THE BLACK WATCH. CHAPTER I. You may tame a tiger, but it is ill jesting with a Highlander. OLD SAYING. THE long day of the pleasant month of April had allowed the lads of the Black Watch to find their quarters early enough to give many of them sufficient time, before the usual hour of rest, to take a short perambulation into the nearer part of the contiguous metropolis. Among others, the M'Phersons, eager to get a sight of the city, proposed to adventure at least as far into it the same evening as would enable them to get some idea of a place of which they had heard so much. Taking with them their gilly Daniel, who was exceedingly anxious to see the king, or at least the town where it pleased his majesty to dwell, the whole adventured some way into that confused mass of streets which then occupied the space between the old Three Cups hostelrie in Aldersgate-street, and the difficult purlieus of the streets of Barbican. Though the streets through which our strangers passed were narrow, and much less picturesque than their own, at home in Perth or Inverness, they were much more crowded with idle or disorderly people, who in these halcyon days of gin-smuggling, then not entirely passed away, were able to get drunk for a penny, and particularly beastly for twopence; and this being the hour when the labours of the day 1 were over, the common people seemed by no means averse to enjoy the delights of intoxication. "Whar'll the king's house be noo?" said Daniel, every now and then, as he gazed up and down the dirty lanes. "Ogh, but the king 'll hae little sense to live in sic a filthy place, amang sic a set o' blawthery," and he snorted with contempt on the people surrounding. "Foigh! if her machesty would just come doon to Scotland, an' take up her quarters on the north Inch o' Perth!--but atweel she would get a better logement e'en in the Fisher-raw o' Inverness, or the Cowgate o' Embro, than in this ill-fawr'd goose-dub, oigh!" As they proceeded along, however, their appearance excited such curiosity, that crowds began to follow them wherever they went. Some among the London rabble-at no time very celebrated for its delicacy, but now more gross in their manners than we who live in improved times are accustomed to witness-began first to insult their loquacious attendant, while others, particularly the women, crowded round them in every direction, as wild Indians may at this day gather round civilized Europeans; clapping their hands, and making a species of remarks on the short kilts and bare knees of the Highlandmen, such as, however appropriate to these free-speaking times, we do not care to repeat. Most of the females, however, indulged in audible praises of the tall forms and manly, martial appearance of the brothers; but others seemed inclined to make free with the short person of the gilly, in a way that he did not at all relish. 66 "Haud aff her hurdies, ye jades! deevil's in her 'pidence!" he exclaimed to a rampageous woman," who seemed disposed to have a pluck at his kilt; "Tamn her! would she hae a ravishment on te vera street? If she tries tat plisk again, I'll coup her creels, tail up, like a Sutherland sealgh."* "What does the creature say?" cried some among the crowd. "It speaks worse than a Welshman or a Lancashire boor,” added others, with true cockney conceit. "Sawney, you've forgot your breeches in Lochaber," cried a third. "Ifear ye'll never get your way bawk again o'er Highgate hill. A louse and a Scotchman never can find the north 66 * The habit of the seal, (or sealgh,) then often a visitant to the coast of Sutherland, in diving into the water "tail up," when chased by the mischievous boys, is well known. road;" and with such elegant mocking speeches did they sorely try the patience of the servitor mountaineer. In the midst of this, as the twilight darkened down, the brothers endeavoured to retrace their steps by the way that led from Aldersgate; but becoming stupified with a crowd and confusion so new to them, and involved in the purlieus of Barbican and Little Britain, and withal a little provoked at their questionable reception, they were fain to take refuge in one of the best-looking inns, many of which, as well as twopenny ale-houses, or mug-houses, as they were then called, and other numerous haunts of low dissipation of that time, stood invitingly open to the casual wayfarer. Although the morals and manners of London might by this period be slightly improved from what they were in earlier times, they were still sufficiently bad, among the rabble orders in particular, to excite in the minds of the strangers, referring as they did to the sober towns of northern Scotland, comparisons but ill calculated to dissipate their own national prejudices. Our strangers, however, entered the Friar and Flitch public with all the natural politeness of Highlanders, yet not without a feeling of condescension on their parts to a proceeding to which necessity only obliged them to submit, but which would be ill understood by the degenerate race of "corporal officers" serving his majesty in the present day. Stooping their lofty ostrich-feathered bonnets, as they entered the low door of the public, the first apartment they made a halt in was the large wainscoted kitchen, which, however, was so well garnished with shining pewter platters, tin sconces, toasting jacks, brass warming-pans, and other articles of cockney convenience, as considerably to raise the notions of the brothers, as to the house they had got into. "I wonder if this 'll be te king's hoose already," said Daniel, gazing round him with admiration. "Hough no! Nothing but te change hoose," he added, observing the regiment of pint stoups and glasses which shone with English cleanliness at the side next the bar The little fat landlady started, and crept behind her husband, upon first seeing the strapping figures and uncommon dresses of the strangers, and the landlord himself stood aghast, and, pushing back his wife, retreated towards the corner; while the tapster wench scalded herself, in her alarm, with the hot water she was at the moment drawing from the boiler for the use of a club, now seated in conclave in an inner room. |