Volume Ii Part 20 (2/2)
At our meal the yeoman offered my master a new war cloak, with belts, bands, and haversack, if he would tell him by what means he disarmed him with such ease, and in so extraordinary a manner; but the other absolutely refused.
”It is allowable in chivalry,” said he, ”to learn and practice any mode of manual defence, and to keep that mode a secret till you prove it on your opponent. That is my secret, and by that mode I would forfeit my life, nay my character itself, to disarm any man that ever pointed a two-edged sword at my breast.”
”I should have liked very much to have known that secret of his,” said Charlie Scott.
I found it out privately with the most perfect certainty, continued Tam; but durst never let him know that I understood aught of the matter. It was owing to his sword's handle, which was made for the purpose. It had an inner sh.e.l.l of steel polished like gla.s.s; then an outer one of basket-work, formed with rounded bars in such a manner that, by turning his hand in a slight degree to humour the position of the opponent's sword, and das.h.i.+ng his hilt against the point of it, that entered between those of the cross-bars, and, running up the polished steel within, bent and fixed itself; then by a sudden wrench against his opponent's thumb, of which he was a perfect master, he not only disarmed him to a certainty, but generally left his arm powerless. After I had discovered it, I went by myself to try the experiment, fixed my own sword, and taking my master's in my hand, I pushed the basket of that slightly against the point of the other, and behold it fixed in it so close, that with all my might, and all my art, I could not extricate it without breaking it in two, and, in that case, I saw I would leave the point sticking where it was, which I durst not do for my life. At length it came into my head to do as my master did. This had the effect at once; the vibration in the blade caused by the swing and jerk, made it loosen, and it flew away through the air like a fiery dragon.
”Master Michael Scott,” said Gibbie, ”and my friends, I again appeal to you all if this man has not fallen through his tale. It is turning out no tale at all, but merely an offputting of time, till we shall all perish of hunger.”
”The story of the hapless maiden Kell, and of our hero's first essays in love, I did admire and prize,” said the poet.
”Od help your crazed head,” said Charlie: ”I wadna gie that duel atween the twa auld chaps for a creelfu' o' love stories.”
”Lo, the tale is good,” said the friar; ”but it goeth here and there, without bound or limit; and wherefore should not a man relate all that befalleth unto him. I suppose it behoveth our friend to go on, without turning aside to the right hand or to the left.
”My tale is indeed long, but to me it is momentous. I should stop here pleasantly; but life is sweet,--and, to give me a fair chance for mine, I beg to be permitted to relate one adventure more.” This, after some demur, was granted, and Tam went on:
After spending several years among the hills of Galloway, and being approved of by the Gorb (as he was called by every body, though his name was Macdougald) for a good swordsman, I tired of the country, being persuaded that the ground did not fatten the cattle properly; and from the moment I began to suspect that, I had no more satisfaction in the place, but utterly despised it. I perceived that their beef was never above an inch thick in the ribs, and what was worse, it was not properly mixed with white layers of fat; even the doubles in the broad bone of the shoulder were nothing but pure red lire. This will never do, thought I. How I despise the people that can put up with such a country as this!
”Master,” says I, one day, ”I am quite tired of this country, and am going to leave it.”
”Wherefore are you going to leave it, Thomas? Have not I been better and kinder to you than to myself?”
”For all that, master, I am resolved not to sojourn another week in it.”
”I warned you that they were a deceitful people before,” said he; ”but we must take them as they are. We cannot make mankind as we would wish to have them.”
”It is not for the men, nor for the women either, that I dislike the country so much,” said I.
”What is it then for?” said he.
”It is,” said I, ”because I suspect that their gra.s.s is not of a good quality.”
I will never forget the look that the Gorb turned on me. He was walking somewhat before me, but when he heard my reason for disliking Galloway he wheeled about, and, taking one of his most striking upright positions, with his lean shoulders set up like two pins, he stared at me with his mouth wide open; and then put the following questions to me at long intervals.
”Gra.s.s! eh! How do you mean?”
”Look at it,” said I; ”What substance is in that wiry stuff, and on these hills of black heather!”
The Gorb's jaws fell down with dismay. He visibly thought that I was deranged, but he answered me mildly to humour my malady.
”True, the gra.s.s is not good; it never was, and never will be so. But I have not observed that you ever eat much of it; nor can I see how a man's happiness any way depends upon the quality of the gra.s.s of a country.”
”If that be all the sense that you have,” thought I, ”I will disdain for my part to exchange another word with you on the subject. Since you think that a man's happiness can depend on _any thing else_ but good gra.s.s, you shall be followed no longer by me.”
”Well,” continued he, after waiting a while for an answer, ”I see you are sulky about this whim, but I will humour it. I have nearly finished my terms among the mountains, and we shall descend upon the sh.o.r.es, where there is as good gra.s.s as any in Scotland, and I promise you full liberty to go into every field that you chuse, and take your bellyful of it. I have likewise many things to teach you, which will amuse you in the highest degree, and which belong to the sublime art of legerdemain.”
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