with a force and a stroke loud and painful in the extreme,
struck first ten, then eleven, then twelve; but there was no return. Again and again were voices heard commingling with the tempest's rush; again and again did the outer door seem to move backwards on its hinges; but nothing entered save the shrill pipe of the blast, accompanied by the comminuted drift, which penetrated through every seam and cranny. This state of uncertainty was awful; even the ascertained reality of death, partial or universal, had perhaps less of soul-benumbing cold in it than this inconceivable suspense. It required Willie Wilson's utmost efforts and mine to keep the frantic woman from madly rushing into the drift; and the voice of lamentation was sad and loud amongst the children and the servant lasses—each of the latter class lamented, indeed, the fate of all, but there was always an under prayer offered up for the safety of Geordie, or Will, or Jamie, in particular. At last the three lads who had encompassed the Dod arrived—alive, indeed, but almost breathless and frozen to death. They had, however, surmounted incredible difficulties, and had succeeded in placing their hirsel in a position of comparative security; but where were Jamie Hogg and the guidman? The violence of the storm had nothing abated, the snow was every moment accumulating, and the danger and difficulty increasing tenfold. Spirits, heat, and friction gradually restored the three lads to their senses, and to the kind attentions of their several favourites of the female order; but there sat the mother and the daughter, whilst the father was either, in all probability, dead or dying. The very thought was distracting; and, accordingly, the young bride, now turning to her lover with a look of inexpressible anguish, exclaimed—
"O Willie! my ain dear Willie, ye maun gang, after a', ye maun gang this instant," (Willie was on his feet and plaided whilst yet the sentence was unfinished,) "and try to rescue my dear, dear faither from this awfu' and untimely
end; but tak care, oh tak care o' the big Scaur, and keep far west by Caplecleuch, and maybe ye'll meet them coming back that way." These last words were lost in the drift, whilst Willie Wilson, with his faithful follower, Rover, were penetrating, and flouncing, and floundering their way towards the place pointed out.
In about half an hour after this, the howl and scratch of a dog were heard at the door-back, and Help immediately rushed in, the welcome forerunner of his master and Hogg. They had, indeed, had a fearful struggle, and fearful wanderings; but, in endeavouring to avoid the dangerous, because precipitous, Head Scaur, they had wandered from the track, and from the object of their travel; and, after having been inclined once or twice to lie down and take a rest (the deceitful messenger of death), they had at last got upon the track of Caple Water; and, by keeping to its windings—which they had often traced at the risk of being drowned—they had at last weathered the old cham'er, the byre, and peat-stack, and were now, thank God! within "bigget wa's."
But where, alas! was Willie Wilson? Him, in consequence of their deviations, they had missed; and over him, thus exposed, the tempest was still renewing at intervals its hurricane gusts. There was one scream heard, such as would have penetrated the heart of a tiger, and all was still. There she lay, the beauteous, but now marble bride; her head reposing on her mother's lap, her lips pale as the snowdrop, her eyes fixed and soulless, her cheek without a tint, and her mouth half-open and breathless. Long, long was the withdrawment—again and again was the dram-glass applied to the mouth, to catch the first expiration of returning breath—ere the frame began to quiver, the hands to move, the lips and cheeks to colour, and the eyes to indicate the approaching return to reason and perception.
"I have killed him! I have killed him!" were the first frantic accents. "I have murdered, murdered my dear Willie! It was me that sent him—forced him—compelled him out—out into the drift—the cold, cold drift. Away!" added the maniac—"away! I'll go after him—I'll perish with him—where he lies, there will I lie, and there will I be buried. What! is there none of ye that will make an effort to save a perishing—a choking—oh, my God! a suffocating man?"
Hereupon she again sank backwards, and was prevented from falling by the arms of a father.
"O my child!" said parental love and affection—"O my dear wean!—oh, be patient!—God is guid—He has preserved us all—He will not desert him in the hour of his need—He neither slumbers nor sleeps—His hand is not shortened that He cannot save—and what He can, He will—He never deserted any that trusted in Him. O my child! my bairn!—my first-born!—be patient—be patient. There—there—there is a scratch at the door-back—it is Rover."