The Antiquary — Complete by Walter Scott (best fiction novels to read TXT) 📖

And as he pared the fruit, in spite of his sister’s “O fie, Monkbarns!” and the prolonged cough of the minister, accompanied by a shake of his huge wig, the Antiquary proceeded to detail the intrigue which had given rise to the fame of the abbot’s apple with more slyness and circumstantiality than was at all necessary. His jest (as may readily be conceived) missed fire, for this anecdote of conventual gallantry failed to produce the slightest smile on the visage of the Earl. Oldbuck then took up the subject of Ossian, Macpherson, and Mac-Cribb; but Lord Glenallan had never so much as heard of any of the three, so little conversant had he been with modern literature. The conversation was now in some danger of flagging, or of falling into the hands of Mr. Blattergowl, who had just pronounced the formidable word, “teind-free,” when the subject of the French Revolution was started—a political event on which Lord Glenallan looked with all the prejudiced horror of a bigoted Catholic and zealous aristocrat. Oldbuck was far from carrying his detestation of its principles to such a length.

“There were many men in the first Constituent Assembly,” he said, “who held sound Whiggish doctrines, and were for settling the Constitution with a proper provision for the liberties of the people. And if a set of furious madmen were now in possession of the government, it was,” he continued, “what often happened in great revolutions, where extreme measures are adopted in the fury of the moment, and the State resembles an agitated pendulum which swings from side to side for some time ere it can acquire its due and perpendicular station. Or it might be likened to a storm or hurricane, which, passing over a region, does great damage in its passage, yet sweeps away stagnant and unwholesome vapours, and repays, in future health and fertility, its immediate desolation and ravage.”

The Earl shook his head; but having neither spirit nor inclination for debate, he suffered the argument to pass uncontested.

This discussion served to introduce the young soldier’s experiences; and he spoke of the actions in which he, had been engaged, with modesty, and at the same time with an air of spirit and zeal which delighted the Earl, who had been bred up, like others of his house, in the opinion that the trade of arms was the first duty of man, and believed that to employ them against the French was a sort of holy warfare.

“What would I give,” said he apart to Oldbuck, as they rose to join the ladies in the drawing-room, “what would I give to have a son of such spirit as that young gentleman!—He wants something of address and manner, something of polish, which mixing in good society would soon give him; but with what zeal and animation he expresses himself—how fond of his profession—how loud in the praise of others—how modest when speaking of himself!”

“Hector is much obliged to you, my lord,” replied his uncle, gratified, yet not so much so as to suppress his consciousness of his own mental superiority over the young soldier; “I believe in my heart nobody ever spoke half so much good of him before, except perhaps the sergeant of his company, when was wheedling a Highland recruit to enlist with him. He is a good lad notwithstanding, although he be not quite the hero your lordship supposes him, and although my commendations rather attest the kindness than the vivacity of his character. In fact, his high spirit is a sort of constitutional vehemence, which attends him in everything he sets about, and is often very inconvenient to his friends. I saw him to-day engage in an animated contest with a phoca, or seal (sealgh, our people more properly call them, retaining the Gothic guttural gh), with as much vehemence as if he had fought against Dumourier—Marry, my lord, the phoca had the better, as the said Dumourier had of some other folks. And he’ll talk with equal if not superior rapture of the good behaviour of a pointer bitch, as of the plan of a campaign.”

“He shall have full permission to sport over my grounds,” said the Earl, “if he is so fond of that exercise.”

“You will bind him to you, my lord,” said Monkbarns, “body and soul: give him leave to crack off his birding-piece at a poor covey of partridges or moor-fowl, and he’s yours for ever—I will enchant him by the intelligence. But O, my lord, that you could have seen my phoenix Lovel!—the very prince and chieftain of the youth of this age; and not destitute of spirit neither—I promise you he gave my termagant kinsman a quid pro quo—a Rowland for his Oliver, as the vulgar say, alluding to the two celebrated Paladins of Charlemagne.”

After coffee, Lord Glenallan requested a private interview with the Antiquary, and was ushered to his library.

“I must withdraw you from your own amiable family,” he said, “to involve you in the perplexities of an unhappy man. You are acquainted with the world, from which I have long been banished; for Glenallan House has been to me rather a prison than a dwelling, although a prison which I had neither fortitude nor spirit to break from.”

“Let me first ask your lordship,” said the Antiquary, “what are your own wishes and designs in this matter?”

“I wish most especially,” answered Lord Glenallan, “to declare my luckless marriage, and to vindicate the reputation of the unhappy Eveline—that is, if you see a possibility of doing so without making public the conduct of my mother.”

“Suum cuique tribuito,” said the Antiquary; “do right to everyone. The memory of that unhappy young lady has too long suffered, and I think it might be cleared without further impeaching that of your mother, than by letting it be understood in general that she greatly disapproved and bitterly opposed the match. All—forgive me, my lord—all who ever heard of the late Countess of Glenallan, will learn that without much surprise.”

“But you forget one horrible circumstance, Mr. Oldbuck,” said the Earl, in an agitated voice.

“I am not aware of it,” replied the Antiquary.

“The fate of the infant—its disappearance with the confidential attendant of my mother, and the dreadful surmises which may be drawn from my conversation with Elspeth.”

“If you would have my free opinion, my lord,” answered Mr. Oldbuck, “and will not catch too rapidly at it as matter of hope, I would say that it is very possible the child yet lives. For thus much I ascertained, by my former inquiries concerning the event of that deplorable evening, that a child and woman were carried that night from the cottage at the Craigburnfoot in a carriage and four by your brother Edward Geraldin Neville, whose journey towards England with these companions I traced for several stages. I believed then it was a part of the family compact to carry a child whom you meant to stigmatize with illegitimacy, out of that country where chance might have raised protectors and proofs of its rights. But I now think that your brother, having reason, like yourself, to believe the child stained with shame yet more indelible, had nevertheless withdrawn it, partly from regard to the honour of his house, partly from the risk to which it might have been exposed in the neighbourhood of the Lady Glenallan.”

As he spoke, the Earl of Glenallan grew extremely pale, and had nearly fallen from his chair.—The alarmed Antiquary ran hither and thither looking for remedies; but his museum, though sufficiently well filled with a vast variety of useless matters, contained