The Fortunes of Nigel

“It was the better for Jock,” said Heriot; “for, if I remember weel, it saved him from a strapping up at Dumfries, which he had weel deserved for other misdeeds.”

“Ay, man, mind ye that?” said the king; “but he had other virtues, for he was a tight huntsman, moreover, that Jock of Milch, and could hollow to a hound till all the woods rang again. But he came to an Annandale end at the last, for Lord Torthorwald run his lance out through him. – Cocksnails, man, when I think of those wild passages, in my conscience, I am not sure but we lived merrier in auld Holyrood in those shifting days, than now when we are dwelling at heck and manger. Cantabit vacuus– we had but little to care for.”

“And if your Majesty please to remember,” said the goldsmith, “the awful task we had to gather silver-vessail and gold-work enough to make some show before the Spanish Ambassador.”

“Vera true,” said the king, now in a full tide of gossip, “and I mind not the name of the right leal lord that helped us with every unce he had in his house, that his native Prince might have some credit in the eyes of them that had the Indies at their beck.”

“I think, if your Majesty,” said the citizen, “will cast your eye on the paper in your hand, you will recollect his name.”

“Ay!” said the king, “say ye sae, man? – Lord Glenvarloch, that was his name indeed —Justus et tenax propositi– A just man, but as obstinate as a baited bull. He stood whiles against us, that Lord Randal Olifaunt of Glenvarloch, but he was a loving and a leal subject in the main. But this supplicator maun be his son – Randal has been long gone where king and lord must go, Geordie, as weel as the like of you – and what does his son want with us?”

“The settlement,” answered the citizen, “of a large debt due by your Majesty’s treasury, for money advanced to your Majesty in great State emergency, about the time of the Raid of Ruthven.”

“I mind the thing weel,” said King James – “Od’s death, man, I was just out of the clutches of the Master of Glamis and his complices, and there was never siller mair welcome to a born prince, – the mair the shame and pity that crowned king should need sic a petty sum. But what need he dun us for it, man, like a baxter at the breaking? We aught him the siller, and will pay him wi’ our convenience, or make it otherwise up to him, whilk is enow between prince and subject – We are not in meditatione fugae, man, to be arrested thus peremptorily.”

“Alas! an it please your Majesty,” said the goldsmith, shaking his head, “it is the poor young nobleman’s extreme necessity, and not his will, that makes him importunate; for he must have money, and that briefly, to discharge a debt due to Peregrine Peterson, Conservator of the Privileges at Campvere, or his haill hereditary barony and estate of Glenvarloch will be evicted in virtue of an unredeemed wadset.”

“How say ye, man – how say ye?” exclaimed the king, impatiently; “the carle of a Conservator, the son of a Low-Dutch skipper, evict the auld estate and lordship of the house of Olifaunt? – God’s bread, man, that maun not be – we maun suspend the diligence by writ of favour, or otherwise.”

“I doubt that may hardly be,” answered the citizen, “if it please your Majesty; your learned counsel in the law of Scotland advise, that there is no remeid but in paying the money.”

“Ud’s fish,” said the king, “let him keep haud by the strong hand against the carle, until we can take some order about his affairs.”

“Alas!” insisted the goldsmith, “if it like your Majesty, your own pacific government, and your doing of equal justice to all men, has made main force a kittle line to walk by, unless just within the bounds of the Highlands.”

“Well – weel – weel, man,” said the perplexed monarch, whose ideas of justice, expedience, and convenience, became on such occasions strangely embroiled; “just it is we should pay our debts, that the young man may pay his; and he must be paid, and in verbo regis he shall be paid – but how to come by the siller, man, is a difficult chapter – ye maun try the city, Geordie.”

“To say the truth,” answered Heriot, “please your gracious Majesty, what betwixt loans and benevolences, and subsidies, the city is at this present – ”

“Donna tell me of what the city is,” said King James; “our Exchequer is as dry as Dean Giles’s discourses on the penitentiary psalms —Ex nihilo nihil fit– It’s ill taking the breeks aff a wild Highlandman – they that come to me for siller, should tell me how to come by it – the city ye maun try, Heriot; and donna think to be called Jingling Geordie for nothing – and in verbo regis I will pay the lad if you get me the loan – I wonnot haggle on the terms; and, between you and me, Geordie, we will redeem the brave auld estate of Glenvarloch. – But wherefore comes not the young lord to Court, Heriot – is he comely – is he presentable in the presence?”

“No one can be more so,” said George Heriot; “but – ”

“Ay, I understand ye,” said his Majesty – “I understand ye —Res angusta domi– puir lad-puir lad! – and his father a right true leal Scots heart, though stiff in some opinions. Hark ye, Heriot, let the lad have twa hundred pounds to fit him out. And, here – here” – (taking the carcanet of rubies from his old hat) – “ye have had these in pledge before for a larger sum, ye auld Levite that ye are. Keep them in gage, till I gie ye back the siller out of the next subsidy.”

“If it please your Majesty to give me such directions in writing,” said the cautious citizen.

“The deil is in your nicety, George,” said the king; “ye are as preceese as a Puritan in form, and a mere Nullifidian in the marrow of the matter. May not a king’s word serve ye for advancing your pitiful twa hundred pounds?”

“But not for detaining the crown jewels,” said George Heriot.

And the king, who from long experience was inured to dealing with suspicious creditors, wrote an order upon George Heriot, his well-beloved goldsmith and jeweller, for the sum of two hundred pounds, to be paid presently to Nigel Olifaunt, Lord of Glenvarloch, to be imputed as so much debts due to him by the crown; and authorizing the retention of a carcanet of balas rubies, with a great diamond, as described in a Catalogue of his Majesty’s Jewels, to remain in possession of the said George Heriot, advancer of the said sum, and so forth, until he was lawfully contented and paid thereof. By another rescript, his Majesty gave the said George Heriot directions to deal with some of the monied men, upon equitable terms, for a sum of money for his Majesty’s present use, not to be under 50,000 merks, but as much more as could conveniently be procured.

“And has he ony lair, this Lord Nigel of ours?” said the king.

George Heriot could not exactly answer this question; but believed “the young lord had studied abroad.”

“He shall have our own advice,” said the king, “how to carry on his studies to maist advantage; and it may be we will have him come to Court, and study with Steenie and Babie Charles. And, now we think on’t, away – away, George – for the bairns will be coming hame presently, and we would not as yet they kend of this matter we have been treating anent. Propera fedem, O Geordie. Clap your mule between your boughs, and god-den with you.”

Thus ended the conference betwixt the gentle King Jamie and his benevolent jeweller and goldsmith.

CHAPTER VI

  O I do know him – tis the mouldy lemon  Which our court wits will wet their lips withal,  When they would sauce their honied conversation  With somewhat sharper flavour – Marry sir,  That virtue’s wellnigh left him – all the juice  That was so sharp and poignant, is squeezed out,  While the poor rind, although as sour as ever,  Must season soon the draff we give our grunters,  For two legg’d things are weary on’t.The Chamberlain – A Comedy

The good company invited by the hospitable citizen assembled at his house in Lombard Street at the “hollow and hungry hour” of noon, to partake of that meal which divides the day, being about the time when modern persons of fashion, turning themselves upon their pillow, begin to think, not without a great many doubts and much hesitation, that they will by and by commence it. Thither came the young Nigel, arrayed plainly, but in a dress, nevertheless, more suitable to his age and quality than he had formerly worn, accompanied by his servant Moniplies, whose outside also was considerably improved. His solemn and stern features glared forth from under a blue velvet bonnet, fantastically placed sideways on his head – he had a sound and tough coat of English blue broad-cloth, which, unlike his former vestment, would have stood the tug of all the apprentices in Fleet Street. The buckler and broadsword he wore as the arms of his condition, and a neat silver badge, bearing his lord’s arms, announced that he was an appendage of aristocracy. He sat down in the good citizen’s buttery, not a little pleased to find his attendance upon the table in the hall was likely to be rewarded with his share of a meal such as he had seldom partaken of.

Mr. David Ramsay, that profound and ingenious mechanic, was safely conducted to Lombard Street, according to promise, well washed, brushed, and cleaned, from the soot of the furnace and the forge. His daughter, who came with him, was about twenty years old, very pretty, very demure, yet with lively black eyes, that ever and anon contradicted the expression of sobriety, to which silence, reserve, a plain velvet hood, and a cambric ruff, had condemned Mistress Marget, as the daughter of a quiet citizen.

There were also two citizens and merchants of London, men ample in cloak, and many-linked golden chain, well to pass in the world, and experienced in their craft of merchandise, but who require no particular description. There was an elderly clergyman also, in his gown and cassock, a decent venerable man, partaking in his manners of the plainness of the citizens amongst whom he had his cure.

These may be dismissed with brief notice; but not so Sir Mungo Malagrowther, of Girnigo Castle, who claims a little more attention, as an original character of the time in which he flourished.

That good knight knocked at Master Heriot’s door just as the clock began to strike twelve, and was seated in his chair ere the last stroke had chimed. This gave the knight an excellent opportunity of making sarcastic observations on all who came later than himself, not to mention a few rubs at the expense of those who had been so superfluous as to appear earlier.

Having little or no property save his bare designation, Sir Mungo had been early attached to Court in the capacity of whipping-boy, as the office was then called, to King James the Sixth, and, with his Majesty, trained to all polite learning by his celebrated preceptor, George Buchanan. The office of whipping-boy doomed its unfortunate occupant to undergo all the corporeal punishment which the Lord’s Anointed, whose proper person was of course sacred, might chance to incur, in the course of travelling through his grammar and prosody. Under the stern rule, indeed, of George Buchanan, who did not approve of the vicarious mode of punishment, James bore the penance of his own faults, and Mungo Malagrowther enjoyed a sinecure; but James’s other pedagogue, Master Patrick Young, went more ceremoniously to work, and appalled the very soul of the youthful king by the floggings which he bestowed on the whipping-boy, when the royal task was not suitably performed. And be it told to Sir Mungo’s praise, that there were points about him in the highest respect suited to his official situation. He had even in youth a naturally irregular and grotesque set of features, which, when distorted by fear, pain, and anger, looked like one of the whimsical faces which present themselves in a Gothic cornice. His voice also was high-pitched and querulous, so that, when smarting under Master Peter Young’s unsparing inflictions, the expression of his grotesque physiognomy, and the superhuman yells which he uttered, were well suited to produce all the effects on the Monarch who deserved the lash, that could possibly be produced by seeing another and an innocent individual suffering for his delict.

Sir Mungo Malagrowther, for such he became, thus got an early footing at Court, which another would have improved and maintained. But, when he grew too big to be whipped, he had no other means of rendering himself acceptable. A bitter, caustic, and backbiting humour, a malicious wit, and an envy of others more prosperous than the possessor of such amiable qualities, have not, indeed, always been found obstacles to a courtier’s rise; but then they must be amalgamated with a degree of selfish cunning and prudence, of which Sir Mungo had no share. His satire ran riot, his envy could not conceal itself, and it was not long after his majority till he had as many quarrels upon his hands as would have required a cat’s nine lives to answer. In one of these rencontres he received, perhaps we should say fortunately, a wound, which served him as an excuse for answering no invitations of the kind in future. Sir Rullion Rattray, of Ranagullion, cut off, in mortal combat, three of the fingers of his right hand, so that Sir Mungo never could hold sword again. At a later period, having written some satirical verses upon the Lady Cockpen, he received so severe a chastisement from some persons employed for the purpose, that he was found half dead on the spot where they had thus dealt with him, and one of his thighs having been broken, and ill set, gave him a hitch in his gait, with which he hobbled to his grave. The lameness of his leg and hand, besides that they added considerably to the grotesque appearance of this original, procured him in future a personal immunity from the more dangerous consequences of his own humour; and he gradually grew old in the service of the Court, in safety of life and limb, though without either making friends or attaining preferment. Sometimes, indeed, the king was amused with his caustic sallies, but he had never art enough to improve the favourable opportunity; and his enemies (who were, for that matter, the whole Court) always found means to throw him out of favour again. The celebrated Archie Armstrong offered Sir Mungo, in his generosity, a skirt of his own fool’s coat, proposing thereby to communicate to him the privileges and immunities of a professed jester – “For,” said the man of motley, “Sir Mungo, as he goes on just now, gets no more for a good jest than just the king’s pardon for having made it.”

Even in London, the golden shower which fell around him did not moisten the blighted fortunes of Sir Mungo Malagrowther. He grew old, deaf, and peevish – lost even the spirit which had formerly animated his strictures – and was barely endured by James, who, though himself nearly as far stricken in years, retained, to an unusual and even an absurd degree, the desire to be surrounded by young people.

Sir Mungo, thus fallen into the yellow leaf of years and fortune, showed his emaciated form and faded embroidery at Court as seldom as his duty permitted; and spent his time in indulging his food for satire in the public walks, and in the aisles of Saint Paul’s, which were then the general resort of newsmongers and characters of all descriptions, associating himself chiefly with such of his countrymen as he accounted of inferior birth and rank to himself. In this manner, hating and contemning commerce, and those who pursued it, he nevertheless lived a good deal among the Scottish artists and merchants, who had followed the Court to London. To these he could show his cynicism without much offence; for some submitted to his jeers and ill-humour in deference to his birth and knighthood, which in those days conferred high privileges – and others, of more sense, pitied and endured the old man, unhappy alike in his fortunes and his temper.

Amongst the latter was George Heriot, who, though his habits and education induced him to carry aristocratical feelings to a degree which would now be thought extravagant, had too much spirit and good sense to permit himself to be intruded upon to an unauthorized excess, or used with the slightest improper freedom, by such a person as Sir Mungo, to whom he was, nevertheless, not only respectfully civil, but essentially kind, and even generous.

Accordingly, this appeared from the manner in which Sir Mungo Malagrowther conducted himself upon entering the apartment. He paid his respects to Master Heriot, and a decent, elderly, somewhat severe-looking female, in a coif, who, by the name of Aunt Judith, did the honours of his house and table, with little or no portion of the supercilious acidity, which his singular physiognomy assumed when he made his bow successively to David Ramsay and the two sober citizens. He thrust himself into the conversation of the latter, to observe he had heard in Paul’s, that the bankrupt concern of Pindivide, a great merchant, – who, as he expressed it, had given the crows a pudding, and on whom he knew, from the same authority, each of the honest citizens has some unsettled claim, – was like to prove a total loss – “stock and block, ship and cargo, keel and rigging, all lost, now and for ever.”

The two citizens grinned at each other; but, too prudent to make their private affairs the subject of public discussion, drew their heads together, and evaded farther conversation by speaking in a whisper.

The old Scots knight next attacked the watchmaker with the same disrespectful familiarity. – “Davie,” he said, – “Davie, ye donnard auld idiot, have ye no gane mad yet, with applying your mathematical science, as ye call it, to the book of Apocalypse? I expected to have heard ye make out the sign of the beast, as clear as a tout on a bawbee whistle.”

“Why, Sir Mungo,” said the mechanist, after making an effort to recall to his recollection what had been said to him, and by whom, “it may be, that ye are nearer the mark than ye are yoursell aware of; for, taking the ten horns o’ the beast, ye may easily estimate by your digitals – ”

“My digits! you d – d auld, rusty, good-for-nothing time-piece!” exclaimed Sir Mungo, while, betwixt jest and earnest, he laid on his hilt his hand, or rather his claw, (for Sir Rullion’s broadsword has abridged it into that form,) – “D’ye mean to upbraid me with my mutilation?”

Master Heriot interfered. “I cannot persuade our friend David,” he said, “that scriptural prophecies are intended to remain in obscurity, until their unexpected accomplishment shall make, as in former days, that fulfilled which was written. But you must not exert your knightly valour on him for all that.”

“By my saul, and it would be throwing it away,” said Sir Mungo, laughing. “I would as soon set out, with hound and horn, to hunt a sturdied sheep; for he is in a doze again, and up to the chin in numerals, quotients, and dividends. – Mistress Margaret, my pretty honey,” for the beauty of the young citizen made even Sir Mungo Malagrowther’s grim features relax themselves a little, “is your father always as entertaining as he seems just now?”

Mistress Margaret simpered, bridled, looked to either side, then straight before her; and, having assumed all the airs of bashful embarrassment and timidity which were necessary, as she thought, to cover a certain shrewd readiness which really belonged to her character, at length replied: “That indeed her father was very thoughtful, but she had heard that he took the habit of mind from her grandfather.”

“Your grandfather!” said Sir Mungo, – after doubting if he had heard her aright, – “Said she her grandfather! The lassie is distraught! – I ken nae wench on this side of Temple Bar that is derived from so distant a relation.”

“She has got a godfather, however, Sir Mungo,” said George Heriot, again interfering; “and I hope you will allow him interest enough with you, to request you will not put his pretty godchild to so deep a blush.”

“The better – the better,” said Sir Mungo. “It is a credit to her, that, bred and born within the sound of Bow-bell, she can blush for any thing; and, by my saul, Master George,” he continued, chucking the irritated and reluctant damsel under the chin, “she is bonny enough to make amends for her lack of ancestry – at least, in such a region as Cheapside, where, d’ye mind me, the kettle cannot call the porridge-pot – ”

The damsel blushed, but not so angrily as before. Master George Heriot hastened to interrupt the conclusion of Sir Mungo’s homely proverb, by introducing him personally to Lord Nigel.

Sir Mungo could not at first understand what his host said, – “Bread of Heaven, wha say ye, man?”

Upon the name of Nigel Olifaunt, Lord Glenvarloch, being again hollowed into his ear, he drew up, and, regarding his entertainer with some austerity, rebuked him for not making persons of quality acquainted with each other, that they might exchange courtesies before they mingled with other folks. He then made as handsome and courtly a congee to his new acquaintance as a man maimed in foot and hand could do; and, observing he had known my lord, his father, bid him welcome to London, and hoped he should see him at Court.

Nigel in an instant comprehended, as well from Sir Mungo’s manner, as from a strict compression of their entertainer’s lips, which intimated the suppression of a desire to laugh, that he was dealing with an original of no ordinary description, and accordingly, returned his courtesy with suitable punctiliousness. Sir Mungo, in the meanwhile, gazed on him with much earnestness; and, as the contemplation of natural advantages was as odious to him as that of wealth, or other adventitious benefits, he had no sooner completely perused the handsome form and good features of the young lord, than like one of the comforters of the man of Uz, he drew close up to him, to enlarge on the former grandeur of the Lords of Glenvarloch, and the regret with which he had heard, that their representative was not likely to possess the domains of his ancestry. Anon, he enlarged upon the beauties of the principal mansion of Glenvarloch – the commanding site of the old castle – the noble expanse of the lake, stocked with wildfowl for hawking – the commanding screen of forest, terminating in a mountain-ridge abounding with deer – and all the other advantages of that fine and ancient barony, till Nigel, in spite of every effort to the contrary, was unwillingly obliged to sigh.

Sir Mungo, skilful in discerning when the withers of those he conversed with were wrung, observed that his new acquaintance winced, and would willingly have pressed the discussion; but the cook’s impatient knock upon the dresser with the haft of his dudgeon-knife, now gave a signal loud enough to be heard from the top of the house to the bottom, summoning, at the same time, the serving-men to place the dinner upon the table, and the guests to partake of it.

Sir Mungo, who was an admirer of good cheer, – a taste which, by the way, might have some weight in reconciling his dignity to these city visits, – was tolled off by the sound, and left Nigel and the other guests in peace, until his anxiety to arrange himself in his due place of pre-eminence at the genial board was duly gratified. Here, seated on the left hand of Aunt Judith, he beheld Nigel occupy the station of yet higher honour on the right, dividing that matron from pretty Mistress Margaret; but he saw this with the more patience, that there stood betwixt him and the young lord a superb larded capon.

The dinner proceeded according to the form of the times. All was excellent of the kind; and, besides the Scottish cheer promised, the board displayed beef and pudding, the statutory dainties of Old England. A small cupboard of plate, very choicely and beautifully wrought, did not escape the compliments of some of the company, and an oblique sneer from Sir Mungo, as intimating the owner’s excellence in his own mechanical craft.

“I am not ashamed of the workmanship, Sir Mungo,” said the honest citizen. “They say, a good cook knows how to lick his own fingers; and, methinks, it were unseemly that I, who have furnished half the cupboards in broad Britain, should have my own covered with paltry pewter.”

The blessing of the clergyman now left the guests at liberty to attack what was placed before them; and the meal went forward with great decorum, until Aunt Judith, in farther recommendation of the capon, assured her company that it was of a celebrated breed of poultry, which she had herself brought from Scotland.