Rollo in Scotland Part 13

"The country was divided in those days," said he, "and some of the n.o.bles were for the poor queen, and some were against her. The owner of this castle was Lady Dougla.s.s, and she was against her; and so they sent Mary here, for Lady Dougla.s.s to keep her safely, while they arranged a new government.

"But she made her escape by this window, which I will show ye."

So saying, the guide led the way up two or three old, time-worn, and dilapidated steps, into the hexagonal tower. The tower was small--being, apparently, not more than twelve feet diameter within. The floors, except the lower one, and also the roof, were entirely gone, so that as soon as you entered you could look up to the sky.

The walls were very thick, so that there was room, not only for deep fireplaces, but also for closets and for a staircase, in them. You could see the openings for these closets, and also various loopholes and windows, at different heights. The top of the wall was all broken away, and so were the sills of the windows; and little tufts of gra.s.s and of wall flowers were to be seen, here and there, growing out of clefts and crevices. There were also rows of small square holes to be seen, at different heights, where the ends of the timbers had been inserted, to form the floors of the several stories.

"This was the window where she is supposed to have got out," said the guide.

So saying, he pointed to a large opening in the wall, on the outer side, where there had once, evidently, been a window.

The boys went to the place, and looked out. They saw beneath the window a smooth, green lawn, with the young trees which had been planted growing luxuriantly upon it.

"I suppose," said Mr. George, "that before the lake was lowered the water came up close under the window."

"Yes, sir," said the guide; "and if you stand upon the sill, and look down, you will see a course of projecting stone at the foot of the wall which was laid to meet the wash of the water."

"Let me see," said Waldron, eagerly.

So saying, Waldron advanced by the side of Mr. George, and looked down.

By leaning over pretty far he could see the course of stone very distinctly that the guide had referred to.

"Who brought the boat here for Mary to go away in?" asked Waldron.

"Young Dougla.s.s," said the guide, "Lady Dougla.s.s's son. He was a young lad, only eighteen years old. His mother was Queen Mary's enemy; but _he_ pitied her, and became her friend, and he devised this way to a.s.sist her to escape. There was a plan devised before this, by his brother. His name was George Dougla.s.s. The one who came in the boat was William. George's plan was for Mary to go on sh.o.r.e in the disguise of a laundress. The laundress came over to the island from the sh.o.r.e in a boat, to bring the linen; and while she was in Mary's room Mary exchanged clothes with her, and attempted to go on sh.o.r.e in the boat with the empty basket. But the boatmen happened to notice her hand, which was very delicate and white, and they knew that such a hand as that could never belong to a real laundress. So they made her lift up her veil, and thus she was discovered."

"That was very curious," said Waldron.

"It is supposed," said the guide, "that this floor, where we stand, was Mary's drawing room, and the floor above was her bed chamber. The staircase where she went up is _there_, in the wall."

"Let's go up," said Rollo.

So Rollo and Waldron went up the stairway. It was very narrow, and rather steep, and the steps were much worn away. When the boys reached the top they came to an opening, through which they could look down to where Mr. George and the guide were standing below; though, of course, they could not go out; for the floor in the second story was entirely gone.

"There was a room above the bed chamber," said the guide, "as we see by the windows and the fireplace, but there was no stairway to it from Queen Mary's apartments. The only access to it was through that door, which leads in from the top of the rampart wall. And there is another room below, and partly under ground. That is the room where Walter Scott represents the false keys to have been forged."

"What false keys?" asked Waldron.

"Why, the story is," said the guide, "that young Dougla.s.s had false keys made, to resemble the true ones as nearly as possible, so as to deceive his mother. He then contrived to get the true ones away from his mother, and put the false ones in their place. I will show you where he did this, and explain how he did it, when we go into the square tower."

"Let us go now," said Waldron.

So they all went across the court yard, and approached the square tower.

The guide explained to the boys that formerly the entrance was in the second story, through an opening in the wall, which he showed them. The way to get up to this opening was by a step ladder, which could be let down or drawn up by the people within, by means of chains coming down from a window above. The step ladder was, of course, entirely gone; but deep grooves were to be seen in the sill of the upper window, which had been worn by the chains in letting down and drawing up the ladder.

To accommodate modern visitors a flight of loose stone steps had been laid outside the square tower, leading to a window in the lower story of it. Mr. George and the boys ascended these steps and went in. The lower room was the kitchen, and they were all much interested and amused in looking at the very strange and curious fixtures and contrivances which remained there--the memorials of the domestic usages of those ancient times.

In a corner of the room was a flight of steps, built in the thickness of the wall, leading to the story above. This was the dining room and parlor of the castle.

"It was here," said the guide, "according to the story of Walter Scott, that Dougla.s.s contrived to get possession of the castle keys. There was a window on one side of the room, from which there was a view, across the water of the lake, of the burying ground already mentioned. Lady Dougla.s.s, like almost every body else in those times, was somewhat superst.i.tious, and William arranged it with a page that he was to pretend to see what was called a corpse light, moving about in the burying ground; and while his mother went to see, he shifted the keys which she had left upon the table, taking the true ones himself, and leaving the false ones in their place.

"That is the story which Sir Walter Scott relates," said the guide; "but I am not sure that there is any historical authority for it."

"And what became of Queen Mary, after she escaped in the boat?" asked Waldron.

"O, there were several of her friends," said the guide, "waiting for her on the sh.o.r.e of the loch where she was to land, and they hurried her away on horseback to a castle in the south of Scotland, and there they gathered an army for her, to defend her rights."

After this the boys looked down through a trap door, which led to a dark dungeon, where it is supposed that prisoners were sometimes confined. They rambled about the ruins for some time longer, and then they returned to the boat, and came back to the sh.o.r.e. When they arrived at the pier they paid the boatman his customary fee, which was about a dollar and a quarter, and then began to walk up towards the inn.

"Well, boys," said Mr. George, "how did you like it?"

"Very much indeed," said Waldron. "It is the best old castle I ever saw."

"You will like the Palace of Holyrood better, I think," said Mr. George.

"Where is that?" asked Rollo.

"At Edinburgh," said Mr. George. "It is the place where Mary lived. We shall see the little room there where they murdered her poor secretary, David Rizzio."

"What did they murder him for?" asked Waldron.

"O, you will see when you come to read the history," said Mr. George.

"It is a very curious story."

CHAPTER XII.

EDINBURGH.

From Loch Leven Castle our party returned in the coach to the railway station, and thence proceeded to Edinburgh. They crossed the Frith of Forth by a ferry, at a place where it was about five miles wide.

Edinburgh is considered one of the most remarkable cities in the world, in respect to the picturesqueness of its situation. It stands upon and among a very extraordinary group of steep hills and deep valleys. A part of it is very ancient, and another part is quite modern, so that in describing it, it is often said that it consists of the old town and the new town. But it seems to me that a more obvious distinction would be, to divide it into the upper town and the lower town; for there are almost literally two towns, one upon the top of the other. The upper town is built on the hills. The lower one lies in the valleys. The streets of the upper town are connected by bridges; and when you stand upon one of these bridges, and look down, you see a street instead of a river below, with ranges of strange and antique-looking buildings on each side, for banks, and a current of men, women, and children flowing along, instead of water.

The different portions of the lower town, on the other hand, are connected by tunnels and arched pa.s.sage ways under the bridges above described; and then there are flights of steps, and steep winding or zigzag paths, leading up and down between the lower streets and the upper, in the most surprising manner.

There are twenty places, more or less, in the town, where you have two streets crossing each other at right angles, one fifty feet below the other, with an immense traffic of horses, carriages, carts, and foot pa.s.sengers, going to and fro in both of them. You come upon these places sometimes very unexpectedly. You are walking along on the pavement of a crowded street, when you come suddenly upon the break, or interruption in the line of building on each side. The s.p.a.ce is occupied by a parapet, or by a high iron bal.u.s.trade. You stop to look over, expecting to see a river or a ca.n.a.l; instead of which, you find yourself looking down into the chimneys of four-story houses bordering another street below you, which is so far down that the people walking in it, and the children playing on the sidewalk, look like pygmies.

At one place, in looking over the parapet of such a bridge, you see a vast market, with carts filled with vegetables standing all around it.

At another, you behold a great railway station, with crowds of pa.s.sengers on the platforms, and trains of cars coming and going; at another, a range of beautiful gardens and pleasure grounds, with ladies and gentlemen walking in them, or sitting on seats under the trees, and children trundling their hoops, or rolling their b.a.l.l.s, over the smooth gravel walks.

Sometimes a street of the upper town, running along on the crest or side of a hill, lies _parallel_ with one in the lower town, that extends below it in the valley. In this case the block of houses that comes between will be very high indeed on the side towards the lower street; so that you see buildings sometimes eight or ten stories high at one front, and only four or five on the other. These structures consist, in fact, of two houses, one on top of the other; the entrances to the lower house being from one of the streets of the lower town, and those leading to the one on the top being from a street in the upper town.

The reason why Edinburgh was built in this extraordinary position was, because it had its origin in a castle on a rock. This rock, with the castle that crowns the summit of it, rears its lofty head now in the very centre of the town, with deep valleys all around it. This rock, or rather rocky hill,--for it is nearly a mile in circ.u.mference,--is very steep on all sides but one. On that side there is a gradual slope, a mile or more in length, leading down to the level country. A great many centuries ago the military chieftains of those days built the castle on the hill. About the same time the monks built a monastery on the level ground at the foot of the long slope leading down from the castle. The rocky hill was an excellent place for the castle, for there was a hundred feet of almost perpendicular precipice on all sides but one, and on that side there was a convenient slope for the people who lived in the castle to go up and down; and thus, by fortifying this side, and making slight walls on all the other sides, the whole place would be very secure. The level ground below, too, was a very good place for the monastery or abbey; for it was easily accessible from all the country around, and was, moreover, in the midst of a region of fertile land, easy for the lay brethren to till. There was no necessity that the abbey should be in a fortified place, for such establishments were considered sacred in those days, and even in the most furious wars they were seldom molested.

In process of time a palace was built by the side of the abbey. This palace and a part of the ruins of the abbey still remain. Of course, when the palace was built, a town would gradually grow up near it. Many n.o.blemen of the realm came and built houses along the street which led from the palace up to the castle--now called High Street. The fronts of these houses were on the street, and the gardens behind them extended down the slopes of the ridge on both sides, into the deep valleys that bordered them. Little lanes were left between these houses, leading down the slopes; but they were closed at the bottom by a wall, which was built along at the foot of the descent on each side, and formed the enclosure of the town.