第37章

sae high that it washed awa' a sheepfold that stood weel up on the hill.And I've seen this verra burn, this bonny clear Callowa, lyin' like a loch for miles i' the haugh.But I never heeds a spate, for if a man just kens the way o't it's a canny, hairmless thing.I couldna wish to dee better than just be happit i' the waters o' my ain countryside, when my legs fail and I'm ower auld for the trampin'."Something in that queer figure in the setting of the hills struck a note of curious pathos.And towards evening as we returned down the glen the note grew keener.A spring sunset of gold and crimson flamed in our backs and turned the clear pools to fire.

Far off down the vale the plains and the sea gleamed half in shadow.Somehow in the fragrance and colour and the delectable crooning of the stream, the fantastic and the dim seemed tangible and present, and high sentiment revelled for once in my prosaic heart.

And still more in the breast of my companion.He stopped and sniffed the evening air, as he looked far over hill and dale and then back to the great hills above us."Yen's Crappel, and Caerdon, and the Laigh Law," he said, lingering with relish over each name, "and the Gled comes doun atween them.I haena been there for a twalmonth, and I maun hae anither glisk o't, for it's a braw place." And then some bitter thought seemed to seize him, and his mouth twitched."I'm an auld man," he cried, " and Icanna see ye a' again.There's burns and mair burns in the high hills that I'll never win to." Then he remembered my presence, and stopped."Ye maunna mind me," he said huskily, " but the sicht o' a' thae lang blue hills makes me daft, now that I've faun i' the vale o' years.Yince I was young and could get where I wantit, but now I am auld and maun bide i' the same bit.And I'm aye thinkin' o' the waters I've been to, and the green heichs and howes and the linns that I canna win to again.I maun e'en be content wi' the Callowa, which is as guid as the best."And then I left him, wandering down by the streamside and telling his crazy meditations to himself.

III

A space of years elapsed ere I met him, for fate had carried me far from the upland valleys.But once again I was afoot on the white moor-roads; and, as I swung along one autumn afternoon up the path which leads from the Glen of Callowa to the Gled, I saw a figure before me which I knew for my friend.When I overtook him, his appearance puzzled and troubled me.Age seemed to have come on him at a bound, and in the tottering figure and the stoop of weakness I had difficulty in recognising the hardy frame of the man as I had known him.Something, too, had come over his face.His brow was clouded, and the tan of weather stood out hard and cruel on a blanched cheek.His eye seemed both wilder and sicklier, and for the first time I saw him with none of the appurtenances of his trade.He greeted me feebly and dully, and showed little wish to speak.He walked with slow, uncertain step, and his breath laboured with a new panting.Every now and then he would look at me sidewise, and in his feverish glance Icould detect none of the free kindliness of old.The man was ill in body and mind.

I asked him how he had done since I saw him last.

"It's an ill world now," he said in a slow, querulous voice.

"There's nae need for honest men, and nae leevin'.Folk dinna heed me ava now.They dinna buy my besoms, they winna let me bide a nicht in their byres, and they're no like the kind canty folk in the auld times.And a' the countryside is changin'.

Doun by Goldieslaw they're makkin' a dam for takin' water to the toun, and they're thinkin' o' daein' the like wi' the Callowa.

Guid help us, can they no let the works o' God alane? Is there no room for them in the dirty lawlands that they maun file the hills wi' their biggins?"I conceived dimly that the cause of his wrath was a scheme for waterworks at the border of the uplands, but I had less concern for this than his strangely feeble health.

"You are looking ill," I said."What has come over you?""Oh, I canna last for aye," he said mournfully."My auld body's about dune.I've warkit it ower sair when I had it, and it's gaun to fail on my hands.Sleepin' out o' wat nichts and gangin'

lang wantin' meat are no the best ways for a long life"; and he smiled the ghost of a smile.

And then he fell to wild telling of the ruin of the place and the hardness of the people, and I saw that want and bare living had gone far to loosen his wits.I knew the countryside, and Irecognised that change was only in his mind.And a great pity seized me for this lonely figure toiling on in the bitterness of regret.I tried to comfort him, but my words were useless, for he took no heed of me; with bent head and faltering step he mumbled his sorrows to himself.

Then of a sudden we came to the crest of the ridge where the road dips from the hill-top to the sheltered valley.Sheer from the heather ran the white streak till it lost itself among the reddening rowans and the yellow birks of the wood.The land was rich in autumn colour, and the shining waters dipped and fell through a pageant of russet and gold.And all around hills huddled in silent spaces, long brown moors crowned with cairns, or steep fortresses of rock and shingle rising to foreheads of steel-like grey.The autumn blue faded in the far sky-line to white, and lent distance to the farther peaks.The hush of the wilderness, which is far different from the hush of death, brooded over the scene, and like faint music came the sound of a distant scytheswing, and the tinkling whisper which is the flow of a hundred streams.

I am an old connoisseur in the beauties of the uplands, but Iheld my breath at the sight.And when I glanced at my companion, he, too, had raised his head, and stood with wide nostrils and gleaming eye revelling in this glimpse of Arcady.Then he found his voice, and the weakness and craziness seemed for one moment to leave him.