Guy Mannering Part 31

While Mrs. Rebecca was curtseying, and endeavouring to make the poor orphan girl curtsey instead of crying, and while Dandie, in his rough way, was encouraging them both, old Pleydell had recourse to his snuff-box. It's meat and drink to me, now, Colonel," he said, as he recovered himself, "to see a clown like this--I must gratify him in his own way,--must a.s.sist him to ruin himself--there's no help for it. Here, you Liddesdale--Dandie--Charlies-hope-what do they call you?"

The farmer turned, infinitely gratified even by this sort of notice; for in his heart, next to his own landlord, he honoured a lawyer in high practice.

"So you will not be advised against trying that question about your marches?"

"No--no, sir--naebody likes to lose their right, and to be laughed at down the haill water. But since your honour's no agreeable, and is maybe a friend to the other side like, we maun try some other advocate."

"There--I told you so, Colonel Mannering!--Well, sir, if you must needs be a fool, the business is to give you the luxury of a lawsuit at the least possible expense, and to bring you off conqueror if possible. Let Mr. Protocol send me your papers, and I will advise him how to conduct your cause. I don't see, after all, why you should not have your lawsuits too, and your feuds in the Court of Session, as well as your forefathers had their manslaughters and fire-raisings."

"Very natural, to be sure, sir. We wad just take the auld gate as readily, if it werena for the law. And as the law binds us, the law should loose us. Besides, a, man's aye the better thought o'

in out country for having been afore the Feifteen."

"Excellently argued, my friend! Away with you, and send your papers to me.--Come, Colonel, we have no more to do here."

"G.o.d, we'll ding [*Defeat] Jock o' Dawston Cleugh now after a'!"

said Dinmont, slapping his thigh in great exultation.

CHAPTER x.x.xIX.

--I am going to the parliament;

You understand this bag: If you have any business Depending there, be short, and let me hear it, And pay your fees. Little French Lawyer.

"SHALL you be able to carry this honest fellow's cause for him?"

said Mannering.

"Why, I don't know; the battle is not to the strong, but he shall come off triumphant over Jock of Dawston if we can make it out. I owe him something. It is the pest of our profession that we seldom see the best side of human nature. People come to us with every selfish feeling newly pointed and grinded; they turn down the very caulkers of their animosities and prejudices, as smiths do with horses' shoes in a white frost. Many a man has come to my garret Yonder, that I have at first longed to pitch out at the window, and yet, at length, have discovered that he was only doing as I might have done in his case, being very angry, and, of course, very unreasonable. I have now satisfied myself, that if our profession sees more of human folly and human roguery than others, it is because we witness them acting in that channel in which they can most freely vent themselves. In civilised society, law is the chimney through which all that smoke discharges itself that used to circulate through the whole house, and put every one's eyes out--no wonder, therefore, that the vent itself should sometimes get a little sooty. But we will take care our Liddesdale-man's cause is well conducted and well argued, so all unnecessary expense will be saved--he shall have his pineapple at wholesale price."

"Will you do me the pleasure," said Mannering, as they parted, "to dine with me at my lodgings? my landlord says he has a bit of red-deer venison, and some excellent wine."

"Venison--eh?" answered the counsellor alertly, but presently added--"But no! it's impossible--and I can't ask you home neither.

Monday's a sacred day--so's Tuesday--and Wednesday, we are to be heard in the great teind case in presence--but stay--it's frosty weather, and if you don't leave town, and that venison would keep till Thursday--"

"You will dine with me that day?"

"Under certification."

"Well, then, I will indulge a thought I had of spending a week here; and if the venison will not keep, why, we will see what else our landlord can do for us."

"Oh, the venison will keep," said Pleydell; "and now good-bye--look at these two or three notes, and deliver them if you like the addresses. I wrote them for you this morning--farewell; my clerk has been waiting this hour to begin a d-d information."--And away walked Mr. Pleydell with great activity, diving through closes and ascending covered stairs, in order to attain the High Street by an access, which, compared to the common route, was what the Straits of Magellan are to the more open, but circuitous pa.s.sage round Cape Horn.

On looking at the notes of introduction which Pleydell had thrust into his hand, Mannering was gratified with seeing that they were addressed to some of the first literary characters of Scotland. "To David Hume, Esq." "To John Home, Esq." "To Dr. Ferguson." "To Dr.

Black." "To Lord Kaimes." "To Mr. Hutton." "To John Clerk, Esq., of Eldin." "To Adam Smith, Esq." "To Dr. Robertson."

"Upon my word, my legal friend has a good selection of acquaintances--these are names pretty widely blown indeed--an East-Indian must rub up his faculties a little, and put his mind in order, before he enters this sort of society."

Mannering gladly availed himself of these introductions; and we regret deeply it is not in our power to give the reader an account of the pleasure and information which he received, in admission to a circle never closed against strangers of sense and information, and which has perhaps at no period been equalled, considering the depth and variety of talent which it embraced and concentrated.

Upon the Thursday appointed, Mr. Pleydell made his appearance at the inn where Colonel Mannering lodged. The venison proved in high order, the claret excellent, and the learned counsel, a professed amateur in the affairs of the table, did distinguished honour to both. I am uncertain, however, if even the good cheer gave him more satisfaction than the presence of Dominie Sampson, from whom, in his own juridical style of wit, he contrived to extract great amus.e.m.e.nt, both for himself and one or two friends whom the Colonel regaled on the same occasion. The grave and laconic simplicity of Sampson's answers to the insidious questions of the barrister, placed the bonhomie of his character in a more luminous point of view than Mannering had yet seen it. Upon the same occasion he drew forth a strange quant.i.ty of miscellaneous and abstruse, though, generally speaking, useless learning. The lawyer afterwards compared his mind to the magazine of a p.a.w.nbroker, stowed with goods of every description, but so c.u.mbrously piled together, and in such total disorganisation, that the owner can never lay his hands upon any one article at the moment he has occasion for it.

As for the advocate himself, he afforded at least as much exercise to Sampson as he extracted amus.e.m.e.nt from him. When the man of law began to get into his alt.i.tudes, and his wit, naturally shrewd and dry, became more lively and poignant, the Dominie looked upon him with that sort of surprise with which we can conceive a tame bear might regard his future a.s.sociate, the monkey, on their being first introduced to each other. It was Mr. Pleydell's delight to state in grave and serious argument some position which he knew the Dominie would be inclined to dispute. He then beheld with exquisite pleasure the internal labour with which the honest man arranged his ideas for reply, and tasked his inert and sluggish powers to bring up all the heavy artillery of his learning for demolis.h.i.+ng the schismatic or heretical opinion which had been stated--when, behold, before the ordnance could be discharged, the foe had quitted the post, and appeared in a new position of annoyance on the Dominie's flank or rear. Often did he exclaim "Prodigious!" when, marching up to the enemy in full confidence of victory, he found the field evacuated, and it may be supposed that it cost him no little labour to attempt a new formation. "He was like a native Indian army," the Colonel said, "formidable by numerical strength and size of ordnance, but liable to be thrown into irreparable confusion by a movement to take them in flank."--On the whole, however, the Dominie, though somewhat fatigued with these mental exertions, made at unusual speed and upon the pressure of the moment, reckoned this one of the white days of his life, and always mentioned Mr. Pleydell as a very erudite and fa-ce-ti-ous person.

By degrees the rest of the party dropped off, and left these three gentlemen together. Their conversation turned to Mrs. Bertram's settlements. "Now what could drive it into the noddle of that old harridan," said Pleydell, "to disinherit poor Lucy Bertram, under pretence of settling her property on a boy who has been so long dead and gone?--I ask your pardon, Mr. Sampson, I forgot what an affecting case this was for you--I remember taking your examination upon it--and I never had so much trouble to make any one speak three words consecutively--You may talk of your Pythagoreans, or your silent Brahmins, Colonel,--go to, I tell you this learned gentleman beats them all in taciturnity--but the words of the wise are precious, and not to be thrown away lightly."

"Of a surety," said the Dominie, taking his blue-checked handkerchief from his eyes, "that was a bitter day with me indeed; ay, and a day of grief hard to be borne--but He giveth strength who layeth on the load."

Colonel Mannering took this opportunity to request Mr. Pleydell to inform him of the particulars attending the loss of the boy; and the counsellor, who was fond of talking upon subjects of criminal jurisprudence, especially when connected with his own experience, went through the circ.u.mstances at full length. "And what is your opinion upon the result of the whole?"

"Oh, that Kennedy was murdered: it's an old case which has occurred on that coast before now--the case of Smuggler versus Exciseman."

"What then is your conjecture concerning the fate of the child?

"Oh, murdered too, doubtless," answered Pleydell. "He was old enough to tell what he had seen, and these ruthless scoundrels would not scruple committing a second Bethlehem ma.s.sacre if they thought their interest required it."

The Dominie groaned deeply, and e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.ed, "Enormous!"

"'Yet there was mention of gipsies in the business too, counsellor," said Mannering, "and from what that vulgar-looking fellow said after the funeral--"

"Mrs. Margaret Bertram's idea that the child was alive was founded upon the report of a gipsy," said Pleydell, catching at the half-spoken hint--"I envy you the concatenation, Colonel--it is a shame to me not to have drawn the same conclusion. We'll follow this business tip instantly--Here, hark ye, waiter, go down to Luckie Wood's in the Cowgate; ye'll find my clerk Driver; he'll be set down to High-jinks by this time (for we and our retainers, Colonel, are exceedingly regular in our irregularities); tell him to come here instantly, and I will pay his forfeits."

"He won't appear in character, will he?" said Mannering.

"Ah! no more of that, Hal, an thou lovest me," said Pleydell. "But we must have some news from the land of Egypt, if possible. Oh, if I had but hold of the slightest thread of this complicated skein, you should see how I would unravel it!--I would work the truth out of your Bohemian, as the French call them, better than a Monitoire, or a Plainte de Tournelle; I know how to manage a refractory witness."

While Mr. Pleydell was thus vaunting his knowledge of his profession, the waiter re-entered with Mr. Driver, his mouth still greasy with mutton pies, and the froth of the last draught of twopenny yet unsubsided on his upper lip, with such speed had he obeyed the commands of his princ.i.p.al.--"Driver, you must go instantly and find out the woman who was old Mrs. Margaret Bertram's maid. Inquire for her everywhere, but if you find it necessary to have recourse to Protocol, Quid the tobacconist, or any other of these folks, you will take care not to appear yourself, but send some woman of your acquaintance--I dare say you know enough that may be so condescending as to oblige you. When you have found her out, engage her to come to my chambers to-morrow at eight o'clock precisely."

"What shall I say to make her forthcoming?" asked the aide-de-camp.

"Anything you choose," replied the lawyer. "Is it my business to make lies for you, do you think? But let her be in praesentia by eight o'clock, as I have said before." The clerk grinned, made his reverence, and exit.

"That's a useful fellow," said the counsellor "I don't believe his match ever carried a process. He'll write to my dictating three nights in the week without sleep, or, what's the same thing, he writes as well and correctly when he's asleep as when he's awake.

Then he's such a steady fellow--some of them are always changing their alehouses, so that they have twenty cadies sweating after them, like the bare-headed captains traversing the taverns of East-Cheap in search of Sir John Falstaff. But this is a complete fixture-he has his winter seat by the fire, and his summer seat by the window, in Luckie Wood's, betwixt which seats are his only migrations; there he's to be found at all times when he is off duty. It is my opinion he never puts off his clothes or goes to sleep--sheer ale supports him under everything. It is meat, drink, and clothing, bed, board, and was.h.i.+ng."

"And is he always fit for duty upon a sudden turn-out? I should distrust it, considering his quarters."

"Oh, s drink never disturbs him, Colonel; he can write for hours after he cannot speak. I remember being called suddenly to draw an appeal case. I had been dining, and it was Sat.u.r.day night, and I had ill will to begin to it--however, they got me down to Clerihugh's, and there we sat birling till I had a fair tappit hen, [*See Note VI. Tappit Hen. ] under my belt, and then they persuaded me to draw the paper. Then we had to seek Driver, and it was all that two men could do to bear him in, for, when found, he was, as it happened, both motionless and speechless. But no sooner was his pen put between his fingers, his paper stretched before him, and he heard my voice, than he began to write like a scrivener--and, excepting that we were obliged to have somebody to dip his pen in the ink, for he could not see the standish, I never saw a thing scrolled more handsomely."

"But how did your joint production look the next morning?" said the Colonel.

"Wheugh! capital--not three words required to be altered; [* See Note VII. Convivial Habits of the Scottish Bar. ] it was sent off by that day's post. But you'll come and breakfast with me to-morrow, and hear this woman's examination?"

"Why, your hour is rather early."

"Can't make it later. If I were not on the boards of the Outer House precisely as the nine-hours bell rings, there would be a report that I had got an apoplexy, and I should feel the effects of it all the rest of the session."

"Well, I will make an exertion to wait upon you."