With a mind more at ease, Waverley could not have failed to admire the mixture of romance and beauty which renders interesting the scene through which he was now passing----the field which had been the scene of the tournaments of old---the rock from which the ladies beheld the contest, while each made vows for the success of some favourite knight---the towers of the Gothic church, where these vows might be paid---and, surmounting all, the fortress itself, at once a castle and palace, where valour received the prize from royalty, and knights and dames closed the evening amid the revelry of the dance, the song, and the feast.All these were objects fitted to arouse and interest a romantic imagination.
But Waverley had other objects of meditation, and an incident soon occurred of a nature to disturb meditation of any kind.Balmawhapple, in the pride of his heart, as he wheeled his little body of cavalry round the base of the castle, commanded his trumpet to sound a flourish, and his standard to be displayed.This insult produced apparently some sensation;for when the cavalcade was at such distance from the southern battery as to admit of a gun being depressed so as to bear upon them, a flash of fire issued from one of the embrasures upon the rock; and ere the report with which it was attended could be heard, the rushing sound of a cannon-ball passed over Balmawhapple's head, and the bullet, burying itself in the ground at a few yards' distance, covered him with the earth which it drove up.There was no need to bid the party trudge.In fact, every man, acting upon the impulse of the moment, soon brought Mr.Jinker's steeds to show their mettle, and the cavaliers, retreating with more speed than regularity, never took to a trot, as the lieutenant afterwards observed, until an intervening eminence had secured them from any repetition of so undesirable a compliment on the part of Stirling Castle.I must do Balmawhapple, however, the justice to say, that he not only kept the rear of his troop, and laboured to maintain some order among them, but, in the height of his gallantry, answered the fire of the castle by discharging one of his horse-pistols at the battlements;although, the distance being nearly half-a-mile, I could never learn that this measure of retaliation was attended with any particular effect.
The travellers now passed the memorable field of Bannockburn, and reached the Torwood---a place glorious or terrible to the recollections of the Scottish peasant, as the feats of Wallace, or the cruelties of Wude Willie Grime, predominate in his recollection.At Falkirk, a town formerly famous in Scottish history, and soon to be again distinguished as the scene of military events of importance, Balmawhapple proposed to halt and repose for the evening.This was performed with very little regard to military discipline, his worthy quarter-master being chiefly solicitous to discover where the best brandy might be come at.Sentinels were deemed unnecessary, and the only vigils performed were those of such of the party as could procure liquor.A few resolute men might easily have cut off the detachment; but of the inhabitants some were favourable, many indifferent, and the rest overawed.So nothing memorable occurred in the course of the evening, except that Waverley's rest was sorely interrupted by the revellers hallooing forth their Jacobite songs without remorse or mitigation of voice.
