Wilson's Tales of the Borders and of Scotland Volume XXIII Part 14

When Lieutenant Morris left India, he obtained permission to remain in England for three years; and it was about twelve months after his arrival that the marriage between him and Maria took place. He had still two years to spend in his native land, and he hired a secluded and neat cottage on the banks of the Annan for that period, for the residence of himself and his young and beautiful wife.

Twelve months after their marriage, Maria became the mother of twins--the twin brothers of our tale. But three months had not pa.s.sed, nor had her infants raised their first smile towards their mother's face, when the sterile hand of death touched the bosom that supplied them with life. The young husband wept by the bed of death, with the hand of her he loved in his.

"William!" said the gentle Maria--and they were her dying words, for she spoke not again--"my eyes will not behold another sun! I must leave you, love! Oh my husband! I must leave our poor, our helpless infants! It is hard to die thus! But when I am gone, dearest--when my babes have no mother--oh, go to _my mother_, and tell her--tell her, William--that it was the dying request of her Maria, that she would be as a mother to them. Farewell, love!--farewell! If"--

Emotion and the strugglings of death overpowered her--her speech failed--her eyes became fixed--her soul pa.s.sed away, and the husband sat in stupefaction and in agony, holding the hand of his dead wife to his breast. He became conscious that she stirred not--that she breathed not--oh! that she was not! and the wail of the distracted widower rang suddenly and wildly through the cottage, startling his infants from their slumber, and, as some who stood round the bed said, causing even the features of the dead to move, as though the departed spirit had lingered, casting a farewell glance upon the body, and pa.s.sed over it again, as the voice it had loved to hear rose loud in agony.

The father of Maria came and attended her body to its last, long resting-place. But he did no more; and he left the churchyard without acknowledging that he perceived his grief-stricken son-in-law.

In a few months it was necessary for Lieutenant Morris to return to India, and he could not take his motherless and tender infants thither.

He wrote to the parents of his departed Maria; he told them of her last request, breathed by her last words; he implored them, as they had once loved her, during his absence to protect his children.

But the hatred between Mr. Sim and Squire Morris had in no degree abated. The former would have listened to his daughter's prayer, and taken her twins and the nurse into his house; but his wife was less susceptible to the influence of natural feeling, and even, while at intervals she wept for poor Maria, she said--

"Take both of them, indeed! No, no! I loved our poor, thoughtless, disobedient Maria, Mr. Sim, as well as you did, but I will not submit to the Morrises. They have nothing to give the children; we have. But they have the same, they have a greater right to provide for them than we have. They shall take one of them, or none of them come into this house." And again she broke into lamentations over the memory of Maria, and, in the midst of her mourning, exclaimed--"But the child that we take shall never be called Morris."

Mr. Sim wrote an answer to his son-in-law, as cold and formal as if it had been a note added to an invoice; colder indeed, for it had no equivalent to the poor, hackneyed phrase in all such, of "_esteemed favours_." In it he stated that he would "bring up" one of the children, provided that Squire Morris would undertake the charge of the other. The unhappy father clasped his hands together on perusing the letter, and exclaimed--

"Must my poor babes be parted?--shall they be brought up to hate each other? Oh Maria! would that I had died with you, and our children also!"

To take them to India with him, where a war was threatened, was impossible, and his heart revolted from the thought of leaving them in this country with strangers. At times he was seen, with an infant son on each arm, sitting over the stone upon the grave of their mother which he had reared to her memory, kissing their cheeks and weeping over them, while they smiled in his face unconsciously, and offered to him, in those smiles, affection's first innocent tribute. On such occasions their nurse stood gazing on the scene, wondering at her master's grief.

Morris, of Morris House, reluctantly consented to take one of his grandchildren under his care; but at the same time he refused to see his son previous to his departure.

The widowed father wept over his twin sons, and invoking a blessing on them, saw their little arms sundered, and each conveyed to the houses of those who had undertaken to be their protectors, while he again proceeded towards India. The names of the twin sons were George and Charles: the former was committed to the care of Mr. Morris, the other to Mr. Sim. Yet it seemed as if these innocent pledges of a family union, instead of destroying, strengthened the deep-rooted animosity that existed between them. Not a month pa.s.sed that they did not, in some way, manifest their hatred of and their persecution towards each other.

The squire exhibited a proof of his vindictiveness, in not permitting the child of his son to remain beneath his roof. He had a small property in Devonshire, which was rented by an individual who, with his wife, had been servants under his father. To them George Morris, one of the infant sons of poor Maria, before he was yet twelve months old, was sent, with an injunction that he should be brought up as their own son, that he should be taught to consider himself as such, and bear their name.

The boy Charles, whose lot it was to be placed under the protection of his mother's parents, was more fortunate. The love they had borne towards their Maria they now lavished upon him. They called him by their own name--they spoke of him as their heir, as their _sole_ heir, and they inquired not after his brother. That brother became included in the hatred which Mrs. Sim, at least, bore to his father's family. As he grew up, his father's name was not mentioned in his presence. He was taught to call his grandfather--father, and his grandmother--mother; and withal, his mother so called instilled into his earliest thoughts an abhorrence of the inmates of Morris House. At times his grandfather whispered to her on such occasions, "Do not do the like of that, dear; we know not how it may end." But she regarded not his admonitions, and she strove that her grandchild should hold the very name of Morris in hatred.

The peasants to whose keeping George was confided, occupied, as has been stated, a small farm under his grandfather, which lay on the banks of the Dart, a few miles from Totnes. Their name was Prescot: they were cold-hearted and ignorant people; they had no children of their own, nor affection for those of others; neither had they received instructions to show any to him whom they were to adopt as a son; and if they had been arraigned for not doing so, they were of a character to have said with Shylock--"It is not in the bond." When he grew up, there was then no school in that part of Devonshire to which they could have sent him, had they been inclined; but they were not inclined; though, if they had had the power to educate him, they could have referred again to their bond, and said that no injunction to educate him was mentioned there. His first ideas were a consciousness of cruelty and oppression. At seven years of age he was sent to herd a few sheep upon Dartmoor; before he was nine, he was placed as a parish apprentice to the owner of a tin mine, and buried from the light of heaven.

Often and anxiously Lieutenant Morris wrote from India, inquiring after his sons. He sent presents--love-gifts to each; but his letters were unheeded, his presents disregarded. His children grew up in ignorance of his existence, or of the existence of each other.

It was about eighteen years after the death of Maria, and what is called an annual _Revel_ was held at Ashburton. Prizes were to be awarded to the best wrestlers, and hundreds were a.s.sembled from all parts of Devonshire to witness the sports of the day. Two companies of soldiers were stationed in the town at the time, and the officers, at the suggestion of a young ensign called Charles Sim, agreed to subscribe a purse of ten guineas towards the encouragement of the games. The young ensign was from c.u.mberland, where the science of wrestling is still a pa.s.sion; and he, as the reader will have antic.i.p.ated from the name he bore, was none other than one of the twin brothers. The games were skilfully and keenly contested; and a stripling from the neighbourhood of Totnes, amidst the shouts of the mult.i.tude, was declared the victor.

The last he had overcome was a gigantic soldier, a native of c.u.mberland.

When the young ensign beheld his champion overcome, his blood rose for the honour of his native county, and he regretted that he had not sustained it in his own person.

The purse subscribed by the officers was still to be wrestled for, and the stripling victor re-entered the ring to compete for it. On his design being perceived, others who wished to have contended for it drew back, and he stood in the ring alone, no one daring to come forward to compete with him. The umpire of the games was proclaiming that, if no one stood against him, the purse would be awarded to him who had already been p.r.o.nounced the victor of the day, when Ensign Sim, who, with his brother officers, had witnessed the sports from the windows of an adjacent inn, said--

"Well, the lad shall have the purse, though I don't expect he will win it; for, if no one else will, I shall give him a throw to redeem the credit of old c.u.mberland."

"Bravo, Sim!" cried his brother officers, and they accompanied him towards the ring.

The people again shouted when they perceived that there was to be another game, and the more so when they discovered that the stranger compet.i.tor was a gentleman. The ensign, having cast off his regimentals, and equipped himself in the strait canvas jacket worn by wrestlers, entered the ring. But now arose a new subject of wonderment, which in a moment was perceived by the whole mult.i.tude; and the loud huzzas that had welcomed his approach were hushed in a confused murmur of astonishment.

"Zwinge!" exclaimed a hundred voices, as they approached each other; "they be loik one anoother as two beans!"

"Whoy, which be which?" inquired others.

The likeness between the two wrestlers was indeed remarkable; their age, their stature, the colour of their hair, their features, were alike.

Spectators could not trace a difference between the one and the other.

The ensign had a small and peculiar mark below his chin; he perceived that his antagonist had the same. They approached each other, extending their arms for the contest. They stood still, they gazed upon each other; as they gazed they started; their arms dropped by their sides; they stood anxiously scrutinizing the countenance of each other, in which each saw himself as in a gla.s.s. Astonishment deprived them of strength; they forgot the purpose for which they met; they stretched forth their hands, they grasped them together, and stood eagerly looking into each other's eyes.

"Friend," said the ensign, "this is indeed singular; our extraordinary resemblance to each other fills me with amazement. What is your name?

from whence do you come?"

"Whoy, master," rejoined the other, "thou art so woundy like myself, that had I met thee anywhere but in the middle o' these folk, I should have been afeared that I was agoing to die, and had zeen mysel'. My name is George Prescot, at your sarvice. I coom from three miles down the river there; and what may they call thee?"

"My name," replied the soldier, "is Charles Sim. I am an orphan; my parents I never saw. And tell me--for this strange resemblance between us almost overpowers me--do yours live?"

"Whoy," was the reply, "old Tom Prescot and his woif be alive; and they zay as how they be my vather and moother, and I zuppose they be; but zoom cast up to them that they bean't."

No wrestling match took place between them; but hand in hand they walked round the ring together, while the spectators gazed upon them in silent wonder.

The ensign presented the youth, who might have been styled his fac-simile, with the purse subscribed by his brother officers and himself; and in so doing he offered to double its contents. But the youth, with a spirit above his condition, peremptorily refused the offer, and said--

"No, master--thank you the zame--I will take nothing but what I have won."

Charles was anxious to visit "old Tom Prescot and his wife," of whom the stranger had spoken; but the company to which he belonged was to march forward to Plymouth on the following day, and there to embark. His brother officers also dissuaded him from the thought.

"Why, Sim," said they, "the likeness between you and the conqueror of the ring was certainly a very pretty coincidence, and your meeting each other quite a drama. But, my good fellow," added they, laughing, "take the advice of older heads than your own--don't examine too closely into your father's faults."

Three years pa.s.sed, and Charles, now promoted to the rank of a lieutenant, accompanied the Duke of York in his more memorable than brilliant campaign in Holland. A soldier was accused of having been found sleeping on guard; he was tried, found guilty, and condemned to be shot. A corporal's guard was accompanying the doomed soldier from the place where sentence had been p.r.o.nounced against him to the prison-house, from whence he was to be brought forth for execution on the following day. Lieutenant Sim pa.s.sed near them. A voice exclaimed--

"Master! master!--save me! save me!"

It was the voice of the condemned soldier. The lieutenant turned round, and in the captive who called to him for a.s.sistance he recognised the Devonshire wrestler--the strange portrait of himself. And even now, if it were possible, the resemblance between them was more striking than before; for, in the stranger, the awkwardness of the peasant had given place to the smartness of the soldier. Charles had felt an interest in him from the first moment he beheld him; he had wished to meet him again, and had resolved to seek for him should he return to England; and now the interest that he had before felt for him was increased tenfold.

The offence and the fate of the doomed one were soon told. The lieutenant pledged himself that he would leave no effort untried to save him; and he redeemed his pledge. He discovered, he obtained proof that the condemned prisoner, George Prescot, had been employed on severe and dangerous duties, against which it was impossible for nature longer to stand up, but in all of which he had conducted himself as a good, a brave, and a faithful soldier; and, more, that it could not be proved that he was actually found asleep at his post, but that he was stupified through excess of fatigue.

He hastened to lay the evidence he had obtained respecting the conduct and innocence of the prisoner before his Royal Highness, who, whatever were his faults, was at least the soldier's friend. The Duke glanced over the doc.u.ments which the lieutenant laid before him; he listened to the evidence of the comrades of the prisoner. He took a pen; he wrote a few lines; he placed them in the hands of Lieutenant Sim. They contained the free pardon of Private Prescot. Charles rushed with the pardon in his hand to the prisoner; he exclaimed--

"Take this--you are pardoned--you are free!"

The soldier would have embraced his knees to thank him; but the lieutenant said--

"No! kneel not to me--consider me as a brother. I have merely saved the life of an innocent and deserving man. But the strange resemblance between us seems to me more than a strange coincidence. You have doubts regarding your parentage; I know but little of mine. Nature has written a mystery on our faces which we need to have explained. When this campaign is over, we shall inquire concerning it. Farewell for the present; but we must meet again."

The feelings of the reprieved and unlettered soldier were too strong for his words to utter; he shook the hand of his deliverer and wept.

A few days after this some sharp fighting took place. The loss of the British was considerable, and they were compelled to continue their retreat, leaving their dead, and many of their wounded, exposed, as they fell behind them. When they again arrived at a halting-place, Lieutenant Sim sought the regiment to which the soldier who might be termed his second self belonged. But he was not to be found; and all that he could learn respecting him was, that, three days before, George Prescot had been seen fighting bravely, but that he fell covered with wounds, and in their retreat was left upon the field.

Tears gushed into the eyes of the lieutenant when he heard the tidings.

His singular meeting with the stranger in Devonshire; their mysterious resemblance to each other; his meeting him again in Holland under circ.u.mstances yet more singular; his saving his life; and the dubious knowledge which each had respecting their birth and parentage,--all had sunk deep into his heart, and thoughts of these things chased sleep from his pillow.

It was but a short time after this that the regiment of Lieutenant Sim was ordered to India, and he accompanied it; and it was only a few months after his arrival, when the Governor-General gave an entertainment at his palace, at which all the military officers around were present. At table, opposite to Lieutenant Sim, sat a man of middle age; and, throughout the evening, his eyes remained fixed upon him, and occasionally seemed filled with tears. He was a colonel in the Company's service, and a man who, by the force of merit, had acquired wealth and reputation.

"I crave your pardon, sir," said he, addressing the lieutenant; "but if I be not too bold, a few words with you in private would confer a favour upon me, and if my conjectures be right, will give us both cause to rejoice."