Chapter IV: Part 4

“Robina--nae mair Tweedie, lass--ye ken I was afflicted with a strange calamity when ye left me. I thought I saw what wasna to be seen. It comes aye back upon me now and then; and I ken it’s on me this mornin’. I may think I see you there standin’ before me, even as I saw you in my broad-tailed coat that day in the High Street; but I ken it’s a’ a delusion. In fact, my dear Robina, _I dinna see you, I dinna even feel your body_,” (pushing her out by the cuff of the neck;) “the merrillygoes, lass! the merrillygoes!”

And David shut the door on the ejected Robina--thereafter living a very quiet and comparatively happy life, free from all glamour or any other affection of the eyes, and seeing just as other people see. Yea, with his old friend Sprunt and his wife he had many a joke on the subject, forgiving John for running away that morning to shirk his creditor, as well as Mrs Janet for being terrified out of the house by the wild rolling eyes of the unhappy David.

The Story of the Six Toes.

A man who makes a will generally knows pretty well the person to whom he leaves a legacy, but it does not follow that other people are to have the same enlightenment as to the identity of the legatee. I make the remark in reference to a common story connected with the will of honest Andrew Gebbie, who officiated once as a ruling elder in the Church of Trinity College, Edinburgh, and was supposed to have done so much good to the people by his prayers, exhortations and psalm-singing, that it was utterly unnecessary for his getting to heaven, where he had sent so many others, that he should bequeath a single plack or bawbee to the poor when he died. Yet whether it was that the good man Andrew determined to make sure work of his salvation, or that he had any less ambitious object in view, certain it is that some time before he died he made a will by his own hand, and without the help of a man of the law, in spite of the Scotch adage--

“Who saves a fee and writes his will
Is friendly to the lawyers still;
For these take all the will contains,
And give the heir all that remains.”

And by this said will honest Andrew bequeathed the sum of three hundred pounds sterling money to “Mistress Helen Grey, residing in that street of the old town called Leith Wynd,” without any further identification or particularisation whatsoever, nor did he say a single word about the cause of making this somewhat generous bequest, or anything about the merits or services of the legatee. A strange circumstance, seeing that the individual being a “Nelly Grey” had long been a favourite of the poets, (and, therefore, rather indefinite,) as she indeed still figures in more than one very popular song, wherein she is even called bonny Nelly Grey.

Then, to keep all matters in harmony, he appointed three clergymen--the minister of his own church, the minister of the Tolbooth, and the minister of the Tron--as his executors for carrying his said will into execution, probably thinking that Nelly Grey’s three hundred, and her soul to boot, could not be in better hands than those of such godly men. So, after living three weeks longer in a very bad world, the worthy testator was gathered to his fathers, and it might perhaps have been as well that his said will had been gathered along with him,--as indeed happened in a recent case, where a sensible man, probably in fear of the lawyers, got his will placed in the same coffin with him,--though no doubt he forgot that worms, if not moths, do corrupt there also, and sometimes thieves, in the shape of body-snatchers, do break through and steal. Passing all which we proceed to say that the executors entered upon their duties. As regards the other legatees they found no difficulty whatever, most probably because legatees are a kind of persons who are seldom out of the way when they are wanted. They accordingly made their appearance, and without a smile, which would have been unbecoming, got payment of their legacies. But as for this Helen Grey, with so large a sum standing at her credit, she made no token of any kind, nor did any of the relations know aught concerning her, though they wondered exceedingly who she could be, and how she came to be in so strange a place as their kinsman’s testament. Not that the three executors, the ministers, shared very deeply in this wondering, because they knew that their elder, honest Andrew, was a good and godly man, and had had good and godly, and therefore sufficient reasons, (probably in the poverty and piety of Helen,) for doing what he had done.

If indeed these gentlemen wondered at all, it was simply that any poor person living in such a place as Leith Wynd should be so regardless of money, as to fail to make her appearance among the grave and happy legatees. The question, who can she be, passed from the one to the other like a bad shilling. Not one of them could answer. Father Tron, and Father Tolbooth, and Father Trinity, were all at fault; the noses of their ingenuity could not smell out the object of their wish. But then they had been trusting so far as yet to the relatives, and had not made personal inquiry in Leith Wynd, which, if they had been men of business, they would have done at once.

“Oh,” said Father Trinity at length, “I think I have it now when I recollect there was an honest woman of that name who was a member of my congregation some years ago, and, if I am not mistaken, she was in honest Andrew Gebbie’s visiting district, and he took an interest in her soul.”

“The thing is patent,” rejoined Father Tron. “Our lamented elder hath done this good thing out of the holy charity that cometh of piety.”

“And a most beautiful example of the fruits of godliness,” added Father Tolbooth.

“Beautiful indeed!” said Trinity. “For we have here to keep in view that Elder Andrew had many poor friends, but he hath chosen to prefer the relationship of the spirit to that of mere earthly connexion. And his reward will verily be reaped in heaven.”

“We must give the good man a paragraph in the _Mercury_,” resumed Father Tolbooth. “And now, brother of Trinity, it will be for you to find Helen Grey out, and carry to her the glad tidings.”

“A pleasant commission,” rejoined Father Trinity, as he rose to depart.

And taking his way to Leith Wynd, he soon reached that celebrated street, nor was it long till he passed “The Happy Land,” that dreaded den of burglars, thieves, and profligate women, which the Scotch, according to their peculiar humour, had so named. That large building he behoved to pass with a sigh as the great forlorn hope of the city, and coming to some of the brokers whose shops were farther down, he procured some information which sent him up a dark close, to the end of which having got, he ascended to a garret in a back tenement, and, knocking at the door, was answered by an aged woman.

“Does Helen Grey live here?”

“Ay, sir!” replied she. “If ye ca’ living the breathing awa o’ the breath o’ life. It’s a sad thing when auld age and poverty come thegither.”

“An old saying, Helen,” replied the father. “Yet there is a third one which sanctifieth the other two, and bringeth all into harmony, peace, and love, and that is religion. But do you not know your old minister?”

“Brawly, brawly, sir,” replied she; “but the truth is, I didna like to speak first; and now, sir, I’m as proud as if I had got a fortune.”

“And so perhaps you have,” added the father. “But come, sit down. I’ve got something to say;” and having seated himself he continued. “Was Maister Andrew Gebbie, our worthy elder, in the habit of visiting you?”

“Indeed, and he did aince or twice come and see me; but never mair,” replied she. “Yet he was sae kind as to bring me the last time this book o’ psalms and paraphrases, and there’s some writing in’t which I couldna read.”

“Let me see it,” he said.

And the woman having handed him the book--

“To Mrs Janet Grey,” said the minister, as he read the inscription.

“A mistake, for my name is Helen,” said she. “But it was weel meant in Mr Gebbie, and it’s a’ the same.”

“A staff to help her on to the happy land,” continued the reverend doctor, reading.

“No ‘The Happy Land’ near bye?” interjected Helen.

“Not likely,” continued the doctor with a smile. “But I have good news for you, Helen.”

“Good news for me!” said the woman. “That must come frae an airth no within the four quarters o’ the earthly compass. I thought a’ gude news for _me_ had ta’en wings, and floun awa to the young and the happy.”

“It seems not,” said he; “for Elder Andrew has left you a legacy of three hundred pounds.”

“Stop, stop, sir!” ejaculated the frightened legatee. “It canna be, and though it was sae, I couldna bear the grandeur. It would put out the sma’ spark o’ life that’s left in my auld heart.”

“No, no!” said he. “It is only an earthly inheritance, Helen, to keep you in ease and comfort in your declining years, till you succeed to that inheritance which knoweth no decay, and fadeth not away.”

“But is it really possible, good sir?” she continued, a little reconciled to that whereunto there is a pretty natural predisposition in human nature. “But I havena blessed Elder Andrew yet. May the Lord receive Andrew Gebbie’s soul into endless glory!”

“Amen!” said the reverend doctor. “I will speak of this again to you, Helen.”

And with these words he left the still confused woman, who would very likely still feel a difficulty in comprehending the length and breadth of the goodness of a man who had seen her only a few times, and given her a psalm-book, and called her Janet in place of Helen--a mistake he must have rectified before he made his will.

Next day the reverend doctor of Trinity had another meeting in the office of the law-agent to the trust, Mr George Crawford, whereat he recounted how he had found out the legatee; how strange it was that the poor woman was entirely ignorant of her good fortune; how grateful she was; and, above all, how strange that the saintly elder had only seen her a few times, and knew so little of her that he had made the foresaid mistake in her name. All which did seem strange to the brethren, not any one of whom would even have thought of giving more than perhaps a pound to such a person. But as the motives of men are hidden from the eyes of their fellows, and are indeed like the skins of onions, placed one above another, so they considered that all they had to do was to walk by the will.

“We have no alternative,” said Father Tron; “nor should we wish any, seeing that the money could not be better applied; for has not the son of Sirach said, ‘Give unto a godly man, and not unto a sinner.’”

“And,” added Tolbooth, “we are also commanded to give of our substance to the poor, and ‘do well unto those that are lowly.’”

“Yes,” said Father Trinity. “Mr Gebbie’s object was clear enough; it was sufficient for him that the woman was poor; therein lay his reward; and I presume we have nothing to do but to authorise Mr Crawford to pay the money.”

“Which I will do, gentlemen,” said the writer, “if you authorise me; but I frankly confess to you that I am not altogether satisfied, because I knew Mr Andrew Gebbie intimately, and, godly as he was, I can hardly think he was the man to make a comparative stranger the medium of the accumulation of compound interest to be got back in heaven. Besides, Helen Grey is so common a name, that I believe I could get several in Edinburgh; and if we were to pay to the wrong woman, you might be bound to refund out of your own stipends, which would not be a very pleasant thing.”

A speech which, touching the word stipend, brought a very grave look into the faces of the brethren.

“A most serious, yea, a momentous consideration,” said Tron, followed by the two others.

Nor had the groan got time to die away when the door opened, and there stood before them a woman of somewhere about forty, a little shabby in her apparel, though with a decayed flush of gaudy colour in it here and there; somewhat blowsy too--the tendency to the tint of the peony being more evident about the region of the nose, where there was a spot or two very clearly predisposed to the sending forth, under favourable circumstances, of a pimple; rather bold-looking in addition, even in presence of holy men who wielded the Calvinistic thunders of the day, and followed them up with the refreshing showers of grace and love.

“I understand,” said she, “that Elder Andrew Gebbie has left me a legacy o’ three hundred pounds, and I will thank you for the siller.”

On hearing which the three fathers looked at each other in amazement, and it was clear they did not like the appearance of the new claimant.

“Who are you?” said Trinity.

“Helen Grey!” replied she. “I live in Leith Wynd. Mr Andrew Gebbie and me were man and wife.”

“Where are your marriage lines?” asked Tron.

“I hae nane,” replied she. “It was a marriage by giving and taking between ourselves--a gude marriage by the law.”

“And no witnesses?” said Tron.

“The deil ane but the Lord.”

“Wh-e-w!” whistled Father Tron, not audibly, only as it were within the mouth.

“It is very true,” said Father Trinity, as he looked askance at the claimant, and contrasted her in his mind with the other Nelly, who he was satisfied was the real Nelly Pure, “that Mr Andrew Gebbie left that sum of money to a certain Helen Grey, but we have no evidence to show that you are the right woman.”

“The right woman!” ejaculated she, with a bold laugh; “and how could I be the wrong ane, when I cut Andrew Gebbie’s corns for ten years?”

“Oh, a chiropodist!” said Father Tron.

“I’m nae corn-doctor, sir,” replied she, with something like offended pride: “I never cut another man’s corns in my life.”

“We are nearly getting into that lightness of speech which betokeneth vanity,” said another of the brethren. “It is a serious matter; and we must require of you, Mrs Grey--seeing that the marriage cannot, even by your own statement, be taken into account, for want of evidence--to prove that you were upon such terms of friendship with Mr Gebbie as to make it probable that he would leave you this large sum of money.”

“Friendship!” cried the woman again. “Ay, for ten years, and wha can tell where the flee may stang? It was nae mair than he should have dune. I am Helen Grey, and I insist upon my rights.”

“But,” said Father Trinity, “there is another Helen Grey in Leith Wynd, with whom Mr Gebbie was acquainted, and to whom he made a present of a psalm-book.”

“And did he no gie me a psalm-book too!” quoth the woman. “I have it at hame, and you are welcome to see my name on’t written by the elder’s ain hand. But did this second Helen Grey cut the good elder’s corns for ten lang years, I wonder? Tell me that, gentlemen, and I’ll tell you something mair that will make your ears ring as they never did at a psalm.”

“Still this irreverend nonsense about corns: woman, are you mad?” said Tron. “Give us the names of respectable people who knew of this asserted friendship between you and the deceased elder.”

“The deil ane kent o’t, sir, but ourselves!” was the sharp answer of the woman. “And if it comes to that, I can prove naething; but I tell you there’s mair in the corns than ye wot.”

“Oh! she wants to prove the _footing_ she was on with Mr Gebbie,” punned Mr Crawford with a laugh, and the grave brethren could not help joining in what Tron called a fine example of the figure called _paronomasia_.

“That’s just it,” said the woman. “I will prove that I knew the length o’ his big tae, and may be mair.”

“And what more?” asked Father Tron.

“That Mr Gebbie had six toes on his left foot!” answered she.

“And what of that?” inquired the agent, as he pricked up his ears at what might turn out a more special means of knowledge than they were dreaming of.

“A great deal,” continued the woman. “Sae muckle that I need nae mair, for be it kenned to ye that Mr Gebbie was aye ashamed o’ what he thought a deformity, and concealed it from a’ living mortals except me. If ye’ll prove that there’s anither person in a’ Edinburgh, in Scotland, or in the hail world, wha kens that Elder Andrew had six toes on his left foot, I’ll give up a’ right to the three hundred pounds!”

“So there is something in the corns after all,” whispered Mr Crawford to Trinity, and the others hearing the remark began to think, and think, and look at each other, as if they felt that the woman had fairly shut them up to a test of her truthfulness easily applied. So telling her to call back next day at the same hour, they requested her to leave them. And after she was gone, the four gentlemen began gradually to relax from their gravity as they saw the ingenuity of the woman, for it was quite apparent that if it should turn out that no one--servant, relative, or doctor--could tell this wonderful fact about the six toes of their own knowledge, however derived, and that this Helen Grey was the sole confidential custodier thereof--the conclusion was all but certain that she knew it by being intrusted with the cutting of the holy man’s corns, as she had asserted. And a confidence of this kind, (setting aside the irregular marriage,) implied a friendship so close as to justify the legacy. What in the meantime remained to be done was for the agent to see any persons connected with the elder’s household who were likely to know the fact, and being an honourable man he behoved to do this without what is called a leading question.

Accordingly, that same afternoon Mr Crawford busied himself to the effect of having seen the good elder’s housekeeper, as well as the doctor who had attended him upon his last illness, with perhaps a dozen of other likely people, such as the other legatees and relations, all of whom were entirely ignorant of the fact set forth by the woman, viz., that Mr Gebbie had six toes on his left foot. And next day the trustees met again, when Mr Crawford told them, before touching on the corns, that an agent had called upon him from the other Helen first seen, demanding payment to her. He then told the trustees the result of his inquiries--that not a single person of all he had seen knew anything of the abnormal foot. At this the clergymen wondered more and more, and how long they might have sat there and wondered it might have been difficult to say, had it not been for an ingenious idea started by Tron, and suggested by the old story about King Charles and the fish in the bucket of water.

“The woman is laughing at us,” said he, “and we are inquiring whether certain people knew a fact without making ourselves acquainted with the prior fact, whether that prior fact had ever any existence except in the brain of this bad woman, whose evidence goes to traduce the character of a holy elder of the Church of Scotland.”

The brethren again laughed at this ingenious discovery of Father Tron’s, and thereupon began to veer round in favour of good Nelly _prima_. In a few minutes more entered Blowsabel again, holding in her hand a psalm-book with some words of an inscription on it in the handwriting of the elder, but subscribed “a friend,” whereas, as the reader may recollect, the inscription in the book given to the first Helen, (with the misnomer of Janet,) was in the name of Andrew Gebbie--a fact rather in favour of Nelly _secunda_, insomuch as it harmonised with her statement that the friendship between the elder and her had been kept a secret known only to themselves.

“That goes for what it’s worth,” said she, as she received back the book. “And now,” she continued, addressing Mr Crawford, “you can tell me whether you were able to find, within the hail o’ Edinburgh, a single person who knew that Elder Andrew had six taes on his left foot.”

“I have found no one,” was the answer, “for the good reason that Andrew Gebbie had no more toes on his left foot than you yourself have on yours.”

Whereupon Helen _secunda_ burst out into a laugh. After which, said she, “I will prove it, as sure as I am a living woman!”

“The man is dead and buried!” replied Mr Crawford, with a voice of triumph.

“That makes nae difference,” said she; “unless it be that the worms have eaten awa the sixth tae; and, by my faith, I’ll see to it!”

And with these words she went away, leaving the trustees in as great a difficulty as ever. Nor had she been long gone when a man of the name of Marshall, the procurator who had taken up the case of the first Helen, entered and said, “he had got evidence to show that a neighbour, who had been present at the last interview between the elder and his client, had heard the worthy man declare, that he had been moved to pity by her age and poverty, and had promised to do something for her, to enable her to pass her remaining years in comfort.”

“But,” said the agent, “there is, I am sorry to say, another Helen in the field; and you must drive her off before we can pay your client the money.”

“And I know who she is,” was the answer. “That woman’s word is not to be relied upon; for she is what she is.” And then he added, “I am determined to see justice done to my client--who, at least, is an honest woman.”

“Now you see, gentlemen,” said Mr Crawford, after the first Helen’s agent had departed--“you see how this extraordinary affair stands. The two claimants are determined to fight it out: so that, if you pay the money to the good woman, you will, as I said before, run a risk of being obliged to pay the other one afterwards out of your stipends.”

“Our stipends are the holy tenths, set apart to the work of the Lord from the beginning of the world,” answered the brethren, “and cannot be touched, except by sacrilegious hands!”

“Then,” continued the agent, “there is only one thing we can do; and that is, to throw the case into court by what we call a multiplepoinding, and let the claimants fight against each other.”

A proposition this to which the trustees felt themselves bound to agree, though with very much reluctance; for they saw that the case would become public, and there would be ill-disposed people that would be inclined to put a false construction upon the motives of the worthy elder of Trinity. But then, to comfort them, they felt assured that the story of the toes was a pure invention; and the elder being buried, there was no possibility of proving the same.

Whereupon the meeting separated. Next day Mr Crawford commenced his law proceedings; and in due time, a record having been prepared, the advocates behoved to plead the causes of their respective clients.

Then stood up Mr Anderson, the advocate of the first Helen, and said:--

“Your lordships must see that--if you lay out of view as a mere invention, which it is, the story of the six toes--the preponderance of the evidence lies with my client. There is a psalm-book in each case; but mine has the name of the testator to the inscription: and you have, in addition, the testimony of one respectable person who heard Mr Gebbie declare his intention to enable this poor old woman to live. On the other side you have no evidence whatever that the elder ever set his foot--corns or no corns--on the floor of the Helen _secunda_. There was no such _footing_ of intimacy as that contended for on the other side; and that I am justified in calling the story of the six toes an invention will appear when I say that, according to the authority of learned men, a _lusus naturæ_ of this kind does not occur once in ten thousand births: so that it is ten thousand to one against the assumption. In addition, there is the character of the deceased, whose whole life and conversation are against the presumption that he would go to Leith Wynd, and get a woman of doubtful character to operate upon a foot of which he is said to have been ashamed. For all which reasons I claim the three hundred pounds for my client.”

Then stood up Mr Sharp, the advocate of the second Helen, and said:--

“It is no wonder at all why my learned friend has a difficulty about his _locus standi_, seeing he is so delicate about the feet. I feel no delicacy on that fundamental point. And it is because my corns of legal right and justice are pared that I stand here with so much ease, and assert that Mr Gebbie having imparted to my client a secret which he never communicated to living mortal besides, that secret could only have been the result of an intimacy and confidence sufficient to justify this legacy in her favour of three hundred pounds. My friend says, that there are many chances against such a freak of nature as six toes. That is true. But he confounds the thing with the assertion of the thing. And were there not a presumption in favour of a person speaking the truth rather than falsehood, what would become of that testimony which is the foundation of our holy religion, not less than of the decisions of our courts of justice? But it is in the power of this court to ascertain the truth of my assertion. The body of the worthy elder can be exhumed; and if it shall appear that it has six toes on the left foot, the presumption of the intimacy of friendship which will justify the legacy is complete. On the other side there is no such presumption. The elder only visited the first Helen once or twice, and what was to induce him to leave her so large a sum to the deprivation of his poor relations?”

Then the President spoke as follows:--

“It appears to the Court that, in this very extraordinary case, we never can get at the truth without testing, by proof, the statement made by the second Helen in regard to the six toes, because if it is really a fact that the testator carried this number on his left foot, and by parity that that number carried him, it is impossible to get quit of the presumption that the fact was communicated confidentially when the operation of paring was resorted to; and as confidence implies friendship, and friendship intimacy, we must assume that there must have been such an amount of mutual liking on the part of these individuals as would justify the legacy which is the subject-matter of this multiplepoinding. The Court will therefore issue an order for the exhumation of the body of Andrew Gebbie, for the purpose of ascertaining whether the testator’s foot was formed in the manner asserted by the claimant.”

The commission was accordingly issued. The body of the elder was examined as it lay in the coffin, and the result of the examination, as stated in the report, was: “That the left foot was furnished with six toes, the sixth or supernumerary one being much smaller than the one next to it. It also appeared that the toes of this foot were supplied with a number of very hard corns, which bore the marks of having been often pared by some very careful hand.”

Whereupon the case was again taken up, when judgment was given for the second Helen, who was thus remarkably well paid for her attention to the corns of the worthy elder. When the decision was reported to the reverend executors, Father Tron shook his head with great gravity, Tolbooth did the same, and so did Trinity: nay, they all shook their heads at the same time: but what they intended to signify thereby was never known, for the reason that it was never declared.

The Story of Mysie Craig.

In detailing the curious circumstances of the following story, I am again only reporting a real law case to be found in the Court of Session Records, the turning-point of which was as invisible to the judges as to the parties themselves--that is, until the end came; a circumstance again which made the case a kind of developed romance. But as an end implies a beginning, and the one is certainly as necessary as the other, we request you to accompany us--taking care of your feet--up the narrow spiral staircase of a tenement called Corbet’s Land, in the same old town where so many wonderful things in the complicated drama--or dream, if you are a Marphurius--of human life have occurred. Up which spiral stair having got by the help of our hands, almost as indispensable as that of the feet--we find ourselves in a little human dovecot of two small rooms, occupied by two persons not unlike, in many respects, two doves--Widow Craig and her daughter, called May, euphuised by the Scotch into Mysie. The chief respects in which they might be likened, without much stress, to the harmless creatures we have mentioned, were their love for each other, together with their total inoffensiveness as regarded the outside world; and we are delighted to say this, for we see so many of the multitudinous sides of human nature dark and depraved, that we are apt to think there is no bright side at all. Nor shall we let slip the opportunity of saying, at the risk of being considered very simple, that of all the gifts of felicity bestowed, as the Pagan Homer tells, upon mankind by the gods, no one is so perfect and beautiful as the love that exists between a good mother and a good daughter.

For so much we may be safe by having recourse to instinct, which is deeper than any secondary causes we poor mortals can see. But beyond this, there were special reasons tending to this same result of mutual affection, which come more within the scope of our observation. In explanation of which we may say that the mother, having something in her power during her husband’s life, had foreseen the advantages of using it in the instruction of her quick and intelligent daughter in an art of far more importance then than now--that of artistic needlework. Nay, of so much importance was this beautiful art, and to such perfection was it brought at a time when a lady’s petticoat, embroidered by the hand, with its profuse imitations of natural objects, flowers, and birds, and strange devices, would often cost twenty pounds Scots, that a sight of one of those operose achievements of genius would make us blush for our time and the labours of our women. Nor was the perfection in this ornamental industry a new thing, for the daughters of the Pictish kings confined in the castle were adepts in it; neither was it left altogether to paid sempstresses, for great ladies spent their time in it, and emulation quickened both the genius and the diligence. So we need hardly say it became to the mother a thing to be proud of, that her daughter Mysie proved herself so apt a scholar that she became an adept, and was soon known as one of the finest embroideresses in the great city. So, too, as a consequence, it came to pass that great ladies employed her, and often the narrow spiral staircase of Corbet’s Land was brushed on either side by the huge masses of quilted and emblazoned silk that, enveloping the belles of the day, were with difficulty forced up to, and down from, the small room of the industrious Mysie.

But we are now speaking of art, while we should have more to say (for it concerns us more) of the character of the young woman who was destined to figure in a stranger way than in making beautiful figures on silk. Mysie was one of a class; few in number they are indeed, but on that account more to be prized. Her taste and fine manipulations were but counterparts of qualities of the heart--an organ to which the pale face, with its delicate lines, and the clear liquid eyes, was a suitable index. The refinement which enabled her to make her imitation of beautiful objects on the delicate material of her work was only another form of a sensibility which pervaded her whole nature--that gift which is only conceded to peculiar organisations, and is such a doubtful one, too, if we go, as we cannot help doing, with the poet, when he sings that “chords that vibrate sweetest pleasures,” often also “thrill the deepest notes of woe.” Nay, we might say that the creatures themselves seem to fear the gift, for they shrink from the touch of the rough world, and retire within themselves as if to avoid it, while they are only courting its effects in the play of an imagination much too ardent for the duties of life. And, as a consequence, how they seek secretly the support of stronger natures, clinging to them as do those strange plants called parasites, which, with their tender arms and something so like fingers, cling to the nearest stem of a stouter neighbour, and embracing it, even though hollow and rotten, cover it, and choke it with a flood of flowers. So true is it that woman, like the generous vine, lives by being supported and held up; yet equally true that the strength she gains is from the embrace she gives, and so it is also that goodness, as our Scottish poet Home says, often wounds itself, and affection proves the spring of sorrow.

All which might truly be applied to Mysie Craig; but as yet the stronger stem to which she clung was her mother, and it was not likely, nor was it in reality, that that affection would prove to her anything but the spring of happiness, for it was ripened by love, and the earnings of the nimble fingers, moving often into the still hours of the night, not only kept the wolf from the door, but let in the lambs of domestic harmony and peace. Would that these things had so continued; but there are other wolves than those of poverty, and the “ae lamb o’ the fauld” cannot be always under the protection of the ewe; and so it happened on a certain night, not particularised in the calendar, that our Mysie, having finished one of these floral petticoats on which she had been engaged for many weeks, went forth with her precious burden to deliver the same to its impatient owner--no other than the then famous Anabella Gilroy, who resided in Advocate’s Close. Of which fine lady, by the way, we may say that of all the gay creatures who paraded between “the twa Bows,” no one displayed such ample folds of brocaded silk, nodded her pon-pons more jantily, or napped with a sharper crack her high-heeled shoes, all to approve herself to “the bucks” of the time, with their square coats brocaded with lace, their three-cornered hats on the top of their bob-wigs, their knee-buckles and shoe-buckles. And certainly not the least important of those, both in his own estimation and that of the sprightly Anabella, was George Balgarnie, a young man who had only a year before succeeded to the property of Balgruddery, somewhere in the north, and of whom we might say that in forming him Nature had taken so much pains with the building up of the body, that she had forgotten the mind, so that he had no more spiritual matter in him than sufficed to keep his blood hot, and enable his sensual organs to work out their own selfish gratifications; or, to perpetrate a metaphor, he was all the polished mahogany of a piano, without any more musical springs than might respond to one keynote of selfishness. And surely Anabella had approved herself to the fop to some purpose, for when our sempstress with her bundle had got into the parlour of the fine lady, she encountered no other than Balgarnie--a circumstance apparently of very small importance, but we know that a moment of time is sometimes like a small seed, which contains the nucleus of a great tree, perhaps a poisonous one. And so it turned out that while Anabella was gloating over the beautiful work of the timid embroideress, Balgarnie was busy admiring the artist, but not merely, perhaps not at all, as an artist--only as an object over whom he wished to exercise power.

This circumstance was not unobserved by the little embroideress, but it was only observed to be shrunk from in her own timid way, and probably it would soon have passed from her mind, if it had not been followed up by something more direct and dangerous. And it was; for no sooner had Mysie got to the foot of the stairs than she encountered Balgarnie, who had gone out before her; and now began one of those romances in daily life of which the world is full, and of which the world is sick. Balgarnie, in short, commenced that kind of suit which is nearly as old as the serpent, and, therefore, not to be wondered at; neither are we to wonder that Mysie listened to it, because we have heard so much about “lovely woman stooping to folly,” that we are content to put it to the large account of natural miracles. And not very miraculous either, when we remember, that if the low-breathed accents of tenderness awaken the germ of love, they awaken at the same time faith and trust; and such was the beginning of the romance which was to go through the normal stages--the appointment to meet again--the meeting itself--the others that followed--the extension of the moonlight walks, sometimes to the Hunter’s Bog between Arthur’s Seat and Salisbury Crags, and sometimes to the song-famed “Wells o’ Weary.” All which were just as sun and shower to the germ of the plant: the love grew and grew, and the faith grew and grew also which saw in him that which it felt in itself. Nay, if any of those moonlight-loving elves that have left their foot-marks in the fairy rings to be seen near St Anthony’s Well had whispered in Mysie’s ear, “Balgarnie will never make you his wife,” she would have believed the words as readily as if they had impugned the sincerity of her own heart. In short, we have again the analogue of the parasitic plant: the very fragility and timidity of Mysie were at once the cause and consequence of her confidence. She would cling to him and cover him with the blossoms of her affection; nay, if there were unsoundness in the stem, these very blossoms would cover the rottenness.

This change in the life of the little sempstress could not fail to produce some corresponding change at home. We read smoothly the play we have acted ourselves--and so the mother read love in the daughter’s eyes, and heard it, too, in her long sighs; nor did she fail to read the sign that the song which used to lighten her beautiful work was no longer heard; for love to creatures so formed as Mysie Craig is too serious an affair for poetical warbling. But she said nothing--for while she had faith in the good sense and virtue of her daughter, she knew also that there was forbearance due to one who was her support. Nor, as yet, had she reason to fear, for Mysie still plied her needle, and the roses and the lilies sprang up in all their varied colours out of the ground of the silk or satin as quickly and as beautifully as they were wont, though the lilies of her cheeks waxed paler as the days flitted. And why the latter should have been we must leave to the reader; for ourselves only hazarding the supposition that, perhaps, she already thought that Balgarnie should be setting about to make her his wife--an issue which behoved to be the result of their intimacy sooner or later, for that in her simple mind there should be any other issue was just about as impossible as that, in the event of the world lasting as long, the next moon would not, at her proper time, again shine in that green hollow, between the Lion’s Head and Samson’s Ribs, which had so often been the scene of their happiness. Nay, we might say that though a doubt on the subject had by any means got into her mind, it would not have remained there longer than it took a shudder to scare the wild thing away.

Of course, all this was only a question of time; but certain it is that by and by the mother could see some connexion between Mysie’s being more seldom out on those moonlight nights than formerly, and a greater paleness in her thin face, as if the one had been the cause of the other; but still she said nothing, for she daily expected that Mysie would herself break the subject to her, and so she was left only to increasing fears that her daughter’s heart and affections had been tampered with, and perhaps she had fears that went farther. Still, so far as yet had gone, there was no remission in the labours of Mysie’s fingers, as if in the midst of all--whatever that all might be--she recognised the paramount necessity of bringing in by those fingers the required and usual amount of the means of their livelihood. Nay, somehow or other, there was at that very time when her cheek was at the palest, and her sighs were at their longest, and her disinclination to speak was at the strongest, that the work increased upon her; for was not there a grand tunic to embroider for Miss Anabella, which was wanted on a given day--and were there not other things for Miss Anabella’s friend, Miss Allardice, which were not to be delayed beyond that same day. And so she stitched and stitched on and on, till sometimes the little lamp seemed to go out for want of oil, while the true cause of her diminished light was really the intrusion of the morning sun, against which it had no chance. It might be, too, that her very anxiety to get these grand dresses finished helped to keep out of her mind ideas which could have done her small good, even if they had got in.

But at length the eventful hour came when the gentle sempstress withdrew the shining needle, made clear by long use, from the last touch of the last rose; and, doubtless, if Mysie had not been under the cloud of sorrow we have mentioned, she would have been happier at the termination of so long a labour than she had ever been, for the finishing evening had always been a great occasion to both the inmates; nay, it had been always celebrated by a glass of strong Edinburgh ale--a drink which, as both a liquor and a liqueur, was as famous then as it is at this day. But of what avail was this work-termination to her now? Was it not certain that she had not seen Balgarnie for two moons, and though the impossibility of his not marrying her was just as impossible as ever, why were these two moons left to shine in the green hollow and on the rising hill without the privilege of throwing the shadows of Mysie Craig and George Balgarnie on the grass, where the fairies had left the traces of their dances? Questions these which she was unable to answer, if it were not even that she was afraid to put them to herself. Then, when was it that she felt herself unable to tie up her work in order to take it home, and that her mother, seeing the reacting effect of the prior sleepless nights in her languid frame, did this little duty for her, even as while she was doing it she looked through her tears at her changed daughter? But Mysie would do so much. While the mother should go to Miss Allardice, Mysie would proceed to Miss Anabella--and so it was arranged. They went forth together, parting at the Netherbow; and Mysie, in spite of a weakness which threatened to bring her with her burden to the ground, struggled on to her destination. At the top of Advocate’s Close she saw a man hurry out and increase his step even as her eye rested on him; and if it had not appeared to her to be among the ultimate impossibilities of things, natural as well as unnatural, she would have sworn that that man was George Balgarnie; but then, it just so happened that Mysie came to the conclusion that such a circumstance was among these ultimate impossibilities.

This resolution was an effort which cost her more than the conviction would have done, though doubtless she did not feel this at the time, and so with a kind of forced step she mounted the stair, but when she got into the presence of Miss Gilroy she could scarcely pronounce the words--

“I have brought you the dress, ma’am.”

“And I am so delighted, Miss Craig, that I could almost take you into my arms,” said the lady; “but what ails ye, dear? You are as white as any snow I ever saw, whereas you ought to have been as blithe as a bridesmaid, for don’t you know that you have brought me home one of my marriage dresses? Come now, smile when I tell you that to-morrow is my wedding-day.”

“Wedding-day,” muttered Mysie, as she thought of the aforesaid utter impossibility of herself not being soon married to George Balgarnie, an impossibility not rendered less impossible by the resolution she had formed not to believe that within five minutes he had flown away from her.

“Yes, Miss Craig, and surely you must have heard who the gentleman is, for does not the town ring of it from the castle to the palace, from Kirk-o’-Field to the Calton?”

“I have not been out,” said Mysie.

“That accounts for it,” continued the lady; “and I am delighted at the reason, for wouldn’t it have been terrible to think that my marriage with George Balgarnie of Balgruddery was a thing of so small a note as not to be known everywhere?”

If Mysie Craig had appeared shortly before to Miss Gilroy paler than any snow her ladyship had ever seen, she must now have been as pale as some other kind of snow that nobody ever saw. The dreadful words had, indeed, produced the adequate effect--but not in the most common way, for we are to keep in view that it is not the most shrinking and sensitive natures that are always the readiest to faint; and there was, besides, the aforesaid conviction of impossibility which, grasping the mind by a certain force, deadened the ear to words implying the contrary. Mysie stood fixed to the spot, as if she were trying to realise some certainty she dared not think was possible, her lips apart, her eyes riveted on the face of the lady--mute as that kind of picture which a certain ancient calls a silent poem, and motionless as a figure of marble.

An attitude and appearance still more inexplicable to Anabella, perhaps irritating as an unlucky omen, and, therefore, not possessing any claim for sympathy--at least, it got none.

“Are you the Mysie Craig,” she cried, as she looked at the girl, “who used to chat to me about the dresses you brought, and the flowers on them? Ah, jealous and envious, is that it? But, you forget, George Balgarnie never could have made _you_ his wife--a working needlewoman; he only fancied you as the plaything of an hour. He told me so himself when I charged him with having been seen in your company. So, Mysie, you may as well look cheerful. Your turn will come next, with some one in your own station.”

There are words which stimulate and confirm--there are others that seem to kill the nerve and take away the sense, nor can we ever tell the effect till we see it produced; and so we could not have told beforehand--nay, we would have looked for something quite opposite--that Mysie, shrinking and irritable as she was by nature, was saved from a faint, (which had for some moments been threatening her,) by the cruel insult which thus had been added to her misfortune. She had even power to have recourse to that strange device of some natures, that of “affecting to be not affected;” and, casting a glance at the fine lady, she turned and went away without uttering a single word. But who knows the pain of the conventional concealment of pain, except those who have experienced the agony of the trial? Even at the moment when she heard that George Balgarnie was to be married, and that she came to know that she had been for weeks sewing the marriage dress of his bride, she was carrying under her heart the living burden which was the fruit of her love for that man. Yet not the burden of shame and dishonour, as our story will show, for she was justified by the law of her country--yea, by certain words once written by an apostle to the Corinthians, all which may as yet appear a great mystery; but, as regards Mysie Craig’s agony, as she staggered down Miss Gilroy’s stairs on her way home, there could be no doubt or mystery whatever.

Nor, when she got home, was there any comfort there for the daughter who had been so undutiful as to depart from her mother’s precepts, and conceal from her not only her unfortunate connexion with a villain, but the condition into which that connexion had brought her. But she was, at least, saved from the pain of a part of the confession, for her mother had learned enough from Miss Allardice to satisfy her as to the cause of her daughter’s change from the happy creature she once was, singing in the long nights as she wrought unremittingly at her beautiful work, and the poor, sighing, pale, heart-broken thing she had been for months. Nor did she fail to see, with the quick eye of a mother, that as Mysie immediately on entering the house laid herself quietly on the bed, and sobbed in her great agony, that she had learned the terrible truth from Miss Gilroy that the robe she had embroidered was to deck the bride of her destroyer. Moreover, her discretion enabled her to perceive that this was not the time for explanation, for the hours of grief are sacred, and the heart must be left to do its work by opening the issues of Nature’s assuagement, or ceasing to beat. So the night passed, without question or answer; and the following day, that of the marriage, was one of silence, even as if death had touched the tongue that used to be the medium of cheerful words and tender sympathies--a strange contrast to the joy, if not revelry, in Advocate’s Close.