Freaks on the Fells by Robert Michael Ballantyne (best way to read e books TXT) 📖

concessions on the side of virtue by inflicting various little torments on the bodies and minds of Mrs Brown and his mother, such as hiding himself at some distance ahead, and suddenly darting out from behind a rock with a hideous yell; or coming up behind with eyes staring and hair flying, and screaming "mad bull," with all the force of his lungs.

Hector and Flora Macdonald were also of the party. George and Fred were particularly attentive to Flora, and Hector was ditto to Lucy. He carried her botanical box, and gave her a good deal of information in regard to plants and wild flowers, in which Lucy professed a deep interest, insomuch that she stopped frequently to gather specimens and listen to Hector's learned observations, until they were more than once left a considerable way behind the rest of the party. Indeed, Lucy's interest in science was so great that she unwittingly pulled two or three extremely rare specimens to pieces while listening to these eloquent discourses, and was only made conscious of her wickedness by a laughing remark from Hector that she "must surely have the bump of destructiveness largely developed."

Arrived at the tarn, each individual deposited his and her basket or bundle on a selected spot of dry ground, and the ladies began to spread out the viands, while Mr Sudberry took the exact bearings of the spot by compass. While thus philosophically engaged, he observed that fish were rising in the tarn.

"Hallo! Hector; why, I see fish in the pond."

"True," replied the young man, "plenty of trout; but they are small."

"I'll fish," said Mr Sudberry.

"So will I," cried George.

And fish they did for half an hour, at the end of which period they were forcibly torn away from the water-side and made to sit down and eat sandwiches--having caught between them two dozen of trout, the largest of which was about five inches long.

"Why, how did ever the creatures get up into such a lake?" inquired Mr Sudberry, eyeing the trout in surprise: "they could never jump up all the waterfalls that we have passed to-day."

"I suppose they were born in the lake," suggested Hector, with a smile.

"Born in it?" murmured Mr Sudberry, pondering the idea; "but the _first_ ones could not have been born in it. How did the first ones get there?"

"The same way as what the first fishes came into the sea, of course," said Jacky, looking very pompous.

Unfortunately he unintentionally tried to perform that impossible feat, which is called swallowing a crumb down the wrong throat, thereby nearly choking himself; and throwing his mother into a flutter of agitation.

There was something so exhilarating in the atmosphere of that elevated region that none of the party felt inclined to waste much time over luncheon. Mr Sudberry, in particular, was very restless and migratory. His fishing propensities had been aroused, and could not be quieted. He had, in the course of a quarter of an hour, gobbled what he deemed it his duty to eat and drink, and, during the remainder of the meal, had insisted on helping everybody to everything, moving about as he did so, and thereby causing destruction to various articles of crockery. At last he declared that he was off to fish down the burn, and that the rest of the party would pick him up on their way back to the coach, which was to start from the inn at Loch Earn Head at five in the afternoon.

"Now don't be late," said he; "be at the inn by half-past four precisely."

"Ay, ay; yes, yes," from everybody; and away he went alone to enjoy his favourite sport.

The rest of the party scattered. Some went to good points for sketching, some to botanise, and others to ascend the highest of the neighbouring peaks. Mrs Brown and Hobbs were left in charge of the _debris_ of luncheon, to the eating up of which they at once devoted themselves with the utmost avidity as soon as the others were gone.

"Come, this is wot I calls comfortable," said Hobbs; (he spoke huskily, through an immense mouthful of sandwich.) "Ain't it, Mrs Brown?"

"Humph!" said Mrs Brown.

It is to be remarked that Mrs Brown was out of temper--not that that was an unusual thing; but she had found the expedition more trying than she had anticipated, and the torments of mind and body to which Jacky had subjected her were of an uncommonly irritating nature.

"Wot," continued Hobbs, attacking a cold tongue, "d'you think of the natives of this 'ere place?"

"Nothink at all," was Mrs Brown's prompt rejoinder.

Hobbs, who was naturally of a jolly, sociable disposition, felt a little depressed at Mrs Brown's repellent manner; so he changed his mode of address.

"Try some of this 'ere fowl, Mrs Brown, it's remarkably tender, it is; just suited to the tender lips of--dear me, Mrs Brown, how improvin' the mountain hair is to your complexion, if I may wenture to speak of improvin' that w'ich is perfect already."

"Get along, Hobbs!" said Mrs Brown, affecting to be displeased.

"My dear, I'm gettin' along like a game chicken, perhaps I might say like Dan, who's got the most uncommon happetite as I ever did see. He's a fine fellow, Dan is, ain't he, Mrs Brown?"

"Brute," said Mrs Brown; "they're all brutes."

"Ah!" said Hobbs, shaking his head, "strong language, Mrs Brown. But, admitting that, (merely for the sake of argument, of course), you cannot deny that they are raither clever brutes."

"I do deny it," retorted Mrs Brown, taking a savage bite out of the leg of a chicken, as if it represented the whole Celtic race. "Don't they talk the most arrant stuff?--specially that McAllister, who is forever speakin' about things that he don't understand, and that nobody else does!"

"Speak for yourself; ma'am," said Hobbs, drawing himself up with as much dignity as was compatible with a sitting posture.

"I _do_ speak for myself. Moreover, I speak for _some_ whom I might name, and who ain't _verra_ far away."

"If, ma'am, you mean that insinivation to apply--"

"I make no insinivations. Hand me that pot of jam--no, the unopened one."

Hobbs did as he was required with excruciating politeness, and thereafter took refuge in dignified silence; suffering, however, an expression of lofty scorn to rest on his countenance. Mrs Brown observed this, and her irate spirit was still further chafed by it. She meditated giving utterance to some withering remarks, while, with agitated fingers, she untied the string of the little pot of cranberry-jam. Worthy Mrs Brown was particularly fond of cranberry-jam. She had put up this pot in her own basket expressly for her own private use. She now opened it with the determination to enjoy it to the full, to smack her lips very much and frequently, and offer none of it to Hobbs. When the cover was removed she gazed into the pot with a look of intense horror, uttered a piercing shriek, and fell back in a dead faint.

This extraordinary result is easily accounted for. Almost every human being has one grand special loathing. There is everywhere some creature which to some individual is an object of dread--a creature to be shrunk from and shuddered at. Mrs Brown's horror was frogs. Jacky knew this well. He also knew of Mrs Brown's love for cranberry-jam, and her having put up a special pot. To abstract the pot, replace it by a similar pot with a live frog imprisoned therein, and then retire to chuckle in solitude and devour the jam, was simple and natural. That the imp had done this; that he had watched with delight the deceived woman pant up Glen Ogle with the potted frog on her arm and perspiration on her brow; that he had asked for a little cranberry-jam on the way, with an expression of countenance that almost betrayed him; and that he had almost shrieked with glee, when he observed the anxiety with which Mrs Brown--having tripped and fallen--opened her basket and smiled to observe that the pot was _not_ broken; that the imp, we say, had been guilty of all this, was known only to himself; but much of it became apparent to the mind of Hobbs, when, on Mrs Brown's fainting, he heard a yell of triumph, and, on looking up, beheld Master Jacky far up the heights, clearly defined against the bright sky, and celebrating the success of his plot with a maniacal edition of the Highland fling.

At a quarter-past four all the party assembled at the inn except Mr Sudberry.

Five arrived--no Mr Sudberry. The coach could not wait! The gentlemen, in despair, rushed up the bed of the stream, and found him fishing, in a glow of excitement, with his basket and all his pockets full of splendid trout.

The result was that the party had to return home in a large wagon, and it was night when at last they embarked in their boat and rowed down their own lake. It was a profound calm. The air was mild and balmy. There was just enough of light to render the surrounding mountains charmingly mysterious, and the fatigues of the day made the repose of the boat agreeable. Even Mrs Sudberry enjoyed that romantic night-trip on the water. It was so dark that there was a tendency to keep silence on landing to speak in low tones; but a little burst of delight broke forth when they surmounted the dark shoulder of the hill, and came at last in sight of the windows of the White House, glowing a ruddy welcome home.


STORY ONE, CHAPTER 18.


THE FAMILY GO TO CHURCH UNDER DIFFICULTIES.

It would seem to be a well-understood and undeniable fact that woman invariably gains the victory over man in the long-run; and even when she does not prove to be the winner, she is certain to come off the conqueror. It is well that it should be so. The reins of the world could not be in better hands!

But, strangely enough, woman triumphs, not only in matters over which she and man have, more or less, united control, but even in matters with which the human race cannot interfere. For instance, in regard to weather--despite the three weeks of unfailing sunshine, Mrs Sudberry maintained her original opinion, that, notwithstanding appearances being against her, the weather in the Highlands of Scotland was, as a rule, execrable. As if to justify this opinion, the weather suddenly changed, and the three weeks of sunshine were followed by _six_ weeks of rain.

Whether there was something unusual in the season or not, we cannot positively say; but certain it is that, for the period we have named, it rained incessantly, with the exception of four days. During a great part of the time it rained from morning till night. Sometimes it was intermittent, and came down in devastating floods. At other times it came in the form of Scotch mist, which is simply small rain, so plentiful that it usually obliterates the whole landscape, and so penetrating that it percolates through everything except water-proof. It was a question which was the more wetting species of rain--the thorough down-pour or the heavy mist. But whether it poured or permeated, there was never any change in the leaden sky during these six weeks,