Bab Bab 16 · THE LAD WITH THE SILVER BUTTON: ACROSS MORVEN

. THE LAD WITH THE SILVER BUTTON: ACROSS MORVEN

There is a regular ferry from Torosay to Kinlochaline on the mainland.

Both shores of the Sound are in the country of the strong clan of the

Macleans, and the people that passed the ferry with me were almost all

of that clan. The skipper of the boat, on the other hand, was called

Neil Roy Macrob; and since Macrob was one of the names of Alan’s

clansmen, and Alan himself had sent me to that ferry, I was eager to

come to private speech of Neil Roy.

In the crowded boat this was of course impossible, and the passage was

a very slow affair. There was no wind, and as the boat was wretchedly

equipped, we could pull but two oars on one side, and one on the other.

The men gave way, however, with a good will, the passengers taking

spells to help them, and the whole company giving the time in

Gaelic boat-songs. And what with the songs, and the sea-air, and the

good-nature and spirit of all concerned, and the bright weather, the

passage was a pretty thing to have seen.

But there was one melancholy part. In the mouth of Loch Aline we found

a great sea-going ship at anchor; and this I supposed at first to be one

of the King’s cruisers which were kept along that coast, both summer

and winter, to prevent communication with the French. As we got a little

nearer, it became plain she was a ship of merchandise; and what still

more puzzled me, not only her decks, but the sea-beach also, were quite

black with people, and skiffs were continually plying to and fro between

them. Yet nearer, and there began to come to our ears a great sound

of mourning, the people on board and those on the shore crying and

lamenting one to another so as to pierce the heart.

Then I understood this was an emigrant ship bound for the American

colonies.

We put the ferry-boat alongside, and the exiles leaned over the

bulwarks, weeping and reaching out their hands to my fellow-passengers,

among whom they counted some near friends. How long this might have gone

on I do not know, for they seemed to have no sense of time: but at last

the captain of the ship, who seemed near beside himself (and no great

wonder) in the midst of this crying and confusion, came to the side and

begged us to depart.

Thereupon Neil sheered off; and the chief singer in our boat struck into

a melancholy air, which was presently taken up both by the emigrants and

their friends upon the beach, so that it sounded from all sides like a

lament for the dying. I saw the tears run down the cheeks of the men and

women in the boat, even as they bent at the oars; and the circumstances

and the music of the song (which is one called “Lochaber no more”) were

highly affecting even to myself.

At Kinlochaline I got Neil Roy upon one side on the beach, and said I

made sure he was one of Appin’s men.

“And what for no?” said he.

“I am seeking somebody,” said I; “and it comes in my mind that you will

have news of him. Alan Breck Stewart is his name.” And very foolishly,

instead of showing him the button, I sought to pass a shilling in his

hand.

At this he drew back. “I am very much affronted,” he said; “and this is

not the way that one shentleman should behave to another at all. The man

you ask for is in France; but if he was in my sporran,” says he, “and

your belly full of shillings, I would not hurt a hair upon his body.”

I saw I had gone the wrong way to work, and without wasting time upon

apologies, showed him the button lying in the hollow of my palm.

“Aweel, aweel,” said Neil; “and I think ye might have begun with that

end of the stick, whatever! But if ye are the lad with the silver

button, all is well, and I have the word to see that ye come safe. But

if ye will pardon me to speak plainly,” says he, “there is a name that

you should never take into your mouth, and that is the name of Alan

Breck; and there is a thing that ye would never do, and that is to offer

your dirty money to a Hieland shentleman.”

It was not very easy to apologise; for I could scarce tell him (what was

the truth) that I had never dreamed he would set up to be a gentleman

until he told me so. Neil on his part had no wish to prolong his

dealings with me, only to fulfil his orders and be done with it; and

he made haste to give me my route. This was to lie the night in

Kinlochaline in the public inn; to cross Morven the next day to Ardgour,

and lie the night in the house of one John of the Claymore, who was

warned that I might come; the third day, to be set across one loch at

Corran and another at Balachulish, and then ask my way to the house of

James of the Glens, at Aucharn in Duror of Appin. There was a good deal

of ferrying, as you hear; the sea in all this part running deep into the

mountains and winding about their roots. It makes the country strong to

hold and difficult to travel, but full of prodigious wild and dreadful

prospects.

I had some other advice from Neil: to speak with no one by the way, to

avoid Whigs, Campbells, and the “red-soldiers;” to leave the road and

lie in a bush if I saw any of the latter coming, “for it was never

chancy to meet in with them;” and in brief, to conduct myself like a

robber or a Jacobite agent, as perhaps Neil thought me.

The inn at Kinlochaline was the most beggarly vile place that ever pigs

were styed in, full of smoke, vermin, and silent Highlanders. I was not

only discontented with my lodging, but with myself for my mismanagement

of Neil, and thought I could hardly be worse off. But very wrongly, as I

was soon to see; for I had not been half an hour at the inn (standing in

the door most of the time, to ease my eyes from the peat smoke) when a

thunderstorm came close by, the springs broke in a little hill on which

the inn stood, and one end of the house became a running water. Places

of public entertainment were bad enough all over Scotland in those days;

yet it was a wonder to myself, when I had to go from the fireside to the

bed in which I slept, wading over the shoes.

Early in my next day’s journey I overtook a little, stout, solemn man,

walking very slowly with his toes turned out, sometimes reading in

a book and sometimes marking the place with his finger, and dressed

decently and plainly in something of a clerical style.

This I found to be another catechist, but of a different order from the

blind man of Mull: being indeed one of those sent out by the Edinburgh

Society for Propagating Christian Knowledge, to evangelise the more

savage places of the Highlands. His name was Henderland; he spoke with

the broad south-country tongue, which I was beginning to weary for the

sound of; and besides common countryship, we soon found we had a

more particular bond of interest. For my good friend, the minister of

Essendean, had translated into the Gaelic in his by-time a number of

hymns and pious books which Henderland used in his work, and held in

great esteem. Indeed, it was one of these he was carrying and reading

when we met.

We fell in company at once, our ways lying together as far as to

Kingairloch. As we went, he stopped and spoke with all the wayfarers

and workers that we met or passed; and though of course I could not tell

what they discoursed about, yet I judged Mr. Henderland must be well

liked in the countryside, for I observed many of them to bring out their

mulls and share a pinch of snuff with him.

I told him as far in my affairs as I judged wise; as far, that is,

as they were none of Alan’s; and gave Balachulish as the place I was

travelling to, to meet a friend; for I thought Aucharn, or even Duror,

would be too particular, and might put him on the scent.

On his part, he told me much of his work and the people he worked among,

the hiding priests and Jacobites, the Disarming Act, the dress, and many

other curiosities of the time and place. He seemed moderate; blaming

Parliament in several points, and especially because they had framed the

Act more severely against those who wore the dress than against those

who carried weapons.

This moderation put it in my mind to question him of the Red Fox and the

Appin tenants; questions which, I thought, would seem natural enough in

the mouth of one travelling to that country.

He said it was a bad business. “It’s wonderful,” said he, “where the

tenants find the money, for their life is mere starvation. (Ye don’t

carry such a thing as snuff, do ye, Mr. Balfour? No. Well, I’m better

wanting it.) But these tenants (as I was saying) are doubtless partly

driven to it. James Stewart in Duror (that’s him they call James of the

Glens) is half-brother to Ardshiel, the captain of the clan; and he is

a man much looked up to, and drives very hard. And then there’s one they

call Alan Breck--”

“Ah!” I cried, “what of him?”

“What of the wind that bloweth where it listeth?” said Henderland. “He’s

here and awa; here to-day and gone to-morrow: a fair heather-cat. He

might be glowering at the two of us out of yon whin-bush, and I wouldnae

wonder! Ye’ll no carry such a thing as snuff, will ye?”

I told him no, and that he had asked the same thing more than once.

“It’s highly possible,” said he, sighing. “But it seems strange ye

shouldnae carry it. However, as I was saying, this Alan Breck is a bold,

desperate customer, and well kent to be James’s right hand. His life

is forfeit already; he would boggle at naething; and maybe, if a

tenant-body was to hang back he would get a dirk in his wame.”

“You make a poor story of it all, Mr. Henderland,” said I. “If it is all

fear upon both sides, I care to hear no more of it.”

“Na,” said Mr. Henderland, “but there’s love too, and self-denial that

should put the like of you and me to shame. There’s something fine about

it; no perhaps Christian, but humanly fine. Even Alan Breck, by all that

I hear, is a chield to be respected. There’s many a lying sneck-draw

sits close in kirk in our own part of the country, and stands well in

the world’s eye, and maybe is a far worse man, Mr. Balfour, than yon

misguided shedder of man’s blood. Ay, ay, we might take a lesson by

them.--Ye’ll perhaps think I’ve been too long in the Hielands?” he

added, smiling to me.

I told him not at all; that I had seen much to admire among the

Highlanders; and if he came to that, Mr. Campbell himself was a

Highlander.

“Ay,” said he, “that’s true. It’s a fine blood.”

“And what is the King’s agent about?” I asked.

“Colin Campbell?” says Henderland. “Putting his head in a bees’ byke!”

“He is to turn the tenants out by force, I hear?” said I.

“Yes,” says he, “but the business has gone back and forth, as folk say.

First, James of the Glens rode to Edinburgh, and got some lawyer (a

Stewart, nae doubt--they all hing together like bats in a steeple) and

had the proceedings stayed. And then Colin Campbell cam’ in again, and

had the upper-hand before the Barons of Exchequer. And now they tell me

the first of the tenants are to flit to-morrow. It’s to begin at Duror

under James’s very windows, which doesnae seem wise by my humble way of

it.”

“Do you think they’ll fight?” I asked.

“Well,” says Henderland, “they’re disarmed--or supposed to be--for

there’s still a good deal of cold iron lying by in quiet places. And

then Colin Campbell has the sogers coming. But for all that, if I was

his lady wife, I wouldnae be well pleased till I got him home again.

They’re queer customers, the Appin Stewarts.”

I asked if they were worse than their neighbours.

“No they,” said he. “And that’s the worst part of it. For if Colin Roy

can get his business done in Appin, he has it all to begin again in the

next country, which they call Mamore, and which is one of the countries

of the Camerons. He’s King’s Factor upon both, and from both he has to

drive out the tenants; and indeed, Mr. Balfour (to be open with ye),

it’s my belief that if he escapes the one lot, he’ll get his death by

the other.”

So we continued talking and walking the great part of the day; until

at last, Mr. Henderland after expressing his delight in my company, and

satisfaction at meeting with a friend of Mr. Campbell’s (“whom,” says

he, “I will make bold to call that sweet singer of our covenanted

Zion”), proposed that I should make a short stage, and lie the night in

his house a little beyond Kingairloch. To say truth, I was overjoyed;

for I had no great desire for John of the Claymore, and since my double

misadventure, first with the guide and next with the gentleman skipper,

I stood in some fear of any Highland stranger. Accordingly we shook

hands upon the bargain, and came in the afternoon to a small house,

standing alone by the shore of the Linnhe Loch. The sun was already gone

from the desert mountains of Ardgour upon the hither side, but shone on

those of Appin on the farther; the loch lay as still as a lake, only

the gulls were crying round the sides of it; and the whole place seemed

solemn and uncouth.

We had no sooner come to the door of Mr. Henderland’s dwelling, than to

my great surprise (for I was now used to the politeness of Highlanders)

he burst rudely past me, dashed into the room, caught up a jar and

a small horn-spoon, and began ladling snuff into his nose in most

excessive quantities. Then he had a hearty fit of sneezing, and looked

round upon me with a rather silly smile.

“It’s a vow I took,” says he. “I took a vow upon me that I wouldnae

carry it. Doubtless it’s a great privation; but when I think upon

the martyrs, not only to the Scottish Covenant but to other points of

Christianity, I think shame to mind it.”

As soon as we had eaten (and porridge and whey was the best of the good

man’s diet) he took a grave face and said he had a duty to perform by

Mr. Campbell, and that was to inquire into my state of mind towards God.

I was inclined to smile at him since the business of the snuff; but he

had not spoken long before he brought the tears into my eyes. There are

two things that men should never weary of, goodness and humility; we get

none too much of them in this rough world among cold, proud people; but

Mr. Henderland had their very speech upon his tongue. And though I was a

good deal puffed up with my adventures and with having come off, as the

saying is, with flying colours; yet he soon had me on my knees beside a

simple, poor old man, and both proud and glad to be there.

Before we went to bed he offered me sixpence to help me on my way, out

of a scanty store he kept in the turf wall of his house; at which excess

of goodness I knew not what to do. But at last he was so earnest with me

that I thought it the more mannerly part to let him have his way, and so

left him poorer than myself.