Wilson's Tales of the Borders and of Scotland Volume VIII Part 1

Wilson's Tales of the Borders and of Scotland.

by Various.

Volume 8

THE DOOM OF SOULIS.

"They roll'd him up in a sheet of lead-- A sheet of lead for a funeral pall; They plunged him in the caldron red, And melted him--lead, and bones, and all."--LEYDEN.

A Gazetteer would inform you that Denholm is a village beautifully situated near the banks of the Teviot, about midway between Jedburgh and Hawick, and in the Parish of Cavers; and perhaps, if of modern date, it would add, it has the honour of being the birth-place of Dr. Leyden.

However, it was somewhat early on a summer morning, a few years ago, that a young man, a stranger, with a fishing-rod in his hand, and a creel fastened to his shoulders, entered the village. He stood in the midst of it, and, turning round--"This, then," said he, "is the birth-place of Leyden--the son of genius--the martyr of study--the friend of Scott!"

Few of the villagers were astir; and at the first he met--who carried a spade over his shoulder, and appeared to be a ditcher--he inquired if he could show him the house in which the bard and scholar was born.

"Ou, ay, sir," said the man, "I wat I can; I'll show ye that instantly, and proud to show you it, too."

"That is good," thought the stranger; "the prophet is dead, but he yet speaketh--he hath honour in his own country."

The ditcher conducted him across the green, and past the end of a house, which was described as being the school-house, and was newly built, and led him towards a humble building, the height of which was but a single storey, and which was found occupied by a millwright as a workshop. Yet, again, the stranger rejoiced to find that the occupier venerated his premises for the poet's sake, and that he honoured the genius of him who was born in their precincts.

"Dash it!"[1] said the stranger, quoting the habitual phrase of poor Leyden, "I shall fish none to-day."

[Footnote 1: This was a common expression of Leyden's, and, perhaps, was in some degree expressive of his headlong and determined character.]

And I wonder not at his having so said; for it is not every day that we stand beneath the thatch-clad roof--or any other roof--where was born one whose name time will bear written in undying characters on its wings, until those wings droop in the darkness of eternity.

The stranger proceeded up the Teviot, oftentimes thinking of Leyden, of all that he had written, and occasionally repeating pa.s.sages aloud. He almost forgot that he had a rod in his hand--his eyes did anything but follow the fly, and, I need hardly say, his success was not great.

About mid-day, he sat down on the green bank in solitariness, to enjoy a sandwich, and he also placed by his side a small flask, containing spirits, which almost every angler, who can afford it, carries with him.

But he had not sat long, when a venerable-looking old man saluted him with--

"Here's a bonny day, sir."

The old man stood as he spoke. There was something prepossessing in his appearance he had a weatherbeaten face, with thin white hair, blue eyes, that had lost somewhat of their former l.u.s.tre, his shoulders were rather bent; and he seemed a man who was certainly neither rich nor affluent, but who was at ease with the world, and the world was at ease with him.

They entered into conversation, and they sat down together. The old man appeared exactly one of those characters whom you will occasionally find fraught with the traditions of the Borders, and still tainted with, and half believing in, their ancient superst.i.tions. I wish not to infer that superst.i.tion was carried to a greater height of absurdity on the Borders than in other parts of England and Scotland, nor even that the inhabitants of the North were as remarkable in early days for their superst.i.tions, as they now are for their intelligence; for every nation had its superst.i.tions, and I am persuaded that most of them might be traced to a common origin. Yet, though the same in origin, they change their likeness with the character of a nation or district. People unconsciously made their superst.i.tions to suit themselves, though their imaginary effects still terrified them. There was, therefore, a something characteristic in the fables of our forefathers, which fables they believed as facts. The cunning deceived the ignorant--the ignorant were willing to deceive themselves; and what we now laugh at as the clever trick of a _hocus-pocus_ man, was, scarce more than a century ago, received as a miracle--as a thing performed by the hand of the "prince of the powers of the air." Religion without knowledge, and still swaddled in darkness, fostered their idle fear; yea, there are few superst.i.tions, though prost.i.tuted by wickedness, that did not owe their existence to some glimmering idea of religion. They had not seen the lamp which lightens the soul, and leadeth it to knowledge; but having perceived its far-off reflection, plunged into the quagmire of error--and hence proceeded superst.i.tion.

But I digress into a descant on the superst.i.tions of our fathers, nor should I have done so, but that it is impossible to write a Border tale of the olden time without bringing them forward, and, when I do so, it is not with the intention of instilling into the minds of my readers the old idea of sorcery, witchcraft, and visible spirits, but of showing what was the belief and conduct of our forefathers. Therefore, without further comment, I shall cut short these remarks, and simply observe, that the thoughts of the young stranger still running upon Leyden, he turned to the elder, after they had sat together for some time, and said--

"Did you know Dr. Leyden, sir?"

"Ken him!" said the old man; "fifty year ago, I've wrought day's wark beside his father for months together."

They continued their conversation for some time, and the younger inquired of the elder if he were acquainted with Leyden's ballad of "Lord Soulis."

"Why, I hae heard a verse or twa o' the ballad, sir," said the old man; "but I'm sure everybody kens the story. However, if ye're no perfectly acquaint wi' it, I'm sure I'm willing to let ye hear it wi' great pleasure; and a remarkable story it is--and just as true, sir, ye may tak my word on't, as that I'm raising this bottle to my lips."

So saying, the old man raised the flask to his mouth, and, after a regular fisher's draught, added--

"Weel, sir, I'll let ye hear the story about Lord Soulis:--You have no doubt heard of Hermitage Castle, which stands upon the river of that name, at no great distance from Hawick. In the days of the great and good King Robert the Bruce, that castle was inhabited by Lord Soulis.[2]

He was a man whose very name spread terror far and wide; for he was a tyrant and a sorcerer. He had a giant's strength, an evil eye,[3] and a demon's heart, and he kept his _familiar_[4] locked in a chest. Peer and peasant became pale at the name of Lord Soulis. His hand smote down the strong, his eye blasted the healthy; he oppressed the poor, and he robbed the rich. He ruled over his va.s.sals with a rod of iron. From the banks of the Tweed, the Teviot, and the Jed, with their tributaries, to beyond the Lothians, an incessant cry was raised against him to heaven and to the king. But his life was protected by a charm, and mortal weapons could not prevail against him."

[Footnote 2: He was also proprietor of Eccles, in Berwickshire, and, according to history, was seized in the town of Berwick; but tradition saith otherwise.]

[Footnote 3: There is, perhaps, no superst.i.tion more widely diffused than the belief in the fascination of an evil eye, or a malignant glance; and, I am sorry to say, the absurdity has still its believers.]

[Footnote 4: Each sorcerer was supposed to have his familiar spirit, that accompanied him; but Soulis was said to keep his locked in a chest.]

The seriousness with which the narrator said this, showed that he gave full credit to the tradition, and believed in Lord Soulis as a sorcerer.

"He was a man of great stature, and his person was exceeding powerful.

He had also royal blood in his veins, and laid claim to the crown of Scotland, in opposition to the Bruce. But two things troubled him: and the one was, to place the crown of Scotland on his head; the other, to possess the hand of a fair and rich, maiden, named Marion, who was about to wed with Walter, the young heir of Branxholm, the stoutest and the boldest youth on all the wide Borders. Soulis was a man who was not only of a cruel heart, but it was filled with forbidden thoughts; and, to accomplish his purpose, he went down into the dungeon of his castle, in the dead of night, that no man might see him perform the 'deed without a name.' He carried a small lamp in his hand, which threw around a lurid light, like a glow-worm in a sepulchre; and as he went, he locked the doors behind him. He carried a cat in his arms; behind him a dog followed timidly, and before him, into the dungeon, he drove a young bull, that had 'never nipped the gra.s.s.' He entered the deep and the gloomy vault, and, with a loud voice, he exclaimed--

"'Spirit of darkness! I come!

"He placed the feeble lamp upon the ground, in the middle of the vault; and with a pick-axe, which he had previously prepared, he dug a pit, and buried the cat alive; and as the poor suffocating creature mewed, he exclaimed the louder--

"'Spirit of darkness! come!'

"He then leaped upon the grave of the living animal, and, seizing the dog by the neck, he dashed it violently against the wall, towards the left corner where he stood, and, unable to rise, it lay howling long and piteously on the floor. Then did he plunge his knife into the throat of the young bull, and, while its bleatings mingled with the howling of the dying dog, amidst what might be called the blue darkness of the vault, he received the blood in the palms of his hands, and he stalked around the dungeon, sprinkling it in circle, and crying with a loud voice--

"'Spirit of darkness! hear me!'

"Again he digged a pit, and, seizing the dying animal, he hurled it into the grave, feet upwards;[5] and again he groaned, while the sweat stood on his brow, 'Come, spirit! come!'

[Footnote 5: These are the recorded practices which sorcerers resorted to, when they wished to have a _glimpse_ of _invisible_ spirits.]

"He took a horse-shoe, which had lain in the vault for years, and which was called, in the family, the _spirit's shoe_, and he nailed it against the door, so that it hung obliquely;[6] and, as he gave the last blow to the nail, again he cried--'Spirit, I obey thee! come!'

[Footnote 6: In the account of the trial of Elizabeth Bathgate, wife of Alexander Pae, maltman in Eyemouth, one of the accusations in the indictment against her was, that she had "ane horse-schoe in ane darnet and secriet pairt of your dur, keepit by you thairopoun, as ane devilish meanis and instructions from the devill." But the superst.i.tions of the Borders, which it is necessary to ill.u.s.trate in these Tales, as exemplifying the character of our forefathers, are more particularly dwelt upon, and their absurdity unmasked, in the Tales ent.i.tled, "Betty Bathgate, the Witch of Eyemouth;" "Peggy Stoddart, the Witch of Edlingham;" and "The Laidley Worm of Spindlestone Heugh."]

"Afterwards, he took his place in the middle of the floor, and nine times he scattered around him a handful of salt, at each time exclaiming--

"'Spirit! arise!'

"Then did he strike thrice nine times with his hand upon a chest which stood in the middle of the floor, and by its foot was the pale lamp, and at each blow he cried--

"'Arise, spirit! arise!'

"Therefore, when he had done these things, and cried twenty-and-seven times, the lid of the chest began to move, and a fearful figure, with a red cap[7] upon its head, and which resembled nothing in heaven above, or on earth below, rose, and, with a hollow voice,[8] inquired--

[Footnote 7: Red-cap is a name given to spirits supposed to haunt castles.]

[Footnote 8: In the proceedings regarding Sir George Maxwell, it is gravely set forth, that the voice of evil spirits is "rough and goustie;" and, to crown all, Lilly, in his "Life and Times," informs us, that they speak Erse; and, adds he, "when they do so, it's like Irishmen, much in the throat!"]