Slains Castle stands alone, a giant watchman upon giant cliffs, built up only one story high, on account of the tremendous winds that prevail there in spring and autumn, and cased with the gray Aberdeen granite of the famous quarries near by. The surrounding country is as bare and uninviting as one could imagine; the road from Aberdeen (twenty miles) is bleak and stony; the young trees near the castle are stunted, and in many cases disfigured by the inroads of hungry cows among their lower branches, and a damp veil of mist hangs perpetually over the scene, softening the landscape, but sometimes depressing the spirits. As the hours pass the place grows on you: a weird beauty begins to loom up from among the mist-wreaths, the jagged rocks, the restless waves, and you forget the desolate moor, which in itself displays attractions you will realize later, in the grandeur of the desolate sea.
The original building is of the time of James VI. (of Scotland), and is due to Francis, earl of Erroll, whose more ancient castle, bearing the same name, was destroyed by the king to punish his vassal for the part he had taken in a rebellion. In the seventeenth century Earl Gilbert made great improvements in it, and early in the eighteenth Earl Charles added the front. In 1836 it was rebuilt by Earl William George, the father of the present owner, with the exception of the lower part of the original tower. In this there used to be in olden times an oubliette in which unhappy prisoners were let down. All at first appeared dark around them, but when they had thankfully assured themselves that they at last stood upon solid ground, they would look about them and presently descry a line of fitful light coming from a door ajar in their dungeon. The poor victims would then go in haste to this door, pull it open and, blinded by the sudden light, step out upon the green slope terminating quickly in a precipice, which went sheer down to the sea.
The rest of the house is built around a large covered piazza, intersected by corridors where pictures, armor and all kinds of old family relics decorate the walls. The drawing-room is on the very edge of the rock, and on stormy days the flocks of uneasy sea-gulls almost flap their wings against its window-panes, while the clouds of spray dash up against them in miniature waterfalls. The rocks in the immediate neighborhood of the castle are rugged in the extreme, here and there rent by a gigantic fissure reaching far inland, and up which the foaming waters gurgle continually as if in impatience of their narrow bounds, now jutting far into the sea like a Titanic staircase and thickly matted with coarse sea-weed, and again reared up on high, a sheer glistening wall, with not a cranny for the steadiest foot, and with Niagaras of spray for ever veiling its smooth, unchanging face. In wonderful hollows you will come upon pools of green water with sea-anemones, delicate sea-weed of pink, yellow or purple hue, and gem-like shells resting on a bottom of clearest sand; and while the waves are roaring on every side, and flinging their dampness into your very face, these fairy pools will lie at your feet without a breath or ripple on their surface.
The most magnificent of these rocks is one called in Gaelic "Dun-Bug" ("Yellow Rock"), the favorite haunt of the white sea-gulls. It stands alone, as if torn from the land and hurled into the tossing waves by some giant hand. Two hundred feet in height and a thousand in circumference, it forms a natural arch, being pierced from its base upward by an opening that widens as it ascends. The waves dash through it with terrific violence, and the very sight of its grim splendor conjures up a vision of shipwreck and danger. Scott has made mention of it in The Antiquary, and Johnson in his Journey to the Hebrides, recalling the grandeur of the rocky coast of Slains, has said that though he could not wish for a storm, still as storms, whether wished for or not, will sometimes happen, he would prefer to look at them from Slains Castle. These rocks and the caves that alternate with them were once famous as a smuggling rendezvous, and as such Scott has again immortalized them in his Guy Mannering. The Crooked Mary, a noted lugger, had many an adventure along this coast during the last century. The skipper's arrival was eagerly looked for at certain stated times, the preconcerted signal was given by him, and the inhabitants bestirred themselves with commendable haste. All ordinary business was immediately suspended: men might be seen stealing along from house to house, or a fisher-girl, bareheaded and barefooted, would hurry to the neighboring village, and deliver a brief message which to a bystander would sound very like nonsense, but which nevertheless was well understood by the person to whom it was given. Soon after a plaid or blanket might be seen spread out, as if to dry, upon the top of a peat-stack. Other beacons, not calculated to draw general notice, but sufficiently understood by the initiated, soon made their appearance, telegraphing the news from place to place. As soon as the evening began to close in the Crooked Mary would be observed rapidly approaching the land, and occasionally giving out signals indicating the creek into which she meant to run. Both on sea and land hairbreadth escapes were the rule rather than the exception, and it is related of one of the Crooked Mary's confederates on shore, poor Philip Kennedy, that one night, while clearing the way for the cargo just landed from the contraband trader's hold, he was simply murdered by the excise-officers. The heavy cart laden with the cargo was yet some distance behind, and Kennedy with some dastardly companions was slowly going forward to ascertain if all was safe, when three officers of the customs suddenly made their unwelcome appearance. Brave as a lion, Kennedy attacked two of them, and actually succeeded for a time in keeping them down in his powerful grasp, while he called to his party to secure the third. They, however, thinking prudence the better part of valor, decamped ignominiously, and the enemy remained master of the brave man's life. Anderson, the third officer, was observed to hold up his sword to the moon, as if to ascertain if he were using the edge, and then to bring it down with accurate aim and tremendous force upon the smuggler's skull. Strange to say, Kennedy, streaming with blood, actually succeeded in reaching Kirkton of Slains, nearly a quarter of a mile away, but expired a few moments after his arrival. His last words were: "If all had been true as I was, the goods would have been safe, and I should not have been bleeding to death." The brave fellow was buried in the churchyard of Slains, where a plain stone marks his grave, and bears the simple inscription, "To the memory of Philip Kennedy, in Ward, who died the 19th of December, 1798. Aged 38."
My own earliest recollections of the grand, desolate old castle are derived, not from my first visit to it made in infancy, but from the descriptions of one whose home it was during a brief but intensely observant period of childhood. There came one day a storm such as seldom even on that coast lashes up the gray, livid ocean. The waves, as far out as sight could reach, were one mass of foam, and the ghastly lightning flashed upon the torn sails of a ship as near destruction as it well could be. Cries came up from below in the brief pauses of the storm, and above lanterns were quickly carried to and fro, while pale attendants hurriedly and silently obeyed the signals of a more collected master. The occupants of the castle hardly knew to what its chambers might be destined—whether to receive the dead or to afford rest to the saved. Beds, fires and cordials were in readiness, and strong men bore dread burdens up dizzy paths leading from beneath. The ship broke in pieces on the merciless rocks, and many a drowned sailor went down to meet the army of his fellow-victims of all times who no doubt lay sleeping in the submarine caves of Slains. Those who survived soon disappeared, full of gratitude for the timely relief offered them at the castle, but one old man remained. He was never known by any other name than "Monsieur," and was beloved by every individual member of the household. A French émigré of the old school, with the dainty, gallant ways of the ancien régime, he still clung to the dress of his earlier days, and wore a veritable queue, silk stockings and buckled shoes. For some time he remained a welcome guest in the "red chamber," where the host's little children would sometimes join him and play with his watch and jeweled baubles. But one day poor little "Monsieur" sickened, and the tiny feet that had made such haste to run to him, now trod the corridor softly and bore a baby-nurse to the gentle invalid. It was a high and coveted reward for the little girls to carry "Monsieur's" medicine to his bedside, and everything that kindness and hospitality could suggest was equally lavished on him; but his feeble life, which had no doubt received a shock from the shipwreck it had barely escaped, went out peacefully like the soft flame of a lamp.
Slains Castle had many gentle and pleasant memories about it, as well as its traditional horrors, and among these were many connected with the history of the old family that owned it. In one of the corridors hangs the picture of James, Lord Hay, a fair-haired, sunny-faced boy, tall and athletic, standing with a cricket-bat in his hand. He would have been earl of Erroll had he lived, but if we follow him in his short life from classic Eton to the field of Quatre-Bras, we shall find him again, on a bright June day in 1815, lying as if asleep, as fair and noble-looking as before, but silent in death. Simple Flemish peasants stand in a group around him, awed and admiring, asking each other if this beautiful youth is an angel fallen from heaven, or only a mortal man slain for the Honor of his country. His was a noble death, and worthy of the suggestive memento of his early boyhood before which we stood just now in the corridor of Slains Castle.
A little farther down this corridor, which to all intents and purposes is a family picture-gallery, we shall be forced to stop before the portrait of a dark woman, masculine and resolute, not beautiful nor like the handsome race of the Hays, of which she was yet the last direct representative. This is the famous Countess Mary, one of the central figures of the family traditions. The Hays were hereditary lords high constable of Scotland, and also one of the few Scottish families in which titles and offices, as well as lands, are transmitted through the female line. So this Countess Mary found herself, at the death of her brother, countess of Erroll in her own right and lord high constable of Scotland. In one of the two pictures of her at Slains, if I remember right, she is represented with the bâton of her office, with which badge she also appeared at court before her marriage (after this it was borne by her husband in the character of her deputy). Her husband was a commoner, a Mr. Falconer of Dalgaty, whose reported history in connection with her is curious and deserves to be told, though the old tradition is moulded into so many different forms that it is very difficult to disentangle the truth from its manifold embellishments. Toward the beginning of the eighteenth century this intrepid and independent lady fell in love with Mr. Falconer, who at first did not seem eager to return or notice her affection. High-strung and chivalric by nature, she did not droop and pine under her disappointment, but vowed to herself that she would bring him to her feet. Mr. Falconer coner left the country after some time, and went to London. The Countess Mary also traveled south the same year, and no news of her was heard at Slains for some time. Meanwhile, she and Mr. Falconer met, but unknown to the latter, who about the same time became acquainted with a very dashing young cavalier, evidently a man of high birth and standing, but resolutely bent on mystifying his friends as to his origin. The two saw each other frequently, and were linked by that desultory companionship of London life which sometimes indeed ripens into friendship, but as often ends in a sudden quarrel. Such was the end of this acquaintance, and one day some trifling difference having occurred between the friends, a cartel reached Mr. Falconer couched in very haughty though perfectly courteous language. These things were every-day matters in such times, and very nonchalantly the challenged went in the early morning to the appointed place to meet the challenger. Here the versions of the story differ. Some say that Mr. Falconer and his antagonist fought, but without witnesses; that the former got the worst of the encounter, and remained at the other's mercy; that then, and not before, the Countess Mary made herself known to him and gave him his choice—a thrust from her sword or a speedy marriage with herself. Others say that it was before the duel that she astonished her lover by this discovery, and that the choice she gave him was between marriage and ridicule.[1]
The fact of her marriage, and that it proved a happy one, is certain. Mr. Falconer dropped his own name to assume that of Hay. The countess was a devoted Jacobite and an earnest churchwoman. When Presbyterianism had got the upper hand in Scotland, and was repaying church persecutions with terrible interest, a Mr. Keith was appointed to the Anglican parish of Deer. This was within the Erroll jurisdiction, and it was not long before the zealous Countess Mary came to the rescue of the congregation, who had assembled for some time in an old farmhouse. In 1719 or '20 she had the upper floor of a large granary fitted up for their accommodation, and this afforded them a grateful shelter for more than a quarter of a century. Of this same parish of Deer a curious story is told in the local annals, showing how conservative and tenacious of traditions the north of Scotland still was in 1711. The skirmish to which it relates goes by the quaint title of the "Rabbling of Deer," and is thus reported: "Some people of Aberdeen, in conjunction with the presbytry of Deer, to the number of seventy horse or thereby, assembled on the twenty-third of March, 1711, to force in a Presbyterian teacher in opposition to the parish; but the presbytry and their satellites were soundly beat off by the people, not without blood on both sides."
There was little of the martyr about the Scot of that warlike day, and most emphatically and literally did he show himself a "soldier of the Lord."