I know not whether it was the nature of my studies, the force of circumstances, or my natural inclination towards high enterprise, that have guided me; but this I may boldly aver, that never, to my knowledge, have I swerved from the proper path which a gentleman of honour and cavalier of spirit ought to pursue in his intercourse with society.
CHAPTER II.
HOW I BECAME A SOLDIER OF FORTUNE.
Having completed my studies at the King's College, I left it in the June of 1626, and returned to my father's house, from which I had been so long absent, and as I felt with bitterness, unregrettedly so, by all save my poor mother, whom to my sorrow I found on the verge of death. She had long been suffering from a pain in her side, and was divining away (as we Scots say,) but I was not prepared to see her only live to bless me, and then close her eyes for ever.
I felt that the only friend I possessed on earth had left both it and me! I was very—very desolate.
Many a ghastly visage, and many a stiffened form, have I seen since that day of grief, which passed so many years ago; but that pale face, and those kind sinking eyes, come vividly before me at times, out of the mist of the years that have gone. My father, as he closed her eyes, averred sorrowfully, "that, had her mouth been larger, she would have respired more freely, and might have lived for ten good years longer;" but she died—and on a bed of pigeons' feathers too, to the dismay of all the wise women in Cromarty; for it is an old superstition, that one cannot die on the feathers of those birds.
Though a numerous host of relations were around that gloomy bed, and crowding the chambers of the old tower, I felt lonely (for such was the miserable prejudice against me), and that I was viewed as somewhat of an alien among them—even by those of my own blood and kindred; and the consciousness of that filled my heart with mingled rage and grief.
My father was cold as ever, the more so, perhaps, as his heart was full of sorrow, and sorrow is ever selfish; but my brothers, Farquhar, Finlay, and Ewen, were colder still with unkind envy, for they had heard such glowing reports of my progress in all those studies which most become a gentleman. Being certain that I had outstripped their slender knowledge, which was confined to the narrow limits of Dominie Daidle's classes, they were so full of jealousy, that our mother had scarcely been lowered down into her dark and lonely home, before these youths, who were now grown into tall and swinging Highlandmen, challenged me to various trials of strength and skill. Though I could easily encounter them with broadsword and target, or with single-stick, Farquhar could beat me at throwing the hammer, and Finlay at tossing the bullet, as Ewen could at bringing down an eagle on the wing with a single shot, or splitting a tree by one blow of a Lochaber axe; for they were all strong as young horses, untamed as mountain goats, and from their cradles had been wont to sup usquebaugh with their porridge.
My mother's funeral was celebrated after the good old fashion of the Highlands, and we buried her by torchlight in the ancient kirk of St. Regulus. Under their chief, Ian Dhu, three hundred of her kinsmen, the M'Farquhars, came down from the hills, with six pipers playing before them, and I shall never forget the sad, low wailing of the lament performed by those mountain minstrels, as the long funeral procession wound by night, along the margin of Cromartie Firth. The pall was emblazoned with sixteen proofs of her gentle blood, and the nearest kinsmen carried her poor remains on a bier, around which all the old women of her own clan, and my father's barony, moved in a melancholy crowd, beating their breasts, tearing their dishevelled hair, and lamenting wildly.
There was no prayer at the grave, because we were old Protestants; but the Seanachie of her father's race pronounced a long oration on her virtues; the M'Farquhars fired their pistols in the air, with an explosion which nearly blew out all the church windows; then followed a frightful shovelling of earth, the careful adjusting of a large stone slab—and all was over.