The Heart of Mid-Lothian, Complete

“Aha!” said Mr. Butler, “Optat ephippia bos piger, nothing new under the sun—But it was a fair hit of Mrs. Saddletree, however.”

“And it wad far better become ye, Mr. Saddletree,” continued his helpmate, “since ye say ye hae skeel o’ the law, to try if ye can do onything for Effie Deans, puir thing, that’s lying up in the tolbooth yonder, cauld, and hungry, and comfortless—A servant lass of ours, Mr. Butler, and as innocent a lass, to my thinking, and as usefu’ in the shop—When Mr. Saddletree gangs out,—and ye’re aware he’s seldom at hame when there’s ony o’ the plea-houses open,—poor Effie used to help me to tumble the bundles o’ barkened leather up and down, and range out the gudes, and suit a’ body’s humours—And troth, she could aye please the customers wi’ her answers, for she was aye civil, and a bonnier lass wasna in Auld Reekie. And when folk were hasty and unreasonable, she could serve them better than me, that am no sae young as I hae been, Mr. Butler, and a wee bit short in the temper into the bargain. For when there’s ower mony folks crying on me at anes, and nane but ae tongue to answer them, folk maun speak hastily, or they’ll ne’er get through their wark—Sae I miss Effie daily.”

“De die in diem,” added Saddletree.

“I think,” said Butler, after a good deal of hesitation, “I have seen the girl in the shop—a modest-looking, fair-haired girl?”

“Ay, ay, that’s just puir Effie,” said her mistress. “How she was abandoned to hersell, or whether she was sackless o’ the sinful deed, God in Heaven knows; but if she’s been guilty, she’s been sair tempted, and I wad amaist take my Bible-aith she hasna been hersell at the time.”

Butler had by this time become much agitated; he fidgeted up and down the shop, and showed the greatest agitation that a person of such strict decorum could be supposed to give way to. “Was not this girl,” he said, “the daughter of David Deans, that had the parks at St. Leonard’s taken? and has she not a sister?”

“In troth has she,—puir Jeanie Deans, ten years aulder than hersell; she was here greeting a wee while syne about her tittie. And what could I say to her, but that she behoved to come and speak to Mr. Saddletree when he was at hame? It wasna that I thought Mr. Saddletree could do her or ony ither body muckle good or ill, but it wad aye serve to keep the puir thing’s heart up for a wee while; and let sorrow come when sorrow maun.”

“Ye’re mistaen though, gudewife,” said Saddletree scornfully, “for I could hae gien her great satisfaction; I could hae proved to her that her sister was indicted upon the statute saxteen hundred and ninety, chapter one—For the mair ready prevention of child-murder—for concealing her pregnancy, and giving no account of the child which she had borne.”

“I hope,” said Butler,—“I trust in a gracious God, that she can clear herself.”

“And sae do I, Mr. Butler,” replied Mrs. Saddletree. “I am sure I wad hae answered for her as my ain daughter; but wae’s my heart, I had been tender a’ the simmer, and scarce ower the door o’ my room for twal weeks. And as for Mr. Saddletree, he might be in a lying-in hospital, and ne’er find out what the women cam there for. Sae I could see little or naething o’ her, or I wad hae had the truth o’ her situation out o’ her, I’se warrant ye—But we a’ think her sister maun be able to speak something to clear her.”

“The haill Parliament House,” said Saddletree, “was speaking o’ naething else, till this job o’ Porteous’s put it out o’ head—It’s a beautiful point of presumptive murder, and there’s been nane like it in the Justiciar Court since the case of Luckie Smith the howdie, that suffered in the year saxteen hundred and seventy-nine.”

“But what’s the matter wi’ you, Mr. Butler?” said the good woman; “ye are looking as white as a sheet; will ye tak a dram?”

“By no means,” said Butler, compelling himself to speak. “I walked in from Dumfries yesterday, and this is a warm day.”

“Sit down,” said Mrs. Saddletree, laying hands on him kindly, “and rest ye—yell kill yoursell, man, at that rate.—And are we to wish you joy o’ getting the scule, Mr. Butler?”

“Yes—no—I do not know,” answered the young man vaguely. But Mrs. Saddletree kept him to point, partly out of real interest, partly from curiosity.

“Ye dinna ken whether ye are to get the free scule o’ Dumfries or no, after hinging on and teaching it a’ the simmer?”

“No, Mrs. Saddletree—I am not to have it,” replied Butler, more collectedly. “The Laird of Black-at-the-Bane had a natural son bred to the kirk, that the Presbytery could not be prevailed upon to license; and so—”

“Ay, ye need say nae mair about it; if there was a laird that had a puir kinsman or a bastard that it wad suit, there’s enough said.—And ye’re e’en come back to Liberton to wait for dead men’s shoon?—and for as frail as Mr. Whackbairn is, he may live as lang as you, that are his assistant and successor.”

“Very like,” replied Butler, with a sigh; “I do not know if I should wish it otherwise.”

“Nae doubt, it’s a very vexing thing,” continued the good lady, “to be in that dependent station; and you that hae right and title to sae muckle better, I wonder how ye bear these crosses.”

“Quos diligit castigat,” answered Butler; “even the pagan Seneca could see an advantage in affliction, The Heathens had their philosophy, and the Jews their revelation, Mrs. Saddletree, and they endured their distresses in their day. Christians have a better dispensation than either—but doubtless—”

He stopped and sighed.

“I ken what ye mean,” said Mrs. Saddletree, looking toward her husband; “there’s whiles we lose patience in spite of baith book and Bible—But ye are no gaun awa, and looking sae poorly—ye’ll stay and take some kale wi’ us?”

Mr. Saddletree laid aside Balfour’s Practiques (his favourite study, and much good may it do him), to join in his wife’s hospitable importunity. But the teacher declined all entreaty, and took his leave upon the spot.

“There’s something in a’ this,” said Mrs. Saddletree, looking after him as he walked up the street; “I wonder what makes Mr. Butler sae distressed about Effie’s misfortune—there was nae acquaintance atween them that ever I saw or heard of; but they were neighbours when David Deans was on the Laird o’ Dumbiedikes’ land. Mr. Butler wad ken her father, or some o’ her folk.—Get up, Mr. Saddletree—ye have set yoursell down on the very brecham that wants stitching—and here’s little Willie, the prentice.—Ye little rin-there-out deil that ye are, what takes you raking through the gutters to see folk hangit?—how wad ye like when it comes to be your ain chance, as I winna ensure ye, if ye dinna mend your manners?—And what are ye maundering and greeting for, as if a word were breaking your banes?—Gang in by, and be a better bairn another time, and tell Peggy to gie ye a bicker o’ broth, for ye’ll be as gleg as a gled, I’se warrant ye.—It’s a fatherless bairn, Mr. Saddletree, and motherless, whilk in some cases may be waur, and ane would take care o’ him if they could—it’s a Christian duty.”

“Very true, gudewife,” said Saddletree in reply, “we are in loco parentis to him during his years of pupillarity, and I hae had thoughts of applying to the Court for a commission as factor loco tutoris, seeing there is nae tutor nominate, and the tutor-at-law declines to act; but only I fear the expense of the procedure wad not be in rem versam, for I am not aware if Willie has ony effects whereof to assume the administration.”

He concluded this sentence with a self-important cough, as one who has laid down the law in an indisputable manner.

“Effects!” said Mrs. Saddletree, “what effects has the puir wean?—he was in rags when his mother died; and the blue polonie that Effie made for him out of an auld mantle of my ain, was the first decent dress the bairn ever had on. Poor Effie! can ye tell me now really, wi’ a’ your law, will her life be in danger, Mr. Saddletree, when they arena able to prove that ever there was a bairn ava?”

“Whoy,” said Mr. Saddletree, delighted at having for once in his life seen his wife’s attention arrested by a topic of legal discussion—“Whoy, there are two sorts of murdrum or murdragium, or what you populariter et vulgariser call murther. I mean there are many sorts; for there’s your murthrum per vigilias et insidias, and your murthrum under trust.”

“I am sure,” replied his moiety, “that murther by trust is the way that the gentry murther us merchants, and whiles make us shut the booth up—but that has naething to do wi’ Effie’s misfortune.”

“The case of Effie (or Euphemia) Deans,” resumed Saddletree, “is one of those cases of murder presumptive, that is, a murder of the law’s inferring or construction, being derived from certain indicia or grounds of suspicion.”

“So that,” said the good woman, “unless poor Effie has communicated her situation, she’ll be hanged by the neck, if the bairn was still-born, or if it be alive at this moment?”

“Assuredly,” said Saddletree, “it being a statute made by our Sovereign Lord and Lady, to prevent the horrid delict of bringing forth children in secret—The crime is rather a favourite of the law, this species of murther being one of its ain creation.”

“Then, if the law makes murders,” said Mrs. Saddletree, “the law should be hanged for them; or if they wad hang a lawyer instead, the country wad find nae faut.”

A summons to their frugal dinner interrupted the farther progress of the conversation, which was otherwise like to take a turn much less favourable to the science of jurisprudence and its professors, than Mr. Bartoline Saddletree, the fond admirer of both, had at its opening anticipated.

CHAPTER FIFTH

But up then raise all Edinburgh.
They all rose up by thousands three.

                                          Johnnie Armstrang’s Goodnight.

Butler, on his departure from the sign of the Golden Nag, went in quest of a friend of his connected with the law, of whom he wished to make particular inquiries concerning the circumstances in which the unfortunate young woman mentioned in the last chapter was placed, having, as the reader has probably already conjectured, reasons much deeper than those dictated by mere humanity for interesting himself in her fate. He found the person he sought absent from home, and was equally unfortunate in one or two other calls which he made upon acquaintances whom he hoped to interest in her story. But everybody was, for the moment, stark-mad on the subject of Porteous, and engaged busily in attacking or defending the measures of Government in reprieving him; and the ardour of dispute had excited such universal thirst, that half the young lawyers and writers, together with their very clerks, the class whom Butler was looking after, had adjourned the debate to some favourite tavern. It was computed by an experienced arithmetician, that there was as much twopenny ale consumed on the discussion as would have floated a first-rate man-of-war.

Butler wandered about until it was dusk, resolving to take that opportunity of visiting the unfortunate young woman, when his doing so might be least observed; for he had his own reasons for avoiding the remarks of Mrs. Saddletree, whose shop-door opened at no great distance from that of the jail, though on the opposite or south side of the street, and a little higher up. He passed, therefore, through the narrow and partly covered passage leading from the north-west end of the Parliament Square.

He stood now before the Gothic entrance of the ancient prison, which, as is well known to all men, rears its ancient front in the very middle of the High Street, forming, as it were, the termination to a huge pile of buildings called the Luckenbooths, which, for some inconceivable reason, our ancestors had jammed into the midst of the principal street of the town, leaving for passage a narrow street on the north; and on the south, into which the prison opens, a narrow crooked lane, winding betwixt the high and sombre walls of the Tolbooth and the adjacent houses on the one side, and the butresses and projections of the old Cathedral upon the other. To give some gaiety to this sombre passage (well known by the name of the Krames), a number of little booths, or shops, after the fashion of cobblers’ stalls, are plastered, as it were, against the Gothic projections and abutments, so that it seemed as if the traders had occupied with nests, bearing the same proportion to the building, every buttress and coign of vantage, as the martlett did in Macbeth’s Castle. Of later years these booths have degenerated into mere toy-shops, where the little loiterers chiefly interested in such wares are tempted to linger, enchanted by the rich display of hobby-horses, babies, and Dutch toys, arranged in artful and gay confusion; yet half-scared by the cross looks of the withered pantaloon, or spectacled old lady, by whom these tempting stores are watched and superintended. But, in the times we write of, the hosiers, the glovers, the hatters, the mercers, the milliners, and all who dealt in the miscellaneous wares now termed haberdasher’s goods, were to be found in this narrow alley.

To return from our digression. Butler found the outer turnkey, a tall thin old man, with long silver hair, in the act of locking the outward door of the jail. He addressed himself to this person, and asked admittance to Effie Deans, confined upon accusation of child-murder. The turnkey looked at him earnestly, and, civilly touching his hat out of respect to Butler’s black coat and clerical appearance, replied, “It was impossible any one could be admitted at present.”

“You shut up earlier than usual, probably on account of Captain Porteous’s affair?” said Butler.

The turnkey, with the true mystery of a person in office, gave two grave nods, and withdrawing from the wards a ponderous key of about two feet in length, he proceeded to shut a strong plate of steel, which folded down above the keyhole, and was secured by a steel spring and catch. Butler stood still instinctively while the door was made fast, and then looking at his watch, walked briskly up the street, muttering to himself, almost unconsciously—

Porta adversa, ingens, solidoque adamante columnae;
Vis ut nulla virum, non ipsi exscindere ferro
Coelicolae valeant—Stat ferrea turris ad auras—etc.[14 - Wide is the fronting gate, and, raised on high, With adamantine columns threats the sky; Vain is the force of man, and Heaven’s as vain, To crush the pillars which the pile sustain: Sublime on these a tower of steel is reard.]

                                            Dryden’s Virgil, Book vi.
Having wasted half-an-hour more in a second fruitless attempt to find his legal friend and adviser, he thought it time to leave the city and return to his place of residence, in a small village about two miles and a half to the southward of Edinburgh. The metropolis was at this time surrounded by a high wall, with battlements and flanking projections at some intervals, and the access was through gates, called in the Scottish language ports, which were regularly shut at night. A small fee to the keepers would indeed procure egress and ingress at any time, through a wicket left for that purpose in the large gate; but it was of some importance, to a man so poor as Butler, to avoid even this slight pecuniary mulct; and fearing the hour of shutting the gates might be near, he made for that to which he found himself nearest, although, by doing so, he somewhat lengthened his walk homewards. Bristo Port was that by which his direct road lay, but the West Port, which leads out of the Grassmarket, was the nearest of the city gates to the place where he found himself, and to that, therefore, he directed his course. He reached the port in ample time to pass the circuit of the walls, and entered a suburb called Portsburgh, chiefly inhabited by the lower order of citizens and mechanics. Here he was unexpectedly interrupted.

He had not gone far from the gate before he heard the sound of a drum, and, to his great surprise, met a number of persons, sufficient to occupy the whole front of the street, and form a considerable mass behind, moving with great speed towards the gate he had just come from, and having in front of them a drum beating to arms. While he considered how he should escape a party, assembled, as it might be presumed, for no lawful purpose, they came full on him and stopped him.

“Are you a clergyman?” one questioned him.