When the last Laird of Ravenswood to Ravenswood shall ride,
And woo a dead maiden to be his bride,
He shall stable his steed in the Kelpie's flow
And his name shall be lost for evermoe.
After the tragedy in the Castle, young Ravenswood rode out to meet the bride's brother, Colonel Ashton, to fight a duel on the sands of Wolf's Hope. In the agitated state of his mind, he neglected the precaution of keeping on the firm sands near the rocks, and took a shorter and more dangerous course. Horse and man disappeared in the deadly quicksands, and thus was the prophecy fulfilled. Only a large sable feather was found as a sign of the young man's dreadful fate. Old Caleb took it up, dried it, and put it in his bosom. Thus ended the tale which Lockhart considered 'the most pure and powerful of all the tragedies that Scott ever penned.'
[[1]] From Robert Chambers's Illustrations of the Author of Waverley.
[[2]] In a note to the introduction to the Chronicles of the Canongate, Scott says, 'I would particularly intimate the Kaim of Uric, on the eastern coast of Scotland, as having suggested an idea for the tower called Wolf's Crag, which the public more generally identified with the ancient tower of Fast Castle.'
[[3]] From Provincial Antiquities of Scotland.
CHAPTER XVI
A LEGEND OF MONTROSE
Dalgetty—Dugald Dalgetty; Ritt-master Dugald Dalgetty of Drumthwacket; learned graduate of the Mareschal College, Aberdeen; stalwart soldier; cavalier of fortune; lieutenant under that invincible monarch, the bulwark of the Protestant faith, the Lion of the North, the terror of Austria, Gustavus Adolphus; Captain Dalgetty; and finally Sir Dugald Dalgetty—stalks with egregious effrontery through the pages of this novel, from start to finish, dragging his good horse Gustavus along with him. He is a bore,—undeniably so. Yet we can laugh at his eccentricities in spite of their tediousness, especially when reading the novel a second time after the desire to know the outcome of the story has been satisfied. As an original character he stands by the side of Bailie Nicol Jarvie, although he does not arouse the same subtle feeling of delightful satisfaction. The Bailie is always welcome, but Dalgetty is everlastingly in the way. And yet we could not possibly get along without him. We can forgive his pedantry and overlook his interminable lectures on military strategy in view of the loyalty and courage with which he faces Argyle in the dungeon, compels that nobleman to furnish a means of escape and rescues Ranald of the Mist. Nor can we help admiring the very effrontery of the man, when he uses it to such excellent advantage in cajoling the Presbyterian chaplain, thereby causing that worthy man to furnish the one thing needed to facilitate his safe retreat. The story might well have been called, as it is in the Italian and Portuguese versions, 'A Soldier of Fortune,' for Dalgetty, rather than Montrose, is the real hero. In this connection it is curious to note that, in so far as its chief incidents concern Montrose, the tale is not a legend, but history. The two important words of the title are both, therefore, slightly misleading.
The journey into the Highlands of the Marquis of Montrose, in disguise and attended by only two gentlemen, is a matter of history. It was in 1644, during the Civil War, when the forces of Charles I were being menaced by an army of twenty thousand men under the Scotch Covenanter, General Leslie. Montrose urged Charles to make a counter-demonstration in the North and to draw Leslie back to the defence of Scotland by uniting the Highlanders with a strong force of ten thousand Irish Catholics. At length, armed with extraordinary powers, as the representative of the King, he was permitted to set out with a small army of about one thousand men. These became dissatisfied, however, and most of them deserted. In despair Montrose now resolved upon the bold stroke which proved to be the beginning of his brilliant military record. Disguised as a groom and attended only by Sir William Rollo and Colonel Sibbald, he made his way to the Perthshire Highlands, where he was joined by Lord Kilpont, son of the Earl of Airth and Menteith, with about five hundred men. The Irish troops, after being in danger of complete extermination by the Marquis of Argyle, finally arrived, but mustered only twelve hundred men instead of ten thousand. They were ordered to march to Blair Atholl, where Montrose met the Highland chiefs and sent out the call to arms. The 'fiery cross,' no doubt very much as described in 'The Lady of the Lake,' went out from house to house and from clan to clan, and Montrose soon had an army of three thousand men. He marched toward Perth, and at Tippermuir, four miles west of that city, defeated the Covenanters on the 1st day of September, 1644. Marching rapidly towards Aberdeen, he won another victory at the Bridge of Dee on the 12th of the same month.