"And I'll to the moon,And the stars aboon,And rack my inventionFor the coming contention:And the wind and the weet,And the snow and the sleet,I'll gather and gather,And drive them on hither."
"And I'll to the moon,And the stars aboon,And rack my inventionFor the coming contention:And the wind and the weet,And the snow and the sleet,I'll gather and gather,And drive them on hither."
"And I'll to the moon,And the stars aboon,And rack my inventionFor the coming contention:And the wind and the weet,And the snow and the sleet,I'll gather and gather,And drive them on hither."
With that the three imps departed on their several missions, but not before they had seized me, and bound me to a ring on a turret of the castle. The Master retired into his apartment for some time, but soon came up to the level space on the top of the castle, our old birth, and strode about in the most violent agitation, but appearing rather to be moved by anger and impatience than by dread. At length, he came up to me, and said, "How now, droich? What thinkest thou of all this?"
I said nothing, for I durst not answer a word.
"Dost thou think," continued he, "that there exists another being, either mortal or immortal, like me, thy master?"
I still durst not answer a word; for if I had saidno, it would have been blasphemy; and if I had saidyes, it would have provoked him to do me a mischief; so I looked at my bonds, and held my peace.
"Thou darest not say there is," continued he; "but I know what thou thinkest. Sit thou there in peace till this great trial of power be over; and if thou darest for thy life invoke another name than mine, thou shalt never stir from that spot dead or alive. But if thou takest heed to this injunction, and cease from all petitions to, or mention of, a name which thou mayest judge superior to mine, then shalt thou be set at liberty to join thy friends."
I determined to attend to this,—but he waited not for my answer, but strode away, looking now and then on the book of destiny, and at the western heaven alternately. At length he exclaimed, "Yonder they come! Yonder they rise in grand battalia! Noble and potent spirits! How speedily have you executed your commission. Yonder comes the muster of my array, and who shall stand against them!"
I looked towards the west when I heard him talking in such ecstacies, but could see nothing save a phalanx of towering clouds, rolling up in wreaths from the dun horizon. I had seen the same scene a hundred times, and could hardly help smiling at his enthusiasm, especially when he went over a long muster-roll of the names of spirits and monsters whom he saw approaching in the cloud. 'It is a sign that warlocks have clear een,' thinks I, quietly, 'for I see nothing but a range of rolling and restless clouds.' However, he was so overjoyed with the sight of this visionary array, that, having no other to communicate with, he came rapidly up to me, and said,"Tell me, droich, didst thou ever witness any thing so truly grand as the approach of this host of mine?"
"You must first lend me the use of your eyes that I may see them," said I; "for, on my word, I see nothing save two or three files of castled clouds, which I have seen an hundred times."
With that he lent me a blow with his rod, and said, though not apparently in wrath, "Thou hast no brighter eyes, and no brighter conceptions, than a hedgehog, but art a mere clod of the valley, a worm; if I knew of aught lower to liken thee to, I would do it! Dost thou see nothing like fleets and armies approaching yonder? Dost thou not see an hundred and seven of the ships of the ocean above, coming full sail, with colours flying, and canvas spread? Seest thou not also, to the south of these, two files of behemoths, with ten thousand warrior-spirits beside?"
I looked again, and though I was sensible it must be a delusion brought on by by the stroke of his powerful rod, yet I did see the appearance of a glorious fleetof ships coming bounding along the surface of the firmament of air, while every mainsail was bosomed out like the side of a Highland mountain. I saw, besides, whole columns of what I supposed to be crocodiles, sharks, kelpies, and water-horses, with a thousand monsters never dreamed of by human being. The Master marked my astonishment, and exulted still the more; and then he desired me to turn round, and look toward the north. At first I could see nothing; but on being touched again with the divining-rod, I shall never forget such a sight as opened gradually to my view. The whole northern hemisphere, from the eastern to the western horizon, was covered with marshalled hosts of the shades of gigantic warriors. They were all mailed in white armour, as if it had been sprinkled with hoar-frost; and their beards, which had the appearance of icicles, hung down, swinging in the wind, like so many inverted forests, stripped of their foliage and bark, and encrusted with ice. They were all mounted on the ghosts of crackens,whales, and walruses: and for bows and quivers each had a blown bladder on his bade as large as the hill of Ben-Nevis. My heart quaked at the view of these tremendous polar spirits, and I said, "Great and magnificent Master, are yon terrible chaps all coming hither?"
"Certes they are," said he: "Why dost thou ask after having heard my mandate sent forth?"
"Because," said I, "If yon bearded spirits be a' coming here, I wish I were somewhere else, for the like of yon was never beheld by man. If your opponents dare face you, they have a spirit beyond what I can conceive."
"They will be here, and that instantly," said he, "And lo! yonder they come! I will go down and meet them on the open field. But, in the meantime, I will loose you with my own hands, for who knows what may be the issue of this day; remain where thou art, for here thou shalt be safe, but no where else."
I looked; and as far as my eyes could discern, I saw as it were a thousand thousand sparks of fire rising from the east, that came in a straight line toward me, and with great velocity. As they came nearer I perceived that they were all fiery serpents, with faces like men, and small flaming spears issuing from their mouths, which they held between their teeth, or drew in as they listed. These were led on to the combat by the arch-fiend himself who came at their head in the form of a huge fiery dragon with his iron crown on his head, and wings springing from his shoulders behind, that reached as high as the hill of Blackandro. 'Aih! God guide us!' thinks I to mysel, 'Michael has an awsome adversary to contend with the day!' He was nothing daunted, however, but went boldly down the valley, where he was met by hosts of crawling monsters, such as snakes, lizards, and a thousand others. These I took to be the spirits of the element of earth,—but they were lubbards in a field of battle, for, at a brandish of the Master's magical rod, they ran off wagging their tails in such a vengeance of a hurry that they overturned one another.
The van of Michael's western array had by this time gained the middle sky, and hung boiling and wheeling like a troubled ocean straight above his head and above mine. Its colour was as dark as pitch, but there was now and then a shade of a dead white colour rolled out, and as suddenly again swallowed up in the darkness. I never saw ought so awfully sublime. It had now descended so low, that it hid the polar giants entirely from my view, and the Master kept waving his rod towards it, and clapping his left hand always on the black book, till at length, with the motion of a whirlpool, the cloud came and settled all round him. The fiend and his firebrands perceiving this, darted with the utmost fury into the middle of it, and the most tremendous crash of thunder ensued that ever shook heaven and earth. My eyes were dazzled so that I could not see ought distinctly, but I perceived these flaming meteors glancing and quivering round the verges of the darkness, and ever and anon darting again into it. Seven of these peals of thunder succeeded one another, and then I saw the spirits of flame would overcome, for the darkness began to scatter, and I saw the Master hard bested, defending himself with his rod against a multitude. He then cried with a loud voice, and waved his rod toward the north, and that moment the giant warriors of the polar regions loosed all their quivers at once, and with such effect, that they tossed the opposing legions before them like chaff. The hailstones, the snow, and the sleet, poured upon them thicker and faster, and the wind roared louder than their thunders had done before. There was no more power in their foes to stand before them; they were scattered, driven away, and extinguished. When the Master saw this, he shouted aloud for joy, calling out 'Victory!' and leaping from the ground in ecstacy. But when he was in the very paroxysm of exultation, the great dragon came round with a circular motion behind the castle, and approaching behind thewizard's back before he was aware, seized him by the hair with one paw, and by the iron belt with the other, and bore him off into the air straight upward. The Master struggled and writhed very hard, but never opened his lips. At length, after great exertion, he struck the monster a blow with his rod that made him quit his hold, and fly away yelling after his discomfited legions.
The Master fell to the ground from a great height, and lay still, and when I saw no one to come near him, I left the corner where I had hid myself, and ran to his assistance; but he was quite dead. His teeth had severed his tongue in two, and were clenched close together; his eyes were open, and every bone of his body was broken. Having witnessed the unspeakable value of the golden rod, I put out my hand and took hold of it, wanting to bring it away with me, but I might as well have tried to have heaved the castle from its foundations. Besides, when I tugged at it, the dead man turned his eyes toward me with a fierceness that chilled me to theheart, so I fled and came hitherward with all my might. He is lying in a little hidden valley, at the side of the burn, immediately above the castle, with the book of fate locked in his bosom, his rod in his hand, and his eyes open. I have now described to your Majesties this scene exactly as I saw it; but I must also tell you, that when I came to the mill, both the miller and his man, neither of whom knew me, said it had been an awful storm of thunder and lightning. I asked if they perceived nothing about it but a common storm of thunder and lightning? And they said, nothing, save that it was exceedingly violent, and rather uncommon at such a season of the year. I have, therefore, some suspicions that there might be magical delusion operating on my sight; but of this I am certain, that the great enchanter was carried up into the middle space between heaven and earth, fell down, and was killed."
"I think there can be no doubt," said the King, "that what you have told us is the plain and unvarnished truth, though,perhaps, the rod of divination might open your eyes to see the storm in a different light from that seen by the eyes of common men. Of this there can be no doubt, that the greatest man, and the most profound scholar of the age, has perished in this conflict of the elements. He has not only kept the world in awe, but in dreadful agitation for the space of thirty years; let us, therefore, all go to-morrow and see him honourably interred. I ask no rites of sepulture to be performed over his remains, which, if living, he would have deprecated, only let us all go and see his body reverendly deposited in the tomb, lest it be left to consume in the open fields."
They went, and found him lying as stated, only that his eyes were shut, some of his attendant elves having closed them over night. His book was in his bosom, and his rod in his hand, from either of which no force of man could sever them, although when they lifted the body and these together, there was no difference in weight from the body of another man. The King then caused these dangerousrelics to be deposited along with the body in an iron chest, which they buried in a vaulted aisle of the abbey of Melrose; and the castle of Aikwood has never more been inhabited by mortal man.
THE END.
Transcriber's NotesThis text is a reproduction of the 1822 edition. It includes many dialect and archaic words and spellings, as well as many typographical errors which have not been changed.Some characters were not printed clearly:p. 79 The letter "i" in "you would deify" was not printed and is conjecturalp. 131 the line ending "The wines and liquor" does not meet the margin; "liquor" may be plural.p. 151 the line ending "of beings so blind" does not meet the margin, and may end in a commap. 274 the colon in "by the Douglas:" is unclear and may be a semi-colonp. 307 the semi-colon in "the attempt prematurely;" is unclear and may be a commaChapters are inconsistently headed "CHAPTER" or "CHAP."The text includes the following inconsistent spellings:Father Lawrence and father Lawrencegalloped and galloppedCastle-Wearie and Castle-WearyCorby and Corbiechace and chaseThe text includes many examples of inconsistent hyphenation. The following are inconsistently hyphenated or printed as two words:yester eve and yester-eveall four and all-fourarch fiend and arch-fiendback friends and back-friendsbowling green and bowling-greencoulter nose and coulter-nosedeep wooded and deep-woodeddivining rod and divining-rodhigh born and high-bornhigh spirited and high-spiritedhoar frost and hoar-frostiron door and iron-doorThe following are inconsistently hyphenated or printed as one word:daylight and day-lightCastlewearie and Castle-Weariedrawbridge and draw-bridgeauldfarrant and auld-farrantbareheaded and bare-headedeyebrows and eye-browsoutdone and out-donestaircase and stair-caseThe following are inconsistently printed as one or two words:fairy land and fairylandGude faith and Gudefaithmean time and meantimeThe text contains the following apparent errors:p. 10 missing apostrophe ("its only the devil")p. 17 missing quotation mark ("What do you think")p. 25 missing quotation mark ("is the better. The imps")p. 30 extra quotation mark ("behind the friar."")p. 46 missing quotation mark ("preserve their worshippers.")p. 47 missing quotation mark ("and who must yield.")p. 60 missing quotation mark ("all unsafe with such.")p. 62 question mark instead of full stop ("off thy frame?")p. 68 missing quotation mark ("those we love.")p. 79 two instances of missing quotation marks (""Stay, they cried, stay the solemnity,")p. 89 missing quotation mark ("your's was the best tale.")p. 98 mis-spelling "in the expecsation"p. 102 extra space in "the sweetest strain s"p. 112 missing quotation mark ("follow them.")p. 158 extra quotation mark ("ever cattle put on."")p. 163 mis-placed apostrophe ("that I ken o.'")p. 163 missing quotation mark ("and that of such momentous")p. 168 missing full stop ("them to think of")p. 183 extra quotation mark ("Scott'" said Yardbire:")p. 189 mis-spelling "possessession"p. 196 duplicate word "themsels; and and if ye hear a Laidlaw"p. 213 mis-spelling "disingeniousness"p. 205 missing quotation mark ("Strangers, I think!")p. 206 comma instead of full stop ("he says, We'll never make")p. 207 missing quotation mark ("But whoever refuses,")p. 222 duplicate word "the fourth was a a boy"p. 225 missing space "andbegan"p. 237 extra quotation mark (""Alas, for my beloved")p. 284 single instead of double quotation mark ("the like o' that?'")p. 299 missing quotation mark ("begging admission to your")p. 321 extra quotation mark (""The Queen crossed herself,")p. 331 extra quotation mark ("'it's 'God's will?'")p. 346 extra quotation mark ("new born beauties."")p. 349 full stop instead of comma ("from a beam's end.")p. 378 mis-spelling "convalesence"p. 379 missing quotation mark ("apply to him again.")p. 380 duplicate word "shew a a"p. 380 missing quotation mark ("Inferiority!")p. 382 missing full stop ("the lord Douglas—But")p. 389 missing quotation mark ("Oh Sir Charles!—")p. 391 missing quotation mark ("or an engagement say?")p. 393 duplicate word "to Sir Charles was was nothing"p. 405 duplicate word "she could not not be"p. 409 "They" instead of "The" ("They rest marshalling")p. 410 mis-spelling "Peatstackknowe"p. 411 missing space ("Gibbie,and")p. 422 missing space ("a delusion, avision")p. 423 comma instead of full stop ("all was darkness, There was no")p. 440 duplicate word "brought on by by the stroke"p. 447 extra quotation mark ("was killed."")
This text is a reproduction of the 1822 edition. It includes many dialect and archaic words and spellings, as well as many typographical errors which have not been changed.
Some characters were not printed clearly:
Chapters are inconsistently headed "CHAPTER" or "CHAP."
The text includes the following inconsistent spellings:
The text includes many examples of inconsistent hyphenation. The following are inconsistently hyphenated or printed as two words:
The following are inconsistently hyphenated or printed as one word:
The following are inconsistently printed as one or two words:
The text contains the following apparent errors: