Imágenes de página
PDF
ePub

restraint will be the only ill consequence that can arise from your accession to these unhappy intrigues."

Waverley listened with great composure until the end of this exhortation, when, springing from his seat with an energy which he had not yet displayed, he replied, "Major Melville, since that is your name, I have hitherto answered your questions with candour, or declined them with temper, because their import concerned myself alone; but as you presume to esteem me mean enough to commence informer against others, who received me, whatever may be their public misconduct, as a guest and friend, - I declare to you that I consider your questions as an insult infinitely more offensive than your calumnious suspicions; and that, since my hard fortune permits me no other mode of resenting them than by verbal defiance, you should sooner have my heart out of my bosom, than a single syllable of information on subjects which I could only become acquainted with in the full confidence of unsuspecting hospitality.”

Mr. Morton and the Major looked at each other; and the former, who, in the course of the examination, had been repeatedly troubled with a sorry rheum, had recourse to his snuff-box and his handkerchief.

[ocr errors]

"Mr. Waverley," said the Major, "my present situation prohibits me alike from giving or receiving offence, and I will not protract a discussion which approaches to either. I am afraid I must sign a warrant for detaining you in custody, but this house shall for the present be your prison. I fear I cannot persuade you to accept a share of our supper? (Edward shook his head) — apartment."

but I will order refreshments in your Our hero bowed and withdrew, under guard of the officers of justice, to a small but handsome room, where, declining all offers of food or wine, he flung himself on the bed, and, stupified by the harassing events and mental fatigue of this miserable day, he sunk into a deep and heavy slumber. This was more than he himself could have expected; but it is mentioned of the NorthAmerican Indians, when at the stake of torture, that on the least intermission of agony, they will sleep until the fire is applied to awaken them.

CHAPTER XXXII.

A Conference, and the Consequence.

MAJOR MELVILLE had detained Mr. Morton during his examination of Waverley, both because he thought he might derive assistance from his practical good sense and approved loyalty, and also because it was agreeable to have a witness of unimpeached candour and veracity to proceedings which touched the honour and safety of a young Englishman of high rank and family, and the expectant heir of a large fortune. Every step, he knew, would be rigorously canvassed, and it was his business to place the justice and integrity of his own conduct beyond the limits of question.

When Waverley retired, the laird and clergyman of Cairnvreckan sat down in silence to their evening meal. While the servants were in attendance, neither chose to say any thing on the circumstances which occupied their minds, and neither felt it easy to speak upon any other. The youth and apparent frankness of Waverley stood in strong contrast to the shades of suspicion which darkened around him, and he had a sort of naïveté and openness of demeanour, that seemed to belong to one unhackneyed in the ways of intrigue, and which pleaded highly in his favour.

Each mused over the particulars of the examination, and each viewed it through the medium of his own feelings. Both were men of ready and acute talent, and both were equally competent to combine various parts of evidence, and to deduce from them the necessary conclusions. But the wide difference of their habits and education often occasioned a great discrepancy in their respective deductions from admitted premises.

Major Melville had been versed in camps and cities; he was vigilant by profession, and cautious from experience, had met with much evil in the world, and therefore, though himself an upright magistrate and an honourable man, his opinions of others were always strict, and sometimes unjustly severe. Mr. Morton, on the contrary, had passed from the literary pursuits of a college, where he was beloved by his companions, and respected by his teachers, to the ease and simplicity of his present charge, where

his opportunities of witnessing evil were few, and never dwelt upon, but in order to encourage repentance and amendment; and where the love and respect of his parishioners repaid his affectionate zeal in their behalf, by endeavouring to disguise from him what they knew would give him the most acute pain, namely, their own occasional transgressions of the duties which it was the business of his life to recommend. Thus it was a common saying in the neighbourhood, (though both were popular characters,) that the laird knew only the ill in the parish, and the minister only the good.

A love of letters, though kept in subordination to his clerical studies and duties, also distinguished the pastor of Cairnvreckan, and had tinged his mind in earlier days with a slight feeling of romance, which no after incidents of real life had entirely dissipated. The early loss of an amiable young woman, whom he had married for love, and who was quickly followed to the grave by an only child, had also served, even after the lapse of many years, to soften a disposition naturally mild and contemplative. His feelings on the present occasion were therefore likely to differ from those of the severe disciplinarian, strict magistrate, and distrustful man of the world.

When the servants had withdrawn, the silence of both parties continued, until Major Melville, filling his glass, and pushing the bottle to Mr. Morton, commenced.

"A distressing affair this, Mr. Morton. I fear this youngster has brought himself within the compass of a halter."

"God forbid!" answered the clergyman.

"Marry, and amen," said the temporal magistrate; "but I think even your merciful logic will hardly deny the conclusion." Surely, Major,” answered the clergyman, "I should hope it might be averted, for aught we have heard to-night?”

[ocr errors]

"Indeed!" replied Melville. "But, my good parson, you are one of those who would communicate to every criminal the benefit of clergy."

"Unquestionably I would: Mercy and long-suffering are the grounds of the doctrine I am called to teach."

“True, religiously speaking; but mercy to a criminal may be

gross injustice to the community. I don't speak of this young fellow in particular, who I heartily wish may be able to clear himself, for I like both his modesty and his spirit. But I fear he has rushed upon his fate."

"And why? Hundreds of misguided gentlemen are now in arms against the government, many, doubtless, upon principles which education and early prejudice have gilded with the names of patriotism and heroism; Justice, when she selects her victims from such a multitude, (for surely all will not be destroyed,) must regard the moral motive. He whom ambition, or hope of personal advantage, has led to disturb the peace of a well-ordered government, let him fall a victim to the laws; but surely youth, misled by the wild visions of chivalry and imaginary loyalty, may plead for pardon."

"If visionary chivalry and imaginary loyalty come within the predicament of high treason," replied the magistrate, "I know no court in Christendom, my dear Mr. Morton, where they can sue out their Habeas Corpus."

"But I cannot see that this youth's guilt is at all established to my satisfaction," said the clergyman.

[ocr errors]

"Because your good-nature blinds your good sense," replied Major Melville. "Observe now: This young man, descended of a family of hereditary Jacobites, his uncle the leader of the Tory interest in the county of, his father a disobliged and discontented courtier, his tutor a non-juror, and the author of two treasonable volumes this youth, I say, enters into Gardiner's dragoons, bringing with him a body of young fellows from his uncle's estate, who have not stickled at avowing, in their way, the high-church principles they learned at Waverley-Honour, in their disputes with their comrades. To these young men Waverley is unusually attentive; they are supplied with money beyond a soldier's wants, and inconsistent with his discipline; and are under the management of a favourite sergeant, through whom they hold an unusually close communication with their captain, and affect to consider themselves as independent of the other officers, and superior to their comrades."

"All this, my dear Major, is the natural consequence of their

attachment to their young landlord, and of their finding themselves in a regiment levied chiefly in the north of Ireland and the west of Scotland, and of course among comrades disposed to quarrel with them, both as Englishmen, and as members of the Church of England."

"I would some This young man the principles

"Well said, parson!" replied the magistrate. of your synod heard you - But let me go on. obtains leave of absence, goes to Tully-Veolan of the Baron of Bradwardine are pretty well known, not to mention that this lad's uncle brought him off in the year fifteen; he engages there in a brawl, in which he is said to have disgraced the commission he bore; Colonel Gardiner writes to him, first mildly, then more sharply — I think you will not doubt his having done so, since he says so; the mess invite him to explain the quarrel, in which he is said to have been involved; he neither replies to his commander nor his comrades. In the meanwhile, his soldiers become mutinous and disorderly, and at length, when the rumour of this unhappy rebellion becomes general, his favourite Sergeant Houghton, and another fellow, are detected in correspondence with a French emissary, accredited, as he says, by Captain Waverley, who urges him, according to the men's confession, to desert with the troop and join their captain, who was with Prince Charles. In the meanwhile this trusty captain is, by his own admission, residing at Glennaquoich with the most active, subtle, and desperate Jacobite in Scotland; he goes with him at least as far as their famous hunting rendezvous, and I fear a little farther. Meanwhile two other summonses are sent him; one warning him of the disturbances in his troop, another peremptorily ordering him to repair to the regiment, which, indeed, common sense might have dictated, when he observed rebellion thickening all round him. He returns an absolute refusal, and throws up his commission."

"He had been already deprived of it," said Mr. Morton.

“But he regrets,” replied Melville, “that the measure had anticipated his resignation. His baggage is seized at his quarters, and at Tully-Veolan, and is found to contain a stock of pestilent jacobitical pamphlets, enough to poison a whole country,

« AnteriorContinuar »