Her Loving Slave. A romance of Sedgemoor ... From an unpublished drama by Mr. H. Moss, etc

Front matter

HER LOVING SLAVE J. MILLER AND SON, PRINTERS, EDINBURGH sedgemoor HER LOVING SLAVE & Romanes of Stbflnnoor BY HUME NISBET Author of' The folly Roger,' 'Bail Up,' 'A Bush Girt's Romance, ' ValUmer the Viking,' etc., etc. FROM AN UNPUBLISHED DRAMA BY MR HUGH MOSS, WITH PERMISSION OF THE DRAMATIST _£ onion DIGBY, LONG & CO, PUBLISHERS 18 BOUVERIE STREET, FLEET STREET, E.C. All ,\'ovel rights reserved TO HUGH MOSS, Esq. DRAMATIST I beg to dedicate this Romance of Sedge moor in grateful recognition for the help which I have received in my story (from his Drama on the same subject. CONTENTS PAOB PREFACE, Xi PROLOGUE, THE SIEGE OF MONS, AUGUST 1 678, . I I. LONDON T684 — THE EXECUTION, . . II II. A BUSINESS INTERVIEW WITH MASTER SCRAPER, 21 III. MORE VISITORS TO THE LAWYER, . . 32 IV. KITCHEN GOSSIP, 42 V. RECRUITS FOR MONMOUTH, . . . 5 1 VI.

THE ROAD TO TAUNTON, .... 58 VII. IN THE PORCH, 68 VIII. MISTRESS RUTH, 78 IX. A SUPPER AT MASTER POLSON's ... 88 X. SPRING AT TAUNTON, 99 XI. AT THE WHITE HART INN, . . . IOO XII. IN THE TAPROOM, IIS XIII. 'GOOD-BYE AND GOD-SPEED,' . , .129 XIV. KING MONMOUTH, Contents X XV. SEDGEMOOR, 147 XVI. AN EVIL COMPACT, 157 XVII. SIR HARRY AND RUTH, . . . . 1 65 XVIII. SIR HARRY MAKES HIS WILL, . . .173 XIX. JUDGE JEFFREYS, l8l XX. THE JUSTICE OF JEFFREYS, . . . . 191 XXI. MASTER SNIP AND RUTH, . . . .202 XXII. THE CAPTURE OF JOSH, . . . .213 XXIII. SLAVERY, 220 XXIV. SIX MONTHS AFTER 232 XXV. IN SCRAPER'S HOUSE, 238 XXVI. IN WHITEFRIARS, 242 XXVII. A MEETING OF OLD FRIENDS, . . . 252 CHAPTER THE LAST,

Preface

WHILE gratefully acknowledging the drama on which I have founded my present romance, I must here state that it has been one of the most difficult and trying tasks that I have attempted since the days when, as an art student, I copied some of the master pieces in the National and other galleries. Mr Hugh Moss generously lent me the manu script of his unpublished drama, on the rising of Monmouth, to make a novel from it, and as drama tists so often go to the novelists for their plots I thought it would be an equally easy task to reverse an ordinary custom and take a drama as the ground work of my novel. But, owing to long habits of faithfully adher ing to what I saw before me when painting from Nature, also excluding myself as much as possible, in such cases, I sat down to my work resolved to be as faithful to my model as I could be.

Before doing this, however, I gorged myself with the history of the period, and the records of the public characters, such as Judge Jeffreys and Mon mouth, as well as the characteristics of the Taunton natives of the time. Prejace Then I began subordinating my own plot-weaving imagination to the plot and incidents that were before me, and this I found to be one of the most trying of exercises. I sketched the characters as closely as I could do, and also kept to the dialogue where I could, reserving only to myself the descriptive portions, ex planations of why certain characters acted and spoke as they did, and perhaps a few reflections, with the portrait-painting as I went along. Whether I have succeeded in making a harmonious whole out of my material I must leave the readers to decide for themselves, only, believe me that this has been the hardest bit of work that I ever tackled, and while I realise it as a serious exercise of what powers I may have as a novelist, wild horses would not drag me to another task of the same description.

The dialogues, with some slight alterations and additions, are entirely those of my friend, Mr Hugh Moss ; the characters also are his creations. The siege of Mons which opens the story, the execution scene that follows are my work, also the description of London, the battle of Sedgemoor with the march of the army of Monmouth, and the slavery of Sir Harry Dunclugh I may lay justly claim to, with such other portions as an author must take the respon sibility of. With these words of explanation, also again returning thanks to the creator of what I consider to be a good plot, otherwise I should not have under taken this story, I beg to leave ' Her Loving Slave ' to the kindly consideration of the reader.

Prologue

THE SIEGE OF MONS, AUGUST 1678 'When wild war's deadly blast was blawn.' — BURNS FOUR days after the treaty of Nimeguen had been made, and that much contested theatre of war, the Netherlands, appeared likely to enjoy a few months of peace, William of Orange attacked the French army under the Duke of Luxembourg at Mons. A bloody and resultless battle that was, in which many men fell on both sides, and although the Dutch general attempted to justify his action, by pleading ignorance of the peace so recently signed, still his excuse has been doubted. He could not have wished certainly to prolong the war, for no one could doubt for a moment that William was as true a patriot and lover of his country as he was the most able prince of his times, but Europe did not wonder if he was dis satisfied with the ignoble terms by which the peace had been concluded.

A These were the days of merry England, when the good-natured Charles the Second was king, and our country, so glorious in Elizabeth's time, so mighty during Cromwell's administration, had been reduced to a condition of contempt amongst nations by the foolish and ignoble later race of Stuarts. The profligate and spendthrift Charles was on the throne then, receiving his wages of serfdom from that aggressive disturber Louis XIV. The iron-hearted, weak-headed butcher, Duke of York, had already given his future subjects a foretaste of his lust for blood and torture in Scotland ; afterwards to be glutted to the full by his creature the infamous Judge Jeffreys. England had poured out her best blood on the scaffold, the torture chamber, and the battle-field, while those who had been lucky enough to escape with their lives found a hospitable retreat in the republican Netherlands.

Royalists who had fought for that fatal man Charles I, and lost everything in his cause, to be afterwards forgotten and ignored by his ungrateful son, found a home here. Roundheads who had battled for their rights and assisted to make their native land great under the Protector, fled here after the Restoration and lent their swords to this great prince and general. Men who had suffered for their religion ; blacklegs who had evaded justice and could tell a lie easily, found secure refuge in the Nether lands, and helped to make the name of Englishmen respected or despised amongst the honest Dutchmen. Prologue 3 Not even the most conservative of the refugees refused to help the stadholders at this time, for their glory and good names were safe at his hands. He judged each man according to his ability, and showed undue favour to none.

If they fought bravely they were rewarded, if they failed in their duty he dis carded them, still they could always hide their heads in his land. Amongst the brave and distinguished refugees who served at the battle of Mons, there were none braver or more worthy of notice than the Dunclughs, Sir Ralph with his young son Harry, and his nephew, also called Harry, the son of his brother Sir Ronald. In the civil wars the brothers had taken opposite sides, Sir Ronald for King Charles, and Sir Ralph for the Parliament. It was the time for brothers to fight against and hate brothers, but these two had not the dreadful experience of having to face each other on the battle-field. They held their estate of Hepsley- Leighton in co-heirship, and throughout their differ ences of opinions did not forget, as some did, the ties of blood, therefore when the Royalists were defeated, Sir Ralph, in possession then of the property, hid his brother, until he could smuggle him across the seas.

Afterwards when the Restoration came about, Sir Ronald Dunclugh did the like service for his brother's wife and his young nephew as well as he could ; he could not hide them at the great house, but he had them removed to the house of their steward, one Master Poison, and then Sir Ralph, who was ailing, died, while his brother promised to look after the two young Harrys. So Sir Ralph died, and soon after wards followed his proud and somewhat vindictive lady, leaving their son an orphan to the care of his uncle. Evil times came upon the Dunclughs, as they fell upon most of the Stuarts' friends. The estate was mortgaged heavily, and Sir Ronald was too honest a man to succeed at the venal court of the gay Charles, and too rigid a Protestant to win favour from the bigotted Duke of York ; therefore like so many others who had bled for their king and shared his adversity, he was forced to leave once more his native land and take service with the Dutch.

The two cousins went with him, and learnt the art of war in one of the best schools then known, facing the hottest fires and the ablest generals until they had grown to regard the tented field as their home. It had been a fierce day, that day in front of Mons, for the French army under the great Duke of Lux embourg was attacked in the trenches while they environed the city, a resultless, if bloody engagement, for neither side could claim the victory when the shades of evening fell. Sir Ronald was one of the slain, with his nephew and ward Harry, and now as his heart-broken son, with the aid of his servant Josh Kilgrew, bore the bodies from the field so that they might be interred decently, he felt that he was alone in the world. His cousin Harry had been killed with a musket Prologue 5 ball in the temple and therefore had fallen without a word, but his father who had been mortally wounded at the termination of the fight lived long enough to give his surviving son some parting instructions and commend him to the care of their body servant, Josh.

Harry Dunclugh was twenty-four years of age on the night that he held his dying father's head upon his breast. Well shaped and hardy from the experi ences he had gone through since his youth; bold, blue-eyed and handsome, if bronzed with the exposure to hot suns and winter blasts. Indeed, with the exception of the beautiful Monmouth, also his warm friend, few young men of his age had been better received by the fair sex, or had more opportunities for playing the gallant if he had chosen, but, unlike his friend, the Absolom of Dryden, he had followed in the footsteps of his noble father and kept himself, as yet, free from intrigues either political or amorous. He was a handsome, high-spirited Englishman of the true, or rather ideal cavalier type, with the long, golden love-locks falling over his shoulders, able to turn a pretty sonnet or flatter a pretty woman with out leaving a sting in either, which was not always the case with the gallants of that age.

Able also to handle his sword and dagger when his honour was called in question, dance lightly, sing tunefully, and pledge his king without losing his head. These accomplishments added to a winning manner, staunch heart and truthful tongue made him the general favourite that he was, in the camp, the reception chamber, and the tavern ; while thanks to the com mission which he held in the State's regiment, he was able to deck himself in the expensive costume which a gentleman required in those days. He inherited with his father's other qualities, that true courage which holds modesty to be its best cloak. He lived amongst boasters, but never boasted nor swaggered. His servant Josh did that sufficiently for him when his master was not near enough to check his voluble tongue. Josh Kilgrew had joined his fortunes to those of the Dunclughs soon after their arrival in the Low Countries, and was honest in his service, and faithful in his attachment.

A brave soldier also, and an exceedingly useful fellow altogether, but the less said about his former adventures in England perhaps the better, although he was by no means reticent about them himself when in his cups. He owned freely that he knew Alsatia a great deal more familiarly than Whitehall, and that Blackheath and other wastes of the like description were not bad places for a man to frequent on dark nights when money was scarce. He was a merry and audacious rogue of about twenty-seven at this time, strongly made, and not bad looking, with dark twinkling eyes, shrewd expression, and always ready to take a hand in the tavern or the brawl, although he could be mighty demure before his masters, yet he had their interests at heart as they had proved on several occasions, and behind his buffoonery had a considerable share of mother-wit Prologue 7 which had also been of service to them more than once.

Josh was a general lover, in the short times of rest which the wars allowed, and neglected no opportunity of ingratiating himself with the fair sex, that is, he loved every daughter of mother Eve indiscriminately, but although brazen enough on most occasions, he was always overcome with a strange shyness when his love of the moment chanced to be young ; then he would stammer and be unable to find the right words at the proper moment, cursing himself afterwards for his folly and stupidity while ' Phyllis flouted him.' But with old or middle-aged dames Josh was a terror, he could flatter them by the hour and make them imagine themselves to be years younger than they were. In Josh's hands Time went backwards rapidly, and the landladies of inns and ancient hand maids were not ungrateful for his brave efforts.

The body of young Harry Dunclugh had been taken from the field as he fell and laid in the tent as it was raised, after the armies had drawn from each other. Although no man knew for certain the result of that sanguinary day, yet all expected that with the rising sun the stern game would be renewed. Prince William and his retinue were resting in their own tents and over against them lay the tents of the French army, while between were the heaped up bodies of the slaughtered and wounded, lighted up by the torches of the searchers and camp followers. Bands of devoted friends passed about seeking for those who were missing, and where life remained, bearing them tenderly to each camp. They had been enemies all that day, they would be blood-thirsty foe men to-morrow most likely; but on this night, in the still grey dusk of that autumn evening, they passed each other gravely and with bent heads, for the dignity of Death ruled over that obscurity and touched their wearied spirits with its icy touch.

Behind them came the camp followers, those human jackals which nothing can touch except cupidity. They shrank and prowled with slouching gait and talon-like greedy hands, tearing the chains and trinkets from dead necks and stiffened fingers, raking through the doublets and pouches for the odd pieces of gold, silver or copper which might be there, stabbing where they could do so safely those who were not yet dead. Male and female beasts of prey these were, the females mostly young, the males miserable objects of infamy. Mons stretched out in the distance with its strong fortifications and the river Troville which divided it and its fine churches, while all round spread a fair and fruitful country. The beleagured city was lighted up and the in habitants restless and watchful, for they could not yet tell which party had won, their friends or their foes.

The French or the Dutch, they had been keenly interested in that battle all day, but the smoke from belching guns had blotted out much of the action, and the darkness and cessation still left them uncertain. Prologue 9 They were praying for Prince William and cursing the Duke of Luxembourg, and waiting with heart choking suspense on the morrow. Inside his tent, with his dead father and dead cousin beside him, young Harry Dunclugh was sitting grief-stricken and desolate, and his servant Josh moved about with gloomy face, sorrowful for the dead master who had been so kind to him, yet anxious to administer comfort to the living. He was a rough soldier and an adventurer, to whom death and violence were no stranger, yet this night some thing had gone out of his life which no surreptitious sucks at the flagon could console him for. ' Ye ha' foughten all day, Sir Harry, let me serve yer supper — it is ready,' said this rough fellow, not knowing what else to say by way of comfort.

The young man shuddered at the new title which his dependent had given him, now his, yet which reminded him of his irreparable loss, and answered shortly : ' I am not hungry, Josh.' 'Then take a cup o' mulled sack, or a glass o' hollands, they are both here to your hand, Sir Harry.' ' Nothing, Josh ; an' as you love me, lad, call me not by that title this night, else I'll go mad.' Josh heard the words and saw the glare of those blue, bloodshot eyes, and shrank out of the tent, dropping the flap behind him, and leaving his young master alone with his mighty grief and his placid dead- Josh partook of the mulled sack which he had prepared for his master, for he was a prudent mercen ary and did not like to see waste on the battlefield ; then he lit his pipe, and looking over the contested field, meditated like the crude philosopher he was, on the results of glory.

And as he sat smoking, the great harvest moon rose over the field and city, blood-red at first, as if it had been dipped in some shambles beyond that gory field, but soon wasting itself in the mists, which floated up from the swamps, it shone forth, whitely, solemnly, majestically, over the city with its spires ; over the laden orchards ; over the grim and crowded battle-field; glistening upon gleaming breastplates and inky pools ; laving dead faces and clenched teeth ; nestling amongst dew-drenched sheafs of wheat and gloating with silver lustre on the broad bosom of that flowing river.

Chapter I London

1684 — THE EXECUTION King James the Second of England, if he gave no other benefits to his trembling subjects during his short and tyrannical reign, provided them with a lavish display of public executions. No man, woman, or child, during the few years of his reign, was able to say that they had not the full opportunity of satisfying their love of the horrible, or of witnessing frequently in every part of the realm, hangings, quarterings, whippings, brandings, and burnings. As we read the account of his butcheries and torturings in aid of the Holy Church, or for his own private love of cruelty, we are appalled, and wonder how a nation that had to an extent been liberated by Oliver Cromwell could have tolerated so long, the awful iniquities of this monster of cruelty and cold profligacy. How they ever permitted him to leave their kingdom is a mystery, without torturing him to death as he had gloatingly tortured his too faithful subjects.

The head of Charles I was enough, perchance, for his perfidy, but the whole body of this Nero-like son of Rome would not compensate for these atrocious murders in which he delighted so greatly. Englishmen are in the habit of grumbling to-day about their rights and wrongs. It is the privilege of free-born Englishmen to grumble at everything, yet who, at the present day would care to live in the days when this last of the royal Stuarts held the reins of Britain. We can live now or die as we think fit. If we cannot pay our debts, to prison we must go for contempt of court if we will not explain our circumstances to the benevolent court, but even at the worst there are no brandings on the cheek or back, no mutilation of the limbs. Swindlers and thieves are lodged as princes used to be of old. We hold out our arms to embrace all aliens, while they still drum our poor out of their countries.

We keep foreign paupers, and they kick out ours. We patronise foreign arts and literature, and they boycot ours. Still we go on and thrive. Our state Church taxes us, and we pay it because it is one of the constitutions which has made us great. No sensible Englishman would ever overturn the state Church, because we might have a Popish dynasty, with King James the Second's time and Bloody Mary's over again, and God keep us long from that. None of us like these taxes who are not rigid churchmen, but better taxes than thumbscrews and auto-da-fas. The King, some of us regard as an expensive super fluity, yet the bees don't think that with their queen and they manage their hives admirably. There is order in London 1684. — The Execution 13 the hive, and they could not have it without their queen and their drones.

Of course the bees destroy the drones when they no longer require them, and that is a point which future parliaments may perhaps take up. It is a great saving of honey to kill drones. King James the Second provided, with the aid of his keeper of the grand seal, Lord Jeffreys, a great number of horrible and unjust pageants for the benefit of his subjects, yet now and again he really gave a satisfactory hanging or burning spectacle for their benefit. In his young days he had been an ardent sailor, and although he did not know much about anything, yet what little discrimination and knowledge he had in his bigotted brains was exemplified in his naval ad ministration. That was fairly well conducted, and sailors had cause to drink, ' God save the King,' for their pay which was now and again paid to them.

He also made a great example of pirates during his reign. When they were caught, they were promptly hanged on the river side ; preserved in boiling pitch and carefully suspended in chains, and when this just retribution overtook those deep sea or river rovers, there was generally a merry and boisterous crowd in attendance to see them 'jerked off.' Such a crowd was assembled, one drizzly and foggy day in February, 1684, at the river side in Southwark, to witness the just and lawful punishment of five notorious pirates who had been brought in after a short but merry career on the high seas. They were parched and sunbaked men, those rovers, with proper hang-dog visages whom no one could pity; they had done murders and other name less crimes galore, and could not possibly have been respited, even by the most righteous of judges or most impartial of juries, and what pleased the mob most of all — they died impenitent to a man.

There was no sentiment about the affair; each hardened criminal was led up scowling fiendishly upon his audience, and when the cart was drawn under him, he made his struggles with great vigour, at which the crowd applauded. A grey and gloomy sky environed each man doomed to die. Drizzling rain fell upon those eager and hardened faces, he scowled upon them hideously, as perhaps he thought upon the sunny skies he had come from, and then a great shout of barbarous laughter went up from a thousand throats, while the poor wretch terminated his misused existence. There was always a keen competition for places at such exhibitions, a great deal of bustling and brawl ing, cursing, and fighting went on, but there was one who had been privileged for some years, by reason of her constant attendance at executions, whom the crowd of ruffians knew as Mistress Hacker and good humouredly allowed a front place.

A little woman was Mistress Aggy Hacker, sharp tongued and sharp-visaged, with pallid face, crow- London 1684. — The Execution 15 blue eyes, iron-grey hair tightly smoothed over he low forehead and hidden carefully inside her house keeper's cap. Most of the audience had at one time or another been forced to apply to her master, Noah Scraper, the old Baillis lawyer and money-lender, who had his house and offices in Drury Lane, for he had thriven at his double calling, was a humble and attentive follower of the bulky Judge Jeffreys, who had not as yet noticed him, and a noted miser, who lived alone with his housekeeper and was much re spected as well as feared by the professional law breakers. He knew most of their secrets and when they had money enough to purchase his interests, could get them out of most of their troubles, therefore they favoured the vixenish little housekeeper for the sake of her master.

Mistress Aggy also knew a great number of her master's secrets, for she had kept house for him for many years, and as he was not partial to over much cleaning or extravagant cooking, nor at all given to hospitality her house duties were light. Her weak ness, like the great father of Pennsylvania, was to see executions, and her boast was that she had not missed many for the past sixteen years. She learned from her master in good time when and where the punish ments had to take place, and therefore always arrived early and stopped till the last. She was an authority on hangings, brandings, whippings, and beheadings, and while waiting upon the tragedy to begin, would entertain those nearest her, with graphic accounts of the behaviour of former noted criminals. Her snort of contempt if some poor doomed wretch showed the white feather was sufficient to inflame the crowd against him and render his exit an exit of execration and insult.

Her approval made him the hero of the hour. On the present occasion she was satisfied with the deportment of the pirates, they were all strong, burly men with fine limbs, and they died hard and defiantly. Mistress Aggy liked a fine tall man and appreciated a game one, so that she gave her entire approval, and the crowd applauded them gleefully and heartily. ' These be proper men,' she remarked calmly, as she picked up the stool which she had brought with her for her greater comfort, and pushed her way through the crowd that respectfully parted for her, after she had critically watched the last quiver of the stalwart bodies. ' We don't ha' many now-a-days as dies properly, but these be proper fellows.' Mistress Aggy Hacker having gratified her curiosity, and accepted some refreshments from one or two of her attentive acquaintances, promised them that she would not keep them waiting, next time they had occasion to see Master Scraper, and thus parting from them with right good will she made her way to where some watermen were waiting for customers, and selecting her boat, was rowed up the river in the direction of Alsatia.

Respectable citizens as a rule avoided this disreput- London 1684 — The Execution 17 able locality, but to Mistress Aggy it had long been familiar and friendly ground. She had many friends here who could not venture out to an execution themselves, but who were always pleased to hear the news, and as she had a bagful on this day, it was not long before she was the entertained guest of a select circle of dames and gentlemen who were more distinguished by their freedom of speech and capacity for drinking than by the sumptuousness of their attire. Mistress Hacker, however, was used to their manners and enjoyed the company immensely. She had some commissions to deliver for her master and when these were over she sat down to spend the remainder of the day with her reckless boon companions, nor did she think of her duties until the afternoon was well ad vanced and then she rose and prepared for home.

She was a thin woman, as well as a small one, and had partaken freely of the liquid hospitality of these noble Alsatians, but beyond a slight reddening at the point of that sharp nose, a watery gleaming in those crow-blue eyes, a more defiant cock of her head, and an extra waspishness of manner, which drew in her thin lips until they could hardly be seen ; with a palpable desire to insult the friends she had been embracing in the earlier part of the day, there were no other signs about this remarkable housekeeper to show that she had spent such a pleasant day. She walked quickly and straightly through crowded Whitesriars, leaving behind her in that smoke-filled B tavern several irate damsels, who had been with great difficulty restrained from falling upon her for her insolence, but who were now being soothed by the more prudent male friends, who had to study the tempers of Master Scraper's housekeeper ; tossing her head, and handling her stool in a manner that made the roysterers clear out of the path of that tiny terma gant, and yield to her the nearest side of the wall.