CHAPTER X.

I have possessed the regulation of the weather and the

distribution of the seasons. The sun has listened to my

dictates, and passed from tropic to tropic by my direction;

the clouds, at my command, have poured forth their waters.

RASSELAS.

Any sudden cause for anxious and mortifying reflection, which, in

advanced age, occasions sullen and pensive inactivity, stimulates youth

to eager and active exertion; as if, like the hurt deer, they

endeavoured to drown the pain of the shaft by the rapidity of motion.

When Mordaunt caught up his gun, and rushed out of the house of

Jarlshof, he walked on with great activity over waste and wild, without

any determined purpose, except that of escaping, if possible, from the

smart of his own irritation. His pride was effectually mortified by the

report of the jagger, which coincided exactly with some doubts he had

been led to entertain, by the long and unkind silence of his friends at

Burgh-Westra.

If the fortunes of Cæsar had doomed him, as the poet suggests, to have

been

"But the best wrestler on the green,"

it is nevertheless to be presumed, that a foil from a rival, in that

rustic exercise, would have mortified him as much as a defeat from a

competitor, when he was struggling for the empery of the world. And even

so Mordaunt Mertoun, degraded in his own eyes from the height which he

had occupied as the chief amongst the youth of the island, felt vexed

and irritated, as well as humbled. The two beautiful sisters, also,

whose smiles all were so desirous of acquiring, with whom he had lived

on terms of such familiar affection, that, with the same ease and

innocence, there was unconsciously mixed a shade of deeper though

undefined tenderness than characterises fraternal love,--they also

seemed to have forgotten him. He could not be ignorant, that, in the

universal opinion of all Dunrossness, nay, of the whole Mainland, he

might have had every chance of being the favoured lover of either; and

now at once, and without any failure on his part, he was become so

little to them, that he had lost even the consequence of an ordinary

acquaintance. The old Udaller, too, whose hearty and sincere character

should have made him more constant in his friendships, seemed to have

been as fickle as his daughters, and poor Mordaunt had at once lost the

smiles of the fair, and the favour of the powerful. These were

uncomfortable reflections, and he doubled his pace, that he might

outstrip them if possible.

Without exactly reflecting upon the route which he pursued, Mordaunt

walked briskly on through a country where neither hedge, wall, nor

enclosure of any kind, interrupts the steps of the wanderer, until he

reached a very solitary spot, where, embosomed among steep heathy hills,

which sunk suddenly down on the verge of the water, lay one of those

small fresh-water lakes which are common in the Zetland isles, whose

outlets form the sources of the small brooks and rivulets by which the

country is watered, and serve to drive the little mills which

manufacture their grain.

It was a mild summer day; the beams of the sun, as is not uncommon in

Zetland, were moderated and shaded by a silvery haze, which filled the

atmosphere, and destroying the strong contrast of light and shade, gave

even to noon the sober livery of the evening twilight. The little lake,

not three-quarters of a mile in circuit, lay in profound quiet; its

surface undimpled, save when one of the numerous water-fowl, which

glided on its surface, dived for an instant under it. The depth of the

water gave the whole that cerulean tint of bluish green, which

occasioned its being called the Green Loch; and at present, it formed so

perfect a mirror to the bleak hills by which it was surrounded, and

which lay reflected on its bosom, that it was difficult to distinguish

the water from the land; nay, in the shadowy uncertainty occasioned by

the thin haze, a stranger could scarce have been sensible that a sheet

of water lay before him. A scene of more complete solitude, having all

its peculiarities heightened by the extreme serenity of the weather, the

quiet grey composed tone of the atmosphere, and the perfect silence of

the elements, could hardly be imagined. The very aquatic birds, who

frequented the spot in great numbers, forbore their usual flight and

screams, and floated in profound tranquillity upon the silent water.

Without taking any determined aim--without having any determined

purpose--without almost thinking what he was about, Mordaunt presented

his fowlingpiece, and fired across the lake. The large swan shot dimpled

its surface like a partial shower of hail--the hills took up the noise

of the report, and repeated it again, and again, and again, to all their

echoes; the water-fowl took to wing in eddying and confused wheel,

answering the echoes with a thousand varying screams, from the deep note

of the swabie, or swartback, to the querulous cry of the tirracke and

kittiewake.

Mordaunt looked for a moment on the clamorous crowd with a feeling of

resentment, which he felt disposed at the moment to apply to all nature,

and all her objects, animate or inanimate, however little concerned with

the cause of his internal mortification.

"Ay, ay," he said, "wheel, dive, scream, and clamour as you will, and

all because you have seen a strange sight, and heard an unusual sound.

There is many a one like you in this round world. But you, at least,

shall learn," he added, as he reloaded his gun, "that strange sights and

strange sounds, ay, and strange acquaintances to boot, have sometimes a

little shade of danger connected with them.--But why should I wreak my

own vexation on these harmless sea-gulls?" he subjoined, after a

moment's pause; "they have nothing to do with the friends that have

forgotten me.--I loved them all so well,--and to be so soon given up for

the first stranger whom chance threw on the coast!"

As he stood resting upon his gun, and abandoning his mind to the course

of these unpleasant reflections, his meditations were unexpectedly

interrupted by some one touching his shoulder. He looked around, and saw

Norna of the Fitful-head, wrapped in her dark and ample mantle. She had

seen him from the brow of the hill, and had descended to the lake,

through a small ravine which concealed her, until she came with

noiseless step so close to him that he turned round at her touch.

Mordaunt Mertoun was by nature neither timorous nor credulous, and a

course of reading more extensive than usual had, in some degree,

fortified his mind against the attacks of superstition; but he would

have been an actual prodigy, if, living in Zetland in the end of the

seventeenth century, he had possessed the philosophy which did not exist

in Scotland generally, until at least two generations later. He doubted

in his own mind the extent, nay, the very existence, of Norna's

supernatural attributes, which was a high flight of incredulity in the

country where they were universally received; but still his incredulity

went no farther than doubts. She was unquestionably an extraordinary

woman, gifted with an energy above others, acting upon motives peculiar

to herself, and apparently independent of mere earthly considerations.

Impressed with these ideas, which he had imbibed from his youth, it was

not without something like alarm, that he beheld this mysterious female

standing on a sudden so close beside him, and looking upon him with such

sad and severe eyes, as those with which the Fatal Virgins, who,

according to northern mythology, were called the _Valkyriur_, or

"Choosers of the Slain," were supposed to regard the young champions

whom they selected to share the banquet of Odin.

It was, indeed, reckoned unlucky, to say the least, to meet with Norna

suddenly alone, and in a place remote from witnesses; and she was

supposed, on such occasions, to have been usually a prophetess of evil,

as well as an omen of misfortune, to those who had such a rencontre.

There were few or none of the islanders, however familiarized with her

occasional appearance in society, that would not have trembled to meet

her on the solitary banks of the Green Loch.

"I bring you no evil, Mordaunt Mertoun," she said, reading perhaps

something of this superstitious feeling in the looks of the young man.

"Evil from me you never felt, and never will."

"Nor do I fear any," said Mordaunt, exerting himself to throw aside an

apprehension which he felt to be unmanly. "Why should I, mother? You

have been ever my friend."

"Yet, Mordaunt, thou art not of our region; but to none of Zetland

blood, no, not even to those who sit around the hearth-stone of Magnus

Troil, the noble descendants of the ancient Jarls of Orkney, am I more a

well-wisher, than I am to thee, thou kind and brave-hearted boy. When I

hung around thy neck that gifted chain, which all in our isles know was

wrought by no earthly artist, but by the Drows,[36] in the secret

recesses of their caverns, thou wert then but fifteen years old; yet thy

foot had been on the Maiden-skerrie of Northmaven, known before but to

the webbed sole of the swartback, and thy skiff had been in the deepest

cavern of Brinnastir, where the _haaf-fish_[37] had before slumbered in

dark obscurity. Therefore I gave thee that noble gift; and well thou

knowest, that since that day, every eye in these isles has looked on

thee as a son, or as a brother, endowed beyond other youths, and the

favoured of those whose hour of power is when the night meets with the

day."

"Alas! mother," said Mordaunt, "your kind gift may have given me favour,

but it has not been able to keep it for me, or I have not been able to

keep it for myself.--What matters it? I shall learn to set as little by

others as they do by me. My father says that I shall soon leave these

islands, and therefore, Mother Norna, I will return to you your fairy

gift, that it may bring more lasting luck to some other than it has done

to me."

"Despise not the gift of the nameless race," said Norna, frowning; then

suddenly changing her tone of displeasure to that of mournful solemnity,

she added,--"Despise them not, but, O Mordaunt, court them not! Sit down

on that grey stone--thou art the son of my adoption, and I will doff, as

far as I may, those attributes that sever me from the common mass of

humanity, and speak with you as a parent with a child."

There was a tremulous tone of grief which mingled with the loftiness of

her language and carriage, and was calculated to excite sympathy, as

well as to attract attention. Mordaunt sat down on the rock which she

pointed out, a fragment which, with many others that lay scattered

around, had been torn by some winter storm from the precipice at the

foot of which it lay, upon the very verge of the water. Norna took her

own seat on a stone at about three feet distance, adjusted her mantle so

that little more than her forehead, her eyes, and a single lock of her

grey hair, were seen from beneath the shade of her dark wadmaal cloak,

and then proceeded in a tone in which the imaginary consequence and

importance so often assumed by lunacy, seemed to contend against the

deep workings of some extraordinary and deeply-rooted mental affliction.

"I was not always," she said, "that which I now am. I was not always the

wise, the powerful, the commanding, before whom the young stand abashed,

and the old uncover their grey heads. There was a time when my

appearance did not silence mirth, when I sympathized with human passion,

and had my own share in human joy or sorrow. It was a time of

helplessness--it was a time of folly--it was a time of idle and

unfruitful laughter--it was a time of causeless and senseless

tears;--and yet, with its follies, and its sorrows, and its weaknesses,

what would Norna of Fitful-head give to be again the unmarked and happy

maiden that she was in her early days! Hear me, Mordaunt, and bear with

me; for you hear me utter complaints which have never sounded in mortal

ears, and which in mortal ears shall never sound again. I will be what I

ought," she continued, starting up and extending her lean and withered

arm, "the queen and protectress of these wild and neglected isles,--I

will be her whose foot the wave wets not, save by her permission; ay,

even though its rage be at its wildest madness--whose robe the whirlwind

respects, when it rends the house-rigging from the roof-tree. Bear me

witness, Mordaunt Mertoun,--you heard my words at Harfra--you saw the

tempest sink before them--Speak, bear me witness!"

To have contradicted her in this strain of high-toned enthusiasm, would

have been cruel and unavailing, even had Mordaunt been more decidedly

convinced than he was, that an insane woman, not one of supernatural

power, stood before him.

"I heard you sing," he replied, "and I saw the tempest abate."

"Abate?" exclaimed Norna, striking the ground impatiently with her staff

of black oak; "thou speakest it but half--it sunk at once--sunk in

shorter space than the child that is hushed to silence by the

nurse.--Enough, you know my power--but you know not--mortal man knows

not, and never shall know, the price which I paid to attain it. No,

Mordaunt, never for the widest sway that the ancient Norsemen boasted,

when their banners waved victorious from Bergen to Palestine--never, for

all that the round world contains, do thou barter thy peace of mind for

such greatness as Norna's." She resumed her seat upon the rock, drew the

mantle over her face, rested her head upon her hands, and by the

convulsive motion which agitated her bosom, appeared to be weeping

bitterly.

"Good Norna," said Mordaunt, and paused, scarce knowing what to say that

might console the unhappy woman--"Good Norna," he again resumed, "if

there be aught in your mind that troubles it, were you not best to go to

the worthy minister at Dunrossness? Men say you have not for many years

been in a Christian congregation--that cannot be well, or right. You are

yourself well known as a healer of bodily disease; but when the mind is

sick, we should draw to the Physician of our souls."

Norna had raised her person slowly from the stooping posture in which

she sat; but at length she started up on her feet, threw back her

mantle, extended her arm, and while her lip foamed, and her eye

sparkled, exclaimed in a tone resembling a scream,--"Me did you

speak--me did you bid seek out a priest!--would you kill the good man

with horror?--Me in a Christian congregation!--Would you have the roof

to fall on the sackless assembly, and mingle their blood with their

worship? I--I seek to the good Physician!--Would you have the fiend

claim his prey openly before God and man?"

The extreme agitation of the unhappy speaker naturally led Mordaunt to

the conclusion, which was generally adopted and accredited in that

superstitious country and period. "Wretched woman," he said, "if indeed

thou hast leagued thyself with the Powers of Evil, why should you not

seek even yet for repentance? But do as thou wilt, I cannot, dare not,

as a Christian, abide longer with you; and take again your gift," he

said, offering back the chain. "Good can never come of it, if indeed

evil hath not come already."

"Be still and hear me, thou foolish boy," said Norna, calmly, as if she

had been restored to reason by the alarm and horror which she perceived

in Mordaunt's countenance;--"hear me, I say. I am not of those who have

leagued themselves with the Enemy of Mankind, or derive skill or power

from his ministry. And although the unearthly powers _were_ propitiated

by a sacrifice which human tongue can never utter, yet, God knows, my

guilt in that offering was no more than that of the blind man who falls

from the precipice which he could neither see nor shun. O, leave me

not--shun me not--in this hour of weakness! Remain with me till the

temptation be passed, or I will plunge myself into that lake, and rid

myself at once of my power and my wretchedness!"

Mordaunt, who had always looked up to this singular woman with a sort of

affection, occasioned no doubt by the early kindness and distinction

which she had shown to him, was readily induced to reassume his seat,

and listen to what she had further to say, in hopes that she would

gradually overcome the violence of her agitation. It was not long ere

she seemed to have gained the victory her companion expected, for she

addressed him in her usual steady and authoritative manner.

"It was not of myself, Mordaunt, that I purposed to speak, when I beheld

you from the summit of yonder grey rock, and came down the path to meet

with you. My fortunes are fixed beyond change, be it for weal or for

woe. For myself I have ceased to feel much; but for those whom she

loves, Norna of the Fitful-head has still those feelings which link her

to her kind. Mark me. There is an eagle, the noblest that builds in

these airy precipices, and into that eagle's nest there has crept an

adder--wilt thou lend thy aid to crush the reptile, and to save the

noble brood of the lord of the north sky?"

"You must speak more plainly, Norna," said Mordaunt, "if you would have

me understand or answer you. I am no guesser of riddles."

"In plain language, then, you know well the family of Burgh-Westra--the

lovely daughters of the generous old Udaller, Magnus Troil,--Minna and

Brenda, I mean? You know them, and you love them?"

"I have known them, mother," replied Mordaunt, "and I have loved

them--none knows it better than yourself."

"To know them once," said Norna, emphatically, "is to know them always.

To love them once, is to love them for ever."

"To have loved them once, is to wish them well for ever," replied the

youth; "but it is nothing more. To be plain with you, Norna, the family

at Burgh-Westra have of late totally neglected me. But show me the means

of serving them, I will convince you how much I have remembered old

kindness, how little I resent late coldness."

"It is well spoken, and I will put your purpose to the proof," replied

Norna. "Magnus Troil has taken a serpent into his bosom--his lovely

daughters are delivered up to the machinations of a villain."

"You mean the stranger, Cleveland?" said Mordaunt.

"The stranger who so calls himself," replied Norna--"the same whom we

found flung ashore, like a waste heap of sea-weed, at the foot of the

Sumburgh-cape. I felt that within me, that would have prompted me to let

him lie till the tide floated him off, as it had floated him on shore. I

repent me I gave not way to it."

"But," said Mordaunt, "I cannot repent that I did my duty as a Christian

man. And what right have I to wish otherwise? If Minna, Brenda, Magnus,

and the rest, like that stranger better than me, I have no title to be

offended; nay, I might well be laughed at for bringing myself into

comparison."

"It is well, and I trust they merit thy unselfish friendship."

"But I cannot perceive," said Mordaunt, "in what you can propose that I

should serve them. I have but just learned by Bryce the jagger, that

this Captain Cleveland is all in all with the ladies at Burgh-Westra,

and with the Udaller himself. I would like ill to intrude myself where I

am not welcome, or to place my home-bred merit in comparison with

Captain Cleveland's. He can tell them of battles, when I can only speak

of birds' nests--can speak of shooting Frenchmen, when I can only tell

of shooting seals--he wears gay clothes, and bears a brave countenance;

I am plainly dressed, and plainly nurtured. Such gay gallants as he can

noose the hearts of those he lives with, as the fowler nooses the

guillemot with his rod and line."

"You do wrong to yourself," replied Norna, "wrong to yourself, and

greater wrong to Minna and Brenda. And trust not the reports of

Bryce--he is like the greedy chaffer-whale, that will change his course

and dive for the most petty coin which a fisher can cast at him. Certain

it is, that if you have been lessened in the opinion of Magnus Troil,

that sordid fellow hath had some share in it. But let him count his

vantage, for my eye is upon him."

"And why, mother," said Mordaunt, "do you not tell to Magnus what you

have told to me?"

"Because," replied Norna, "they who wax wise in their own conceit must

be taught a bitter lesson by experience. It was but yesterday that I

spoke with Magnus, and what was his reply?--'Good Norna, you grow old.'

And this was spoken by one bounden to me by so many and such close

ties--by the descendant of the ancient Norse earls--this was from Magnus

Troil to me; and it was said in behalf of one, whom the sea flung forth

as wreck-weed! Since he despises the counsel of the aged, he shall be

taught by that of the young; and well that he is not left to his own

folly. Go, therefore, to Burgh-Westra, as usual, upon the Baptist's

festival."

"I have had no invitation," said Mordaunt; "I am not wanted, not wished

for, not thought of--perhaps I shall not be acknowledged if I go

thither; and yet, mother, to confess the truth, thither I had thought to

go."

"It was a good thought, and to be cherished," replied Norna; "we seek

our friends when they are sick in health, why not when they are sick in

mind, and surfeited with prosperity? Do not fail to go--it may be, we

shall meet there. Meanwhile our roads lie different. Farewell, and speak

not of this meeting."

They parted, and Mordaunt remained standing by the lake, with his eyes

fixed on Norna, until her tall dark form became invisible among the

windings of the valley down which she wandered, and Mordaunt returned to

his father's mansion, determined to follow counsel which coincided so

well with his own wishes.

FOOTNOTES:

[36] The Drows, or Trows, the legitimate successors of the northern

_duergar_, and somewhat allied to the fairies, reside, like them, in the

interior of green hills and caverns, and are most powerful at midnight.

They are curious artificers in iron, as well as in the precious metals,

and are sometimes propitious to mortals, but more frequently capricious

and malevolent. Among the common people of Zetland, their existence

still forms an article of universal belief. In the neighbouring isles of

Feroe, they are called Foddenskencand, or subterranean people; and Lucas

Jacobson Debes,(_h_) well acquainted with their nature, assures us that

they inhabit those places which are polluted with the effusion of blood,

or the practice of any crying sin. They have a government, which seems

to be monarchical.

[37] The larger seal, or sea-calf, which seeks the most solitary

recesses for its abode. See Dr. EDMONSTONE'S _Zetland_, vol. ii., p.

294.