Page:Old Castles.djvu/29

Rh are said to be the impression of the fingers of the poor Scotch prisoners, who as they incessantly stood gazing on their own dear distant hills, wore the impression of their strained fingers on the hard stone. It is a sad momento of the stern past, and one of the most pathetic of the many touching records time has left on these old walls. This cell has also an additional interest from the fact of Sir Walter Scott having been here on his last sad journey home—from Italy. He was accompanied by his daughter Ann, and the officious conductor, unknowing his visitor, explained to him how this had been Fergus's cell, and those the print of his fingers.

Outside these two cells there is a great deal of rude carving on the walls all around, of grifiins, boars, scorpions, and armorial emblems, some of these latter being the arms of the ancient families of the county. There are some also of more pious design—women with lifted hands and eyes, and one with a child bearing the cross. One, too, we noticed, of Justice, her eyes bandaged, and the scales; and there was one also of Fortune and her wheel. That grand monster of the good old times, the rack, is also duly depicted, as is its ally and competitor, the redoubted thumbscrew—figures under the operations of these mixing wofully with bands of pilgrims and solitary palmers, a pictorial compendium of the history of the times. These want no comment. Stolid indeed must he be who cannot read thoughts in things here; and more stolid still who, when read, cannot sympathize with the great pondering, yearning human heart from which these thoughts flowed.