Chambers's Journal of Popular Literature, Science, and Art, No. 706

'Yes, Philip.'

'And you must let me know what I ought to do besides procuring the ring and license. I am sure you will give me credit for wishing not to be remiss in any way, and will not mind giving me a hint if I appear likely to fall short in any of the – proper observances.'

Proper observances! How coldly the words struck upon me!

'Shall you not come down once, Philip?' I murmured.

'Once? O yes, of course; and – you can give me any little commission by letter, you know.'

Then looking at his watch, he found that he might catch the eight o'clock train, and hastily bade me good-night; asking me to excuse him at the cottage, and tell them about our plans.

'Eh bien, Philippe,' I returned, more disappointed than I should have cared to acknowledge at his not asking me to accompany him the remainder of the distance to the stile, to which I always walked with him when Robert Wentworth was not with us. Moreover, I thought that the parting kiss was to be forgotten. I believe that it was forgotten for a moment. But he turned back and pressed his lips for a moment upon my brow.

'Good-night, Mary. God grant I may be worthy of you!'

'Good-night, Philip,' I faltered.

As in a dream I walked down the lane, entered the cottage, and turned into the little parlour, not a little relieved to find no one there.

The heat was almost stifling, the swallows flying low beneath the lowering sky, and there was the heavy stillness – the, so to speak, pause in the atmosphere which presages a coming storm. The windows and doors were flung wide open; and I could hear Mrs Tipper and Becky talking to each other in their confidential way, as they bustled in and out the back garden, fetching in the clothes, which the former always put out to 'sweeten,' as she termed it, after they were returned from the wash. Lilian was, I suppose, in her own room, as her habit was of late.

Throwing off my hat, I sat down, and with my hands tightly locked upon my lap, I tried to think – to understand my own sensations, asking myself over and over again what was wrong – what made me like this? half conscious all the while of a discussion over a hole in a tablecloth, that ought not to have been allowed to get to such a stage without being darned.

'A stitch in time saves nine, you know, Becky; never you leave a thin place, and you'll never have a hole to mend;' and so on.

Suddenly, as my eyes wandered aimlessly about the room, they fell upon some documents on the table referring to the sale of Hill Side, which Philip had brought down to shew us, and which I knew he had intended to take away. Reflecting that he was very desirous of completing the purchase, that the delay of a post might make a difference, and that I might yet overtake him if I were quick, I hurriedly caught up the papers in my hand and ran down the lane towards the stile. Have I mentioned that there was a sharp curve in the lane before it reached the stile, so that you came close upon the latter before it was in sight? I had just arrived at the curve when the sound of voices reached me; and recollecting that I had not waited to put my hat on, and not wishing to be recognised by any one, I paused a moment to draw the hood of my cloak over my head.

Robert Wentworth and Philip! I had time for a moment's surprise that the former should be there when we had not seen him at the cottage, before Philip's words reached me: 'And you have been waiting here to say this to me. But I am not so base as that, Wentworth! I have just begged her to be my wife at once, and she has consented. She suspects nothing.'

'Thank God for that!' ejaculated Robert Wentworth.

I could not have moved now had my life depended upon it – though my life did seem to depend upon it. 'Suspect what? What was there to suspect?' I asked myself in a bewildered kind of way.

'God grant that she may be always spared the knowledge!'

'She shall be, Wentworth, if it be in my power to spare her.'

'Great heavens! that it should be possible to love another woman after knowing her! Man, you never can have known her as she is, or it would be impossible for another woman to come between you. The other is no more to be compared' —

'Respect her, Wentworth; blame me as you will, but respect Lilian.'

'Lilian!' I muttered – 'Lilian!'

'She is, I think – I trust, utterly unconscious of my – madness. But if she knew, and if she – cared for me, she would be loyal to the right. You ought to be sure of that, knowing what her love for Mary is, Wentworth.'

'Yes; she is true; she will try to be true. But it is quite time that' —

I knew that the voices sounded fainter and fainter, and that the sense of the words became lost to me, because they were walking on; I knew that they were great drops of rain and not tears pattering down upon me where I lay prone upon the ground; and I could recollect that the papers must not be lost; so I had kept my senses.

THE STORY OF THE QUIGRICH OR STAFF OF ST FILLAN

The recent acquisition of that curious medieval work of art called the Quigrich or crosier of St Fillan by the Society of Antiquaries of Scotland, and its final deposit in their National Museum at Edinburgh, is in itself an incident of more than ordinary interest. Apart from its historical associations, the 'Cogerach,' 'Coygerach,' or 'Quigrich,' as it is variously styled in writings of the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries, is unsurpassed in interest as a work of art of a class and period of which no other Scottish specimen is now known to exist. Briefly described, it is simply the massive silver head of a pastoral staff of the form peculiar to the Celtic Church in very early times. Its shape resembles that of the bent head of a walking-stick, with a slanting prolongation of the outer end. The lower part of the crook expands into a large bulbous socket, beautifully ornamented with interlaced knot-work. A ridge or crest, pierced with quatrefoils, rises from the socket, and is continued over the back of the crook, terminating in the bust of an ecclesiastic, probably meant for St Fillan. The slanting front of the staff-head is ornamented by a large oval setting of cairngorm, and the terminal plate has an engraved representation of the Crucifixion. The body of the crook is covered with lozenge-shaped plaques of filigree-work in floral scrolls.

What may be termed the private history of the crosier commences in the early part of the eighth century, when as the bacul or walking-staff of St Fillan, it accompanied him in his missionary journey to the wilds of Glendochart. The saint came of a royal race. His mother, Kentigerna, was a daughter of the king of Leinster; and both she and her brother St Comgan are enrolled among the saints of Celtic Alba. Placed often in the darkest and wildest districts of the country, solely with the view of reclaiming the people from paganism and diffusing the benefits of Christian civilisation, these monastic churches were truly centres of light and progress. Such was the famous church of Columcille at Hy. Such also was the monastery of St Mund at the Holy Loch, where St Fillan spent part of his days, and in which he succeeded the founder as abbot. Growing weary of its comparatively peaceful life, he sought a desert for himself in the wilds of Glendochart, where he might reclaim a new garden for the church, and close his days among an ecclesiastical family of his own uprearing. As founder and first abbot of Glendochart his memory would be fondly cherished by the community of clerics over whom he had presided. Their veneration would increase with time, as the traditions of his saintly life became fixed by constant repetition; and there was no object around which that veneration and these legends could more appropriately cluster than around the staff which was the symbol of his abbatial office, and the lasting memorial of his presence among them.

Not the least interesting of the many picturesque associations which gather round the crosier of St Fillan is that which connects it with Scotland's warrior-king, Robert Bruce, and assigns to it a prominent part in the great struggle for Scottish independence that culminated in the glorious victory of Bannockburn. There is no evidence on record by which we can positively prove the presence of the crosier on the eventful field; but it is the tradition of the Dewars, its hereditary keepers, that it was there; and there is evidence that certain other relics of St Fillan were brought to the battle-field by the abbot of Inchaffray, the ecclesiastical superior of the church of Strathfillan, who was the king's confessor; and that this was done, if not by the king's express desire, at least in the knowledge that it would be consonant with his personal feelings and belief in their efficacy. If the narrative that was written by Boece is to be accepted at all, it must be accepted to the extent of establishing that there was a relic of St Fillan at Bannockburn. He calls it the arm-bone of the saint, and tells in his picturesque way that when the king, being sorely troubled in mind on the evening before the battle, had retired into his tent, and was engaged in prayer to God and St Fillan, suddenly the silver case which contained the arm-bone of the saint opened of itself, and shewed him the relic, and then 'clakkit to again.' The priest who had charge of it immediately proclaimed a miracle, declaring that he had brought into the field only the 'tume cais' (empty case), being fearful lest the precious relic should fall into the hands of the English.

If we accept Boece's statement to the extent of believing on the strength of it that any of the relics of St Fillan were brought to the field, we may believe that they were all there, and that they were carried round the army on the morning of the fight, when the abbot of Inchaffray walked barefooted in front of the ranks bearing aloft 'the croce in quhilk the crucifix wes hingin.' That such practices were not uncommon is gleaned from other instances, such as that of the crosier of St Columba – the Cath Bhuaidh or 'Battle-Victory' – so named because it used to give the victory to the men of Alba when carried to their battles. If then the crosier of St Fillan was present at the battle of Bannockburn, and the victory was ascribed to the saint's intervention, this may have been the occasion of its being glorified with such a magnificent silver shrine.

But if it had no public history and no picturesque associations, the story of its transmission from age to age, linked as it was with the chequered fortunes of the religious foundation to which it was attached, and of the strange and varied circumstances in which it has been preserved by a succession of hereditary keepers, through failing fortunes and changes of faith, in poverty and exile, is sufficient to invest it with surpassing interest.

Since its arrival at Edinburgh the singular discovery has been made that the gilt silver casing of the crosier had been constructed for the purpose of inclosing an older staff-head of cast bronze. This has been taken out of its concealment, and is now exhibited alongside the silver one. The surface of this older crosier is divided into panels by raised ridges ornamented with niello. These panels correspond in number, shape, and size to the silver plaques now on the external casing, and they are pierced with rivet-holes which also correspond with the position of the pins by which the plaques are fastened. It is thus clear that when the old crosier was incased, it was first stripped of its ornamental plaques of filigree-work, which were again used in making up the external covering so far as they were available. Such of them as had been either entirely absent, or so much worn as to require redecoration, were renewed in a style so different from the original workmanship, as to demonstrate that it is a mere imitation of an art with which the workman was unfamiliar. This establishes two distinct phases in the history of the crosier, and suggests that at some particular period, a special occasion had arisen for thus glorifying the old relic with a costly enshrinement. What that occasion was may be inferred from some considerations connected with its public history.

We know nothing of the history of St Fillan's foundation during the first five centuries, in which the founder's staff passed through the hands of his various successors as the symbol of office of the abbot of Glendochart. But in the time of King William the Lion, we find that the office had become secularised, and the abbot appears as a great lay lord, ranking after the Earl of Athole, and appointed alternatively with him as the holder of the assize, in all cases of stolen cattle in that district of Scotland. Whether he held the crosier in virtue of his office we cannot tell; but the likelihood is that it was when the office was first usurped by a layman, that the crosier was placed by the last of the true successors of St Fillan in the custody of a 'dewar' or hereditary keeper, with the dues and privileges which we afterwards find attached to this office. Such an arrangement was not uncommon in connection with similar relics of the ancient Celtic church. We thus find the dewar of the Cogerach of St Fillan in possession of the lands of Eyich in Glendochart in 1336. In process of time the official title of dewar became the family surname of Dewar; and we have a curious instance of the Celtic form of the patronymic in a charter granted in 1575 by Duncan Campbell of Glenorchy to Donald Mac in Deora vic Cogerach.

The inquiry is naturally suggested why a relic with such associations, intrinsically so valuable, and always so highly venerated, should have been allowed to remain in the possession of laymen, and to be kept in their private dwellings, often no better than turf cottages in the glen. The crosier was splendid enough to have graced the processional ceremonials of the highest dignitary of the Church, and thus to have been a coveted acquisition to the richest monastery in the land. That it was so coveted may be fairly inferred from the fact that on the 22d April 1428, John de Spens of Perth, Bailie of Glendochart, summoned an inquest of the men of Glendochart to hold inquisition regarding the authority and privileges of 'a certain relick of St Felane called the Coygerach.' Of the fifteen summoned, three were Macnabs, deriving their origin from the son of a former abbot; three were of the clan Gregor; and one was named Felan, after the saint. Their verdict sets forth that the Coygerach was in the rightful possession of the deoire, because the office of bearing it had been given hereditarily by the successor of St Fillan to a certain progenitor of Finlay, the deoire at the time of the inquest; that the privileges pertaining to the office had been enjoyed and in use since the days of King Robert Bruce; and that when cattle or goods were stolen or taken by force from any inhabitant of the glen, and they were unable to follow them from fear or feud, the dewar was bound to follow the cattle or goods wherever they might be found throughout the kingdom.

We hear no more of the rights of the Cogerach till 1487, when the dewar sought the sanction of the royal prerogative to aid him in holding his charge with all its ancient rights. In that year, King James III. issued letters of confirmation under the Privy Seal, in favour of Malice Doire, who, as the document sets forth, 'has had a relic of St Felan called the Quigrich in keeping of us and our progenitors since the time of King Robert Bruce, and of before, and has made no obedience or answer to any person spiritual or temporal in any thing concerning it, in any other way than is contained in the auld infeftment granted by our progenitors.' The object was to establish the rights of the Crown in the relic, as distinguished from the rights of the Church; and we may presume that the royal infeftment to which it refers may have been granted by Bruce on the occasion when the old crosier was glorified by incasement in a silver shrine, in token of the king's humble gratitude to God and St Fillan for the victory of Bannockburn.

We find traces of the dewars and their lands in charters down to the time of Queen Mary. The Reformation deprived them of their living, and converted the relic, of which they were the keepers, into a 'monument of idolatry,' fit only to be consigned to the crucible. Still they were faithful to their trust, although instead of emolument it could only bring them trouble. In the succeeding centuries their fortunes fell to a low ebb indeed. In 1782 a passing tourist saw the Quigrich in the house of Malice Doire, a day-labourer in Killin. His son, a youth of nineteen, lay in an outer apartment at the last gasp of consumption; and the traveller was so moved by concern for the probable fate of the Quigrich, in the prospect of the speedy death of the heir to this inestimable possession, that he wrote an account of the circumstances, and transmitted it, with a drawing of the crosier, to the Society of Antiquaries of Scotland. At that time the Society could not have acquired it; but fortunately their intervention was not necessary for its preservation. On the failure of the older line, by the death of this youth, the relic passed into the hands of a younger brother of Malice Doire's. His son removed to Glenartney, where the Quigrich was again seen by Dr Jamieson, and was described by him in his edition of Barbour's Bruce. Archibald Dewar removed from Glenartney to Balquhidder, where he rented a sheep-farm; but having suffered heavy losses at the close of the French war in 1815, he emigrated to Canada, where he died, aged seventy-five.

His son, Alexander Dewar, the last of the hereditary dewars of the Crosier, is a hale old man of eighty-eight, in comfortable circumstances, the patriarch of a new race of Dewars, rejoicing in upwards of thirty grandchildren, and nephews and nieces innumerable. It is in consequence of his desire to see the ancient relic returned to Scotland before he dies, and placed in the National Museum at Edinburgh, 'there to remain in all time coming for the use, benefit, and enjoyment of the Scottish nation,' that the Society of Antiquaries has been enabled, partly by purchase and partly by his donation, to acquire the Quigrich, the most remarkable of all existing relics associated with the early history of the Scottish nation.

It was five centuries old before the light of authentic record reveals it in 1336 in possession of the dewar Cogerach, and since then it can be traced uninterruptedly in the line of the Dewars for five hundred and forty years. 'Its associations with the Scottish monarchy,' says Dr Daniel Wilson, 'are older than the Regalia, so sacredly guarded in the castle of Edinburgh; and its more sacred memories carry back the fancy to the primitive missionaries of the Christian faith, when the son of St Kentigerna, of the royal race of Leinster, withdrew to the wilderness of Glendochart, and there initiated the good work which has ever since made Strathfillan famous in the legendary history of the Scottish Church.'

Mr and Mrs Woodford were enjoying a confidential matrimonial chat over their tête-à-tête dessert, and discussing at some length the antecedents and probable future of a cousin, Mr Richard Broughton, who had lately dropped down on them, not from the clouds, but from a Liverpool express train. This gentleman had in his youth been 'crossed in love.' Always a musical enthusiast, he had become attached to an amiable girl, a young concert-singer, who was the main stay of her mother – the widow of a captain in the army – and some younger sisters; and having himself not yet made a fair start in life, the elders of both families rose up in arms against the alliance.

COUSIN DICK

Mrs Woodford, of nearly the same age as her Cousin Dick, had been his confidante in their boy and girl days, had sympathised warmly with his disappointment, without very precisely understanding how it had come about, and was now assuring her husband that the attachment had been a far more serious affair than very youthful fancies commonly are. It was true the gentleman had so far consoled himself as to marry another lady; though it was reported he had wedded a shrew, who had not made him supremely happy. But he lost his wife some time before leaving Australia; and now, after a sojourn of nearly twenty years in the colonies, had returned to England with something more than competence.

'But what became of Miss Clifton?' asked Mr Woodford.

'That I do not know,' returned the lady. 'Clifton was only her professional name; her real one I quite forget; therefore if from any circumstances she passed into private life, it would not be easy to track her. Dick only called her Alice to me.'

'Probably she also married,' said Mr Woodford.

'Possibly,' replied his wife; 'though women are more constant than men; and though she ceased to answer Dick's letters, and really brought him to a state of misery which drove him out of England, I never thought the fault was quite her own.'

While Mrs Woodford was yet speaking, there was a knock at the door, and Mr Broughton was announced.

'Why did you not come to dinner?' cried Mr Woodford, rising to greet the visitor. 'But we can have the lamb brought back,' he added.

'Thanks, thanks,' said Mr Broughton; 'but I dined at the hotel. I am sure I ought to apologise for calling at such a time, and for having brought Dandy with me.'

Dandy was a terrier, and his master's almost inseparable companion.

'Now Dandy, behave!' continued his master; 'and go and beg pardon for both of us. Say we know we are two unmannerly colonial boors, at present unfit for good society.'