"And girdles in the Saint's domain; Of staves and sandall'd feet the trace.” And though instead of pilgrims we should now meet a fisherman or a licensed victualler driving a cart, we should find "dryshod" to be a poetical fiction, and there is always a stream more or less wide which must be waded. Walking on plashy sands is not agreeable, especially with nothing to interest you on the way; and remembering how uneasy I once felt while crossing the sands on foot from Lancaster to Ulverstone, I resolved to try the boat. To the Old Law, a sandy spit projecting from the opposite shore, the site of the two tall red beacons, the distance is about half a mile. I gathered up my equipments, shook hands with Eliana, who had won my respect by her cheerfulness and extraordinary good sense, paid my share of the cost to the boatmen, the other to be paid when he landed the lady at Bamborough, and, after the manner of boatmen, he grumbled. He received the payment he bargained for; he and his boys had as much as they would to eat and drink, and more, for there was some left, and yet he grumbled. However, I felt no sympathy with his discontent, and the stern of the boat having been grounded, within a few feet of the water's edge, I leaped into the shallow ripples, and strode away quickly across the spit, for I saw that the depression in its rear was all but covered by the tide swelling up on each side. The water met just as I had passed. What a wild scene lay before me when I scrambled A TOUGH WALK. 283 up the sand-hills! A rough trackless region; great straggling patches of reedy grass; great uneven patches of bare sand, where your foot slips back at every step; then patches of gorse, wanton brambles, dense beds of fern, and roods of heath. Crossing all this up and down, and in and out, is very tough walking. I shaped a course at a venture for Belford station, some five miles distant, and came after a while to smoother ground, and a lane by a farm-place, and so on between hedgerows to the hamlet of Easington, and thence across fields to the station, where I arrived in time for the last train to Berwick. I went back to my former quarters at the Red Lion, and finished the evening in company with a Northumbrian clergyman, who had taken a day's ramble along the shore in quest of new species of mollusca, visiting Holy Island on the way. His success had not been great, but he hoped for better fortune on his return the next day. He had walked across from the Island by the Pilgrims' track, and though he had to take off his shoes and stockings, the tide was too low for anything more serious than wet feet. It is nevertheless true that people have been drowned while crossing Fenham Flats, as the sands are called. The day seemed long as I looked back upon it, yet not too long; and I went to bed overcharged, in a sense, with pleasurable emotions. CHAPTER XX. Up Tweedside-An Enviable Walk—Salmon-fishers-A Lucky Spate— A Crack with a Radical-The way Sneaks Vote-The Plucky Blacksmith-The Kettle-Mr. Newte's Description-Outcry from Crows' Nests-Horncliff Hill-Norham Castle-Reminiscences-The Traitor's Reward-What Leland says-Marmion-A Good Rector-The Legate's Adventure Ladykirk-View of the Vale-Knowing it Fine-Dirty Mothers; Shy Children-Twizell Bridge-The Till-Tillmouth Chapel -The Blue-Bell-Rainy-day for a Battlefield-Flodden-A Baptism in Blinkbonny-Scenes of Battle-What might have happened had the Scots beaten-A Start for Cornhill. AGAIN delightful weather on the morrow. The clergyman was as ready to profit by it as myself, and our breakfast over, we walked together down to the wall overlooking the river. There we parted; he to make for the pier and get a cast across to Spittal Point in one of the salmon boats, and I for a walk up the Tweed. It is a walk rich in promise of enjoyment. Do you not envy me, gracious reader? Never mind; though you were not there, let us see if we cannot enjoy it together. After the first mile it will be all new to me. We cross and ascend the right bank, whence there is a good view of the bold heights opposite, crowned by houses, traversed by the ancient wall, with its bastions: the green slope striped with paths, the railway-station looking like a castle, the towering railway-bridge with its row of great round arches, the broad river flowing past, all combine to make up a striking picture. The THE VALE OF TWEED. 285 old bridge, many-arched though it be, appears insignificant by the side of its mighty rival; and to look up as we walk beneath the soaring structure makes us feel dwarf-like. 'Tis highwater, and Tweed looks his proudest. Seaweeds and marine grasses growing along the margin reveal the nearness of the sea; but these become fewer as we advance, and long before we are weary of cheerful meadows and wooded slopes, will have disappeared. The river winds; new views open, the bends marked by a bluff, now on the right, now on the left bank: and there on the left, the Whitadder, a stream well known to anglers, pours in its tribute. Presently we come to a fishing-station; a shiel, that is, a small one-roomed cottage, a cool stone vault for the fish, with the complement of seven or eight men, and two boats. They have just hauled in the net and caught nothing; and one of the boats is already started for a fresh cast. Then the bank rises to a considerable elevation and abuts precipitously on the river, and looking back from the brow, we see the broad slopes of Halidown Hill, no longer a waste, but chequered with fields. The breeze blows merrily up here, the leaves rustle as if they too were merry, and you feel inclined to pity the passengers shut up in the train which rattles past, speeding to Kelso. The turnips wag their leaves; the wheat-field rolls with quick, green waves, and makes a chorus of sound, as we pass through it to the pasture beyond, where the turf is so elastic that we seem to dance along. Truly, if but for its natural advantages, the vale of Tweed is an inviting place! A little farther, and the bank is broken by a steep and deep gulley, steep as a Devonshire coomb. The descent brings us down to another fishing-station, where there is the same report of bad luck as lower down. "How can you expect to catch fish," I said, "when there are so many nets below to stop them?" "There's fish enough gets up the river," answered one of the men, "there's fish enough gets up, but the folk in the west country don't let many come down again." From the height beyond, there is a view of Berwick, and surprisingly near, considering the time we have spent in walking hither. And we can look down on an island in the river, a pretty bright green oval dotted with haycocks. By and by we find obstructions in the way, and have to plunge down through the trees from the top of the bank to its base, and pursue the path along the margin of the stream; a change which deprives us of the breeze, but brings us within hearing of the rippling water. Presently, another station; more men and boats, but nothing in the fish-vault except one small grilse, that is, a young salmon. These fishing stations belong to the Berwick Company, who supply all the material and employ the men during the season. A boat comes up the river every morning, and on plentiful days in the evening also, to collect the salmon, grilse, and trout that have been caught: all other kinds fall to the men's share. On very lucky days too, each man is allowed a pound and a-half of salmon for himself. "You see," said one of the party whom I engaged in talk, "the Company find shiels for us to lodge in, and coals and kettles, and pays us thirteen shillings a-week. Not bad, you see, as times go; we don't want so much to eat as them as works harder:" which struck me as a refined way of putting the question of wages. Seeing that the salmon only enter the river with the flood tide, it follows that the catchers can have but little to do while the water is falling. |