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HORNIE.
It was now time he should resume his journey up Daurside, and he set
out to follow the burn that he might regain the river. It led him
into a fine meadow, where a number of cattle were feeding. The
meadow was not fenced -- little more than marked off, indeed, upon one
side, from a field of growing corn, by a low wall of earth, covered
with moss and grass and flowers. The cattle were therefore herded
by a boy, whom Gibbie recognized even in the distance as him by
whose countenance he had been so much attracted when, like an old
deity on a cloud, he lay spying through the crack in the ceiling.
The boy was reading a book, from which every now and then he lifted
his eyes to glance around him, and see whether any of the cows or
heifers or stirks were wandering beyond their pasture of rye-grass
and clover. Having them all before him, therefore no occasion to
look behind, he did not see Gibbie approaching. But as soon as he
seemed thoroughly occupied, a certain black cow, with short sharp
horns and a wicked look, which had been gradually, as was her wont,
edging nearer and nearer to the corn, turned suddenly and ran for
it, jumped the dyke, and plunging into a mad revelry of greed, tore
and devoured with all the haste not merely of one insecure, but of
one that knew she was stealing. Now Gibbie had been observant
enough during his travels to learn that this was against the law and
custom of the country -- that it was not permitted to a cow to go into
a field where there were no others -- and like a shot he was after the
black marauder. The same instant the herd boy too, lifting his eyes
from his book, saw her, and springing to his feet, caught up his
great stick, and ran also: he had more than one reason to run, for
he understood only too well the dangerous temper of the cow, and saw
that Gibbie was a mere child, and unarmed -- an object most
provocative of attack to Hornie -- so named, indeed, because of her
readiness to use the weapons with which Nature had provided her.
She was in fact a malicious cow, and but that she was a splendid
milker, would have been long ago fatted up and sent to the butcher.
The boy as he ran full speed to the rescue, kept shouting to warn
Gibbie from his purpose, but Gibbie was too intent to understand the
sounds he uttered, and supposed them addressed to the cow. With the
fearless service that belonged to his very being, he ran straight at
Hornie, and, having nothing to strike her with, flung himself
against her with a great shove towards the dyke. Hornie, absorbed
in her delicious robbery, neither heard nor saw before she felt him,
and, startled by the sudden attack, turned tail. It was but for a
moment. In turning, she caught sight of her ruler, sceptre in hand,
at some little distance, and turned again, either to have another
mouthful, or in the mere instinct to escape him. Then she caught
sight of the insignificant object that had scared her, and in
contemptuous indignation lowered her head between her forefeet, and
was just making a rush at Gibbie, when a stone struck her on a horn,
and the next moment the herd came up, and with a storm of fiercest
blows, delivered with the full might of his arm, drove her in
absolute rout back into the meadow. Drawing himself up in the
unconscious majesty of success, Donal Grant looked down upon Gibbie,
but with eyes of admiration.
"Haith, cratur!" he said, "ye're mair o' a man nor ye'll luik this
saven year! What garred ye rin upo' the deevil's verra horns that
gait?"
Gibbie stood smiling.
"Gien't hadna been for my club we wad baith be owre the mune 'gain
this time. What ca' they ye, man?"
Still Gibbie only smiled.
"Whaur come ye frae? -- Wha's yer fowk? -- Whaur div ye bide? -- Haena ye
a tongue i' yer heid, ye rascal?"
Gibbie burst out laughing, and his eyes sparkled and shone: he was
delighted with the herd-boy, and it was so long since he had heard
human speech addressed to himself!
"The cratur's feel (foolish)!" concluded Donal to himself pityingly.
"Puir thing! puir thing!" he added aloud, and laid his hand on
Gibbie's head.
It was but the second touch of kindness Gibbie had received since he
was the dog's guest: had he been acquainted with the bastard emotion
of self-pity, he would have wept; as he was unaware of hardship in
his lot, discontent in his heart, or discord in his feeling, his
emotion was one of unmingled delight, and embodied itself in a
perfect smile.
"Come, cratur, an' I'll gie ye a piece: ye'll aiblins un'erstan'
that!" said Donal, as he turned to leave the corn for the grass,
where Hornie was eating with the rest like the most innocent of
hum'le (hornless) animals. Gibbie obeyed, and followed, as, with
slow step and downbent face, Donal led the way. For he had tucked
his club under his arm, and already his greedy eyes were fixed on
the book he had carried all the time, nor did he take them from it
until, followed in full and patient content by Gibbie, he had almost
reached the middle of the field, some distance from Hornie and her
companions, when, stopping abruptly short, he began without lifting
his head to cast glances on this side and that.
"I houp nane o' them's swallowed my nepkin!" he said musingly. "I'm
no sure whaur I was sittin'. I hae my place i' the beuk, but I
doobt I hae tint my place i' the gerse."
Long before he had ended, for he spoke with utter deliberation,
Gibbie was yards away, flitting hither and thither like a butterfly.
A minute more and Donal saw him pounce upon his bundle, which he
brought to him in triumph.
"Fegs! ye're no the gowk I took ye for," said Donal meditatively.
Whether Gibbie took the remark for a compliment, or merely was
gratified that Donal was pleased, the result was a merry laugh.
The bundle had in it a piece of hard cheese, such as Gibbie had
already made acquaintance with, and a few quarters of cakes. One of
these Donal broke in two, gave Gibbie the half, replaced the other,
and sat down again to his book -- this time with his back against the
fell-dyke dividing the grass from the corn. Gibbie seated himself,
like a Turk, with his bare legs crossed under him, a few yards off,
where, in silence and absolute content, he ate his piece, and
gravely regarded him. His human soul had of late been starved, even
more than his body -- and that from no fastidiousness; and it was
paradise again to be in such company. Never since his father's
death had he looked on a face that drew him as Donal's. It was fair
of complexion by nature, but the sun had burned it brown, and it was
covered with freckles. Its forehead was high, with a mass of foxy
hair over it, and under it two keen hazel eyes, in which the green
predominated over the brown. Its nose was long and solemn, over his
well-made mouth, which rarely smiled, but not unfrequently trembled
with emotion -- over his book. For age, Donal was getting towards
fifteen, and was strongly built, and well grown. A general look of
honesty, and an attractive expression of reposeful friendliness
pervaded his whole appearance. Conscientious in regard to his work,
he was yet in danger of forgetting his duty for minutes together in
his book. The chief evil that resulted from it was such an
occasional inroad on the corn as had that morning taken place; and
many were Donal's self-reproaches ere he got to sleep when that had
fallen out during the day. He knew his master would threaten him
with dismissal if he came upon him reading in the field, but he knew
also his master was well aware that he did read, and that it was
possible to read and yet herd well. It was easy enough in this same
meadow: on one side ran the Lorrie; on another was a stone wall; and
on the third a ditch; only the cornfield lay virtually unprotected,
and there he had to be himself the boundary. And now he sat leaning
against the dyke, as if he held so a position of special defence;
but he knew well enough that the dullest calf could outflank him,
and invade, for a few moments at the least, the forbidden
pleasure-ground. He had gained an ally, however, whose faculty and
faithfulness he little knew yet. For Gibbie had begun to comprehend
the situation. He could not comprehend why or how anyone should be
absorbed in a book, for all he knew of books was from his one
morning of dame-schooling; but he could comprehend that, if one's
attention were so occupied, it must be a great vex to be interrupted
continually by the ever-waking desires of his charge after dainties.
Therefore, as Donal watched his book, Gibbie for Donal's sake
watched the herd, and, as he did so, gently possessed himself of
Donal's club. Nor had many minutes passed before Donal, raising his
head to look, saw the curst cow again in the green corn, and Gibbie
manfully encountering her with the club, hitting her hard upon head
and horns, and deftly avoiding every rush she made at him.
"Gie her't upo' the nose," Donal shouted in terror, as he ran full
speed to his aid, abusing Hornie in terms of fiercest vituperation.
But he needed not have been so apprehensive. Gibbie heard and
obeyed, and the next moment Hornie had turned tail and was fleeing
back to the safety of the lawful meadow.
"Hech, cratur! but ye maun be come o' fechtin' fowk!" said Donal,
regarding him with fresh admiration.
Gibbie laughed; but he had been sorely put to it, and the big drops
were coursing fast down his sweet face. Donal took the club from
him, and rushing at Hornie, belaboured her well, and drove her quite
to the other side of the field. He then returned and resumed his
book, while Gibbie again sat down near by, and watched both Donal
and his charge -- the keeper of both herd and cattle. Surely Gibbie
had at last found his vocation on Daurside, with both man and beast
for his special care!
By and by Donal raised his head once more, but this time it was to
regard Gibbie and not the nowt. It had gradually sunk into him that
the appearance and character of the cratur were peculiar. He had
regarded him as a little tramp, whose people were not far off, and
who would soon get tired of herding and rejoin his companions; but
while he read, a strange feeling of the presence of the boy had, in
spite of the witchery of his book, been growing upon him. He seemed
to feel his eyes without seeing them; and when Gibbie rose to look
how the cattle were distributed, he became vaguely uneasy lest the
boy should be going away. For already he had begun to feel him a
humble kind of guardian angel. He had already that day, through
him, enjoyed a longer spell of his book, than any day since he had
been herd at the Mains of Glashruach. And now the desire had come
to regard him more closely.
For a minute or two he sat and gazed at him. Gibbie gazed at him in
return, and in his eyes the herd-boy looked the very type of power
and gentleness. How he admired even his suit of small-ribbed,
greenish-coloured corduroy, the ribs much rubbed and obliterated!
Then his jacket had round brass buttons! his trousers had patches
instead of holes at the knees! their short legs revealed warm
woollen stockings! and his shoes had their soles full of great
broad-headed iron tacks! while on his head he had a small round blue
bonnet with a red tuft! The little outcast, on the other hand, with
his loving face and pure clear eyes, bidding fair to be naked
altogether before long, woke in Donal a divine pity, a tenderness
like that nestling at the heart of womanhood. The neglected
creature could surely have no mother to shield him from frost and
wind and rain. But a strange thing was, that out of this pitiful
tenderness seemed to grow, like its blossom, another unlike
feeling -- namely, that he was in the presence of a being of some
order superior to his own, one to whom he would have to listen if he
spoke, who knew more than he would tell. But then Donal was a Celt,
and might be a poet, and the sweet stillness of the child's
atmosphere made things bud in his imagination.
My reader must think how vastly, in all his poverty, Donal was
Gibbie's superior in the social scale. He earned his own food and
shelter, and nearly four pounds a year besides; lived as well as he
could wish, dressed warm, was able for his work, and imagined it no
hardship. Then he had a father and mother whom he went to see every
Saturday, and of whom he was as proud as son could be -- a father who
was the priest of the family, and fed sheep; a mother who was the
prophetess, and kept the house ever an open refuge for her children.
Poor Gibbie earned nothing -- never had earned more than a penny at a
time in his life, and had never dreamed of having a claim to such
penny. Nobody seemed to care for him, give him anything, do
anything for him. Yet there he sat before Donal's eyes, full of
service, of smiles, of contentment.
Donal took up his book, but laid it down again and gazed at Gibbie.
Several times he tried to return to his reading, but as often
resumed his contemplation of the boy. At length it struck him as
something more than shyness would account for, that he had not yet
heard a word from the lips of the child, even when running after the
cows. He must watch him more closely.
By this it was his dinner time. Again he untied his handkerchief,
and gave Gibbie what he judged a fair share for his bulk -- namely
about a third of the whole. Philosopher as he was, however, he
could not help sighing a little when he got to the end of his
diminished portion. But he was better than comforted when Gibbie
offered him all that yet remained to him; and the smile with which
he refused it made Gibbie as happy as a prince would like to be.
What a day it had been for Gibbie! A whole human being, and some
five and twenty four-legged creatures besides, to take care of!
After their dinner, Donal gravitated to his book, and Gibbie resumed
the executive. Some time had passed when Donal, glancing up, saw
Gibbie lying flat on his chest, staring at something in the grass.
He slid himself quietly nearer, and discovered it was a daisy -- one
by itself alone; there were not many in the field. Like a mother
leaning over her child, he was gazing at it. The daisy was not a
cold white one, neither was it a red one; it was just a perfect
daisy: it looked as if some gentle hand had taken it, while it slept
and its star points were all folded together, and dipped them -- just
a tiny touchy dip, in a molten ruby, so that, when it opened again,
there was its crown of silver pointed with rubies all about its
golden sun-heart.
"He's been readin' Burns!" said Donal. He forgot that the daisies
were before Burns, and that he himself had loved them before ever he
heard of him. Now, he had not heard of Chaucer, who made love to
the daisies four hundred years before Burns. -- God only knows what
gospellers they have been on his middle-earth. All its days his
daisies have been coming and going, and they are not old yet, nor
have worn out yet their lovely garments, though they patch and darn
just as little as they toil and spin.
"Can ye read, cratur?" asked Donal.
Gibbie shook his head.
"Canna ye speyk, man?"
Again Gibbie shook his head.
"Can ye hear?"
Gibbie burst out laughing. He knew that he heard better than other
people.
"Hearken till this than," said Donal.
He took his book from the grass, and read, in a chant, or rather in
a lilt, the Danish ballad of Chyld Dyring, as translated by Sir
Walter Scott. Gibbie's eyes grew wider and wider as he listened;
their pupils dilated, and his lips parted: it seemed as if his soul
were looking out of door and windows at once -- but a puzzled soul
that understood nothing of what it saw. Yet plainly, either the
sounds, or the thought-matter vaguely operative beyond the line
where intelligence begins, or, it may be, the sparkle of individual
word or phrase islanded in a chaos of rhythmic motion, wrought
somehow upon him, for his attention was fixed as by a spell. When
Donal ceased, he remained open-mouthed and motionless for a time;
then, drawing himself slidingly over the grass to Donal's feet, he
raised his head and peeped above his knees at the book. A moment
only he gazed, and drew back with a hungry sigh: he had seen nothing
in the book like what Donal had been drawing from it -- as if one
should look into the well of which he had just drunk, and see there
nothing but dry pebbles and sand! The wind blew gentle, the sun
shone bright, all nature closed softly round the two, and the soul
whose children they were was nearer than the one to the other,
nearer than sun or wind or daisy or Chyld Dyring. To his amazement,
Donal saw the tears gathering in Gibbie's eyes. He was as one who
gazes into the abyss of God's will -- sees only the abyss, cannot see
the will, and weeps. The child in whom neither cold nor hunger nor
nakedness nor loneliness could move a throb of self-pity, was moved
to tears that a loveliness, to him strange and unintelligible, had
passed away, and he had no power to call it back.
"Wad ye like to hear't again?" asked Donal, more than half
understanding him instinctively.
Gibbie's face answered with a flash, and Donal read the poem again,
and Gibbie's delight returned greater than before, for now something
like a dawn began to appear among the cloudy words. Donal read it a
third time, and closed the book, for it was almost the hour for
driving the cattle home. He had never yet seen, and perhaps never
again did see, such a look of thankful devotion on human countenance
as met his lifted eyes.
How much Gibbie even then understood of the lovely eerie old ballad,
it is impossible for me to say. Had he a glimmer of the return of
the buried mother? Did he think of his own? I doubt if he had ever
thought that he had a mother; but he may have associated the tale
with his father, and the boots he was always making for him.
Certainly it was the beginning of much. But the waking up of a
human soul to know itself in the mirror of its thoughts and
feelings, its loves and delights, oppresses me with so heavy a sense
of marvel and inexplicable mystery, that when I imagine myself such
as Gibbie then was, I cannot imagine myself coming awake. I can
hardly believe that, from being such as Gibbie was the hour before
he heard the ballad, I should ever have come awake. Yet here I am,
capable of pleasure unspeakable from that and many another ballad,
old and new! somehow, at one time or another, or at many times in
one, I have at last come awake! When, by slow filmy unveilings,
life grew clearer to Gibbie, and he not only knew, but knew that he
knew, his thoughts always went back to that day in the meadow with
Donal Grant as the beginning of his knowledge of beautiful things in
the world of man. Then first he saw nature reflected,
Narcissus-like, in the mirror of her humanity, her highest self.
But when or how the change in him began, the turn of the balance,
the first push towards life of the evermore invisible germ -- of that
he remained, much as he wondered, often as he searched his
consciousness, as ignorant to the last as I am now. Sometimes he
was inclined to think the glory of the new experience must have
struck him dazed, and that was why he could not recall what went on
in him at the time.
Donal rose and went driving the cattle home, and Gibbie lay where he
had again thrown himself upon the grass. When he lifted his head,
Donal and the cows had vanished.
Donal had looked all round as he left the meadow, and seeing the boy
nowhere, had concluded he had gone to his people. The impression he
had made upon him faded a little during the evening. For when he
reached home, and had watered them, he had to tie up the animals,
each in its stall, and make it comfortable for the night; next, eat
his own supper; then learn a proposition of Euclid, and go to bed.
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