Redgauntlet: A Tale Of The Eighteenth Century

‘No, my good friend,’ said I, taking Mr. Geddes’s hand, ‘I am not so happy as you suppose me. Were my span to be concluded this evening, few would so much as know that such a being had existed for twenty years on the face of the earth; and of these few, only one would sincerely regret me. Do not, therefore, refuse me the privilege attending you; and of showing, by so trifling an act of kindness, that if I have few friends, I am at least desirous to serve them.’

‘Thou hast a kind heart, I warrant thee,’ said Joshua Geddes, returning the pressure of my hand. ‘Rachel, the young man shall go with me. Why should he not face danger, in order to do justice and preserve peace? There is that within me,’ he added, looking upwards, and with a passing enthusiasm which I had not before observed and the absence of which perhaps rather belonged to the sect than to his own personal character – ‘I say, I have that within which assures me, that though the ungodly may rage even like the storm of the ocean, they shall not have freedom to prevail against us.’

Having spoken thus, Mr. Geddes appointed a pony to be saddled for my use; and having taken a basket with some provisions, and a servant to carry back the horses for which there was no accommodation at the fishing station, we set off about nine o’clock at night, and after three-quarters of an hour’s riding, arrived at our place of destination.

The station consists, or then consisted, of huts for four or five fishermen, a cooperage and shed, and a better sort of cottage at which the superintendent resided. We gave our horses to the servant, to be carried back to Mount Sharon; my companion expressing himself humanely anxious for their safety – and knocked at the door of the house. At first we only heard a barking of dogs; but these animals became quiet on snuffing beneath the door, and acknowledging the presence of friends. A hoarse voice then demanded, in rather unfriendly accents, who we were, and what we wanted and it was not; until Joshua named himself, and called upon his superintendent to open, that the latter appeared at the door of the hut, attended by three large dogs of the Newfoundland breed. He had a flambeau in his hand, and two large heavy ship-pistols stuck into his belt. He was a stout elderly man, who had been a sailor, as I learned, during the earlier part of his life, and was now much confided in by the Fishing Company, whose concerns he directed under the orders of Mr. Geddes.

‘Thou didst not expect me to-night, friend Davies?’ said my friend to the old man, who was arranging seats for us by the fire.

‘No, Master Geddes,’ answered he, ‘I did not expect you, nor, to speak the truth, did I wish for you either.’

‘These are plain terms: John Davies,’ answered Mr. Geddes.

‘Aye, aye, sir, I know your worship loves no holiday speeches.’

‘Thou dost guess, I suppose, what brings us here so late, John Davies?’ said Mr. Geddes.

‘I do suppose, sir,’ answered the superintendent, ‘that it was because those d – d smuggling wreckers on the coast are showing their lights to gather their forces, as they did the night before they broke down the dam-dyke and weirs up the country; but if that same be the case, I wish once more you had stayed away, for your worship carries no fighting tackle aboard, I think; and there will be work for such ere morning, your worship.’

‘Worship is due to Heaven only, John Davies,’ said Geddes, ‘I have often desired thee to desist from using that phrase to me.’

‘I won’t, then,’ said John; ‘no offence meant: But how the devil can a man stand picking his words, when he is just going to come to blows?’

‘I hope not, John Davies,’ said Joshua Geddes. ‘Call in the rest of the men, that I may give them their instructions.’

‘I may cry till doomsday Master Geddes, ere a soul answers – the cowardly lubbers have all made sail – the cooper, and all the rest of them, so soon as they heard the enemy were at sea. They have all taken to the long-boat, and left the ship among the breakers, except little Phil and myself – they have, by – !’

‘Swear not at all, John Davies – thou art an honest man; and I believe, without an oath, that thy comrades love their own bones better than my goods and chattels. And so thou hast no assistance but little Phil against a hundred men or two?’

‘Why, there are the dogs, your honour knows, Neptune and Thetis – and the puppy may do something; and then though your worship – I beg pardon – though your honour be no great fighter, this young gentleman may bear a hand.’

‘Aye, and I see you are provided with arms,’ said Mr. Geddes; ‘let me see them.’

‘Aye, aye, sir; here be a pair of buffers will bite as well as bark – these will make sure of two rogues at least. It would be a shame to strike without firing a shot. Take care, your honour, they are double-shotted.’

‘Aye, John Davies, I will take care of them, throwing the pistols into a tub of water beside him; ‘and I wish I could render the whole generation of them useless at the same moment.’

A deep shade of displeasure passed over John Davies’s weatherbeaten countenance. ‘Belike your honour is going to take the command yourself, then?’ he said, after a pause. ‘Why, I can be of little use now; and since your worship, or your honour, or whatever you are, means to strike quietly, I believe you will do it better without me than with me, for I am like enough to make mischief, I admit; but I’ll never leave my post without orders.’

‘Then you have mine, John Davies, to go to Mount Sharon directly, and take the boy Phil with you. Where is he?’

‘He is on the outlook for these scums of the earth,’ answered Davies; ‘but it is to no purpose to know when they come, if we are not to stand to our weapons.’

‘We will use none but those of sense and reason, John.’

‘And you may just as well cast chaff against the wind, as speak sense and reason to the like of them.’

‘Well, well, be it so,’ said Joshua; ‘and now, John Davies, I know thou art what the world calls a brave fellow, and I have ever found thee an honest one. And now I command you to go to Mount Sharon, and let Phil lie on the bank-side – see the poor boy hath a sea-cloak, though – and watch what happens there, and let him bring you the news; and if any violence shall be offered to the property there, I trust to your fidelity to carry my sister to Dumfries to the house of our friends the Corsacks, and inform the civil authorities of what mischief hath befallen.’

The old seaman paused a moment. ‘It is hard lines for me,’ he said, ‘to leave your honour in tribulation; and yet, staying here, I am only like to make bad worse; and your honour’s sister, Miss Rachel, must be looked to, that’s certain; for if the rogues once get their hand to mischief, they will come to Mount Sharon after they have wasted and destroyed this here snug little roadstead, where I thought to ride at anchor for life.’

‘Right, right, John Davies,’ said Joshua Geddes; ‘and best call the dogs with you.’

‘Aye, aye, sir,’ said the veteran, ‘for they are something of my mind, and would not keep quiet if they saw mischief doing; so maybe they might come to mischief, poor dumb creatures. So God bless your honour – I mean your worship – I cannot bring my mouth to say fare you well. Here, Neptune, Thetis! come, dogs, come.’

So saying, and with a very crestfallen countenance, John Davies left the hut.

‘Now there goes one of the best and most faithful creatures that ever was born,’ said Mr. Geddes, as the superintendent shut the door of the cottage. ‘Nature made him with a heart that would not have suffered him to harm a fly; but thou seest, friend Latimer, that as men arm their bull-dogs with spiked collars, and their game-cocks with steel spurs, to aid them in fight, so they corrupt, by education, the best and mildest natures, until fortitude and spirit become stubbornness and ferocity. Believe me, friend Latimer, I would as soon expose my faithful household dog to a vain combat with a herd of wolves, as yon trusty creature to the violence of the enraged multitude. But I need say little on this subject to thee, friend Latimer, who, I doubt not, art trained to believe that courage is displayed and honour attained, not by doing and suffering as becomes a man that which fate calls us to suffer and justice commands us to do, but because thou art ready to retort violence for violence, and considerest the lightest insult as a sufficient cause for the spilling of blood, nay, the taking of life. But, leaving these points of controversy to a more fit season, let us see what our basket of provision contains; for in truth, friend Latimer, I am one of those whom neither fear nor anxiety deprives of their ordinary appetite.’

We found the means of good cheer accordingly, which Mr. Geddes seemed to enjoy as much as if it had been eaten in a situation of perfect safety; nay, his conversation appeared to be rather more gay than on ordinary occasions. After eating our supper, we left the hut together, and walked for a few minutes on the banks of the sea. It was high water, and the ebb had not yet commenced. The moon shone broad and bright upon the placid face of the Solway Firth, and showed a slight ripple upon the stakes, the tops of which were just visible above the waves, and on the dark-coloured buoys which marked the upper edge of the enclosure of nets. At a much greater distance – for the estuary is here very wide – the line of the English coast was seen on the verge of the water, resembling one of those fog-banks on which mariners are said to gaze, uncertain whether it be land or atmospherical delusion.

‘We shall be undisturbed for some hours,’ said Mr. Geddes; ‘they will not come down upon us: till the state of the tide permits them to destroy the tide-nets. Is it not strange to think that human passions will so soon transform such a tranquil scene as this into one of devastation and confusion?’

It was indeed a scene of exquisite stillness; so much so, that the restless waves of the Solway seemed, if not absolutely to sleep, at least to slumber; on the shore no night-bird was heard – the cock had not sung his first matins, and we ourselves walked more lightly than by day, as if to suit the sounds of our own paces to the serene tranquillity around us. At length, the plaintive cry of a dog broke the silence, and on our return to the cottage, we found that the younger of the three animals which had gone along with John Davies, unaccustomed, perhaps, to distant journeys, and the duty of following to heel, had strayed from the party, and, unable to rejoin them, had wandered back to the place of its birth.

‘Another feeble addition to our feeble garrison,’ said Mr. Geddes, as he caressed the dog, and admitted it into the cottage. ‘Poor thing! as thou art incapable of doing any mischief, I hope thou wilt sustain none. At least thou mayst do us the good service of a sentinel, and permit us to enjoy a quiet repose, under the certainty that thou wilt alarm us when the enemy is at hand.’

There were two beds in the superintendent’s room, upon which we threw ourselves. Mr. Geddes, with his happy equanimity of temper, was asleep in the first five minutes. I lay for some time in doubtful and anxious thoughts, watching the fire, and the motions of the restless dog, which, disturbed probably at the absence of John Davies, wandered from the hearth to the door and back again, then came to the bedside and licked my hands and face, and at length, experiencing no repulse to its advances, established itself at my feet, and went to sleep, an example which I soon afterwards followed.

The rage of narration, my dear Alan – for I will never relinquish the hope that what I am writing may one day reach your hands – has not forsaken me, even in my confinement, and the extensive though unimportant details into which I have been hurried, renders it necessary that I commence another sheet. Fortunately, my pygmy characters comprehend a great many words within a small space of paper.

CHAPTER IV

DARSIE LATIMER’S JOURNAL, IN CONTINUATION

The morning was dawning, and Mr. Geddes and I myself were still sleeping soundly, when the alarm was given by my canine bedfellow, who first growled deeply at intervals, and at length bore more decided testimony to the approach of some enemy. I opened the door of the cottage, and perceived, at the distance of about two hundred yards, a small but close column of men, which I would have taken for a dark hedge, but that I could perceive it was advancing rapidly and in silence.

The dog flew towards them, but instantly ran howling back to me, having probably been chastised by a stick or a stone. Uncertain as to the plan of tactics or of treaty which Mr. Geddes might think proper to adopt, I was about to retire into the cottage, when he suddenly joined me at the door, and, slipping his arm through mine, said, ‘Let us go to meet them manfully; we have done nothing to be ashamed of. – Friends,’ he said, raising his voice as we approached them, ‘who and what are you, and with what purpose are you here on my property?’

A loud cheer was the answer returned, and a brace of fiddlers who occupied the front of the march immediately struck up the insulting air, the words of which begin —

Merrily danced the Quaker’s wife,

And merrily danced the Quaker.

Even at that moment of alarm, I think I recognized the tones of the blind fiddler, Will, known by the name of Wandering Willie, from his itinerant habits. They continued to advance swiftly and in great order, in their front when, coming close up, they surrounded us by a single movement, and there was a universal cry, ‘Whoop, Quaker – whoop, Quaker! Here have we them both, the wet Quaker and the dry one.’

The fiery fiddlers playing martial airs;

‘Hang up the wet Quaker to dry, and wet the dry one with a ducking,’ answered another voice.

‘Where is the sea-otter, John Davies, that destroyed more fish than any sealch upon Ailsa Craig?’ exclaimed a third voice. ‘I have an old crow to pluck with him, and a pock to put the feathers in.’

We stood perfectly passive; for, to have attempted resistance against more than a hundred men, armed with guns, fish-spears, iron-crows, spades, and bludgeons, would have been an act of utter insanity. Mr. Geddes, with his strong sonorous voice, answered the question about the superintendent in a manner the manly indifference of which compelled them to attend to him.

‘John Davies,’ he said, ‘will, I trust, soon be at Dumfries’ —

‘To fetch down redcoats and dragoons against us, you canting old villain!’