The Antiquary — Complete, Walter Scott [best novels for beginners .TXT] 📗
- Author: Walter Scott
Book online «The Antiquary — Complete, Walter Scott [best novels for beginners .TXT] 📗». Author Walter Scott
“The lassie!—the puir sweet, lassie!” said the old man: “mony such a night have I weathered at hame and abroad, but, God guide us, how can she ever win through it!”
His apprehension was communicated in smothered accents to Lovel; for with the sort of freemasonry by which bold and ready spirits correspond in moments of danger, and become almost instinctively known to each other, they had established a mutual confidence.—“I’ll climb up the cliff again,” said Lovel—“there’s daylight enough left to see my footing; I’ll climb up, and call for more assistance.”
“Do so, do so, for Heaven’s sake!” said Sir Arthur eagerly.
“Are ye mad?” said the mendicant: “Francie o’ Fowlsheugh, and he was the best craigsman that ever speel’d heugh (mair by token, he brake his neck upon the Dunbuy of Slaines), wodna hae ventured upon the Halket-head craigs after sun-down—It’s God’s grace, and a great wonder besides, that ye are not in the middle o’ that roaring sea wi’ what ye hae done already—I didna think there was the man left alive would hae come down the craigs as ye did. I question an I could hae done it mysell, at this hoar and in this weather, in the youngest and yaldest of my strength—But to venture up again—it’s a mere and a clear tempting o’ Providence.”
“I have no fear,” answered Lovel; “I marked all the stations perfectly as I came down, and there is still light enough left to see them quite well—I am sure I can do it with perfect safety. Stay here, my good friend, by Sir Arthur and the young lady.”
“Dell be in my feet then,” answered the bedesman sturdily; “if ye gang, I’ll gang too; for between the twa o’ us, we’ll hae mair than wark eneugh to get to the tap o’ the heugh.”
“No, no—stay you here and attend to Miss Wardour—you see Sir Arthur is quite exhausted.”
“Stay yoursell then, and I’ll gae,” said the old man;—“let death spare the green corn and take the ripe.”
“Stay both of you, I charge you,” said Isabella, faintly; “I am well, and can spend the night very well here—I feel quite refreshed.” So saying, her voice failed her—she sunk down, and would have fallen from the crag, had she not been supported by Lovel and Ochiltree, who placed her in a posture half sitting, half reclining, beside her father, who, exhausted by fatigue of body and mind so extreme and unusual, had already sat down on a stone in a sort of stupor.
“It is impossible to leave them,” said Lovel—“What is to be done?—Hark! hark!—did I not hear a halloo?”
“The skreigh of a Tammie Norie,” answered Ochiltree—“I ken the skirl weel.”
“No, by Heaven!” replied Lovel, “it was a human voice.”
A distant hail was repeated, the sound plainly distinguishable among the various elemental noises, and the clang of the sea-mews by which they were surrounded. The mendicant and Lovel exerted their voices in a loud halloo, the former waving Miss Wardour’s handkerchief on the end of his staff to make them conspicuous from above. Though the shouts were repeated, it was some time before they were in exact response to their own, leaving the unfortunate sufferers uncertain whether, in the darkening twilight and increasing storm, they had made the persons who apparently were traversing the verge of the precipice to bring them assistance, sensible of the place in which they had found refuge. At length their halloo was regularly and distinctly answered, and their courage confirmed, by the assurance that they were within hearing, if not within reach, of friendly assistance.
CHAPTER EIGHTH. There is a cliff, whose high and bending head Looks fearfully on the confined deep; Bring me but to the very brim of it, And I’ll repair the misery thou dost bear. King Lear.
The shout of human voices from above was soon augmented, and the gleam of torches mingled with those lights of evening which still remained amidst the darkness of the storm. Some attempt was made to hold communication between the assistants above and the sufferers beneath, who were still clinging to their precarious place of safety; but the howling of the tempest limited their intercourse to cries as inarticulate as those of the winged denizens of the crag, which shrieked in chorus, alarmed by the reiterated sound of human voices, where they had seldom been heard.
On the verge of the precipice an anxious group had now assembled. Oldbuck was the foremost and most earnest, pressing forward with unwonted desperation to the very brink of the crag, and extending his head (his hat and wig secured by a handkerchief under his chin) over the dizzy height, with an air of determination which made his more timorous assistants tremble.
“Haud a care, haud a care, Monkbarns!” cried Caxon, clinging to the skirts of his patron, and withholding him from danger as far as his strength permitted—“God’s sake, haud a care!—Sir Arthur’s drowned already, and an ye fa’ over the cleugh too, there will be but ae wig left in the parish, and that’s the minister’s.”
“Mind the peak there,” cried Mucklebackit, an old fisherman and smuggler—“mind the peak—Steenie, Steenie Wilks, bring up the tackle—I’se warrant we’ll sune heave them on board, Monkbarns, wad ye but stand out o’ the gate.”
“I see them,” said Oldbuck—“I see them low down on that flat stone—Hilli-hilloa, hilli-ho-a!”
“I see them mysell weel eneugh,” said Mucklebackit; “they are sitting down yonder like hoodie-craws in a mist; but d’yo think ye’ll help them wi’ skirling that gate like an auld skart before a flaw o’ weather?—Steenie, lad, bring up the mast—Od, I’se hae them up as we used to bouse up the kegs o’ gin and brandy lang syne—Get up the pickaxe, make a step for the mast—make the chair fast with the rattlin—haul taught and belay!”
The fishers had brought with them the mast of a boat, and as half of the country fellows about had now appeared, either out of zeal or curiosity, it was soon sunk in the ground, and sufficiently secured. A yard across the upright mast, and a rope stretched along it, and reeved through a block at each end, formed an extempore crane, which afforded the
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