CHAPTER LXIII
From the time of my evasion from the tolbooth, and during the controversy between James Gottera and the mob in the street, there was a whirlwind in my mind that made me incapable of reason. But when we had passed through the town-end port, and the cart had stopped at the minister's carse till I could throw off my female weeds and put on a sailor's garb, provided for the occasion, tongue nor pen cannot express the passion wherewith my yearning soul was then affected.
The thought of having left Sarah Lochrig within bolts and bars, a ready victim to the tyranny which so thirsted for blood, lightened within me as the lightnings of heaven in a storm. I threw myself on the ground,—I grasped the earth,—I gathered myself as it were into a knot, and howled with horror at my own selfish baseness. I sprung up and cried, "I will save her yet!" and I would have run instanter to the town; but the honest man who was with me laid his grip firmly upon my arm, and said in a solemn manner,—
"This is no Christian conduct, Ringan Gilhaize; the Lord has not forgotten to be gracious."
I glowered upon him, as he has often since told me, with a shudder, and cried, "But I hae left Sarah Lochrig in their hands, and, like a coward, run away to save mysel."
"Compose yoursel, Ringan, and let us reason together," was his discreet reply. "It's vera true ye hae come away and left your wife as it were an hostage in the prison, but the persecutors and oppressors will respek the courageous affection of a loving wife, and Providence will put it in their hearts to spare her."
"And if they do not, what shall I then be? and what's to become of my babies?—Lord, Lord, thou hast tried me beyond my strength!"
And I again threw myself on the earth, and cried that it might open and swallow me; for, thinking but of myself, I was becoming unworthy to live.
The considerate man stood over me in compassionate silence for a season, and allowed me to rave in my frenzy till I had exhausted myself.