Volume I Part 14 (2/2)
”A good morning, and fair grace to you, n.o.ble and worthy gentlemen!”
said the foremost: ”May we presume to be of the party?”
”You may _presume_,” said the deil's Tam, ”for that is what befits you; if you are willing to put up with the presumer's reward.”
”You are witty, sir, I suppose,” said the trooper; ”and pray what may that reward be?”
”Yes, I am witty,” said Tam; ”and my wit is sharp when it is not in its sheath. Do you understand me? As for the reward of presumption, it is in Scotland to be crankit before and kicked behind.”
”The road is at least as free to us as it is to you,” said the mosstrooper; ”and of that we intend to avail ourselves for the present.
We go to join the army before Roxburgh, whither are you bound?”
”We follow our noses,” said Tam; ”but they guide us not to the army before Roxburgh, and into your rearward they caution us not to enter.
Raw hides and rank bacon, keep your distance.”
While Tam Craik and the trooper were thus jangling on before, Charlie said to Jordan, ”Laird, what do think o' yoursel' now? Ye hae played us a fine pliskie wi' your ill tackit tongue! It is my thought that ere we ride a mile and a half we'll be attacked by a hale troop o' horse. That chap that disna speak is ane o' the wale o' the Ha's: I ken him weel for a' his half visor. The other horseman that left them on the height is ower to the fords of Kale, and, if I guess right, he'll appear at yon scroggy bush wi' sae mony at his back that we wad hardly be a mouthfu'
to them, an' that in less time than ane wad gang a mile.”
”It is an ill business this,” said Gibby: ”It brings me in mind o'--o'
mair than I's name. But, gudesake, Yardbire, an ye be sure he is ane o'
the Halls, what for do nae ye rin your sword in at the tae side o' him an' out at the t.i.ther? The sooner a knave like that is put down the better.”
”Fair occasion, an' face to face, Peatstacknowe, an' ye sanna see Charlie Scott slack; but ye wadna hae me stick a man, or cleave him down ahint his back, an' that without fair warning and fair arming?”
”Ay, honour an' generosity are braw things, but life's a brawer thing an' a better thing than ony o' the twa. For my part, I wad never stop.
My very heart flighters when I look at him, an' I amaist think I find his steel quivering at my midriff. I wish I had a drive at him, wi' a chance o' a hale head.”--And from that time Gibby leaned himself forward on his saddle, and fixed his large grey eyes on the mosstrooper like a pointer going to fly on his game; and, in that att.i.tude, he rode several times close up to his side, or very nearly opposite to him, laying his hand now and then on his hilt; but Charlie observed that he never looked his foe in the face with threatening aspect, and, perplexed as he was, could not help laughing at Gibby.
Yardbire now putting the spurs to Corby, galloped aslant the brae to a rising ground, whence he could see if any enemy was approaching by the swire from the fords of Kale, as he suspected. He had not well gained the height before he saw a dozen hors.e.m.e.n coming at the light gallop, but one part of the cavalcade considerably behind the others, owing to their being either worse mounted or worse hors.e.m.e.n.
By this time Charlie's own friends were coming round the bottom of the hill below him, quarrelling with the strangers so loudly, that Charlie heard their voices ascending on the gale in most discordant notes. The deil's Tam and the English trooper had never since their meeting ceased the jibe and the keen retort; but Tam's words were so provokingly severe, that the moss-man was driven beyond all further forbearance.
Just when they were at the hottest, the helmets of the front men of the Northumberland cavalcade began to appear in the swire; a circ.u.mstance that was well noted by their offended kinsman, but of which Tam was perfectly unconscious.
”Well, now, thou jaundiced looking thief,” said the moss-trooper, turning his horse's head towards Tam's left hand, and making him amble and curvette with his side foremost; ”thou lean, nerveless, and soul-less jabberer, all tongue and nothing else--I say, what hast thou to say more?”
The alteration in the man's key of voice somewhat astounded Tam; but his perverse nature would not let him soften his reply, although he liked as well to see others fall into a mischief as himself. ”Eh? what do I say?”
said he; and with that he turned his horse's head to that of the other, making their two noses to meet; and caricaturing the Englishman's capers, he laughed sneeringly and triumphantly in his face. ”What do I say? Eh? what do I say? I say I thought I heard wind, and smelled it a wee too. Hagg-hiding fox that thou art! Wild tike of the moors, dost thou think Tam Craik fears thy prancing and thy carrion breath, or ony o' the bur-throated litter of which thou art the outwale? Nay, an capering and prancing show ought of a spirit, I can caper and prance as well as thou. Out on thee, thou bog-thumper, thou base-born heather-blooter, what do _you_ say? Or what _dare_ you say?”
Tam had by this time drawn his sword completely to cow the Englishman, and put him to silence;--but he saw what Tam did not see, and knew more than he.
”I dare both say and do, and that thou shalt find,” said the trooper; and forthwith he attacked Tam with all his prowess, who, not quite expecting such a thing gave way, and had very nearly been unhorsed; he, however, fought stoutly, defending himself, though manifestly at the disadvantage. The brave friar, at the first clash of the swords, wheeled about his mule, and drawing out a good sword from under his frock, (for he wore the sword on the one side and the cross on the other,) he stretched it forth, pointing it as if to thrust it between them. But, addressing himself to the Englishman, he cried with a loud voice, ”Put up _thy_ sword again into its place, or verily I will smite thee with the edge of _my_ sword.”
The other Englishman, who had never yet opened his mouth, and who had always kept apart, as if anxious to conceal who he was, now rode briskly up to the fray; and perceiving the quick approach of his friends, and judging his party quite secure of victory, he struck up the friar's sword in apparent derision. But the inveterate laird of the Peatstacknowe had been watching him all this time, as one colley dog watches another of which he is afraid, in order to take him at an advantage, and the moment that his arm was stretched, so that his sword came in contact with the friar's, Gibby struck him behind, and that with such violence that the sword ran through his body. The wounded trooper reined up his steed furiously, in order to turn on his adversary; Gibby reined his up as quickly to make his escape, but the convulsive force of the Englishman threw his horse over, and in its fall it tumbled against the legs of Gibby's horse with such force that it struck them all four from under him, and both he and his rider fell in a reverse direction, rolling plump over the wounded warrior and his forlorn enc.u.mbered steed, that was pawing the air at a furious rate. The two horses falling thus on different sides, their iron-shod hoofs were inter-mixed, and clas.h.i.+ng and rattling away in a tremendous manner, tremendous at least to poor Gibby, whose leg and thigh being below his charger, he was unable to extricate himself. ”Happ, Davie, happ!” cried he to the steed: ”Up you stupid, awkward floundering thief! Happ, Davie, happ!” Davie could neither happ nor weynd, but there he lay groaning and kicking above his master, who was in a most deplorable plight.
Charlie perceiving the commencement of the fray, was all this while galloping furiously toward the combatants. But the battle was of short duration; for the English trooper, seeing his comrade fall he wist not how, and the friar and Tam having both their swords pointed at him, broke furiously through between them and fled towards his companions, Tam being only enabled to inflict a deep wound on the hinder part of the horse as he pa.s.sed by.
”I have made him to pa.s.s away as the stubble that is driven by the whirlwind,” said the friar; ”yea, as the chaff before the great wind, so is he fled from the arm of the mighty. Brother, I say unto thee, that thou hadst better arise!” continued he, looking upon the disconsolate Jordan; and pa.s.sing by on the other side with great _ang froid_, he rode up to Delany, the boy Elias, and the poet, the latter of whom had not been engaged, but, drawing his sword manfully, had stood as a guard to the other two.
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