I saw a hill fox rise and run. He was a fine beast and very red, and held his tail nobly behind him like a flag. But, hardly beset1 as we were, we could with difficulty have eaten fox, even had I been able to shoot him, which I was not.
The day passed slowly, the night came, and it went sore to my heart that I was able to do so little for the friend of one I loved. I saw that he would have mended readily enough, if he had received the right nutriment, which, alas2! it seemed far out of my power to obtain. Yet in the morning, when I went to the mouth of the cave, lo! there, immediately to the right of me, on a bare place, were two great whaup eggs, broad-buttocked and splashed with black. I never was gladder to see food. It was late for the whaups to be breeding; and, indeed, they had mostly left the moorland by that time. But, nevertheless, it was manifest that Providence3 had bidden some bird, perhaps disappointed of an earlier brood or late mated, to come and lay the eggs before our door.
I bade Anton take the eggs by the ancient method of sucking—which he made shift to do, and was very greatly strengthened thereby6. So every morning as long as we remained there, the wild bird laid an egg in the morning, which made the Covenanter's breakfast. This is but one of the daily marvels8 from the Lord which attended our progress. For whensoever those that have been through the perilous9 time come together, they recount these things to one another, and each has his like tale of preservation10 and protection to tell.
But that minds me of a strange thing. Once during the little while when I companied with the Compellers, it was my hap4 to meet with clattering11 John Crichton, that rank persecutor12. And what was my surprise to hear that all his talk ran upon certain providential dreams he had had in the night time, by which there was revealed to him the hiding place of many of the "fanatics13." Aye, and even the very place pointed5 out to him in the dream where it would be most convenient to compass their capturing. And this in due time he brought about, or said he did. But, for all that, I do not think that the company he was among set great store by his truthfulness14. For after each wondrous15 story of adventure and second-sight they would roar with laughter, and say: "Well done, Crichton! Out with another one!"
After a day or two of this lack of food, it came suddenly to me what a dumbhead I was, to bide16 with an empty belly17 in a place where at least there must be plenty of fish near at hand. So I rose early from off my bed of heather tops, and betook me down to the river edge. It is nothing but a burn which they call the Eglin Lane, a long, bare water, slow and peaty, but with some trout18 of size in it. Also from the broads of Loch Macaterick, there came another burn with clearer sparkling water and much sand in the pools. There were trout in both, as one might see by stealing up to the edge of the brow and looking over quickly. But owing to the drought, there was water only in the pools of Eglin, and often but the smallest trickle19 beneath the stones.
I had a beauty out in a few moments; for so eager was I that I leaped into the burn just as I was, without so much as waiting to take off any of my garments. So in the pool there was a-rushing and a-chasing till I had him out on the grass, his speckled sides glinting bonny on the heather as he tossed himself briskly from side to side. I followed the burn down to the fork of the water that flows from Loch Macaterick, and fished all the pools in this manner. By that time I had enough for three meals at the least; or perhaps, considering the poor state of our appetites, for more than that. I put those we should not want that day into a pretty little fish-pond, which makes a kind of backwater on one of the burns springing down from the side of the Rig of the Star. And this was the beginning of the fish-pond which continued to supply us with food all the time we abode20 there.
While I was in the river bottom, it chanced that I looked up the great smooth slopes of the opposite hill, which is one of the range of Kells.
There is a little shaggy clump21 of trees on the bare side of it, and I could have sworn that among the trees I saw people stirring.
I could only think that the people there were wanderers like ourselves, or else spies sent to keep an eye on this wide, wild valley between the Garryhorn hill and the Spear of the Merrick.
So I came back to the cave no little dashed in spirit, in spite of my great successes with the trout. I said nothing about what I had seen to Auld22 Anton, for he was both weak and feverish23. And though certainly mending, he was not yet able to move out into the sunshine and lie among the bracken, a thing which would have done him much good on these still warm days.
But I made a fire with heather and the roots of ancient trees, which in that strange wild desert stick out of the peat at every step. There I roasted the trout, of which Anton Lennox ate heartily24. I think they had more relish25 to a sick man's palate than whaup eggs, even though these came to him as it were in a miraculous26 manner; while I had guddled the trout with my boots and breeks on.
When the meal was over, I bethought me that I should make an excuse, and steal away over to the side of the Meaull, to see what it might be that was stirring on that lonely brae-face. For save the scraggy scrunts of the rowan trees and birks that surround the cave, there was not a tree within sight, till the woods at the upper end of Loch Doon began to take the sun.
I carefully charged my pistols and told Anton how I proposed to go out to shoot mountain hares or other victual that I could see.
He did not say a word to bid me stay, but only advised me to keep very close to the cave. Because, once off the bosky face of the cliff, there was no saying what hidden eyes might spy me out. For Lag, he said, was certainly lying in hold at Garryhorn at that time, and Claverhouse himself was on the borders of the country. Concerning this last I knew better than he, and was much desirous that we could get Anton well enough to move further out of the reach of his formidable foes27.
I started just when the heated haze28 of the afternoon was clearing with the first early-falling chill of even. The hills were casting shadows upon each other towards the Dungeon29 and Loch Enoch, where, in the wildest and most rugged30 country, some of the folk of the wilderness31 were in hiding.
As I went I heard the grey crow croak32 and the muckle corbie cry "Glonk," somewhere over by the Slock of the Hooden. They had got a lamb to themselves or a dead sheep belike. But to me it sounded like the gloating of the dragoons over some captured company of the poor wandering Presbyters. It seemed a strange thing for me, when I came to think of it, that I, the son of the Laird of Earlstoun, my mother, that had long time been the lady thereof, and my brother Sandy, that was now Earlstoun himself, should all be skipping and hiding like thieves, with the dragoons at our tail. Now this thought came not often to us, who were born during the low estate of the Scottish kirk. But when it did come, the thought was even more bitter to us, because we had no sustaining memories of her former high estate, nor remembered what God's kirk had been in Scotland from the year 1638 down to the weary coming of Charles Stuart and the down-sitting of the Drunken Parliament in the Black Year of Sixty.
But for all that I thought on these things as I went. Right carefully I kept the cover of every heather bush, peat hag, muckle grey granite33 stone, and waving clump of bracken. So that in no long space, by making a wide circuit, I came to look down upon the little clump of trees, where I had seen the figures moving, as I guddled the trout for our dinner in the reaches of the Eglin Lane.
Now, however, there seemed to be a great quietness all about the place, and the scanty34 trees did not so much as wave a branch in the still air of the afternoon.
Yet I saw, as it had been the waft35 of a jaypiet's wing among them, when I came over the steep rocks of the Hooden's Slock, and went to ford36 the Gala Lane—which like the other water was, by the action of the long dry year, sunken to no more than a chain of pools. But as I circled about and came behind the trees, there was, as I say, a great quiet. My heart went up and down like a man's hand at the flail37 in a barn. Yet for my unquiet, there was no great apparent reason. It might be, indeed, that the enemies had laid a snare38 for me, and that I was already as good as setting out for the Grassmarket, with the ladder and the rope before me, and the lad with the piebald coat at my tail. And this was a sore thought to me, for we Gordons are not of a race that take hanging lightly. We never had more religion than we could carry for comfort. Yet we always got our paiks for what little we had, on which side soever we might be. It is a strange thing that we should always have managed to come out undermost whichever party was on top, and of this I cannot tell the reason. On the other hand, the Kennedies trimmed their sails to the breeze as it blew, and were ever on the wave's crest40. But then they were Ayrshiremen. And Ayr, it is well kenned39, aye beats Galloway—that is, till it comes to the deadly bellyful of fighting.
Thus I communed with myself, ever drawing nearer to the clump of trees on the side of the Meaull, and murmuring good Protestant prayers, as if they had been no better than Mary's beads41 all the time.
As I came to the little gairy above the trees, I looked down, and from the verge42 of it I saw the strangest contrivance. It was a hut beside a tiny runlet of water—a kind of bower43 with the sides made of bog-oak stobs taken from the edges of the strands44. The roof was daintily theeked with green rushes and withes, bound about with heather. Heather also was mingled45 with the thatching rushes, so that from a little distance the structure seemed to be part of the heath. I lay and watched to see what curious birds had made such a bower on the Star in the dark days. For such dainty carefulness was not the wont46 of us chiels of the Covenant7, and I could not think that any of the rough-riders after us would so have spent their time. An inn yard, a pint47 stoup, and a well-cockered doxie were more to their liking48, than plaiting the bonny heather into a puppet's house upon the hillside.
点击
收听单词发音
收听单词发音 |
1
beset
|
|
| v.镶嵌；困扰，包围 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
2
alas
|
|
| int.唉(表示悲伤、忧愁、恐惧等) | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
3
providence
|
|
| n.深谋远虑，天道，天意；远见；节约；上帝 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
4
hap
|
|
| n.运气；v.偶然发生 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
5
pointed
|
|
| adj.尖的，直截了当的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
6
thereby
|
|
| adv.因此，从而 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
7
covenant
|
|
| n.盟约，契约；v.订盟约 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
8
marvels
|
|
| n.奇迹( marvel的名词复数 )；令人惊奇的事物（或事例）；不平凡的成果；成就v.惊奇，对…感到惊奇( marvel的第三人称单数 ) | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
9
perilous
|
|
| adj.危险的，冒险的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
10
preservation
|
|
| n.保护，维护，保存，保留，保持 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
11
clattering
|
|
| 发出咔哒声（clatter的现在分词形式） | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
12
persecutor
|
|
| n. 迫害者 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
13
fanatics
|
|
| 狂热者，入迷者( fanatic的名词复数 ) | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
14
truthfulness
|
|
| n. 符合实际 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
15
wondrous
|
|
| adj.令人惊奇的，奇妙的；adv.惊人地；异乎寻常地；令人惊叹地 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
16
bide
|
|
| v.忍耐；等候；住 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
17
belly
|
|
| n.肚子，腹部；(像肚子一样)鼓起的部分，膛 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
18
trout
|
|
| n.鳟鱼；鲑鱼(属) | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
19
trickle
|
|
| vi.淌，滴，流出，慢慢移动，逐渐消散 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
20
abode
|
|
| n.住处，住所 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
21
clump
|
|
| n.树丛，草丛；vi.用沉重的脚步行走 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
22
auld
|
|
| adj.老的，旧的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
23
feverish
|
|
| adj.发烧的，狂热的，兴奋的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
24
heartily
|
|
| adv.衷心地，诚恳地，十分，很 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
25
relish
|
|
| n.滋味，享受，爱好，调味品；vt.加调味料，享受，品味；vi.有滋味 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
26
miraculous
|
|
| adj.像奇迹一样的，不可思议的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
27
foes
|
|
| 敌人，仇敌( foe的名词复数 ) | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
28
haze
|
|
| n.霾，烟雾；懵懂，迷糊；vi.(over)变模糊 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
29
dungeon
|
|
| n.地牢，土牢 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
30
rugged
|
|
| adj.高低不平的，粗糙的，粗壮的，强健的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
31
wilderness
|
|
| n.杳无人烟的一片陆地、水等，荒漠 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
32
croak
|
|
| vi.嘎嘎叫，发牢骚 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
33
granite
|
|
| adj.花岗岩，花岗石 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
34
scanty
|
|
| adj.缺乏的，仅有的，节省的，狭小的，不够的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
35
waft
|
|
| v.飘浮，飘荡；n.一股；一阵微风；飘荡 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
36
Ford
|
|
| n.浅滩，水浅可涉处；v.涉水，涉过 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
37
flail
|
|
| v.用连枷打；击打；n.连枷（脱粒用的工具） | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
38
snare
|
|
| n.陷阱，诱惑，圈套；（去除息肉或者肿瘤的）勒除器；响弦，小军鼓；vt.以陷阱捕获，诱惑 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
39
kenned
|
|
| v.知道( ken的过去式和过去分词 )；懂得；看到；认出 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
40
crest
|
|
| n.顶点；饰章；羽冠；vt.达到顶点；vi.形成浪尖 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
41
beads
|
|
| n.（空心）小珠子( bead的名词复数 )；水珠；珠子项链 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
42
verge
|
|
| n.边，边缘；v.接近，濒临 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
43
bower
|
|
| n.凉亭，树荫下凉快之处；闺房；v.荫蔽 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
44
strands
|
|
| n.（线、绳、金属线、毛发等的）股( strand的名词复数 )；缕；海洋、湖或河的)岸；（观点、计划、故事等的）部份v.使滞留，使搁浅( strand的第三人称单数 ) | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
45
mingled
|
|
| 混合，混入( mingle的过去式和过去分词 )； 混进，与…交往[联系] | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
46
wont
|
|
| adj.习惯于；v.习惯；n.习惯 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
47
pint
|
|
| n.品脱 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
48
liking
|
|
| n.爱好；嗜好；喜欢 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
| 欢迎访问英文小说网 |