“Off or not off, sir, I doesn’t budge a foot. I stays with my young missus.”
“Very well, only let us out of the house.” While preparations were making for a rapid retreat, one of the brigands went up to Jane Somers and whispered, “my carriage is waiting on the bridge. Lady Teysham, and the other ladies at my shooting-box, expect us every moment; so be under no alarm.”
Jane bowed her head and yielded to her destiny, and since that time has been as happy a specimen of the married life as is often to be met with. Ben-na-Groich, on finding out the hoax, was too much afraid of the ridicule of his friends to make it public; and to this hour, Aunt Alice tells the most wondrous tales of the lawlessness of the Highlands, and the blood-thirstiness and revenge characteristic of a Scottish Chieftain. “Only to think of people cherishing a resentment for nearly a thousand years, and only satisfying it at last by marriage or murder. Oh, Mrs Hobbins, never believe what people says when they talk to you about the foodle system—the starvation system would be a much better name for it, for the whole country is made of nothing but heath, and the gentlemen’s clothes is no covering from the cold; and besides all that, they are indelicate to a degree!”——
PRINTED BY WILLIAM BLACKWOOD AND SONS, EDINBURGH.
Footnote:
[A] “Knieving trouts” (they call it tickling in England) is good sport. You go to a stony shallow at night, a companion bearing a torch; then, stripping to the thighs and shoulders, wade in; grope with your hands under the stones, sods, and other harbourage, till you find your game, then gripe him in your “knieve” and toss him ashore.
I remember, when a boy, carrying the splits for a servant of the family, called Sam Wham. Now Sam was an able young fellow, well-boned and willing; a hard-headed cudgel-player, and a marvellous tough wrestler, for he had a backbone like a sea-serpent; this gained him the name of the Twister and Twiner. He had got into the river, and with his back to me, was stooping over a broad stone, when something bolted from under the bank on which I stood, right through his legs. Sam fell with a great splash upon his face, but in falling jammed whatever it was against the stone. “Let go, Twister,” shouted I, “’tis an otter, he will nip a finger off you.”—“Whisht,” sputtered he, as he slid his hand under the water; “may I never read a text again, if he isna a sawmont wi’ a shouther like a hog!”—“Grip him by the gills, Twister,” cried I.—“Saul will I!” cried the Twiner; but just then there was a heave, a roll, a splash, a slap like a pistol-shot; down went Sam, and up went the salmon, spun like a shilling at pitch and toss, six feet into the air. I leaped in just as he came to the water; but my foot caught between two stones, and the more I pulled the firmer it stuck. The fish fell in a spot shallower than that from which he had leaped. Sam saw the chance, and tackled to again; while I, sitting down in the stream as best I might, held up my torch, and cried fair play, as shoulder to shoulder, throughout and about, up and down, roll and tumble, to it they went, Sam and the salmon. The Twister was never so twined before. Yet through crossbuttocks and capsizes innumerable, he still held on; now haled through a pool; now haling up a bank; now heels over head; now head over heels; now head and heels together; doubled up in a corner; but at last stretched fairly on his back, and foaming for rage and disappointment; while the victorious salmon, slapping the stones with his tail, and whirling the spray from his shoulders at every roll, came boring and snoring up the ford. I tugged and strained to no purpose; he flashed by me with a snort, and slid into the deep water. Sam now staggered forward with battered bones and peeled elbows, blowing like a grampus, and cursing like nothing but himself. He extricated me, and we limped home. Neither rose for a week; for I had a dislocated ankle, and the Twister was troubled with a broken rib. Poor Sam! he had his brains discovered at last by a poker in a row, and was worm’s meat within three months; yet, ere he died, he had the satisfaction of feasting on his old antagonist, who was man’s meat next morning. They caught him in a net. Sam knew him by the twist in his tail.