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While this was doing, the other boats had also pulled off to safer distance, and now, from these as well as from the shore, the unfortunate native of the deep was overwhelmed by all kinds of missiles, – harpoons and spears flew against him on all sides – guns were fired, and each various means of annoyance plied which could excite him to exhaust his strength in useless rage. When the animal found that he was locked in by shallows on all sides, and became sensible, at the same time, of the strain of the cable on his body, the convulsive efforts which he made to escape, accompanied with sounds resembling deep and loud groans, would have moved the compassion of all but a practised whale-fisher. The repeated showers which he spouted into the air began now to be mingled with blood, and the waves which surrounded him assumed the same crimson appearance. Meantime the attempts of the assailants were redoubled; but Mordaunt Mertoun and Cleveland, in particular, exerted themselves to the uttermost, contending who should display most courage in approaching the monster, so tremendous in its agonies, and should inflict the most deep and deadly wounds upon its huge bulk.
The contest seemed at last pretty well over; for although the animal continued from time to time to make frantic exertions for liberty, yet its strength appeared so much exhausted, that, even with the assistance of the tide, which had now risen considerably, it was thought it could scarcely extricate itself.
Magnus gave the signal to venture nearer to the whale, calling out at the same time, “Close in, lads, he is not half so mad now – The Factor may look for a winter’s oil for the two lamps at Harfra – Pull close in, lads.”
Ere his orders could be obeyed, the other two boats had anticipated his purpose; and Mordaunt Mertoun, eager to distinguish himself above Cleveland, had, with the whole strength he possessed, plunged a half-pike into the body of the animal. But the leviathan, like a nation whose resources appear totally exhausted by previous losses and calamities, collected his whole remaining force for an effort, which proved at once desperate and successful. The wound, last received, had probably reached through his external defences of blubber, and attained some very sensitive part of the system; for he roared aloud, as he sent to the sky a mingled sheet of brine and blood, and snapping the strong cable like a twig, overset Mertoun’s boat with a blow of his tail, shot himself, by a mighty effort, over the bar, upon which the tide had now risen considerably, and made out to sea, carrying with him a whole grove of the implements which had been planted in his body, and leaving behind him, on the waters, a dark red trace of his course.
“There goes to sea your cruise of oil, Master Yellowley,” said Magnus, “and you must consume mutton suet, or go to bed in the dark.”
“Operam et oleum perdidi,” muttered Triptolemus; “but if they catch me whale-fishing again, I will consent that the fish shall swallow me as he did Jonah.”
“But where is Mordaunt Mertoun all this while?” exclaimed Claud Halcro; and it was instantly perceived that the youth, who had been stunned when his boat was stove, was unable to swim to shore as the other sailors did, and now floated senseless upon the waves.
We have noticed the strange and inhuman prejudice, which rendered the Zetlanders of that period unwilling to assist those whom they saw in the act of drowning, though that is the calamity to which the islanders are most frequently exposed. Three men, however, soared above this superstition. The first was Claud Halcro, who threw himself from a small rock headlong into the waves, forgetting, as he himself afterwards stated, that he could not swim, and, if possessed of the harp of Arion, had no dolphins in attendance. The first plunge which the poet made in deep water, reminding him of these deficiencies, he was fain to cling to the rock from which he had dived, and was at length glad to regain the shore, at the expense of a ducking.
Magnus Troil, whose honest heart forgot his late coolness towards Mordaunt, when he saw the youth’s danger, would instantly have brought him more effectual aid, but Eric Scambester held him fast.
“Hout, sir – hout,” exclaimed that faithful attendant – “Captain Cleveland has a grip of Mr. Mordaunt – just let the twa strangers help ilk other, and stand by the upshot. The light of the country is not to be quenched for the like of them. Bide still, sir, I say – Bredness Voe is not a bowl of punch, that a man can be fished out of like a toast with a long spoon.”
This sage remonstrance would have been altogether lost upon Magnus, had he not observed that Cleveland had in fact jumped out of the boat, and swum to Mertoun’s assistance, and was keeping him afloat till the boat came to the aid of both. As soon as the immediate danger which called so loudly for assistance was thus ended, the honest Udaller’s desire to render aid terminated also; and recollecting the cause of offence which he had, or thought he had, against Mordaunt Mertoun, he shook off his butler’s hold, and turning round scornfully from the beach, called Eric an old fool for supposing that he cared whether the young fellow sank or swam.
Still, however, amid his assumed indifference, Magnus could not help peeping over the heads of the circle, which, surrounding Mordaunt as soon as he was brought on shore, were charitably employed in endeavouring to recall him to life; and he was not able to attain the appearance of absolute unconcern, until the young man sat up on the beach, and showed plainly that the accident had been attended with no material consequences. It was then first that, cursing the assistants for not giving the lad a glass of brandy, he walked sullenly away, as if totally unconcerned in his fate.
The women, always accurate in observing the telltale emotions of each other, failed not to remark, that when the sisters of Burgh-Westra saw Mordaunt immersed in the waves, Minna grew as pale as death, while Brenda uttered successive shrieks of terror. But though there were some nods, winks, and hints that auld acquaintance were not easily forgot, it was, on the whole, candidly admitted, that less than such marks of interest could scarce have been expected, when they saw the companion of their early youth in the act of perishing before their eyes.
Whatever interest Mordaunt’s condition excited while it seemed perilous, began to abate as he recovered himself; and when his senses were fully restored, only Claud Halcro, with two or three others, were standing by him. About ten paces off stood Cleveland – his hair and clothes dropping water, and his features wearing so peculiar an expression, as immediately to arrest the attention of Mordaunt. There was a suppressed smile on his cheek, and a look of pride in his eye, that implied liberation from a painful restraint, and something resembling gratified scorn. Claud Halcro hastened to intimate to Mordaunt, that he owed his life to Cleveland; and the youth, rising from the ground, and losing all other feelings in those of gratitude, stepped forward with his hand stretched out, to offer his warmest thanks to his preserver. But he stopped short in surprise, as Cleveland, retreating a pace or two, folded his arms on his breast, and declined to accept his proffered hand. He drew back in turn, and gazed with astonishment at the ungracious manner, and almost insulting look, with which Cleveland, who had formerly rather expressed a frank cordiality, or at least openness of bearing, now, after having thus rendered him a most important service, chose to receive his thanks.
“It is enough,” said Cleveland, observing his surprise, “and it is unnecessary to say more about it. I have paid back my debt, and we are now equal.”
“You are more than equal with me, Captain Cleveland,” answered Mertoun, “because you endangered your life to do for me what I did for you without the slightest risk; – besides,” he added, trying to give the discourse a more pleasant turn, “I have your rifle-gun to boot.”
“Cowards only count danger for any point of the game,” said Cleveland. “Danger has been my consort for life, and sailed with me on a thousand worse voyages; – and for rifles, I have enough of my own, and you may see, when you will, which can use them best.”
There was something in the tone with which this was said, that struck Mordaunt strongly; it was miching malicho, as Hamlet says, and meant mischief. Cleveland saw his surprise, came close up to him, and spoke in a low tone of voice: – “Hark ye, my young brother. There is a custom among us gentlemen of fortune, that when we follow the same chase, and take the wind out of each other’s sails, we think sixty yards of the sea-beach, and a brace of rifles, are no bad way of making our odds even.”
“I do not understand you, Captain Cleveland,” said Mordaunt.
“I do not suppose you do, – I did not suppose you would,” said the Captain; and, turning on his heel, with a smile that resembled a sneer, Mordaunt saw him mingle with the guests, and very soon beheld him at the side of Minna, who was talking to him with animated features, that seemed to thank him for his gallant and generous conduct.
“If it were not for Brenda,” thought Mordaunt, “I almost wish he had left me in the voe, for no one seems to care whether I am alive or dead. – Two rifles and sixty yards of sea-beach – is that what he points at? – It may come, – but not on the day he has saved my life with risk of his own.”
While he was thus musing, Eric Scambester was whispering to Halcro, “If these two lads do not do each other a mischief, there is no faith in freits. Master Mordaunt saves Cleveland, – well. – Cleveland, in requital, has turned all the sunshine of Burgh-Westra to his own side of the house; and think what it is to lose favour in such a house as this, where the punch-kettle is never allowed to cool! Well, now that Cleveland in his turn has been such a fool as to fish Mordaunt out of the voe, see if he does not give him sour sillocks for stock-fish.”
“Pshaw, pshaw!” replied the poet, “that is all old women’s fancies, my friend Eric; for what says glorious Dryden – sainted John, —
‘The yellow gall that in your bosom floats,Engenders all these melancholy thoughts.’”“Saint John, or Saint James either, may be mistaken in the matter,” said Eric; “for I think neither of them lived in Zetland. I only say, that if there is faith in old saws, these two lads will do each other a mischief; and if they do, I trust it will light on Mordaunt Mertoun.”
“And why, Eric Scambester,” said Halcro, hastily and angrily, “should you wish ill to that poor young man, that is worth fifty of the other?”
“Let every one roose the ford as he finds it,” replied Eric; “Master Mordaunt is all for wan water, like his old dog-fish of a father; now Captain Cleveland, d’ye see, takes his glass, like an honest fellow and a gentleman.”
“Rightly reasoned, and in thine own division,” said Halcro; and breaking off their conversation, took his way back to Burgh-Westra, to which the guests of Magnus were now returning, discussing as they went, with much animation, the various incidents of their attack upon the whale, and not a little scandalized that it should have baffled all their exertions.
“I hope Captain Donderdrecht of the Eintracht of Rotterdam will never hear of it,” said Magnus; “he would swear, donner and blitzen, we were only fit to fish flounders.”41
CHAPTER XVIII
And helter-skelter have I rode to thee,And tidings do I bring, and lucky joys,And golden times, and happy news of price.Ancient Pistol.Fortune, who seems at times to bear a conscience, owed the hospitable Udaller some amends, and accordingly repaid to Burgh-Westra the disappointment occasioned by the unsuccessful whale-fishing, by sending thither, on the evening of the day in which that incident happened, no less a person than the jagger, or travelling merchant, as he styled himself, Bryce Snailsfoot, who arrived in great pomp, himself on one pony, and his pack of goods, swelled to nearly double its usual size, forming the burden of another, which was led by a bare-headed bare-legged boy.
As Bryce announced himself the bearer of important news, he was introduced to the dining apartment, where (for that primitive age was no respecter of persons) he was permitted to sit down at a side-table, and amply supplied with provisions and good liquor; while the attentive hospitality of Magnus permitted no questions to be put to him, until, his hunger and thirst appeased, he announced, with the sense of importance attached to distant travels, that he had just yesterday arrived at Lerwick from Kirkwall, the capital of Orkney, and would have been here yesterday, but it blew hard off the Fitful-head.
“We had no wind here,” said Magnus.
“There is somebody has not been sleeping, then,” said the pedlar, “and her name begins with N; but Heaven is above all.”
“But the news from Orkney, Bryce, instead of croaking about a capful of wind?”
“Such news,” replied Bryce, “as has not been heard this thirty years – not since Cromwell’s time.”
“There is not another Revolution, is there?” said Halcro; “King James has not come back, as blithe as King Charlie did, has he?”
“It’s news,” replied the pedlar, “that are worth twenty kings, and kingdoms to boot of them; for what good did the evolutions ever do us? and I dare say we have seen a dozen, great and sma’.”
“Are any Indiamen come north about?” said Magnus Troil.
“Ye are nearer the mark, Fowd,” said the jagger; “but it is nae Indiaman, but a gallant armed vessel, chokeful of merchandise, that they part with so easy that a decent man like my sell can afford to give the country the best pennyworths you ever saw; and that you will say, when I open that pack, for I count to carry it back another sort lighter than when I brought it here.”
“Ay, ay, Bryce,” said the Udaller, “you must have had good bargains if you sell cheap; but what ship was it?”
“Cannot justly say – I spoke to nobody but the captain, who was a discreet man; but she had been down on the Spanish Main, for she has silks and satins, and tobacco, I warrant you, and wine, and no lack of sugar, and bonny-wallies baith of silver and gowd, and a bonnie dredging of gold dust into the bargain.”
“What like was she?” said Cleveland, who seemed to give much attention.
“A stout ship,” said the itinerant merchant, “schooner-rigged, sails like a dolphin, they say, carries twelve guns, and is pierced for twenty.”
“Did you hear the captain’s name?” said Cleveland, speaking rather lower than his usual tone.
“I just ca’d him the Captain,” replied Bryce Snailsfoot; “for I make it a rule never to ask questions of them I deal with in the way of trade; for there is many an honest captain, begging your pardon, Captain Cleveland, that does not care to have his name tacked to his title; and as lang as we ken what bargains we are making, what signifies it wha we are making them wi’, ye ken?”
“Bryce Snailsfoot is a cautious man,” said the Udaller, laughing; “he knows a fool may ask more questions than a wise man cares to answer.”
“I have dealt with the fair traders in my day,” replied Snailsfoot, “and I ken nae use in blurting braid out with a man’s name at every moment; but I will uphold this gentleman to be a gallant commander – ay, and a kind one too; for every one of his crew is as brave in apparel as himself nearly – the very foremast-men have their silken scarfs; I have seen many a lady wear a warse, and think hersell nae sma’ drink – and for siller buttons, and buckles, and the lave of sic vanities, there is nae end of them.”
“Idiots!” muttered Cleveland between his teeth; and then added, “I suppose they are often ashore, to show all their bravery to the lasses of Kirkwall?”
“Ne’er a bit of that are they. The Captain will scarce let them stir ashore without the boatswain go in the boat – as rough a tarpaulin as ever swabb’d a deck – and you may as weel catch a cat without her claws, as him without his cutlass and his double brace of pistols about him; every man stands as much in awe of him as of the commander himsell.”
“That must be Hawkins, or the devil,” said Cleveland.
“Aweel, Captain,” replied the jagger, “be he the tane or the tither, or a wee bit o’ baith, mind it is you that give him these names, and not I.”
“Why, Captain Cleveland,” said the Udaller, “this may prove the very consort you spoke of.”
“They must have had some good luck, then,” said Cleveland, “to put them in better plight than when I left them. – Did they speak of having lost their consort, pedlar?”
“In troth did they,” said Bryce; “that is, they said something about a partner that had gone down to Davie Jones in these seas.”
“And did you tell them what you knew of her?” said the Udaller.
“And wha the deevil wad hae been the fule, then,” said the pedlar, “that I suld say sae? When they kend what came of the ship, the next question wad have been about the cargo, – and ye wad not have had me bring down an armed vessel on the coast, to harrie the poor folk about a wheen rags of duds that the sea flung upon their shores?”
“Besides, what might have been found in your own pack, you scoundrel!” said Magnus Troil; an observation which produced a loud laugh. The Udaller could not help joining in the hilarity which applauded his jest; but instantly composing his countenance, he said, in an unusually grave tone, “You may laugh, my friends; but this is a matter which brings both a curse and a shame on the country; and till we learn to regard the rights of them that suffer by the winds and waves, we shall deserve to be oppressed and hag-ridden, as we have been and are, by the superior strength of the strangers who rule us.”
The company hung their heads at the rebuke of Magnus Troil. Perhaps some, even of the better class, might be conscience-struck on their own account; and all of them were sensible that the appetite for plunder, on the part of the tenants and inferiors, was not at all times restrained with sufficient strictness. But Cleveland made answer gaily, “If these honest fellows be my comrades, I will answer for them that they will never trouble the country about a parcel of chests, hammocks, and such trumpery, that the Roost may have washed ashore out of my poor sloop. What signifies to them whether the trash went to Bryce Snailsfoot, or to the bottom, or to the devil? So unbuckle thy pack, Bryce, and show the ladies thy cargo, and perhaps we may see something that will please them.”
“It cannot be his consort,” said Brenda, in a whisper to her sister; “he would have shown more joy at her appearance.”
“It must be the vessel,” answered Minna; “I saw his eye glisten at the thought of being again united to the partner of his dangers.”
“Perhaps it glistened,” said her sister, still apart, “at the thought of leaving Zetland; it is difficult to guess the thought of the heart from the glance of the eye.”
“Judge not, at least, unkindly of a friend’s thought,” said Minna; “and then, Brenda, if you are mistaken, the fault rests not with you.”
During this dialogue, Bryce Snailsfoot was busied in uncoiling the carefully arranged cordage of his pack, which amounted to six good yards of dressed seal-skin, curiously complicated and secured by all manner of knots and buckles. He was considerably interrupted in the task by the Udaller and others, who pressed him with questions respecting the stranger vessel.
“Were the officers often ashore? and how were they received by the people of Kirkwall?” said Magnus Troil.
“Excellently well,” answered Bryce Snailsfoot; “and the Captain and one or two of his men had been at some of the vanities and dances which went forward in the town; but there had been some word about customs, or king’s duties, or the like, and some of the higher folk, that took upon them as magistrates, or the like, had had words with the Captain, and he refused to satisfy them; and then it is like he was more coldly looked on, and he spoke of carrying the ship round to Stromness, or the Langhope, for she lay under the guns of the battery at Kirkwall. But he” (Bryce) “thought she wad bide at Kirkwall till the summer-fair was over, for all that.”
“The Orkney gentry,” said Magnus Troil, “are always in a hurry to draw the Scotch collar tighter round their own necks. Is it not enough that we must pay scat and wattle, which were all the public dues under our old Norse government; but must they come over us with king’s dues and customs besides? It is the part of an honest man to resist these things. I have done so all my life, and will do so to the end of it.”
There was a loud jubilee and shout of applause among the guests, who were (some of them at least) better pleased with Magnus Troil’s latitudinarian principles with respect to the public revenue, (which were extremely natural to those living in so secluded a situation, and subjected to many additional exactions,) than they had been with the rigour of his judgment on the subject of wrecked goods. But Minna’s inexperienced feelings carried her farther than her father, while she whispered to Brenda, not unheard by Cleveland, that the tame spirit of the Orcadians had missed every chance which late incidents had given them to emancipate these islands from the Scottish yoke.
“Why,” she said, “should we not, under so many changes as late times have introduced, have seized the opportunity to shake off an allegiance which is not justly due from us, and to return to the protection of Denmark, our parent country? Why should we yet hesitate to do this, but that the gentry of Orkney have mixed families and friendship so much with our invaders, that they have become dead to the throb of the heroic Norse blood, which they derived from their ancestors?”
The latter part of this patriotic speech happened to reach the astonished ears of our friend Triptolemus, who, having a sincere devotion for the Protestant succession, and the Revolution as established, was surprised into the ejaculation, “As the old cock crows the young cock learns – hen I should say, mistress, and I crave your pardon if I say any thing amiss in either gender. But it is a happy country where the father declares against the king’s customs, and the daughter against the king’s crown! and, in my judgment, it can end in naething but trees and tows.”
“Trees are scarce among us,” said Magnus; “and for ropes, we need them for our rigging, and cannot spare them to be shirt-collars.”
“And whoever,” said the Captain, “takes umbrage at what this young lady says, had better keep his ears and tongue for a safer employment than such an adventure.”
“Ay, ay,” said Triptolemus, “it helps the matter much to speak truths, whilk are as unwelcome to a proud stomach as wet clover to a cow’s, in a land where lads are ready to draw the whittle if a lassie but looks awry. But what manners are to be expected in a country where folk call a pleugh-sock a markal?”
“Hark ye, Master Yellowley,” said the Captain, smiling, “I hope my manners are not among those abuses which you come hither to reform; any experiment on them may be dangerous.”
“As well as difficult,” said Triptolemus, dryly; “but fear nothing, Captain Cleveland, from my remonstrances. My labours regard the men and things of the earth, and not the men and things of the sea, – you are not of my element.”
“Let us be friends, then, old clod-compeller,” said the Captain.
“Clod-compeller!” said the agriculturist, bethinking himself of the lore of his earlier days; “Clod-compeller pro cloud-compeller, Νεφεληγερέτα Ζευς —Græcum est, – in which voyage came you by that phrase?”
“I have travelled books as well as seas in my day,” said the Captain; “but my last voyages have been of a sort to make me forget my early cruizes through classic knowledge. – But come here, Bryce, – hast cast off the lashing? – Come all hands, and let us see if he has aught in his cargo that is worth looking upon.”
With a proud, and, at the same time, a wily smile, did the crafty pedlar display a collection of wares far superior to those which usually filled his packages, and, in particular, some stuffs and embroideries, of such beauty and curiosity, fringed, flowered, and worked, with such art and magnificence, upon foreign and arabesque patterns, that the sight might have dazzled a far more brilliant company than the simple race of Thule. All beheld and admired, while Mistress Baby Yellowley, holding up her hands, protested it was a sin even to look upon such extravagance, and worse than murder so much as to ask the price of them.