"She gazed—she reddened like a rose—
Syne pale as ony lily;
She sank within my arms and cried,
'Art thou my ain dear Willie?'
'By Him who made yon sun and sky,
By whom true love's regarded,
I am the man!' and thus may still
True lovers be rewarded."—BURNS.
Hastening to the drawing-room, she immediately found herself in the arms of her husband, who was throwing off his drab-coloured riding-coat, with its heavy cape, his small triangular Nivernois hat, boot-tops, and whip, to his favourite valet and constant attendant, old Jack Andrews.
Rohallion kissed his wife's hand and then her forehead, for he had not outlived either affection or respect, though verging on his fifty-fifth year; and he had all that gentleness of bearing and true politeness which the Scottish gentlemen of the old school, prior to, and long after the Union, acquired from our ancient allies, the French.
"And you returned from London——"
"By sea, Winny—by sea," said Rohallion, "After all my entreaties!"
"Zounds! Winny, I can't abide the mail, and am too old to post it now, as my old friend Monboddo used to do yearly, to kiss the king's hand; and so preferred the 'Lord Nelson' smack, from London to Leith, armed with twelve carronades, and sailing without convoy."
"And the voyage was pleasant?"
"A head-wind, a fourteen days' run, and an exchange of shots with a French privateer off Flamborough Head. At Edinburgh I took the stage to Ayr, and from thence Andrews and I jogged quietly home on horseback."
Still a handsome man, though portly in person, as became his years, Reynold Crawford, Lord Rohallion, had features that were alike noble in character and striking in expression. The broad, square forehead indicated intelligence and candour, his mouth, good humour; and the form of his closely shaved chin, spoke of decision and perseverance. His nose was perhaps too large, but his eyes were dark grey, gentle and soft, usually, in expression. He wore his own hair, which was still thick and wavy, powdered white as a cauliflower, and tied with a broad ribbon, having a double bow at the back.
He still adhered to the frilled shirt, and had a large pearl brooch in the breast thereof; his long waistcoat was of scarlet cloth, edged with silver; his coat of bright blue broadcloth, with large, flat steel buttons, had a high rolling collar, small cape, and enormous lapels. Hessian boots, with tassels of gold and spurs of steel, and tight buff pantaloons for riding, showed to advantage his stout, well turned limbs, and completed his costume. He had a ruddy complexion, a hearty laughing manner, and a jolly brusquerie about him that smacked more of the soldier or the agriculturist than the peer of the realm.
"And now, Rohallion, tell me about our Cosmo—how is he looking?"
"Twice as well as ever I did at the same age, and that is saying something—eh, Winny? Why he is the pattern man of the Household Brigade, but a strange boy withal. Duty about the Court has increased that cold hauteur which always marked his character. I don't know where the deuce he picked it up—not from you or me, Winny. But the butler says that an early supper is served——"
"Yes, dearest—in my little parlour."
"Egad! the snuggest billet in the house, and I can assure you that I am as well appetised as ever I used to be when a hungry ensign in Germany. Permit me, madam," said he, drawing her hand caressingly upon his arm; "and now tell me, how do you like the mode in which my hair is queued?"
"Why, Reynold?"
"'Tis a new fashion taught to Jack Andrews by old Hugh Hewson, of St. Martin-in-the-Fields—the Scotch hairdresser—you have heard of him, of course?"
"The original of Dr. Smollett's Hugh Strap—who has not?" said she, laughing; "well, his dressing is very smart! I see now, Andrews, his lordship looks quite a beau!"
"I was—or had the reputation of being so, when first I wore that gorget at Minden, a boy of fifteen or thereabouts; and before I saw you, Winny, dear."
"I have a surprise for you——"
"Supper first, Winny, egad! I don't like surprises; we had enough of them in Holland, and they were not at all to our taste. Eh, Jack Andrews—do you remember our night march for Valenciennes?" he asked, turning to his old valet, who grinned an assent as he deposited a pair of silver-mounted holster pistols in a mahogany case. To Rohallion this veteran, Jack Andrews, was all that Corporal Trim was to Uncle Toby (both of whom, according to Sterne, had served in the 25th Foot, then known as Leven's Regiment), a servant, and at times friend and companion, and perpetual resort or reference on military matters. Long and hard service together, community of sentiment on most matters, combined the sympathy of camaraderie with the steady faith of a Scottish servitor of the old school in Andrews, who was a sour-featured, thin, and erect old fellow, in a powdered wig (though, by the Act of 1795, hair powder cost a guinea per head), with a pigtail, and the family livery, grey faced with scarlet; and somehow on old Jack it always looked like a uniform.
Attended by this valet, both well mounted, and having holster pistols at their saddles, he had ridden from Ayr, through Maybole, and was now ready for supper, braced by the keen December blast, and feeling happy and jovial to find himself once more at home from London, which, so far as travelling and the ideas of the time are concerned, was then nearly as distant from the Scottish capital as Moscow is to-day; and a perfect picture they formed, that gentle, high-bred, and loving old couple in powdered hair, seated at supper, with their antique equipage, conversing in the plain old Scottish accent, which was still used, with a Doric word here and there, by the Scottish aristocracy.
"Andrews and I would have been here an hour earlier," said his lordship, slicing down a daintily-roasted capon, "but the old piper of Maybole, in the burgh livery, would play before us all the way through the town and two miles beyond it, according to use and wont—a glass of wine, Andrews—but Pate is growing old, Winny, now; he fairly broke down in playing 'Lord Lennox March,' so I think we must add something to his piper's-croft and cow's-mailing. They scarcely keep the poor fellow, when meal, malt, and everything are at such prices. I had, moreover, to inspect the Maybole volunteers. I say, Andrews, did you see how they shouldered arms?"
"Ay, my lord; knocking all their fore-and-aft cocked hats off, as they canted their firelocks from right to left," replied the valet, with a grim smile.
"Then we had to see an effigy of Tom Paine burned in front of the Tolbooth, with a copy of the 'Rights of Man,' while we drank Confusion to the French, the Friends of the People, the National Convention, and Charles Fox. So you see, Winny, my time was fully occupied."
The wax lights in the silver candelabra and crystal girandoles, and the fire that blazed in the polished brass grate, diffused a warm and ruddy glow through the cosy old-fashioned parlour, with its pink damask chairs and curtains; and speedily the old general dismissed his supper and glass of dry sherry.
Then, Andrews, as if according to use and wont, without requiring to be told, removed the decanters, and placed before his master the "three elements," whisky, hot water, and sugar, and Rohallion, with ladle and jug, proceeded to make a jorum of hot steaming toddy.
"Now, Andrews, my man," said he, "make a browst like this for yourself in the butler's pantry, and then turn in; neither you nor I are so young as we have been, and you've had a long journey to-day. Good night. I require nothing more."
Andrews gave a military salute, wheeled round, as if on a pivot, so that his pigtail described a horizontal circle, and withdrew.
"Now, what is the surprise you have for me, Winny?" asked Rohallion, as he filled her ladyship's glass, a long one, with a white worm in its stem.
"Tell me first the news from London."
"Well, gudewife Winny, nobody speaks of anything but this expedition to Egypt, and the expected surrender of Malta. Then if all goes right, ere long General Abercrombie will have about 15,000 men with him in the Bay of Marmorice."
"I am so glad our Cosmo did not think of going on foreign service."
"Why?"
"Can you ask me, Reynold—our only son?"
"I had been ten times under fire before I was half his age. He was most anxious to go, and I wished him too; but, as the staff appointments were all filled up, and his battalion of the Guards will soon be detailed for service, I thought it a pity that the boy should lose his regimental rank."
"Cosmo will be twenty-five on his next birth-day," said Lady Rohallion, thoughtfully, a remark probably suggested by the term "boy;" "our only son, Rohallion; we must indeed be careful of him."
"Careful of a strapping Guardsman like Cosmo!"
"There are times—when—when——"
"What, Winny?"
"I regret his having gone into the army at all."
"Odds my heart! then he would be the first Crawford of Rohallion that ever was out of it. His battalion may soon go to Ireland; the people there are more than ever discontented with the proposed union, and hope that the First Consul, the upstart Bonaparte, may enable them to cut a better figure than they and their allies under Humbert did at Ballnamuck last summer. I don't think the Horse Guards used me well in refusing me a brigade for service; so I don't return to London for some time, having paired off with our friend Eglinton, who is to put himself at the head of his Fencibles."
"Oh, I am so happy to hear this!" exclaimed Lady Winifred, clasping her plump white hands, the rings on which sparkled through her black lace mittens.
"Despite all I could urge, my old comrade, Jack Warrender of Ardgour, goes to Egypt in command of the Corsican Rangers."
"So Lady Eglinton wrote to me."
"And if he is knocked on the head,—which God forbid!—his daughter, Flora, will be long under trust, so her estate will be a fair one; and now, Winny, when I add that Mr. Fox and the Opposition are having their hair dressed à la Brutus, in imitation of the Parisian rabble, you have all my news."
"And now for mine," said she, with a delightful smile.
"Your surprise?"
"Yes—but you must come with me."
"Where?"
"To the nursery."
"That which was once the nursery, you mean."
"And which has become so again," she replied, laughing at his bewilderment.
Passing her arm through his, she led him to the sleeping-room, which adjoined their own, and desired him to look into Cosmo's little cot. Rohallion did so, and great indeed was his surprise to find a beautiful little boy, whose hair, all golden and curly, and whose form of face, rich bloom, and long dark eyelashes, powerfully reminded him of what Cosmo had been at the same age, when sleeping in the same chamber and in the same cot.
"Zounds, Winifred, what in the world does this mean?" said he, with a droll expression twinkling in his dark grey eyes; "whose little fellow is this? Not ours, certainly; you can't have been stealing a march on me now-a-days."
"'Tis a long story and a sad one; but return with me to the parlour, and I shall tell you all about it," she replied, while selecting the key of her escritoire from the huge, housewife-like bunch that glittered at her chatelaine.
"Egad, then I'll brew another jug of punch the while; and now, Winny, I am all attention."
She related all that the reader knows: the storm on that gloomy November night; the attack made by the armed Frenchman, and the consequent flight of the British ship; her wreck on the Partan Craig and the loss of the crew, with the recovery of the child from a state of insensibility, and the burial of his father, by the ground bailie, John Girvan.
"My worthy old quartermaster did right—'twas like my good comrade!" said Lord Rohallion, while his eyes glistened; "I can imagine I see him marching up the glen at the head of the funeral party, erect as ever he marched under fire—a trifle more, maybe. The old Borderer did just what I should have done myself!"
Lady Winifred now laid before her husband the ring, the purse with its few franc pieces, and the papers of the drowned stranger, and all of these he examined with interest and commiseration, for he was a kind, generous, and warm-hearted man.
"This is sad—very sad, indeed!" he muttered.
"By the handwriting, Rohallion, and by the crest on the ring——"
"A lily, stalked and leaved, rising from a coronet."
"Yes."
"Well, Winny?"
"I should say they must have been people of figure and fashion—of good quality, at least."
"An old fashioned phrase that, and going out now, like our fathers' swords and our mothers' hoops; call them aristocrats—eh, Winny?"
"Undoubtedly, and under suspicion, too, by the tenor of the poor lady's letter."
"'Josephine,'" said he, reading the inscription upon the ring; "why, that is the name of the widow Beauharnais, who three or four years ago married the First Consul to escape the guillotine! You must preserve these relics with care, Winny; and as for the poor bairn, Rohallion must be his home till we find his mother, a task very unlikely to be accomplished, if ever at all, in these times, when France is at war with all the world, and her scaffolds are drenched daily with the blood of women, children, and priests, as well as of brave and loyal gentlemen. But into no better hands than ours, Winny, could this poor waif of misfortune have fallen. He is the child of a faithful royalist soldier, too—we must always remember that."
Like his worthy wife, Lord Rohallion inherited with his blood a strong dash of Jacobitism, thus his sympathies were all with the humbled royalty of France.
The worthy old Defender of the Faith, who muddled away his time at Windsor, and his son, the "first gentleman" in Europe, who spent his days and nights less reputably in his Pavilion at Brighton—Thackeray's man of waistcoats, wigs, and uniforms—had perhaps no truer servant than Major-General Reynold Lord Rohallion, K.C.B., &c. Yet among the "Stuart Papers," which, in 1807, found their way into the royal archives, there was discovered a correspondence between a certain peer whose initial was R. and "His Majesty Henry II. of Scotland and IX. of England," which rather excited the surprise of the ministry and privy council; but like the same secret correspondence of many other nobles of both kingdoms, it was deemed only wise and charitable to commit it to oblivion, for the grave had closed over the good old Cardinal Duke of York—the last of the Stuarts—and few knew why, for a year and a day, the hilt of Rohallion's sword was covered by a band of crape.