many a mile over moss and fell after the foxes of the
Lainuierimiirs ; he had his sword, and in his holsters a pair of long
pistols. His servant, Archie Birniebousle, a son of the old butler,
was similarly mounted and armed, but had in addition a musketoon
slung across his back, for he was a private in the Life Guards.
Bryde, with her pretty face masked, a pleasant protection from
the chill wind that came whistling from the seaward, rode her own
cherished pad by his side, and night had thoroughly set in when
they crossed the Esk and passed rapidly through the old woods of
Pinkeycleugh and the scene of the recent battle.
Bryde looked at it with a little shiver, and rode beside her grand-
father in silence ; for many a grave lay there. He was silent too,
for both were full of their own thoughts ; but had Bryde guessed
for a year and a day, she would never have discovered what was
passing in the busy brain of old Sir Baldred.
Appointed Lord Keeper of the Palace of Holyrood, and finding
himself high in favour with the winning young PRnce (who, as
"Regent, had bestowed upon him the Grand Cross of the Bath), he
had beheld with suddenly-awakened emotions of pride and ambi-
tion how much that ill-fated heir of Britain had distinguished Bryde
at all his drawing-rooms, his reviews in the King's Park, and his
levees in the Palace, and how he seemed to prefer her as a partner
in the dance, beyond even the Duchesses of Gordon and Perth, and
all the titled dames (and there were many proud and jealous too)
who thronged his hastily collected court.
What if the Prince loved Bryde, and should marry her ? What
if he, the Laird of Auldhame bothered by wadsets, bad rents, and
the cattle plague should become the father of a line of kings, far
stretching into futurity, like Banquo's issue, and some with ' two-
fold balls and treble sceptres ?' Had not such alliances with sub-
jects been common in Scotland long before a stranger sat upon her
throne, who ruled her with hot hate, and spoke the German
tongue ?
Was not the mother of Malcolm Caninore the wife of ' the
222 THE WHITE COCKADE.
gracious Duncan,' but the daughter of a miller at Fortevoit, as old
Andro Wynton tells us ? Then there was David I., who wedded
the daughter of his liegeman and subject the Earl of Northumber-
land and Huntingdon ; for Scotland in those old times was some-
times bordered by the Tyne and sometimes by the Humber. Er-
mengarde de Beaumont, the queen of William the Lion, was but
an earl's daughter ; and the queen of the second Alexander was
but a child of the Count de Couci. True ; but before that marriage
she had been Queen of Jerusalem. The victor of Bannockburn
wedded a daughter of the Earl of Ulster ; and the second David,
a daughter of Sir John Logic of that ilk the hapless Lady Jean
who died of a broken heart in a foreign land, but no man knows
where ! Robert II. wedded a daughter of the Earl of Ross : and
Robert III. wedded Annabella Drummond of Stobhall ; for all those
Scottish kings, so true to their country in the times of old, were of
the people's blood, and proud of their Celtic name and royal clan.
' Oh, 'tis plain plain as a pikestaff!' exclaimed the old man,
like Alnaschar lost in a realm of brilliant dreams, amid which he
forgot, for the time, all about poor Lord Dalquharn in the prisons
of the Bass.
' What is plain as a pikestaff, grandfather dear ?' asked Bryde,
surprised by the sudden exclamation.
The old man chuckled and said,
' In time you may know, sweet one ; but not now not now.'
' I wish the way were plainer at all events 'tis very dark,' said
she.
' A little time and the moon will rise j but keep a firm hand on
your horse's bridle, darling, and shorten the reins, for the road is
rough and full of deep ruts ; and these Longniddery woods are dark
and eerie.'
Bryde rode*on cheerfully, and all unaware of the triple crown
her doting grandfather was fashioning for her. With the success
of the Prince's cause, she now fully linked the rescue of her lover
from the Bass ; his restoration to title, estate and position, and
more than all; to her sweet little self ! Ah, how much she must
love him for all he had dared and endured ! As for the reptile
Balcraftie, with whom the world was yet prospering, his punish-
ment, she had resolved, would come anon ; but at present it was
almost a minor consideration.
' If that happen whilk I hope for, lassie,' said Sir Baldred, still
pursuing his own train of thought, ' who can say, but for past faith
and loyalty, I may be created Lord Auldhame and Viscount Otter-
burn of Seacliff who knows who knows ? More unlikely ships
have come to land !'
While he indulged in these dreams, it must be borne in mind,
that the worthy Baronet knew notlu'ng positively, of the engagement
between Lord Dalquharn and his grand-daughter, though he often
suspected some such matter was on the tapis j for his visitor had
*HE WHITE COCKADE. 2^3
been, by circumstances, prevented from informing him of the actual
state of matters ; thus Sir Baldred was at full liberty to count over
the old royal alliances on his fingers, and to revel in the most
flattering visions his ambition inspired, or his fancy suggested.
Rapidly they traversed the woods of Gosford, and saw on their
left, the stars reflected in the Bay of Aberlady ; and erelong they
spurred their horses harder to pass speedily the fragments of a
ruined house, to which local superstition gave an evil name ; for
there in the days of the Reformation, dwelt a wicked Laird, who
came into the world with both hands clenched, and with an entire
set of teeth, from which John Knox, (the future Reformer) when
baptising him at the font, predicted that he would be a cruel and
bloody man. And so it proved : for when the storm burst forth in
1555, and the temporalities were torn from the church, he it was
who slew a Carmelite of Aberlady, rifled the church, made a posset
cup of the chalice, and cut himself doublets and trunk hose out of
the rich taffeta altar cloths ; who gave feasts in Lent, and held a
high fete on Good Friday ; but who, as he rode forth in his bravery,
on the Saturday following, deriding a tempest of lightning and
wind, which was dashing many a ship upon the shore, was struck
dead from his saddle, on Luffness Muir by a storm-bolt, or meteoric
stone, which fell from heaven !
His house was haunted by his unquiet spirit, and was abandoned
by his heir, who flung the keys thereof into the Kelpies Pool in the
Peffer, where they were long seen to glitter among the pebbles, and
are yet sometimes visible on the anniversary of his doom : so his
lands passed to grim old Sir Alexander Hamilton, General of the
Swedish artillery, who built thereby, the now ruined fortalice of the
Redhouse.
So as Bryde and her two companions thought of those old tales,
they pushed on all the quicker, and soon saw before*them the waste
of Luffness Muir.
The family which Sir Baldred respected most in the world, was
the House of Stuart, and next to that, his own, which he was wont
to aver, possessed Auldhame before the Stuarts succeeded the
Bruces on the throne. He was prouder too of his baronetcy than
any man of similar rank would be in these days. M. Ferre de St.
Constant, in 1814, stigmatised the new peers of Britain, as mere
nabobs, merchants, and bankers, whose servility had bought their
titles, ' and who, instead of shedding their blood for the state, have
sucked up its marrow ; so,' he adds, ' the title of baronet, which
was formerly confined to the performers of military exploits, is now
given to army agents, contractors, and shopkeepers.'
But it was not so in the days of our last civil war ; thus as he
rode on, Sir Baldred thought of his old ancestral estate, and felt all
the satisfaction of being the owner of green hills and waving woods,
of farm and field, of teeming loch and flowing river, of lowing herds
and woolly flocks. Every man must feel this pleasure, though he
224 THE WHITE COCKADE.
became the lord of all these only yesterday ; but with Sir Baldred,
to be Otterburn of Auldhame, brought all the past, historic, tradi-
tionary, feudal and family memories of long, long remembered
years. Few in the constabulary of Haddington could say when
there was not an Otterburn of Auldhame ; and the fancied glory of
his race seemed to the fine old Laird, to be but a ray of the sturdy
old Scottish glory of other years.
He knew that his family shield was without a stain of political
dishonour, and few men in Scotland can make such a boast to-day.
Through long, long years of war with England war that knew no
peace save a short and ill-kept truce his people had been loyal
a la morte to their native kings, whose last representative he had
left in Holyrood ; and though the Prince was but a lad, and he an
aged man, he had knelt and prayed God to bless him, with all the
patriarchal loyalty and fervour of a Scottish gentleman of those
stormy days when men's hands were hardened, less by the use of
the hammer and spade, than by the hilt of the sword. And so in
the enthusiasm, of the moment he began, in a voice that was some-
what cracked and quavering, to sing the Royal Archers' march ; for
those same archers were in secret, but a society of Jacobites whose
loyalty was never so fervid, as when over the punch-bowl.
' 'Tis now tlie Archers Royal,
A hearty band and loyal,
A hearty band and loyal,
That in just thoughts agree;
Appear in ancient bravery,
Despising all whig knavery,
Which brings to foreign slavery,
Souls worthy to live free !'
But now Bryde reminded him that they were traversing Luffness
Muir, a place s.aid to be of ill-omen to his family in ancient times ;
there in 1715, he had broken a leg when hunting, and there his
only son had fallen by the hand of a robber and assassin !
Though all cultivated now, the muirland waste was then open
and bare, yielding only rushy grass and whin bushes, a wild and
desolate place, where in his young days he had been wont to hunt
and bring down, by a single bullet, many a five and twenty pound
bustard ; for these links (or downs) were then a favourite haunt of
those birds, the largest and most shy of all the Scottish land fowl.
' Sir Baldred,' cried his servant, suddenly uuslinging his muske-
toon, ' gang warily if it please you armed men are on the muir.'
' Armed men, say you, Archie ?'
' Yes, sir.'
Where ?'
* Just in front.'
At that moment something like a summons a loud exclamation,
was heard ; and in a foreign language apparently.
' Speak again who are you ?' cried Sir Baldred reining up, and
drawing his sword, adding, ' keep behind me, Bryde, darling,' as he
THE WHITE COCKADE. 225
now saw seTeral figures before him, but dimly and uncertainly, in
the starlight.
' Halt wer da ?' (who goes there) demanded a voice, as a num-
ber of soldiers came suddenly round in extended order, and in the
form of a semi-circle, with their bayonets at the charge.
A slight scream escaped Bryde's lips on seeing this array.
' Rendre monsieur surrender ?' said a voice in imperfect Eng-
lish. It was Lieutenant la Eoqus who spoke.
' Surrender 'Sdeath and the devil in the name of whom ?'
' In the name of Robert Craigie, of Glendoick, Lord Advocate of
Scotland,' said a person, coming forward.
' Surely I should know that voice," said Bryde.
'Weel, you may, Miss Otterburn 'tis I, Provost Balcraftie,
come thither, by force o' stern duty, on a most sorrowfu" errand ;
but anxious to save your venerated kinsman, my gude friend, Sir
Baldred, from receiving harm at the foreigner's hands.'
'Oh,' moaned Bryde, in sudden horror and anguish ; ' wretch
is it you ?'
' I am to surrender in the name of Glendoick ! ' muttered Sir
Baldred ; ' the skulking Perthshire land-louper ! I would he were
here, within range of my pistols, instead of being in safe hiding on
the English border, like a Hanoverian rebel as he is! And thou
too, Balcraftie villain and murderer of my son art come on his
foul errand ?'
' Tak' back your injurious words, Sir Baldred,' whined the other ;
' I'm your friend Reuben Balcraftie, Provost and Elder o' North
Berwick, praised bo heaven for its mercies.'
' Wretch dare you speak of friendship to me ?' exclaimed Sir
Baldred, firing a pistol at Balcraftie, so suddenly that the earthly
career of our enterprising magistrate was nearly ended. As the
shot whistled through the fore-cock of his beaver, it elicited a half-
stifled shriek from Bryde, and something very like a malediction
from Balcraftie.
'My hand hath lost its cunning,' said Sir Baldred ; 'but I hope
to see you hung by the neck yet in the face of the royal host.'
'A royal host ! ca' ye that rabble rout o' Highland mohocks, at
Duddingstone, a royal host ?' said Balcraftie, whose rage or fear
now got the better of his usual discretion. 'A rieving gang o'
backsliders, tainted either wi' Popish, Pelagian, Arminian, or
Socinian heresies, or steeped to the lips in utter Paganism, and a'
whomling doon the slippery brae that leadeth to the flames o' perdi-
tion ; kirk-ruining, zeal-quenching upholders o' the false and per-
jured House of Stuart a race doomed, even as the prophets o' the
Covenant hae foretold, like brands to the burning ?'
1 Foul kite,' exclaimed Sir Baldred, choking with rage, as he
sought to spur his horse over the speaker, and tread him under
foot ; ' hypocrite inayst thou be accursed !'
' Thy maledictions may end, Sir Baldred, even like Sbimei's cur-
15
226 THE -WHITE COCKADE.
sing of David,' said the Provost, suddenly, becoming gentle, as lie
remembered his habitual bearing of pretended suavity and meek
Christian humility.
Sir Baldred was past his seventieth year, yet he disdained to
yield without fighting, even as he would have done in his rash boy-
hood, when King Charles was on the throne. He shortened his
reins, and made a furious and sweeping horizontal blow at the
charged bayonets ; but Lieutenant La Koque, by a circular parry
in reply to a thrust, wrenched away the old man's rapier, which
flew from his hand into the air. He was also deprived of his
pistols, and made prisoner, somewhat ignominiously too, for his
feet were instantly secured by a rope to his horse's girths.
' Bide, Archie,' cried he to his servant, ' away to the camp at
Duddinstone, and tell Sir John Mitchell the evil that hath befallen
us.'
' Harm him not, I pray you, good gentlemen ; harm him not
he is very old !' said Bryde, to the stolid and, we are sorry to say
it, somewhat brutal Dutch soldiers, who at once plundered their
captive of purse, watch, and rings, and who did not understand a
word she uttered ; but La Eoque did, and he said, while politely
lifting his hat, for he was a Frenchman,
' Fear nothing, mademoiselle, and you may accompany him, if
you please."
' Thank you, sir, oh, thank you ; but to where ?'
' Le chateau le chatelet de de parbleu I have forgotten,'
stammered the young Frenchman.
' The castle o' Carlisle,' said Balcraftie, through his teeth, while
his cruel, vulture eyes glittered like fish scales in the dark.
' I am a Scottish subject, sirs,' said Sir Baldred, with something
like a great sob in his throat ; ' a subject of the king of Scotland, born
many years before the time of that hated union, which puts me, a
baron of Parliament, in your power ! What care I for the unlawful
suspension of your Habeas Corpus Act ? it was never meant for
us ; but to be caught in the toils, snared, tracked, run to earth, and
the prisoner of those Southron landloupers at last ! Oh, black sor-
row and woe be on the hour when King James crossed the Borders,
with his sword in its sheath!'
The Dutchmen laughed at the ravings of the old man, as they
led his horse away by the bridle, and Bryde rode by his side, with
his right hand clasped in her left, as she strove to soothe and cheer
him.
Slowly Balcraftie rubbed his hands over each other, and chuckled
in the dark, and leered after them with fiendish glee, as he heard
Bryde sob.
' If that spruce young lieutenant but bear in mind all I've told
and hinted,' he muttered ; ' and if he uses his opportunities, the
countryside will see uae mair o' you or your fine aire, my bra\v
madam.'
THE WHITE COCKADE. 227
In the agony of that time she forgot even her lover, and thought
only of her poor old, doting grandfather, and what he was enduring
on being so suddenly hurled from the high and happy pedestal on
which he had placed himself, and of all he would have to suffer at
his years, in being marched under escort, in the chill autumnal
weather, over the rough mountain roads, by which they would have
to travel for more than eighty miles, to the castle of Carlisle !
CHAPTER XLIII.
CAHXISLE.
' My father's blood's in that flower top,
My brother's in that hare-bell's blossom.
This White Rose was steep'd in my love's blood,
But I'll aye wear it in my bosom.
' When I came first by merry Carlisle,
Was ne'er a town sae sweetly seeming ;
The White Rose flaunted owre the wall,
The thibtled banner wide was streaming.'
Old Sallad.
WITH morning came to North Berwick, the startling, but to Bal-
craftie, most welcome, intelligence, that the Lord Dalquharn had
been either shot or drowned, in a gallant but desperate attempt to
escape from the castle of the Bass.
' Everything seemed to favour and to prosper with him. In one
night three great enemies had been removed !
Four days after this, Keuben Balcraftie, Provost of North Ber-
wick, and Justice of the Peace for the shire of Haddington, found
himself duly commissioned and appointed, by the fugitive legal
authorities, to take charge of the lands and estate of Auldhame, be-
longing to Sir Baldred Otterburn, of that ilk, ' under ward, in our
castle of Carlisle, for treasonable practices, and complicity with the
vile Popish Pretender to the throne of these realms.'
We are loth to accompany the ex-Bailie to the old estate and
manor house, over which he roamed in the plenitude of his power
and legal authority ; making inventories of everything in stable-
court, in barn, and byre, noting the living and moveable stock ; how
he broke open all lockfast places in search of treasonable papers,
money, and jewellery ; how he numbered the pictures, and counted
the plate, defiling with his covetous fingers, and wrenching from its
ambre, the ancient heirloom and palladium of the house, St. Bal-
dred's silver tankard in the hall ; how he did not even respect
Bryde's pretty little bed-chamber, but turned her wardrobe and desk
outside in, and viciously struck, with his clenched hand, the laced
pillows on which her soft cheek would never more repose ; how al-
ternately he shrunk from and scowled in grotesque aud vulgar
defiance at the mailed portraits and ruffed ladies, who looked at him
staringly, and disdainfully, out of the canvasses whereon Vandyke
and Jameson had depicted them.
15-2
228 THE WHITE COCKADE.
He rubbed his coarse hands -with ill-concealed glee, and half-
closed his cunning eyes, as he compelled the enraged butler to un-
cork a bottle of the best port, and seated himself in the baronet's
own peculiar leathern chair, planting his hobnailed and square-
buckled shoes on the velvet tabourette which Bryde's own hands
had wrought, kicking away the while an old and half-blind terrier
who usually occupied it.
Then he looked over the stubble fields that stretched far away
westward to the base of Berwick Law, and felt himself to be at
last at last supreme there, and in a fair way with his wiles and
his wadsets, to occupy and become hereditary lord of those lands
for which he had perilled his sinful soul, and which, to use his own
phraseology, he had coveted, even as Ahab did the vineyard of
Naboth.
The evening of that fourth day which saw the Prwost in posses-
sion of Auldhame, was closing on its late lord under very different
circumstances.
On the northern verge of that wild district known as Eskdale-
muir, a place surrounded by the heathy summits of lonely and silent
hills, the Dutch escort had found themselves compelled to halt.
The roads were rough ; the scenery stern and rugged ; the peaks of
Etterick Pen and Loch Fell, each more than two thousand feet in
height, towered into the autumn evening sky, and the setting sun
cast their giant shadows far eastward along the waste of purple
muirland. An intense stillness, a mighty hush of all nature seemed
to pervade the place, nor was it broken by the note of a plover or
the whistle of a curlew.
The Dutch had piled their arms, and were chatting and smoking
by the side of a runnel, in which they dipped from time to time
their hard black biscuits.
Two horses were hobbled by the roadside ; they were the old
hunter of Sir Baldred, and Bryde's handsome pad ; and where were
their riders ?
The long and rough journey by mountain paths and deep rivers,
together with his mental sufferings, had proved too much for the
poor old man ; and long ere La Koque (chiefly perhaps to win fa-
vour from Bryde) had relieved him of the useless bonds, Sir Bal-
dred's failing strength and spirit were completely gone ; he was no
longer able to ride bis horse or even to hold the bridle, and now he
lay in a hah? stupor upon the grass, with his head in the lap of
Bryde, who strove hard to soothe him and to conceal her own sor-
row and alarm, for now her velvet mask was off, and the observant
Frenchman could perceive at leisure, the piquant character of her
fresh and blooming beauty.
' Grandfather dearie, dearie,' said Bryde in his ear ; ' your poor
hands are cold very, very cold !'
'Aye, lassie, and so is my heart cold as the winter of 1707,
when I saw puir Scotland a dead kingdom a kingdom now no
TUB WHITE COCKADB. 229
more lying in her winding-sheet of snow white over hill and
muirland.'
Even at that moment the ruling passion was strong within him,
and he closed his eyes wearily.
' You see, sir, lie sleeps a little time pray, and we shall proceed
again,' said Bryde to La Eoque, who bowed a* if assenting, and
hammered away with a flint and steel to light his pipe which had a
gay china howl, of which he was a little vain.
This lieutenant, son of a French Protestant refugee (who like
most of those refugees for conscience sake, ended in having neither
conscience or religion) was a very handsome young man. His black
hair was unpowdered, and flowed in natural curls ; he had a black
moustache, sharply pointed, with a clear olive complexion ; well de-
fined, but straight eyebrows, vith bold, dark, saucy eyes, and a full,
red and voluptuous lip ; every way, he was good looking enough to
be a dangerous fellow.
Strongly made, his fine figure appeared to great advantage in his
bright yellow uniform, which was faced with scarlet velvet and ela-
borately laced with silver. He wore a little triangular hat edged
with white feathers, aud had scarlet velvet small clothes, and long,
black, military boots. A white buff shoulder belt, on the gilt plate
of which was the lion of Nassau, sustained his long, straight
sword.
For some time past, he had been observing Bryde with great
attention and ill-coacealed admiration ; but she was too much oc-
cupied by her own griefs to heed either his glances or his presence.
He saw the helpless state of the poor old man, aud the utterly
friendless condition of the girl ; both circumstances made him con-
ceive the most daring ideas ideas that were chiefly and originally
suggested by Baluraftie, whose evil seed had not been sown in
vain.
The tears fell fast over Bryde's cheek large round tears that
filled her dimples as she watched the deathly pallor of her grand-
father's face, and felt assured, that soon oh, very soon she would
be quite alone in the world !
' Whence comes all this bitter this most excessive grief, Made-
moiselle ?' asked La Roque, in what he meant to be his softest and
most insinuating voice, as he knelt on one knee by her side.
' My grandfather is old so very old '
' Ah of course and old people must die.'
' Die? alas yes ; but hush we disturb him, sir.'
'Old true,' said the Frenchman, whispering so close that his
moustache almost touched her beautiful ear ; but when once we are
at Carlisle, he will soon recover his wasted strength.'
4 Carlisle !' repeated Bryde in a voice of mingled grief and anger,
for to her who had never been out of sight of the Pentland Hills,
it sounded like speaking of Tobolsk, to Polish exiles halted some-
where about the bauka of tke Volga, so little did people move from
200 THE WHITE COCKADE.
home in those days, and so limited were their ideas of distance and
their means of locomotion.
' Oh, sir,' said Bryde, after a pause, looking imploringly in the
face of the young Frenchman ; ' they cannot have so little heart as
to put him to death at his years !'
' They who, Mademoiselle ?' he asked with a bland smile.
' Those English among whom we are going.'
' Those English do very odd things. They have put a foreign
king on their throne, and are bringing over whole armies of Dutch,
Swiss and Hessians to keep him there, in opposition to a British
prince, followed by a purely British army. 'Tis very droll !'
' Ah yes what have they not done, those Scottish whigs and
English traitors ?'
' Diable yes !' assented La Eoque, whose ideas of what they had
done, were very vague indeed.
' Are not thirty thousand pounds offered for the Prince's head, by
their parliament ?'
' Morte de ma vie ! 'tis a charming blonde, with lovely brown
eyes,' muttered La Eoque under his breath, ( but your great grief,
Mademoiselle '
' My great grief well ?'
' Tells me that you must have other causes for it, than what I
see.'
' How ?' asked Bryde with surprise.
' A lover, perhaps a little affaire du cceur it may be.'
' Sir !' she exclaimed indignantly.
'All tres bon! that beautiful blush tells me all ; it tells mi '
'That your language and looks offend nothing more, sir.'
'Ouf chut parbleu! as you please, Mademoiselle,' said La
Eoque, rising with an imperturbable smile as he withdrew a few
paces and replaced his tasselled pipe in his mouth.
' What the devil shall we do ?' thought he ; ' stay here all night
if her old man can't ride a rare business, and in no way contem-
plated by the marche route furnished to me by Monsieur the G-over-
nor of Berwick.'
Insular prejudices, fortunately, rather than actual experience, has
inspired every genuine Briton with a contempt of foreign soldiery,
and a wholesome dread of permitting them to tread our soil. In
Scotland, in those days, even our own troops were not very popular,
and the sound of a drum near a village, was sufficient to make
every careful housewife rush to the hedge-rows to secure her linen,
if it chanced to be drying thereon. Bryde now began to view La
Eoque with mistrust and alarm, though those were times when ( an
unprotected female ' might ride with pistols at her saddle-bow ; and
only some twenty years before (about the time when Bryde was
born), the public had seen Helen Macgregor, sword in hand, rout-
ing Tyrawly's South British Fusiliers at the Pass of Lochard ; but
the conduct of our troops in Scotland, was often singularly brutal.
THE WHITE COCKADE. 231
Thus, in the year 1746, that party of His Britannic Majesty's Light
Dragoons, who, under an officer, brought to Edinburgli Castle the
captive Duchess of Perth and the Viscountess of Strathallan, treated
these noble ladies with every indignity, stripped the Ladies Mary
and Amelia Drumniond of their clothes, and tore the wedding-rings
from their fingers with their teeth, just as the ' faithful ' sepoys did
to our women at Cawnpore, or as certain gallant Cossacks might do
in Warsaw to-day.
La Roque was not however without compassion, and, at a farm-
house which stood near the moor in a secluded glen, he procured
an old two-wheeled vehicle, called the Italian chair, which was then
very common in Scotland, when the roads were generally narrow.
Into this Sir Baldred was lifted, and cosily muffled up in an ample
border plaid, with other comforts freely given by the farmer's wife,
whose Jacobite sympathies were speedily awakened, and seemed so
keen, that she would readily have put her whole household at the
disposal of the sufferers, who set out on their way once more.
La Roque now rode beside Bryde on Sir Baldred' s horse 5 the
chaise being horsed by the farmer, and driven by one of his ser-
vants.
The Dutch shouldered their long, heavy muskets, grumbling in
guttural consonants, and smoking heavily as they plodded on through
Eskdalemuir towards Ewesdale, and as the night deepened, the
whole train disappeared from the eyes of the farmer's sympathising
household, who watched it long from the summit of a slope.
The third day from this saw it entering Carlisle, followed to the
gate of the castle by a mocking, taunting and pitiless crowd. Every
injurious epithet thai national animosity and political rancour could
suggest, were dinned into the ears of the terrified Bryde, who
shrieked from time to time as stones were hurled at the little chaise,
round which the Dutch soldiers marched with their bayonets fixed.
La Roque boiled wkli fury, and used the flat of his sword freely,
and did not feel himself or his escort safe, until the great gates of
the noble old castle were closed behind them by the soldiers of the
1st Regiment of Foot Guards, some of whom then formed its gar-
rison.
From the little Italian chaise, Sir Baldred, now unable to stand
or walk, was conveyed at once to bed, in a chamber which was ap-
portioned to him as a prison, in that part of the fortress which was
built by David of Scotland before the battle of the Standard.
There Bryde was his sole nurse and attendant, by night as well
as by day ministering as only a gentle, thoughtful and loving
woman can minister ; and with mingled satisfaction and horror, she
afterwards looked back to those times in that gloomy old castle of
Carlisle, and its grim, quaint towering keep, with pointed and
grated windows, when longing for home, with a fever a passion
that could not be satisfied a heart sickness, during which, in the
long, long nights or last weeks of a gloomy autumn, she wept
232 THE WHITE COCKADB.
silently aud unseen for the past days of youth, pleasure, safety and
plenitude, in dear, dear Auldhame Auldhame, that, though she
knew it not, had another tenant now !
Then came the terrible reflection, that if hy her care and minis-
tration she prolonged, or even saved her beloved grandfather's life, to
what end or purpose did she save or prolong it ? The scaffold the
judicial shambles of the Hanoverian Elector, perhaps.
She was frequently visited by La Koque more frequently than
she desired ; but as ' the rebels were advancing,' no one knew by
what route, his orders were, to place himself with his party under
Colonel Durand, in the castle of Carlisle, and hence his protracted
sojourn there.
' Home, take me home, Bryde darling, from this strange place-
home, lest I die here !' the old man would say, querulously, at times ;
and amid the gloomy chambers of that old Saxon keep, he sighed
for the sea-breeze that came up Auldhame Bay, and rustled the oak
woods of his ancestral home, the home of his boyhood, manhood
and age the cradle of his brave old stainless race.
Weaker and more ailing he grew daily, and one morning, a great
shack was given him, when the thunder of cannon pealing a salute
from the walls, seemed to shake his prison to its strong foundations.
He feebly asked what this portended, and when told that the battery
was being fired in honour of His Royal Highness the Duke of Cum-
berland, as Captain-General of Great Britain, having arrived at
Litchfield, to take command of an overwhelming force, British and
foreign, against the rebels tidings of which joyful event had just
come a gloomy foreboding of future sorrow and defeat came over
him ; he clasped his thin and tremulous hands, aud turned his face
to the wall.
' God's will be done,' he muttered, ' perhaps the last Laird of
Auldhame has lived long enough !'
After a time he turned to Bryde poor girl, pale, hollow-eyed
and unslept who in the dim light of the autumn morning, a sit
struggled through the ponderous bars of the window, could see the
coming change, and in the filmy orbs, that expression which is seen
but once in the human eye an awful one which the loving and
the dutiful never forget, till that dread hour, when hi turn, it shall
inevitably overspread their own.
' Bryde,' said he, clasping her hands in his own ; ' I am dying,
lassie, at last dying, my bonnie Bryde going to the far awa land,
where your father and mother await me. When I am gone you
will be free, for oh, my sinless one, even the false German carle can-
not make a traitor of thee ! Oh bury me, lassie, if you can, north
of yonder Solway and in Scottish ground, for well I trow that
English earth will never hold me never hold me !'
The poor old enthusiast then continued to mutter prayers for
Bryde, for the young Prince, for his exiled king and distracted
country, and then for Bryde again, until all who heard, and they
IHE Wnrrfi COCKADB. 233
were many now, for Bryde in the excess of her grief and terror had
summoned them were deeply moved, and how could it be other-
wise for after nearly eighty years of life, the aged man was now
face to face with Death ; and, moreover, the dying who pray are
but a short space distant from One who reads the hearts of all.
That night he slept away into eternity, with his head on Bryde's
shoulder, and then the cup of her great grief was full to overflow-
ing.
The chaplain of the garrison (who was afterwards killed by Comet
Gardiner, of Cope's Dragoons, in a duel about Miss Pattie Maylie)
had very properly, he thought some religious scruples about
reading the service of the church over a Presbyterian ; and after a
consultation with his bishop, declined to be present at the inter-
ment, despite the tears of Bryde ; so next day, that venerated old
man, who was deemed a Prelatist in his own country, was buried in
England, without a prayer or ceremony, in the ditch before the
castle wall ; and there he still lies ; for notwithstanding his hate
and fear, and his love for the land that lay beyond the Border,
English earth held him fast and sure. And it was currently said,
that on the night he died in Carlisle, the ghostly drummer beat a
loud and last angry chamade in the avenue of Auidhame, and the
roll of his spectral drum was heard to die away on the skirt of the
wind to seaward. Sceptics have always existed, and some there
were who asserted that the drum was beaten by certain drunken
Jacobites, who were on the march from Dunbar to the Prince's
camp at Duddingstone.
No mourner stood by that unhallowed grave, save Bryde, who
was alone now, and almost without money alone in Carlisle, and
with no friend, save the dangerous La Koque.
CHAPTER XLIV.
T11K CAVERN OF THE BAS3.
'Ah me! whmi o'er a length of waters tost,
These eyes at length beheld th' uuhop'd for coast,
No port receives me from the angry main,
But the loud deeps demand me back again.
Above sharp rocks forbid access ; around
Roar the wild waves ; beneath is sea profound !
No footing sure, affords the faithless sand,
To stem too rapid, and too deep to stand.'
WHEN Dalquharn felt the boat dashed again and again on the cliffs,
which rose sheer above liim to the height of many hundred feet, he
felt all hope die away in his heart. He made no effort to push off
once more, for in resisting the mighty force of the water, urge^l
against the isle by the ebb tide, his strength seemed but as that of
234 THE WHITE COCEADE.
an infant, and almost heedless now he heard the shouts of the pur-
suers, and saw their boat advancing through the gloom.
Thick as gnats in the sunshine, the giant solan geese, whose wings
measure six feet from tip to tip, were flying above him in mid-air,
where they seemed like snow flakes against the sky of night. Like
an ocean tower of vast extent, solemn, impending, and terrible, rose
the place of his captivity :
' Dread rock ! thy life is two eternities _
The last in air the former of the deep ;
First with the whales last with the eagle skies :
Drowned wast thou, till an earthquake made thee steep 1
Another cannot have thy giant size 1'
Suddenly, by the reflux of a wave, the boat was capsized, and
Dalquharn found himself struggling in the cold, dark water. He
had always anticipated some horrible catastrophe, and it had come
at last !
He was a stout swimmer, and strove to avoid being dashed by the
waves upon the perpendicular rocks, but they proved too strong for
him. Once he was thrown against the flinty bluff with such force
that he nearly became insensible ; the second wave would have de-
stroyed him, but instead of hurling him on the wall of rock as he
expected, it washed him gently on into gloom and utter darkness,
and after a few moments of deathly terror and bewilderment, he
found himself in the place of wlu'ch he had heard so often, the
famous cavern by which the Bass is perforated from east to west.
There he found firm footing on a ledge of rock, breathless, faint,
and though he knew it not then, bleeding from several wounds and
bruises. He now hoped that his pursuers might come to his rescue ;
as their boat came sheering round near the cavern's mouth, he was
about to hail them, when the cruel and coarse speech of Congalton
made him pause, and the boat was put about and pulled away from
the entrance, which is half blocked up by a mass of rock, that at
every reflux of the waves, shows its terrible tusks above the foam.
Dalquharn's situation was doubtless one of intense horror, and
calculated to inspire the bravest man with dismay ! It was terrible
to be alone utterly alone any time, by day or by night, in the
solitude of that vast cavern, with the mountain of rock above, and
the profundity of sea below gloom and darkness, apparently solid
and palpable blackness everywhere, save at the lofty entrance, where
the stars shone coldly, and the sky gave indications that the moon
was about to rise.
Erelong she rose, and her pale light, that made a long and shining
path of tremulous silver across the waste of waters, penetrated the
deep solitude where the poor shivering fugitive sat on his ledge of
rock, afraid to move, lest he should fall into the water that filled the
lower portion of the cavern, and which, for aught he knew, might
have no floor or bottom but the ocean bed, hundreds of feet below.
In, aud further in, stole the moonlight through that cavern, long,
THE WHITE COCKADE. 235
deep and solemn as the Valley of the Shadow, revealing a terrible,
yet fairy-like scene of ' drear and ghostly uncertainties ' of many
lengths and depths of alternate darkness and silver sheen, by which
Dalquharn was able to perceive that the entrance to this grotto
the wonderful and terrible handiwork of God was apparently a
hundred feet in height, its roof bristling all over with tiny tufts of
rock fern and brown algae ; the sea, still and waveless within, was its
floor, and all this was visible by the tremulous rays of the moon,
which illumined the slimy sides, the strange plants, and the water,
with ten thousand points of prismatic light, like the abode of fays
or water-nymphs in a German romance.
The tide was still ebbing, but uncertain of his position, Dalquharn
never moved from the piece of rock on which he was seated, and
erelong the moon passed away, though her path of light remained
upon the waters; and then he knew that the weird shadow of
old St. Baldred's chapel high over head, would be cast drearily
athwart the sward, even as the darker shadow of the lofty isle would
be cast for leagues along the sea.
The cavern was sunk again in utter gloom ; it seemed to have
become colder than ever, and to be full of dropping dams and chilly
currents of air, that swept through it from east to west.
What was to be the end of this perilous adventure ? He was too
feeble to attempt to swim from the island, and dared not again to
brave, with his wasted powers, the terrible surf that boiled around
its rocks. Moreover, were lie skilful as Leander, he could scarcely
make the trial by day, without being seen from the garrison and
fired on ; and for the same reason, no boat could approach his hiding
place from the land side unnoticed.
Was he to linger there and die of starvation, or of thirst, of which
he already felt the acute pangs ?
If he died, how long wonld he live ere death came ? Was he
ever likely to be found ; and if so, after the cormorants, gulls, and
perhaps the fish had half devoured him, would his bones ever find
a human grave ?
These were moments when the multitude of thoughts, and the
greatness of his misery made him almost mad ! Then he would
feel as if lie must be in a dream, and should ultimately waken to
find himself in his old vaulted prison in the castle above, instead of
being where he was, some hundred feet and more below it.
There were thoughts also of fearful black creeping things swim-
ming about in the water, that made him shudder ; and erelong, his
eyes, accustomed to the darkness, began to fashion strange, fantastic,
and horrible faces of giant size, in the angularities of the rocks,
where the pale starlight revealed or touched them ; and these faces
seemed to frown, or mock and jabber at him, till he fancied himself
becoming insane.
The heavy and oppressed panting of his heart had passed away
now, and after a time he became gradually more composed. He
236 THE WHITE COCKADE.
wrung the brine from some of his garments ; they dried on him
rapidly, and though greatly -chilled, he knew that; the salt water
had no evil property, so he strove to be hopeful to be thankful
that he had escaped the musket .shots from the castle, and death by
drowning after. He strove also to keep awake (lest he should fall
into the chasm of water which he supposed was beneath him), and
thus he endeavoured to wait with patience till morning dawned.
So the dark and melancholy hours passed slowly and miserably
on.
From a heavy and dull sensation of drowsiness and oppression,
more the result of reaction and lassitude than actual slumber, he
was suddenly roused to consciousness by the sea flowing roughly
over his ankles, and by the sound of the surge reverberating like
thunder in the cavern.
The wind was from the east now ; it was freshening, moreover,
and was bringing with it the tide from the German Sea. As the
latter met the river's downward flow, the waters rose rapidly in the
cavern ; and as Dalquharn thought of flood tides, and knew not
how high they might rise, the dread of being drowned helplessly,
and ignominiously, like a rat in a vast drain, rushed vividly upon
him, and he was compelled, at all hazards, to climb upward in
search of another, and more secure resting-place ; and ultimately
he reached a nook that felt comparatively dry and warm.
But a cry escaped him a cry that wakened a hundred strange
echoes, and he nearly fell from his perch, as he seemed to dislodge
an uncouth animal, as large as a dog, but with a peculiarly soft and
velvet-like skin, which slid down past him, and splashed deep into
the water below. Then, as he saw it swim away from the mouth
of the cavern and disappear, he knew that he had only tumbled from
its lair, one of those sea-otters, which used to be so numerous on
the shores of the Forth in those days, and, according to Sir .Robert
Sibbald, especially on the Fifeshire coast.
At last the tide began to ebb again ; the roaring of the waves
grew less ; the grey light of dawn stole over the sea, and as it pene-
trated the cavern at each end, Dalquharn was able to observe it in
all its wonderful details. Its average height throughout is not more
than thirty feet, and its length about one hundred and eighty yards.
He could traverse it safely, and was glad to do so, that he might
thereby restore warmth and action to his stiffened limbs.
At the western end is a beach of fine gravel which is never
covered save by flood tides ; a deep, dark pool lies in the centre,
and a wilderness of weed-covered boulders spreads to the eastward.
There Dalquharn found one of the oars of his boat, lying just
where the ebb-tide had left it. Of this, he at once possessed him-
self and deposited it high up in a place of security.
Crabs and limpets were there in plenty ; but he feared to eat lest
he should thereby increase the thirst that tormented him ; and there,
TUB WHITE COCKADE. 237
too, among the dark boulders, were vast numbers of purple, sea
anemone, of wondrous size and beauty.
The scart, the kittiwake, the turtle-dove, and other birds flew
wildly about the cavern mouth, as if in wonderment to see a human
being in such a place. There were times when Dalquharn imagined
that lie heard the drum beaten in the garrison ; but it must have
been mere fancy, as no sound could reach him there.
He took a seat near the western mouth of this horrible place, to
which he had become somewhat used, and watched intently for a
passing fisher-boat. He saw numerous vessels bearing up and
down the great river, and many fisher-boats, too, but they were
far away on the Fifeshire side, or at least, beyond hail.
As the hours passed slowly on, his impatience and his thirst in-
creased together, and he sighed for the marine corporal's black-jack
of spring water in the vault, which he hoped he had left for ever.
He was beginning to conceive the idea of attempting to swim for
the land, if favoured by the flowing tide, and before his strength
became totally exhausted, when suddenly a large fisherboat came in
sight, with her brown, wet sides shining in the sun, three bluff,
weather-beaten fellows on board, with their blue bonnets drawn
well over their eyes, and her lug sails swelling out in the breeze,
as she came before it, sheering close in, and unusually near to the
rocks.
Dalquharn uttered a shout of joy and entreaty, and throwing his
oar into the sea made a spring towards it. He caught it with one
hand, and swam vigorously and despairingly with the other towards
the boat.
He was both heard and seen !
Down went the rudder and the lug sails together ; the boat lay
to under bare poles ; strong hands seized him : he was dragged on
board, and then a stupor came over all his faculties.
Some brandy was poured between his lips ; hard and rough, but
honest hands, chafed his kindlv, and when he became sufficiently
recovered, he found himself, lying not on a luxuriant bed certainly
but on a pile of oysters and damp nets at the bottom of a great
fisher-boat, which was tearing westward before the wind, past the
little rocky isle of Fidra, with the dreaded Bass, all reddened by
the afternoon sun, looming above the ocean, some five miles or so
astern.
At last he was in safety !
He was beyond the reach, too, of Livingstone of Saltcoates, whom
he never saw again, as that officer was killed, two years afterwards,
when serving with the Scots Foot Guards at the unfortunate battle
of Val in Flanders.
Not long after the period of our story, the castle of the Bass was
abandoned and dismantled by the government, and since then, it
has been permitted to become an open and desolate ruin.
238 THE WHITE COCKADE.
CHAPTER XLV.
DALQUHARN IN EDINBURGH.
' 'Tis an honourable man :
A lord, Meg, and commands a regiment
Of soldiers ; and, what's rare, is one himself,
A bold and understanding one ; and to be
A lord, and a good leader, in one volume,
Is granted unto few, but such as raise up
The kingdom's glory.' Massinger.
THE fishermen gave Dalquharn a warm, rough overcoat of Campsie
grey, a species of stuff that has been woven in Strathmore since
the days of James VI. The garment had a strong odour of tar
and herring-scales, but he was too cold and miserable to be over-
nice or particular.
The fishermen had been dredging for oysters at a distance off the
Fifeshire coast, and had heard nothing of the last night's alarm at
the Bass ; he informed them, that in the dusk he had fallen over-
board from a lettre of marque brig, and that an oar had been flung
to him, by the aid of which, and by swimming, he reached the
cavern under the Bass.
This completely satisfied the curiosity of the fishermen, who, on
seeing that he was very weak and wasted, redoubled their kindness.
From them he learned that the Prince was still at Holyrood ; that
he had a fabulous number of Highlanders in his camp at Dudding-
stone ; that the sea was covered by the King's ships ; but that the
Elector was losing heart or courage fast, and that many regiments
of Dutch, Germans, and Swiss were coming over to fight his battles
and defend England.
Evening was closing when the boat stood round Luffness Point,
and was hauled up for the Bay of Aberlady, to which place the
fishermen belonged. As this was unpleasantly near the Bass, and
the story of his escape might have spread thus far along the coast,
as soon as the boat was moored alongside the little pier, he quitted
his protectors with genuine gratitude on one hand, and wise pre-
caution on the other, and departed at once for Edinburgh.
The night proved a very dark one ; the sky was covered by masses
of cloud, and no moon was visible. Ignorant of the way, Dalqu-
harn proceeded with great difficulty. The roads seemed deserted,
and no one was abroad, for the time was perilous and the arm of
the civil law was paralysed. The way-side cottages, then few and
far between, had all their doors and windows secured, as the inmates
had a wholesome dread of the alleged plundering propensities of the
Highlanders, for many thieves and footpads assumed the white
THE WHITE COCKADE. 239
cockade, for the mere purpose of highway robbery, until shot or
hanged by the Prince's provost-marshal.
Hence, at every dwelling where he knocked or sought informa-
tion, he met with obstinate silence, or the threat of having a bullet
put into him ; BO he had to stumble wearily on in the dark,
steering in what he supposed would be the direction of Edinburgh,
and keeping to the highway along the sea shore, the old Roman
road from Dunbar to Cramond.
He had no dread of molestation, for he had nothing to lose ; a
shilling which he found in a pocket of the old coat given to him by
the fishermen being the whole extent of his finances.
At midnight he heard the hour tolled from a church steeple
he found himself on a high, narrow, and ancient bridge, beneath
which a broad river flowed, and which seemed to connect two small
towns, then sunk in sleep, and dark and unlighted.
This, a wayfarer informed him, was the bridge of Inveresk, and
that seven miles further would bring him to Edinburgh. He had
made so many detours, and had wandered so far already ; he had
undergone so much fatigue and suffering since his escape, and had
been so completely deprived of sleep and rest for nearly forty-eight
hours, that his courage sunk on hearing this ; yet after a time, he
pushed resolutely on, and on passing some salt-pans, the lurid
glare of which shed strange and weird gleams on the sea, and far
along a wide and desolate expanse of flat and sandy beach, he lost
all traces of the path, and for hours wandered about a vast and
dreary common of many miles in extent.
Here and there lay hollows or pools of water, and the whole sur-
face was rough and covered by the moss-grown roots of aged trees.
In some places, a few great oaks of vast size and beauty, still lin-
gered to cast their shadows on the waste, which then lay eastward
of Edinburgh, extending from the palace gardens to the sea, and
was known as the Figgate Muir, though five centuries before it had
been a royal forest, where the snow-white bull was hunted by the
Scottish kings, and where William Wallace mustered his brother
patriots, prior to the recapture of Berwick.
Overcome by intense lassitude, Dalquharn lay down under one of
those old trees, and fell into a deep and dreamless slumber.
When he awoke, the morning sun was high in the clear blue sky ;
the waves were rolling in silver foam along the far extent of yellow
sand that stretched away to the eastward, where the green woods of
Pinkey and Wallyford, with the hills of Haddington, closed the
landscape.
The verdant slopes of Arthur's Seat, the white tents of Budding-
stone camp, and the smoke of the grey city that towered high into
the blue welkin met his eye to the westward, and just as he roused
himself to proceed, the covered waggon from Berwick came slowly
rumbling along the old paved Roman causeway, and the driver, a
good-natured fellow, offered for the shilling our hero possessed, to
210 THE WHITE COCKADE.
convey him to the city, and Dalquharn gladly availed himself of
the easier mode of locomotion, which this humble conveyance
afforded.
Among the half-dozen of poor folks who were travelling town-
ward by the waggon, was one who immediately recognised Dalqu-
harn. and of whose interest in his affairs the young peer had riot
the least suspicion. This personage was no other than the lean and
shrunken drudge of Balcraftie ; Mr. Jabez Starvieston, who shrunk
from observation in a dark corner, and watched the fugitive with
those keen, cruel, and hungry-looking eyes, which, together with
his mean and vicious nature, local scandal said in whispers, he in*
herited from the ex-Bailie, on whose business he had been sent to
Edinburgh (concerning the sale of certain moveables at Auldhame),
and for whose interest and purpose he resolved not to lose sight of
Dalquharn.
A short time afterwards, the latter saw with joy the towers of
Holyrood, and found himself approaching the Water-gate of Edin-
burgh, where a guard of Highlanders was stationed. With some-
thing of mingled wonder and pleasure, he surveyed the half bar-
baric, but picturesque costume of those sturdy Celts, who were all
clad in the bright Cameron tartan, and were armed with dirk, clay-
more, and pistols, together with muskets and bayonets, no doubt
gleaned up from the field of Preston, or found in the arsenals of
the city. On quitting the waggon, his first welcome was a strange
and unpleasant one, for an advanced sentinel deliberately cocked
and levelled a musket at him, and in some gibberish of his own,
demanded so far as Dalquharn could understand money.
' I have nothing, fellow !' replied his lordship, sternly, for the
black muzzle of a loaded piece never has a pleasing appearance,
when levelled at one's head.
1 Hoich oich ! tak ye tat, then, puir teevil !' said the Celt,
thrusting a sixpence into the hand of Dalquharn ; and this coin, as
the fellow seemed fierce and irritable, and was bristling with wea-
pons, he felt constrained to accept ; but he had not proceeded ten
paces before he was halted by the charged Lochaber axe of another,
who, oddly enough, had added to his paraphernalia the crimson
sash and gold eye-glass of some officer, who had probably fallen at
Preston.
'Here, fellow,' said Dalquharn, proffering the sixpence; 'take
this, in the devil's name 'tis all I possess.'
But the Highlander shook his read head, muttering, ' She only
wanted a little penny for a sneeshin (snuff), and that the sixpence
was too much,' adding, as he shouldered his terrible axe, ' oich
got-tam she'll pe a Ninglander, I doubt nae.'
The guard was entirely composed of men of the Clan regiment
of Lochiel, and the officer in command now appeared at the arch-
way, which was called the Water-gate, but was simply then a half-
TJ1E WHITE COCEADfi. fcll
circular rib of stone, that epanned the street, and was surmounted
by a round knob or ball.
He was a handsome young man, in full tartans, with the belted
plaid, and wore a bright green jacket, trimmed with gold, and
fastened not with buttons, but rows of elaborately chased clasps.
His powder-born, pistols, dirk, and sporran, were glittering with
silver mounting, and he wore in his blue bonnet the eagle's wing,
to denote that lie was a gentleman, and the invariable white rose to
evince his loyalty, for he was Ian nan Fassiefern (John of the
Alder's Point, the woody promontory that still stretches into the
beautiful Highland lake), the Tanister of Lochiel, or next heir to
the chief.
He spoke English slowly, and with difficulty, and with equal
difficulty could he be made to understand that the squalid personage
who addressed him, and sought to approach the palace, after quit-
ting the common waggon, was Henry Douglas, Lord Dalquharn, of
the Holm, in Galloway, but those were the days of strange dis-
guises and of wild adventures.
' Can you inform me where I shall find Sir Baldred Otterburn
he is with the Prince's court ?'
'As Lord Keeper of Holyrood, he has usually resided at the
palace, I believe,' replied the Cameron ; ' but he has gone'
'Gone has he left?'
' Fatally for himself yes.'
'Explain, sir I pray you, explain!' urged Dalquharn, with
alarm in his manner.
' He left Holyrood for his own house of Auldhame two days ago,
and lias not been heard of tiince.'
' Not heard of since?' repeated the other, in a breathless voice.
'At first it was supposed tliat some crime had been committed,
or that an accident had befallen him, as his horse was spirited, and
the good baronet is old and (Vail ; but now it is known that he has
been arrested and conveyed under a Dutch Guard towards the Eu-
giish Border.'
' By what route ?'
'That is unknown; but Sir John Mitchell, with forty of the
Life Guards, scoured, in vain, the Berwick road aa far as Green-
law.'
' And Miss Otterburn '
' Ah one of the most charming yonng ladies about the court !
She is, unfortunately, with her grandfather, a prisoner in the hands
of the Elector's troops.'
Closely, and within earshot, skulked one who could have informed
them fully of all the details of tint epUo.le on Luffness Muir.
Dalquharn stood for some time with a bewildered air, over-
whelmed by these unexpected tidings ; but the young Highland
officer, who felt grjat commiseration for him for sooth to any his
appearance was miserable and woebegone iu the extreme, said
16
242 THE WHITE COCKADE.
' In what can I serve you ?'
'By informing me, if in your power, where I may find Sir John
Mitchell, of Pitreavie.'
' Does he ride with the Prince's Life Guard ?'
' I presume so but as a prisoner in the Bass, confined closely
and barbarously, I have heard but little of what transpired in the
world beyond.'
' I think Sir John will most probably be found at the Laigh
coffee-house, about a mile from this. Do you know the city ?'
' No I am a stranger here almost a stranger in the land, sir ;
I have been- exiled in France since my boyhood," was the sad reply.
The keen eagle-like eyes of the Highlander sparkled, and he
shook Dalquharn's hand.
' We have had one day of vengeance already,' said he, ' and
others are to come ! I shall send a friend, who will guide your
lordship.'
The officer retired, and in a minute or so, re-appeared with a tall
and powerfully-made Highlander, in the prime of life. He was
six feet four inches in height, but singularly handsome and athletic,
with his thick dark brown hair gathered in what was named a club.
His jacket, with deep cuffs and low cut collar, was of fine white
cloth, braided with narrow gold cord ; he wore the Macintosh tar-
tan, and was fully armed with sword, dirk and skene, pistols and
target ; but indeed no Highlander then ever appeared otherwise, so
that one might almost fancy they slept with all their weapons about
them.
He looked curiously and a little disdainfully at Dnlquharn ; but
lifted his bonnet witli grace and courtesy, on being informed by
Fassiefern of his rank and unfortunate circumstances.
He was Gillies Macbane, a gentleman of the Clan Chattan, whose
name and character for courage, were conspicuous even in that
little army of volunteers, where all were brave.
' Gillies will conduct you, my lord, and if I can serve you further
in any way, fail not to command me. Among the Camerons any
one will show you my tent, which is next to Locheil's in the camp
at Duddingstone. That same tent was lately Sir John Cope's ; but
'tis not the worse for that.'
As Dalquharn proceeded lip the long and picturesque vista of
that thoroughfare, which so many painters have depicted, and so
many novelists and historians described the scene of so many
conflicts and great national events, since King David saw the
miraculous cross come out of the flaming cloud in the wooded
' hollow between two hills,' and since Guy of Namur's Flemish
knights fled in defeat, for shelter to the castle-rock the old High
Street of Edinburgh the ridgy backbone of our modern Athens
he met many a toper going home in the early morning, with a wig
awry and sword reversed ; the shopkeepers in the Luckenbooths
and Lawu-market were taking off their shutters and displaying
111E WHITE COCEADE. 213
their wares freely now, for strict order was maintained by the guards
of Highlanders who were placed at every point, the old gendarm-
erie or local police of the city, having been disarmed and dispersed.
Matters had gone peacefully in Edinburgh since the blockade of
the castle had been withdrawn by the Prince, humanely to save the
city from its destructive batteries ; provisions were openly and
plentifully conveyed into the garrison ; but the Union Jack still
floated daily in defiance, from the great dark bastion of the Half-
moon.
As he proceeded with his guide, (who, to tell the truth, was a
little ashamed of him) up that long and stately street, Dalquharn
was struck with surprise on seeing the ponderous doors, studded
thickly with nails and swinging on immense hinges, that closed in
every turnpike stair, and the head or entrance of every close and
wynd. All these doors had been hurriedly prepared and hung in
their places, as a security against the supposed rapacity of the
Highlanders. Those barriers are all gone now ; but in hundreds of
instances, their massive hooks are yet remaining in the walls and
archways.
Close by, like Dalquharn's shadow, glided Starvieston, in his
rusty, sad coloured garments, with shrunken limbs and cadaverous
visage, ' need and oppression starving in his eyes,' like the lean apo-
thecary of Mantua.
Near the cross and Parliament Square, where King Charles's
statue now wore permanently a wreath of laurel, was a high tene-
ment of quaint aspect, that rose from a deep and shady arcade of
arches and pillars. In the first story of this was the Laigh (or
lower) Coffee-house, and just as they approached the door, there
came forth a military looking personage, clad in a blue uniform,
faced and lapelled with scarlet, and laced with broad bars of gold, a
scarlet vest, and white breeches, long boots and buff belts, his
troopers' sword and spurs jangling on the pavement.
He was Sir John Mitchell in the uniform of the Prince's Life
Guards, with a white peruke a la Brigadiere, in mien and bearing,
seeming better than ever, with his sturdy figure, bronzed face, and
clear grey eyes. His own brown hair, shorn short, was now thickly
seamed with white ; but he looked jolly and pleasant as usual, and
was full of hope and high enthusiasm for the good old cause.
'How now, Macbane?' said he, 'what cheat-the-woodie bring
you here ? Not a recruit for me, I hope, for what ! how !
God save us all 'tis my friend the Lord Dalquharn !' he suddenly
added, and took him in his arms.
' Escaped from the Bass, by something like a miracle, Mitchell,
and in the plight you see me."
' I' faith 'tis a melancholy one ; but it can be amended. Come
with me come with me, (adieu Macbane, with many kindly thanks)
come inside with me ; I bide at this coffee-house all night, but my
duties keep me at the camp or palace all day. Come, my friend,
162
2iJ THE WHITE COCKADE.
and make a toilette that may beseem you, and then we shall have
breakfast together. My wardrobe is most ample now I captured
one of the cavalry baggage carts at Preston. I have a thousand
tilings to ask you and a thousand more to tell. Escaped from the
Bass ? Zounds how did you accomplish that feat ? No mor-
tal man ever did so before. Even the Covenanters had but one
way of quitting it in their coffins. It was arranged that Sir Bal-
dred was to have demanded your release from the Laird of Salt-
coates, under protection of a flag of truce poor Sir Baldred you
have perhaps heard of his fate ?'
'Fate !' repeated Dalquharn in a faint voice.
' And dear Miss Bryde, too ?'
' You make me tremble for worse than yonder Highlander told
me.'
' Worse what could be worse than to be prisoners of the Hano-
verian Elector, when we know the unparalleled barbarity to which
he subjects them or his ministry, 'tis all one carried off within a
few miles of his own gate, too.'
' Balcraftie has been at the bottom of this.'
' Devil a doubt he has.'
' The subtle villain !'
' Justice will never be satisfied until we give her a stout rope with
a tree at one end of it, and that fellow at the other.'
Sir John soon had his friend under the hands of a barber and
valet, and when, in the course of half an hour after, he appeared in
a suit of light blue velvet laced with silver (which whilom belonged
to Cornet Gardiner, of Cope's Dragoons), cravat and ruffles of fine
lace, his fair hair dressed with a blue ribband, a handsome silver-
hilled hanger, tilting up his buckram stiffened skirts, and a hat
smartly cocked, with a white silk rosette on it, Gillies Macbane
would have bad some difficulty in recognising the scarecrow, of
whose absurd appearance he had felt ashamed, when traversing the
streets. As Mitchell said when they sat down to chocolate and a
rasher of bacon and eggs in the coffee-room, ' he looked every inch
a lord, and lacked but a well-filled purse now.'
' True,' sighed Dalquharn ; ' but a quarter's rent of my Galloway
estates, would make me feel myself a rich man.'
' Byde ye yet,' replied Mitchell, 'and in good time you may yet
have by the throat the truckling whig who brooks them.'
In the next box sat Mr. Jabez Starvieston, supping a huge bowl
of porridge and butter-milk, and listening the while witli his large,
cat-like ears strained to catch every word that fell from the two
friends, who were quite unconscious of liis vicinity.
' We have now nearly two hundred fine fellows enrolled for our
Life Guard," said Mitchell, in the course of conversation.
' So many and altogether, in camp ?'
' More than six thousand.'
' About half the number only that maivaed with the Earl of Mar
THE WHITE COCKADE. 245
to Sheriff Muir !' exclaimed Dalquharn, with a tone of disappoint-
ment and regret.
'True, but -we live in hope ; every day fresh men are joining UB.
and the Elector won't get rid of us in a hurry, I suspect, for as Gay
has it in his sarcasm,
' " Soldiers are perfect devils in tlielr way,
When once they're raised, they're cursed hard to lay." '
' And your rank is '
' Only lieutenant,' said Mitchell, colouring, for he had too much
good taste to tell that he had resolutely declined a troop, to the end
that its command might be given to his young friend, whose civil
rank was higher than his own.
1 Surely, my dear Mitchell, considering your years '
' Come, zounds ! I'm not so devilish old, after all only forty-
eight, and a bonnie lasa may fall in love with me yet.'
' Well, then, considering your sufferings and losses your thirty
years' exile, and that you served with my Lord Balmerino in the
Scots Grey Dragoons, I think that his Royal Highness the Prince
Eegent, might have bestowed upon you a higher rank in his Life
Guard, than merely that of lieutenant.'
' True ; but consider all are not so single-hearted as I ; think
how many fears there were to soothe how much ambition to
flatter, while I have neither, but for the success of King James's
pause. This is no time for me to grumble or repine. The Elector
once fairly beaten and safely housed in Herrenhausen (I was about
to say a hotter place, God forgive me !) I may be colonel of a dra-
goon guard corps yet ; and may, after all, die a general officer in
my old house of Pitreavie.'
Dalquharn was now free, at liberty, and at length among his
friends, and had become a sharer at last in the desperate game for
which he had so long panted ; but withal he was most unhappy.
The absence, the capture and loss of Bryde, with the doubt and
mystery that involved the whole affair of her seizure, filled him with
an intense anxiety, in which his companion, who loved her with the
most disinterested of all passions, fully shared ; but still he strove
to be hopeful and cheery.
' Come,' said he ; ' plague on't, man ; don't let your heart fail
you. I know what you are thinking of our dear Bryde, is it
not?'
' Of what or of whom else can I think now ?' exclaimed Dal-
quharn.
' Action, my friend, is the best cure for your complaint just now.
We'll have a stoup of claret and then ride over to the camp. The
wine is excellent here, and the living is cheap, as it would need to
be, considering the state of our rent-rolls and our pay ! Ah, dj
you remember how often over a bottle of claret and a supper of
Dutch herrings and salad, at the Hotel der Nederlander in Cainp-
yere with a pipe of tobacco, too, and all for forty stivers we uaed
216 THE WHITE COCKADE.
to talk about the time that lias come at last the time we scarcely
hoped to see when the white rose would be in full bloom, and the
" auld Stuarts back again" in Holyrood? God keep them there!
I don't much fancy this projected advance into England. It is a
flat and open country, without military positions of the rugged
kind, that suit a small force like ours. Then the mass of the people
are indifferent to the cause, and care not whether a Scot or a German
sits on their throne, while many view us with the rancour of other
days.'
' And the Prince, you say, wins the hearts of all ?'
'Yes he assuredly possesses the great hereditary charm of his
race. Egad, 'twas a wise axiom that of Henry IV. of France.'
'What about?'
' Sweetness.'
' How, Mitchell ?'
' For there are more flies caught by one spoonful of honey than
by ten tuns of vinegar. His Royal Highness goes to an entertain-
ment a little supper at the house of the Lord Provost to-night.'
' Openly ? Hush is there not a person in the next box ?'
Mitchell peeped in and saw Starvieston to all appearance fast
asleep across the table, with a roll of paper in his right hand.
' Well and the Prince goes there '
' Secretly,' said Mitchell, in a whisper ; ( I also am invited, and
shall present you to-night, but we must go armed to the teeth, and
be ready for any emergency, for the house is in perilous proximity
to the castle guns.'
They went forth from the coffee-house, leaving Starvieston with
the roll of paper at his ear, for he had ingeniously fashioned it
funnel-wise into a species of trumpet ; and hence he had heard
all ALL that the Prince was going in secret to the mansion of the
Lord Provost, which was, he knew, within musket-shot of the castle
gates, and that if he was secured, taken, or slain, by his Jabez
Starvieston's information thirty thousand pounds would be his
prize !
Wealth, enormous wealth, seemed to be within his grasp ; but
his coward heart trembled and seemed to stand still with fear at
the magnitude of the dastardly conception the vastness of the foul
scheme it conceived.
'Thirty thousand pounds thirty thousand pounds!' he con-
tinued to mutter, and the shining gold seemed to glitter on every
side of him, as he issued into the now sunny and bustling street,
and after several long pauses and fearful self-communings, took his
way slowly and stealthily towards the gate of the fortress.
THE WHITE COCKADB, 247
CHAPTER XLVI.
GENEEAL PBESTON.
' Urged, nathless on by the fury,
Of their feudal rancours hot ;
For never can hungry wolf hate wolf,
As can hungry Scot hate Scot !'
Ballad.
IT was with much internal quaking of the heart that Mr. Jabez
Starvieston glided stealthily up the castle-hill on his peculiar
errand, nursing his courage chiefly by thoughts of the admiration,
if not envy, his skill and treachery, and his wonderful good fortune
too, would assuredly excite in the breast of his master, mentor and
tyrant, Reuben Balcraftie, of whom the conception of this plan to
win the favour of His Majesty's ministers, was quite worthy.
As he approached the gate, by the then open and uninclosed area
which is now named the Esplanade, and saw the lofty Half-moon
Battery with its black arched port-holes, its tier of bristling cannon,
and the hostile standard flying defiantly above them, he felt his
heart almost fail ; but he fanned his courage as he thought of the
thirty thousand pounds, and walked slowly on, till two sentinels,
posted at a trench and bulwark recently formed across the castle-
hill, commanded him to stop, and made him spring nearly a yard
high, as they brought the muskets to the ' ready ' and he heard the
click of their locks.
This newly-formed outwork of earth, had been an additional de-
fence conceived by General Preston ; but it had been stormed by
the Duke of Athole's Highlanders, who, with the loss of one officer
and twenty clansmen, drove in the 47th Regiment, under a fire of
round shot from the depressed guns of the Half-moon, and of
canister from some brass field-pieces. One of the latter was still
lying dismounted in the trench, as Starvieston scrambled over it,
and was roughly collared by two sentinels of the 47th or Peregrine
Lascelles' Lancashire Regiment, who demanded his purpose, and
surveyed him with mingled curiosity and contempt, to both of
which this Scottish worthy was perfectly insensible, having been
pretty well used to endure them, since the days of his infancy, now
some thirty years before.
On stating that he wished to see the Governor, he was asked
1 which Governor ?' for there were actually two : General Joshua
Guest, the newly appointed English commander, who, although his
monument in Westminster Abbey eulogises his brave defence of
the fortress ' against the rebels,' as a cavalier at heart, was only too
glad to subside into a cypher, and leave the responsibility of main-
taining the place to the late Scottish Lieutenant Governor, whom
he had been specially sent to supersede, General George Preston.
The privates of the Lancashire Regiment addressed their visitor
218 TUB WHITE COCKADE.
in a wonderful accent, and he replied in a patois which they deemed
equally so.
They demanded his business with the general. That, however,
lest others might share his secret and get the expected reward the
legal and acute Mr. Jabez Starvieston was too reserved and cautious
to tell ; but he resolutely asserted that his message was on the
king's service, and must be given to the governor and the governor
only!
The soldiers seemed surly fellows and were about to trundle him
over the trench, when the altercation attracted the attention of the
officer in charge of the barrier guard, who, from the battery at the
tete-du-pont, called authoritatively, to ' search the Scotch scare-
crow, and if he was without arms, to pass him, if he had any mes-
sage to deliver.'
By the intervention of this personage a spruce young captain of
Lascelles' Foot, in a scarlet uniform, faced with white, and laced
with silver, a long waistcoat and small clothes of white kerseymere,
a Ramillie wig and conical cap with the white horse of Hanover
thereon he was speedily passed into the fortress, up a steep and
winding pathway overshadowed by many grim gates, a deep arch-
way and an iron portcullis with a jagged row of rusty teeth ; and
ere long he found himself in a small pannelled room in the house of
the Lieutenant Governor, the windows of which faced the dark
walls and rugged rock of the citadel or inner castle.
It was low in the ceiling, gloomy as dark wainscofc could make it,
and plainly furnished with massive and antique tables and chairs of
black oak ; and Starvieston's stealthy and timid eyes glanced hur-
riedly from a trophy of old swords and matchlock-pistols, that had
seen service in the wars of the Covenant and Claverhouse, to some
pikes and muskets that stood in a corner, and then to some printed
' standing orders for y e Garrison,' with a copy of the identical pro-
clamation, which in the name of His Majesty King George, offered
the sum of thirty thousand pounds sterling, ' for the head of the
vile Popish Pretender, now in arms against our royal crown and
authority.'
This document alone cheered him, for the room had something in
its aspect rather chilling.
In that sombre chamber, on the 7th of January, 1743, died the
aged and gallant William Macintosh of Boiium, in the fifteenth
year of his imprisonment, for his share in the rising of 1715, after
writing on the wall an invocation of God's blessing on King James
VIII., with one of his teeth, for which he had no further use ; and
in that room once yearly, as the soldiers tell us still, a spectre is
heard heard but not seen. At midnight there distinctly comes
the sound of a man in heavy boots rushing frantically across it to-
wards the window, which, however securely it may be fastened, ha
throws violently up, and springs over it with a shriek. Then the
window recloses by its own weight, and all becomes still j but tradi-
THE WHITE COCKADE. 219
tion avers that long ago a soldier committed suicide thus, in re-
morse for having sold to the government a Jacobite prisoner, who
proved to be his own father.
Starvieston heard the strange sound of wheels grating on the oak
floor; the door was dashed violently open, and in a wheeled arm-
chair, which was pushed forward, by an old and weather-beaten
valet, in a uniform waistcoat, pipe-clayed small clothes and brigadier
wig, General Preston made his appearance, and it was an appear-
ance, somewhat remarkable.
' D n my limbs !' he exclaimed, while viciously grasping his
crutch, ' are you the infernal scarecrow I have been brought in here
to see ? what the devil can you want with me eh ? Speak out, or
by all the fiends I'll bring you to the halberts !'
Starvieston felt his heart sinking to his heels ; he could but gasp
and survey this ferocious commander and wish himself in safety
outside the gate of the castle, which he regarded as a species of
trap into which his avarice had lured him.
General Preston, a veteran of the wars of King William, had
come over with the Dutch in 1688 to fight against Viscount Dun-
dee, at Killycrankie, where a goodly slice of his skull, which was
shred away by the trenchant claymore of a Cameron, had to be re-
placed by trepanning. Ho had an arm broken by a musket shot, at
Steinkirk, and was left for dead under his horse at the battle of
Blenheim. In the prime of life he must have been more than six
feet in height ; but now in his eighty- seventh year for he was born
during the usurpation of Cromwell he stooped considerably.
Though hopelessly disabled by gout, his complexion was still bron-
zed and weather-beaten ; he had an ill-healed old sword cut, which
rather disfigured his nose, and he had few or no teeth remaining.
His face was a mass of wrinkles, and his brow wore a permanent
and terrible frown ; but his eves were keen, sharp and fierce as
those of a rattle-snake, a.nd, owing to his lack of incisors, there was
a hiss in his voice sufficient to remind one of some such reptile.
He still, with the eccentricity of age, adhered to the long flowing
wig of King William's time, an ornament that cast the hair of a
man completely in the shade ; as Holmo, writing in the year of the
Revolution, assures us that the adoption of great wigs so generally
by men, ' was quite contrary to the custom of their forefathers, who
got estates, loved their wives, and wore their own hair. In these
days,' he adds, with simplicity, ' there be no such things.'
The general also adhered to the hat of the period, turned up on
two sides only, and edged with white feathers. He had his cravat
of Flemish lace passed through a button hole of his buff waistcoat,
like the military bucks of 1690, and his ample Bcarlet coat, like the
former (which had huge thigh flaps), came nearly to his knees, also
in the fashion of the Revolution, for he doted on the memory of
King William, in a manner that would have enchanted my Lord
Macaulay, and certainly have found him a place in his brilliant
250 THE WHITE COCKADE.
romance of history. But the general had one unpleasant peculiarity,
that pertained unto the gentlemen of his time, and particularly
those of ' our army of Flanders ;' he swore so fearfully that we
shall have some difficulty in retailing the conversation which en-
sued between him and his trembling and terrified visitor.
Notwithstanding his age, wounds, and infirmity, so indefatigable
was General Preston, in conducting the defence of the castle, after
the council of war, at which General Guest and the officers of the
47th proposed to surrender it, that every two hours by night and
day, a party of soldiers wheeled him round the various posts and
batteries, that he might personally see if all were on the alert
against a surprise ; and whenever an unfortunate Highlander ap-
peared, however casually, he ordered him. to be fired on, and in
some instances with round shot or grape.
After surveying the lean, cadaverous, and stealthy- eyed visitor,
in the rusty and sad coloured clothes, and scratch wig made of a
terrier's skin, which in no way improved his general appearance,
as he stood in a corner, nervously brushing the three flaps of his
scurvy old beaver, with his deep, square, threadbare cuff, the gene-
ral, whose naturally diabolical temper, a recent fit of the gout had
severely exasperated, thundered out,
' Sirrah 'tention ! what the devil is your name ?'
' Jabez St t tarvieston so please you, general.'
' Starvieston you're rightly named, you hunger-eyed loon ; and
what are you ?'
' Clerk to the Provost o' North Berwick, sir.'
' And what is your purpose ?'
' A maist loyal one, at your service, general,' whined the other,
who accompanied every answer by a bow and slight bending of the
knees.
' Speak out, you son of a shotten herring,' roared the old Wil-
liamite ; ' what do you want with me ?'
' I'm your honour's maist humble servant '
' Was it to tell me that you ventured into the castle of Edinburgh,
troubling nie thus ?' shouted Preston, in a louder key, and uplifting
his crutch.
' N no, n no '
' What then speak out, or I'll beat you into a jelly.'
With considerable trepidation, and an amount of circumlocution,
which elicited many oaths, threats, and signs of fierce impatience
from the old general, Starvieston related what he had heard in the
coffee-house that ' the Pretender ' was on that night secretly to
sup with the Provost, attended by a select few, the chiefs of his
army and court ; that the Provost's house was close to the castle,
and that if they were all seized there by an armed party, through
his humble instrumentality, he hoped that his honour, the general,
would see that he got the reward so generously offered by the
crown,
THE WHITE COCKADE. 251
While the meagre visaged and trembling wretch proceeded thu*.
the stern old general clutched his formidable crutch, and eyed him
with very saturnine expression of face.
' Hah the Provost a Stuart too,' he muttered ; ' I ever sus-
pected that loon to be a Jacobite, a traitor, it may be a papist at
heart! for he and his cowardly psalm-singing volunteers heroes
from the desk and counter surrendered the city, without firing a
shot at the bare-legged Highland rabble ; but I'll mar their handi-
work that shall I, sure as my name is George Preston !'
' Indubitably you will, general indubitably you will,' said Star-
vieston, bowing and cringing.
' And so, wretch/ said the veteran, after a pause, pointing with
his crutch to the printed proclamation, ' you would seek to gain
the thirty thousand pounds offered for for this young gentleman's
head eh ?'
' I wad seek through your honour's grace, to be o' some sma' ser-
vice to my king, and the covenanted Kirk as by law established."
' Of course, and of some small service to yourself,' sneered the
general, adding with a fierce oath, ' you hang-dog and dyvour-loon,
I would rather you had not put this foul temptation before me !
But since you have done it, a party shall surround the house of
Provost Stuart, and carry off at the point of the bayonet, nil who
may be found in it. By this means, we may secure the Popish
Pretender, if it be as you say. If not, we may capture at least
some of those Highland disturbers of the peace.'
' And shall I win the promised reward, general the promised
reward ?'
' Undoubtedly, and tacked thereto the curse of more than the
half of Europe, while every hand in the Highlands will be itching
to take you by the throat. Meanwhile, you shall stay here till this
matter be ended.'
' Here !' exclaimed Starvieston, as his shrunken limbs tottered
with dismay ; ' here, said you, sir ?'
' Yes what the devil do you mean by repeating my words ?'
'But the Highlanders may storm the castle to rescue their Prince,
and put ilka soul in't, to the edge o' the sword, as Argyle did at
Dunavertie, and Monk at Dundee.'
' Let them try let them try,' responded Preston, grinding his
toothless gums ; ' it has never been stormed yet, and 'sblood ! it
sha'n't be in George Preston's time. I have it I have it,' he
muttered to himself ; ' one party shall march down the Castle
Wynd to the foot of Donaldson's Close ; another shall march to the
Weigh-house, and blockade all the avenues to the High Street ;
thus every chance of escape will be cut off! Major Robertson slmll
see to it. Would that I could go with him but this twinge of the
gout the thrice d ned gout ! And now, you sir 'tention !
Zounds what's your infernal name ?'
' Starvieston, humbly at your honour's service,'
252 THE WHITE COCKADE.
' And the devil's too, apparently. Well you shall be kept close
prisoner, till every man of my party return.'
Wherefore, gude, worthy general ?'
' If it is a snare/ said Preston, -with a glare in his snake-like eyes,
' a lure, merely to draw my men into the town, while those High-
land savages assault the fortress, woe be unto you woe ! And if
it is only a mistake a failure '
' It may be sae, gude general,' urged the other piteously, ' it may
be, and through nae short comings o' mine.'
' I care not the value of a brass bodle ! if it is a failure,' hissed
the old man through his toothless gums. c I'll hang you owre the
Half-moon Battery like a dog yea, hang you in the face of the
whole city by the God of my kindred, I shall ! Call the sergeant
of the guard !' he bellowed to his valet ; and so closed an interview
that completely deranged the nervous system of the acquisitive Mr.
Jabez Starvieston.
The niglit closed in another cloudy and moonless one. In the
gloomy seclusion of the Black Hole, a vaulted chamber above the
Portcullis (a place wherein the Duchess of Perth and Lady Stra-
thallan pined for twelve weary months, after the battle of Culloden),
Starvieston was left to his own not over-pleasant reflection, and the
society of certain lively rats, which, by their scampering hither and
thither, evidently considered him an intruder on their premises.
It may be imagined with what emotions, as the general's savage
threat recurred to memory, he saw the regiment of Lascelles (at
least that portion of it which was not at the battle of Preston), and
the rest of the garrison, after carefully loading with ball cartridge,
defiling silently, but with measured tramp, through the dark arch-
way beneath his prison, and issuing upon that terrible errand
which he had suggested, and the sequel to which he could not fore-
see ; but alarm and utter dismay were in his craven soul. He
wept, lie howled, he tore his scratch-wig and bit his long nails in
the dark, and would gladly have forfeited all his chances of ill-
gotten wealth by the sale of human blood, to have found himself
once more at liberty and in safety on Lufihess Muir, or the Links
of North Berwick.
After the troops had departed, the barrier gates had been closed,
and the guards were got under arms, so as to be ready for any
emergency, no sound was heard in the vast fortress which overhung
the silent city. There seemed a great hush a preternatural still-
ness in the air of the autumn night a strange quietness in and
about everything ; and amid it, in the darkness of his self-acquired
prison, the trembling wretch, after the scared rats had departed,
heard only the painful beating of his avaricious heart, as he pressed
his throbbing temples against the rusty grating of the little window
which still opens towards the far off hills of Fife.
Mr. Jabez Starvieston, like his protector and mentor, Mr. Reuben
Balcraftie, had learned to quote Scripture most glibly 5 but now,
T11E WlllTE COCKADE. 25$
iii this his extreme tribulation, no text or prayer occurred to him ;
his soul was full of vague fear and loathing, and his tongue was
loaded and tremulous with unuttered maledictions.
Dart as this poor wretch's own spirit was the blackness of the
uight without, and of the vault within ; he was just in the act of
commencing a psalm in a shrill cracked voice, when a howl of
terror escaped him, and he toppled down on his knees, for at that
moment the explosion of musketry rang suddenly out upon the
silence of the night in the city below, making the sentinels in their
stone turrets at the angles of the ramparts peep out and listen ; but
all became still again.
: Meanwhile Major Robertson, a brave and careful officer who
afterwards served with distinction at the battle of Val, divided his
force, which consisted of some four hundred men, nearly the half of
whom were the castle company, a veteran band which remained in
existence until 1813, when their drums beat for the last time the
old Scottish march, before the gates of the fortress.
One portion under a captain stealthily descended that steep and
picturesque alley known as the Castle Wynd, through a gate in the old
town waU of 1450, and wheeling to the left took possession of the foot
of Donaldson's Close, placing a line of sentinels from thence towards
the Candlemaker's Row, completely cutting off all chance of escape
towards the south. They were without knapsacks, and all had the
square skirts of their red coats buttoned back, to enable their, to act
with more freedom and activity ; and there was not a man of Las-
cellos' Regiment but who burned to avenge the loss and capture of
their colours at the late battle of Preston.
"Under the Major, the remainder took possession of the entrance
to the close, and the upper end of the Bow, quite as effectually
precluding all hope of escape to the northward.
The sentinels turned back all persons who approached in either
direction the high, dark, steep and narrow street where the intended
victims were. Few men were abroad at such an hour, for St. Giles's
bell had tolled midnight ; scarcely a light was seen in the houses,
and the meagre oil lamps that were still lighted, occasionally, amid
the confusion of the city affairs, the seizure of funds and flight of
officials, were all extinguished by order of Major Robertson, thus
adding greatly to the weird aspect of the great mansions of stone and
timber that overshadowed the street.
So early as the time of James V., but more particularly during
the Regency of his widow, Mary of Guise, the streets had been lit
by lanterns, which burned from five till nine in the winter evenings.
These were found so unsatisfactory, that in 1684 a lantern with a
candle in it was ordered to be hung from the first story of every
house from five till ten in autumn and winter, under a penalty of
five marks Scots for each omission ; and after the introduction of
oil lamps in 1745, it was supposed that the ne plus ultra had been
attained in Auld Reekie.
25 i T1IE WJIIXE COCEADfi.
On the extinction of all the adjacent lamps by the soldiers, ft
solemn gloom involved all the streets and alleys about the West
Bow, a thoroughfare of which now little more remains than the
lofty dwelling of Weir, the wizard, who perished at the stake some
sixty years before the period of our story. It was a place abound-
ing in quaint antique mansions of the middle ages, beyond any other
quarter of the city, and these presented the same striking aspect that
they had done in the wild days of the Douglas wars, and the storm
of the Reformation ; and dark indeed were the traditions and the
history of many of those old houses.
Their singular impending fronts, projecting on ponderous beams
and grotesque corbels, piled story over story ; their acute gables,
dove-cot-like outshots, gloomy galleries and giant chimney stalks,
all studded with white oyster shells ; their dark vaults and profun-
dities haunted by tales of ghosts, of human heads that dropped down
the vents to grin and jabber on the hobs sorrowful stories, too, of
love and bloodshed ; the deep cul de sac, where many a time and oft,
in our ' feudal rancours hot,' a fugitive had to turn at bay and de-
fend himself, sword in hand, or die ; the vast height of some of the
tenements, whereon the iron crosses that marked them as the pro-
perty of the Knights of the Temple, and latterly of St. John of
Jerusalem, crosses beyond the reach of reforming iconoclasts all
served to make this steep and winding street one of the most re-
markable in Europe.
When partly demolished to make way for Victoria Terrace, in
many instances secret trap stairs, pannelled hiding places, blood
spots, human bones and concealed swords and daggers, that had
done murderous work in the lawless times of old, were brought to
light.
Between the crimson curtains of the tall narrow windows of a
mansion which overlooked the middle of this quaint street, the
bright radiance of many wax candles from within, streamed athwart
the gloom without. The sound of many voices rang out upon the
night ; elsewhere all the houses seemed sunk in silence and dark-
ness, as their inmates most probably were, in slumber.
This mansion Major Robertson knew to be the residence of Archi-
bald Stuart, the Lord Provost ; it was of that kind which in Scot-
land is termed ' self-contained,' and entered from Donaldson's Close,
the avenues to which were strictly guarded.
He posted forty men, witli loaded muskets opposite those win-
dows, with orders to shoot down or bayonet all who might attempt
to escape by dropping therefrom with the aid of cords or curtains ;
aud then he ordered the door to be at once assailed.
Immediately on this alarm being given, the lights in the house
were extinguished ; the sound of voices was instantly hushed within,
and nothing was heard but the clatter of musket butts on the strong
oak door of the Provost's beleaguered mansion.
THE WHITE COCKADE. 255
CHAPTER XLVIL
THE PBOVOST'S SUPPEB.
' Awa, whigs, awa awa, whigs, awa,
Ye are but a pack o' traitor loons,
Ve'll ne'er do glide at a' !
Grim vengeance lang has taen a nap,
But we may see him wauken ;
God help the day when Royal heads,
Are haunted like a maukeu V Jacobite Song.
SoMB time prior to this, about the hour of nine in the evening, Sir
John Mitchell, in his Life Guard uniform and baronet's decoration,
an orange ribband and badge with St. Andrew's Cross and the royal
arms of Scotland, accompanied by his friend Dalquham, attired as
we have already described, quitted the Laigh coffee-house, and
proceeding up the broad Lawnmarket, where a few dim oil lamps
were now lighted, presented themselves at the mansion of the chief
magistrate, where they were admitted, on Sir John showing his card
of invitation, and giving a secret password, agreed upon, to an usher,
a young merchant of Edinburgh, named Koderick Mackenzie of
whom there is much more to relate anon. He was armed with broad
eword and pistols, and led them into the house, which, says the
local antiquary, Mr. Eobert Chambers, 'is of singular construction,
and is as full of curious little rooms and concealed closets and trap-
stairs, as any house that ever had the honour of being haunted.'
Archibald Stuart, the Lord Provost, a pleasant-looking man, in a
bright cherry-coloured suit of velvet, with a bobwig, huge ruffles,
and his insignia of office, received them at the door of the apart-
meut, which was not very large, so that it seemed to be crowded by
the company already assembled.
' You are the last comer, Sir John,' said his lordship } ' his
Highness, the Regent, is already here.'
l)alquharn felt his heart stirred strangely by those words. It was
something glorious to hear his long exiled prince thus spoken of by
the chief magistrate of Edinburgh, even under the muzzles of the
castle guns !
There was a subdued hum of voices ; with the gaiety of rich coats
and vests of brilliantly coloured silk, velvet, or cloth of gold, spark-
ling orders and rich embroidery, for here the crosses of St. Louis
hung side by side with those of the Thistle and Bath. There, too,
were bright, red and green tartans, well-powdered wigs, of two or
three obsolete fashions (for the Scots then, as now, always adhered
tenaciously to old modes), and the glitter of jewelled weapons, for
all were fully armed with sword, dirk, and pistols.
The apartment in which they met would be considered much too
snwll for such a titled assemblage in the present day ; but what it
lacked in size, it made up for iu the comfort and richness of its fur-
niture and decorations.
25<j tHE WUIIE COCKAUE.
It was entirely wainscoted, even the ceiling was so, and, like the
walls, was divided into deeply pannelled compartments, each con-
taining a work of art a landscape, fruit, flowers, nymphs and
fairies by the pencil of Norrie, a well-known fresco painter, who
decorated thus most of the fine old houses of Edinburgh.
The mantlepiece of carved freestone, was lined with blue Delft-
ware, that reflected the glow of the coal fire, which burned upon
the hearth, between two grotesque iron dogs. The furniture of
dark mahogany was massive, antique, and richly carved ; but the
leading feature was a very beautifully formed .oak cabinet, little
more than three feet high.
Surmounted by two magnificent china vases, each nearly five feet
in height, it was a miracle of oak carving, and bore in each of the
two pannels, into which its front was divided, the escutcheon of
the sirname of Stuart, a fess checque, for the worthy Provost,
though but a merchant in the Crames, ' was come o' gude kith and
kin' (and what Scotsman is not?), and could reckon blood with
the best in the land. Thus, his daughter Grizel was wedded to the
Laird of Lees, in the Merse, as Sir Bernard Burke carefully records,
and her descendants are now baronets of Great Britain.
Before this cabinet the Prince was standing, engaged in conver-
sation with the Duke of Perth, the venerable Marquis of Tully-
bardine, sly old Simon, Lord Lovat, and one or two others, who
wore clan-tartan truis, and short coats of the same material, but
richly laced with gold. There too, was the frank, jovial, and con-
vivial Lord Balmerino, in the blue and scarlet uniform of the Life
Guard ; and with him were the tall and stately Lochiel, and the
venerable, the noble, and white-haired Kcppoch, each in tlieir
home-spun clan tartans, with sporrans and cuams (or shoes) made
from the skins of the deer and goats, that rail wild on their own
mountains.
The Duke of Perth, a lieutenant-general in the Highland army,
looked handsome, brilliant, and animated; Tullybardine seemed
careworn and full of thought, for the lines of age and anxiety were
blended in his finely cut features ; old Simon, of Lovat, looked fat,
sleek, and sly a kind of Dr. Johnson in the costume of a Celtic
chief with his hea'd on one side, and a leer in his cunning eyes
(just as we see him depicted in Hogarth's famous portrait) while
listening to some joke of the half-witted Earl of Kellie.
' In spite of a very delicate constitution,' says Sir Robert Douglas,
of Gleubervie, ' the Duke of Pertli underwent the greatest of
fatigues, and was the first on every occasion of duty, where his
head or his hands could be of use ; bold as a lion in the field of
battle, but ever merciful in the hour of victory ! With a heart
open to all the delicate feelings of humanity, those mild and gentle
affections that peculiarly distinguish the brave, filled his breast with
universal benevolence, made him attentive to relieve the calamities
THB WHITE COCKADJ. 25?
of the distressed, and put him always in remembrance that no dis-
tinction of party can blot out the diameter of MAN !'
Such was this noble peer who died an exile at the siege of Ber-
gen-op-Zoom, and was buried in charity by the English nuns of
Antwerp.
Tall, fair, and slender, the young Prince seemed the most striking
of that stately and picturesque group, of which a photograph (could
such a thing have been taken then and preserved till now) would
have been priceless ! He was leaning on his claymore, his ri^lit
hand resting involuntarily on the star of the Thistle, that sparkled
on his coat, which was of the white tartan, known as the dress-
Stuart, and was thickly braided with silver. His dear blue eyes
and fine aquiline features were full of animation, and his thick fair
hair, which had a ripple in it, like that of a young girl, was, as
usual, queued simply with a knot of blue ribband, behind that
stately head for which 90 many thousand pounds were offered at
every market cross in Britain and Ireland.
'There is a majesty doth hedge a king 1'
Was it the sense of this, or rather the stirring memory of Scot-
land's romantic past that story of a war for freedom, ' red war
that twenty ages round her blnzed,' which welled up in the heart
of Lord Dalquharn, on suddenly finding himself almost face to face
with the son of his exiled king that gentle, unrepining, and un-
crowned king whom, from earliest infancy, he had been taught to
view as the sole fountain of all British and Scottish honour, the re-
presentative of that right divico, in defence of which so many loyal
and noble hearts have grown cold on the scaffold, and on the battle
field!
Sublime but silly bubble ! Though the Jacobites had Scripture
for it, we can laugh at it now.
Loyalty, moreover, is a cheap commodity, when majesty is so
often seen 'hedged* simply by the prosaic police; and when
happily no axe, or cord, or line of battle need be faced on British
ground. We may be loyal to our heart's core ; but thank Heaven,
the terrible tettt that made loyalty like martyrdom, and rendered a
belief in the old Scottish regal line, second only to a belief in Hea-
ven itself, can no longer be applied.
Just as Sir John Mitchell took his friend by the hand, the Lord
Provost, who had been looking over his guests, exclaimed, with
sudden perturbation,
' My lords and gentlemen, there is present one person more than
the number invited. We are twenty-two, inc ding His Royal High-
ness instead of twenty-one. Pardon me for having counted you ;
but
' One too many ! And who is this person ?' exclaimed the Duke
of Perth, with a hand on one of his pistols.
' 'Tis inv friend the Lord Dalquharn, whom I take this the
17
238 TilE WHITE COCKADE.
earliest opportunity of presenting to your Royal Highness, 1 said
Mitchell, leading forward his friend, who knelt and kissed the hand
of the Prince.
' Dalquharn Lord Dalquharn of the Holm who escaped from
the Bass Hock!' muttered all present, crowding round, while a
murmur of congratulation and applause greeted him ; for all their
party remembered vividly the loyalty, the genuine Scottish patriot-
ism, of his father, and the bitter wrongs he had endured at the
hands of a servile ministry.
' Dalquharn, my dear friend, and my father's most faithful adhe-
rent !' exclaimed the Prince, as he shook his hand, and placed an
arm caressingly on his shoulder.
' I sincerely trust that I have not incommoded you, my Lord
Provost, and more especially your Eoyal Highness, by presenting
my young friend here ?' said Sir John Mitchell.
' My worthy friend, Sir John," replied the Prince, shaking his
hand with great cordiality, and smiling with that singular mixture
of kindness and condescension which he peculiarly possessed, 'be
assured that I am not easily incommoded now. Adversity is the
great school for kings and for kings' sous too ; and I have fully
learned to make the most of time and of all things ; and to appre-
ciate the maxim of the Grand Monarque " Inexactitude c'est la
politesse des Rois."'
A folding door was now opened, and a hot, steaming, and plen-
tiful supper table, glittering with massive plate, quaintly cut crystal,
and attended by eight valets in the royal livery, each with a brace
of pistols in his girdle, could be seen in a handsome tapestried room
beyond.
For obvious and politic reasons, none of the ladies of the Pro-
vost's household were present ; and when the Prince inquired for
them, his Lordship, laughingly, reminded him that a woman's
tongue had caused the losa of Edinburgh Castle in the Rising of
1715.
' You shall sit near me, my Lord Dalquharn. I must hear all
about your escape from the Bass Rock, which seems to be like the
Bastille of St. Antoine, the castle of Loches, or that on the Isle of
Saint Marguerite quite a devil of a place, in fact!' said the Prince,
as the supper party seated themselves with strict accordance to
rank, the Provost having his royal guest on his right, and old Kep-
poch on his left, the Duke of Perth declining that place, and saying,
laughingly, that ' any king might make a peer, but that God alone
could make a Celtic chief.'
' The vacant troop of the Life Guard must be yours, Dalquharn,'
said Charles Edward.
' Vacant, I fear, tln-ough the single-heartedness of one who haa
ever preferred others to himself.'
' You will see to this to-morrow, Perth ?'
THE WM11B COCKADE. 259
The Duke bowed to the Prince, and made a memorandum in his
note-book.
The supper-party consisted exactly of twenty-two, including the
host and Dalquharn, and a jovial band they were, who pushed the
flasks of port, sherry, claret, brandy, and usquebaugh rapidly round
the board.
Some were there, young, noble, and gallant in bearing as the
Prince himself, full of the romance, the gaiety, and enthusiasm of
life, and of the cause in which they were all embarked for weal or
woe, hopeful, with their good broadswords, ' to cut a passage to the
British throne.'
Others were there, old cavaliers, like Tullybardine, Keppoch, and
Mitchell, whose youth had long since gone ; whose brows were
marked by the lines of deep thought ; who had endured years of
exile, with its consequent penury and humiliation ; whose hearts
were full of gravity (even when they laughed with the loudest), full
of memories of the devoted dead, and of the dangers they had dared
together ; who had laid their nearest and dearest in foreigu graves,
or been compelled to abandon them unburied, to the kite and the
wolf, on the battle-fields lost by the shores of the Khine and the
Vistula.
' We have at last resolved on war, my Lord Dalquharn,' said the
Prince ; ' a war that shall v\ iu, I hope, the approving smiles of cer-
tain bright eyes, now far away in France. To the Black Eyes,
gentlemen!' lie exclaimed, draining a glass of wine; 'to the Black
Eyes!'
1 To the Black Eyes !' exclaimed all present, imitating his ex-
ample ; for this toast was known to be dedicated to the Princess of
the House of Bourbon, by whom, in the end, this poor young prince
was fooled, deluded, and made a mere tool, to further the wars and
wiles of France.
' Yes,' he resumed, ' we are now bent on war the last argument
of kings !'
' Ratio ultima Regum an old inscription I have often read on
French field-pieces,' said Tullybardine.
' Alas ! that it should be civil war !' exclaimed the Prince ; ' but,
to punish usurpation, what other course was left us ?'
' Allow me to congratulate your Koyal Highness on your recent
glorious victory at Preston. I heard of it in the solitude of iny
prison on yonder terrible rock.'
' Good, my Lord : it cut me to the heart when I saw the poor
Red Coats BO slaughtered there, even as when I saw them borne
down, in rout and disorder, before the Irish bayonets at Fontenoy.
I could not but remember how, when my father the king served
with the army under the Marechal Due de Vendome, thousands of
the British troops then serving in the field "recovered" their arms,
and cheered cheered him even in the ranks of France ! I can as-
sure you, Lord Dalquharn, tliat on that day at Preston, my heart,
172
260 THE WHITE COCKADB.
in the moment of victory, bled for the vanquished, even as that of
niy royal grandsire did when he saw the slaughter of the soldiers at
the Boyne, and cried, " Oh, spare my English subjects !" It was
but the same sentiment that made his bosom fill with triumph,
when, a spectator and in exile, he saw his own English sailors
whom he had led so often to victory conquerors at La Hogue.
" Ah !" he exclaimed, full of admiration and regret, when he saw the
French fleet in flames, " none but my brave English tars could have
performed an action so gallant !" You have doubtless,' continued
the Prince, after a pause, ' heard of the arrest of Sir Baldred Otter-
burn, and Miss Bryde too an arrest perpetrated on Scottish soil by
Dutch troops ? But we shall mate those same Dutchmen smart for
their interference in our affairs, when we take the high road for
England !'
' When I was made a prisoner,' said Dalquharn, hurriedly, to
conceal the flush that crossed his face on hearing Bryde's name,
' I was compelled to destroy the sword with which your Royal
Highness honoured me, to save it from pollution by ignoble hands.'
'A sword did I give you one?'
'Yes,' replied Dalquharn, a little mortified, 'when we last
parted '
' Vrai mon dieuvrai !' exclaimed Charles, who often used
French ; ' I forgot, and am perpetually forgetting, my dear Dalqu-
harn. Kings have short memories is it not so, Perth thus the
failing must descend to princes, who are the sons of kings, though
our intrusive friend, the Elector, might dispute the proposition.
Take this claymore, my lord,' said the gracious Prince, unbuckling
a handsome steel-hilted broadsword, and presenting it to Dalqu-
harn ; ' 'twill make amends ; I had it as a gift from old Glenbucket
himself.'
Dalquharn bowed low, kissed the hilt and appended the weapon
to his belt.
' You have heard, no doubt,' Charles resumed, while his blue
eyes sparkled with indignation slightly mingled with drollery, ' of
the handsome sum offered for my head by the authorities in Lon-
don?'
' I have so heard, your highness yea, with shame and just re-
sentment ?'
Old Keppoch twisted up his silvery white moustache, which he
had reddened in a goblet of claret, and muttered something fiercely
in the spirit of the Celtic song, which says bitterly,
We hate the Saxon and the Dane,
We hate the Norman men
Their cursed greed for blood and gain,
, And curse them now again 1'
1 They ofler more for my head than for taking me alive ! It says
Tomch for the generosity of my Q-erinau cousin, the Elector ; but
THE WHITE COCKADE. 2G1
such lack of common kanour and humanity, suits better the lati-
tude of Herrenhauscn, than that of Holyrood. Had the ting, my
father,' lie added, sternly, ' perished by the hand of the hired as-
sassin at Nonancourt, I had not been here as his regent to-day, in
our ancient capital of Scotland.'
' God's wratli ! and that dark plot,' said the Duke of Perth, with
a sombre frown on his fine dark face, ' was alike worthy of its in-
ventors the Elector George I., and that base Scottish Earl, who
was afterwards his ambassador at Paris.'
' True,' added Lord Lorat, who with his serviette was carefully
wiping and returning to their places, the knife and fork of his
dirk ; ' but we should remember that the family which abetted
King William in the massacre of Glencoe, and the torture of the
poor Englishman Payne, is fit for anything. And who fears to
speak of them ? Sirs, know we not the Dalrymples of Stair ?'
An angry but approving murmur went round the table, and more-
than one hand touched with grim significance the hilt of a dirk or
the butt of a pistol.
"With what stern satisfaction would the Jacobites have contem-
plated the retribution, which, on a Sunday in September, 1866, fell
on poor George V., the good and amiable King of Hanover, when
he futilely ' protested to the cabinets of Eui'ope, against the annex-
ation of his cherished and historic kingdom, by William I. of
Prussia. His majesty having made the ordinary appeal of right
against might, awaits the future with full trust in the justice of his
cause, and holds to a firm hope that Heaven will not fail to end the
intrigues, dishonesty and violence, whereby so many estates, along
with Hanover, have been made the victims.'
Such were identically the words used over and over again by the
House of Stuart and its devoted adherents in their day ; but Han-
over proved stronger than Heaven in the end j at least, to the Jaco-
bites it seemed so.
Aware that Bryde Otterburn and Sir Baldred were in the hands
of the authorities beyond the Border, Dalquharn was most anxious
to learn when the rash and desperate idea of an advance into Eng-
land, was to take place, but could gather no information on the sub-
ject from those around him, and he had not boldness to enquire of
the Prince personally. Indeed, the intended movements and the
line of march to be adopted by the different columns of the little
army, were wisely kept, as yet, a profound secret.
The conversation was lively and unrestrained, and the hopes and
high enthusiasm of all increased as the wine ebbed in the decanters,
which were replenished repeatedly, and the convivial Lord Balme-
rino, at the request of the Prince, was just about to sing a stirring
party song, and to mix a bowl of whiskey punch, in the manufac-
ture of which he excelled, when the clatter of musket butts was
suddenly heard at the street door, and the clamour of voices, loudly
and authoritatively demanding admittance !
2,32 T11E WHITE COCKADE.
All started to their feet and changed colour ; each man looked in-
quiringly into Ins neighbour's face, and then all turned to Prince
Charles Edward, who, sternly composed and resolute, drew his
sword and dirk, an example instantly followed by his officers.
The poor Provost was pale with terror and rage, and his eyes
were full of tears, lest a suspicion of treason to the Prince' should
fall upon him.
' Betrayed discovered lost!' exclaimed the Duke of Perth,
priming his pistols anew.
' Oh, infandum !' cried Lord Lovat, who was fond of using Latin ;
but he added with a terrible oath in Gaelic, ' the street is full of
red- coats !'
Dalquharn looked from the nearest window, and there, sure
enough, was a party of Lascelles' Regiment, in their three-cornered
hats and white cross-belts, their loaded muskets and fixed bayonets,
with the sergeants' halberts and officers' spontoons all glittering in
the light which streamed from the windows of that room they were
ordered to watch.
CHAPTER XLVJII.
THE CABINET.
' Oh pardon me that I descend so low,
To shew the line and the predicament,
Wherein you range under this subtle king.
Shall it, for shame, be spoken in these days,
Or fill up chronicles in time to come,
That men of your nobility and power
Did 'gage them both in an unjust behalf?'
Henry IV. Part I.
RODERICK MACKENZIE, the young Highlander who acted as usher,
now rushed in with his face livid, and his eyes blazing with rage, to
announce that the Close was full of soldiers, and that every avenue
was beset!
' Sirs, extinguish all the lights save one,' said the Provost ; ' I
shall in person confront those who dare thus to assault my house.'
'Stand by me, my lords and gentlemen,' said the Prince; 'for
by my hopes of a heavenly rather than of an earthly crown, and by
the souls of all my royal forefathers, I shall never be taken alive !'
' Nor I nor I nor I !' exclaimed all ; 'we shall die with your
Royal Highness !'
In the glorious enthusiasm of that terrible moment, the desire to
fight for and die for his Prince, Dalquharn almost forgot Bryde
Otterburn, or remembered only what she would feel, on hearing
that his name might go down to posterity in the records of Scottish
devotion, like that of a daughter of his house, Catherine Douglas,
' the tender and true,' who thrust her delicate arm into the iron
THE WHITE COCKADE. 263
staple from winch the bolt had secretly been removed by the regi*
cides of James I.
' Keep together, gentlemen,' he exclaimed, ' we have each a life to
give for Scotland and the son of King James VIII.'
Old Lord Lovat with a cynical smile, felt the edge of his clamore
(as coolly as, ere dying, he felt the edge of the headsman's axe),
and muttered
' Duke et decorum est pro patria mori.'
He foresaw not the time when, on Tower Hill, eighteen months
afterwards, he would smilingly quote the same line from his favourite
Horace, within five minutes of his execution and eternity.
Meanwhile the thunder of musket butts on the door continued,
and the windows of the dark and narrow close were filled with the
night-capped heads and excited faces of startled sleepers, who
peered fearfully and anxiously out to learn the cause of a disturb-
ance so unusual.
' Mackenzie Roderick Mackenzie,' exclaimed the Provost, gather-
ing courage in his desperation, ' the cabinet remember the cabinet
see to it on your life and reputation. Please your Royal High-
ness, and all of you gentlemen, to trust my friend, while I confront
those red-coated rebels of the king!'
The door of the Provost's house was of great strength and was
secured by a complication of those numerous bolts, locks, and
chains, which were so necessary for safety in the olden time. It
successfully resisted the united efforts of several musket-butts, so
several bullets were discharged at it, in the region where the lock
was supposed to be ; but in reality its chief strength lay in a masiivo
bar of oak which was simply drawn across it, the ends being re-
ceived into the stone wall, for a foot or so in depth on each side.
After the half-bewildered Provost thought that a sufficient time
had elapsed, he withdrew tin's bar, and with a branch candlestick
in his hand, confronted the assailants, among whom he immedi-
ately recognised an officer, by his sash and gorget, as well as by a
spontoon which he carried.
' Who are you, sir, that dare to assault my house at this untime*
ous hour ?' he demanded, sternly.
' I am Major Robertson of Lascelles' Foot,' replied the other,
cocking his hat fiercely forward. ' Blood and wounds, you have
kept us waiting a precious time, rascal !'
'Passing your oaths and injurious epithet with the contempt
they merit,' said the Provost calmly, 'I demand your warrant, sir,
for this outrage ?'
' This is my warrant, sirrah the blade of my sword,' replied this
ferocious field officer, drawing his hanger, ' there are graven the
crown and the king's cypher, O.B., enough, forsooth, for a pitiful
trencher-scraping citizen and suspected tory.'
'Zounds, sir, tliis is intolerable! By whose orders are you
2G4 THE WHITE COCKADE.
committing this act of housebreaking, forcible haimsticken and
felony ?'
' Those of Lieutenant-General Preston, who will be answerable
therefor.'
' He shall!' said the Provost, sternly, still barring entrance by
standing in the narrow door-way; 'know you not, sir, that by
virtue of my office I am Lord Provost, Lord Lieutenant, and High
Sheriff of the capital of Scotland, Admiral of the Forth, Colonel of
the City Guard, and City Eegiment that all civil and military
authority within the gates and walls are vested in my person, and
that in resisting me, you violate the law ?'
1 The law be d ned and carbonadoed, too !' roared the Major ;
' when the drum beats the voice of the law is dumb.'
1 Alas ! it would seem so.'
' You are in gala costume, my Lord Provost ; but that cherry-
coloured suit, scarcely becomes so white a face, and not white with-
out reason, I warrant me ! Harkee in short, without further
palaver or delay, we happen to know that you, who by a treason-
able collusion, surrendered the city to the rebels and their mock
prince, have now that person within your house, and we demand
his body in the Sing's name, dead or alive. 'Sblood ! dead or
alive !'
' Such an errand ill becomes one who bears the surnsme of Clan
Donnoquhy.'
' That is my affair, sir, not yours ; now make way, or I'll whip
you through the body. Soldiers, guard well the door bayonet
all who may attempt to escape. Follow me, [twelve of you, and
we shall unkennel this cur of St. Peter.'
The Provost was roughly thrust aside by the Major, whose pati-
ence (he parley had exhausted, and whose party rushed all over the
house to the great terror of its inmates, making a noisy and vigorous
search. The debris of the supper, the half-finished decanters, the
extinguished wax lights, the overturned chairs, some stray gloves, a
cockade or so, of white silk ribband, were found, but not another
vestige of the guests all had vanished !
Beds were viciously bayonetted ; pannels were pricked by hal-
berts and perforated by bullets ; carpets were torn up and the floors
examined and sounded ; shots were fired up the chimneys, and after
an hour's most careful investigation, the Major, who had a great
desire to arrest the Provost, but feared to do so, was compelled to
draw off his men, declare himself baffled, and return somewhat
crestfallen to his ferocious old commander in the castle. There the
latter was still seated in his wheelchair, crutch in hand, awaiting
the triumphant capture of the Popish Pretender, who long ere that
time, with all his devoted friends, was safe on his way to Holyrood.
The quaint cabinet in the Provost's dining-room has been de-
scribed as a miracle of carving, but little more than three feet high,
and any not acquainted with the arcana of ancient houses, would
THE WHITE COCKADE. 265
suppose it to be a cupboard ; but under this modest and unassuming
dicguise, it concealed a thing of no less importance and interest than
a trapstair !'
Conducted by Roderick Mackenzie through this secret avenue of
escape, Prince Charles Edward and his titled friends reached the
lower end of the West Bow, unseen and in safety, and traversing
the spacious and silent extent of the Grass-market, ascended the
steep and narrow street named the Vennel, under the shadow of
the wall and bastile-houses of the old city fortifications, and from
thence, by a detour near the Burgh-loch and Pleasance, reached the
Pulace of Holyrood in safety.
But all who were present that night at Provost Stuart's supper,
had long reason to remember it, and their narrow escape from a
sudden, and perhaps inglorious death !
There was one other personage who had exceeding good reason to
remember the adventures that night to wit, Mr. Jabez Starvieston.
By Major Robertson's report of what he had seen, there could be
no doubt that an entertainment had taken place in the house of the
Jacobite provost ; but how his guests had escaped, was beyond the
field officer's comprehension.
' Hah Gad's mercy, and so they, and more particularly he, have
given you all the slip, eh?' said Preston, grinding his toothless
gums.
' Yes, sir. 'Sdeath, I don't understand it at all.'
' But I do the house must have a secret escape which you have
overlooked. Very glad on't very glad ! Egad, as I'm a gentle-
man and bear the King's commission, Robertson, an old Williamite
whose zeal for the Protestant succession no scoundrel would dare
to doubt, I should not like to have that young man's blood upon
my old head, as Assynt had the blood of Montrose, as Argyle had
the blood of King diaries ! But that infamous reptile Starvieston
who set us on this foul scent '
' What shall we do with him ?'
' He came hither in hopes of gaining thirty thousand pounds.
Strap him to the halberts in the castle butts, and let the stoutest
drummer in your regiment give him thirty lashes, laid on by tap of
drum too ; that will be one lash for every thousand he expected,
and then trundle him out of the castle.'
This was literally done, just as grey daylight was breaking, and
despite the shrieks, prayers, and blasphemies of Starvieston, he had
thirty lashes, and one into the bargain, well laid on his bare and
meagre back, by a sturdy drummer of the 47th ; and feeling some-
what as if he had a ton of scalding lead between his shoulders, he
crawled forth from the gate of that hated castle, amid the jeers of
the guard, breathing vengeance and actions of damages, for false
imprisonment, assault and battery to the effusion of his precious
blood ; and with his lacerated person, his blighted hopes, and hit
wrongs, he betook himself, by the first waggon from the White
266 THE WHITE COCKADE.
Horse Cellar, back to his native region of North Berwick, there to
lay his outrages and sufferings at the feet of his mentor, Provost
Balcraftie, whose faithfully attached drudge, toady, and factotum ho
had been through life.
Preston reaped nothing from his zeal for the House of Hanover ;
he was soon after discarded, and died at his house in Fifeshire,
forgotten, unrewarded, and in obscurity.
The Lord Provost was long and severely prosecuted for his share
in those affairs. The poor man was conveyed as a felon to the
Tower of London, but was sent home again to Edinburgh for trial
before the Supreme Courts as a traitor, and narrowly for Scotland
teemed with time-servers escaped with his life, after the ruin of
his health and fortune.*
CHAPTER XLIX.
THE PBINCE'S COUET.
'Oh, Scotland ! realm of old renown,
Thou land of later wonder.
Pilgrims shall come to hail thy light,
Whom widest oceans sunder.
' I love to shape thy martial air,
When the foiled Roman found theet
But dearer art thou to the soul,
With songs' broad halo round thee.'
Washington living.
this night forward, the time of Lord Dalquharn was amply
occupied, but chiefly in the camp at Duddingstone with the com-
pletion of that troop of the Life Guards to which he had been
appointed.
All agreed that he was one of the most brilliant and distinguished
looking men about the court. His figure was tall and round ; his
features were classically regular; his eyes a clear blue, with a calm,
inquiring, but somewhat determined expression in them now, and
his hair, as already described, was very fair. He was a graceful
horseman, and was expert alike in the use of his sword and pistol ;
he rode well and boldly, shone in every species of dance, the minuet
de la cour especially, and was king of the Tennis Court at the
Girth Cross.
In a paper, written evidently in the hand-writing of Sir John
Mitchell, ' the order and ranking of His Royal Highness, y e Prince
Eegents, Life Guard of Horse,' is given thus, at this period :
* Patronised, however, by the English Jacobites, he became afterwards a
banker in London, where lie realised a large fortune. Kay's Edinburgh Portrait^
TUB WHITE COCEADE. 267
' First troop ; David Lord Elcho, K.C.B., Captain.
Second Arthur Lord Italmerino, K.C.B., Captain.
Third Henry Lord Dalquharn, K.C.B., Captain.
Fourth Sir J. Mitchell, Bart, of Pitrearie and y' Ilk, K.C.B., Cap-
tain.'
The poor Prince would seem to have bestowed the order of the
Bath on all the leaders of troops.
Many of the cavalier bucks who joined those guards were in but
indifferent circumstances, the result of the impoverishment and
ruin that had fallen upon their families by adherence to a falling
cause, but chiefly to the rising of 1715, in which so many estates
were forfeited, and twelve of Scotland's noblest peers lost their
titles. Many there were too, upon whose constitutions riotous days
and nights, and the recklessness of foreign camps, where they
sought to drown the recollection of all they had lost, now told
severely.
Their costume was generally somewhat dilapidated, and they
criticised each other's appearance freely, even at the risk of mea-
suring swords, for most of them were out of pocket, and all ripe
and ready for anything that would further the good old cause. Sir
John Mitchell's faded green frock was ridiculed by the Laird of
Bowhill, who appeared in blue velvet with tarnished silver ; and
Dalquharn's queued hair was quizzed by the Lord Dunkeld, who
could boast of a court peruke, and a somewhat out-at-elbow green
and gold suit ; and whose attainted father, after being killed in the
French service, left him in penury, with an only sister, who found
a refuge from it, as a nun in the Val de Grace at Paris. All were
free and funny in their remarks, at the ordinary which was their
usual rendezvous ; but after a time, thanks to the corporation of
tailors, all erelong appeared in the blue, scarlet, and gold lace of
the Life Guards, with feather-bound hats and long jack-boots, so
called still, from their resemblance to a jack or long black leather
stoup.
Lord Elcho, captain of the first troop, ultimately forfeited the
inheritance of his father's title and estates, which were 'conveyed*
past him to his younger brother James. His grandfather was vice-
admiral of Scotland, and the fiery old lord, whom Dean Swift men-
tions in a letter, written in 1733 to Francis Grant of Cullen, as
being in the habit of firing cannon on the Dutch fishermen, unless
they brought to his castle of Wemyss a sufficient tribute of fish
the best they caught in Scottish waters.
Lord Balrnerino, the captain of the second troop, was a man of
undoubted courage, spirit, and resolution, and was a trained cavalry
officer, having served in the wars of Queen Anne, as a captain in
the Scots Greys.
The five hundred guineas given by Sir Baldred to Sir John
Mitchell, (a sum wortli more than double then what it would be
now), had been most judiciously laid out by him ; thus the troops
268 THE WHITE COCKADB.
raised for himself and Dalquharn, fully equalled those of Elcho
and Balmerino, and a brave and hopeful show the squadrons made,
when occasionally they drew up in front of Holyrood, with their
swords glittering in Ihe sunshine, their crimson guidons waving in
the wind, and all their trumpets sounding.
Dalquharn was presented by Lord Elclio with a fine black horse,
which was so fleet of foot, that it had borne at its neck for three
consecutive years, the Paisley Bell, which was given by King Wil-
liam the Lion, to be run for yearly at the Lanark races, where, unto
this day, it is the yearly guerdon of the winning horse.
Cumberland's legions, English, Dutch, Swiss and Hessian, were
gathering like a thunder-cloud in the south ; but little heed was
taken of that by the Jacobite party at Edinburgh, who fondly flat-
tered themselves that all the north of England, more than half of
London, and certainly the Welsh, would rise in their favour, the
moment the Prince crossed the Scottish border.
Vain delusion !
Meanwhile in the grey metropolis of the north, time seemed to
have gone almost to the middle ages; the present the sour,
prosaic, phlegmatic and Calvinistic present had fled, and the ro-
mantic past had come again in all its warlike bravery and with all
its wild enthusiasm !
A Stuart a handsome and gallant young prince of the people's
own Scottish blood, one with whom every plaided shepherd on the
green hills of Appin or those of Ardvoirlich could count kindred-
was again in Holyrood ; and again as in the days of James Duke of
Albany and York, when the Princesses Anne and Mary gave balls
and drums and tea-parties, there were assemblages of sedans and
chariots gorgeous with gildings and heraldry, liverymen with sword
and cane, linkmen with torches and flambeaux that nightly shed a
glare on the old towers that had seen llizzio's bloody corpse, buried
under cloud of night, before the Abbey door of the Holy Cross,
and Mary dragged a weeping captive to Lochleven ; and there, too,
were glittering crowds of gentlemen, with square-skirted coats,
embroidered vests, swords and perriwigs ; and tall old ladies (fear-
less in their loyalty), in tub-fardingales and nithsdale hoods dames
who, for half a century, had nightly prayed for that event, which
had now come to pass.
In the Palace courts and corridors were seen the liveries, and
heard the names of those whose memory and whose devotion are
embalmed in history now ; the Duke of Perth, the Earl of Mar,
Tullybardine and Strathallan, Elcho and Balmerino, Dundee, Dun-
keld and Dalquharn ; and on guard at the same pillared porch,
where now our soldiers of the line tread hourly to and fro, were to
be seen the bearded veterans of Sheriffmuir and GUenshiel.
On those nights when the Prince held a levee or reception, in the
long gallery of the kings of Scotland, these sturdy, grave and keen-
eyed sons of the Q-ael were posted with their Lochaber axes in the
iHE WHITE COCKADE. 269
corridors. They still claimed the privilege of being Charles's
special body guard, or Leine Chrios, and viewed with a little
jealousy the Lord Elcho's jack-booted guardsmen, who stood under
the archways, carbine in hand, and had as yet a bearing more like
yeomanry cavalry than like that of Her Majesty's Oxford Blues.
On the reception nights the scenes at the Palace were rendered
singularly picturesque, by the component parts of the Prince's
army and retinue. In chandeliers of crystal, hundreds of wax
lights shed a brilliance on the long and usually sombre walls of the
gallery of the kings, where the grotesque and imaginary portraits
of Jacob de Witt's production, that bring something of ridicule
upon those of Vandyke and Lely, looked down on the fair and
splendid throng which pressed about the Prince. Many of those
portraits were now garlanded with real or artificial flowers, among
which the Thistle, the White Rose, and the Lilies of France were
conspicuous, especially those of James VII. and his queen, Mary
Beatrix d'Este of Modena.
The varied costumes, the flowers, lights and music, the splendid
toilets and brilliant beauty of many of the ladies for the noblest
and best blood of the land were in the Prince's train the gallant
air and remarkable equipment of many of the Highlanders who
had come from remote glens in the far north, with Lochiel, Kep-
poch, or Glengarry, all produced an effect upon the long-secluded
prisoner of the Bass, that was certainly quite bewildering.
On those occasions the Prince always appeared with the insignia
of the Garter, and the broad blue ribband which he wore was long
afterwards preserved by Veitch of Bowhill (a gentleman who rode
in Dalquharn's troop), and since whose death it has been placed
among the Jacobite relics of the Scottish antiquarians : and nightly
by the side of Charles stood Cluny MacPherson, captain of the
clan Chattan, a splendid specimen of the old Highland chief, as
heritable royal swordbearer, carrying the sword given to his an-
cestor by James V., with the single word JESUS graven on its
blade.
Amid these gay scenes Dalquharn was generally sad and ab-
stracted, for Bryde Otterburn was ever present in his mind, which
yearned to know where she was, and how circumstanced, and how,
it was fortunate, he could little imagine !
' 'Tis thirty years since I last saw so many white cockades on
Scottish ground, and that was when my Lord of Mar was in the
field,' said Lord Dunkeld.
' Thirty years,' repeated Graham of Duntroon, a stern -looking
young man, who was titular viscount of Dundee ; ' ah me, sirs !
since those days in 1715, how many a loyal heart has grown cold,
and how many a brave mountain warrior has gone to his last long
sleep, beside the silent cairn, without the joy of witnessing a
triumph such as this !'
'Gad, my lords,' exclaimed the cheerful Sir John Mitchell,
270 THE WHITE COCKAD.
' when I served iu the Scotch-Dutch served for guilders rather
than glory I thought nothing could surpass the frauleins of Am-
sterdam, or the belles Bruxellaises '
' But now you find them beaten hollow by the dames of Can-
non gate and Blackfriars' Wynd is it not so ?' struck in Lovat
(who was a sad old rake), as he proffered his rappee box of S6vres
china : ' I vow and protest that the white taper arms, the bright
eyes and blooming cheeks we see here would warm even old Xing
David's blood eh !'
' Shame on you, my Lord Lovat,' said Lady Strathallan, a tall but
passe belle in diamonds and powder, tapping him with her fan, as
she swept past, attended by her two daughters, who were both
celebrated for their beauty.
' Excuse me, noble Madame/ said the old Lord, bowing low,
with his hand on his heart ; ' but, as the old rhyme says
' " He was never cut out
For a court that's devout,"
so neither am I, Simon Frazer. Among such loveliness the heart
flies to the head. Lady Amelia, your most humble and devoted
servant my Lady Mary, yours. Ah, Lady Strathallan, as my
friend Horace hath it, " Laudantur simili prole puerperce," &c.
' " The mother's virtues in the daughters shine." '
And without understanding his meaning, the young girls passed
blushing onward, believing that whatever Lord Lovat said must be
something wicked, of course.
It was at one of these receptions that Dalquharn incidentally
heard Lord Elcho mention, that among the wounded officers of the
king's forces, lying in the Infirmary of the city, there was one of
the Kentish Buffs named Captain Marmaduke Wyvil, concerning
the care of whom Bryde's friend, Lady Haddington, had written
him a letter.
The sound of his name brought back a tumult of emotion, of
almost forgotten mortification, rage, and unmerited shame in the
heart of Dalquharn. He resolved to visit this officer on the first
opportunity, to have an explanation with him on the subject of
Talbot Egerton's death, a crime which he now resolved to punish
with his own hand.
lilt W1111B COCKADB. 271
CHAPTER L.
CHAGBIN.
' fro might nor greatness in mortality
Can censure 'scape : back wounding calumny
The whitest virtue strikes. What king so strong,
Can tie the gall up in a slanderous tongue?
But who conies here f Measure for Measure.
LEAVING his quarters in the Laigh Coffeehouse, early next fore-
noon, Lord Dalquharn proceeded by the Bristo Porte to a great
building still known as the Eojal Infirmary, which had been re-
cently erected in a large open space near the site of the ancient
Black Friary, and immediately within a portion of the second, or
outer city wall, which was erected after the battle of Flodden.
It is a huge edifice, four stories high, perforated with numerous
windows, having projecting wings and an elaborate front, in the
centre of which our Jacobite officer recognised, through its laurel
wreath and Koman costume, a statue of George II., a statue which
he hoped ere long to see cast down like a false idol, and replaced
by another.
In this building were all the wounded officers and soldiers of
Sir John Cope's army, who had been conveyed thither in carts
from the field of Preston. There the most eminent practitioners
of the city attended them daily and nightly, and among the fore-
most in that work of charity and humanity, in which the sons of
Esculapius are generally conspicuous, was Dr. Archibald Cameron,
who accompanied the clan regiment of his brother Lochiel as a
surgeon a mild, amiable, and irreproachable gentleman, who was
arrested, and most barbarously executed in London, as a rebel, ten
years after the battle of Culloden, and whose fate excited the sym-
pathy of nearly all England, which is saying a good deal in 1745,
as the said Doctor was ' a pestilent Scot.'
The Prince was unremitting in his care and anxiety for the
wounded soldiers of the Line, who had fallen into his hands. In a
letter written to his father on the night after the battle, the reflec-
tion that his victory had been obtained over Englishmen, says
Charles, had thrown a great damp over him, and he adds,
' I am in great difficulties how to dispose of my wounded pi'ison-
ers. If I make a hospital of the church, it will be looked upon as
a great profanation. ***** Come what will, I am re-
solved not to let the poor wounded men lie in the streets ; and if
I can do no better, I will make a hospital of the palace, and leave
it to them.'*
Who can compare these sentiments with those that inspired the
horrors subsequent to Culloden, and marvel that to this hour, the
* Hist. Scot., vol. ii. p. 928.
272 THE WHITE COCKADE.
name of Cumberland is execrated by every just and generous heart
in the Highlands ?
In the quadrangle, several soldiers who had undergone amputa-
tion, and were recovering, were seated on benches in the autumn
sunshine, smoking and chatting hopefully, perhaps of their chances
of Chelsea and a pension ; and these poor fellows made efforts to
rise and salute Dalquharn civilly as he passed them, for they could
not forget how tenderly the active Highlanders cared for their wants
after the battle, and supplied them with bread, wine, and ale, which
they procured at Port Seton, and brought to the field for the sus-
tenance and relief of the sufferers.
Conducted by a nurse, through many great wards and long corri-
dors, and past several rooms, the doors of which bore labels such
as these : ' Lee's Foot six wounded officers ;' ' Lascelles' Foot
sixteen wounded officers,' he was ushered into an airy, lofty, and
white- washed apartment, which was minus a carpet, but was scrupu-
lously neat and clean. The windows of it faced the west, and he
could see the quaint, low, rambling buildings which formed the old
University of Edinburgh, with the brown autumn woods of Lauris-
ton, and the turrets and vanes of Heriot's Hospital shining in the
distance.
A regimental cocked hat, considerably battered and broken, a
brigadier wig, a red coat, somewhat stained by blood, &c., hung on
pegs close by a bed, whereon lay Captain Wyvil, of the Buffs,
propped up by pillows, with an ample white cotton night-cap on
his closely-shorn head, and several books and newspapers (brought
by his nurse and doctor,) littered round him.
He was pale and thin, for he had received a sword-cut in the left
arm, a bullet in his right thigh, and had lost much blood, before
ho had been found, almost expiring under a hedge near Bankton
House, into which he was borne in the sturdy arms of Gillies Mac-
bane.
An old friend, Sergeant Tony Teesdale, who had been also
wounded, but was now convalescent, was in attendance upon the
Captain, who surveyed with a somewhat doubtful expression of face
(wherein a species of sneer was blended with haughty surprise), the
blue and scarlet uniform of the visitor, who now approached his
bed, hat in hand, and said, while lifting his trooper's sword to pre-
vent it jarring the floor,
' Your servant, Captain Wyvil I am truly glad to perceive that
you are in a fan* way of recovery.'
' Captain Douglas if my eyes do not deceive me ?'
' Lord Dalquharn I find that I must introduce myself again,'
said the other, smiling ; ' times have changed with us, Captain
Wyvil the Prince Regent is now in Holyrood.'
' And what may be your your lordship's business with me ?
asked Wyvil, coldly and languidly, as he closed the book he had
THE WHITE COCKADE. 273
been rending ; ' not to offer me the command of a regiment under
that misguided young gentleman, I hope ?'
' No, Captain Wyvil, though a time may come, when you will be
glad to accept of it.'
' Never, sir 'Sdeath ! what do you take me for,' said the other,
with growing irritation, ' and what do you want ?'
' You cannot have forgotten our residence together at Auldhame,
and certain events that occurred while we were there ?' observed
Dalquharn, with an air of annoyance.
' Gadamercy, sir, I am not likely to forget anything connected
with my sojourn in this infernal country,' replied the captain, ' es-
pecially with a leg and arm such as these to remind me of it.'
' Those who dislike the country should keep out of it the
remedy is easy.'
1 Well, sir my lord, I mean to the point.*
'I told you, Captain Wyvil, that within three months, I hoped
to be at full liberty to explain to you, how basely your friend and
brother officer, Mr. Egerton, was assassinated, almost in my pre-
sence, by a subtle villain, named Balcraftie.'
'Balcraftie one of your psalm-singing Scotch pharisees what
how he, the magistrate the Bailie ?'
' The same, sir.'
' And he assassinated poor Egerton ?'
1 For some reason best known to himself, and sought to fir the
stigma on me. Having discovered my name, rank, and purpose
here, on the Prince's secret service, he made his own safety the price
of mine. Him I dared not denounce, lest in turn he should de-
nounce me, and hand over to the merciless government, certain
papers and letters, of wliich he had possessed himself, together with
the cypher thereto letters which would have jeopardised the
estates, titles, and lives of the Lords Kilmarnock, Balmerino, Elcho,
and of many of the gallant and devoted gentlemen who are now in
arms, together with my own. I could not then tell you all this, aa
I tell it to you now, sir. In three months, if my memory serves
me rightly, I promised that all should be explained ; but I was
made prisoner and shut up in the castle of the Bass, and hence
found it impossible to communicate with you, especially after the
recent battle of Preston, as I knew not where you were whether
in England, or a prisoner of war in Athole.'
1 You were shut up in the castle of the Bass,' said Wyvil, with
increasing coldness of manner. ' On what charge, pray ?'
' Alleged treason to the Elector of Hanover.'
' You mean King Q-eorge, I presume ?'
' I mean what I say."
' Was there no other crime inferred ?' asked the captain, fixing
a keen and stern glance on Dalquharn's face ; ' was there no other
crime ?'
The hot blood rushed to Dalquharn's temples, and then left him
18
274 THE -WHITE COCKADE.
deadly pale ; there was a tingling in his ears, and an angry clamour
about his heart ; but ere he could reply, the captain spoke again.
' I road in a newspaper the ' Evening Couraut,' I think '
' A vile organ of the government!"
' Well that you had been sent to the Bass by the magistrates
of North Berwick (chiefly by the instrumentality of Bailie Bal-
craftie), " for the wilful slaughter of an Englishman one John
Gage, an Exciseman." You seem to have a luck for such mischances,
if one may use a paradox. If you shot Q-age, you were quite as
likely to have shot my friend, who certainly quarrelled with you
and insulted you. It looks ill, sir deuced ill, I can tell you ; and
'tis not often that one pretending to the character of a gentleman
of a peer of the realm, egad ! lies under suspicion of two such
ugly charges !'
These words stabbed Dalquharn like a sword ; but making a
tremendous effort to preserve his countenance and temper with
this petulant invalid, he replied, calmly,
' The person who shot the poor Exciseman in that scuffle witli the
smugglers near Tantallan, was a French mulatto boy. I own my-
self to have been thus, in both fatal instances, the victim of circum-
stances, and of the aspect put upon them, by the subtlety of a
matchless Tillain,whom I shall unmask and punish before to-mor-
row's sun rises !'
The captain gave one of his dubious coughs.
' If you, sir,' resumed Dalquharn, ' are still resolved to misjudge
me, I must reserve all further explanations to a future time."
' Be it so.'
' Here I shall say no more, but ask if there is aught in which I
can serve you ?'
' Personally not but otherwise, you might.'
' Command me, Captain Wyvil.'
' You will serve me and all lovers of good order, by seeking to
dissuade as many of your unfortunate compatriots, as you may have
influence over, to disarm, disperse, and return to their homes, and
to their allegiance. Trust not to the sympathy of England with
you, and I tell you, that so sure as my name is Mannaduke Wyvil,
that this pitiful revolt of a few discontented clans, will only end in
the ruin of them all !'
'You might as well seek to stop the course of the everlasting sun,
or roll a mountain torrent back to its source, as attempt to dissuade
us now. The fatal die has been cast, and the sword drawn, I de-
voutly hope, for the last time, on British ground !'
The captain shook his head.
' I said to you once before,' said he, ' that we old English folks
cared nothing for your House of Stuart, because they were Scots ;
so thought we but little of the House of Ghielph, as foreigners
strangers, too ; but then we could live in peace under the latter,
and so, preferred 'em. Moreover, it is evident to me, that the
THE WHITE COCKADE. 275
House of Stuart bath always found the greatest number of adherents
among the unreasoning, the wildly enthusiastic and the weak the
weaker sex, certainly ; and so I thought, when I heard of our
pretty friend, Miss Otterburn, sitting mounted, sword in hand at
the cross, while her exiled darling, King James VIII., was pro-
claimed by those Scottish heralds, whom I hoped to see hanged
therefrom.'
' On these points, you and I are not likely to agree, Captain
Wyvil,' said Dalquharn, haughtily.
' I should think not, and some other points, too,' replied the
Captain, whose natural suavity seemed to have been displaced by
sourness and hauteur, the result of his old suspicions of recent
affairs, his two wounds, his captivity, and irritated national vanity.
' Of those other matters to which you refer, I shall only be too
happy to render you a befitting account, at another time, and in any
fashion you please ; and so, till then, sir, your servant.'
With these words, Dalquharn drew himself up to his full height,
put on his cocked hat and retired. He left the hospital with the
doubtful and angry dread that he was suspected by that brave,
blunt and worthy officer, who had heard his story without believing
it. This galled and enraged him beyond description, and made
him long for the vengeance he meant to execute upon Bal-
craftie.
In fact, Marmaduke Wyvil, that stout John Bull, after the recent
defeat at Preston, was in no humour to view the Scots with much
favour, and Dalquharn he deemed a representative man among
them. He could not but smile, however, at the anxious and sym-
pathising letters which he received from his own family (at Hurst-
monceaux, in Salop), who believed him to be lodged in a species of
wigwam, and in the hands of people not much more civilized than
those Choc-taws aud Cherokees among whom he had lately served
in America save that they were Christians but strange kind of
Christians, who had sold their confiding king for a groat, ' who did
not keep Good Friday or any other holiday, save the birthday of
one George Heriot, who left them fifty thousand pounds,' as an
English traveller once related who sat in their churches (kirks
they called them) with their bonnets on who all went bare-legged,
lived on fish and oatmeal, and were in league with wild Irish
thieves, soup-maigre Frenchmen, pestilent Italian Jesuits, the Pope,
the Devil and the Pretender !
Full of intense chagrin, for his soul rebelled at the conviction
that he was slighted and suspected by an honourable man, Dalqu-
harn in hot haste and high anger, sought out his friend, Mitchell,
to whom he related his interview with Captain Wyvil, and the
result of that futile explanation to which he had so long and so
anxiously looked forward.
1 Wyvil ah, egad ! I have not forgotten his haughty and dis-
tant bearing to us both at Auldhame,' said the baronet, testily ;
18-2
276 THE WHITE COCKADE.
1 and if he recovers sufficiently, I shall invite him to breathe the
morning air in the Duke's Walk at Holyrood.'
This walk (a favourite promenade of James VII., when Duke of
York) was the usual place of settling affairs of honour in the Scot-
tish capital.
' I had some such thoughts, only they are unpleasant to mention
to one who is ill, wounded and abed,' said Dalquharn ; ' moreover,
I fear for obvious reasons, that the Prince Eegent would not approve
of duels or other personal encounters, between his officers and those
of the Elector.' {
That evening, after obtaining 'permission from Lieutenant-
General the Duke of Perth, Lord Dalquharn and Mitchell, with
twenty troopers of the Life Guard, rode from the camp at Dudding-
stone, and took the way direct for East Lothian, intent on punish-
ing in the most summary manner, Mr. Keuben Balcraftie.
CHAPTER LI.
THE EAID OP DAlQTTHABtf.
' Still as T view each well-known scene,
Think what is now and what hath been,
Seems as, to roe, of all bereft,
Sole friends thy woods and streams were left,
And thus I love them better still
Even in extremity of ill.' Scott. ,
closing the evening of a September day, when the
sober sun must set at six o'clock when Dalquharn halted his little
troop for a time, near the old tower of Fenton, from where, in the
distance, looming large and indistinct, amid the haze of the evening
sea and sky, he could behold the cliffs of the Bass, and he shuddered
as he looked on them.
After a time, darkness set completely in, and then dividing his
party in two, sending Sir John Mitchell witli ten troopers into the
little town by the west-gate, at the head of other ten, he entered it
from the east, and after ascertaining from several wayfarers that
the Provost was certainly at home in his own mansion they sur-
rounded that distinguished edifice, in front and rear, cutting off all
chance of escape, quite as surely as Major Robertson of ' Lascelles'
Foot,' supposed he had done elsewhere, on a recent important occa-
sion.
The usual announcement of a weekly prayer-meeting on the Links
was placarded all about the town, coupled with the sale of live
stock, ' horses, nowte, and hoggs ' (i.e. cattle and sheep), at Auld-
hame, on a certain day, the name of the worthy Provost being ap-
pended to both papers.
THE WHITE COCKADE. 277
The back of his house faced the sea, and was enclosed bj a low
garden wall, which Mitchell's ten men watched with carbines
cocked.
Tho front to the street had a species of circular tower, called in
ScotLmd a turnpike staircase, which still remains, and was then
closed by a door of great strength ; the small windows hi the first
and second stories were all strongly grated, so either escape or egress
could be achieved by the door alone.
' Keep your carbines cocked, gentlemen, and capture or shoot
dowii all who may sally from the house, all men at least ; but be-
ware how you injure women and children.'
Such were the orders of Dalquharn, and when he sharply handled
the risp on the door it seemed but as yesternight when he and
Mitchell were brought hither as prisoners (filled with alarm and
doubt) by the unfortunate Gage, to be interrogated by the smug-
gling magistrate. Evening prayers were probably over now, for all
was silent within.
The clatter of the hoofs had already given an alerte to the inmates,
and supposing that those armed men in the street might be some
of Cope's fugitive dragoons, come hither as a patrol or reconnoi-
tring party from the English border, Balcraftie, after a long delay,
looked fortli from an upper window.
Those pale, cunning eyes, which quailed, shifted, and hid them-
selves when exposed to the scrutiny of any honest man, gazed fear-
fully forth into the night, and then then lie felt the hair bristle on
his scalp, and a cold perspiration, like nn icy finger, traverse his
spine, on seeing the dark uniforms of the Prince's Guard, and
hearing the well-remembered, and to him at that time terrible
voice cf the outraged Lord Dalquharn !
' Come forth, Mr. Provost Balcraftie come forth, villain !' he
added ; ' evasion or delay are alike useless ; we have surrounded
your house in front and rear, so hope not to escape, for we shall
shoot down without mercy all who attempt to do so. I once threatened
to requite your insolence, perhaps, by hanging you at your own
market cross, and by the heaven above us the hour is come, so yield
at once, lest we set the house on fire!'
The head was instantly withdrawn, as well as that of another
person, who had been peering timidly into the street, with a face
that was sunken-eyed, hollow-cheeked, and blanched alike by pre-
sent fear and recent suffering, for he was no other than the flagel-
lated speculator, Starvieston, who thought of the formidable trap
he had so recently laid for the Prince, and was superstitious enough
to see the retributive hand of Fate in the matter now.
The shutters were closed, and the noise of additional bolts, bars,
and barricades being applied to secure the back and front doors,
sufficiently indicated that the Provost had no intention of comply-
ing vrlth the pressing invitation of his enemy.
Dalquharn knew that there was no time to be lost. The party
278 *
numbered only twenty-two, their leaders included : the people of
the town might rise in arms to defend their Provost, or expel those
who had come to make a fray within the hurgh, for few Scottish
households are ever without some warlike weapons, even in the pre-
sent day ; but Sir John Mitchell roughly told a few persons who
approached to inquire, that these troopers formed an advanced
patrol of the Prince's whole army, and if they were molested, the
entire town would be laid in ashes by the wild Macraas and Mac-
gregors before the morning dawned, tidings which made many begin
to secrete their money and articles of value in cellars and thatched
roofs, or parry away their most prized effects to boats in the har-
bour, leaving their luckless Provost to his fate and his foes.
Finding the door immovable as a rock, and that all ingress by
the windows was impossible, sledge hammers were brought from a
neighbouring smith's forge, and under their weight the door was
shaken, and the house resounded like a vast drum, while the shrieks
and cries of women from the attic windows came shrilly upon the
night.
' Help, help in the name o' the Lord ! Fie we shall be mur-
dered by Hieland reivers oh, waly, waly, and wae's me !' for the
females of the household, taking courage in the knowledge their sex
would be respected, feared not alternately to summon assistance and
revile the besiegers.
' Together use your hammers well, and strike together,' said
Dalquharn to two of his troopers, who had dismounted.
' Down with the door, in the name of the king !' cried they.
' Yea, gentlemen, and in the name of retributive justice," said
Dalquharn, through his clenched teeth.
Thick and heavy rang the blows upon the oak. The door shook
and groaned, while splinters flew from it in all directions, and while
the men hi their saddles cheered and applauded ; but still the door
was so securely guarded and fenced within by iron plates and bands,
that the assailants made but little progress.
Terrified as a hunted hare, pale as death, breathless, and in a cold
perspiration, Balcraftie, who had been about to retire to a couch,
that conscience sometimes made like one of thorns, or Damien's
bed of steel, already felt, by feverish anticipation, all the terrors of
a fierce and rapid death. Two fellow creatures (at least) had fallen
by his pitiless hand ; a hundred times by day, and in the sleepless
hour of the long gloomy night* their thin figures and glaring eyes
had haunted him, and, in terrible mockery, they seemed beside
him now !
In his tingling ears the blows on the house-door sounded as the
thunder in the firmament, and he already seemed to feel the cord
of the avenger tightening round his throat !
Sometime* he stood still listening, or as if stunned and be-
wildered ; at others, he sought, in nervous haste, to conceal in
secret places, or about his person, money, in gold, silver, and bank-
THE WHITE COCKADB. 279
notes. Anon, he would rush wildly from room to room, peep from
the windows, and wring his hands despairingly and hopelessly. The
moon was up now, her light revealed the gleam of arms before and
behind, and he could see also the cocked hats of the troopers, whose
numbers his terror and bewilderment multiplied to a whole army.
Further off, he could see people hurrying hither and thither, with
lanterns and torches, bearing goods and furniture, and believing the
whole town to be in the possession of the insurgents of whose
cause, as a losing one, he had ever been a bitter enemy he gave
himself up for lost utterly lost!
Of all his many prayers, quotations, and texts, not one was in hia
craven heart, or on his pallid lips now. But he pressed his tremb-
ling hands upon his temples, and his attempted invocations to
heaven turned always somehow into blasphemous revilings of the
enemy who menaced him. He was mad apparently with consider-
able method in his madness, for he now proceeded, in great haste,
to tear up or commit to the flames vast numbers of written docu-
ments.
He might have saved himself the trouble of doing this, as a loud
explosion which shook the house and brought him grovelling, with
heavy groans, upon his knees, soon informed him. A second and
a third followed, and with the wild shrieks of his old housekeeper
and servant lassie, came the appalling odour and the cry of ' fire !'
Sir John Mitchell, who, as an old soldier, was usually ready for
any emergency, had brought with him a few hand-grenades in a
leather pouch. These missiles, which are no longer in use, were
hollow balls of iron, about two and a- half inches in diameter, filled
with fine powder ; they were exploded by means of a small fuse
driven into the touch-hole, and were wont to be thrown by the
Horse and Foot Grenadiers, wherever an enemy stood thickest ;
they were showered into breaches against stormers, and into thickets
were an ambush was suspected.
Sir John, losing all patience, swore that he would ' smoke forth
the wolf from his den,' and, lighting the fusees, very skilfully (for
his old regiment, the Greys, were Horse Grenadiers), threw three
of these dangerous explosives, crashing in quick succession through
the windows of the upper story, and set the house on fire !
A red glow of light filled all the windows of the upper floor for a
time ; the sashes soon fell outward or inward ; flames began to ap-
pear, and volumes of smoke that rolled away to seaward ; then fiery
little spouts or jets of flumes started from under the slates ; the
chimney and gables of the neighbouring houses were erelong red-
dened in the glow, and as the destroying element shot fairly up
into the roof, and broke through it, the sky above was ruddied by
the gleam. Still, however, the flames were confined to the upper
story, but there was no appearance of the inmates capitulating.
A quarter of an hour elapsed, and Dalquharu began to repeut bit-
terly of his friends' precipitation, lest the other inmates might
280 IHE WHITE COOKADB.
perish of the flames, or by suffocation together, with the wretch
who had so long vaunted himself ' a pardoned sinner.'
An old man, wearing a sky-blue bonnet and long coat of Catnpsie
grey, a weaver apparently, whose house adjoined Balcraftie's, now
came forth, and uncovering his bald head, caught Dalquharn by the
stirrup leather, and implored that his ' gude-wife,' who was ill with
a perilous fever, might be permitted to pass forth, lest she should
perish abed, if the flames spread to his poor dwelling.
This was at once granted, and, borne by two men, assisted by
several women, the patient came forth on a pallet, carefully muffled
up in blankets. Dalquharn kindly made a passage through a crowd
which now had gathered in the thoroughfare, and the sufferer and
attendants quickly disappeared down a neighbouring alley.
Instantly on this taking place, the door of the Provost's house
was flung open ; his housekeeper, an old woman in a plaid and
curchie, a slip-shod servant girl, and Starvieston, emaciated, looking
pale and woe-begone, in his shabby habiliments and scratch wig,
rushed forth, craving mercy in abject tones.
1 Pass on, and quickly, too our business is with the villain, your
master,' said Dalquharn, leapirg from his horse. With sword and
pistol in hand, he ruslied into the house, but the floors of the second
story were now in flames ; beams, plaster, furniture, partitions, and
rafters, with all the debris of the roof, were falling inward and col-
lapsing, amid clouds of murky smoke and columns of red sparks.
The place was no longer habitable for a moment, and he and those
who followed him, were rapidly driven, half scorched and half
choked, into the street.
Balcraftie had neither come forth from the back nor the front
door of his house, and the whole edifice was now one pyramid of red
and roaring flame, against which the square openings of the win-
dows, and the outline of the iron grills which secured them, were
darkly and strongly visible. Thus all concluded that he must have
perished ; and after humanely assisting to prevent the conflagration,
from spreading to the adjoining houses, the troopers departed from,
the bewildered and terrified little burgh, with the thorough convic-
tion that the great object of their raid had been achieved, and that
Beuben Balcraftie had expiated his long career of crime and hypo-
crisy, by the awful penalty of death by fire !
It was some time before his lordship knew that the snake had
only been scotched, or rather scorched, not killed, on that exciting
uight.
In the wild extremity of his terror, the Provost had been seized
by a brilliant idea. Well aware that all chance of escape from his
own dwelling was precluded, he conceived that he might escape from
the house of his neighbour the weaver.
With the aid of a pick-axe he broke through their mutual wall, at
a place where he knew it was thin, at the back of a fire-place, and
making his way through, he replaced the iron grate, and was carried
ttfE WHITE COCKADE. 281
past the unsuspecting troopers of Dalquharn, muffled on the pallet,
as a fever-stricken woman, the pretended wife of the wearer, who
was a bachelor.
He was bonie straight to the sea-beach, where he got on board a
boat, aided by the light of his burning dwelling, and breathing his
execrations on the night wind, sailed for Dunbar, from whence he
travelled by the waggon to Berwick-upon-Tweed. There his losses,
liis loyalty, and sufferings, were so powerfully brought before the
Duke of Cumberland, by Craigie of Glendoick, the Lord Advocate,
that he was rewarded by a commission, pro temp., in his Majesty's
service !
He did not join, however, as a man of the sword ; to wear that
ungodly weapon suited not his tastes, which were more inclined to
profit and peculation. Thus Dalquharn, to his intense astonish-
ment, after a time learned from the ' London Gazette ' ' that Reuben
Balcraftie, Esquire,' instead of perishing miserably amid the flames
of his house, had joined the Duke's stuff at head-quarters, as ' Pur-
veyor to the fforces then mustered to oppose the rebells.'
' How the world wags !' said Mitchell, laughing ; ' he thought
you had gone out of this wicked world by water ; and you thought
he had quitted it by fire ; but the game has to be played again
you are both on the chess-board still !*
The atrocious conduct of the Jacobites in attempting to take the
life of such a man as Balcraftie a pious, upright and wealthy
magistrate, a vehement upholder of the king, and a professor of re-
ligionmade a great noise at that time, and was even mentioned
by certain Scottish Pharisees in the House of Commons, as showing
the character of the Popish Pretender and his vile adherents.
Next day Dalquharn took measures to have the remains of poor
Talbot Egerton exhumed, placed in a suitable coffin, and interred
with every respect in the old chapel of St. Baldred. There he acted
as chief mourner, while Mitchell read the burial service of the
Church of England, and their troopers fired three vollies with their
carbines.
It was somewhat remarkable that when the turfs which covered
the remains in the Deil's Loan were removed, Balcraftie's breeches
Bible, with his autograph written on a fly leaf thereof, was found
in that unhallowed grave, and was transmitted, with a statement
drawn up on the spot, and signed by the eye-witnesses, to the sheriff
of the county, who sent the Bible as a relic to the Kirk Session ;
and as the acec punying document was framed by rebels, it was
very properly committed as a libel to the flames.
The day of the funeral wns a stormy one, and from the bleak
promontory where the old chapel stood, Dalquharn could see the
Boss standing grimly up in the midst of a foaming and raging sea,
with dark and murky vapours, and clouds of wild birds hovering
about its arid scalp. Midway between, a large mast a relic of the
' Fox ' perhaps was tossing on the waters, with the grey gulls and
282 THE WHITE COCKADE.
puffins wheeling round it ; and, as he gazed, he seemed in fancy to
hear once again the cries of the solan geese above, and the roaring
of the billows below, as he had heard them in the dreary days and
nights of his captivity.
The sneering faces and voices of the reckless Ensign Congalfcon,
of the Laird of Saltcoates, and the stunted figure of Lieutenant
Pudge of the Marines, came vividly back to memory ; and gladly
would he have punished them all for the past, by cutting oft' their
supplies, and starving them into a surrender, had time suited ; but
his^ dnys at the camp of Duddingstone were numbered now ; he
could but pay a farewell visit to Auldhame, and then turn his horse's
head to Edinburgh.
As he rode towards the well-remembered house, every step of the
way filled him more and more with thoughts of his lost love, Bryde,
of his present anxiety and misery about her and the future. The
old trees under which they had so often lingered, the long shady
avenue where the spectre drummer had appeared, the moss-grown
barbican with its armorial gate, where Dame Dorriel Q-rahame and
old John Birniebousle, the butler, welcomed him with open arms,
eeemed still full of her presence and of past delights.
These old servants exulted with considerable ferocity on hearing
of the supposed fiery demise of Provost Balcraftie, whose insolence
had nearly driven them demented.
The butler particularly had ' graned ' as he somewhat savagely
said, ' to gang red-wat-shod in the heart's bluid o* the prick-eared
tyke !' and Dorriel Grahame had related how all the household
dogs (who, like most of the canine species, loved good, and hated
bad, people) flew, barking and biting at the calves of Balcraftie's
legs whenever he appeared, until he had them all seized and sold
at the market-cross all save Sir Baldred's old Scottish gaze-
hound.
This was a noble animal of a breed no longer known in Scotland.
It had chased the fox, the hare, and the roebuck for years on the
Lainmer-muirs and in Binning Woods, depending alike on its
quickness of eye, its swiftness of foot and its subtlety, selecting
always the fairest and the fattest of the herd. Old and blind, it
had been a special pet of Sir Baldred and his grand- daughter, and
a pensioner on their bounty.
As it was imsaleable, the whig commissioner on the estate
ordered it to be poisoned ; so poisoned it was, by his clerk, Mr.
Starvieston.
The cellar had been emptied of all its wines, (which Mitchell es-
pecially was sorry to hear,) the contents of every binn having been
transmitted by Balcraftie to his own house. The family plate had
been packed up, and the old palladium of the House of Otterburn,
the silver cup of St. Baldred, had been wrenched from its stone
niche in the Hall. Books, arms, pictures and tapestry were all
THE WHITE COCEADE. 283
ready for transmission and sale, and all the live stock on the estate
had been duly catalogued for transformation into cash.
'Twas well that poor old Sir Baldred saw not all this devastation
(unless he could smile at the littleness thereof in heaven) but
was lying in his quiet grave under Carlisle wall.
Dulquharn paid a long and lingering visit to Bryde's room 5 he
surveyed himself in the mirror which had so often reflected her be-
loved features ; he kissed the pillow on which her dear head had so
often reposed, and slowly, slowly retired, carefully closing the door
with a sigh.
Would lie, or would she ever be within that chamber again ?
Heaven alone knew !
After tins, he acted exactly as she and Sir Baldred would have
wished. He took all the arms in the house that were modern
enough for use ; he advised the butler to bury all plate and other
valuables, for the behoof of the family. He seized all the horses
and cattle for the Prince's service, and leaving Dorriel Grrahame,
and old John Birniebousle in full command of the premises, re-
turned to the camp at Duddingstone, from which he and his party,
had been fully two days absent.
CHAPTER LII.
A TBIEND.
' She tore her liaffet links o' gowd,
And dichted her comely ee ;
"My father lies at bliudy Carlisle,
At Preston sleep ray brethren three!
I thocbt my heart could hand nae mair,
Mair tears could never blind ray ee ;
But the fa' o' ane has burst my heart,
A dearer ane there ne'er could be !" ' Old Ballad.
Aix the time that those events were passing elsewhere, Bryde Otter-
burn considered herself in a land of bondage.
Prior to this, the poor girl had never been further from her home
than to Edinburgh, when she had ridden there occasionally on a
pillion behind a groom, or to the Dunse spa, in my Lady Hadding-
ton's glass coach and now she felt herself as if in a foreign country,
where her unmistakable Scottish accent, even in Cumberland
(though once an integral part of Scotland) caused her to be ridi-
culed, and, in that hot political time, occasionally reviled.
The pet of her doting grandfather, the idol of an old-fashioned
household, among whom she had grown up from infancy ; knowing
the events of history and the tide of political affairs, and learning
to think long before the time proper for reflection ; hating the
Elector of Hanover with childish rancour, and adoring an exiled
king as the embodiment of every human virtue, and for whom she
284 THE WHIIE COCKADE.
prayed as fervently as she did for those at sea (which she never
failed to do when she heard the wind bellowing in the woods, and
the waves booming as they rolled up Auldhame Bay) Bryde
Otterburn was of a temperament and turn of thought very different
from those who had seen that which few saw in those days more
of the great world that lay beyond the blue wavy line of their na-
tive mountains.
Four days had now passed away since Sir Baldred's interment,
and in a species of stupor she lingered at Carlisle, scarcely knowing
what to do. Bryde was young when her father was assassinated
on Luffness Muir, ar.d when her mother died of a broken heart ;
so tins was, in reality, her first great grief, for the poor old man
who was gone had been father, mother, and kindred to her. She
knew of none else. Her lover she had deemed lost, and the world
a blank, till in a stray copy of the ' Westminster Journal,' she saw
it duly notified, that ' the third troop of the rebel Life Guards
was commanded by Henry Douglas, calling himself Lord Dalqu-
harn.'
She thus learned that her lover was free free, and with the de-
voted army of the Prince !
She heard of the overwhelming masses of troops assembling in
the south of England, and all assured her that ' the Pretender and
his adherents ' were marching to their doom ; hence her only cra-
ving now was to go home to die home to the old beloved place,
which would seem so lonely now home, that once again she might
look on the sea-beaten rocks, with all their gulls and gannets ; that
she might sit by St. Baldred's gurgling well, pray as of old in the
ruined chapel where her forefathers lay, and wander in the shady
avenue or the tapestried rooms of the old house, for Bryde knew
nothing of confiscation and attainder, and that her inheritance was
to become the spoil of the whig and Hanoverian.
She longed for old Dorriel Grahame, who had been her nurse
(and the nurse of her mother before her,) and on whose maternal
heart she would so gladly have laid her aching head, and indulged
in all the luxury of woe.
Bryde was resolved to go home afoot, if she could not proceed
otherwise, though the mountain paths by which the Dutch escort
had marched seemed so wild, lonely, toilsome and perilous, that her
heart shrunk within her at the prospect ; but what was she to do ?
Her little stock of money, raised chiefly by selling her ornaments to
the castle sutler, was nearly expended, as she had spent so much of
it in necessaries and comforts for her grandfather.
La Roque still hovered about, and his attentions terrified her, so
home she resolved to go at all hazards, and secretly. He had re-
peatedly and tenderly declared his passion for her, and been no less
than three times coldly and angrily repulsed, or dismissed from her
presence, but he was too much of a Frenchman to acknowledge him-
self baffled.
THE WHITE COCKADE. 285
In her limited ideas of distance and travel, Bryde, as we have
said, thought and felt herself quite in a strange country t and when
weeping for her sole relation, Sir Baldred. and thinking on his
lonely grave, the lines of the late Mr. Alexander Pope of Twicken-
ham, often carne to memory :
' By foreign hands thy dying eyes were closed,
By foreign hands thy decent limbs composed ;
By foreign hands thy humble grave adorned.
By strangers honoured, and by strangers urued.'
On the last evening she had resolved to spend in the castle of
Carlisle, Bryde out of her little stock of money, procured some
slips of roses, with the seeds of the crocus, the snowdrop and other
spring flowers, and on her knees she planted them over the lonely
grave beneath the old ramparts that they might come forth in the
early months of the next year, when she should be far away
from it.
Her tears were flowing fast as she performed this filial tribute,
and not until it was concluded did she become aware of a man's
shadow being thrown by the sunshine across the grave. She thought
of La Roque, and looked up with an angry shudder.
Instead of her persevering admirer, a fine-looking man, of a noble
and stately presence, wearing a very rich scarlet uniform, a three-
cornered hat bound with gold, thick lace ruffles, a sword and
clouded cane, stood before her. He was well up in years ; time
had powdered his hair so whitely that he needed not the puff of a
peruquier ; but he lifted his hat, and saluted the young girl re-
spectfully.
' Your humble servant,' said he ; ' Miss Otterburn, I believe?'
Bryde rose, crossed her white hands on her bosom, and bowed,
with one of those graceful old-fashioned curtsies, which she had
been taught by Madam Straiten, that notable ' mistress of man-
ners.'
' I am Colonel Durand of the First English Guards allow me to
introduce myself,' said the old officer.
Bryde curtsied again, but bowed somewhat coldly.
' I am the Governor of this castle of Carlisle without seeking to
intrude upon your natural sorrows, I come to offer you my dutiful
service, my kindly advice.'
Bryde looked timidly and earnestly at the speaker with her soft
pleading eyes. There was a benevolent expression in the face of
this fine old English officer, and when she took his hand she burst
into tears.
' You will pardon me, young lady, that I did not come to you
sooner in your great grief ; but I have been absent, and I have had
much to do since my return so many things to think about for
ere long Carlisle may be attacked.'
' Attacked, sir, by whom ?'
286 THE WHITE COCKADE.
' The Chevalier de St. G-eorge and his adherents, of whom -we
hare had no recent or reliable accounts, though some say they have
begun their march, no one knows for where, unless it be our Eng-
lish border ; but peraiit me to lead you from this spot.'
' My poor old grandfather, would I were laid beside thee there
even there !' said Bryde, looking wistfully on the grave under the
shadow of the old castle wall.
' I pray you, Miss Otterburn, not to speak thus. Long may God
keep you from thinking, as you now, I hope, talk idly,' said Colonel
Durand. ' I've met death face to face at Ramillies, Malplaquet,
and Oudenarde, and in many a later field, and feared him not ;
but,' added this old soldier, with a piety that was quite unaffected,
as he lifted his triangular beaver and looked upward, ' may He who
sees all, keep us each and all, from thinking that our only chance of
peace on earth, is there in the dark grave.'
Bryde's gentle and tender brown eyes were still bent on that
solemn place, where she had sown the seeds of the spring flowers.
' Come,' resumed the Colonel, drawing her hand through his arm,
' come with me, the good old gentleman is at rest now.'
' At rest, sir true, but where ? In that horrid unconsecrated
castle ditch, he whose ancestors '
'Miss Otterburn, I have seen ten thousand men, some of whose
ancestors may have been nobler than yours and certainly than mine,
taking their eternal repose in a place equally unconsecrated ; but it
was the broad field of honour! What matters it what matters
it ; as the tree falleth, so let it lie. Whatever betide us, it all ends
at last in a hole six feet by three. But to return to mine errand, I
am most anxious to be of service to you.'
' Sir, I thank you,' said Bryde, in a choking voice. ' I have had
no one save that poor old man, and and another to care for me.
Whom had I to love ? No father, no mother, sister or brother. In
the wide world, there was none to love me, but my grandfather, and
he is there there under those unhallowed sods!'
' My poor young friend ! But that other of whom you speak, is
he is he the Lieutenant La Roque ?'
'Oh, sir how can you think so?' exclaimed Bryde, growing
paler with anger.
' Well, I am glad that 'tis not yonder popinjay Frenchman.'
' I referred, sir,' said she in a low voice, and with extreme annoy-
ance, ' to my intended husband, now with His Royal Highness.'
' Ah, with the Duke of Cumberland ?'
Bryde's disgust was intense, as she said rather vehemently :
' No, Colonel Duraud with Charles Edward Stuart the Prince
of Wales !'
The worthy old colonel shook his white head sadly, and patting
her hand kindly, said, after a pause :
' I vow, Miss Otterburn, that I am more than ever sorry for you.
I am sorry, too, for the little section of your countrymen who have
THE WHITE COCKADE. 287
joined the young chevalier, for evil days will come upon them all.
I served in Scotland, under the Duke of Argyle, at the battle of
Duniblane, and I am too true nn English gentleman, not to deplore
the miseries of a civil war, which I know is to be attributed quite
as much to the horrible barbarities of the government in 1715, as
to the hereditary loyalty of your people to their banished kings.'
Kind old Colonel Durand arranged that he would procure a post-
chaise for Bryde, whose whole anxiety was now to reach home, or
her old friend Lady Helen Hope, the Countess of Haddington,
whose stately house of Tyninghame would always afford her a safe
and proper place of shelter or residence until affairs were settled ;
until the Prince was finally victorious, or but ah, she thrust aside
the next idea, for she had not the courage to contemplate it.
Did she not fear the lawless character of the rebels (asked the old
Colonel) and of this Popish Perkin Warbeck, whom the king of
France had sent over to disturb the country and divert us from the
Flanders war ?
' Oh, no,' Bryde replied, with a sad smile, ' she feared neither the
Prince nor his followers, but devoutly hoped she might meet them
by the way.'
CHAPTER LIII.
LraUTBNAIfT LA BOQTTB.
'But the spite on 't is, no praise
IB due at all to me*
Love with me had made no stales,
Had it any been but bhe.
' Had it any been hut she,
And that very face,
There hat) been at least ere this,
Twelve dozen in her place.'
Sir John FuckHny.
THE quarter-master of the First Guards purchased for eighty
guineas equal then to thrice the same sum now Bryde's favourite
pad and Sir Baldred's old bay hunter with their horse-trappings.
Fortunately she was thus pecuniarily independent of kind Colonel
Durand, who had freely proffered his purse for her use, for the
loneliness of the girl interested the fine old English officer greatly,
all the more, that his daughter had died, when almost Bryde's age,
a few years before. So this was her last night in Carlisle.
' At this hour to-morrow,' thought she, ' I shall be far away and
drawing nearer home ; but oh, what a desolate home !'
She had prepared and packed the few things she possessed, to-
gether with some reliques of her grandfather, his signet ring, his
sword belt, the buckles of his shoes, and the qnaint black cavalier
wig, to which he had so rigidly adhered in opposition to the white
288 THE WHITE COCKADE.
tow wigs of the Hanoverian era, and now she was seated thought-
fully and alone, in the gloomy vaulted room which had been appor-
tioned to her. It was known as King David's chamber, for there
that good Scottish monarch, one of whose favourite residences was
the castle of Carlisle, died on the 24th of May, 1153, when he was
found stiff and cold in an attitude of devotion, so ' that you would
not have believed he was dead,' says Aldred. ' He was found with
his hands clasped devoutly upon his breast, in the very posture in
which he had been raising them to heaven.'
And, as Bryde sat there, half lost in thought, her pale cheek
resting on her soft white hand, and her bright chestnut hair, as her
head drooped, falling in a shower over her rounded arm and ivory
neck, the old legend, which John the Prior of Hexham records, came
vividly back to her memory, for it tells in all good faith and sim-
plicity, how, when the Scottish courtiers conveyed their dead king
northward to the place of his sepulchre in the abbey of the Holy
Trinity, near Dunfermline in the woods, on reaching the shore of
the Forth at the Queen's Ferry, they found the waves so boisterous
that they feared to embark. But no sooner had they placed the
royal corpse within the barge, than the summer storm abated, the
billows smoothed down into placidity, and the funeral train passed
over in safety. Immediately after this, the wind bellowed again in
tempestuous gusts, and piled the waves in white foam, on either
side of the narrow strait, and shrouded in spray the little rocky isle
that lies between.
Brydfe was so full of this old legend, which, on this night, her
room and its gloomy aspect brought to memory, that she did not
perceive that the servant, who removed her tray of chocolate and
macaroon biscuits, had ushered in a stranger, till she looked up, and
by the light of the two branch girandoles, saw Lieutenant LaRoque
standing near her, hat in hand, and looking so handsome, so plead-
ing, and so full of admiration for her beauty, that she found herself
compelled to restrain a gesture of impatience, all the more perhaps,
that this was, she knew, the last occasion on which she could be an-
noyed by his assiduity or attention.
The Dutch regiment of La Roque had been ordered back to the
continent ; but he, being wealthy, and the son of the colonel or
proprietor, remained behind, whether with or without leave we are
unable to state, nor does it matter much.
' All, Mademoiselle Otterburn (we fear he pronounced it Ottair-
boorn) I have heard all, 1 said he, ' and deplore my unhappy fate."
' All, M. La Roque what mean you ?'
'That you leave this place to-morrow !'
' Yea and the sooner the better, now surely."
' But helas ! I shall see you no more !' said he, pressing his
feather-bound hat with both hands on his breast, and looking sadly
on the ground.
The yellow uniform, with its scarlet velvet trimmings, and long
THE WHITE COCKADE. 289
black military boots, the pale croamy complexion, rich dark hair, and
fine but saucy eyes he possessed, all made the handsome young fel-
low quite a picture, and the beau ideal of what a young girl would
admire as a lover; but Bryde felt his attentions as a source of
wrong, and as an insult that arose from her unprotected situation,
which certainly was a powerful incentive to such a roue as La
Roque.
With mingled timidity and impatience her soft brown eyes looked
into his, that were so black and tender, yet expressive of something
more than tenderness, as she said,
' Sir, this black robe the outward livery of inward sorrow might
teach you to respect my emotions, and to cease tormenting me
thus.'
4 Ah, mademoiselle,' said La Roque, as he knelt down, ' have you
no pity, have you no compassion ? B -hold mo I arn at your feet,
and see how I weep! (The rogue actually contrived to squeeze out
a few tears.) I am the most constant of lovers the most miserable
of men !'
' Of Frenchmen, likely/ said Bryde, with a faint smile ; ' but,
prithee, Monsieur La Roque, from what romance have you culled
these choice speeches ?'
La Roque drew himself up with something like hauteur in his
bearing, and resentment in his eye ; he withdrew a pace, and then
regarded her tenderly again, while toying with hia little three-
cornered beaver.
' Patience,' thought he ; ' I must not relinquish a chase so charm-
ing, so seductne, and so secure from peril as the pursuit of this
lovely and solitary girl promises to be. Parbleu, but she is mar-
vellously attractive ! How is it possible to look on such a girl and
not love her, or without longing to toy with her thick brown hair,
her soft, wliite hands ; to caress" and kiss again and again her tender
eyelids and her beautiful lips? How clear and gentle her eyes
how white her skin ! Mort de ma vie ! and her ear 'tis like a tiny
white shell she is perfect!'
All this occurred in thought to La Roque, and so he knelt again,
and, with extreme volubility, said a great deal to which the pretty
ear, which was so like a delicate white shell, was closed with pro-
Yoking indifference.
I 'Tis useless to talk to mo thus,' said Bryde, after a pause, as she
sighed with annoyance; 'I could not marry you, Monsieur La
Roque, even if I learnt to love you, which I never will '
' Hah ! you have then a lover a favoured one, mademoiselle ?'
said the Frenchman, whose eyes glittered dangerously, while his
fingers played ominously with his sword-knot.
' I have not said so.'
' But I think and suspect it.'
I 1 cannot help your fancies or suspicions, M. La Roque. 1
' ludieu ! why so vajue and uncertain in your answer ? You
19
290 THE WHITE COCEADE.
either have or Lave not a lover at least, clear mademoiselle,' he
added submissively, ' you can never have cue more tender than I
am.'
' Whether I have or have not, can in no way concern you/ said
Bryde, almost in tears.
' It does, mademoiselle,' responded the impetuous Frenchman ;
1 it does concern me, and all men who have the happiness, and, alas !
the misfortune for it is both to see and to know you.'
' Romancing again, forsooth !'
'Peste ! such a delightful, but provoking little chit it is, with its
retrousse nose and touch-me-not face !' muttered La Roque, as he
again knelt and strove to take her hand ; ' ah, ma belle ma mig-
nonne !' he exclaimed ; ' but do you know French ?'
' Enough, at least to know what your phrases imply."
' That you are delicate, agreeable beautiful.'
' Compliments to which I must not listen, and which, in my un-
protected situation, become insults.'
' Mademoiselle !'
' I said, insults ; yet think not that I am so totally unprotected.'
'Aha our lover is at hand, I presume; if so, I hope he has
carte and tierce at his finger ends.'
' Sir, if you do not leave me instantly, I shall desire a servant to
summon Colonel Durand, and he, at least, will rid me of your
persecution.'
Bryde rose as she said this, and laid a white hand, which trembled
violently, on a bell that lay near, on the table. Her upper lip was qui-
vering, and her eyes had a dangerous sparkle in them, for the etourdi
bearing of her French admirer was becoming offensive, far more so
than the queer mode in which love was made to her by poor Beau
Egerton, of the Buffs. Poor Bryde was not a heroine, but only a
loving, trusting, gentle, and affectionate girl ; yet one withal who
could act decidedly and resolutely enough at times, as her raid ou
Balcraftie's household proved.
' Do not, mademoiselle, I implore you, insult me so far, as to ring
for assisting,' said the French officer, bowing, and stepping back
as he did so. ' If my presence is so hateful I shall hasten to relieve
you of it. To morrow you will be far away, and for the intrusion
of to-night I entreat your pardon."
' I pardon you, Monsieur, with all my heart,' said she, presenting
her hand ; ' and for your kindness to one who is now no more, and
your care of him too, I thank you truly and gratefully more I can-
not do and now, good-bye.'
. ' You travel north,' said he, still lingering over her hand.
' By post-chaise.'
' I know that, Durand told me ; by the way of Berwick, proba-
bly.'
' Oh no by Longtown, direct towards Dumfries-shire.'
1 Longtown ah, I must remember that,' muttered La Roque, as
THE WHITE COCKADE. 291
he kissed her hand with great tenderness, and, after murmuring
his adieux, retired.
The moment he left her, lie thrust his hat upon his head with
the air of a man whose resolution is taken ; he stroked his mous-
tache, smiled to himself, and made a pirouette on the heels of his
military boots.
' I should not hare said adieu, hut an revoir, for we shall meet
again, ma belle Ecossais, and where, perhaps, you little expect me,
in a lonelier place tlian this. La Roque was never baffled yet, even
by prouder and nobler demoiselles than you !'
Bryde's beauty seemed all the more fair and rare to the French-
man, that he had been accustomed to the dark and sallow women
of his own country. Then she was so fresh, so white and dazzling,
so innocent, and yet so self possessed, so timid, and yet so proud!
Great was the spell of all this love and purity, so the mind of La
Roque was full of love as he thought it but love darkened by da-
ring and evil.
From his earliest boyhood, our enterprising lieutenant of the
Nassau Contingent, had been in love with every pretty girl, maid,
wife, or widow who happened to be near him. A handsome and
winning fellow, he had found most of the women to whom he had
made love, remarkably facile ; but, doubtless, he knew those that
would prove so, by an intuition, the result of experience, for 'that
virtue which requires to be guarded, is scarcely worth the sentinel,'
says the dear old Vicar of Wakefield.
Bryde puzzled him ; she had no such sentinels, and required
none. Her own innocence and her deep love for Dalquham were
guards enough. Hence her unstudied coldness and calm aversion,
which piqued La Roque, and inspired him with an odd and re-
vengeful emotion a desire to conquer her at all risks and hazards
even of shame to himself. Thus, wounded vanity and inordinate
self-esteem served as spurs to him in this unworthy pursuit.
If she had a lover in Scotland, what the deuce did that matter,
save that it added piquancy to the whole affair? Poor devil of a
lover, how disappointed he would be ! Moreover, he might be
shot or hung in the coming troubles, if he really existed at all.
She was unhappy ; her tears told all that she was so, and Tudieu !
he Lieutenant la Roque was the identical person to soothe and
console her. She was so charming and girlish so full of the
beauty of the devil that it would be delightful to act the good
Samaritan, to heal the wounds of her heart, and kiss those tears
away.
It is not improbable that La Roque nursed himself into the con-
viction, that he was a very well-meaning and good-hearted fel-
low.
But it was a dangerous peculiarity of our flirting Lieutenant,
that he could become sadly lover-like, and his tenderness was gene-
rally the more perilous and infectious, that while in the mood for
19- -2
292 THE WHITE COCKADE.
it, he always seemed to be and perhaps actually felt bewitched
by the fair one who stimulated his amorous proclivities ; and so,
full of these thoughts, he put a round sura in guineas in his purse,
quitted the Castle of Carlisle, and betook himself to the residence
of the Postmaster in Scotch-street, that he might make some little
private arrangements with the postilion who was to take ' made-
moiselle ' north on the morrow.
**##***
On reaching Berwick-upon -Tweed, the fugitive Balcraftie, had
learned the demise of Sir Baldred in the Castle of Carlisle. He
rejoiced at that event ; another barrier between him and the Auld-
hame lands was removed for ever, even King George's ministry,
albeit ignorant of clemency or mercy, could not forgive the old
baronet now. But Bryde still remained, and though the estates
would certainly be forfeited to the Government, and doubtlessly be
placed iu his power, under the commission given to him, and so
become virtually a gift to himself, Bryde had many noble and
powerful friends, and the authorities might pity her desolate con-
dition, and do he knew not what reserve a portion for her
perhaps.
This his grasping avarice resented !
Could he but discover her, and get her kidnapped to the planta-
tions (such things were done daily in those days) or or not
that not that !
No, no, he had shed enough already, and he thrust the fierce
thought aside.
But erelong Bryde was encompassed by perils sufficient to have
satisfied even his avarice and hatred ; and bitter indeed, was the
rancour he bore her !
CHAPTER LIV.
THB LAIGH COFFEE-HOUSE.
*O charming noons ! and nights divine!
Or when I sup or when I dine,
My friends above, my folks below,
Chatting and laughing nil a-row.
The beans and bacon set before 'era,
The grace cup nerved with all decorum:
Each willing to be pleased and please,
Aud e'en the very day's at ease !' Pope.
THB Laigb. ooffee-house an ancient establishment, having been
the first opened in Edinburgh in 1677 fully rivalled the White
Horse Hostel, as one of the chief rendezvous of the Prince's officers ;
and as the final day of October was to be their last in the camp and
city, it was filled by them and their friends, drinking a cheerful
THE WHITE COCKADE.
and farewell glass. So many a bottle of rare old port wa
many a quaigli of usquebaugh emptied, and many a steaming bowl
of punch brewed and drained to the success of the expedition, to
the health of all true-hearted Englishmen who dwelt beyond the
borders, to the confusion of the Elector and all Hanoverian Bats
and Rumpers, amid scraps of party songs, and shouts of ' Riyh
Hamish yu Bragh ' ' the hills, the Glens, and the people!' the
dearest toast of the Highlanders ; with many a fierce Cathghairm,
or battle cry, which were yet to ascend to heaven, from the fields of
Falkirk and Culloden !
This Laigh coffee-house, of which a certain Mr. John Loch was
then the Boniface, was a famous place in those days for the ' roup '
of landed property, of houses, cattle, ships and prizes taken at sea ;
and therein was established an ordinary for gentlemen. Living
was then very cheap in Edinburgh ; at such an ordinary, gentlemen
of good fashion could get as the Reverend Mr. Carlyle tells us
a good dinner of broth, roast-beef, and even potatoes at four-pence
a head, including ' all the beer that was called for till the cloth was
removed ;' but, he adds, there used to be only one glass on the
table, and it went round witli the bottle, even as the dram-glass
doth to this hour, among the humbler and jollier folks in Her Ma-
jesty's kingdom of Scotland.
The furniture was strong, old and imperishable. There were
still the chairs and the table, which had been used by the great and
terrible Duke of Lauderdale, who was wont to sit there, with pe-
ruke awry and his vest unbuttoned, that he might drink more at
his ease and swear in his cups at the crop-eared Covenanting Carles,
and the English Pock-puddings, who, between them, kept him for
nine years in the Tower, after the field of Worcester was stricken,
and well would it have been for Scotland, had they kept His Grace
there for ever. There too, had been wont to come, Claverhouse in
the pride of his manly beauty, Tom Dalzell of Binns, his white
beard waving to his girdle, the ' bloody Douglas,' the ferocious
Grierson of Lag, the Duke of Rothes, and other high flying cava-
liers, to drink confusion to the Covenant and all the adherents
thereof, before Dutch William came over, to turn their stormy
world of madness and misrule upside down.
And now, at Mr. Loch's, all the chiefs and gentlemen of the
Prince's little army were wont to come and go ; and there might
be seen all the nobles whose names we have elsewhere mentioned,
and all the prominent leaders, such as the hapless Major Macdonald
of Tiendrish, who began the insurrection, by the brilliant affair of
the Spean Bridge ; Lieutenant Colonel Macdonald of Kinlochmoi-
dart, A.D.C. to the Prince, a splendid and heroic chieftain, who
was basely captured in his bed, by a rabble at midnight and by the
treachery of a clergyman, who received an incumbency as the price
of his blood! Here too, came Gillies Macbtuie, John of Fassiiern
294 THE WHITE
and Roderick Mackenzie, -whose fate made him a somewhat notable
character in the insurrection.
No doubt when in this large but gloomy Edinburgh tavern, Dal-
quharn and others, who had been long exiled in Paris, would think
of the Cafe Zoppi in the Eue St. Germain-des-Pres, where elegant
suppers were served in luxurious private cabarets, for the bucks of
the French Guards, and filles de I'opera, or the actresses of the old
Comedie Francaise which was just opposite ; and comparisons
might be drawn, that were disadvantageous to the establishment of
Mr. John Loch ; and when dining at his ordinary some might miss
the niceties of the French cuisine ; but still what it lacked in
splendour, the Laigh coffee-house made up for, in comfort and
jollity.
And among many other groups there, on this farewell night,
amid the smoke of tobacco pipes, and the light of wax candles in
tin sconces on the walls, were seated Dalquharn, the Duke of Perth,
old Simon of Lovat and others, including the worthy and amiable
Lord Balmerino, who was master of the punch-bowl, which he never
permitted to be emptied, but always to use an old Scottish phrase
eked by additions of whiskey, hot water and lemon ; thus in
memory of this convivial Lord, ' Balmerino's Eke ' is proverbial
still, among all good fellows in Scotland.
They had left the ball given by the Prince to his officers in lloly-
rood a ball, the glories and delights of which were the fond theme
and memory of many an aged grandmother, long after good old
George III. was king, when the Black Watch were winning their
scarlet plumes under the shadow of the Pyramids, and the last of
the Stuai-ts lay forgotten in his grave at Frascati forgotten by all,
save a doting few, who remembered the days of old.
The Duke of Perth was dressed in a coat of richly-flowered blue
velvet. It was without a collar, but had heavy deep cuffs ; his flap
waistcoat was of rich silk, sprigged with silver ; his breeches, of
peai-ly-coloured silk, were joined to his pink silk stockings by dia-
mond buckles, while his ruffles and cravat were of the finest Brussels
lace, and the star of the Garter which sparkled on his left breast,
and was the gift of James VIII., added to the general nobility of
his appearance.
Cunning old Simon of Lovat, stout, sturdy and florid, with his
great obesity of calf and paunch, was sitting with a comical leer in
his wicked eyes, his vast full-bottomed wig awry, and his gold laced
coat, which was of the Fraser tartan, and had a row of very elabo-
rate silver clasps, open for ease and comfort. He was smoking a
long clay pipe, with his feet planted on a tabourette, his white silk
hose making his short, thick legs seem double their actual size.
Cards had been relinquished, and amid the buzz of voices in the
large room, all their energies were now devoted to the punch-bowl.
' By my troth, I'll play no more till I see London town,' said
Lovat, testily j ' I've lost more thau I ain ever likely to win.'
THE WHITE COCKADE. 295
' Yet what can a man do, my lord,' asked Mitchell, ' but play
like his fellows freely and boldly ?'
'Aye, truly, what can he do, as Horace hath it, but like others,
inter scabiem tantam et contagia and so forth, amid the poison of
such infectious times ?'
' You talk of play, sirs,' said the Duke of Perth ' (our glasses
wait your pleasure, Balmerino), but I have seen nothing like the
wild play of my boyish days, in the salons of La Belle Duclus, the
famous Parisian actress.'
' In the year when Louis XIV. died,' said Mitchell, ' and Philip
of Orleans became Kegent ?'
'Exactly, Sir John; in that year, John Law, the Mississipi
schemer, was the demigod of the faro tables. Gad-zounds, two
hundred thousand livres of a night were a joke to our Laird of
Lauriston, until M. D'Argensen, the Lieutenant-G-eneral of Police,
warned him to quit Paris, or he found favour in the eyes of Duke
Philip, which he was not long of doing. But you have heard of
all those things, of course, Sir John ?'
' When I came over to France, after being out at Sheriffmuir ;
but when La Belle Duclus was in her glory, I was in the Greys,
under old Maryborough, in Flanders. I have heard that she was
unsurpassed in her studied deshabille.'
'And I have heard that was her chief mistake as a toilette,' said
Dalquharn.
'True because an actor, an actress, coryphee or a favourite
author, should never be seen like other folks in deshabille. The
poor appearance of the late Mr. Pope a little, lame and withered
crookback disappointed his greatest admirers, and dissolved, with
some, the charm of his poetry. Louis-le-Grand, wlio was a good
type of taste, was never visible, save in a full-bottomed wig '
' To any but his mistresses,' exclaimed Lovat, emitting a cloud of
smoke in successive rings ; ' ah, Duke, 'ods fish, I have you there."
'He was a safe model, at all events, my Lord Lovat,' said Perth,
with a tinge of hauteur in his tone.
'You are very silent, Dalquharn,' observed Balmerino ; ' allow me
to replenish your glass ; but first I must add some more whiskey
and a dash of lemon to the bowl ; there, I knew it gadso ! I've
overdone both hallo, tapster another tankard of hot water. You
are thinking of the Bass, perhaps ?'
' Ah tres bon !' exclaimed the Duke of Perth, who had been so
long in France, that like many other returned exiles, he inter-
spersed his conversation with several French phrases ; ' your lord-
ship escaped out of that devilish stone trap by a most gallant coup
de maitre .''
' On the contrary, I beg to assure your Grace, that I was not
thinking of the past, but of the future.'
' Nay wherefore so gloomily ?'
' I hare lost more to-night at whist than I quite relish, and find
296 SUE WHItE COCKADE.
that I shall have to march south at the head of iny troop to-mor-
row, with empty pockets.'
'Soldiers' thighs, as we used to say in the old Greys !' exclaimed
Sir John Mitchell, laughing.
' Alas yes I am in ill luck.'
' That shall you not be, my good lord,' said a young man, who
was seated at a table hard by, and had been observing the titled
group with some interest, over his bottle of claret ; ' here are forty
English guineas and three Portugal pieces at your service, and wel-
come to them !'
All gazed at the speaker with some surprise.
'Art sober, sir ?' asked the Duke of Perth, whose dukedom was
only recognised by the Jacobites, his patent never having passed the
great seal of Scotland.
' The deuce, sir,' said Dalquharn ; ' how can I take money
from a stranger and when repay him, if I accept of an offer so
generous ?'
' If I am unknown to your lordship, you are no stranger to me.
If we are successful, you can repay me (if God spares us) out of the
first rents you draw from the Holm in Galloway ; if we fail, 'twill
make but little difference to me, if 'twere ne'er repaid at all : there
will have been more lost then, than my poor forty guineas !'
The speaker was a young man of singularly prepossessing appear-
ance; his face was a perfect oval, and his yellow, almost golden,
hair, rose in spouts from his forehead, like that of the Phidian Jove,
and fell behind in long waving curls, which were tied by a silk rib-
band. He wore it quite unpowdered, for like every fair-haired
Scotsman at this time, and for long, long after, it was, perhaps, his
' weakness ' to be thought like ' bonnie Prince Charlie ' and if so,
a fatal folly it proved for him in the sequel.
He wore a full suit of the green Mackenzie tartan ; his figure
and limbs were a model of combined strength and symmetry, and
he had that remarkable smallness of the ankle, which is the pride
of the Highlander, and it was improved by his neat brogues, which
were tied about them sandal wise. His short coat was of pearl-grey
cloth, fastened by a row of quaint silver clasps, and he was, of
course, fully armed with broad-sword, dirk, skene, and pistols. In
his smart round bonnet, which he instantly removed on addressing
Dalquharn, was the Burning Mountain (Tulloch-ard !), the silver
badge of the attainted Earl of Seaforth. He spoke English, but
with a strong west Highland accent.
' I hope,' said the young man, reddening, as he proffered his
pocket-book, ' that your lordship will not will not, degrade me
by declining.'
' May I ask your name?' enquired Dalquharn.
'I am Roderick Mackenzie, humbly at your lordship's service. I
am not ashamed to say, that I have made my money as a simple
haberdasher behind a counter in the Luckeubooths, without there ;
THE WHITE COCKADfi. 207
yet I aui nevertheless of as good blood as any man in the North,
and am a kinsman of Seaforth himself! Every farthing I hare
made, I mean to dedicate to the service of his Highness the Prince
so up I say wi' the White Eose, and the Caber Feigh hurrah
for Kintail !'
' By my soul, but thou art a rare fellow ! Give me your hand,
and sit with us at this table,' said the Duke of Perth, as the young
man's colour deepened, on joining a group so high in rank.
1 Taste of our bowl, my good fellow,' said Balmerino, who was
seated at the head of the table, ladle in hand.
'I thank your lordship this, to the health of our most gracious
Prince !' exclaimed Mackenzie, draining the proffered glass, with an
enthusiasm that made his temples flush, and his eyes nil with tears
and fire together.
' Ah,' said Lovat, somewhat cynically, as there were some doubts
about his being created Duke of Fraser, lest they should lose all
hope of the Laird of Grant, who had been secretly promised the
Earldom of Strathspey. ' No king, saith a certain adage, is ever
thoroughly gracious, until he has passed a year or two in dethrone-
ment. And so as Horace hath it '
' No more of Horace, my lord, or I shall be ill,' said Balmerino ;
' tapster waiter pass the three elements this way, as we say at
Mother Kilwinning ; and now, once more to eke out the bowl.
Zounds ! I once used to take three bottles of French claret every
night, till my conscience smote me '
' For imbibing so much ?'
' The devil, Dalquharn, I should think not !'
4 For what, then ?'
' For bringing so much custom to the Elector's exchequer as one
thousand and ninety- five bottles per annum insured, and so I betook
me to a bowl of punch nightly instead punch that had paid duty
to no man, whether he wore the Scottish crown or the Electoral
hat.'
' I vow, Mr. Mackenzie,' said Sir John Mitchell, ' that we are
charmed to make your acquaintance would that we had ten thou-
sand more such Highlanders !'
'A handsome fellow, i'faith!' said Balmerino, with something
like a hiccup, ' and somewhat reminds me of the Prince himself. I
warrant me, Mackenzie, thou'lt leave many a fair lass in sorrow be-
hind thee to-morrow.'
' Nay, my lord I shall leave but one woman, with a sad heart
and she is far away.'
But one, egad but one ?' exclaimed the old roue Lovat, mock-
ingly.
' Yes my mother,' said Mackenzie, in a tremulous voice, while
his fine, open features suddenly overcast ; ' there were three of us,
when the Prince landed in Moidart three brothers, Duncan,
298 THE WHITE COCKADfi.
Hainish, and Roderick, my lord, and I was her favourite, if indeed
she could choose between me and the other two.'
' <And where are tliey?'
'Buried in their bloody tartans under the old Thorn-tree, at
Gladsmuir.'
'Slain in the battle?" said the Duke of Perth.
' They fell, my Lord Duke, just as we rushed, sword in hand, on
the cannon the same volley of grape slew them both. Oh sirs,
my mother loved us with all her soul, but she risked us freely in
King James's cause ! I escaped the late battle without a scratch,
but I have reason to know, and believe, that I, too, shall fall as
Duncan and Haniish have done yet I shrink not from my duty
and loyalty.'
'You know and believe how so?' asked the Duke.
' It was by a dream,' said the Highlander, sighing.
'A dream?'
' If not a dream that revealed this to me, I know not what it was
a vision, an instance of second sight perhaps, but a double case of
it two seeing at once a travelling of the soul, while the weary
body slept.'
' Pray tell us what you mean by this enigma ?'
' I shall, my Lord Dalquharn, if you accept the money I offer
you.'
' Sir, you are generous as you are remarkable ! I shall accept the
gold as a loan, and give '
' Me a receipt true I earned it behind a counter but say not
this, my lord your word is sufficient for me,' said Mackenzie,
proudly, while his face turned crimson, as the blood rushed to his
temples.
' Nay, good friend and comrade, I was about to give you but my
thanks, meanwhile ; and now about this dream ?'
' It happened thus, my lord,' replied Mackenzie ; and after a few
moments of thought, during which he sat with his face half muffled
in his belted plaid, as if ashamed of his emotion, he began as nar-
rated in the following chapter.
THE W11I1E COCKADE. 20$
CHAPTER LV.
THE DOUBLE DKEA3I.
'Though thy slumber must be deep,
Yot thy spirit shall not Bleep ;
There are shades which will not vanish ;
There are thoughts thnu canst not banish ;
II y a power to thee unknown,
Thou canst never be alone !
Thou art wrapt as with a shroud,
Thuu art gathered in a cloud.' Byron.
' IT was in the grey morning, shortly before we attacked the army of
Sir John Cope, near Preston Pans. I was lying asleep under the
shelter of a whin-bush, with my head wrapped in my plaid, as a
chill mist and wind were coming from the eastern sea, and with my
target and claymore for a pillow. Duncan and Hamish were asleep
beside me. God and Mary ! (here Mackenzie raised his eyes up-
ward with reverence,) they slept a sounder slumber on the morrow,
but not unavenged, for we found beside them a gory heap of the
Sassenach Seider Dearg.*
'In a dream my thoughts, my spirit seemed to roam far, faraway
from that field, wliere, thick as sheaves in harvest, and in close ranks,
the clansmen lay asleep in their plaids away to the Head-of-the-
two-Seas to Kintail of the Mackenzies. Once more I seemed to
tread my wild native mountains ; once more I felt the soft heather
as it bent beneath my tread, and again the air seemed laden with
the sweet scent of the bog-myrtle. I saw the shaggy black cattle
browsing in the glens, and contending with the fierce red dear for
the greeu pasturage that grew by the sides of the rolling torrent.
' I went on with a heart that grew full, well nigh to bursting, for
I had a strange consciousness that I did but drearn, and marvelled
what was to be revealed to me. In thought I trod the steep and
winding path that led to the home of my father. He was in his
grave at Bundalloch ; but his figure seemed to come before me in
memory, just as I had often seen him limping up the road, for he
had lost a leg in 1716, when the Saxon ships fired on our chiefs
castle at Don an, and he was known as Rorri Crubach, or lame Ro-
derick, a true old Celt, who always bowed his head and lifted his
bonnet, on hearing the name of his Maker, and never was known to
take that sacred name in vain, though he used the devil's freely
enough.
' Morning was tinging with grey light the summits of Tulloch Ard,
and the hign hills of Belloch, when I passed through, the gap or
gorge, but for which the latter would be inaccessible, for there the
vast mountains are cleft down to their base, as if by the hand of
God, so that only three men can pass in abreast, aud there the
* Cod Saxon solJIcry.
300 THE^WTIITE COCKADB.
scenery is so terrific, that many a wayfarer pauses, or quickens his
pace, as he proceeds.
' I quickened mine, methought, for black darkness lay in the narrow
glen beyond. I knew that at such an hour I should find my dear
mother, from whom I had been long absent, asleep in the same
ancient bed, where many a time and oft she had nursed me, and
soothed my infant petulance in the winter nights long past.
' I let the gate close behind me with a clank, and traversed the
little farm yard, amid the old familiar barking of our dogs, till they
recognised me, fawned upon rue, and licked my hands. I rung the
large ring on the twisted bar of the risp at the front door, but .IUDO
seemed to be stirring within, and none heard me; thrice I did so,
and then knocked with the hilt of my dirk, but all the household
seemed to slumber like the seven sleepers, though the first rays of
the morning sun were brightening now the peak of Tulloch Ard !
' Then my heart seemed to shrink with a vague and unknown
fear ; but, lifting one of the windows, I entered, and found myself
in the parlour which I remembered so well every chair, table,
and other feature, being impressed upon my memory with vivid dis-
tinctness. I passed upstairs to my mother's room, and knocked on
the door. Still no voice responded. Anxiously and fearfully I
entered, and saw her, as she lay abed, holding back the curtains
with one hand, and supporting herself with the other; but gazing
at me, pale and affrighted yea, paralysed with a horror that became
too great for her.
' Why was this ? for now the grey light of the early dawn poured
coldly, but clearly, in upon me, and she must have recognised my
face and figure.
' " I am come again to see you, mother, dear mother !" said I hur-
riedly ; " and, before the coming battle, to kiss you, and to say fare-
well !"
' Then, as I bent towards her, she uttered a wild, convulsive cry,
shrunk from me, and fainted !
' With that shrill cry still ringing in my ears, I awoke to find my-
self cold and stiff, under the whin-bush at Preston Pans, and heard
the half-whispered orders passed along the lines to stand to our
colours, as we were close upon the Saxon soldiers, and were about
to bear down on them in the mist with target and claymore.
' I escaped that glorious battle scatheless, though my two poor
brothers fell, covered with wounds.
4 Five days after this, my mother arrived in Edinburgh (just as I
was closing, for the last time, my shop in the Luckenbooths), pale,
wan, sorrow and terror stricken, as she had appeared in my dream.
With a wild cry she embraced me, and, on becoming more com-
posed, informed me that on the morning of our victory at Preston
the morning of my vision she, too, had a dream, and it was of
me !
1 In fancy she beard the gate of the farmyard open and shut, and
THE WHITE COCKADE. SOI
the subsequent barking and whining of the dogs, as if one whom
they recognised had passed amid them. She had heard the jingling
of the risp thrice, and the knocking with the dirk-hilt, without
having the power to rise from her bed, or summon assistance ; for
a strange emotion seemed to congeal her blood, and to deprive her
of all power of action.
' Auon she heard a window lifted and closed as some one entered
the parlour, and deliberately ascended the stair to her room, and
then a tumultuous joy filled her heart as she recognised my step
on entering, after giving my old familiar knock on the door.
' Breathlessly and bewildered, I listened to all this, and as she
proceeded, I seemed to be in my dream again.
' "You entered, my son," said she, in a broken and tremulous voice ;
"I knew your step, Rorri laoighe mo chriRorri, calf of my heart!
I knew your gait, your figure, and the set of your tartans, as you
stood by me in the grey light of the morning ; but I saw not your
comely ruddy face; nor your blue eyes, that 1 was proud to think
were like my own ; nor the long, fair, silken locks which were as
those of your father in youth, when the false Saxons were at Castle
Donan, and the Spaniards in Glensheil ; for, by the Blessed God and
Mary, you were headless, and I saw the hot blood streaming from
your neck !
' " ' I am come to see you, mother, dear mother !' said a voice,
' and, before the coming battle, to kiss you and say farewell !'
' " The voice was yours, my fair-haired son ; but it was strange in
sound, and seemed to come from a vast distance from some place
far, far away.
1 " Then you stooped towards me, on which the infernal spell was
broken. I uttered a cry, and became senseless. When I recovered
all our household were around my bed ; but the vision was so
strongly impressed upon me that I could not rest, and so set out
for Edinburgh to learn whether you were in the land of the living.
Blessed be Heaven, I have found you : though that dream is a
warning that we shall be spared to each other for a time a brief
time only !"
'I know, my Lords,' concluded the young; man, 'that in the
Prince's cause I am one who is doomed ; for the'drenm of my be-
loved old mother was the very counterpart of mine. Why it should
have been, God alone knoweth, for I cannot understand it, even
through the medium of the powerful regard and filial affinity that
exist between us. We have never had a seer in our family ; the
fatal, the terrible, power of the Taischatr was never known to exist
among us ; and for myself, I am, as you see, a plain and practical
fellow, who worked hard at business till the Prince landed in Moi-
dart, when I exchanged the broadcloth for the tartans again, and
the ellwand for the claymore.'
*****
302 THE WHITE COCKADE.
Dalquliarn heard many a legend stranger and wilder than this
during his campaign with the Highland army ; but there came a
time when he remembered, with singular and melancholy interest,
the strange double dream of the mother and son.
' And now Balmerino, the grace cup,' said the Duke of Perth,
rising and assuming his sword and pistols ; ' and then to quarters,
sirs. To-morrow fife and drum will summon us all to our posts,
when we mai'ch to proclaim King James III. of England and VIII.
of Scotland, at Charing Cross, and to make ourselves masters of
London!'
' Delenda est Carthago !' added Lord Lovat, knocking the ashes
from his pipe, and adjusting his great wig.
CHAPTER LVI.
THE MAECH.
' We've left our bonnie Highland hills,
Our wives and bairnies dear,
To draw the sword for Scotland's lord,
And the young chevalier 1
For Charlie is our darling, &c.
' Oh many were the prayers we said,
Wi' many a hope and fear,
And many a sigh we gave to God,
For the young chevalier!
For Charlie was our darling.'
Old Song.
THE Lowlanders of Scotland at this period, as at every other, were
remarkably jealous and tenacious of their civil and religious liber-
ties. It was this noble spirit which roused them to oppose with
such stern vigour the armed and most unwise interference of Charles
I. and the zealot Laud : and by neglecting to secure the free exer-
cise of the Presbyterian religion after the Restoration when it was
viewed as merely another phrase of vulgar puritanism they were
exposed to much persecution and to many foul wrongs by the Scot-
tish ministry of Charles II.
The memory of the terrible ' Highland Host,' which swept the
west country, was still fresh in the minds of all. Like the English,
they had already become totally unused to the practice of arms,
while the Highlanders were still warlike, hardy and expert in hand-
ling the sword, pistol, axe, and musket, as every father trained his
sons and the males of his household to war and the chase ; thus,
the Lowlanders became filled with melancholy forebodings, on hear-
ing of the intended march of Charles Edward and his victorious
' handful ' into England. The monetary ruin that followed King
William's treachery at Darien, the more recent military disasters
THE TVHITE COCKADE. 308
and disgraces in Flanders, the rapid progress of the French power,
and the defenceless state of the country all the arsenals, cannon,
and munition of war had been secretly abstracted by the govern-
ment, who, after the Union, thought ' the Scottish Lion would be
all the surer prey, without his teeth and claws pressed upon their
minds and filled them with gloom and apprehension, while nearly
all the Highlands territorially more than half of Scotland looked
quietly and exultingly on, awaiting the final catastrophe, whatever
it might be, and watching with secret exultation, the rapid success
of the brave but adventurous few, who had cast their lot with Prince
Charles ; for the genuine Celt viewed the Englishman and the
Scottish Lowlander, as Saxons and intruders alike, and felt himself
the common enemy of both.
Our clansmen foresaw not then those happy and more glorious
days, when their descendants, side by side with their English fellow
subjects and brethren, would march to the splendid fields of Spain,
of India and the Crimea, and when the ' gathering ' of the Came-
rons, the Gordons and Clan Ronald, would summon many a red-
coated Highland Brigade to battle and to victory !
The morning of the 1st November, 1745, dawned gloomily and
drearily on the grey old city of the Stuarts. The steep castle-
rock and the slopes of all the hills were powdered with a thin
coating of snow. Shorn of his rays, the sun came upward from
the Lammermuirs, enveloped in dull clouds, through which he
oomed like a large crimson globe, while the smoke of the city hung,
blackly and ominously, over its summit like a pall.
It was the morning of the march for England, and through the
quaint old streets, 'piled deep and massy, close and high,' the
pipers sent up their shrill summons, as the gatherings of various
clans were played before the lodging or quarters of many of the
Prince's officers and chiefs ; and rapidly the capital poured forth
its thousands, to witness, from the eastrn slopes of Arthur Seat,
the departure of that small but courageous army from its camp at
Duddingstone.
The tents were already struck, and the baggage was going in the
carts of the Lothian farmers, under a guard of Pitsligo's Horse.
The Lord Ogilvie's Clan-Regiment, consisting of six hundred men
from Strathmore and Airlie, had marched as an advanced giiard,
and all the ground presented a stirring scene of bustle, amid which
the smoke of the night-fires, as the dying embers reddened at times,
curled up through the old copsewood, and rolled along the green hill
slopes in light clouds.
The whole line of march had been regularly arranged, for the
major and adjutant of each regiment or clan, had been with the
Prince over-night to receive his final orders.*
The beautiful village of Duddingstone was then, as it is now, one
* ' March of the Highland army, by Captain Stuart of the Lcrd Ogilvie'a
Regiment' a most interesting work.
304 THE WHITE COCKADE.
of the most picturesque environs of the Scottish capital, and it
presented a wonderful scene of animation on this morning, when so
many Highlanders, all clad in their striking garb and variously co-
loured tartans, mustered under the banners of their chiefs, fully
equipped for the field, each summoned by the pipers, playing the
' Gathering ' of their peculiar tribe.
Woods then bare or brown, rock and river, mountain and ravine,
with land under the richest tillage, were all there to enhance the
charming scenery round that broad sheet of water, on a promontory
of which stands the square white tower of the quaint old white
Saxon kirk, which once belonged to the monks of Kelso, and which
was a place of worship for a more populous village than the pre-
sent. Two hundred looms were once plied in Duddingstone Loan ;
but the people were all swept off by the plague, and now their bones
are found from time to time, in the demesne of the Marquis of
Abercorn.
Away to the westward of where the army mustered, stretched
the loch which the coming winter should see covered with skaters
and curlers, and which was then the haunt of the badger, the otter
and the wild swan ; and high over it rose the bare rocky scalp and
the slopes of Arthur's Seat, with the snow that coated them, melt-
ing in the morning sun, and covered by thousands of interested
spectators, among whom the old Jacobites were unusually noisy
and vociferous, throwing up their blue bonnets, their bob-wigs,
and three cornered bearers, shouting the while, as the ' Mercury '
records,
' This is the Prince for us ! He can eat a dry crust and sleep
on pease-straw tak' his dinner in four minutes, and win a battle
in five!'
And his soldiers, some of whom in after years lived to see George
IV. iu Holyrood and steamers traversing the great Glen of Albyn,
were wont to weep when they spoke of him, and boast, in their
quaint phraseology, that Prince Charles ' their beloved Prionse
Tearlach Steiubart, was straight as a lance and round as an egg !'
On this eventful morning the Highland army mustered six thou-
sand five hundred infantry, and five hundred horse, witli seven six-
pound field-pieces ; and all had four days provisions per man. They
were formed in thirteen regiments, clad almost entirely in the garb
of old Gaul, and nearly all had muskets, in addition to their national
weapons. The regiment of Perth alone wore scarlet coats with the
Drummond tartan.
Carlisle was selected as the first point of attack ; while to mis-
lead Marshal Wade as to the route he intended to follow, Prince
Charles sent forward a party under Gillies Macbane, to order quar-
ters for his forces in all the principal towns on the road to Berwick-
upon-Tweed.
The Du>pf Perth was on this day made General of the Forces;
Lord Geo' 3 Murray, Lieutenant-General ; Lord Elcho was made
THE WHITE COCKADE. 805
Colonel of tho Life Guard ; the Earl of Kilrnarnock, Colonel of
the Hussars, and the Lord Forbess of Pitsligo, Colonel of the An-
gus Horse, for so they named those corps, which they fondly hoped
were only, as yet, the nucleus of their cavalry.
The enthusiasm of the Jacobites (and, let us hope, the commise-
ration of the whigs) was at its height, when Charles, who had slept
that night at Pinkie House, the ancient seat of the Earls of Dun-
fermline, appeared in a simple Highland garb to march on foot,
kilted with target and claymore, like a humble clansman ; and in
this costume, he gathered round him, for a farewell harangue, the
highborn chiefs of his army, all of whom leaped from their horses
and uncovered their heads with reverence.
' God bless your Royal Highness !' exclaimed old Simon of Lo-
vat, as two sturdy Frasers lifted him from the saddle.
'The benison of an old man, my lord, must ever be given for
good,' replied Charles, bowing and laying his right hand on the star
of the Thistle.
'Then in the name of sixteen generations of the House of Lovat,
I bless tliee !'
Probably the titled octogenarian really felt what he said at the
time, but the Prince bowed again to conceal his smile, at the proud
old Highland reprobate's sudden affectation of piety.
' And what of this fellow Balcraftie, my Lord Dalquham ?' said
the Prince ; ' I heard that you had burned his house about his
wicked old ears.'
' He has fled to Berwick'
'And so escaped us!'
' Yes, your Royal Highness ; but I hope for a time only. Gil-
lies Macbane may pick him up in that quarter, and do justice on
him.'
' Too probably they may never meet ; for, as the Due de Sully
has it, " petty rascals only fall into the net of justice the greater
always escape." '
' Of a verity, he is no petty rascal but a villain of the most por-
tentous magnitude !' exclaimed Dalquharn.
' Please you, to put on your bonnets, my Lords and gentlemen,'
said the Prince ; ' the morning air is cold.'
But they all delayed to do so, for he now took off his own, which
was simply adorned by three eagles' feathers, and a white rose,
which had been made for him by the Duchess of Gordon, and
while the red morning sun lit up his fine young face, and made his
fair curly hair glitter like gold, or floss silk, he delivered to his
chiefs a most animated harangue, a few memoranda of which have
come down to us, in the neat small hand-writing of Sir John
Mitchell.
As on the day when his standard was unfurled in Glenfinnan, he
expatiated on the grievances of Scotland, which from being a royal
kingdom was, by the maladniiuistratiou of the act of union, re-
20
306 THE WHITE .COCKADE.
duced to a province, despised by England, neglected by the Elector
and blotted out of the map of Europe a province impoverished
by the absenteeism of alienated nobles, and burdened by oppressive
taxes for the maintenance of wicked German wars. He promised
pardon to all who quitted the service of the Elector and returned
to their allegiance under James Stuart, their lawful king. He pro-
mised the abolition of lay-patronage and the restoration of the
kirk of Scotland to that state which was established by the Revolu-
tion Settlement and Treaty of Union, both of which had been reck-
lessly violated by the British Parliament in 1712, by an overwhelm-
ing majority of English votes.
' With all this, my lords," continued the Prince, ' I am opposed to
a separation of the crowns. I say Britain for ever, and Scotland
the home of my forefathers for one day longer ! I am the heir of
England and of Ireland, as well as of Scotland the representative
of Tudor as well as Stuart. The Union of 1707, is a great fact not
easily got rid of ; separation would ensure a mortal strife for years
to come, and who among us would see that, and wish to live ? We
march into England not against Englishmen oh no Q-od forbid !
but against those who have usurped my father's throne. If England
fails me, then shall I seek at least to secure and defend Scotland,
the ancient cradle of our House and Race, and I shall then dissolve
that Union which is so obnoxious to the masses of the people ; but
such a measure, be assured, most noble lords and clu'efs, will be the
last resource of Charles Edward Stuart. The right of the first born
is the right of the exiled king my father the divine and irrefra-
gable right which comes direct from God, and no illegal convention
of the estates of Scotland or of the Parliament of England can
subvert that claim, which I shall defend, even as God is my de-
fence !'
The Prince put on his bonnet and struck the steel hilt of his
claymore, as he concluded, and it was the only sound which broke
the solemn silence until Lord Elcho said,
' Your Royal Highness has spoken well ! The departed spirits of
the faithful dead are with us now, so let us march and fear not. This
poor Scotland of ours could once boast of a race of men, whose love
for their native soil was a glorious passion a passion in its strength
and fulness second to no emotion that God hath planted in the
human heart ! They loved the land of Spearmen well, when her
soil was arid and barren, her treasures scanty, and the vast re-
sources of her mines and waters were unknown ; when her cities
were thatched with straw or heather ; when her nobles dwelt in
solitary towers and her peasantry in huts little better than the wig-
wams of the Cherokees. Yet with all its sterile poverty, they loved
well the mountain land, which God gave to their Celtic sires in the
unkuown time, and it was in this pure spirit that our barons de-
clared to Pope John XXII., that so long as one hundred Scotsmen
remained alive upon a hill side, they would never submit to the
tun WHITE COCKADE. 30?
proud dominion of a foreigner ! Let us be worthy of our fore-
fathers of the true hearted men of the days of old!'
(' Here,' says Sir John Mitchell, ' methought that the brief and
ingenious harangue of my Lord Elcho, did surpass that of His High-
ness, as it drew a wild shout from the hearers.')
A few hours after this, nothing remained of all the once inspiring
scene, but the white ashes of the camp fires.
The sound of the pipes, the waving of the standards and the tar-
tan plaids, the glitter of claymore and musket barrel had all passed
away by the wooded valley of the Esk on the road to Lauder,
Charles marching on foot at the head of the first column, with his
round shield on his arm, and his sword in his hand and so, on and
on towards the old warlike borders, advanced that devoted army,
when the brown spoil of autumn was lying deep between the hedge-
rows, when the forests were fast becoming stripped, bare, and cheer-
less, while the fir cones and the crisp leaves lay among the withered
reeds and grass of the past summer.
On the night before the Highland army departed, the autumn
wind had been heard by the superstitious to sough and moan with
a singular sound among the old woods near the camp, and it was
alleged that the groaning of the great oaks came mournfully on the
breeze, as it sighed away in the darkness, over the waste muirlaud
towards the sea.
Some there were who shook their heads, and spoke of Flodden
and King James.
The Prince was gone, but the hopes and the heartfelt prayers of
the Jacobites followed him ; and that absurdity might not be want-
ing, now that all danger had passed away, once more the hoarse
drums beat to arms, the Edinburgh volunteers donned their red
coats, and came forth from their hiding places. Great was the mar-
tial furore ; and again the Seceders betook them to burnishing their
firelocks, singing psalms, and vowing vengeance on the Highland
Amorites, and that man of Moab their leader, should he or they
but dare to come once more. The flag on the castle was pulled
down, and the officers of State returned from Berwick, pouring into
the city with their retinues in a great stream, many on horseback
and others in great pavilion-roofed coaches, crammed with property,
children and livestock, spaniels and parrots, many of these vehicles
being so piled with baggage, as to resemble pyramids on wheels, for
all had ' levanted' with their plate, jewellery, and other valuables at
the first approach of the Highlanders.
Among other returned emigres, came my Lord GHentoady of that
Ilk, a famous whig noble, whose secret services to George II., his
mistresses, and hia ministry, together with his votes (ever adverse
to the interests of his country), had been repaid by several pleasant
and lucrative pluralities, such as the office of Groom of the Back
Stairs, Hereditary Keeper of the Royal Guinea Pigs, and Commis-
sioner to the General Assembly of the Kirk ; and through whose
202
308 THE WHITE COCKADE.
good offices the much, injured Provost Balcraftie had been specially
recommended to the august notice of His Royal Highness the Duke
of Cumberland.
CHAPTER LVII.
THE NETHERBY ABMS.
' Despatch !
From'Antony win Cleopatra ; promise,
And in our name, what she requires; add more,
From thine invention, offers : women are not
In their best fortunes strong.'
Antony and Cleopatra.
How La Roque contrived matters we know not ; but a singular
and most provoking delay took place before Bryde ultimately de-
parted from Carlisle in a chaise, the comforts of which would not
be very apparent in these luxurious days of ours, as it was desti-
tute of springs, and was merely slung in chains, that depended
from four pieces of wood, that started at an angle of forty-five
degrees from the lower carriage ; and in this she was to be jolted
over narrow, steep, and rough roads, such as, happily for us, have
been unknown in the land since the time of Mr. Macadam.
Kind Colonel Durand, who accompanied her to the gate of the
castle, hat in hand, with the stately courtesy of the old school, and
there bade her farewell, kissing her hand with such an ah- as Sir
Charles Sedley would have displayed, promised that the solitary
grave under the fore wall should be cared for and respected so long
as he was governor of Carlisle which was fated to be but a short
time now and as she departed, she prayed devoutly that it might
be venerated, even as the Pagans of old invoked Nemesis to defend
the relics and the memory of their dead from insult ; but ere the
leaves of the next autumn were whirling in the blast, many another
heart was mouldering in the castle-ditch where Sir Baldred lay.
The Colonel had inquired of Bryde whether she was not afraid
of falling into the hands of the lawless rebels ?
And Bryde had smiled, for was not Dalquharn with those loyal-
ists, misnamed ' rebels,' because their eflbrts failed in blood and
disaster? When did rebellion ever prosper? Were not Crom-
well's army and the Covenanters alike rebels, till each was vic-
torious ?
If the Prince's troops were advancing, as the Colonel assured her
they were, then every moment might be bringing her nearer to that
heart on which she could repose her head and her lonely sorrows !
Great alarm was apparent on this day in Carlisle, and the whole
militia of Cumberland and Westmoreland were pouring into the
castle, for everywhere tidings were rife of the advance of the
dreaded ' rebels,' of whose ferocity, rapacity, and cruelty, the moat
311
TQE WHITE COCKAC3.
Ulv a
false and malicious reports were spread by the emissaries of '..
Government and the absurd fears of the peasantry.
She left the city about mid-day by the Scotch gate, but her pro-
gress was slow, and from the little windows of the chaise she
looked lingeringly back to where the sun of the November noon
reddened the walls of the venerable fortress, with its buttressed
ramparts, eo long one of England's chief bulwarks against the
Scot, and to the square tower and great It^ade of the Gothic cathe-
dral, which rose above the city.
Bryde was gone from Carlisle at last, and so was La Roque, well
mounted, with his purse well filled, his holster-pistols loaded, and
his sword at his side ; but he took a different route, and making a
detour towards Stapleton, pushed on at great speed for Longtown.
There were times, however, in steep parts of the road, when he
drew his reins, and checking his horse, permitted them to drop on
its mane, while he gave way to the dreamy luxury of exulting
reverie. The only man in England whose control or interference
he dreaded was worthy old Colonel Durand, and Bryde was beyond
his care or supervision now !
As he rode on, he thought of her as he had seen her last night,
seated in that gloomy old chamber wherein David, King of Scot-
land, knighted Henry of England, and wherein he died. The last
sound of her voice lingered in his memory, and Bryde's was a voice
with a strange melody in it, that touched not only the tympanum
of the ear, but thrilled at times upon the nerves, especially when
she sung ; tha last touch of that soft white hand, witli its violet-
tinted veins, seemed to linger on his, and his excited fancy pour-
trayed alluringly her fair, young face, with its brown, tender eyes,
long, dark lashes, and curling chesnut hair all the more alluringly,
that the country through which he rode was pastoral and lonely
that the girl seemed completely at his mercy, and that, in those
lawless times of tumult and civil war when to be a Scot was almost
to be an alien in England there was no one to protect her or to
call him to account.
' How oft the sight of means to do ill deeds
Makes ill deeds done.'
Very wicked all this was, no doubt, of M. La Eoque ; but wicked
fellows have existed in the world, even before David placed Uriah
in his perilous post of honour, and such probably will always be,
until the lion shares his couch with the lamb.
As he was particularly anxious that his prey should not enter
Scotland, having a vague dread that if once there, she would be
more sure of protectors, he spurred on till he reached Longtown, a
market borough, and then a very small one, in the northern part of
Cumberland, on the banks of the Esk, near its confluence with the
Liddel. A stone bridge crosses the river now, but then there was
none, and the water was not always fordable. Around Longtown
the country was pleasant, but pastoral and lonely.
THE WHITE COCKADE.
good
rei,a Boque rode straight to the only inn, or house of entertain-
ment of which the place could boast the ' Netherby Arms,' which
were represented by three huge escallop shells on a sign-board, that
swung from an iron rod above the trellis-work porch, over and
about which were twined the dead creepers of the past summer.
It was evident that the landlord, Mr. Toby Badley, was a wag,
as under the scutcheon, with the three escallop shells, in chief of
Squire Grahame, of Netherby, was painted this distich
' In Longtown here, where dwells old Toby,
Pray stop and drink before you go by ;
Drink deep you may, withouten sorrow.
Tobacco given away to-morrow !'
The inn was the largest house in the straggling street, which was
but a line of cottages, occupied by weavers of checks for the Car-
lisle market.
Built of solid stone, and roofed with grey slate, the inn was a
massive old two-storied house, with a great chesnut tree before it.
A deal table encircled the gnarled stem of the latter, and there
many a tankard of ale was served to those riders, or travellers by
the waggon, who cared not to alight ; and there also the male
gossips of the town were wont to congregate in the warm summer
evenings, for it was more pleasant as a rendezvous than the smith's
forge, and more convenient too, if Giles Chawbacon, or Gaffer Hob-
nail, required a foaming tankard, which was pretty often the
case.
With low ceilings, wainscoted rooms, narrow corridors, and oak
furniture, an entrance which had several steps down instead of up,
and a damp, earthy odour pervading it, the ' Netherby Arms' had
been an inn from time immemorial, which meant, since old Field
Marshal Lesly, leader of the armies of the Covenant, and whilome
' Governor of all the cities on the Baltic coast,' with the Scots, was
marching exactly one hundred and one years before, to the capture
of Carlisle ; and tradition still told that his officers, whose thirst
seemed very troublesome, were all regaled with brown October,
under the identical chesnut which overshadowed the porch.
And now, seated there, enjoying a yard of clay, and a brimming
silver tankard of beer, with a little wall-eyed bull-terrier crouching
under his chair, was Mr. Toby Badley, the host, a thickset, burly
English borderer (looking excessively like Toby Tosspot, or the little
squat mugs which bear his name). He was about sixty years of
age, and wore a kind of stable-dress, with top-boots, over which he
had a frock of strong light blue linen. His fat rubicund visage was
surmounted by a scratch wig and a weather-beaten brown beaver,
turned up on two sides, and presenting a cock only to the front.
He regarded somewhat suspiciously the horseman in the yellow
uniform, who now rode briskly up to him, and reining his horse
back upon its haunches, rather cavalierly bade him good-morrow.
' Auan,' replied Mr. Toby Badley, that he might have time to
THE WHITE COCKADE. 311
Benitinise the stranger and rally big thoughts, which was usually a
slow process.
' Monsieur le Maitre diable ! I forget you are the host the
landlord, I presume ?' asked La Roque.
' My sarvice t'ye, sir,' said Toby, bowing and draining hia
tankard ; 'yes I be what lack ye ?'
' Refreshment for man and horse and quarters here for the
night.'
'Odsbud!' muttered Mr. Radley, pushing his scratch wig on
one side, and rubbing his bald head with the mouthpiece of his
pipe.
' You are not afraid of me, I trust ?'
' Darn no I'se feared o' nae man that ever wore a laced quoat
ods bud !' said the landlord, who, however, was not so favourably
impressed by the gay yellow uniform and gallant air of the rider,
as his wife, a comely and buxom dame, who was reconnoitring from
behind a window blind, where her black eyes twinkled with smiles,
as she adjusted her curly dark hair and her spruce mob cap.
La Eoque, who had made up his mind to remain, dismounted,
threw a guinea on the table, and ordered a stomp of red wine, while
his horse was taken away by the ostler, after he had transferred the
holster pistols to his girdle. Toby Radley took up the gold, but it
failed to impress him with greater respect for this swaggering visitor,
as he had seen many a bold highwayman do the same thing, in the
same place, and with the same gallant air, ere now.
' You will share the wine with me, my friend ?' said La Roque,
as he seated himself by the table under the chesnut, and assumed
his most insinuating air, when the drawer brought the wine and
the change, out of which he tossed him a crown piece, ' with the air
of a lord,' as the landlady thought.
Toby, whose deeply set and keen twinkling eyes had never been
removed from the stranger's dark and handsome face, begged to be
excused, ' for wine aye gied him the mulligrubs, and he preferred
yail.'
His wife, a plump and handsome woman, now passed and re-
passed, curtseying and smiling demurely to La Roque, till Toby
rose and angrilv told her to go and ' prepare summut for the gen-
tleman's supper,' as the sun was setting now.
' Ken ye who he be ?' she whispered.
' Wounds ! no how can I say ? I vear mickle he may be the
Pope or the Pretender, if he be na a highwayman as I vear mair
so look to thy spoons, good wife.'
' He's a pretty and a canny youth, anyway.'
The landlord of the ' Netherby Arms ' only answered by a prowl
and an ill-concealed frown at his helpmate, who was greatly flattered
by La Roque lifting his hat as she tripped away, and who was really
pretty, pleasing, some thirty years Toby'f junior, aud io full and
312 THE WBITE COCKADB.
round in her bust, that she seemed to have grown up in her tight
bodice and long peaked stomacher.
Toby ngain seated himself beside the stranger, who, after sipping
his wine once or twice, said
' Is that comely dame your wife, my friend ?'
'I'm nae friend o' yours, sir. What if she be or what if she
be na?' was the surly rejoinder of Mr. Radley, who laid down his
pipe with a cloudy expression of eye, while his terrier began to
growl and show his teeth, as if impressed by the sound of his mas-
ter's voice.
'Pardon, me I only envy you though I, too, have the mis-
fortune to be married."
' Ods firkin, ye dunna look loike it,' exclaimed Toby.
'But my wife has run away from me,' said La Roque, with a
deep sigh.
' Ods bud !' exdaimed the landlord, resuming his pipe and be-
coming suddenly interested.
' Has a chaise passed this way ?'
' A chaise and four cream-coloured nag-tnils ?'
' No ; a chaise drawn by a bay and a piebald horse ?'
' No, maister ; besides, the river be na fordable at the present
time, as ye may see.'
' G-ood tres bon ! she will be here anon, and compelled to tarry.'
' She who, maister ?'
'My wife. I wish to stay here to-night for the purpose of
arresting the fugitive. When she arrives, you will say nothing
about my being in the house here you comprehend, my friend ?'
Mr. Toby Radley again applied the mouth-piece of his long pipe
vigorously to his pole, and looked perplexed ; the strange foreign
accent, the confident bearing, and excited manner of La Roque,
puzzled one of a nature so slow and lymphatic.
' She's goin' to stop here, say ye ?'
' Yes.'
' And you too, maister ?'
' Yes yes.'
' And one's to ken nought about t'other, loike ?'
' She is not to hear of me till such time as I choose to make my-
self known. Mort de ma vie, what a stupid old beast it is !' mut-
tered La Roque. 'Truly, Father Adam has some very vulgar
offspring. A French Aubergiste would have taken in the whole
situation at once, and guessed my wishes in an instant.'
' This business be na canny, maister, and I dunna loike it,' said
the landlord, ' dang me if I does !'
' I tell thee, sirrah, that the lady of whom I am in pursuit
whom I must have passed en route, and who will be here anon, is
my wife!'
' Your wife art sure ?'
' Sabre de Bois ! I have twice said so, fool.'
THE WHITE COCKADE. 313
'But ods firkins, why do ye follow her in this wild fashion,
maister?'
' Because she will leare me, despite all my love and tenderness, to
join her rascally lover among these Su-ots rebels lea Sauvages
Ecossais dost sec dost comprehend ?'
1 If so be as that is the case, wounds ; but I'm wi' ye, and there's
the hand o' Toby Radley on't.' exclaimed the landlord, who waa
chronically jealous of a certain son of Vulcan, whose ponderous
sledge hammer could be heard at that moment ringing on his anvil
at the town end.
' Be you a voreigner, maister ?'
'Yes, a countryman, and, what is more, a kinsman of King
George, and as such I thank you, monsieur.'
' A chaise drawn by a bay 'orso and a piebald ?'
1 Peste yes.'
' Then there they be, a rattling down the road frae Blaokford
now, sure as my name be Toby Kadley !'
As the landlord spoke, La Roque at once recognised the chaise
with its yellow panels, and glasses shining in the setting sun, as it
approached Longtown at a rapid pace, swaying from side to side
with fearful jolts on the rough and stony highway.
' 'Tis she ! caution and secrecy now, M. L'Aubergiste, and be
assured I shall pay you nobly and well !' said La Roque to Mr.
Eadley, who winked portentously, and placed his right forefinger
by the side of his nose, on which the officer, who thought it might
be an English mark of politeness, lifted his hat, as he hastened into
the house, muttering, ' En avant, M. La Roque ! oulles diables, je
le ferai bien ! en avant !'
C!H AFTER LVII1
LOKGTOWN.
' I hold thee base enough
To break through law and spurn at social onhr,
And to do a brutal injury like this;
Yet mark me well, young Lord, I think Calista
Too nice, too noble, and too great of soul,
To be the prey of such a thing as thnu art !'
The Fair Penitent.
IT seemed to Bryde that a singular fatality attended this first short
stage of her journey. The delays were incessant; the horses, fre-
quently restive, proceeded slowly, while the postilion seemed deaf
alike to her orders and intreaties to travel quicker.
At a cross road, whore the way was narrowed by prodigious
hedges, they had to halt for nearly an hour until a suicide was in.
terred, with a stake driven through his body, according to the cus-
tom of that enlightened age, and after 'his uncouth grave was
311 THE WHITE COCKADE.
covered up, and Brjde shuddered as the chaise passed over it ; a
malefactor's corpse swung close by on a gibbet, to add to the horror
of the place.
At Biackford one of the horses cast a shoe ; the smith was tipsy
at his forge, and another hour was lost ere a substitute could be
found and the horse reshod.
The postilion next mistook the road, and drove her some miles
on the way to Scaleby, before he pretended to discover his mistake,
and poor Bryde shed tears of vexation, before she saw the strag-
gling street of Longtown, and the desolate expanse of Solway Moss
that lay to the westward of it, and there learned that the Esk was
too deep for her chaise to cross that night, and she must wait until
the morrow ; and as if that contingency was not enough, when just
opposite the porch and chesnut tree of the ' Netherby Arms,' the
near hind wheel of the vehicle, singularly came off (the driver had
just abstracted the linch-pin), and in a great fright, Bryde allowed
herself to be conducted into that celebrated caravanserai by Mr.
Toby Eadley, who felt that he was assisting in the performance of a
high moral ' dooty,' by securing the pretty runaway.
This was on the evening of the 9th November, when the early
sun sets at a quarter-past four. Bryde felt lonely and oppressed by
an uncomfortable sense of her unprotected situation, as she saw the
shadows deepening in this strange place ; and so she requested to
be led at once to her room.
The hostess was kind, and her presence was very assuring to
Bryde, who little knew fiom whom she was only separated by a
partition, and who felt puzzled, however, by her manner especially
by her strange smirks and smiles of intelligence. These surprised
and annoyed her. What thought Bryde haughtily can this per-
son mean ; for whom does she take me ?
After having a cup of chocolate, she desired to be left alone, as
she meant to i. jt forth betimes on the morrow, and from the window
of her room, which was secured by iron bars, and which Toby Ead-
ley took especial care was at the top of the house, she sat alone, for
hours, watching the new moon rising in the north-west above the
pastoral hills of Annandale.
She saw it shining on the White Esk, which rises in the shire of
Selkirk, enters England at the Scots Dyke and flows past Longtown
to the Solway Firth. At least she was so much nearer home ! A
Scottish river flowed beneath her window, and those were Scottish
hills over which the moon's sharp crescent was soaring. Poor
Bryde's maladie du pays would seem very strange to the wanderers
of the world in this age of locomotion.
Well, to-morrow, if the spirits of the stream proved friendly,
would see her beyond its banks, and travelling away towards the
lonely wastes of Eskdalemuir. She remembered the halt among the
mountains, when her grandfather grew weary and lay by the way-
side with his poor old aching head iu her lap. It seemed as if all
THE WHITE COCEADE. 315
that had passed but last night! She resolved that she would visit
the kind farmer who had befriended them, and was considering the
various presents she would make to his wife and little ones, when,
after saying her prayer very devoutly, with her hands folded as she
used to do in childhood, the amiable girl dropped into a calm and
pleasant sleep.
A certain vague sense of alarm had prevented her disrobing, so
she lay down in her walking- dress and drew the coverlet over her
for warmth.
She had thought of securing her door prior to this ; but the key
of the lock was gone ! Indeed, at that moment it was safe in the
pocket of La Roque.
Bryde had been unconscious for some hours, when that personage,
who had been, as he would have phrased it, ' priming' himself with
wine to deaden any small scruples he might have felt, stole stealthily
into her room, carefully shading his candle with one hand, lest he
might startle or rouse her too suddenly, for one of his chief objects
was to compromise Bryde if he could, by placing her in a false position.
Time was further advanced than our enterprising officer supposed,
for notwithstanding the daring offence he meditated, he had actually
fallen asleep with his head on the bar-table.
The silence of the apartment and of the time, was profound 5 he
heard only the soft and regular breathing of Bryde, as she lay half
hidden by the coverlet, in a pretty little tent bed with white muslin
curtains, in her tout ensemble, looking very much as we have all seen
Desdemona in the last scene of her tragic story.
Bryde was pale, but looking almost beautiful, and there was a
sublime innocence in her calm sleeping face ; her long eyelashes
seemed black when contrasted with the purity of her cheek, and her
rich, bright chesnut hair was spread in some disorder over her pil-
low. One hand, white and faultless in its symmetry, rested on the
tucker of her bodice ; the other was under her round and softly
shaded cheek. Her lips were parted. She was dreaming und smi-
ling in her sleep, for midnight was long since passed ; the morning
was nigh, and then it is, that one generally dreams most.
' Peste !' muttered La Roque ; ' she is charming superbe mag-
nifique ! But there has been a decided dash of the devil at times
in these glorious eyes, when they have surveyed me. Tudieu! my
little beauty, 1 would rather when you are provoked be your
lover than your husband, as I have given myself out to be, to the
boors here. Mademoiselle has a chin and upper-lip that evince de-
termination of purpose. She sleep* and dreams dreams of that
other lover, whoever he may be. Ah sacre shall I ever teach her
to love me ?'
He had been gradually drawing nearer as he muttered thus, and
now stooping over her, he daringly pressed his lips to hers ! Bryde
started, and awoke with a sob of terror, and she was about to scream,
when he somewhat rudely placed his Jvaud on her mouth,
316 THE W1ITTE COCKADB.
'Oh, Heaven ! most merciful Heaven! who is this?' she ex-
claimed, supporting herself on one hand, and seeking to protect her-
self with the other.
' "Tis I, mademoiselle 'tis I, dearest : do not alarm yourself,' said
he, as she furiously dashed aside his arm, and forcibly sprang to the
floor ; hut he confronted her midway to the door, in which he very
deliberately turned the key, and placed the latter once more in his
pocket.
At this action Bryde became seriously alarmed, but rallying all
her courage
'Monsieur La Roque you here, sir,' she exclaimed: 'here and
at this hour!'
' As you see ; at your service, my dearest girl tender, devoted,
and true.'
' Oh, M. La Roque, you are cruel, insolent, and heartless ! How
can you how dare you to treat me thus ?'
' Heartless tres bon ! '
' Leave this room nay, this house instantly, and begone ! be-
gone, or my cries shall bring me aid.'
' Nay, mademoiselle, do not deceive yourself as to that, or be so
rash as to make any unpleasant noise. This inn is perfectly soli-
tary ; it contains no travellers, fortunately, but ourselves, and your
postilion, an unparalleled fellow, who fulfilled my instructions to the
letter! I have completely won over madame the landlady, and "le
maitre d'hotel," the " aubergiste," or whatever yon call him, he is
far too judicious and well-bred to interfere between a wedded pair,
as they conceive you and I to be.'
' Have you dared to say this ?' exclaimed Bryde, who felt more
indignation than fear on hearing this bantering speech, which La
Roque uttered with a somewhat thick and uncertain voice.
' What will love for you not make me dare and do ? Ah, mademoi-
selle, have you no heart ?'
' I have a heart a resentful one, as you shall find,' said Bryde,
sternly, as she looked round ; but there was no bell or other means
of summoning assistance.
' A heart peste ! then it must be of stone, or of ice. Don't you
see, my beloved one, how I suffer ?' exclaimed La Roque, tearing his
hair with both hands in a manner ludicrously French.
' I have told you often ere this, that my regard is irrevocably
another's ; and if it were not'
' Ah diable if it were not '
' This ruffianism would only serve to steel me against you.'
' I am not so assured of that,' replied the young Frenchman, with
a saucy smile, for the fumes of the wiue he had imbibed overnight
were still affecting him ; ' I never met a brawn-eyed girl yet who
did not like fire and vivacity in a lover. Ah, my angel, if you were
but half as much in love with me as I am with you, how happy we
should be! what devilish fuss and trouble would be spared us !'
11IE WHITE COCKADE. 3l7
As La Eoque had never before permitted himself to speak in this
audacious strain, Bryde became seriously alarmed ; and, on his
attempting to take her hand, started back with a dangerous ex-
pression sparkling in her eyes.
' Tres bon tres belle ! C'est la beaute-du-diable !' exclaimed La
Roque, laughing and making a rather unsteady pirouette.
' Oh, that I were a man and had a sword, or even a riding whip,
wherewith to punish you as you deserve, base and ignoble coward,
for such conduct as this ! Sir, I command you to leave this room
instantly !'
A very dark expression came over La Roque's face at these words,
which stung him keenly, and completely sobered him. He drew
back a little way.
' Thank Heaven,' said Bryde, ' day is at hand, and will bring suc-
cour with it the dawn spreads fast across the east.'
1 1 have but one excuse, mademoiselle I love you so much, and
love should pardon anything. It is in vain to resist me, for my plans
are laid with care. You travel not one step further towards Scot-
land, but must go with me."
' With you ?'
' Yes, my little coquette.'
' To where ?'
' Wherever I please. 1
'Leave me, sir leave me or I shall faint,' said Bryde, whose
courage began to fail her.
' For to-night or rather, for what remains of the morning, I shall
leave you if if '
'What, sir?'
' You will give me one kiss, freely, willingly only one little kiss 5
people always seem to know each other so much better after that.'
' Enough, sir begone, I command you,' said Bryde, rushing to
the window, and throwing it up, but it was closed by the bars with-
out, and no one seemed abroad yet.
La Roque, inflamed alike by her beauty and helplessness, sprang
towards her ; threw his left arm around her waist, and grasped her
right hand resolutely within his own.
' Ah, sir, have mercy upon me, if you are a gentleman mercy, I
beseech you, 1 said Bryde, whose tears could no longer be controlled,
' I am all alone in the world alone among total strangers in this
wild place, too ! You will have pity upon me, and no longer insult
me, La Roque I know you will, for the sake of your mother of
your sister, if you have one ?'
Her soft brown eyes so imploring and full of earnest sweetness
were turned to those of the Frenchman ; but she saw that he was
unflinching in his purpose ; that her very glances served only to
inflame him more, and now a long and shrill cry for help escaped
her.
' Sacre-bleu,' said he, c such a very unpleasant sound ; but you
318 THE \talITE COCEAbE.
may scream for succour here a long time before it will come to you,
little one.'
At that moment there was a loud knocking on the door of the
room, and the voice of the landlord was heard saying in a very ex-
cited tone
' Open Maister open ! get forth the chaise and away wi' your
wife, for Odrabbit it, here be these pestilent Scots a comin' !'
At the same moment the sound of many bagpipes was heard, and
Bryde from the window saw in the grey twilight of the morning a
great body of Highlanders marching straight for the banks of the
swollen stream, which they began to cross, without the slightest
doubt or hesitation.
In fact they formed part of that column of the Prince's army,
which, under the Duke of Perth, was destined to capture Carlisle.
A hundred men abreast, they flung themselves, hand-in-hand, in the
Scottish fashion, into the rushing stream, and soon more than two
thousand of them were in the water at once, stemming thus the
fierce torrent, without the loss of a man. Little more was visible
than their heads, and the standards which their bearers held trium-
phantly aloft.
The first who plunged into this deep and dangerous ford was the
heroic Gillies Macbane, who, before doing so, drunk a mouthful of
the water, exclaiming, as he waved his bonnet :
' Deoch slaint an Kigh Hamish !' (To the health of King James.)
As soon as they had all crossed, they brandished their swords,
gave three loud cheers, and shouted
' Prionse Tearlach gu bragh !'
They then danced reels to the sound of the bagpipes till their
kilts, plaids and other clothing were dry and this sudden passage
of a swollen stream, was achieved by those brave and hardy fellows
in the space of five minutes.
A horseman in blue uniform, with an upright white feather in his
hat, attended by a trumpeter, swam his charge across the river, and
after a few words of conversation, with one who rode a white horse,
and who was no other than the Duke of Perth, galloped off by the
road to Carlisle.
Did nothing of his air seem familiar to Bryde ?' For that horse-
man who crossed the stream within a hundred yards of the window,
from whence she and La E/oque, who was now thoroughly startled
and dismayed by the sudden apparition of this hostile column, were
gazing was no other than her affianced husband, who was despatched
to summon the city of Carlisle, and who spurred on, mentally vow-
ing that, ere nightfall, he would free Bryde from the captivity he
supposed she was enduring there, or he would lie dead in the
castle ditch.
The inmates of Mr. Toby Radley's establishment were all roused
now. Terror and dismay filled the hearts of all the simple folks in
HE WHITE COCEJDE. 310
Longtown ; for they believed that a general pillage aud massacre
were certain to ensue.
La Roque took his measures instantly ; lie looked to the priming
of his pistols, and stuck them in his girdle. Bryde was rushing
from the inn porch to effect her escape and join the Highlanders,
when, with the assistance of Toby Radley, her tormentor thrust
her forcibly into the chaise, which was now at the doer, with the
horses traced and the corrupt postilion in the saddle.
Poor Bryde uttered a succession of piercing cries ; but a handker-
chief was thrust into her mouth ; the glasses were closed, and while
La Roque held her firmly in his arms, they were bcrne away at a
tearing pace, she knew not whither.
CHAPTER LIX.
J ENGLAND.
'O, Pattlson! O chon! O clion
Thou wonder of a mayor !
Thou blest thy lot, thoii we.rt no Scot,
And blustered like a player.
What hast tlioti done with sword and gun,
To baffle the Pretender?
Of mouldy cheese and bacon grease,
Thou art more fit defender.'
S'lug, The Mayor of Carlisle.
LOED DAIQTTHARN'S mind was as full of Bryde Otterburn as of
his duty while he rode along the same road, which she had pursued
yesterday, (but in an opposite direction) and soon saw before him,
all reddened by the morning sun, the fine old city and fortress, so
long alike the key and bulwark of England's western frostier,
whilome besieged by many a Scottish army, and sometimes in vain.
Dalquharn knew now of Sir Baldred's death ; but he hoped to find
and free Bryde from the old border city, and so, spurred on with
emotions of joy and ardour, that, however, were not untinged by
anxiety.
Surrounded by massive walls of the time of Henry VIII., and
which were greatly strengthened against the Scots by Queen Eliza-
beth, the town, under its Mayor, Mr. Pattison, was fully prepared
for resistance ; and that civic dignitary was at the pains, in a pro-
clamation, to inform all whom it might concern, that he was not
Paterson, a Scottish man, but a free-born Englishman, ' which would
fight to the last gasp for his king and country.'
With the garrison of the castle, under Colonel Durand, and the
cannon on the walls of the city, a noble defence was expected, as
the column of the Duke of Perth was furnished with only a few
small field-pieces.
320 THE WHITE COCEADB.
Dalquharn, as he approached, saw the union-jack flying on thd
castle ; the gates all closed, and guards of militia and the line on
the alert. He reined in his horse ; his trumpeter did the same,
and blew three shrill blasts, while waving a white handkerchief in
sign of truce, for they were not without fears of being fired on, in
defiance of the laws of war, for the hostility of the people they
were advancing among, was extremely bitter, though they were
nearly the same race as the Scottish Lowlanders, for Cumbria, the
most north-west part of England, and southern of Scotland, was a
province of the Scoto Britons, (including those of Galloway and
Strathclyde), who, after the Saxon invasion, withstood it in the
west, and forming an independent kingdom, subsisted as such, till
conquered by Gregory the Great, in the tenth century.
After a little parley, Dalquharn announced to an officer, who came
forth, his name and rank, and stated that he had come on the part
of His Grace the Duke of Perth, to demand in the name of His
Royal Highness the Prince Regent, for James III. of England and
VIII. of Scotland the precedence was changed now the surren-
der of the castle and city of Carlisle, otherwise they should be taken
at the point of the sword.
To this, the Mayor, a very vulgar little cheesemonger, replied by
a recapitulation of his placard, adding,
' Sir thof you call yourself a lord I'm a freeborn Englishman,
which won't submit to no Roman vermin, French dragoons, Irish
brigades, or Highland cut-throats; Hurrah for the land of liberty,
say I, and down with the Popish Pretender the lousy son of a
Scotch warming-pan !'
Dalquharn was weak enough to be irritated by this man's foolish
insolence, and his right hand wandered involuntarily towards his
holster flaps, a motion which Mr. Mayor Pattison was quick enough
to detect, for he slunk behind Colonel Durand.
' The Mayor speaks for the city, my Lord,' said that stately old
officer ; ' I am governor and commandant of the garrison Colonel
Durand of the First Guards, at your service.'
' Permit me, Colonel, in future, to confer with you, for with this
person, the Mayor, I can do so no more,' said Dalquharn, eyeing
Mr. Pattison sternly.
Colonel Durand bowed, all the more politely, perhaps, that in
our regular army, officers and men had greatly lost confidence by
the result of the battle of Preston ; and as a means of resisting the
furious onset of the Highland swordsmen, it was actually proposed
to have portable chevaux-de-frise to place in front of the lines of
infantry, a timid precaution never adopted ; but the rumour thereof
caused great anxiety to the Prince and his officers, lest it should
baffle their simple tactics.
Durand listened with courteous politeness to the demands of Dal-
quham, and glancing with a smile at the heavy ten-gnu battery of
THE WHITE COCKADE. 321
the castle, said, that as a British officer he knew his duty, and that
liia garrison would stand on its defence.
' I regret to hear it, sir ; but I too have a duty to perform. And
now, Colonel, ere we part, I have a favour to ask of you. Sir Bal-
dred Otterburn, who was prisoner here '
' Lies buried in yonder ditch, where many more may be ere long,
I fear ; but what is the favour, my Lord ?'
'It is the release of his granddaughter, Miss Otterburn, who was
brought here prisoner under a Dutcli escort?' said Dalquharn,
whom this information greatly shocked.
' Tinder favour, good my Lord, she was no prisoner, but simply
her grandfather's attendant. She is no longer here, having left Car-
lisle yesterday.'
' For whence ?'
' By chaise for Scotland. I had the pleasure to be of some spe-
cial service to the poor young lady, who, I hope, will soon be safe
among her friends.'
' I thank you, sir,' said Dalquharn, who could scarcely conceal
his disappointment. 'Then, Colonel, you have no amended answer
for His Grace the Duke of Perth.'
1 None save that if he would be wise, he should sheath his
sword and go home. Mere hereditary right is a doctrine no longer
understood by Englishmen, and your Prince deceives himself if he
hopes to find either friends or allies on this side of the Tweed. I
would not question either him or you, my lord, as to whether a king
can do no wrong ; I would only ask, if King James comes to rule
over us, will he do right ? Here ends our confidence.'
They saluted each other and separated.
The citizens of Carlisle fully equalled those of Edinburgh in the
display of valour and in noisy preparations for defence ; but when
the Duke of Perth's column came in sight, and a battery was formed,
under the direction of Captain James Grant, the Prince's chief en-
gineer, on the east side of the town a work at which, in their
enthusiasm, the Duke, the Marquis of Tullybardine, and Sir John
Mitchell, worked with their coats off the gallant Mayor desired at
once to make terms for himself and the city, meanly leaving to
his fate Colonel Durand, who, however, fired briskly on the trench,
and threw over hand-grenades in great numbers ; but his cannon
and explosives were so ill served, that they excited only the derision
of the Highlanders, who waved their bonnets, whenever a missile
fell among them.
Finding himself abandoned by the warlike Pattison, Durand
substituted a white flag for the Union Jack, and once more Lord
Dalquharn rode forward to parley with him. The sequel to this
conference, was the surrender of the castle and city after a mock
siege, (in which one man was killed and one wounded) on condition
that all public rights were to be respected ; that the militia should
disperse, leaving two hundred horses, one thousand muskets, one
21
322 THE WHITE COCKADE.
hundred barrels of powder, fifteen coehorns, and three months'
provisions at the disposal of the Prince, who, on the 17th made his
triumphal entry, amid a royal salute from the ramparts and the
ringing of bells.
He was mounted on a white charger, and preceded by one hun-
dred pipers, whose united strains must have made a terrific din to
those who heard it. At the head of these musicians, swaggered
John Macgregor of Fortingall, his own favourite piper. The Life
Guards rode in two abreast, with one kettle-drum beating/ and
next day Pattison the mayor, and the other magistrate (who had
delivered the keys on their knees), with the city sword and mace
borne before them, proclaimed James king of England, Scotland,
France, and Ireland, while Marshal Wade, with his division of the
British forces, was pushing from Newcastle towards Hexham,
thro.ugh fields and roads, buried deep under the heavy snows of an
early winter, that rendered them nearly impassable.
Every reader of history knows the sad tale of the young Prince's
campaign ; how the rapidity and boldness of his expedition filled
with ardour the brave ; with pity, the wise and wary ; with terror,
the pusilanimous ; and how it astonished all Europe, though his
force grew smaller daily, for a thousand Highlanders declined to
cross the Borders, and returned home.
When we consider the orderly and gentle conduct of the High-
land Insurgents, who really believed that they were advancing to
free their southern fellow subjects from a foreign thrall, the lan-
guage of loathing and hate, adopted by the English towards them,
seems now alike absurd and horrible.
A gentleman writing from Derby describes them as looking
1 like so many fiends turned out of hell to ravage the kingdom, and
cut throats ; and under their plaids nothing to be seen but butcher-
ing weapons of various sorts ; the sight at first must be thought
very shocking and terrible.' After much grossness and obscenity,
the letter adds, ' but what really did afford me some matter for un-
avoidable laughter, was to see these desperadoes, officers, and com-
mon men, at all their meals, first pull off their bonnets, then lift
their eyes in a solemn manner, and mutter something by way of
grace as if they had been so many primitive Christians. Their
dialect seemed to me as if a herd of Hottentots, wild monkies, or
vagrant gypsies had been jabbering, screaming, and howling to-
gether ; and really their jargon was very properly suited to such a
set of banditti.'*
Even a clergyman, the Reverend Dr. Doddridge, in his memoirs
of the foolish visionary Gardiner, who fell at Preston, announced,
that were ' an hecatomb of Highland brutes slain across the grave '
of his hero, his hate would not be quenched.
Scotland had not been wanting in those who have coarsely and
* Hist, of the present' Rebellion, by John MoreJant. 'Gent. London. 1747,
P. 212,
THE WHITE COCKADE. 323
ungenerously written in a similar strain. We can smile at such bit-
terness now ; but we should also remember that though among the
chosen twelve of God, there was one Judas, all England's profiered
gold could not produce ONE traitor from among those ' Highland
brutes and banditti,' who followed Charles Edward Stuart to the
three last battles fought on Scottish ground.
CHAPTER LX.
THE EETUEAT FEOM DEEBY.
' The sun will not be seen to-day ;
The sky doth frown and lower upon our army.
I would these dewy tears were from the ground.
Not shine to-day ! Why what is that to me
More than to Richmond ? For the self-same heaven
That frowus on me, looks sadly upon him.'
Xichard III., Act v.
LDED DALQTTHARN'S troop of the Life Guards formed the advance
of the Prince's army, when after a long, fatiguing and harassing
march, performed by Charles on foot, as he gave his coach to the
aged and infirm Lord Pitsligo a march, on which, especially after
leaving Manchester, they were everywhere received with signs of
aversion the Insurgents entered Derby.
In London, terror reigned among the Whigs, and exultation
among the Tories ; the Guards were at Finchley, and King George's
yacht, laden with all his plate and valuables, lay off the Tower
Stairs. Fielding, who was then in town, says, ' when the High-
landers, by an almost incredible march, got between the Duke's
army and the metropolis, they struck a terror into it, scarcely to
be credited,' while the fear of the country people was as absurd as
it is inconceivable.
Locheil with the Lords Dalquharn and Nairn, were quartered in
the same house at Derby, and the Chevalier Jolmstone records that
on their entrance, the landlady, an old woman, threw herself on her
knees before the astonished Highland chief, and with clasped hands,
and eyes full of tears, exclaimed in piercing accents
' Oh, sir, take my life but spare my two little children !'
' Are you in your senses, my good woman pray explain yourself ?'
said he.
Then she answered him with sobs, that everybody believed the
Highlanders to be cannibals who ate little children. The good chief
laughed heartily and assured her, but with some difficulty, that
neither she, her little ones, or any one else would be injured. After
this, she opened a secret press, saying :
' Come out, children the gentleman says he will not eat you.'
212
324 THE WHITE COCKADE.
Then two trembling and half-stiflecl children came forth and
threw themselves at the feet of the gallant Locheil, as if he had
been the ogre of a nursery tale.
' They affirmed in the newspapers of London,' adds the Cheva-
lier, ' that we had dogs in our army trained to fight ; and that we
were indebted for our victory at G-ladsmuir (or Preston) to these
dogs, who darted with fury on the English army. They represented
the Highlanders as monsters with claws instead of hands ; in a
word, they never ceased to circulate every day, the most extrava-
gant and ridiculous stories with respect to the Highlanders.'
In all the towns along their route no man cried God save Prince
Charles, or his father. It was too evident, when too late, that all
England looked on with coldness, timidity, or hate, and felt, like he
of the Night Thoughts, enraged to see
1 A Pope-bred princeling crawl ashore
And whistle cut-throats with those swords that scraped
Their native hills for barren sustenance,
To hew a passage to the British throne.'
They mocked, or with stupid wonder stared at those men, speaking
an unknown language, wearing a wild barbaric dress, so quaintly
and so amply armed, and who, though orderly and civilized, seemed
uncouth, savage and garish in the appurtenances of their mountain
chivalry, and marching bare-legged through the deep December
snows ! Yet in the ranks of that small army, so mocked and re-
viled, were many of Scotland's greatest nobles, perilling all that
makes life dear for their native king, and many a young hero, whose
mother had prayed on her knees, by his bedside in the lonely glens
of the north prayed as only a mother can pray, with her head on
his pillow, and her tears on his cheek, ere he went forth with Appin,
Locheil, Lord Louis or Glengarry, with the white rose in his bon-
net, high hope in his heart, and his loyal father's sword by his side,
to find, perhaps, a grave on the field, or under the scaffold ; for in
Scotland, many a mother could say, in the words of the old song
' I once had sons, I now hae nane,
I bore them, toiling salrly 1
But I would bear them a' again,
To lose them a' for Charlie !'
With an army reduced to 4400 men, the Prince was now but lit-
tle more than a hundred miles distant from London ; but save 200
men of Manchester, under Colonel Townley, a brave and accom-
plished English gentleman, none joined him, and he was menaced
by no less than three British armies ; one under Marshal Wade in
Yorkshire, another under the Duke of Cumberland at Lichfield, a
day's march in front, and a third encamped at Finchley, under
Marshal the Earl of Stair, while, beyond, lay London, filled with
the militia and volunteers of the city and all Middlesex !
To advance seemed desperate ; to retreat hopeless, while rivalry,
THE WHITE COCKADE. 325
jealousy, and dissension, the usual curses of the Celtic race, were
not wanting in the unfortunate Highland camp. To all, but more
especially to the ill-starred young Prince, had it become apparent
that the pretended English Jacobites had lured him to his doom!
' We have had ocular demonstration,' says the editor of John-
stone's Memoirs, 'from the archives of the Stuart family, now in
the possession of his majesty, that he (Prince Charles) was first in-
vited into Great Britain, and then basely abandoned to his fate, by
a great part of the English aristocracy. This fact cannot be denied,
as there is evidence in their own handwriting. These archives con-
sist of more than half a million of documents ;' hence ' the project
of the Pretender was not so wild, as since the result, it has usually
been pronounced ; and the conduct of the Highland chiefs, though
certainly bold, was not so imprudent, as it might, at first sight, ap-
pear to be.'
So in the mansion of Brownlow Earl of Exeter, was summoned
that celebrated council of war, which was attended by all the nobles
and chiefs of that little army a stormy and a bitter council it
proved !
Many had to impart intelligence of a gloomy nature. All the
west of Scotland was now in arms against them under John of
Mammore, the heir of Argyle ; in Perth the Jacobites and whigs
had come to blows ; in Dundee the Prince's governor had been ex-
pelled by force of arms. In Edinburgh the demonstrations against
him were remarkably vehement, and there General Handyside was
rallying a large force, among whom were the fugitives from Preston .
Worse than all, the Macleods, the Grants, and other powerful whig
clans were all in arms, and mustering for King George, beyond the
Grampians and the Spey !
Notwithstanding all this gathering gloom, M. du Boyer, the Mar-
quis de Guilles, Captain of the marine regiment, 6th of the French
line, and styling himself the ambassador of King Louis, who had
only the selfish ends of that monarch in view, urged an advance,
and spoke largely of the Irish brigades which were to join a few
troops just landed at Montrose under Lord John Drummond.
Even the Lords Dalquharn, Nairn, and Balmerino urged that they
should at once march and fight the Duke of Cumberland or the
King.
1 To London !' they exclaimed, ' to London, your Royal High-
ness ; it lies open to the first comers, Scots or Dutch ; let us fight
t lie Elector at the head of his Guards and train-bands, and die
under the walls of London if we cannot be victorious !'
To all this Lord George Murray, who acted as Adjutant General,
replied in the name of the majority which adhered to him, calmly,
briefly, and wisely :
' Your Highness, my lords and gentlemen, we have marched thus
far into the heart of England, and Colonel Townley, with 200 loyal
men of Manchester, alone have joined us, though our route has lain
326 THE WHITE COCKADE.
through those counties which were supposed to be most favourable
to our cause. Of that descent from France, of which M. le Mar-
quis de Q-uilles speaks so largely, we hear only from himself. If
one yea, even one Englishman of note, shewed us favour, we
might march to London or anywhere else ; but 'tis not so, and no-
thing is left us now but to consult our own safety to regain those
mountains, from which we have been lured on false and base pre-
tences ! As matters stand at present, even if we eluded the armies
of Marshals Wade, Stair, and the so-called Duke of Cumberland,
now more than 30,000 strong, we would have to fight a fourth army
in front of London, when every man of us would be destroyed, and
the 30,000 which are set upon the head of your Highness, would
probably be realised by some enterprising cockney.
' With whomsoever we fight, to a force so small as ours, victory
would be impossible on one hand, and fruitless on the other. We
could no more command the vast multitudes of London than the
waves of the sea. We have many friends yet in the North, where
Viscount Strathallan has mustered 4000 loyal claymores ; let us join
them if we can ; if we cannot, let us die, as our fathers have died,
sword in hand, on the way !'
The Duke of Perth and Sir John Mitchell suggested a march
into Wales ; but Lord Q-eorge shewed the impossibility of opposing
the army of Cumberland, whose junction with Wade would hope-
lessly cut them off. On all hands menaced, harassed, disappointed,
and despairing, it was carried that the retreat should be im-
mediate !
The Prince had listened to all this, while his blue eyes, sparkling
with tears of rage, were fixed on the road that led to London,
through a level and fertile plain surrounded by beautiful scenery,
over which a gloom, consonant with his own emotions, was cast by
the dull grey clouds that enveloped the winter sun. His face was
pale now, and his fair hair in disorder. Had charming Mrs. Gibber
seen him then, perhaps she might not have played Polly Peachum
for three nights gratis, to furnish money for his enemies, even
though the candles for old Drury, were given, also gratis, by the
chandlers of London.
His hopes were all but blasted now.
' I shall call no more councils now, my lords,' said he bitterly
and proudly, ' since I am accountable only to Q-od and the King
my father. To Scotland then be it!'
In those simple old days, great folks were not, like the veriest
snobs of the present, ashamed of exhibiting the natural emotions of
their heart, and some stormy words ensued at that council board,
and tears even were shed by some, tears of rage and mortification,
by old and young.
Next day, in the dusk of the December morning, the pipes sum-
moned the clans to their colours, and, as they joyfully supposed,
against Cumberland.
THE WHITE COCKADE. 827
'The Life Guards had the van ; Kilmamock next; the Athole
hrigade had the Koyal Standard ; Cluny and Pitsligo had the rear
guards of foot and horse,' according to Captain Stuart of the Lord
Ogilvie's regiment ; but when day broke and the increasing light
shewed to the Highlanders that they were retreating, fleeing as
they deemed it, a moan of rage and fierce lamentation ran along
their whole line of march ; and now the vindictiveness of the
peasantry became prominent ; most of them were in arms, says Sir
Walter Scott, and all stragglers were murdered or made prisoners.
When taken they were led away, half stripped, with their hands
tied behind their backs and halters about their necks.
The Prince, who had always marched at the heads of his clans
when advancing, and was ever the first at the muster-place, now
seemed to follow rather than lead them. He rode on silently and mood-
ily, or spoke only to Perth and Dalquharn, who had vehemently,
but unwisely, opposed the retreat ; and no more was his cheerful
voice heard carolling a scrap of a French song, or calling to old
Macgregor, his favourite piper, ' Seid suas do phiob, Ian !' (blow up
your pipes, John), and to march beside him ; and strange as it may
seem, to the music of those identical pipes did Q-eorge IV. dance in
Holyrood and Her Majesty the Queen at Taymouth Castle.*
Sad and preoccupied, he rode on in silence, with the reins of his
white horse resting on its neck, and his eyes fixed on vacancy, or
like one who saw something unseen by others, in the infinity of
time and space. But last night he had been discussing whether or
not he should enter London in the kilt, and now !
Dalquham and others hoped that if they could elude the three
armies, which were striving to hem them in, and join Strathallan
in the north, a vigorous stand might be made in Scotland yet ; but
at times old Lord Lovat was vehemently of a different opinion, and
consoled himself by sundry quotations from Horace, and affirming
that ' this retreat was like the madness of men doomed by the gods!'
But it was a retreat unsurpassed by any, for rapidity, order, and
skill, and they had been two days on their homeward march before
the unwieldy hero of Fontenoy heard that they had outflanked and
eluded both Wade and him. To traverse level England was easy
work to those hill- climbing warrior shepherds, who wore the garb
cf old Gaul.
At all the cutler's shops in the various towns, they gathered in
clamorous bands to have their dirks and claymores sharpened. At
Kendal, the young baronet of Kirkbrae, a gentleman of the Life
Guards, was assassinated from a window by a musket shot. The ball
narrowly missed the Duke of Perth, and pierced the hat of Sir John
Mitchell. In retribution for this, Dalquharn ordered his troop
to pillage the adjacent houses, and endeavoured to set the town
on fire.
* See Notes, post.
328 THE WHITE COCKADE.
So on, and on, was continued that weary and harassing retreat,
through the winter slough and by execrable roads, with all the
British cavalry, and even mounted infantry, the Yorkshire Hunters
and armed peasantry in close pursuit, until the 18th of December,
when, just as dusk was closing, shots were exchanged between the
rear sections of Dalquharn's troop, the clansmen of Cluny MacPher-
son, and the dragoons of Cumberland, when a resolute stand was
made by the rear guard of the fugitive army on Clifton Moor, an
episode, some of the incidents of which were never to be forgotten
by Dalquharn.
CHAPTER LXI.
THE ABDTTCTION.
' I am as bold, I am aa bold,
I am as bold, and more, lady ;
And any man who doubts my word,
May try my good claymore, lady.
'Then be content, then be content,
And run away with me, lady ;
For you shall be my wedded wife,
Until the day you die, lady.'
Ballad of Robin Oig.
To be dragged away as Bryde was by her daring abductor, in a
chaise and pair, her own vehicle too dragged away she knew not
whither, when almost within hail of the Prince's army, was madden-
ing ! She uttered several shrill cries, and for a time struggled
violently with her captor. Filled with just indignation by the deli-
berate insolence of La Roque, she wished for a dagger, and once
she made a snatch at one of the handsome silver-plated pistols
which hung at his girdle, though she knew not her object in
doing so.
He strove to soothe her by caresses, which she angrily repelled;
he tenderly besought her not to weep, saying also that lie had loved
her since the first evening on which he had seen her, when he came
on that unwelcome errand from Berwick with M. le Provost loved
her dearly, fondly ; that he would marry her if she would have him
milles bombes ! actually marry, though it was not mucli in his
way to do such things ; that she was a portion of his Fate he of
hers ; that there was a hidden tie which bound them, and a great
deal more to the same purpose.
But notwithstanding the outrageous nature of his conduct, it
must not be supposed that Lieutenant La Roque was so madly in
love with Bryde Otterburn as his too ready flow of words would
infer ; a flirtation, philander, affaire du coeur what you will with
some fair one, formed a necessary portion of the business of life,
THE WHITE COCKADE. 329
with this young mal vivant, for such, he was, rather than a regular
Mortal.
It was, he thought, excessively annoying to find that he, who had
found so much favour with the gayest women of Paris, who had but
to throw the handkerchief (like our old friend to the Commander of
the Faithful) to delight the most charming of the opera girls and
fair ones of the corps dramatique, should be repelled and baffled
thus, by a little cossaque Ecossais, as he playfully termed her.
A reckless audacity had chiefly caused him to avail himself of a
handsome girl's unprotected situation among strangers ; a love of
adventure, and a desire of seeing the affair to an end, had spurred
him on, for all his life, especially since he had joined the army, had
been spent in wild and dissolute scrapes, duels, and love affairs with
girls ofall classes.
Bryde sat silent now, or only started from time to time as some la-
bourer in the fields, or some wayfarer, turned for an instant to gaze,
with wonder and inquiry, at the chaise, as it was torn along the road,
both horses being lashed to such furious speed, that the ill-hung
vehicle swayed madly from side to side, in imminent danger appa-
rently of being overturned.
The hot tears which, since early morning, had by their ceaseless
flow inflamed Bryde's delicate eyelids, were still welling forth
copiously.
The sight of this grief and unconquerable repugnance horribly
bored La Roque, and there were times when he eyed her gloomily,
and felt inclined to leave her, and say,
' Mademoiselle, we weary each other ; turn your horses' heads
towards the north, and begone to your bare-legged friends, in the
devil's name.'
On, on, amid the bold, abrupt, and precipitous scenery of Cum-
berland, along a road bordered by sterile fells, cut by brawling tor-
rents, and over moors, where the old Cumbrian steers, a tiny breed,
with giant horns, were browsing ; on they drove by Carleton and
Scalesheugh, by Hesket, in the old forest of Inglewood, by Plump-
ton Wall, and the vast Druidical temple of Salkeld, where Meg and
her seventy-seven daughters, each a mighty monolith of grey stone,
stood in dark outline against the clear blue sky ; and now the town
and ruins of Penrith were before them, as they proceeded at an
easier pace over an open waste, or moorland, till the report of a
fire-arm was heard, and the chaise was suddenly stopped, and two
men muffled in dark roquelaures, with hats unflapped and crape-
covered faces, and each with a pistol in his right hand, came gallop-
ing to the windows.
' Voleurs des grands chemins !' exclaimed La Eoque, leaping out,
with a pistol in each hand ; but at that moment a shot pierced his
shoulder, he staggered and fell to the ground, while one of his
pistols exploded harmlessly, and the other fell from his relaxed
grasp.
330 THE WHITE COCKADE.
' 'Sblood ! surrender, purse, watch and everything, or your life
arn't worth a tester, whatever that may be,' cried the first who
came up, a hideous fellow with two squinting eyes, that seemed to
leer at each other through the holes in his crape mask ; ' heyday,
Jack what the devil have we here ? a Frenchman by his lingo,,
and a tight little lass!'
'Ah (liable inhumain excessivement brutale! me regardes-tu
coquin !' muttered La Eoque, who soon after fainted in agony ; and
before Bryde had recovered from her consternation, she found that
the robbers had possessed themselves of the well filled purse, rings
and watch of La Roque, and after contenting themselves by grimly
surveying her, on hearing some alarm, had galloped off as rapidly
as they had come ; the whole episode appeared like a dream, and
there she was, on an open moorland, she knew not where, far from
help, with La Eoque, as she thought, dying beside her, and quite
alone, for the postilion, like a pusillanimous knave, had untraced
the saddle horse and fled.
Bryde's generosity and pity now made her do all in her power
for La Eoque ; the blood was pouring from a wound in his shoul-
der ; the collar-bone, apparently, was broken, and his gay yellow
uniform was all stained by the crimson current. His handsome
features were deathly pale. She dipped her handkerchief in a cool
runnel and bathed his temples ; then she tore a portion of her dress
aud folded it into a species of pad to place over the wound, her
tears flowing fast all the while, alike for her desolate condition and
this unfortunate fellow's danger. In the tenderness of her heart,
she forgave all his wildness now ; and while she was occupied in
acting the good Samaritan, on looking up, she saw a stranger hur-
riedly approaching.
By his strictly black dress of sable broad cloth, his large cuffed
and long skirted coat, his bob-wig and the low-cock of his hat, he
appeared to be a clergyman ; he carried a long ivory handled cane
and a bag, which evidently contained a surplice and prayer-book.
He was a pleasant-looking man of a dignified presence, with a very
bland and benevolent expression of face, and seemed to be about
twenty-seven or thirty years of age. Bryde rushed towards him,
and took the hand which he kindly extended towards her.
' You look kind and good you will protect me, dear sir, will you
not ?' she exclaimed ; ' you are, I think, a clergyman ?'
' I am the Vicar of Penrith Dr. Thomas Cappock, at your ser-
vice, madam. You have been waylaid by robbers a sad affair
truly, a sad affair ! Here is the postilion returning I see.'
' And I am here alone all alone sir, without a friend God help
me !' said Bryde wringing her white hands, the delicacy of which
the young Vicar perceived, as well as the sweet beauty of the clear
brown eyes, that were bent on his so imploringly.
' But this gentleman,' said he, stooping down and feeling the
pulse of La Eoque, ' by his dress belongs to the foreign troops
THE WHITE COCKADB. 831
brought over against the the the Chevalier he is your brother
I presume ?'
' Oh !' exclaimed Bryde with sorrow, alarm and confusion min-
gled, as she saw all the falsehood of her position, and knew not
what to say.
' Alas he seems sorely wounded. Your husband ?'
' Nor brother, nor husband, nor lover ; I shall tell you all, good
sir, if you will but save him and protect me. I have much need of
protection and and '
Then after all she had undergone, the landscape, the church
spire and the ruined castle in the distance, with the summits of the
hills, all seemed to chase each other in wild career around her ; she
sank on the ground, and for a time, was happily unconscious of
everything.
CHAPTER LXII.
THE VICABAGE OF PENEITH.
' How different man the imp of noise and strife,
Who courts the storm that tears and darkens life,
Blest when the passions wild his soul Invade!
How nobler far to bid those whirlwinds cease,
To taste, like thee, the luxury of peace,
And silent shine in solitude and shade.' Wolcot.
THE ancient vicarage of Penrith was then situated a mile or two
distant on the road that led from the quaint old border town of that
name, towards the beautiful valley of Kendal.
From the roadway could be discerned the heavy roof, steep ogee
gables, and clustered chimneys, twisted, octagon and square, of the
antique house ; here and there an oriel, or a latticed window witli
deep Elizabethan mullions, shone as the sunlight glinted on them
through the masses of ivy and woodbine that covered all the quaint
facade affording shelter for uncounted sparrows ; or when it threw
long wavy beams of light between the gorgeous chesnut trees, to
flicker on the close and velvet-like green sward, where the Yicar's
cheviots were grazing.
A pleasant old house of the Tudor days, that had been many a
time pillaged and burned by the Scots, but had always been re-
stored again, it was remarkably picturesque in its stone patchwork,
over which the ivy and time together had cast a tone to please an
artist's eye. It was embowered among knotty oaks, great chesnuts,
and grand old elms, remnants of the once vast Forest of Inglewood ;
and many shady green lanes, where the hedgerows were wild and
luxuriant, and the grass grew rank and long (delightful for summer
evening rambles), diverged on all sides from it.
The old house with its wainscoted rooms, tiled hall and dining-
room, was suggestive of all that was comfortable j and so thought
332 THE WHITE COCKADE.
the hearty young Vicar, when seated in his easy chair, dressing-
gown, and slippers, he saw from the lozenged windows of his oaken
library, so solemn, silent, andtranquil, the sunny landscape stretch-
ing far away towards the Border mountains, and in middle distance
the old town of Penrith, the spire of his own church, and the ruined
castle, in the little valley northward of the Eamont.
Then he would light his long pipe, after his evening cup of cho-
colate had been brought to him by blooming sister Cicely, ere he
turned wearily from Archbishop Tillotson and the last notes for his
next sermon, to the more congenial but certainly not very exciting
pages of ' Papal Tyranny,' by Mr. Gibber the player, or of ' Tan-
cred and Sigismunda,' by Mr. James Thompson the poet.
There, in that pleasant old English vicarage, dwelt Thomas Cap-
pock, D.D., a tall, full, round and manly-looking divine a bold,
free Lancashire lad, as he was fond of boasting himself ; and as
such, one who was inspired by the strongest high church and Jaco-
bite sympathies ; for his father had been taken in 1725, for serving
under General Foster in 1715, and was hanged therefore at New-
gate ' murdered by the brutal whigs,' as he bitterly phrased it.
He possessed an intellect of the highest order ; a conscience that was
upright, tender, and true. Cheerful and adored by his neighbours
and hearers (especially by the unmarried spinsters) and more par-
ticularly by bis two pretty sisters, Cicely and Olive, who considered
Tom, as they called him, the beau-ideal of all manly excellence,
though they often quizzed his sermons, for all that.
To Cicely and Olive Cappock, timid country girls, accustomed
only to visit bed-ridden old folks in the cottages among the green
lanes close by, to superintend the Sunday evening school and the
choir of brother Tom's church, whose daily round was one of mo-
notony ; to potter about the secluded garden in huge hats and old
fardingales, with thick gloves on their delicate hands, to snip off
decayed buds and tie up drooping rose trees ; to cook and make
pickles, preserves, and home-brewed cordials of gooseberries or
cowslips ; to feed rabbits and canaries ; to copy out Tom's ser-
mons ; to take physic to Goody Hubbard's sick baby, or some
elder-flower wine to Gaffer Gurton for his quinsy ; to girls, we say,
accustomed only to such mild excitements as these, the approach of
the Highland army, the proclamation of King James at Carlisle,
and the episode of the wounded gentleman and the delirious young
lady who were brought to the Vicarage in a chaise by Tom, were
wonders only to be equalled by Skiddaw or Helvellyn turning into
a volcano and spouting fire, or an earthquake swallowing up Pen-
rith, church and all !
They were simple but affectionate girls ; both possessed of a great
beauty purely English, and both were just after Bryde's own heart,
as she felt when she had learned to know them, and their mutual
regard ripened rapidly and wonderfully.
Among the first to tender hia allegiance to Charles as Prince
THE WHITE COCKADE. 333
Regent, was the young Vicar, whom he immediately appointed
Bishop of Carlisle, to the great disgust of Sir George Fleming,
Baronet of Rydal Hall, then holder of the see. Great was the
gratitude of Tom and his sisters for the sudden promotion ; it was
a retribution almost sufficient for their father's murder, and not
even among his faithful Highlanders, had Charles three hearts more
loyal, devoted, and true, than those in the old Vicarage of Penrith ;
but they foresaw not the terrible sequel of that ephemeral appoint-
ment, which history records.
What enhanced the soft beauty of those girls was, that their dark
brown hair was most unfashionably unpowdered ; but ' brother
Tom,' though he had on an ample bob-wig such as became a vicar,
and consequently was ' all shaven and shorn,' was an uncompro-
mising foe to the absurdity of that time, when, as a writer says,
' there were some inconveniences attending the use of wigs. There
was no such thing as walking forth to enjoy fresh air and exercise,
except in the finest weather, if attired as became a gentleman ; to
be carried about by chairmen, and jolted in a sort of trunk or
bandbox, was a most unenviable distinction. If a dark cloud hung
over the Park or Mall, away hurried the magnificent perriwigs, and
away flew the pretty women in their hoods and ribbands.'
Till the march of the Prince into England, Dr. Cappock had
been inspired by no desire but the wish to fulfil his calling as a
churchman and citizen ; and humbly, earnestly, and faithfully ' to
do his duty in that state of life to which God had called him ;' but
the new tide of events uprooted his simple plan. A thousand stir-
ring emotions and old inbred sympathies were awakened in his
breast, and with all his heart and soul, in private, and in public, he
prayed for the success of King James's cause, and the downfall of
George II.
The excitement and terror she had undergone for months past,
and the violent emotions to which she had been more recently sub-
jected, cast Bryde on a fever bed. Her pulses beat with the rapidity
of lightning ; her poor head was racked by incessant pains ; she
was alternately anxious and passive, delirious, and sleepless. She
had a parched throat and a burning thirst ; but Dr. Cappock knew
something of medicine, and Cicely, by his directions, prepared for
hervarious cooling drinks, decocted of tamarinds, apple-tea, orange-
whey, and from marsh-mallow roots ; and as fashion reigns in
physic as in other things, with arbitrary away, she was copiously
bled.
As for La Roque, he, too, was a patient on Cicely's hands ; but
as the pistol ball had not broken the collar-bone, but had only in-
flicted a severe wound, loss of blood prevented inflammation from
setting in, and he recovered rapidly.
In her delirium, Bryde frequently implored Dalquharn, Mitchell,
and others, to save her from La Roque. Thus the Cappock family
became pretty familiar with many names which occur in these
334 THE WHITE COCKADB.
pages, and were impressed with a great mistrust of the handsome
young rogue, who, when questioned, said with the most perfect sang
froid
' Oh madame is my wife.'
' She denies that such is the case,' said Dr. Cappock, with some
gravity of manner.
' A strange erreur. But poor thing, she is at times quite deli-
rious.'
'She has no wedding-ring,' urged the divine.
' Of course not diable ! the thieves took care of that, I doubt
not. It has gone the way of my watch and purse. And how is
madame ?'
' Still weak ill and feverish.'
' Peste a dreadful nuisance !' muttered La Koque, who, erelong,
began to retain the hand of Cicely or Olive it mattered not which
to say his soft tilings, and to startle the girls by making love to
them, which they thought very odd in a married man, and feared to
mention to their impetuous brother Tom.
When Cicely laid Bryde's head on her shoulder, and by caresses
sought to soothe her, the poor girl occasionally imagined herself at
home, and attended by old Dorriel Grahame, would, in fancy, hear
her saying :
' Oh, the bairn I've nursed at these breasts that I've borne in
these arms that hath lain for hours in my lap crowing and smiling !
Bryde Miss Bryde my bonnie cushie doo my ain pet lammie !'
and then soothed with ideas of home, she would go to sleep like a
child in the white arms of the tender-hearted Cicely.
One day in her dreams, she heard the hum of the Highland pipes,
and after waking, the sound lingered like a reality in her ear. It
was the Prince's army marching southward from Carlisle on the
21st of November, and as the troops defiled along the road, Dalqu-
harn rode past the old vicarage of Penrith, little knowing who was
sheltered under its kind and hospitable roof.
Dr. Cappock had heard of the old cavalier who died in the castle
of Carlisle, and on learning that Bryde was his grand-daughter, his
friendly interest in her was redoubled.
' She seems a grand Scottish lady, Tom,' said Cicely, ' but then,
they are all so grand and so vain, these Scots !'
' Don't say so, Cis,' replied her brother ; ' a handful of Scottish
men are setting an example for loyalty to all England, and their
leader hath made your Tom a Bishop !'
* She has a sweet, almost a beautiful face and her dress is black
mourning.'
' She is no way grand, Cis 5 but seems to be just like yourself, a
warm-hearted, good, brave and honest girl. Colonel Durand, whose
" occupation's gone," like Othello's, told me all about her.'
' But this Frenchman, Tom ?'
1 Gad, Cis, I can't make him out at all.'
THE WHITE COCKADE. 335
' She vehemently denies that she is his wife, and implores us to
save her from him. The mere mention of him always brings on
her fever again.'
' Then saved she shall be !'
' But the young man seems so handsome and so winning,' urged
Olive.
' Anyway, he shall leave this house as soon as he can move. Evi-
dently our roof is no place for him, whose heart, I fear me, is too
much like that of man in general, " deceitful above all things, and
desperately wicked." '
Poor Oh've thought she could forgive much wickedness in one so
handsome, and possessing such beautiful black eyes.
' Bah !' muttered La Roque, one day when he was convalescent,
and after a few words of conversation with the new made Bishop,
who seemed exceedingly dissatisfied, ' this devil of an Abbe, Vicar,
or whatever he is, doesn't like me, I can see that with half an eye.
What does it matter whether I am married to Mademoiselle Ottair-
bourn or not ! These Anglais are too well fed to have any romance
about them. Peste, upon their narrow prejudices their prepos
terous idees insitlaire* !'
Soon after this, finding his position becoming exceedingly un-
pleasant, all the more so, that the Highlanders were falling back
from Derby, La Roque, after writing a note of apologies to Bryde,
and another of thanks to the Cappock family, levanted without
beat of drum, and was heard of no more, unless we can identify
him with the Colonel of the same name, who fell at the head of the
Regiment de Perigord when, some years after, General St. Clair
attacked L'Orient with the Royals, and a few other troops.
Leaning on Cicely's arm, Bryde was erelong able to walk during
the warmer hours of the winter days, in the quiet shady lanes,
where the large gnarled trees of old Inglewood Forest met over-
head by entwining their branches, like the arms of so many giant
wrestlers. The blithesomeness of her fair young brow had changed
to sad and quiet pensiveness and sorrow now. She told all her
story ; of her engagement with Lord Dalquharn ; her recent per-
secution by La Roque, and the Bishop was justly indignant that
tlu's personage had escaped unpunished. Unclerical though the
duty, he would doubtless have let 'the Johnnie Crapaud' feel the
weight of a hunting whip ; and when Bryde thanked him for all
his kindness, he replied hurriedly, and while blushing like a great
schoolboy
' I am too much of an Englishman a blunt Lancashire lad to
care about being thanked ; and look you, Miss Otterhurn, I hate
it ! When you are a little stronger, you shall repay us, by aiding
Cicely, till my Lord Dalquharn comes to claim you j for Cis is my
little almoner, and the distributor of the crumbs and pence my
small funds enable me to share with the poor here, and God help
them, they are many.'
336 THE WHITE COCKADE.
' Oh, that will be charming !' exclaimed Cicely, as she clung
about her. ' Bryde, darling, you are lovely you have the face of
an angel, it is so full of truth and sweetness ; but our Bishop Tom
here will tell us angels are only in Heaven.'
There was a demonstrative fondness, a sudden impulsiveness and
friendship in those sisters two black-eyed Lancashire witches
for Bryde, which is a charming peculiarity of English girls ; their
frankness puzzled and dazzled her, accustomed as she had always
been to the cold, hard, and stiff puritanism of her own country.
But certainly there was a double charm in Bryde's face now, for
her cherry mouth expressed smiles, while her eyes remained pen-
sive even to sadness.
Clouds were now gathering over that happy English home.
Daily came tidings of how the Highlanders found themselves
totally unsupported, hemmed in by three armies, each more than
double their number, in the middle of winter, amid a hostile
country, and they were now retreating fast ; and passing couriers
left word successively, that they were at Leeds, then at Burton,
next at Kendal, and might be expected hourly at Carlisle, followed
swiftly by all the troops and militia in England, mounted volun-
teers, and armed peasantry.
How wildly and anxiously Bryde's heart beat at this intelligence !
At last, one evening, Dr. Cappock heard that they had been over-
taken at a place but a few miles distant, and that a battle was ex-
pected. Wreathed arm-in-arm, and all clinging together like three
Graces, the girls were in tears, terror, and excitement, when he
assumed his hat, cane, and roquelaure, and went forth into the
moonlight, to discover what was passing in the vicinity, for the
defiant notes of the Highland war-pipe, and the^report of fire-arms,
came at times on the passing breeze.
He had been absent more than an hour, when he returned, look-
ing pale and agitated, to inform Cicely, whom he called aside, that
there had been a severe skirmish between the Highlanders and the
Duke of Cumberland's cavalry ; that he had seen many poor fellows
lying dead or wounded, among the hedgerows, and that he had
stumbled over a horseman, who lay at a place little more than a
mile distant, dead, beside Ins charger. His coat had been torn off
him by plunderers, perhaps, and lay close by covered with blood.
It was the blue uniform of the Prince's Life Guard.
A document, which had fallen from it, attracted the Bishop's at-
tention, and it proved to be a letter from the Prince to the Lord
Dalquharn, who was doubtless the dead horseman in question, and
their hearts gushed witli old-fashioned reverence and loyalty, as
they read and kissed the signature, ' Charles, Prince Regent.'
Then, with trembling hands, Cicely spread the blood-stained
letter before her, and her eyes grew blind with tears.
' He has fallen her lover poor girl poor girl !' said Dr. Cap-
pock. ' Heaven help and sustain her !'
THE TfrEITB COCKADE. 337
' Oh ! Tom, dear, dear ; what shall we do ? We can never break
her heart by telling her of this new sorrow,' said Cicely.
' She is hale, strong, and well now, fortunately.'
' But the shock might kill her she doth so love this poor Lord
Dalquharn. I am the repository of a thousand confidences.'
' Yet who so fit to prepare, to tell, and to console her, as I a
clergyman ?'
' And such a dear, kind soul as you are, Tom ! But hark what
is that ?'
4 A horseman a dragoon, is clamouring at the gate !' exclaimed
Olive, rushing in with a white and scared face.
' One of the Hanoverian crew ?' said the Bishop, frowning. He
looked forth, and there was a mounted trooper, whose scarlet uni-
form was distinct enough in the moonlight, knocking hurriedly with
the hilt of his sword at the gate of the Vicarage, which the family
still occupied.
' Is this the road to Penrith speak, I command you in the King's
name !' shouted the trooper.
CHAPTER LXIII.
THE EEAE GFABD ATTACKED.
' There's news ! news! gallant news!
That Carle dinna ken, joe ;
There's gallant news of Tartan trews,
And Red Clan-Ranald's men, joe.
There has been blinking on the bent,
And flashing on the fell, joe ;
The Red Coat-sparks hae got their yerks,
But Carle daurna tell, joe.' Jacobite Minstrelsy.
LOUD DALQCHAEN commanded the personal escort of the Prince,
when the main body of the Highland army, after marching one
hundred and fifty miles in twelve days, by muddy and execrable
roads, buried often among snow, entered Penrith, on the gloomy
evening of the 17th December.
Lord George Murray, who, to vindicate his sincerity for the cause
he embraced, chose that arduous post of peril and honour, the Rear
Guard, brought on the baggage and artillery, now numbering thir-
teen pieces ; and these, from the state of the roads and the weather,
were perpetually breaking down and causing dangerous delays.
Hence, on this night, Lord George, with a mind full of great
anxiety, found himself compelled to halt at Shap, a village consist-
ing of one straggling street, with an old abbey, _amid thick woods, in
the mountainous district of Westmoreland. At that time the clans-
22
338 THE WHITE COCKADE.
men of Glengarry and Clan Eanald, with John Roy Stewart's corps
(which was reduced to two hundred men), formed the Rear Guard.
By break of day, Lord John began his march to rejoin the Prince
in Penrith ; but lo ! as the dawn brightened, and the red beacons,
which had been blazing all night on the mountains, died out, he saw
in his front the hamlet of Clifton, which lies about three miles from
Penrith, full of armed men, and the heights beyond it, covered by
red-coated cavalry !
Since the battle of Preston, the Highlanders had rather despised
the British cavalry (of whom before they had been in awe), and so
the Macdonalds prepared at once to attack those who barred the
way.
' Use your claymores against the heads and limbs of their horses,'
was the order of Lord George Murray ; ' confusion will then ensue,
and the riders be your own.'
Throwing off their green plaids, with heads stooped and targets
up, the Macdonalds rushed to the onset with a yell of defiance, on
which the cavalry, who were only county volunteers, fled instantly,
leaving in their hands several prisoners, one of whom proved to be
a footman of the Duke of Cumberland, who stated that his master
was close at hand with four thousand Light and Heavy Horse.
On receiving this alarming news, Lord George dispatched a mes-
senger to Charles, who sent Dalquharn with orders for the rear guard
to fall back at once upon Penrith, while Cluny MacPherson, with
his clan, would keep Clifton Bridge, together with the Stewarts of
Appin under Ardsheil, and with his compliments, to send back
Cumberland's valet to his master, a courtesy never acknowledged.
' Murray,' said Dalquharn, ' His Eoyal Highness's orders are, that
you are to avoid an engagement.'
' Too late, my Lord, we're in for it now ; Cumberland is close at
hand, and a stand must be made here. Return and tell His High-
ness so.'
' Nay,' said Dalquharn ; ' hap what may, I stay here to share it
with you.'
' Bland' s horse and dragoons are immediately in our front."
' On their colours and grenadier caps are the white horse of
Hanover.'
' May that glandered quadruped break its neck over a mound of
its own making, or one made by the little gentleman who works
under-ground!' said Lord George, alluding to the molehill which
caused the death of William III. ' Let us hope that the thistle is
grown, and bearded too, that shall choke it !'
Slowly and anxiously passed the day, for now the whole of Cum-
berland's cavalry were drawn up in order of battle, on the open
moor of Clifton, cutting off the artillery, baggage and rear guard,
under Lord George, who at once prepared to make a stout resist-
ance, and then cut a passage through them to Penrith, or die in the
essay.
TIIB WHITE COCKADB. 339
The defence of the high road he entrusted to the regiment of
Glengarry ; the Appin Stewarts lined some enclosures on the left,
with the MacPhersons flanking them beyond. Colonel John Boy
Stewart, a celebrated officer, had the right covered by a wall. Dal-
quharn remained with Cluny.
Everything was very silent on this exciting evening, and the poor
Celts snuffed, or smoked their pipes to comfort themselves. The
night, as it drew on, was clear and cold, with a hard frost, which
rarified the keen mid-winter air.
Beyond the moor the rear guard would necessarily have to con-
tinue their march through the pine plantations of Lord Lonsdale.
There the fir cones lay thick among the long grass ; the stagnant
water was congealed in the corn fields, and the land was frozen so
hard that the farmers were unable to set their ploughs in it. The
husbandmen had begun to lop their hedges and hew timber, and
the sheep and swine were at the pea-ricks.
The night was generally dark, for great masses of sombre cloud
rolled swiftly across the sky ; and when the moon did shine forth,
it was with apparently unnatural brightness ; then the highway to
Penrith, which passed right through the centre of the Glengarry
men, seemed white as snow, as it crossed the lonely heaths that un-
dulated far and wide, while the shadows of wind-driven masses of
vapour shaded them, giving a weird effect to the whole scene. In
the distance rose some funeral-like clumps of trees round Lowtlier-
hall, and afar off alarm fires were burning redly on Skiddaw and
Helvellyn.
' They are coming on,' said Lord George, and every heart beat
quicker.
Dalquharn thought of Bryde Otterburn tenderly and vividly now.
Should he be fated to die on that field, what would he not give to
have her face near him once more, that her eyes might be the last
earthly object on which he might gaze !
He never thought of being taken prisoner ; for that contingency,
with ita future legal forms and bloody fate, was too horrible for con-
templation.
A thousand dragoons, chiefly composed of Kingston's Horse and
Humphry Eland's corps, the King's own,* were dismounted, and,
under Lieutenant- Colonel Philip Honeywood, advanced softly and
stealthily to take the Highlanders in flank, while the Duke, with
the rest of his cavalry, 3000 strong, remained upon the moor, to
press, if need be, on Lord Murray's rear.
A clear white gleam of moonlight revealed the advancing party,
and the latter consulted with Cluny.
' Give me but the order,' said that brave chief, ' and I shall attack
them mid-way, sword in hand.'
Advancing like infantry, the troopers, with their square-skirted
* Now Third Hussars.
222
340 THE WHITE COCKADS.
coats, heavy cocked hats and jack boots, were but indistinctly visible
beyond the hedge-row ; though the bayonets glittered brightly on
their short musketoons, and, armed with sword and pistol, their
officers urged them on.
A volley of musketry now whistled through the Highlanders, and
the dragoons came on shouting
' Down with rebel Highland dogs ! cut the mangy Scots curs to
pieces ! Britons strike home hurrah !'
In these outcries and taunts, none surpassed Cornet Hamilton of
Eland's (son of a Scotch whig M.P., whose anti-nationality and
total apostacy were rewarded by the Petty Bag office iu the Court
of Chancery), but two feet of a good claymore cut him short, and
gave him cause to remember the Clan-Chattan to the end of his
days.
' Musketry what the devil is this ?' exclaimed Cluny, drawing
his sword ; ' I thought we were to attack a body of Horse. Clay-
more ! forward forward dirk and claymore !'
The MacPhersons and Stewarts fired a volley with their muskets,
and then, sword in hand, rushed on in the smoke, with a fury that
was uncontrollable. Bursting through a hedge, they fell upon the
dismounted cavalry ; the thud of clubbed muskets ringing on
Highland shields, the clash of claymores on iron barrels, a few yells,
curses and outcries filled the air for a minute, and then all was over ;
the dragoons, in an incredibly short space of time were completely
routed, with the loss of about one hundred killed and wounded, in-
cluding Colonel Honey wood of the King's Own, son of a distin-
guished knight and general of the same name. The aspect of the
light-footed MacPhersons in their white tartans, striped with grey,
was weird and wild, as they swept on in pursuit of the jack-booted
fugitives.
In this charge Lord George lost his bonnet and wig, and would
have been cut down by Colonel Honeywood, had not Dalquharn
saved him by running that officer through the body after a few
passes ; but ere he fell, Honeywood levelled a pistol at the young
lord, who, to save himself, skilfully made his horse rear violently.
The poor animal received the ball in its head, and fell over on its
rider, crushing him so heavily that he lay for a considerable time
stunned and senseless.
When consciousness returned, he found the moon shining out
clearly, and all still and quiet around him, save the moans from
some wounded who lay near. The fires were yet burning on the
mountain-tops ; but Lord Greorge and the rear guard were gone, all
save some twelve MacPhersous, who had run too far in pursuit,
and been killed or taken, together with Captain Hamilton of Ked-
house.
Cumberland was somewhat cooled by this repulse, or thought
lie had done enough for one night, and permitted Prince Charles to
continue hia retreat unmolested in future, save that sixteen carts
THE WHITE COCKADE. 341
laden with tents fell into the hands of General Bland, through the
information furnished by ' Mr. Balcraftie, purveyor to the forces ;'
and in revenge for this, the Highlanders plundered Penrith, de-
stroying much property that they were unable to remove. After
this they pushed on to Carlisle, in all their advance and retreat
leaving behind no sick or stragglers, fortunately for themselves,
death being the penalty of all who were taken. Only forty men
perished iu England, including those who fell at Clifton.
Left alone on the moor, Dalquharn found himself in aprilous
predicament. The whole country, he knew, was alarmed, and filled
with hovering bands of variously armed peasantry. Moreover,
great bodies of regulars aad militia, horse and foot, were moving
on all the northern roads. His uniform was certain to betray him
to the first foe who came ; he was weak, giddy, and almost in-
capable of travelling, or even moving, for some time ; so he crept
close to the hedge of Lord Lonsdale's plantation for shelter from
the bitter frosty wind, and endeavoured to think over his situation.
If taken by the peasantry he might be helplessly murdered ;
if by the king's troops, he would be reserved for that future fate,
the terrible programme of which haunted him daily and nightly in
the prisons of the Bass ; and, again, as in his dreams, the four mi-
narets of the Tower of London rose ominously and gloomily before
him.
' Of all those sparkling stars,' thought he, as he looked to the
blue dome of Heaven, ' does one preside if such things be over
my wayward and miserable fate ?'
Then some desponding remarks of Mitchell at the Derby council
occurred to him.
' Surely, the House of Stuart must have risen under an evil star.
Well, if they lose all on earth, 'tis something to have a portion of
heaven even a star !'
That he must lose no time in reaching Penrith or Carlisle, where
the Prince had left a garrison under Colonel Hamilton, was evi-
dent ; but his blue uniform how was he to get over that ?
By the fall he had received, his coat was fairly rent in twain. It
was soaked, moreover, in the blood of his horse, and the crimson
current had frozen on him. A thought flashed on his mind ; he
would pass himself off as one of Cumberland's dragoons ; and this
thought was no sooner conceived than acted upon. He threw aside
his ruined uniform, and tore the white cockade from his hat, together
with the large white feather.
The groans of some one near drew him to where Colonel Honey-
wood of the King's Own, lay with one of his legs crushed under his
horse, which had been killed ; for he had come to the attack mounted,
iu virtue of his rank. Captain East, and Cornets Owen and Hamil-
ton of the 3rd, lay severely wounded close by.
With great compunction now for the wound he had inflicted, Dal-
quharn humanely drew the poor Colonel from under the dead charger,
342 THE WHITE COCXADE.
and propped his head upon a dead trooper ; but from the saddle-
bow, he unstrapped the Colonel's scarlet military cloak to disguise
his own person, spreading over Honeywood his own blue roquelaure
of the Prince's Life Guards ; and setting forth thus muffled, with a
slow and laboured pace, he took that direction which he supposed
must lead to Penrith.
He had not proceeded half a mile when he met a mounted trooper
leading a saddled horse.
' Which way have the rebels gone ?' asked Dalquharn, with a tone
of authority.
' Straight along that ere road, sir,' replied the soldier, saluting.
1 You are one of Kingston's by your uniform ?'
' Yes I be, sir,' replied the soldier.
' I am of Eland's,' said Dalquharn ; ' where are you going ?'
' I was sent wi' a spare horse for Colonel Honeywood, who is
main sorely wounded, and if so be as he canna roide, theer cooni
the bearers wi' a stretcher.'
' All right our Colonel is too severely wounded to ride, so I shall
take his horse and rejoin.'
'At your honour's sarvice, sir,' replied the soldier, who by his
dialect seemed to be a Yorkshire man.
'Adjust the stirrups for me, good fellow; I have no time to
lose.'
There was none, indeed, for a fatigue party, with lanterns and
stretchers for the wounded, was now crossing the moor.
' An awkward business this defeat of ours ?'
'A plaaguey oogly business, sir?'
' And will read ill in London,' added Dalquharn.
' Aye ; I dunna loike the Scots I hates 'em woundily ; but I
think it's a danged hard thing, as a young gentleman loike their
prince, should suffer for the faults o' his an-cestors ; so I dunna
care a doit, as vaither used to say, if they should square up matters,
by gien' one o' the young Q-erman princesses, Amelia or Elizabeth,
to the Pretender, and make a' things tidy loike, chookin' that ere
blasted Hangover into the bargain.'
Dalquharn laughed as he mounted and rode away, for to him, it
seemed that in this Yorkshire bumpkin, there was more sound po-
litical sense than in those whose heads were deemed wiser.
He made a detour to avoid the advancing party of dismounted
dragoons, and skirting the plantations of Lowtherhall, erelong
found himself upon the highway, when the moon was shining
brightly. As any mistake of his route might prove fatal, he ap-
proached a picturesque old house embosomed among trees ; but
alarm being prevalent in the district, he knocked repeatedly on the
gates before he gained attention. At last he cried with a loud and
authoritative voice,
' Is this the road to Penrith speak, I command you in the king's
name!'
THE WHITE COCKADE. 343
'Who speaks that voice that voice, Cicely Olive! I cannot
be mistaken in it!' exclaimed Bryde Otterburn, who, with the two
Miss Cappocks, had been seated at an open window, listening fear-
fully, to the sounds of the distant skirmish. ' Henry Henry
Dalquharn, I am here !' she added, imploringly.
' Bryde Bryde !' he cried, leaping from his horse, ' can it be
can it be ?' he added, pushing past the bewildered Dr. Cap-
pock.
'Henry, dearest you here, and in that dress? oh!' she ex-
claimed, with a shudder and a low cry, as she sank on his breast,
when he dropped the scarlet cloak, and she saw that his shirt was
saturated with blood but fortunately, as stated, the blood only of
his charger.
CHAPTER LXIV.
A. MABBIAGE.
Full many maids, clad in their best array,
In honour of the bride, come with their flaskets
Fill'd full with flowers : others in wicker baskets
Bring from the marsh rushes to o'erspread
The ground whereon to church the lovers tread.'
Srowne's British Pastoralt.
STIRRING times produce startling events, and with rapidity.
Written in the true spirit of that age (and we are sorry to say, of
later times) in London, we find about this period, the following an-
nouncement in a metropolitan journal.
' Married on the 20th December, at St. Mary's Cathedral, by the
Rev. T. Cappock (the Popish Pretender's Bishop of Carlisle) the
attainted Lord Dalquharn, to Miss Otterburn, with a fortunate of
8,000 per annum (if it be not lost in the present unnaturall (sic)
rebellion). The Pretender, the so-called Duke of Perth, the Lord
Elcho, and so many Scots all a-scratching themselves, attended
this wedding, that the church hath not been fit for Christians
since.'
Circumstanced as our lovers were, with the army retreating, and
before them all a future which none could foresee, Dr. Cappock, who,
with his sisters had retired into the city of Carlisle, to avoid cap-
ture by the Duke of Cumberland's patrols, had urged them to wed
at once, lest they might be separated, never, perhaps, to meet again ;
for in those days of old Scottish loyalty, many a loving pair, many
a husband and wife, many a parent and child were rent asunder
hopelessly, and many a happy home made desolate, by the banish-
ment and proscription which were daily ensuing.
If the Prince conquered in the end, then would Dalquliarn be
Lord of the Holm, in Galloway, and Bryde, the heiress of Auld-
344 THE WHITE COCKADE.
hame ; but if the Prince failed, then would all be lost too all but
honour as Francis said at Pavia, when he threw up his sword, and
only three of the Scottish Guard surrived by his side.
' I shall perform the ceremony,' said Dr. Cappock ; ' I am Bishop
of Carlisle, however old Fleming of Rydal Hall may protest to the
contrary bishop through my own loyalty and my father's rather
than personal merit ; but without committing the sin of Simon
Magus, so obnoxious to our church courts, when he offered money
for apostolical power.'
In ' merry Carlisle ' Cis and Olive had a busy time of it, to have
all arranged for the marriage in two days ; and there were others
who had a busy time of it too, for various columns of the govern-
ment troops were pressing on from several points, and the retreating
army had to cross the Eden or the Esk, which were both now
swollen and deeper than ever, by the winter floods and melting
snows.
Cicely and Olive chose the marriage gloves and dress, the garter
that was to be undone, and the stocking to be thrown ; for many
old customs that were in fashion then are forgotten now, even in
the most rural districts. They had to prepare the hippocras and
sweet cakes for the marriage luncheon ; the sack-posset, a special
treat for the bridegroom, composed of hot milk curdled by some
infusion, was made by Olive ; while the wedding sops, cakes, or
wafers, which the Bishop blessed, prior to their being put into sweet
wine for the company, were all made by the white hands of Cis
Cappock. But she was famous above all things for her hippocras,
which was composed of red wine, sugared and spiced ; and, for the
marriage luncheon, the Duke of Perth, at whose quarters in the
Castle Street it was served up, provided enough and to spare of
liqueurs, that were more consonant to the tastes of those hardy
fellows who had marched, barelegged, through the winter snows
from Derby.
So the marriage took place in the grand old cathedral of St.
Mary, and the ceremony was performed by Dr. Cappock, who was
not ' assisted ' by any one, as the newspapers have it now, as the
Dean, the Chancellor, the four prebendaries, and the eight canons
had all departed from the city in fear ; and the spousal chime of
Bryde, which rung so merrily in the old square tower of the Anglo-
Saxon days, was the signal for the baggage and artillery of the army
to march, and proceed to the Scottish side of the river.
She leaned on the arm of the graceful young Prince, whogave
her away at the altar, and a charming picture she would have made
in all her bridal loveliness, attended by Olive and Cicely Cappock,
though that monstrosity, the hoop-petticoat, was at its zenith in
1745. The masses of her chesnut hair, which shone like gold in
the morning sunlight, as it streamed through the great cathedral
windows, were dressed low over the forehead, and covered by a
email wreath, of which rosemary was then a component part.
THE WHITE COCKADE. 315
For the information of the ladies, we may state that her dress
and train were of white satin, sprigged with silver, and trimmed
with Malines lace, with in the odd fashion of the time a long
straight apron of pale blue silk, that reached to the ground. Over
her left arm hung a gipsy straw hat, bound with white roses, and of
a most piquante, but milkmaid form. Her earrings, watch, and
etui, her bracelets, worn over her long white gloves, were all of a
suite, and a French esclavage (an ornament unknown in England
till more than fifteen years after, when George III. was king),
composed of several rows of gold chains and jewels, the first close
round the throat, and the others falling in glittering festoons over
all her beautiful neck and bosom, was clasped on by the adroit
hands of the Prince, whose gift it was, as he gallantly claimed the
first kiss, which the pale bride, in her bewildered state, accorded to
him pretty much as a statue would have done.
Then she became aware that the benediction had been pronounced,
and that the soldier-like fellow in the perruque a la brigadier, the
tarnished uniform, sword and spurs, rusty with fording rivers, was
her husband ; and a little to her annoyance, even amid all the de-
licious confusion of the time, the next who claimed the privilege of
a salute was old Lord Lovat, who loudly greeted her with
' My Lady Dalquharn may you live a thousand years !'
How strange, how novel, sounded her new name!
Cicely, Olive, Lady Ogilvie, and others were all crushing round
her, with smiles, tears, kisses, and congratulations ; she felt as if in
a dream. She saw the broad flakes of parti-coloured light from the
tall, painted windows, falling hazily athwart the great church, which
was crowded, but chiefly by armed and tartaned clansmen ; she
saw the grotesque screens in the aisle, covered with painted legends
of St. Augustine and St. Anthony, and the roof emblazoned with
the arms of the Warrens, the Lucys, the Piercys. She heard the
merry clangour of the bridal peal that jangled in the tower over-
head, and the mingled braying of many bagpipes in the streets,
where some were played in honour of her, but others to summon
the various clan regiments to their colours ; and ere long, with old
John Macgregor, the Prince's piper, blowing ' a tempest of wild
dissonance,' in front, she was borne away by her husband in Charles
Edward's coach, which the veteran Lord Pitsligo who had been a
youth when Kilicrankie was fought relinquished for her use, re-
solving to follow the fortunes of the army on horseback now.
The marriage luncheon was a splendid, but necessarily a hurried
affair, and soon as a hint for departure chocolate was served
round by the Prince's valets, four servants in the royal livery of
Scotland, scarlet and yellow, bearing salvers of silver, the various
armorial bearings on which, showed that they had been contributed
for his service, by the loyal lords and gentlemen of his court and
army.
Palquharii thought the fresh and blooming English faces of the
346 THE WHITE COCKADE.
two Lancashire bridesmaids charming ; but he loved Bryde, and
was in that peculiar mood, when a man thinks there is only one
beautiful woman in the world.
' You look divine, my Lady Dalquharn,' mumbled Lord Lovat,
for the old rake could not resist hovering about her, she seemed so
pure and angelic, enshrined in her white lace ; ' and, no doubt, you
dazzle the good man God hath given you uratur vestis amor tuce,
as Ovid hath it your very dress shall captivate his heart.'
Worthy Sir John Mitchell, who loved Bryde with his whole
heart, was the groom's man, and marched to luncheon with Cicely
Cappock, while Lord Elcho led Olive. Sir John carried his hat
under his left arm, for he found it, as he whispered to Cicely, a
rash measure bowing with it to the people, ' for the flaps won't bear
much now, and since our march to and from Derby, it has lost all
the elegant polish it possessed, when I bought it in the Lucken-
booths, on the day after Prestonpans.'
From the bustle and gaiety of the bridal luncheon, the speeches,
toasts, and jests (some rather rough, perhaps), amid which all
sought for a time to forget that doubt was in front, and disaster in
the rear of the retreating army, Dalquharn, as he looked into the
tender brown eyes of his flushed bride, and pressed her trembling
hand from time to time to reassure her, wondered in his heart if he
would ever see her a happy wife, in peace, security, and ease, in
his ancestral mansion of the Holm in Galloway !
Would the voices of their children ever waken its echoes ; or
would their little feet ever help to hollow the stairs of its quaint
stone turrets, as his had done, and those of his forefathers in youth,
long, long ago ?
God alone knew !
The Cappocks remained in the castle of Carlisle, with that little
garrison of 200 devoted Englishmen, called the Manchester Regi-
ment, who, under Colonel Francis Townley, preferred to risk their
fortunes in England, and so fell a terrible sacrifice to the merciless
Government, together with 200 Scots, Irish, and Frenchmen, under
Sir Francis Geoghegan, of the Regiment de Lally.
Often in after years, when far, far away, did Bryde think of
Cicely and Olive, those two attractive and affectionate English girls,
and their good and manly brother, who had so befriended her in
her sore necessity, and of their quiet secluded home, under the trees
of old Inglewood forest a home which, like many others, civil war
laid bare and desolate ; and she wondered whether the girls were
still alive, or what was their fate, for after the fall of Carlisle, she
heard of them no more.
****** *
On the same forenoon when her marriage took place, the whole
Highland army completed the passage of the river at Longtown,
where our old friend, Toby Radley, had the honour of giving the
Prince a stoup of wine, and that stoup is now k in possession of his
THE WHITE COCKADE. 347
descendants, the treasured palladium of the Radleys. Four days of
incessant rain had swollen the stream by four additional feet, and
the passage was one of extreme peril.
' Our cavalry,' says the Chevalier Johnstone, who was aide-de-
camp to Lord George Murray, ' formed in the river to break the
force of the current, about twenty-five paces above that part of the
ford where our infantry were to pass, and the Highlanders formed
themselves into ranks of ten or twelve abreast, with their arms
locked in such a manner as to support one another against the ra-
pidity of the stream, leaving sufficient intervals between their ranks
for the passage of the water. Cavalry were likewise stationed in
the river below the ford, to pick up and save those who might be
carried away by the violence of the current. The interval between
the cavalry appeared like a paved street through the river, the heads
of the Highlanders being generally all that was to be seen above the
water.
In an hour all had crossed in safety save a few luckless English
girls, who wished to share the fortune of their kilted lovers, and
were swept into the Solway.
When on the Scottish side of the river, the pipes struck up, and
to prevent their tartans freezing in the December blast, the poor
fellows danced joyous reels till they were dry and warm ere their
northward march began.
The courage and humanity of the Prince were never more con-
spicuous than on this trying occasion. Stemming the current with
his horse like a common trooper, he saw a poor Highlander, whom
the fierce torrent had swept from his comrade's grasp, being borne
past him.
' Cohear cohear ! (help, help) for the love of God and Mary !'
cried the drowning man, and Charles skilfully caught him by his
long fair hair, as he was floating down.
By St. George, my friend,' said the Prince, laughingly, as he
dragged him across his saddle-bow, ' your locks are very like my
own. Thank Heaven, I have saved you you will still have a gal-
lant life it may be, a head, at my father's service.'
The blood of the rescued man ran cold at these words, for he was
Roderick Mackenzie, and even there, amid the tumult of the rush-
ing river, the dark memory of a double-dream haunted him.
And among such stirring scenes and events as the migratory
movements of the insurgent army produced, were passed the first
months of poor Bryde's experience, as the wife of Lord Dalquharn.
Yet she was so happy, and she felt that even God coidd add no-
thing to her joy, save to give her the hope that it might endure.
Alas poor Bryde !
348 THE WHITE COCKADE.
CHAPTER LXV.
AT THE CAILENDEE.
'Let not King James, though foiled in arms, despair,
Whilst on his side he reckons half the fair :
In Britain's lovely isle a shining throng,
War in his cause, a thousand beauties strong !
Th' unthinking victors vainly boast their powers,
Be theirs the musket, while the tongue is ours.
Then mourn not, hapless Prince, thy kingdoms lost,
A ctown, though late, thy sacred brow may boast !'
Tickell, 1749.
IT was now the January of 1746, and the winter was severe ' win-
ter that changes into stone the water of Heaven and the heart of
man,' and though the brand of civil war was lit, the New Year had
been welcomed over all Scotland, with the usual frolics and jollity,
buttered cake and het-pint, dancing, piping, and mutual good will.
To Dalquharn and Bryde, too, love for a time gilded and bright-
ened everything ; it drew forth all the latent virtues of their nature,
and both strove to merit that affection which made them all the
world to each other.
As a husband, the poor young lord's solicitude for their future,
his secret prayers and aspirations for the success of the Prince's
cause, were greater now than ever, though scarcely but he knew it
not so single-hearted as they were before ; for now he had a more
dear and vital object at stake.
If driven again to penniless exile, where he would have to feed
himself by selling his sword and services in foreign camps, what a
prospect for Bryde she so tender, so gentle and so delicate-natured
torn, perhaps, from her sequestered home, to tremble among the
wars that were then waged by the shores of the Danube and Eux-
ine ! He reproached himself, as the means of destroying, it might
be, all the peace of her future life, by weaving it up witli his own
miserable destiny. Bryde also had similar fears and anticipations,
but neither spoke of them to the other.
With all their estates and rank, they were now but a landless
lord and a landless lady. Dalquharn thought of committing Bryde
to the care of her old friend, the Countess of Haddington ; but her
residence at Tyninghame would compromise a family already deeply
in the interest of the government. Even that door was closed
against her now, as the wife of an insurgent Jacobite, so with the
Lady Ogilvie she found a temporary shelter at the hospitable man-
sion of the Callender, the seat of the Earl of Kilmarnock, while
Dalquharn with the Prince's army, after marching by Dumfries to
Glasgow, to levy tribute on the whigs, crossed the Forth, and laid
Fife under military contribution.
In the unsuccessful attack made by the Highlanders on the castle
pf Stirling, Dalquharn received a gunshot wound in the left arm j
THE WHITE COCEADB. 349
but this circumstance lie carefully concealed from Bryde, amid the
severe weather of the season, he rode with the wounded limb in a
sling, when the army toot possession of Dumblane and the castle
of Doune, and ultimately had its head quarters fixed at Perth.
It was, while resident at Callender House, that Bryde heard of
the fall of Carlisle after a nine days' siege, and that among other
prisoners, Dr. Thomas Cappock had fallen into the tender hands of
the Duke of Cumberland. After a time she heard of his impeach-
ment, for ' wearing a hanger, white cockade and a plaid-sash, the
distinguishing mark of the Manchester Regiment,' for which hein-
ous crime, he was half-hanged, disembowelled alive, and subjected
to other horrors, prior to which, he prayed for the House of Stuart,
and denounced King George as a foreign usurper, adding to those
who died with him,
'Never mind, my friends, for were our Blessed Saviour here?
those fellows would condemn him. In the other world we shall
not be tried by a Cumberland jury !'*
Bryde shuddered and wept as she read of these things, and her
grateful thoughts went sorrowfully back to the hospitable vicarage
of Penrith, to the handsome young vicar and his two affectionate
sisters, so loving, so tender, and so true ; and amid all her own per-
plexities and troubles, she sorrowed for them.
The Prince was still blocking up Stirling Castle, when Lieutenant-
General Hawley, on the 13th of January, after barbarously and
boastfully erecting a huge gallows at Edinburgh to hang his
prisoners, marched from that city to Linlithgow. Next day his
whole army rendezvoused at Falkirk, while the Highlanders were
cantoned at Bannockburn, prior to advancing to attack him.
Impelled by a natural desire to see Bryde once more, before the
terrible risks of a general action were run, Dalquharn, accompanied
by the Earl of Kilmarnock and Sir John Mitchell, with the Prince's
permission most unwillingly accorded, early on the morning of the
17th, rode from their camp, and proceeded by the old Roman way
to Callender House, a somewhat perilous excursion, as the roads
might have been patrolled by Hawley's cavalry, which, however,
they were not, an omission which that gallant officer had soon
especial cause to regret.
Though Dalquharn had neither the civil nor military rank of the
Duke of Perth, the Earls of Kilmarnock or Dumbarton, nor the
territorial power of the Lords Ogilvie, Nairn, Strathallan, and a
hundred others of the Prince's army, he had somehow become a
man of especial mark to the enemy.
His adroitly escaping from Dunkirk and evading the fleet of
Admiral Byng ; his supposed knowledge of all the intrigues and in-
tentions of the French court ; his alleged pistolling of Egerton and
Gage, and his subsequent escape from the Bass Rock ; his energy
at the Derby Council of War, and the attempt to fire Jiundal j his
* Scots Mag. 1716.
S50 THE WHITE COCKADE.
having been a prime emissary of the old chevalier, and an avant
courier of the young one ; his burning the house of Provost Bal-
craftie, and so forth, all made the government and its myrmidons
anxious to have him in their hands. An accurate description of his
person, penned by Balcraftie, was forwarded to William Grant, of
Preston Grange, the new Lord Advocate, together with the offer of
one hundred guineas from the ex-provost, for his capture ; so this
morning ride to Callender House was fraught with more perils for
Dalquharn than he knew of.
The estates of the Earl were very extensive ; thus he and his two
friends were soon enabled to quit the highway, and traverse the
Kilmarnock property unquestioned, though they all wore the now
well-known uniform of the Prince's Life Guard.
Callender House had once been fortified; its walls were of
enormous thickness, dating, according to some accounts, from the
days of the Romans, when it was the residence of an official, whose
duty it was to furnish fuel from the Torwood, for the Imperial camp
close by, and who called himself Calloner, from Calo, a faggot of
wood. Be that as it may, the deep fosse which encircled it was
visible about the beginning of the present century, and the mansion
was able to stand a determined siege by Cromwell, who stormed it
at the head of Monk's Kegiment, when it was garrisoned by the
men of Falkirk. It is still embowered amid magnificent wood, but
the Dule-tree, a giant ash, whereon for four centuries the lords of
the land could string up their refractory vassals, fell in 1826. In
the days of our story, there were, in the walls, many niches, having
large statues, and one of these long survived the rest. It was
named the Lady Alicreech, and represented a female of terrible as-
pect, with a dagger in her right hand, and her entrails wrapped
round her left arm. Legends were not wanting to relate that this
statue represented a noble matron, who had been wronged by some
ancient Lord of the Callender, and perished by her own hand, like
the wife of Tarquinus Collatinus. This stone lady was said to walk
at times, and in the twilight was a terror to the truant schoolboys
or children who chanced to come upon her, when stealing apples in
the orchard or nutting in the woods.
This fine old mansion, with all the fertile land around it, had
passed by marriage to the Livingstones from the Callenders of that
ilk, and now had gone to the Earl of Kilmarnock with his Coun-
tess, who was Anne Livingstone, daughter and sole heiress of the
great cavalier, Earl of Callender and Linlithgow, and the inheritrix
alike of his loyalty, his pride, and his high-souled enthusiasm.
As the three friends rode through the grounds where the fallen
leaves lay more than fetlock deep upon the winter sward, the Earl
uttered an exclamation of pleasure, when he saw the white walls of
Callender House shining through the woodlands in the noon-day
sun ; but this emotion was speedily checked, when they saw upon
the terrace before the house, a trooper in scarlet uniform, and
THE WIIITE COCKADB. 351
several horses accoutred with military saddle-cloths and holsters.
These were evidently chargers, and were all linked together, and iu
the care of this solitary man, who seemed to be an orderly.
They simultaneously reined their horses back, on beholding this
alarming sight, and rode straight to the house of the Earl's ground-
bailie, whose dismay and alarm on seeing him could scarcely be
controlled.
' My lord my lord in Heaven's name what brings you here at
sic a time ?' he exclaimed ; ' General Hawley and ever so many
more are now in the house wi' my lady, the Countess.'
'The devil they are!' exclaimed the Earl, angrily ; 'how came
they there ?'
1 The general sent word to my lady that he would do himself the
honour of visiting her with his staff.'
' Hah and she knew what that meant.'
' Precisely so, my lord, for she sent me back wi' word, that dinner
would be on the table at one o'clock, so some dozen and more
officers o' rank arc round your lordship's mahogany at this moment,
and a sumptuous feast they have o" everything that flies, swims, or
runs pork excepted.'
' Of course, for that is disliked by we Scots in general, and was
abhorred by James VI. in particular, so it hath never been fashion-
able since. And Mr. Hawley is here ! Well, I shall not be kept
out of my own house for all that,' said Kilmarnock, as he dis-
mounted, gave a glance at the locks of his holster pistols, and stuck
them in his girdle, while Dalquharn and Mitchell did so too. 'You
have the key of the private door, I presume, Bailie ?'
1 Yes, my lord but but '
1 Then give it to me, and keep our horses here from the eyes of
all, for iu less than an hour we shall mount again. A fig for the
empty boaster, Hawley ! I would relish no better sight than to see
him hanging in his boots and wig, where better and braver men
have hung, on the branch of yonder old ash tree.'
'Oh, my lord, be wary, be wary!" implored his adherent, who
was an old man, with tears in his earnest eyes, and clasping his
hands, which the Earl shook warmly.
' Trust me, John Livingstone ; but if I fall into a trap, my son,
the Lord Boyd will, I have no doubt, keep his feet clear.'
The Earl said this with something of bitterness in his tone, for
his eldest son and heir was at that time a captain in one of the
Line Regiments of Hawley's army. This good Earl, who was a
father to all his tenantry, and the fosterer of the ' Bairns of Fal-
kirk,' as the townsmen named themselves ; who always went out
with his pockets full, and came home with them empty ; who had a
kindly word for all, and was welcome in every house and cottage on
his lands ; who cordially lent his aid afield, if a horse fell, or a
wheel stuck fast ; who once carried a blind beggar through the
Carron on his back, and around whom the children of the poor
352 THE Will-IE
' swarmed like gnats,' as lie was wont to say, was the idol of his
people.
' But for the treachery of the thing, I would collect a few stout
fellows, and make all these staff officers prisoners,' said he, laugh-
ing. ' G-O round by the front of the house, John, and whisper to
my lady that we shall be in my study, and will thank her to send
us something from the General's table, in care of old Ailie, the
housekeeper.'
Conducted by the Earl, the two visitors, feeling very far from
safe, and reassured in their own minds, were led under cover of the
old garden walls, close to the back portion of the house, where a
small door, that was almost hidden among ivy, gave access to a
vaulted passage and secret stair, which led to the more private
apartments of the family ; and erelong Kilmarnock ushered them
into his study, a little panelled room, having a small book-case,
where Pope, Addison, the Spectator, Shakespere, the Scots Maga-
zine, and all his favourite reading, were at hand ; and the chief de-
corations of which were portraits of old horses and pet-dogs that
were defunct ; but over the mantel-piece hung a two-handled sword
of great size the gift of Eobert Bruce to his friend and comrade,
Sir Eobert Boyd, first Lord of Kilmarnock, Kilbride, and Dairy.
This rusty old blade was supposed to be the palladium of his
family, and the Earl looked wistfully at it, as he carefully closed
the door.
' Listen, sirs,' said he ; ' how jovial our enemies are !'
In the next apartment, which was the dining-room, they heard
loud and noisy laughter, the clatter of plates and knives, the jing-
ling of glasses, and there were times when Dalquharn felt his heart
thrill, when lie thought he could detect the low gentle voice of
Bryde of his wife.
Would he be alive to hear that beloved voice on the morrow ?
There was a dark and angry flush in the face of the Earl, and he
muttered something scornfully about ' acting the eavesdropper in
his own house.' Kilmarnock was a fine-looking man, in the prime
of life. His face was perfectly regular and pleasing in expression,
and he wore a full bottomed grey wig, divided in the centre, with
four rows of curls at each side, and a large black silk knot behind.
Carefully and scrupulously shaven in the fashion of the time, his
cheeks, and more especially his chin, had rather a tinge of blue in
their colour, and his eyes were dark and sparkling. He was very
moderate in all his tastes and habits, and was, singular to say in
that age, a vehement temperance reformer, and frequently inveighed
in public against the growing use of wine, spirits, and tea among
the lower classes.
By the relays of bottles which were carried in by the sulky and
reluctant butler, it was evident that Hawley and his officers were
drinking deeply, and were making fun with the old cellarer, who
would much more willingly have supplied them with poison.
THE WHITE COCEADB. 353
' Zounds !' said the Earl, ' 'twould be a rare jest, and one that
would live in history, if my Lady Anne sent them all, drunk as fid-
dlers, to the field.'
When old Ailie, the housekeeper a plump and grey-haired
matron in a black wheel fardingale of Tilh'coultry serge (a woollen
stuff made there since the days of Mary), with her white coif, and
bunch of bright keys dangling at her chatelaine appeared, witli
terror on her face, and a salver of refreshments in her hand,
the Earl good humouredly kissed her wrinkled forehead, and
said,
1 Fear not, good Ailie you looked scared, as if you had seen the
ghost of the Lady Alicreech ! But you know our auld Scottish pro-
verb " the nearer the fire, the further frae reek." So Hawley will
never dream that I am separated from him only by a board or two.
Fill the wine and drink, Dalquharn, and you Sir John to our
next merry meeting at the Callender!'
The fated Earl knew little, that never more would he be under
its roof tree : that in less than two years, he would be a headless
corpse on a London scaffold, and that his gay, beautiful, and witty
countess would be dead of a broken heart !
But they all clanked their glasses together and drank gaily. At
that moment, they heard a gruff voice in the next room reply to
some remark of the Countess
' Yes, madam, by G d, I assure you, that witli two regiments of
Dragoons, I will undertake to tread all the Highland rabble under
foot, in the snapping of a flint !'
' Who speaks ?' asked the Earl in a whisper.
' That is General Hawley,' replied Ailie, trembling with spite and
fear.
This was General Hawley's frequent boast, and he coarsely
added,
' I have left a gallows building at Edinburgh, which will enable
me to save ammunition on one hand, or troubling the government
with prisoners on the other. Begad, they shall swing by dozens,
like beads on a string.'
' I trust, General, you will not forget that I hare a son serving
under you ; and that if an evil hour should come for those with
whom you know too well we weak women sympathise so much, you
will remember that Lady Dalqubaru, Lady Ogilvie and I, have each
a husband on yonder field.'
' 'Tis my dear Anne who retorts so gently,' said the Earl, with a
kindling eye.
' Husbands and sons must take the chances of war,' was the gruff
response ; ' but I thank God, madam, that we shall meet these
rebel dogs, on auspicious ground, for I have read that in this neigh-
bourhood the Scots were defeated by King Edward I., in 1296,
under one, William Wallace, a thief and outlaw, as this same Popish
Pretender is.'
23
354 THE WHITE COCKADE.
' True,' said the Countess, ' and on that disastrous day when Wal-
lace wept over the corpse of Graham, under the old yew tree by the
roadside yonder, many a brave man was dying for his country, amid
these woods of Callender, with his good sword before his glazing
eyes as the cold steel imaged alike the blade that fought for Scot-
land, and the cross whereon Christ died."
'All this stuff sounds rather Popish, madam,' said the General;
' but here conies some one who seems in a devil of a hurry.'
From the windows of the study, a mounted officer was visible, as
he came galloping through the woods, in hot haste towards tlic
house. He dismounted at the terrace, threw his bridle to the or-
derly, and then came fussily, with staff-importance, into the house,
where his sword and spurs were heard ringing on the stone stair-
case, as he ascended to the dining-room.
'Drink again, my friends,' said the Earl, 'for here cometh news
for Hawley, and too probably for us too.'
They heard the officer hastily introduce himself as ' Captain "\Vy-
vil, of the Kentish Buffs.'
4 What's up, Wyvil ?' asked Hawley witli a hiccup.
' The rebels are in full march to attack us, and they are now cross-
ing the Carron with such speed, that they have left their cannon in
the rear,' replied Wyvil in an excited manner.
Hawley uttered a fierce imprecation, and struck his clenched hand
on the table, making all the crystal jingle.
' I have the honour to say, General, that your presence is in-
stantly required at head-quarters, where General Iluske is getting
the Brigades under arms, but awaits further orders."
' Blood and "oons, sir ! I don't require Brigadier Huske, you, or
any other man to inform me as to my line of duty,' was the rude
response ; ' I shall soon be at my post, and see whether I cannot
cope better than Sir John, baronet though he be, with those bare-
breeched scoundrels ! Meantime, your ladyship, I shall, with an-
other glass of your wine, replenish my glass, refresh this my poor
carcase, and drink the health of His Majesty King George !'
He was fond of speaking of his body as ' his carcase,' and ac-
tually designated it so in his will. Hawley, as an officer, was
dreaded and disliked by the troops, for his disposition was as sa-
vage and severe as that of Sir John Cope (whom he rudely stigma-
tised as a coward) was gentle and humane ; and though he had been
a Lieutenant in Evan's Dragoons (now the 3rd Hussars) at the
battle of Sheriff Muir, and had seen how Highlanders could fight,
ho had a bull-headed contempt for them, that was only equalled by
his hate.
In a few minutes after this, with all his staff, the General was
galloping furiously towards Falkirk Muir, ' where rougher cheer was
preparing for him than he experienced at Callender.'
Ere the sound of their hoofa had died away, Bryde's head was
THE W11ITE COCKADE. 355
nestling on Palquharn's breast, and she was sobbing heavily, as if
her poor little heart would break, for it was the noon of the battle
of Falkirk !
CHAPTER LXYI.
THE DAT OF THE BATTLE.
' Oh ! what are meetings in this weary life?
The closing agony devours all else,
And makes fond greetings he hut partings all :
Must I again unto my lonely hower,
To hold harsh converse with the gusty winds
Months and he will return ! a Sow brief months I'
Daniel.
THE Countess of Kilmarnoclc, Linlithgow, and Callender for she
held the triple title had schooled and tasked herself to receive
with politeness, and even to entertain with courtesy, the self-invited,
coarse, and blustering Genenxl Hawley, and the officers of his staff,
though he and they spoke in terms undisguised, coldly and snecr-
ingly of her country, her party, and her politics, even while sharing
the good cheer and rare wines provided for them, making the tears
often start to the eyes of Bryde and of Lady Ogilvie, wlio at last
rose with scorn in her face and left the table ; but that task was
ended now ; the scene was over, and she wept on the breast of her
husband, to whom she and her two little boys, Charlie and Willie
clung for it was a farewell visit a parting hour.
The very haste in which Hawley departed, urged that the inter-
view would need to be a brief one, for it spoke of battle close at
hand!
The Earl is said to have seen how desperate was the cause of the
House of Stuart, with half Scotland and all England against it ; but
was seduced by the Countess to risk all in its behalf, against the
dictates of his calmer reason. Anne Livingstone was doubtless the
syreu that lured him to destruction, and now that the time of mortal
strife was nigh, she hung on his neck, despairingly, and perhaps full
of self-reproach.
The old dining hall of the Callender was hung with Gobelin
tapestry, representing shepherds and shepherdesses with flowing
hair and crooks adorned by knots of ribbons, a present from Louis
XIV., (in whose galleys it was worked) to George Earl of Lin-
lithgow, and long after this parting, did the quaint faces and dis-
. torted figures of that pale green and russet piece of needlework,
recur to Bryde's memory, as being painfully associated with it.
' My dear Sir John,' said Bryde, taking in both her hands those
of Mitchell, who had no one to bid a sad or tender farewell to him,
and who was turning wistfully and alternately from her to the
233
356 THE WHITE COCKADE.
Countess ; ' if,' continued Bryde, drawing him caressingly a little
way aside, ' you really are so fond of me as you say '
' Fond of you,' interrupted poor Mitchell, gazing tenderly into the
clear, bright eyes that were so full of tears and earnestness ; ' fond
of you,' he repeated in a strange thick voice j ' well, Lady Dal-
quharn ?'
' My husband is younger than you, by nearly twenty years, and
may be more rash ; oh, pray do all you can to protect, to save him
in case of peril to save him for me, for he is all I have left to love
on earth !'
' I promise you by my right hand, that I shall be by him and to
him, as a brother,' replied the other gravely.
' Then, my dear, dear friend, you will indeed be worthy of all the
love I can give you.'
Mitchell sighed, and stooped to kiss her delicate little hand, with
a troubled expression on his face, and something like a sob in his
throat.
' We are on the eve of a severe engagement, and to-night may see
the last of me, and little would I care, provided King James's cause
were triumphant, as life hath but few charms for me ; yet, while it
lasts, I promise faithfully to watch over the safety of Dalquharn, for
your sake, as much as for his own.'
' Thanks, most worthy friend.'
' To know you, is to love you dearly, Lady Dalquharn, and I fear
that T I love you tod well perhaps for for my own peace.'
' Ah, don't speak thus,' said Bryde growing very pale ; and then
with a little sickly smile, she added, ' Henry, here is Sir John Mit-
chell actually making love to me.'
' Why did he not ask you first, and then you might have been
my Lady Mitchell of Pitreavie ?' asked Dalquharn, laughing.
' Ah why indeed ? especially as my rent roll is about as valuable
as your own,' replied Mitchell, with an air of affected gaiety. A
great secret had escaped him, and luckily had been partly misun-
derstood ; but he gazed sadly at Bryde, for his good heart was too
full for jesting even with her, and he had but one firm conviction,
that the less he saw of her, the better for his own peace.
A few minutes after this saw them depart.
Ailie the housekeeper lived long to relate how ' the women folk '
wept when the Countess made her husband put on a waistcoat of
tough bull's hide, which had been worn by Marshal the Earl of
Callender at the storming of Newcastle in the days of King Charles
L, and he buttoned his blue uniform over it.
The Earl and his two fric ids left the Callender by what was
named the ' White Yett,' and rejoined the Highland army, when it
was marching by the south side of the Torwood.
The winter day passed slowly on, and the shadows of the old
woods around Callender House began to deepen and assume fan-
tastic shapes ; but the Countess, with her two children nestling by
TITE WHITE COCKADB. 357
her knee, and Bryde drooping beside her, sat at a window of the
dining-room, silent, sad and anxious. Each had her heart full of
prayer and of solicitude.
At times, vollies of musketry came on the passing wind, and found
a terrible echo in the hearts of those two pale-faced listeners. Each
had a husband, and one, a son opposed to his father on that fatal
field. As she spread her matronly arms over her two little ones, the
Countess murmured
' If I lose my dear husband, I must love these dear children more
than ever and more than ever must they love me.'
Bryde shivered.
If Dalquharn fell, whom was she to love on earth, and who would
love her ?
As she gazed on the darkening landscape, the shadowy woods, the
masses of angry cloud gathering overhead and rolling slowly awnv,
it was with sensations of grief and suspense, which she thought
would last till death.
' I may never see him more never more hear his voice never
more it may be hushed already !' she thought, with her eyes and
heart full of tears.
After a time the affrighted chargers of the slain or dismounted
dragoons, which crowded all the fields and lanes about Falkirk,
were seen to fly through Callender Park, with saddles reversed, and
some of them were disembowelled and dying.
Anon these sights and sounds of evil passed away, and the ladies
sat in each other's arms with the wearied children asleep and half
forgotten at their feet.
In the dusk, two figures, bareheaded and tied with ropes, were
dragged past Callender House, under a dragoon escort, on the road
that led to Edinburgh.
It was well that neither Bryde nor the Countess of Kilmarnock
could see these two miserable men, who passed almost within a
musket shot of where they were seated !
Just as the darkness closed in, the ladies were startled by a wild
and prolonged shriek, that woke all the echoes of the old mansion.
It came from the apartment of Ailie the housekeeper, who was
found in a swoon on the floor, and lying on her face, with her hands
outspread before her.
On being recovered by the usual restoratives and appliances, after
some hours of bewilderment, delirium, and repeated faintings, she
solemnly alleged that she had seen her chamber door flung violently
open by an invisible hand, and then a human head rolled past her,
gnashing its teeth fearfully and its face bore the livid likeness of
her lord her son her bairn (for so she called him, with all that
deep affection of an old Scottish retainer) the Earl of Kilmarnock !
fbia legend was long current in the district of Falkirk, and the.
358 THE WHITE COCKADE.
vision was supposed to be a wraith, or supernatural foreshadowing
of the future fate awaiting the amiable, unfortunate and last Lord
of the Callender.
CHAPTER LXVII.
THE 17TH OF JANTTABY, 1746.
'Great William posts up to his royal papa,
And sends down old Hawley to hang them up a' ;
Brave Hawley advances to fight at Falkirk,
But the Jacobite blades send him back with a jerk ;
He lost all his cannon, his colours and men,
lint the butcherly Duke may restore them again.
See ! he comes in four days, and he never will yield,
Though the living run off, yet the dead keep the field.'
Jacobite Minstrelsy.
HAWLEY'S second in command, notwithstanding that general's great
carelessness, had all the troops under arms, in front of the camp
before he arrived. They consisted of twelve chosen battalions of
the line, whose flanks were covered by three regiments of cavalry,
with a reserve, consisting of the 3rd Buffs, the four militia corps of
Paisley, Glasgow and the Argyleshire Highlanders, chiefly of the
sirname of Campbell.
The Duke of Perth with one portion of the Highland army was
left to press the siege of Stirling, which greatly weakened the force
of Charles in the field.
On debouching from the flank of the Torwood, all bare and
leafless then, the Highlanders could see the King's troops, the 1st
Royal Scots, the Kentish Bufls, and other veterans of Dettingen
and Fontenoy, drawn up in order of battle, the cocked hats of the
battalion companies, formed in ranks three deep, the grenadiers
with their conical caps on the right flank of each regiment ; their
white cross-belts, white gaiters and scarlet coats, with the skirts
buttoned back ; their colours advanced and waving, and all pre-
senting a fine appearance of steadiness, discipline and order, that
proved very imposing ; while the majors with their canes and the
adjutants with their swords, dressed to a nicety ; the ranks of
officers and men, the former being armed with spontoons, and
covered, when in line, by the long halberts of the sergeants.
'In their rear was the old burgh of Falkirk on its ridge, crowned
by the octagonal tower and spire of St. Modan's church. The
moor, under the richest cultivation now, was then a rugged and
broken upland, interspersed with green morasses, and shaggy brown
heath. The Highlanders occupied the higher ground, while the
regular army were formed with their rear to the town, and their
THE WHITE COCKADE. 859
masses looked greater through the mist that rolled over the moor
at times upon the stormy wind.
A flash seemed to pass along theJBritish line, and then came the
rattle of steel upon the blast ; it was the three lines of infantry
fixing their bayonets, while the drums and fifea of each battalion
struck up ' the Point of War ;' next followed the flourish of trum-
pets and patter of kettledrums on the extreme flanks of the army,
as the cavalry drew their swords, to the air of 'Britons strike
home,' just as if the poor Children of the Mist had not been
Britons like themselves.
With their pipes playing, their varied tartans waving in the wind,
their muskets or drawn swords and brass-studded targets shining in
the fitful gleams of the winter afternoon, the Blue Bonnets marched
steadily into position, clan after clan, in no wise daunted by the
war array of Hawley.
Lord Ogilvie's battalion carried the Eoyal Standard, and all were
eager for battle !
1 Yonder hill to the west would be a good basis for future opera-
tions, if we could only get our d necl guns up,' said Hawley ;
'ride, Captain Wyvil, and send forward the dragoons of Ligonier,
Cobham, and Hamilton, that we may enfilade these half-naked
scoundrels in flank. The order is, " threes right," and then " left
wheel by squadrons." Let them ride as if all hell were uncoupled
nt their hoofs !' he added to the aide-de-camp in that rough style,
which prevailed in the service until the opening of the present
century.
The cavalry one corps of which was composed of the poltroons
of Preston were burning to avenge a repulse they had received on
the previous day in front of Linlithgow, where they had been
driven back by Lord Elcho, with the Life Guards dashed spurs
into their horses, and pushed on to reach the eminence ; but the
Highlanders anticipated them, and first gained the crest of the
ridge, on which the brigade of horse fell back, and on the slope of
the ascent, the order of battle was formed by successive clans, Kep-
poch on the right (a post claimed by the Macdonalds since Ban-
nockbum), Lovat on the left, in three small lines, the reserve under
Prince Charles mustering only 450 swordsmen in the rear !
Neither army had any artillery ; in his fiery haste, the Prince had
left his far behind, and those of Hawley, who, as the rhyme has it,
' could not hawl his cannon to the foe,' were wedged helplessly
among the winter mud at Bantaskine ; so by the bayonet, against
the claymore, waa the battle to be decided !
At three in the afternoon it was begun by Hawley ordering a
charge of cavalry he ' believed* greatly in dragoons.
His three regiments, and a volunteer corps called the Yorkshire
Blues, advanced at a rapid trot towards the column of Lord George
Murray, under whom were the men of Appin, Clanranald, and
Keppoch. The trot was speedily lengthened into a gallop, and on
360 THE WHITE "COCKADE.
they came like a thunder-cloud, or some vast monster, having more
than a thousand legs, devouring distance, and as if to tread all
under foot. Already their uplifted swords were glittering in the
sun, and the cheers of defiance and encouragement were ringing
from flank to flank, when the clansmen brought their muskets to
the ' present,' and their heads drooped, as they took aim at twelve
paces distance.
' Fire 1' cried Lord George Murray, adding, ' dirk and claymore,
men dirk and claymore !'
This deliberate volley threw the whole brigade into confusion,
and the officers were heard shouting, ' advance advance !' ' rally,
brave boys, rally !' but many more cried ' threes about retire,'
and in an instant the Stewarts and Macdonalds were down upon
them with sword and target.
Where a few moments before all had been quiet and still on the
heath-clad slope, were now horsemen and Highlanders engaged in
wild melee, ffow rung scattered vollies of musketry and pistols,
the united clamour of a thousand voices cheers, cries, and fierce
yells of defiance, the hoarse Cathghairm or Celtic war cry, or the
orders of some officer, given in pure English, and rising with strange
distinctness ; and too often amid the clang of weapons, the sudden
and infernal hurly burly of the tumult :
' The death-cry drowning in the battle's roar.'
' The cavalry,' says the Chevalier Johnstone, ' rode many of the
Highlanders down, and a most singular combat followed. The
Highlanders, stretched upon the ground, thrust their dirks into the
bellies of the horses ; some seized the riders by their clothes,
dragged them down and stabbed them with their dirks ; several
used their pistols, but few had space to handle their swords.' Clan-
ranald had a horse killed over him, and was nearly smothered by
it; but the conflict ended by the whole cavalry retiring at full
speed, riding down their own killed and wounded, and abandoning
the infantry, they never drew bridle till they reached Linlithgow,
seven miles distant from the field. In their terror and confusion,
the 10th Dragoons contrived to ride along the whole fire of the
Highland line.
A shower of sleety rain now fell to thicken the atmosphere of
the misty and storm-covered moor, and the low smoke of the recent
skirmish was blown towards Hawley's lines, when the whole High-
land force, throwing down their muskets and plaids, drew sword
and dirk, ' and with all their pipes playing the onset, from flank to
flank,' rushed on, shoulder to shoulder, and with a dreadful shock
on the charged bayonets of Hawley's triple lines, which, in the
usual fashion after a Highland charge, were broken, hurled on each
other, cut down , .trod under foot, and routed in an instant.
Brigadier Cholmondely made a slight attempt to rally the 4th
and 48th regiments ; but after firing briskly for a few minutes, they
THE WHITE COCKADE. 361
were forced to give way. As the Highlanders came on, they seemed
to produce on the king's troops the same effect that Campbell's
brigade did on the Russian column at the Alma amazement and
terror.
Foaming with rage and shame, Hawley was swept off the field
by the human tide, and, in his blind fury, is said to have broken
his sword, by madly hewing at the market-cross of Falkirk, as he
rode past it a fugitive.
' Pell mell, in headlong confusion, the sixteen regiments of in-
fantry (militia inclusive) were driven through Falkirk, abandoning
their camp, baggage, and everything to the victorious Highlanders,
who gleaned up all the arms, accoutrements, colours, and knap-
sacks, which were thrown away by the fugitives, who that night
reached Linlithgow.'
Before the Prince's quarters, which are yet shown in Falkirk,
were brought the trophies of the field ; 9 cannon and mortars ; 5
pair of colours, 600 stand of arms, tents for 5000 men, and 28
artillery waggons laden with the munition of war. Never was vic-
tory more complete !
On the field lay slain 20 officers and 500 privates ; among the
former was the gallant old Colonel Sir Eobert Munro, of Foulis,
who after killing or wounding sir Highlanders, with his half-pike,
was pistolled by Gillies Macbane, at the head of his regiment, the
37th Foot, known chiefly then as Major-General Ponsonby's.
Dalquharn, who had lost his hat, and had his coat cut to ribbons,
when the slender reserve advanced into the general melee, with a
few men of the Life Guard, had ridden to Bantaskine in the dark
to capture the artillery, which were wedged fast in the mud of a
deep and narrow road. One piece only was removed by the brave
grenadiers of the 4th, who drew it to Linlithgow with their own
hands.
He ordered his party to divide in two, and defile through the
gaps of a hedge, to prevent the escape of the artillery by front or
rear. By some mistake in the dusk and confusion, only two
troopers followed him (the majority having ridden after Mitchell)
as he turned towards the rear of the artillery, when Captain Kon-
ingham, the officer in command, ordered his gunners and drivers
c to cut their traces and be off !' a mandate which they instantly
obeyed, and for issuing which, after being cashiered by a court-
martial, he nearly committed suicide in a singularly terrible
manner.
As the mounted gunners, a hundred and more in number, swept
sword in hand along the narrow road, they instantly cut down and
unhorsed Dalquharn and his two troopers, taking him prisoner,
though he strove in vain to pass himself off as a Yorkshire hunter.
He was dragged away, with a rope round his waist, and committed
to the care of a few of the 10th Dragoons, who came from a farm-
yard where they had been plundering.
362 THE WHITE COCKADE.
Meanwhile Mitchell, an active and wary old soldier, lost no time
in procuring horses and hands, and had the guns started out of
their muddy lair, and brought into head-quarters, where he learned
that no traces could be found of Dalquharn, till a trooper, sorely
wounded and dying, crawled in with tidings that he had been cap-
tured.
' Taken taken prisoner under my very eyes, and despite my
promise to her ! oh, my Q-od, how shall I ever break the news ?'
exclaimed poor Mitchell, who felt inclined to shoot himself with
rage and vexation.
The Prince was greatly concerned on hearing of the loss of Dal-
quharn, and so were most of the army ; but Lord Lovat quoted
Horace, and laughed at the affair, for he was too old, and too much
of ^philosopher, to value life or fear death.
' What ! my Lord Dalquharn a prisoner again ! I protest he
hath a singular luck that way.'
The Prince turned from him in anger, and said in a whisper
to Viscount Strathallan, whose sword arm was slung in a bloody
scarf
' Lovat bah ! he is a strange compound of the stoic and the
cynic the snaky, slimy old Scotch whig, with the cavalier ; the
frivolity and stateliness of the old Scoto-French courtier, with the
simplicity of the patriarchal times, and the ferocity of the middle
ages. Pardieu, Viscount, the man is an enigma !'
' Thank Heaven/ replied Strathallan in a whisper, ' we have not
another in our army like old Simon of Beaufort and Lovat !'
All the affair with the artillery had passed with such rapidity
that Dalquharn, half-stunned and confused by the fury with which
he had been struck from his horse, almost thought himself dream-
ing ; but erelong he realised all the bitterness of the case, and
found that he had a companion in misfortune, to whom he was
secured by a rope.
This was Donald Macdonald, of Teindreish, the senior major of
the venerable Keppoch's regiment, who has usually been called
Hawley's ' sole trophy' of the field of Falkirk a character of
great note in the Highland army, as the hero of the Spean Bridge,
where the first shot of the Insurrection was fired.
Amid the headlong confusion of the Highland charge, in conse-
quence of mistaking the brigade of General Huske for that of Lord
John Drummond, he was captured. By Huske, he was sworn at
as ' a lousy Scotch rebel dog !'
'Remember, sir, that I too am an officer,' said the unfortunate
Highlander, ' and, moreover, a gentleman.'
' A gentleman quotha,' sneered Huske. ' I thank you for the
information.'
' Why, sir ?'
' For, 'pon my soul, I'd never have thought it.'
By Huske, to whom he proffered his sword and pistols, he was
THE WHITE COCKADE. 363
treated with singular brutality, and would have been pinned to the
enrth by twenty bayonets, but for the intervention of Lord Kobert
Kerr, of the House of Lothian, a humane young officer, who after-
wards fell at the battle of Culloden.
Though severely wounded in the sword arm, Macdonald's hands
were roughly tied behind him, and he was dragged away like a
felon from that field where his friends were victorious.
On reaching Edinburgh, the first use made by Hawley of the
shambles he had erected in the Grass-market, was to hang a number
of his own soldiers thereon ; and the cat-o'-nine-tails was wielded
unsparingly ; while his blind and childish rage was further exas-
perated by a knowledge that Sir John Cope had offered bets,
amounting to ten thousand guineas, in several coffee-houses in
London, that the first general sent against the Highlanders would
be beaten, just as he had been at Preaton. By this, Cope ' gained
a considerable sum of money, and recovered his honour to a cer-
tain degree.'
The whole Gazettes of those unhappy affairs, published by the
government, are invariably a tissue of falsehoods from beginning to
end, and unworthy of credence.*
CHAPTER LXVIII.
COBHAM'S
'Farewell, then, fame, ill sought through fields and blood,
Farewell unfaithful promiser of good :
Thou music, warbling to the deafened earl
Thou incense wasted on the funeral bier !
Through life pursued in vain, by death obtained,
When asked, denied us, and when given disdained.'
Tkkell.
To be dragged away thus ignominiously, in the very moment of
victory pinioned like a black slave, or a common felon dragged
past the stately woods and noble demesne of Callender House,
where Bryde, pale, anxious, and tearful, was waiting and watching
tidings from the field, was maddening to Dalquharn !
All his old and worst terrors and anticipations rose up like
ghoules and spectres before him now, and his mind became full of
bitterness and rage with sorrow for her, and apprehension for him-
self.
Perhaps the Prince might follow up this new success by march-
ing on Edinburgh, or again advancing into England. In either
case, Dalquharn felt assured that his own transmission south, either
by land or sea, was pretty certain, for every Highlander and ad-
* Constable's MiscelL xvi. "
364 THE WHITE COCKADE.
herent of Charles that could be gleaned up, were dispatched to ' the
shambles at Carlisle,' as- the illegal court which sat there and to
which no Scotsmen were amenable for acts committed in Scotland
was not inaptly named.
The escort consisted of twenty of Cobham's dragoons, under a
young officer whose temper a pistol bullet in his thigh had in no
way improved ; and he pushed on at a pace, which Dalquharn, and
more especially the poor wounded Macdonald, tied as they were,
found great difficulty in accomplishing, and every instant they were
in danger of being trod down by the hoofs of the horses.
These dragoons, among other plunder at the farm-house, had evi-
dently procured some alcohol, for many of them were tipsy, and, on
being encouraged by their foolish young officer, began to sing a long
song, then current in London. It went to the air of ' The C ut-
purse,' and two verses will serve as a sample of the anti-Jacobite
muse. The troopers trolled it lustily, and rattled their chain- bridles
when they came to the chorus
'From Paris, Cartouche into Scotland has come,
And his barelegged banditti will rob your estates ;
His itchy Scotch lords are the valets of Rome,
Consult but their annals record but their dates I
It's their politics,
To burn heretics,
Or poison by water that's fetched from the Styx.
Chorus.
Or each Highland cut-purse will soon give us law,
For their cut-throats as daring as Tyler or Straw 1
' Let curses most vile, and anathemas roar ;
Let half- ruined France and the Pope tribute pay,
Our thundering cannon shall guard Britain's shore
And none but great George will true Britons obey.
Then France and proud Spain,
Have laboured in vain ;
For the mountains have brought forth a Scots mouse again.
The Pretender must scamper and quit every chin,
And to Rome, or to hell, get home if he can.
Chorus.
And no Highland cut-purse shall give to us law,
Though the devil should help him, or Tyler, or Straw! 1
And, strange as it may seem now, stuff more perilous than this,
drew storms of applause in the London theatres, if sung, or spoken
in epilogue, by pretty Mrs. Woffington, when she swaggered so
saucily before the float-lights, in the Kevenhuller hat and regimen-
tals of a London volunteer.
The song being ended, Dalquharn ventured to remonstrate on the
unworthy treatment to which they were subjected ; but the officer
was deaf to him, and received his complaints in the true temper of
the time.
' I beseech you, sir,' exclaimed Dalquharn, ' at least to unbind
my friend, who is severely wounded in the arm -'
' Serve him right, egad !' was the brief response,
THE WHITE COCKAT8. 365
' But he suffers acutely.'
' He complains less than you, fellow, who have not a scratch.'
' It is the pride of his race, which disdains to murmur.'
' Pride, quotha ! Why don't his pride provide him with a decent
pair of breeches ?'
'Sir, he is like myself, an officer'
1 An officer gadamercy ! who holds his commission from the
Pretender,'
' No, sir from King James V11I.'
' You are over bold to talk thus, my bonny Scot, with your pre-
cious neck in a noose over bold, I can tell you.'
'Noose, sirrah!' exclaimed Dalquharn, losing all patience, at the
cool insolence of the officer ; ' I demand my parole.'
The other laughed angrily, as he made his horse curvet in the
half-frozen mud, and said
1 'Sblood, but this is rare the idea of paroling a rebel ! You
should not have it, even had I the power to grant it, which I do not
possess.'
' Be it so ! then I can fully, without dishonour, escape.'
' If you can ; but beware my fine fellow, for on the smallest ap-
pearance of such an attempt, you will be pistolled without mercy,'
replied the officer, cocking his Kevenhuller very much over his right
eye ; ' I know that the government have no wish to be troubled
with prisoners.'
A time may come when I shall requite this lack of common
humanity this coarse brutality.'
' Scarcely,' sneered the other ; ' but in case that time ever comes,
you would wish to be favoured with my name, perhaps ?'
' Assuredly, sirrah for the name of a friend or a foe will never
be forgotten by me.'
' I am Jack Dormer, a Lieutenant of Viscount Cobham'a dra-
goons.'
' Dormer, of Cobham's good,' said Dalquharn, through his
clenched teeth ; ' I shall not fail to remember it '
' On the gallows, to which I am marching you,' said the other
coarsely, and with all the petulant impertinence of youth ; ' the
name of Dormer may adorn your last speech : but excuse me hold-
ing further parley with you,' he added, and checking his horse,
dropped to the rear of the escort, which rode in two sections, one
in front and one in rear, along the narrow road, with a file on each
side of the prisoners, who were tied together by a rope, the ends of
which were secured to the stirrup-leather of the trooper beside them,
so the idea of escape seemed a bootless boast.
' Heed not these fellows, my Lord,' said Macdonald, who marched
on with his teeth clenched, to repress the groans that his wound
and the tight pinioning of his arms must otherwise have wrung
from him ; ' heed them not,' added this gentle and chivalrous
Highland gentleman, ' for even the Black Chanter of the Clan Chat-
366 THE WHITE COCKADE.
tan, would not inspire them with courage to face us on a fo lighten
ficLl again.'
' The Black Chanter is it a spirit, Macdonald ?'
The Highlander gave a mournful laugh, and replied
' I forgot that your Lordship is a Lowlander. In the Highlands,
we all know of the Feadhan Dhu the Black Chanter, or Holy Pipe
of the Clan Chattan which, according to tradition, fell among
them from the clouds of heaven, at the battle of the North Inch in
1396, and the sound of which ensures prosperity, and inspires with
heroic courage all who hear it.'
' I never heard of it,' replied Dalquharn, gravely enough, for lie
was in no smiling mood.
'Three of our clan Macdonalds of Glencoe had once taken a
creagh on Strathspey, but were followed and caught by the Grants,
near Aviemore, in a wild place, where, from an eminence, one may
see the great green plain of the Alvie, and the course of the Spey,
roaring in foam between its forests of dark and bronze-like pines.
Two of the Macdonalds were pinioned, as your Lordship and I
now are,' continued the major, who, like all Highlanders, dearly
loved to tell a clan story; 'the youngest, an ancestor of my own,
escaped, with an arrow in his cheek, but followed his friends in
secret. Two miles from the base of Craigellachie, the Grants
halted to refresh themselves, when the young Macdouald stole near,
and released the two captives, with whom he fell sword in hand
upon the Grants. They killed seven, wounded] sixteen, and suc-
ceeded in carrying off the creagh, a fine herd of cattle in triumph !
' " A mhic ! a mhic !" was the cry of the oldest Macdonald, as
he showered his blows around him : " do laimh o' cruadhich, do
bhuille !" (my son my son, harden thy strokes.)
' So enraged was the Laird of Grant by this affair, that he forced
the survivors, on three successive Sundays, to march round the old
Vicarage church of Inverallan (in presence of all his people), car-
rying wooden swords in derision ; and further to complete their
shame, he borrowed of Cluny, the Feadhan Dhu, that its sound
might animate them ; and alter hearing his own piper play thereon,
they became, for ever after, brave men and true.'*
' I would advise General Hawley to get some such instrument, and
play it in front of his dragoons ; for, by my soul, I never saw so
many hen-hearted knaves, with good Sheffield blades by their sides,'
said Dalquharn, with a bitter laugh.
' A lord,' said one of the dragoons, who had been listening ; ' do
you say, Jack, that the petticoated rebel calls t'other one a Lord ?'
' So I hear,' replied his comrade.
' Scotch lords, or lairds, as they calls em, ain't worth much, I
reckon.'
* The Grants would seem to have kept this remarkable bag-pipe long enough,
as it was not until 1822 that Glenmorristou returned it to Evan MacPherBon, of
Cluny._ Logans Gael.
THE WHITE COCKADE. 367
* But tliis one is worth a hundred yellow Geordies, doan't co
know, boy ?'
' Offered by whom the King ?'
' No boy.'
' No the Book o' Coomberland, lad ?'
1 Offered by the Scotch Purveyor to the Forces one Mr. Reuben
Balcraftie.'
' Did he surrender to you T asked the other, becoming suddenly
interested.
' No I wishes as he 'ad.'
' Whose prisoner will he be then ?'
' Leaftenant Dormer's, in course whish to God he was mine."
' You hear, my lord ?' whispered Macdonald.
' I have heard every word these rascals know my market value
to a shilling.'
1 You must escape,' whispered Macdonald in French.
' Ah but how ?'
1 Never may there be a better opportunity than this ; on the open
highway, in a dark night too.'
' I can see no way, my friend.'
' Once within gates and walls, the idea may be hopeless. What
said a Douglas of old better hear the lark sing, than the mouse
cheep.'
Dalquharn shuddered as he recalled the Bass Rock with its pri-
sons, and the awful perils of his escape therefrom.
' I repeat, my lord, that you must make a bold effort to escape.
I was at your marriage in the Cathedral of Carlisle as a mere
spectator, of course, as I had not the honour of being known to
your lordship. I felt deeply interested in Miss Otterburn her
story, her beauty, and sweetness. Think now of her of your poor
young wife, and escape if you can. As for me, I have neither wife
nor child to sorrow for me ; but blessed be God, I shall leave many
a bold heart, and many a keen claymore among the Clan Donald,
to avenge me !'
' Poor Bryde poor Bryde ?' murmured Dalquham, in a voice of
great sorrow.
' Listen to me, my lord. On disarming me in the field, the Red-
coats contented themselves with my sword, dirk, and pistols ; the
sharp Skene Dhu in my right garter escaped them, and it is at your
lordship's service.'
' My hands are tied '
1 But not behind you, as mine are ; being in the kilt, I am
deemed the more dangerous of the two, by the twenty heroes who
guard us.'*
' And the knife what of it ?' .
' Take it from my garter,' replied Macdonald, still in French ;
* Twenty men were detailed by General Huske, as the Guard over this solitary
Highlander. Htnd. Hiit. Ittbellion.
368 THE WHITE COCKADE.
' and cut the rope that binds us together, and to that trooper on the
left. Plunge it into his horse or himself, or both if you can, and
trust to Providence for the rest or stay ! Erelong we shall be at
the Bridge of the Avon then will be the time to act ; but mean-
while possess yourself of my skene.'
In the dark, though his hands were tied tightly but about twelve
inches apart, Dalqunarn easily contrived to draw from Macdonald's
garter the little dagger, known among Highlanders as the black-
knife, and still used by them when hunting to cut the throat of the
deer.
' But the sheath has come with it,' he whispered.
' Draw it off with your teeth many a time have I done so, when
under a charger's belly. Fail not to use it, and use it well for your
life, and it may be hers too, depends upon it !'
' And you, Macdonald I shall not escape without you !'
' With a wounded arm I am helpless, and wouid but ensure your
recapture, and why should both perish ? Moreover, another oppor-
tunity may come, if they don't hang me before I atn healed. A
brave fellow has chances often enough ; and at all events 'tis better
to be shot, than to die a dog's death, at Carlisle wall.'
' Still we shall make the attempt together.'
' Allons, mon ami as you please, my lord and at the Bridge of
the Avon must the deed be done !'
Possessed of this weapon so sharp and so deadly, Dalquharn felt
a wild glow of hope and vengeance swell together in his heart ; and
with it, there grew a fierce and pitiless desire to slay right and left
to be without mercy to the merciless !
The night was pitchy dark ; westward and northward, large
masses of black cloud enveloped the sky. Eastward it was toler-
ably clear, and the stars of the Plough shone, sharply and clearly,
and a patch of cold dark blue. In the southern quarter Mars, red
and fiery, glinted at times through the flying scud above the western
shoulder of the Pentland range, and a watch-fire was burning lu-
ridly on the summit of Cathail Khi (or the hill of the Strife of
Kings) to which the Scottish vulgar, have given the absurd name of
Cockleroy. A cold wind swept over the road by which they
marched ; the leafless copsewoods moaned in the blast, and the dead
leaves were whirled 
