“My native land, good night.”
Lord Byron.
In the present day, a journey from Edinburgh to London is a matter at once safe, brief, and simple, however inexperienced or unprotected the traveller. Numerous coaches of different rates of charge, and as many packets, are perpetually passing and repassing betwixt the capital of Britain and her northern sister, so that the most timid or indolent may execute such a journey upon a few hours’ notice. But it was different in 1737. So slight and infrequent was the intercourse betwixt London and Edinburgh, that men still alive remember that upon one occasion the mail from the former city arrived at the General Post-Office in Scotland with only one letter in it.1
The usual mode of travelling was by means of post-horses, the traveller occupying one, and his guide another, in which manner, by relays of horses from stage to stage, the journey might be accomplished in a wonderfully short time by those who could endure fatigue. To have the bones shaken to pieces by a constant change of those hacks was a luxury for the rich — the poor were under the necessity of using the mode of conveyance with which nature had provided them.
With a strong heart, and a frame patient of fatigue, Jeanie Deans, travelling at the rate of twenty miles a-day, and sometimes farther, traversed the southern part of Scotland, and advanced as far as Durham.
Hitherto she had been either among her own country-folk, or those to whom her bare feet and tartan screen were objects too familiar to attract much attention. But as she advanced, she perceived that both circumstances exposed her to sarcasm and taunts, which she might otherwise have escaped; and although in her heart she thought it unkind, and inhospitable, to sneer at a passing stranger on account of the fashion of her attire, yet she had the good sense to alter those parts of her dress which attracted ill-natured observation. Her chequed screen was deposited carefully in her bundle, and she conformed to the national extravagance of wearing shoes and stockings for the whole day. She confessed afterwards, that, “besides the wastrife, it was lang or she could walk sae comfortably with the shoes as without them; but there was often a bit saft heather by the road-side, and that helped her weel on.” The want of the screen, which was drawn over the head like a veil, she supplied by a bon-grace, as she called it; a large straw bonnet like those worn by the English maidens when labouring in the fields. “But I thought unco shame o’ mysell,” she said, “the first time I put on a married woman’s bon-grace, and me a single maiden.”
With these changes she had little, as she said, to make “her kenspeckle when she didna speak,” but her accent and language drew down on her so many jests and gibes, couched in a worse patois by far than her own, that she soon found it was her interest to talk as little and as seldom as possible. She answered, therefore, civil salutations of chance passengers with a civil courtesy, and chose, with anxious circumspection, such places of repose as looked at once most decent and sequestered. She found the common people of England, although inferior in courtesy to strangers, such as was then practised in her own more unfrequented country, yet, upon the whole, by no means deficient in the real duties of hospitality. She readily obtained food, and shelter, and protection at a very moderate rate, which sometimes the generosity of mine host altogether declined, with a blunt apology — “Thee hast a long way afore thee, lass; and I’se ne’er take penny out o’ a single woman’s purse; it’s the best friend thou can have on the road.”
It often happened, too, that mine hostess was struck with “the tidy, nice Scotch body,” and procured her an escort, or a cast in a waggon, for some part of the way, or gave her a useful advice and recommendation respecting her resting-places.
At York our pilgrim stopped for the best part of a day, partly to recruit her strength — partly because she had the good luck to obtain a lodging in an inn kept by a countrywoman — partly to indite two letters to her father and Reuben Butler; an operation of some little difficulty, her habits being by no means those of literary composition. That to her father was in the following words. —
“Dearest Father — I make my present pilgrimage more heavy and burdensome, through the sad occasion to reflect that it is without your knowledge, which, God knows, was far contrary to my heart; for Scripture says, that ‘the vow of the daughter should not be binding without the consent of the father,’ wherein it may be I have been guilty to tak this wearie journey without your consent. Nevertheless, it was borne in upon my mind that I should be an instrument to help my poor sister in this extremity of needcessity, otherwise I wad not, for wealth or for world’s gear, or for the haill lands of Da’keith and Lugton, have done the like o’ this, without your free will and knowledge. Oh, dear father, as ye wad desire a blessing on my journey, and upon your household, speak a word or write a line of comfort to yon poor prisoner. If she has sinned, she has sorrowed and suffered, and ye ken better than me, that we maun forgie others, as we pray to be forgien. Dear father, forgive my saying this muckle, for it doth not become a young head to instruct grey hairs; but I am sae far frae ye, that my heart yearns to ye a’, and fain wad I hear that ye had forgien her trespass, and sae I nae doubt say mair than may become me. The folk here are civil, and, like the barbarians unto the holy apostle, hae shown me much kindness; and there are a sort of chosen people in the land, for they hae some kirks without organs that are like ours, and are called meeting-houses, where the minister preaches without a gown. But most of the country are prelatists, whilk is awfu’ to think; and I saw twa men that were ministers following hunds, as bauld as Roslin or Driden, the young Laird of Loup-the-dike, or ony wild gallant in Lothian. A sorrowfa’ sight to behold! Oh, dear father, may a blessing be with your down-lying and up-rising, and remember in your prayers your affectionate daughter to command,
“Jean Deans.”
A postscript bore,
“I learned from a decent woman, a grazier’s widow, that they hae a cure for the muir-ill in Cumberland, whilk is ane pint, as they ca’t, of yill, whilk is a dribble in comparison of our gawsie Scots pint, and hardly a mutchkin, boiled wi’ sope and hartshorn draps, and toomed doun the creature’s throat wi’ ane whorn. Ye might try it on the bauson-faced year-auld quey; an it does nae gude, it can do nae ill. — She was a kind woman, and seemed skeely about horned beasts. When I reach Lunnon, I intend to gang to our cousin Mrs. Glass, the tobacconist, at the sign o’ the Thistle, wha is so ceevil as to send you down your spleuchan-fu’ anes a year; and as she must be well kend in Lunnon, I doubt not easily to find out where she lives.”
Being seduced into betraying our heroine’s confidence thus far, we will stretch our communication a step beyond, and impart to the reader her letter to her lover.
“Mr. Reuben Butler — Hoping this will find you better, this comes to say, that I have reached this great town safe, and am not wearied with walking, but the better for it. And I have seen many things which I trust to tell you one day, also the muckle kirk of this place; and all around the city are mills, whilk havena muckle wheels nor mill-dams, but gang by the wind — strange to behold. Ane miller asked me to gang in and see it work, but I wad not, for I am not come to the south to make acquaintance with strangers. I keep the straight road, and just beck if onybody speaks to me ceevilly, and answers naebody with the tong but women of my ain sect. I wish, Mr. Butler, I kend onything that wad mak ye weel, for they hae mair medicines in this town of York than wad cure a’ Scotland, and surely some of them wad be gude for your complaints. If ye had a kindly motherly body to nurse ye, and no to let ye waste yoursell wi’ reading — whilk ye read mair than eneugh wi’ the bairns in the schule — and to gie ye warm milk in the morning, I wad be mair easy for ye. Dear Mr. Butler, keep a good heart, for we are in the hands of Ane that kens better what is gude for us than we ken what is for oursells. I hae nae doubt to do that for which I am come — I canna doubt it — I winna think to doubt it — because, if I haena full assurance, how shall I bear myself with earnest entreaties in the great folk’s presence? But to ken that ane’s purpose is right, and to make their heart strong, is the way to get through the warst day’s darg. The bairns’ rime says, the warst blast of the borrowing days2 couldna kill the three silly poor hog-lams.
“And if it be God’s pleasure, we that are sindered in sorrow may meet again in joy, even on this hither side of Jordan. I dinna bid ye mind what I said at our partin’ anent my poor father, and that misfortunate lassie, for I ken you will do sae for the sake of Christian charity, whilk is mair than the entreaties of her that is your servant to command,
“Jeanie Deans.”
This letter also had a postscript.
“Dear Reuben, If ye think that it wad hae been right for me to have said mair and kinder things to ye, just think that I hae written sae, since I am sure that I wish a’ that is kind and right to ye and by ye. Ye will think I am turned waster, for I wear clean hose and shoon every day; but it’s the fashion here for decent bodies and ilka land has it’s ain landlaw. Ower and aboon a’, if laughing days were e’er to come back again till us, ye wad laugh weel to see my round face at the far end of a strae bon-grace, that looks as muckle............