It is well enough for popular rulers like presidentsto live in public and shake hands with every person; but absolute monarchs, who govern with an iron hand and pay not the slightest attention to the public mind, ought to be veiled in mystery. If Bulldog had walked homeward with his boys in an affectionate manner, and inquired after their sisters, like his temporary assistant, Mr. Byles, or had played with interesting babies on the North Meadow, as did Topp, the drawing-master—Augustus de Lacy Topp—who wore a brown velvet jacket and represented sentiment in a form verging on lunacy; or if he had invited his classes to drink coffee in a very shabby little home, as poor Moossy did, and treated them to Beethoven's Symphonies, then even Jock Howieson, the stupidest lad in the Seminary, would have been shocked, and would have felt that the Creation was out of gear. The last thing we had expected of Bulldog was polite conversation, or private hospitality. His speech was confined to the class-room, and therewas most practical; and his hospitality, which was generous and widespread, was invariably public. Hisrôlewas to be austere, unapproachable, and lifted above feeling, and had it not been for Nestie he had sustained it to the day of his death.
Opinion varied about Bulldog's age, some insisting that he had approached his century, others being content with "Weel on to eighty." None hinted at less than seventy. No one could remember his coming to Muirtown, and none knew whence he came. His birthplace was commonly believed to be the West Highlands, and it was certain that in dealing with a case of aggravated truancy he dropped into Gaelic. Bailie McCallum used to refer in convivial moments to his schooldays under Bulldog, and always left it to be inferred that had it not been for that tender, fostering care, he had not risen to his high estate in Muirtown. Fathers of families who were elders in the kirk, and verging on grey hair, would hear no complaints of Bulldog, for they had passed under the yoke in their youth, and what they had endured with profit—they now said—was good enough for their children. He seemed to us in those days like Melchizedek, without father or mother, beginning or end of days; and now that Bulldog has lain for many a year in a quiet Perthshire kirkyard, it is hardly worth while visiting Muirtown Seminary.
Every morning, except in vacation, he crossed the bridge at 8.45, with such rigid punctuality that theclerks in the Post Office checked the clock by him, and he returned by the way he had gone, over the North Meadow, at 4.15, for it was his grateful custom to close the administration of discipline at the same hour as the teaching, considering with justice that any of the Muirtown varlets would rather take the cane than be kept in, where from the windows he could see the North Meadow in its greenness, and the river running rapidly on an afternoon. It would have been out of place for Bulldog to live in a Muirtown street, where he must have been overlooked and could not have maintained his necessary reserve. Years ago he had built himself a house upon the slope of the hill which commanded Muirtown from the other side of the river. It was a hill which began with wood and ended in a lofty crag; and even from his house, halfway up and among the trees, Bulldog could look down upon Muirtown, compactly built together on the plain beneath, and thinly veiled in the grey smoke which rose up lazily from its homes. It cannot be truthfully said that Bulldog gave himself to poetry, but having once varied his usual country holiday by a visit to Italy, he ever afterwards declared at dinner-table that Muirtown reminded him of Florence as you saw that city from Fiesole, with the ancient kirk of St. John rising instead of the Duomo, and the Tay instead of the Arno. He admitted that Florence had the advantage in her cathedral, but he stoutly insisted thatthe Arno was but a poor, shrunken river compared with his own; for wherever Bulldog may have been born, he boasted himself to be a citizen of Muirtown, and always believed that there was no river to be found anywhere like unto the Tay. His garden was surrounded with a high wall, and the entrance was by a wooden door, and how Bulldog lived within these walls no one knew, but many had imagined. Speug, with two daring companions, had once traced Bulldog home and seen him disappear through the archway, and then it was in their plan to form a ladder one above the other, and that Peter, from the top thereof, should behold the mysterious interior and observe Bulldog in private life; but even Speug's courage failed at the critical moment, and they returned without news to the disappointed school.
Pity was not the characteristic of Seminary life in those days, but the hardest heart was touched with compassion when Nestie Molyneux lost his father and went to stay with Bulldog. The Seminary rejoiced in their master; but it was with trembling, and the thought of spending the evening hours and all one's spare time in his genial company excited our darkest imagination. To write our copy-books and do our problems under Bulldog's eye was a bracing discipline which lent a kind of zest to life, but to eat and drink with Bulldog was a fate beyond words.
As it was an article of faith with us that Bulldogwas never perfectly happy except when he was plying the cane, it was taken for granted that Nestie would be his solitary means of relaxation, from the afternoon of one day to the morning of the next, and when Nestie appeared, on the third morning after his change of residence, the school was waiting to receive him.
His walking across the meadow by Bulldog's side, with his hands in his pockets, talking at his ease and laughing lightly, amazed us on first sight, but did not count for much, because we considered this manner a policy of expediency and an act of hypocrisy. After all, he was only doing what every one of us would have done in the same circumstances—conciliating the tyrant and covering his own sufferings. We kept a respectful distance till Nestie parted with his guardian, and then we closed in round him and licked our lips, for the story that Nestie could tell would make any Indian tale hardly worth the reading.
Babel was let loose, and Nestie was pelted with questions which came in a fine confusion from many voices, and to which he was hardly expected to give an immediate answer.
"What like is the cane he keeps at home?" "Has Bulldog tawse in the house?" "Div ye catch it regular?" "Does he come after you to your bedroom?" "Have ye onything to eat?" "Is the garden door locked?" "Could ye climb over the wall ifhe was thrashing you too sore?" "Did he let ye bring yir rabbits?" "Have ye to work at yir lessons a' night?" "What does Bulldog eat for his dinner?" "Does he ever speak to you?" "Does he ever say onything about the school?" "Did ye ever see Bulldog sleeping?" "Are ye feared to be with him?" "Would the police take ye away if he was hurting ye?" "Is there ony other body in the house?" "Would he let ye make gundy (candy) by the kitchen fire?" "Have ye to work all night at yir books?" "Does he make ye brush his boots?" "What do ye call him in the house?" "Would ye call him Bulldog for a shilling's-worth of gundy if the garden gate was open?" "Has he ony apples in the garden?" "Would ye daur to lay a finger on them?" "How often have ye to wash yir hands?" "Would ye get yir licks if yir hair wasna brushed?" And then Speug interfered, and commanded silence that Nestie might satisfy the curiosity of the school.
"Haud yir blethering tongues!" was his polite form of address. "Noo, Nestie, come awa' wi' yir evidence. What like is't to live wi' Bulldog?"
"It's awfully g-good of you fellows to ask how I'm getting on with Bully," and Nestie's eyes lit up with fun, for he'd a nice little sense of humour, and never could resist the temptation of letting it play upon our slow-witted, matter-of-fact intellects. "And I declare you seem to know all about what h-happens. I'll j-just tell you something about it, but it'll make youcreepy," and then all the circle gathered in round Nestie. "I have to rise at five in the morning, and if I'm not down at half-past, Bulldog comes for me with a c-cane" (Howieson at this point rubbed himself behind gently). "Before breakfast we have six 'p-props' from Euclid and two vulgar f-fractions" (a groan from the school): "for breakfast we've porridge and milk, and I have to keep time with Bulldog—one, two, three, four—with the spoonfuls. He's got the c-cane on the table." ("Gosh" from a boy at the back, and general sympathy.) "He has the t-tawse hung in the lobby so as to be handy." ("It cowes all.") "There are three regular c-canings every day, one in the morning, and one in the afternoon, and one before you go to bed." At this point Speug, who had been listening with much doubt to Nestie's account, and knew that he had a luxuriant imagination, interfered.
"Nestie," he said, "ye're an abandoned little scoundrel, and ye're telling lees straicht forward," and the school went into the class-room divided in opinion. Some were suspicious that Nestie had been feeding their curiosity with highly spiced meat, but others were inclined to believe anything of Bulldog's household arrangements. During the hour Speug studied Nestie's countenance with interest, and in the break he laid hold of that ingenious young gentleman by the ear and led him apart into a quiet corner, where he exhorted him to unbosom the truth.Nestie whispered something in Speug's ear which shook even that worthy's composure.
"Did ye say rabbits?"
"Lop-ears," said Nestie after a moment's silence, and Speug was more confounded than he had ever been in all his blameless life.
"Ernest Molyneux, div ye kin whar ye 'ill go to if ye tell lees."
"I'm telling the t-truth, Speug, and I never tell lies, but sometimes I compose t-tales. Lop-ear rabbits, and he feeds them himself."
"Will ye say 'as sure as death'?"—for this was with us the final test of truth.
"As sure as death," said Nestie, and that afternoon Speug had so much to think about that he gave almost no heed when Bulldog discovered him with nothing on the sheet before him except a remarkably correct drawing of two lop-eared rabbits.
Speug and Nestie crossed the North Meadow together after school, and before they parted at the bridge Nestie entreated the favour of a visit in his new home that evening from Speug; but, although modesty was not Speug's prevailing characteristic, he would on no account accept the flattering invitation. Maybe he was going to drive with his father, who was breaking-in a new horse, or maybe he was going out on the river in a boat, or maybe the stable gates were to be shut and the fox turned loose for a run, or maybe——
"Nestie whispered something in Speug's ear.""Nestie whispered something in Speug's ear."
"Maybe you are going to learn your l-lessons,Speug, for once in your life," said Nestie, who, his head on one side, was studying Speug's embarrassment.
"A'm to do naething o' the kind," retorted Speug, turning a dark red at this insult. "Nane o' yir impidence."
"Maybe you're f-frightened to come," said Nestie, and dodged at the same time behind a lamp-post. "Why, Speug, I didn't know you were f-frightened of anything."
"Naither I am," said Speug stoutly; "an' if it had been Jock Howieson said that, I'd black his eyes. What sud I be frightened of, ye miserable little shrimp?"
"Really, I don't know, Speug," said Nestie; "but just let me g-guess. It might be climbing the hill; or did you think you might meet one of the 'Pennies,' and he would fight you; or, Speug—an idea occurs to me—do you feel as if you did not want to spend an hour—just a nice, quiet hour—all alone with Bulldog? You and he are such f-friends, Speug, in the Seminary. Afraid of Bulldog? Speug, I'm ashamed of you, when poor little me has to live with him now every day."
"When I get a grip o' you, Nestie Molyneux, I'll learn ye to give me chat. I never was afraid of Bulldog, and I dinna care if he chases me round the garden wi' a stick, but I'm no coming."
"Youareafraid, Speug; youdarenot come." And Nestie kept carefully out of Speug's reach.
"You are a liar," cried Speug. "I'll come up this very night at seven o'clock, but I'll no come in unless ye're at the garden door."
Speug had fought many pitched battles in his day, and was afraid neither of man nor beast, but his heart sank within him for the first time in his life when he crossed the bridge and climbed the hill to the residence of Mr. Dugald MacKinnon. Nothing but his pledged word, and a reputation for courage which must not be tarnished, since it rested on nothing else, brought him up the lane to Bulldog's door. He was before his time, and Nestie had not yet come to meet him, and he could allow his imagination to picture what was within the walls, and what might befall his unfortunate self before he went down that lane again. His one consolation and support was in the lop-eared rabbits; and if it were the case, as Nestie had sworn with an oath which never had been broken at the Seminary, that there were rabbits within that dreadful enclosure, there was hope for him; for if he knew about anything, he knew about rabbits, and if anyone had to do with rabbits—and although it was incredible, yet had not Nestie sworn it with an oath?—there must be some bowels of mercy even in Bulldog. Speug began to speculate whether he might not be able, with Nestie's loyal help, to reach the rabbits and examine thoroughly into their condition, and escape from the garden without a personal interview with its owner; and at the thought thereof Speug's heart was lifted. For of all his exploits which had delighted the Seminary, none, for its wonder and daring, its sheer amazingness, could be compared with a stolen visit to Bulldog's rabbits. "Nestie," he murmured to himself, as he remembered that little Englishman's prodigal imagination, "is a maist extraordinary leear, but he said 'as sure as death.'"
"Why, Speug, is that you? You ought to have opened the door. Come along and shake hands with the master; he's just l-longing to see you." And Speug was dragged along the walk between the gooseberry bushes, which in no other circumstances would he have passed unnoticed, and was taken up to be introduced with the air of a dog going to execution. He heard someone coming down the walk, and he lifted up his eyes to know the worst, and in that moment it appeared as if reason had deserted the unhappy Speug. It was the face of Bulldog, for the like of that countenance could not be found on any other man within the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland. Yes, it was Bulldog, and that Speug would be prepared to swear in any court of justice. The nose and the chin, and the iron-grey whiskers and hair, and above all those revolving eyes. There could not be any mistake. But what had happened to Bulldog's face, for it was like unto that of another man? The sternness had gone out ofit, and—there was no doubt about it—Bulldog was smiling, and it was an altogether comprehensive and irresistible smile. It had taken the iron lines out of his face and shaped his lips to the kindliest curve, and deprived his nose of its aggressive air, and robbed the judicial appearance of his whiskers, and it had given him—it was a positive fact—another pair of eyes. They still revolved, but not now like the guns in the turret of a monitor dealing destruction right and left. They were shining and twinkling like the kindly light from a harbour tower. There never was such a genial and humoursome face, so full of fun and humanity, as that which looked down on the speechless Speug. Nor was that all; it was a complete transformation. Where were the pepper-and-salt trousers and the formal black coat and vest, which seemed somehow to symbolise the inflexible severity of Bulldog's reign? and the hat, and the gloves, and the stick—what had become of his trappings? Was there ever such a pair of disreputable old slippers, down at the heel, out at the sides, broken at the seams, as those that covered the feet of Bulldog in that garden. The very sight of those slippers, with their suggestion of slackness and unpunctuality and ignorance of all useful knowledge and general Bohemianism, was the first thing which cheered the heart of Speug. Those slippers would tolerate no problems from Euclid and would laugh a cane to scorn. Where did he ever get those trousers, and from whose hands did they originally come, baggy at the knee and loose everywhere, stained with garden mould and torn with garden bushes?
"Speug was dragged along the walk.""Speug was dragged along the walk."
Without question it was a warm night in that shelteredplace on the side of the hill; but would any person believe that the master of mathematics, besides writing and arithmetic, in Muirtown Seminary, was going about in his garden, and before the eyes of two of his pupils, without the vestige of a waistcoat. Speug now was braced for wonders, but even he was startled with Bulldog's jacket, which seemed of earlier age than the trousers, with which it had no connexion in colour. It may once have had four buttons, but only two were left now; there was a tear in its side that must have been made by a nail in the garden wall, the handle of a hammer projected from one pocket, and a pruning-knife from the other. And if there was not a pipe in Bulldog's mouth, stuck in the side of his cheek, "as sure as death!" There was a knife in his hand, with six blades and a corkscrew and a gimlet and the thing for taking the stones out of a horse's hoof—oath again repeated—and Bulldog was trying the edge of the biggest blade upon his finger. Speug, now ascending from height to height, was not surprised to see no necktie, and would have been prepared to see no collar. He had now even a wild hope that when he reached Bulldog's head it might be crowned with a Highland bonnet, minus the tails; but instead thereof there was a hat, possiblyonce a wide-awake, so bashed, and shapeless, and discoloured, and worn so rakishly, partly on the back and partly on the side of his head, that Speug was inwardly satisfied, and knew that no evil could befall him in that garden.
"Speug, my mannie, how are ye?" said this amazing figure. "Ye've been long of coming. There's something like a knife, eh!" and Bulldog opened up the whole concern and challenged Speug to produce his knife, which was not so bad after all, for it had six departments, and one of them was a file, which was wanting in Bulldog's.
"Show the master your peerie, Speug," said Nestie. "It's split more tops than any one in the school; it's a r-ripper," and Nestie exhibited its deadly steel point with much pride, while Speug endeavoured to look unconscious as the owner of this instrument of war.
"Dod, I'll have a try myself," said Bulldog. "It's many a year since I've spun a top. Where's yir string?" and he strode up the walk winding the top, and the boys behind looked at one another, while Nestie triumphed openly.
"Are you frightened, Speug?" he whispered. "Ain't he great? And just you wait; you haven't begun to see things yet, not h-half."
Upon the doorstep Bulldog spun the top with a right hand that had not lost its cunning, but ratherhad been strengthened by much cane exercise. "It's sleeping," he cried in huge delight. "If you dare to touch it, pity you!" but no one wished to shorten its time, and the three hung over that top with fond interest, as Bulldog timed the performance with his watch, which he extricated from his trouser pocket.
"Ye're a judge of rabbits, Speug," said the master. "I would like to have yir advice," and as they went down through the garden they halted at a place, and the robins came and sat on Bulldog's shoulder and took crumbs out of his hand, and a little further on the thrushes bade him welcome, and he showed the boys where the swallows had built every year, and they also flew round his head.
"If ye dinna meddle with them, the birds 'ill no be afraid o' you, will they, Dandie?" and the old terrier which followed at his heels wagged his tail and indicated that he also was on good terms with every living thing in the garden.
No one in the Seminary ever could be brought to believe it, even although Speug tried to inculcate faith with his fists, that Bulldog had carried out a litter of young rabbits in his hat for inspection, and that, before the three of them laid themselves out for a supper of strawberries, Speug had given to his master the best knowledge at his command on the amount of green food which might be given with safety to a rabbit of adult years, and had laid it downwith authority that a moderate amount of tea-leaves and oatmeal might be allowed as an occasional dainty.
After the attack on the strawberries, in which Speug greatly distinguished himself, and Bulldog urged him on with encouraging words, they had tarts and lemonade in the house, where not a sign of cane or tawse could be found. Bulldog drew the corks himself, and managed once to drench Speug gloriously, whereat that worthy wiped his face with his famous red handkerchief and was inordinately proud, while Nestie declared that the thing had been done on purpose, and Bulldog threatened him with the tawse for insulting his master.
"Div ye think, Speug, ye could manage a piece of rock before ye go," and Bulldog produced the only rock that a Muirtown man will ever think worth eating—Fenwick's own very best, thick, and pure, and rich, and well-flavoured; and when Speug knew not whether to choose the peppermint, that is black and white, or the honey rock, which is brown and creamy, or the cinnamon, which in those days was red outside and white within, his host insisted that he should take a piece of each, and they would last him till he reached his home.
"Speug," and Bulldog bade farewell to his pupil at the garden gate, "ye're the most aggravating little scoundrel in Muirtown Seminary, and the devilry that's in you I bear witness is bottomless; but ye'refine company, and ye 'ill, maybe, be a man yet, and Nestie and me will be glad to see ye when ye're no engaged with yir study. Ye 'ill no forget to come, Peter."
Peter's tongue, which had been wagging freely among the rabbits, again forsook him, but he was able to indicate that he would seize an early opportunity of again paying his respects to Mr. Dugald MacKinnon in his own home; and when Bulldog thrashed him next day for not having prepared an exercise the night before, the incident only seemed to complete Speug's pride and satisfaction.
Bulldog's southern assistant had tried the patienceof the Seminary by various efforts to improve its mind and manners, but when he proposed at the beginning of the autumn term to occupy Saturdays with botanical excursions to Kilspindie Woods, which, as everybody knows, are three miles from Muirtown, and a paradise of pheasants, it was felt that if there was any moral order in the universe something must happen. From the middle of September, when the school opened, on to the beginning of October, when football started, our spare time was given to kites, which we flew from the North Meadow in the equinoctial gales gloriously. Speug had one of heroic size, with the figure of a dragon upon it painted in blue and yellow and red—the red for the fire coming out of his mouth—and a tail of eight joints, ending in a bunch of hay fastened with a ribbon. None but a sportsman like Speug could have launched the monster from the ground—bigger than Peter by a foot—and nursed it through thelower spaces till it caught the wind, and held it in the higher as it tore upwards and forwards till the dragon was but the size of a man's hand in the clear autumn sky. Then Peter would lie down upon his back, with his hands below his head, and the stick with the kite string beneath his feet, and gaze up at the speck above, with an expression so lifted above this present world that a circle of juniors could only look at him with silent admiration and speculate whether they would ever become so good and great.
It must not be thought, however, that kite-flying was chiefly done upon your back, for it gave endless opportunities for intricate man[oe]uvres and spectacular display. When Peter was in the vein he would collect twelve mighties—each with a kite worth seeing—and bringing the kites low enough for the glory of their size and tails to be visible they would turn and wheel and advance and retire, keeping line and distance with such accuracy that Sergeant McGlashan would watch the review with keen interest and afterwards give his weighty approval. Then the band would work their way up to the head of the Meadow in the teeth of a north-wester, and forming in line, with half a dozen yards between each boy, would let the kites go and follow them at the run as the kites tore through the air and almost pulled their owners' arms out of the sockets. It was so fine a demonstration that the women bleaching theirclothes would pick up half a dozen of the goodman's shirts to let Speug keep his course—knowing very well that he would have kept it otherwise over the shirts—and golfers, who expect everyone to get out of their way on pain of sudden death, would stop upon the putting green to see the kites go down in the wind with the laddies red-faced and bareheaded at their heels. If the housewives shook their heads as they spread out the shirts on the grass again—weighing them down with clean stones that they might not follow the kites—it was with secret delight, for there is no wholesome woman who does not rejoice in a boy and regard his most vexatious mischief with charity. And old Major MacLeod, the keenest of golfers and the most touchy of Celts, declared that this condemned old Island was not dead yet when it could turn out such a gang of sturdy young ruffians. And it was instead of such a mighty ploy that Mr. Byles proposed to take the Seminary for a botanical excursion.
It was in the mathematical class-room that Mr. Byles announced the new departure, and, even if Bulldog had not been keeping watch with an inscrutable countenance, the school was too much amazed to interrupt. Having touched on the glories of the creation amid which we lived, Mr. Byles pointed out, in what the newspapers call "neat and well-chosen terms," that it was not enough to learn mathematics as they all did so diligently—Jock Howieson's eyeturned instinctively to Bulldog's cane—but they must also know some natural science in order to become, as he hoped they would, cultured men—Speug was just able to cast a longing glance at Thomas John. That no pursuit was easier and more delightful than botany, especially among wild flowers. That on Saturday he proposed to go with as many as would join him to ransack the treasures of Kilspindie Woods. That these woods were very rich, he believed, in flowers, among which he mentioned wild geraniums—at which the school began to recover and rustle. That the boys might dry the geraniums and make books for Christmas presents with them, and that he hoped to see a herbarium in the Seminary containing all the wild flowers of the district. The school was now getting into good spirits, and Bulldog allowed his eye to fall on Speug. That any boy who desired to improve his mind was to put on his oldest suit and bring a bag to carry the plants in and be in front of the Seminary at nine to-morrow. Then Bulldog brought his cane down on the desk with energy and dismissed the school, and Nestie told Peter that his mouth had begun to twitch.
Outside the school gathered together on the terrace around the Russian guns, which was our Forum, and after five seconds' pause, during which we gathered inspiration from each others' faces, a great shout of laughter went up to the sky, full-toned, unanimous, prolonged. Any sense of humour in theSeminary was practical, and Mr. Byles's botany class, with expeditions, was irresistible.
"Geranniums!" cried Howieson, who was immensely tickled; "it cowes a'. An' what was the ither flooer—'herbarries'? It's michty; it'ill be poppies an' mustard seed next. Speug, ye'ill be making a book for a present to Bulldog."
"Tak care o' yirsel," Bauldie shouted to the Dowbiggins, who were making off, as mass meetings did not agree with them, "an' see ye dinna wet yir feet or dirty yir hands. Ye'ill get yir wheeps at home if ye do. Give us a bit o' Byles, Nestie," and then there was instant silence, for Nestie had a nice little trick of mimicry which greatly endeared him to a school where delicate gifts were rare.
"S-silence, if you please," and Nestie held up his hand with Mr. Byles's favourite polite deprecating gesture. "I hear a smile. Remember, d-dear boys, that this is a serious s-subject. Do p-please sit quiet, Peter McGuffie; your fidgetin' is very t-tryin' indeed, and I 'ope, I mean h-hope, you will make an effort to l-learn. This, my l-lads, is a common object of Nature which I 'old, that is hold, in my h-hands—Howieson, I must ask you not to annoy Thomas John Dowbiggin—the c-colour is a lovely gold, and yet—no talking, if you please, it is r-rude—we pass it every day without n-notice. Each boy may take a dandelion h-home to his sister. Now go hout ... or rather out, quietly."
"Gosh, it's just Byles to the ground!" cried Bauldie; and Johnston passed a half stick of gundy to Nestie to refresh him after his labours. "Are ony o' you chaps goin'? It wud be worth seein' Byles traking thro' the Kilspindie Woods, with thae bleatin' sheep o' Dowbiggins at his heels, carryin' an airmful o' roots and sic like."
"You'ill no catch me tramping oot at the tail o' Byles and a litter o' Dowbiggins!"—and Jock was very emphatic. "Dod, it'ill just be like a procession o' MacMuldrow's lassies, two and two, and maybe airm in airm!"
This fearful and malignant suggestion settled the matter for the Seminary, as a score of its worthies marching across the bridge in the interests of science, like a boarding-school, would be a scandal for ever. So it was agreed that a body of sympathisers should see the Byles expedition off next morning, and then hold a field day of kites in the meadow.
The deterioration of the best is the worst, and that means that when a prim, conventional, respectable man takes in his head to dress as a Bohemian, the effect will be remarkable. Byles had been anxious to show that he could be quite the gay rustic when he pleased, and he was got up in a cap, much crushed, and a grey flannel shirt, with a collar corresponding, and no tie, and a suit of brown tweeds, much stained with futile chemical experiments. He was also equipped with a large canvas bag, slung over hisshoulder, and a hammock net, which he explained could be slung from a tree and serve as a resting-place if it were damp beneath. The Dowbiggins had entered into the spirit of the thing, and were in clothes reserved for their country holidays. They had each an umbrella, large and bulgy, and altogether were a pair of objects to whom no one would have lent a shilling. Cosh, whose attack on Nestie made him a social outcast, had declared himself a convert to natural science, and was sucking up to Byles, and two harmless little chaps, who thought that they would like to know something about flowers, made up the Botanical Society.
They were a lonely little group standing on the terrace, while Mr. Byles was securing a trowel and other instruments of war from his room, but a large and representative gathering of the Seminary did their best to cheer and instruct them.
Howieson insisted that the bottle of milk which bulged from the bag of the younger Dowbiggin contained spirituous liquors, and warned the two juniors to keep clear of him and to resist every temptation to drinking. He also expressed an earnest hope that a rumour flying round the school about tobacco was not true. But the smell on Dowbiggin's clothes was horrid. Cosh was affectionately exhorted to have a tender care of his health and personal appearance, not to bully Lord Kilspindie's gamekeepers, nor to put his foot into a steel trap, nor to meddle with therabbits, nor to fall into the Tay, but above all things not to tell lies.
Thomas John was beset with requests—that he would leave a lock of his hair in case he should not return, that he would mention the name of the pawn-broker from whom he got his clothes, that he would bring home a bouquet of wild flowers for Bulldog, that he would secure a supply of turnips to make lanterns for Halloween, that he would be kind to Mr. Byles and see that he took a rest in his net, that he would be careful to gather up any "h's" Mr. Byles might drop on the road, and that he should not use bad language under any circumstances.
"Never mind what those boys say, Thomas," said Mr. Byles, who had come out in time to catch the last exhortation: "it is far better to himprove, I mean cultivate, the mind than to fly kites like a set of children; but we all hope that you will have a nice fly, don't we, boys?" And sarcasm from so feeble a quarter might have provoked a demonstration had not Byles and his flock been blotted out by an amazing circumstance. As the botanists started, Speug, who had maintained an unusual silence all morning, joined the body along with Nestie, and gave Mr. Byles to understand that he also was hungering for scientific research. After their friends had recovered themselves they buzzed round the two, who were following the Dowbiggins with an admirable affectation of sedateness, but received no satisfaction. Speug contented himself with warning off a dozen henchmen who had fallen in by him with the idea of forming a mock procession, and then giving them a wink of extraordinary suggestiveness. But Nestie was more communicative, and explained the situation at length——
"Peter was a b-botanist all the time, but he did not know it; he fairly loves g-geranniums, and is sorry that he wasted his time on k-kites and snowballs. We are going to himprove our m-minds, and we don't want you to trouble us." But this was not knowledge.
It remained a mystery, and when Jock and Bauldie tailed off at the bridge, and Speug, halfway across, turned round and winked again, it was with regret that they betook themselves to their kites, and more than once they found themselves casting longing glances to the distant woods, where Speug was now pursuing the study of botany.
"Bauldie," said Jock suddenly, as the kites hung motionless in the sky, "this is weel enough, but tak' my word for't it's nothing to the game they're playin' in yon woods."
"Div ye mean howkin' geranniums? for I canna see muckle game in that: I would as soon dig potatoes." Bauldie, though a man of his hands, had a prosaic mind and had little imagination.
"Geranniums! ger—— havers, that's no' what Speug is after, you bet. He's got a big splore (exploit) on hand or he never crossed Muirtown Brig in such company. Man, Bauldie, I peety Byles, I do. Peter'ill lose the lot o' them in the woods or he'ill stick them in a bog, or"—and Jock could hardly hold his kite—"what div ye say to this, man? he'ill row them over to Woody Island and leave them there till Monday, with naething but bread and milk and the net to sleep in." And the joy of Jock and Bauldie at this cheerful prospect was rather a testimony to their faith in Peter's varied ability than a proof of sympathy with their fellow-creatures.
If Speug was playing the fox he gave no sign on the way to the woods, for he was a model of propriety and laid himself out to be agreeable. He showed an unwonted respect for the feelings of the Dowbiggins, so that these two young gentlemen relaxed the vigilant attention with which they usually regarded Speug, and he was quite affable with Cosh. As for the master, Peter simply placed himself at Mr. Byles's service, expatiating on the extent of the woods and their richness in flowers—"just fair scatted up wi' geranniums and the rest o' them:" offering to take the expedition by the nearest way to the treasures, and especially insisting on the number and beauty and tameness of the pheasants, till Mr. Byles was charmed and was himself surprised at the humanising influence of scientific pursuits.
Nor had Peter boasted vainly of his wood lore,for he led them by so direct a way that, before they came to the place of flowers, the expedition—except the two little chaps, whom Speug sent round in Nestie's charge, to a selected rendezvous as being next door to babies—had climbed five dykes, all with loose stones, fought through three thickets very prickly indeed, crawled underneath two hedges, crossed three burns, one coming up to the knees, and mired themselves times without number. Cosh had jostled against Speug in leaping from one dry spot to another and come down rolling in the mud, which made his appearance from behind wonderful; Speug, in helping Thomas John out of a very entangling place, had been so zealous that the seat had been almost entirely detached from Thomas John's trousers, and although Mr. Byles had done his best with pins, the result was not edifying; his brother's straw hat had fallen in the exact spot where Speug landed as he jumped from a wall, and was of no further service, and so the younger Dowbiggin—"who is so refined in his ways," as his mother used to say—wore as his headgear a handkerchief which had been used for cleaning the mud from his clothes. Upon Mr. Byles, whom fate might have spared, misfortunes had accumulated. His trousers had been sadly mangled from the knee downwards as he crawled through a hole, and had to be wound round his legs with string, and although Speug had pulled his cap out of a branch, he had done his work so hastily asto leave the peak behind, and he was so clumsy, with the best intentions, that he allowed another branch to slip, which caught Mr. Byles on the side of the head and left a mark above his eye, which distinctly suggested a prizefight to anyone not acquainted with that gentleman's blameless character. Peter himself had come unscathed from the perils of land and water, save a dash of mud here and there and a suspicion of wet about his feet, which shows how bad people fare better than good. The company was so bedraggled and discouraged that their minds did not seem set on wild flowers, and in these circumstances Peter, ever obliging and thoughtful, led the botanists to a pleasant glade, away from thickets and bogs, where the pheasants made their home and swarmed by hundreds. Mr. Byles was much cheered by this change of environment, and grew eloquent on the graceful shape and varied plumage of the birds. They were so friendly that they gathered round the party, which was not wonderful, as a keeper fed them every day, but which Mr. Byles explained was due to the instinct of the beautiful creatures, "who know, my dear boys, that we love them." He enlarged on the cruelty of sport, and made the Dowbiggins promise that they would never shoot pheasants or any other game, and there is no reason to doubt that they kept their word, as they did not know one end of a gun from another, and would no sooner have dared to fire one than they would have whistled on Sunday. A happy thought occurred to Mr. Byles, and he suggested that they should now have their lunch and feed the birds with the fragments. He was wondering also whether it would be wrong to snare one of the birds in the net, just to hold it in the hand and let it go again.
"They were so friendly that they gathered round the party.""They were so friendly that they gathered round the party."
When things had come to this pass—and he neverhad expected anything so good—Speug withdrew unobtrusively behind a clump of trees, and then ran swiftly to a hollow where Nestie was waiting with the juniors.
"Noo, my wee men," said Peter to the innocents, "div ye see that path? Cut along it as hard as ye can leg, and it 'ill bring you to the Muirtown Road, and never rest till ye be in your own houses. For Byles and these Dowbiggins are carryin' on sic a game wi' Lord Kilspindie's pheasants that I'm expectin' to see them in Muirtown jail before nicht. Ye may be thankful," concluded Peter piously, "that I savit ye from sic company."
"Nestie," Peter continued, when the boys had disappeared, "I've never clypit (told tales) once since I cam to the Seminary, and it's no' a nice job, but div ye no' think that the head keeper should know that poachers are in the preserves?"
"It's a d-duty, Peter," as they ran to the keeper's house, "especially when there's a g-gang of themand such b-bad-looking fellows—v-vice just written on their faces. It's horried to see boys so young and so w-wicked."
"What young prodigals are yon comin' skelpin' along, as if the dogs were aifter them?" and the head keeper came out from the kennels. "Oh, it's you, Speug—and what are you doin' in the woods the day? there's no eggs now." For sporting people are a confederacy, and there was not a coachman or groom, or keeper or ratcatcher, within twelve miles of Muirtown, who did not know Mr. McGuffie senior, and not many who did not also have the acquaintance of his hopeful son.
"Nestie and me were just out for a run to keep our wind richt, an' we cam on a man and three boys among the pheasants in the low park."
"Among the what? Meddlin' with Lord Kilspindie's birds?"
"Well, I dinna ken if they were juist poachin', but they were feedin' them, and we saw a net."
"Sandie," shouted the head keeper, "and you, Tom, get up out of yir beds this meenut; the poachers are after the pheasants. My word, takin' them alive, as I'm a livin' man, to sell them for stock: and broad daylight; it beats everything. He 'ill be an old hand, frae Dundee maist likely. And the impidence o't, eleven o'clock in the forenoon an' the end o' September. Dod: it's a depairture in poachin'." And as the sight of Mr. Byles burst onhis view, surrounded by trustful birds, and the two Dowbiggins trying very feebly to drop the net on a specially venturesome one, the head keeper almost lost the power of speech.
"Dinna let us interrupt you," and Mr. Byles looked up to see three armed keepers commanding their helpless party, and one of them purple with rage. "I hope we don't intrude; maybe we could give you a hand in catchin' the birds, and if a spring-cart would be of ony use ... confound your cheek!
"Gathering flowers, are ye, and gave the pheasants a biscuit, did ye, and the boys thought they would like to stroke one, would they? How is that, lads? I've seen two or three poachers in my time, but for brazen-faced lyin' I've never seen your match. Maybe you're a Sabbath-school out for a trip, or an orphan asylum?
"Assistant mathematical master at the Seminary, that's what you are, is it, ye awfu' like blackguard, an' the laddies are the sons o' a respectable Free Kirk minister, the dirty dogs? Are ye sure ye're no' the principal o' Edinburgh University? Tak' yir time and try again. I'm enjoying it. Is't by the hundred ye sell them, and wud it be a leeberty to ask for whose preserves? Dash the soople tongue o' ye.
"If ye dare to put yir hand in a pocket, I'll lodge a charge o' shot in ye: we'ill hae nae pistol-work in Kilspindie Woods. Come along wi' ye, professor an'students, an' I'll give ye a ride into Muirtown, an' we'ill just be in time to catch the magistrate. He hasna tried a learned institution like this since he mounted the bench. March in front, but dinna try to run, or it will be the waur for ye. Ma certes, sic a band o' waufies!"
Then those two officers of justice, Peter and Nestie, having seen all without being seen, now started for Muirtown to gather the kite-players and as many of the Seminary as could be found to see the arrival of the botanists. They were brought in a large spring-cart—Mr. Byles seated between the head keeper and the driver, in front, and the other three huddled like calves in the space behind—a mass of mud, tatters, and misery, from which the solemn, owl-like face of Thomas John, whose cap was now gone also, looked out in hopeless amazement. As they were handed over to the police the Seminary, which had been at first struck dumb, recovered speech and expressed itself with much vivacity.
"Who would have thought Byles had as much spirit? Sall, he 'ill be rinnin' horses at Muirtown Races yet;" "For ony sake walk backwards, Thomas—yir breeks are barely decent;" "The pheasants have been hard on yir legs, Cosh;" "Where's the geranniums?" "Has his Lordship kept yir bonnet, Dowbiggin?" "It 'ill be a year's hard labour." For boys are only in the savage state, and the discomfiture of such immaculate propriety was very sweet to the Seminary.