The Fair Maid of Perth | Page 2

they
are called, and a stain of two hundred and fifty years' standing was
interesting to him, not because it had been caused by the blood of a
queen's favourite, slain in her apartment, but because it offered so
admirable an opportunity to prove the efficacy of his unequalled
Detergent Elixir. Down on his knees went our friend, but neither in
horror nor devotion.
"Two hundred and fifty years, ma'am, and nothing take it away? Why,
if it had been five hundred, I have something in my pocket will fetch it

out in five minutes. D'ye see this elixir, ma'am? I will show you the
stain vanish in a moment."
Accordingly, wetting one end of his handkerchief with the all deterging
specific, he began to rub away on the planks, without heeding the
remonstrances of Mrs. Policy. She, good soul, stood at first in
astonishment, like the abbess of St. Bridget's, when a profane visitant
drank up the vial of brandy which had long passed muster among the
relics of the cloister for the tears of the blessed saint. The venerable
guardian of St. Bridget probably expected the interference of her
patroness--she of Holyrood might, perhaps, hope that David Ruzzio's
spectre would arise to prevent the profanation. But Mrs. Policy stood
not long in the silence of horror. She uplifted her voice, and screamed
as loudly as Queen Mary herself when the dreadful deed was in the act
of perpetration--
"Harrow, now out, and walawa!" she cried.
I happened to be taking my morning walk in the adjoining gallery,
pondering in my mind why the kings of Scotland, who hung around me,
should be each and every one painted with a nose like the knocker of a
door, when lo! the walls once more re-echoed with such shrieks as
formerly were as often heard in the Scottish palaces as were sounds of
revelry and music. Somewhat surprised at such an alarm in a place so
solitary, I hastened to the spot, and found the well meaning traveller
scrubbing the floor like a housemaid, while Mrs. Policy, dragging him
by the skirts of the coat, in vain endeavoured to divert him from his
sacrilegious purpose. It cost me some trouble to explain to the zealous
purifier of silk stockings, embroidered waistcoats, broadcloth, and deal
planks that there were such things in the world as stains which ought to
remain indelible, on account of the associations with which they are
connected. Our good friend viewed everything of the kind only as the
means of displaying the virtue of his vaunted commodity. He
comprehended, however, that he would not be permitted to proceed to
exemplify its powers on the present occasion, as two or three
inhabitants appeared, who, like me, threatened to maintain the
housekeeper's side of the question. He therefore took his leave,
muttering that he had always heard the Scots were a nasty people, but
had no idea they carried it so far as to choose to have the floors of their
palaces blood boltered, like Banquo's ghost, when to remove them

would have cost but a hundred drops of the Infallible Detergent Elixir,
prepared and sold by Messrs. Scrub and Rub, in five shilling and ten
shilling bottles, each bottle being marked with the initials of the
inventor, to counterfeit which would be to incur the pains of forgery.
Freed from the odious presence of this lover of cleanliness, my good
friend Mrs. Policy was profuse in her expressions of thanks; and yet her
gratitude, instead of exhausting itself in these declarations, according to
the way of the world, continues as lively at this moment as if she had
never thanked me at all. It is owing to her recollection of this piece of
good service that I have the permission of wandering, like the ghost of
some departed gentleman usher, through these deserted halls,
sometimes, as the old Irish ditty expresses it--
Thinking upon things that are long enough ago;
--and sometimes wishing I could, with the good luck of most editors of
romantic narrative, light upon some hidden crypt or massive antique
cabinet, which should yield to my researches an almost illegible
manuscript, containing the authentic particulars of some of the strange
deeds of those wild days of the unhappy Mary.
My dear Mrs. Baliol used to sympathise with me when I regretted that
all godsends of this nature had ceased to occur, and that an author
might chatter his teeth to pieces by the seaside without a wave ever
wafting to him a casket containing such a history as that of Automates;
that he might break his shins in stumbling through a hundred vaults
without finding anything but rats and mice; and become the tenant of a
dozen sets of shabby tenements without finding that they contained any
manuscript