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It rained heavily at
intervals all night, and, though it has cleared a little since daybreak,
there is not a patch of blue to be seen yet in the sky, and the torn
skirts of the clouds are still trailing low among the hills. The day can
hardly brighten now before twelve o’clock, and as the woods, at anyrate,
will be rain-laden and weeping for hours, the walk through "fair
Kirkconnel lea" is not to be thought of. The lawn, too, is out of
condition for tennis. But see! the burn, brown with peat and flecked with
foam, is running like ale under the bridge, and though the spate is too
heavy for much hope of catching trout down here, there will be good sport
for the trouble higher up among the moorland becks. Bring out the
fishing-baskets, some small Stewart tacklings, and a canister of bait. Put
up, too, a substantial sandwich and a flask; for the air among the hills
is keen, and the mists are sometimes chilly.
Wet and heavy the roads
are, and there will be more rain yet, for the pools in the ruts are not
clear. That slender larch on the edge of the wood has put on a greener
kirtle in the night, and stands forward like a young bride glad amid her
tears. If a glint of sunshine came to kiss her there, she would glitter
with a hundred rain-jewels. The still, heavy air is aromatic with the
scent of the pines. By the roadside the ripening oats are bending their
graceful heads after the rain, like Danae, with their golden burden,
though the warrior hosts of the barley beyond still hold their spiky
crests green and erect. The long, springing step natural on the heather
shortens the road to the hills; and already a tempting burn or two have
been crossed by the way. But nothing can be done without rods; and these
have first to be called for at the shepherd’s. A quiet, far-off place it
is, this shieling upon the moors, with the drone of bees about and the
bleating of sheep. The shepherd himself is away to the "big house" about
some "hogs," but his wife, a weather-grey woman of sixty, with rough
hospitable hands and kindly eyes, says that "maybe Jeanie will take a rod
to the becks." Jeanie, by her dark glance, is pleased with the liberty;
and indeed this lithe, handsome girl of fifteen will not be the least
pleasant of guides, with her hair like the raven’s wing, and on her clear
features the thoughtful look of the hills. Here are the rods, straight ash
saplings of convenient length, with thin brown lines.
"Ye’ll come back and take a
cup o’ tea; and dinna stay up there if it rains," says the goodwife, by
way of parting.
Jeanie is frank and
interesting in speech, and with a gentle breeding little to be expected in
so lonely a place. She has the step of a deer, and seems to know every
tuft of grass upon the hills. There is not so much heather in Galloway as
in the Highlands. A long grey bent takes its place, and on mossy ground
the white tufts of the cotton grass appear.
But here is a chance for a
trial cast. A small burn comes down a side glen, and, just before it joins
the main stream, runs foaming into a deeper pool. Keep well back from the
bank, adjust a tempting worm on the hook, and drop it in just where the
water runs over the stones. Let the line go: the stream carries it down
into the pool. There! the bait is held. Strike quickly down stream: the
trout all swim against the current. But it is not a fish; the hook has
only caught on a stone. Disentangle it, and try again. This time there is
no mistaking the wriggle at the end of the rod; with a jerk the hungry
nibbler is whipped into the air, and alights among the grass, a dozen
yards from his native pool. A plump little fish he is, his pretty brown
sides spotted with scarlet, as he gasps and kicks on terra firma.
Not another trout, however, can be tempted to bite in that eddy; the fish
are too well fed by the spate, or too timid. "There will be more to catch
higher up the becks," says Jeanie. She is right. Perhaps the trout in
these narrow streamlets are less sophisticated than their kind lower down,
for in rivulets so narrow as almost to be hidden by the bent-grass there
seem plenty of fish eager to take the bait. They are darker in colour than
those in the river, taking their shade from the peat, and, though small,
of course, averaging about a quarter of a pound in weight, are plump, and
make merry enough rivalry in the whipping of them out.
But the mists droop lower
overhead, and a small smirring rain has been falling for some time; so, as
Jeanie, at least, has a fair basketful, it will be best to put up the
lines, discuss a sandwich under the shelter of the birches close by, and
hold a council of war. Desolate and silent are these grey hillsides!
Hardly a sheep is to be seen; the far-off cry of the curlew is the only
sound heard; and as the white mists come down and shroud the mountains,
there is an eerie, solemn feeling, as at the near presence of the
Infinite. This, however, will never do. The rain is every moment coming
down more heavily, and the small leaves of the birches are but scant
protection. Off, then; home as fast as possible! The mountain maid knows a
shorter way over the hill; and lightly and swiftly she leads the Indian
file along the narrow sheep-path. Over there, through the grey mist and
rain, appear the stone walls of a lonely sheepfold; and just below, in the
channel of the beck, is the deep pool, swirling now with peaty water and
foam, where every year they wash the flocks.
The shepherd’s wife appears
at her door. Her goodman is home. There is a great peat fire glowing on
the warm hearth, and she is "masking the tea." "Ye’ll find a basin
of soft water in the little bedroom there, and ye’ll change ye’re coats
and socks, and get them dried," says the kindly woman. This is real
hospitality. The rough coats and thick dry socks bespeak warm-hearted
thoughtfulness; and a wash in clean water after the discomforts of fishing
is no mean luxury. The small, low-raftered bedroom, with quaintly-papered
walls and little window looking out upon the moors, is comfortably
furnished; and the stone-floored kitchen, clean and bright and warm, with
geraniums flowering in the window, has as pleasant a fireside seat as
could be desired. Why should ambition seek more than this, and why are so
many hopeless hearts cooped up in the squalid city?
Here comes Jeanie down from
the "loft," looking fresher and prettier than ever in her dry wincey
dress, with a little bit of blue ribbon at the throat. The tea is ready;
her mother has fried some of the trout, and the snowy table is loaded with
thick white scones, thin oatmeal cakes, homemade bramble jelly, and the
freshest butter. Kings may be blest; but what hungry man needs more than
this? The shepherd, too, is well-read, for is not Steele and Addison’s
"Spectator" there on the shelf along with Sir Walter Scott, Robert Burns,
and the Bible? With fare like this for body and mind, Man may indeed
become "the noblest work of God."
But an hour has passed too
quickly; the rain has cleared at last, and away to the south and west the
clouds are lifting in the sunset. Yonder, under the clear green sky,
glistens the treacherous silver of the Solway, and as far again beyond it
in the evening light rises the dark side of Skiddaw, in Cumberland. The
gravel at the door is glistening after the shower, the yellow marigolds in
the little plot are bright and opening, and the moorland air is perfumed
with flint and bog-myrtle. A hearty handshake, then, from the shepherd, a
warm pressing to return soon from his goodwife, a pleasant smile from
Jeanie, and the road must be taken down hill with a swinging step. |
