Transcript

027 - Chapter 5 · Pirate

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Speaker 1: Chapter five of the Pirate by Sir Walter Scott. This
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Speaker 1: LibriVox recording is in the public domain. Read by Dion Jins,
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Speaker 1: Salt Lake City, Utah. I do love these ancient ruins.
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Speaker 1: We never tread upon them, but we set our foot
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Speaker 1: upon some reverend history and questionless. Here in this open court,
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Speaker 1: which now lies naked to the injuries of stormy weather.
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Speaker 1: Some men lie interred, loved the church so well and
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Speaker 1: gave so largely to it, they thought it should have
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Speaker 1: canopied their bones till doomsday. But all things have their end.
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Speaker 1: Churches and cities which have diseases like to men must
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Speaker 1: have like death, which we have, Duchess of Maulfrey. The
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Speaker 1: ruinous Church of Saint Ninian had in its time enjoyed
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Speaker 1: great celebrity, for that mighty system of Roman superstition, which
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Speaker 1: spread its roots over all Europe, had not failed to
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Speaker 1: extend them even to this remote archipelago. And Zettelund had
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Speaker 1: in the Catholic times her saints, her shrines, and her relics, which,
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Speaker 1: though little known elsewhere, attracted the homage and commanded the
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Speaker 1: observance of this simple inhabitants of Tule. Their devotion to
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Speaker 1: this Church of Saint Ninian, or as he was provincially
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Speaker 1: termed Saint Ringan, situated as the edifice was close to
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Speaker 1: the sea beach and serving in many points as a
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Speaker 1: landmark to their boats, was particularly obstinate and was connected
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Speaker 1: with so much superstitious ceremonial and credulity that the Reformed
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Speaker 1: clergy thought it best by the order of the Church
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Speaker 1: courts to prohibit all spiritual service within its walls, as
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Speaker 1: tending to foster the rooted faith of the simple and
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Speaker 1: rude people around in saint worship and other erroneous doctrines
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Speaker 1: of the Romish Church. After the Church of Saint Ninian
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Speaker 1: had been thus denounced as a seat of idolatry and desecrated,
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Speaker 1: of course, the public worship was transferred to another church,
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Speaker 1: and the roof, with its lead and its rafters having
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Speaker 1: been stripped from the little, rude old Gothic building, it
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Speaker 1: was left in the wilderness to the mercy of the elements.
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Speaker 1: The fury of the uncontrolled winds, which howled along an
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Speaker 1: exposed space resembling that which we have described at Dralshoff,
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Speaker 1: very soon choked up nave and aisle on the northwest side,
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Speaker 1: which was chiefly exposed to the wind, hid the outside
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Speaker 1: walls more than half way up with mounds of drifted sand,
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Speaker 1: over which the gable ends of the building, with the
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Speaker 1: little belfry which was built upon its eastern angle, arose
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Speaker 1: in ragged and shattered nakedness of ruin. Yet deserted as
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Speaker 1: it was, the kirk of Saint Ringan still retained some
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Speaker 1: semblance of the ancient homage formerly rendered there. The rude
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Speaker 1: and ignorant fishermen of Dunrossness observed a practice of which
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Speaker 1: they themselves had well nigh forgotten the origin, and from
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Speaker 1: which the Protestant clergy in Vain endeavored to deter them.
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Speaker 1: When their boats were in extreme peril, it was common
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Speaker 1: amongst them to propose to vow an Amus, as they
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Speaker 1: termed it, that is, an Holmes to Saint Ringan. And
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Speaker 1: when the danger was over, they never failed to absolve
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Speaker 1: themselves of their vow by coming singly and secretly to
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Speaker 1: the old church and putting off their shoes and stockings
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Speaker 1: at the entrance of the churchyard, walking thrice around the ruins,
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Speaker 1: observing that they did so in the course of the sun.
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Speaker 1: When the circuit was accomplished, for the third time, the
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Speaker 1: votary dropped his offering, usually a small silver coin, through
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Speaker 1: the mullions of a lanceolated window which opened into a
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Speaker 1: side aisle, and then retired, avoiding carefully to look behind
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Speaker 1: him till he was beyond the precincts which had once
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Speaker 1: been hollowed ground, For it was believed that the skeleton
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Speaker 1: of the saint received the offering in his bony hand
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Speaker 1: and showed his ghastly death's head at the window into
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Speaker 1: which it was thrown. Indeed, the scene was rendered more
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Speaker 1: appalling to weak and ignorant minds because the same stormy
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Speaker 1: and eddying winds, which on the one side of the
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Speaker 1: church threatened to bury the ruins with sand, and had
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Speaker 1: in fact heaped it up in huge quantities so as
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Speaker 1: almost to hide the sidewalk with its buttresses, seemed in
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Speaker 1: other places bent on uncovering the graves of those who
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Speaker 1: had been laid to their long rest. On the southeastern quarter,
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Speaker 1: and after an unusually hard gale, the coffins and sometimes
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Speaker 1: the very corpses of those who had been interred without
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Speaker 1: the usual cerements, were discovered in a ghastly manner to
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Speaker 1: the eyes of the living. It was to this desolated
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Speaker 1: place of worship that the elder mertown now proceeded, though
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Speaker 1: without any of those religious or superstitious purposes with which
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Speaker 1: the Church of Saint Ringan was usually approached. He was
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Speaker 1: totally without the superstitious fears of the country, nay from
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Speaker 1: the sequestered and sullen manner in which he lived, withdrawing
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Speaker 1: himself from human society even when assembled for worship. It
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Speaker 1: was the general opinion that he aired on the more
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Speaker 1: fatal side, and believed rather too little than too much
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Speaker 1: of that which the Church receives and enjoins to Christians.
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Speaker 1: As he entered the little bay, on the shore, and
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Speaker 1: almost on the beach of which the ruins are situated,
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Speaker 1: he could not help pausing for an instant and becoming
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Speaker 1: sensible that the scene, as calculated to operate on human feelings,
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Speaker 1: had been selected with much judgment, as the site of
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Speaker 1: a religious house. In front lay the sea, into which
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Speaker 1: two headlands which formed the extremities of the bay, projected
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Speaker 1: their gigantic causeways of dark and sable rocks, on the
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Speaker 1: ledges of which the gulls, scouries and other seafowl appeared
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Speaker 1: like flakes of snow, while upon the lower ranges of
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Speaker 1: the cliff stood whole lines of cormorants drawn up alongside
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Speaker 1: of each other like soldiers in their battle array, and
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Speaker 1: other living thing was there none to see. The sea,
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Speaker 1: although not in a tempestuous state, was disturbed enough to
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Speaker 1: rush on these capes with a sound like distant thunder,
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Speaker 1: and the billows, which rose in sheets of foam half
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Speaker 1: way up these sable rocks, formed a contrast of coloring
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Speaker 1: equally striking and awfal The TwixT the extremities or cave
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Speaker 1: of these projecting headlands were rolled on the day when
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Speaker 1: Mrtown visited, the scene a deep and dense aggregation of
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Speaker 1: clouds through which no human eye could penetrate, and which,
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Speaker 1: bounding the vision and excluding all view of the distant ocean,
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Speaker 1: rendered it no unapt representation of the sea in the
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Speaker 1: vision of mrsa, whose extent was concealed by vapors and
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Speaker 1: clouds and storms. The ground, rising steeply from the sea beach,
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Speaker 1: permitting no view into the interior of the country, appeared
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Speaker 1: a scene of irretrievable barrenness, where scrubby and stunted heath
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Speaker 1: intermixed with the long, bent or coarse grass which first
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Speaker 1: covered sandy soils, were the only vegetables that could be seen.
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Speaker 1: Upon a natural elevation, which rose above the beach in
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Speaker 1: the very bottom of the bay and receded a little
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Speaker 1: from the sea, so as to be without reach of
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Speaker 1: the waves, arose the half buried ruin which we have
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Speaker 1: already described, surrounded by a wasted, half ruinous, and moldering wall,
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Speaker 1: which breached in several places, served still to divide the
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Speaker 1: precincts of the cemetery. The mariners, who were driven by
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Speaker 1: accident into this solitary bay pretended that the church was
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Speaker 1: occasionally observed to be full of lights, and from that
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Speaker 1: circumstance were used to prophesy shipwrecks and deaths by sea.
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Speaker 1: As Mertown approached nearer to the chapel, he adopted insensibly
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Speaker 1: and perhaps without much premeditation, measures to avoid being himself seen,
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Speaker 1: until he came close under the walls of the burial ground,
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Speaker 1: which he approached as it chanced on that side where
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Speaker 1: the sand was blowing from the graves in the manner
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Speaker 1: we have described here. Looking through one of the gaps
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Speaker 1: in the wall which time had made, he beheld the
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Speaker 1: person whom he sought occupied in a manner which assorted
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Speaker 1: well with the ideas popularly entertained of her character, but
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Speaker 1: which was otherwise sufficiently extraordinary. She was employed beside a
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Speaker 1: rude monument, on one side of which was represented the
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Speaker 1: rough outline of a cavalier or night on horseback, while
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Speaker 1: on the other appeared a shield with the armorial bearings
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Speaker 1: so defaced as not to be intelligible, which a scotcheon
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Speaker 1: was suspended by one angle, contrary to the modern custom
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Speaker 1: which usually places them straight and upright. At the foot
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Speaker 1: of this pillar was believed to repose as Mertown had
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Speaker 1: formerly heard the bones of Ribal Troil, one of the
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Speaker 1: remote ancestors of Magnus, and a man renowned for deeds
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Speaker 1: of valorous emprize in the fifteenth century. From the grave
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Speaker 1: of this warrior, Norna of the Fitful Head seemed busied
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Speaker 1: in shoveling the sand, an easy task where it was
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Speaker 1: so light and loose, so that it seemed plain that
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Speaker 1: she would shortly complete what the rude winds had begun
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Speaker 1: and make bear the bones which lay there interred. As
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Speaker 1: she labored, she muttered her magic song, for without the
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Speaker 1: runic rhyme, no form of northern superstition was ever performed.
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Speaker 1: We have perhaps preserved to many examples of these incantations,
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Speaker 1: but we cannot help attempting to translate that which follows
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Speaker 1: Champion famed for warlike toil, art thou silent ribalt, troil,
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Speaker 1: sand and dust and pebbly stones are leaving bare thy
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Speaker 1: giant bones, who dared touch the wild bear's skin. Ye
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Speaker 1: slumbered on while life was in a woman? Now or
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Speaker 1: babe may come and cast the covering from thy tomb.
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Speaker 1: Yet be not wrathful chief, nor blight mine eyes or
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Speaker 1: ears with sound or sight. I come not with unhallowed
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Speaker 1: tread to wake the slumbers of the dead, or lay
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Speaker 1: thy giant relics bear. But what I seek, thou well
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Speaker 1: canst spare? Be it to my hand, allowed to shear
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Speaker 1: a murk's weight from thy shroud, Yet leave thee sheeted
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Speaker 1: lad enough to shield thy bones from weather rough See
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Speaker 1: I draw my magic knife. Never while thou wert in life,
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Speaker 1: latest thou still for sloth or fear, when point and
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Speaker 1: edge were glittering near See the ceremons. Now I sever
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Speaker 1: waken now or sleep forever Thou wilt not wake. The
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Speaker 1: deed is done. The prize I sought is fairly won.
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Speaker 1: Thanks Ribolt, Thanks for this. The sea shall smooth its
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Speaker 1: ruffled crust for thee, And while afar its billow's foam
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Speaker 1: subside to peace near Ribolt's tomb, Thanks Ribolt, thanks for this.
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Speaker 1: The might of wild winds raging at their height, when
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Speaker 1: to thy place of slumber nigh shall soften to a lullaby.
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Speaker 1: She the dame of doubt and dread, Norna of the
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Speaker 1: fitful head, mighty in her own despite miserable in her might,
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Speaker 1: in despair and frenzy, great in her greatness, desolate, wisest, wickedest,
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Speaker 1: who lives well can keep the word she gives. While
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Speaker 1: Norna chanted the first part of this rhyme, she completed
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Speaker 1: the task of laying there a part of the leaden
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Speaker 1: coffin of the ancient warrior, and severed from it with
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Speaker 1: much caution and apparent awe, a portion of the metal.
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Speaker 1: She then reverentially threw back the sand upon the coffin,
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Speaker 1: and by the time she had finished her song, no
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Speaker 1: trace remained that the secrets of the sepulcher had been violated.
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Speaker 1: Mertown remained gazing on her from behind the churchyard, wall
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Speaker 1: during the whole ceremony, not from any impression of veneration
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Speaker 1: for her or her employment, but because he conceived that
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Speaker 1: to interrupt a mad woman in her act of madness
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Speaker 1: was not the best way to obtain from her such
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Speaker 1: intelligence as she might have to impart. Meanwhile, he had
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Speaker 1: full time to consider her figure, although her face was
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Speaker 1: obscured by her disheveled hair and by the hood of
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Speaker 1: her dark mantle, which permitted no more to be visible
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Speaker 1: than a druidess would probably have exhibited at the celebration
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Speaker 1: of her mystical rites. Mertown had often heard of Norna
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Speaker 1: before Nay, it is most probable that he might have
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Speaker 1: seen her repeatedly, for she had been in the vicinity
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Speaker 1: of Dralshoff more than once since his residence there. But
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Speaker 1: the absurd stories which were in circulation respecting her prevented
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Speaker 1: his paying any attention to a person whom he regarded
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Speaker 1: as either an impostor or a mad woman, or a
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Speaker 1: compound of both. Yet, now that his attention was, by
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Speaker 1: circumstances involuntarily fixed upon her person and deportment, he could
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Speaker 1: not help acknowledgeing to himself that she was either a
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Speaker 1: complete enthusiast or rehearsed her parts so admirably that no
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Speaker 1: pythoness of ancient times could have excelled her the dignity
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Speaker 1: and solemnity of her gesture, the sonorous yet impressive tone
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Speaker 1: of voice with which she addressed the departed spirit, whose
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Speaker 1: mortal relics she ventured to disturb, were such as failed
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Speaker 1: not to make an impression upon him, careless and indifferent,
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Speaker 1: as he generally appeared to all that went on around him.
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Speaker 1: But no sooner was her singular occupation terminated than entering
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Speaker 1: the churchyard with some difficulty. By clambering over the disjointed
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Speaker 1: ruins of the wall. He made Norna aware of his presence.
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Speaker 1: Far from starting or expressing the least surprise at his
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Speaker 1: appearance in a place so solitary, she said, in a
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Speaker 1: tone that seemed to intimate that he had been expected.
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Speaker 1: So you have sought me at last and found you,
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Speaker 1: replied Murtown, judging he would best introduce the enquiries he
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Speaker 1: had to make by assuming a tone which corresponded to
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Speaker 1: her own. Yes, she replied, found me, you have, and
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Speaker 1: in the place where all men must meet amid the
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Speaker 1: tabernacles of the dead, Here we must indeed meet at last,
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Speaker 1: replied Murtown, glancing his eyes on the desolate scene, around
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Speaker 1: where headstones have covered in sand, and others from which
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Speaker 1: the same wind had stripped the soil on which they rested,
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Speaker 1: covered with inscriptions and sculptured with the emblems of mortality,
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Speaker 1: were the most conspicuous objects here, as in the house
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Speaker 1: of death. All men must meet at length, happy those
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Speaker 1: that come soonest to the quiet haven. He that dares
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Speaker 1: desire this haven, said Norna, must have steered a steady
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Speaker 1: course in the voyage of life. I dare not hope
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Speaker 1: for such quiet harbor. Darest thou expect it, or hast
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Speaker 1: the course thou hast kept deserved it? It matters not
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Speaker 1: to my present purpose, replied Murtown. I have to ask
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Speaker 1: you what tidings you know of my son Mordaunt murtown,
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Speaker 1: a father, replied the sibyl asks of a stranger. What
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Speaker 1: tiding she has of his son? How should I know
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Speaker 1: aught of him? The cormorant says, not to the mallard,
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Speaker 1: where is my brood? Lay aside this useless affectation of mystery,
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Speaker 1: said Murtown, with the vulgar and ignorant it has its effect,
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Speaker 1: but upon me it is thrown away. The people of
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Speaker 1: Rolshoff have told me that you do know or may know,
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Speaker 1: something of Mordaunt Murtown, who has not returned home after
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Speaker 1: the festival of Saint John's held in the house of
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Speaker 1: your relative Magnus Troil. Give me such information, if indeed
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Speaker 1: ye have it to give, and it shall be recompensed,
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Speaker 1: if the means of the recompense are in my power
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Speaker 1: the wide round of earth, replied Norna holds nothing that
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Speaker 1: I would call a recompense for the slightest word that
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Speaker 1: I throw away upon a living ear, but for thy son,
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Speaker 1: if thou wouldst see him in life repair to the
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Speaker 1: approaching fair of Kirkwall in Orkney. And wherefore thither said Murtown.
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Speaker 1: I know he has no purpose in that direction. We
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Speaker 1: drive on the stream of fate, answered Norna, without owe
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Speaker 1: or rudder. You had no purpose this morning of visiting
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Speaker 1: the kirk of Saint Ringan, Yet you are here. You
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Speaker 1: had no purpose but a minute hence of being at Kirkwall.
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Speaker 1: And yet you will go thither, not unless the cause
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Speaker 1: is more distinctly explained to me. I am no believer.
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Speaker 1: Dame in those who assert your supernatural powers, you shall
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Speaker 1: believe in them. Ere we part, said Norna, as yet
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Speaker 1: you know but little of me, nor shall you know more.
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Speaker 1: But I know enough of you, and could convince you
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Speaker 1: with one word that I do so convince me, then
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Speaker 1: said Mertown, For unless I am so convinced, there is
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Speaker 1: little chance of my following your counsel. Mark, then said Norna.
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Speaker 1: What I have to say on your son's score, else,
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Speaker 1: what I shall say to you on your own will
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Speaker 1: banish every other thought from your memory. You shall go
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Speaker 1: to the approaching fair at Kirkwall, and on the fifth
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Speaker 1: day of the fair, you shall walk, at the hour
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Speaker 1: of noon in the outer aisle of the cathedral of
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Speaker 1: Saint Magnus, and there you shall meet a person who
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Speaker 1: will give you tidings of your son. You must speak
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Speaker 1: more distinctly, Dame, returned Murtwn scornfully. If you hope that
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Speaker 1: I should follow your counsel. I have been fooled in
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Speaker 1: my time by women, but never so grossly as you
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Speaker 1: seem willing to gull me. Hearken, then said the old woman.
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Speaker 1: The word which I speak shall touch the nearest secret
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Speaker 1: of thy life, and thrill thee through nerve and bone,
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Speaker 1: so saying, she whispered a word into Murtown's ear, the
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Speaker 1: effect of which seemed almost magical. He remained fixed and
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Speaker 1: motionless with surprise. As waving her arms slowly aloft with
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Speaker 1: an air of superiority and triumph, Norna glided from him,
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Speaker 1: turned round a corner of the ruins, and was soon
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Speaker 1: out of sight. Mertown offered not to follow or to
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Speaker 1: trace her. We fly from our fate in vain, he said,
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Speaker 1: as he began to recover himself, and turning, he left
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Speaker 1: behind him the desolate ruins with their cemetery. As he
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Speaker 1: looked back from the very last point at which the
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Speaker 1: church was visible, he saw the figure of Norna, muffled
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Speaker 1: in her mantle, standing on the very summit of the
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Speaker 1: ruined tower, and stretching out in the sea breeze, something
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Speaker 1: which resembled a white pennon or flag. A feeling of
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Speaker 1: horror similar to that excited by her last words, again
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Speaker 1: thrilled through his bosom, and he hastened onwards with unwonted speed,
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Speaker 1: until he had left the Church of Saint Ninian, with
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Speaker 1: its bay of sand far behind him. Upon his arrival
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Speaker 1: at Charles Hoff. The alteration in his countenance was so
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Speaker 1: great that Swartha conjectured he was about to fall into
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Speaker 1: one of those fits of deep melancholy, which she termed
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Speaker 1: his dark hour. And what better could be expected, thought Swerth,
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Speaker 1: when he must needs go visit Norna of the Fitful
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Speaker 1: Head when she was in the haunted kirk of Saint Ringan's,
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Speaker 1: But without testifying any other symptoms of an alienated mind
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Speaker 1: than that of deep and sullen dejection, her master acquainted
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Speaker 1: her with his intention to go to the fair of Kirkwall,
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Speaker 1: a thing so contrary to his usual habits that the
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Speaker 1: housekeeper well nigh refused to credit her ears. Shortly after,
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Speaker 1: he heard with the parent indifference the accounts returned by
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Speaker 1: the different persons who had been sent out in quest
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Speaker 1: of Mordaunt by sea and land, who all of them
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Speaker 1: returned without any tidings. The equanimity with which Murtown heard
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Speaker 1: the report of their bad success convinced Swertha still more
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Speaker 1: firmly that in his interview with Norna, that issue had
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Speaker 1: been predicted to him by the sibyl, whom he had consulted.
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Speaker 1: The township were yet more surprised when their taxmen, mister Murtown,
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Speaker 1: as if on some sudden resolution, made preparations to visit
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Speaker 1: Kirkwall during the fair, although he had hitherto avoided sedulously
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Speaker 1: all such places of public resort. Swartha puzzled herself a
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Speaker 1: good deal without being able to penetrate this mystery, and
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Speaker 1: vexed herself still more concerning the fate of her young master.
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Speaker 1: But her concern was much softened by the deposit of
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Speaker 1: a sum of money, seeming however moderate in itself, a
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Speaker 1: treasure in her eyes, which her master put into her hands,
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Speaker 1: acquainting her at the same time that he had taken
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Speaker 1: his passage for Kirkwall in a small bark belonging to
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Speaker 1: the proprietor of the island of Musa. End of Chapter
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Speaker 1: five