Waverley; Or, 'Tis Sixty Years Since, Walter Scott [important of reading books TXT] 📗
- Author: Walter Scott
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“He had been already deprived of it,” said Mr. Morton.
“But he regrets,” replied Melville, “that the measure had anticipated his resignation. His baggage is seized at his quarters and at Tully-Veolan, and is found to contain a stock of pestilent Jacobitical pamphlets, enough to poison a whole country, besides the unprinted lucubrations of his worthy friend and tutor Mr. Pembroke.”
“He says he never read them,” answered the minister.
“In an ordinary case I should believe him,” replied the magistrate, “for they are as stupid and pedantic in composition as mischievous in their tenets. But can you suppose anything but value for the principles they maintain would induce a young man of his age to lug such trash about with him? Then, when news arrive of the approach of the rebels, he sets out in a sort of disguise, refusing to tell his name; and, if yon old fanatic tell truth, attended by a very suspicious character, and mounted on a horse known to have belonged to Glennaquoich, and bearing on his person letters from his family expressing high rancour against the house of Brunswick, and a copy of verses in praise of one Wogan, who abjured the service of the Parliament to join the Highland insurgents, when in arms to restore the house of Stuart, with a body of English cavalry—the very counterpart of his own plot—and summed up with a “Go thou and do likewise” from that loyal subject, and most safe and peaceable character, Fergus Mac-Ivor of Glennaquoich, Vich Ian Vohr, and so forth. And, lastly,” continued Major Melville, warming in the detail of his arguments, “where do we find this second edition of Cavalier Wogan? Why, truly, in the very track most proper for execution of his design, and pistolling the first of the king’s subjects who ventures to question his intentions.”
Mr. Morton prudently abstained from argument, which he perceived would only harden the magistrate in his opinion, and merely asked how he intended to dispose of the prisoner?
“It is a question of some difficulty, considering the state of the country,” said Major Melville.
“Could you not detain him (being such a gentleman-like young man) here in your own house, out of harm’s way, till this storm blow over?”
“My good friend,” said Major Melville, “neither your house nor mine will be long out of harm’s way, even were it legal to confine him here. I have just learned that the commander-in-chief, who marched into the Highlands to seek out and disperse the insurgents, has declined giving them battle at Coryarrick, and marched on northward with all the disposable force of government to Inverness, John-o’-Groat’s House, or the devil, for what I know, leaving the road to the Low Country open and undefended to the Highland army.”
“Good God!” said the clergyman. “Is the man a coward, a traitor, or an idiot?”
“None of the three, I believe,” answered Melville. “Sir John has the commonplace courage of a common soldier, is honest enough, does what he is commanded, and understands what is told him, but is as fit to act for himself in circumstances of importance as I, my dear parson, to occupy your pulpit.”
This important public intelligence naturally diverted the discourse from Waverley for some time; at length, however, the subject was resumed.
“I believe,” said Major Melville, “that I must give this young man in charge to some of the detached parties of armed volunteers who were lately sent out to overawe the disaffected districts. They are now recalled towards Stirling, and a small body comes this way to-morrow or next day, commanded by the westland man—what’s his name? You saw him, and said he was the very model of one of Cromwell’s military saints.”
“Gilfillan, the Cameronian,” answered Mr. Morton. “I wish the young gentleman may be safe with him. Strange things are done in the heat and hurry of minds in so agitating a crisis, and I fear Gilfillan is of a sect which has suffered persecution without learning mercy.”
“He has only to lodge Mr. Waverley in Stirling Castle,” said the Major; “I will give strict injunctions to treat him well. I really cannot devise any better mode for securing him, and I fancy you would hardly advise me to encounter the responsibility of setting him at liberty.”
“But you will have no objection to my seeing him tomorrow in private?” said the minister.
“None, certainly; your loyalty and character are my warrant. But with what view do you make the request?”
“Simply,” replied Mr. Morton, “to make the experiment whether he may not be brought to communicate to me some circumstances which may hereafter be useful to alleviate, if not to exculpate, his conduct.”
The friends now parted and retired to rest, each filled with the most anxious reflections on the state of the country.
A CONFIDANT
Waverley awoke in the morning from troubled dreams and unrefreshing slumbers to a full consciousness of the horrors of his situation. How it might terminate he knew not. He might be delivered up to military law, which, in the midst of civil war, was not likely to be scrupulous in the choice of its victims or the quality of the evidence. Nor did he feel much more comfortable at the thoughts of a trial before a Scottish court of justice, where he knew the laws and forms differed in many respects from those of England, and had been taught to believe, however erroneously, that the liberty and rights of the subject were less carefully protected. A sentiment of bitterness rose in his mind against the government, which he considered as the cause of his embarrassment and peril, and he cursed internally his scrupulous rejection of Mac-Ivor’s invitation to accompany him to the field.
“Why did not I,” he said to himself, “like other men of honour, take the earliest opportunity to welcome to Britain the descendant of her ancient kings and lineal heir of her throne? Why did not I—
Unthread the rude eye of rebellion,
And welcome home again discarded faith,
Seek out Prince Charles, and fall before his feet?
All that has been recorded of excellence and worth in the house of Waverley has been founded upon their loyal faith to the house of Stuart. From the interpretation which this Scotch magistrate has put upon the letters of my uncle and father, it is plain that I ought to have understood them as marshalling me to the course of my ancestors; and it has been my gross dulness, joined to the obscurity of expression which they adopted for the sake of security, that has confounded my judgment. Had I yielded to the first generous impulse of indignation when I learned that my honour was practised upon, how different had been my present situation! I had then been free and in arms fighting, like my forefathers, for love, for loyalty, and for fame. And now I am here, netted and in the toils, at the disposal of a suspicious, stern, and cold-hearted man, perhaps to be turned over to the solitude of a dungeon or the infamy of a public execution. O, Fergus! how true has your prophecy proved; and how speedy, how very speedy, has been its accomplishment!”
While Edward was ruminating on these painful subjects of contemplation, and very naturally, though not quite so justly, bestowing upon the reigning dynasty that blame which was due to chance, or, in part at least, to his own unreflecting conduct, Mr. Morton availed himself of Major Melville’s permission to pay him an early visit.
Waverley’s first impulse was to intimate a desire that he might not be disturbed with questions or conversation; but he suppressed it upon observing the benevolent and reverend appearance of the clergyman who had rescued him from the immediate violence of the villagers.
“I believe, sir,” said the unfortunate young man, “that in any other circumstances I should have had as much gratitude to express to you as the safety of my life may be worth; but such is the present tumult of my mind, and such is my anticipation of what I am yet likely to endure, that I can hardly offer you thanks for your interposition.”
Mr. Morton replied, that, far from making any claim upon his good opinion, his only wish and the sole purpose of his visit was to find out the means of deserving it. “My excellent friend, Major Melville,” he continued, “has feelings and duties as a soldier and public functionary by which I am not fettered; nor can I always coincide in opinions which he forms, perhaps with too little allowance for the imperfections of human nature.” He paused and then proceeded: “I do not intrude myself on your confidence, Mr. Waverley, for the purpose of learning any circumstances the knowledge of which can be prejudicial either to yourself or to others; but I own my earnest wish is that you would intrust me with any particulars which could lead to your exculpation. I can solemnly assure you they will be deposited with a faithful and, to the extent of his limited powers, a zealous agent.”
“You are, sir, I presume, a Presbyterian clergyman?” Mr. Morton bowed. “Were I to be guided by the prepossessions of education, I might distrust your friendly professions in my case; but I have observed that similar prejudices are nourished in this country against your professional brethren of the Episcopal persuasion, and I am willing to believe them equally unfounded in both cases.”
“Evil to him that thinks otherwise,” said Mr. Morton; “or who holds church government and ceremonies as the exclusive gage of Christian faith or moral virtue.”
“But,” continued Waverley, “I cannot perceive why I should trouble you with a detail of particulars, out of which, after revolving them as carefully as possible in my recollection, I find myself unable to explain much of what is charged against me. I know, indeed, that I am innocent, but I hardly see how I can hope to prove myself so.”
“It is for that very reason, Mr. Waverley,” said the clergyman, “that I venture to solicit your confidence. My knowledge of individuals in this country is pretty general, and can upon occasion be extended. Your situation will, I fear, preclude your taking those active steps for recovering intelligence or tracing imposture which I would willingly undertake in your behalf; and if you are not benefited by my exertions, at least they cannot be prejudicial to you.”
Waverley, after a few minutes’ reflection, was convinced that his reposing confidence in Mr. Morton, so far as he himself was concerned, could hurt neither Mr. Bradwardine nor Fergus Mac-Ivor, both of whom had openly assumed arms against the government, and that it might possibly, if the professions of his new friend corresponded in sincerity with the earnestness of his expression, be of some service to himself. He therefore ran briefly over most of the events with which the reader is already acquainted, suppressing his attachment to Flora, and indeed neither mentioning her nor Rose Bradwardine in the course of his narrative.
Mr. Morton seemed particularly struck with the account of Waverley’s visit to Donald Bean Lean. “I am glad,” he said, “you did not mention this circumstance to the Major. It is capable of great misconstruction on the part of those who do not consider the power of curiosity and the influence of romance as motives of youthful conduct. When I was a young man like you, Mr. Waverley, any such hair-brained expedition (I beg your pardon for the expression) would have had inexpressible charms for me. But there are men in the world who will not believe that danger and fatigue are often incurred without any very adequate cause, and therefore who are sometimes led to assign motives of action entirely foreign to the truth. This
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