Old Mortality Part 24

"Henry Morton?" replied Burley, wiping his b.l.o.o.d.y brow with his bloodier hand; "did I not say that the son of Silas Morton would come forth out of the land of bondage, nor be long an indweller in the tents of Ham? Thou art a brand s.n.a.t.c.hed out of the burning--But for this booted apostle of prelacy, he shall die the death!--We must smite them hip and thigh, even from the rising to the going down of the sun. It is our commission to slay them like Amalek, and utterly destroy all they have, and spare neither man nor woman, infant nor suckling; therefore, hinder me not," he continued, endeavouring again to cut down Lord Evandale, "for this work must not be wrought negligently."

"You must not, and you shall not, slay him, more especially while incapable of defence," said Morton, planting himself before Lord Evandale so as to intercept any blow that should be aimed at him; "I owed my life to him this morning--my life, which was endangered solely by my having sheltered you; and to shed his blood when he can offer no effectual resistance, were not only a cruelty abhorrent to G.o.d and man, but detestable ingrat.i.tude both to him and to me."

Burley paused.--"Thou art yet," he said, "in the court of the Gentiles, and I compa.s.sionate thy human blindness and frailty. Strong meat is not fit for babes, nor the mighty and grinding dispensation under which I draw my sword, for those whose hearts are yet dwelling in huts of clay, whose footsteps are tangled in the mesh of mortal sympathies, and who clothe themselves in the righteousness that is as filthy rags. But to gain a soul to the truth is better than to send one to Tophet; therefore I give quarter to this youth, providing the grant is confirmed by the general council of G.o.d's army, whom he hath this day blessed with so signal a deliverance.--Thou art unarmed--Abide my return here. I must yet pursue these sinners, the Amalekites, and destroy them till they be utterly consumed from the face of the land, even from Havilah unto Shur."

So saying, he set spurs to his horse, and continued to pursue the chase.

"Cuddie," said Morton, "for G.o.d's sake catch a horse as quickly as you can. I will not trust Lord Evandale's life with these obdurate men.--You are wounded, my lord.--Are you able to continue your retreat?" he continued, addressing himself to his prisoner, who, half-stunned by the fall, was but beginning to recover himself.

"I think so," replied Lord Evandale. "But is it possible?--Do I owe my life to Mr Morton?"

"My interference would have been the same from common humanity," replied Morton; "to your lords.h.i.+p it was a sacred debt of grat.i.tude."

Cuddie at this instant returned with a horse.

"G.o.d-sake, munt--munt, and ride like a fleeing hawk, my lord," said the good-natured fellow, "for ne'er be in me, if they arena killing every ane o' the wounded and prisoners!"

Lord Evandale mounted the horse, while Cuddie officiously held the stirrup.

"Stand off, good fellow, thy courtesy may cost thy life.--Mr Morton," he continued, addressing Henry, "this makes us more than even--rely on it, I will never forget your generosity--Farewell."

He turned his horse, and rode swiftly away in the direction which seemed least exposed to pursuit.

Lord Evandale had just rode off, when several of the insurgents, who were in the front of the pursuit, came up, denouncing vengeance on Henry Morton and Cuddie for having aided the escape of a Philistine, as they called the young n.o.bleman.

"What wad ye hae had us to do?" cried Cuddie. "Had we aught to stop a man wi' that had twa pistols and a sword? Sudna ye hae come faster up yoursells, instead of flyting at huz?"

This excuse would hardly have pa.s.sed current; but Kettledrummle, who now awoke from his trance of terror, and was known to, and reverenced by, most of the wanderers, together with Mause, who possessed their appropriate language as well as the preacher himself, proved active and effectual intercessors.

"Touch them not, harm them not," exclaimed Kettledrummle, in his very best double-ba.s.s tones; "this is the son of the famous Silas Morton, by whom the Lord wrought great things in this land at the breaking forth of the reformation from prelacy, when there was a plentiful pouring forth of the Word and a renewing of the Covenant; a hero and champion of those blessed days, when there was power and efficacy, and convincing and converting of sinners, and heart-exercises, and fellows.h.i.+ps of saints, and a plentiful flowing forth of the spices of the garden of Eden."

"And this is my son Cuddie," exclaimed Mause, in her turn, "the son of his father, Judden Headrigg, wha was a douce honest man, and of me, Mause Middlemas, an unworthy professor and follower of the pure gospel, and ane o' your ain folk. Is it not written, 'Cut ye not off the tribe of the families of the Kohathites from among the Levites?' Numbers, fourth and aughteenth--O! sirs! dinna be standing here prattling wi' honest folk, when ye suld be following forth your victory with which Providence has blessed ye."

This party having pa.s.sed on, they were immediately beset by another, to whom it was necessary to give the same explanation. Kettledrummle, whose fear was much dissipated since the firing had ceased, again took upon him to be intercessor, and grown bold, as he felt his good word necessary for the protection of his late fellow-captives, he laid claim to no small share of the merit of the victory, appealing to Morton and Cuddie, whether the tide of battle had not turned while he prayed on the Mount of Jehovah-Nissi, like Moses, that Israel might prevail over Amalek; but granting them, at the same time, the credit of holding up his hands when they waxed heavy, as those of the prophet were supported by Aaron and Hur. It seems probable that Kettledrummle allotted this part in the success to his companions in adversity, lest they should be tempted to disclose his carnal self-seeking and falling away, in regarding too closely his own personal safety. These strong testimonies in favour of the liberated captives quickly flew abroad, with many exaggerations, among the victorious army. The reports on the subject were various; but it was universally agreed, that young Morton of Milnwood, the son of the stout soldier of the Covenant, Silas Morton, together with the precious Gabriel Kettledrummle, and a singular devout Christian woman, whom many thought as good as himself at extracting a doctrine or an use, whether of terror or consolation, had arrived to support the good old cause, with a reinforcement of a hundred well-armed men from the Middle Ward.

[Note: Skirmish at Drumclog. This affair, the only one in which Claverhouse was defeated, or the insurgent Cameronians successful, was fought pretty much in the manner mentioned in the text. The Royalists lost about thirty or forty men. The commander of the Presbyterian, or rather Convenanting party, was Mr Robert Hamilton, of the honourable House of Preston, brother of Sir William Hamilton, to whose t.i.tle and estate he afterwards succeeded; but, according to his biographer, Howie of Lochgoin, he never took possession of either, as he could not do so without acknowledging the right of King William (an uncovenanted monarch) to the crown. Hamilton had been bred by Bishop Burnet, while the latter lived at Glasgow; his brother, Sir Thomas, having married a sister of that historian. "He was then," says the Bishop, "a lively, hopeful young man; but getting into that company, and into their notions, he became a crack-brained enthusiast."

Several well-meaning persons have been much scandalized at the manner in which the victors are said to have conducted themselves towards the prisoners at Drumclog. But the principle of these poor fanatics, (I mean the high-flying, or Cameronian party,) was to obtain not merely toleration for their church, but the same supremacy which Presbytery had acquired in Scotland after the treaty of Rippon, betwixt Charles I. and his Scottish subjects, in 1640.

The fact is, that they conceived themselves a chosen people, sent forth to extirpate the heathen, like the Jews of old, and under a similar charge to show no quarter.

The historian of the Insurrection of Bothwell makes the following explicit avowal of the principles on which their General acted:--

"Mr Hamilton discovered a great deal of bravery and valour, both in the conflict with, and pursuit of, the enemy; but when he and some other were pursuing the enemy, others flew too greedily upon the spoil, small as it was, instead of pursuing the victory; and some, without Mr Hamilton's knowledge, and directly contrary to his express command, gave five of those b.l.o.o.d.y enemies quarter, and then let them go; this greatly grieved Mr Hamilton when he saw some of Babel's brats spared, after that the Lord had delivered them into their hands, that they might dash them against the stones. Psalm cx.x.xvii., 9. In his own account of this, he reckons the sparing of these enemies, and letting them go, to be among their first steppings aside, for which he feared that the Lord would not honour them to do much more for him; and says, that he was neither for taking favours from, nor giving favours to, the Lord's enemies." See A true and impartial Account of the persecuted Presbyterians in Scotland, their being in arms, and defeat at Bothwell Brigg, in 1679, by William Wilson, late Schoolmaster in the parish of Douglas.

The reader who would authenticate the quotation, must not consult any other edition than that of 1697; for somehow or other the publisher of the last edition has omitted this remarkable part of the narrative.

Sir Robert Hamilton himself felt neither remorse nor shame for having put to death one of the prisoners after the battle with his own hand, which appears to have been a charge against him, by some whose fanaticism was less exalted than his own.

"As for that accusation they bring against me of killing that poor man (as they call him) at Drumclog, I may easily guess that my accusers can be no other but some of the house of Saul or s.h.i.+mei, or some such risen again to espouse that poor gentleman (Saul) his quarrel against honest Samuel, for his offering to kill that poor man Agag, after the king's giving him quarter. But I, being to command that day, gave out the word that no quarter should be given; and returning from pursuing Claverhouse, one or two of these fellows were standing in the midst of a company of our friends, and some were debating for quarter, others against it. None could blame me to decide the controversy, and I bless the Lord for it to this day.

There were five more that without my knowledge got quarter, who were brought to me after we were a mile from the place as having got quarter, which I reckoned among the first steppings aside; and seeing that spirit amongst us at that time, I then told it to some that were with me, (to my best remembrance, it was honest old John Nisbet,) that I feared the Lord would not honour us to do much more for him. I shall only say this,--I desire to bless his holy name, that since ever he helped me to set my face to his work, I never had, nor would take, a favour from enemies, either on right or left hand, and desired to give as few."

The preceding pa.s.sage is extracted from a long vindication of his own conduct, sent by Sir Robert Hamilton, 7th December, 1685, addressed to the anti-Popish, anti-Prelatic, anti-Erastian, anti-sectarian true Presbyterian remnant of the Church of Scotland; and the substance is to be found in the work or collection, called, "Faithful Contendings Displayed, collected and transcribed by John Howie."

As the skirmish of Drumclog has been of late the subject of some enquiry, the reader may be curious to see Claverhouse's own account of the affair, in a letter to the Earl of Linlithgow, written immediately after the action. This gazette, as it may be called, occurs in the volume called Dundee's Letters, printed by Mr Smythe of Methven, as a contribution to the Bannatyne Club. The original is in the library of the Duke of Buckingham. Claverhouse, it may be observed, spells like a chambermaid.

"FOR THE EARLE OF LINLITHGOW. [COMMANDER-IN-CHIEF OF KING CHARLES II.'s FORCES IN SCOTLAND.]

"Glaskow, Jun. the 1, 1679.

"My Lord,--Upon Sat.u.r.day's night, when my Lord Rosse came into this place, I marched out, and because of the insolency that had been done tue nights before at Ruglen, I went thither and inquyred for the names. So soon as I got them, I sent our partys to sease on them, and found not only three of those rogues, but also ane intercomend minister called King. We had them at Strevan about six in the morning yesterday, and resolving to convey them to this, I thought that we might make a little tour to see if we could fall upon a conventicle; which we did, little to our advantage; for when we came in sight of them, we found them drawn up in batell, upon a most adventageous ground, to which there was no coming but through mosses and lakes. They wer not preaching, and had got away all there women and s.h.i.+ldring. They consisted of four battaillons of foot, and all well armed with fusils and pitchforks, and three squadrons of horse. We sent both partys to skirmish, they of foot and we of dragoons; they run for it, and sent down a battaillon of foot against them; we sent threescore of dragoons, who made them run again shamfully; but in end they percaiving that we had the better of them in skirmish, they resolved a generall engadgment, and imediately advanced with there foot, the horse folowing; they came throght the lotche; the greatest body of all made up against my troupe; we keeped our fyre till they wer within ten pace of us: they recaived our fyr, and advanced to shok; the first they gave us broght down the Coronet Mr Crafford and Captain Bleith, besides that with a pitchfork they made such an openeing in my rone horse's belly, that his guts hung out half an elle, and yet he caryed me af an myl; which so discoraged our men, that they sustained not the shok, but fell into disorder. There horse took the occasion of this, and purseued us so hotly that we had no tym to rayly. I saved the standarts, but lost on the place about aight or ten men, besides wounded; but he dragoons lost many mor. They ar not com esily af on the other side, for I sawe severall of them fall befor we cam to the shok. I mad the best retraite the confusion of our people would suffer, and I am now laying with my Lord Rosse. The toun of Streven drew up as we was making our retrait, and thoght of a pa.s.s to cut us off, but we took courage and fell to them, made them run, leaving a dousain on the place. What these rogues will dou yet I know not, but the contry was flocking to them from all hands. This may be counted the begining of the rebellion, in my opinion.

"I am, my lord,

"Your lords.h.i.+p's most humble servant,

"J. Grahame.

"My lord, I am so wearied, and so sleapy, that I have wryton this very confusedly."]

CHAPTER XVIII.

When pulpit, drum ecclesiastic, Was beat with fist instead of a stick.

Hudibras.

In the meantime, the insurgent cavalry returned from the pursuit, jaded and worn out with their unwonted efforts, and the infantry a.s.sembled on the ground which they had won, fatigued with toil and hunger. Their success, however, was a cordial to every bosom, and seemed even to serve in the stead of food and refreshment. It was, indeed, much more brilliant than they durst have ventured to antic.i.p.ate; for, with no great loss on their part, they had totally routed a regiment of picked men, commanded by the first officer in Scotland, and one whose very name had long been a terror to them. Their success seemed even to have upon their spirits the effect of a sudden and violent surprise, so much had their taking up arms been a measure of desperation rather than of hope. Their meeting was also casual, and they had hastily arranged themselves under such commanders as were remarkable for zeal and courage, without much respect to any other qualities. It followed, from this state of disorganization, that the whole army appeared at once to resolve itself into a general committee for considering what steps were to be taken in consequence of their success, and no opinion could be started so wild that it had not some favourers and advocates. Some proposed they should march to Glasgow, some to Hamilton, some to Edinburgh, some to London. Some were for sending a deputation of their number to London to convert Charles II. to a sense of the error of his ways; and others, less charitable, proposed either to call a new successor to the crown, or to declare Scotland a free republic. A free parliament of the nation, and a free a.s.sembly of the Kirk, were the objects of the more sensible and moderate of the party. In the meanwhile, a clamour arose among the soldiers for bread and other necessaries, and while all complained of hards.h.i.+p and hunger, none took the necessary measures to procure supplies. In short, the camp of the Covenanters, even in the very moment of success, seemed about to dissolve like a rope of sand, from want of the original principles of combination and union.

Burley, who had now returned from the pursuit, found his followers in this distracted state. With the ready talent of one accustomed to encounter exigences, he proposed, that one hundred of the freshest men should be drawn out for duty--that a small number of those who had hitherto acted as leaders, should const.i.tute a committee of direction until officers should be regularly chosen--and that, to crown the victory, Gabriel Kettledrummle should be called upon to improve the providential success which they had obtained, by a word in season addressed to the army. He reckoned very much, and not without reason, on this last expedient, as a means of engaging the attention of the bulk of the insurgents, while he himself, and two or three of their leaders, held a private council of war, undisturbed by the discordant opinions, or senseless clamour, of the general body.

Kettledrummle more than answered the expectations of Burley. Two mortal hours did he preach at a breathing; and certainly no lungs, or doctrine, excepting his own, could have kept up, for so long a time, the attention of men in such precarious circ.u.mstances. But he possessed in perfection a sort of rude and familiar eloquence peculiar to the preachers of that period, which, though it would have been fastidiously rejected by an audience which possessed any portion of taste, was a cake of the right leaven for the palates of those whom he now addressed. His text was from the forty-ninth chapter of Isaiah, "Even the captives of the mighty shall be taken away, and the prey of the terrible shall be delivered: for I will contend with him that contendeth with thee, and I will save thy children.

"And I will feed them that oppress thee with their own flesh; and they shall be drunken with their own blood, as with sweet wine: and all flesh shall know that I the Lord am thy Saviour and thy Redeemer, the Mighty One of Jacob."

The discourse which he p.r.o.nounced upon this subject was divided into fifteen heads, each of which was garnished with seven uses of application, two of consolation, two of terror, two declaring the causes of backsliding and of wrath, and one announcing the promised and expected deliverance. The first part of his text he applied to his own deliverance and that of his companions; and took occasion to speak a few words in praise of young Milnwood, of whom, as of a champion of the Covenant, he augured great things. The second part he applied to the punishments which were about to fall upon the persecuting government. At times he was familiar and colloquial; now he was loud, energetic, and boisterous;--some parts of his discourse might be called sublime, and others sunk below burlesque. Occasionally he vindicated with great animation the right of every freeman to wors.h.i.+p G.o.d according to his own conscience; and presently he charged the guilt and misery of the people on the awful negligence of their rulers, who had not only failed to establish presbytery as the national religion, but had tolerated sectaries of various descriptions, Papists, Prelatists, Erastians, a.s.suming the name of Presbyterians, Independents, Socinians, and Quakers: all of whom Kettledrummle proposed, by one sweeping act, to expel from the land, and thus re-edify in its integrity the beauty of the sanctuary. He next handled very pithily the doctrine of defensive arms and of resistance to Charles II., observing, that, instead of a nursing father to the Kirk, that monarch had been a nursing father to none but his own b.a.s.t.a.r.ds. He went at some length through the life and conversation of that joyous prince, few parts of which, it must be owned, were qualified to stand the rough handling of so uncourtly an orator, who conferred on him the hard names of Jeroboam, Omri, Ahab, Shallum, Pekah, and every other evil monarch recorded in the Chronicles, and concluded with a round application of the Scripture, "Tophet is ordained of old; yea, for the King it is provided: he hath made it deep and large; the pile thereof is fire and much wood: the breath of the Lord, like a stream of brimstone, doth kindle it."

Kettledrummle had no sooner ended his sermon, and descended from the huge rock which had served him for a pulpit, than his post was occupied by a pastor of a very different description. The reverend Gabriel was advanced in years, somewhat corpulent, with a loud voice, a square face, and a set of stupid and unanimated features, in which the body seemed more to predominate over the spirit than was seemly in a sound divine. The youth who succeeded him in exhorting this extraordinary convocation, Ephraim Macbriar by name, was hardly twenty years old; yet his thin features already indicated, that a const.i.tution, naturally hectic, was worn out by vigils, by fasts, by the rigour of imprisonment, and the fatigues incident to a fugitive life. Young as he was, he had been twice imprisoned for several months, and suffered many severities, which gave him great influence with those of his own sect. He threw his faded eyes over the mult.i.tude and over the scene of battle; and a light of triumph arose in his glance, his pale yet striking features were coloured with a transient and hectic blush of joy. He folded his hands, raised his face to heaven, and seemed lost in mental prayer and thanksgiving ere he addressed the people. When he spoke, his faint and broken voice seemed at first inadequate to express his conceptions. But the deep silence of the a.s.sembly, the eagerness with which the ear gathered every word, as the famished Israelites collected the heavenly manna, had a corresponding effect upon the preacher himself. His words became more distinct, his manner more earnest and energetic; it seemed as if religious zeal was triumphing over bodily weakness and infirmity. His natural eloquence was not altogether untainted with the coa.r.s.eness of his sect; and yet, by the influence of a good natural taste, it was freed from the grosser and more ludicrous errors of his contemporaries; and the language of Scripture, which, in their mouths, was sometimes degraded by misapplication, gave, in Macbriar's exhortation, a rich and solemn effect, like that which is produced by the beams of the sun streaming through the storied representation of saints and martyrs on the Gothic window of some ancient cathedral.

He painted the desolation of the church, during the late period of her distresses, in the most affecting colours. He described her, like Hagar watching the waning life of her infant amid the fountainless desert; like Judah, under her palm-tree, mourning for the devastation of her temple; like Rachel, weeping for her children and refusing comfort. But he chiefly rose into rough sublimity when addressing the men yet reeking from battle. He called on them to remember the great things which G.o.d had done for them, and to persevere in the career which their victory had opened.

"Your garments are dyed--but not with the juice of the wine-press; your swords are filled with blood," he exclaimed, "but not with the blood of goats or lambs; the dust of the desert on which ye stand is made fat with gore, but not with the blood of bullocks, for the Lord hath a sacrifice in Bozrah, and a great slaughter in the land of Idumea. These were not the firstlings of the flock, the small cattle of burnt-offerings, whose bodies lie like dung on the ploughed field of the husbandman; this is not the savour of myrrh, of frankincense, or of sweet herbs, that is steaming in your nostrils; but these b.l.o.o.d.y trunks are the carca.s.ses of those who held the bow and the lance, who were cruel and would show no mercy, whose voice roared like the sea, who rode upon horses, every man in array as if to battle--they are the carca.s.ses even of the mighty men of war that came against Jacob in the day of his deliverance, and the smoke is that of the devouring fires that have consumed them. And those wild hills that surround you are not a sanctuary planked with cedar and plated with silver; nor are ye ministering priests at the altar, with censers and with torches; but ye hold in your hands the sword, and the bow, and the weapons of death. And yet verily, I say unto you, that not when the ancient Temple was in its first glory was there offered sacrifice more acceptable than that which you have this day presented, giving to the slaughter the tyrant and the oppressor, with the rocks for your altars, and the sky for your vaulted sanctuary, and your own good swords for the instruments of sacrifice. Leave not, therefore, the plough in the furrow--turn not back from the path in which you have entered like the famous worthies of old, whom G.o.d raised up for the glorifying of his name and the deliverance of his afflicted people--halt not in the race you are running, lest the latter end should be worse than the beginning.

Wherefore, set up a standard in the land; blow a trumpet upon the mountains; let not the shepherd tarry by his sheepfold, or the seedsman continue in the ploughed field; but make the watch strong, sharpen the arrows, burnish the s.h.i.+elds, name ye the captains of thousands, and captains of hundreds, of fifties, and of tens; call the footmen like the rus.h.i.+ng of winds, and cause the hors.e.m.e.n to come up like the sound of many waters; for the pa.s.sages of the destroyers are stopped, their rods are burned, and the face of their men of battle hath been turned to flight. Heaven has been with you, and has broken the bow of the mighty; then let every man's heart be as the heart of the valiant Maccabeus, every man's hand as the hand of the mighty Sampson, every man's sword as that of Gideon, which turned not back from the slaughter; for the banner of Reformation is spread abroad on the mountains in its first loveliness, and the gates of h.e.l.l shall not prevail against it.

"Well is he this day that shall barter his house for a helmet, and sell his garment for a sword, and cast in his lot with the children of the Covenant, even to the fulfilling of the promise; and woe, woe unto him who, for carnal ends and self-seeking, shall withhold himself from the great work, for the curse shall abide with him, even the bitter curse of Meroz, because he came not to the help of the Lord against the mighty.

Up, then, and be doing; the blood of martyrs, reeking upon scaffolds, is crying for vengeance; the bones of saints, which lie whitening in the highways, are pleading for retribution; the groans of innocent captives from desolate isles of the sea, and from the dungeons of the tyrants'

high places, cry for deliverance; the prayers of persecuted Christians, sheltering themselves in dens and deserts from the sword of their persecutors, famished with hunger, starving with cold, lacking fire, food, shelter, and clothing, because they serve G.o.d rather than man--all are with you, pleading, watching, knocking, storming the gates of heaven in your behalf. Heaven itself shall fight for you, as the stars in their courses fought against Sisera. Then whoso will deserve immortal fame in this world, and eternal happiness in that which is to come, let them enter into G.o.d's service, and take arles at the hand of his servant,--a blessing, namely, upon him and his household, and his children, to the ninth generation, even the blessing of the promise, for ever and ever!

Amen."