The Black Colonel

by James Milne

Nor would there be much to divide your monarchy; only a chimney, reeking blue into the grey sky, from a fire of peat, a few sheep, or some hardly [Transcriber's note: hardy?] cattle turned out in the height of the day to gather what scraps of food they might, a pair of wandering red deer at the same hard game of finding a living, or a hare, grown bluish-white for the winter-time, to resemble the friendly snow, scampering off before the snap of your foot on the heather. When the rigour of winter lies upon the land, men and women can do little but keep their beasts alive, and themselves sit round the fire, passing the slow time of day with what gossip may be made.

We froze within the old walls of Corgarff Castle, for they were time and weather worn. Gales had beaten them, snowstorms had driven at them, and rains had lashed them, until they were corrugated with furrows and hollows, like the face of an ancient man. It is curious how age, whether in a face or in a building, takes on the same milestones of hollow and hillock, to record the march of time and the dents in a soul.

But come the summer in Corgarff, and the far-flung ranges of hill lose their white severity and assume the kindlier mantle of sprouting heather and green grass; the ptarmigan flies back to its heights above the snow-line, content with the thin picking and the splendid peace which summer there provides; the red deer no more falls hungrily upon the lower pastures, with the roaring fight gone out of the stags and the hinds left bleating to their own company, like so many widowed women of the wild.

Instead, the thin sheep of the clansmen, each with its owner's brand to identify it, wander forth to the common grazings, glad that the bloom of living is on Nature again. That brings a panorama of scenery which lights the eye and braces the heart and mind, hills which run into mountains, mountains which run into the skies, all proclaiming the splendour of God.

Now, I have tried to tell you this, not very well, perhaps, because our surroundings in life have much to do with our actions, and the two sets of circumstance must be comprehended together, especially in a sparsely peopled countryside. You unconsciously take your dispositions from the atmosphere, and you cannot be certain always where you may either begin or end. Thus a simple Highland ball which we soldiers organized at Corgarff Castle, to while away a night, and be a token of friendliness towards our neighbours, developed a deep import in my true story.

It was natural for me to smooth and sweeten, as far as I could, the relations between those in formal authority whom I represented, and the local clan-folk. To that end I organized this dance in the ancient Castle, and made it known that anybody and everybody would be welcome. Any misgiving I had about the response, was balanced by my knowledge of the Highland fondness for dancing. It has been in the Celtic blood from the beginning of time; and gillie-callum, over the swords, the throbbing, squeezing, square reel, the sultry Highland Schottische, and the rest of the figures, will last until the last trump sounds the last morning.

You dance for the joy of life, if you are born in a land of the sun, and in a land of cold you dance for the joy which springs from warmth. It is a primal expression of feeling, and the Scottish Highlanders have always had beautiful dances, and danced them well; dances with the music of sex in them, though they might not admit it, or did not know it. Religion and dancing have often been the only things in their lives, apart from the common round of fighting and working, when they cared for work. Thus, my ball, though it might be an affair of the enemy, had a subtle call to the Highland blood, especially in the women.

My first invitation was to Marget Forbes and her mother, because, if I could only persuade them to be present everything would be well. Let the ladies of the ancient great house come, and there was no reason why the commonalty should stay away. The times had been sorrowful for mother and daughter, as the black they wore betokened, but, I wrote gently, "We must let the dead bury their dead, and try and build some bridge on which the living may meet."

So it was arranged that Marget, the young chieftainess of the Corgarff Forbeses, with her mother, should open the ball. This news was out a week before the event, and we soon learned that, as I had thought, we should have a good muster of guests. I took my soldier men entirely into my confidence, and they grew keen to make the dance a success, being kindly fellows and open to softer adventures, as well as the other kind.

They were collectively to be hosts, and whoever crossed the doorstep on the night was to be received without prejudice and with all honour. Everybody should have what we could give to eat and drink, and when they set home again it would be from a warm welcome and a sincere good-bye. Ah! if I could only have foreseen one acceptance of that general invitation to the countryside; but I didn't, and how could I? Men are not gods in wisdom, and how dull life would be it they were; how dull especially for their women-folk who, thanks be, are not always angels, except of light, and even they know how to darken the radiance.