Salute to Adventurers. Buchan John
as the common run of men.
All this looks babyish in the writing, but there was a method in this self-examination. I believed that I was fated to engage in strange ventures, and I wanted to equip myself for the future. The pressing business was that of self-defence, and I turned first to a gentleman's proper weapon, the sword. Here, alas! I was doomed to a bitter disappointment. My father had given me a lesson now and then, but never enough to test me, and when I came into the hands of a Glasgow master my unfitness was soon manifest. Neither with broadsword nor small sword could I acquire any skill. My short arm lacked reach and vigour, and there seemed to be some stiffness in wrist and elbow and shoulder which compelled me to yield to smaller men. Here was a pretty business, for though gentleman born I was as loutish with a gentleman's weapon as any country hind.
This discovery gave me some melancholy weeks, but I plucked up heart and set to reasoning. If my hand were to guard my head it must find some other way of it. My thoughts turned to powder and shot, to the musket and the pistol. Here was a weapon which needed only a stout nerve, a good eye, and a steady hand; one of these I possessed to the full, and the others were not beyond my attainment. There lived an armourer in the Gallowgate, one Weir, with whom I began to spend my leisure. There was an alley by the Molendinar Burn, close to the archery butts, where he would let me practise at a mark with guns from his store. Soon to my delight I found that here was a weapon with which I need fear few rivals. I had a natural genius for the thing, as some men have for sword-play, and Weir was a zealous teacher, for he loved his flint-locks.
"See, Andrew," he would cry, "this is the true leveller of mankind. It will make the man his master's equal, for though your gentleman may cock on a horse and wave his Andrew Ferrara, this will bring him off it. Brains, my lad, will tell in coming days, for it takes a head to shoot well, though any flesher may swing a sword."
The better marksman I grew the less I liked the common make of guns, and I cast about to work an improvement. I was especially fond of the short gun or pistol, not the bell-mouthed thing which shot a handful of slugs, and was as little precise in its aim as a hailstorm, but the light foreign pistol which, shot as true as a musket. Weir had learned his trade in Italy, and was a neat craftsman, so I employed him to make me a pistol after my own pattern. The butt was of light, tough wood, and brass-bound, for I did not care to waste money on ornament. The barrel was shorter than the usual, and of the best Spanish metal, and the pan and the lock were set after my own device. Nor was that all, for I became an epicure in the matter of bullets, and made my own with the care of a goldsmith. I would weigh out the powder charges as nicely as an apothecary weighs his drugs, for I had discovered that with the pistol the weight of bullet and charge meant much for good marksmanship. From Weir I got the notion of putting up ball and powder in cartouches, and I devised a method of priming much quicker and surer than the ordinary. In one way and another I believe I acquired more skill in the business than anybody then living in Scotland. I cherished my toy like a lover; I christened it "Elspeth "; it lay by my bed at night, and lived by day in a box of sweet-scented foreign wood given me by one of my uncle's skippers. I doubt I thought more of it than of my duty to my Maker.
All the time I was very busy at Uncle Andrew's counting-house in the Candleriggs, and down by the river-side among the sailors. It was the day when Glasgow was rising from a cluster of streets round the High Kirk and College to be the chief merchants' resort in Scotland. Standing near the Western Seas, she turned her eyes naturally to the Americas, and a great trade was beginning in tobacco and raw silk from Virginia, rich woods and dye stuffs from the Main, and rice and fruits from the Summer Islands. The river was too shallow for ships of heavy burthen, so it was the custom to unload in the neighbourhood of Greenock and bring the goods upstream in barges to the quay at the Broomielaw. There my uncle, in company with other merchants, had his warehouse, but his counting-house was up in the town, near by the College, and I spent my time equally between the two places. I became furiously interested in the work, for it has ever been my happy fortune to be intent on whatever I might be doing at the moment. I think I served my uncle well, for I had much of the merchant's aptitude, and the eye to discern far-away profits. He liked my boldness, for I was impatient of the rule-of-thumb ways of some of our fellow-traders. "We are dealing with new lands," I would say, "and there is need of new plans. It pays to think in trading as much as in statecraft," There were plenty that looked askance at us, and cursed us as troublers of the peace, and there were some who prophesied speedy ruin. But we discomforted our neighbours by prospering mightily, so that there was talk of Uncle Andrew for the Provost's chair at the next vacancy.
They were happy years, the four I spent in Glasgow, for I was young and ardent, and had not yet suffered the grave miscarriage of hope which is our human lot. My uncle was a busy merchant, but he was also something of a scholar, and was never happier than when disputing some learned point with a college professor over a bowl of punch. He was a great fisherman, too, and many a salmon I have seen him kill between the town and Rutherglen in the autumn afternoons. He treated me like a son, and by his aid I completed my education by much reading of books and a frequent attendance at college lectures. Such leisure as I had I spent by the river-side talking with the ship captains and getting news of far lands. In this way I learned something of the handling of a ship, and especially how to sail a sloop alone in rough weather, I have ventured, myself the only crew, far down the river to the beginning of the sealocks, and more than once escaped drowning by a miracle. Of a Saturday I would sometimes ride out to Auchencairn to see my mother and assist with my advice the work of Robin Gilfillan. Once I remember I rode to Carnwath, and looked again on the bleak house where the girl Elspeth had sung to me in the rain. I found it locked and deserted, and heard from a countrywoman that the folk had gone. "And a guid riddance," said the woman. "The Blairs was aye a cauld and oppressive race, and they were black Prelatists forbye. But I whiles miss yon hellicat lassie. She had a cheery word for a'body, and she keepit the place frae languor."
But I cannot linger over the tale of those peaceful years when I have so much that is strange and stirring to set down. Presently came the Revolution, when King James fled overseas, and the Dutch King William reigned in his stead. The event was a godsend to our trade, for with Scotland in a bicker with Covenants and dragoonings, and new taxes threatened with each new Parliament, a merchant's credit was apt to be a brittle thing. The change brought a measure of security, and as we prospered I soon began to see that something must be done in our Virginian trade. Years before, my uncle had sent out a man, Lambie by name, who watched his interests in that country. But we had to face such fierce rivalry from the Bristol merchants that I had small confidence in Mr. Lambie, who from his letters was a sleepy soul. I broached the matter to my uncle, and offered to go myself and put things in order. At first he was unwilling to listen. I think he was sorry to part with me, for we had become close friends, and there was also the difficulty of my mother, to whom I was the natural protector. But his opposition died down when I won my mother to my side, and when I promised that I would duly return. I pointed out that Glasgow and Virginia were not so far apart. Planters from the colony would dwell with us for a season, and their sons often come to Glasgow for their schooling. You could see the proud fellows walking the streets in brave clothes, and marching into the kirk on Sabbath with a couple of servants carrying cushions and Bibles. In the better class of tavern one could always meet with a Virginian or two compounding their curious drinks, and swearing their outlandish oaths. Most of them had gone afield from Scotland, and it was a fine incentive to us young men to see how mightily they had prospered. My uncle yielded, and it was arranged that I should sail with the first convoy of the New Year. From the moment of the decision I walked the earth in a delirium of expectation. That February, I remember, was blue and mild, with soft airs blowing up the river. Down by the Broomielaw I found a new rapture in the smell of tar and cordage, and the queer foreign scents in my uncle's warehouse. Every skipper and greasy sailor became for me a figure of romance. I scanned every outland face, wondering if I should meet it again in the New World. A negro in cotton drawers, shivering in our northern dune, had more attraction for me than the fairest maid, and I was eager to speak with all and every one who had crossed the ocean. One bronzed mariner with silver earrings I entertained to three stoups of usquebaugh, hoping for strange tales, but the little I had from him before he grew drunk was that he had once voyaged to the Canaries. You may imagine that I kept my fancies to myself, and was outwardly only the sober merchant with a mind set on freights and hogsheads. But whoever remembers his youth will