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Books: The Monastery

S >> Sir Walter Scott >> The Monastery




"Na," answered Luckie Grimslees, in the true sleepy tone of a Scottish
matron when ten o'clock is going to strike, "he's no in his bed, but
I'se warrant him no gae out at this time o' night to keep folks
sitting up waiting for him--the Captain's a decent man."

I plainly perceived this last compliment was made for my hearing, by
way both of indicating and of recommending the course of conduct which
Mrs. Grimslees desired I should pursue. But I had not been knocked
about the world for thirty years and odd, and lived a bluff bachelor
all the while, to come home and be put under petticoat government by
my landlady. Accordingly I opened my chamber-door, and desired my old
friend David to walk up stairs.

"Captain," said he, as he entered, "I am as glad to find you up as if
I had hooked a twenty pound saumon. There's a gentleman up yonder that
will not sleep sound in his bed this blessed night unless he has the
pleasure to drink a glass of wine with you."

"You know, David," I replied, with becoming dignity, "that I cannot
with propriety go out to visit strangers at this time of night, or
accept of invitations from people of whom I know nothing."

David swore a round oath, and added, "Was ever the like heard of? He
has ordered a fowl and egg sauce, a pancake and minced collops and a
bottle of sherry--D'ye think I wad come and ask you to go to keep
company with ony bit English rider that sups on toasted cheese, and a
cheerer of rum-toddy? This is a gentleman every inch of him, and a
virtuoso, a clean virtuoso-a sad-coloured stand of claithes, and a wig
like the curled back of a mug-ewe. The very first question he speered
was about the auld drawbrig that has been at the bottom of the water
these twal score years--I have seen the fundations when we were
sticking saumon--And how the deevil suld he ken ony thing about the
old drawbrig, unless he were a virtuoso?" [Footnote: There is more to
be said about this old bridge hereafter. See Note, p. 57.]

David being a virtuoso in his own way, and moreover a landholder and
heritor, was a qualified judge of all who frequented his house, and
therefore I could not avoid again tying the strings of my knees.

"That's right, Captain," vociferated David; "you twa will be as thick
as three in a bed an ance ye forgather. I haena seen the like o' him
my very sell since I saw the great Doctor Samuel Johnson on his tower
through Scotland, whilk tower is lying in my back parlour for the
amusement of my guests, wi' the twa boards torn aff."

"Then the gentleman is a scholar, David?"

"I'se uphaud him a scholar," answered David: "he has a black coat on,
or a brown ane, at ony-rate."

"Is he a clergyman?"

"I am thinking no, for he looked after his horse's supper before he
spoke o' his ain," replied mine host.

"Has he a servant?" demanded I.

"Nae servant," answered David; "but a grand face o' his ain, that wad
gar ony body be willing to serve him that looks upon him."

"And what makes him think of disturbing me? Ah, David, this has
been some of your chattering; you are perpetually bringing your guests
on my shoulders, as if it were my business to entertain every man who
comes to the George."

"What the deil wad ye hae me do, Captain?" answered mine host; "a
gentleman lights down, and asks me in a most earnest manner, what man
of sense and learning there is about our town, that can tell him about
the antiquities of the place, and specially about the auld Abbey--ye
wadna hae me tell the gentleman a lee? and ye ken weel eneugh there is
naebody in the town can say a reasonable word about it, be it no
yoursell, except the bedral, and he is as fou as a piper by this time.
So, says I, there's Captain Clutterbuck, that's a very civil gentleman
and has little to do forby telling a' the auld cracks about the Abbey,
and dwells just hard by. Then says the gentleman to me, 'Sir,' says
he, very civilly, 'have the goodness to step to Captain Clutterbuck
with my compliments, and say I am a stranger, who have been led to
these parts chiefly by the fame of these Ruins, and that I would call
upon him, but the hour is late.' And mair he said that I have
forgotten, but I weel remember it ended,--'And, landlord, get a bottle
of your best sherry, and supper for two.'--Ye wadna have had me refuse
to do the gentleman's bidding, and me a publican?"

"Well, David," said I, "I wish your virtuoso had taken a fitter hour--
but as you say he is a gentleman--"

"I'se uphaud him that--the order speaks for itsell--a bottle of sherry
--minched collops and a fowl--that's speaking like a gentleman, I
trow?--That's right, Captain, button weel up, the night's raw--but
the water's clearing for a' that; we'll be on't neist night wi' my
Lord's boats, and we'll hae ill luck if I dinna send you a kipper to
relish your ale at e'en." [Footnote: The nobleman whose boats are
mentioned in the text, is the late kind and amiable Lord Sommerville,
an intimate friend of the author. David Kyle was a constant and
privileged attendant when Lord Sommerville had a party for spearing
salmon; on such occasions, eighty or a hundred fish were often killed
between Gleamer and Leaderfoot.]

In five minutes after this dialogue, I found myself in the parlour of
the George, and in the presence of the stranger.

He was a grave personage, about my own age, (which we shall call about
fifty,) and really had, as my friend David expressed it, something in
his face that inclined men to oblige and to serve him. Yet this
expression of authority was not at all of the cast which I have seen
in the countenance of a general of brigade, neither was the stranger's
dress at all martial. It consisted of a uniform suit of iron-gray
clothes, cut in rather an old-fashioned form. His legs were defended
with strong leathern gambadoes, which, according to an antiquarian
contrivance, opened at the sides, and were secured by steel clasps.
His countenance was worn as much by toil and sorrow as by age, for it
intimated that he had seen and endured much. His address was
singularly pleasing and gentlemanlike, and the apology which he made
for disturbing me at such an hour, and in such a manner, was so well
and handsomely expressed, that I could not reply otherwise than by
declaring my willingness to be of service to him.

"I have been a traveller to-day, sir," said he, "and I would willingly
defer the little I have to say till after supper, for which I feel
rather more appetized than usual."

We sate down to table, and notwithstanding the stranger's alleged
appetite, as well as the gentle preparation of cheese and ale which I
had already laid aboard, I really believe that I of the two did the
greater honour to my friend David's fowl and minced collops.

When the cloth was removed, and we had each made a tumbler of negus,
of that liquor which hosts call Sherry, and guests call Lisbon, I
perceived that the stranger seemed pensive, silent, and somewhat
embarrassed, as if he had something to communicate which he knew not
well how to introduce. To pave the way for him, I spoke of the
ancient ruins of the Monastery, and of their history. But, to my great
surprise, I found I had met my match with a witness. The stranger not
only knew all that I could tell him, but a great deal more; and, what
was still more mortifying, he was able, by reference to dates,
charters, and other evidence of facts, that, as Burns says, "downa be
disputed," to correct many of the vague tales which I had adopted on
loose and vulgar tradition, as well as to confute more than one of my
favourite theories on the subject of the old monks and their
dwellings, which I had sported freely in all the presumption of
superior information. And here I cannot but remark, that much of the
stranger's arguments and inductions rested upon the authority of Mr.
Deputy Register of Scotland, [Footnote: Thomas Thomson, Esq., whose
well-deserved panegyric ought to be found on another page than one
written by an intimate friend of thirty years' standing.] and his
lucubrations; a gentleman whose indefatigable research into the
national records is like to destroy my trade, and that of all local
antiquaries, by substituting truth instead of legend and romance.
Alas! I would the learned gentleman did but know how difficult it is
for us dealers in petty wares of antiquity to--

Pluck from our memories a rooted "legend,"
Raze out the written records of our brain.
Or cleanse our bosoms of that perilous stuff--

and so forth. It would, I am sure, move his pity to think how many old
dogs he hath set to learn new tricks, how many venerable parrots he
hath taught to sing a new song, how many gray heads he hath addled by
vain attempts to exchange their old _Mumpsimus_ for his new
_Sumpsimus_. But let it pass. _Humana perpessi sumus_--All
changes round us, past, present, and to come; that which was history
yesterday becomes fable to-day, and the truth of to-day is hatched
into a lie by to-morrow.

Finding myself like to be overpowered in the Monastery, which I had
hitherto regarded as my citadel, I began, like a skilful general, to
evacuate that place of defence, and fight my way through the adjacent
country. I had recourse to my acquaintance with the families and
antiquities of the neighbourhood, ground on which I thought I might
skirmish at large without its being possible for the stranger to meet
me with advantage. But I was mistaken.

The man in the iron-gray suit showed a much more minute knowledge of
these particulars than I had the least pretension to. He could tell
the very year in which the family of De Haga first settled on their
ancient barony.

[Footnote: The family of De Haga, modernized into Haig, of Bemerside,
is of the highest antiquity, and is the subject of one of the
prophecies of Thomas the Rhymer:--

Betide, betide, whate'er betide.
Haig shall be Haig of Bemerside. ]

Not a Thane within reach but he knew his family and connexions, how
many of his ancestors had fallen by the sword of the English, how many
in domestic brawl, and how many by the hand of the executioner for
march-treason. Their castles he was acquainted with from turret to
foundation-stone; and as for the miscellaneous antiquities scattered
about the country, he knew every one of them, from a _cromlech_
to a _cairn_, and could give as good an account of each as if he
had lived in the time of the Danes or Druids.

I was now in the mortifying predicament of one who suddenly finds
himself a scholar when he came to teach, and nothing was left for me
but to pick up as much of his conversation as I could, for the benefit
of the next company. I told, indeed, Allan Ramsay's story of the Monk
and Miller's Wife, in order to retreat with some honour under cover of
a parting volley. Here, however, my flank was again turned by the
eternal stranger.

"You are pleased to be facetious, sir," said he; "but you cannot be
ignorant that the ludicrous incident you mentioned is the subject of a
tale much older than that of Allan Ramsay."

I nodded, unwilling to acknowledge my ignorance, though, in fact, I
knew no more what he meant than did one of my friend David's
post-horses.

"I do not allude," continued my omniscient companion, "to the curious
poem published by Pinkerton from the Maitland Manuscript, called the
Fryars of Berwick, although it presents a very minute and amusing
picture of Scottish manners during the reign of James V.; but rather
to the Italian novelist, by whom, so far as I know, the story was
first printed, although unquestionably he first took his original from
some ancient _fabliau_." [Footnote: It is curious to remark at how
little expense of invention successive ages are content to receive
amusement. The same story which Ramsay and Dunbar have successively
handled, forms also the subject of the modern farce, No Song, no
Supper.]

"It is not to be doubted," answered I, not very well understanding,
however, the proposition to which I gave such unqualified assent.

"Yet," continued my companion, "I question much, had you known my
situation and profession, whether you would have pitched upon this
precise anecdote for my amusement."

This observation he made in a tone of perfect good-humour. I pricked
up my ears at the hint, and answered as politely as I could, that my
ignorance of his condition and rank could be the only cause of my
having stumbled on anything disagreeable; and that I was most willing
to apologize for my unintentional offence, so soon as I should know
wherein it consisted.

"Nay, no offence, sir," he replied; "offence can only exist where it
is taken. I have been too long accustomed to more severe and cruel
misconstructions, to be offended at a popular jest, though directed at
my profession."

"Am I to understand, then," I answered, "that I am speaking with a
Catholic clergyman?"

"An unworthy monk of the order of Saint Benedict," said the stranger,
"belonging to a community of your own countrymen, long established in
France, and scattered unhappily by the events of the Revolution."
"Then," said I, "you are a native Scotchman, and from this
neighbourhood?"

"Not so," answered the monk; "I am a Scotchman by extraction only,
and never was in this neighbourhood during my whole life."

"Never in this neighbourhood, and yet so minutely acquainted with its
history, its traditions, and even its external scenery! You surprise
me, sir," I replied.

"It is not surprising," he said, "that I should have that sort of
local information, when it is considered, that my uncle, an excellent
man, as well as a good Scotchman, the head also of our religious
community, employed much of his leisure in making me acquainted with
these particulars; and that I myself, disgusted with what has been
passing around me, have for many years amused myself, by digesting and
arranging the various scraps of information which I derived from my
worthy relative, and other aged brethren of our order."

"I presume, sir," said I, "though I would by no means intrude the
question, that you are now returned to Scotland with a view to settle
amongst your countrymen, since the great political catastrophe of our
time has reduced your corps?"

"No, sir," replied the Benedictine, "such is not my intention. A
European potentate, who still cherishes the Catholic faith, has
offered us a retreat within his dominions, where a few of my scattered
brethren are already assembled, to pray to God for blessings on their
protector, and pardon to their enemies. No one, I believe, will be
able to object to us under our new establishment, that the extent of
our revenues will be inconsistent with our vows of poverty and
abstinence; but, let us strive to be thankful to God, that the snare
of temporal abundance is removed from us."

"Many of your convents abroad, sir," said I, "enjoyed very handsome
incomes--and yet, allowing for times, I question if any were better
provided for than the Monastery of this village. It is said to have
possessed nearly two thousand pounds in yearly money-rent, fourteen
chalders and nine bolls of wheat, fifty-six chalders five bolls
barley, forty-four chalders and ten bolls oats, capons and poultry,
butter, salt, carriage and arriage, peats and kain, wool and ale."

"Even too much of all these temporal goods, sir," said my companion,
"which, though well intended by the pious donors, served only to make
the establishment the envy and the prey of those by whom it was finally
devoured."

"In the meanwhile, however," I observed, "the monks had an easy life
of it, and, as the old song goes,

--made gude kale
On Fridays when they fasted."

"I understand you, sir," said the Benedictine; "it is difficult, saith
the proverb, to carry a full cup without spilling. Unquestionably the
wealth of the community, as it endangered the safety of the
establishment by exciting the cupidity of others, was also in frequent
instances a snare to the brethren themselves. And yet we have seen the
revenues of convents expended, not only in acts of beneficence and
hospitality to individuals, but in works of general and permanent
advantage to the world at large. The noble folio collection of French
historians, commenced in 1737, under the inspection and at the expense
of the community of Saint Maur, will long show that the revenues of
the Benedictines were not always spent in self-indulgence, and that
the members of that order did not uniformly slumber in sloth and
indolence, when they had discharged the formal duties of their rule."

As I knew nothing earthly at the time about the community of St. Maur,
and their learned labours, I could only return a mumbling assent to
this proposition. I have since seen this noble work in the library of
a distinguished family, and I must own I am ashamed to reflect, that,
in so wealthy a country as ours, a similar digest of our historians
should not be undertaken, under the patronage of the noble and the
learned, in rivalry of that which the Benedictines of Paris executed
at the expense of their own conventual funds.

"I perceive," said the ex-Benedictine, smiling, "that your heretical
prejudices are too strong to allow us poor brethren any merit, whether
literary or spiritual."

"Far from it, sir," said I; "I assure you I have been much obliged to
monks in my time. When I was quartered in a Monastery in Flanders, in
the campaign of 1793, I never lived more comfortably in my life. They
were jolly fellows, the Flemish Canons, and right sorry was I to leave
my good quarters, and to know that my honest hosts were to be at the
mercy of the Sans-Culottes. But _fortune de la guerre!_"

The poor Benedictine looked down and was silent. I had unwittingly
awakened a train of bitter reflections, or rather I had touched
somewhat rudely upon a chord which seldom ceased to vibrate of itself.
But he was too much accustomed to this sorrowful train of ideas to
suffer it to overcome him. On my part, I hastened to atone for my
blunder. "If there was any object of his journey to this country in
which I could, with propriety, assist him, I begged to offer him my
best services." I own I laid some little emphasis on the words "with
propriety," as I felt it would ill become me, a sound Protestant, and
a servant of government so far as my half-pay was concerned, to
implicate myself in any recruiting which my companion might have
undertaken in behalf of foreign seminaries, or in any similar design
for the advancement of Popery, which, whether the Pope be actually the
old lady of Babylon or no, it did not become me in any manner to
advance or countenance.

My new friend hastened to relieve my indecision. "I was about to
request your assistance, sir," he said, "in a matter which cannot but
interest you as an antiquary, and a person of research. But I assure
you it relates entirely to events and persons removed to the distance
of two centuries and a half. I have experienced too much evil from the
violent unsettlement of the country in which I was born, to be a rash
labourer in the work of innovation in that of my ancestors."

I again assured him of my willingness to assist him in anything that
was not contrary to my allegiance or religion.

"My proposal," he replied, "affects neither.--May God bless the
reigning family in Britain! They are not, indeed, of that dynasty to
restore which my ancestors struggled and suffered in vain; but the
Providence who has conducted his present Majesty to the throne, has
given him the virtues necessary to his time--firmness and
intrepidity--a true love of his country, and an enlightened view of
the dangers by which she is surrounded.--For the religion of these
realms, I am contented to hope that the great Power, whose mysterious
dispensation has rent them from the bosom of the church, will, in his
own good time and manner, restore them to its holy pale. The efforts
of an individual, obscure and humble as myself, might well retard, but
could never advance, a work so mighty."

"May I then inquire, sir," said I, "with what purpose you seek this
country?"

Ere my companion replied, he took from his pocket a clasped paper
book, about the size of a regimental orderly-book, full, as it seemed,
of memoranda; and, drawing one of the candles close to him, (for
David, as a strong proof of his respect for the stranger, had indulged
us with two,) he seemed to peruse the contents very earnestly.

"There is among the ruins of the western end of the Abbey church,"
said he, looking up to me, yet keeping the memorandum-book half open,
and occasionally glancing at it, as if to refresh his memory, "a sort
of recess or chapel beneath a broken arch, and in the immediate
vicinity of one of those shattered Gothic columns which once supported
the magnificent roof, whose fall has now encumbered that part of the
building with its ruins."

"I think," said I, "that I know whereabouts you are. Is there not in
the side wall of the chapel, or recess, which you mention, a large
carved stone, bearing a coat of arms, which no one hitherto has been
able to decipher?"

"You are right," answered the Benedictine; and again consulting his
memoranda, he added, "the arms on the dexter side are those of
Glendinning, being a cross parted by a cross indented and
countercharged of the same; and on the sinister three spur-rowels for
those of Avenel; they are two ancient families, now almost extinct in
this country--the arms _part y per pale_."

"I think," said I, "there is no part of this ancient structure with
which you are not as well acquainted as was the mason who built it.
But if your information be correct, he who made out these bearings
must have had better eyes than mine."

"His eyes," said the Benedictine, "have long been closed in death;
probably when he inspected the monument it was in a more perfect
state, or he may have derived his information from the tradition of
the place."

"I assure you," said I, "that no such tradition now exists. I have
made several reconnoissances among the old people, in hopes to learn
something of the armorial bearings, but I never heard of such a
circumstance. It seems odd that you should have acquired it in a
foreign land."

"These trifling particulars," he replied, "were formerly looked upon
as more important, and they were sanctified to the exiles who retained
recollection of them, because they related to a place dear indeed to
memory, but which their eyes could never again behold. It is possible,
in like manner, that on the Potomac or Susquehannah, you may find
traditions current concerning places in England, which are utterly
forgotten in the neighbourhood where they originated. But to my
purpose. In this recess, marked by the armorial bearings, lies buried
a treasure, and it is in order to remove it that I have undertaken my
present journey."

"A treasure!" echoed I, in astonishment.

"Yes," replied the monk, "an inestimable treasure, for those who know
how to use it rightly."

I own my ears did tingle a little at the word treasure, and that a
handsome tilbury, with a neat groom in blue and scarlet livery, having
a smart cockade on his glazed hat, seemed as it were to glide across
the room before gay eyes, while a voice, as of a crier, pronounced my
ear, "Captain Clutterbuck's tilbury--drive up." But I resisted the
devil, and he fled from me.

"I believe," said I, "all hidden treasure belongs either to the king
or the lord of the soil; and as I have served his majesty, I cannot
concern myself in any adventure which may have an end in the Court of
Exchequer."

"The treasure I seek," said the stranger, smiling, "will not be envied
by princes or nobles,---it is simply the heart of an upright man."

"Ah! I understand you," I answered; "some relic, forgotten in the
confusion of the Reformation. I know the value which men of your
persuasion put upon the bodies and limbs of saints. I have seen the
Three Kings of Cologne."

"The relics which I seek, however," said the Benedictine, "are not
precisely of that nature. The excellent relative whom I have already
mentioned, amused his leisure hours with putting into form the
traditions of his family, particularly some remarkable circumstances
which took place about the first breaking out of the schism of the
church in Scotland. He became so much interested in his own labours,
that at length he resolved that the heart of one individual, the hero
of his tale, should rest no longer in a land of heresy, now deserted
by all his kindred. As he knew where it was deposited, he formed the
resolution to visit his native country for the purpose of recovering
this valued relic. But age, and at length disease, interfered with his
resolution, and it was on his deathbed that he charged me to undertake
the task in his stead. The various important events which have crowded
upon each other, our ruin and our exile, have for many years obliged
me to postpone this delegated duty. Why, indeed, transfer the relics
of a holy and worthy man to a country, where religion and virtue are
become the mockery of the scorner? I have now a home, which I trust
may be permanent, if any thing in this earth can be, termed so.
Thither will I transport the heart of the good father, and beside the
shrine which it shall occupy, I will construct my own grave."