that they were there. His motions were strikingly erratic; for all the way, as he returned to the spot where his master was, he continued to advance by a zigzag course, like a vessel beating up by short tacks; and several times he stood still, as on the very point of retreating. At length he vanished from their sight in the little hollow.
It was not long till the lad again made his appearance, shouting and waving his cap for them to come likewise; on which they all went away to him as fast as they could, in great amazement what could be the matter. When they came to the green hollow, a shocking spectacle presented itself: There lay the body of their master, who had been struck dead by the lightning; and, his right side having been torn open, his bowels had gushed out, and were lying beside the body. The earth was rutted and ploughed close to his side, and at his feet there was a hole scooped out, a full yard in depth, and very much resembling a grave. He had been cut off in the act of prayer, and the body was still lying in the position of a man praying in the field. He had been on his knees, with his elbows leaning on the brae, and his brow laid on his folded hands; his plaid was drawn over his head, and his hat below his arm; and this affecting circumstance proved a great source of comfort to his widow afterwards, when the extremity of her suffering had somewhat abated.
No such awful visitation of Providence had ever been witnessed, or handed down to our hinds on the ample records of tradition, and the impression which it made, and the interest it excited, were also without a parallel. Thousands visited the spot, to view the devastations made by the flood, and the furrows formed by the electrical matter; and the smallest circumstances were inquired into with the most minute curiosity: above all, the still and drowsy embers of superstition were rekindled by it into a flame, than which none had ever burnt brighter, not even in the darkest days of ignorance; and by the help of it a theory was made out and believed, that for horror is absolutely unequalled. But as it was credited in its fullest latitude by my informant, and always added by him at the conclusion of the tale, I am bound to mention the circumstances, though far from vouching them to be authentic.
It was asserted, and pretended to have been proved, that old Peter Maxwell was not in the glen of Laverhope that day, but at a great distance in a different county, and that it was the devil who attended the folds in his likeness. It was farther believed by all the people at the folds, that it was the last explosion of the whole that had slain Mr Adamson; for they had at that time observed the side of the brae, where the little green slack was situated, covered with a sheet of flame for a moment. And it so happened, that thereafter the profane gaberlunzie had been no more seen; and therefore they said—and here was the most horrible part of the story—there was no doubt of his being the devil, waiting for his prey, and that he fled away in that sheet of flame, carrying the soul of John Adamson along with him.
I never saw old Pate Maxwell,—for I believe he died before I was born; but Robin Johnston said, that to his dying day, he denied having been within forty miles of the folds of Laverhope on the day of the thunder-storm, and was exceedingly angry when any one pretended to doubt the assertion. It was likewise reported, that at six o'clock afternoon a stranger had called on Mrs Irvine, and told her, that John Adamson, and a great part of his stock, had been destroyed by the lightning and the hail. Mrs Irvine's house was five miles distant from the folds; and more than that, the farmer's death was not so much as known of by mortal man until two hours after Mrs Irvine received this information. The storm exceeded any thing remembered, either for its violence or consequences, and these mysterious circumstances having been bruited abroad, gave it a hold on the minds of the populace, never to be erased but by the erasure of existence. It fell out on the 12th of July, 1753.
The death of Mr Copland of Minnigapp, in Annandale, forms another era of the same sort. It happened, if I mistake not, on the 18th of July, 1804. It was one of those days by which all succeeding thunder-storms have been estimated, and from which they are dated, both as having taken place so many years before, and so long after.
Adam Copland, Esquire, of Minnigapp, was a gentleman esteemed by all who knew him. Handsome in his person, and elegant in his manners, he was the ornament of rural society, and the delight of his family and friends; and his loss was felt as no common misfortune. As he occupied a pastoral farm of considerable extent, his own property, he chanced likewise to be out at his folds on the day above-mentioned, with his own servants, and some neighbours, weaning a part of his lambs, and shearing a few sheep. About mid-day the thunder, lightning, and hail, came on, and deranged their operations entirely; and, among other things, a part of the lambs broke away from the folds, and being in great fright, they continued to run on. Mr Copland and a shepherd of his, named Thomas Scott, pursued them, and, at the distance of about half a mile from the folds, they turned them, mastered them, after some running, and were bringing them back to the fold, when the dreadful catastrophe happened. Thomas Scott was the only person present, of course; and though he was within a few steps of his master at the time, he could give no account of any thing. I am well acquainted with Scott, and have questioned him about the particulars fifty times; but he could not so much as tell me how he got back to the fold; whether he brought the lambs with him or not; how long the storm continued; nor, indeed, any thing after the time that his master and he turned the lambs. That circumstance he remembered perfectly, but thenceforward his mind seemed to have become a blank. I should likewise have mentioned, as an instance of the same kind of deprivation of consciousness, that when the young lad who went first to the body of Adamson was questioned why he fled from the body at first, he denied that ever he fled; he was not conscious of having fled a foot, and never would have believed it, if he had not been seen by four eye-witnesses. The only things of which Thomas Scott had any impressions were these: that, when the lightning struck his master, he sprung a great height into the air, much higher, he thought, than it was possible for any man to leap by his own exertion. He also thinks, that the place where he fell dead was at a considerable distance from that on which he was struck and leaped from the ground; but when I inquired if he judged that it would be twenty yards or ten yards, he could give no answer—he could not tell. He only had an impression that he saw his master spring into the air, all on fire; and, on running up to him, he found him quite dead. If Scott was correct in this, (and he being a man of plain good sense, truth, and integrity, there can scarce be a reason for doubting him,) the circumstance would argue that the electric matter by which Mr Copland was killed issued out of the earth. He was speaking to Scott with his very last breath; but all that the survivor could do, he could never remember what he was saying. Some melted drops of silver were standing on the case of his watch, as well as on some of the buttons of his coat, and the body never stiffened like other corpses, but remained as supple as if every bone had been softened to jelly. He was a married man, scarcely at the prime of life, and left a young widow and only son to lament his loss. On the spot where he fell there is now an obelisk erected to his memory, with a warning text on it, relating to the shortness and uncertainty of human life.
The Prodigal Son
"Bring me my pike-staff, daughter Matilda,—the one with the head turned round like crummy's horn; I find it easiest for my hand. And do you hear, Matty?—Stop, I say; you are always in such a hurry.—Bring me likewise my best cloak,—not the tartan one, but the grey marled one, lined with green flannel. I go over to Shepherd Gawin's to-day, to see that poor young man who is said to be dying."
"I would not go, father, were I you. He is a great reprobate, and will laugh at every good precept; and, more than that, you will heat yourself with the walk, get cold, and be confined again with your old complaint."
"What was it you said, daughter Matilda? Ah, you said that which was very wrong. God only knows who are reprobates, and who are not. We can judge from nought but external evidence, which is a false ground to build calculations upon; but He knows the heart, with all our motives of action, and judges very differently from us. You said very wrong, daughter. But women will always be speaking unadvisedly. Always rash! always rash!—Bring me my cloak, daughter, for as to my being injured by my walk, I am going on
