The Living age ... / Volume 209, Issue 2701
65-128
LITTELLS flYING AGE.
Sixth Series,
Volume X. } No. 2701.April 11, 1896.
From Beginning,
Vol. COJX.
CONTENTS.
RECENT SCIENCE. By Prince Kropotkin,
THE HEIRS OF KELLIE
THE SCOTTISH GUARD OF FRANCE,
IN THE LAND OF THE NORTHERNMOST
ESKIMO. By Eivind Astrup,.
RAMBLES IN HERTFORDSHIRE. By Ar-
thur Grant
THE CHEVALIER DEON AS A BOOK
COLLECTOR. By W. Roberts,
COUNTRY LIFE IN THE LAST CENTURY.
By T. W. Speight
Nineteenth Century,
Blackwoods Magazine,
Macmillans Magazine,
Fortniglitly Review,
Temple Bar,...
Gentlemans Magaziuc,
Argosy, .
POETRY.
THE OLD GARDEN SEAT,
THE OUTDOOR CHURCH,
66 An!
66
ME, TIS WINTER YET,
PUBLISHED EVERY SATURDAY BY
LITTELL &
CO., BOSTON.
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I.
II.
III.
IV.
V.
VI.
VII.
67
78
94
102
114
120
125
66
The Old Garden Seat, etc.
THE OLD GARDEN SEAT.
I stand beside the yew-tree fence,
Mid gaiety of blue-eyed May;
Rose perfumes hit my sluggish sense
And human accents to me stray.
Grandfather tells his old-world tales
And Granny smiles her hundredth smile,
Round me each eve the nightingales
With song their nesting cares beguile.
Here happy lovers seek the shade
And rest them in my ample seat,
Joy in the future hope has made,
And hear the far-off lambs faint bleat.
I holdalas! in cast-iron arms
Sweethearts for whom Id gladly die,
Catch their soft whispers, weigh the
charms
For which enamoured suitors sigh.
A maid here, pink and white, Loves rose,
Drank in yestreen a gallants praise;
He plucked for her each flower that blows
What time they paced these lonely ways.
They rested here; I jealous heard
Each murmured answer mid their bliss,
And tried to blushtwas too absurd
When troth they plighted with a kiss.
Loves gauds I laugh at, honeyed speech,
Hyperboles of all thats sweet;
I scoff when softened accents reach
The coldness of a garden seat.
And yet, old wisdom still can see
That nought excels the married life:
Wisest of mortals, blest is he
Who wins himself a loving wife.
Gentlemans Magazine. M. G. WATKINS.
THE OUTDOOR CHURCH.
The carven pillars of the trees,
The flowered mosaic of the grass,
The green transparent traceries
Of leaf on leaf that lightly lies
And lightly move when breezes pass,
The anthem of the waterfall,
My chorister the blackbirds lay,
And mingling with, suffusing all,
Borne by the wind and still let fall,
The incense of the new-mown hay:
This is my church, my altar there;
Here Earth the kindly mother kneels,
Her mighty hands outspread in prayer,
While oer her brow the sunny air,
A south wind full of blessing, steals.
She wraps me in her mantle-fold,
I kneel and pray beside her there
As children do whom mothers hold.
And living air, and sunlight-gold,
And wood and meadow, pray with me.
Spectator. EVAN KEANE.
AH! ME, TIS WINTER YET.
I know a time shall be,
When, from each slumbering bough,
Shall flash on you and me
The beautiful young leaves,
Like glimmering emeralds set
In Aprils coronet:
When the warm south wind shall sough,
And, to the silent eaves
The twittering martlets cling,
With tidings of the spring.
AhI me, tis winter yet.
I know a time shall be,
When, for our sweet delight,
The pretty pageantry
Of April shall unfold;
The herald violet,
With purple banneret;
Gay king-cups, bravely dight
In shining cloth of gold;
And, dancing in the breeze,
Virgin anemones.
Ah! me, tis winter yet.
I know a time shall be,
When, on my longing ear,
Your voice, a melody
Of silver strings, shall sound,
And charm away the fret
Your absence doth beget;
When love shall cast out fear,
In chains eternal bound,
And, coming to his own,
Raise in our hearts his throne.
AhI me, tis winter yet.
I know a time shall be,
When all, save love, shall fail;
That dim futurity
When we, dear heart, must stand
Where life and death are met.
May there be no regret
As, down the stream, we sail
Toward the shadowy land
Where, crowned with asphodels,
Springtime forever dwells.
Ah! me, tis winter yet.
Chambers Journal. OLIVER GREY.
66
Recent Science.
From The Nineteenth Century.
RECENT SCIENCE.
BY PRINCE KROPOTKIN.
I.
BONTOENS RAYS.
Since the year 1860, when Kirchhoff
and Bunsen endowed science with a
new method of chemical analysisthe
spectral analysisno scientific discov-
ery has so rapidly conquered a wide
popularity as R~5ntgens discovery of
the photography of the invisible by
means of an invisible light. The won-
derful photographs of the bones within
the living human body obtained by the
Wflrzburg professor, and their possible
applications in medical practice, as well
as the mysterious character itself of
invisible rays of light which reveal
things concealed from the human eye,~~
have certainly contributed a great deal
to render the discovery so widely
popular. But there is in it something
more than that: it arms science with a
new means of investigation; it opens a
new field of research; and it touches
upon one of the most vital physical
problems of the momentthe relations
between electricity and light. This is
why the new radiations are so eagerly
studied by this time in all centres of
learning in Europe and America.
That our eye is but a very imperfect
optical instrument, which is not affected
by most of the vibrations of which a
beam of light is composed, and that
vibrations to which it is blind affect,
nevertheless, the photographic plate,
was certainly known long since. We
know perfectly well that just as with
our ear we perceive only such vibrations
of air-molecules as are not slower than
thirty and not quicker than thirty thou-
sand per second, so also with our eye
we perceive only such waves in the
ether as are not shorter than one sixty-
three thousandth part of an inch, and
not longer than twice that length; and
we know also that the invisible shorter
waves, which appear in .a spectrum at
its violet end and far beyond it, are
precisely those which the photographic
plate is most sensitive to. Photography
by means of an invisible light would
thus offer nothing new. But the dark
radiations discovered by R~intgen dis-
play many other remarkable properties
besides; they are different from the just-
mentioned ultra-violet rays of the
spectrum, and they so widely differ
from light altogether as to upset our
current notions about light. In fact,
they belong to the wide borderland be-
tween electricity and light, discovered
by Hertz,1 and only those who have
closely watched the latest researches
in that domain, made on the lines indi-
cated by Hertz and recently followed
by the Hungarian Professor, Philipp
Lenard, could foresee the existence of
radiations endowed with such remark-
able properties.
Among the many sources of light
which we have at our disposal, the most
interesting of all is undoubtedly th~
Geissler tube. A glass tube, sealed at
both ends after air has been pumped~
out of it as much as possible, and hav-
ing at its ends two platinum wires
sealed through the glass, which are
brought in connection with a source of
electricitythis is the simplest form of
what is known in physics as a Geissler
tube, or, in its perfected and modified
forms, as a Hittorfs or a Crookess
tube, or simply as a vacuum tube.2
When its two wires are connected with
the two poles of an induction coil, or
with the two electrodes of an influence
electrical machine, the most striking
luminous effects are obtained. A
1 Hertzs discoveries were discussed in this re-
view in May, 1892.
2 Geissler was its first inventor and maker; but.
in the hands of Hittorf, and especially of Crookes~
it has been improved and turned to such a splen-.
did account that it often goes under the name of
a Crookess tube or a Hittorfs tube. Geissler
used to exhaust it so as to leave in it no more than
one three-hundredth part of the air which it con-
tained when it was open. Now, with the Sprengel
air-pump, the exhaustion may be rendered sc~
complete as to leave in it only one-millionth part
of the air, or even less. It is evident that the
tube may also be arranged in such way as to pnmj~
out the air (or any other gas it may be filled with)
during the experiments themselves. Instead of
two platinum wires we can also introduce two or
more electrodes, of any shape and of any metal, t&
vary the experiments. Tesla often used one elec-
trode only.
67
Recent Science.
stream of luminous matter, partly coin-
jposed of minute particles of metal torn
off the negative pole (cathode), rushes
towards the other pole; and where ~t
meets it, or where it strikes the glass, a
beautiful glow is produced, especially if
the glass is such as to become easily
fluorescent. And beautiful as these
effects are in their simplest form, they
niay be embellished and diversified
almost infinitely by varying the nature
and exhaustion of the gas with which
the tube was filled, the shape of the
tube itself, and the nature and the
shape of the electrodes; while the study
of the intimate nature of the luminous
emanations which proceed from the
cathodethe so-called cathode rays
opens an immense field of investigation
into some of the most arduous problems
~f physics. Suffice it to say that Tesla
made his striking experiments by pass-
ing rapidly alternating currents through
such tubes; and that the suggestive re-
searches of Mr. Crookes into what he
named radiant matter, and of J. J.
Thomson into the substance of these
emanations, lately analyzed in this
review,1 were made with the aid of the
same apparatus.
However, it was not before 1892 that
Hertz, shortly before his death, dis-
covered a remarkable peculiarity in
these streams of luminous matterthe
cathode rays: namely, that they pass
through thin plates of various rays of
light.2 The Hungarian Professor
Lenard at once utilized this property of
the cathode rays for bringing them out
of the vacuum tube into another glass
tube, where he could experiment upon
them at his ease under a variety of con-
ditions. He made in a vacuum tube a
little window, out of a very thin leaf
of aluminium (about one one-thousandth
of an inch thick), and directed the lu-
minous stream emanating from the
cathode upon the window. For
ordinary light an aluminium plate evi-
dently would have been a shutter; but
for the cathode rays it really proved
to be a window. They passed through
1 Nineteenth Century, January, 1894, p. 141.
2 Wiedemauns Annalen der Physik, 1892, Bd.
xlv., p. 28.
it and entered the next tube, producing
a strong smell of ozone.
Most of them, after having emerged
from the window, were invisible to
the eye; but as soon as they fell upon
a screen covered with some fluorescent
matter, this matter began to glow as if
it had been struck by a beam of sun-
light or electric arc light; but when
Lenard made the rays pass through
different gases, liquids, .and solids, their
behavior proved quite different from
that of ordinary light. Various sub-
stances are, we all know, not equally
transparent to sunlight, but their
different degrees of transparency de-
pend upon their inner structure, or their
chemical composition, not upon their
density. Glass has a greater density
than paper, but it is transparent to
ordinary light, while paper is not.
With the cathode rays it was quite the
reverse. Paper was more transparent
to them than glass, and aluminium,
which is slightly less dense than mica,
was more transparent than mica; as to
the denser metals, such as gold and
silver, they were quite opaque for the
cathode rays even in very thin leaves.
The same was noticed with all gases;
their transparency too depended en-
tirely upon their density. At the
ordinary atmospheric pressure the
cathode rays ceased to act upon the
phosphorescent paper at a distance of a
little over two inches; but in rarefied
air they travelled a distance of six feet
without being absorbed; and when
Lenard experimented upon gases of
different densities, such as oxygen and
hydrogen, he found that it was suffi-
cient to rarefy oxygen to one-~sixteenth
part of its usual density to render the
two gases equally transparent. In
short, the absorption of the cathode
rays proved to be in direct proportion to
the density of the medium which they
passed through. Like inertia and
gravity, Lenard wrote in December last.
the cathode rays depend in their absorp-
tion upon the mass of matter they
traverse. They do not behave like
light, but like a cannon-ball which is
arrested in its course by the density of
the heap of earth which it has to pierce.
68
Recent Science.
Moreover, while usual luminous vibra-
tions would take no heed of a magnet
placed near their path, the cathode rays
explored by Lenard were deflected by a
magnet from their ordinary rectilinear
directions. And yetsuch is at least
Lenards opinionthe magnet acted not
upon the rays themselves, but upon the
medium they passed through; and what
seemed still more incomprehensible was
that the action of the magnet depended
upon the way in which the cathode rays
were generated; the more the air was
rarefied in the vacuum tube where they
took origin, the greater was the mag-
netic deflection. At every step the
physicist thus met with some new
problem which he could by no means
explain under the now current theory
of luminous radiations.
And finally, as if it were to establish
one more affinity between these extraor-
dinary rays and common light, Lenard
discovered that when a. photographic
plate was brought near to the alu-
minium window, the silver salts of
the plate were decomposed by the
invisible rays. One step morea simple
piece of wire placed between the win-
dow and the plateand Lenard would
have obtained a shadow photograph
similar to those obtained a few weeks
later by Wintgen.
This step was made by R6ntgen. His
researches, however, were carried on
on a somewhat different plan. He also
took a vacuum tube, and made it glow
in the usual way; but he entirely
wrapped it up in black paper, and when
its light was thus intercepted, and the
room was quite darkened, he saw that
a piece of paper striped with fluores-
cent matter began to shine when it was
approached to the tube exactly as if it
were struck with rays of sunlight or
arc-light.2 The effects were thus
1 Phulipp Lenard, On cathode Rays in Gases
under Atmospheric Pressure and in Complete
Vacuum, in Sitzungsberichte of the Vienna
Academy of Sciences, 1893, p. 3; On the Magnetic
Deflection of Cathode Rays, and On the Ab-
sorption of Cathode Rays, in Wiedemauns An-
nalen der Physik, 1894, Bd. lii., p. 23, and 1895, Bd.
lvi., p. 255.
2 Barium platino-cyanide was used in this case.
Other fluorescent bodies, such as rock-salt, Iceland I
similar to those which Lenard obtained
with his cathode rays; but there was a
great difference in intensity. The
invisible radiations which emanated
from the vacuum tube wrapped in black
paper made the fluorescent screen shine
even at a distance of six feet. Their
force of penetration through solids was
also much greater. Pine boards one
inch thick, a book of a thousand pages,
two packs of cards, and a block of
ebonite over one inch thick, proved to
be as transparent to the new rays as
glass is to ordinary light; they passed
through these bodies and made the
fluorescent screen shine. Even metals,
especially the lighter ones, were to
some extent transparent to the new
radiations; a sheet of aluminium over
half an inch thick still allowed them to
pass, and only the heavier metals easily
intercepted them; still, a thickness of
eight one-thousandths of an inch of
platinum and of six on& -hundredths of
an inch of lead was required to secure
practical opacity to these rays. And
finally, when the hand was placed
between the tube and the fluorescent
screen, the result was especially strik-
ing; the flesh was pierced by the rays
without any trace of absorption, while
the bones totally intercepted the rays,
and threw black shadows. A shadow
of the skeleton of the hand, devoid of
the flesh, thus appeared in black on the
fluorescing screen.
More peculiarities became apparent in
the course of investigation. Light, as
we all know, is reflected from polished
surfaces; and when a beam of ordinary
light passes from one transparent
medium, such as air, into another trans-
parent medium of greater density, such
as glass, or vice versa, the beam is
broken. But the new rays had not that
property. A glass or an ebonite lens
placed in their path had no effect upon
them. A mica prism filled with water,
or with carbon bisuiphide, which would
break a beam of ordinary light, was
traversed by the new rays without
deflecting them from the straight line;
and although a very thin prism of
spar, uranium glass, and calcium sulphide, pro-
duce the same effects.
69
70
aluminium seemed to have some break-
ing effect, its action was, at any rate,
very small. Regular reflection of the
new rays could not be obtained, al-
though they spread, like ordinary light,
along straight lines. As to powders,
such as glass powder, which evidently
stop the passage of ordinary light be-
cause every grain reflects and refracts
light in all possible directions, they
were, on the contrary, as transparent
for Rtintgens rays as the coherent solid
itself.
Like Lenards cathode rays, Rt~ntgens
radiations also decomposed the silver
salts of the photographic plate, and
consequently photographs of the above-
mentioned shadows, or shadowgrams,
could easily be obtained. It is evident,
however, that for such photographs the
camera is of no use, as its lenses have
no effect upon the rays. Besides, wood
being transparent for the new radia-
tions, the dry plate need not be taken
out of its flat wooden box, nor need its
wooden shutter be removed. The plate
can be kept in its protecting box, or,
still better, it can be placed in a black
cardboard envelope and laid on the
table; the hand, or any other object of
which we wish to obtain a shadowgram,
is placed upon it; the glowing vacuum
tube is then brought above the object,
at a distance of from four to twenty
inches, and after an exposure of a few
minutes the photograph, or rather the
shadowgram, is ready.1 Those portions
of the negative upon which the rays fall
unhindered are decomposed, while all
those portions which are in the shadows
of opaque bodies (the bones, or pieces
of metal and so on) remain unaltered.
If a hand or a foot is photographed in
this way, all the bones, and the bones
alone, appear on the positive in black,
while the flesh, being quite transparent
to the Ri5ntgen rays, does not appear at
all, or is indicated only as a faint
shadow round the bones. On the con-
1 The length of necessary exposure evidently
depends upon the intensity of the rays, which
varies according to the character of electrical ex-
eitation in the vacuum tube. With strong Wim-
hurst machines, exposures of less than one minute
seem to be sufficient.
trary, the metals, such as a ring on the
finger, or a piece of wire laid upon the
hand, come out in dark black on the
positive. Again, when a closed wooden
box containing a set of metallic weights,
or a leather purse containing coins, a
key, and a lead pencil, were photo-
graphed by the new rays, the wood of
the box and the leather of the purse left
no traces whatever, while the metallic
weights, the coins, the key, and the
graphite of the lead pencil appeared
with a remarkable accuracy.
As soon as WSntgens discovery be-
came known through a preliminary
communication which he made in
December last at the fiftieth anniver-
sary of the Wllrzburg Society of
Physics and Medicine,2 his experiments
were repeated all over Europe, with full
success, and attempts were made at
once to utilize them for medical pur-
poses. It often happens, indeed, that a
needle, or even the point of a fishing-
hook, enters our flesh, and before it has
been extracted it goes so deep that there
is no means to find where it is lodged
and to get it out. Then it may travel
for years through different parts of the
body, its presence always offering a cer-
tain danger lest it may affect some vital
organ. RUntgens rays will often offer
the means for making out the exact
position of such an intruder, and both
at $ern and in this country needles
have already been extracted, and pellets
of lead have been found out, with the
aid of the new photography. A mal-
formation of one of the bones in the
foot, the actual state of a broken bone,
a tubercular growth on a finger, nay,
even the consequences of a tubercular
outgrowth in the knee and of a disease
in the thigh-bone of an eight years old
child,3 could be studied in this way, the
inner structure of the bones becoming
more and more apparent in proportion
2 An English translation of this paper was given
in Nature, January 23, 1896, vol. liii., p. 274.
These two last were obtained by Lannelongue
and Oudin (Comptes Rendus of the Paris Academy
of Sciences, February 110, 1896, vol. cxxa., p. 283).
Nothing which would not have been known to the
surgeons was discovered, but photography con-
firmed their previsions in every point of detail.
Recent Science.
Recent Science.
as the methods of the new photography
are improved. Professor Neusser at
Vienna could even exhibit before his
students two photographs, one of which
represented gall-stones in the liver of
a patient, while the other indicated the
presence of a stone in the bladder. The
former appeared admirably, while the
latter, which seemed to be half trans-
parent to the rays, was shown, never-
theless, quite well as to its form. To
be enabled thus to explore the inner
cavities of the human body is evidently
an immense advantage, while other use-
ful applications of the new method will
undoubtedly be discovered in time.
For theoretical science, however, the
interest of R~intgens rays lies else-
where. The Wtirzburg professor was
quite right in describing them as is
rays, because they are different from
all luminous rays previously known,
even from the ultra-violet radiations
and from Lenards cathode rays, and
all we can do now is to make hypotheses
as to their true nature. That they
should pierce wooden planks and other
di-electrics is one of their less astound-
ing properties. Since Hertz proved the
affinity which exists between electrical
waves and waves of light, and, produc
ing his waves on the one side of a
wooden door, detected them in the next
room on the other side of the door, we
see nothing extraordinary in the fact
that R~intgen could obtain a shadow-
gram with rays which had passed
through a wooden door devoid of its
usual white-lead painting. This is only
the chemical counterpart of Hertzs
experiment But the chief feature of
Hertzs electric waves is that they have
all the properties of ordinary light; they
spread at the speed of two hundred
thousand miles in a second, air is trans-
parent for them, and they are reflected,
broken, and polarized in exactly the
same way as waves of light are re-
flected, refracted, and polarized. Runt-
gen s rays, on the contrary, seem to
have an incomparably smaller speed,
and they are not capable of either
regular reflection or refraction. They
differ also from the invisible ultra-
violet rays of the spectrum, although
they have something in common with
them especially in their electrical
effects. And they are certainly differ-
ent from the above-mentioned cathode
rays studied by Lenard. They do not
emanate from the cathode itself, but
originate from the glass of the vacuum
tube, at the spot where it is struck by
the cathode rays. They are thus the
descendants of the cathode rays, not
those rays themselves; and while these
latter are deflected by a magnet, Rtint-
gens radiations take no heed of it and
pursue their course in a straight line.
It may thus be said that they are
neither ultra-violet radiations, nor
cathode rays, nor Hertzs electric
waves, although they have something
in common with all of them. What are
they in such case?
The readers of this review may per-
haps remember that the same question
was raised with regard to the cathode
rays themselves. In those flows of
luminous matter which rush from one
pole of the Geissler tube towards the
other pole, Crookes, J. J. Thomson, and
many others see a stream of minute
electrified particles, or perhaps mole-
cules or atoms of matter; while Hertz,
Goldstein, and Lenard consider them as
vibrations of the ether similar to ordi-
nary light, only of a very short wave-
length; and quite lately Mr. Schuster, in
a letter to Nature,1 suggested that the
same explanation might apply to Runt-
gens radiations. Two explanations,
almost equally probable, are thus ad-
vocated for the cathode rays, and
scientific opinion remains undecided be-
tween the two. Still more we must be
in the dark with the newly discovered
radiations. Consequently Ruintgen is
very cautious in his hypotheses, and
only ventures at the end of his paper
the suggestion that the new rays may
be ascribed to longitudinal waves in the
ether. As there is, however, something
more to say in favor of this suggestion,
a few words of explanation as to its
1 Nature, January 23, 1896, vol. liii. In the
Comptes Rendus of the French Academy (Decem-
ber 30, 1895) M. Perrier has also described experi-
ments, giving some new support to the views of
Crookes and 4. 4. Thomson.
71
Recent Science.
real meaning may perhaps be welcome
to the general reader.
When a fan is waved to and fro in
the air, each time that it is moved one
way the air is pushed before it, and as
all the mass of air cannot be moved at
once, part of it is condensed in front
of the fan; a wave of slightly condensed
air is thus sent into space, and can even
be felt with the hand at a certain dis-
tance. But when the fan is moved the
other way, a slight rarefaction of air
takes place behind it, which rarefaction
will again be followed by a condensa-
tion when the movement of the fan is
reversed. Waves of slightly condensed
and slightly rarefied air are thus pro-
duced, and sent into space. The same,
we know, happens when a tuning-fork
is set vibrating; only the waves of con-
densation follow each other much more
rapidlyat the rate of, say, several
thousands in the second. This is what
is described in physics as a wave of
sound. If we could follow that wave
as it travels from, say, the fork to the
ear, we should see all the molecules of
the air on this line vibrating and de-
scribing circles or ovals, which are all
placed lengthways along the line fol-
lowed by the sound; we should say ia
such case that these vibrations are
longitudinal.
Now, light is supposed to be due to
vibrations or oscillations of the minut-
est particles of ether; but in order to
work out the laws of propagation of
light in full accordance with the ob-
served phenomena, mathematicians
were compelled to postulate that the
luminous vibrations take place in a
medium absolutely incompressible, in
which no waves of compression or rare-
faction and, accordingly, no vibrations
in the direction of the beam, such as are
produced by the fan or the fork, can
originate. The particles of ether, they
suppose, vibrate only across the line of
propagation of light. To speak, there-
fore, of longitudinal vibrations is a sort
of heresy, because it means to imply
that ether is compressible to some ex-
tent, and that it differs from ordinary
matter by only being extremely rarefied.
However, the number of heretics who
take this last view grows every year,
and Lord Kelvin is one of them. In his
Baltimore lectures, delivered in 1884, he
even forcibly developed his arguments
in favor of the possible compressibility
of the ether, and the possibility of
longitudinal waves in it. True, the
longitudinal vibrations of the ether
enjoy a bad reputationwitty critics
insinuating that physicists resort to
them, as physicians resort to nerves,
when they can find no better explana-
tion. But quite lately Jaumann, in
Vienna, has submitted the whole sub-
ject to a thorough experimental and
mathematical investigation; he has
even devised a method for ascertaining
by experiment in which direction the
luminous oscillations take place; and,
applying his method to ordinary light
first, and then to the study of Lenards
cathode rays, he came to the conclusion,
confirmed by mathematical analysis,
that the latter are nothing but electri-
cal radiations consisting of longitudinal
vibrations.2 One objection, however,
has been raised against this conclusion
by the great mathematical expert in
molecular physics in France, Poincar6,3
namely, that longitudinal vibrations
could not be deflected from their path
by the action of a magnet. But this is
Precisely what Lenard insists upon with
regard to his cathode rays. The mag-
net, he says, has no action upon the
1 See the abstracts from these lectures, now in
print, communicated by Mr. Bottomley to Nature,
January 23, 1896, vol. liii., p. 268.
2 Taking the last researches of Elster and Gei-
tel, he has proved that ordinary light, when it
penetrates into ararefied air medium or is reflected
from it, gives origin to coherent longitudinal
waves which have an amplitude three times
smaller than the amplitude of the transversal
vibrations. Applying, further, the same method
to Lenards cathode rays, he proves that they are
electrical rays, consisting of longitudinal vibra-
tions, and having periods of oscillation of from
one-millionth to one-hundred-millionth of a sec-
ond. He has developed, moreover, the mathe-
matical theory of these vibrations on the basis of
Maxwells theory. (Sitzungsberichte of the Vi-
enna Academy, Bd. civ., January and July, 1895;
smnmed up by the authorin Ostwalds Zeitschrift
fur physikalische Chemie, 1896, Bd. xix., p. 16~.)
2 Cornptes 1? dus of the Paris Academy of Sci-
ences, 2 dlcembre, 1895, tome cxxi., p. 792, and 13
janvier, 1896, tome cxxii., p. 74.
72
Recent Science.
rays themselves; it acts upon the me-
dium they pass through, and this
medium is the ether. As to R~5ntgens
rays, it is most remarkable that they
fully answer to Poincar~s requirement;
they are not deflected by the magnet.
Supposing that the experiments are
decisiveis this a mere coincidence?
Or must it be taken as a confirmation
of the view which gradually gains
ground in chemistry and physics, and
according to which waves of rarefaction
and compression really exist in the ether,
because it is simply a more rarefied
form of ordinary matter? Time alone,
and further research, can solve this im-
portant question. In the mean time we
can only say that the electrical proper-
ties of the new rays and their mass
effects become more and more apparent.
It results also from some remarkable
experiments made in January last by
Gustave Le Bon at Paris,1 and con-
tinued by Professor Sylvanus Thomson
and Lord Blythswood,2 that similar
dark rays, also capable of piercing
metallic plates and of acting upon
photographic films, exist not only in the
light of the glow tube, but also in the
light of an ordinary lamp. Black
light, as Le Bon names it, consisting
of certain vibrations different from
those of ordinary light, would thus
seem to be a regular accompaniment of
all the vibrations which we have
hitherto known as light.
All this shows that the discovery of
Hertz, Lenard, and R~5ntgen is even
more important for the theory of light
than it seemed to be at the outset. But
when all the immense amount of re-
search that has been made in the bor-
derland between electricity and light
is taken into account, and when one
realizes the amount of thought already
evolved in connection with these re-
searches, one cannot expect that the
new step, now made in advance, should
solve all the difficulties. All that can be
said is that it is a step in the right
direction, which makes one feel a little
nearer to the solution of the great prob-
1 Comptes I?endus, 27 janvier and 3 fdvrier, 1896,
tome cxxii., p. 188, 233.
2 Nature, February 13, 1896, vol. liii., p. 310.
lems of the day relative to the structure
of matter and the movements of its
finest particles.
U.
THE ERECT APE-MAN.
Step by step the theory of evolution
has fought its way against many hostile
criticisms. The builders of this theory
have proved that variation is con-
tinually going on in organisms, even
nowadays under our very eyes; they
have studied and indicated its causes;
and to the anti-evolutionists, who defied
them to produce from the older strata
of the earth the organisms which could
be looked upon as common ancestors of
different now existing species, they
have answered by producing whole
series of such common ancestors, not
only for species nearly akin to each
other, but for different families as well,
and even for whole classes of the ani-
mal kingdom. The bird-like feathered
lizards, or lizard-birds; the ancestors of
the great flightless birds; the ancestors
of the ruminants, of the horses, and of
the entire group of the hoofed quad-
rupedsi.e., the even-toed and the odd-
toed ungulatesnay, even the common
ancestors of both the ungulates and the
rodentsall these have been disen-
tombed in such numbers during the last
twenty years that genealogical trees of
whole classes of animals have lately
been reconstituted almost in full, in
one point only the evolutionists had
failed: they had not yet succeeded in
discovering the fossil remains which
would bridge over the gap between man
and the higher manlike apes; and the
words with which Huxley concluded,
thirty-two years ago, his review of evi-
dence relative to mans place in nature,
continued to hold good almost up to
the present daythat is, all fossil re-
mains of man hitherto known were dis-
tinctly human in their characters and
represented but a very slight approach
to the apes; while the oldest fossil re-
mains of apes, obtained from Tertiary
strata, were hardly nearer to man than
the now existing chimpanzees, gorillas,
or gibbons. Quite lately some new and
important evidence has been added to
74
the above, and only a few months ago
the remarkable discovery by Eugene
Dubois, in Java, of an intermediate
organism between ape and man eame
to fill up to some extent the above-
mentioned gap.
The difficulties which stand in the
way of a discovery of this missing
link are evidently enormous; but their
proper nature is not always well under-
stood, because we are all inclined to
underrate the necessary antiquity of
the organism which once occupied an
intermediate position between man and
the primates. That such an organism
need not be searched for in our super-
ficial post-glacial deposits, even though
they represented a duration of at least
ten thousand years, becomes evident as
soon as we consider the human remains
concealed in these deposits. Numerous
and widely spread human populations,
belonging to the Neolithic age, have left
their traces in the post-glacial beds; but
their manners of life, their industry,
nnd their implements were so similar
to the manners, industry, and imple-
ments of so many of our contemporary
savages, that their physical features
must have been, and really were, the
same as those which we see now when
we travel in lands untouched by civili-
zation. Whole tribes of now living
savages may still be described as living
in the later stone age.
For the same reason we cannot expect
to find ape-like ancestors of man in the
deposits of the glacial period, or imme-
diately pre-glacial, when the mammoth,
the woolly rhinoceros, the reindeer, the
cave bear, and the cave hyena inhabited
Europe. The Palseolithic flint imple-
ments which we find in the deposits of
that period differ so little from those
which are still in use among certain
lower savages, such as the Papuans or
the Fuegians, that the men who used
to make the Palseolithic flint scrapers
and knives could not have been im-
mensely different in their physical
features from the lowest representa-
tives of the human race who are still in
existence. Even now the New Guinea
Papuan lives partially in the Palseo-
lithic period. He uses fire, but he does
Recent Science.
not know how to obtain it; and when
he wants a knife, he breaks a chip off a
flint and uses it, such as it isvery
effectually, it must be said, as Miklukho
Maclay convinced himself when he
gave his foot to be shaved with a
chipped flint obtained on the spot by
merely breaking it off a flint stone
picked up on the beach.
Although representing an antiquity
of some twenty thousand years or much
more, the Palseolithic age is still too
near to us. And yet, even from that
age, the fossil remains of man are
scarce, and we have up till now no more
than four or five human skulls undoubt-
edly Palteolithic.
True that the two skulls discovered at
Neanderthal and at Spy, the fragment
of a skull unearthed at Bury St. Ed-
munds, the jaw which was found at La
Naulette, and the Kanstadt skull decid-
edly point to a very low organization of
man. The low cranial arch of these
skulls, their depressed frontal area,
their narrow foreheads, and their im-
mense superciliary ridges are charac-
teristic of such low specimens of the
human race that when the Neanderthal
skull first became known it was de-
scribed as the skull of an idiot; and
this opinion was held by the antagonists
of evolution so long as more skulls bear-
ing exactly the same characters were
not produced. But still, even the
Neanderthal cranium shows a brain
capacity estimated at nearly twelve
hundred cubic centimetres, while the
highest skull of an anthropoid ape has
only a brain capacity of five hundred
cubic centimetres. The distance be-
tween ape and man, which thus re-
mains to be bridged, is still very
considerable.
This is, however, as Huxley wrote
years ago, only what might be expected
from Palseolithic men, who knew the
use of fire and could already shape
pieces of flint into more or less perfect
implements. In order to find beings
still more simian in their characters, we
evidently must ransack the Pleistocene
depositsi.e., the uppermost deposits of
1 Miklukho Maclay, in the Izvestia of the This-
an Geographical Society.
Recent Science.
the Tertiary age, then the Pliocene
beds, which probably represent a length
of time twice as great as the preceding
division, and finally the Miocene strata;
but to look for ape-like ancestors of man
in the Quaternary period was simply to
pay unconsciously a tribute to the cur-
rent prejudice as to the quite recent
appearance of man. It is the Tertiary
deposits that we must now explore, the
more so as the existence of human-like,
reasoning beings during the middle por-
tion of the Tertiary agei.e., the
Miocene timescan be taken as fully
granted. True that when the French
geologists came forward to claim so
high an antiquity for man, or at least
for human-like beings, their evidence
was met with distrust and was sub-
mitted to a very searching criticism.
The scratched and cut bones which
were unearthed from the Tertiary
strata in France and Italy, and which
were brought forward as evidence of
mans existence at that time, certainly
could have been scratched and cut by
some other agency than mans hand,
and it was necessary to discuss these
agencies. But after all sorts of tests
had been applied to those bones,
and after a most minute inquiry
had been made into the causes which
might have produced similar cuts,
anthropologists gradually came to the
conclusion that some, at least, of these
scratched bones must have been cut,
when they were still fresh, by some
trenching instrument other than the
teeth of any known animal. As to the
flints discovered by the Abbe Bourgeois
at Thenay, in the department of Loir-et-
Cher, and better explored since, al-
though very little art appears in their
shaping, they are now generally con-
sidered as having been obtained or
fashioned by some reasoning being
which lived in France during the
Miocene times. The fossil flora of the
same deposits having been studied by
no less an authority than Oswald Heer,
and the fauna by Gaudry, it is now cer-
tain that both belonged to the Upper
Miocene age, so that there can be no
doubt concerning the high antiquity of
these remains. As to whether the
reasoning beings who fashioned the
Miocene flints were human-like crea-
tures or highly developed apesas
Gaudry and Boyd Dawkins are in-
clined to believethis is a question
which necessarily must remain un-
settled so long as no fossil remains of
those beings are known.
Better results might have been ob-
tained in the search for fossil remains of
anthropoid apes. During the Miocene
period, when our continent enjoyed a
much warmer climate than now, and
even the Arctic lands were covered
with forests now characteristic of
southern Europe, apes and monkeys
lived in great numbers all over Europe
and Asia, even as far north as these
isles. Properly speaking, it was an
ape-age, and fossil remains of apes dat-
ing from that period have been found
in many parts of Europe and Asia.
But while the hitherto known fossil
Miocene apes represent less differ-
entiated forms than the now living
ones, and combine in one single form
the characteristics of several modern
genera, there is only one of them, the
Dryopithecus Fontan4, discovered years
ago in France, which represents a form
considerably higher than the now exist-
ing anthropoid apes. It had a nearly
human size, its incisor teeth were small,
and the cusps of its molar teeth, al-
though less rounded than those of a
Europeans tooth, had a great resenv
blance to the cusps of the teeth of an
Australian.2 However, it must be said
that the Tertiary deposits, from which
the best finds might have been ex-
pected, continue to be very little known.
Even the Pliocene deposits of the
1 Albert Gaudry, Les Enchainements du Monde
Animal; Mammifi~res Tertiaires. Paris, 1878,
and Fossiles Secondaires, Paris, 1890; W. Boyd
Dawkins, Early Man in Britain and his Place in
the Tertiary Period, London, 1880, p. 68. The
works of Lyell, Huxley, and Sir John Lubbock,
and Mortillets Le Pr6historique (Paris, 1883), are
so well known as sources of general information
upon the subject that they hardly need be men-
tioned. A very valuable addition to this litera-
ture is the tiny book published last year by Mr.
Edward Clodd, The Story of Primitive Man,
London, 1895.
2 Gaudry, i.e. p. 236.
75
76
Siwalik Hills, at the foot of the Him-
alayas, where the remains of a chim-
panzee which had affinities with both
man and the gibbon were found, still
await the geologist who can explore
their treasuries in the same way as the
American geologists have explored the
Uinta formation in the United States
and the Pliocene beds of the Argen-
tine.
Such was, in brief sketch, the state of
our previous knowledge when Eug~ne
Dubois made ill5 remarkable discovery
of the erect ape-manthe Anthro-
popithecus erectus. There are in Java,
on the southern slope of the Kendeng
Hills, thick layers of a volcanic tuff~,
consisting of clay, sand, and volcanic
lapilli, cemented together and re-
arranged by rivers. The Bengawan
River has cut its channel through them.
These beds, over eleven hundred feet
thick, lie upon marine deposits of the
Pliocene period, and may be safely
taken as belonging to the earliest sub-
divisions of the following period, the
Pleistocene. They contain, indeed, con-
siderable numbers of fossil bones of
stegodon, the hippopotamus, the hytena,
several species of deer, a gigantic
pangolin, three times larger than the
same ant-eater now living in Java, and
so on. Attention has been paid to these
deposits since the time of Junghuhns
visit, and in the years 18901895 M.
Eugene Dubois explored them for the
Dutch Indian government. There lie
found, in September, 1891, the cranium
and one molar tooth of a human-like
being, and, resuming his excavations
next spring, he succeeded in digging
out of the same bed, at the same level,
another molar tooth and the left thigh-
bone of presumably the same individ-
ual. The thigh-bone was nearly three
times as heavy as the average femur
of modern man, and indicated a high
stature of the individual; it combined,
moreover, both human and simian
characters, while it indicated at the
same time that the creature to which it
belonged walked in an erect posture.
As to the skull, it was decidedly too
small in comparison with the big thigh-
bone, if we judge from the present
1?ecen t Sctenee.
human proportions; but it was at the
same time much bigger than the largest
skulls of the present apes, and repre-
sented such a combination of human
and ape characters that M. Dubois dlii
not hesitate to describe the individual
to whom the skull, the teeth, and the
femur belonged as a Pitl& ecanthropus
rectus, an erect ape-man.
As might have been foreseen, Duboiss
discovery was met with distrust in
Europe so long as the actual specimens
were not known to anatomists. When
the subject was introduced before the
Berlin Anthropological Society in Jan-
uary, 1895, by W. Krause, the German
doctor unhesitatingly declared that the
tooth was a molar of an ape, the skull,
notwithstanding its remarkably great
capacity, was that of a gibbon, and the
thigh-bone was a human bone; that
consequently the three could not belong
to the same individual, although each
of them, taken separately, represented
a remarkable find, as no one could
expect to unearth an ape of such a great
brain capacity, or to discover in the
Pliocene age a fossil man attaining the
stature of five feet seven inches.2:
Virchow also submitted Duboiss con-
clusions to a strong criticism.
A few days later the fossil ape-man
received a somewhat better treatment
at the Dublin Royal Society, where the.
subject was introduced by Dr. Cunning-
ham. In full opposition to Virchow and
W. Krause, Dr. Cunningham described
both the cranium and the femur as dis-
tinctly human; and in support of his
views he produced two very interesting
diagrams upon which the fossil Java
cranium was compared with an average
Irish cranium, the Neanderthal and the
Spy (No. 2) cranium, and the skull of a
young gorilla. The results of the coin-
1 Pithecanthropus erectus: eine mensehenlilin--
liche lJebergangsform aus Java, by E. Dubois.
Batavia, 1894.
2 Five feet five inches would perhaps be more
correct. The length of the femur being 455 milli-
metres, Dr. cunningham obtains 1,654 millimetres
(5 ft. 5 in.) for the height of the individual. This.
is, he remarks, the average size of a Frenchman.
Zeitschrift far Ethnologic, 1895, Jahrgang
xxvii., p. 78.
Recent Science.
parison are striking.1 The Java skull
has the same depressed frontal region
and cranial arch as the Neanderthal
skull, the same striking development of
the superciliary ridges, and very much
the same general aspect; but all these
features being still more marked, it
belongs to a still more inferior being; it
has decidedly a much more simian
character, and by its shape it stands
exactly midway between the European
skull and that of a gorilla. Dr. Cun-
ninghams conclusion was that the
cranium is decidedly human, but repre-
sents a form considerably Lower than
any human form at present known.
Two specialists thus pronouncing, the
one for man and the other for a gibbon,
gave the exact description of what the
cranium is in realityan intermediate
form between ape and man.
A further change in favor of Dubois~s
opinions took place at the last Inter-
national Zoological Congress at Ley-
den, when the fossils themselves were
laill before specialists, together with a
number of bones and skulls intended
for comparison. Such a specialist in
fossil bones as the American palleon-
tologist Professor Marsh is did not
hesitate to support many of Duboiss
conclusions by the weight of his own
wide experience; and although Virchow,
who presided at the meeting, still main-
tained that the four fossils could hardly
belong to the same species, he gave to
his remarks more of the character of an
interrogation than of a denial of
Duboiss views. The anatomist Pro-
fessor Rosenberg took the same posi-
tion; he saw in the fossils a human
femur and the skull of a remarkably
highly developed ape.
At last, in November, 1595, Dubois
was invited to bring all his evidence
before the Dublin Royal Society, where
it was carefully examined and dis-
cussed,2 and next before the Anthro-
pological Institute of Great Britain and
1 The two diagrams are given in Nature, Feb-
ruary 28, 1895, vol. ii., p. 528, where Cunninghams
paper is reported in full.
2 Sitting of November 20, 1895, reported in Na-
tare, December 5, 1895, vol. liii., p. 115.
Ireland.3 When the real fossils were
submitted to the Dublin anthropolo-
gists, their doubts as to the four pieces
belonging to the same individual seem
to have been abandoned, as they were
mentioned no more in the discussion.
This evidently was a great point, be-
cause the human characters of the
femur are so pronounced that nearly all
anatomists recognized them at once;
.while the cranium so much combines
the characters of man with those of an
ape that some anatomists prefer to call
it a gibbons skull, while others unhesi-
tatingly pronounce for a very low
specimen of man. As already said, by
its shape it undoubtedly occupies an
intermediate position midway between
the European and the gorilla; and the
same is true of its interior capacity.
While the average European brain has
a volume of from fourteen hundred to
fifteen hundred cubic centimetres, and
the brain of the highest ape has a
capacity of but five hundred cubic
centimetres, the fossil Java skull has a
capacity of one thousand cubic centi--
metresthat is, two hundred cubic
centimetres lower than that of the
Neanderthal cranium. It thus stands,
in this respect also, half-way between
the two, somewhat nearer to man than
to the ape. The same, again, must be
said of its various dimensions; they
also are intermediate between the
corresponding dimensions in ape a Ild
man,4 while its very narrow and low
forehead and the shape of its back parts
give it such a decidedly simian aspect
that Dr. Krause, as we have seen, took
it for the skull of a gibbon.
The same intermediate characters
appear in the thigh-bone, and still more
in the teeth. Dr. Pearsall, a leading
dental surgeon at Dublin, found that
the human characters of the teeth are
3 I have not yet the report of this last sitting.
The length of both the Neanderthal and Spy
(No. 2) crania is 200 millimetres; their respective
width, 144 and 140 millimetres. The length of the
fossil Java skull is 185 and its width 135 milli-
metres. The same dimensions in an average
chimpanzee skull are 132 and 91 millimetres.
These measures were given by Dr. Cunningham
(Nature, vol. ii., p. 428).
.77
78
striking; and yet they are larger than
human teeth, and the considerable
development of their cusps is decidedly
simian. But for the anatomist, as Dr.
Alexander Macalister pointed out a few
years ago in his presidential address
before the British Association,1 this fact
alone of larger teeth implies a whole
association of conclusions relative to
the shape of the face. Bigger teeth
imply a bigger and much heavier lower
jaw; and to work it more powerful
muscles are wanted, which muscles, in
their turn, require a sharper definition
of the areas of the bones to which they
are attached. And when big teeth are
associated with a small brain, and
especially with a narrow foreheadas
is the case with the fossil Java cranium
the jaws must protrude very much
and the whole face must take a snouty
appearance; moreover, as the heavy
jaws affect the centre of gravity of the
head, they affect at the same time the
set of the skull on the vertebral column;
nay, speech itself is modified, and the
sibilant sounds must disappear from
the speech of a big-toothed individual.
In short, as Professor Sollas said at
Dublin, the fossil remains discovered
by Dubois offer invaluable evidence of
an organism which was either a
pithecoid man or a remarkably human
ape. It was an erect ape-man.~~
As to the true place of the Pithecaa-
thropus erectus in our genealogical tree,
it certainly will be ascertained in time,
when more missing links will
gradually fill up the present gap. In
the mean time the genealogical trees of
the Hominidcs and the Simiidw, which
were published last month in the corre-
spondence arising out of Duboiss com-
munication, are considered by their
authors themselves (Dr. Cunningham,
Professor Sollas, and Dubois2) merely
as graphical suggestions. One thing is,
however, certain. Although Duboiss
Pithecanthropus is, of course, very much
posterior to organisms which might
claim the ancestorship of both the
1 British Association Reports, meeting of 1892,
section of Anthropology.
Nature, December 5 and 19, 1895; January 16
and 30, 1896; vol. liii. pp. 116, 151, 215, 296.
The Heirs of Kellie.
anthropoid apes and mansuch organ-
isms belonging to a far more remote
epoch than the Plioceneit must be
placed, nevertheless, a long way off
from man, on the line leading to those
ancestors. Upon this point scientific
opinion is unanimous; and it hardly
need be said how encouraging such a
progress, due to one single discovery, is
for further research. At the same time
it must be pointed out that already the
fossils discovered by Dubois contain
some very precious indications as to the
lines upon which evolution was going
during the latest periods of the earths
history.
From Blackwoods Magazine.
THE HEIRS OF KELLIE.
AN EPISODE OF FAMILY HISTORY.
CHAPTER I.
Sir Walter Oliphant of Kellie in Fife
was a man who had grown old amid
many perturbations of the State iind
of the house. In Marys stormy and
troubled day he had been, as many
were, not so certain in his beliefs, either
political or religious, as a person of so
much consequence in his county ought
to have been. He had been the queens
man, and he had been the kings man,
without, however, being either a time-
server or a turncoat. He was one of
those who would have given his life
to prove his queens innocence, but
who all the time could not but feel that
this would be a poor argument, and no
evidence at all, against the cold chill
of doubt that lingered all the time even
in his own heart. And his reason was
convinced of the advantages of the
English alliance, and that everything
must be risked rather than King
Jamess heirship, notwithstanding the
strong revolt in his heart against that
which was so likely to follow, the
abandonment of Scotland, and ebbing
away of her dearly bought glory and
the pride of her independence, second
to none. But all the active struggles
of life had died away from him when
he sate in his old hall, in the dreary
years after the court had gone away-
The Heirs of Kellie.
to London, drawing so many with it;
and the change had stricken to the
heart of Scotland. as wise men had
known it would, although all the coun-
try had cheered and shouted when their
king assumed the English crown, as
if it had been by his prowess and for
their greatness that he had won that
other kingdom. The land was subdued
and troubled in these days, yet did not
venture to complain; for had not they
desired that which had come to pass?
And the Kirk was troubled and uncer-
tain too, alarmed by threatenings of
interference, though no great thing had
yet been attempted, and the ministers
still had dominion more or less, and,
though many things were tolerated
that had been condemned, still guided
most things their own way.
But all the affairs of the world had
groWn dim to Sir Walter Oliphant,
sitting in his little warm chamber
the room of panelled and carved oak,
which opened from the hail of Kellie
Castle, as all the chief rooms did and
do to this day, without any chill of
corridors or passages, but one room
out of another, after the ancient fash-
ion. He sat by his fire, and his mind
was full of thoughts. He was an old
man, but not so old in years as in con-
dition. His life, which had been a
stirring one, was far off from him, as
if it had been a dream. There were
times when it came up into his mind
like a tale that had been told, with
which he had little to dothe time
when he was stout and strong, and
rode out to feast and to fight, and came
back to hear the shouts and the sports
of his boys making the rafters ring.
He thought of all these things some-
times vaguely, as of things that had
been; but at present his occ~pation was
chiefly to keep himself warm, and to
think who should be the heir of his
castle and his lands when he should
be carried for the last time down the
winding stair. He was not much con-
cerned about that, any more than he
was concerned for all that had hap-
pened to him in the past; but the
thought of who should have Kellie
after him was still real in his mind.
79
That the natural heirs were gone had
caused him bitter sorrow in his day;
but even that had grown far away and
dim to him, and all his life had shrunk
into the routine of getting up from his
bed and going back to itboth tire-
some processesand swallowing the
food that had no taste, and sitting by
the fire that had so little warmth. Only
this one thing held him, the great care
of making up his mind who was to
be the heir of Kellie in the days when
he should be there no more.
It was not that he was without kin
or heirs at law. There was one even
at his own hearthstone who might well
have ended all difficulties, being its
natural inheritress. Though Sir Walter
was an old man, he had a sister who
was little more than a girl, though that
is a strange thing to think of. His
father had lived long, and had made
a foolish marriage in his old age, and
left behind him a child much younger
than his grandsons, and who was like
a grandchild to her brother. She had
grown up in the house, the plaything
of everybody, her right to her home
never doubted, yet without any posi-
tion in it. When the others disappeared
Jean remained, and it might be that
the father bereaved felt in the bottom
of his heart some grudge that she of
whom no account was made should
continue when the loftier heads were
laid low. But if this was in his heart
he did not betray it. She grew and
blossomed out, and came to her full
height, which was not small, and was
now of an age to be considered the
lady of the house. And no doubt, the
old knight might easily have given her
to a fitting wooer, and thus found him-
self an heir among the best blood of
Fife; but of this he never thought, nor
of Jean his little sister as in any sense
his successor. It angered him greatly
when Master Melville of Carubee kirk
and parish took it upon him to speak
a word to this effect. Her, the heir-
ess! cried the old knight, with a roar
in his throat like a wounded lion. And
he would not speak to Master Melville
again for many a day.
And wha but her should be the
80
heir? said Mistress Marjory, the old
nurse, who had long been the house-
keeper at Kellie, and to whom Jean
was as the light of her eyes. Waes
me for all the bonnie lads that are
away I and no an Oliphant left to keep
up the honor of the old house. But
though shes but a lass she has the
blood as well as any one, knight or
lord, that ever owned the name. And
wherefore should she not get a good
man and raise up the race?
If she had a good man the morn
the race she would raise up would be
for his house and no hers, said Neil
Morison, who was the head of the other
section of the household, and in most
things opposed to Mistress Marjory.
He gave forth a dry laugh, as was his
wont, and added, For all so grand as
ye are, the name never comes from
the side of the distaff. Thats aye
something to our side.
Theres times, said the housekeeper,
when nae less a thing than a crown
comes from that sideas is well kent
in poor auld Scotland this day.
Ye may say that, said Neil, forced
into sudden sympathy, and if we had
vanquished thae English loons by our
swords and our spears, as it is written
in Scripture, it would hae been the
better way.
Oh, hold your tongue with your
spears and your swords! It would set
ye better, Maister Morison, to do what
you can with our auld knight and keep
sore injustice out of his headfor who
should have the lands after him but
his am flesh and blood?
It would never do, it would never
do, cried Neil. A lass! that couldna
keep her am held, and muckle less the
old Oliphant landsthat are not what
they used to be, lack-a-day, whoever
was the heir.
What are they colloguing about, the
two great rulers of the house, said a
young voice, bursting in as its owner
did, with a sudden gush of fresh air
and the fragrance of the out-door world,
putting each other in mind of the
greatness of the Oliphants, now that
its like the flowers of the forest, and a
wede away.
Mistress Jean! and a in a confusion,
your hair about your haffits, and the
lace torn off your rioing-coat! What
has happened to you? Will ye never
mind what a the house tells you, that
it sets you not, a lady like you, to ride
a powney about the roads like a farm-
ers lass?
Or maybe worse things than that,
said Neil, who had risen hurriedly to
his feet on the young ladys entrance,
and shot this Parthian arrow at her
as he went away.
I will shoot that auld earle some
day if he looks at me so, she cried,
with a sudden gleam of anger, then
laughed and clapped her hands, with
my bow and arrows, she added, mer-
rily. Well put him against the castle
wall, and pin him tot like that bonny
saint in the old picture. Whats hap-
pened, said she? A great deal has
happened. I have had a~grand adven-
ture, Marjory, simple as I sit here.
Oh, bairn, bairn! cried the house-
keeper, youll just break my heart.
Its been broken so often, and aye
mended again, said the girl. Wait
till I tell you. I was rattling along on
the Pittenweem road, my pony and
me, very well pleased with the fine
day, and just singing to ourselves, for
it was too sunny to keep silence; when
lo! I was aware of a horses hoofs
coming pelting after me. I thought
what you said, never to mind, but just
keep the road quietly and pay no at-
tention. I would not even give a look
over my shoulder to see if it was one
of the Anstruthers or Roland Dishing-
ton, till I came to a corner and gave
a glint. And it was a muckle trooper
on a muckle grey horse, not canny to
see, and no another soul within sight.
Lord bless my soul! ane of the dis-
banded Greys! cried Marjory, lifting
up her hands and eyes. Oh, lassie,
lassie! will ye never learn ?
My heart was in my mouth, said
Jean, whose eyes were dancing, how-
ever, with excitement and triumph,
but I had to keep up my courage. I
gave the pony just a touch tospeed
her onand you know she cannot thole
even a touch, she has such a spirit.
[[he Heirs of Kellie.
The Heirs of Kellie.
And then there came a muckle voice,
as muckle as the man, calling to me,
Hey, my bonnie lass! and hey, my bon-
nie bird! The cannaillye! to use such
words to me!
Jeans eyes shone with a momentary
gleam of rage and shame. It is maybe
my fault, she said, as ye are always
telling me, to ride alone; but who would
I get to come behind? No Maister
Morison, the major-domo, nor Jamie
Webster, that is everybodys man, nor
Jaicque the groom. No, no; theres
nobody to follow Jean; so I must
either bide in the house or ride my
lane.
My darlin! and what did he do?
Oh, no harm, cried the girl, laugh-
ing, since here I am, and none the
worse but for the lace on my cape,
that he gave a snatch at as he came
up thundering, till I thought it was a
real charge of cavalry, and I would be
ridden down.
Lassie! and how did ye escape?
For gude sake dinna keep me in my
trouble.
There is no need for trouble, said
Jean, since here you see me; though
I allow, she added, with a pleasure
in working upon the old ladys fears,
that a minute longer and I cannot
tell what I would have done; for he
had gripped my cape in his hand,
though the pony was just flying, and
the muckle grey horse thundering, and
my heart bursting out of my throat
with fright and fury. She paused,
half from the keenness of the recollec-
tion and half maliciously, to pile up the
agony.
And then? and then?
Then? said Jean, looking innocently
into her old nurses face. Why, then!
there was just nothing more.
Oh, bairn! you are enough to drive
ten women out of their senses.
Well, said Jean, I will admit there
were causes for it. But just at that
moment there came another galloping,
just as muckle a horse and as muckle
a man, on the other side. And my
man he dropped hold of my cape, and
tore the lace off it with his glove, as
you see. And the pony, she just set
LIVING AGE. VOL. 1. 474
81
her feet to the ground as if she were
riding a race, and the new man and
my man they faced each other. Im
thinking nothing happened. I saw
with that eye I have in the back of
my head that they rode up to each
other awfu civil, like two towers; and
then the trooper he took the turn to
St. Monance, and me I flew up the
Carubee road, and the grand adventure
was done. You can see Im not a prin
the worse, except my riding-cape, and
Kirsten must just sew on the lace
again.
And that was a ! cried Mistress
Marjory, relieved, but at the same
time a little disappointed to hear no
more.
All! was it not enough? said Jean;
would you have had me assaulted on
the kings highway, and put in peril
of my purse, that has nothing in it,
or maybe of my life, which has not
very much Jean made a pause,
and then, looking up demurely, she said
in very quiet tones, No; it was not
all.
Oh, my hinny,you just play upon
me as if I were a fiddle.
You are much more like a harpsi-
chord, said Jean, contemplating the
housekeepers ample person reflectively.
Yon man after he had dispersed the
trooper never came rushing up as Ro-
land Dishington or one of the Ansters
would have done, but just rode steady
behind as if he had been my servant.
The word has or had two meanings,
and probably the second of these flashed
over her memory, for she made an al-
most perceptible pause and reddened.
I was still a little feared; and what
did I do but head the pony for yon
house you know, of Over-Kellie, where
you never would let me go
And then? cried Mrs. Marjory again,
breathless.
Well, they came fleeing out, and he,
he came riding in. And it was who
would be the most concerned, and was
I hurt and was I frightenej, and would
I bide and rest? The leddyor is she
the gudewife?for I could not tell
Some calls her the one and sonic
the other, said M~rjoi~y shortly.
82
Never you mind. Youll be telling
me now the man that came up and
saved ye was
That is just it, said Jean, and if
youll tell nobody, Marjory, ill just
whisper in your earhes a bonnie
lad.
Mistress Jean! cried the house-
keeper in consternation.
Well! say hes just a country fellow,
and no grand cock to his hat, nor lace
on his coat; I am not saying hes a
grand gentleman. But I have a pair
of sharp eyes in my headyou are
always saying thatand I cannot but
see whats set before them. He is a
bonnie lad; and that is just as true as
all the rest.
What do you call a the rest?
You know as well as I do; or maybe
you know better, said Jean, with a
little indignation; because he is Peter
Oliphant, and because he is the next
of kin, thats not to say that he is not
a bonnie lad!
It might be a good reason, Mistress
Jean, for you kenning naething about
him, and no going out of your way to
make acquaintance with him
Me go out of my way to make ac-
quaintance with him! Neither him nor
any man, if it were a prince or a king!
It was he that came out of his way to
protect a lass he knew nothing of when
he saw she was in need. Maybe you
would have thought it better had he
left me to the trooper? said the girl,
with much indignation.
Oh, no that, no that, said the old
woman; but it would have been better
you had not put yourself in the way of
wanting protection, my bonnie leddy
no from him nor from any man! she
said.
You forget who you are speaking
to, cried Mistress Jean, with quick
anger, flinging away. But she came
hack next minute to fling her arms
round her old nurses neck. And
thats true, she said; I was just think-
ing so mysel.
CHAPTER II.
While this was going on, Sir Walter
was sitting in his warm panelled chain-
ber, pondering by the side of the fire.
His old castle, which was not one of
the famous strongholds of the time, but
yet an ancient house dating far back
into the mist of ages, and standing
four-square to all the winds that blew,
a house that time could scarcely wear
more than the rocks, would soon be a
desolate and masterless house. Since
the days of Bruce the Oliphants had
been there, and the first lord of Kellie
had good King Roberts blood in his
veins. But now there was no one to
come after him in the old home of his
race. The gloom of that consciousness
had settled down upon his mind, and
filled him with an immense and inde-
scribable darkness in which he went
tottering, seeking for something to re-
place what was lost, though by mo-
ments he was not very clear as to what
it was that was lost, which made it
necessary for him to grope in the dark
and seek that substitute. And his
thoughts were very slow, wandering,
and confused, though they always came
back with unbroken persistency to the
one point. Who should have Kellie
after him? Who would replace the
heirs who were no more? This had
been the preoccupation of many years;
it almost seemed as if all his life he
had been thinking of it. His own active
days had vanished away, and all the
adventures and troubles that had filled
his house with rejoicing and with wall-
ing. Sometimes while he sat musing
on that one sole question he would be
surprised by a recollection of himself,
as in the days when he rode in Queen
Marys train, or those in which he hung
about the ante-chambers at St. Jamess,
half proud to feel himself one of the
new masters there, half furious to see
the dark looks which the southern lords
threw upon King Jamess train. Was
that himself? or one of the former Oh-
phants who held a larger traIn at Kel-
lie? or perhaps one of the young ones
the lads, the, those who ought to
have been here to receive Kelhie from
his hands. Their faces would some-
times flash out from his memory too.
Who were they, old heirs of Kehhie slain
in the wars, or lost in the wildering
1/he Heirs of Kellie.
[17~e ]zlieirs of Kellie.
world, never coming back to claim
their heritage? And who was to have
it now? Who would keep it safe, and
guard all its rights and keep up the
auld name? On this subject his
thoughts would clear, his mind re-
tained its force. It was the one clear
point in the misty universe of dreams
that surrounded the old man.
Almost his only visitors were the
clergymen of the two neighboring par-
ishes, each of which claimed Kellie
Castle as part of its own. He retained
enough of his natural keenness to per-
ceive that each of them took a different
side in this great question, and some-
times to play upon their contradictions
with something of the pleasure which
the quarrels of priests and women be-
tween themselves so often afford to a
man of the world. The difference be-
tween them gave him a vague amuse-
ment, or something at least as like
amusement as he was capable of. Mas-
ter Melville of Carnbee was a Reforma-
tion minister who had known John
Knox, and who, though of a much
milder temper, was yet very strong as
to his duty of speaking in season and
out of season, and letting no man avoid
or mistake his duty without full warn-
ing of it; but Sir John Low at Pitten-
weem was no better than a mass priest
the country folk said, and loved the
great, and to speak smooth things, flat-
tering the old laird and supporting him
in taking his own way. Sir Walter
listened to what they said on both
sides, but he was little moved by their
arguments. What he was really doing
while he seemed to be listening was
slowly settling upon his own plans,
and deciding for himself while they
talked, which neither of them was at
all unwilling to do. It was Mr. Mel-
ville who was his visitor the day after
the incident in the last chapter, a grave
man of gentle manners, with a black
velvet cap upon a bald head.
What are ye saying? said Sir Wal-
ter. Reason gude ay, Ive reason
gude for all I say to you. Its no fit
that an auld race should die out of the
land.
And yet, said the other, in the heat
of argument, if its so ordained, its
ill striving with the will aboon. But
ye have heirs in plenty at your hand,
and little danger of your name. How
often must I be telling ye, Sir Walter
Oliphant, there is your am fathers
daughter, your am flesh and blood, the
one that has the best right? Where
would ye go furder than your am ingle-
side? Who could be so near to you?
and young and likely and one to raise
up heirsalways if it be the Almichtys
will__
Whos that? said the old knight.
Jean! a bit lassie! how often have I
teilt you, minister? just as often as
you have telled me. What would I do
with a lassie in my seat, that could
neither keep the house nor keep her
head, a thing with neither might nor
right? Na! that will not do for me.
She would get a man, said Mr.
Melville.
Ay, she would get a man! little
doubt of that; and my auld lands would
be sweepit up into lands that march
with mine, and there would be an
Anster of Kellie, or a Dishington, or a
Lindsay, or the Lord knows what. No!
if I have said it once I have said it a
hundred times, nae lass shall reign and
rule in my auld house.
Well-a-well, well-a-well! if ye say
so, said the minister, I have no cer-
tain teaching about the heirship of a
woman, though the daughters of Zelo-
phehad had a portion with their breth-
ren, as we read in the Book of Numbers;
but I would not force the word of the
Lord, and that might be a special case.
But ye know well, Sir Walter, as well
as I do, that failing her, theres one
of your blood no far from your door
that is as weel capable of keeping his
am house and his am head as Arthur
and a his knights. And that is Peter
Oliphant of Over-Kellie------
Pah! the old man spat vehemently
into the smouldering fire. I will have
none of hima country clowna cal-
lant from the plough. And what was
his father but a clown before him, with
no more spirit of a gentleman than Neil,
my man?
Neil, said the minister, is a decent
84
man now, whatever he may have been;
but would pocket a crown-piece and
hold his tongue if any grand gallant
had need of him; whereas your cousin
of Over-Kellie, Sir Walter
Cousin! a hundred times removed!
Is it you I hear shaming your own
blood? said the other. Me, I am
maybe a hundred times, as you say,
or more, removed from the head of my
name; but I have yet to learn, the
minister added, raising his head, that
the strain of the younger is less pure
than the strain of the elder when it
flows in an unbroken and lawful line.
I ken, and we all ken, said Sir
Walter, subdued, minister, that theres
no better name in Fife
I am standing upon no such van-
ities, said Melville. Your cousin has
neither been at the college nor at the
court, Sir Walter, and maybe as well
for him in these evil days; but hes a
handy man at weapons, and a lad that
kens his own mind. Theres no man
in the parish better kent or better
liked, or more a man of his word. I
ken but little of my Lord Oliphant, or
of his house; but well I wot there is
not a better in it than Pate, or one that
can master him, or daunton him, among
the best of his name.~~
Ye mean the lad to wed one of your
lasses, that you are so hot upon him,
Sir Walter said.
I ken well, said Melville, what
lass I want him to wed; but she is none
of mine. Will you see the young man,
Sir Walter, and judge for yourself? I
will bring him to you in my hand, for
he has always been a good lad to his
minister; though he would not set foot
over your door-stane for other mo-
tives.
And wherefore, cried Sir Walter,
would this farmer-lad no set foot over
my door-stane?
For an evil reason, said the min-
ister; for pride, and a high head that
would not stoop before any man but
the king.
Ha! ha! cried the old knight; bring
me tbis clown with his high head that
would not stoop under the door of
Kellie Castle. Bigger men than him
have entered at that dooray, and
stooped too, and even bitten the dust
before them that owned it. Hes then
a deevil of pride and conceit, this yeo-
man lad of yours?
Ye are right, and again right, Sir
Walter, said the minister, gravely,
when you say that pride, the pride
that you, and even myself, that should
ken better, take in the vanity of a name
is a devilish thing.
If that were all! Sir Walter said,
with a snap of his thumb and finger,
which failed and gave no sound. He
paused, and his countenance grew
grave as he observed this, looking with
a half piteous surprise at his own
large, feeble hand. I canna even snap
my thoom, he said under his breath.
Then with a feeble wave of that hand
to his companion, he added, If its to
be done, lose no time.
This was the warrant upon which
the minister brought Peter Oliphant to
Kellie Castle. He had as much trouble
with the young man as he had with
the old. The house of Over-Kellie was
still excited with the flying visit of Mis-
tress Jean when the minister reached
it; and the leddy, or the gudewifefor
Marjory said truly that she was called
sometimes one and sometimes the other,
according to the courtesy or indiffer-
ence of her rare visitorscould not be
persuaded that the extraordinary mis-
sion of the minister had not something
to do with that exciting incident. The
mistress felt that her Peter was called
to the castle to receive the hand of the
princess, who must have found time
enough in the ten minutes of her stay
to fall in love with him; and that this
event at once and forever established
his claims as heir-at-law, and made
Kellie Castle his. The young man nat-
urally was more hard to be convinced;
but he too was excited, and not in per-
fect command of his faculties. If Jean
had discovered that he was a bonnie
lad, he had still better means of dis-
covering that she was fair enough to
dream of; and though this encounter
had made her first aware of him, it
was by no means the first time that
her humble cousin had seen the young
The Heirs of Kellie.
The Heirs of Kellie.
lady of Kellie. And, in the glow of
pride with which he remembered,
though no such claim had ever been
acknowledged, that he was the un-
doubted next of kin, there was, per-
haps, something of a more generous
fervor, a warm and noble sentiment
towards the friendless girl to whom
the head of the house, as all the coun-
tryside knew, was little more gentle
than towards himself. When Sir Walter
died, it was he who would be the nearest
in blood to her to defend her rights or
herself. The Lord Oliphant might be
the head of the name; but he was a
man who loved gear, and was secretly
operating, as all the countryside be-
lieved, to draw the lands of Kellie and
the old castle to himself.
It was therefore with no small exal-
tation of mind that Peter Oliphant flung
his bonnet upon his head, notwithstand-
ing his mothers prayers that he would
put on his better suit and the hat in
which he appeared at kirk and market,
to show his better breeding. I will
not stand covered in Sir Walters pres.
ence,~~ he said; and, as for my clothes,
theyre well enough. He knows me
for a country loon, whatever fine suit
I might wear.
Loon, did the laddie say? and what
next? I would like to see either knight
or yeoman, in all Fife, that would dare
to call Peter Oliphant loon, his mother
said.
And so would I, he said, with a
laugh. He was strong and straight and
tall, with the brown hair and the laugh-
ing eyes that belonged to his race. But
they were eyes that could look fierce
enough when occasion required.
By my troth, I would like that bet-
ter, he continued, as they set out; a
bout at single-stick, or a good frank
blade, I am not that ill at; but what
am I to say to the old laird? a man
wants lear for a presence-chamber, even
if its but an old knights.
You have lear enough for that, said
the minister, if you would but mind
half that I have put into you, at the
point of the sword, as a man may say.
A little Latin, and a shelf of old
books, said Peter; but you would not
advise me, Maister Melville, to tirl off
a verb to Sir Walter, even if I could.
mind it, the first time he has bethought
himself that I am alive and within
reach.
My lad, I would not lippen to his
bethinking himself, said the minister;
just you mind its mostly my doing.
and my credits concerned. Na, I will
not tell you, not a word, what to say;
nature will tell you, and that fine spirit
of your am that never let you be overly
modest before me. And I hope, so far
as learning goes, I am of more account
than Sir Walter, if that was of any
consequence.~~
Little doubt of that, said Peter;
but he was wise enough to know that
this was indeed of very little conse-
quence, and that it was an extremely
different thing standing before the min-
ister in Carnbee manse, though he was
a man of learning, and thus stepping
suddenly into the presence of old Sir
Walter, though he had no letters at all.
CJLAPTEE III.
Peter Oliphant went into the great
hall of Kellie Castle with very mingled
feelings. Though he had lived all his
life almost within sight of the home
of his race, he had never crossed the
threshold before; and a kind of awe,
a kind of defiance, the inalienable at-
traction of an ancient family house,
mingled with the indignant sentiment
of a scion of the family upon whom its
door has been always closed, made his
cheek glow and his heart beat. This,
then, was Kellie, which had been the
home of his fathers, which might be
his home if justice prevailed and the
law of heirship and lineage. It was
not a splendid place to overawe him.
The house of Kellie was not rich.
Whatever superfluity the family had
ever possessed Sir Walter and his sons
had managed to get rid of in the days
when they went to England with King
Jamesperhaps, like so many Scotch
gentlemen, in hope of advancement,
but, like so many more, only wasting
their small substance in a brief attempt
to hold head among the great English
lords ten times as rich as they were~
The heirs of Kellie.
There were few signs of grandeur in
the hail: a little show of silver on the
buffet; heavy old velvet curtain with
tarnished embroideries; some carved
furniture of noble workmanship,
marked with the three crescents of
the family arms. Those arms were
dimly blazoned, too, on the high, carved
mantelpiece, with that proud motto
which poverty turns into a brag or a
jest, according to the humor of the
wearerA tout pourvoir. Peter knew
that much at least, if no other word,
of the French tongue, and had said it
over to himself many a day. It was
but a sad word in the old house that
had little to provide and few to pro-
vide fornone but the old man and the
helpless girl. But if ever this house
should come to the strong hands, that
if strength and labor and daring could
do it would, so help him heaven! carry
it out to the letter! Peters head, all
throbbing and resounding with excite-
ment, was in a state of exaltation to
which he had never felt the parallel.
And as it happened, the first thing that
met his eye was Mistress Jean, the
heroine of the other days half-adven-
ture. She was seated on a stool in the
recess of the great window, with a
great book clasped in her arms, too
heavy to hold, and over which she was
stooping, bent almost double. Jeans
kirtle was not so well preserved nor
her snood so fresh as those of his own
little sister at Over-Kellie; and to his
yeomans eyes she was doing nothing
useful, nor perhaps able to do anything
usefula creature not made for com-
mon occupations, but to be kept in
sweet leisure and pleasure like one of
the lilies of the field. A tout pourvoir!
here was one of the things for which
it would be his duty to provide. The
thought brought a sudden glow over
himthe heat of resolution and enthu-
siasm. It was the climax of all those
mingled and tumultuous thoughts that
had been surging in his breast.
Jean looked up at the sound of the
heavy steps ringing upon the floor, and.
throwing down her heavy book, darted
forward; but, seized with a sudden
access of shyness, stopped and drew
back before she had come up to the
visitors, and stood looking at them
herself a very pleasant image, impetu-
ous yet timid, her figure suddenly ar-
rested in all its swiftness of motion,
her lips in their meaning of speech.
The sight of Peter Oliphant, so unex-
pected an apparition, made her dumb.
We have come, Mistress Jean, said
Mr. Melville, to speak a word with
Sir Walter, so please you, and by your
brothers am desire.
By hisam desire! Jean looked at
the pair before her. The well-known
figure of the minister, and the other,
so much more interesting, still in all
the novelty of recent discovery, a per-
sonage not precisely like the young
Ansters of her acquaintance, wanting
something, possessing something, a dif-
ferent kind of being. Indeed the rustic
young gentlemen were but little supe-
rior even in breeding to this handsome
yeoman, with his great maturity and
higher consciousness of life and its
struggles. They were good to laugh
with, to mock at, to dance with on the
very few occasions when such an op-
portunity occurred. But she had met
with a reality of life in the person of
this modest yet ardent young man,
who reddened when he looked at her,
which Jean had never encountered be-
fore. At Sir Walters own desire! was
it on account of herself, for some rea-
son connected with that meeting, which
some one must have betrayed and re-
ported? This idea had no time to grow,
but it flashed upon her suddenly, al-
most choking her with the sudden rise
and hurried pulsation of her heart.
We will but bide a moment with
your permission till Maister Neil comes
forth to bid us to the knights presence,
said the minister. And it will not be
long, seeing the hour was fixed by him-
sel.
There is somebody with him, said
Jean; and then her awe of the situa-
tion yielding a little as she grew fa-
miliar with it, she laughed and added,
It is one you do not love.
And who may that be? said Mel-
ville. His question was answered in
a way much more significant than any
86
The heirs of Kellie.
reply of hers. The curtain over the
door of Sir Walters sitting-room was
audibly thrust back, without, however,
revealing immediately the person com-
ing forth; and a voice said, speaking
to the old knight within, My lord shall
hear every word of your good inten-
tions, every word! it is the thought of
a true kinsman, whatever comes. Be
sure my lord shall hear; and farewell,
sir, and the blessing of God.
The new-coiner paused to draw the
curtain back to its usual folds, cover-
ing the door, and then he turned round,
and with a hasty exclamation of sur-
prise became aware of the group in the
hail. He was more conspicuous in his
dress as a clergyman than was the min-
ister of Carubee, with something on
his dark head that suggested a tonsure,
though no such mark of the beast was
permitted in Scotland, and wearing the
cassock of a priest. He came forward,
however, with much appearance of cor-
diality, Ah, Brother Melville, its long
since we met! If weve both come on
the same ghostly errand, I wot our
penitent will get something confused
in his belief.
I come on no ghostly errand, said
Mr. Melville, but concerning the af-
fairs of this fleeting world: which have
their importance too, as you will agree
with me.
That do Iand whiles more bewil-
dering still, said the curate of Pitten-
weem, rubbing his hands. We have
no doubt the luck, my kind neighbor,
to take different views on that subject
too.
It may be so, Melville replied
gravely, but he added no more. He
had no inclination to disclose his hand,
as his opponent had done involuntarily
by those last words behind the curtain.
Low of Pittenweem looked at him
fiercely, but without any visible change
of tone.
And hows all with you, Pate ? he
said with a smile. I heard a bonnie
story the other day of one of these
wild soldier fellows that are just a pest
on the roads, and how he was scared
away and took the road west, meddling
with no person: for fear of a certain
87
muckle rider, bigger than himself, from
the Over-Kellie gait.
Oh, and it was me, Sir John! cried
Jean; and the loon was after me on
my pony, till there came in sight
Jean stopped suddenly, crimson all over,
half with annoyance at herself for hav-
ing spoken, half because of the smiling
glance which Low directed from her to
Peter Oliphant, and back againa smile
which developed into a low laugh of
malice, and which filled her with unac-
countable shame.
There came in sightthe palladin.
the grand knighthe said these words
to the accompaniment of his laugh, till
every line of Peters rustic dress, the
blue bonnet in his hand, the heavy
shoes on his feet, seemed to come out
under the sarcastic look, as if the curate
had been holding up a candle to show
their ro~ighness. And then he turned
away, still laughing softly to himself,
and rubbing his hands. I will not
interrupt such braw company, he
said. Good-day to you, Mistress Jean;
and I wish ye, madam, a good fulfil-
ment to all your virtuous wishes; and
one of those days ye can tell your
mother, Pate, Ill come in for a crack,
and to hear the country news. Brother
Melville, well probably not be so long,
you and me, this time of meeting
again.
Maybe not, Maister Low, said Mel-
ville.
Wherever the is, there will the
eagles be gathered together, said the
other, going lightly towards the door,
with a wave of his hand and a nod of
his head. Mr. Melville drew a long
breath.
That is no canny forerunner, he
said, Peter, my good lad, for you and
me; but I will haste and see if the auld
knight is weariet, or if hell see you
still. Bide here for me.
When Peter was left alone with the
young lady, there was a pause of much
embarrassment between these two
young people, so suddenly brought
together by malicious suggestion, and
by the involuntary flash of thought
that went from one to another, in the
unlikely and unexpected combination,
88
in which all suddenly, in a moment,
they had been placed. Jean, who was
full of saucy words at other times and
in other company, at this moment,
when she would have given all her
small possessions for the power to
throw one jibe at him, could not find
a word to say. It was Peter, whose
grave mood had more solidity and could
better resist the excitement of the sit-
uation, who was the first to speak. I
have a charge from my mother, Mis-
tress Jean, with her dutywhich is
maybe more than is due from her to
you; but my mother, Lady Jean, though
she is the best woman in the world,
was but a farmers daughter, and can-
not get out of her head that the lairds
daughter is a princess in the land.
I have no quarrel with her for that,
said Jean, restored to herself; but if
I am a princess you will maybe live to
be the king. Here we are, us two, and
its between us, Maister Peter. You
are the just heir; but I am the more
just if it were not that I am a lassie,
and whose fault is that? I am sure it
is by no will of mine.
My Lady Jean, said Peter, you
say well it is my just right, as the next
man of the blood; but if by Sir Walters
will it should fall to you, as may be
mind you this, whatever happens, Ill
stand for you through fire and water,
and be your man, and a true kinsman
as long as I live.
No me! cried Jean, giving a spring
in her excitement. If it falls to you,
Ill fight you every step, and go to the
law with you, and never yield while
Ive breath!
Peter looked at her with a tender
admirationbut that ineffable way of
taking the girls hot words as if they
meant nothing, which not even love
itself can make palatable to a girl.
Well-a-well, he said gently, the one
thing and the other they mean just
about the same.
But nothing of the kind, she cried,
almost with a soft shout of passion,
nothing of the kind! they mean
here it suddenly struck Jean quite
irrelevantly, as he stood before her
with a deprecating smile, by every turn
of his figure and change of his face
recommending himself to her, seeking
to please her, asking nothing better
than to serve and help her,suddenly
and supremely that he was a bonnie
lad, that nobody had ever looked at hcr
like that, nor spoken to her like that
before. She stopped and gasped and
put out her hand to him, which was
as unexpected as any other of her
movements. Cousin Peter, she cried,
theres my hand upon it; well be
grand enemies! well be true as auld
Sir Williams sword, that he keepit the
castle of Stirling with, that hangs there
upon the wall. Well fight fair, and
never say an ill word one of the other.
And theres my hand.
She expected nothing but a comrades
grasp; but young Pate of Over-Kellie
had the gracious manners of the old
chivalry, without knowing whence they
came. He stooped low almost to his
knee, and kissed the hand held out to
himan unlooked-for homage which
altogether overwhelmed the rustic
maiden, who was scarcely by her own
nature a lady of romance. And at that
moment the heavy curtain was drawn,
and Mr. Melvilles head put out calling
Peter. The sudden light of a delight-
ful smile shone over the ministers face.
Ah! he said, with a soft laugh, which
was not of ridicule but content. It was
enough, however, to send Jean back to
her window-seat, all one blush, and to
make Peter draw himself up almost
to more than his stature, as very red
and portentously serious he followed,
transported out of all his nervousness
about Sir Walterinto the presence of
the old knight.
Sir Walter sat by the fire, which
smouldered sullenly, as if it felt the
inappropriateness of its presence on a
warm spring day, as the centre of the
scene. But the old master of Kellie
was cold, the blood ran slow in his
veins, and all the fires of living were
as low in him as the dull glow in the
coals. The gown in which he was
enveloped was lined with fur, and
wrapped closely round him; and his
head was so sunk into its soft collar
that the effect of his upward look was
The Heirs of Kellie.
as if a pair of eyes alone looked over
his raised shoulder at the young man
who came in. But there was life in the
look, which contradicted every other
sign of diminished vitality. It seemed
almost to strike at Peter like the flash
of a blade into the air. The steel-like
light quivered, and then suddenly the
old man turned his head away. There
was a pause, and both of his visitors
thought for a moment that the old
knight had fallen asleep or lost con-
sciousness till at last the minister
spoke, half alarmed. He touched with
a finger the wide sleeve of Sir Walters
coat. Here is the young lad, Sir Wal-
ter. Come in bye, Pateshow yourself
and be not blate. What, man! ye
are here in what may be your own
house.
Peter took a step forward into the
room, opposite to the light which fell
full upon him, his somewhat rustic air
lost in the temporary exaltation of his
look; but Sir Walter had returned to
his fire, and looked at him no more.
His voice came out of the fur collar
of his gown, as out of a cave. Ay!
the young lad, say you? And what is
his will, and his errand here ?
Speak to him, man; speak to him!
said the minister, in an undertone.
I have no purpose, Sir Walter, said
Peter; but that ye were thought to
send for me; and meI was very will-
ing to come, as your kinsman, and to
ask how you did.
Ay! said Sir Walter again, as my
kinsman! Blate! I see little sign that
he is blate. Let him speak for himself.
There are plenty of loons in Fife that
will swear themselves my kinsmen,
however they came by the name.~~
Peter was stung by this disdainful
speech. I am no loon, he said, min-
ister, as you well know; and as for
how I got the name, Sir Walter he kens
wed, seeing I am but his second cousin,
when all is done, twice removed.
Ah, so! are you all that? said the
old knight; he raised his head, and
once more Peter felt himself struck as
by a flame. But again the light quiv-
ered. and Sir Walter swerved, and his
head sank among his furs. Then he
89
added, averting his look, What is your
will of me, young man?
Nothing, said Peter. His heart
swelled, a sudden sense of pity moved
him for the desolate old age before him
so lonely, so void of all the charities
and tenderness which ought to encircle
the old. And yet, he said, a remorse-
ful sense of all his own advantages
over this solitary, chilled, and suffering
old man melting his spirit, Sir Walter,
if there was any pleasure I could do
you, for the sake of the drops blood
between us, and because you have none
of your own
Eh! eh! what is that he says?what
is that he says?
Sir, I would fain, fain do you a
pleasure, if that were possible, Peter
said.
It was some time before the old
knight spoke. Gramercy for your
kindness, lad, he said; I have plenty
to do for me all I want. I seek no ser-
vice from the like of you.
Yet it would be given out of a good
heart, Peter said.
These words of manly kindness to the
weak, given with an insistence of which
Peter, blate of nature as the minister
had saidthat is, proudly shy of ex-
pressing emotion, as it is the draw-
back of his countrymen to bewould
not have believed himself capable, made
a curious commotion in the still air of
that chamber, where all was stagnant,
and life and charity were seldom heard.
Sir Walter put out a blanched hand
with a gesture to the minister, calling
him forward, Ye have tutored the lad
what to say.
I would think shame, said Melville,
to try to tutor whats native to a
gentle spirit. And, Sir Walter, you are
more understanding than to believe
what you say.
The old knight dropped his head
again, and was silent once more. Then
he said, without raising his face, with
his eyes fixed on the low red of the
fire, and a voice half buried in his fur
collar, Did I hear ye say Pate ?
His name is Peter
Pate, repeated the old man vaguely.
There was once anotherbut keen,
The Heirs of Kellie.
The Heirs of Kellie.
keen as a hawk, and gallant, and fine
in every limb. Not like that yeoman
from the fields. Take him hence, take
him hence! There is that in the turn
of his head that goes, that goeshe
made a pause, and gave forth a long,
slow breathto my hert!
And again there was silence. Peter
would have stolen away by natural
instinct, but did not dare to break the
deep stillness by a movement, and the
minister stood doubtful, hesitating,
afraid to shorten an interview that
might have important results, yet afraid
at the same time to injure the impres-
sion that had been made.
Ay, Pate, Sir Walter said almost
to himself, Patelike day to night,
like a prince to a churlbut just a turn
of the head, a trick of the voice. EhI
ye are still here? is it a service do ye
think, young man, to spy on the pri-
vacy of one that, kinsman or no kins-
man, is the head of your name? he
raised himself, putting his hand upon
the tablein Fife, he added with a
faint laugh, in Fifesaving the rights
pf my lord. Ay, my lord, thats the
question. Well, sir! I thank ye for
your coming, and dismiss ye from fur-
ther attendance. Master Melville, at
your leisure I will see you again.
The hall was vacant when Peter, with
strange visions through his brain, con-
fused with his own good impulses and
the less kind ones that came hurrying
after, stepped into it again. He did
not know what he had expected or
hoped for, but there was disappoint-
ment and a little offence in his mind.
He was not sure if he had acquitted
himself as a man in this unusual trial
or if he had failed. He was new to all
these strange and conflicting feelings.
The old man in his chamber, the death
in life which Pates animated youth
had never seen before, and the young
lady in the hail, had given to him
equally a great thrill and sensation of
the novel and unknown. Life seemed
to have begun for him to-day.
CHAPTER IV.
In Sir Walters chamber, after that
interview, there were many comings
and goings. Sir John Low, as it was
still the habit to call the curate, came
every day, for the knight, in the many
fluctuations of his mind, had at the
last swayed towards the ritual and
formulas to which he had been accus-
tomed in his youth, and there were con-
solations boldly administered, though
with precaution, by the curate which
the minister, although no further re-
moved than the next parish, would
have esteemed sinful mummeries and
off ences to the truth. Mr. Melville
gave no absolution, which the curate
dispensed with confidence, soothing the
aged gentleman with rites by which
his wavering mind was supported,
though he could not give above half
hi~ attention to them, but sat turning
over and over in his mind the one ques-
tion that occupied him even when the
viaticum was put to his lips. Sir John
came and went, and a silent man from
St. Andrews, with a soberly clad at-
tendant bearing a bag full of papers
and an inkhorn, also came and went,
spending hours in the castle, and called
in ever for a new discussion by the
major-domo, Neil Morison, who shared
all the consultations, to which indeed
his master gave but the same distracted
half attention which he gave to the
rites of the Church. The time had
come to him when he could not fix his
mind to anythingwhether it was those
matters which were pressed upon him
as for his souls weal, or those others
which were in reality the permanent
subjects of his thoughts. Sir Walter,
indeed, amid his dreams and distrac-
tions, which broke everytning with
which he was occupied as an image
reflected in water is broken by every
blowing breeze, was conscious of many
people coming and going, who were
not seen of men. While he pondered
over the disposal of his property, his
sons, to whom it should have gone by
course of nature, came and went fit-
fully, more clearly realized at those
moments when, in his malaise of mind
and body, he became impotent of all
other thoughts, and turned towards
them as of old. Something had brought
them back into the still air of that
The Heirs of Kellie.
death-chamber something which no
one knew of, which the old man him-
self did not understand. It was the
look of young Pate Oliphant, the turn
of his head, something in his voice,
those subtle tokens of kin which come
and go, broken always, like that same
reflection in water, not to be traced,
but thrilling for a moment now and
then through every nerve. That fugi-
tive likeness had not inclined him
towards Peter of Over-Kellie. It had
struck out rather a tone of wrath, of
harsh contrariety and opposition in his
mindwith the impulse to push that
interloper out of his way who dared
to remind him of Pate, his own Pate
of the other times. In his confusion of
mind he did not remember how that
suggestion camehad he dared to speak
of Pate, this stranger who had no
right? He forgot how it came. But
Pate and the others had come back;
they were vaguely about him, always
eluding him when he would have ap-
pealed to thempresent there he felt,
by some secret understanding, known
only to himself and them, which if he
betrayed it would harm them all. And
Sir John, quieting all the vague terrors
in the old mans mind in respect to
deathterrors only half real, too, for
nothing was very real with Sir Walter
mingled other counsels, suggestions
of another name in which there per-
haps was an escape from the confusion
of his soul.
The silent man from St. Andrews
disappeared one dim morning when
the world was all white, stifled in an
easterly haar, after a sitting of an hour
with Sir Walter in his chamberand
that afternoon when the minister of
Carnbee appeared he was informed
that all was nearly over, and that the
old knight, who had hung so long be-
tween life and death, was in the very
act of ending. The curtain was held
back that Mr. Melville might enter;
but as this was at the very moment
when Sir John was bending over the
couch of the sufferer administering
those rites which were sacrilege to the
preacher, Melville solemnly and indig-
nantly withdrew, and stood outside till
91
all should be over. He stood against
the curtain with a stern expression on
his face, his eyes half closed, his lips
sometimes moving. I fear he was
angry that this mummery should be
permitted in a Christian land, and
thought many a harsh word of his
brother, even while he prayed fervently
for the passing soul which these rites
were dismissing in peace. A little
time after Sir John emerged, solemn
too, yet with something of triumph in
his look. He hath gone forth well
provided on his last journey, he said;
his end has been peace. If you call
that peace, Melville could not keep
from saying; I hope his end was also
justice. It was judgment, said the
other priest, walking back as if in a
procession with his little vials; and the
old hail, so large, so empty, its great
windows full of the whitened mist, the
shroud of the haar that covered all
things, looked more desolate, cold, bare,
and empty of life than words could
say.
Before Sir Walter was carried to his
rest in the family vault in Carnbee
kirkyard it was known all over Fife
that Kellie Castle and estates had been
left by his will neither to his sister nor
to the next of kin, but to the head of
the family, my Lord Oliphant, then in
London with King James, and not
likely to put himself to much trouble
in doing honor to the funeral. It is
true that he was the head of the fam-
ily, and also that there existed an
additional link in the fact that Sir
Walter had married his sister. But
the flef of Kellie was one which came
not from the parent house, but was
acquired for his own hand by the origi-
nal holder, the founder of this branch,
so that its bequest to the chief was
no reversion, but a free gift. Lord
Oliphant was not rich; and poor as
had been the state kept by the old
knight in the lingering end of his days,
his inheritance was not one to be de-
spised. The knowledge made a great
sensation in the neighborhood, where
there had been many speculations on
the subject, the claims of Mistress Jean
and of Pate Oliphant having been
92
largely discussed. By some of the
neighbors it had been believed that
Sir Walter had no right to exclude the
heir-at-law; but this had been warmly
disputed by others, who held that the
death of all the immediate members
of his own family left the old knight
a free hand, and that, in the absence
of any legal settlement, he had a right
to do what he liked with his own.
His funeral brought together all the
gentry from that side of Fife, both
gentle and simple indeed, of the East
Neuk, neighbors and tenants, a nu-
merous company. And at this cere-
mony the positions of the two clergymen
were reversed. Sir John of Pitten-
weem was not looked upon with very
favorable eyes in the kingdom, and
his return to the ancient ways, though
it had to be winked at by those who
were aware that authority was no
longer entirely on the side of the Re-
formed Kirk, and that protection was
now extended even to something very
like the odious Masswas much against
him in the opinion of the multitude.
That he had played his cantrips
about the dying man was whispered
from one to another, and that he was
a rank prelatist was universally known.
Maister Melville, that excellent and
sound divine, had now all the say.
There were other strange features in
this funeral which were long remem-
bered. For one thing, there was no-
body to conduct the mourning with
authority. Peter Oliphant stepped for-
ward to follow the coffin, and no one
gainsaid his right to take the place of
chief mourner; but he was modest and
a little backward in marshalling the
others, notwithstanding the support he
received from several of the chief gen-
tlemen present, who acknowledged the
title of the next of kin, even though
it was known that he was not the heir.
But was he not the heir? would not
natural right prevail, though in oppo-
sition to an old mans testament, a
doited old man! These words were
freely spoken even as the long proces-
sion set out upon the heavy country
road, winding dark and silent between
the hedgerows. Was he not a doited
old man? Had not he taken, as some~
body had related, Pate Oliphant for~
his own son Pate, who, poor lad, had
been but a rover, and broken, folk said,.
his fathers heart. And there were
some even who whispered that it was
with the idea that Pate of Over-Kellie
was his own Pate, and to punish that
neer-do-weel, that Sir Walter in his
dotage had left his lands away from
the natural heir. This discussion, how-
ever, was not all or even the most re-
markable part of what occurred. For
at the cross-roads, where the way to~
Carnbee turned off from the highway,
a young gentleman, followed by three
or four retainers, came up almost at
a gallop, with every sign of hard rid-
ing, and in his travelling-dress, and
made an effort to disturb the decorum
of the funeral by forcing his horse into
the line and taking the place next to
the coffin where Pate walked leading
the procession. This incident caused a
pause, and such an interruption of the
solemnity as threw the line of the
mourners into confusion, and turned
the conventional stillness and whis-
pered conversations of the funeral party
into something like a brawl. The new-
comer proclaimed himself the represen--
tative of Lord Oliphant, his son, sent
to render the last honors to his kins-
man, and could only be prevented with
the greatest difficulty from taking his
place forcibly at the head.
This noisy interruption, and the bad
manners of the young gallant, who,
when prevented from taking the place
of Pate, rode on himself and his fol-
lowers at either side of the coffin,
breaking the quiet not only by the
excitement of their appearance but by
the clangor of their ride, and the breach
of all those Scotch decorums which
have always been so rigid in respect
to burial. Brawling at such a moment
was not indeed unheard of, any more
than at other moments, in the temper
of the times. But the depths of the
peaceful country, where no such thing
had been thought of, and where my
Lord Oliphant had neither friend nor
enemy, was displeasing to all. Never-
theless, perhaps, had it not been for
The Heirs of Kellie.
The Heirs of Kellie.
the steady backing of the minister and
one or two of the elder men, the posi-
tion of Pate would have been a dis-
agreeable one; for the sympathies of the
gentry were more with the master of
Oliphant than with the humbler youth,
whose blood they acknowledged, but
whose breeding had been that of a
yeoman rather than of a landed gentle-
man. Pate himself, however, proved
his gentility by a bearing much more
noble than that of the intruder. He
held his place with determination and
without flinching, yielding no step.
And thus they carried old Sir Walter
to his grave.
On the return, however, Pate was
less certain of his right and less sup-
ported. It was the intruder then who
had the upper hand. The elder men
might look coldly upon so irreverent
an assertion of the position; but the
younger ones, who knew, or desired
to know, the master of Oliphant, were
glad to push forward, to claim his ac-
quaintance, and to accompany him back
to Kellie Castle, where at least he had
now the first right to be. Pate felt
himself left behind to the company of
the tenants and the smaller lairds, who,
like himself, were rather patronized
than on an equal footing with the great
proprietors. Mr. Melville made an ef-
fort to draw him into the quiet of the
manse, which would have been safer;
but it was more natural that, indignant
and injured as he felt himself, he
should prefer the sympathy of the
others, who were full of angry sug-
gestion and advice. The young man
had been profoundly disappointed and
cast down by Sir Walters will. It was
the destruction of his brightest hopes;
but it had not occurred to him that the
question was not closed, or that there
might still be a chance of having jus-
tice done him. Now the utterances of
his companions were no longer in whis-
pers. The doited auld man? Was he
indeed a doited auld man? Pate
thought of the heavy look, the dreamy
eye, the sudden kindling like a flame
of Sir Walters brief words and mo-
ments of animation. He shook his
head at first, but afterwards his own
93
mind took fire. It was galling to hear
the voices, already gay, of the others
who clustered round young Oliphant,
and streamed after him, full of pleas-
ure in the excitement of the strangers
arrival, and also in their release from
the gloomy ceremony; he and his
friends came behind, and different
were their tones and their looks.
It is een like the impudence of thae
minions of the court, said one of the
neighbors, that follow the English
fashion, and despise their native ways.
English fashion or no, said another,
right is right. Body and banes! If it
were me, I would have my lord before
the Feifteen before I drew breath.
And let them prove that the old
knight was fit to mak a disposition
Ill tell ye just this, Over-Kellie,
said one of the tenants, raising an ex-
pository hand. I had a word with
Andrew Morison, that is the cousin of
Neil at the castle, and the hired man
of Maister Playfair of St. Andrews,
the writerhim ye ken of. He had a
look within yon closed chamer, at his
maisters call, to bring in the papers.
And Andrew, he says the auld man
was like an auld ghaistthe color o
the pairchment spread out on the table,
and his een dead in his held.
Which was nowise natural, said
another. I hae seen him mysel, when
there was question o a feu or siclike,
that took his pairt, and a free-spoken
man that would hae his argument and
tak his jest like another. Youll no
tell me its the time to test, when a
mans like yon.
If it had been a reasonable testa-
ment
Or like a leal kinsman; now Sir Wal-
ter was aye considered a very honor-
able person when he was in his own
command.
Pate Oliphant, said one of his own
comrades, I would fecht till my last
drop o blood, before I wad yield Kellie
Castle and your auld name to a popin-
jay of an Englished lord.
My auld name, said Pate, holding
his head high, is in no danger, Beaton,
from any man.~~
Oh. ny, ay, cried Beaton, impa
The Scottish Guard of France.
tiently, we all ken your pride. But east us out; and the hot-blooded prov-
Oliphant of Over-Kellie is one thing ince of the South, for all that it had
and Oliphant of Kellie Castle is an- once rebelled against the Black Prince,
other; and Lordl if it were but for this entreated us to stay.
days work With Scotland the case was different.
Cause enough, and reason gude for She had for many hundred years a
feud or fray; but its law and not blood friendship, hardly extinguished until
thats in the question, said another, the middle of the last century, which
A bit of yellow pairchment and a brought woes unnumbered both upon
muckle false seal, and the name of a England and herself, and many times
doited auld man! threatened to overwhelm England
All these speeches and many more altogether. So surely as an English
of the same kind rang in Pates ear expedition went to France, down came
and echoed through and through him the Scots across the border. The
as he rode home, victory of Nevilles Cross was won
when Edward the Third lay before
Calais; the victory of Flodden was won
when Henry the Eighth lay before
Tournay. The story was eternally the
same.
From Macmillans Magazine.
THE SCOTTISH GUARD OF FRANCE.
The friendships of nations, like the
friendships of individuals, are often
so strangely assorted as to admit only
of the paradoxical explanation that
those which differ most in character
work best when yoked together. The
influence of climate and of race does
indeed invincibly assert itself at times
of great moment, as, for instance,
when the Teutonic nations accepted
the Reformation and the Latin nations
rejected it; but such critical occasions
are rare, and even they can only
gradually shake the stability of a
popular sentiment that has endured
for centuries. England as a nation
has not, and rarely has had, a friend;
she is isolated, and the world delights
to impress her isolation upon her.
Once indeed she drew very close to
Holland, so close that, after fighting
her battles for generations, she offered
to make one Republic with her; but the
only results were seven of the fiercest
naval engagements ever known, and
the ousting of the Dutch from their
dominion of the sea. The only Euro-
pean people, who, having passed from
under our rule, conspired to return to
it, were the Gascons at the close of the
Hundred Years War. There can be no
more curious example of the caprices of
national friendship than this. Nor-
mandy and Brittany, nearer to us in
breed, climate, and position, joyfully
If that you will France win,
Then with Scotland first begin.
Nothing could shake the friendship of
France and Scotland; and it was when
France was in her direst need that
Scotland came forward to help her in
her own territory, and for reward
received the high privilege of guarding
the sacred person of the French king.
If we are to believe the legend that
grew up around the sentimental con-
nection between the two countries,
Charles the Fat had a guard of eighty
Scots in the year 886; and Saint Louis,
when he went to the Holy Land, took
with him, according to one authority,
the same number of Scotch gentlemen
to guard him night and day, and called
them Archers of the Body. Charles
the Fifth is said to have added seventy-
five archers to this corps, of which two
were always to be at his side at every
meal. But the true rise of the Scots
Guard must be traced to those darker
days, after the victory of Agincourt
and the irresistible progress of Henry
the Fifth had wrung from France
the Treaty of Troyes and the heritage of
the French crown for an English king.
Already in 1418, four years before
the death of Henry, the Dauphin
Charles had sent ambassadors to the
Court of Scotland to beg for aid; and
it was then decided by the regent,
94
The Scottish Guard of France.
Robert Stewart, Duke of Albany, to
send a considerable force to France,
under his son, Sir John Stewart, Earl
of Buchan, Archibald Douglas, Earl of
Wigton, and Sir John Stewart of
Daruley. Spain provided a fleet of
transports, and in May of the follow-
ing year, a first detachment of four
hundred and fifty men, eluding the
vigilance of the English, landed in
France under Douglas, and was pres-
ently followed by seven thousand more
under Buchan. Yet another division
under John Stewart of Darnicy came
over in January, 1421, and therewith
the Scotch contingent was complete.
It consisted, as usual, of lancers
armored from head to heel, and of
archers who, it was hoped, though in
vain, might vie with their more famous
brethren of England. Moreover they
had learned by painful experience the
tactics of the English, and had to all
intents adopted them as their own.
Their first encounter with the En-
glish a month later was not encourag-
ing, for though they lost but few men,
they left in the hands of the enemy the
whole of their pay, twelve thousand
crowns in gold, which was a blow on a
sensitive point. In a very few weeks,
however, they took their revenge by
defeating the Duke of Clarence at
Beaug~, Clarence himself falling by the
hand of Buchan, and some two thou-
sand English falling by his side. The
victory was really notable, for it
marked the first pause in the long flood
of English triumph since Agincourt.
Charles, the dauphin, was lavish in his
rewards; Buchan was made constable
of France, the highest military office
in the kingdom; the other leaders re-
ceived grants of land, and every captain
some benefit in money or in kind. In
fact, for the moment the French seemed
to have looked upon their troubles as
over; but they were prematurely san-
guine.
The defeat of Clarence brought King
Henry in high wrath into the field, and
French garrisons fell before him like
autumn leaves before the wind. No
quarter was given to Scotch prisoners,
whom he treated as rebels; it was too
95
much to see his work in France undone
by his neighbors in the North, when
their king lay prisoner in his hands.
So while the French were spared, the
Scotch went to the gallows; and this
treatment did not make them less bitter
against the English. But presently
the great warrior was struck down by
his last illness. It was hard for him
to die at thirty-four, having done so
much; but men explained that it was
a judgment for having permitted his
soldiers to violate the Abbey of Saint
Fiacre, the son of an ancient king of
Scotland. What, he said impatiently,
I cant go anywhere without being
bearded by Scotchmen, living or dead!
Had he lived he would have taken his
revenge on this irritating nation; but
in a few weeks he was carried slowly
across France to his last home in
Westminster Abbey, and the Scots
were free to take satisfaction from his
successor, if they could get it.
They rested not long before they
sought it. In July, 1423, Stewart of
Darnicy laid siege to Crevant, and on
the evening of the 31st he was face to
face, across the Yonne, with an English
force under the earl of Salisbury, which
had come to relieve the town. The
situation of the English was critical;
another army was coming up in their
rear, and unless they could force the
passage of the river they were ruined.
In the course of the night they found a
bridge, over which they threw part of
their army, and in the morning the rest
forded the river in their front, waist-
deep, to attack the Scots who were
awaiting them on the other bank. The
turning movement of the party that had
crossed the bridge, and a sally from
the garrison in the rear scared away
the Gascons, Spaniards, and Lombards
who formed part of the French army,
and the Scots were left to fight the
battle alone. They fought it gallantly;
but out-maneuvred and deserted they
had no chance, and were cut to pieces
wbere they stood. Robert Stewart
was wounded and taken, and three
thousand Scots were left dead on the
field. The English army did not ex-
ceed four thousand men.
96
Charles now sent Buchan back to
Scotland to beg reinforcements, and in
the opening days of 1424, ten thousand
Scottish men-at-arms, together with
other troops, arrived at Rochelle under
the command of Douglas. Charles was
in raptures; he made over to Douglas
the Duchy of Touraine; and for a few
months all went merrily, till on the 17th
of August the English met the French
and their Scotch allies under the walls
of Verneuil. The French had twenty
thousand men against twelve thousand
English; but the latter had with them
John Duke of Bedford, Suffolk, Salis-
bury, and old John Talbot. The French
were drawn up in one dense line, with
the Scots men-at-arms dismounted,
after the English fashion, in the centre
under the constable; and cavalry on
each wing. The English centre con-
sisted of four thousand dismounted
men-at-arms, with archers on the
flanks. Bedford brought but ten thou-
sand men into line, two thousand
archers being detached to guard the
horses and baggage. The whole morn-
ing the two armies stood and looked at
each other, until at last, at three in the
afternoon, the French advanced, and
were received by the English with a
mighty shout. The French cavalry
on the wings charged, swept round the
rear of the English, fell upon the
baggage, and after capturing some
small quantity of it galloped away,
making sure that the victory was won.
But meanwhile the dismounted men,
Scotch and English, had met, and were
fighting desperately. For a moment the
English gave way before overwhelming
numbers, but they recovered them-
selves, and presently the archers,
broken for the moment by the cavalry,
rallied, while the baggage-guard, re-
leased from all anxiety, hurried up
likewise with loud shouts. Then the
Scots wavered; the English pressing
on broke up the huge battalion, and
all was confusion. The slaughter was
terrible, for the Scots had warned
Bedford before the action that they
would neither give nor receive quarter;
and they certainly received none.
Buchan, Douglas, and his son, were
slain, and five thousand more with
them, and two hundred more men of
rank were taken prisoners. The En-
glish loss did not exceed sixteen hun-
dred. Yerneuil was in fact as brilliant
an action as ever was fought by the
English; it was not till Blenheim that
France received such another defeat at
their hands.
For the present the Scots could do
no more for Charles; and Charles
could do no more for the Scots, except
to appoint them to be his body-guard;
and from the year 1425 it may cer-
tainly be said that the kings of France
were guarded by Scotchmen. It was
not till three years later that King
James the First bound himself by
treaty to send over six thousand more
men-at-arms; and before that time the
relics of the original force had re-
ceived yet another disgraceful beating
from the English at the Battle of the
Herrings. The problem that was set
to them in that action was simple
enough, being no more than the capture
of an ill-guarded convoy; but the Scotch
and the French could not agree as to
the method of attack. The former
wished to fight on foot, and the latter on
horseback. Finally each party at-
tacked in its own style, with the result
that the Scotch were very roughly
handled by the English archers while
the French rode out of range, and that
the convoy made its way triumphantly
with its Lenten victuals to the trenches
round Orleans.
Soon after the tide turned, and under
the leadership of Joan of Arc the
Scotch auxiliaries took heavy ven-
geance for their past defeats. It was a
Scotchman, Hamish Poiwart, who
painted her standard; and it was a
body-guard of Scotchmen who escorted
the French king, under her guidance,
to his coronation at Rheims. An old
engraving is still preserved which
shows them striding into the city, bow
and shaft in hand; gigantic men, a
head and shoulders taller than any
Frenchman, but all bearing the white
cross of France on their breasts, and
round the hem of their breastplates
the name of their master Charles. Dur
The Scottish Guard of France.
ing the next fifteen years they were
incessantly engaged against their old
enemies, until in 1444, a truce was
made, and the English, reduced to ex-
haustion by a task beyond their
strength, took their last breathing-
space before their final expulsion from
France.
Charles turned the time of peace to
good account. Hitherto English tactics
and organization had been far superior
to French; but France now shot ahead,
and laid the foundation of her stand-
ing army by the establishment of her
Compagnies dOrdonnance. Of these
the first two were composed entirely of
Scots and were named respectively the
Scotch Company of the Kings Body-
guard, and the Scotch Men-at-arms.
Thus early were the North Britons in-
stalled in the place which they held for
three centuries and more, the senior
corps, both of Guards and of Gendarme-
rie, in the French army. The rank
was high and the service was honorable;
the whole company of men-at-arms had
the grade of gentlemen; they were well
paid and sumptuously dressed, and the
flower of the youth of Scotland flocked
willingly to the French standard.
Every man-at-arms had the right to
keep a squire, a valet, a page, and two
servants, the first three of which places
were filled by young apprentices who
could all hope to rise from rank to rank
until they reached the highest. Stuarts,
Murrays, Douglases, Spens, Cunning-
hams, Crawfords, Ramsays, and a score
more of great names filled the muster-
rolls; and some of them, strangely dis-
torted, may still be read in the lists
collected in these days by patriotic
countrymen.
The brief truce of 1444 was soon
broken, and the Scots at liberty to do
their worst against the English. Gas-
cony, as has been said, would have
clung to England, so a Scotch captain,
Robert Patillock, was sent to reduce
it to the French allegiance,as strange
an incongruity as can be found in his-
tory. The feeble Somerset, whose
avarice had done more to destroy En-
glish dominion in France even than
French military reform, sought to gain
LIVING AGE. VOL. x. 475
97
the Scots by bribery, but succeeded only
in enticing one Robert Campbell to a
traitors death. France, except Calais,
was lost to England, and the Scotch
companies were now to fight against
new enemies.
A few years later, in 1461, Charles
the Seventh died, amid the loud lam-
entation of his faithful Scots, and
there came on the scene the man whom
the genius of Walter Scott has identified
forever with the Scotch Guard, King
Louis the Eleventh, with the leaden
Virgin in his hat. The turbulent
French nobles, headed by Charles of
Charolais, soon to be known as Charles
the Bold, at once turned against him~
and at Montlh~ry the two parties met to
decide the issue by force of arms. Louis,
alive, as few soldiers of the day were, to
the value of rapid movement, allowed
no time for his army to be concentrated,
but pressed on with a handful of
men, his Guards and two thousand
cavalry, and meeting the Burgun-
dians attacked them without hesitation.
His assault was so impetuous that he
routed the enemys vanguard, which
was ill-ordered and undisciplined.
But the bulk of the Burgundians were
still undamaged, and Louis was so hard
pressed that but for the devotion of the
Scotch Guard he would not have saved
the day. When night came he still
held his position, but each side was
under the impression that it had gained
the victory; and the Scotch Guards
finally carried him back in their arms
to the castle of Montlh6ry, where they
closed the engagement by beating off a
detachment of the enemys cavalry and
severely wounding Charles himself.
Three years later, at the siege of
Liege, a sally by the townsmen brought
Louis into still greater peril of his life,
and put his Guard still more to the
proof in defence of his person. True to
their charge, they took their stand in
the house where he lay, and refused
to budge an inch, showering arrows in
the confusion impartially on friend and
foe, but at all events sweeping the
whole turmoil away. Louis then
formed a fresh company of Guardsmen,
to which none were admitted but gentle-
The Scottish Guard of France.
98
men of good family, and so gathered
yet another hundred Scots around
him. In the days of an old age sour
and suspicious even beyond those of his
prime, the Scottish Guards seem to
have been the one body that he regarded
with something approaching to con-
fidence; and it was to them that on his
deathbed he entrusted the care of his
son Charles.
With him they began a new career
of adventure; and the country in which
the English had made, through Hawk-
wood, an undying name, looked for the
first time, not without amazement, on
the Guard that escorted the French king
through Florence and Rome. The
Swiss, with their military dignity and
astonishing order, were the force that
most impressed the men, but the Scots
in their white jerkins covered with gold
embroidery, setting off their stately
appearance and their gigantic stature,
conquered men and women alike; and
many a tender glance, if we are to
believe a rhyming French chronicle,
was thrown at them as they rode
through the streets of Rome. Each
mans a giant, big as an elephant, bold
and triumphant; God save them allI
such were the whispers that passed,
according to our authority, from lip to
lip of the Roman ladies, and we cannot
doubt but that they were received with
becoming condescension by the Gentle-
men of the Guard.
Then, after the idle time of display,
came that of serious business. At
Fornovo, during the first retreat from
Italy, a hundred of the Scottish Guard
stood shoulder to shoulder against a
charge of Italian men-at-arms, after
a fashion not expected of archers
taken at such disadvantage, and did
great execution with their swords,
though in saving the king they left a
tenth of their number dead on the
ground. But Charles had endeared
himself most singularly to his Scotch
archers; so much so that one actually
died of grief at his death.
After him came Louis the Twelfth,
who carried on the enterprise against
Italy as vigorously as his predecessor
and showed a particular predilection
for the Scots, who served him, volun-
teers as well as Guards, with more
devotion than success, and in the person
of Marshal Stuart dAubigny earned
grateful recognition in the chronicles of
Brant6me. The Guard was more
fortunate than its chivalrous country-
men. It helped to crush the power
of Yenice at Agnadel in 1509, and did
most notable service against the Span-
ish at Ravenna in 1512. At the latter
action the French infantry, lands-
knechts for the most part, had been
pretty well beaten by the artillery and
musketry of the Spaniards, when two
hundred of the Scottish archers came
up, armed with axes, and fell on with
such fury that they beat the Spaniards
back and captured their most brilliant
soldier, the Marquis Pescayra himself.
So excellent indeed was the service
done by the Scottish auxiliaries that
Louis in 1513 granted letters of den-
izenation to the Scottish people at large,
and drew the bond that united the two
nations closer than ever.
Shortly after the Guard was engaged
in the terrible two days battle of the
French against the revolted Swiss at
Marignano, where they behaved so
gallantly that a French historian,
Joachim du Bellay, vowed he would
make the world ring with their fame.
Then, ten years later, they learned
at Pavia the meaning of a great defeat,
and for the first time failed, in spite of
all possible bravery, to save their
sovereign in the time of need. Pes-
cayra, the same man who had surren-
dered to them at Ravenna, had been
carefully studying the tactics of
musketry in the interval, and had taught
the Spanish arquebusiers how to main~
tam a continuous fire which could not
only annihilate columns of pikemen,
but overthrow the chivalry of France
as efficiently as the archers of Crecy
had overthrown it. So Francis, his
armor dinted in a score of places by
bullets, was taken prisoner in spite of
the body-guard, after the heaviest
defeat suffered by the French since
Agincourt. The Scotch enjoy the
credit of having been cut to pieces
around him; but the muster-rolls show
The Scottish Guard of France.
The Scottish Guard of France. 99
that, how many soever may have been leader of the Huguenots, and after
wounded, but few were killed, so the inflicting a severe defeat on the
legend must unfortunately be aban- Catholics at Orthez, was finally cap-
doned. tured, after a gallant defence of a be-
We come next to the strangest sieged town, and beheaded in Paris.
tragedy in the history of the Scottish His career was emblematic of much
Guards, the death of a king of France that went forward in the sixteenth
by the hand of one of them. The century. Religious differences, with
long wars of France and the Empire two sucb persons as Mary Stuart and
had for the moment ceased with the John Knox to represent opposing
peace of Chateau Cambr~sis, and the parties, were fast undermining the old
king, Henry the Second, was celebrat- friendship of France and Scotland.
ing the weddings of his sister and Scotch Catholics fled to France, and
daughter with the usual amusement French Huguenots took refuge in
of jousts. He ran two courses against England, and England had consider-
the Duke of Savoy and the Duke of ably the best of the exchange. Henry
Guise with much skill, for he was one the Third even refused to take a
of the best horsemen in his kingdom; Scotch company of men-at-arms, which
and then in an unlucky moment he had volunteered to serve him, into his
called on Gabriel Montgomery, son of pay. England, in fact, was growing
the captain of the Scottish Guard, too strong to be lightly offended, and.
and himself second in command, to the Scotch alliance, since it did not
break yet another lance with him. bind the whole nation, was no longer
Montgomery, a big, powerful young of value. Henry the Fourth was a.
fellow, was not very eager; but he man far more to the taste of Scotland
obeyed, and struck the king so roughly at large; the old allies helped him to
with his lance as almost to thrust him gain his throne, and the Guard, honored
out of the saddle. Irritated by his by him as by every sovereign, escorted
failure, Henry challenged him to run him to his coronation.
again. Montgomery refused point- So for a short time the ancient
blank, and when pressed offered every friendship was revived and refreshed
excuse that he could find; the queen by tactful compliments from Henry,
also twice endeavored to dissuade the who gave to all Scots resident in
king, but in vain. He bade Mont- France greater advantages than they
gomery on his allegiance to mount, and had ever enjoyed, and to the Guards
the course was run. Both lances were in particular his own special protec-
shivered, but the broken shaft in tion. But the play was by this time
Montgomerys hand flew up, and played out. England and Scotland
forcing open the visor of his helmet were now united under one crown,
drove a splinter deep into the kings and the French began to complain~
head above the right eye. Henry that the recruits for the Guard were
dropped his reins and reeled over his not Scotch, but English; and though
horses neck, but, on being lifted from there had been in the past English
the saddle, said that it was nothing, companies in the French service, and
and that Montgomery was not to were yet to be regiments, Royal-
blame. The wound was, however, Anglais and others, yet the truc~
fatal, and in a fortnight he was dead. Englishman preferred as a rule to fight
against rather than for France, while
Quem Mars non rapuit, Martis imago Frenchmen, on their part, liked th&
rapit, English better as enemies than aa
wrote the French court-poet of the friends. The Scotch Guard rapidly
day, without noticing the really tragic ceased to be Scotch in anything but
point in the incident. Gabriel, poor name. As early as 1612 the corps pre-
man, also came to a bad end, for he sented a petition of complaint that two-
embraced Protestantism, became a thirds of its numbers were French,
100
and that its old privileges were dis-
appearing. James the First took up
their cause in England, and endeavored
to reinstate them, not without a certain
measure of success; but the heart of
the matter, the old alliance of France
and Scotland, was gone, and nothing
but the empty husk remained. There
was still the old division of twenty-five
Archers of the Body, and seventy-five
Archers of the Guard; but French
names became ever more frequent, and
Scotch names rarer on the muster-rolls.
The outward change came more
swiftly in the senior corps of archers
than in that of the men-at-arms. The
last Scotch captain of the former was
appropriately enough the Gabriel Mont-
gomery who had been the death of
Henry the Second; and his reign ceased
in 1557 the very year, singular to say,
when the first Scotch covenant was
signed in Edinburgh, and but one year
before the final expulsion of the English
from Calais. The coincidence is nota-
ble, for from the moment that the
Scotch ceased to be a united nation the
old alliance began to wane. The men-
at-arms enjoyed a Scotch chief for some
time longer. To all intent the corps
was an appanage of the Stuarts of
Aubigny, James Hamilton, Earl of
Arran, furnishing in 1515 the one break
during a century and a half of the
eternal recurrence of the same name.
But the list of the last five captains is
curious. In 1567 James the Sixth of
Scotland was appointed at the request
of his mother Mary; in 1601 Henry,
afterwards Prince of Wales, succeeded
him; and in 1620 Charles, Prince of
Wales, followed his brother. Then
came a captain who brought in a new
name, George Gordon, Earl of Enzie,
afterwards second Marquis of Huntly.
He actually took command of them,
and served with great distinction
against the Austrians in Lorraine and
Alsace; fighting indeed for the French
king more resolutely than he ever
fought for his own sovereign, though
he ended his career on the scaffold
through the tender mercies of his
brother-in-law Argyll. Finally, in 1645,
the year of Naseby, came James, Duke
of York, who fittingly closed the reign
of the Stuarts alike over the Scotch
men-at-arms and the kingdom of Great
Britain. Thus of the five captains three
were heirs-apparent to the crown of
England, three actually ascended the
throne, and two, as if to make a
parallel with Gabriel Montgomery of
the archers, fell by the headsmans
axe.
In 1667 Louis the Fourteenth took
the command to himself; and in this
very same year there was added to the
French service a new corps of English
men-at-arms, which took rank after
their brethren of Scotland. It was coni-
posed of a medley of English, Scotch,
and Irish Catholics brought over by a
Hamilton of the house of Abercorri.
Louis drafted the Scotchmen into the
corps of their compatriots, and erected
the remainder into the English Com-
pany already named, with himself for
captain and Hamilton for lieutenant.
The new men-at-arms wore, like so
many of the French regiments, a uni-
form of scarlet, which had been adopted
twenty years before by the English,
while their Scottish comrades wore
blue. Both bodies saw plenty of active
service, the Scotch meeting the English
at Dunkirk Dunes, and the English at
Namur, Steinkirk, and Maiplaquet.
But, as with the archers, both soon
became French in everything but name,
and in 1788 they were disbanded.
Minden was the last battle-field of the
Scotch men-at-arms, so that they were
unlucky in their final exit from active
service.
The senior corps, the original archers,
likewise perished in the Revolution,
though it was galvanized into a false
resurrection after Waterloo, and
actually endured until 1830. Though
it had long lost its natural character, it
jealously retained until the crash of
1789 all its curious old privileges, which,
though they led to constant wrangles
with other regiments, had been duly
allowed by Louis the Fourteenth. He
was actually obliged to intervene at his
own wedding to compose a dispute as
to the precedence of the Scots Guards
and the Cent Gentlishommes. Proud
The Scottish Guard of France.
The Scottish Guard of France.
as a Scotchman was an old proverb
in France, and their successors in the
body-guard did their best to justify it.
But the most curious survival, long
after a word of Scotch had been heard
in the corps, was the practice of
answering hamir (a corruption for I am
here) when the roll was called, which
was religiously maintained, at all
events, down to the Revolution.
In truth one has only to look at an
old French Army List to appreciate the
extreme conservatism of that nation,
at any rate in military matters, before
1789. One such list, included in a col-
lection of the forces of Europe, which
was prepared by Captain Lloyd in 1761,
is now lying before the writer. At the
head of all come the Household troops,
led of course by the Scotch, then the
Gendarmerie, again led by the Scotch,
and immediately followed by the En-
glish. In the Horse are the Royal
Strangers, and Dauphins Strangers,
Royal Croatia, Royal Piedmont, Royal
Germany, Royal Poland; in the Guards,
the Swiss; in the Line nine regiments
called Swiss, five called, and probably
rightly, Irish, two German, a Royal
Italian, a Royal Bavarian, and a Royal
Corsican; and all this at the close of the
Seven Years War. Further. it is
particularly noted that certain Royal
Scots, then in the French service,
took precedence by Ordinance of 1670
as the twelfth regiment of the French
line. If it be asked where they are now,
we have only to turn back a few pages
to the list of the British army, and there
we shall find them as we know them
still, at the head of the English line.
It does not fall to the lot of every regi-
ment to have been called Royal in two
distinct and bitterly hostile armies; but
here there is, in the heart of us, a
living record of the transition from
Scotland and France against England,
to England and Scotland against
France.
The sight suggests curious reflections,
when one thinks of the cost paid to
make Royal Ecossais into Royal Scots.
To go no further back than the thir-
teenth century, the list of battles is
terribly long: Dunbar in 1296, Cam-
buskenneth, Falkirk (after which Ed-
ward tried to accomplish the union four
hundred years before his timei,
Bannockburn, Halidon Hill, Nevills
Cross, Homildon Hill, then passing
across the Channel, Beaug~, Crevant,
Yerneuil, Patay,all of them Scotch
actions, and a hundred minor engage-
ments equally Scotch, Flodden, Sol-
way Moss, Pinkie, Leith, Haddington,
Newliurn, Preston, Dunbar, to say
nothing of border-raids beyond name or
number. And all this, and a great deal
more, was needed to unite under one
government a country of one race and
one language, divided by an arbitrary
boundary, and kept apart mainly by
their opposing relations with France.
England wasted incalculable strength
in her mad endeavor to annex the
territory of her powerful neighbor Lo
the South, and just when she seemed to
have gained her end the Scotch stepped
in and spoiled all. The incident was
unpleasant at the -time, but it was the
best service that they could have done
to us, and equally to France. It en-
couraged them, however, on a wrong
path, for their true way lay with En-
gland; and it is significant that though
Scotchmen were happy enough in
France, Frenchmen were much the
reverse of happy in Scotland. But for
the unlucky chance that set such a race
as the Stuarts on the throne of England
it is possible that Scotch influence
might have done something in promot-
ing friendship between United Britain
and France; and even as things are, it
mayperhaps be pleasant for Frenchmen
to remember that the most sturdy of
those colonists who have fretted her
sensitive soul by eternally hoisting the
Union Jack in new places are generally
of the same race as those who delivered
France from the English, and gave to
her army the first of all its regiments
and to her kings the most faithful guard
that ever saved a crown.
101
In the Land of the Northernmost Eskimo.
From The Fortnightly Review.
IN THE LAND OF THE NORTHERNMOST
ESKIMO.
As a member of the second Peary
expedition I had, in the spring of 1894,
an opportunity of undertaking a sledge
journey Eskimo fashion, from the win-
ter quarters of the expedition in Ingle-
held Gulf to the untrodden shores of
Melville Bay. The journey, which was
the only long excursion on this expe-
dition, was in many respects executed
so simply and so effectively, and re-
sulted in geographical discoveries of
such importance, that I venture to
think a description thereof will interest
even persons outside Arctic circles.
At the commencement of April I be-
gan the necessary preparations, which,
for more reasons than one, were both
few and simple. As regards meat, I
had to rely solely on my luck as a
hunter, and it was therefore necessary
for me to secure a good native com-
panion and fellow sportsman, which I
found in my friend Kolotengva. Kolo-
tengva is Ii young Eskimo of about five-
and-twenty years of age, low of stature
but well knit, with sinews of steel, and
quite incredible muscular strength.
His eyes are small, but he sees with
them objects far beyond the vision of
ordinary mortals. His long black hair
is by nature slightly curled, and forms
a rather handsome frame around a
daring and regular face. As a hunter
h- has no equalhe reminds me in
many respects of Fenimore Coopers
Indian chiefs. Nobody in the whole
tribe could be prouder than Kolotengva,
nobody more free and independent, no-
body cooler in the hour of danger, or
more astute during the huntin fact,
he was a hero. And with him as com-
panion I knew I should pull through.
Our equipment was otherwise simple
enough. Of instruments we had a the-
odolite, a thermometer, a chronometer,
a compass, binocular, snow spectacles,
charts, scientific tables, etc.; and of
food, a little tea, sugar, pea flour, ships
bread, and bacon. In addition, two
rifles, fifty cartridges, a small lamp of
stone for cooking with seal oil, as there
was neither spirits nor paraffin oil to
spare then, some reindeer skins, an
axe, and a few extra pairs of socks
and leggings. Of dogs I succeeded in
borrowing or bartering eight, whilst
our sledge was made by Kolotengva
and myself just before our start, on
native model, with runners shod with
polished bone.
On the morning of April 6th every-
thing was ready for the start, and al-
though the weather was a little doubt-
ful, with overcast sky, and the air
threateningly mild (zero Fah.), we
set off in the forenoon. Between the
dark, almost perpendicular mountains
out in the fjord the fog hung heavy
and leaden, and further in, near our
winter quarters, a keen, cutting north-
easter swept the hills and the ice. We
took it in turns to sit on the sledge
whilst one ran behind holding to the
stand-up steering arms. At racing
pace we sped across the ice covered
with hard, frozen snow, whilst the
weather cleared. The sun does not
rise high in the sky so early in the
spring in these latitudes, so that we
did not derive any warmth from it, but,
on the other hand, it remained up so
long that we had no cause for com-
plaint. And a long day we needed, for
the distance to the nearest Eskimo
colony was a stiff one, i.e., close upon
seventy miles, and people we must
reach that day, as our supper depended
on native hospitality.
It was just midnight, with a faint
twilight, when we reached the south-
east cape of Herbert Island, where our
friends dwelt. The spot was called
Oloschynni, and the colony consisted
of five stone huts, of which only two
were then occupied. Here we found
one of the most famous bear hunters
of the tribe, Nordingjer, who had just
returned from several weeks hunting
south, at Cape York. The bears had
treated him badly this time, two of his
best trained dogs having been killed.
and he himself nearly sharing the same
fate, to which his clawed-up arm, cov-
ered with fur rags, bore witness. Sur-
gery is only but little understood by
these people; on the other hand, nature
comes to their aid very powerfully,
102
In the Land of the Northernmost Eskimo.
healing quickly broken bones and
wounds which in other climates would
require weeks.
- The poor m.an was now seated on his
couch, naked, chanting mystic incan-
tations to hidden spirits in order to
accelerate the healing of the wound.
Fortunately it was healing fast. Be-
fore going to rest we had an excellent
supper of polar bears meat, boiled
bacon, and ships bread. The first was
frozen, and tasted like melon, at least
that is my own personal impression,
though it may not be corroborated by
others. All the night through two
charming old ladies were engaged in
sewing me a pair of new seal kamik-
ker, as the Eskimo would on no ac-
count permit me to start on our long
journey in my old top-boots, in which
the toes showed a dangerous tendency
to come through. For this work I pre-
sented them with a fork, two prongs
of which were gone, and five-and-thirty
matches.
The next morning there was a thick
fog, and as our way lay right across
the mouth of Whale Sound to some
huts on its southern side, I was at first
of opinion that we would have to await
clearer weather before being able to
set out, as no compass course could be
shaped by the chart which here, as
everywhere else, proved utterly incor-
rect, and we might have been poking
about at the south side of the sound
if we got a bit astray. But Kolotengva
only smiled quietly at my suggestions,
and opined that it was hard upon him
to be accused of not knowing the way
in his own country, even in a fog, and
my confidence in him as one of natures
children being unbounded, we set out
forthwith for Netchilumi, the next in-
habited spot.
For many hours we sledged through
the thick fog, so thick, in fact, that we
could hardly see the dogs in front of
us, but in spite of this Kolotengva suc-
ceeded in reaching our destination in
a direct line! Some will at once say
that he was led by animal instinct;
but no, I shall not insult my Eskimo
friends by endorsing that view. Nay,
alike in the main among all wild tribes,
and the man only performed what his
splendid practical geometrical faculties
suggested to him. For the direction of
the wind along these shores is generally
most remarkably uniform, and if it be
a little strong, it will cause the loose
fine snow to drift like desert sand.
And during this action every tiny speck
of snow will shift according to the same
physical laws, and shape themselves
during their progress into various forms
and figures with such regularity that
long parallel streaks are formed on the
surface of the snow. Now, by observ-
ing that the angle between these streaks
and the line of march to be followed
always remains the same, there is not
much difficulty in steadily maintaining
the same course; and it was this
method Kolotengva followed. During
our march across the Greenland inland
ice in 1892, Lieutenant Peary and I be-
came accustomed in thick weather to
follow the same wind indications, and
the traces of them up in these storm
realms are far more pronounced and
characteristic than further south. In-
deed, often the surface of the snow
resembles a sea in violent motion sud-
denly arrested and turned into a cold,
still ocean of snow.
Towards evening we arrived at Net-
chilumi, where we were most heartily
welcomed by the settlers, and took up
our abode in the hut of the oldest
hunter, Terrikotti. With him we spent
an enjoyable evening.
His good old woman fried bacon and
made tea for us without wanting any
particular instructions, whilst Kolo-
tengva chanted weird incantations in
the dim light afforded by the train-oil
lamp, and the master of the hut and
his visitors listened to a little im-
promptu geography, aided by a polar
chart and a blown-out bladder where-
with to explain the globular theory of
the earth. But when we came to the
consequences of the latter assertion,
viz., that people in the two hemispheres
walk feet to feet, the teaching came to
an end. Nobody was able to follow
these wild flights of fancy. In vain I
the human brain seems pretty much demonstrated the attraction of the earth
103
104
with the aid of dropping objects, when
suddenly the half-grown son seemed
to catch a glimmer of light. His tongue
was Loosened, and he began to rattle
away to his countrymen in their curi-
ous, guttural tongue. What he said I
was unable to catch, but at the end of
his discourse every one seemed con-
vinced of the new theory.
The next day the fog was thicker
than ever, and as at the same time
there blew a strong southerly gale, we
had to remain weather-bound till the
following morning. In the mean time
we collected some minerals, and set
four women to sew us new breeches
of young, strong bear skin. This was
a fresh addition to our wardrobe, and
with the Kamikker, transformed me
into a veritable north Greenland
dude. The following morning, as
stated, we were again able to start.
The weather was then cracking cold,
with a clear sun. To our delight our
host when we were about to start in-
formed us that he would accompany
us as far as Cape York, a distance of
about one hundred and seventy-five
miles, as he had business there. His
son had the previous autumn left his
Kajak down there, and this the old
man now intended to fetch before the
ice broke up. His journey, moreover,
was prompted by the unexpected op-
portunity now presenting itself of hav-
ing the company of a Kablunachsuak
(white man), and enjoying the dainties
flowing therefrom, such as bacon rinds
and other remnants of his feasts. Ter-
rikotti took his wife with him, too,
looking upon the journey of three hun-
dred and fifty miles in the depth of
winter as rather a pleasure or recrea-
tion trip than anything else. He had
with him seven splendid strong dogs,
which careered magnificently acros.s
the ice, and they were, as is generally
the case with these animals, so beau-
tifully trained that a shout only from
their master was sufficient to make
them run either right or left, stop dead
or increase speed, watch for seal, or
sniff the hard snow for bear tracks.
The journey certainly became both
more interesting and lively by this un
In the Land of the Northernmost Eskimo.
expected addition to our party. They
followed all their old customs and
modes of travelling, and revealed many
of their forms of worship and supersti-
tions, looking upon the Kabluna as
one of themselves.
In the course of the day we passed
round a ness running into Whale Sound
and Boat Inlet, halted at Cape Parry,
then surrounded with open water, and
having to make a detour inland, reached
an altitude of about a thousand feet.
At this elevation the weather condi-
tions were, no doubt on account of the
proximity of the sea, so entirely differ-
ent from those at a lower level, that
we could hardly make any progress
against the blinding snow and fog, and
the cutting winds which seem.ed quite
to scorch our faces. But it did not last
long, for soon we were past the highest
point of the snow hill covering the
plateau-shaped ness; we got the wind
with us, and rushing at great speed
down through a narrow gulch, we again
emerged among the sun-bathed glaciers
and icebergs. But far beyond the glit-
tering icebergs and the immense ocean
of snow-covered ice utterly void of life,
we beheld the dark blue ocean, inde-
scribably lovely and fascinating, here
and there glittering and shining where
the sun rays were reflected from the
long foam crested swell.
What effect that sight had upon one
who had passed six months in semi-
darkness in these dreary ice-bound sur-
roundings, and with a badly suppressed
home longing at heart, I must leave
to the readers imagination. Memories
of the far-off sea-girt fatherland rushed
upon me, and threw me into a dreamy
melancholy state, most undesirable for
the work in hand. As I halted and
stood gazing out towards the blue
horizon my followers inquired what I
was looking for, but only badly could
I explain what I thought and felt.
Nevertheless these sensitive people,
children of the ice and snow, quite
gathered my meaning, and the old man
exclaimed several times in a sympa-
thetic undertone ayonai, ayonai (how
sad, how sad).
On coming down from our land jour-
In the Land of the Northernmost Eskimo.
ney we continued along the rather low,
flat shores of Booth Inlet, passing the
remarkable Fitz Clarence Rock, a little
island rising in terraces to a height of
about a thousand feet. During thou-
sands of years wet, ice, and storm have
gradually eroded the rock, and the
blocks thrown down have fallen with
such regularity around the whole
island that it rises above the flat ice
fields like an enormous black cone, out
of which the solid central part with
perpendicular sides stands forth.
Just below this weird looking island
we had again to seek the mainland,
as the ice during the equinoctial gales
a few weeks before had broken up and
drifted into the partly open Baffins
Bay. Fortunately the land here, whilst
lofty south and north, was compara-
tively level, so that we could continue
our journey without difficulty, although
the sharp stones projecting through the
snow here and there ripped the sledges
unpleasantly.
A little after noon we came upon
fresh reindeer tracks, and there must
have been quite a herd of them; there
were spoors in all directions. We had
no meat for supper, nor any for our
hungry dogs, so it would be a godsend
to obtain an animal or two. The na-
tives were nearly mad with excitement
and proposed to set off in pursuit at
once. I let them have a rifle each
whilst I went to examine some white
quartz-like rocks in the vicinity. Ter-
rikottis wife was left behind to look
after the dogs, which, in some circum-
stances, cannot be left alone, as when
these half-tamed wolves get the scent
of game nothing can stop them.
Ten minutes had barely gone by be-
fore I heard a rifle shot close at hand,
and presently Kolotengvas little square
figure appeared on a ridge, calling to
us to bring the sledges up. This was
but the work of a few moments, and
we beheld a great reindeer cow lying
dead on the snow. A meal followed,
in which four human beings and fifteen
dogs participated without distinction,
only that we human beings seized the
tit-bits. We saved, however, a fine
piece of steak for supper, with the rein-
deer belly, which the two Arctics had
not the heart to leave behind, for it is
their greatest delicacy.
We did not travel much farther that
day, having sledged without a break
for thirteen hours, so we halted at
about seven oclock on the north side
of Whalstenholme Sound, where we
built a cosy little snow hut in a suit-
able, well-sheltered drift. It was con-
structed in the usual Eskimo fashion,
of large blocks cut out of the snow-
drift, put together so as to form a solid
cupola over the space below, sufficient
to hold us all. The dogs always sleep
in the open, winter as well as summer,
and in all kinds of weather. They
were, therefore, simply tied to Kolo-
tengva~s walrus lance, rammed into
the ground just outside the hut. We
will now peep inside, all fissures in
roof and walls having been closed with
snow, and the lamps lighted. To get
in it is necessary to crawl through the
little hole on the lee side, and when
of the Caucasian race, great care has
to be exercised not to wreck the proud
structure, as the opening is only in~
tended for tiny Eskimo bodies. Inside
a comparatively high temperature pie-
vails, which causes the snow in the
roof to melt, whereby the structure is
strengthened, as the blocks then sink
a little, freeze together, and form on
the inside a hard polished dome of ice.
The water thus formed by degrees
trickles slowly down the walls of the
hut towards the floor, forming the
most beautiful glittering ice - taps.
However, at night, when cooking is
over, the melting ceases, as the
lamps then only burn with a faint
flame.
But as we enter the cooking is in full
swing, and under the little stone ves-
sels the flames are made as long as
the saucer-shaped lamps with moss
wicks and blubber will allow. On the
raised platform at the back of the hut
I and Kolotengva are installed, whilst
opposite reside the old man and his
woman. All of us are airily dressed,
as it would of course be absurd to
sleep in the stiff wet garments when
there is an opportunity of throwing
105
106
them off and crawling into soft warm
reindeer skins instead.
The old woman mostly sees to the
cooking, and in order to ascertain
whether the water for the tea is get-
ting warm, she now and again puts
her hand flat into it, a manner of tak-
ing boiling temperature which I at
first have great difficulty in reconciling
myself to, but by philosophically argu-
ing the point with myself, I come to
the conclusion that it is no worse than
the handling of the meat we are to eat,
and I reconcile myself to my fate.
The next morning the weather con-
tinued gloriously fine, and at half past
seven we were again off. Our road
now lay right across the broad Whals-
tenholme Sound. Saunders Island, sit-
uated about midway, we had intended
to pass to the west, as this route was
the shortest; but on reaching the west-
ern point of the island we were arrested
by open water, and had to proceed east-
ward in order to reach the inner side.
We did, however, not omit first to try
the new steel-like ice just below the
lofty mountain walls rising to a height
of over two thousand feet, in order
perhaps to save the long detour, but
it was no good. The ice was too weak,
and I cannot help confessing that I
breathed more freely after the discov-
ery, as my recent experiences on new
ice were anything but pleasant. I may
as well tell the story as we travel.
It was in the first half of February,
just as the cold was severest, that I
was travelling far to the north of our
winter quarters for the purpose of ob-
taining meat for our many dogs, which
were half-starved. I had for com-
panion a native, Kaschu by name, a
lively, amusing fellow; but I must add
he was a thief and a liar of the first
water to boot, under certain exten-
uating circumstances. Here, out cam-
paigning, he was a splendid fellow
indeed. We had left the nearest colony
at five in the morning in brilliant moon-
shine, and had for hours, with twelve
dogs, been speeding out towards the
broad Smiths Sound, in order to reach
new ice, where the walrus love to romp
in winter time. When about twenty
miles distant from the coast, we halted,
tied the dogs to hummocks, and pro-
ceeded on foot a couple of miles farther
out, watching for walrus, as these ani-
mals are in the habit of thrusting their
big heads through the thin ice in order
to breathe, and it is then that the
Eskimo watches his opportunity of
launching his harpoon into their car-
case, keeping it tied with the line till
the animal is exhausted. A little after
noon we succeeded in killing an enor-
mous she-walrus, a task, however, com-
paratively easy, as we had both harpoon
and rifle, and whilst Kaschu was cut-
ting it up I was to fetch the sledge
and dogs. At a rattling pace we sped
seawards towards him. See him I
could not, although it was only just
after noon, as twilight had already set
in, and only a faint streak in the south
indicated where the long-looked-for sun
was. Suddenly I feel a slight jerk of
the sledge as it speeds silently out upon
the dark violet colored surface of elastic
new ice; I at once conclude that in the
gloaming we have steered right across
a newly frozen clear in the ice, and
although the sledge is already in a
swaying motion, it looks at the mo-
ment as if we might be able to get
safely over without accident. Just
then one of the native sledge runners
cuts through, the pace slackens, and
then almost ceases. The sledge is al-
ready partly under the ice! An icy
bath I knew at once I was to have, so
I slid off the sledge slowly, and gave
at the same time a violent pull at the
steering band, whereby the front part
again reached the ice sheet, and then
began a terrible fight for life as we
slowly splashed through the water to
the other side. The dogs needed no
encouragement to pull now, the keen
animals exerted themselves to their
utmost, understanding quite well that
it was a struggle for life. At one mo-
ment most of them were in the water,
in the next they obtained foothold on
the ice with their sharp claws, but only
again to be immersed in the icy waves.
I shall not enlarge upon the horrors of
the situation and my reflections, but
only add that we reached the solid ice
In the Land of the Northernmost Eskimo.
In the7Land of the Northernmost Eskimo.
at last on the other side of the clear
more than forty feet wide, and that I
was soaked to the arm-pits under a
temperature 400 F. below freezing
point, and no land in sight. I ran out
to my companion in my heavy fur gar-
ments, which already began to be
coated with icicles, and got him to
drive me home at once. The dogs did
their duty in the fine moonlight, and
in four hours we were safely back in
one of the warm earth huts of the
natives. And I suffered no more from
my awful immersion, but forget it I
never shall.
We had, it may be remembered, been
compelled to make a great detour east-
wards to get past Saunders Island on
the inside, and as we passed the east
side of the island we came upon the
tracks of three bears, two old ones and
a young one. It is hardly possible to
form an idea of the excitement pro-
duced upon the Eskimo all ardent
hunters and their semi-savage dogs
under such circumstances. The dogs
pull violently at their leather traces
and scan with raised ears keenly the
snowy wastes, whilst their masters
stop, converse in whispers, listen, scan
the wastes, run a little, stop again,
and then repeat the whole performance
anew. It might be doubted whether
men who so absolutely lose their cool-
ness on coming upon the tracks of
game are really worth anything as
hunters. But the doubt is soon dis-
pelled. The excitement, in fact, tends
to stimulate their intellectual faculties
and keenness, and the spectator is soon
compelled to admire their qualifications
as hunters and sportsmen of a very
high order. In the present case, how-
ever, the hunt was fruitless. We fol-
lowed three bear tracks right and left
across the wide dreary expanse of ice,
until the suns disk, huge and glowing,
touched the snow-white horizon to the
north-west, disappearing presently be-
hind distant icebergs. In vain the
natives scanned the vast white expanse
with my glasses, the remarkable qual-
ities of which they soon learnt to ad-
mire, but no sign of a living thing in
any direction. We had therefore to
107
abandon the quest and resume our
journey along the coast south of the
mouth of the fjord. A little after we
passed Cape Atholl, where the ice be-
gan; being snow free, we could advance
much faster, and at midnight, after
sixteen hours of incessant travelling,
we halted at a spot called Igluduhugni.
During our entire journey the dogs had
gone at a great pace, the bear chase
included, and the distance covered that
day (sixteen hours) was equal to about
a degree of latitude, or no less than
seventy miles.
We had expected to find natives at
this place, but all we could discover
in the gloom of midnight was a long
deserted tumbledown snow hut. liolo-
tengva and I at once set to work to
repair the hut, whilst the old man and
his woman began to dig in the snow
under a huge travelled boulder, main-
taining that they would, according to
an old charitable Eskimo custom, find
seal blubber for the aid of needy trav-
ellers in general. Long and deep they
dug, and blubber there was, sure
enongh, in plenty. The old man cut
up some in bits for the dogs, whilst
the woman prepared other for our
lamps, making the pieces soft by chew-
ing them with her teeth before putting
them on the lamp saucers. In a short
while we were snugly ensconced under
our snow roof, consuming the remains
of our reindeer steak of yesterday,
whilst chatting about the events of the
day. And, indeed, we were on the
point of getting fox steak too for sup-
per that night, as just before we
reached our quarters we enjoyed an
exciting and remarkable chase after a
couple of Arctic Reynards, which only
got away by the skin of their teeth.
The whole affair reminded me much
of an English foxhunt, with the excep-
tion that we chased the foxes on sledges
instead of on horseback; but for ex-
citement and novelty I must accord the
palm to the latter mode of hunting these
vile animals. In the faint rays of the
Arctic midnight sun these little foxes
often tramp long distances across the
silent, icy expanse, in search of the
remnants of feasts by polar bears, dead
108
seal cubs, and the like. It was two
such midnight prowlers we had come
upon. Hardly had the dogs spotted
the two black little dots away in front
of usfor they were so-called blue~
foxesbefore they set off at such a ter-
rific pace that we were just able to
fling ourselves on the sledges and enjoy
the chase too. Away galloped the
foxes; after them raced the dogs. But
we did not gain much upon the vile
beggars, as, of course, the sledges
handicapped the dogs so much that
one fox succeeded in at once escaping,
having astutely enough made for the
shore. The other, however, was just
in front of us, but seemed to be get-
ting away. What then do my worthy
sporting friends, who in the most in-
tense excitement have been watching
the unequal chase, and who now begin
to see a doubtful issue, do? Quick as
thought Kolotengva seizes his knife,
bends forward, and cuts with a single
rapid stroke the trace of the fastest
of our animals, a little lady dog. And,
in an instant, his companion follows
his example. Like arrows shot from a
bow the two animals dart forward.
But one dog appears to gain over tbe
other, and this does not please our
companion at all, so, quick as lightning,
he despatches another grey touzier from
his team, which is immediately followed
by another from our side. Now follow
encouraging shouts to the dogs from
both contesting parties, exactly as in
a north country coursing match, and a
laughing, rattling, shrieking dispute
between the two sledges as to the
merits and chances of their respective
animals. My dog won the match in
securing the little terrified blue fox;
but, alas! artful as ever, Reynard, at
the moment of victory, jumped for
dear life on to the top of a high fiat
iceberg, where our dogs were unable
to follow and our guns to reach it, as
the fox lay down fiat. And thus ended
an exciting foxhunt and coursing match
~ la Eskimo.
The next day the weather was still
magnificent, and at midday the sun
became so warm that here and there
a solitary seal was enticed to come up
In the Land of the .ZVorthernmost Eskimo.
to his breathing hole in the ice in order
to bask in the rays of the sun.
It was midnight again before we
reached Cape York, the last inhabited
spot in our journey; again we had trav-
elled incessantly for sixteen hours, and
covered a distance of fifty miles since
daybreak. At this time only a few
stars of the first magnitude glittered
in the southern heavens, and we wel-
comed the lovely light nights of the
Arctic summer. But I will at once con-
fess that we were in no mood for such
charming and idyllic reflections when
we drove on that night before the stone
huts at Smnaminomen. The glass
stood at 240 F. below zero (560 of frost),
and being famishing like wolves we
felt the cutting night wind and the cold
the more. But the natives at this place
received us with customary Eskimo
hospitality. Sleep and rest were what
we most needed, and after a solid meal
for ourselves and the dogs, we fell im-
mediately asleep, only to awake when
the sun had risen far into the heavens.
Two days (April 13th and 14th) we
remained at the colony to give our dogs
a good rest and to await a change in
the weather, which had now become
stormy. It cannot be denied that we
felt ennui during these days of enforced
idleness, and the North Greenland huts
become rather confined to a European,
however contented and frugal, when
weather-bound for any length of time.
But in the daytime our life was lively
enough, and many were the questions
put and answered on both sides, of the
customs, sagas, and traditions of the
North Greenlanders, as well as of the
far-away southern lands and their
many races, and especially, I venture
to think, the Eskimo gained a good
idea of my own fatherland, Old Nor-
way, with its soughing forests, greea
hillsides, roaring falls, and splendid
climate. I had to describe them all
over and over again. Equally interest-
ing, perhaps, were the musical soirees,
which took place in some hut or an-
other, attended by the entire elite of
the colony. At these charming reunions
the blubber drum or tom-tom was
heard incessantly, whilst hysterical
In the Land of the Northernmost Eskimo.
witches and mystic old men in turns
chanted monotonous half-wailing in-
cantations to spirits supposed to be
hovering about. Some of the so-called
Angekokkes or sorcerers exercise a
most remarkable influence on their lis-
teners, who frequently listen to their
monotonous chants in trembling and
breathless expectancy.
At last, early on the morning of April
15th, we were able to continue our
journey eastward. Kolotengva and I
were now again alone, the old couple
who had accompanied us on the pre-
vious days having remained at Cape
York, the goal of their journey. Our
course now lay straight for the islands
in Melville Bay, whence I hoped to get
a good view of the unknown shores
within, in case ice should prevent my
reaching them. During the morning
we passed Bushmans Island, situated
about twenty miles east of Cape York.
Even before we reached it I became
aware that the coast-land just to the
northward of us formed no part of the
mainland, but consisted, in fact, of two
large islands hitherto unknown. Dur-
ing the afternoon, as we sledged farther
eastwards, we came in sight of enor-
mous glaciers such as I had always
been of opinion existed along the north-
eastern shores of Melville Bay. IndeeO.
I found that practically the whole coast-
line from Cape York eastwards, as far
as the eye could reach, was continually
broken by vast and active glaciers.
At 6 P.M. we halted, having covered
fifty miles, and built our snow hut for
the night. We were then nearly di-
rectly south of Cape Melville, and only
a few miles from the shore. The ice
on which we sledged during the first
part of our journey from Cape York
was very smooth and quite different
from what I had expected. With the
exception of a belt of ice a couple of
miles broad, the surface of which
formed a chaos of irregular edged and
wildly piled up blocks, rising to a height
of from six feet to eight feet, the rest
of our road was perfectly level and
smooth. This I may, perhaps, ascribe
to Kolotengvas intimate knowledge of
ice navigation.
109
Having enjoyed a refreshing nights
rest in the hut, we continued the fol-
lowing day our journey in fine but
hazy weather. About midday land was
clearly discernible to the north-east,
but in the afternoon everything was
again hidden in a thick fog. We halted
at 5 P.M., having covered forty miles.
It then snowed hard. Again we had
a good nights rest, but found the next
morning that several inches of new
snow had fallen, whilst the fog was
as thick as ever and completely hid the
land. But at noon, when everything
seemed most dreary and hopeless, the
fog suddenly lifted, like an enormous
curtain, and displayed to our astonished
gaze a panorama so grand and impos-
ing that it will never fade from my
mind. Lofty, sombre mountains, gigan-
tic, snowy glaciers, and a~rial blue
glittering snow cones, all charmingly
bathed in the purple rays of the noon-
day sun, stretched in wild disorder
along the horizon, the tout ensemble
forming a most striking and fascinat-
ing spectacle of a land never trodden
by human being.
By continuing our east-south-east
course, which we had followed since
the morning, we reached, at about
6 P.M., a small isolated island, where
I decided to remain a day or two in
order to take observations. The island
proved to be identical with Thom
Island of the chart, having in its centre
a conically shaped rock three hundred
feet to four hundred feet in height,
which would afford a most desirably
high plateauwhence to fix the glaciers
and capes of the mainland. We there-
fore built a snow hut at the bottom of a
sheltered cleft in the rocks at the south
side of the island, and found the
weather the next morning, to our great
satisfaction, all that could be desired.
The air was remarkably clear, the most
distant mountains standing forth dis-
tinctly. I obtained an observation of
the sun at noon, as well as all requi-
site determinations of the mainland.
The island I found to be situated in
longitude 750 41 44 N., and the com-
pass variation 88/~ y4T, I delineated
also the profile of the entire coast-line,
110
including several new islands of con-
siderable size. While I was thus en-
gaged my worthy friend had set off
seal hunting, as we were in want of
meat for ourselves and dogs, and Nub-
ber for the lamps. And he succeeded
in an hours time in killing a fine
animal.
I watched him through my glasses
as he cautiously and silently crawled,
or rather hauled himself along towards
the dozing seal. To me up here it
seemed as if he was near enough to
touch it with his hand; but still I waited
and waited for the report of his rifle.
At last a faint cloud arose, and the re-
port rang through the still clear air,
and in the same instant Kolotengvas
knife flashed for a second in the sun,
burying itself in the next in the body
of his valuable spoil, which now re-
lieved us from all anxieties as to food
for ourselves and our faithful, almost
half-starved, companions for some time
to come.
Of the fifty miles long coast-line,
bounded in north-west by Cape Mel-
ville and in south-east by Red Head,
which I could overlook from the top
of the little mountain ridge on Thom
island, nearly one-half consisted of
larger and smaller glacier fronts. If
to the glaciers here referred to, which
I could overlook from the island, be
added the glaciers which I discovered
between Cape Melville and Cape York,
as well as the enormous ice floe, the
northern wall of which I was just able
to discern south of Red Head, and
which in all probability stretches down
to the neighborhood of the Devils
Thumb, the whole number of these
ice streams covers an area of some
two hundred miles. They form a mag-
nificent overflow for the ice masses
inland, and are therefore of the high-
est importance. The glaciers of Mel-
ville Bay form, without doubt, the
vastest glacial system yet discovered
on the Greenland coast. Most of these
glaciers are situated close to each other;
indeed, as regards some of the larger,
as, for instance, those of King Oscar,
Peary, Rink, Nansen, and Nordenski~5ld,
the land divisions among them are so
insignificant that they might be really
considered two huge glaciers of enor-
mous dimensions.
As regards the geological character
of the coast-land itself, which here
and there juts forth from the glacial
cap, either as dominant headland and
ness or single nunatak further in-
land, I could discover nothing of partic-
ular interest. The trap formation, with
its dark color, in strong contrast to
the white snow cupolas which crowned
its plateau-shaped surfaces, was appar-
ently the most common, whilst the
coast in general was of the usual
archaic structure. The perpendicular
walls nearest the ocean ice attained
generally a height of a couple of thou-
sand feet, whilst the Hinterland,
where such existed, rose to far greater
heights; thus the snowy summit of
Cape Walker has a height of quite three
thousand feet, whilst a glittering cone,
to which I gave the name of Mount
Haffner, after the Norwegian savant,
and which is situated about fifteen
miles inland on the north side of the
bay, is, without doubt, five thousand
feet in height. At Cape Melville there
was a comparatively vast stretch of
low land, but its nature I was unable
to make out at this distance.
Having concluded my observations
en the island, I built a small cairn on
the top, in which I placed a tin box
containing a brief notice of our visit.
Before turning in that night we were
pleasantly surprised by the sight of a
snow sparrow, the first of the season~
which occasioned us several times dur-
ing supper (a dainty meal of fresh
seals liver and dry ships bread) to
congratulate each other on the coming
of summer.
The next morning we found the
weather had completely changed in
the course of the night; it was blow-
ing a gale from the south-east, filling
the air with the finest drifting snow.
We had, therefore, to lie weather-bound
that day, which might have been dull
enough if my companion had not sped
the time by naively-told tales of inci-
dents from his own life, which in the
most striking manner illustrated the
In the Land of the Northernmost Eskimo.
In the Land of the Northernmost Eskimo.
admirable toughness, strength, and
courage of this little race of humanity
in itt tutte pour itt vie. Among other
things I was told that the bear-hunters
of the tribes often in their excursions
reach the east coast of Melville Bay. I
am, however, of the opinion that ere
long some spring day the inhabitants
of the northernmost Danish colony,
Tessiusak, will be surprised by a visit,
the first known, from the sledging wild
men of Cape York. I have supplied
them with full particulars and instruc-
tions for such a journey.
The next day, April 20th, the wind
was still strong from the south. We
were now again nearly out of meat
and blubber, so that we did not care
to venture far away from Cape York,
which we had otherwise intended had
the weather been better. After being
weather-bound for a day we steered
for the north-east, almost unknown,
corner of Melville Bay, where I hoped
to find something of interest, and where
also we might slay a bear, which we
greatly needed. We started at seven
oclock A.M., and shaped our course
straight for the lofty mountain ridge,
which according to the vague indica-
tions of the chart should be Cape Mur-
doch. But as we approached we found
that this towering ridge did not con-
stitute any projecting point in the coast
line, but, on the contrary, rose far
behind it, and was only a solitary
nunatak in the vast ice-field, the
lofty perpendicular face of which com-
pletely arrested our progress. We
halted at half past one by a small
island, the inner side of which almost
touched the ice-wall, and here we had
to remain for the rest of the day and
the next night. Kolotengva at once
began the erection of the indispensable
snow-hut, whilst I climbed the island,
a few hundred feet in height, in order
to take observations. By and by he
too, came up, anxious to see this for-
lorn corner of the bay, whither the
lively sledge parties of his tribe had
never yet penetrated. But even to the
frugal-minded Eskimo at my side the
desolate spot could offer no attraction;
he only shook his head and said with
111
emphatic conviction: Pujungi-toksua
nuna manni (the land about here is
no good). On the hard rocky ground
lay long adamant snowdrifts, carried
thither by raging winds from the near-
est glaciers, whilst here and there,
where the naked rocky terraces were
visible through the snow, the scour-
ing marks of former glacial action
were distinctly observable. Having
concluded my observations, we col-
lected all the stones we were able to
find and raised a small cairn on the
summit, when we returned to the hut.
But a few yards from it, right under
the wall of an iceberg, we came upon
some deep holes in the snow, a bear
having evidently been engaged in dig-
ging for sea-holes. The same animal,
or another, had curiously enough vis-
ited the summit of the island, to which
even we had a difficulty in climbing.
Kolotengva thought the bear had come
on land in search of dead grass or moss,
as polar bears are believed by the na-
tives to like a certain amount of veg-
etable matter in their diet.
The next morning at seven we con-
tinued our journey in calm, hazy
weather. We had barely travelled two
hours before, on turning a headland,
we suddenly espied the bear some eight
hundred yards in front of us. At racing
pace the dogs sped away across the
hard snow, but the bear did not take
long to consider his position and then
to deal with it. He decided not to deal
with the dilemma at all, and simply
bolted. But we were down upon him,
when Kolotengva quickly cut the single
trace of the eight dogs, the sledge
stopped dead, and the liberated dogs
flew with redoubled energy at the
hairy giant, who now turned to de-
fend himself at last. During the short
space of time occupied by us coming
up with the combatants, I bad a good
opportunity of watching the splendid
tactics of the dogs. As soon as they
came up with the bear they spread out
in a semicircle right in front of their
foe, and attacked him by making dashes
at his long thick coat with their sharp,
glistening teeth, and they displayed
during these proceedings such cuteness
112
and skill, that it was evident they quite
understood that it was a question of
breakfast or no breakfast for them.
Whenever the bear angrily raised one
of his huge paws to crush one of his
tormentors, the latter slid away in the
most agile manner, whilst his com-
panions gave the wretched brute
enough to attend to in another direc-
tion. However, a few shots from our
Winchesters soon ended the combat,
and an hour later we had the large
magnificent bear-skin safely packed on
the sledge, together with a good quan-
tity of meat, whilst the dogs were
treated to a substantial meal, which
they indeed wanted badly, and we
again continued our journey.
Our course now lay straight for an
island some ten miles W.S.W. from our
last days halting-place. We reached
it just before noon, and remained there
some hours, during which I took the
latitude and some determinations, the
weather having now become very fine
again. In the afternoon we proceeded,
and halted eventually at 5.30 P.M. for
the night, after a most interesting but
very hard day.
On April 23rd we reached again, safe
and sound, Cape York and our friendly
Eskimo. I decided to remain two days
and let the dogs have a good rest, not
because they actually wanted it, but
because I thought they thoroughly de-
served it after their preceding eight
days hard and steady work. The next
day was beautifully fine, and. almost
summer-like, so that the entire colony,
small and large, turned out en masse
and squatted most of the day, basking
in the suns rays, on a small clearing
in front of the huts where bones and
offal used to be thrown. True, the air
was a bit chilly, but having built a wall
of snow to shelter from the cutting
north wind, and with the sun shining
right upon our ruddy faces, and being
well wrapped up in furs, we had a fine
time of it, chatting merrily about the
coming spring, for which we all longed
~o much.
In the midst of our merry group lay
-a huge piece of walrus meat, the some-
whit gamey smell of which left no
doubt as to its respectable age. Beside
it lay an axe, which was used when-
ever any man or woman wanted to
satisfy their hungry cravings, for the
meat was frozen hard and had to be
chopped. At the side of this lump of
meat stood also a huge block of ice,
clear as crystal, whence the commu-
nity obtained water, as in the centre of
it a cavity had been cut, at the bottom
of which a stone was placed of the
size of a mans fist, on which there
burned with a good flame a piece of
moss intersected with blubber; and as
the ice melted at the sides of the cav-
ity, the water collected at the bottom
in a small, clear pool, whence it was
consumed by the many parched mouths
by sucking it up through hollow rein-
deer marrow-bones, in exactly the same
manner as we enjoy a sherry cobbler
through a straw. The whole party was
throughout in the cheeriest and most
talkative mood; and although no toasts
were drunk or speeches made, the chat-
ting and laughing of everybody and of
all sizes proceeded so merrily that the
incident furnished another strong proof
of the thorough contentment of these
people with their lot in life.
The next day I had an opportunity of
seeing how the natives train their bear
dogs. A bear-skin is carried secretly
by two lads out behind an iceberg close
by, one of whom returns, whilst the
other wraps the skin round his body
and then emerges, appearing at a dis-
tance like a real bear, in the creamy
fur of which the sun played. Then an
alarm is raised by the older hunters,
and with fine histrionic skill the younger
ones rush out as if in great excitement
at the sight of the impudent bear.
Some of the dogs have now also espied
it, half-a-dozen sledges are harnessed
speeding towards the imagined foe,
who then wisely lets fall his disguise.
After two days rest I and my com-
panion eventually said good-bye to our
hospitable hosts. But at the last mo-
ment we were pleasantly surprised at
learning that the whole colony had
decided to accompany us in a body~
It seemed as if a sudden mania for
travelling had seized upon these free
in the Land of the Northernmost Eskimo.
In the Land of the Northernmost Eskimo.
and unfettered persons. Why not then
at once satisfy the desire? Their minds
were made up on the spur of the mo-
ment, and half an hour had hardly
elapsed before the whole colony had
taken the field with all their belong-
ingsfurs, harpoons, lamps, suckling
babies, blubber, meat, etc., well stowed
away on their sledges. They num-
bered, including ours, nine in all, drawn
by fifty-two splendid dogs. But we
did not enjoy our merry escort long,
as it left us by degrees, the members
taking up their abodes along the coast
in their airy skin tents, now being ex-
changed for the dark hovels of the long
and dreary winter.
The first night after leaving Cape
York we halted at the bottom of an
inlet, where we had to remain for
thirty-six hours through a storm. We
found quarters in some old ruins of
a hut. The next night we were en-
abled to proceed, and as it was the first
on which the sun would remain above
the horizon that season, we decided to
travel all the night. The snow track
was capital, and we advanced rapidly,
reaching the western extremity of
Saunders Island at 5 A.M. Here we
slept in a remarkable grotto, which
runs in under the perpendicular moun-
tain wall, about a thousand feet in
height, the floor being below high-
water mark. We passed the Colony
Akpan, situated on the south-west
side of the island, then deserted. I
mention it, as here as well as on the
mainland just south, there are remains
of stone huts which are now under
water at high tide. The natives have,
therefore, been obliged to vacate their
old huts and erect others, the former
having gradually been covered by the
sea. Similar proofs of the depression
of the land along these shores were at
one time also observed by Dr. Kane
somewhat farther south, who suggested
that the axis of the oscillating move-
ment to which it is generally assumed
that the greenland continent is sub-
jected, should be found just south of
the 77th degree of latitude. Judging
by my own observations on Saunders
Island just referred to, and partly from
LIVT~G AGE. VOL. X. 476
statements made by natives, I am of
opinion that this axis must be fixed
somewhat farther south.
On April 29th, at about nine at night,
we left Saunders Island in splendid
weather. We determined again to
travel across country to Whale Sound
to escape the journey around Cape
Parry. On the way we succeeded in
killing a hare, whose white coat up in
a dark ravine offered a splendid target
for our rifles. I shall not describe how
welcome this piece of fresh meat was
to us just then. Suffice it to say that
for some days we had lived from hand
to mouth, and our provision bag was
slenderer than just desirable.
We had decided to attempt to reach
the south side of Whale Sound before
again halting, which we did after
twenty hours of hard travelling. For
the last time we lit our blubber lamp,
cooked the rest of the hare, and en-
joyed a good long sleep under the
tumbledown roof of a deserted native
hut. We were still some thirty miles
from the winter quarters of the expe-
dition, but this we covered without
more adventures on the following day,
being back once more safe and sound,
on April 30th.
Our little journey was at an end,
and although its geographical results,
which, however, constituted the only
ones yielded by the second Peary ex-
pedition, cannot be said to be start-
ling, the journey has to me been of
great value and advantage, for it has
more than ever before made me famil-
iar with the methods of travelling
followed for hundreds of years by the
race dwelling in nearest proximity to
the Pole, and gained from experience
during their extended sledge journeys
along the vast ice-choked shores of
their land. And I feel confident that,
had this tribe possessed the scientific
enthusiasm which fires civilized na-
tions, they would have reached the
highly coveted goal long ago, and ex-
plored the mystic regions into which
the great nations of the earth, in noble
rivalry and self-sacrifice, have hitherto
attempted to penetrate in vain. But
suddenly to impart to these children of
113
114
nature an ardent enthusiasm for this
task of solving some of the greatest
geographical and other scientific prob-
lems of the age would indeed be an
impossibility. On the other hand, how-
ever, it might be that the sons of civ-
ilization themselves could learn from
the natives, by sojourning among them,
the best mode of solving those prob-
lems.
There are those who maintain that
Nansen and his gallant little band will
carry victory home; and no one who
is acquainted with the brilliant equip-
ment and manning of this expedition,
with other factors to be considered,
can deny that its prospects of success
are highly promising. But should even
this be so, there will still remain many
mysteries to be penetrated in the polar
regions. No single expedition, be it
ever so successful, could solve all these.
There still are vast regions on both
sides of the Pole yet to be explored;
and in this glorious labor it is to be
hoped that the Scandinavian and Anglo-
Saxon races may lead the way hand in
hand.
EIYIND ASTRITP.
First Officer in both the Peary Expeditions.
NOTESince this article, which has been trans-
lated by carl Siewers, was first received, Fivind
Astrups death has been reported in the news-
papers. The last paragraphs were written before
the news of Nansens successED.
From Temple Bar.
RAMBLES IN HERTFORDSHIRE.
When William Cowper, himself a
Hertfordshire man, dashed off the
diverting history of John Gilpin, he
little thought that he had made the
Ware Road from London to Hertford-
shire the best known in all Britain, that
generation after generation would read
with delight the story of that famous
ride over the stones of Cheapside, on
through merry Islington, past The
Bell at Edmonton, to Ware. John Gil-
pin has familiarized to us that great
north road more than all the pageant-
ries of history that had passed before,
eventful though they were. Had not
Queen Elizabeth travelled by it when
she held her court at her Castle of
Hertford? Familiar, too, it was to the
lordly Cecils whose house of Theobalds
was situated on the same road midway
between London and Hertford. Hither
also from his fathers country house at
Gormanbury near St. Aihans would
come young Fi~ancis Bacon, the future
lord chancellor, to visit his august uncle
Lord Burleigh, in the hope of advance-
ment in Elizabeths service. At Theo-
balds in 1603 James I. and VI. rested
on his way from Scotland to London.
It was a case of love at first sight, for
James afterwards acquired Theohalds
from the Cecils in exchange for royal
Hatfield, and at Theobalds twenty-two
years later he died. In a hook which is
less often read nowadays. The Let-
ters of Howell, clerk to the Privy
Council of Charles I., and the first
historiographer-royal of England, there
is an account of King Jamess death.
Howell happened to be at court at the
time, and relates that as soon as the
king expired, the Privy Council sat, and
in less than a quarter of an hour King
Charles was proclaimed at Theobalds
Court gate . . - This being done, I took
my horse instantly and came to London
first, except one, who was come a little
before me, insomuch that I found the
gates shut. His now Majesty took
coach, and the Duke of Buckingham
with him, and came to St. James; in the
evening he was proclaimed at White-
hall. Truly there seems to have been
many a race on this old Ware Road
before John Gilpins time! Later still
we find this road the scene of Mon-
mouths abortive conspiracy against
Charles II., when the kings coach was
to have been stopped at the Rye House.
Such references might he multiplied
ad inftn4tum, and one might easily pass
from the world of fact to the world of
conjecture. Did Shakespeare, for in-
stance, travel by this road and Inspect
the great hed of Ware, referred to in
his Twelfth Night, on the way to
Hitchin, that fine old market-town in
the northern extremity of the county
where dwelt his friend Chapman, the
Elizabethan translator of Homer?
Rambles in Hertfordshire.
Rambles in Hertfordshire.
115
Our last reference will be to the father Well walled, dyched, and amended late,
of English anglers, Izaak Walton. By her, the onely mirror of the world,
How gleefully he trod this road we Our gracious Queen and Prince Elizabeth,
know from the very opening lines of his and thence due south to Theobalds
Compleat Angler, You are well
The new and worthy seat
overtaken, gentlemen: a good-morning Of famous Cicill, treasoror of the land,
to you both. I have stretched my legs Whose wisdom, counsell, skill of princes
up Tottenham Hill to overtake you, state
hoping your business may occasion you The world admires.
towards Ware, whither I am going this (Quoted from Cussans History of Hert-
fine, fresh May morning. Old Izaak fordshire.)
knew every part of that road. His was Following the course thus mapped
not a race like Gilpins and Howells. out for us as long ago as 1589, I, too,
On he walked past Theobalds to the have rambled from Kempton towne
Thatched House in Hoddesdon, or the village of Kimpton. A glance at
where he and his scholars had their the map will show that this typical
mornings draught of ale before they Hertfordshire village lies in the very
began the serious business of the day, centre of the county, and is distant
to wit, angling. The Lea and its trib- some five-and-twenty miles, as the crow
utaries, winding through the length flies, from London Bridge; but who
and breadth of Hertfordshire, had been shall reckon the distance by road along
to Walton the scene of his not infre- these winding Hertfordshire lanes?
quent holiday from London, and they Three miles from the nearest railway
had gladdened his heart even as they station, Wheathampstead, and removed
must have done that of the still earlier from the line of the great north roads~
patroness of hunting and fishing in the so full, as we have seen, of historical
fifteenth century, Dame Juliana Ber- associations, Kimpton is a centre for
ners, authoress of The Book of St. those fine old English lanes that radiate
Albans. in all directions, past hamlets brown
Milton incidentally, but at the same and dim-discovered spires. In bright-
time correctly, refers to the sedgy est noonday the lanes lie buried in
Lea; Armstrong, to the silent Lee, shadow amid their high hedge-rows of
and Michael Drayton speaks of the hazel, holly, and hawthorn, beech, elm,
old Lea bragging of the Danish and oak. In the spring these hedges
blood, a reference to the slaughter of are white with may. In August they
the Danes near Weiwyn, where their are white with great creamy clusters of
name is still perpetuated in Danesbury. wild Qlematis, and dotted with the pink
But the Lea has had more than a mere of the bramble flower. Sometimes, too,
casual reference to it in our literature, they are half smothered in bracken.
It had its own poet three hundred years Now and then, as they border a resi-
ago in that brilliant Elizabethan period. dential estate, the hedges are clipped,
In his poem A Tale of Two Swannes, and form a wall of greenery; but,
one William Yallens, a native of the planted as they must have been cen-
county, described the fruitful fields of tunes ago, in many places they have
pleasant Hertfordshire, and the course long since grown far beyond the reach
of the river from its source: of the hedgers knife or the pruning-
shears. In Scottish fields the farmer
Whence Lea doth spring, not farre front can plough right up to the dry-stone
Kempton towne, dyke that separates them from the
past Whethamsted, so called of the highway, but here nature holds prodigal
come, and Bishops Hatfield to Hert- sway over acre upon acre monopolized
ford: by these old hedges. What a world oI~
The chiefest towne interest to the lover of nature there is
Of all the shire, the greatest of accompt, to be found in these old lanes! Where
Defended with a castle of some strength can you find more unfamiliar as well as
116
familiar wild flowers, a richer luxu-
riance of woodhine? In nutty autumn
these lanes form a childrens paradise,
and already the hollies give promise of
a rich harvest of holly-berries for
Christmastide to mingle with the bays
and rosemary.
Linger for a moment at the gateway
that breaks the hedge and reveals a
field of trifolium. What a blaze of
imperial purple, and how beautifully it
contrasts with the wheat-field beyond!
This county is celebrated for its wheat.
As we have already noted, Wheathamp-
stead was so called of the corn cen-
turies ago, and Sir Henry Chauncey in
his grand old-fashioned history of the
county, published in 1700, also points
out that this parish was so called from
the great plenty of excellent wheat
~which that place afforded. To-day the
wheat-harvest is as fine as ever it could
have been in the days of Yallens or
Qhauncey, and it is curious to note, as
the result of this excellence in wheat,
that the chief industry of the district
is the manufacture of straw hats.
Wherever you turn the women of the
village or hamlet are busy plaiting
straw for the markets at Hitchin, St.
Albans, Luton, and Dunstable. The old
adage, Make hay while the sun
shines, is locally interpreted, Make
straw hats while the sun shines, and
accordingly a spell of exceptionally
warm weather causes a season of unex-
ampled prosperity also as far as the
local industry is concerned. It is most
interesting to drive into Hitchin on a
Tuesday morning and observe the tidy
women-folk walking into market with
their large parcels of plaited straw, and
returning with neat bundles of straw
to resume their busy task. Like knit-
ting, it is a task that requires nimble
fingers, but allows the workers to gos-
sip out of doors or wander about with
their children. Unfortunately, in ac-
cordance with the inexorable economic
laws of supply and demand, the work-
ers are many and the remuneration
small. The odd shillings to be earned
by straw-plaiting are nevertheless
eagerly sought after by the thrifty
peasants of Hertfordshire.
Rambles in Hertfordshire.
To return to our leafy lane, beyond
the wheat-field lies the farmhouse with
its great barns and outhouses, nestling
in an orchard. Now we are at the gate,
and can admire the wonderful coloring
with which time has painted the old
brick walls and the cross-beams of oak
that grew in Elizabethan woods. The
roofs, too, are a studygreat high roofs
that slope down almost to the ground
on one side of the house. They are
often thatched, green and lichened, but
even the red tiles acquire a venerable
moss-grown appearance and harmonize
with the red brick of the walls. Here
the bricks may have at one time been
painted with whitewash, but now they
are a pale yellow; there they have been
coated with stucco, and where that has
crumbled away the old deep red brick
reveals itself. The whole picture is
mellowed into one soft pervading tone
of warm coloring, like the deep russet-
orange lichens melancholy gold.
What revelations of color are lost to
Scottish artists by the universal use,
north of the Tweed, of cold grey stones
and slated roofs!
Now our old road opens upon a heath
or common, so pleasing a feature in an
English landscape, and in Scotland con-
spicuous only by its absence. English-
men have had the knack of preserving
their rights to these commons; but in
Scotland a hungry nobility seem long
ago to have swallowed up every inch of
land but the kings highway. Such
open spaces are to be found all round
Kimpton, Wheathampstead Common,
Bower Heath, Codicote Heath, Peters
Green, Chiltern Green, etc. Wheat-
hampstead Common has been invaded
by a golf club, and a splendid course it
makes with its close-cropped turf, its
hillocks and hollows and patches of
gorse and heather. Codicote or Calde-
cote Heath is more luxuriant, and the
heather is so long and full, so rich in
color and so fragrant, that you can
lounge on its southern slope and with
eyes half-closed dream of the heather
hills that girt Loch Awe.
Another feature essentially English
is the cheery inn that overlooks the
common. From that upper latticed
Rambles in Hertfordshire.
window the jolly innkeeper of yore
would watch the solitary horseman of
romance crossing the heath, and per-
haps hint his opinion of the traveller to
the gentlemen of the roadthe Claud
Duvalswho found it convenient to
keep on good terms with mine host.
But those days are gone, and now we
can take our ease at our inn with its
deep bay windows on either side of the
entrance, its swinging sign-post, its
horse-trough, pump, and outdoor settle.
Enter and you will find that the bay
window forms a delightful sunny recess
with a seat all round. In one instance
a branch of a vine from the adjoining
greenhouse had been trained into this
recess, and round the window bunches
of grapes were hanging, some begin-
ning to purple in the warm August sun.
The fireplace is often a great old-
fashioned one, with seats on either side
of the ingleneuk, right under the
chimney, whilst framed over one of
these fireplaces I found the following
verse from Sir Matthew Hale:
A Sabbath well spent
Brings a week of content
And health for the toils of the morrow,
But a Sabbath profaned
Whateer may be gained
Is a certain forerunner of sorrow.
There is indeed an almost Puritanical
simplicity about many of the old inns
and alehouses, often in keeping with the
old-world names of their proprietors,
as for example, Amos Gale, Shadrach
Meade, Samuel Ward, or Mary Ann
Mulcock. The names of the inns would
require a paper to themselves. The
Three Horse-Shoes has for its rival
across the road The Four Horse-
Shoes. At Peters Green the sign of
the Half Moon nods complacently
across the heath to The Bright Star.
A favorite name in many a village is
derived from the number of bells in the
tower of the parish church; thus there
is The Six Bells at St. Michaels,
where Lord Bacon lies buried, and Hat-
field and Luton have each their Eight
Bells. The bull, the bell, the plough,
the rose and crown, the George and the
dragon, the red lion, are old stagers to
117
be found everywhere, reminding one of
Joseph Addisons delightful essay in the
earlier Spectators on the sign-posts of
London, in which he says that our
streets are filled with blue boars, black
swans, and red lions, not to mention
flying pigs and hogs in armor.
All anglers will remember how fre-
quently Walton refers to the Hertford-
shire inns: the Thatcht House at
Hoddesdon, where he had his first cup
of ale and a little rest, and the honest
alehouse where he found a cleanly
room, lavender in the windows, and
twenty ballads struck about the wall;
where the linen looked white and smelt
of lavender, and where by the way the
hostess was both cleanly and convei~-
lently handsome. (Old Izaak evidently
loved to be served by a handsotm~
Hebe.) Then there were mine host
Rickabies, at the George, in Ware,
and the alehouse near Waltham Cross
with the inviting designation of Catch-
her-by-the-way.
There are, however, far too many
licensed premises in Hertfordshire.
Every little village seems to have haif-
a-dozen at least; but we learn from Mr.
Cussans exhaustive history, that this
disproportionate number of licensed
houses has been a vexed question for
centuries. So long ago as 1577, the
subject attracted the notice of the gov-
ernment, and a special commission was
appointed by the Privy Council to
inquire into the number of inns, taverns,
and alehouses in the county. The
commissioners reported that as we
find some of the kepers of the said innes
and alehouses of good weith, so do we
finde the greatest nombre of them
vearie simple houses and the inhabi-
tants of them vearie poore. This de-
scription still applies. Little seems to
have been done to reduce their number.
There are still the fine old coaching
inns and the vearie simple alehouses
so very simple indeed that most of the
alehouse keepers, to judge from their
signboards, seemed to eke out a live-
lihood in some other way. It is as
likely as not that much of their small
beer in stock is used in home consump-
tion. Of the infrequent customer the
118
hostess might often have occasion to
exclaim with Mariana in the moated
grange, He cometh not! An attempt
was made by his Highness the lord
protector of the Commonwealth to
license only those innkeepers who were
well affected towards his government;
and at the same time he forbade the
playing at Tables, Billiard Table,
Shovel-Board, Card Dice, Ninepins,
Pigeon Holes, or the keeping Bowling
Alley or Bowling Green. This was in
1656. The first edition of the Coin-
pleat Angler, published in 1653, shows
that even honest Izaak, or at least his
companions, were not above playing at
one of those proscribed games, for we
find them (Peter and Coridon) going to
an honest alehouse on one occasion, and
playing at shovel-board half the day.
All the time that it rained we were
there, and as merry as they that fished.
I wonder what Walton thought of
Cromwells unco guid legislation, and
whether he rendered himself liable to
imprisonment by playing shovel-board
at an inn any time between 1656 and
1660? After all, these enactments had
come too late in the day. Four years
later the merry bells rang in the
Restoration, and poor old Nolls legisla-
tion was forgotten.
Forgotten perhaps for a time, inas-
much as the harmless pleasures of the
bowling alley and green might now be
renewed; but the salutary effect of
Cromwells rule has not been forgotten.
Reference has already been made to
such names as Shadrach, Samuel, and
Amos occurring in the district. If
nomenclature means anything at all,
surely a pious race sleeps in the little
churchyard at Ayott St. Lawrence,
when one can cull from the gravestones,
apart from the popular Christian names
of Mary, James, and John, such other
peculiarly Biblical names as Esther,
Lydia, Martha, Sarah, Abigail, Daniel,
Jeremiah, Joseph, and Jonathan. We
may still be reaping the fruits of the
Puritan regime in the possession of a
sober and industrious peasantry, but
why, oh! why was it necessary to con-
demn ninepins, and sanction, or at
least fail to prevent, the whitewashing
Rambles in Hertfordshire.
of the parish churches, the destruction
of the stained glass, and the tearing up
of the brasses from their matrices on
the chancel floors? Golden priests
with wooden chalices, are better than
wooden priests with golden chalices;
but if the churches were rightly purged
of their wooden priests, might not
the golden chalices have been allowed
to remain?
English ecciesiologists, however, have
much to be thankful for in this respect,
when we remember the iconoclastic zeal
of the Scottish Reformers, coupled with
the wanton destruction that signalized
the Earl of Hertfords invasion of Scot-
land; and we may wander among the
parish churches of England, so pictur-
esque a feature in the landscape with
their slender spires or great battle-
mented curfew towers, without evi-
dence of the fiercer phases of sectarian
strife being continually thrust upon our
vision.
To enter into an account of the parish
churches of Hertfordshire would carry
us far beyond the limits of this paper.
I can only glance at one here and there.
Accustomed as we are to our massive
churches of hewn stone, one cannot
help noticing that in Hertfordshire
they are mostly built either of the small
flints, such as the plough turns over in
the fields in this district, or of brick and
flint harled. On the banks of the river
Ver at St. Albans, I found that the
Roman remains of ancient Verulam
were of similar construction, stratas of
cemented flints alternating with hor-
izontal rows of old Roman brick. The
older parts of St. Albans Cathedral were
very similar in treatment to the old wall
at Verulam, and in fact the Roman re-
mains formed a convenient quarry for
the founders of the abbey, or cathedral,
as it has now become. Beginning with
the great brick Norman tower, tran-
septs, and choir, the archa~ologist can
follow step by step westwards down
the nave, and eastwards to the Lady
Chapel, the history of church architec-
ture from the eleventh to the fifteenth
centuries. Contrast, for example, the
almost savage grandeur of the tran-
septs, Paul de Caens work, as if hewn
Rambles in Hertfordshire.
out of a mountain, with the delicate
tracery of the Lady Chapel.
On entering St. Albans Cathedral
from the west doorway, I was struck
with the entire absence of color. Here
are no storied windows richly dight.
Some there are in the distant Lady
Chapel beyond the altar screen, but
they are invisible from the nave. Even
the old-world frescoes are a faded
brown color on a faded yellow back-
ground. Six hundred years ago they
had been painted by the monks, but
time has well-nigh obliterated them.
One can just make out that the series
dealt with the subject of our Lords
crucifixion. The richness of detail is
lost The dim figure on the cross, like
the one outstanding truth which the
frescoes are meant to keep in remem-
brance, alone remains. Even the ex-
quisitely carved reredos, the high altar
screen, and the Saints Chapel have all
been left without color, and the sun
shines in through the unglazed win-
dows. That this has not always been
the case, we know from the fresco
paintings and from the old painted ceil-
ing of the choir, with its chequered
design and the legend I.H.S. in alter-
nate squares.
It is remarkable how little of the
pre-Reformation glass is to be found
here. Few churches have been spared
as York Minster was. There are some
interesting specimens of old glazing in
Luton church, and some tiny bits at
Hitchin; but if the parish churches are
poor in so fragile a relic of medisevalism
as stained glass, they are rich in other
features of archseological interest of
a more durable i~ature. Foremost
among these is the old Gothic rood-
screens, sometimes separating the choir
from the transepts and nave, sometimes
marking off the chapels. Fine speci-
mens of these I found at Hitchin,
Wheathampstead, and Kimpton, and
at Luton in Bedfordshire. The inter-
esting early Norman church of St.
Michaels contains some old wain-
scoting, and a carved oak pulpit and
communion-table, all pre-Reformation
work. The monumental brasses to be
found on the floors of many of the
119
churches are not only beautiful as
works of art, with their heraldic scrolls
aud quaint Gothic lettering, but they
are also valuable as illustrative of
media~val costume. Very fine brasses
are still to be seen in St. Albans Cathe
dral, and in Wheathampstead and
Hitchin churches; but, as already
pointed out, too often the place where
they once were is indicated by the brass
pins which fixed them to the paved
floor, or by the matrice where their out-
lines can still be traced.
I have already referred to the church-
yard of Ayott St. Lawrence. The ham-
let itself, consisting, as it does, of the
manor, the old and new church, the
vicarage, and half-a-dozen picturesque
cottages, is one of the most beautiful
in the country. Its old Gothic church,
dating from the fifteentheentury, is now
an ivy-mantled ruin. When Sir Henry
Chauncey wrote his history it was still
used for public worship, and he notes
that the chancel windows were adorned
with curious pictures in stained and
painted glass, beyond many other
churches. In 1779 we find the old
church deserted because it was said to
be in a ruinous condition, and a brick
church, with a Greek portico, conse-
crated in its stead. Fortunately, the
faade only is exposed to view at the
west end of a noble park. The naked
brick walls of the rest of the building
are mercifully hid by sheltering trees.
This church need never have been built
at all, but these were not the days of
church restorations. In the eigh-
teenth century the beauties of Gothic
architecture were unappreciated, and
the old fane once deserted went rapidly
to ruin.
On the last Sunday evening of August
I wandered by lane and stile-path from
Kimpton to Ayott St. Lawrence. In-
voluntarily I lingered by the wicket-
gate leading into the churchyard, to
admire the fine old square tower with its
Gothic louver windows. Fassing up the
churchway path, and stepping on to the
velvet turf, I walked with noiseless
step into the roofless nave, where the
font still stands among the grass.
Here a pedestal tomb, once richly
120
carved, supports the recumbent effigies,
now sadly mutilated, of a knight and
his lady. Yonder a single mural mon-
ument adorns the walls. On the south
side of the chancel there are the re-
mains of a piscina, and the arches that
once spanned the nave still disclose,
where they are not completely hidden
from view by the thickly matted ivy,
a boss of leaves or an angels head.
The western doorway, now closed for-
ever, is ornamented with a simple
moulding of leaves.
Not a breath of wind rustled the
stately trees that shut out the little
world of the hamlet from this last
resting-place; and as I walked up the
grassy aisle that leads into the south
chancel chapel, thence into the chancel
itself, and down the nave to the old
belfry again, I thought how simply
beautiful this church must have been
in its prime, beyond many other
churches, as Chauncey quaintly puts
it. Suddenly, out of the summer-
evening stillness, arose in a joyous out-
burst of song the thanksgiving hymn
of the Virgin, the Magnificat of the
Church of England prayer-book. An
invisible choir and a pealing organ
seemed to have filled once more the
ruined aisle with melody. Again all
was quiet, and againthis time like a
lullabythe ivy-mantled choir echoed
the calm, inspiring Song of Simeon
the Nunc Dimittis. It was the even-
song at the new parish church in the
park. The doors were open, as is the
custom in summer time, and the music
floated across the pathway to the neg-
lected shrine. The old church wanted
nothing more to add to its impressive-
ness. Through the whim of a country
squire it was no longer thronged with
worshippers, but Sabbath after Sab-
bath the spirit of praise and prayer
passed from the new to the old, and
lingered among the gravestones sculp-
tured all with their Old Testament
names, their Esthers, their Abigails,
their Daniels, and their Jonathans
memorials of a closed page of English
history.
But late August twilights are short,
and the kindly vicar, mindful that his
little flock could read only with difficulty
in such a waning light, had chosen a
familiar closing hymn. As I wended
back to Kimpton the western sky
crimsoned, the bats began to flutter in
the empty belfry, and into the still air
arose the voices of the worshippers
singing Newmans immortal hymn:
Lead, kindly Light, amid the encircling
gloom,
Lead Thou me on.
ARTHUR GRANT.
From The Gentlemans Magazine.
THE CHEVALIER DEON AS A BOOK
COLLECTOR.
A history of charlatans in general,
and of eccentric characters in particu-
lar, would form a volume, or rather a
series of volumes, of surpassing inter-
est. The surprise is that such an at-
tractive subject has not yet found a
competent chronicler, for its fascina-
tion far exceeds the history of a whole
crowd of kings and rulers whose lives
have been written to death, and whose
careers usually offer less entertaining
variety than a directory or a dictionary.
It is true that a recent biographer has
given us a diverting volume in which
he deals with the careers of twelve
bad men, butwhat are they among
so many? A large percentage of the
eccentric individuals whose idiosyn-
crasies would have to be taken into
account in the suggested history
were unquestionably charlatans of the
most unmitigated character; but many
others were eccentric through no fault
of their own, whilst not a few were,
in their own peculiar way, men whose
real talents have been obscured by
their foibles. In the last category the
Chevalier DEon would occupy a very
distinguished position. It would be
absurd to attempt to prove that he was
a hero, for he was nothing of the kind;
nor was he a great man, as that much-
abused definition is now understood.
But there are many points about him
and his career which at once rescue
him from among the commonplace spe
The Chevalier DEon as a Book Collector.
The Chevalier DEon as a Book Collector.
cie~s of humanity. Of these points,
none is more interesting or has been
more completely trifled with by his
various biographers than that which
concerns him as a book collector.
The main facts of the remarkable
career of Charles Genevi~ve Louis
Auguste Andr6 Timoth~e DEon de
Beaumont are too well known to need
repeating here. It will be convenient,
however, to point out that he was born
at Tonnerre, Burgundy, October 5, 1728,
and that he accompanied the Due de
Rivernais to England in 1762, remain-
ing here until August, 1777, when he
returned to Paris. He remained in
France until 1785, when he came to
this country and died here May 21, 1810.
Although the chevalier lived in a con-
stant whirl of excitement and extrava-
gance, his pecuniary troubles do not
appear to have begun until he came
over to England for the second and
last time. They were brewing, how-
ever, during his long absence of eight
years; and, in the summer of 1784, the
landlord of DEons rooms in Brewer
Street, Golden Square, despairing of
getting his rent in the ordinary way,
appears to have threatened to sell his
tenants goods and chattels. As a mat-
ter of fact, he did sell DEons pictures.
The Morning Herald of July 28, 1784,
contains the announcement that Mr.
Chapman would offer the superla-
tively fine assemblage of pictures of
the French, Italian, Flemish, and Dutch
Schools of the Chevalier DEon, at
Toms Coffee House, opposite the Royal
Exchange, No. 30 Cornhill, on Friday,
July 30. The advertisement further
states the whole being left with a mer-
chant, who has sent them to be sold
without reserve. The catalogues of
this sale are exceedingly rare, but Mr.
G. Redford, in Art Sales, gives an
abstract of some of the principal prices,
which in no instance reached 20 per
lot.
During the period of his first stay in
this country, DEon was an inveterate
book-collector, and a constant attendant
and buyer at book auctions. He was
omnivorous in his reading. Messrs.
Sotheby possess a most curious docu
121
ment relative to the Chevaliers book-
buying proclivities; it is nothing less
than the original bill for books bought
at Baker & Leighs on January 10, 1771.
The total of the bill amounts to 8 4s.,
which was paid on January 12. The
list is an interesting one, but it con-
tains few books of special importance.
The greater majority are in French;
those in English include Bolingbrokes
Study of History, Mutels Causes of
the Corruption of Christians, Halifaxs
Advice to a Daughter, and an En-
glish Gazetteer. The French books
being translations of Tacitus, Livy,
Seneca Dc la Consolation de la Mort,
lives, memoirs or letters of Richelieu
and Colbert, a number of works on
commerce and finances, Le Vrai Cu-
isinier Fran~ois, a Voyage Litt&
raire, of Two Benedictines, and so
forth.
Even after his return from what he
regarded as exile in his native country,
DEon could not resist the temptation
of book-buying; the res angusta domi
began to press very heavily on him at
about this period, and for the last
twenty-five years of his life he was in
pecuniary difficultiespartly as a nat-
ural result of the Revolution stopping
his pension, but chiefly through the
rascality of Lord Ferrers, who applied
to his own private use 5,000 which the
French government had transmitted to
his care for DEon.
Among the extensive collection of
DEon books and unpublished manu-
scripts in the possession of Mr. R.
Copley Christie, there is a curious
account of Livres que Mr Boissiere,
libraire, rue le St. James, a Londres,
a fournis a Mile.2 la Chre DEon. All
the books in this bill are in French,
several dealing with the Bastille, and
the others including La Vie Priv&
de Louis XV. and the Fastes de Louis
1 Mr. christie, who at one time contemplated a
life of the Chevalier DEon, has most generously
permitted me to examine his valuable collection
of DEon literature.
2 During his stay in England, DEon was known
by the title of Chevalier; on the second occasion,
and up to the time of his death, when, in fact, he
dressed as a woman, he assumed the title of
ChevalThre.
122
XV. These purchases, which amount
to 9 Os. 6d., are quite insignificant when
compared with that effected by DEon
at Christies on February 11, 1792. The
Library of a Gentleman, otherwise
Dr. James Douglas, included as one lot
a matchless collection of the various
editions and translations of Horace,
five hundred and sixty volumes in all,
for which the Chevalier paid, it is said,
100. This assembla~je incomparable, as
DEon himself termed it, was retained
by him until his death. His first work
was to prepare, on the most ample scale,
a catalogue raisonn6, written on cards,
of the five hundred and sixty volumes.
Each edition has at least one, and some-
times two or three cards; on these a
complete transcription of the title-page
is written, frequently followed by some
descriptive or critical remarks. The
ulterior object of all this preliminary
work being a gigantic edition of Horace
in five different sections, viz.
Horatius Profanus.
Horatius Christianus.
Horatius Catholicus, Apostolicus et
Romanus.
Horatius Reformatus.
Horatius Gallus, sive purgatus, ex-
purgatus, castratus et Eununchus [sic]
secundum Societatem Jesu defunctam,
etc., et Amplissimas Europm Univer-
sitates.
It is scarcely necessary to state that
D9Eons idea never got beyond the
manuscript stage. An examination of
these MSS., which are now in posses-
sion of Mr. R. Copley Christie, proves
that, had the Chevaliers edition been
printed, it would have been an unqual-
ified failure, any such edition being
entirely beyond his power.
With the purchase of Dr. Douglass
collection of Horace, the Chevaliers
1 This is the amount stated in all the biographies
of DEon. A reference to the Christie catalogue,
however, shows that this collection of Horace
~started by Dr. Mead and continued by Dr. Douglas
was bought in at 199 guineas. This, of course,
may have been the reserve price at which the col-
lection was put up by the auctioneer. The collec-
tion may have been sold to DEon privately by the
executors of Dr. Douglas; but it is quite certain
that he did not, as is usually stated, purchase the
collection under the hammer for 100.
career as a book-buyer appears to have
ended. He next appears in the charac-
ter of bookseller. In the spring of 1791,
it was announced that the Chevalier
DEons books and MSS. were to be
sold by auction, in order, as he him-
self explains, to satisfy and pay her
creditors, before her departure for
Paris. Iustitia3 Soror Fides. The cat-
alogue was drawn up by the Chevalier
himself, and the sale announced by
James Christie for Thursday, May 5,
1791, and following days. At the same
time it was announced that the sale
would include her mahogany book-
cases, her prints, household furniture,
swords, trinkets, jewels, and, in gen-
eral, all her wearing apparel, consti-
tuting the wardrobe of a captain of
Dragoons and a French lady. The
title-page of the catalogue contained a
quotation ostensibly from Juvenal:
Quale decus rerum si Virginis Auctio fiat
Balteus, et Manica!, et Cristile, crurisque
sinistri
Dimidium Tegmen! ...
Tn felix, Ocreas vendente Puella;
but the auctioneer, who was a wag,
adapted the lines to suit the occasion,
and substituted Virginis for the origi-
nal word conjugis. The announce-
ment of the sale attracted very wide
interest, and all the principal newspa-
pers of the time contained comments,
the Public Advertiser publishing on May
3 and 5, Memoirs of the Life of Made-
moiselle La Chevali~re DEon.
But the sale did not take place. The
good sense and the good feeling, ac-
cording to the Public Advertiser of May
6, were, perhaps, never exerted with
more propriety than in the request
made by some very liberal persons
(not Aristocrats) to Mr. Christie, on the
evening before Madame DEons sale,
to desire him to stop the sale of her
books and MSS. in order to procure a
subscription to enable her to pay her
debts, and to enjoy, those silences of
age and of infirmity, to which her
talents, her conduct, and her sex had
so well entitled her. The ChevalEire
consented to this proposition with
The Chevalier DEon as a Book Collector.
The Chevalier DEon as a Book Collector.
great difficulty, after having burst into
tears at the kindness and generosity
of the persons who made this offer,
and on its taking place she insisted
upon presenting her MSS. and her Ori-
ental books to the British Museum.
A subscription list was opened at Ham-
mersleys Bank, Pall Mall, and in a
very short time the sum of 465 5s. was
obtained, the Prince of Wales giving
100. A public benefit for the Chevalier
was got up at Ranelagh in June of the
same year, and for a time the Chevalier
was comfortably situated. By Febru-
ary, 1792, he appears to have been just
as badly off as ever. The Public Adver-
tiser of January 25 of that year con-
tains the following note, which reads
curiously enough in connection with
the recent celebration of the France-
German war: What resources might
the democrats and emigrants of France
find in Marshal Saxes MS. Memoirs,
which come to the hammer very soon,
at the Chevalibre DEon sale. There is
amongst them a complete description of
all the souterrains of that very impor-
tant fortress Strasburg.
Seventy-three lots of valuable and
elegant jewels, a few fine prints, valu-
able coins, medals, plate, etc., which
Christie sold on February 17, 1792, pro-
duced a total of 348 17s. 74., some of
the more valuable lots being bought
in. On the 3rd and 4th of the same
month a small parcel of books and
prints had been sold at this place.
During the next year the Chevalier
disposed of another instalment at Leigh
& Sothebys, to whom, in sending a list
of books and MSS. on April 3, 1793, he
wrote and requested them to do the
best they could. The Chevalier, appar-
ently, expecting every day to return
to France, desired that the result of
the sale be sent to M. Dutens, Davies
Street, Berkeley Square, No. 24, who
will forward the amount to him in
Burgundy if he has left England. The
sale of these books took place on May
22 and the two following days, and
the one hundred and four lots brought
a total of over 19, as the statement
of account, now in the possession of
Mr. R. C. Christie, shows:
SALE OF MILE. DEoNs BooKs.
By Leigh & Sotheby.
Selling at 12 per cent.
Duty and Stamp
Carriage of Books
Monies to pay Madame
.217 0
012 5
...026
.19 310
22 16 0
A month after the sale the balance
was paid to the Chevalier, who signed
the receipt G. Deon. The sale of the
residue of the Chevaliers library took
place at Christies on February 19, 1813,
and included the collection of Horace:
the total proceeds amounted to 313,
which apparently went to pay out-
standing accounts. The more valuable
portion of the Chevaliers library un-
doubtedly changed hands privately, as
there is no record of very many im-
portant items having occurred for sale
in the auction-rooms. The Chevaliers
catalogue contained an announcement
that any of the articles therein men-
tioned were for sale by private contract.
The great variety and importance of
the Chevaliers library can only be fully
grasped after a careful perusal of the
original catalogue, which has itself be-
come a considerable rarity. The manu-
scripts to which the Chevalier attached
the greatest value were unquestionably
those of Mar~chal de Vauban, to whom
DEons uncle had been secretary.
These MSS., which date from 1677 to
1706, are of the greatest interest. But
Vauban, who fortified three hundred
ancient citadels, created thirty-three
new ones, had the direction of fifty-
three sieges, and was present at one
hundred and forty engagements, was
a genius at applying the ideas of others
a contingency which does not in any
way minimize the fact of his being the
greatest of French military engineers.
DEons collection contained all the
manuscripts of the Mar6chal, with
plans, instructions on the fortifications,
the attack and defence of the particular
places, the encampments, and an in-
finite variety of other important mat-
ter, into which it is not necessary to
enter. The Chevalier also attached
much importance to several large folio
123
124
volumes containing a variety of manu-
scripts on civil and criminal law in
France, but more especially the proc~s-
verbal of the Conferences held in 1667,
concerning the reformation of the
Ordre Judiclaire.
Of MSS. on history, politics, arts, and
sciences, there were nearly fifty items,
in either French, Spanish, or English.
Perhaps the most remarkable of these
articles was Les Ethiques, Politiques,
Economiques, etc., of Aristotle, mag-
nifiquement written in Gothic letters, in
black ink, and with capitals in gold,
blue, or red, on fine vellum. Another
entry, in Latin, describes a beautiful
MS. of Plinys Epistles elegantly illu-
minated. There was a thirteenth-cen-
tury MS. of Ciceros Rhetorics; a
fifteenth-century MS. of the Legenda
Sanctorum; and another MS. about
the same date comprising the treatise
attributed to Aristotle, De Secretis
Secretorum; the last three, with a
Greek Codex, elegantly written
towards the close of the twelfth cen-
tury, are now in the British Museum,
and form a part of the bequest of Dr.
Burney. Yet another interesting entry
consists of the ~IEuvres M~l~es et Coin-
pl~tes du Vergier, which ran into
three volumes quarto. This MS., which
belonged to an intimate friend of the
poet, contains a number of pieces, in
verse and prose, which had not, up to
the time at which they became DEons
property, appeared in any edition; his
works, which were not printed during
his lifetime, were first collected and
published at Amsterdam in 1726.
His collection of Bibles, MS. and
printed, including editions in Hebrew,
Chaldaic, Syriac, Talmudic-Rabbinic,
Arabic, Persian, Turkish, Ethiopian,
Georgian, Malay, Gothic, Greek, Latin,
Gauloise, French, and English, nearly
fifty in all, and many of the greatest
rarity and interest, from the twelfth
century MS. of the Biblia Latina with
Dr. Jeromes Prologis (now in the Brit-
ish Museum) downwards. Perhaps the
most interesting entry in this section
is the Basle edition of Divinre Scrip-
turre Veteris ac Novi Testamenti, 1545.
This splendid edition was published
The Chevalier DEon as a Book Collector.
under the direction of Melanchthon, to
whom DEons copy once belonged, as
is evidenced by the fact that nearly
every page contains the editors notes
in Greek and Latin. DEon also pos-
sessed a New Testament in Greek, in
which Melanchthon had made a num-
ber of notes; there was also a copy
each of the extremely rare French
translation of the Bible, printed by
Antoine Verard, in Paris, about 1487,
and of the beautiful edition issued
from the Estienne Press in 1546.
The variety and number of the Chev-
aliers dictionaries and encyclopa~dias
comprised the most reliable works deal-
ing with history, literature, law, gar-
dening, agriculture and botany, arts,
sciences, military, and theology. After~
these books of referencewhich, after
all, are not necessarily an indication
of a mans literary proclivitiesDEons
library was largely made up of French
m6moires. The standard French au-
thors were well represented. The cdi--
tion of Rousseaus ~Euvres is that in
eleven volumes, printed under the eye
of the author by his intimate friend,
Marc Michel Rey, of Amsterdam, 1769;
the whole set is half-bound in calf,
bien propre, as the Chevalier adds
with the true pride of the bibliophile.
But of exceedingly curious books, or
of works which one rarely meets with
outside Brunet, DEons library was
very full. He possessed, for instance,
Magellans Description des Octants et
Sextants; he rejoiced in the possession
of a certain Trait6 des Maladies des
Femmes grosses, published in 1712; a
copy of the Dissertation sur la Pr&
eminence des Chats (Amsterdam, 1767),
a very curious treatise on the position
of the cat in society, its place among
the other animals of Egypt, on the dis-
tinctions and privileges which cats have
personally enjoyed, their honorable
treatment in life, and of the monu-
ments and so forth which have been
erected to them after their death, and
much other quaint inform~ition in re-
gard to this topic. In the library of
so expert a swordsman, the presence
of LHonneur consid6r6 en lui-m~me
et relativement au Duel (Paris, 1752)-
is not, perhaps, surprising, although it
is not easy to imagine a student of
either of the foregoing books indulging
in the luxury of sermons, of which the
Chevalier possessed a goodly number.
Indeed, theology, in the widest sense
of the term, was distinctly a speciality
of the Chevalier, one of whose greatest
treasures was a copy of the Catechisms
composed by Cardinal Richelieu, and
dedicated by him to the Sovereign,
Louis XIII. This book is in folio,
and is very highly ornamented with
vignettes. The Public Advertiser, in an
obviously inspired paragraph which it
published in January, 1792, described
this as the finest printed book in
the world, perhaps beating Boydells
Shakespeare, and the Louvre Thomas
~L Kempis.
DEons library included singularly
few Italian books, the only noteworthy
exception, indeed, being a splendid
copy on vellum of Martinellis Istoria
Critica della Vita Civile (Naples, 1764),
with the large and beautiful vignettes
in gold and blue. To perpetrate an
Irishism most of the Chevaliers En-
glish books were in French. Even
after so long a residence in this coun-
try, the Chevaliers English was ex-
ceedingly indifferent, and whenever it
was possible to obtain French versions
of English classics he appears to have
preferred them thus. We find, for ex-
ample, among his books, Costes trans-
lation of Lockes Essay on the Human
Understanding, Popes works, both in
separate pamphlets, and the collected
edition in eight volumes published at
Amsterdam in 1767; Youngs poems, and
even Dr.Wattss, appear in their French
dress.
The Chevalier DEona lady tam
Marti quam Minerva, tam Camilke
quam Cornelia, tam Matrona~ quam Tm-
peratoriwas a true bibliophile, one
who collected books because he loved
them; and not a specimen of that too
common type who collects books with
the primary object of being considered
a wise man. The Chevalier wrote his
name or pasted his book-plate in every
one of his books, and de la biblio-
th~que de la Chevali~re DEon. is an
125
announcement which one occasionally
notices in a book which almost invari-
ably attracts the bibliophiles attention,
either by its exterior beauty or by its
intrinsic interest. The Chevalier was
neither wise nor diplomatic in many
things, and much of the misery of his
later years is distinctly traceable to his
own foolishness, but amid all his in-
firmities and in spite of all his foibles,
his love for books is almost beautiful
in its sincerity and in its intensity; and,
having said all they can against him,
perhaps his detractors would occasion-
ally ask themselves whether they can
lay claim to so great a virtue.
W. ROBERTS.
From The Argosy.
COUNTRY LIFE IN THE LAST CENTURY.
English country and provincial life
at the close of the eighteenth century
had changed greatly in several of its
esseutia~ features from what it had
been at the beginning of the long
reign of George the Third.
At the earlier period the aspect of the
country itself was for the most part
desolate and dreary in the extreme.
Agriculture had made but compara-
tively little progress, sparse patches of
cultivation, alternating at wide inter-
vals with the swamps and wastes,
which made up the prevailing features
of the landscape. It was the opening
out of fresh roads in every direction,
and the conversion of muddy bridle-
paths and narrow footways into wide
and properly levelled turnpikes, pass-
able for vehicles of every kind, which
wrought so material a change in the
social relations and the manners of
English country life.
Between the years 1760 and 1774,
upwards of seven hundred Inclosure
Acts were obtained, while of Turnpike
Acts, four hundred and fifty-two were
passed during the same period. It was
a silent revolution, but, as the results
proved, a most beneficial one.
The taste and comfort which nowa-
days are rarely absent from a villa or
Country Lfe in the Last Century.
126
suburban residence of even the hum-
blest kind were seldom to be found
even among the homes of the country
gentry prior to the middle of last cen-
tury. Landscape gardening was con-
fined to the seats of the great propri-
etors, and such a thing as an ordinary
flower-garden was a by no means usual
accessory even to the mansion of a
gentleman qualified to dub himself a
knight of the shire. The houses them-
selves, although generally substantial
structures enough, were rarely kept in
a state of repair and cleanliness such
as would accord with our modern no-
tions of decency and comfort. The
stables and kennels were in too close
proximity to them, occupying the site
which is now usually devoted to con-
servatories and flower-borders. The
rough fields and stony rutted lanes
through which the mansion was ap-
proached presented the greatest possi-
ble contrast to the carefully kept
avenues, the shaven lawns, and all
the ornate surroundings of a modern
country residence.
One of the chief points in the educa-
tion, so-called, of a gentlewoman of
those days was that she should become
a proficient cook; while, if her parents
were ambitious that she should shine
in after-life as an accomplished hostess,
she received lessons from a carving-
master. The chief duty of hospitality,
as taught her at home, was for the
lady to press the guests to eat to re-
pletion, while the main care of the
master of the house was to induce
them to drink to excess. This, it may
be, was not an unfitting education for
a young woman who was destined to
become the helpmate of some country
boor, who regarded a wife in the light
of an upper servant, and to whom the
company of the opposite sex was an
irksome restraint on the freedom of
social intercourse.
To a woman of any education and
refinement an English manor-house of
a hundred and fifty years ago must
have been an intolerable home.
The state of the roads during a great
part of the year was such as to render
visiting impracticable. The library of
the Hall probably consisted of a book
of recipes, the Justice of the Peace,
a volume of drinking songs, a book
of sports, and a tract or two against
popery. There were no country book-
clubs or London circulating libraries in
those days. The country town, unless
it were one of the chief centres of pro-
vincial life, had probably not even one
booksellers shop, and was dependent
for its literary supplies upon the occa-
sional visits of a hawker, or the trav-
elling agent of some large firm, who
went round with his pack from house
to ho