Old Mortality; The black dwarf; A legend of Montrose; The surgeon's daughter

Front matter

FROM THE- LIBRARY- OF

A. ''U Ryder

EaO%

INTRODUCTION TO OLD MORTALITY xi

good friend/* was the reply. '' And may I ask if yon have ever heard of a place called Dnnnottar ? '' "I onght to know something about it, my friend/' said Mr. Walker, '* since I have been several years the minister of the parish.** *' I am glad to hear it,** said the Dumfriesian, " for one of my near relations lies buried there, and there is, I believe, a monument over his grave. I would give half of what I am aught to know if it is still in existence.*' *' He was one of those whoperished in the Whigs* Vault at the castle ? ** said the minister ; '' for there are few southlanders besides lying in our churchyard, and none, I think, having monuments.** " Even sae — even sae,** said the old Cameronian, for such was the farmer. He then laid down his spade, cast on his coat, and heartily offered to see the minister out of the moss, if he should lose the rest of the day's dargue, Mr. Walker was able to requite him amply, in his opinion, by reciting the epitaph, which he remembered by heart. The old man was enchanted with finding the memory of his grandfather or great-grandfather faithfully recorded among the names of brother sufferers ; and rejecting all other offers of recompense, only requested, after he had guided Mr. Walker to a safe and dry road, that he f would let him have a written copy of the inscription.

It was. while I was listening to this story, and looking at

.^ the monument referred to, that I saw Old Mortality engaged i5,his daily task of cleaning and repairing the ornaments and

^ epitaphs upon the tomb. His appearance and equipment were exactly, as described in the Novel. I was very desirous

^ to see something of a person so singular, and expected to have -done so, as he took up his quarters with the hospitable and liberal -spirited minister. But though Mr. Walker invited him up after dinner to partake of a glass of spirits and water, to which he was supposed not to be very averse, yet he would not speak frankly upon the subject of his occupation. He _ was in bad humor, and had, according to his phrase, no freedom for conversation with us.

His spirit had been sorely vexed by hearing, in a certain Aberdonian kirk, the psalmody directed by a pitch-pipe, or Bome similar instrument, which was to Old Mortality the abomination of abominations. Perhaps, after all, he did not feel himself at ease with his company ; he might suspect the questions asked by a north-country minister and a young barrister to savor more of idle curiosity than profit. At any rate, in the phrase of John Bunyan, Old Mortality went on his way, and I saw him no more. "-—

The remarkable figure and occupation of this ancient piladi WAVERLEY NOVELS

grim was recalled to my memory by an account transmitted by my friend, Mr. Joseph Train, supervisor of excise at Dumfries, to whom I owe many obligations of a similar nature. From this, besides some other circumstances, among which are those of the old man^s death, I learned the particulars described in the text. I am also informed that the old palmer's family, in the third generation, survives, and is highly respected both for talents and worth.

While these sheets were passing through the press, I re^ ceived the following communication from Mr. Train, whose nndeviating kindness had, during the intervals of laborious duty, collected its materials from an indubitable source:

*' In the course of my periodical visits to the Glenkens, I have become intimately acquainted with Robert Paterson, a son of Old Mortality, who lives in the little village of Balmaclellan ; and although he is now in the seventieth year of his age, preserves all the vivacity of youth — has a most retentive memory, and a mind stored with information far above what could be expected from a person in his station of life. To him I am indebted for the following particulars relative to his father and his descendants down to the present time.

'' Robert Paterson, alias Old Mortality, was the son of Walter Paterson and Margaret Scott, who occupied the farm of Haggisha, in the parish of Hawick, during nearly the first half of the 18th century.. Here Robert was born, in the memorable year 1715.

" Being the youngest son of a numerous family, he, at an early age, went to serve with an elder brotlier, named Francis, who rented, from Sir John Jardine of Applegarth, a small tract in Corncockle Moor, near Lochmaben. During his residence there he became acquainted with Elizabeth Gray, daughter of Robert Gray, gardener to Sir John Jardine, whom he afterwards married. His wife had been for a considerable time a cook-maid to Sir Thomas Kirkpatrick of Closeburn, who procured for her husband, from the Duke of Queensberry, an advantageous lease of the freestone quarry of Gatelowbrigg, in the parish of Morton. Here he built a house, and had as much land as kept' a horse and cow. My informant cannot say with certainty the year in which his father took up his residence at Gatelowbrigg, but he is surw it must have been only a short time prior to the year 1746, ag^ during the memorable frost in 1740, he says his mother still resided in the service of Sir Thomas Kirkpatrick. When the Highlanders were returning from England on their route t4^ Glasgow, in the year 1745-46, they plundered Mr. Pate^so^'d

INTRODUCTION TO OLD MORTALITY xiii

house at Gatelowbrigg, and carried him a prisoner as far as Glenbuck, merely because he said to one of the straggling army that their retreat might have been easily foreseen, as the strong arm of the Lord was evidently raised, not only against the bloody and wicked house of Stewart, but against all who attempted to support the abominable heresies of the Church of Eome. From this circumstance it appears that Old Mortality had, even at that early period of his life, imbibed the religious enthusiasm by which he afterwards became so much distinguished.

" The religious sect called Hill-men, or Cameronians, was at that time much noted for austerity and devotion, in imitation of Cameron, their founder, of whose tenets Old Mortality became a most strenuous supporter. He made frequent journeys into Galloway to attend their conventicles, and occasionally carried with him gravestones from his quarry at Gatelowbrigg, to keep in remembrance the righteous whose dust had been gathered to their fathers. Old Mortality was not one of those religious devotees who, although one eye is seemingly turned towards heaven, keep the other steadfastly fixed on some sublunary object. As his enthusiasm increased, his journeys into Galloway became more frequent ; and he gradually neglected even the common prudential duty of pre vidirig for his offspring. From about the year 1758, he neglected wholly to return from Galloway to his wife and. five children at Gatelowbrigg, which induced her to send her eldest son Walter, then only twelve years of age, to Galloway in search of his father. After traversing nearly the whole of that extensive district, from the Nick of Benncorie to the Fell of Barhullion, he found him ait last working on the Oameronian monuments, in the old kirkyard of Kirkchrist, on the west side of the Dee, opposite the town of Kirkcudbright, The little Avanderer used all the influence in his power to induce his father to return to his family ; but in vain. Mrs. Paterson sent even some of her female children into Galloway in search of their father, for the same purpose of persuading him to return home ; but without any success. At last, in tlie summer of 1768, *she removed to the little upland village of Balmaclellan, in the Glenkens of Galloway, where, upou the small pittance derived from keeping a little school, she supported her numerous family in a respectable manner.

^' Tliere is a small monumental stone in the farm of the Caldon, near the House of the Hill, in Wigtonshire, which is highly venerated as being the first erected, by Old Mortality,

Jdr WAVERLEY NOVELS

to the memory of several persons who fell at that place in defence of their religious tenets in the civil war, in tne reign of Charles Second.*

*' From the Caldon, the labors of Old Mortality, in the course of time, spread over nearly all the Lowlands of Scotland. There are few churchyards in Ayrshire, Galloway, or Dumfriesshire, where the work of his chisel is not yet to be seen. It is easily distinguished from the work of any other artist by the primitive rudeness of the emblems of death, and of the inscriptions which adorn the ill-formed blocks of his erection. This task of repairing and erecting gravestones, practised without fee or reward, was the only ostensible employment of this singular person for upwards of forty years. The door of every Cameronian's house was indeed open to him at all times when he chose to enter, and he was gladly received as an inmate of the family ; but he did not invariably accept of these civilities, as may be seen by the following account of his frugal expenses, found, among other little papers (some of which I have likewise in my possession), in his pocketbook after his death ;

Gatehotise of Fleet, 4th February 1796.

Robert Paterson debtor to Margaret Chrystale

To drye Lodginge for seven weeks . . . .£041

To Four Auchlets of Ait Meal 0 3 4

To 6 Lippies of Potatoes 0 13

To Lend Money at the time of Mr. Reid's Sacrament 0 6 0 ToSChappinsof Yell with Sandy the Keelmanf . 0 0 9

£0 15 5 Received in part . . . 0 10 0

'* This statement shows the religious wanderer to have been Tery poor in his old age ; but he was so more by choice than through necessity, as at the period here alluded to his children were all comfortably situated, and were most anxious to keep their father at home, but no entreaty could induce him to alter his erratic way of life. He travelled from one churchyard to another, mounted on his old white pony, till the last day of his existence, and died, as you have described, at Bankhill, near Lockerby, on the 14th February 1801, in the eighty,

♦ The house was stormed by a Captain Orchard or Urquhart, who was shot In the attack.

t A well-known huraorist, still alive, popularly called by the name of Old KmI)^ baci, who deals In the keel or chalk with wnioh farmers mark their flooka.

INTRODUCTION TO OLD MORTALITY xt

sixth year of his age. As soon as his body was found, intimation was sent to his sons at Balmaclellan ; but, from the great depth of the snow at that time, the letter communicating the particulars of his death was so long detained by the way that the remains of the pilgrim were interred before any of his relations could arrive at Bankhill.

" The following is an exact copy of the account of his funeral expenses, the original of which I have in my possession :

Memorandum of the Funral Charges of Robert Paterson, who dyed at Bankhill on the 14th day of February 1801

To a Coffon £0 12 0

To Hunting for do 0 2 8

To a Shirt for him 0 5 0

To a pair of Cotton Stockings . . . . . 0 2 0

To Bread at the Founral 0 2 6

To Chise at ditto 0 3 0

To 1 pint Rume 0 4 6

To 1 pint Whiskie 0 4 6

To a man going to Annan 0 2 P

To the grave diger ...••.. 010 To Linnen for a sheet to him . .,028

£2 1 10 Taken off him when dead . 1 7 (>

£0 14 4

" The above account is authenticated by the son of the deceased.

*' My friend was prevented by indisposition from even going to Bankhill to attend the funeral of his father, which I regret very much, as he is not aware in what churchyard he was interred.

*' For the purpose of erecting a small monument to his memory, I have made every possible inquiry, wherever 1 thought there was the least chance of finding out where Old Mortality was laid ; but I have done so in vain, as his death is not registered in the session-book of any of the neighboring parishes. * I am sorry to think that in all probability this singular person, who spent so many years of his lengthened

♦TIus good intention was, however, carried out. A headstone was erected November, 1869, to the memory of Old Mortality in the churchyard of Caerlavrock, where there is satisfactory proof of his havin.^ been interred in the month of February, 1801. Mr. Train seems to have been misled in his information respecting the name of the village where Robert Paterson died. There is now strong evidence that not Bankhill, but Bankend, about fifteen miles from Bankhill, was the place when Old Mortality breathed his last CLaing^

3tvi ^,r . WAVERLEY NOVELS

existence in striving with his chisel and mallet to perpetuate the memory of many less deserving than himself, must remain even without a single stone to mark out the resting-place of his mortal remains.

'' Old Mortality had three sons, Eobert, Walter, and John ; the former, as has been already mentioned, lives in the village of Balmaclellan, in comfortable circumstances, and is much respected by his neighbors. Walter died several years ago, leaving behind him a family now respectably situated in this point. John went to America in the year 1776, and, after various turns of fortune, settled at Baltimore."

Old Nol himself is said to have loved an innocent jest (see Captain Hodgson^s Memoirs), Old Mortality somewhat resembled the Protector in this turn to festivity. Like Master Silence, he had been merry twice and thrice in his time ; but even his jests were of a melancholy and sepulchral nature, and sometimes attended wdth inconvenience to himself, as will appear from the following anecdote :

The old man was at one time following his wonted occupation of repairing the tombs of the martyrs, in the churchyard of Girthon, and the sexton of the parish was plying his kindred task at no small distance. Some roguish urchins were sporting near them, and by their noisy gambols disturbing the old men in their serious occupation. The most petulant of the juvenile party were two or three boys, grandchildren of a person well known by the name of Cooper Climent. This artist enjoyed almost a monopoly in Girthon and the neighboring parishes for making and selling ladles, caups, bickers, bowls, spoons, cogues, and trenchers, formed of wood, for the use of the country people. It must be noticed that, notwithstanding the excellence of tlie cooper's vessels, they were apt, when new, to impart a reddish tinge to whatever liquor was put into them, a circumstance not uncommon in like cases.

. The grandchildren of this dealer in wooden work took it into their head to ask the sexton what use he could possibly make of the numerous fragments of old coffins which were thrown up in opening new graves. '* Do you not know,'' said Old Mortality, ^' that he sells them to your grandfather, who makes them into spoons, trenchers, bickers, bowies, and so forth ? " At this assertion, the youthful group broke up in great confusion and disgust, on reflecting how many meals they had eaten out of dishes which, by Old Mortality's account, were only fit to be used at a banquet of witches or of ghouls. Tliey carried the tidings home, when many a dinner was spoiled by the loathing which the intelligence imparted;

INTRODUCTION TO OLD MORTALITY xvii

for the account of the materials was supposed to explain the reddish tinge which, even in the days of the cooper^s fame, had seemed somewhat suspicious. The ware of Cooper Climent was rejected in horror, much to the benefit of his rivals the muggers, who dealt in earthenware. The man of cutty-spoon and ladle saw his trade interrupted, and learned , the reason, by his quondam customers coming upon him in wrath to return the goods which were composed of such unliallowed materials, and demand repayment of their money. In this disagreeable predicament, the forlorn artist cited Old Mortality into a court of justice, where he proved that the wood he used in his trade was that of the staves of old wine-pipes bought from smugglers, with whom the country then abounded, a circumstance which fully accounted for their imparting a color to their contents. Old Mortality himself made tlie fullest declaration that he had no other purpose in making the assertion than to check the petulance of the children. But it is easier to take away a good name than to restore it. Cooper Climent's business continued to languish, and he died in a state of poverty.

Chapter I Preliminary

Why seeks he with unwearied toil Through death's dim walks to urge his waj,

Reclaim his long-asserted spoil, And lead oblivion into day ?

liANaHOBNB.

"Most readers," says the Manuscript of Mr. Pattieson, "mnst have witnessed with delight the joyous burst which attends the dismissing of a village school on a fine summer evening. The buoyant spirit of childhood, repressed with so much difficulty during the tedious hours of discipline, may then be seen to explode, as it were, in shout, and song, and frolic, as the little urchins join in groups on their playground, and arrange their matches of sport for the evening. But there is one individual who partakes of the relief afforded by the moment of dismission, whose feelings are not so obvious to the eye of the spectator, or so apt to receive his sympathy. I mean the teacher himself, who, stunned with the hum, and suffocated with the closeness of his schoolroom, has spent the whole day (himself against a host) in controlling petulance, exciting indifference to action, striving to enlighten stupidity, and laboring to soften obstinacy ; and whose very powers of intellect have been confounded by hearing the same dull lesson repeated a hundred times by rote, and only varied by the various blunders of the reciters. Even the flowers of classic genius, with which his solitary fancy is most gratified, have been rendered degraded in his imagination by their connection with tears, with errors, and with punishment; so that the Eclogues of Virgil and Odes of Horace are each inseparably allied in association with the sullen figure and monotonous recitation of some blabbering schoolboy. If to these mental distresses are added a delicate frame of body, and a mind ambitious of some higher distinction than that of being the tyrant of childhood, the reader may have some slight conception of the relief which a solitary walk in the cool of a fine summer evening affords to the head which has ached, and the nerves which liave been shattered, for so many hours in plying the irksome task of public instruction. ' ': -

" To me these evening strolls have been the happiest hours of an unhappy life ; and if any gentle reader shall hereafter find pleasure in perusing these lucubrations, I am not unwilling he should know that the plan of them has been usually "traced in those moments when relief from toil and clamor, combined with the quiet scenery around me, has disposed my mind to the task of composition.

''My chief haunt, in these hours of golden leisure, is the banks of the small stream which, winding through a ' lone vale of green bracken,' passes in front of the village school-house of Gandercleugh. For the first quarter of a mile, perhaps, I may be disturbed from my meditations in order to return the scrape or doffed bonnet of such stragglers among my pupils as fish for trouts or minnows in the little brook, or seek rushes and wild flowers by its margin. But beyond the space I have mentioned the juvenile anglers do not after sunset voluntarily extend their excursions. The cause is, that further up the narrow valley, and in a recess which seems scooped out of the side of the steep heathy bank, there is a deserted burial-ground, which the little cowards are fearful of approaching in the twilight. To me, however, the place has an inexpressible charm. It has been long the favorite termination of my walks, and, if my kind patron forgets not his promise, will (and probably at no very distant day) be my final resting-place after my mortal pilgrimage.*

" It is a spot which possesses all the solemnity of feeling attached to a burial-ground, without exciting those of a more unpleasing description. Having been very little used for many years, the few hillocks which rise above the level plain are covered with the same short velvet turf. The monuments, of which there are not above seven or eight, are half sunk in the ground and overgrown with moss. No newly erected tomb disturbs the sober serenity of our reflections by reminding ua of recent calamity, and no rank-springing grass forces upon our imagination the recollection, that it owes its dark luxuriance to the foul and festering remnants of mortality which ferment beneath. The daisy which sprinkles the sod, and

* See ii'Mw F»ttieioa'« Grave. Note 1.

OLD MORTALITY t

the harebell which hangs over it, derive their pure nourishment from the dew of heaven, and their growth impresses us with no degrading or disgusting recollections. Death has indeed been here^ and its traces are before us ; but they are softened and deprived of their horror by our distance from the period when they have been first impressed. Those who sleep beneath / are only connected with us by the reflection, that they have once been what we now are, and that, as their relics are now identified with their mother earth, ours shall at some future period undergo the same transformation.

" Yet, although the moss has been collected on the most modern of these humble tombs during four generations of mankind, the memory of some of those who sleep beneath them is still held in reverent remembrance. It is true that, upon the largest, and, to an antiquary, the most interesting monument of the group, which bears the effigies of a doughty knight in his hood of mail, with his shield hanging on his breast, the armorial bearings are defaced by time, and a few worn-out letters may be read at the pleasure of the decipherer, Dns. Johan de Hamel, or Jolian de Lamel. And it is also true that of another tomb, richly sculptured with an ornamental cross, mitre, and pastoral staff, tradition can only aver that a certain nameless bishop lies interred there. But upon other two stones which lie beside may still be read in rude prose and ruder rhyme the history of those who sleep beneath them. They belong, we are assured by the epitaph, to the class of persecuted Presbyterians who afforded a melancholy subject for history in the times of Charles II. and his successor. * In returning from the battle of Pentland Hills, a party of the insurgents had been attacked in this glen by a small detachment of the king's troops, and three or four either killed in the skirmish, or shot after being made prisoners, as rebels taken with arms in their hands. The peasantry continued to attach to the tombs of those victims of prelacy an honor which they do not render to more splendid mausoleums ; and, when they point them out to their sons, and narrate the fate of the sufferers, usually conclude by exhorting them to be ready, should times call for it, to resist to the death in the cause of civil and religious liberty, like their brave forefathers.

'^ Although I am far from venerating the peculiar tenets asserted by those who call themselves the followers of those men, and whose intolerance and narrow-minded bigotry are at least as conspicuous as their devotional zeal, yet it is with-

* James, Seventh King of Scotland of that name, and Second according to the nxuneration of the Kings of England.— J. C.

out depreciating the memory of those sufferers, many of whom united the independent sentiments of a Hampden with the suffering zeal of a Hooper or Latimer. On the other hand, it would be unjust to forget that many even of those who had been most active in crushing what they conceived the rebellious and seditious spirit of those unhappy wanderers, displayed themselves, when called upon to suffer for their political and religious opinions, the same daring and devoted zeal, tinctured, in their case, with chivalrous loyalty, as in the former with republican enthusiasm. It has often been remarked of the Scottish character, that the stubbornness with which it is moulded shows most to advantage in adversity, when it seems akin to the native sycamore of their hills, which^scorns to be biassed in its mode of growth even by the influence of the prevailing wind, but, shooting its branches with equal boldness in every direction, shows no weather-side to the storm, and may be broken, but can never be bended. It must be understood that I speak of my countrymen as they fall under my own observation. When in foreign countries, I have been informed that they are more docile. But it is time to return from this digression.

'' One summer evening as, in a stroll such as I have described, I approached this deserted mansion of the dead, I was somewhat surprised to hear sounds distinct from those which usually soothe its solitude, the gentle chiding, namely, of the brook, and the sighing of the wind in the boughs of three gigantic ash-trees, which mark the cemetery. The clink of a hammer was on this occasion distinctly heard ; and I entertained some alarm that a march dike, long meditated by the two proprietors whose estates were divided by my favorite brook, was about to be drawn up the glen, in order to substitute its rectilinear deformity for the graceful winding of the natural boundary.* As I approached I was agreeably undeceived. An old man was seated upon the monument of the slaughtered Presbyterians, and busily employed in deepening with his chisel the letters of the inscription which, announcing in Scriptural language the promised blessings of futurity to be the lot of the slain, anathematized the murderers with corresponding violence. A blue bonnet of unusual dimensions covered the grav hairs of the pious workman. His dress was a large old-fashioned coat of the coarse cloth called ' lioddengray,' usually worn by the elder peasants, with waistcoat and breeches of the same ; and the whole suit, though still in decent repair, had obviously seen a train of long service.

♦ See A March-Dike Boundary. Note 8.

Strong clouted shoes, studded with hob-nails and ' gramashes ' or ' leggins/ made of thick black cloth, completed his equipment. Beside him, fed among the graves a pony, the companion of his journey, whose extreme whiteness, as well as its projecting bones and hollow eyes, indicated its antiquity. It was harnessed in the most simple manner, with a pair of branks, a hair tether, or halter, and a ' sunk,' or cushion of straw, instead of bridle and saddle. A canvas pouch hung around the neck of the animal, for the purpose, probably, of containing the rider's tools, and anything else he might have occasion to carry with him. Although I had never seen the old man before, yet from the singularity of his employment and the style of his equipage, I had no difficulty in recognizing a religious itinerant whom I had often heard talked of, and who was known in various parts of Scotland by the title of Old Mortality.

" Where this man was born, or what was his real name, I have never been able to learn ; nor are the motives which made him desert his home and adopt the erratic mode of life which he pursued known to me except very generally. According to the belief of most people, he was a native of either the county of Dumfries or Galloway, and lineally descended from some of those champions of the Covenant whose deeds and sufferings were his favorite theme. He is said to have held, at one period of his life, a small moorland farm ; but, whether from pecuniary losses or domestic misfortune, he had long renounced that and every other gainful calling. In the language of Scripture, he left his house, his home, and his kindred, and wandered about until the day of his death, a period of nearly thirty years.

" During this long pilgrimage, the pious enthusiast regulated his circuit so as annually to visit the graves of the unfortunate Covenanters who suffered by the sword, or by the executioner, during the reigns of the two last monarch s of the Stewart line. These are most numerous in the western districts of Ayr, Galloway, and Dumfries ; but they are also to be found in other parts of Scotland, wherever the fugitives had fought, or fallen, or suffered by military or civil execution. Their tombs are often apart from all human habitation, in the remote moors and wilds to which the wanderers had fled for concealment. But wherever they existed, Old Mortality was sure to visit them when his annual round brought them within his reach. In the most lonely recesses of the mountains the moor-fowl shooter has been often surprised tc find him busied in cleaning the moss from the gi-ay stones, renewing with his chisel the half-defaced inscriptions, and repairing the emblems of death with which these simple monuments are usually adorned. Motives of the most sincere, though fanciful, devotion induced the old man to dedicate so many years of existence to perform this tribute to the memory of the deceased warriors of the church. He considered him-, self as fulfilling a sacred duty, while renewing to the eyes of posterity the decaying emblems of the zeal and sufferings of their forefathers, and tliereby trimming, as it were, the beaconlight which was to warn future generations to defend their religion even unto blood.