The Fair Maid of Perth; Or, St. Valentine's Day Read online

  CHAPTER VI.

  Never to man shall Catharine give her hand.

  Taming of the Shrew.

  The breakfast was served, and the thin soft cakes, made of flour andhoney according to the family receipt, were not only commended with allthe partiality of a father and a lover, but done liberal justice to inthe mode which is best proof of cake as well as pudding. They talked,jested, and laughed. Catharine, too, had recovered her equanimity wherethe dames and damsels of the period were apt to lose theirs--in thekitchen, namely, and in the superintendence of household affairs, inwhich she was an adept. I question much if the perusal of Seneca for aslong a period would have had equal effect in composing her mind.

  Old Dorothy sat down at the board end, as was the homespun fashionof the period; and so much were the two men amused with their ownconversation, and Catharine occupied either in attending to them or withher own reflections, that the old woman was the first who observed theabsence of the boy Conachar.

  "It is true," said the master glover; "go call him, the idle Highlandloon. He was not seen last night during the fray neither, at least I sawhim not. Did any of you observe him?"

  The reply was negative; and Henry's observation followed:

  "There are times when Highlanders can couch like their own deer--ay,and run from danger too as fast. I have seen them do so myself, for thematter of that."

  "And there are times," replied Simon, "when King Arthur and his RoundTable could not make stand against them. I wish, Henry, you would speakmore reverently of the Highlanders. They are often in Perth, both aloneand in numbers, and you ought to keep peace with them so long as theywill keep peace with you."

  An answer of defiance rose to Henry's lips, but he prudently suppressedit. "Why, thou knowest, father," he said, smiling, "that we handicraftsbest love the folks we live by; now, my craft provides for valiant andnoble knights, gentle squires and pages, stout men at arms, and othersthat wear the weapons which we make. It is natural I should like theRuthvens, the Lindsays, the Ogilvys, the Oliphants, and so many othersof our brave and noble neighbours, who are sheathed in steel of mymaking, like so many paladins, better than those naked, snatchingmountaineers, who are ever doing us wrong, especially since no five ofeach clan have a rusty shirt of mail as old as their brattach; and thatis but the work of the clumsy clan smith after all, who is no member ofour honourable mystery, but simply works at the anvil, where his fatherwrought before him. I say, such people can have no favour in the eyes ofan honest craftsman."

  "Well--well," answered Simon; "I prithee let the matter rest even now,for here comes the loitering boy, and, though it is a holyday morn, Iwant no more bloody puddings."

  The youth entered accordingly. His face was pale, his eyes red, andthere was an air of discomposure about his whole person. He sat down atthe lower end of the table, opposite to Dorothy, and crossed himself, asif preparing for his morning's meal. As he did not help himself to anyfood, Catharine offered him a platter containing some of the cakes whichhad met with such general approbation. At first he rejected her offeredkindness rather sullenly; but on her repeating the offer with a smile ofgoodwill, he took a cake in his hand, broke it, and was about to eat amorsel, when the effort to swallow seemed almost too much for him; andthough he succeeded, he did not repeat it.

  "You have a bad appetite for St. Valentine's morning, Conachar," saidhis good humoured master; "and yet I think you must have slept soundlythe night before, since I conclude you were not disturbed by the noiseof the scuffle. Why, I thought a lively glune amie would have been athis master's side, dirk in hand, at the first sound of danger whicharose within a mile of us."

  "I heard but an indistinct noise," said the youth, his face glowingsuddenly like a heated coal, "which I took for the shout of some merryrevellers; and you are wont to bid me never open door or window, oralarm the house, on the score of such folly."

  "Well--well," said Simon; "I thought a Highlander would have knownbetter the difference betwixt the clash of swords and the twanging onharps, the wild war cry and the merry hunt's up. But let it pass, boy; Iam glad thou art losing thy quarrelsome fashions. Eat thy breakfast, anyway, as I have that to employ thee which requires haste."

  "I have breakfasted already, and am in haste myself. I am for the hills.Have you any message to my father?"

  "None," replied the glover, in some surprise; "but art thou besidethyself, boy? or what a vengeance takes thee from the city, like thewing of the whirlwind?"

  "My warning has been sudden," said Conachar, speaking with difficulty;but whether arising from the hesitation incidental to the use of aforeign language, or whether from some other cause, could not easilybe distinguished. "There is to be a meeting--a great hunting--" Here hestopped.

  "And when are you to return from this blessed hunting?" said the master;"that is, if I may make so bold as to ask."

  "I cannot exactly answer," replied the apprentice. "Perhaps never,if such be my father's pleasure," continued Conachar, with assumedindifference.

  "I thought," said Simon Glover, rather seriously, "that all this was tobe laid aside, when at earnest intercession I took you under my roof. Ithought that when I undertook, being very loth to do so, to teach youan honest trade, we were to hear no more of hunting, or hosting, or clangatherings, or any matters of the kind?"

  "I was not consulted when I was sent hither," said the lad, haughtily."I cannot tell what the terms were."

  "But I can tell you, sir Conachar," said the glover, angrily, "thatthere is no fashion of honesty in binding yourself to an honestcraftsman, and spoiling more hides than your own is worth; and now, whenyou are of age to be of some service, in taking up the disposal ofyour time at your pleasure, as if it were your own property, not yourmaster's."

  "Reckon with my father about that," answered Conachar; "he will pay yougallantly--a French mutton for every hide I have spoiled, and a fat cowor bullock for each day I have been absent."

  "Close with him, friend Glover--close with him," said the armourer,drily. "Thou wilt be paid gallantly at least, if not honestly. MethinksI would like to know how many purses have been emptied to fill thegoat skin sporran that is to be so free to you of its gold, and whosepastures the bullocks have been calved in that are to be sent down toyou from the Grampian passes."

  "You remind me, friend," said the Highland youth, turning haughtilytowards the smith, "that I have also a reckoning to hold with you."

  "Keep at arm's length, then," said Henry, extending his brawny arm: "Iwill have no more close hugs--no more bodkin work, like last night. Icare little for a wasp's sting, yet I will not allow the insect to comenear me if I have warning."

  Conachar smiled contemptuously. "I meant thee no harm," he said. "Myfather's son did thee but too much honour to spill such churl's blood. Iwill pay you for it by the drop, that it may be dried up, and no longersoil my fingers."

  "Peace, thou bragging ape!" said the smith: "the blood of a true mancannot be valued in gold. The only expiation would be that thou shouldstcome a mile into the Low Country with two of the strongest galloglassesof thy clan; and while I dealt with them, I would leave thee to thecorrection of my apprentice, little Jankin."

  Here Catharine interposed. "Peace," she said, "my trusty Valentine, whomI have a right to command; and peace you, Conachar, who ought to obey meas your master's daughter. It is ill done to awaken again on the morrowthe evil which has been laid to sleep at night."

  "Farewell, then, master," said Conachar, after another look of scorn atthe smith, which he only answered with a laugh--"farewell! and I thankyou for your kindness, which has been more than I deserve. If I have attimes seemed less than thankful, it was the fault of circumstances, andnot of my will. Catharine--" He cast upon the maiden a look of strongemotion, in which various feelings were blended. He hesitated, as ifto say something, and at length turned away with the single word"farewell."

  Five minutes afterwards, with Highland buskins on his feet and a smallbundle in his hand, he passed through th
e north gate of Perth, anddirected his course to the Highlands.

  "There goes enough of beggary and of pride for a whole Highland clan,"said Henry. "He talks as familiarly of gold pieces as I would of silverpennies, and yet I will be sworn that the thumb of his mother's worstedglove might hold the treasure of the whole clan."

  "Like enough," said the glover, laughing at the idea; "his mother was alarge boned woman, especially in the fingers and wrist."

  "And as for cattle," continued Henry, "I reckon his father and brotherssteal sheep by one at a time."

  "The less we say of them the better," said the glover, becoming againgrave. "Brothers he hath none; his father is a powerful man--hath longhands--reaches as far as he can, and hears farther than it is necessaryto talk of him."

  "And yet he hath bound his only son apprentice to a glover in Perth?"said Henry. "Why, I should have thought the gentle craft, as it iscalled, of St. Crispin would have suited him best; and that, if the sonof some great Mac or O was to become an artisan, it could only be in thecraft where princes set him the example."

  This remark, though ironical, seemed to awaken our friend Simon's senseof professional dignity, which was a prevailing feeling that marked themanners of the artisans of the time.

  "You err, son Henry," he replied, with much gravity: "the glovers' arethe more honourable craft of the two, in regard they provide for theaccommodation of the hands, whereas the shoemakers and cordwainers dobut work for the feet."

  "Both equally necessary members of the body corporate," said Henry,whose father had been a cordwainer.

  "It may be so, my son," said the glover; "but not both alike honourable.Bethink you, that we employ the hands as pledges of friendship and goodfaith, and the feet have no such privilege. Brave men fight with theirhands; cowards employ their feet in flight. A glove is borne aloft; ashoe is trampled in the mire. A man greets a friend with his openhand; he spurns a dog, or one whom he holds as mean as a dog, with hisadvanced foot. A glove on the point of a spear is a sign and pledge offaith all the wide world over, as a gauntlet flung down is a gage ofknightly battle; while I know no other emblem belonging to an old shoe,except that some crones will fling them after a man by way of good luck,in which practice I avow myself to entertain no confidence."

  "Nay," said the smith, amused with his friend's eloquent pleading forthe dignity of the art he practised, "I am not the man, I promise you,to disparage the glover's mystery. Bethink you, I am myself a maker ofgauntlets. But the dignity of your ancient craft removes not my wonder,that the father of this Conachar suffered his son to learn a trade ofany kind from a Lowland craftsman, holding us, as they do, altogetherbeneath their magnificent degree, and a race of contemptible drudges,unworthy of any other fate than to be ill used and plundered, as oftenas these bare breeched dunnie wassals see safety and convenience fordoing so."

  "Ay," answered the glover, "but there were powerful reasons for--for--"he withheld something which seemed upon his lips, and went on: "forConachar's father acting as he did. Well, I have played fair with him,and I do not doubt but he will act honourably by me. But Conachar'ssudden leave taking has put me to some inconvenience. He had thingsunder his charge. I must look through the booth."

  "Can I help you, father?" said Henry Gow, deceived by the earnestness ofhis manner.

  "You!--no," said Simon, with a dryness which made Henry so sensible ofthe simplicity of his proposal, that he blushed to the eyes at his owndulness of comprehension, in a matter where love ought to have inducedhim to take his cue easily up.

  "You, Catharine," said the glover, as he left the room, "entertain yourValentine for five minutes, and see he departs not till my return. Comehither with me, old Dorothy, and bestir thy limbs in my behalf."

  He left the room, followed by the old woman; and Henry Smith remainedwith Catharine, almost for the first time in his life, entirely alone.There was embarrassment on the maiden's part, and awkwardness on thatof the lover, for about a minute; when Henry, calling up his courage,pulled the gloves out of his pocket with which Simon had supplied him,and asked her to permit one who had been so highly graced that morningto pay the usual penalty for being asleep at the moment when he wouldhave given the slumbers of a whole twelvemonth to be awake for a singleminute.

  "Nay, but," said Catharine, "the fulfilment of my homage to St.Valentine infers no such penalty as you desire to pay, and I cannottherefore think of accepting them."

  "These gloves," said Henry, advancing his seat insidiously towardsCatharine as he spoke, "were wrought by the hands that are dearest toyou; and see--they are shaped for your own."

  He extended them as he spoke, and taking her arm in his robust hand,spread the gloves beside it to show how well they fitted.

  "Look at that taper arm," he said, "look at these small fingers; thinkwho sewed these seams of silk and gold, and think whether the glove andthe arm which alone the glove can fit ought to remain separate, becausethe poor glove has had the misfortune to be for a passing minute in thekeeping of a hand so swart and rough as mine."

  "They are welcome as coming from my father," said Catharine; "and surelynot less so as coming from my friend (and there was an emphasis on theword), as well as my Valentine and preserver."

  "Let me aid to do them on," said the smith, bringing himself yet closerto her side; "they may seem a little over tight at first, and you mayrequire some assistance."

  "You are skilful in such service, good Henry Gow," said the maiden,smiling, but at the same time drawing farther from her lover.

  "In good faith, no," said Henry, shaking his head: "my experience hasbeen in donning steel gauntlets on mailed knights, more than in fittingembroidered gloves upon maidens."

  "I will trouble you then no further, and Dorothy shall aid me, thoughthere needs no assistance; my father's eye and fingers are faithful tohis craft: what work he puts through his hands is always true to themeasure."

  "Let me be convinced of it," said the smith--"let me see that theseslender gloves actually match the hands they were made for."

  "Some other time, good Henry," answered the maiden, "I will wear thegloves in honour of St. Valentine, and the mate he has sent me forthe season. I would to Heaven I could pleasure my father as well inweightier matters; at present the perfume of the leather harms theheadache I have had since morning."

  "Headache, dearest maiden!" echoed her lover.

  "If you call it heartache, you will not misname it," said Catharine,with a sigh, and proceeded to speak in a very serious tone.

  "Henry," she said, "I am going perhaps to be as bold as I gave youreason to think me this morning; for I am about to speak the first upona subject on which, it may well be, I ought to wait till I had to answeryou. But I cannot, after what has happened this morning, suffer myfeelings towards you to remain unexplained, without the possibility ofmy being greatly misconceived. Nay, do not answer till you have heard meout. You are brave, Henry, beyond most men, honest and true as the steelyou work upon--"

  "Stop--stop, Catharine, for mercy's sake! You never said so much thatwas good concerning me, save to introduce some bitter censure, of whichyour praises were the harbingers. I am honest, and so forth, you wouldsay, but a hot brained brawler, and common sworder or stabber."

  "I should injure both myself and you in calling you such. No, Henry, tono common stabber, had he worn a plume in his bonnet and gold spurs onhis heels, would Catharine Glover have offered the little grace she hasthis day voluntarily done to you. If I have at times dwelt severely uponthe proneness of your spirit to anger, and of your hand to strife, it isbecause I would have you, if I could so persuade you, hate in yourselfthe sins of vanity and wrath by which you are most easily beset. I havespoken on the topic more to alarm your own conscience than to expressmy opinion. I know as well as my father that, in these forlorn anddesperate days, the whole customs of our nation, nay, of every Christiannation, may be quoted in favour of bloody quarrels for trifling causes,of the taking deadly and deep revenge for slight offences, and theslaughte
r of each other for emulation of honour, or often in mere sport.But I knew that for all these things we shall one day be called intojudgment; and fain would I convince thee, my brave and generous friend,to listen oftener to the dictates of thy good heart, and take less pridein the strength and dexterity of thy unsparing arm."

  "I am--I am convinced, Catharine" exclaimed Henry: "thy words shallhenceforward be a law to me. I have done enough, far too much, indeed,for proof of my bodily strength and courage; but it is only from you,Catharine, that I can learn a better way of thinking. Remember, myfair Valentine, that my ambition of distinction in arms, and my loveof strife, if it can be called such, do not fight even handed with myreason and my milder dispositions, but have their patrons and sticklersto egg them on. Is there a quarrel, and suppose that I, thinking on yourcounsels, am something loth to engage in it, believe you I am left todecide between peace or war at my own choosing? Not so, by St. Mary!there are a hundred round me to stir me on. 'Why, how now, Smith, is thymainspring rusted?' says one. 'Jolly Henry is deaf on the quarrellingear this morning!' says another. 'Stand to it, for the honour of Perth,'says my lord the Provost. 'Harry against them for a gold noble,' criesyour father, perhaps. Now, what can a poor fellow do, Catharine, whenall are hallooing him on in the devil's name, and not a soul putting ina word on the other side?"

  "Nay, I know the devil has factors enough to utter his wares," saidCatharine; "but it is our duty to despise such idle arguments, thoughthey may be pleaded even by those to whom we owe much love and honour."

  "Then there are the minstrels, with their romaunts and ballads, whichplace all a man's praise in receiving and repaying hard blows. It is sadto tell, Catharine, how many of my sins that Blind Harry the Minstrelhath to answer for. When I hit a downright blow, it is not--so saveme--to do any man injury, but only to strike as William Wallace struck."

  The minstrel's namesake spoke this in such a tone of rueful seriousness,that Catharine could scarce forbear smiling; but nevertheless sheassured him that the danger of his own and other men's lives ought notfor a moment to be weighed against such simple toys.

  "Ay, but," replied Henry, emboldened by her smiles, "methinks nowthe good cause of peace would thrive all the better for an advocate.Suppose, for example, that, when I am pressed and urged to lay hand onmy weapon, I could have cause to recollect that there was a gentle andguardian angel at home, whose image would seem to whisper, 'Henry, do noviolence; it is my hand which you crimson with blood. Henry, rushupon no idle danger; it is my breast which you expose to injury;' suchthoughts would do more to restrain my mood than if every monk in Perthshould cry, 'Hold thy hand, on pain of bell, book, and candle.'"

  "If such a warning as could be given by the voice of sisterly affectioncan have weight in the debate," said Catharine, "do think that, instriking, you empurple this hand, that in receiving wounds you harm thisheart."

  The smith took courage at the sincerely affectionate tone in which thesewords were delivered.

  "And wherefore not stretch your regard a degree beyond these coldlimits? Why, since you are so kind and generous as to own some interestin the poor ignorant sinner before you, should you not at once adopthim as your scholar and your husband? Your father desires it, the townexpects it, glovers and smiths are preparing their rejoicings, and you,only you, whose words are so fair and so kind, you will not give yourconsent."

  "Henry," said Catharine, in a low and tremulous voice, "believe me Ishould hold it my duty to comply with my father's commands, were therenot obstacles invincible to the match which he proposes."

  "Yet think--think but for a moment. I have little to say for myself incomparison of you, who can both read and write. But then I wish to hearreading, and could listen to your sweet voice for ever. You love music,and I have been taught to play and sing as well as some minstrels. Youlove to be charitable, I have enough to give, and enough to keep, aslarge a daily alms as a deacon gives would never be missed by me. Yourfather gets old for daily toil; he would live with us, as I should trulyhold him for my father also. I would be as chary of mixing in causelessstrife as of thrusting my hand into my own furnace; and if there cameon us unlawful violence, its wares would be brought to an ill chosenmarket."

  "May you experience all the domestic happiness which you can conceive,Henry, but with some one more happy than I am!"

  So spoke, or rather so sobbed, the Fair Maiden of Perth, who seemedchoking in the attempt to restrain her tears.

  "You hate me, then?" said the lover, after a pause.

  "Heaven is my witness, no."

  "Or you love some other better?"

  "It is cruel to ask what it cannot avail you to know. But you areentirely mistaken."

  "Yon wildcat, Conachar, perhaps?" said Henry. "I have marked hislooks--"

  "You avail yourself of this painful situation to insult me, Henry,though I have little deserved it. Conachar is nothing to me, more thanthe trying to tame his wild spirit by instruction might lead me totake some interest in a mind abandoned to prejudices and passions, andtherein, Henry, not unlike your own."

  "It must then be some of these flaunting silkworm sirs about thecourt," said the armourer, his natural heat of temper kindling fromdisappointment and vexation--"some of those who think they carry itoff through the height of their plumed bonnets and the jingle of theirspurs. I would I knew which it was that, leaving his natural mates, thepainted and perfumed dames of the court, comes to take his prey amongthe simple maidens of the burgher craft. I would I knew but his name andsurname!"

  "Henry Smith," said Catharine, shaking off the weakness which seemed tothreaten to overpower her a moment before, "this is the language of anungrateful fool, or rather of a frantic madman. I have told you already,there was no one who stood, at the beginning of this conference, morehigh in my opinion than he who is now losing ground with every word heutters in the tone of unjust suspicion and senseless anger. You had notitle to know even what I have told you, which, I pray you to observe,implies no preference to you over others, though it disowns anypreference of another to you. It is enough you should be aware thatthere is as insuperable an objection to what you desire as if anenchanter had a spell over my destiny."

  "Spells may be broken by true men," said, the smith. "I would it werecome to that. Thorbiorn, the Danish armourer, spoke of a spell he hadfor making breastplates, by singing a certain song while the iron washeating. I told him that his runic rhymes were no proof against theweapons which fought at Loncarty--what farther came of it it is needlessto tell, but the corselet and the wearer, and the leech who salved hiswound, know if Henry Gow can break a spell or no."

  Catharine looked at him as if about to return an answer little approvingof the exploit he had vaunted, which the downright smith had notrecollected was of a kind that exposed him to her frequent censure. Butere she had given words to her thoughts, her father thrust his head inat the door.

  "Henry," he said, "I must interrupt your more pleasing affairs, andrequest you to come into my working room in all speed, to consult aboutcertain matters deeply affecting the weal of the burgh."

  Henry, making his obeisance to Catharine, left the apartment upon herfather's summons. Indeed, it was probably in favour of their futurefriendly intercourse, that they were parted on this occasion at theturn which the conversation seemed likely to take. For, as the wooerhad begun to hold the refusal of the damsel as somewhat capricious andinexplicable after the degree of encouragement which, in his opinion,she had afforded; Catharine, on the other hand, considered him ratheras an encroacher upon the grace which she had shown him than one whosedelicacy rendered him deserving of such favour. But there was livingin their bosoms towards each other a reciprocal kindness, which, on thetermination of the dispute, was sure to revive, inducing the maidento forget her offended delicacy, and the lover his slighted warmth ofpassion.