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and poetical powers, contradicted at once by his own conscious smile of confidence and by the general shout of the company, the lighthearted old man came forward to play his part in the proposed entertainment.
But just as it was about to commence, the arrangement of parts was singularly altered. Norna of the Fitful Head, whom every one excepting the two sisters believed to be at the distance of many miles, suddenly, and without greeting, entered the apartment, walked majestically up to the bearskin tabernacle, and signed to the female who was there seated to abdicate her sanctuary. The old woman came forth, shaking her head, and looking like one overwhelmed with fear; nor, indeed, were there many in the company who saw with absolute composure the sudden appearance of a person so well known and so generally dreaded as Norna.
She paused a moment at the entrance of the tent; and, as she raised the skin which formed the entrance, she looked up to the north, as if imploring from that quarter a strain of inspiration; then signing to the surprised guests that they might approach in succession the shrine in which she was about to install herself, she entered the tent, and was shrouded from their sight.
But this was a different sport from what the company had meditated, and to most of them seemed to present so much more of earnest than of game, that there was no alacrity shown to consult the oracle. The character and pretensions of Norna seemed, to almost all present, too serious for the part which she had assumed; the men whispered to each other, and the women, according to Claud Halcro, realised the description of glorious John Dryden —
With horror shuddering, in a heap they ran.
The pause was interrupted by the loud manly voice of the Udaller. “ Why does the game stand still, my masters? Are you afraid because my kinswoman is to play our voluspa? It is kindly done in her, to do for us what none in the isles can do so well; and we will not baulk our sport for it, but rather go on the merrier.”
There was still a pause in the company, and Magnus Troil added, “ It shall never be said that my kinswoman sat in her bower unhalsed, as if she were some of the old mountain giantesses, and all from faint heart. I will speak first myself, but the rhyme comes worse from my tongue than when I was a score of years younger. — Claud Halcro, you must stand by me.”
Hand in hand they approached the shrine of the supposed sibyl, and after a moment’s consultation together, Halcro thus expressed the query of his friend and patron. Now, the Udaller, Kke many persons of consequence in Zetland, who, as Sir Robert Sibbald has testified for them, had begun thus early to apply both to commerce and navigation, was concerned to some extent in the whale-fishery of the season, and the bard had been directed to put into his halting verse an inquiry concerning its success.
Claud Halcro “Mother darksome, Mother dread — Dweller on the Fitful Head, Thou canst see what deeds are done Under the never-setting sun. Look through sleet, and look through frost, Look to Greenland’s caves and coast, — By the iceberg is a sail Chasing of the swarthy whale; Mother doubtful, Mother dread, Tell us, has the good ship sped?”
The jest seemed to turn to earnest, as all, bending their heads around, listened to the voice of Norna, who, without a moment’s hesitation, answered from the recesses of the tent in which she was enclosed: —
Norna “The thought of the aged is ever on gear, — On his fishing, his furrow, his flock, and his steer; But thrive may his fishing, flock, furrow, and herd, While the aged for anguish shall tear his grey beard.”
There was a momentary pause, during which Triptolemus had time to whisper, “ If ten witches and as many warlocks were to swear it, I will never believe that a decent man will either fash his beard or himself about anything, so long as stock and crop goes as it should do.”
But the voice from within the tent resumed its low monotonous tone of recitation, and, interrupting farther commentary, proceeded as follows: —
Norn a “The ship, well-laden as bark need be, Lies deep in the furrow of the Iceland sea; — The breeze for Zetland blows fair and soft, And gaily the garland1 is fluttering aloft: Seven good fishes have spouted their last, And their jaw-bones are hanging to yard and mast;3 Two are for Lerwick, and two for Kirkwall, — And three for Burgh-Westra, the choicest of all.”
“Now the powers above look down and protect us!” said Bryce Snailsfoot; “for it is mair than women’s wit that has spaed out that ferly. I saw them at North Ronaldshaw, that had seen the good bark, the Olavt of Lerwick, that our worthy patron has such a great share in that she may be called his own in a manner, and they had broomed3 the ship, and, as sure as there are stars in heaven, she answered them for seven fish, exact as Norna has telled us in her rhyme!”
“Umph — seven fish exactly? and you heard it at North Ronaldshaw?” said Captain Cleveland, “and I suppose told it as a good piece of news when you came hither?”
“It never crossed my tongue, Captain,” answered the pedlar; “ I have kend mony chapmen, travelling merchants, and such like, neglect their goods to carry clashes and clavers up and down, from one countryside to another; but that is no traffic of mine. I dinna believe I have mentioned the Olave’s having made up her cargo to three folks since I crossed to Dunrossness.”
“But if one of those three had spoken the news over again, x The garland is an artificial coronet, composed of ribbons by those young women who take an interest in a whaling-vessel or her crew: it is always dis- / played from the rigging, and preserved with great care during the voyage.
a The best oil exudes from the jaw-bones of the whale, which, for the purpose of collecting it, are suspended to the masts of the vessel.
3 There is established among whalers a sort of telegraphic signal, in which a certain number of motions, made with a broom, express to any other vessel the number of fish which they have caught.
and it is two to one that such a thing happened, the old lady prophesies upon velvet.”
Such was the speech of Cleveland, addressed to Magnus Troil, and heard without any applause. The Udaller’s respect for his country extended to its superstitions, and so did the interest which he took in his unfortunate kinswoman. If he never rendered a precise assent to her high supernatural pretensions, he was not at least desirous of hearing them disputed by others.
“Norna,” he said, “ his cousin” (an emphasis on the word), “ held no communication with Bryce Snailsfoot, or his acquaintances. He did not pretend to explain how she came by her information; but he had always remarked that Scotsmen, and indeed strangers in general, when they came to Zetland, were ready to find reasons for things which remained sufficiently obscure to those whose ancestors had dwelt there for ages.”
Captain Cleveland took the hint, and bowed, without attempting to defend his own scepticism.
“And now forward, my brave hearts,” said the Udaller; “ and may all have as good tidings as I have! Three whales cannot but yield — let me think how many hogsheads”
There was an obvious reluctance on the part of the guests to be the next in consulting the oracle of the tent.
“Gude news are welcome to some folks, if they come frae the deil himsell,” said Mistress Baby Yellowley, addressing the Lady Glowrowrum, — for a similarity of disposition in some respects had made a sort of intimacy betwixt them — ” but I think, my leddy, that this has ower mickle of rank witchcraft in it, to have the countenance of douce Christian folks like you and me, my leddy.”
“There may be something in what you say, my dame,” replied the good Lady Glowrowrum; “but we Hialtlanders are no just like other folks; and this woman, if she be a witch, being the Fowd’s friend and near kinswoman, it will be ill taen If we haena our fortunes spaed like a’ the rest of them; and sae my nieces may e’en step forward in their turn, and nae harm dune. They will hae time to repent, ye ken, in the course of nature, if there be onything wrang in it, Mistress Yellowley.”
While others remained under similar uncertainty and apprehension, Halcro, who saw by the knitting of the old Udaller’s brows, and by a certain impatient shuffle of his right foot, like the motion of a man who with difficulty refrains from stamp ing, that