The Gold of Fairnilee

The Gold Of Fairnilee, by
Andrew Lang

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Title: The Gold Of Fairnilee
Author: Andrew Lang
Release Date: June 25, 2007 [EBook #21934]
Language: English
Character set encoding: ASCII
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OF FAIRNILEE ***

Produced by David Widger

THE
GOLD OF FAIRNILEE
By Andrew Lang

TO
JEANIE LANG,
LARRA
Dear Jeanie,
For you, far away on the other side of the world, I made this little tale
of our own country. Your father and I have dug for treasure in the
Camp of Rink, with our knives, when we were boys. We did not find it:
the story will tell you why.
Are there Fairies as well as Bunyips in Australia? I hope so.
Yours always,
WHUPPITY STOORIE'S SONG IN THIS TALE IS BY THE
AUTHOR'S FRIEND, F. De Q. M.

THE GOLD OF FAIRNILEE
[Illustration: Page 237]
[Illustration: Chapter One]
CHAPTER I.
--The Old House
YOU may still see the old Scotch house where Randal was born, so
long ago. Nobody lives there now. Most of the roof has fallen in, there
is no glass in the windows, and all the doors are open. They were open
in the days of Randal's father--nearly four hundred years have passed
since then--and everyone who came was welcome to his share of beef
and broth and ale. But now the doors are not only open, they are quite
gone, and there is nobody within to give you a welcome.

So there is nothing but emptiness in the old house where Randal lived
with Jean, three hundred and sixty years or so before you were born. It
is a high old house, and wide, with the broken slates still on the roof. At
the corner there are little round towers, like pepperboxes, with sharp
peaks. The stems of the ivy that covers the walls are as thick as trees.
There are many trees crowding all round, and there are hills round it
too; and far below you hear the Tweed whispering all day. The house is
called Fairnilee, which means "the Fairies' Field;" for people believed
in fairies, as you shall hear, when Randal was a boy, and even when my
father was a boy.
Randal was all alone in the house when he was a little fellow--alone
with his mother, and Nancy the old nurse, and Simon Grieve the butler,
who wore a black velvet coat and a big silver chain. Then there were
the maids, and the grooms, and the farm folk, who were all friends of
Randal's. He was not lonely, and he did not feel unhappy, even before
Jean came, as you shall be told. But the grown-up people were sad and
silent at Fairnilee. Randal had no father; his mother, Lady Ker, was a
widow. She was still quite young, and Randal thought her the most
beautiful person in the world. Children think these things about their
mothers, and Randal had seen no ladies but his mother only. She had
brown hair and brown eyes and red lips, and a grave kind face, which
looked serious under her great white widow's cap with the black hood
over it. Randal never saw his mother cry; but when he was a very little
child indeed, he had heard her crying in the night: this was after his
father went away.
[Illustration: Chapter Two]
CHAPTER II.
--How Randal's Father Came Home
RANDAL remembered his father's going to fight the English, and how
he came back again. It was a windy August evening when he went
away: the rain had fallen since morning. Randal had watched the white
mists driven by the gale down through the black pine-wood that covers

the hill opposite Fairnilee. The mist looked like armies of ghosts, he
thought, marching, marching through the pines, with their white flags
flying and streaming. Then the sun came out red at evening, and
Randal's father rode away with all his men. He had a helmet on his
head, and a great axe hanging from his neck by a chain, and a spear in
his hand. He was riding his big horse, Sir Hugh, and he caught Randal
up to the saddle and kissed him many times before he clattered out of
the courtyard. All the tenants and men about the farm rode with him, all
with spears and a flag embroidered with a crest in gold. His mother
watched them from the tower till they were out of