The Heart of Mid-Lothian, Volume 1

by Walter Scott

  CHAPTER TWENTIETH.

  Yet though thou mayst be dragg'd in scorn To yonder ignominious tree, Thou shalt not want one faithful friend To share the cruel fates' decree. Jemmy Dawson.

  After spending the greater part of the morning in his devotions (for hisbenevolent neighbours had kindly insisted upon discharging his task ofordinary labour), David Deans entered the apartment when the breakfastmeal was prepared. His eyes were involuntarily cast down, for he wasafraid to look at Jeanie, uncertain as he was whether she might feelherself at liberty, with a good conscience, to attend the Court ofJusticiary that day, to give the evidence which he understood that shepossessed, in order to her sister's exculpation. At length, after aminute of apprehensive hesitation, he looked at her dress to discoverwhether it seemed to be in her contemplation to go abroad that morning.Her apparel was neat and plain, but such as conveyed no exact intimationof her intentions to go abroad. She had exchanged her usual garb formorning labour, for one something inferior to that with which, as herbest, she was wont to dress herself for church, or any more rare occasionof going into society. Her sense taught her, that it was respectful to bedecent in her apparel on such an occasion, while her feelings induced herto lay aside the use of the very few and simple personal ornaments,which, on other occasions, she permitted herself to wear. So that thereoccurred nothing in her external appearance which could mark out to herfather, with anything like certainty, her intentions on this occasion.

  The preparations for their humble meal were that morning made in vain.The father and daughter sat, each assuming the appearance of eating, whenthe other's eyes were turned to them, and desisting from the effort withdisgust, when the affectionate imposture seemed no longer necessary.

  At length these moments of constraint were removed. The sound of St.Giles's heavy toll announced the hour previous to the commencement of thetrial; Jeanie arose, and with a degree of composure for which she herselfcould not account, assumed her plaid, and made her other preparations fora distant walking. It was a strange contrast between the firmness of herdemeanour, and the vacillation and cruel uncertainty of purpose indicatedin all her father's motions; and one unacquainted with both couldscarcely have supposed that the former was, in her ordinary habits oflife, a docile, quiet, gentle, and even timid country maiden, while herfather, with a mind naturally proud and strong, and supported byreligious opinions of a stern, stoical, and unyielding character, had inhis time undergone and withstood the most severe hardships, and the mostimminent peril, without depression of spirit, or subjugation of hisconstancy. The secret of this difference was, that Jeanie's mind hadalready anticipated the line of conduct which she must adopt, with allits natural and necessary consequences; while her father, ignorant ofevery other circumstance, tormented himself with imagining what the onesister might say or swear, or what effect her testimony might have uponthe awful event of the trial.

  He watched his daughter, with a faltering and indecisive look, until shelooked back upon him, with a look of unutterable anguish, as she wasabout to leave the apartment.

  "My dear lassie," said he, "I will." His action, hastily and confusedlysearching for his worsted mittans* and staff, showed his purpose ofaccompanying her, though his tongue failed distinctly to announce it.

  * A kind of worsted gloves, used by the lower orders.

  "Father," said Jeanie, replying rather to his action than his words, "yehad better not."

  "In the strength of my God," answered Deans, assuming firmness, "I willgo forth."

  And, taking his daughter's arm under his, he began to walk from the doorwith a step so hasty, that she was almost unable to keep up with him. Atrifling circumstance, but which marked the perturbed state of his mind,checked his course.

  "Your bonnet, father?" said Jeanie, who observed he had come out with hisgrey hairs uncovered. He turned back with a slight blush on his cheek,being ashamed to have been detected in an omission which indicated somuch mental confusion, assumed his large blue Scottish bonnet, and with astep slower, but more composed, as if the circumstance, had obliged himto summon up his resolution, and collect his scattered ideas, againplaced his daughter's arm under his, and resumed the way to Edinburgh.

  The courts of justice were then, and are still, held in what is calledthe Parliament Close, or, according to modern phrase, Parliament Square,and occupied the buildings intended for the accommodation of the ScottishEstates. This edifice, though in an imperfect and corrupted style ofarchitecture, had then a grave, decent, and, as it were, a judicialaspect, which was at least entitled to respect from its antiquity. Forwhich venerable front, I observed, on my last occasional visit to themetropolis, that modern taste had substituted, at great apparent expense,a pile so utterly inconsistent with every monument of antiquity around,and in itself so clumsy at the same time and fantastic, that it may belikened to the decorations of Tom Errand the porter, in the _Trip to theJubilee,_ when he appears bedizened with the tawdry finery of BeauClincher. _Sed transeat cum caeteris erroribus._

  The small quadrangle, or Close, if we may presume still to give it thatappropriate, though antiquated title, which at Lichfield, Salisbury, andelsewhere, is properly applied to designate the enclosure adjacent to acathedral, already evinced tokens of the fatal scene which was that dayto be acted. The soldiers of the City Guard were on their posts, nowenduring, and now rudely repelling with the butts of their muskets, themotley crew who thrust each other forward, to catch a glance at theunfortunate object of trial, as she should pass from the adjacent prisonto the Court in which her fate was to be determined. All must haveoccasionally observed, with disgust, the apathy with which the vulgargaze on scenes of this nature, and how seldom, unless when theirsympathies are called forth by some striking and extraordinarycircumstance, the crowd evince any interest deeper than that of callous,unthinking bustle, and brutal curiosity. They laugh, jest, quarrel, andpush each other to and fro, with the same unfeeling indifference as ifthey were assembled for some holiday sport, or to see an idle procession.Occasionally, however, this demeanour, so natural to the degradedpopulace of a large town, is exchanged for a temporary touch of humanaffections; and so it chanced on the present occasion.

  When Deans and his daughter presented themselves in the Close, andendeavoured to make their way forward to the door of the Court-house,they became involved in the mob, and subject, of course, to theirinsolence. As Deans repelled with some force the rude pushes which hereceived on all sides, his figure and antiquated dress caught theattention of the rabble, who often show an intuitive sharpness inascribing the proper character from external appearance,--

  "Ye're welcome, whigs, Frae Bothwell briggs,"

  sung one fellow (for the mob of Edinburgh were at that time jacobiticallydisposed, probably because that was the line of sentiment mostdiametrically opposite to existing authority).

  "Mess David Williamson, Chosen of twenty, Ran up the pu'pit stair, And sang Killiecrankie,"

  chanted a siren, whose profession might be guessed by her appearance. Atattered caidie, or errand-porter, whom David Deans had jostled in hisattempt to extricate himself from the vicinity of these scorners,exclaimed in a strong north-country tone, "Ta deil ding out herCameronian een--what gies her titles to dunch gentlemans about?"

  "Make room for the ruling elder," said yet another; "he comes to see aprecious sister glorify God in the Grassmarket!"

  "Whisht; shame's in ye, sirs," said the voice of a man very loudly,which, as quickly sinking, said in a low but distinct tone, "It's herfather and sister."

  All fell back to make way for the sufferers; and all, even the veryrudest and most profligate, were struck with shame and silence. In thespace thus abandoned to them by the mob, Deans stood, holding hisdaughter by the hand, and said to her, with a countenance str
ongly andsternly expressive of his internal emotion, "Ye hear with your ears, andye see with your eyes, where and to whom the backslidings and defectionsof professors are ascribed by the scoffers. Not to themselves alone, butto the kirk of which they are members, and to its blessed and invisibleHead. Then, weel may we take wi' patience our share and portion of thisoutspreading reproach."

  The man who had spoken, no other than our old friend, Dumbiedikes, whosemouth, like that of the prophet's ass, had been opened by the emergencyof the case, now joined them, and, with his usual taciturnity, escortedthem into the Court-house. No opposition was offered to their entranceeither by the guards or doorkeepers; and it is even said that one of thelatter refused a shilling of civility-money tendered him by the Laird ofDumbiedikes, who was of opinion that "siller wad make a' easy." But thislast incident wants confirmation.

  Admitted within the precincts of the Court-house, they found the usualnumber of busy office-bearers, and idle loiterers, who attend on thesescenes by choice, or from duty. Burghers gaped and stared; young lawyerssauntered, sneered, and laughed, as in the pit of the theatre; whileothers apart sat on a bench retired, and reasoned highly, _inter apicesjuris,_ on the doctrines of constructive crime, and the true import ofthe statute. The bench was prepared for the arrival of the judges. Thejurors were in attendance. The crown-counsel, employed in looking overtheir briefs and notes of evidence, looked grave, and whispered with eachother. They occupied one side of a large table placed beneath the bench;on the other sat the advocates, whom the humanity of the Scottish law (inthis particular more liberal than that of the sister-country) not onlypermits, but enjoins, to appear and assist with their advice and skillall persons under trial. Mr. Nichil Novit was seen actively instructingthe counsel for the panel (so the prisoner is called in Scottishlaw-phraseology), busy, bustling, and important. When they entered theCourt-room, Deans asked the Laird, in a tremulous whisper, "Where will_she_ sit?"

  Dumbiedikes whispered Novit, who pointed to a vacant space at the bar,fronting the judges, and was about to conduct Deans towards it.

  "No!" he said; "I cannot sit by her--I cannot own her--not as yet,at least--I will keep out of her sight, and turn mine own eyeselsewhere--better for us baith."

  Saddletree, whose repeated interference with the counsel had procured himone or two rebuffs, and a special request that he would concern himselfwith his own matters, now saw with pleasure an opportunity of playing theperson of importance. He bustled up to the poor old man, and proceeded toexhibit his consequence, by securing, through his interest with thebar-keepers and macers, a seat for Deans, in a situation where he washidden from the general eye by the projecting corner of the bench.

  "It's gude to have a friend at court," he said, continuing his heartlessharangues to the passive auditor, who neither heard nor replied to them;"few folk but mysell could hae sorted ye out a seat like this--the Lordswill be here incontinent, and proceed _instanter_ to trial. They wunnafence the Court as they do at the Circuit--the High Court of Justiciaryis aye fenced.--But, Lord's sake, what's this o't--Jeanie, ye are a citedwitness--Macer, this lass is a witness--she maun be enclosed--she maun onnae account be at large.--Mr. Novit, suldna Jeanie Deans be enclosed?"

  Novit answered in the affirmative, and offered to conduct Jeanie to theapartment, where, according to the scrupulous practice of the ScottishCourt, the witnesses remain in readiness to be called into Court to giveevidence; and separated, at the same time, from all who might influencetheir testimony, or give them information concerning that which waspassing upon the trial.

  "Is this necessary?" said Jeanie, still reluctant to quit her father'shand.

  "A matter of absolute needcessity," said Saddletree, "wha ever heard ofwitnesses no being enclosed?"

  "It is really a matter of necessity," said the younger counsellor,retained for her sister; and Jeanie reluctantly followed the macer of theCourt to the place appointed.

  "This, Mr. Deans," said Saddletree, "is ca'd sequestering a witness; butit's clean different (whilk maybe ye wadna fund out o' yoursell) fraesequestering ane's estate or effects, as in cases of bankruptcy. I haeaften been sequestered as a witness, for the Sheriff is in the use whilesto cry me in to witness the declarations at precognitions, and so is Mr.Sharpitlaw; but I was ne'er like to be sequestered o' land and gudes butance, and that was lang syne, afore I was married. But whisht, whisht!here's the Court coming."

  As he spoke, the five Lords of Justiciary, in their long robes ofscarlet, faced with white, and preceded by their mace-bearer, enteredwith the usual formalities, and took their places upon the bench ofjudgment.

  The audience rose to receive them; and the bustle occasioned by theirentrance was hardly composed, when a great noise and confusion of personsstruggling, and forcibly endeavouring to enter at the doors of theCourt-room, and of the galleries, announced that the prisoner was aboutto be placed at the bar. This tumult takes place when the doors, at firstonly opened to those either having right to be present, or to the betterand more qualified ranks, are at length laid open to all whose curiosityinduces them to be present on the occasion. With inflamed countenancesand dishevelled dresses, struggling with, and sometimes tumbling overeach other, in rushed the rude multitude, while a few soldiers, forming,as it were, the centre of the tide, could scarce, with all their efforts,clear a passage for the prisoner to the place which she was to occupy. Bythe authority of the Court, and the exertions of its officers, the tumultamong the spectators was at length appeased, and the unhappy girl broughtforward, and placed betwixt two sentinels with drawn bayonets, as aprisoner at the bar, where she was to abide her deliverance for good orevil, according to the issue of her trial.