Kidnapped—Chapter 15: The Lad With The Silver Button: Through The Isle Of Mull

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Kidnapped—Chapter 15: The Lad With The Silver Button: Through The Isle Of Mull

May 24, 2020

For the Easter season, I am posting some rather different things on this channel, in addition to my regular output, as a little gift to my followers and supporters. This is the fourth book I am reading through: 'Kidnapped', by Robert Louis Stevenson. I hope that you all enjoy!

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You can also listen to the audio of these episodes on iTunes: https://itunes.apple.com/gb/podcast/alastairs-adversaria/id1416351035?mt=2.

Transcript

Chapter 15 The Lad With The Silver Button Through The Isle Of Mull The Ross of Mull which I had now got upon was rugged and trackless, like the isle I had just left, being all bog and briar and big stone. There may be roads for them that know that country well, but for my part I had no better guide than my own nose, and no other landmark than Benmore. I aimed as well as I could for the smoke I had seen so often from the island, and with all my great weariness and the difficulty of the way, came upon the house in the bottom of a little hollow about five or six at night.

It was low and longish, roofed with turf and built of unmortared stones, and on a mound in front of it an old gentleman sat smoking his pipe in the sun. With what little English he had he gave me to understand that my shipmates had got safe ashore, and had broken bread in that very house on the day after. "'Was there one?' I asked, dressed like a gentleman.

He said they all wore rough greatcoats, but to be sure the first of them, the one that came alone, wore breeches and stockings, while the rest had sailor's trousers. "'Ah,' said I, "'and he would have a feathered hat.' He told me no, that he was bare-headed like myself. At first I thought Alan must have lost his hat, and then the rain came in my mind, and I judged it more likely he had it out of harm's way under his greatcoat.

This set me smiling, partly because my friend was safe, partly to think of his vanity and dress. And then the old gentleman clapped his hand to his brow, and cried out that I must be the lad with the silver button. "'Why, yes!' said I, in some wonder.

"'Well then,' said the old gentleman, 'I have a word for you, that you are to follow your friend to his country, by Torrasay.' He then asked me how I had fared, and I told him my tale. A South Country man would certainly have laughed, but this old gentleman—I call him so because of his manners, for his clothes were dropping off his back—heard me all through with nothing but gravity and pity. When I had done, he took me by the hand, led me into his hut—it was no better—and presented me before his wife, as if she had been the Queen, and I a Duke.

The good woman set oat-bread before me, and a cold grouse, patting my shoulder and smiling to me all the time, for she had no English, and the old gentleman, not to be behind, brewed me a strong punch out of their country spirit. All the while I was eating, and after that when I was drinking the punch, I could scarce come to believe in my good fortune, and the house, though it was thick with the peat-smoke, and as full of holes as a colander, seemed like a palace. The punch threw me in a strong sweat and a deep slumber.

The good people let me lie, and it was near noon of the next day before I took the road, my throat already easier and my spirits quite restored by good fare and good news. The old gentleman, although I pressed him hard, would take no money, and gave me an old bonnet for my head, though I am free to own I was no sooner out of view of the house than I very jealously washed this gift of his in a wayside fountain. Thought I to myself, if these are the wild Highlanders, I could wish my own folk wilder.

I not only started late, but I must have wandered nearly half the time. True, I met plenty of people, grubbing in little miserable fields that would not keep a cat, or herding little kine about the bigness of asses. The Highland dress being forbidden by law since the rebellion, and the people condemned to the lowland habit, which they much disliked, it was strange to see the variety of their array.

Some went bare only for a hanging cloth or a greatcoat, and carried their trousers on their backs like a useless berthen. Some had made an imitation of the tartan with little party-coloured stripes patched together like an old wife's quilt. Others again still wore the Highland fuller bag, but by putting a few stitches between the legs transformed it into a pair of trousers like a Dutchman's.

All those makeshifts were condemned and punished, for the law was harshly applied, in hopes to break up the clan spirit. But in that out-of-the-way sea-bound isle there were few to make remarks, and fewer to tell tales. They seemed in great poverty, which was no doubt natural, now that Rappine was put down, and the chiefs kept no longer an open house, and the roads, even such a wandering country by-track as the one I followed, were infested with beggars.

And here again I marked a difference from my own part of the country. For our lowland beggars, even the gownsmen themselves, who begged by patent, had a louting, flattering way with them, and if you gave them a plaque and asked change, would very civilly return you a bottle. But these Highland beggars stood on their dignity, asked alms only to buy snuff, by their account, and would give no change.

To be sure this was no concern of mine, except in so far as it entertained me by the way. What was more to the purpose, few had any English, and those few, unless they were of the brotherhood of beggars, not very anxious to place it at my service. I knew Torrasay to be my destination, and repeated the name to them, and pointed.

But instead of simply pointing in reply, they would give me a screed of the Gaelic that set me foolish. So it was small wonder if I went out of my road as often as I stayed in it. At last, about eight at night, and already very weary, I came to a lone house, where I asked admittance, and was refused, until I bethought me of the power of money in so poor a country, and held up one of my guineas in my finger and thumb.

Thereupon the man of the house, who had hitherto pretended to have no English, and driven me from his door by signals, suddenly began to speak as clearly as was needful, and agreed for five shillings to give me a night's lodging, and guide me the next day to Torrasay. I slept uneasily that night, fearing I should be robbed. But I might have spared myself the pain, for my host was no robber, only miserably poor and a great cheat.

He was not alone in his poverty, for the next morning we must go five miles about to the house of what he called a rich man, to have one of my guineas changed. This was perhaps a rich man for Mull. He would have scarce been thought so in the south, for it took all he had, the whole house was turned upside down, and a neighbour brought under contribution, before he could scrape together twenty shillings and silver.

The odd shilling he kept for himself, protesting he could ill afford to have so great a sum of money lying locked up. For all that he was very courteous and well-spoken, made us both sit down with his family to dinner, and brewed punch in a fine china bowl, over which my rascal guide grew so merry that he refused to start. I was for getting angry, and appealed to the rich man—Hector Maclean was his name—who had been a witness to our bargain and to my payment of the five shillings.

But Maclean had taken his share of the punch, and vowed that no gentleman should leave his table after the bowl was brewed, so there was nothing for it but to sit and hear Jacobite toasts and Gaelic songs, till all were tipsy and staggered off to the bed or the barn for their night's rest. Next day, the fourth of my travels, we were up before five upon the clock, but my rascal guide got to the bottle at once, and it was three hours before I had him clear of the house, and then, as you shall hear, only for a worse disappointment. As long as we went down a heathery valley that lay before Mr. Maclean's house, all went well.

Only my guide looked constantly over his shoulder, and when I asked him the cause, only grinned at me. No sooner, however, had we crossed the back of a hill, and got out of sight of the house windows, than he told me Torrasay lay right in front, and that a hill-top, which he pointed out, was my best landmark. "'I care very little for that,' said I, "'since you are going with me.' The impudent cheat answered me in the Gaelic that he had no English.

"'My fine fellow,' I said, "'I know very well your English comes and goes. Tell me what will bring it back. Is it more money you wish?' "'Five shillings, ma'am,' said he, "'and Hosell will bring ye there.' I reflected a while, and then offered him two, which he accepted greedily, and insisted on having in his hands at once, for luck, as he said.

But I think it was rather for my misfortune. The two shillings carried him not quite as many miles, at the end of which distance he sat down upon the wayside and took off his brogues from his feet, like a man about to rest. I was now red-hot.

"'Ha!' said I. "'Have you no more English?' he said impudently. "'No.' At that I boiled over, and lifted my hand to strike him, and he, drawing a knife from his rags, squatted back and grinned at me like a wildcat. At that, forgetting everything but my anger, I ran in upon him, put aside his knife with my left, and struck him in the mouth with the right.

I was a strong lad and very angry, and he but a little man, and he went down before me heavily. By good luck his knife flew out of his hand as he fell. I picked up both that and his brogues, wished him a good morning, and set off upon my way, leaving him barefoot and disarmed.

I chuckled to myself as I went, being sure I was done with that rogue, for a variety of reasons. First he knew he could have no more of my money, next the brogues were worth in that country only a few pence, and lastly the knife, which was really a dagger. It was against the law for him to carry.

In about half an hour of walk I overtook a great ragged man, moving pretty fast, but feeling before him with the staff. He was quite blind, and told me he was a catechist, which should have put me at my ease. But his face went against me, it seemed dark and dangerous and secret, and presently as we began to go alongside I saw the steel butt of a pistol sticking from under the flap of his coat-pocket.

To carry such a thing meant a fine of fifteen pounds sterling upon a first offence, and transportation to the colonies upon a second. Nor could I quite see why a religious teacher should go armed, or what a blind man could be doing with a pistol. I told him about my guide, for I was proud of what I had done, and my vanity for once got the heels of my prudence.

At the mention of the five shillings he cried out so loud that I made up my mind I should say nothing of the other two, and was glad he could not see my blushes. Was it too much? I asked, a little faltering. Too much? cries he.

Why, I would guide you to Torresay myself for a dram of brandy, and give you the great pleasure of my company, me that is a man of some learning, in the bargain. I said I did not see how a blind man could be a guide, but at that he laughed aloud, and said his stick was eyes enough for an eagle. In the Isle of Mull at least, says he, where I know every stone in Heatherbush by mark of head, see now, he said, striking right and left as if to make sure.

Down there a burn is running, and at the head of it there stands a bit of a small hill with a stone cocked upon the top of that, and it's hard at the foot of the hill, that's the way runs by to Torresay, and the way here, being for droves, is plainly trodden, and will show grassy through the heather. I had to own he was right in every feature, and told my wonder. Ha! says he, that's nothing, would ye believe me now, that before the act came out, and when there were weapons in these country I could shoot, ay, could I? cries he, and then with a leer, if ye had such a thing as a pistol here to try with, I would show ye how it's done.

I told him I had nothing of the sort, and gave him a wider berth. If he had known, his pistol stuck at that time quite plainly out of his pocket, and I could see the sun twinkle on the steel of the butt, but by the better luck for me he knew nothing, thought all was covered, and lied on in the dark. He then began to question me cunningly, where I came from, whether I was rich, whether I could change a five-shilling piece for him, which he declared he had that moment in his sporran, and all the time he kept edging up to me, and I avoiding him.

We were now upon a sort of green cattle-track, which crossed the hills towards Torrasay, and we kept changing sides on that like dancers in a reel. I had so plainly the upper hand that my spirits rose, and indeed I took a pleasure in this game of blind man's buff, but the catechist grew angrier and angrier, and at last began to swear in Gaelic, and to strike for my legs with his staff. Then I told him that, sure enough, I had a pistol in my pocket as well as he, and if he did not strike across the hill due south, I would even blow his brains out.

He became at once very polite, and after trying to soften me for some time, but quite in vain, he cursed me once more in Gaelic, and took himself off. I watched him striding along, through bog and briar, tapping with his stick, until he turned the end of a hill and disappeared in the next hollow. Then I struck on again for Torrasay, much better pleased to be alone than to travel with that man of learning.

This was an unlucky day, and these two, of whom I had just rid myself, one after the other, were the two worst men I met with in the Highlands. At Torrasay, on the sound of Mull, and looking over to the mainland of Morvan, there was an inn with an innkeeper, who was Maclean, it appeared, of a very high family, for to keep an inn is thought even more genteel in the Highlands than it is with us, perhaps as partaking of hospitality, or perhaps because the trade is idle and drunken. He spoke good English, and finding me to be something of a scholar, tried me first in French, where he easily beat me, and then in the Latin, in which I don't know which of us did best.

This pleasant rivalry put us at once upon friendly terms, and I sat up and drank punch with him, or to be more correct, sat up and watched him drink it, until he was so tipsy that he wept upon my shoulder. I tried him, as if by accident, with a sight of Allan's button, but it was plain he had never seen or heard of it. Indeed he bore some grudge against the family and friends of Arshile, and before he was drunk he read me a lampoon, in very good Latin, but with a very ill meaning, which he had made in elegiac verses upon a person of that house.

When I told him of my catechist, he shook his head, and said I was lucky to have got clear off. That is a very dangerous man, he said. Duncan Mackay is his name.

He can shoot by the ear at several yards, and has often been accused of highway robberies, and once of murder. The cream of it is, says I, that he called himself a catechist. And why should he not, says he, when that is what he is? It was Maclean of Duart gave it to him because he was blind, but perhaps it was a pity, says my host, for he is always on the road, going from one place to another to hear the young folks say their religion, and doubtless that is a great temptation to the poor man.

At last, when my landlord could drink no more, he showed me to a bed, and I lay down in very good spirits, having travelled the greater part of that big and crooked island of Mull, from Ered to Taurese, fifty miles as the crow flies, and with my wanderings much nearer a hundred, in four days and with little fatigue I was by far in better heart and health of body at the end of that long tramp than I had been at the beginning.