intellect have been confounded by hearing the same dull lesson repeated a hundred times by rote, and only varied by the various blunders of the reciters. Even the flowers of classic genius, with which his solitary fancy is most gratified, have been rendered degraded, in his imagination, by their connexion with tears, with errors, and with punishment; so that the Eclogues of Virgil and Odes of Horace are each inseparably allied in association with the sullen figure and monotonous recitation of some blubbering school-boy. If to these mental distresses are added a delicate frame of body, and a mind ambitious of some higher distinction than that of being the tyrant of childhood, the reader may have some slight conception of the relief which a solitary walk, in the cool of a fine summer evening, affords to the head which has ached, and the nerves which have been shattered, for so many hours, in plying the irksome task of public instruction. many years, the few hillocks which rise above the level plain are covered with the same short velvet turf. The monuments, of which there are not above seven or eight, are half sunk in the ground, and overgrown with moss. Νο newly-erected tomb disturbs the sober serenity of our reflections by reminding us of recent calamity, and no rank-springing grass forces upon our imagination the recollection, that it owes its dark luxuriance to the foul and festering remnants of mortality which ferment beneath. The daisy which sprinkles the sod, and the harebell which hangs over it, derive their pure nourishment from the dew of heaven, and their growth impresses us with no degrading or disgusting recollections. Death has indeed been here, and its traces are before us; but they are softened and deprived of their horror by our distance from the period when they have been first impressed. Those who sleep beneath are only connected with us by the reflection, that they have once been what we now are, and that, as their relics are now identified with their mother earth, ours shall, at some future period, undergo the same transformation. "To me these evening strolls have been the happiest hours of an unhappy life; and if any gentle reader shall hereafter find pleasure in perusing these lucubrations, I am not unwilling he should know, that the plan of them has been usually traced in those moments, when relief on the most modern of these humble tombs from toil and clamour, combined with the quiet | scenery around me, has disposed my mind to the task of composition. "Yet, although the moss has been collected during four generations of mankind, the memory of some of those who sleep beneath them is still held in reverent remembrance. It is true, that, "My chief haunt, in these hours of golden upon the largest, and, to an antiquary, the most leisure, is the banks of the small stream, which, interesting monument of the group, which bears winding through a 'lone vale of green bracken,' the effigies of a doughty knight in his hood of passes in front of the village school-house of mail, with his shield hanging on his breast, the Gandercleugh. For the first quarter of a mile, armorial bearings are defaced by time, and a perhaps, I may be disturbed from my medita- few worn-out letters may be read, at the pleasure tions, in order to return the scrape, or doffed of the decipherer, Dns. Johan - de Hamel,bonnet, of such stragglers among my pupils as or Johan de Lamel. And it is also true, fish for trouts or minnows in the little brook, that of another tomb, richly sculptured with an or seek rushes and wild-flowers by its margin. ornamental cross, mitre, and pastoral staff, traBut, beyond the space I have mentioned, the dition can only aver, that a certain nameless juvenile anglers do not, after sunset, volun- bishop lies interred there. But upon other two tarily extend their excursions. The cause is, stones which lie beside, may still be read in that farther up the narrow valley, and in a rude prose, and ruder rhyme, the history of recess which seems scooped out of the side of those who sleep beneath them. They belong, the steep heathy bank, there is a deserted we are assured by the epitaph, to the class burial-ground, which the little cowards are fear- of persecuted Presbyterians who afforded a ful of approaching in the twilight. To me, melancholy subject for history in the times of however, the place has an inexpressible charm. Charles II. and his successor. In returning It has been long the favourite termination of from the battle of Pentland Hills, a party of my walks, and, if my kind patron forgets not the insurgents had been attacked in this glen his promise, will (and probably at no very dis- by a small detachment of the King's troops, tant day) be my final resting-place after my and three or four either killed in the skirmish, mortal pilgrimage. or shot after being made prisoners, as rebels "It is a spot which possesses all the solem-taken with arms in their hands. The peasantry nity of feeling attached to a burial-ground, continued to attach to the tombs of those vicwithout exciting those of a more unpleasing tims of prelacy an honour which they do not description. Having been very little used for render to more splendid mausoleums; and, when they point them out to their sons, and narrate | seated upon the monument of the slaughtered the fate of the sufferers, usually conclude, by presbyterians, and busily employed in deepening, exhorting them to be ready, should times call with his chisel, the letters of the inscription, for it, to resist to the death in the cause of civil and religious liberty, like their brave forefathers. which, announcing, in scriptural language, the promised blessings of futurity to be the lot of the slain, anathematised the murderers with corresponding violence. A blue bonnet of unusual dimensions covered the grey hairs of the pious workman. His dress was a large oldfashioned coat of the coarse cloth called hoddingrey, usually worn by the elder peasants, with waistcoat and breeches of the same; and the whole suit, though still in decent repair, had obviously seen a train of long service. Strong clouted shoes, studded with hobnails, and gra moches or leggins, made of thick black cloth, completed his equipment. Beside him, fed among the graves a pony, the companion of his journey, whose extreme whiteness, as well as its projecting bones and hollow eyes, indicated its antiquity. It was harnessed in the most simple manner, with a pair of branks,3 a hair tether, or halter, and a sunk, or cushion of straw, instead of bridle and saddle. A canvas pouch hung around the neck of the animal, for the purpose, probably, of containing the rider's tools, and any thing else he might have occasion to carry with him. Although I had never seen the old man before, yet from the singularity of his employment, and the style of his equipage, I had no difficulty in recognising a religious itinerant whom I had often heard talked of, and who was known in various parts of Scotland by the title of Old Mortality. "Although I am far from venerating the peculiar tenets asserted by those who call themselves the followers of those men, and whose intolerance and narrow-minded bigotry are at least as conspicuous as their devotional zeal, yet it is without depreciating the memory of those sufferers, many of whom united the independent sentiments of a Hampden1 with the suffering zeal of a Hooper or Latimer.2 On the other hand, it would be unjust to forget, that many even of those who had been most active in crushing what they conceived the rebellious and seditious spirit of those unhappy wanderers, displayed themselves, when called upon to suffer for their political and religious opinions, the same daring and devoted zeal, tinctured, in their case, with chivalrous loyalty, as in the former with republican enthusiasm. It has often been remarked of the Scottish character, that the stubbornness with which it is moulded shows most to advantage in adversity, when it seems akin to the native sycamore of their hills, which scorns to be biased in its mode of growth, even by the influence of the prevailing wind, but, shooting its branches with equal boldness in every direction, shows no weather-side to the storm, and may be broken, but can never be bended. It must be understood that I speak of my countrymen as they fall under my own "Where this man was born, or what was his observation. When in foreign countries, I have real name, I have never been able to learn; nor been informed that they are more docile. But are the motives which made him desert his home. it is time to return from this digression. and adopt the erratic mode of life which he pur sued, known to me except very generally. According to the belief of most people, he was a native of either the county of Dumfries or Galloway, and lineally descended from some of those champions of the Covenant, whose deeds and sufferings were his favourite theme. He is said to have held, at one period of his life, a small moorland farm; but, whether from pecuniary losses, or domestic misfortune, he had long renounced that and every other gainful calling. In the language of Scripture, he left his house, his home, and his kindred, and wandered about until the day of his death, a period of nearly thirty years. "One summer evening, as in a stroll, such as I have described, I approached this deserted mansion of the dead, I was somewhat surprised to hear sounds distinct from those which usually soothe its solitude, the gentle chiding, namely, of the brook, and the sighing of the wind in the boughs of three gigantic ash-trees, which mark the cemetery. The clink of a hammer was, on this occasion, distinctly heard; and I entertained some alarm that a march-dike, long meditated by the two proprietors whose estates were divided by my favourite brook, was about to be drawn up the glen, in order to substitute its rectilinear deformity for the graceful winding of the natural boundary. As I approached, I was agreeably undeceived. An old man was "During this long pilgrimage, the pious enthusiast regulated his circuit so as annually to visit the graves of the unfortunate Covenanters, who suffered by the sword, or by the execuBishop Latiwere both tioner, during the reigns of the two last monburned for heresy in 1555. 1 John Hampden, who 2 John Hooper and refused to pay taxes levied by Charles I. mer 3 curbs, or bridle was grave and sententious, not without a cast of severity. But he is said never to have been observed to give way to violent passion, excepting upon one occasion, when a mischievous truant-boy defaced with a stone the nose of a cherub's face, which the old man was engaged in retouching. I am in general a sparer of the rod, notwithstanding the maxim of Solomon, for which school-boys have little reason to thank his memory; but on this occasion I deemed it proper to show that I did not hate the child.-But I must return to the circumstances attending my first interview with this interesting enthusiast. archs of the Stewart line. These are most numerous in the western districts of Ayr, Galloway, and Dumfries; but they are also to be found in other parts of Scotland, wherever the fugitives had fought, or fallen, or suffered by military or civil execution. Their tombs are often apart from all human habitation, in the remote moors and wilds to which the wanderers had filed for concealment. But wherever they existed, Old Mortality was sure to visit them when his annual round brought them within his reach. In the most lonely recesses of the mountains, the moor-fowl shooter has been often surprised to find him busied in cleaning the moss from the grey stones, renewing with his chisel "In accosting Old Mortality, I did not fail the half-defaced inscriptions, and repairing the to pay respect to his years and his principles, emblems of death with which these simple monu- beginning my address by a respectful apology ments are usually adorned. Motives of the most for interrupting his labours. The old man intersincere, though fanciful devotion, induced the mitted the operation of the chisel, took off his old man to dedicate so many years of existence spectacles and wiped them, then, replacing them to perform this tribute to the memory of the on his nose, acknowledged my courtesy by a deceased warriors of the church. He considered suitable return. Encouraged by his affability, himself as fulfilling a sacred duty, while renew- I intruded upon him some questions concerning ing to the eyes of posterity the decaying em- the sufferers on whose monument he was now blems of the zeal and sufferings of their fore-employed. To talk of the exploits of the fathers, and thereby trimming, as it were, the Covenanters was the delight, as to repair their beacon-light, which was to warn future genera- monuments was the business, of his life. He tions to defend their religion even unto blood. was profuse in the communication of all the "In all his wanderings, the old pilgrim never minute information which he had collected conseemed to need, or was known to accept, pecu- cerning them, their wars, and their wanderings. niary assistance. It is true, his wants were One would almost have supposed he must have very few; for wherever he went, he found ready been their contemporary, and have actually bequarters in the house of some Cameronian1 of held the passages which he related, so much had his own sect, or of some other religious person. he identified his feelings and opinions with The hospitality which was reverentially paid to theirs, and so much had his narratives the him he always acknowledged, by repairing the circumstantiality of an eye-witness. gravestones (if there existed any) belonging to the family or ancestors of his host. As the wanderer was usually to be seen bent on this pious task within the precincts of some country churchyard, or reclined on the solitary tombstone among the heath, disturbing the plover and the black-cock with the clink of his chisel and mallet, with his old white pony grazing by his side, he acquired from his converse among the dead, the popular appellation of Old Mortality. "The character of such a man could have in it little connexion even with innocent gaiety. Yet, among those of his own religious persuasion, he is reported to have been cheerful. The descendants of persecutors, or those whom he supposed guilty of entertaining similar tenets, and the scoffers at religion by whom he was Sometimes assailed, he usually termed the generation of vipers.5 Conversing with others, he 4 An austere sect of Presbyterians. 5 Matthew iii, 7. ''We,' he said, in a tone of exultation,'we are the only true whigs. Carnal men have assumed that triumphant appellation, following him whose kingdom is of this world. Which of them would sit six hours on a wet hill-side to hear a godly sermon? I trow an hour o❜t wad stawe them. They are ne'er a hair better than them that shamena to take upon themsells the persecuting name of bludethirsty tories. Selfseekers all of them, strivers after wealth, power, and worldly ambition, and forgetters alike of what has been dree'd' and done by the mighty men who stood in the gap in the great day of wrath. Nae wonder they dread the accomplishment of what was spoken by the mouth of the worthy Mr. Pedens (that precious servant of the Lord, none of whose words fell to the ground), that the French monzies sall rise as fast in the 6 disgust 7 suffered 8 Alexander Peden, an eloquent minister who was glens of Ayr, and the kenns10 of Galloway, as ever the Highlandmen did in 1677. And now they are gripping to the bow and to the spear, when they suld be mourning for a sinfu' land and a broken covenant.' my span of life may be abridged in youth, I had over-estimated the period of his own pi grimage on earth. It is now some years sin he has been missed in all his usual haunts, whi moss, lichen, and deer-hair, are fast coverin those stones, to cleanse which had been the bus ness of his life. About the beginning of th "Soothing the old man by letting his peculiar opinions pass without contradiction, and anxious to prolong conversation with so singu-century he closed his mortal toils, being four lar a character, I prevailed upon him to accept that hospitality, which Mr. Cleishbotham is always willing to extend to those who need it. In our way to the schoolmaster's house, we called at the Wallace Inn, where I was pretty certain I should find my patron about that hour of the evening. After a courteous interchange of civilities, Old Mortality was, with difficulty, prevailed upon to join his host in a single glass of liquor, and that on condition that he should be permitted to name the pledge, which he prefaced with a grace of about five minutes, and then, with bonnet doffed and eyes uplifted, drank to the memory of those heroes of the Kirk11 who had first uplifted her banner upon the mountains. As no persuasion could prevail on him to extend his conviviality to a second cup, my patron accompanied him home, and accommodated him in the Prophet's Chamber, as it is his pleasure to call the closet which holds a spare bed, and which is frequently a place of retreat for the poor traveller. on the highway near Lockerby, in Dumfrie shire, exhausted and just expiring. The o white pony, the companion of all his wande ings, was standing by the side of his dyin master. There was found about his person sum of money sufficient for his decent inte ment, which serves to show that his death wa in no ways hastened by violence or by wan The common people still regard his memo with great respect; and many are of opinio that the stones which he repaired will not aga require the assistance of the chisel. They eve assert that on the tombs where the manner the martyrs' murder is recorded, their nam have remained indelibly legible since the dea of Old Mortality, while those of the persecuto sculptured on the same monuments, have be entirely defaced. It is hardly necessary to s that this is a fond imagination, and that, sin the time of the pious pilgrim, the monumen which were the objects of his care are hastenin like all earthly memorials, into ruin or decay. CHARLES LAMB (1775-1834) FROM ELIA* DREAM-CHILDREN: A REVERIE "The next day I took leave of Old Mortality, who seemed affected by the unusual attention with which I had cultivated his acquaintance and listened to his conversation. After he had mounted, not without difficulty, the old white pony, he took me by the hand and said, 'The blessing of our Master be with you, young man! My hours are like the ears of the latter harvest, and your days are yet in the spring; and yet Children love to listen to stories about the you may be gathered into the garner of mor- elders, when they were children; to stretch the tality before me, for the sickle of death cuts imagination to the conception of a traditiona down the green as oft as the ripe, and there is great-uncle, or grandame, whom they never sa a colour in your cheek, that, like the bud of the It was in this spirit that my little ones cre rose, serveth oft to hide the worm of corruption.about me the other evening to hear about th Wherefore labour as one who knoweth not when his master calleth. And if it be my lot to return to this village after ye are gane hame to your ain place, these auld withered hands will frame a stane of memorial, that your name may not perish from among the people.' "I thanked Old Mortality for his kind intentions in my behalf, and heaved a sigh, not, I think, of regret so much as of resignation, to think of the chance that I might soon require his good offices. But though, in all human probability, he did not err in supposing that 10 From Gaelic ceann, head, headland, mountain. 11 The Scotch, or Presbyterian Church. great-grandmother Field, who lived in a gre house in Norfolk (a hundred times bigger th "Elia," the signature under which Lamb p hat in which they and papa lived) which had cause she was so good and religious. Then I been the scene (so at least it was generally told how she was used to sleep by herself in a believed in that part of the country) of the lone chamber of the great lone house; and how tragic incidents which they had lately become she believed that an apparition of two infants familiar with from the ballad of the Children was to be seen at midnight gliding up and down in the Wood. Certain it is that the whole story the great staircase near where she slept, but of the children and their cruel uncle was to be she said, "those innocents would do her no seen fairly carved out in wood upon the harm;" and how frightened I used to be, himney-piece of the great hall, the whole story though in those days I had my maid to sleep down to the Robin Redbreasts; till a foolish with me, because I was never half so good or rich person pulled it down to set up a marble religious as she-and yet I never saw the inone of modern invention in its stead, with no fants. Here John expanded all his eyebrows story upon it. Here Alice put out one of her and tried to look courageous. Then I told how lear mother's looks, too tender to be called up- good she was to all her grandchildren, having raiding. Then I went on to say how religious us to the great house in the holidays, where I and how good their great-grandmother Field in particular used to spend many hours by mywas, how beloved and respected by everybody, self, in gazing upon the old busts of the Twelve hough she was not indeed the mistress of this Cæsars, that had been Emperors of Rome, till great house, but had only the charge of it the old marble heads would seem to live again, (and yet in some respects she might be said to or I to be turned into marble with them; how be the mistress of it too) committed to her by I never could be tired with roaming about that the owner, who preferred living in a newer and huge mansion, with its vast empty rooms, with nore fashionable mansion which he had pur- their worn-out hangings, fluttering tapestry, chased somewhere in the adjoining county; but and carved oaken panels, with the gilding alstill she lived in it in a manner as if it had been most rubbed out-sometimes in the spacious her own, and kept up the dignity of the great old-fashioned gardens, which I had almost to house in a sort while she lived, which after-myself, unless when now and then a solitary wards came to decay, and was nearly pulled gardening man would cross me—and how the down, and all its old ornaments stripped and nectarines and peaches hung upon the walls, carried away to the owner's other house, where without my ever offering to pluck them, bethey were set up, and looked as awkward as if cause they were forbidden fruit, unless now some one were to carry away the old tombs and then,—and because I had more pleasure in they had seen lately at the Abbey,† and stick strolling about among the old melancholy-lookthem up in Lady C.'s tawdry gilt drawing- ing yew-trees, or the firs, and picking up the zoom. Here John smiled, as much as to say, red berries, and the fir-apples, which were good 'that would be foolish indeed." And then I for nothing but to look at—or in lying about told how, when she came to die, her funeral upon the fresh grass with all the fine garden was attended by a concourse of all the poor, smells around me-or basking in the orangery, and some of the gentry too, of the neighbour- till I could almost fancy myself ripening too hood for many miles round, to show their re-along with the oranges and the limes in that spect for her memory, because she had been grateful warmth-or in watching the dace that such a good and religious woman; so good in- darted to and fro in the fish-pond, at the bottom leed that she knew all the Psaltery by heart, of the garden, with here and there a great sulky ay, and a great part of the Testament besides. pike hanging midway down the water in silent Here little Alice spread her hands. Then I told state, as if it mocked at their impertinent friskwhat a tall, upright, graceful person their ings, I had more pleasure in these busy-idle great-grandmother Field once was; and how in diversions than in all the sweet flavours of her youth she was esteemed the best dancer- peaches, nectarines, oranges, and such-like comhere Alice's little right foot played an invol- mon baits of children. Here John slyly depos ntary movement, till, upon my looking grave, ited back upon the plate a bunch of grapes, t desisted-the best dancer, I was saying, in which, not unobserved by Alice, he had medihe county, till a cruel disease, called a cancer, tated dividing with her, and both seemed willing ame, and bowed her down with pain; but it to relinquish them for the present as irrelevant. could never bend her good spirits, or make Then, in somewhat a more heightened tone, I hem stoop, but they were still upright, be- told how, though their great-grandmother Field Lamb was fond of visiting Westminster Abbey, loved all her grandchildren, yet in an especial and he wrote an essay in protest against the manner she might be said to love their uncle, charge for admittance which had lately been John L, because he was so handsome and imposed. |