THE LOST HEIR OF THE HOUSE OF ELPHINSTONE.[2]
"There are few men," says a peculiar moralist, "however much they may have been loved and esteemed in their day, whose return to life, after any considerable interval, would not be regarded with feelings of regret." In this observation there is some truth. The places once occupied by the departed have been supplied by others; their return to life would be regretted by those whom they would "push from their stools;" and it may be very well believed that, if the rightful heir of a great estate were to make his appearance in life, after having been long lost and regarded as dead, the feelings of the person whom he would supplant, whose possessions, prerogatives, and ostensibility, he would take away, would not be particularly pleasant. But, when no personal interests are at stake, and no feelings of malign selfishness are awakened, there are few things from which a person well constituted in heart and mind, will derive a more vivid delight, or a more exquisite excitement, than the return, and an unexpected meeting with, a long lost and long absent friend. Mark, in proof, the stare of astonishment, the eyes eagerly looking into each other, while the mind gradually opens into recognition, and such exclamations as, "Guide me! it's no possible! can this be really you?—eh, it's lang since I hae seen ye!—hoo hae ye been a' this time?" In no place are such feelings more vivid, or such exclamations more rife, than on the Scottish Borders, whose good-humoured natives have always been distinguished for enterprising energy, as well as warmth of heart, producing a disposition both to rove and to return.
On the east coast—somewhere between Berwick and St Abb's Head—a village is situated at the mouth of a small stream, which gives it an immediate access to, and egress from the open sea. Its harbour does not admit vessels of any considerable burthen; but there is good anchorage ground in the offing, and its situation being favourable for the irregular discharge of a cargo, it is said to have been, in former times, notorious for the contraband trade. It continued to enjoy an honourable prosperity, however, after this infamous and most pernicious traffic had been put down by the vigilance of government, owing to its permanent local advantages. The chief employment of its inhabitants is fishing; and its coasting trade is considerable, affording to the tenantry of the adjoining country a ready market for farm produce of all kinds—grazing, pastoral, and agricultural. In this village, long before the formation of those regularly constituted clubs which now exist in every considerable market town, a number of persons, whom business had brought together, used to hold regular meetings in the evening of the market day. These meetings, of which, when a young man, I was a constant attender, were generally composed of nearly the same persons, who, by tacit agreement, used to assemble at the same time and in the same place; one particular apartment of the principal inn being always reserved for their use. On these occasions, there was much innocent enjoyment and little variety. In allusion to the chief avocations of the persons present, and the commodities which formed the staple of the market, it was customary to give, as the toast of the evening—
"The life of man, the death of fish,
The boat, the crook, the plough;
Horn, corn, lint, and yarn,
Flax, and tarry woo."
The chief transactions of the day having been talked over, and the party having gradually diminished as the evening advanced, to a few intimates who dwelt in the immediate neighbourhood, many a tale, anecdote, and legend used to be told, while the glass circled round. The appetite for legendary lore, orally delivered, had not begun to abate in the days of my youth.
I remember well a particular evening in which many stories were told, of "hair-breadth 'scapes," strange coincidences, and remarkable incidents of various kinds; but gene rally connected with the departure and return of Scottish adventurers. Mr Plainworth, and the patient butt of his playful humour, Mr Wonderlove, two respectable Septuagenarians, and the venerable fathers of the club, occupied, as usual, the two arm chairs which stood one on each side of the fire. At length, after having been long a silent listener, Mr Plainworth stated that an incident as remarkable as any that had yet been told, had occurred in the very apartment in which we were sitting, and when he himself was present. "Did any of you," said he, "know the late William Elphinstone, Esq.?"
"I for one knew him well, for a most excellent and worthy man," said Wonderlove; "and his family is said to be the first of their line that ever did well. I have heard of a dule (doom) which was formerly laid upon that house, by a mother cursing, in the anguish of her heart, and on her bare knees, the bearing of which was, that the sword would never be off the race, till their pride had been humbled—till their head had wedded a maiden of low degree."
"That," said Plainworth, "I regarded as a mere folly of the olden time. Some aggravated case of seduction, in which family pride was exhibited, and innocence ruined and forsaken, had suggested the idea of a suitable doom, which was supposed to hang over the house; or a curse may have been pronounced under such awful circumstances; and as there would be no black and white upon the matter, its import and bearing might easily be made to correspond with subsequent events. An obliquity of disposition—a transmitted depravity of character—will sometimes be hereditary for two or three generations in a particular race; on the removal of which, the evils to which, by natural consequence, it had led, and which might seem to flow from a hereditary fatality or doom, will also pass away. The fortunes of the house of Elphinstone seem to have improved with the improved character of the race."
"You are a deep thinker, Mr Plainworth," said the other; "but it is well-known that, for a long period of time, the sword never was off that house. Deeply involved in the troubles that preceded and followed the civil wars, they always came off with the worst. Some fell in battle; some bled on the scaffold; and when others ceased to kill them, they began to put an end to themselves."
"You allude," said Plainworth, "to the death of Edward Elphinstone, the brother of the laird. Poor unhappy young man! I knew him well."