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By Allan Cunningham
CHAPTER I
The romantic vale of
Corriewater, in Annandale, is regarded by the inhabitants, a pastoral
and unmingled people, as the last border refuge of those beautiful and
capricious beings, the fairies. Many old people, yet living, imagine
they have had intercourse of good words and good deeds with the " gude
folk ;" and continue to tell that in the ancient days the fairies danced
on the hill, and revelled in the glen, and showed themselves, like the
mysterious children of the Deity of old, among the sons and daughters of
men. Their visits to the earth were periods of joy and mirth to mankind,
rather than of sorrow and apprehension. They played on musical
instruments of wonderful sweetness and variety of note, spread
unexpected feasts, the supernatural flavour of which overpowered on many
occasions the religious scruples of the Presbyterian shepherds,
performed wonderful deeds of horsemanship, and marched in midnight
processions, when the sound of their elfin minstrelsy charmed youths and
maidens into love for their persons and pursuits ; and more than one
family of Corriewater have the fame of augmenting the numbers of the
elfin chivalry. Faces of friends and relatives, long since doomed to the
battle trench, or the deep sea, have been recognised by those who dared
to gaze on the fairy march. The maid has seen her lost lover, and the
mother her stolen child ; and the courage to plan and achieve their
deliverance has been possessed by, at least, one border maiden. In the
legends of the people of Corrievale, there is a singular mixture of chin
and human adventure, and the traditional story of the Cupbearer to the
Queen of the Fairies appeals alike to our domestic feelings and
imagination.
In one of the little green loops or bends, on the banks of Corriewater,
mouldered walls, and a few stunted wild plum-trees and vagrant roses,
still point out the site of a cottage and garden. A well of pure
spring-water leaps out from an old tree-root before the door ; and here
the shepherds, shading themselves in summer from the influence of the
sun, tell to their children the wild tale of Elphin Irving and his
sister Phemie; and, singular as the story seems, it has gained full
credence among the people where the scene is laid.
"I ken the tale and the place weel,” interrupted an old woman, who, from
the predominance of scarlet in her apparel, seemed to have been a
follower of the camp; " I ken them weel, and the tale’s as true as a
bullet to its aim, and a spark to powder. Oh, bonnie Corriewater! a
thousand times have I pu’ed gowans on its banks wi’ ane that lies stiff
and stark on a foreign shore in a bloody grave :” and sobbing audibly,
she drew the remains of a military cloak over her face, and allowed the
story to proceed.
When Elphin Irving and his sister Phemie were in their sixteenth year
(for tradition says they were twins, their father was drowned in
Corriewater, attempting to save his sheep from a sudden swell, to which
all mountain streams are liable; and their mother, on the day of her
husband’s burial, laid down her head on the pillow, from which, on the
seventh day, it was lifted to be dressed for the same grave. The
inheritance left to the orphans may be briefly described: seventeen
acres of plough and pasture land, seven milk cows, and seven pet sheep
(many old people take delight in odd numbers) ; and to this may be added
seven bonnet pieces of Scottish gold, and a broadsword and spear, which
their ancestor had wielded with such strength and courage in the battle
of Dryfe-sands, that the minstrel who sang of that deed of arms ranked
him only second to the Scotts and the Johnstones.
The youth and his sister grew in stature and in beauty. The brent bright
brow, the clear blue eye, and frank and blithe deportment of the former,
gave him some influence among the young women of the valley; while the
latter was no less the admiration of the young men, and at fair and
dance, and at bridal, happy was he who touched but her hand, or received
the benediction of her eye. Like all other Scottish beauties, she was
the theme of many a song; and while tradition is yet busy with the
singular history of her brother, song has taken all the care that rustic
minstrelsy can of the gentleness of her spirit, and the charms of her
person.
"Now I vow," exclaimed a wandering piper, "by mine own honoured
instrument, and by all other instruments that ever yielded music for the
joy and delight of mankind, that there are more bonnie songs made about
fair Phemie Irving than about all the other maidens of Annandale, and
many of them are both high and bonnie. A proud lass maun she be, if her
spirit hears ; and men say the dust lies not insensible of beautiful
verse ; for her charms are breathed through a thousand sweet lips, and
no farther gone than yester morn, I heard a lass singing on a green
hillside what I shall not readily forget. If ye like to listen, ye shall
judge; and it will not stay the story long nor mar it much, for it is
short, and about Phemie Irving." And accordingly he chanted the
following rude verses, not unaccompanied by his honoured instrument, as
he called his pipe, which chimed in with great effect, and gave richness
to a voice which felt better than it could express :—-
FAIR PHEMIE IRVING.
I.
Gay is thy glen, Corrie,
`With all thy groves flowering:
Green is thy glen, Corrie,
When July is showering;
And sweet is yon wood, where
The small birds are bowering,
And there dwells the sweet one
Whom I am adoring.
II.
Her round neck is whiter
Than winter when snowing ;
Her meek voice is milder
Than Ae in its flowing;
The glad ground yields music
Where she goes by the river ;
One kind glance would charm me
For ever and ever.
III.
The proud and the wealthy
To Phemie are bowing ;
No looks of love win they
With sighing or suing ;
Far away maun I stand
With my rude wooing,
She’s a flow’ret too lovely
To bloom for my pu’ing—
IV.
O were I yon violet
On which she is walking ;
O were I yon small bird
To which she is talking ;
Or yon rose in her hand,
With its ripe ruddy blossom ;
Or some pure gentle thought,
To be blest with her bosom !
This minstrel
interruption, while it established Phemie lrving’s claim to grace and to
beauty, gave me additional confidence to pursue the story.
But minstrel skill and true love tale seemed to want their usual
influence, when they sought to win her attention; she was only observed
to pay most respect to those youths who were most beloved by her
brother; and the same hour that brought these twins to the world, seemed
to have breathed through them a sweetness and an affection of heart and
mind, which nothing could divide. If, like the virgin queen of the
immortal poet, she walked " in maiden meditation fancy free," her
brother Elphin seemed alike untouched with the charms of the fairest
virgins in Corrie. He ploughed his field, he reaped his grain, he
leaped, he ran and wrestled, and danced and sang, with more skill and
life and grace than all other youths of the district ; but he had no
twilight and stolen interviews. When all other young men had their loves
by their side, he was single, though not unsought ; and his joy seemed
never perfect save when his sister was near him. If he loved to share
his time with her, she loved to share her time with him alone, or with
the beasts of the field, or the birds of the air. She watched her little
flock late, and she tended it early; not for the sordid love of the
fleece, unless it was to make mantles for her brother, but with the look
of one who had joy in its company. The very wild creatures, the deer and
the hares, seldom sought to shun her approach, and the bird forsook not
its nest, nor stinted its song, when she drew nigh; such is the
confidence which maiden innocence and beauty inspire.
It happened one summer, about three years after they became orphans,
that rain had been for a while withheld from the earth ; the hillsides
began to parch, the grass in the vales to wither, and the stream of
Corrie was diminished between its banks to the size of an ordinary rill.
The shepherds drove their flocks to rnoorlands, and marsh and tarn had
their reeds invaded by the scythe, to supply the cattle with food. The
sheep of his sister were Elphin’s constant care; he drove them to the
moistest pastures during the day, and he often watched them at midnight,
when flocks, tempted by the sweet dewy grass, are known to ‘ browse
eagerly, that he might guard them from the fox, and lead them to the
choicest herbage. In these nocturnal watchings he sometimes drove his
little flock over the water of Corrie, for the fords were hardly
ankle-deep; or permitted his sheep to cool themselves in the stream, and
taste the grass which grew along the brink. All this time not a drop of
rain fell, nor did a cloud appear in the sky.
One evening during her brother’s absence with the flock, Phemie sat at
her cottage door, listening to the bleatings of the distant folds, and
the lessened murmur of the water of Corrie, now scarcely audible beyond
its banks. Her eyes, weary with watching along the accustomed line of
road for the return of Elphin, were turned on the pool beside her, in
which the stars were glimmering fitful and faint. As she looked, she
imagined the water grew brighter and brighter; a wild illumination
presently shone upon the pool, and leaped from bank to bank, and,
suddenly changing into a human form, ascended the margin, and passing
her, glided swiftly into the cottage. The visionary form was so like her
brother in shape and air, that, starting up, she flew into the house,
with ;he hope of finding him in his customary seat. She found him not;
and impressed with the terror which a wraith or apparition seldom fails
to inspire, she uttered a shriek so loud and so piercing is to be heard
at Johnstonebank, on the other side of the vale of Corrie.
An old woman now rose suddenly from her seat in the window-sill, the
living dread of shepherds, for she travelled the country with a
brilliant reputation for witchcraft, and thus she broke in upon the
narrative : " I vow, young man, ye tell us the truth upset and
downthrust ; I heard my douce grandmother say that on the night when
Elphin Irvlng, disappeared--disappeared, I shall call it, for the bairn
can but be gone for a season, to return to us in his own appointed
time,— she was seated at the fireside at Johnstonebank; the laird had
laid aside his bonnet to take the Book, when a shriek mair loud, believe
me, than a mere woman’s shriek, —-and they can shriek loud enough, else
they’re' sair wranged,—-came over the water of Corrie, so sharp and
shrilling, that the pewter plates dinnelled on the wall; such a shriek,
my douce grandmother said, as rang in her ear till the hour of her
death, and she lived till she was aughty and aught, forty full ripe
years after the event. But there is another matter, which, doubtless, I
cannot compel ye to believe; it was the common rumour that Elphin Irving
came not into the world like the other sinful creatures of the earth,
but was one of the Kane-bairns of the fairies, whilk they had to pay to
the enemy of man’s salvation every seventh year. The poor lady fairy, —a
mother’s aye a mother, be she elf’s flesh or Eve’s flesh,—hid her elf
son beside the christened flesh in Marion Irving’s cradle, and the auld
enemy lost his prey for a time. Now hasten on with your storv, which is
not a bodle the waur for me. The maiden saw the shape of her brother,
fell into a faint or a trance, and the neighbours came flocking in. Gang
on wi’ your tale, young man, and dinna be affronted because an auld
woman helped ye wi’ it.”
It is hardly known, I resumed, how long Phemie Irving continued in a
state of insensibility. The morning was far advanced, when a
neighbouring maiden found her seated in an old chair, as white as
monumental marble; her hair, about which she had always been solicitous,
loosened from its curls, and hanging disordered over her neck and bosom,
her hands and forehead. The maiden touched the one and kissed the other;
they were as cold as snow ; and her eyes, wide open, were fixed on her
brother’s empty chair, with the intensity of gaze of one who had
witnessed the appearance of a spirit. She seemed insensible of any one’s
presence, and sat fixed, and still, and motionless. The maiden, alarmed
at her looks, thus addressed her: " Phemie, lass, Phemie Irving! Dear
me, but this is awful ! I have come to tell ye that seven o’ yer pet
sheep have escaped drowning in the water; for Corrie, sae quiet and sae
gentle yestreen, is rolling and dashing frae bank to bank this morning.
Dear me, woman, dinna let the loss o’ the world’s gear bereave ye of
your senses. I would rather make ye a present of a dozen mug ewes of the
Tinwald brood mysel ; and now I think on’t, if ye’ll send ower Elphin, I
will help him hame with them in the gloaming mysel. So Phemie, woman, be
comforted.”
At the mention of her brother’s name, she cried out, " Where is he? oh,
where is he ?” —gazed wildly round, and, shuddering from heart to foot,
fell senseless on the floor. Other inhabitants of the valley, alarmed by
the sudden swell of the river, which had augmented to a to! rent deep
and impassable, now came in to inquire if any loss had been sustained,
for numbers of sheep and teds ofhay had been observed floating down
about the dawn of the morning. They assisted in reclaiming the unhappy
maiden from her swoon; but insensibility was joy compared to the sorrow
to which she awakened.
"They have ta’en him away, they have ta’en him away;” she chanted in a
tone of delirious pathos; "him that was whiter and fairer than the lily
on Lyddal-lee. They have long sought, and they have long sued, and they
had the power to prevail against my prayers at last. They have ta’en him
away; the flower is plucked from among the weeds, and the dove is slain
amid a flock of ravens. 'They came with shout, and they came with song,
and they spread the charm, and they placed the spell, and the baptised
brow has been bowed down to the unbaptised hand. They have ta’en him
away, they have ta’en him away ; he was too lovely, and too good, and
too noble, to bless us with his continuance on earth ; for what are the
sons of men compared to him? —the light of the moonbeam to the morning
sun; the glow-worm to the eastern star. They have ta’en him away, the
invisible dwellers of the earth. I saw them come on him, with shouting
and with singing, and they charmed him where he sat, and away they bore
him; and the horse he rode was never shod with iron, nor owned before
the mastery of human hand. They have ta’en him away, over the water, and
over the wood, and over the hill. I got but ae look o’ his bonnie blue
ee, but ae look. But as I have endured what never maiden endured, so
will I undertake what never maiden undertook,—I will win him from them
all. I know the invisible ones of the earth; I have heard their wild and
wondrous music in the wild woods, and there shall a christened maiden
seek him and achieve his deliverance.”
She paused, and glancing round a circle of condoling faces, down which
the tears were dropping like rain, said, in a calm, but still delirious
tone ….
“Why do you weep, Mary Halliday? and why do you weep, John Graeme? Ye
think that Elphin Irving, -- oh, it’s a bonnie, bonnie name, and dear to
many a maiden’s heart as well as mine, -- ye think that he is drowned in
Corrie, and ye will seek in the deep, deep pools for the bonnie, bonnie
corse, that ye may weep over it, as it lies in its last linen. And lay
it, amid weeping and wailing, in the dowie kirkyard. Ye may seek, but ye
shall never find ; so leave me to trim up my hair, and prepare my
dwelling, and make myself ready to watch for the hour of his return to
upper earth.”
And she resumed her household labours with an alacrity which lessened
not the sorrow of her friends. |
