Chapter XIII: Part II (3)

“Miss Potune is very fat, she pretends to be very learned, she says she saw a stone that dropt from the skies, but she is a good Christian.” (The sequence of thought is not particularly apparent, but we begin to follow with more confidence in the next “lap,” starting with “Christian.”) “An annababtist is a thing I am not a member of; I am a Pisplikan just now and a Prisbeteren at Kercaldy, my native town, which though dirty is clein in the country; sentiment is what I am not acquainted with, though I wish it and should like to pratise it. I wish I had a great deal of gratitude in my heart and in all my body. The English have great power over the french; Ah me per adventure at this moment some noble Colnel at this moment sinks to the ground without breath; and in convulsive pangs dies; it is a melancholy consideration.”

Cousin Isabella had the little maid for a bedfellow, and we get some funny glimpses of what she had to endure from that arrangement. “I’ve slept with Isabella, but she cannot sleep with me. I’m so very restless. I danced over her legs in the morning and she cried ‘Oh! dear, you mad girl, Madgie,’ for she was very sleepy.”—(Oh! those little “Early wide-awakes!” Which of us who have been wakened by them at four o’clock in the morning will not sympathise with poor Isa Keith?) “Every morn I awake before Isa, and oh I wish to be up and out with the larkies, but I must take care of Isa, who when aslipe is as beautiful as Viness and Jupiter in the sky.” On a later occasion Marjorie records: “I went into Isabella’s bed to make her smile like the Genius Demedicus, or the statute in ancient Greece, but she fell asleep in my very face, at which my anger broke forth, so that I awoke her from a very comfortable nap. All was now hushed up, but my anger again burst forth at her bidding me get up.” Finally poor Isabella, in self-defence against “continual figiting and kicking” had to banish Marjorie to the foot of the bed, an arrangement not without its advantages, for it gave a certain young person opportunity “to be continialy at work reading the Arabian nights entertainment, which I could not have done had I slept at the top.” The situation, moreover, inspired the following remarkable verses:—

“I love in Isa’s bed to lie
O such a joy and luxury
The bottom of the bed I sleep
And with great care I myself keep
Oft I embrace her feet of lillys
But she has got on all the pillies
Her neck I never can embrace
But I do hug her feet in place.
But I am sure I am contented
And of my follies am repented
I’m sure I’d rather be
In a small bed at liberty.”

Isabella would seem to have restored her soon again, however, for we learn from a later poem:—

“When cold as clay when cold as ice
To get into a bed tis nice
It is a nice thing for to creep
But not to dose away and sleep
Into a bed where Isa lies
And to my questions she replies
Corrects my faults improves my mind
And tells me of the faults she find
But she is sound asleep sometimes
For that I have not got good rimes
But when awake I her teize much
And she doth squall at every touch
Then Isa reads in bed alone
And reads the fasts by good Nelson
Then I get up to say my prayers
To get my porridge and go downstairs.”

If Marjorie’s journal ranges in its discussion of subjects literally from “Shakespeare” (or, as she calls him, “Shakepear,” “of which I have a little knolege of,” thus summed up: “Macbeth is a pretty compisition but awful one Macbeth is so bad and wicked, but Lady Macbeth is so hardened in guilt she does not mind her faults and sins no,”) to the “Musical Glasses” (Nancy’s and Isabella’s uncle has got musical glasses and the sound of them is exceedingly sweet), her poetry is equally universal in its range. From the “Ephibol on my Dear Love Isabella,” composed when the poetess was six, to loyal verses on the King’s Birthday:—

“Poor man his health is very bad
And he is often very mad,”

and the Chef d’Oeuvre on “Mary Queen of Scots” we have a wide selection:—

“Poor Mary Queen of Scots was born
With all the graces which adorn
Her birthday is so very late
That I do now forget the date
Her education was in france
There she did learn to sing and dance
There she was married to the dauphin
But soon he was laid in the coffin,”

and so on through the whole romantic and tragic story to the end at Fotheringay. Nay, even beyond it, goes our poet historian, lured on by her sense of poetical justice against Queen Elizabeth:

“Elizabeth was a cross old maid
Now when her youth began to fade
Her temper was worce then before
And people did not her adore
But Mary was much loved by all
Both by the great and by the small
But hark her soul to heaven did rise
And I do think she gained a prize
For I do think she would not go
Into the awfull place below
There is a thing that I must tell
Elizabeth went to fire and hell
Him who will teach her to be cevel
It must be her great friend the divel.”

It is very consoling to know that Marjorie did not think any the worse of beautiful Queen Mary for being a Catholic:

“She was a Roman Catholic strong
Nor did she think that it was wrong.”

Perhaps the fact that she herself was a “Pisplikan just now and a Prisbeteren at Kercaldy, my native town, which though dirty is clein in the country,” made her more tolerant than others of her nation:

“For they her faith could not well bear
And to upbraid her they would dare.”

Marjorie did not always keep to these “Epic Heights.” Her muse is sometimes occupied with such subjects as the death of three young turkeys eaten by the rats, the elopement of Jessy Watson the servant maid, and her aunt’s monkey:

“There is a thing I love to see
That is our monkey catch a flee.”

Indeed her latest biographer opines that the lament for the three turkeys will become the most famous of Marjorie’s poems:

“Three turkeys fair their last have breathed
And now this world for ever leaved
Their father and their mother too
Will sigh and weep as well as you
Mourning for their osprings fair
Whom they did nurse with tender care
Indeed the rats their bones have cranched
To eternity are they launched
There graceful form and pretty eyes
Their fellow fowls did not despise
A direful death indeed they had
That would put any parent mad
But she was more than usual calm
She did not give a single dam[19]
She is as gentel as a lamb
Here ends this melancholy lay
Farewell poor Turkeys I must say.”

This “melancholy lay” was addressed to the owner of the turkeys, Mrs. Crawfurd, of Braehead—a “delightfull place” in Marjorie’s opinion. “Now I am quite happy,” she records on the eve of a visit there, “for I am going to-morrow to a delightfull place, Braehead by name, belonging to Mrs. Craford, where there is ducks, cocks, hens, bubbyjocks, 2 dogs, 2 cats and swine, which is delightful.”

The visit had its disappointments. First in the matter of the weather: “I came here as I thought to enjoy nature’s delightful breath, it is sweeter than a fial of rose oil, but Alas my hopes are dissopointed, it is always spitring, but then I often get a blink and then I am happy.” Moreover Marjorie’s and Job’s old enemy (and Elizabeth’s “great friend”) was particularly busy at this time, and we have a constant record of ill behaviour. “To-day I affronted myself before Miss Margaret and Miss Isa Craford and Mrs. Craford and Mrs. Kermical, which was very nauty, but I hope there will be no more evil in all my journal.” Alas for good intentions! Behold what happened a few days after. “I am going to telle you that in all my life I never behaved so ill, for when Isa bid me go out of the room I would not go, and when Isa came to the room I threw my book at her in a dreadful passion and she did not lick me but said ‘Go into the room and pray,’ and I did it. I will never do it again. I hope that I will never afront Isa, for she said she was never so afronted in her life, but I hope it will never happen again.”

“I am going to turn over a new life and am going to be a very good girl and be obedient to Isa Keith, here there is plenty of goosberrys which makes my teath water....

“My religion is greatly falling off because I don’t pray with so much attention when I am saying my prayers and my character is lost away a-mong the Braehead people. I hope I will be religious again, but as for regaining my character I despare for it.... Everybody just now hates me and I deserve it, for I don’t behave well.”

In spite of her unfortunate experiences at Braehead, she was very anxious to return to it, and upbraided Isa in verse, on another occasion, when their visit, she learned, was only to be two days long:

“Beautious Isabella say
How long at braehead will you stay
O for a week or not so long
Then weel desart the busy throng
Ah can you see me sorrow so
And drop a hint that you must go
I thought you had a better hart
Than make me with my dear friends part
But now I see that you have not
And that you mock my dreadful lot
My health is always bad and sore
And you have hurt it a deal more.”

“The reason I wrote this poem is because I am going to Braehead only two days.”

No wonder she loved Braehead: “Here at Braehead I enjoy rurel felisity to perfection, content, retirement, rurel friendship, books all these dwell here, but I am not sure of ease and alternate labour useful life.” At Braehead even prose must take the colour of poetry from waving trees and morning sunbeams:

“In the morning the first thing I see is most beautiful trees spreading their luxurant branches between the Horison and me....

“I love to see the morning sun that rise so long before the moon ... the moon that casts her silver light when the Horison sinks beneath the clouds and scateres its light on the surface of the earth.”

Another place where Marjorie dearly loved to go visiting was Ravelston House: “Ravelston is a fine place, because I get balm wine and many other dainties, and it is extremely pleasant to me by the company of swine, geese, cocks, etc., and they are the delight of my heart.”

Whether at home in Edinburgh, or in Braehead, or Ravelston, Isabella continues the education of her little charge: “I am thinking,” says Marjorie, in a serious Sunday mood, “how I shall improve the many talents I have. I am sorry I have threwn them away, it is shocking to think of it when many have not the instruction. I have, because Isabella teaches me to or three hours every day in reading and writing and arethmatick and many other things and religion into the bargain. On Sundays she teaches me to be virtuous.” Saturday was a half-holiday—even from virtue! “This is Saturday, and I am very glad of it, because I have play half of the day and I get money too, but alas I owe Isabella fourpence, for I am fined 2 pence whenever I bite my nails.”

On another Saturday we hear of her having “sauntered about the woulds and by the burn side and dirtied myselfe, which puts me in mind of a song my mother composed. It was that she was out and dirtied herselfe, which is like me.”

Poor Isabella did not always have an easy task. The “multiplication table” gave particular trouble. “I am now going to tell you about the horible and wretched plaege that my multiplication gives me you can’t conceive it—the most Devilish thing is 8 times 8 and 7 times 7; it is what nature itself can’t endure....” Sometimes the Devil gets out of the “multiplication table” and comes even near more sacred ground. “To-day I have been very ungrateful and bad and disobedient, Isabella gave me my writing, I wrote so ill that she took it away and locked it up in her desk where I stood trying to open it till she made me come and read my bible, but I was in a bad homour and red it so carelessly and ill that she took it from me and her blood ran cold, but she never punished me, she is as gental as a lamb to me an ungrateful girl.”

Isabella tries the effect of praise:—

“Isabella has given me praise for checking my temper, for I was sulky even when she was kneeling an hole hour teaching me to write.”

But Marjorie is honest enough to think a whipping would do herself good: “But she never whipes me, so that I thinke I should be the better of it, and the next time that I behave ill, I think she should do it, for she never does it, but she is very indulgent to me, but I am very ungrateful to her.”

It may have been at Ravelston (where “I am enjoying nature’s fresh air, the birds are singing sweetly, the calf doth frisk and play, and nature shows her glorious face, the sun shines through the trees”) that Marjorie first saw and conquered Sir Walter. For all readers of _Waverley_ will remember how deeply its author loved the old house and garden, where he had played as a boy. The conquest was completed when Marjorie returned to Edinburgh, and by all accounts it was not her beauty that worked the charm. As Marjorie herself says, “I am very strong and robust and not of the delicate sex, nor of the fair, but of the deficient in looks,” and poor Isa Keith is quite concerned about her plainness: “She is grown excessively fat and strong,” she writes about this time to Kirkcaldy, “but I cannot say she is in great beauty, as she has lost two front teeth, and her continued propensity to laugh exhibits the defect rather strongly.” But in the eyes of Sir Walter, she was better than beautiful: “She’s the most extraordinary creature I ever met with,” he told Mrs. Keith, “and her repeating of Shakespeare overpowers me as nothing else does.”

Dr. Brown draws some charming pictures of the great man and the little child together, Marjorie teaching him nursery rhymes:—“He used to say when he came to Alibi Crackaby he broke down. Pin-Pan, Musky-Dan, Tweedle-um, Tweedle-um made him roar with laughter. He said Musky Dan especially was beyond his endurance, bringing up an Irishman and his hat fresh from the Spice Islands and odoriferous Ind; she getting quite bitter in her displeasure at his ill behaviour and stupidity. Then he would read ballads to her in his own glorious way, the two getting wild with excitement over _Gil Morrice_ or the _Baron of Smailholm_, and he would take her on his knees and make her repeat Constance’s speeches in _King John_ till he swayed to and fro sobbing his fill.”

The year before she died she was at a Twelfth Night Supper at Scott’s in Castlestreet. The company had all come—all but Marjorie; and all were dull because Scott was dull. “Where’s that bairn? What can have come over her? I’ll go myself and see!” And he was getting up, and would have gone, when the bell rang, and in came Duncan Roy and his henchman Dougal, with the Sedan chair which was brought right into the lobby and its top raised. And there in its darkness and dingy old cloth sat Maidie in white, her eyes gleaming, and Scott bending over her in ecstacy. “Sit ye there, my dautie, till they all see you,” and forthwith he brought them all. You can fancy the scene. And he lifted her up and marched to his seat with her on his stout shoulder, and set her down beside him; and then began the night, and such a night! Those who knew Scott best said that night was never equalled. Maidie and he were the stars; and she gave them Constance’s speeches, and Helvellyn, and all her repertoire, Scott showing her off, and being oftimes rebuked by her for his intentional blunders.

Perhaps the prudent mother at home in Kirkcaldy began to fear the effects of all this notoriety and excitement on her little daughter’s character. At all events she did not leave her in Edinburgh very many months after this. In July, 1811, Marjorie bade good-bye to her darling Isabella and returned to Kirkcaldy.

We have letters of hers, mainly to Isa, to fill up the simple story of the next few months. In one of them, she refers to an epidemic of measles. Little did Isabella think, as she laughed over the quaint phrases, that there was something ominous in it. In November Marjorie herself fell a victim to the epidemic, and was very ill for many weeks.

It was a strange Maidie even to those who knew her best that developed in this illness—a very patient, submissive, and quiet Maidie, who liked best to lie still and think. One day as she was lying very still her mother asked her if there was anything she wished. “Oh, yes. If you would just leave the room door open a wee bit, and play the ‘Land o’ the Leal,’ and I will lie and think and enjoy myself.”

On Sunday, the 15th December, she was allowed to be up for a little while, and her sister thus describes the scene.

“It was Sabbath evening, and after tea my father, who idolized the child, and never afterwards in my hearing mentioned her name, took her in his arms; and while walking up and down the room, she said: ‘Father, I will repeat something to you: what would you like?’ He said ‘Just choose yourself, Maidie.’ She hesitated for a moment, between the paraphrase ‘Few are Thy Days and Full of Woe,’ and the lines of Burns, ‘Why I am loth to leave this Earthly Scene?’” but chose the latter.

That was the last earthly scene for poor little Maidie. Six days later, they laid her to rest in the churchyard of Abbotshall.

FOOTNOTES

[1] Echlasc = horse-rod, with a goad at the end of it.

[2] Cuchairi = “trappers.”

[3] Immdorus = door-porch.

[4] Feici = ridge-pole.

[5] House of Manuscripts.

[6] Walther von der Vogelweide, a celebrated Middle High German lyrical poet.

[7] Wolfram von Eschenbach, Middle High German epic poet.

[8] Watch-tower.

[9] 1425.

[10] A poem by Prudentius.

[11] A collection of fables.

[12] Gianfrancesco Gonzaga was made Marquis of Mantua on the occasion of the visit of the Emperor Sigismund in 1433.

[13] The great codex of the Ptolemian System of the Universe.

[14] The residences of the smaller landed gentry in France, of the old Régime, were called “noblesses” or “gentilhommières.”

[15] These were at the end of the garden.

[16] One of the lay-sisters.

[17] “If we have sown unto you spiritual things, is it a great matter if we reap your carnal things?”

[18] A book of riddles.

[19] I am afraid Marjorie’s language is sometimes very “shoking” and poor cousin Isa has her own troubles getting her to conform to a more “ladylike” standard in the matter. “To-day,” she confesses on one occasion, “I pronounced a word which should never come out of a lady’s lips, but Isabella kindly forgave me because I said I would not do it again. I will tell you what I think made me in so bad a humour is I got 1 or 2 cups of that bad bad sina tea to Day.”