Peveril of the Peak Part 8

"Men should go to war, then," said Peveril, "that they may send their silver plate to the mint, and eat from pewter dishes and wooden plates?"

"Not so, my son," said Bridgenorth. Then checking himself as he observed the deep crimson in Julian's cheek and brow, he added, "I crave your pardon for such familiarity; but I meant not to limit what I said even now to such trifling consequences, although it may be something salutary to tear men from their pomps and luxuries, and teach those to be Romans who would otherwise be Sybarites. But I would say, that times of public danger, as they call into circulation the miser's h.o.a.rd and the proud man's bullion, and so add to the circulating wealth of the country, do also call into action many a brave and n.o.ble spirit, which would otherwise lie torpid, give no example to the living, and bequeath no name to future ages. Society knows not, and cannot know, the mental treasures which slumber in her bosom, till necessity and opportunity call forth the statesman and the soldier from the shades of lowly life to the parts they are designed by Providence to perform, and the stations which nature had qualified them to hold. So rose Oliver--so rose Milton--so rose many another name which cannot be forgotten--even as the tempest summons forth and displays the address of the mariner."

"You speak," said Peveril, "as if national calamity might be, in some sort, an advantage."

"And if it were not so," replied Bridgenorth, "it had not existed in this state of trial, where all temporal evil is alleviated by something good in its progress or result, and where all that is good is close coupled with that which is in itself evil."

"It must be a n.o.ble sight," said Julian, "to behold the slumbering energies of a great mind awakened into energy, and to see it a.s.sume the authority which is its due over spirits more meanly endowed."

"I once witnessed," said Bridgenorth, "something to the same effect; and as the tale is brief, I will tell it you, if you will:- "Amongst my wanderings, the Transatlantic settlements have not escaped me; more especially the country of New England, into which our native land has shaken from her lap, as a drunkard flings from him his treasures, so much that is precious in the eyes of G.o.d and of His children. There thousands of our best and most G.o.dly men--such whose righteousness might come of cities--are content to be the inhabitants of the desert, rather encountering the unenlightened savages, than stooping to extinguish, under the oppression practised in Britain, the light that is within their own minds. There I remained for a time, during the wars which the colony maintained with Philip, a great Indian Chief, or Sachem, as they were called, who seemed a messenger sent from Satan to buffet them. His cruelty was great--his dissimulation profound; and the skill and prompt.i.tude with which he maintained a destructive and desultory warfare, inflicted many dreadful calamities on the settlement. I was, by chance, at a small village in the woods, more than thirty miles from Boston, and in its situation exceedingly lonely, and surrounded with thickets. Nevertheless, there was no idea of any danger from the Indians at that time, for men trusted to the protection of a considerable body of troops who had taken the field for protection of the frontiers, and who lay, or were supposed to lie, betwixt the hamlet and the enemy's country. But they had to do with a foe, whom the devil himself had inspired at once with cunning and cruelty. It was on a Sabbath morning, when we had a.s.sembled to take sweet counsel together in the Lord's house. Our temple was but constructed of wooden logs; but when shall the chant of trained hirelings, or the sounding of tin and bra.s.s tubes amid the aisles of a minster, arise so sweetly to Heaven, as did the psalm in which we united at once our voices and our hearts! An excellent worthy, who now sleeps in the Lord, Nehemia Solsgrace, long the companion of my pilgrimage, had just begun to wrestle in prayer, when a woman, with disordered looks and dishevelled hair, entered our chapel in a distracted manner, screaming incessantly, 'The Indians! The Indians!'--In that land no man dares separate himself from his means of defence; and whether in the city or in the field, in the ploughed land or the forest, men keep beside them their weapons, as did the Jews at the rebuilding of the Temple. So we sallied forth with our guns and pikes, and heard the whoop of these incarnate devils, already in possession of a part of the town, and exercising their cruelty on the few whom weighty causes or indisposition had withheld from public worship; and it was remarked as a judgment, that, upon that b.l.o.o.d.y Sabbath, Adrian Hanson, a Dutchman, a man well enough disposed towards man, but whose mind was altogether given to worldly gain, was shot and scalped as he was summing his weekly gains in his warehouse. In fine, there was much damage done; and although our arrival and entrance into combat did in some sort put them back, yet being surprised and confused, and having no appointed leader of our band, the devilish enemy shot hard at us and had some advantage. It was pitiful to hear the screams of women and children amid the report of guns and the whistling of bullets, mixed with the ferocious yells of these savages, which they term their war-whoop. Several houses in the upper part of the village were soon on fire; and the roaring of the flames, and crackling of the great beams as they blazed, added to the horrible confusion; while the smoke which the wind drove against us gave farther advantage to the enemy, who fought as it were, invisible, and under cover, whilst we fell fast by their unerring fire. In this state of confusion, and while we were about to adopt the desperate project of evacuating the village, and, placing the women and children in the centre, of attempting a retreat to the nearest settlement, it pleased Heaven to send us unexpected a.s.sistance. A tall man, of a reverend appearance, whom no one of us had ever seen before, suddenly was in the midst of us, as we hastily agitated the resolution of retreating. His garments were of the skin of the elk, and he wore sword and carried gun; I never saw anything more august than his features, overshadowed by locks of grey hair, which mingled with a long beard of the same colour. 'Men and brethren,' he said, in a voice like that which turns back the flight, 'why sink your hearts? and why are you thus disquieted? Fear ye that the G.o.d we serve will give you up to yonder heathen dogs? Follow me, and you shall see this day that there is a captain in Israel!' He uttered a few brief but distinct orders, in a tone of one who was accustomed to command; and such was the influence of his appearance, his mien, his language, and his presence of mind, that he was implicitly obeyed by men who had never seen him until that moment. We were hastily divided, by his orders, into two bodies; one of which maintained the defence of the village with more courage than ever, convinced that the Unknown was sent by G.o.d to our rescue. At his command they a.s.sumed the best and most sheltered positions for exchanging their deadly fire with the Indians; while, under cover of the smoke, the stranger sallied from the town, at the head of the other division of the New England men, and, fetching a circuit, attacked the Red Warriors in the rear. The surprise, as is usual amongst savages, had complete effect; for they doubted not that they were a.s.sailed in their turn, and placed betwixt two hostile parties by the return of a detachment from the provincial army. The heathens fled in confusion, abandoning the half-won village, and leaving behind them such a number of their warriors, that the tribe hath never recovered its loss. Never shall I forget the figure of our venerable leader, when our men, and not they only, but the women and children of the village, rescued from the tomahawk and scalping-knife, stood crowded around him, yet scarce venturing to approach his person, and more minded, perhaps, to worship him as a descended angel, than to thank him as a fellow-mortal. 'Not unto me be the glory,' he said; 'I am but an implement, frail as yourselves, in the hand of Him who is strong to deliver. Bring me a cup of water, that I may allay my parched throat, ere I essay the task of offering thanks where they are most due.' I was nearest to him as he spoke, and I gave into his hand the water he requested. At that moment we exchanged glances, and it seemed to me that I recognised a n.o.ble friend whom I had long since deemed in glory; but he gave me no time to speak, had speech been prudent. Sinking on his knees, and signing us to obey him, he poured forth a strong and energetic thanksgiving for the turning back of the battle, which, p.r.o.nounced with a voice loud and clear as a war-trumpet, thrilled through the joints and marrow of the hearers. I have heard many an act of devotion in my life, had Heaven vouchsafed me grace to profit by them; but such a prayer as this, uttered amid the dead and the dying, with a rich tone of mingled triumph and adoration, was beyond them all--it was like the song of the inspired prophetess who dwelt beneath the palm-tree between Ramah and Bethel. He was silent; and for a brief s.p.a.ce we remained with our faces bent to the earth--no man daring to lift his head. At length we looked up, but our deliverer was no longer amongst us; nor was he ever again seen in the land which he had rescued."

Here Bridgenorth, who had told this singular story with an eloquence and vivacity of detail very contrary to the usual dryness of his conversation, paused for an instant, and then resumed--"Thou seest, young man, that men of valour and of discretion are called forth to command in circ.u.mstances of national exigence, though their very existence is unknown in the land which they are predestined to deliver."

"But what thought the people of the mysterious stranger?" said Julian, who had listened with eagerness, for the story was of a kind interesting to the youthful and the brave.

"Many things," answered Bridgenorth, "and, as usual, little to the purpose. The prevailing opinion was, notwithstanding his own disclamation, that the stranger was really a supernatural being; others believed him an inspired champion, transported in the body from some distant climate, to show us the way to safety; others, again, concluded that he was a recluse, who, either from motives of piety, or other cogent reasons, had become a dweller in the wilderness, and shunned the face of man."

"And, if I may presume to ask," said Julian, "to which of these opinions were you disposed to adhere?"

"The last suited best with the transient though close view with which I had perused the stranger's features," replied Bridgenorth; "for although I dispute not that it may please Heaven, on high occasions, even to raise one from the dead in defence of his country, yet I doubted not then, as I doubt not now, that I looked on the living form of one, who had indeed powerful reasons to conceal him in the cleft of the rock."

"Are these reasons a secret?" said Julian Peveril.

"Not properly a secret," replied Bridgenorth; "for I fear not thy betraying what I might tell thee in private discourse; and besides, wert thou so base, the prey lies too distant for any hunters to whom thou couldst point out its traces. But the name of this worthy will sound harsh in thy ear, on account of one action of his life--being his accession to a great measure, which made the extreme isles of the earth to tremble. Have you never heard of Richard Whalley?"

"Of the regicide?" exclaimed Peveril, starting.

"Call his act what thou wilt," said Bridgenorth; "he was not less the rescuer of that devoted village, that, with other leading spirits of the age, he sat in the judgment-seat when Charles Stewart was arraigned at the bar, and subscribed the sentence that went forth upon him."

"I have ever heard," said Julian, in an altered voice, and colouring deeply, "that you, Master Bridgenorth, with other Presbyterians, were totally averse to that detestable crime, and were ready to have made joint-cause with the Cavaliers in preventing so horrible a parricide."

"If it were so," said Bridgenorth, "we have been richly rewarded by his successor."

"Rewarded!" exclaimed Julian; "does the distinction of good and evil, and our obligation to do the one and forbear the other, depend on the reward which may attach to our actions?"

"G.o.d forbid," answered Bridgenorth; "yet those who view the havoc which this house of Stewart have made in the Church and State--the tyranny which they exercise over men's persons and consciences--may well doubt whether it be lawful to use weapons in their defence. Yet you hear me not praise, or even vindicate the death of the King, though so far deserved, as he was false to his oath as a Prince and Magistrate. I only tell you what you desired to know, that Richard Whalley, one of the late King's judges, was he of whom I have just been speaking. I knew his lofty brow, though time had made it balder and higher; his grey eye retained all its l.u.s.tre; and though the grizzled beard covered the lower part of his face, it prevented me not from recognising him. The scent was hot after him for his blood; but by the a.s.sistance of those friends whom Heaven had raised up for his preservation, he was concealed carefully, and emerged only to do the will of Providence in the matter of that battle. Perhaps his voice may be heard in the field once more, should England need one of her n.o.blest hearts."

"Now, G.o.d forbid!" said Julian.

"Amen," returned Bridgenorth. "May G.o.d avert civil war, and pardon those whose madness would bring it on us!"

There was a long pause, during which Julian, who had scarce lifted his eyes towards Alice, stole a glance in that direction, and was struck by the deep cast of melancholy which had stolen over features, to which a cheerful, if not gay expression, was most natural. So soon as she caught his eye, she remarked, and, as Julian thought, with significance, that the shadows were lengthening, and evening coming on.

He heard; and although satisfied that she hinted at his departure, he could not, upon the instant, find resolution to break the spell which detained him. The language which Bridgenorth held was not only new and alarming, but so contrary to the maxims in which he was brought up, that, as a son of Sir Geoffrey Peveril of the Peak, he would, in another case, have thought himself called upon to dispute its conclusions, even at the sword's point. But Bridgenorth's opinions were delivered with so much calmness--seemed so much the result of conviction--that they excited in Julian rather a spirit of wonder, than of angry controversy. There was a character of sober decision, and sedate melancholy, in all that he said, which, even had he not been the father of Alice (and perhaps Julian was not himself aware how much he was influenced by that circ.u.mstance), would have rendered it difficult to take personal offence. His language and sentiments were of that quiet, yet decided kind, upon which it is difficult either to fix controversy, or quarrel, although it be impossible to acquiesce in the conclusions to which they lead.

While Julian remained, as if spell-bound to his chair, scarce more surprised at the company in which he found himself, than at the opinions to which he was listening, another circ.u.mstance reminded him that the proper time of his stay at Black Fort had been expended. Little Fairy, the Manx pony, which, well accustomed to the vicinity of Black Fort, used to feed near the house while her master made his visits there, began to find his present stay rather too long. She had been the gift of the Countess to Julian, whilst a youth, and came of a high-spirited mountain breed, remarkable alike for hardiness, for longevity, and for a degree of sagacity approaching to that of the dog. Fairy showed the latter quality, by the way in which she chose to express her impatience to be moving homewards. At least such seemed the purpose of the shrill neigh with which she startled the female inmates of the parlour, who, the moment afterwards, could not forbear smiling to see the nose of the pony advanced through the opened cas.e.m.e.nt.

"Fairy reminds me," said Julian, looking to Alice, and rising, "that the term of my stay here is exhausted."

"Speak with me yet one moment," said Bridgenorth, withdrawing him into a Gothic recess of the old-fashioned apartment, and speaking so low that he could not be overheard by Alice and her governante, who, in the meantime, caressed, and fed with fragments of bread the intruder Fairy.

"You have not, after all," said Bridgenorth, "told me the cause of your coming hither." He stopped, as if to enjoy his embarra.s.sment, and then added, "And indeed it were most unnecessary that you should do so. I have not so far forgotten the days of my youth, or those affections which bind poor frail humanity but too much to the things of this world. Will you find no words to ask of me the great boon which you seek, and which, peradventure, you would not have hesitated to have made your own, without my knowledge, and against my consent?-- Nay, never vindicate thyself, but mark me farther. The patriarch bought his beloved by fourteen years' hard service to her father Laban, and they seemed to him but as a few days. But he that would wed my daughter must serve, in comparison, but a few days; though in matters of such mighty import, that they shall seem as the service of many years. Reply not to me now, but go, and peace be with you."

He retired so quickly, after speaking, that Peveril had literally not an instant to reply. He cast his eyes around the apartment, but Deborah and her charge had also disappeared. His gaze rested for a moment on the portrait of Christian, and his imagination suggested that his dark features were illuminated by a smile of haughty triumph. He stared, and looked more attentively--it was but the effect of the evening beam, which touched the picture at the instant. The effect was gone, and there remained but the fixed, grave, inflexible features of the republican soldier.

Julian left the apartment as one who walks in a dream; he mounted Fairy, and, agitated by a variety of thoughts, which he was unable to reduce to order, he returned to Castle Rushin before the night sat down.

Here he found all in movement. The Countess, with her son, had, upon some news received, or resolution formed, during his absence, removed, with a princ.i.p.al part of their family, to the yet stronger Castle of Holm-Peel, about eight miles' distance across the island; and which had been suffered to fall into a much more dilapidated condition than that of Castletown, so far as it could be considered as a place of residence. But as a fortress, Holm-Peel was stronger than Castletown; nay, unless a.s.sailed regularly, was almost impregnable; and was always held by a garrison belonging to the Lords of Man. Here Peveril arrived at nightfall. He was told in the fishing-village, that the night-bell of the Castle had been rung earlier than usual, and the watch set with circ.u.mstances of unusual and jealous repet.i.tion.

Resolving, therefore, not to disturb the garrison by entering at that late hour, he obtained an indifferent lodging in the town for the night, and determined to go to the Castle early on the succeeding morning. He was not sorry thus to gain a few hours of solitude, to think over the agitating events of the preceding day.

CHAPTER XV.

----What seem'd its head, The likeness of a kingly crown had on. --PARADISE LOST.

Sodor, or Holm-Peel, so is named the castle to which our Julian directed his course early on the following morning, is one of those extraordinary monuments of antiquity with which this singular and interesting island abounds. It occupies the whole of a high rocky peninsula, or rather an island, for it is surrounded by the sea at high-water, and scarcely accessible even when the tide is out, although a stone causeway, of great solidity, erected for the express purpose, connects the island with the mainland. The whole s.p.a.ce is surrounded by double walls of great strength and thickness; and the access to the interior, at the time which we treat of, was only by two flights of steep and narrow steps, divided from each other by a strong tower and guard-house; under the former of which, there is an entrance-arch. The open s.p.a.ce within the walls extends to two acres, and contains many objects worthy of antiquarian curiosity. There were besides the castle itself, two cathedral churches, dedicated, the earlier to St. Patrick, the latter to St. Germain; besides two smaller churches; all of which had become, even in that day, more or less ruinous. Their decayed walls, exhibiting the rude and ma.s.sive architecture of the most remote period, were composed of a ragged grey-stone, which formed a singular contrast with the bright red freestone of which the window-cases, corner-stones, arches, and other ornamental parts of the building, were composed.

Besides these four ruinous churches, the s.p.a.ce of ground enclosed by the ma.s.sive exterior walls of Holm-Peel exhibited many other vestiges of the olden time. There was a square mound of earth, facing, with its angles to the points of the compa.s.s, one of those motes, as they were called, on which, in ancient times, the northern tribes elected or recognised their chiefs, and held their solemn popular a.s.semblies, or /comitia/. There was also one of those singular towers, so common in Ireland as to have proved the favourite theme of her antiquaries; but of which the real use and meaning seems yet to be hidden in the mist of ages. This of Holm-Peel had been converted to the purpose of a watch-tower. There were, besides, Runic monuments, of which legends could not be deciphered; and later inscriptions to the memory of champions, of whom the names only were preserved from oblivion. But tradition and superst.i.tious eld, still most busy where real history is silent, had filled up the long blank of accurate information with tales of Sea-kings and Pirates, Hebridean Chiefs and Norwegian Resolutes, who had formerly warred against, and in defence of, this famous castle. Superst.i.tion, too, had her tales of fairies, ghosts, and spectres--her legions of saints and demons, of fairies and of familiar spirits, which in no corner of the British empire are told and received with more absolute credulity than in the Isle of Man.

Amidst all these ruins of an older time arose the Castle itself,--now ruinous--but in Charles II.'s reign well garrisoned, and, in a military point of view, kept in complete order. It was a venerable and very ancient building, containing several apartments of sufficient size and height to be termed n.o.ble. But in the surrender of the island by Christian, the furniture had been, in a great measure, plundered or destroyed by the republican soldiers; so that, as we have before hinted, its present state was ill adapted for the residence of the n.o.ble proprietor. Yet it had been often the abode, not only of the Lords of Man, but of those state prisoners whom the Kings of Britain sometimes committed to their charge.

In this Castle of Holm-Peel the great king-maker, Richard, Earl of Warwick, was confined, during one period of his eventful life, to ruminate at leisure on his farther schemes of ambition. And here, too, Eleanor, the haughty wife of the good Duke of Gloucester, pined out in seclusion the last days of her banishment. The sentinels pretended that her discontented spectre was often visible at night, traversing the battlements of the external walls, or standing motionless beside a particular solitary turret of one of the watch-towers with which they are flanked; but dissolving into air at c.o.c.k-crow, or when the bell tolled from the yet remaining tower of St. Germain's church.

Such was Holm-Peel, as records inform us, till towards the end of the seventeenth century.

It was in one of the lofty but almost unfurnished apartments of this ancient Castle that Julian Peveril found his friend the Earl of Derby, who had that moment sat down to a breakfast composed of various sorts of fish. "Welcome, most imperial Julian," he said; "welcome to our royal fortress; in which, as yet, we are not like to be starved with hunger, though well-nigh dead for cold."

Julian answered by inquiring the meaning of this sudden movement.

"Upon my word," replied the Earl, "you know nearly as much of it as I do. My mother has told me nothing about it; supposing I believe, that I shall at length be tempted to inquire; but she will find herself much mistaken. I shall give her credit for full wisdom in her proceedings, rather than put her to the trouble to render a reason, though no woman can render one better."

"Come, come; this is affectation, my good friend," said Julian. "You should inquire into these matters a little more curiously."

"To what purpose?" said the Earl. "To hear old stories about the Tinwald laws, and the contending rights of the lords and the clergy, and all the rest of that Celtic barbarism, which, like Burgesse's thorough-paced doctrine enters at one ear, paces through, and goes out at the other?"

"Come, my lord," said Julian, "you are not so indifferent as you would represent yourself--you are dying of curiosity to know what this hurry is about; only you think it the courtly humour to appear careless about your own affairs."

"Why, what should it be about," said the young Earl "unless some factious dispute between our Majesty's minister, Governor Nowel, and our va.s.sals? or perhaps some dispute betwixt our Majesty and the ecclesiastical jurisdictions? for all which our Majesty cares as little as any king in Christendom."

"I rather suppose there is intelligence from England," said Julian. "I heard last night in Peel-town, that Greenhalgh is come over with unpleasant news."

"He brought me nothing that was pleasant, I wot well," said the Earl. "I expected something from St. Evremond or Hamilton--some new plays by Dryden or Lee, and some waggery or lampoons from the Rose Coffee- house; and the fellow has brought me nothing but a parcel of tracts about Protestants and Papists, and a folio play-book, one of the conceptions, as she calls them, of that old mad-woman the d.u.c.h.ess of Newcastle."

"Hush, my lord, for Heaven's sake," said Peveril; "here comes the Countess; and you know she takes fire at the least slight to her ancient friend."

"Let her read her ancient friend's works herself, then," said the Earl, "and think her as wise as she can; but I would not give one of Waller's songs, or Denham's satires, for a whole cart-load of her Grace's trash.--But here comes our mother with care on her brow."

The Countess of Derby entered the apartment accordingly, holding in her hand a number of papers. Her dress was a mourning habit, with a deep train of black velvet, which was borne by a little favourite attendant, a deaf and dumb girl, whom, in compa.s.sion to her misfortune, the Countess had educated about her person for some years. Upon this unfortunate being, with the touch of romance which marked many of her proceedings, Lady Derby had conferred the name of Fenella, after some ancient princess of the island. The Countess herself was not much changed since we last presented her to our readers. Age had rendered her step more slow, but not less majestic; and while it traced some wrinkles on her brow, had failed to quench the sedate fire of her dark eye. The young men rose to receive her with the formal reverence which they knew she loved, and were greeted by her with equal kindness.

"Cousin Peveril," she said (for so she always called Julian, in respect of his mother being a kinswoman of her husband), "you were ill abroad last night, when we much needed your counsel."

Julian answered with a blush which he could not prevent, "That he had followed his sport among the mountains too far--had returned late--and finding her ladyship was removed from Castletown, had instantly followed the family hither; but as the night-bell was rung, and the watch set, he had deemed it more respectful to lodge for the night in the town."

"It is well," said the Countess; "and, to do you justice, Julian, you are seldom a truant neglecter of appointed hours, though, like the rest of the youth of this age, you sometimes suffer your sports to consume too much of time that should be spent otherwise. But for your friend Philip, he is an avowed contemner of good order, and seems to find pleasure in wasting time, even when he does not enjoy it."

"I have been enjoying my time just now at least," said the Earl, rising from table, and picking his teeth carelessly. "These fresh mullets are delicious, and so is the Lachrymae Christi. I pray you to sit down to breakfast, Julian, and partake the goods my royal foresight has provided. Never was King of Man nearer being left to the mercy of the execrable brandy of his dominions. Old Griffiths would never, in the midst of our speedy retreat of last night, have had sense enough to secure a few flasks, had I not given him a hint on that important subject. But presence of mind amid danger and tumult, is a jewel I have always possessed."

"I wish, then, Philip, you would exert it to better purpose," said the Countess, half smiling, half displeased; for she doated upon her son with all a mother's fondness, even when she was most angry with him for being deficient in the peculiar and chivalrous disposition which had distinguished his father, and which was so a.n.a.logous to her own romantic and high-minded character. "Lend me your signet," she added with a sigh; "for it were, I fear, vain to ask you to read over these despatches from England, and execute the warrants which I have thought necessary to prepare in consequence."

"My signet you shall command with all my heart, madam," said Earl Philip; "but spare me the revision of what you are much more capable to decide upon. I am, you know, a most complete /Roi faineant/, and never once interfered with my /Maire de palais/ in her proceedings."

The Countess made signs to her little train-bearer, who immediately went to seek for wax and a light, with which she presently returned.

In the meanwhile the Countess continued, addressing Peveril. "Philip does himself less than justice. When you were absent, Julian (for if you had been here I would have given you the credit of prompting your friend), he had a spirited controversy with the Bishop, for an attempt to enforce spiritual censures against a poor wretch, by confining her in the vault under the chapel."[*]

[*] Beneath the only one of the four churches in Castle Rushin, which is or was kept a little in repair, is a prison or dungeon, for ecclesiastical offenders. "This," says Waldron, "is certainly one of the most dreadful places that imagination can form; the sea runs under it through the hollows of the rock with such a continual roar, that you would think it were every moment breaking in upon you, and over it are the vaults for burying the dead. The stairs descending to this place of terrors are not above thirty, but so steep and narrow, that they are very difficult to go down, a child of eight or nine years not being able to pa.s.s them but sideways."--WALDRON'S /Description of the Isle of Man, in his Works/, p. 105, folio.

"Do not think better of me than I deserve," said the Earl to Peveril; "my mother has omitted to tell you the culprit was pretty Peggy of Ramsey, and her crime what in Cupid's courts would have been called a peccadillo."

"Do not make yourself worse than you are," replied Peveril, who observed the Countess's cheek redden,--"you know you would have done as much for the oldest and poorest cripple in the island. Why, the vault is under the burial-ground of the chapel, and, for aught I know, under the ocean itself, such a roaring do the waves make in its vicinity. I think no one could remain there long, and retain his reason."

"It is an infernal hole," answered the Earl, "and I will have it built up one day--that is full certain.--But hold--hold--for G.o.d's sake, madam--what are you going to do?--Look at the seal before you put it to the warrant--you will see it is a choice antique cameo Cupid, riding on a flying fish--I had it for twenty zechins, from Signor Furabosco at Rome--a most curious matter for an antiquary, but which will add little faith to a Manx warrant.

"My signet--my signet--Oh! you mean that with the three monstrous legs, which I supposed was devised as the most preposterous device, to represent our most absurd Majesty of Man.--The signet--I have not seen it since I gave it to Gibbon, my monkey, to play with.--He did whine for it most piteously--I hope he has not gemmed the green breast of ocean with my symbol of sovereignty!"

"Now, by Heaven," said the Countess, trembling, and colouring deeply with anger, "it was your father's signet! the last pledge which he sent, with his love to me, and his blessing to thee, the night before they murdered him at Bolton!"

"Mother, dearest mother," said the Earl, startled out of his apathy, and taking her hand, which he kissed tenderly, "I did but jest--the signet is safe--Peveril knows that it is so.--Go fetch it, Julian, for Heaven's sake--here are my keys--it is in the left-hand drawer of my travelling cabinet--Nay, mother, forgive me--it was but a /mauvaise plaisanterie/; only an ill-imagined jest, ungracious, and in bad taste, I allow--but only one of Philip's follies. Look at me, dearest mother, and forgive me."

The Countess turned her eyes towards him, from which the tears were fast falling.

"Philip," she said, "you try me too unkindly, and too severely. If times are changed, as I have heard you allege--if the dignity of rank, and the high feelings of honour and duty, are now drowned in giddy jests and trifling pursuits, let /me/ at least, who live secluded from all others, die without perceiving the change which has happened, and, above all, without perceiving it in mine own son. Let me not learn the general prevalence of this levity, which laughs at every sense of dignity or duty, through your personal disrespect--Let me not think that when I die----"

"Speak nothing of it, mother," said the Earl, interrupting her affectionately. "It is true, I cannot promise to be all my father and his fathers were; for we wear silk vests for their steel coats, and feathered beavers for their crested helmets. But believe me, though to be an absolute Palmerin of England is not in my nature, no son ever loved a mother more dearly, or would do more to oblige her. And that you may own this, I will forthwith not only seal the warrants, to the great endangerment of my precious fingers, but also read the same from end to end, as well as the despatches thereunto appertaining."

A mother is easily appeased, even when most offended; and it was with an expanding heart that the Countess saw her son's very handsome features, while reading these papers, settle into an expression of deep seriousness, such as they seldom wore. It seemed to her as if the family likeness to his gallant but unfortunate father increased, when the expression of their countenances became similar in gravity. The Earl had no sooner perused the despatches, which he did with great attention, than he rose and said, "Julian, come with me."

The Countess looked surprised. "I was wont to share your father's counsels, my son," she said; "but do not think that I wish to intrude myself upon yours. I am too well pleased to see you a.s.sume the power and the duty of thinking for yourself, which is what I have so long urged you to do. Nevertheless, my experience, who have been so long administrator of your authority in Man, might not, I think, be superfluous to the matter in hand."

"Hold me excused, dearest mother," said the Earl gravely. "The interference was none of my seeking; had you taken your own course, without consulting me, it had been well; but since I have entered on the affair--and it appears sufficiently important--I must transact it to the best of my own ability."

"Go, then, my son," said the Countess, "and may Heaven enlighten thee with its counsel, since thou wilt have none of mine.--I trust that you, Master Peveril, will remind him of what is fit for his own honour; and that only a coward abandons his rights, and only a fool trusts his enemies."

The Earl answered not, but, taking Peveril by the arm, led him up a winding stair to his own apartment, and from thence into a projecting turret, where, amidst the roar of waves and sea-mews' clang, he held with him the following conversation:-- "Peveril, it is well I looked into these warrants. My mother queens it at such a rate as may cost me not only my crown, which I care little for, but perhaps my head, which, though others may think little of, I would feel it an inconvenience to be deprived of."

"What on earth is the matter?" said Peveril, with considerable anxiety.

"It seems," said the Earl of Derby, "that old England who takes a frolicsome brain-fever once every two or three years, for the benefit of her doctors, and the purification of the torpid lethargy brought on by peace and prosperity, is now gone stark staring mad on the subject of a real or supposed Popish plot. I read one programme on the subject, by a fellow called Oates, and thought it the most absurd foolery I ever perused. But that cunning fellow Shaftesbury, and some others amongst the great ones, having taken it up, and are driving on at such a rate as makes harness crack, and horses smoke for it. The King, who has sworn never to kiss the pillow his father went to sleep on, temporises, and gives way to the current; the Duke of York, suspected and hated on account of his religion, is about to be driven to the continent; several princ.i.p.al Catholic n.o.bles are in the Tower already; and the nation, like a bull at Tutbury-running, is persecuted with so many inflammatory rumours and pestilent pamphlets, that she has c.o.c.ked her tail, flung up her heels, taken the bit betwixt her teeth and is as furiously unmanageable as in the year 1642."

"All this you must have known already," said Peveril; "I wonder you told me not of news so important."

"It would have taken long to tell," said the Earl; "moreover, I desired to have you /solus/; thirdly, I was about to speak when my mother entered; and, to conclude, it was no business of mine. But these despatches of my politic mother's private correspondent put a new face on the whole matter; for it seems some of the informers--a trade which, having become a thriving one, is now pursued by many-- have dared to glance at the Countess herself as an agent in this same plot--ay, and have found those that are willing enough to believe their report."

"On mine honour," said Peveril, "you both take it with great coolness. I think the Countess the more composed of the two; for, except her movement hither, she exhibited no mark of alarm, and, moreover, seemed no way more anxious to communicate the matter to your lordship than decency rendered necessary."

"My good mother," said the Earl, "loves power, though it has cost her dear. I wish I could truly say that my neglect of business is entirely a.s.sumed in order to leave it in her hands, but that better motive combines with natural indolence. But she seems to have feared I should not think exactly like her in this emergency, and she was right in supposing so."

"How comes the emergency upon you?" said Julian; "and what form does the danger a.s.sume?"

"Marry, thus it is," said the Earl: "I need not bid you remember the affair of Colonel Christian. That man, besides his widow, who is possessed of large property--Dame Christian of Kirk Truagh, whom you have often heard of, and perhaps seen--left a brother called Edward Christian, whom you never saw at all. Now this brother--but I dare say you know all about it."

"Not I, on my honour," said Peveril; "you know the Countess seldom or never alludes to the subject."

"Why," replied the Earl, "I believe in her heart she is something ashamed of that gallant act of royalty and supreme jurisdiction, the consequences of which maimed my estate so cruelly.--Well, cousin, this same Edward Christian was one of the dempsters at the time, and, naturally enough, was unwilling to concur in the sentence which adjudged his /aine/ to be shot like a dog. My mother, who was then in high force, and not to be controlled by any one, would have served the dempster with the same sauce with which she dressed his brother, had he not been wise enough to fly from the island. Since that time, the thing has slept on all hands; and though we knew that Dempster Christian made occasionally secret visits to his friends in the island, along with two or three other Puritans of the same stamp, and particularly a p.r.i.c.k-eared rogue, called Bridgenorth, brother-in-law to the deceased, yet my mother, thank Heaven, has. .h.i.therto had the sense to connive at them, though, for some reason or other, she holds this Bridgenorth in especial disfavour."

"And why," said Peveril, forcing himself to speak, in order to conceal the very unpleasant surprise which he felt, "why does the Countess now depart from so prudent a line of conduct?"

"You must know the case is now different. The rogues are not satisfied with toleration--they would have supremacy. They have found friends in the present heat of the popular mind. My mother's name, and especially that of her confessor, Aldrick the Jesuit, have been mentioned in this beautiful maze of a plot, which if any such at all exists, she knows as little of as you or I. However, she is a Catholic, and that is enough; and I have little doubt, that if the fellows could seize on our sc.r.a.p of a kingdom here, and cut all our throats, they would have the thanks of the present House of Commons, as willingly as old Christian had those of the Rump, for a similar service."

"From whence did you receive all this information?" said Peveril, again speaking, though by the same effort which a man makes who talks in his sleep.

"Aldrick has seen the Duke of York in secret, and his Royal Highness, who wept while he confessed his want of power to protect his friends-- and it is no trifle will wring tears from him--told him to send us information that we should look to our safety, for that Dempster Christian and Bridgenorth were in the island, with secret and severe orders; that they had formed a considerable party there, and were likely to be owned and protected in anything they might undertake against us. The people of Ramsey and Castletown are unluckily discontented about some new regulation of the imposts; and to tell you the truth, though I thought yesterday's sudden remove a whim of my mother's, I am almost satisfied they would have blockaded us in Rushin Castle, where we could not have held out for lack of provisions. Here we are better supplied, and, as we are on our guard, it is likely the intended rising will not take place."

"And what is to be done in this emergency?" said Peveril.

"That is the very question, my gentle coz," answered the Earl. "My mother sees but one way of going to work, and that is by royal authority. Here are the warrants she had prepared, to search for, take, and apprehend the bodies of Edward Christian and Robert--no, Ralph Bridgenorth, and bring them to instant trial. No doubt, she would soon have had them in the Castle court, with a dozen of the old matchlocks levelled against them--that is her way of solving all sudden difficulties."

"But in which, I trust, you do not acquiesce, my lord," answered Peveril, whose thoughts instantly reverted to Alice, if they could ever be said to be absent from her.

"Truly I acquiesce in no such matter," said the Earl. "William Christian's death cost me a fair half of my inheritance. I have no fancy to fall under the displeasure of my royal brother, King Charles, for a new escapade of the same kind. But how to pacify my mother, I know not. I wish the insurrection would take place, and then, as we are better provided than they can be, we might knock the knaves on the head; and yet, since they began the fray, we should keep the law on our side."

"Were it not better," said Peveril, "if by any means these men could be induced to quit the island?"

"Surely," replied the Earl; "but that will be no easy matter--they are stubborn on principle, and empty threats will not move them. This stormblast in London is wind in their sails, and they will run their length, you may depend on it. I have sent orders, however, to clap up the Manxmen upon whose a.s.sistance they depended, and if I can find the two worthies themselves, here are sloops enough in the harbour--I will take the freedom to send them on a pretty distant voyage, and I hope matters will be settled before they return to give an account of it."

At this moment a soldier belonging to the garrison approached the two young men, with many bows and tokens of respect. "How now, friend?" said the Earl to him. "Leave off thy courtesies, and tell thy business."

The man, who was a native islander, answered in Manx, that he had a letter for his honour, Master Julian Peveril. Julian s.n.a.t.c.hed the billet hastily, and asked whence it came.

"It was delivered to him by a young woman," the soldier replied, "who had given him a piece of money to deliver it into Master Peveril's own hand."