Weir of Hermiston , livre ebook

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pubOne.info thank you for your continued support and wish to present you this new edition. IN the wild end of a moorland parish, far out of the sight of any house, there stands a cairn among the heather, and a little by east of it, in the going down of the brae-side, a monument with some verses half defaced. It was here that Claverhouse shot with his own hand the Praying Weaver of Balweary, and the chisel of Old Mortality has clinked on that lonely gravestone. Public and domestic history have thus marked with a bloody finger this hollow among the hills; and since the Cameronian gave his life there, two hundred years ago, in a glorious folly, and without comprehension or regret, the silence of the moss has been broken once again by the report of firearms and the cry of the dying.

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Publié par	Pub One Info
Date de parution	23 octobre 2010
Nombre de lectures	0
EAN13	9782819917694
Langue	English

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INTRODUCTORY
IN the wild end of a moorland parish, far out of thesight of any house, there stands a cairn among the heather, and alittle by east of it, in the going down of the brae-side, amonument with some verses half defaced. It was here thatClaverhouse shot with his own hand the Praying Weaver of Balweary,and the chisel of Old Mortality has clinked on that lonelygravestone. Public and domestic history have thus marked with abloody finger this hollow among the hills; and since the Cameroniangave his life there, two hundred years ago, in a glorious folly,and without comprehension or regret, the silence of the moss hasbeen broken once again by the report of firearms and the cry of thedying.
The Deil's Hags was the old name. But the place isnow called Francie's Cairn. For a while it was told that Franciewalked. Aggic Hogg met him in the gloaming by the cairnside, and hespoke to her, with chattering teeth, so that his words were lost.He pursued Rob Todd (if any one could have believed Robbie) for thespace of half a mile with pitiful entreaties. But the age is one ofincredulity; these superstitious decorations speedily fell off; andthe facts of the story itself, like the bones of a giant buriedthere and half dug up, survived, naked and imperfect, in the memoryof the scattered neighbours. To this day, of winter nights, whenthe sleet is on the window and the cattle are quiet in the byre,there will be told again, amid the silence of the young and theadditions and corrections of the old, the tale of the Justice-Clerkand of his son, young Hermiston, that vanished from men'sknowledge; of the two Kirsties and the Four Black Brothers of theCauldstaneslap; and of Frank Innes, "the young fool advocate," thatcame into these moorland parts to find his destiny.
CHAPTER I - LIFE AND DEATH OF MRS. WEIR
THE Lord Justice-Clerk was a stranger in that partof the country; but his lady wife was known there from a child, asher race had been before her. The old "riding Rutherfords ofHermiston," of whom she was the last descendant, had been famousmen of yore, ill neighbours, ill subjects, and ill husbands totheir wives though not their properties. Tales of them were rifefor twenty miles about; and their name was even printed in the pageof our Scots histories, not always to their credit. One bit thedust at Flodden; one was hanged at his peel door by James theFifth; another fell dead in a carouse with Tom Dalyell; while afourth (and that was Jean's own father) died presiding at aHell-Fire Club, of which he was the founder. There were many headsshaken in Crossmichael at that judgment; the more so as the man hada villainous reputation among high and low, and both with the godlyand the worldly. At that very hour of his demise, he had ten goingpleas before the Session, eight of them oppressive. And the samedoom extended even to his agents; his grieve, that had been hisright hand in many a left-hand business, being cast from his horseone night and drowned in a peat-hag on the Kye-skairs; and his verydoer (although lawyers have long spoons) surviving him not long,and dying on a sudden in a bloody flux.
In all these generations, while a male Rutherfordwas in the saddle with his lads, or brawling in a change-house,there would be always a white- faced wife immured at home in theold peel or the later mansion-house. It seemed this succession ofmartyrs bided long, but took their vengeance in the end, and thatwas in the person of the last descendant, Jean. She bore the nameof the Rutherfords, but she was the daughter of their tremblingwives. At the first she was not wholly without charm. Neighboursrecalled in her, as a child, a strain of elfin wilfulness, gentlelittle mutinies, sad little gaieties, even a morning gleam ofbeauty that was not to be fulfilled. She withered in the growing,and (whether it was the sins of her sires or the sorrows of hermothers) came to her maturity depressed, and, as it were, defaced;no blood of life in her, no grasp or gaiety; pious, anxious,tender, tearful, and incompetent.
It was a wonder to many that she had married -seeming so wholly of the stuff that makes old maids. But chancecast her in the path of Adam Weir, then the new Lord-Advocate, arecognised, risen man, the conqueror of many obstacles, and thuslate in the day beginning to think upon a wife. He was one wholooked rather to obedience than beauty, yet it would seem he wasstruck with her at the first look. "Wha's she?" he said, turning tohis host; and, when he had been told, "Ay," says he, "she looksmenseful. She minds me - "; and then, after a pause (which somehave been daring enough to set down to sentimental recollections),"Is she releegious?" he asked, and was shortly after, at his ownrequest, presented. The acquaintance, which it seems profane tocall a courtship, was pursued with Mr. Weir's accustomed industry,and was long a legend, or rather a source of legends, in theParliament House. He was described coming, rosy with much port,into the drawing-room, walking direct up to the lady, and assailingher with pleasantries, to which the embarrassed fair one responded,in what seemed a kind of agony, "Eh, Mr. Weir!" or "O, Mr. Weir!"or "Keep me, Mr. Weir!" On the very eve of their engagement, it wasrelated that one had drawn near to the tender couple, and hadoverheard the lady cry out, with the tones of one who talked forthe sake of talking, "Keep me, Mr. Weir, and what became of him?"and the profound accents of the suitor reply, "Haangit, mem,haangit." The motives upon either side were much debated. Mr. Weirmust have supposed his bride to be somehow suitable; perhaps hebelonged to that class of men who think a weak head the ornament ofwomen - an opinion invariably punished in this life. Her descentand her estate were beyond question. Her wayfaring ancestors andher litigious father had done well by Jean. There was ready moneyand there were broad acres, ready to fall wholly to the husband, tolend dignity to his descendants, and to himself a title, when heshould be called upon the Bench. On the side of Jean, there wasperhaps some fascination of curiosity as to this unknown maleanimal that approached her with the roughness of a ploughman andthe APLOMB of an advocate. Being so trenchantly opposed to all sheknew, loved, or understood, he may well have seemed to her theextreme, if scarcely the ideal, of his sex. And besides, he was anill man to refuse. A little over forty at the period of hismarriage, he looked already older, and to the force of manhoodadded the senatorial dignity of years; it was, perhaps, with anunreverend awe, but he was awful. The Bench, the Bar, and the mostexperienced and reluctant witness, bowed to his authority - and whynot Jeannie Rutherford?
The heresy about foolish women is always punished, Ihave said, and Lord Hermiston began to pay the penalty at once. Hishouse in George Square was wretchedly ill-guided; nothinganswerable to the expense of maintenance but the cellar, which washis own private care. When things went wrong at dinner, as theycontinually did, my lord would look up the table at his wife: "Ithink these broth would be better to sweem in than to sup." Or elseto the butler: "Here, M'Killop, awa' wi' this Raadical gigot - tak'it to the French, man, and bring me some puddocks! It seems rathera sore kind of a business that I should be all day in Courthaanging Raadicals, and get nawthing to my denner." Of course thiswas but a manner of speaking, and he had never hanged a man forbeing a Radical in his life; the law, of which he was the faithfulminister, directing otherwise. And of course these growls were inthe nature of pleasantry, but it was of a recondite sort; anduttered as they were in his resounding voice, and commented on bythat expression which they called in the Parliament House"Hermiston's hanging face" - they struck mere dismay into the wife.She sat before him speechless and fluttering; at each dish, as at afresh ordeal, her eye hovered toward my lord's countenance and fellagain; if he but ate in silence, unspeakable relief was herportion; if there were complaint, the world was darkened. She wouldseek out the cook, who was always her SISTER IN THE LORD. "O, mydear, this is the most dreidful thing that my lord can never becontented in his own house!" she would begin; and weep and praywith the cook; and then the cook would pray with Mrs. Weir; and thenext day's meal would never be a penny the better - and the nextcook (when she came) would be worse, if anything, but just aspious. It was often wondered that Lord Hermiston bore it as he did;indeed, he was a stoical old voluptuary, contented with sound wineand plenty of it. But there were moments when he overflowed.Perhaps half a dozen times in the history of his married life -"Here! tak' it awa', and bring me a piece bread and kebbuck!" hehad exclaimed, with an appalling explosion of his voice and raregestures. None thought to dispute or to make excuses; the servicewas arrested; Mrs. Weir sat at the head of the table whimperingwithout disguise; and his lordship opposite munched his bread andcheese in ostentatious disregard. Once only, Mrs. Weir had venturedto appeal. He was passing her chair on his way into the study.
"O, Edom!" she wailed, in a voice tragic with tears,and reaching out to him both hands, in one of which she held asopping pocket-handkerchief.
He paused and looked upon her with a face of wrath,into which there stole, as he looked, a twinkle of humour.
"Noansense!" he said. "You and your noansense! Whatdo I want with a Christian faim'ly? I want Christian broth! Get mea lass that can plain-boil a potato, if she was a whure off thestreets." And with these words, which echoed in her tender earslike blasphemy, he had passed on to his study and shut the doorbehind him.
Such was the housewifery in George Square. It wasbetter at Hermiston, where Kirstie Elliott, the sister of aneighbouring bonnet-laird, and an eighteenth cousin of the lady's,bore the char