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A Legend of Montrose-Part3_WALTER SCOTT(1771-1832)_English Literature(文学名著)-第2页

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advanced rent, the payment of which must have reduced them to the



extremity of poverty, which they were yet contented to face, for

permission to live and die on their native soil. Nor did Janet



forget the portents which had announced the departure of the

Celtic race, and the arrival of the strangers. For two years



previous to the emigration, when the night wind howled dawn the

pass of Balachra, its notes were distinctly modelled to the tune



of "HA TIL MI TULIDH" (we return no more), with which the

emigrants usually bid farewell to their native shores. The



uncouth cries of the Southland shepherds, and the barking of

their dogs, were often heard in the midst of the hills long



before their actualarrival. A bard, the last of his race, had

commemorated the expulsion of the natives of the glen in a tune,



which brought tears into the aged eyes of the veteran, and of

which the first stanza may be thus rendered:--



Woe, woe, son of the Lowlander,

Why wilt thou leave thine own bonny Border?



Why comes thou hither, disturbing the Highlander,

Wasting the glen that was once in fair order?



What added to Sergeant More M'Alpin's distress upon the occasion

was, that the chief by whom this change had been effected, was,



by tradition and common opinion, held to represent the ancient

leaders and fathers of the expelled fugitives; and it had



hitherto been one of Sergeant More's principal subjects of pride

to prove, by genealogical deduction, in what degree of kindred he



stood to this personage. A woful change was now wrought in his

sentiments towards him.



"I cannot curse him," he said, as he rose and strode through the

room, when Janet's narrative was finished--"I will not curse him;



he is the descendant and representative of my fathers. But never

shall mortal man hear me name his name again." And he kept his



word; for, until his dying day, no man heard him mention his

selfish and hard-hearted chieftain.



After giving a day to sad recollections, the hardy spirit which

had carried him through so many dangers, manned the Sergeant's



bosom against this cruel disappointment. "He would go," he said,

"to Canada to his kinsfolk, where they had named a Transatlantic



valley after the glen of their fathers. Janet," he said, "should

kilt her coats like a leaguer lady; d--n the distance! it was a



flea's leap to the voyages and marches he had made on a slighter

occasion."



With this purpose he left the Highlands, and came with his sister

as far as Gandercleugh, on his way to Glasgow, to take a passage



to Canada. But winter was now set in, and as he thought it

advisable to wait for a spring passage, when the St. Lawrence



should be open, he settled among us for the few months of his

stay in Britain. As we said before, the respectable old man met



with deference and attention from all ranks of society; and when

spring returned, he was so satisfied with his quarters, that he



did not renew the purpose of his voyage. Janet was afraid of the

sea, and he himself felt the infirmities of age and hard service



more than he had at first expected. And, as he confessed to the

clergyman, and my worthyprincipal, Mr. Cleishbotham, "it was



better staying with kend friends, than going farther, and faring

worse."



He therefore established himself and his domicile at

Gandercleugh, to the great satisfaction, as we have already said,



of all its inhabitants, to whom he became, in respect of military

intelligence, and able commentaries upon the newspapers,



gazettes, and bulletins, a very oracle, explanatory of all

martial events, past, present, or to come.



It is true, the Sergeant had his inconsistencies. He was a

steady jacobite, his father and his four uncles having been out



in the forty-five; but he was a no less steady adherent of King

George, in whose service he had made his little fortune, and lost






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