The incident which we have just described was unobserved by any other party but those concerned in it; or, at least, if it was observed, it was not understood; and in this predicament also stood he who had the best opportunity of seeing it—namely, the laird. He saw all that passed between Jones and the fiddler; but he could not make out what it meant; nor did he seem to concern himself about discovering it. Having got the fiddle into his possession, the laird commenced tuning it with great assiduity, and with a bow stroke that showed he was well practised in the use of the instrument. The tuning effected to his mind, he struck up, with great vigour, a ranting Scotch reel, which he played with uncommon spirit and skill. At first, the novelty of the measure took the greater part of the audience by surprise. For a time they could make nothing of it; but music being a universal language, both the spirit and rhythm of the tune soon began to be perceived and appreciated; and, with a little schooling from Jones, who seemed not only to understand the music, but to be delighted with it, the dancers were placed in the order of a reel; and, by a vigilant superintendence of their motions on the part of the latter, they contrived to get through the figure with tolerable correctness. All were delighted with the new dance. It was repeated again and again, and every time with increased success, and a diminishing necessity for the interference of Jones, who, having entered fully into the spirit of the mirthful train, whooped and yelled as vociferously as ever the laird had done. His enthusiasm was infectious; all caught it—even the broad-beamed wife of Vander Tromp, who moved under the inspiring influence of the laird's bow with an agility that no one could have believed her ponderous person capable of; while the others, including mine portly host himself, flung, and flew, and shuffled, as madly as the witches in the midnight dance in Alloway Kirk. The spell, in short, of the laird's music was complete, and each owned the hilarious spirit which it was so well calculated to diffuse over all who were within reach of its influence—in other words, over all who were within hearing of the laird's admirably-played fiddle. Inspired with additional glee by these indications of the powerful effect of his music, the laird still further heightened its influence by breaking out, as he played, into short, abrupt shouts, which were responded to, from time to time, by the male dancers, but with most especial emphasis by Jones, who seemed to be, altogether, at the very acme of human enjoyment.
It was while the revellers were thus dinning the drowsy ear of night with their obstreperous mirth, and while they were yet in the full career of enjoyment, that four persons suddenly entered the kitchen of the Drouthsloken. They were in the garb of seamen, wearing large, shaggy pea-jackets, and low, round-crowned, glazed hats, with circular flaps projecting behind. Although, however, all were dressed nearly alike, there was one who evidently took the lead amongst them. He was a young man, and had an air of authority in his manner to which the rest seemed to pay deference. Some differences, too, in his outer habiliments, notwithstanding of the general resemblance that prevailed in this particular, pointed him out as of a superior grade to the others. This person was not unknown to the inmates of the house. He was recognised as Captain Hagedorn of the Jungfrau of Rotterdam—a man of fierce, irascible temper, and an ardent, although not very acceptable, admirer of Juliana. On his entrance, therefore, he was immediately greeted as an acquaintance by Tromp, his wife, and their two daughters—by Juliana, however, with an evident confusion and embarrassment of manner. To these greetings, Hagedorn vouchsafed the return only of a surly and unintelligible muttering, while he proceeded to provide himself with a chair, on which he placed himself directly opposite the one-eyed minstrel, at whom he threw, from time to time, looks of the most malignant ferocity.
All, especially Juliana, who had reasons for fearing the worst, seemed impressed with the belief that the fellow was bent on mischief, and that he had come there for the especial purpose. Of this they were more convinced, on observing the brass-tipped sheaths of cutlasses projecting from beneath the pea-jackets of the intruders. Their fears were not long of being realised.
"Tromp," said Hagedorn (we take the liberty of translating, in this, and all other similar cases), "I thought you kept a regular, decent house. Such is the character you pretend to, at any rate."
"And such," replied Tromp, with a blush of honest indignation, "is the character I maintain. Who shall gainsay it?"
"Why, there are some things going on here to-night that don't look much like it," replied Hagedorn. "Know ye, Tromp, or does Juliana know, who this one-eyed gallant is?" pointing to the late serenader.
"Whether they do or not, they shall soon know, and so shall you to your cost, Hagedorn!" replied the minstrel, starting to his feet, and hastily stripping off the disguise, eye-patch and all, in which he was enveloped; a proceeding which discovered to the astonished onlookers—not, however, including either Jones or Juliana, who had a previous knowledge of his identity—a tall, handsome, gentlemanly-looking young man, well known as Sir Lionel Musgrave, one of the gayest and most respected of those English gentlemen who shared the misfortunes and exile of Charles II. during the existence of the Commonwealth.
"Ha!" said Hagedorn, starting to his feet, on Musgrave discovering himself. "So, I have unearthed the fox, eh!" And, as he spoke, he made a grasp at Musgrave's throat; which the latter evaded by adroitly stepping back a pace, when he instantly drew his sword and made a pass at Hagedorn, who, however, skilfully warded it off with his cutlass, to which he had had recourse the moment he missed his hold of his antagonist. These proceedings were, of course, a signal to all the other men in the apartment to muster on their respective sides; and this they instantly did. Hagedorn's men immediately drew; Jones and his party did the same; and the women ran screaming from the scene of the impending contest. In one instant after, a general melée commenced. There were deep oaths, overturning of tables, and clashing of swords in every direction, and all the other characteristics of a tremendous and very serious hubbub. Blows, too, were not wanting. They fell thick and fast on all sides.
Hitherto our friend the laird had remained an idle, but sufficiently-astonished spectator of the strange and sudden scene that had been thus brought before his visual organs. Though an idle, he was not altogether, however, a mute witness of the proceedings that were going forward.
"'Od! this is a queer business!" he muttered to himself. "Wha on earth wad hae thocht that yon blin-ee'd, broken-doon-lookin soul o' a fiddler wad hae turned oot a braw young swanky like that? Na, na, that'll no do," suddenly added the laird, and now referring to the circumstance of Jones being hard pressed by two of the intruders. "Twa on ane—that'll never do." And the laird looked around him for some weapon wherewith he might compensate the odds against his friend. Nothing of this kind more efficient than the tongs presenting itself, the laird leaped down from the table on which he had been perched in the quality of musician, and, seizing the afore-mentioned instrument by the feet, advanced upon the foe, shouting, "Stan to them, Jones! stan to them, lad! till I gie them a taste o' the tangs!" And, in the same instant, he discharged a blow at the head of one of Jones' assailants that laid him senseless on the floor. Finding his first effort so successful, the laird repeated the experiment on the prostrate man's companion with precisely the same result. Down he went also with a fractured skull. "That's the way!" shouted the laird, now greatly excited by his own destructive exertions; "ca' them down like nine-pins! Soop them aff the face o' the yearth!"