The Stickit Minister's Wooing/The Little Fair Man/Chapter 1

among my father's papers was one bundle quite by itself which he had always looked upon with peculiar veneration. The manuscripts which composed it were written in crabbed hand-writing on ancient paper, very much creased at the folds, and bearing the marks of diligent perusal in days past. My father could not read these, but had much reverence for them because of the great names which could be deciphered here and there, such as "Mr. D. Dickson," "Mr. G. Gillespie," and in especial "Mr. Samuel Rutherfurd."

How these came into the possession of my father's forbears, I have no information. They were always known in the family as "Peden's Papers," though so far as I can now make out, that celebrated Covenanter had nothing to do with them—or, at least, is never mentioned in them by name. On the other hand I find from the family Bible, written as a note over against the entry of my great-grandmother's death, "Aprile the seventeene, 1731," the words, "Cozin to Mr. Patrick Walker, chapman, of Bristo Port, Edinburgh."

The letters and narratives are in many hands and vary considerably in date, some being as early as the high days of Presbytery, about 1638, whilst others in a plainer hand have manifestly been copied or rewritten in the first decade of last century.

Now after I came from college and before my marriage, I had sometimes long forenights with little to do. So having got some insight into ancient handwriting from my friend Mr. James Robb, of the College of Saint Mary, an expert in the same—a good golfer also, and a better fellow—I set me to work to decipher these manuscripts both for my own satisfaction and for the further pleasure of reading them to my father on Saturday nights, when I was in the habit of driving over to see my mother at Drumquhat on my way from visiting my patients in the Glen of Kells.

That which follows is from the first of these documents which I read to my father. He was so much taken by it that he begged me to publish it, as he said, "as a corrective to the sinful compliances and shameless defections of the times." And though I am little sanguine of any good it may do from a high ecclesiastic point of view, the facts narrated are interesting enough in themselves. The manuscript is clearly written out in a tall copy-book of stout bluish paper, without ruled lines, and is bound in a kind of grey sheepskin. The name "Harry Wedderburn" is upon the cover here and there, and within is a definitive title in floreated capitals, very ornately inscribed:

"The Story of the Turning of me, Harry Wedderburn, from Darkness to Light, by the means and instrument of Mr. Samuel Rutherfurd of Anwoth, Servant of God."

Then the manuscript proceeds:—

"The Lord hath spared me, Harry Wedderburn, these many years, delaying the setting of my sun till once more the grass grows green where I saw the blood lie red, and I wait in patience to lay my old head beneath the sod of a quiet land.

"This is my story writ at the instance of good Mr. Patrick Walker, and to be ready at his next coming into our parts. The slack between hay and harvest of the Year of Deliverance, 1689, is the time of writing.

"I, Harry Wedderburn, of Black Craig of Dee, in the country of Galloway, acknowledging the mercies of God, and repenting of my sins, set these things down in my own hand of write. Sorrow and shame are in my heart that my sun was so high in the heavens before I turned me from evil to seek after good.

"We were a wild and froward set in those days in the backlands of the Kells. It was not long, indeed, since the coming of a law stronger than that of the Strong Hand. Our fathers had driven the cattle from the English border—yea, even out of the fat fields of Niddisdale, and over the flowe of Solway. And if a man were offended with another, he went his straightest way home and took gun and whinger to lie in wait for his enemy. Or he met him foot to foot with staff on the highway, if he were of ungentle heart and possessed neither pistol nor musketoon.

"I mind well that year 1636, more than fifty years bygone—I being then in the twenty-second year of my age, a runagate castaway loon, without God and without hope in the world. My father had been in his day a douce sober man, yet he could do little to restrain myself or my brother John, who was, they said, 'ten waurs' than I. For there was a wild set in the Glen of Kells in those days, Lidderdale of Slogarie and Roaring Raif Pringle of Kirkchrist being enough to poison a parish. We four used to forgather to drink the dark out and the light in, two or three times in the week at the change house of the Clachan. Elspeth Vogie keeped it, and no good name it got among those well-affected to religion—aye, or Elspeth herself either.

"But these are vain thoughts, and I have had of a long season no pleasure in them. Yet will I not deny that Elspeth Vogie, though in some things sore left to herself, was a heartsome quean and well-favoured of her person.

"So at Elspeth's some half-dozen of us were drinking down the short dark hours of an August night. It was now the lull between the hay-winning and the corn-shearing. For hairst was late that year, and the weather mostly backward and dour. There had come, however, with the advent of the new month, a warm drowsy spell of windless days, the sun shining from morn to even through a kind of unwholesome mist, and the corn standing on the knowes with as little motion as the grey whinstane tourocks and granite cairns on the hilltaps. The farmers and cottiers looked at their scanty roods of ploughland, and prayed for a rousing wind from the Lord to winnow away the still dead easterly mist, and gar the corn reestle ear against ear so that it might fill and ripen for the ingathering.

"But we that were hand-fasted to sin and bonded to iniquity, young plants of wrath, ill-doers and forlorn of grace, cared as little for the backward year as we did for the sad state of Scotland and the strifes that were quickly coming upon that land. So long as our pint-stoup was filled, and plack rattled on plack in the pouch, sorrow the crack of the thumb we cared for harvest or sheep-shearing, king or bishop, Bible or incense-pot.

"To us sitting thus on the Sabbath morning (when it had better set us to have been sleeping in our naked beds) there came in one Rab Aitkin of Auchengask, likeminded with us. Rab was seeking his 'morning' or eye-opening draught of French brandy, and to us bleared and leaden-eyed roisterers, he seemed to come fresh as the dew on the white thorn in the front of May. For he had a clean sark upon him, a lace ruffle about his neck, and his hair was still wet with the good well water in which he had lately washen himself.

"'Whither away, Rab?' we cried; 'is it to visit fair Meg o' the Glen so early i' the mornin'?'

"'He is on his way to holy kirk!' cried another, daffingly.

"'If so—'tis to stand all day on the stool of repentance!' declared another. Then in the precentors whining voice he added: 'Robert Aitkin, deleted and discerned to compear at both diets of worship for the heinous crime of—and so forth!' This was an excellent imitation of the official method of summoning a culprit to stand his rebuke. It was Patie Robb of Ironmannoch who said this. And this same Patie had had the best opportunities for perfecting himself in the exercise, having stood the session and received the open rebuke on three several occasions—two of them in one twelve-month, which is counted a shame even among shameless men.

"'No, Patie,' said Rab in answer, 'I am indeed heading for the kirk, but on no siccan gowk's errand as takes you there twice in the year, my man. I go to hear the Gospel preached. For there is to be a stranger frae the south shore at the Kirk of Kells this day, and they say he has a mighty power of words; and though ye scoff and make light o' me, I care not. I am neither kirk-goer nor kirk-lover, ye say. True, but there is a whisper in my heart that sends me there this day. I thank ye, bonny mistress!'

"He took the pint-stoup, and with a bow of his head and an inclination of his body, he did his service to Mistress Elspeth. For that lady, looking fresh as himself, had just come forth from her chamber to relieve Jean McCalmont, who, poor thing, had been going to sleep on her feet for many weary hours.

"Then Roaring Raif Pringle cried out, 'Lads, we will a' gang. I had news yestreen of this ploy. The new Bishop, good luck to him, has outed another of the high-flying prating cushion-threshers. This man goes to Edinburgh to be tried before his betters. He is to preach in Kells this very morn on the bygoing, for the minister thereof is likeminded with himself. We will all gang, and if he gets a hearin' for his rebel's cant—why, lads, you are not the men I tak you for!'

"So they cried out, 'Weel said, Roaring Raif!' and got them ready to go as best they could. For some were red of face and some were ringed of eye, and all were touched with a kind of disgust for the roisterous spirit of the night. But a dabble in the chill water of the spring and a rub of the rough-spun towel brought us mostly to some decent presentableness. For youth easily recovers itself while it lasts, though in the latter end it pays for such things twice over.

"We partook of as mickle breakfast as we could manage, and that was no great thing after such a night. But we each drank down a stirrup-cup and with various good-speeds to Elspeth Vogie and Jean her maid, we wan to horseback and so down the strath to the Kirk of Kells. It sits on the summit of a little knowe with the whin golden about it at all times of the year, and the loch like a painted sheet spread below.

"We could see the folk come flocking from far and near, from their mailings and forty-shilling lands, their farm-towns and cot-houses in half-a-dozen parishes.

"'We are in luck's way, lads,' cried Lidderdale, called Ten-tass Lidderdale because he could drink that number of stoups of brandy neat; 'it is a great gathering of the godly. Lads, the shutting of this man's mouth will make such a din as will be heard of through all Galloway!'

"And so to our shame and my sorrow we made it up. We were to go the rounds of the meeting, and gather together all the likely lads who would stand with us. There were sure to be plenty such who had no goodwill to preachings. And with these in one place we could easily shut the mouth of this fanatic railer against law and order. For so in our ignorance and folly we called him. Because all this sort (such as I myself was then) hated the very name of religion, and hoped to find things easier and better for them when the king should have his way, and when the bishops would present none to parishes but what we called 'good fellows'—by which we meant men as careless of principle as ourselves—loose-livers and oath-swearers, such as in truth they mostly were themselves.

"But when we arrived that August morning at the Kirk of Kells, lo! there before us was outspread such a sight as my eyes never beheld. The Kirk Knowe was fairly black with folk. A little way off you could see them pouring inward in bands like the spokes of a wheel. Further off yet, black dots straggled down hill sides, or up through glens, disentangling themselves from clumps of birches and scurry thorns for all the world like the ants of the wise king gathering home from their travels.

"Then we were very well content and made it our business to go among the gay young blades who had come for the excitement, or, as it might be, because all the pretty lasses of the country-side were sure to be there in their best. And with them we arranged that we should keep silence till the fanatic minister was well under way with his treasonable parles. Then we would rush in with our swords drawn, carry him off down the steep and duck him for a traitorous loon in the loch beneath.

"To this we all assented and shook hands upon the pact. For we knew right sickerly what would be our fate, if in the battle which was coming on the land, the Covenant men won the day. Perforce we must subscribe to deeds and religious engagements, attend kirks twice a day, lay aside gay colours, forswear all pleasant daffing with such as Elspeth Vogie and Jean her maid (not that there was anything wrong in my own practice with such—I speak only of others). The merry clatter of dice would be heard no more. The cartes themselves, the knowledge of which then made the gentleman, would be looked upon as the 'deil's picture-books.' A good broad oath would mean a fine as broad. Instead of chanting loose catches we should have to listen to sermons five hours long, and be whipt for all the little pleasing transgressions that made life worth living.

"So 'Hush,' we said—'we will salt this preacher's kail for him. We will drill him, wand-hand and working-hand, so that he cannot stir. We will make him drink his fill of Kells Loch this day!'

"All this while we knew not so much as the name of the preacher—nor, indeed, cared. He came from the south, so much we knew, and he had a great repute for godliness and what the broad-bonnets called 'faithfulness,' which, being interpreted, signified that he condemned the king and the bishops, and held to the old dull figments about doctrine, free grace, and the authority of Holy Kirk.

"The man had not arrived when we reached the Kirk of Kells. Indeed, it was not long before the hour of service when up the lochside we saw a cavalcade approach. Then we were angry. For, as we said, 'This spoils our sport. These are doubtless soldiers of the king who have been sent to put a stop to the meeting. We shall have no chance this day. Our coin is spun and fallen edgewise between the stones. Let us go home!'

"But I said: 'There may be some spirity work for all that, lads. Better bide and see!'

"So they abode according to my word.

"But when they came near we could see that these were no soldiers of the king, nor, indeed, any soldiers at all, though the men were armed with whingers and pistolets, and rode upon strong slow-footed horses like farmers going to market. There was a gentleman at the head of them, very tall and stout, whom Roaring Raif, in an undertone, pointed out as Gordon of Earlstoun, and in the midst, the centre of the company, rode a little fair man, shilpit and delicate, whom all deferred to, clad in black like a minister. He rode a long-tailed sheltie like one well accustomed to the exercise and bore about with him the die-stamp of a gentleman.

"This was the preacher, and these other riders were mostly his parishioners, come to convoy him through the dangerous and ill-affected districts to the great Popish and Prelatic city of Aberdeen, where for the time being he was to be interned.

"Then Roaring Raif whispered amongst us that we had better have our swords easy in the sheath and our pistols primed, for that these men in the hodden grey would certainly fight briskly for their minister.

"'Gordon of Cardoness is there also,' he said, 'a stout angry carle. Him in the drab is Muckle Ninian Mure of Cassencarry. Beyond is Ugly Peter of Rusco, and that's Bailie Fullerton o' Kirkcudbright, the man wi' the wame swaggin' and the bell-mouthed musket across his saddle-bow. There will be a rare tulzie, lads. This is indeed worth leavin' Elspeth's fireside for. We will let oot some true blue Covenant bluid this holy day!'

"And when the Little Fair Man dismounted there was a rush of the folk and some deray. But we of the other faction kept in the back part and bided our time.

"Then the Little Fair Man went up into the pulpit, which was a box on great broad, creaking, ungreased wheels, which they had brought out from the burial tool-house as soon as they saw that the mighty concourse could in no wise be contained in the kirk—no, not so much as a tenth part of them!

"After that there was a great hush which lasted at least a minute as the minister kneeled down with his head in his hands. Then at last he rose up and gave out the psalm to be sung. It was the one about the Israelites hanging their harps on the trees of Babylon. And I mind that he prefaced it with several pithy sayings which I remembered long afterwards, though I paid little heed to them at the time. 'This tree of Babylon is a strange plant,' he said; 'it grows only in those backsides of deserts where Moses found it, or by Babel streams where men walk in sorrow and exile. It is an ever-burning bush, yet no man hath seen the ashes of it.'

"Then the people sang with a great voice, far-swelling, triumphant, and the Little Fair Man led them in a kind of ecstasy. I do not mind much about his prayer. I was no judge of prayers in those days. All I cared about them was that they should not be too long and so keep me standing in one position. But I can recall of him that he inclined his face all the time he was speaking towards the sky, as if Some One Up There had been looking down upon him. At that I looked also, following the direction of his eyes. And so did several others, but could see nothing. But I think it was not so with the Little Fair Man.

"Now it was not till the sermon was well begun that we were to break in and 'skail' the conventicle with our swords in our hands. I could hear Lidderdale behind me murmuring, 'How much longer are we to listen to this treason-monger?'

"'Let us give him five minutes by the watch lads!' I said, 'the same as a man that is to be hanged hath before the topsman turns him off. And after that I am with you.'

"Then Roaring Raif said in my ear, 'We have them in the hollow of our hand. This will be a great day in the Kells. We will put the broad bonnets to rout, so that no one of them after this shall be able to show face upon the causeway of Dumfries. There are at least fifty staunch lads, good honest swearing blades, in and about the kirkyard of Kells this day!'

"For even so we delighted to call ourselves in our ignorance and headstrong folly—as the Buik sayeth, glorying in our shame.

"And according to my word we waited five minutes on the minister. He had that day a text that I will always mind, 'God is our refuge and our strength,' from the 46th Psalm—one that was ever afterwards a great favourite with me. And when at first he began, I thought not muckle about what he said, but only of the great ploy and bloody fray that was before me. For we rejoiced in suchlike, and called it among ourselves a 'bloodletting of the whey-faced knaves!'

"Then the Little Fair Man began to warm to his work, and just when the five minutes drew on to their end, he was telling of a certain Friend that he had, One that loved him, and had been constantly with him for years—so that his married wife was not so near and dear. This Friend had delivered him, he said, from perils of great waters, and from the edge of the sword. He had also put up with all the evil things he had done to Him. Ofttimes he had cast this Friend off and buffeted Him, but even then He would not go away from him or leave him desolate.

"So, as I had never heard of such strange friendship, I was in a great sweat to find out who this Friend might be, so different from the comrades I knew, who drew their swords at a word and gave buffet for buffet as quick as drawing a breath.

"So I whispered again, 'Give him another five minutes!'

"And I could hear them growl behind me, Tam Morra of the Shields, called Partan-face Tam, Glaikit Gib Morrison, and the others—'What for are ye waitin'? Let the grey-breeks hae it noo!'

"But since I was by much the strongest there, and in a manner the leader, they did not dare to counter me, fearing that I might give them 'strength-o'-airm' as I did once in the vennel of Dumfries to Mathew Aird when he withstood me in the matter of Bonny Betty Coupland—a rencontre which was little to my credit from any point of view.

"And then the Little Fair Man threw himself into a rapture like a man going out of the body, and his voice sounded somehow uncanny and of the other world. For there was a 'scraich' in it like the snow-wind among the naked trees of the wood at midnight. Yet for all it was not unpleasant, but only eery and very affecting to the heart.

"He told us how that he had shamed and grieved his Friend, how he had oftentimes wounded Him sore, and once even crucified Him

"Then when he said that I knew what the man was driving at, and if I had been left to myself I would have fallen away and thought no more of the matter. But at that moment, with a sudden calm, there fell a hush over the people. They seemed to be waiting for something. Then the Little Fair Man leaned out of the pulpit and stretched his arm toward me, where I stood like Saul, taller by a head than any about me.

"'There is a great strong young man there,' he said, 'standing by the pillar, that hitherto has used his strength for the service of the devil, but from this forward he shall use it for the Lord. Even now he is plotting mischief. He, too, hath wounded my Friend, even Jesus Christ, and smitten Him on the cheekbone. But to-day he shall stand in the breach and fight for Him. Young man, I bid you come forward!'

"And with that he continued, pointing at me with his finger a little crooked. At first I was angry, and could have made his chafts ring with my neive had I been near enough. But presently something uprose in my heart—great, and terrible, and melting all at once. I took a step forward. But my companions held me back. I could feel Lidderdale and Roaring Raif with each a hand on a coat tail.

"'Harry,' they said, 'do not mind him—cry the word and we will fall on and pull the wizard down by the heels!'

"'Come hither!' said the Little Fair Man again, in a stronger voice of command. 'Come up hither, friend. Thou didst come to this place to do evil; but the Spirit hath thee now by the head, though well do I see that a pair of black deils have thee yet by the tail. Come hither, friend, resist not the Spirit!'

"Then there arose a mighty flame in my heart, the like of which I never felt before. It was a very gale of the Spirit—a breaking down of dams that imprisoned waters might flow free. And before I knew what I did I took my hand and dealt a buffet right and left, so that Roaring Raif roared amain. And as for Jock Lidderdale, I know not what became of him, for they carried him over the heads of the crowd and laid him under a tree to come to himself again.

"'Thou shalt know a Friend to-day, young man,' the minister said, when, being thus enlarged, I came near. 'Thou shall be the firstfruits to the Lord in the Kells this day. There is to be a great ingathering of sheaves here, though some of them shall yet have bloody shocks. But thou, young sir, shalt be the first of all and shalt stand the longest!'

"Then on the outskirts of the crowd there arose a mighty turmoil. For all those that had been of my party made a rush forward, that they might rescue me from what they thought was rank witchcraft.

"'Overturn! Overturn!' they cried, 'ding doon the wizard! He hath bewitched "Harry Strength-o'-Airm"! Fight, Harry—for thine own hand, and we will rescue thee!'

"And so ardent was their onset that they had well-nigh opened a way to where the Little Fair Man stood, as unmoved and smiling as if he had been sitting in his own manse. So great became the crowd that the very preaching-box rocked. The men of the cavalcade drew their swords and met the assailants hand to hand. In another minute there had been bloodshed.

"But by some strange providence there came into my hand the pole of a burying bier, whereon men bear coffins to the kirkyard. I know not how it came there, unless, peradventure, they had used it to roll out the preaching-box. But, in any case, it made a goodly and a gruesome weapon.

"Then the Spirit of the Lord came upon me, and I shouted aloud: 'I am on the Little Fair Man's side—and on the side of his Friend! Peace! Peace!'

"And with that I laid about me as the Lord gave me strength, and I heard more than one sword snap, and more than one head crack.

"Then, again, I cried louder than before: 'Let there be peace—and God help ye if ye come in Harry Wedderburn's road this day—all ye that are set on mischief!'

"And lo! by means of the bier-pole, a way was opened, a large and an effectual, before me; and, like Samson, I smote and smote, and stayed not, till I was weary. For none could stand against me, and such as could, ran out to their horses. But the most part of them, I, with my grave-pole, caused to remain—that they, too, might be turned to the Lord by the Word of the preacher.

"So they came back, and I bade the Little Fair Man preach to them, while I kept guard. And at that he smiled and said: 'Did I not say that thou also shouldst be a soldier of God? Thine arm this day hath been indeed an arm of flesh. But thou shalt yet wield in thy time the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God!' And of a truth, there was a great work and an effectual that day in the Kells. For they say that more than four score turned them from their evil way, and many of these blessed me thereafter for the breaking of their heads—yes, even upon their dying beds.

"Now I have myself backslidden since that, but have not altogether fallen away or shamed my first love. And when the cavalcade rode away up the muir road, I heard them tell that the Little Fair Man, who had called me out of my heady folly, was no other than the famous Mr. Samuel Rutherfurd, minister of Anwoth, on his way to his place of exile in Aberdeen, for conscience sake.

"That these things are verity I vouch for with my soul. The truth is thus, neither less nor more. Which is the testimony of me, Harry Wedderburn, written in this year of Grace and a freed Israel, 1689."