Rob Roy Read online

  ‘Doubtless—doubtless—it has been one main reason, Mr. Osbaldistone. I doubtna but what the ready money he carried off wi’ him might be another. But that makes comparatively but a sma’ part o’ your father’s loss, though it might make the maist part o’ Rashleigh’s direct gain. The assetts he carried off are of nae mair use to him than if he were to light his pipe wi’ them. He tried if MacVittie and Co. wad gie him siller on them—that I ken by Andro Wylie—but they were ower auld cats to draw that strae afore them—they keepit aff and gae fair words. Rashleigh Osbaldistone is better kend than trusted in Glasgow, for he was here about some jacobitical papistical troking in seventeen hundred and seven, and left debt ahint him. Na, na, he canna pit aff the paper here; folk will misdoubt him how he came by it. Na, na, he’ll hae the stuff safe at some o’ their haulds in the Hielands, and I daur say my cousin Rob could get at it gin he liked.’

  ‘But would he be disposed to serve us in this pinch, Mr. Jarvie?’ said I. ‘You have described him as an agent of the Jacobite party, and deeply connected in their intrigues; will he be disposed for my sake, or, if you please, for the sake of justice, to make an act of restitution, which, supposing it in his power, would, according to your view of the case, materially interfere with their plans?’

  ‘I canna preceesely speak to that—the grandees among them are doubtfu’ o’ Rob, and he’s doubtfu’ o’ them—and he’s been weel friended wi’ the Argyle family, wha stand for the present model of government.—If he was freed o’ his hornings and captions, he wad rather be on Argyle’s side than he wad be on Breadalbane’s, for there’s auld ill-will between the Breadalbane family and his kin and name. The truth is, that Rob is for his ain hand, as Henry Wynd feught1—he’ll take the side that suits him best; if the deil was laird, Rob wad be for being tenant, and ye canna blame him, puir fallow, considering his circumstances. But there’s ae thing sair again ye—Rob has a grey mear in his stable at hame.’

  ‘A grey mare?’ said I. ‘What is that to the purpose?’

  ‘The wife, man—the wife,—an awfu’ wife she is. She downa bide the sight o’ a kindly Scot, if he come frae the Lowlands, far less of an Inglisher, and she’ll be keen for a’ that can set up King James, and ding down King George.’

  ‘It is very singular,’ I replied, ’that the mercantile transactions of London citizens should become involved with revolutions and rebellions.’

  ‘Not at a’, man—not at a’,’ returned Mr. Jarvie, ‘that’s a’ your silly prejudications. I read whiles in the lang dark nights, and I hae read in Baker’s Chronicle that the merchants o’ London could gar the Bank of Genoa break their promise to advance a mighty sum to the King of Spain, whereby the sailing of the Grand Spanish Armada was put aff for a haul year—What think you of that, sir?’

  ‘That the merchants did their country golden service, which ought to be honourably remembered in our histories.’

  ‘I think sae too; and they wad do weel, and deserve weel baith o’ the state and o’ humanity, that wad save three or four honest Hieland gentlemen frae louping heads ower heels into destruction, wi’ a’ their puir sackless2 followers, just because they canna pay back the siller they had reason to count upon as their ain—and save your father’s credit— and my ain gude siller that Osbaldistone and Tresham awes me into the bargain—I say if ane could manage a’ this, I think it suld be done and said unto him, even if he were a puir ca’-the-shuttle body, as unto one whom the king delighteth to honour.’

  ‘I cannot pretend to estimate the extent of public gratitude,’ I replied;’but our own thankfulness, Mr. Jarvie, would be commensurate with the extent of the obligation.’

  ‘Which,’ added Mr. Owen, ‘we would endeavour to balance with a per contra, the instant our Mr. Osbaldistone returns from Holland.’

  ‘I doubtna—I doubtna—he is a very worthy gentleman, and a sponsible, and wi’ some o’ my lights might do muckle business in Scotland—Weel, sir, if these assetts could be redeemed out o’ the hands o’ the Philistines, they are gude paper—they are the right stuff when they are in the right hands, and that’s yours, Mr. Owen.—And I’se find ye three men in Glasgow, for as little as ye may think o’ us, Mr. Owen,—that’s Sandie Steenson in the Trade’s-Land, and John Pirie in Candleriggs, and another, that sail be nameless at this present, sail advance what soums are sufficient to secure the credit of your house, and seek nae better security.’

  Owen‘s eyes sparkled at this prospect of extrication; but his countenance instantly fell on recollecting how improbable it was that the recovery of the assetts, as he technically called them, should be successfully achieved.

  ‘Dinna despair, sir—dinna despair,’ said Mr. Jarvie; ‘I hae taen sae muckle concern wi’ your affairs already, that it maun een be ower shoon ower boots wi’ me now. I am just like my father the deacon, (praise be wi’ him!) I canna meddle wi’ a friend’s business, but I aye end wi’ making it my ain— Sae, I’ll een pit on my boots the morn, and be jogging ower Drymen-Muir wi’ Mr. Frank here; and if I canna mak Rob hear reason, and his wife too, I dinna ken wha can—I hae been a kind freend to them afore now, to sae naething o’ ower-looking him last night, when naming his name wad hae cost him his life—I’ll be hearing o’ this in the council maybe frae Bailie Grahame, and MacVitrie, and some o’ them. They hae coost up my kindred to Rob to me already—set up their nashgabs! I tauld them I wad vindicate nae mon’s faults; but set apart what he had done again the law o’ the country, and the hership o’ the Lennox, and the misfortune o’ some folk losing life by him, he was an honester man than stude on ony o’ their shanks—And what for suld I mind their clavers?—If Rob is an outlaw, to himsell be it said—there is nae laws now about reset of intercommuned persons, as there was in the ill times o’ the last Stewarts—I trow I hae a Scotch tongue in my head—if they speak, I’se answer.’

  It was with great pleasure that I saw the Bailie gradually surmount the barriers of caution, under the united influence of public spirit and good-natured interest in our affairs, together with his natural wish to avoid loss and acquire gain, and not a little harmless vanity. Through the combined operation of these motives he at length arrived at the doughty resolution of taking the field in person, to aid in the recovery of my father’s property. His whole information led me to believe, that if the papers were in possession of this Highland adventurer, it might be possible to induce him to surrender what he could not keep with any prospect of personal advantage; and I was conscious that the presence of his kinsman was likely to have considerable weight with him. I therefore cheerfully acquiesced in Mr. Jarvie’s proposal, that we should set out early next morning.

  That honest gentleman was indeed as vivacious and alert in preparing to carry his purpose into execution as he had been slow and cautious in forming it. He roared to Mattie to ‘air his trot-cosey, to have his jack-boots greased and set before the kitchen-fire all night, and to see that his beast be corned, and a’ his riding gear in order.’ Having agreed to meet him at five o’clock next morning, and having settled that Owen, whose presence could be of no use to us upon this expedition, should await our return at Glasgow, we took a kind farewell of this unexpectedly zealous friend. I installed Owen in an apartment in my lodgings, contiguous to my own, and, giving orders to Andrew Fairservice to attend me the next morning at the hour appointed, I retired to rest with better hopes than it had lately been my fortune to entertain.

  CHAPTER XXVII

  Far as the eye could reach no tree was seen,

  Earth, clad in russet, scorn’d the lively green;

  No birds, except as birds of passage flew;

  No bee was heard to hum, no dove to coo;

  No streams, as amber smooth—as amber clear,

  Were seen to glide, or heard to warble here.

  Prophecy of Famine

  IT was in the bracing atmosphere of a harvest morning, that I met by appointment Fairservice, with the horses, at the door of Mr. Jarvie’s house, which was but little space listant
from Mrs. Flyter’s hotel. The first matter which caught my attention was, that whatever were the deficiencies of the pony which Mr. Fairservice’s legal adviser, Clerk Touthope, generously bestowed upon him in exchange for Thorn-cliff’s mare, he had contrived to part with it, and procure in its stead an animal with so curious and complete a lameness, that it seemed only to make use of three legs for the purpose of progression, while the fourth appeared as if meant to be flourished in the air by way of accompaniment. ‘What do you mean by bringing such a creature as that here, sir? and where is the pony you rode to Glasgow upon?’ were my very natural and impatient enquiries.

  ‘I sell’t it, sir. It was a slink beast, and wad hae eaten its head off, standing at Luckie Flyter’s at livery. And I hae bought this on your honour’s account. It’s a grand bargain —cost but a pund sterling the foot—that’s four a’thegither. The stringhalt will gae aff when it’s gaen a mile; it’s a well-kend ganger; they ca’ it Souple Tarn.’

  ‘On my soul, sir!’ said I, ‘you will never rest till my supple-jack and your shoulders become acquainted. If you do not go instantly and procure the other brute, you shall pay the penalty of your ingenuity.’

  Andrew, notwithstanding my threats, continued to battle the point, as he said it would cost him a guinea of rue-bargain to the man who had bought his pony before he could get it back again. Like a true Englishman, though sensible I was duped by the rascal, I was about to pay his exaction rather than lose time, when forth sallied Mr. Jarvie, cloaked, mantled, hooded, and booted, as if for a Siberian winter, while two apprentices, under the immediate direction of Mattie, led forth the decent ambling steed which had the honour on such occasions to support the person of the Glasgow magistrate. Ere he ‘clombe to the saddle,’ an expression more descriptive of the Bailie’s mode of mounting than that of the knights-errant to whom Spenser applies it, he enquired the cause of the dispute betwixt my servant and me. Having learned the nature of honest Andrew‘s manoeuvre, he instantly cut short all debate by pronouncing that if Fairservice did not forthwith return the three-legged palfrey, and produce the more useful quadruped which he had discarded, he would send him to prison, and amerce him in half his wages. ‘Mr. Osbaldistone,’ said he, ‘contracted for the service of both your horse and you—twa brutes at ance—ye unconscionable rascal!—but I‘se look weel after you during this journey.’

  ‘It will be nonsense fining me,’ said Andrew doughtily, ‘that hasna a grey groat to pay a fine wi’—it’s ill taking the breeks aff a Hielandman.’

  ‘If ye hae nae purse to fine, ye hae flesh to pine,’ replied the Bailie, ‘and I will look weel to ye getting your deserts the tae way or the tither.’

  To the commands of Mr. Jarvie, therefore, Andrew was compelled to submit, only muttering between his teeth, ‘Ower mony maisters—ower mony maisters, as the paddock said to the harrow, when every tooth gae her a tig.’

  Apparently he found no difficulty in getting rid of Supple Tarn, and recovering possession of his former Bucephalus, for he accomplished the exchange without being many minutes absent; nor did I hear further of his having paid any smart-money for the breach of bargain.

  We now set forward but had not reached the top of the street in which Mr. Jarvie dwelt, when a loud hallooing, and breathless call of ‘Stop, stop!’ was heard behind us. We stopped accordingly, and were overtaken by Mr. Jarvie’s two lads, who bore two parting tokens of Mattie’s care for her master. The first was conveyed in the form of a voluminous silk handkerchief, like the main-sail of one of his own West-Indiamen, which Mrs. Mattie particularly desired he would put about his neck, and which, thus entreated, he added to his other integuments. The second youngster brought only a verbal charge (I thought I saw the rogue disposed to laugh as he delivered it) on the part of the housekeeper, that her master would take care of the waters. ‘Pooh! pooh! silly hussy,’ answered Mr. Jarvie; but added, turning to me, ‘it shows a kind heart though—it shows a kind heart in sae young a quean—Mattie’s a carefu’ lass.’ So speaking, he pricked the sides of his palfrey, and we left the town without farther interruption.

  While we paced easily forward, by a road which conducted us north-eastward from the town, I had an opportunity to estimate and admire the good qualities of my new friend. Although, like my father, he considered commercial transactions the most important objects of human life, he was not wedded to them so as to undervalue more general knowledge. On the contrary, with much oddity and vulgarity of manner,—with a vanity which he made much more ridiculous by disguising it now and then under a thin veil of humility, and devoid as he was of all the advantages of a learned education, Mr. Jarvie’s conversation showed tokens of a shrewd, observing, liberal, and, to the extent of its opportunities, a well-improved mind. He was a good local antiquary, and entertained me, as we passed along, with an account of remarkable events which had formerly taken place in the scenes through which we passed. And as he was well acquainted with the ancient history of his district, he saw with the prospective eye of an enlightened patriot, the buds of many of those future advantages, which have only blossomed and ripened within these few years. I remarked also, and with great pleasure, that although a keen Scotchman, and abundantly zealous for the honour of his country, he was disposed to think liberally of the sister kingdom. When Andrew Fairservice (whom, by the way, the Bailie could not abide) chose to impute the accident of one of the horses casting his shoe to the deteriorating influence of the Union, he incurred a severe rebuke from Mr. Jarvie.

  ‘Whisht, sir!—whisht! it’s ill-scraped tongues like yours, that make mischief atween neighbourhoods and nations. There’s naething sae gude on this side o’ time, but it might hae been better, and that may be said o’ the Union. Nane were keener against it than the Glasgow folk, wi’ their rabblings and their risings, and their mobs, as they ca‘them now-a-days. But it’s an ill wind blaws naebody gude—Let ilka ane roose the ford as they find it—I say, Let Glasgow flourish! whilk is judiciously and elegantly putten round the town’s arms, by way of by-word.—Now, since St. Mungo catched herrings in the Clyde, what was ever like to gar us flourish like the sugar and tobacco-trade? Will ony body tell me that, and grumble at the treaty that opened us a road west-awa’ yonder?’

  Andrew Fairservice was far from acquiescing in these arguments of expedience, and even ventured to enter a grumbling protest, ‘That it was an unco change to hae Scotland’s laws made in England; and that, for his share, he wadna for a’ the herring-barrels in Glasgow, and a’ the tobacco-casks to boot, hae gien up the riding o’ the Scots Parliament, or sent awa our crown, and our sword, and our sceptre, and Mons Meg,1 to be keepit by thae English pock-puddings in the Tower o’ Lunnon. What wad Sir William Wallace, or auld Davie Lindsay, hae said to the Union, or them that made it?’

  The road which we travelled, while diverting the way with these discussions had become wild and open, as soon as we had left Glasgow a mile or two behind us, and was growing more dreary as we advanced. Huge continuous heaths spread before, behind, and around us in hopeless barrenness, now level and interspersed with swamps, green with treacherous verdure, or sable with turf, or, as they call them in Scotland, peat-bogs and now swelling into huge heavy ascents, which wanted the dignity and form of hills, while they were still more toilsome to the passenger. There were neither trees nor bushes to relieve the eye from the russet livery of absolute sterility. The very heath was of that stinted imperfect kind which has little or no flower, and affords the coarsest and meanest covering, which, as far as my experience enables me to judge, mother Earth is ever arrayed in. Living thing we saw none, except occasionally a few straggling sheep of a strange diversity of colours, as black, bluish, and orange. The sable hue predominated, however, in their faces and legs. The very birds seemed to shun these wastes, and no wonder, since they had an easy method of escaping from them; at least I only heard the monotonous and plaintive cries of the lapwing and curlew, which my companions denominated the peasweep and whaup.

  At dinner, however, w
hich we took about noon, at a most miserable alehouse, we had the good fortune to find that these tiresome screamers of the morass were not the only inhabitants of the moors. The goodwife told us, that ‘the gudeman had been at the hill;’ and well for us that he had been so, for we enjoyed the produce of his chasse in the shape of some broiled moor-game a dish which gallantly eked out the ewe-milk cheese, dried salmon, and oaten bread, being all besides that the house afforded. Some very indifferent two-penny ale, and a glass of excellent brandy, crowned our repast; and as our horses had, in the meantime, discussed their corn, we resumed our journey with renovated vigour.

  I had need of all the spirits a good dinner could give, to resist the dejection which crept insensibly on my mind, when I combined the strange uncertainty of my errand with the disconsolate aspect of the country through which it was leading me. Our road continued to be, if possible, more waste and wild than that we had travelled in the forenoon. The few miserable hovels that showed some marks of human habitation, were now of still rarer occurrence; and at length, as we began to ascend an uninterrupted swell of moorland, they totally disappeared. The only exercise which my imagination received was, when some particular turn of the road gave us a partial view, to the left, of a large assemblage of dark-blue mountains stretching to the north and north-west, which promised to include within their recesses, a country as wild perhaps, but certainly differing greatly in point of interest, from that which we now travelled. The peaks of this screen of mountains were as wildly varied and distinguished as the hills which we had seen on the right were tame and lumpish; and while I gazed on this Alpine region, I felt a longing to explore its recesses, though accompanied with toil and danger, similar to that which a sailor feels when he wishes for the risks and animation of a battle or a gale, in exchange for the insupportable monotony of a protracted calm. I made various enquiries of my friend Mr. Jarvie respecting the names and positions of these remarkable mountains; but it was a subject on which he had no information, or he did not choose to be communicative. ‘They’re the Hieland hills—the Hieland hills—Ye’ll see and hear eneugh about them before ye see Glasgow Cross again—I downa look at them—I never see them but they gar me grew.—It’s no for fear, but just for grief, for the puir blinded half-starved creatures that inhabit them—But say nae mair about it—it’s ill speaking o’ Hielandmen sae near the line. I hae kend mony an honest man wad na hae ventured this length without he had made his last will and testament—Mattie had ill-will to see me set awa on this ride, and grat awee, the sillie tawpie; but it’s nae mair ferlie to see a woman greet than to see a goose gang barefit.’