by Walter Scott
CHAPTER X.
But, hark! the tent has changed its voice, There's peace and rest nae langer. Burns.
The Lowdien Mallisha they Came with their coats of blew; Five hundred men from London came, Claid in a reddish hue. Bothwell Lines.
When Morton had left the well-ordered outposts of the regular army, andarrived at those which were maintained by his own party, he could not butbe peculiarly sensible of the difference of discipline, and entertain aproportional degree of fear for the consequences. The same discords whichagitated the counsels of the insurgents, raged even among their meanestfollowers; and their picquets and patrols were more interested andoccupied in disputing the true occasion and causes of wrath, and definingthe limits of Erastian heresy, than in looking out for and observing themotions of their enemies, though within hearing of the royal drums andtrumpets.
There was a guard, however, of the insurgent army, posted at the long andnarrow bridge of Bothwell, over which the enemy must necessarily advanceto the attack; but, like the others, they were divided and disheartened;and, entertaining the idea that they were posted on a desperate service,they even meditated withdrawing themselves to the main body. This wouldhave been utter ruin; for, on the defence or loss of this pass thefortune of the day was most likely to depend. All beyond the bridge was aplain open field, excepting a few thickets of no great depth, and,consequently, was ground on which the undisciplined forces of theinsurgents, deficient as they were in cavalry, and totally unprovidedwith artillery, were altogether unlikely to withstand the shock ofregular troops.
Morton, therefore, viewed the pass carefully, and formed the hope, thatby occupying two or three houses on the left bank of the river, with thecopse and thickets of alders and hazels that lined its side, and byblockading the passage itself, and shutting the gates of a portal, which,according to the old fashion, was built on the central arch of the bridgeof Bothwell, it might be easily defended against a very superior force.He issued directions accordingly, and commanded the parapets of thebridge, on the farther side of the portal, to be thrown down, that theymight afford no protection to the enemy when they should attempt thepassage. Morton then conjured the party at this important post to bewatchful and upon their guard, and promised them a speedy and strongreinforcement. He caused them to advance videttes beyond the river towatch the progress of the enemy, which outposts he directed should bewithdrawn to the left bank as soon as they approached; finally, hecharged them to send regular information to the main body of all thatthey should observe. Men under arms, and in a situation of danger, areusually sufficiently alert in appreciating the merit of their officers.Morton's intelligence and activity gained the confidence of these men,and with better hope and heart than before, they began to fortify theirposition in the manner he recommended, and saw him depart with three loudcheers.
Morton now galloped hastily towards the main body of the insurgents, butwas surprised and shocked at the scene of confusion and clamour which itexhibited, at the moment when good order and concord were of suchessential consequence. Instead of being drawn up in line of battle, andlistening to the commands of their officers, they were crowding togetherin a confused mass, that rolled and agitated itself like the waves of thesea, while a thousand tongues spoke, or rather vociferated, and not asingle ear was found to listen. Scandalized at a scene so extraordinary,Morton endeavoured to make his way through the press to learn, and, ifpossible, to remove, the cause of this so untimely disorder. While he isthus engaged, we shall make the reader acquainted with that which he wassome time in discovering.
The insurgents had proceeded to hold their day of humiliation, which,agreeably to the practice of the puritans during the earlier civil war,they considered as the most effectual mode of solving all difficulties,and waiving all discussions. It was usual to name an ordinary week-dayfor this purpose, but on this occasion the Sabbath itself was adopted,owing to the pressure of the time and the vicinity of the enemy. Atemporary pulpit, or tent, was erected in the middle of the encampment;which, according to the fixed arrangement, was first to be occupied bythe Reverend Peter Poundtext, to whom the post of honour was assigned, asthe eldest clergyman present. But as the worthy divine, with slow andstately steps, was advancing towards the rostrum which had been preparedfor him, he was prevented by the unexpected apparition of HabakkukMucklewrath, the insane preacher, whose appearance had so much startledMorton at the first council of the insurgents after their victory atLoudon-hill. It is not known whether he was acting under the influenceand instigation of the Cameronians, or whether he was merely compelled byhis own agitated imagination, and the temptation of a vacant pulpitbefore him, to seize the opportunity of exhorting so respectable acongregation. It is only certain that he took occasion by the forelock,sprung into the pulpit, cast his eyes wildly round him, and, undismayedby the murmurs of many of the audience, opened the Bible, read forth ashis text from the thirteenth chapter of Deuteronomy, "Certain men, thechildren of Belial, are gone out from among you, and have withdrawn theinhabitants of their city, saying, let us go and serve other gods, whichyou have not known;" and then rushed at once into the midst of hissubject.
The harangue of Mucklewrath was as wild and extravagant as his intrusionwas unauthorized and untimely; but it was provokingly coherent, in so faras it turned entirely upon the very subjects of discord, of which it hadbeen agreed to adjourn the consideration until some more suitableopportunity. Not a single topic did he omit which had offence in it; and,after charging the moderate party with heresy, with crouching to tyranny,with seeking to be at peace with God's enemies, he applied to Morton, byname, the charge that he had been one of those men of Belial, who, in thewords of his text, had gone out from amongst them, to withdraw theinhabitants of his city, and to go astray after false gods. To him, andall who followed him, or approved of his conduct, Mucklewrath denouncedfury and vengeance, and exhorted those who would hold themselves pure andundefiled to come up from the midst of them.
"Fear not," he said, "because of the neighing of horses, or theglittering of breastplates. Seek not aid of the Egyptians, because of theenemy, though they may be numerous as locusts, and fierce as dragons.Their trust is not as our trust, nor their rock as our rock; how elseshall a thousand fly before one, and two put ten thousand to the flight!I dreamed it in the visions of the night, and the voice said, 'Habakkuk,take thy fan and purge the wheat from the chaff, that they be not bothconsumed with the fire of indignation and the lightning of fury.'Wherefore, I say, take this Henry Morton--this wretched Achan, who hathbrought the accursed thing among ye, and made himself brethren in thecamp of the enemy--take him and stone him with stones, and thereafterburn him with fire, that the wrath may depart from the children of theCovenant. He hath not taken a Babylonish garment, but he hath sold thegarment of righteousness to the woman of Babylon--he hath not taken twohundred shekels of fine silver, but he hath bartered the truth, which ismore precious than shekels of silver or wedges of gold."
At this furious charge, brought so unexpectedly against one of their mostactive commanders, the audience broke out into open tumult, somedemanding that there should instantly be a new election of officers, intowhich office none should hereafter be admitted who had, in their phrase,touched of that which was accursed, or temporized more or less with theheresies and corruptions of the times. While such was the demand of theCameronians, they vociferated loudly, that those who were not with themwere against them,--that it was no time to relinquish the substantialpart of the covenanted testimony of the Church, if they expected ablessing on their arms and their cause; and that, in their eyes, alukewarm Presbyterian was little better than a Prelatist, anAnti-Covenanter, and a Nullifidian.
The parties accused repelled the charge of criminal compliance anddefection from the truth with scorn and indignation, and charged theiraccusers with breach of faith, as well as wi
th wrong-headed andextravagant zeal in introducing such divisions into an army, the jointstrength of which could not, by the most sanguine, be judged more thansufficient to face their enemies. Poundtext, and one or two others, madesome faint efforts to stem the increasing fury of the factious,exclaiming to those of the other party, in the words of thePatriarch,--"Let there be no strife, I pray thee, between me and thee,and between thy herdsmen and my herdsmen, for we be brethren." Nopacific overture could possibly obtain audience. It was in vain thateven Burley himself, when he saw the dissension proceed to such ruinouslengths, exerted his stern and deep voice, commanding silence andobedience to discipline. The spirit of insubordination had gone forth,and it seemed as if the exhortation of Habakkuk Mucklewrath hadcommunicated a part of his frenzy to all who heard him. The wiser, ormore timid part of the assembly, were already withdrawing themselvesfrom the field, and giving up their cause as lost. Others weremoderating a harmonious call, as they somewhat improperly termed it, tonew officers, and dismissing those formerly chosen, and that with atumult and clamour worthy of the deficiency of good sense and good orderimplied in the whole transaction. It was at this moment when Mortonarrived in the field and joined the army, in total confusion, and on thepoint of dissolving itself. His arrival occasioned loud exclamations ofapplause on the one side, and of imprecation on the other.
"What means this ruinous disorder at such a moment?" he exclaimed toBurley, who, exhausted with his vain exertions to restore order, was nowleaning on his sword, and regarding the confusion with an eye of resolutedespair.
"It means," he replied, "that God has delivered us into the hands of ourenemies."
"Not so," answered Morton, with a voice and gesture which compelled manyto listen; "it is not God who deserts us, it is we who desert him, anddishonour ourselves by disgracing and betraying the cause of freedom andreligion.--Hear me," he exclaimed, springing to the pulpit whichMucklewrath had been compelled to evacuate by actual exhaustion--"I bringfrom the enemy an offer to treat, if you incline to lay down your arms. Ican assure you the means of making an honourable defence, if you are ofmore manly tempers. The time flies fast on. Let us resolve either forpeace or war; and let it not be said of us in future days, that sixthousand Scottish men in arms had neither courage to stand their groundand fight it out, nor prudence to treat for peace, nor even the coward'swisdom to retreat in good time and with safety. What signifiesquarrelling on minute points of church-discipline, when the whole edificeis threatened with total destruction? O, remember, my brethren, that thelast and worst evil which God brought upon the people whom he had oncechosen--the last and worst punishment of their blindness and hardness ofheart, was the bloody dissensions which rent asunder their city, evenwhen the enemy were thundering at its gates!"
Some of the audience testified their feeling of this exhortation, by loudexclamations of applause; others by hooting, and exclaiming--"To yourtents, O Israel!"
Morton, who beheld the columns of the enemy already beginning to appearon the right bank, and directing their march upon the bridge, raised hisvoice to its utmost pitch, and, pointing at the same time with his hand,exclaimed,--"Silence your senseless clamours, yonder is the enemy! Onmaintaining the bridge against him depend our lives, as well as our hopeto reclaim our laws and liberties.--There shall at least one Scottishmandie in their defence.--Let any one who loves his country follow me!"
The multitude had turned their heads in the direction to which hepointed. The sight of the glittering files of the English Foot-Guards,supported by several squadrons of horse, of the cannon which theartillerymen were busily engaged in planting against the bridge, of theplaided clans who seemed to search for a ford, and of the long successionof troops which were destined to support the attack, silenced at oncetheir clamorous uproar, and struck them with as much consternation as ifit were an unexpected apparition, and not the very thing which they oughtto have been looking out for. They gazed on each other, and on theirleaders, with looks resembling those that indicate the weakness of apatient when exhausted by a fit of frenzy. Yet when Morton, springingfrom the rostrum, directed his steps towards the bridge, he was followedby about an hundred of the young men who were particularly attached tohis command.
Burley turned to Macbriar--"Ephraim," he said, "it is Providence pointsus the way, through the worldly wisdom of this latitudinarian youth.--Hethat loves the light, let him follow Burley!"
"Tarry," replied Macbriar; "it is not by Henry Morton, or such as he,that our goings-out and our comings-in are to be meted; therefore tarrywith us. I fear treachery to the host from this nullifidian Achan--Thoushalt not go with him. Thou art our chariots and our horsemen."
"Hinder me not," replied Burley; "he hath well said that all is lost, ifthe enemy win the bridge--therefore let me not. Shall the children ofthis generation be called wiser or braver than the children of thesanctuary?--Array yourselves under your leaders--let us not lack suppliesof men and ammunition; and accursed be he who turneth back from the workon this great day!"
Having thus spoken, he hastily marched towards the bridge, and wasfollowed by about two hundred of the most gallant and zealous of hisparty. There was a deep and disheartened pause when Morton and Burleydeparted. The commanders availed themselves of it to display their linesin some sort of order, and exhorted those who were most exposed to throwthemselves upon their faces to avoid the cannonade which they mightpresently expect. The insurgents ceased to resist or to remonstrate; butthe awe which had silenced their discords had dismayed their courage.They suffered themselves to be formed into ranks with the docility of aflock of sheep, but without possessing, for the time, more resolution orenergy; for they experienced a sinking of the heart, imposed by thesudden and imminent approach of the danger which they had neglected toprovide against while it was yet distant. They were, however, drawn outwith some regularity; and as they still possessed the appearance of anarmy, their leaders had only to hope that some favourable circumstancewould restore their spirits and courage.
Kettledrummle, Poundtext, Macbriar, and other preachers, busiedthemselves in their ranks, and prevailed on them to raise a psalm. Butthe superstitious among them observed, as an ill omen, that their song ofpraise and triumph sunk into "a quaver of consternation," and resembledrather a penitentiary stave sung on the scaffold of a condemned criminal,than the bold strain which had resounded along the wild heath ofLoudon-hill, in anticipation of that day's victory. The melancholy melodysoon received a rough accompaniment; the royal soldiers shouted, theHighlanders yelled, the cannon began to fire on one side, and themusketry on both, and the bridge of Bothwell, with the banks adjacent,were involved in wreaths of smoke.