Having started a wild boar out of this forest, it took a westerly course towards Kingsmuir (which, as its name implies, also belonged to the crown), and the party set off in hot pursuit. This muir, now highly cultivated, was, at the time to which we refer, a waste or common of little value, and on which many of the neighbouring proprietors, in consequence, claimed a servitude right of pasturage; but it was under an officer of the crown, styled "Heritable Keeper of the Kingsmuir." Here, then, while engaged in the exciting sport of the chase of the boar (which, in the end, was killed at Kingscairn Mill), a deer, a fox, and a wild cat also broke cover, and the attention of the hunters and hounds being thus divided, the party separated, and the king found himself alone upon the muir.
David was in the prime of life—a very handsome man, and of princely bearing, and, while thus unattended and unknown, he met with a lovely young shepherdess in a lonely part of the muir, tending her father's sheep. The name of the young woman, he found, was Maude, or Matilda, and, having inquired of her where she abode, he departed, resolving to cultivate the acquaintance he had thus accidentally formed. He frequently visited the shepherdess after this (who was entirely ignorant of his rank), in the capacity of a private gentleman, and her conversation was his delight. There was something mysterious to him in her deportment and her accomplishments: she possessed the strictest innocence and the most dignified bearing without the slightest embarrassment. Though plainly attired, "grace was in all her steps," and every action exhibited courtly propriety and ease. Though her observations were chiefly confined to her flocks, and to rural affairs, yet she would occasionally surprise the king with her remarks upon astronomy, history, geography, morals, and agriculture, which bespoke a mind informed far above the common level. Being thus engaging in her mind and manners, it was not to be wondered at that every additional visit increased the love and affection of the astonished king, whose dignity was her torture. His passion grew stronger every day.
The king was captivated with her charms. Honour, however, governed his actions, and subjected his wishes to the control of virtue: he wished to raise her to an exalted situation, not to triumph over her innocence—in short, he wished to make her his royal bride; but this seemed impossible, and he returned dejected to his Castle of Crail. He regretted that high rank should now stand in the way of his happiness, and almost wished he had not been born a king. He consulted the Lord of Douglas, his prime minister, urged the beauty, the virtue, the genius of Matilda, but all in vain; the reply was, that policy and prudence required him to seek a union with some exalted character—an alliance with the daughter of a powerful and wealthy prince; and that, were he to place a shepherdess on the throne, his nobles would be disgusted, and quit his court, and in all probability proceed by open violence to resent the supposed insult to their dignity. The king admitted that what was said was too likely to be the fact, and at the same time reprobated that pride which deemed an alliance with obscure and untitled virtue disgraceful; but he knew the prejudices of his nobility were unconquerable, and he submitted with great reluctance to his fate. His friends—and amongst others the Lairds of Cambo, Anstruther, Grangemuir, and Balcombie, the Provost of Crail, and Prior of St Rufus, the remains of whose chapel may still be seen a little eastward of Crail, near Roome Bay, and whose well (called the Prior's Well) is yet resorted to occasionally by the good people of the Nethergate—those friends, we say, tried in vain to divert the king's thoughts, and alleviate his distress. They informed him of the great antiquity of the burgh—that it was a place of note in the ninth century. They conveyed him on horseback to the Dane's Dyke, the remains of a bulwark of stones thrown up by our Danish invaders in one night, where human bones, in great quantities, are yet cast up by the plough on the farm of Kilmining; and they then passed on to the Cave of Balcombie Sands, where they told him one of his majesty's predecessors, Constantine, the Scottish king, was beheaded by the Danes, in the year 871, he having been taken prisoner in a skirmish, while the enemy were retreating. The party then visited the Castle of Balcombie, a lofty and extensive pile of building, of immense strength and remote antiquity, where, in after years, Mary of Guise was hospitably entertained, on landing, after a tempestuous passage, at Fifeness-haven, in order to be married to King James V. From hence King David proceeded to Airdrie, or Ard-rhi—a name which in the Celtic language denotes "the king's height"—then a favourite royal hunting-station on the borders of Kingsmuir; and, returning to Crail, the Runic Cross was not forgotten.[9]
It were endless to tell of all the devices resorted to by his friends to alleviate the king's melancholy. The greatest beauties of the castle courted his smiles without effect. Their charms seemed but to remind him of the superior fascinations of his beloved Matilda. Nothing seemed to remain to him but the trying task of parting, perhaps for ever, from his captivating shepherdess.
The king often thought of asking Matilda for the story of her life, but dreaded that the narrative would but confirm his misery. Upon one of his visits, he missed her at the accustomed spot, but found a venerable old man attending the sheep in her place. The king anxiously inquired for Matilda, and was informed that she was visiting a family in the neighbourhood.
The family which she had gone to visit lived in an unpretending mansion beautifully situated on a ridge of rising ground, which stretches from east to west, nearly through the middle of what is now the Parish of Carnbee. This ridge rises in different places into hills of a beautiful conical form, and are green and verdant to the summit; these are Carnbee-law, Kellie-law. Gillingshill, and Cunner-law. It was to Gillingshill Matilda had directed her steps, and, occupying as it did an elevated position, the house commanded an extensive and splendid view.[10]
The maiden had acquainted her father that she often had a visiter when keeping her flocks in the muir, and, from her description of him, the old man conceived the individual present to be that person, and accordingly invited him to their habitation, which invitation David, throwing aside for awhile his usual courtly ceremony, accepted.
He went on with sorrowing steps, and yet would not have staid behind. The small and unpretending cottage before him damped him at first, but when he thought upon it as the home of his fair enchantress, his spirits were again cheered. He found in the place neatness and rural elegance. He would have been happy to have changed his sceptre for a shepherd's crook, and his noble Castle of Crail for this humble dwelling. He was invited to refresh himself, and Matilda soon joined them; but, although the table was spread with healthful rustic dainties, he could not do justice to the feast. Matilda's charming company and conversation was his regalement. The old man apologised for the homeliness of his fare, supposing that to be the cause of his guest's abstinence, and said, "That once he could have entertained him better, but now he had little more to offer than a hearty welcome."
A knock was heard at the door, and a young farmer having entered who wished to buy some sheep, the old man retired with him with the view of making a bargain.
The young couple being left alone, David moved his chair nearer to that of Matilda, and began to renew his attentions to her; but, however much she was pleased with the courtly air and intellectual conversation of her visiter, she was resolved to act with prudence and circumspection. She therefore took this opportunity of stating to him, in a polite and kindly manner, that, as he had said his visits were paid for the purpose of making her acquaintance, and that while she thanked him for the favourable opinion he had often expressed with regard to her, yet, as he was a stranger, and had never been regularly introduced, she should be obliged to decline his future visits. She further stated, that he must be well aware there can be no safe principle except this, that every man aiming at our acquaintance must be introduced to us by some person we already know, who becomes a guarantee, as it were, for the propriety of his behaviour and the honour of his views; that without this we can never be sure that the individual addressing us is not a designing adventurer, who would think nothing of making our happiness his sport; and that for a young female to admit the addresses of an unknown young man, however fascinating his manners or noble his air, would be to run a great risk of disappointment and unhappiness for life.