Wilson's Tales of the Borders and of Scotland, Volume 14

by Unknown

But it is long since the treatment of a master of the revels ceased even to be decent—we would say merciful. In most places he is no longer paraded as an absolute monarch upon the shoulders of his subjects, but as the slave of the multitude, of whom they delight to make pastime. The mayor of the village feast, "has fallen from his high estate," of dictating imperious commands for his short hour of power; and now he is generally placed in the condition of the frog in the fable, and what may be sport to his tormentors, is well-nigh death to him.

The festival from which our present story takes its rise was held in Tweedmouth (the southern suburb of Berwick), nearly seventy years ago; and, according to custom, on Margaret's day, or the following Monday. For, although most of them are in some degree held upon the Sunday (a celebration which would "be more honoured in the breach than in the observance"), Monday may always be considered as the chief day of the feast. Now at that period there resided at Tweedmouth a Mrs Mordington, the widow of the commander of a coasting sloop, who had left her with two children, a son and daughter. The son, at the period our tale begins, was about one-and-twenty; his sister, two years younger. The son's name was George, and he was then a clerk in the office of a merchant in Gateshead. At the feast of St Margaret's, therefore—which is commemorated in Tweedmouth in July, when the sun is in the plenitude of its strength, and when the very birds, oppressed with its heat, leave the thin air and the upper branches, and, folding their wings, sit silently in the umbrageous shades, enjoying, well pleased, the coolness of their leafy shelter—George Mordington returned to Tweedside, to see his mother and his sister; yea, and there was another whom he longed not less eagerly to behold, and that was Marion Weatherly, a fair-headed maiden of nineteen, and the daughter of a master fisherman, who had the lease of some two hundred yards upon the Tweed, somewhere between where the Whitadder joins it and the bridge; but whether on the south or north side I cannot tell. As there may be thousands of the readers of these tales unacquainted with the nature of salmon fisheries, or of what is meant by having been a master fisherman in those days, I shall simply state that Mr Weatherly had taken a lease of a particular spot on one side of the Tweed, and which was in length about two hundred yards, and on that space he had the right of casting out and dragging in his nets. He had this river-farm at a very small sum annually; though, within a mile from the spot where he held it, we have known a lesser portion of fishing right in the river let for nearly two thousand pounds sterling per annum; and that, too, when the wisdom of the present generation (perhaps I ought to put the generation in the past tense) almost threw a dyke across the mouth of the river, which built up what was called the Meadow Haven, and which haven was a gut in the rocks, by which the fish, coming in shoals from the north, entered the river; and this being built up by the dyke or pier aforesaid, after running their noses against a stone wall, instead of meeting with the natural entrance to the river which nature dictated to them to pursue, they were left, like a pack of fox-hounds that had been thrown off their scent, to seek the artificial entrance where they might find it, or for another river if they chose. Thus, the good old Tweed being half blocked up, fishing waters, in the present day, do not abound with the silver-mailed salmon, as they did in the days of Mr Weatherly. Besides, the river was then fished, not harried! It is not, therefore, wonderful that the father of Marion became a man of property.

Now, George Mordington and Marion Weatherly had known each other from childhood. I do not say that they had loved each other from that period; but they were at the same school together, and even before they left it, they were equalled to each other. This equalling, or, as it is sometimes called, evening to each other, by schoolmates or acquaintances, often goes far towards producing the wedded love of riper years. Many a match would never have been made, but for the schoolboy's or the comrade's jeer. Once name young hearts in the same breath, and you draw a magic circle round them; and, however little they may be acquainted with each other, whoever of the two may break through that circle, strikes a passing pang into the bosom of the other. Pride feels wounded, if nothing else does; but there is a feeling deeper and more tender than pride that has been rudely touched. It does not last long; but it is keen while it lasts. I am perfectly aware that there are many who may say, "Pshaw! it is all nonsense; who cares anything about these things now?" No middle-aged person, I grant you. Individuals of such an age like some home truth—something that comes home to their business and their bosoms as they are; and when such a thing meets them they say, "Oh, it is very natural." Granted that it is natural, why should people of middle age, yea, or of grey hairs, forget that they were once young; and that what is now "stale, flat, and unprofitable" to them, is still the feelings of thousands—is still delightful to thousands—was once their feelings, and delightful to them? Though past the sunny heyday ourselves, we like not to hear either man or woman cry out, with the Preacher, "all is vanity!" For light is beautiful—so is the sun that sheds it forth. The fair earth, with its buds, its flowers, its leaves, its fruits, and its trees with their singing birds—they are all beautiful—exquisitely beautiful! No man can look upon the works of his Maker, without adoring, worshipping, and loving the Power that formed them. Oh, when we so look abroad upon the glorious creation that is above, beneath, and around us—when we see so much that is measureless, magnificent, and that steals forth in beauty as a bud opens, until its loveliness is revealed before the very soul; and, above all, when we think also of the kind hearts that share our sorrows and our joys, that watch over us and that throb for us, that mourn with us and rejoice with us, and that are one with us in all things—we are tempted to say that all is "not vanity," but that man is the author of his own "vexation of spirit." Now George Mordington was one who loved all the works of nature for their loveliness. He saw nothing to which his young heart would respond, "it is vanity!" He loved the very worm that crawled—writhing and dying as it crawled—over his path, and pushed it gently with his foot upon its parent earth, that it might live. Was there nothing in the scenery of his birthplace that he should admire it? There was neither the sublimity of mountains to awe him into remembrance—the majesty of wooded hills (which there might be), nor lakes where echoes died in music; but there was the Tweed, the stream of his nativity, which rushes into the arms of the ocean, like a beautiful bride that has been cast off by her parent, and falls upon the neck of her lover without adornments; and there was the rich lands of the Merse and Islandshire, for ever spread out before him, with the everlasting ocean, its calms and its storms, its placid stillness and its terrible waves—forming together a scene such as he that has once looked upon can never forget. Through such scenes George Mordington recollected Marion Weatherly.

It has been mentioned that he was a clerk in Gateshead, and at the annual festival held in Tweedmouth, he went to visit his mother, his sister, and the fair Marion. I might—for I have often been a witness of such a scene—describe the joy of the doating mother as she beheld her son, in the youthful bloom of manhood, seated at her table. With delight sparkling in her eyes, she sat gazing on his face, until the tear of affection rose and bedimmed their radiance. On her left hand sat her son, and on her right her daughter, and her intended daughter, Marion Weatherly. Their dinner passed over in happiness—the mother smiled to look upon her children's joy; and when "a gentle tap came to the door," which the daughter best understood, and blushing, responded to it, George and Marion also arose, and they went into the fields together. They wandered to and fro in a narrow pathway, the length of which was rather less than a mile, while on each side of them the ripening grain formed a waving wall, giving promise of an abundant harvest. They wandered backward and forward, hand locked in hand, until the sun was lost behind Hallidon, and the stars began to steal out through the grey twilight.

When they shook hands at parting—"Now, George," said Marion, "you have your acquaintances to see, but do not remain late with them; for my sake and your mother's, do not."

"Dear Marion," said he, "wherefore remind me of this? I know that I must meet my acquaintances to-night, all of whom are my old friends, many of them my schoolfellows; I have promised to meet them—I have to leave for Newcastle to-morrow—and wherefore remind me that I should not remain late with them?"

"Oh!" she replied, "only that you will remember your character, George."

"Do not be interested about my character," said he; "I have hitherto supported it with credit to myself, and, I think, dear Marion, I may do also for the future."

He pressed his lips to hers, and, shaking her hand fervidly, they parted for the night; but before they parted, they had renewed their young vows, beneath an ash-tree, where they had sat down together (upon the footpath which is now known by the name of the "Willow Back"), and where he had carved their names four years before, and there he deepened the incision which recorded their initials; and, as Virgil somewhere hath it (though neither of them knew anything about Virgil), they vowed that, as the "bark expanded, their love would grow." This is a very common idea amongst love-engravers upon trees; but though a Mantuan swain might so write, a British peasant would frequently have cause to say, that, as the tree grew, and the bark expanded, so did his initials spread, and become vague, and more vague, until fog grew over them; and upon the heart, as on the tree where he had first carved his name, there was no trace left.

But George Mordington parted with Marion, and went to a street called the Kiln Hill, in which there then was an inn, known by the name of "The Salmon." In it all the associates of his youth were assembled; and when he entered they rose simultaneously, each offering his hand, and exclaiming, "Ah! George! my dear fellow, how are you?"