Miscellany 77

MISCELLANY No 77

 

CLASSIC SCOTTISH POETRY: II

Although Dorothy and William Wordsworth (and Coleridge) may be home safe in Grasmere, we continue to think Scottish this week, with a (short) Scottish epic poem that became famous.  In order to appreciate it, you need to read it out loud, preferably in a Scots accent, and even better in the style of Private Frazer (John Laurie in Dad’s Army).  More discussion at the end...

Ye Highlands, and ye lawlands,

Oh where have ye been?

They have slain the Earl of Murray,

And layd him on the green.

"Now wae be to thee, Huntly!

And wherefore did you see?

I bade you bring him wi' you,

But forbade you him to slay."

He was a braw gallant,

And he rid at the ring;

And the bonny Earl of Murray,  

Oh he might have been a king!

 He was a braw gallant,

And he play'd at the ba';

And the bonny Earl of Murray

Was the flower among them a'.

He was a braw gallant,

And he play'd at the glove;

And the bonny Earl of Murray,

Oh he was the Queen's love!

Oh lang will his lady

Look o'er the castle Down,

Eer she see the Earl of Murray 

Come sounding thro the town!

This poem gave rise to the invention of the term ‘mondegreen’, a misinterpretation of a phrase as a result of near-homophony, with the ear and the brain combining to try to make sense of an ambiguous group of sounds, especially in a poem or a song. The story goes that an American journalist,  Sylvia Wright, coined the term in 1954, writing about how as a girl she had mis-heard the end of the first verse of this poem, "...and laid him on the green" as "...and Lady Mondegreen", thus:

They have slain the Earl of Murray,

And Lady Mondegreen.

 and had had felt sympathy for Lady Mondegreen who seemed not to have done anything to deserve being slain alongside the Earl of Murray.  

  

 

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No 76

MISCELLANY No 76

 

RECOLLECTIONS OF A TOUR MADE IN SCOTLAND: XIV

 

Wednesday, September 21st.—The house where we lodged was airy, and even cheerful, though one of a line of houses bordering on the churchyard, which is the highest part of the town, overlooking a great portion of it to the opposite hills.  The kirk is, as at Melrose, within the walls of a conventual church; but the ruin is much less beautiful, and the church a very neat one.  The churchyard was full of graves, and exceedingly slovenly and dirty; one most indecent practice I observed: several women brought their linen to the flat table-tombstones, and, having spread it upon them, began to batter as hard as they could with a wooden roller, a substitute for a mangle.

After Mr. Scott’s business in the Courts was over, he walked with us up the Jed—‘sylvan Jed’ it has been properly called by Thomson—for the banks are yet very woody, though wood in large quantities has been felled within a few years.  There are some fine red scars near the river, in one or two of which we saw the entrances to caves, said to have been used as places of refuge in times of insecurity.

Walked up to Ferniehurst, an old hall, in a secluded situation, now inhabited by farmers; the neighbouring ground had the wildness of a forest, being irregularly scattered over with fine old trees.  The wind was tossing their branches, and sunshine dancing among the leaves, and I happened to exclaim, ‘What a life there is in trees!’ on which Mr. Scott observed that the words reminded him of a young lady who had been born and educated on an island of the Orcades, and came to spend a summer at Kelso and in the neighbourhood of Edinburgh.  She used to say that in the new world into which she was come nothing had disappointed her so much as trees and woods; she complained that they were lifeless, silent, and, compared with the grandeur of the ever-changing ocean, even insipid.  At first I was surprised, but the next moment I felt that the impression was natural.  Mr. Scott said that she was a very sensible young woman, and had read much.  She talked with endless rapture and feeling of the power and greatness of the ocean; and with the same passionate attachment returned to her native island without any probability of quitting it again.

The valley of the Jed is very solitary immediately under Ferniehurst; we walked down the river, wading almost up to the knees in fern, which in many parts overspread the forest-ground.  It made me think of our walks at Allfoxden, and of our own park—though at Ferniehurst is no park at present—and the slim fawns that we used to startle from their couching-places among the fern at the top of the hill.  We were accompanied on our walk by a young man from the Braes of Yarrow, an acquaintance of Mr. Scott’s,  who, having been much delighted with some of William’s poems which he had chanced to see in a newspaper, had wished to be introduced to him; he lived in the most retired part of the dale of Yarrow, where he had a farm: he was fond of reading, and well informed, but at first meeting as shy as any of our Grasmere lads, and not less rustic in his appearance.  He had been in the Highlands, and gave me such an account of Loch Rannoch as made us regret that we had not persevered in our journey thither, especially as he told us that the bad road ended at a very little distance from the place where we had turned back, and that we should have come into another good road, continued all along the shore of the lake.  He also mentioned that there was a very fine view from the steeple at Dunkeld.

The town of Jedburgh, in returning along the road, as it is seen through the gently winding narrow valley, looks exceedingly beautiful on its low eminence, surmounted by the conventual tower, which is arched over, at the summit, by light stone-work resembling a coronet; the effect at a distance is very graceful.  The hills all round are high, and rise rapidly from the town, which though it stands considerably above the river, yet, from every side except that on which we walked, appears to stand in a bottom.

We had our dinner sent from the inn, and a bottle of wine, that we might not disgrace the Sheriff, who supped with us in the evening,—stayed late, and repeated some of his poem.

Thursday, September 22d.—After breakfast, the minister, Dr. Somerville, called upon us with Mr. Scott, and we went to the manse, a very pretty house, with pretty gardens, and in a beautiful situation, though close to the town.  Dr. Somerville and his family complained bitterly of the devastation that had been made among the woods within view from their windows, which looked up the Jed.  He conducted us to the church, which under his directions has been lately repaired, and is a very neat place within.  Dr. Somerville spoke of the dirt and other indecencies in the churchyard, and said that he had taken great pains to put a stop to them, but wholly in vain.  The business of the assizes closed this day, and we went into Court to hear the Judge pronounce his charge, which was the most curious specimen of old woman’s oratory and newspaper-paragraph loyalty that was ever heard.  When all was over they returned to the inn in procession, as they had come, to the sound of a trumpet, the Judge first, in his robes of red, the Sheriffs next, in large cocked hats, and inferior officers following, a show not much calculated to awe the beholders.  After this we went to the inn.  The landlady and her sister inquired if we had been comfortable, and lamented that they had not had it in their power to pay us more attention.  I began to talk with them, and found out that they were from Cumberland: they knew Captain and Mrs. Wordsworth, who had frequently been at Jedburgh, Mrs. Wordsworth’s sister having married a gentleman of that neighbourhood.  They spoke of them with great pleasure.  I returned to our lodgings to take leave of the old woman, who told me that I had behaved ‘very discreetly,’ and seemed exceedingly sorry that we were leaving her so soon.  She had been out to buy me some pears, saying that I must take away some ‘Jedderd’ pears.  We learned afterwards that Jedburgh is famous in Scotland for pears, which were first cultivated there in the gardens of the monks.

Mr. Scott was very glad to part from the Judge and his retinue, to travel with us in our car to Hawick; his servant drove his own gig.  The landlady, very kindly, had put up some sandwiches and cheese-cakes for me, and all the family came out to see us depart.  Passed the monastery gardens, which are yet gardens, where there are many remarkably large old pear-trees.  We soon came into the vale of Teviot, which is open and cultivated, and scattered over with hamlets, villages, and many gentlemen’s seats, yet, though there is no inconsiderable quantity of wood, you can never, in the wide and cultivated parts of the Teviot, get rid of the impression of barrenness, and the fir plantations, which in this part are numerous, are for ever at war with simplicity.  One beautiful spot I recollect of a different character, which Mr. Scott took us to see a few yards from the road.  A stone bridge crossed the water at a deep and still place, called Horne’s Pool, from a contemplative schoolmaster, who had lived not far from it, and was accustomed to walk thither, and spend much of his leisure near the river.  The valley was here narrow and woody.  Mr. Scott pointed out to us Ruberslaw, Minto Crags, and every other remarkable object in or near the vale of Teviot, and we scarcely passed a house for which he had not some story.  Seeing us look at one, which stood high on the hill on the opposite side of the river, he told us that a gentleman lived there who, while he was in India, had been struck with the fancy of making his fortune by a new speculation, and so set about collecting the gods of the country, with infinite pains and no little expense, expecting that he might sell them for an enormous price.  Accordingly, on his return they were offered for sale, but no purchasers came.  On the failure of this scheme, a room was hired in London in which to exhibit them as a show; but alas! nobody would come to see; and this curious assemblage of monsters is now, probably, quietly lodged in the vale of Teviot.  The latter part of this gentleman’s history is more affecting:—he had an only daughter, whom he had accompanied into Spain two or three years ago for the recovery of her health, and so for a time saved her from a consumption, which now again threatened her, and he was about to leave his pleasant residence, and attend her once more on the same errand, afraid of the coming winter.

We passed through a village, whither Leyden, Scott’s intimate friend, the author of Scenes of Infancy, was used to walk over several miles of moorland country every day to school, a poor barefooted boy.  He is now in India, applying himself to the study of Oriental literature, and, I doubt not, it is his dearest thought that he may come and end his days upon the banks of Teviot, or some other of the Lowland streams—for he is, like Mr. Scott, passionately attached to the district of the Borders.

Arrived at Hawick to dinner; the inn is a large old house with walls above a yard thick, formerly a gentleman’s house.  Did not go out this evening.

Friday, September 23d.—Before breakfast, walked with Mr. Scott along a high road for about two miles, up a bare hill.  Hawick is a small town.  From the top of the hill we had an extensive view over the moors of Liddisdale, and saw the Cheviot Hills.  We wished we could have gone with Mr. Scott into some of the remote dales of this country, where in almost every house he can find a home and a hearty welcome.  But after breakfast we were obliged to part with him, which we did with great regret: he would gladly have gone with us to Langholm, eighteen miles further.  Our way was through the vale of Teviot, near the banks of the river.

Passed Branxholm Hall, one of the mansions belonging to the Duke of Buccleuch, which we looked at with particular interest for the sake of the Lay of the Last Minstrel.  Only a very small part of the original building remains: it is a large strong house, old, but not ancient in its appearance—stands very near the river-side; the banks covered with plantations.

A little further on, met the Edinburgh coach with several passengers, the only stage-coach that had passed us in Scotland.  Coleridge had come home by that conveyance only a few days before.  The quantity of arable land gradually diminishes, and the plantations become fewer, till at last the river flows open to the sun, mostly through unfenced and untilled grounds, a soft pastoral district, both the hills and the valley being scattered over with sheep: here and there was a single farm-house, or cluster of houses, and near them a portion of land covered with ripe corn.

Near the head of the vale of Teviot, where that stream is but a small rivulet, we descended towards another valley, by another small rivulet.  Hereabouts Mr. Scott had directed us to look about for some old stumps of trees, said to be the place where Johnny Armstrong was hanged; but we could not find them out.  The valley into which we were descending, though, for aught I know, it is unnamed in song, was to us more interesting than the Teviot itself.  Not a spot of tilled ground was there to break in upon its pastoral simplicity; the same soft yellow green spread from the bed of the streamlet to the hill-tops on each side, and sheep were feeding everywhere.  It was more close and simple than the upper end of the vale of Teviot, the valley being much narrower, and the hills equally high and not broken into parts, but on each side a long range.  The grass, as we had first seen near Crawfordjohn, had been mown in the different places of the open ground, where it might chance to be best; but there was no part of the surface that looked perfectly barren, as in those tracts.

We saw a single stone house a long way before us, which we conjectured to be, as it proved, Moss Paul, the inn where we were to bait.  The scene, with this single dwelling, was melancholy and wild, but not dreary, though there was no tree nor shrub; the small streamlet glittered, the hills were populous with sheep; but the gentle bending of the valley, and the correspondent softness in the forms of the hills, were of themselves enough to delight the eye.  At Moss Paul we fed our horse;—several travellers were drinking whisky.  We neither ate nor drank, for we had, with our usual foresight and frugality in travelling, saved the cheese-cakes and sandwiches which had been given us by our countrywoman at Jedburgh the day before.  After Moss Paul, we ascended considerably, then went down other reaches of the valley, much less interesting, stony and barren.  The country afterwards not peculiar, I should think, for I scarcely remember it.

Arrived at Langholm at about five o’clock.  The town, as we approached, from a hill, looked very pretty, the houses being roofed with blue slates, and standing close to the river Esk, here a large river, that scattered its waters wide over a stony channel.  The inn neat and comfortable—exceedingly clean: I could hardly believe we were still in Scotland.

After tea walked out; crossed a bridge, and saw, at a little distance up the valley, Langholm House, a villa of the Duke of Buccleuch: it stands upon a level between the river and a steep hill, which is planted with wood.  Walked a considerable way up the river, but could not go close to it on account of the Duke’s plantations, which are locked u When they ended, the vale became less cultivated; the view through the vale towards the hills very pleasing, though bare and cold.

Saturday, September 24th.—Rose very early and travelled about nine miles to Longtown, before breakfast, along the banks of the Esk.  About half a mile from Langholm crossed a bridge.  At this part of the vale, which is narrow, the steeps are covered with old oaks and every variety of trees.  Our road for some time through the wood, then came to a more open country, exceedingly rich and populous; the banks of the river frequently rocky, and hung with wood; many gentlemen’s houses.  There was the same rich variety while the river continued to flow through Scottish grounds; but not long after we had passed through the last turnpike gate in Scotland and the first in England—but a few yards asunder—the vale widens, and its aspect was cold, and even dreary, though Sir James Graham’s plantations are very extensive.  His house, a large building, stands in this open part of the vale.  Longtown was before us, and ere long we saw the well-remembered guide-post, where the circuit of our six weeks’ travels had begun, and now was ended.

We did not look along the white line of the road to Solway Moss without some melancholy emotion, though we had the fair prospect of the Cumberland mountains full in view, with the certainty, barring accidents, of reaching our own dear home the next day.  Breakfasted at the Graham’s Arms.  The weather had been very fine from the time of our arrival at Jedburgh, and this was a very pleasant day.  The sun ‘shone fair on Carlisle walls’ when we first saw them from the top of the opposite hill.  Stopped to look at the place on the sand near the bridge where Hatfield had been executed.  Put up at the same inn as before, and were recognised by the woman who had waited on us.  Everybody spoke of Hatfield as an injured man.  After dinner went to a village six miles further, where we slept.

Sunday, September 25th, 1803.—A beautiful autumnal day.  Breakfasted at a public-house by the road-side; dined at Threlkeld; arrived at home between eight and nine o’clock, where we found Mary in perfect health, Joanna Hutchinson with her, and little John asleep in the clothes-basket by the fire.

SONNET

 

COMPOSED BETWEEN DALSTON AND GRASMERE,
SEPTEMBER 25th, 1803.

Fly, some kind spirit, fly to Grasmere Vale!
Say that we come, and come by this day’s light
Glad tidings!—spread them over field and height,
But, chiefly, let one Cottage hear the tale!
There let a mystery of joy prevail,
The kitten frolic with unruly might,
And Rover whine as at a second sight
Of near-approaching good, that will not fail:
And from that Infant’s face let joy appear;
Yea, let our Mary’s one companion child,
That hath her six weeks’ solitude beguiled
With intimations manifold and dear,
While we have wander’d over wood and wild—
Smile on its Mother now with bolder cheer!

Home again at Grasmere.

Earth has not anything to show more fair. 

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No 75

MISCELLANY No 75

 

RECOLLECTIONS OF A TOUR MADE IN SCOTLAND: XIII

 

Wednesday, September 14th.—Rose early, and departed before breakfast.  The morning was dry, but cold.  Travelled as before, along the shores of Loch Lubnaig, and along the pass of the roaring stream of Leny, and reached Callander at a little past eight o’clock.  After breakfast set off towards Stirling, intending to sleep there; the distance eighteen miles.  We were now entering upon a populous and more cultivated country, having left the mountains behind, therefore I shall have little to tell; for what is most interesting in such a country is not to be seen in passing through it as we did.  Half way between Callander and Stirling is the village of Doune, and a little further on we crossed a bridge over a pleasant river, the Teith.  Above the river stands a ruined castle of considerable size, upon a woody bank.  We wished to have had time to go up to the ruin.  Long before we reached the town of Stirling, saw the Castle, single, on its stately and commanding eminence.  The rock or hill rises from a level plain; the print in Stoddart’s book does indeed give a good notion of its form.  The surrounding plain appears to be of a rich soil, well cultivated.  The crops of ripe corn were abundant.  We found the town quite full; not a vacant room in the inn, it being the time of the assizes: there was no lodging for us, and hardly even the possibility of getting anything to eat in a bye-nook of the house.  Walked up to the Castle.  The prospect from it is very extensive, and must be exceedingly grand on a fine evening or morning, with the light of the setting or rising sun on the distant mountains, but we saw it at an unfavourable time of day, the mid-afternoon, and were not favoured by light and shade.  The Forth makes most intricate and curious turnings, so that it is difficult to trace them, even when you are overlooking the whole.  It flows through a perfect level, and in one place cuts its way in the form of a large figure of eight.  Stirling is the largest town we had seen in Scotland, except Glasgow.  It is an old irregular place; the streets towards the Castle on one side very stee On the other, the hill or rock rises from the fields.  The architecture of a part of the Castle is very fine, and the whole building in good repair: some parts indeed, are modern.  At Stirling we bought Burns’s Poems in one volume, for two shillings.  Went on to Falkirk, ten or eleven miles.  I do not recollect anything remarkable after we were out of sight of Stirling Castle, except the Carron Ironworks, seen at a distance;—the sky above them was red with a fiery light.  In passing through a turnpike gate we were greeted by a Highland drover, who, with many others, was coming from a fair at Falkirk, the road being covered all along with horsemen and cattle.  He spoke as if we had been well known to him, asking us how we had fared on our journey.  We were at a loss to conceive why he should interest himself about us, till he said he had passed us on the Black Mountain, near King’s House.  It was pleasant to observe the effect of solitary places in making men friends, and to see so much kindness, which had been produced in such a chance encounter, retained in a crowd.  No beds in the inns at Falkirk—every room taken up by the people come to the fair.  Lodged in a private house, a neat clean place—kind treatment from the old man and his daughter.

Thursday, September 15th.—Breakfasted at Linlithgow, a small town.  The house is yet shown from which the Regent Murray was shot.  The remains of a royal palace, where Queen Mary was born, are of considerable extent; the banks of gardens and fish-ponds may yet be distinctly traced, though the whole surface is transformed into smooth pasturage where cattle graze.  The castle stands upon a gentle eminence, the prospect not particularly pleasing, though not otherwise; it is bare and wide.  The shell of a small ancient church is standing, into which are crammed modern pews, galleries, and pulpit—very ugly, and discordant with the exterior.  Nothing very interesting till we came to Edinburgh.  Dined by the way at a small town or village upon a hill, the back part of the houses on one side overlooking an extensive prospect over flat corn fields.  I mention this for the sake of a pleasant hour we passed sitting on the bank, where we read some of Burns’s poems in the volume which we had bought at Stirling.

Arrived at Edinburgh a little before sunset.  As we approached, the Castle rock resembled that of Stirling—in the same manner appearing to rise from a plain of cultivated ground, the Firth of Forth being on the other side, and not visible.  Drove to the White Hart in the Grass-market, an inn which had been mentioned to us, and which we conjectured would better suit us than one in a more fashionable part of the town.  It was not noisy, and tolerably chea Drank tea, and walked up to the Castle, which luckily was very near.  Much of the daylight was gone, so that except it had been a clear evening, which it was not, we could not have seen the distant prospect.

Friday, September 6th.—The sky the evening before, as you may remember the ostler told us, had been ‘gay and dull,’ and this morning it was downright dismal: very dark, and promising nothing but a wet day, and before breakfast was over the rain began, though not heavily.  We set out upon our walk, and went through many streets to Holyrood House, and thence to the hill called Arthur’s Seat, a high hill, very rocky at the top, and below covered with smooth turf, on which sheep were feeding.  We climbed up till we came to St. Anthony’s Well and Chapel, as it is called, but it is more like a hermitage than a chapel,—a small ruin, which from its situation is exceedingly interesting, though in itself not remarkable.  We sate down on a stone not far from the chapel, overlooking a pastoral hollow as wild and solitary as any in the heart of the Highland mountains: there, instead of the roaring of torrents, we listened to the noises of the city, which were blended in one loud indistinct buzz,—a regular sound in the air, which in certain moods of feeling, and at certain times, might have a more tranquillizing effect upon the mind than those which we are accustomed to hear in such places.  The Castle rock looked exceedingly large through the misty air: a cloud of black smoke overhung the city, which combined with the rain and mist to conceal the shapes of the houses,—an obscurity which added much to the grandeur of the sound that proceeded from it.  It was impossible to think of anything that was little or mean, the goings-on of trade, the strife of men, or every-day city business:—the impression was one, and it was visionary; like the conceptions of our childhood of Bagdad or Balsora when we have been reading the Arabian Nights’ Entertainments.  Though the rain was very heavy we remained upon the hill for some time, then returned by the same road by which we had come, through green flat fields, formerly the pleasure-grounds of Holyrood House, on the edge of which stands the old roofless chapel, of venerable architecture.  It is a pity that it should be suffered to fall down, for the walls appear to be yet entire.  Very near to the chapel is Holyrood House, which we could not but lament has nothing ancient in its appearance, being sash-windowed and not an irregular pile.  It is very like a building for some national establishment,—a hospital for soldiers or sailors.  You have a description of it in Stoddart’s Tour, therefore I need not tell you what we saw there.

When we found ourselves once again in the streets of the city, we lamented over the heavy rain, and indeed before leaving the hill, much as we were indebted to the accident of the rain for the peculiar grandeur and affecting wildness of those objects we saw, we could not but regret that the Firth of Forth was entirely hidden from us, and all distant objects, and we strained our eyes till they ached, vainly trying to pierce through the thick mist.  We walked industriously through the streets, street after street, and, in spite of wet and dirt, were exceedingly delighted.  The old town, with its irregular houses, stage above stage, seen as we saw it, in the obscurity of a rainy day, hardly resembles the work of men, it is more like a piling up of rocks, and I cannot attempt to describe what we saw so imperfectly, but must say that, high as my expectations had been raised, the city of Edinburgh far surpassed all expectation.  Gladly would we have stayed another day, but could not afford more time, and our notions of the weather of Scotland were so dismal, notwithstanding we ourselves had been so much favoured, that we had no hope of its mending.  So at about six o’clock in the evening we departed, intending to sleep at an inn in the village of Roslin, about five miles from Edinburgh.  The rain continued till we were almost at Roslin; but then it was quite dark, so we did not see the Castle that night.

Saturday, September 17th.—The morning very fine.  We rose early and walked through the glen of Roslin, past Hawthornden, and considerably further, to the house of Mr. Walter Scott at Lasswade.  Roslin Castle stands upon a woody bank above a stream, the North Esk, too large, I think, to be called a brook, yet an inconsiderable river.  We looked down upon the ruin from higher ground.  Near it stands the Chapel, a most elegant building, a ruin, though the walls and roof are entire.  I never passed through a more delicious dell than the glen of Roslin, though the water of the stream is dingy and muddy.  The banks are rocky on each side, and hung with pine wood.  About a mile from the Castle, on the contrary side of the water, upon the edge of a very steep bank, stands Hawthornden, the house of Drummond the poet, whither Ben Jonson came on foot from London to visit his friend.  We did hear to whom the house at present belongs, and some other particulars, but I have a very indistinct recollection of what was told us, except that many old trees had been lately cut down.  After Hawthornden the glen widens, ceases to be rocky, and spreads out into a rich vale, scattered over with gentlemen’s seats.

Arrived at Lasswade before Mr. and Mrs. Scott had risen, and waited some time in a large sitting-room.  Breakfasted with them, and stayed till two o’clock, and Mr. Scott accompanied us back almost to Roslin, having given us directions respecting our future journey, and promised to meet us at Melrose two days after.

We ordered dinner on our return to the inn, and went to view the inside of the Chapel of Roslin, which is kept locked up, and so preserved from the injuries it might otherwise receive from idle boys; but as nothing is done to keep it together, it must in the end fall.  The architecture within is exquisitely beautiful.  The stone both of the roof and walls is sculptured with leaves and flowers, so delicately wrought that I could have admired them for hours, and the whole of their groundwork is stained by time with the softest colours.  Some of those leaves and flowers were tinged perfectly green, and at one part the effect was most exquisite: three or four leaves of a small fern, resembling that which we call adder’s tongue, grew round a cluster of them at the top of a pillar, and the natural product and the artificial were so intermingled that at first it was not easy to distinguish the living plant from the other, they being of an equally determined green, though the fern was of a deeper shade.

We set forward again after dinner.  The afternoon was pleasant.  Travelled through large tracts of ripe corn, interspersed with larger tracts of moorland—the houses at a considerable distance from each other, no longer thatched huts, but farm-houses resembling those of the farming counties in England, having many corn-stacks close to them.  Dark when we reached Peebles; found a comfortable old-fashioned public-house, had a neat parlour, and drank tea.

 

SIXTH WEEK.

 

Sunday, September 8th.—The town of Peebles is on the banks of the Tweed.  After breakfast walked up the river to Neidpath Castle, about a mile and a half from the town.  The castle stands upon a green hill, overlooking the Tweed, a strong square-towered edifice, neglected and desolate, though not in ruin, the garden overgrown with grass, and the high walls that fenced it broken down.  The Tweed winds between green steeps, upon which, and close to the river side, large flocks of sheep pasturing; higher still are the grey mountains; but I need not describe the scene, for William has done it better than I could do in a sonnet which he wrote the same day; the five last lines, at least, of his poem will impart to you more of the feeling of the place than it would be possible for me to do:—

Degenerate Douglass! thou unworthy Lord
Whom mere despite of heart could so far please,
And love of havoc (for with such disease
Fame taxes him) that he could send forth word
To level with the dust a noble horde,
A brotherhood of venerable trees,
Leaving an ancient Dome and Towers like these
Beggar’d and outraged!  Many hearts deplored
The fate of those old trees; and oft with pain
The Traveller at this day will stop and gaze
On wrongs which Nature scarcely seems to heed;
For shelter’d places, bosoms, nooks, and bays,
And the pure mountains, and the gentle Tweed,
And the green silent pastures yet remain.

I was spared any regret for the fallen woods when we were there, not then knowing the history of them.  The soft low mountains, the castle, and the decayed pleasure-grounds, the scattered trees which have been left in different parts, and the road carried in a very beautiful line along the side of the hill, with the Tweed murmuring through the unfenced green pastures spotted with sheep, together composed an harmonious scene, and I wished for nothing that was not there.  When we were with Mr. Scott he spoke of cheerful days he had spent in that castle not many years ago, when it was inhabited by Professor Ferguson and his family, whom the Duke of Queensberry, its churlish owner, forced to quit it.  We discovered a very fine echo within a few yards of the building.

The town of Peebles looks very pretty from the road in returning: it is an old town, built of grey stone, the same as the castle.  Well-dressed people were going to church.  Sent the car before, and walked ourselves, and while going along the main street William was called aside in a mysterious manner by a person who gravely examined him—whether he was an Irishman or a foreigner, or what he was; I suppose our car was the occasion of suspicion at a time when every one was talking of the threatened invasion.  We had a day’s journey before us along the banks of the Tweed, a name which has been sweet to my ears almost as far back as I can remember anything.  After the first mile or two our road was seldom far from the river, which flowed in gentleness, though perhaps never silent; the hills on either side high and sometimes stony, but excellent pasturage for shee In some parts the vale was wholly of this pastoral character, in others we saw extensive tracts of corn ground, even spreading along whole hill-sides, and without visible fences, which is dreary in a flat country; but there is no dreariness on the banks of the Tweed,—the hills, whether smooth or stony, uncultivated or covered with ripe corn, had the same pensive softness.  Near the corn tracts were large farm-houses, with many corn-stacks; the stacks and house and out-houses together, I recollect, in one or two places upon the hills, at a little distance, seemed almost as large as a small village or hamlet.  It was a clear autumnal day, without wind, and, being Sunday, the business of the harvest was suspended, and all that we saw, and felt, and heard, combined to excite one sensation of pensive and still pleasure.

Passed by several old halls yet inhabited, and others in ruin; but I have hardly a sufficiently distinct recollection of any of them to be able to describe them, and I now at this distance of time regret that I did not take notes.  In one very sweet part of the vale a gate crossed the road, which was opened by an old woman who lived in a cottage close to it; I said to her, ‘You live in a very pretty place!’  ‘Yes,’ she replied, ‘the water of Tweed is a bonny water.’  The lines of the hills are flowing and beautiful, the reaches of the vale long; in some places appear the remains of a forest, in others you will see as lovely a combination of forms as any traveller who goes in search of the picturesque need desire, and yet perhaps without a single tree; or at least if trees there are, they shall be very few, and he shall not care whether they are there or not.

The road took us through one long village, but I do not recollect any other; yet I think we never had a mile’s length before us without a house, though seldom several cottages together.  The loneliness of the scattered dwellings, the more stately edifices decaying or in ruin, or, if inhabited, not in their pride and freshness, aided the general effect of the gently varying scenes, which was that of tender pensiveness; no bursting torrents when we were there, but the murmuring of the river was heard distinctly, often blended with the bleating of shee In one place we saw a shepherd lying in the midst of a flock upon a sunny knoll, with his face towards the sky,—happy picture of shepherd life.

The transitions of this vale were all gentle except one, a scene of which a gentleman’s house was the centre, standing low in the vale, the hills above it covered with gloomy fir plantations, and the appearance of the house itself, though it could scarcely be seen, was gloomy.  There was an allegorical air—a person fond of Spenser will understand me—in this uncheerful spot, single in such a country,

‘The house was hearsed about with a black wood.’

We have since heard that it was the residence of Lord Traquair, a Roman Catholic nobleman, of a decayed family.

We left the Tweed when we were within about a mile and a half or two miles of Clovenford, where we were to lodge.  Turned up the side of a hill, and went along sheep-grounds till we reached the spot—a single stone house, without a tree near it or to be seen from it.  On our mentioning Mr. Scott’s name the woman of the house showed us all possible civility, but her slowness was really amusing.  I should suppose it is a house little frequented, for there is no appearance of an inn.  Mr. Scott, who she told me was a very clever gentleman, ‘goes there in the fishing season;’ but indeed Mr. Scott is respected everywhere: I believe that by favour of his name one might be hospitably entertained throughout all the borders of Scotland.  We dined and drank tea—did not walk out, for there was no temptation; a confined barren prospect from the window.

At Clovenford, being so near to the Yarrow, we could not but think of the possibility of going thither, but came to the conclusion of reserving the pleasure for some future time, in consequence of which, after our return, William wrote the poem which I shall here transcribe:—

From Stirling Castle we had seen
The mazy Forth unravell’d,
Had trod the banks of Clyde and Tay,
And with the Tweed had travell’d.
And when we came to Clovenford,
Then said my winsome Marrow,
‘Whate’er betide we’ll turn aside
And see the Braes of Yarrow.’

‘Let Yarrow Folk frae Selkirk Town,
Who have been buying, selling,
Go back to Yarrow:—’tis their own,
Each Maiden to her dwelling.
On Yarrow’s banks let herons feed,
Hares couch, and rabbits burrow,
But we will downwards with the Tweed,
Nor turn aside to Yarrow.

‘There’s Gala Water, Leader Haughs,
Both lying right before us;
And Dryburgh, where with chiming Tweed
The lintwhites sing in chorus.
There’s pleasant Teviot Dale, a land
Made blithe with plough and harrow,
Why throw away a needful day,
To go in search of Yarrow?

‘What’s Yarrow but a river bare,
That glides the dark hills under?
There are a thousand such elsewhere,
As worthy of your wonder.’
Strange words they seem’d of slight and scorn,
My true-love sigh’d for sorrow,
And look’d me in the face to think
I thus could speak of Yarrow.

‘Oh! green,’ said I, ‘are Yarrow’s Holms,
And sweet is Yarrow flowing,
Fair hangs the apple frae the rock,
But we will leave it growing.
O’er hilly path and open Strath
We’ll wander Scotland thorough,
But though so near we will not turn
Into the Dale of Yarrow.

‘Let beeves and home-bred kine partake
The sweets of Burnmill Meadow,
The swan on still St. Mary’s Lake
Float double, swan and shadow.
We will not see them, will not go,
To-day nor yet to-morrow;
Enough if in our hearts we know
There’s such a place as Yarrow.

‘Be Yarrow stream unseen, unknown,
It must, or we shall rue it,
We have a vision of our own,
Ah! why should we undo it?
The treasured dreams of times long past,
We’ll keep them, “winsome Marrow,”
For when we’re there, although ’tis fair,
’Twill be another Yarrow.

‘If care with freezing years should come,
And wandering seem but folly,
Should we be loth to stir from home,
And yet be melancholy,
Should life be dull and spirits low,
’Twill soothe us in our sorrow
That earth has something yet to show—
The bonny Holms of Yarrow.’

The next day we were to meet Mr. Scott, and again join the Tweed.  I wish I could have given you a better idea of what we saw between Peebles and this place.  I have most distinct recollections of the effect of the whole day’s journey; but the objects are mostly melted together in my memory, and though I should recognise them if we revisit the place, I cannot call them out so as to represent them to you with distinctness.  William, in attempting in verse to describe this part of the Tweed, says of it,

More pensive in sunshine
Than others in moonshine.

which perhaps may give you more power to conceive what it is than all I have said.

Monday, September 19th.—We rose early, and went to Melrose, six miles, before breakfast.  After ascending a hill, descended, and overlooked a dell, on the opposite side of which was an old mansion, surrounded with trees and steep gardens, a curious and pleasing, yet melancholy spot; for the house and gardens were evidently going to decay, and the whole of the small dell, except near the house, was unenclosed and uncultivated, being a sheep-walk to the top of the hills.  Descended to Gala Water, a pretty stream, but much smaller than the Tweed, into which the brook flows from the glen I have spoken of.  Near the Gala is a large modern house, the situation very pleasant, but the old building which we had passed put to shame the fresh colouring and meagre outline of the new one.  Went through a part of the village of Galashiels, pleasantly situated on the bank of the stream; a pretty place it once has been, but a manufactory is established there; and a townish bustle and ugly stone houses are fast taking place of the brown-roofed thatched cottages, of which a great number yet remain, partly overshadowed by trees.  Left the Gala, and, after crossing the open country, came again to the Tweed, and pursued our way as before near the river, perhaps for a mile or two, till we arrived at Melrose.  The valley for this short space was not so pleasing as before, the hills more broken, and though the cultivation was general, yet the scene was not rich, while it had lost its pastoral simplicity.  At Melrose the vale opens out wide; but the hills are high all round—single distinct risings.  After breakfast we went out, intending to go to the Abbey, and in the street met Mr. Scott, who gave us a cordial greeting, and conducted us thither himself.  He was here on his own ground, for he is familiar with all that is known of the authentic history of Melrose and the popular tales connected with it.  He pointed out many pieces of beautiful sculpture in obscure corners which would have escaped our notice.  The Abbey has been built of a pale red stone; that part which was first erected of a very durable kind, the sculptured flowers and leaves and other minute ornaments being as perfect in many places as when first wrought.  The ruin is of considerable extent, but unfortunately it is almost surrounded by insignificant houses, so that when you are close to it you see it entirely separated from many rural objects, and even when viewed from a distance the situation does not seem to be particularly happy, for the vale is broken and disturbed, and the Abbey at a distance from the river, so that you do not look upon them as companions of each other.  And surely this is a national barbarism: within these beautiful walls is the ugliest church that was ever beheld—if it had been hewn out of the side of a hill it could not have been more dismal; there was no neatness, nor even decency, and it appeared to be so damp, and so completely excluded from fresh air, that it must be dangerous to sit in it; the floor is unpaved, and very rough.  What a contrast to the beautiful and graceful order apparent in every part of the ancient design and workmanship!  Mr. Scott went with us into the gardens and orchards of a Mr. Riddel, from which we had a very sweet view of the Abbey through trees, the town being entirely excluded.  Dined with Mr. Scott at the inn; he was now travelling to the assizes at Jedburgh in his character of Sheriff of Selkirk, and on that account, as well as for his own sake, he was treated with great respect, a small part of which was vouchsafed to us as his friends, though I could not persuade the woman to show me the beds, or to make any sort of promise till she was assured from the Sheriff himself that he had no objection to sleep in the same room with William.

Tuesday, September 20th.—Mr. Scott departed very early for Jedburgh, and we soon followed, intending to go by Dryburgh to Kelso.  It was a fine morning.  We went without breakfast, being told that there was a public-house at Dryburgh.  The road was very pleasant, seldom out of sight of the Tweed for any length of time, though not often close to it.  The valley is not so pleasantly defined as between Peebles and Clovenford, yet so soft and beautiful, and in many parts pastoral, but that peculiar and pensive simplicity which I have spoken of before was wanting, yet there was a fertility chequered with wildness which to many travellers would be more than a compensation.  The reaches of the vale were shorter, the turnings more rapid, the banks often clothed with wood.  In one place was a lofty scar, at another a green promontory, a small hill skirted by the river, the hill above irregular and green, and scattered over with trees.  We wished we could have brought the ruins of Melrose to that spot, and mentioned this to Mr. Scott, who told us that the monks had first fixed their abode there, and raised a temporary building of wood.  The monastery of Melrose was founded by a colony from Rievaux Abbey in Yorkshire, which building it happens to resemble in the colour of the stone, and I think partly in the style of architecture, but is much smaller, that is, has been much smaller, for there is not at Rievaux any one single part of the ruin so large as the remains of the church at Melrose, though at Rievaux a far more extensive ruin remains.  It is also much grander, and the situation at present much more beautiful, that ruin not having suffered like Melrose Abbey from the encroachments of a town.  The architecture at Melrose is, I believe, superior in the exactness and taste of some of the minute ornamental parts; indeed, it is impossible to conceive anything more delicate than the workmanship, especially in the imitations of flowers.

We descended to Dryburgh after having gone a considerable way upon high ground.  A heavy rain when we reached the village, and there was no public-house.  A well-dressed, well-spoken woman courteously—shall I say charitably?—invited us into her cottage, and permitted us to make breakfast; she showed us into a neat parlour, furnished with prints, a mahogany table, and other things which I was surprised to see, for her husband was only a day-labourer, but she had been Lady Buchan’s waiting-maid, which accounted for these luxuries and for a noticeable urbanity in her manners.  All the cottages in this neighbourhood, if I am not mistaken, were covered with red tiles, and had chimneys.  After breakfast we set out in the rain to the ruins of Dryburgh Abbey, which are near Lord Buchan’s house, and, like Bothwell Castle, appropriated to the pleasure of the owner.  We rang a bell at the gate, and, instead of a porter, an old woman came to open it through a narrow side-alley cut in a thick plantation of evergreens.  On entering, saw the thatch of her hut just above the trees, and it looked very pretty, but the poor creature herself was a figure to frighten a child,—bowed almost double, having a hooked nose and overhanging eyebrows, a complexion stained brown with smoke, and a cap that might have been worn for months and never washed.  No doubt she had been cowering over her peat fire, for if she had emitted smoke by her breath and through every pore, the odour could not have been stronger.  This ancient woman, by right of office, attended us to show off the curiosities, and she had her tale as perfect, though it was not quite so long a one, as the gentleman Swiss, whom I remember to have seen at Blenheim with his slender wand and dainty white clothes.  The house of Lord Buchan and the Abbey stand upon a large flat peninsula, a green holm almost covered with fruit-trees.  The ruins of Dryburgh are much less extensive than those of Melrose, and greatly inferior both in the architecture and stone, which is much mouldered away.  Lord Buchan has trained pear-trees along the walls, which are bordered with flowers and gravel walks, and he has made a pigeon-house, and a fine room in the ruin, ornamented with a curiously-assorted collection of busts of eminent men, in which lately a ball was given; yet, deducting for all these improvements, which are certainly much less offensive than you could imagine, it is a very sweet ruin, standing so enclosed in wood, which the towers overtop, that you cannot know that it is not in a state of natural desolation till you are close to it.  The opposite bank of the Tweed is steep and woody, but unfortunately many of the trees are firs.  The old woman followed us after the fashion of other guides, but being slower of foot than a younger person, it was not difficult to slip away from the scent of her poor smoke-dried body.  She was sedulous in pointing out the curiosities, which, I doubt not, she had a firm belief were not to be surpassed in England or Scotland.

Having promised us a sight of the largest and oldest yew-tree ever seen, she conducted us to it; it was a goodly tree, but a mere dwarf compared with several of our own country—not to speak of the giant of Lorton.  We returned to the cottage, and waited some time in hopes that the rain would abate, but it grew worse and worse, and we were obliged to give up our journey, to Kelso, taking the direct road to Jedburgh.

We had to ford the Tweed, a wide river at the crossing-place.  It would have been impossible to drive the horse through, for he had not forgotten the fright at Connel Ferry, so we hired a man to lead us.  After crossing the water, the road goes up the bank, and we had a beautiful view of the ruins of the Abbey, peering above the trees of the woody peninsula, which, in shape, resembles that formed by the Tees at Lickburn, but is considerably smaller.  Lord Buchan’s house is a very neat, modest building, and almost hidden by trees.  It soon began to rain heavily.  Crossing the Teviot by a stone bridge—the vale in that part very wide—there was a great deal of ripe corn, but a want of trees, and no appearance of richness.  Arrived at Jedburgh half an hour before the Judges were expected out of Court to dinner.

We gave in our passport—the name of Mr. Scott, the Sheriff—and were very civilly treated, but there was no vacant room in the house except the Judge’s sitting-room, and we wanted to have a fire, being exceedingly wet and cold.  I was conducted into that room, on condition that I would give it up the moment the Judge came from Court.  After I had put off my wet clothes I went up into a bedroom, and sate shivering there, till the people of the inn had procured lodgings for us in a private house.

We were received with hearty welcome by a good woman, who, though above seventy years old, moved about as briskly as if she was only seventeen.  Those parts of the house which we were to occupy were neat and clean; she showed me every corner, and, before I had been ten minutes in the house, opened her very drawers that I might see what a stock of linen she had; then asked me how long we should stay, and said she wished we were come for three months.  She was a most remarkable person; the alacrity with which she ran up-stairs when we rung the bell, and guessed at, and strove to prevent, our wants was surprising; she had a quick eye, and keen strong features, and a joyousness in her motions, like what used to be in old Molly when she was particularly elated.  I found afterwards that she had been subject to fits of dejection and ill-health: we then conjectured that her overflowing gaiety and strength might in part be attributed to the same cause as her former dejection.  Her husband was deaf and infirm, and sate in a chair with scarcely the power to move a limb—an affecting contrast!  The old woman said they had been a very hard-working pair; they had wrought like slaves at their trade—her husband had been a currier; and she told me how they had portioned off their daughters with money, and each a feather-bed, and that in their old age they had laid out the little they could spare in building and furnishing that house, and she added with pride that she had lived in her youth in the family of Lady Egerton, who was no high lady, and now was in the habit of coming to her house whenever she was at Jedburgh, and a hundred other things; for when she once began with Lady Egerton, she did not know how to stop, nor did I wish it, for she was very entertaining.  Mr. Scott sate with us an hour or two, and repeated a part of the Lay of the Last Minstrel.  When he was gone our hostess came to see if we wanted anything, and to wish us good-night.  On all occasions her manners were governed by the same spirit: there was no withdrawing one’s attention from her.  We were so much interested that William, long afterwards, thought it worth while to express in verse the sensations which she had excited, and which then remained as vividly in his mind as at the moment when we lost sight of Jedburgh:—

Age! twine thy brows with fresh spring flowers,
And call a train of laughing Hours;
And bid them dance, and bid them sing,
And Thou, too, mingle in the Ring!
Take to thy heart a new delight!
If not, make merry in despite
That one should breathe who scorns thy power.
—But dance! for under Jedborough Tower
A Matron dwells who, tho’ she bears
Our mortal complement of years,
Lives in the light of youthful glee,
And she will dance and sing with thee.

Nay! start not at that Figure—there!
Him who is rooted to his Chair!
Look at him, look again; for He
Hath long been of thy Family.
With legs that move not, if they can,
And useless arms, a Trunk of Man,
He sits, and with a vacant eye;
A Sight to make a Stranger sigh!
Deaf, drooping, such is now his doom;
His world is in that single room—
Is this a place for mirthful cheer?
Can merry-making enter here?

The joyous Woman is the Mate
Of him in that forlorn estate;
He breathes a subterraneous damp;
But bright as Vesper shines her lamp,
He is as mute as Jedborough Tower,
She jocund as it was of yore
With all its bravery on, in times
When all alive with merry chimes
Upon a sun-bright morn of May
It roused the Vale to holiday.

I praise thee, Matron! and thy due
Is praise, heroic praise and true.
With admiration I behold
Thy gladness unsubdued and bold:
Thy looks, thy gestures, all present
The picture of a life well spent;
This do I see, and something more,
A strength unthought of heretofore.
Delighted am I for thy sake,
And yet a higher joy partake:
Our human nature throws away
Its second twilight, and looks gay,
A Land of promise and of pride
Unfolding, wide as life is wide.

Ah! see her helpless Charge! enclosed
Within himself as seems, composed;
To fear of loss and hope of gain,
The strife of happiness and pain—
Utterly dead! yet in the guise
Of little Infants when their eyes
Begin to follow to and fro
The persons that before them go,
He tracks her motions, quick or slow.
Her buoyant spirits can prevail
Where common cheerfulness would fail.
She strikes upon him with the heat
Of July suns; he feels it sweet;
An animal delight, though dim!
’Tis all that now remains for him!

I look’d, I scann’d her o’er and o’er,
And, looking, wondered more and more:
When suddenly I seem’d to espy
A trouble in her strong black eye,
A remnant of uneasy light,
A flash of something over-bright!
Not long this mystery did detain
My thoughts.  She told in pensive strain
That she had borne a heavy yoke,
Been stricken by a twofold stroke;
Ill health of body, and had pined
Beneath worse ailments of the mind.

So be it!—but let praise ascend
To Him who is our Lord and Friend!
Who from disease and suffering
As bad almost as Life can bring,
Hath call’d for thee a second Spring;
Repaid thee for that sore distress
By no untimely joyousness;
Which makes of thine a blissful state;
And cheers thy melancholy Mate!

 To be continued

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