When Fortune Frowns. ... Cheap edition

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Being the Life and Adventures of (Biffierf &0BlBavt§+ A GENTLEMAN OF CORNWALL, How he fought for Prince Charles in the years 1745 and 1746, and what befell him thereafter. BY KATHARINE LEE (Mrs. Henry Jenner), Author of A Western Wildflower," In London Town," Katharine Blythe," "An Imperfect Gentleman," ''Love or Money," In the Alsatian Mountains, fee., &c. "Why, Morar," said the Prince, " this is very hard ; you were very kind to me yester night, and said you would find out a hiding place proof against all search of the enemy's forces, and now you say you can do nothing at all for me. . . . When Fortune smiled on me 1 found some people ready enough to serve me; but noiv, WHEN FORTUNE FROWNS on me and I have no pay to give, they forsake me in my necessity," — Mackinnon's Narrative, "The Lyon in Mourning."

ILorrtJnn : HOMAGE GOX, Windsor House, Bream's Buildings, E.C. [CHEAP EDITION.] l897- London : Printed by Horace Cox, Windsor House, Bream's Buildings, E.C. PREFATORY NOTE. In this story I have not set before myself the task of writing up any particular side, but rather of representing truly and faithfully the events of the period which I have selected from the point of view of a quiet, studious country gentleman, whose conscientious principles, inherited from his nonjuror mother, impelled him, sorely against his inclina tions, to take part in political strife. It began early for him in the proclamation of the King by James Paynter at St. Columb, which is an historical fact, as is also the subsequent trial and acquittal of Paynter. Donald Dubh an t-Ephiteach was a real man, who fought in 1745, and not, as Mr. Allardyce in his " Balmoral " has made him, in the Fifteen.

The conduct of the Macdonalds at Culloden is related in a manner which differs from the usually received story, in this I have followed the theory set forth from contemporary accounts, some of them published for the first time, in a paper by my husband in The Royalist of April last. The characters and fate of James Dawson and the fair VI PKKKATOKY NOTK. Kitty are, alas, only too true ; and I regret to say that the details of the harrying of the Highlands and the scenes in Inverness gaol are not only not exaggerated, but rather understated. This, how ever, is well known matter of history. Of the dialects used in this book, one, the Cornish, I can warrant, but in the case of the Lowland Scots, I do not pretend to any pedantic accuracy, and can do no more than give a " foreigner's " impression of that language.

Chapter I. Oueen Anne Is Dead

Here's a health to the King whom the Crown doth belong to ; Confusion to those who the right King would wrong so ; I do not here mention either old King or new King; But here's a health, boys, a health to the true King. Jacobite Toast. There is a canopied well within an ancient cloistered garden at Ryalton, in the county of Cornwall, round which many of my childish memories are grouped. In half-remembered popish times a savour of holiness and healing dwelt within its crystal waters. And in farther off, and still more shadowy ages (according to Mr. Hoblyn's and my belief), the country folk brought their children to be cured by its waters, with observance of many a secret rite and mystic charm, derived from God only knows what far off dim groping of reverent pagan minds amidst the shadows that environed them. 'Tis sure that the votive rags fluttering still on the bushes that surround the wells of Madron, St. Kevern, and many others, and the ceremony of B named pins and pebbles, cast for augury upon the waters, belong not to Christianity, but have come down to us from the pious fears and trembling awe of older and ruder times.

Albeit, in my time, save among such few folk, chiefly dwelling in Lanherne valley under guardianship of the great house of Arundel, as still held to the old religion, all thought of godliness and healing had fled from people's minds in connection with the arched and canopied well in our ancient garden. The house had been in Henry VIII. 's time a Priory attached to the great monastic house of Bodmin, and, after the dissolution of the monasteries, passed into the hands of one John Munday, a servant of the King, whose heirs held it until after James I.'s time. Then it was granted to my ancestor, Gilbert, brother of Gregory Coswarth, the head of the family of Coswarth of Coswarth, in the parish of Colan, from whom it passed by heirs male to my own father, unhappily deceased on the very day that made so many women widows, known to history as that of the great victory of Blenheim, and two days before I first saw the light.

I do not like to dwell on my mother's grief, for during my childhood the shadow of it lay heavy on my mind, and I was conscious, even amid my play, that my mother's thoughts were with her dead rather than with the present, though never son was more idolised and loved than I. Indeed, one of the hardest things I have had to withstand in mv life has been my dear mother's passionate love for me, a love which would have kept me under her wing all my days, as a hen shelters her chickens, and could only at the cost of bitter suffering to herself, permit me to pursue the line which duty and honour marked out for me. To go back to the ancient well in our Priory garden ; from my babyhood, when, from my mother's arms, I looked down through the gloom of the pointed arch to its reflecting, vibrating waters, it ever had a fascination for me such as no other spot on earth has possessed.

The waters lay deep down ; how deep I do not know exactly, for its bottom was never visible. A flight of much-worn stone steps led from the arched way down to its waters. A rude stone seat was on two sides of the building, while on the wall opposite to the entrance, below the moulding of the groined arch of the roof, was a dim half-obliterated recess, a niche, doubtless once containing a figure of holy man or woman, but now all draped with feathery ferns, silent, filmy, pointing mysteriously to the clear, dark eye of the waters below. What child could resist the spell of the place, its shadows and the broken lights reflected on the wellingwater, for the water was never still ; it seemed to heave and palpitate, never breaking into bubbles or frothing, like the more vulgar streams and wells in fields, but just vibrating with an inner life of its own.

Child-like legends and half-formed tales, coupled with old superstitions, were uttered before me bv peasant folk, whose dread of ridicule B would lead them to deny all credence of them before older ears. Old women in the village could still remember how their grandmothers had told of children cured and sick folk healed, and proces sions with banners and priests, and holy vessels, wending from the church upon the hill to the Priory well, tales mingled now, however, in memory with quaint bits of magic practice and interspersed with stories of fairy folk and witch craft. What wonder, then, that a lonely child, the only son of a widowed mother, who hid herself in terrified seclusion from the fierceness of party politics and unsettled State, should find his chief companion and diversion in the mysterious well.

Ryalton lay at the bottom of a little flat valley rilled with orchard trees, at whose base primroses and daffodils made the spring a golden glory. The house was old and was built of moorstone, so covered with grey and yellow lichen that its original colour could not be seen. A carved balustrade sur rounded the great stone windows, and at the back, round two sides of the garden, were the old carved cloisters in which the Austin Canons were wont to read their breviaries or take the air ; a trifle ruinous they were, but still whole, and a pleasant place in warm weather in which to sit and see the garden. An old wall, older even than the house, surrounded this pleasance, and inside it grew hollyhocks and white virgin lilies, roses and sweet peas, heartsease, snapdragon, myrrh, and pansy, and many another sweet-smelling plant and flower.

Over the wall the orchard trees were pink and white in spring, and crimson and gold in autumn, while beyond them were the slopes of the low hills with heather summits which kept the fiercer western winds from rushing in upon us from the Atlantic sea. The Coswarths had loved their home too well ever to leave it save on urgent call of duty. They had ever been on the side of law and order, espousing the cause of those whom they believed to have been set over them by God, and willing to lose all rather than fail them. Ryalton for a brief period during the Commonwealth had passed away from them, but at the Restoration Gilbert Coswarth was allowed to buy his patrimony back, and by great good luck had the money to do it with. Of late years politics had not disturbed us much. Had King James made a stand for his right, I have no manner of doubt my father would have fought for him, but no such horror as civil war fell upon the nation, and my forefathers died in their beds, as God grant I may do too.

To go back again to my well, which seems to elude me as the secret of it eluded my childish fancy. It was by the well that the first intimation of the troubles that lay outside our quiet valley was borne in upon my young consciousness. I had never been outside Ryalton save to visit my grandfather, the rector of St. Columb, or to go with Molly to the beach, distant some two miles, for my mother neither went abroad herself on visits nor suffered me to do so. A few of my father's old friends came to see his widow at intervals, but of social intercourse with our neighbours there was none. Until the evening, then, of my tenth birthday, I had no interest, or scarce any knowledge of the world out side my home. I was allowed to sit up that night to supper with my mother, a stupendous event of the utmost magnitude.

The time was early August, and we supped in the long low room over the cloisters that had once been the refectory of the Canons, with the golden blaze of the sinking sun casting diamonds and cusped lights upon our floor. I remember how dark the apple trees were against the glowing sky, and into what blue spires the poplars down the valley rose above the hills. The shadows from the garden wall lay across the grass, while the row of white virgin lilies stood like pale shrouded ghostly ladies meekly within its shade ; a red light touched the summit of the canopy over the well, showing the splints in the stone from which a cross had once risen. A pale star came out in the misty blue over head, and seemed to me to shine down into the well. " Mother," I said, as I knelt on the window seat with my face pressed close to the glass, " I have never seen a star shine on the well.

Let me go and look if I can see it in the water." " It is time for bed, my son." ' Yes, dear mother, but one little look at the well ; on my birthday, too. I will not stay long, nor go down the steps, only just look in ; the red is all gone but one streak. Mother, do let me o-0," and I slipped down from the seat and ran down the winding stairs into the cloisters below. How black and dark and silent they were ! In my anxiety to get out I had forgotten that I must pass through their echoing blackness. I paused a moment on the threshold, then setting my teeth and holding my clothes tight round me, made a dash for it, and reached the well, now all in shadow in the thickly hanging dusk. I stepped inside the arch on the square topmost step which led to the water. I never can tell the nameless horror and fear that fell upon me when a hand stretched out of the darkness and grasped my shoulder.

All the tales I had heard of witch and giant, fairy and water-sprite, rose up in my mind in that one moment and froze my speech with fear, or certainly I should have cried out. " Hush," said a whispered voice close beside me ; " has your mother sent you to me ? " " No," I gasped ; " I came to look at the well." The man made an impatient sound, and then paused for a moment. " Well, since you are here, I must make the best of it. Do you guess who I am ? " " My godfather, Mr. James Paynter," I answered, for I recognised him after the first moment by his voice. " Can you keep a secret ? " " I never have had one, but I think I could " Good boy. Now, Gilbert, nobody must know that I am within twenty miles of this place save your mother only ; can you keep that tongue of yours from chattering to the servants and all else, and I will bring you a present from London town itself."

" Why? " I began, but he cut me short. " Boys must never ask why until they are fifteen years old at least. You must do as you are told now, and ask no questions." I wrenched my shoulder away from his grasp. " I only obey my mother," I said with dignity. " I am ten years old to-day. I do not obey any body but my mother any more." " You have the grit for a good king's man in you. You will obey the lawful authority and resist all other. Look here, Gilbert, I have enemies, you know what that means, and if they find me here after what is going to happen to-night, perhaps they will put me in prison. Now will you tell anybody except your mother ? " " I will die first," I said, and I put out my hand in the dusk, where I knew he must be, and laid it in his. "That's my brave boy; now run in, child, and get your mother alone and whisper to her that your godfather is out here, and she must devise some means of bringing me into the house unknown.

Hark ! there they are." And he clasped my hand tight in his as a sudden wild jubilation burst upon the air with a clang that almost seemed as if the skies were of brass and re echoed it. Crash after crash of sound filled the air OUEEN ANNE IS DEAD. 9 from the old grey tower of the church upon the hill close by, and it was taken up and answered by the great peal of St. Columb Major, far over the hills, with fainter echoes answering back from Colan and Mawgan towers. The sky suddenly paled as if in fright, and then mysterious points of flame shot up like crimson spires upon the hills, and beacon answered to beacon until a chain of fire seemed to hem the world in. My companion's mood jarred a little upon me, baby-awed with the sound and flames ; he chuckled as if in intense delight, and I could hear him rub bing his hands as if in glee.

" Nothing could have been better," he murmured, " Oh, that I must be out of it to-morrow ! The best horses all the way for the king's service ! I wonder how my worthy successor fares ; he has had a fine collection of brutes left to choose from. Now, my lad, in you go, and whisper to your mother. There, she calls you from the cloisters." And my mother's voice, anxious and terrified, came to me from the house. " Gilbert, Gilbert, where are you, why are you so long?" I ran across the grass to where she stood under the dark arches of the cloisters, and, putting my arms round her neck, drew her face down, and whispered to her that my godfather was in the well. She gave a start and clutched me close, drawing me into the shadow as if even to keep me from his sight. " Your godfather ! " she whispered ; " oh what does he mean coming here in this way to a lone widow's house?

Cruel of him not to let me live in peace ! What new trouble is over the land to-night ? why is he in hiding, and what do the bells and bonfires mean ? Oh, why could he not leave us alone ! " " Madam, Madam ! " and at the further end of the cloisters, where was a door leading to the kitchens, a faint light of a candle gleamed, and our two maid servants appeared with Abraham Demonfryat, our one man, manager, steward, bailiff, groom, and gardener, behind them. " Madam ! Madam ! Oh, here is Madam. What do 'ee think, Madam, and true it es as gospel ! Now, Abraham Demonfrvat, do 'ee hold thy jaw; how es a body to tell Madam, and vou contradictin' every word ! 'Tes so, Madam, the young king has been proclaimed to Lunnon church town, and the bad times es stopped, and the price o' flour will go down, an' the king, God bless 'un, will pardon everybody ; hark to the bells, and can 'ee see the fires 'pon the hills ?

Quick too, Madam, and leave us dress the windows. I wouldn't have it said for all the world that Ryalton was weth they Noyes and Dennises in not lightin' up for the king's coming." "Away weth thy clackin'," said Abraham Demon frvat, pushing aside the two maids, " thy tongue es like a mill wheel. Harken, Madam, the bells es ringin' sure 'nuff, but ill news, and false news do flv faster than true. For all we do knaw of a surety this news may be false." " Shame to thee, Abraham ; 'tes only thy wicked Whig ways, which es wantin' to keep the King out of hes own. I wonder you don't go for to say as the House o' Commons es King. Dont 'ee hark to 'un, Madam, he es vexed as he can live, for the news es true ; 'twas brought by a gentleman, rode all the way post from Lunnon, and left the news as he galloped through all the church-towns.

A candle for every pane o' glass, Madam, or we shall be shamed to all the country." "Mother, mother!" I cried, excited out of my little wits by the evening's adventures. " We must, we must ; my father was a King's man, Molly has told me ; we must light for the King." " Child, what can it avail the King or any one else if we stick candles in our windows ? But I would not teach your father's son disloyalty ; go, Molly, and light up as you will. In our lonely valley there will be none to see whether we rejoice or keep silent. No, Abraham, I cannot listen to you now." "Madam, Madam, 'tes a needless risk. I have 'un from a sure hand that the Queen hath named the Prince George of Hanover to succeed her. Godol phins have sent an express to Truro, and I had 'un from their groom, who see'd the messenger."

" And to-day there is another messenger! What times these are ! Pray God the right prevail. Any wise, my son must not go back from his father's honour. Light up, Molly, and if we suffer for it, we suffer." " Then I go out," said Abraham, sternly. " No bite, nor sup, nor rest do I take under a roof lit up for Stuarts and Popery." " Hark to 'un," cried Molly, exultingly. " Stuarts and Popery ! and what was Queen Anne but a Stuart ? an' I wish, weth all my soul, the old Popes had burnt out all such long-faced, kill-joy, bigoted old Puritans as thee art always praatin' about, Abraham Demonfryat." " Hush, hush," said Madam. " Molly, go take the candles." And, breathing mutual defiance, our man and maid betook them out of the cloisters again. Bidding me run and fetch my godfather into the cloisters before the windows were lit up, my mother waited his coming.

Abraham Demonfryat had gone off in high dudgeon, and, as soon as the windows were all ablaze, my mother, greatly to their astonish ment, gave the maids leave to go to the village to see what was going on. As soon as they were out of the house, my god father was brought upstairs and refreshed with food and drink. Madam showed him into her own room to prevent suspicion, and kept watch outside, in a little ante-chamber used by me as a play-room, until, in the early hours of the morning, he left the house as the dawn was breaking. 1 heard him steal down the stairs and out through the cloisters, and, with my face close against the window, I saw him glide, like a grey shadow, across the dim garden, and go out by the little door in the wall to the orchard. Why he should come like this in hiding, why steal mysteriously away, what mystery hung around him, all perplexed and fas cinated my small soul to the uttermost.

I had considered myself to be a big boy on my tenth birthday. I was, in my own estimation, a full-grown and rather important man on the day after, when I held, as it were, my godfather's liberty on my tongue. I pictured him in prison, perhaps cast there by some unlucky slip of my speech ; saw his handsome, jovial face pale and emaciated, his limbs loaded with fetters. I could hear the clank of the chains upon the ground. I got up again from my little bed whereon I pictured these enormities, and, with panting breath and desperate soul, prayed that I might keep the trust reposed in me. So fearful, indeed, was I of betraying it, that even to my mother, when I met her at breakfast, not one word did I say of my godfather's presence the night before. I think she must have thought that I had forgotten all about it after childhood's deep sleep.

Certainly she never guessed of how I had lain awake with the shadow of my secret dull and heavy on me. Would to God, indeed, that the shadow that fell from his presence had blighted my own life only ! Ah me ! 'tis too sore a wound to touch upon, too awful the doom which fell on innocent heads, to bear recording save in tears of blood. Yet, with the horror of all upon me, as it lies upon no other man on God's earth, I can still keep my wits straight enough to see that my godfather was but an instrument in bringing about the doom that fell upon us, and was as innocent of all evil intent as I was on that dim morning in my little nightshirt, with my face pressed close against the glass, watching his grev form stealing from the house, my boyish heart all aglow with ardour of fresh awakened chivalry.

I would have died for my godfather's liberty ; in my secret soul, I longed to have my courage put to the test ; would have hailed with delight fierce interrogatories, threats, and blows. But nothing happened. My mother's face was more anxious, her brow more strained next dav, but not a word passed between us of the night. I would not leave her that morning for mv customary ramble in the fields and orchard. In some dim childish way I had an idea that she might need protection ; that I ought to be at hand to bear any possible unpleasantness that might arise. So I hung about the cloister garden and the grass plats in front of the house, and my devotion was re warded by seeing two gentlemen ride down the distant road towards our house early in the after noon. The first thrill of excitement gave way to one of disappointment.

I knew that sober, slow, ambling nag, so portly, so decorous, so superior to all road side sights and agitations. The plump, comfortable figure that bestrode it was my mother's father, the rector of St. Columb Major, a worthy and esteemed parson, one indeed who used this world as not abusing it nor suffering it to abuse him. Through whatever changes of religions and dynasties, my good grandfather was rector of St. Columb, and in that faith desired to live and die. The other gentleman, who rode a tall grey horse, was of another complexion altogether, being no less than the nephew and heir of the last of the great Arundels of Lanherne, of whom history says truly, " the great Arundels, and greatest for love, living, and respect in the country." He, like his forebears, was of the ancient faith, holding ever to their religion through good and bad times, as men do to their own lives.

The roads from Lanherne and St. Columb joining not far from our house, the two gentlemen rode in company, and as far as I could judge, mostly in silence towards my home. Both seemed downcast, anxious, and brooding, though Mr. Arundel's face betrayed the deepest dejection, while my grandfather seemed more annoyed and irritated. Calling on Abraham Demonfryat, I ran forward to meet them, and to assist in their dismounting at the great stone horse-block outside the gates. " You have heard the good news, of course, Demonfryat," began my grandfather, as he threw his leg over the saddle; " such news should travel fast. The Lords of the Council, true to the Act of Settlement, have proclaimed a successor to our late most gracious Sovereign in the person of his now most sacred majesty, George of Hanover."

And he looked nervously and rather defiantly around him, then, his eyes falling upon the window, he asked in a sharp voice : " Your mistress" is betimes in preparing for the illuminations to-night ?" "They were lit last night, grandfather," I burst in. "Did you not hear all the bells, and see the bonfires for King James ? " " Hey, now, what is this, King James ? There is no King James. George of Hanover is our most gracious king ; let me hear no more King James from your mouth, my lad. Abraham Demonfryat, you are a sensible man ; you should have seen to your mistress in these troublous times. 'Tis not fit for a lone widow woman to go lighting her house according to every breath of evil report that sweeps the kingdom." " But, grandfather, it is true," I cried, my little soul in flame. " We had it last night, and your own bells rang, I am sure I heard them, and 'tis King James has the right !

" "Pshaw! Gilbert; I forbid you to talk of what vou know nothing about. The King's messenger himself hath arrived this morning, 'Twas a most grievous false report last night, and I would I knew where to clap my hands upon the malicious spreader of the evil ; he should lie in jail, and I doubt not it would go hard with him for inciting to rebellion with malice and high treason. An example should be made of such folks leading honest men astray. You will see to the lighting up to-night, Demonfryat. God bless the King ! " " Amen," said our man, on whose usually sombre face a fierce joy seemed to shine from his dark eyes, " this es the day of the Lord of Hosts, a day of vengeance, that he shall avenge him of his adversaries. King George and the Protestant succession ! No more of false Stuarts and Popery !

The punishment of their iniquity es accomplished, they shall howl and mourn for their sins, they shall be devoured as stubble fully dry, and as — " " Enough, enough, Demonfryat ; it becomes us not to call for vengeance on our brethren, we are all liable to error. Let us be thankful that the Protestant succession is indeed preserved, and that the Church and State will be maintained in their integrity." " Until the next popular outcry, or a turn in the elections," said Mr. Arundel dryly, as he got off his horse, " when perhaps the sovereign people may change its mind and pull down the man it set up, as other nations have done before it." My mother appearing at the door at this point happily gave a turn to the conversation, which, boy as I was, and ignorant of current politics, I felt to be getting on dangerous grounds ; but what angered me sorely was to hear Demonfryat, as he took the horses round into the yard, call out to Molly in an excited tone, "What do 'ee say now, Molly, 'tes all up weth thy Pretender. 'Tes King George and the Protestant succession.