The record-union., 1894-08-04

was cooked upon and against a peat fire
as in ancient times. Opening upon the
street was one window, wide and low
Against this stood a deal table, and un-
derneath this was a stout oaken IRON
| bound chest.
The unique character. who, afterward
| learned, had performed more than q
thousand Gretna, or civil contract mar
riages-simply consisting of an agree
ment by man and woman to become hus-
band and wife, in the presence of wit
nesSes, with subsequent official registra.
| ton OF the same-sat in sacerdotal state
beside the deal table, one arm resting
record books, his whole manner one Of
impatient reckoning as to how much
'slller" there might be ''ahint' any pos
sible transaction between US.
But, like all members of the legal pro-
fession was not to be hurried. Another
| person, one who singularly and patheti-
cally impressed me, stood or rather teet-
cred, about the middle of the room.
This was the old mans wife, deaf for
more than forty years, her voice faded
into touching falsetto gurgle, and her
face and thin old form suggesting some
| ghostly. white field flower trem bling
teebly in the wind-whipped autumn OF
its passing life.
The old man was fercely grave and
| dignitied. The old woman was all feeble
smiles, swaying salaams and soft and
! piteous cacklings. For days, subject to
the most conscienceless petty blackmail
of which l was ever cognizant, | was
busy delving among the musty records
of this strange marital curiosity shop.
| First after the doors and windows were
made fast, the iron-bound oaken chest
was opened. This contained the records
OF nearly ten thousand Gretna marriages,
now scarcely more than a mass of shreds,
but still quite legible, and on Innumera-
bic occasions worth, in Scottish and Eng
lish Courts, far more than their weight in
gold. Then the transcript records were
examined. These place, at glance. in
chronological order every marriage re-
corded as performed by old Paisley and
the three Laings, down to the present
time.
Entirely aside from my professional
zeal i'll our clients cause, what an inter-
est and fascination were In these silent
reminders of the romances, the well-high
tragedies, of the past! And, besides,
what momentous pages were here writ
ten in the lives of not only the lowly but
of the proud aristocracy of England and
Scotland.
From the first romantic Gretna mar
riage of the lovelorn Cumberland couple,
John Edgar and Jean Scott. who barely
cious pursuers across the tempest-tossed
Solway, in III, down to the Cumberland
couple who had been married by the old
rascal before me only the day preceding
my visit, there danced before my aston
ished eyes the names OF the noble and
great, in their own handwriting, set
where they had so strangely sealed the
tates Of such as Thomas, Lord Erskine,
with Sarah Buck; Edward Conroy with
Lady Alicia Parsons, daughter of the
Earl OF Ross; John George hampton,
grandfather of the present Lord Dur
ham, with Miss Cholmundley; Edward
Gibbon, Lord Wakefield, with Ellen Tur-
ner, for which Lord Wakefield suffered
two years imprisonment, his hasty-made
spouse being ward of the Chancery
Court. which brought the noble wooer
within punishable contempt; Lord George
William Coventry with Mary Beauclalre,
and hundreds OF other couples, ancestors
OF the best blood OF Britain to-dayi
| soon found / was dealing with the
very incarnation of drunken thrift, saw
age ignorance, aggressive avarlce and IN
senate brutality, all In the person OF one
who never permitted eyes to rest on those
records save for both 'siller" and gold,
who was cunning itselfin all conceivable
mean expediences to make my investiga-
| tions the source OF utmost delay and
| profit. and who added to the unbearable-
! ness of my situation by compelling me TO
witness such bullyings and exquisitely
outrageous tormentings of his poor old
belpmeet as rendered the memorable
! Quilp a model OF propriety in compari-
son.
| In the first instance / met cunning
with cunning, and eventually trimmed
| the spurs of his Venallty by insisting
that the desired names were others than
they really were; that the marriage,
whose record / sought, had probably oc-
| Cured at Coldstrean or some other bor-
| der town, and that there could be no fur
! ther object in taxing his episcopal pa
| tience and my own purse.
| This threw sthe old ogre into a fever OF
! fear lest further profit should be lost.
! Making oaths that he had seen the al
/ legged names among the records, thus
cast upon him the burden of anxiety and
| Ieisurely followed him in his excited
searchings until my own success had
| been secretly established.
NV resentment became more and more
| intense. Besides, my compassion for
the victim of his endless brutalities Was
| fast taking on the nature OF personal
| cause.
Her pitiful hopelessness sickened me.
| What, this side OF death, could change
! the wretched husbands nature, or give
! that helpless, desolate soul, who had
ministered her life long to fiend with
out single tender response one ray of this
worlds light and brightness.
To a stranger the brutalities of the
wretch were as various as they were blood
/ curdllng.
| From morning until night he would
shrek out to her vituperative commands
and indignities as if to merely give vent
| to the raging excess of his own evil spirit.
! She would start, pale, smile and endeavor
! in her feeble way TO merit at least cessa-
tion of his maledictions. But her very
| meekness and patience seemed to mad
den him.
''Ye auld pock pudding,v he would
shout with the face OF demon. ''Mend
yer ways or Ili let ye grafel (grovel) as
! fand YEP As though the poor thing
would not have given her chance OF
| heaven TO have been again safe from his
clutches, the humble lassie that she once
vast
notwithstanding body! Wha can un-
/ derstan' ye?'' was as a loving endear-
ment to many OF his outbursts, and when
| the broken life would pant and pause
and murmur: "I'll deel Pll dee-t'aith.
| William, Pll deep he would roar as il
with savage anticipation and delight:
'tWeel-dee! Gin yer gaun tae heaven,
/ ye can tell 'em that we're all well at
Gretna!''
Sometimes out of the desperation of her
! life she would seem to catch at the half
/ forgotten hope in prayer. Driven to this
| extremity by his badgerings she would
/ cry out:
"But I maun just gae doom tae th'
garden, an say my bit wordiesr' her