Frank Osbaldistone had nearly reached the entrance to his uncle's house when he met the beautiful Diana Vernon. Miss Cranstoun, afterwards the Countess of Purgstall, one of Scott's early friends in the social circles of Edinburgh, was thought by many to be the original of Diana,—a belief which she herself shared, chiefly because she was an expert horsewoman. Others have said that Scott's first love was the real Diana. But Miss Vernon is totally unlike either Margaret of Branksome or Matilda of Rokeby, both of whom were, to some extent, portraits of Miss Williamina Stuart. Moreover, in the unexpected meeting of a charming young woman on horseback, her long black hair streaming in the breeze, her animated face glowing with the exercise, and her costume attractively arranged in the most striking fashion, there is a strong suggestion of the circumstances to which I have previously referred,[[1]] under which the poet first met the future Lady Scott.
The next day after our visit to Chillingham we followed the footsteps of Frank Osbaldistone to Glasgow, where we soon found the cathedral to which Frank was conducted by Andrew Fairservice. It well justifies the old gardener's encomium: 'Ah! it's a brave kirk—none o' yere whigmaleeries and curliewurlies and open steek hems about it!—a' solid, weel-jointed mason-wark, that will stand as lang as the warld, keep hands and gunpowther aff it.' A part of the present building was erected in 1175. It has been the scene of some important events in Scottish history. At Christmas of 1301, Edward I of England, on his campaign against Scotland, made offerings at the high altar. Five years later, Robert Bruce stood before the same altar and was there absolved for the murder of his rival, the Red Comyn, at Dumfries.
The cathedral is supported by sixty-five pillars, some of them eighteen feet in circumference. The effect of these huge masses is to throw the crypt into almost total darkness except in the parts near the narrow stained-glass windows. To make my photograph I set up the camera, opened the shutter, and left a workman to keep watch while I went to luncheon. Returning in an hour I shut off the exposure and realized later that two hours would have been better.
In this dark crypt it was formerly the custom to hold services. While standing in front of one of the huge pillars, listening to the sermon, Frank Osbaldistone heard the mysterious voice of Rob Roy, warning him that his life was in danger. Turning quickly he could see no one. I could never understand this scene until I saw the crypt. The large size of the pillars and the dense shadows which they cast would make it easy for one to disappear in the darkness as Rob Roy was supposed to do.
On High Street, Glasgow, we found an old tower, which was a part of the Tolbooth, where Rob Roy had his curious interview with Bailie Nicol Jarvie. The old Salt Market has changed greatly since the days of the good Bailie and his father, the deacon, and it is no longer necessary at night to be escorted along the city streets by a young maidservant with a lantern.
Rob Roy's parting injunction to Frank was 'forget not the clachan of Aberfoyle.' We therefore made it our business to find that interesting spot, combining it, as did Scott, with our investigation of the scenery of 'The Lady of the Lake.' The portion of the Scottish Highlands generally included in the so-called Rob Roy country comprises all that part of central Perthshire from Loch Ard and the river Forth on the south to Strath Fillan and Glen Dochart on the north, and from Loch Lubnaig on the east to Loch Lomond on the west. This region, so easily accessible to us by means of carriages and automobiles, was in the time of Rob Roy not only difficult to approach, but exceedingly dangerous. The only highways of travel were narrow defiles through the mountains, easy enough, perhaps, for the experienced and hardy clansman, who knew every twist and turn of the paths, but as impassable to the unguided Lowlander or 'Sassenach' as the tablelands of Tibet.
Frank Osbaldistone and Bailie Nicol Jarvie, guided by the officious and rascally, but always laughable, Andrew Fairservice, are supposed to enter the hamlet of Aberfoyle by crossing an old stone bridge over the Forth. It is the bridge which Scott doubtless crossed when he visited the place, and is still standing, but it had not been built in the time of Rob Roy. That, however, was one of those details which never interested Sir Walter to any great extent.
We approached from the opposite direction, driving over the hills from the Trossachs and pausing just above the village to view the splendid valley to the westward, the termination of which was the mountain peak of Ben Lomond. Arriving at Aberfoyle, we were fortunately spared the necessity of stopping at an inn such as the novelist describes, where the worthy Bailie valiantly defended himself against a too aggressive Highlander, by wielding a red-hot poker so vigorously as to burn a hole in his opponent's plaid. But the enterprising landlord of the modern hotel near the bridge capitalizes the incident by exhibiting the identical poker, which he has attached to the limb of a tree, thereby recalling Scott's story of the keeper of a museum who showed the very sword with which Balaam was about to kill his ass. A visitor interrupted him with the remark that Balaam did not possess a sword; he only wished for one. 'True, sir,' was the ready reply, 'but this is the very sword he wished for.'
There are two groups of old cottages in Aberfoyle, corresponding closely with those described in the novel.
The miserable little bourocks (or heap of rocks) as the Bailie termed them, of which about a dozen formed the village called the clachan of Aberfoyle, were composed of loose stones, cemented by clay instead of mortar, and thatched by tufts, laid rudely upon rafters formed of native and unhewn birches and oaks from the woods around. The roofs approached the ground so nearly, that Andrew Fairservice observed, we might have ridden over the village the night before, and never found out we were near it, unless our horses' feet had 'gane through the riggin'.'