Chapter Five.

Chapter Five.Leaving the Nest.“I’ve kept old ways, and loved old friends,Till, one by one, they’ve slipped away;Stand where we will, cling as we like,There’s none but God can be our stay.’Tis only by our hold on HimWe keep a hold on those who passOut of our sight across the seas,Or underneath the churchyard grass.”Isabella Fyvie Mayo.

“I’ve kept old ways, and loved old friends,Till, one by one, they’ve slipped away;Stand where we will, cling as we like,There’s none but God can be our stay.’Tis only by our hold on HimWe keep a hold on those who passOut of our sight across the seas,Or underneath the churchyard grass.”Isabella Fyvie Mayo.

Carlisle, April the 5th, 1744 or 5.

I really feel that I must put a date to my writing now, when this is the first time of my going out into the great world. I have never been beyond Carlisle before, and now I am going, first into a new country, and then to London itself, if all go well.News came last night, just before we started, that my Lord Orford is dead—he that was Sir Robert Walpole, and the Elector’s Prime Minister. Father says his death is a good thing for the country, for it gives more hope that the King may come by his own. I don’t know what would happen if he did. I suppose it would not make much difference to us. Indeed, I rather wish things would not happen, for the things that happen are so often disagreeable ones. I said so this evening, and Mr Keith smiled, and answered, “You are young to have reached that conviction, Miss Caroline.”“Oh, rubbish!” said Angus. “Only old women talk so!”“Angus, will you please tell me,” said I, “whether young men have generally more sense than old women?”“Of course they have!” replied he.“The young men are apt to think so,” added Flora.“But have young women more sense than old ones?” said I. “Because I see, whenever people mean to speak of anything as particularly silly, they always say it is worthy of an old woman. Now why an old woman? Have I more commonsense now than I shall have fifty years hence? And if so, at what age may I expect it to take leave of me?”“You are not talking sense now, at any rate,” replied Angus—who might be my brother, instead of my cousin, for the way in which he takes me up, whatever I say.“Pardon me,” said Mr Keith. “I think Miss Caroline is talking very good sense.”“Then you may answer her,” said Angus.“Nay,” returned Mr Keith. “The question was addressed to you.”“Oh, all women are sillies!” was Angus’s flattering answer. “They’re just a pack of ninnies, the whole lot of them.”“It seems to me, Angus,” observed Mr Keith, quite gravely, “that you must have paid twopence extra for manners.”Flora and I laughed.“I was not rich enough to go in for any,” growled Angus. “I’m not a laird’s son, Mr Duncan Keith, so you don’t need to throw stones at me.”“Did I, Angus? I beg your pardon.”Angus muttered something which I did not hear, and was silent. I thought I had better let the subject drop.But before we went to bed, something happened which I never saw before. Mr Keith took a book from his pocket, and sat down at the table. Flora rose and went to the sofa, motioning to me to come beside her. Even Angus twisted himself round, and sat in a more decorous way.“What are we going to do?” I asked of Flora.“The exercise, dear,” said she.“Exercise!” cried I. “What are we to exercise?”A curious sort of gurgle came from Angus’s part of the room, as if a laugh had made its way into his throat, and he had smothered it in its cradle.“The word is strange to Miss Caroline,” said Mr Keith, looking round with a smile. “We Scots people, Madam, speak of exercising our souls in prayer. We are about to read in God’s Word, and pray, if you please. It is our custom, morning and evening.”“But how can we pray?” said I. “There is no clergyman.”“Though I am not a minister,” replied Mr Keith, “yet I trust I have learned to pray.”It seemed to me so strange that anybody not a clergyman should think of praying before other people! However, I sat down, of course, on the sofa by Flora, and listened while Mr Keith read something out of the Gospel of Saint John, about the woman of Samaria, and what our Lord said to her. But I never heard such reading in my life! I thought I could have gone on listening to him all night. The only clergymen that I ever heard read were Mr Bagnall and poor old Mr Digby, and the one always read in a high singsong tone, which gave me the idea that it was nothing I need listen to; and the other mumbled indistinctly, so that I never heard what he said. But Mr Keith read as if the converse were really going on, and you actually heard our Lord and the woman talking to one another at the well. He made it seem so real that I almost fancied I could hear the water trickling, and see the cool wet green mosses round the old well. Oh, if clergymen would always read and preach as if the things were real, how different going to church would be!Then we knelt down, and Mr Keith prayed. It was not out of the Prayer-Book. And I dare say, if I were to hear nothing but such prayers, I might miss the dear old prayers that have been like sweet sounds floating around me ever since I knew anything. But this evening, when it was all new, it came to me as so solemn and so real! This was not saying one’s prayers; it was talking to one’s Friend. And it seemed as if God really were Mr Keith’s Friend—as if they knew each other, and were not strangers at all, but each understood what the other would like or dislike, and they wanted to please one another. I hope I am not irreverent in writing so, but really it did seem like that. And I never saw anything like it before.I suppose, to the others, it was an old worn-out story—all this which came so new and fresh to me. When we rose up, Angus said, without any pause,—“Well! I am off to bed. Good-night, all of you.”Flora went up to him and offered him a kiss, which he took as if it were a condescension to an inferior creature; and then, without saying anything more to Mr Keith or me, lighted his candle and went away. Flora sighed as she looked after him, and Mr Keith looked at her as if he felt for her.“I shall be glad to get him home,” said Flora, answering Mr Keith’s look, I think. “If he can only get back to Father, then, perhaps—”“Aye,” said Mr Keith, meaningly, “it is all well, when we do get back to the Father.”Flora shook her head sorrowfully. “Not that!” she answered. “O Duncan, I am afraid, not that, yet! I feel such terrible fear sometimes lest he should never come back at all, or if he do, should have to come over sharp stones and through thorny paths.”“‘So He bringeth them unto their desired haven,’” was Mr Keith’s gentle answer.“I know!” she said, with a sigh. “I suppose I ought to pray and wait. Father does, I am sure. But it is hard work!”Mr Keith did not answer for a moment; and when he did, it was by another bit of the Bible. At least I think it was the Bible, for it sounded like it, but I should not know where to find it.“‘Wait on the Lord; be of good courage, and He shall strengthen thine heart; wait, I say, on the Lord.’”

News came last night, just before we started, that my Lord Orford is dead—he that was Sir Robert Walpole, and the Elector’s Prime Minister. Father says his death is a good thing for the country, for it gives more hope that the King may come by his own. I don’t know what would happen if he did. I suppose it would not make much difference to us. Indeed, I rather wish things would not happen, for the things that happen are so often disagreeable ones. I said so this evening, and Mr Keith smiled, and answered, “You are young to have reached that conviction, Miss Caroline.”

“Oh, rubbish!” said Angus. “Only old women talk so!”

“Angus, will you please tell me,” said I, “whether young men have generally more sense than old women?”

“Of course they have!” replied he.

“The young men are apt to think so,” added Flora.

“But have young women more sense than old ones?” said I. “Because I see, whenever people mean to speak of anything as particularly silly, they always say it is worthy of an old woman. Now why an old woman? Have I more commonsense now than I shall have fifty years hence? And if so, at what age may I expect it to take leave of me?”

“You are not talking sense now, at any rate,” replied Angus—who might be my brother, instead of my cousin, for the way in which he takes me up, whatever I say.

“Pardon me,” said Mr Keith. “I think Miss Caroline is talking very good sense.”

“Then you may answer her,” said Angus.

“Nay,” returned Mr Keith. “The question was addressed to you.”

“Oh, all women are sillies!” was Angus’s flattering answer. “They’re just a pack of ninnies, the whole lot of them.”

“It seems to me, Angus,” observed Mr Keith, quite gravely, “that you must have paid twopence extra for manners.”

Flora and I laughed.

“I was not rich enough to go in for any,” growled Angus. “I’m not a laird’s son, Mr Duncan Keith, so you don’t need to throw stones at me.”

“Did I, Angus? I beg your pardon.”

Angus muttered something which I did not hear, and was silent. I thought I had better let the subject drop.

But before we went to bed, something happened which I never saw before. Mr Keith took a book from his pocket, and sat down at the table. Flora rose and went to the sofa, motioning to me to come beside her. Even Angus twisted himself round, and sat in a more decorous way.

“What are we going to do?” I asked of Flora.

“The exercise, dear,” said she.

“Exercise!” cried I. “What are we to exercise?”

A curious sort of gurgle came from Angus’s part of the room, as if a laugh had made its way into his throat, and he had smothered it in its cradle.

“The word is strange to Miss Caroline,” said Mr Keith, looking round with a smile. “We Scots people, Madam, speak of exercising our souls in prayer. We are about to read in God’s Word, and pray, if you please. It is our custom, morning and evening.”

“But how can we pray?” said I. “There is no clergyman.”

“Though I am not a minister,” replied Mr Keith, “yet I trust I have learned to pray.”

It seemed to me so strange that anybody not a clergyman should think of praying before other people! However, I sat down, of course, on the sofa by Flora, and listened while Mr Keith read something out of the Gospel of Saint John, about the woman of Samaria, and what our Lord said to her. But I never heard such reading in my life! I thought I could have gone on listening to him all night. The only clergymen that I ever heard read were Mr Bagnall and poor old Mr Digby, and the one always read in a high singsong tone, which gave me the idea that it was nothing I need listen to; and the other mumbled indistinctly, so that I never heard what he said. But Mr Keith read as if the converse were really going on, and you actually heard our Lord and the woman talking to one another at the well. He made it seem so real that I almost fancied I could hear the water trickling, and see the cool wet green mosses round the old well. Oh, if clergymen would always read and preach as if the things were real, how different going to church would be!

Then we knelt down, and Mr Keith prayed. It was not out of the Prayer-Book. And I dare say, if I were to hear nothing but such prayers, I might miss the dear old prayers that have been like sweet sounds floating around me ever since I knew anything. But this evening, when it was all new, it came to me as so solemn and so real! This was not saying one’s prayers; it was talking to one’s Friend. And it seemed as if God really were Mr Keith’s Friend—as if they knew each other, and were not strangers at all, but each understood what the other would like or dislike, and they wanted to please one another. I hope I am not irreverent in writing so, but really it did seem like that. And I never saw anything like it before.

I suppose, to the others, it was an old worn-out story—all this which came so new and fresh to me. When we rose up, Angus said, without any pause,—

“Well! I am off to bed. Good-night, all of you.”

Flora went up to him and offered him a kiss, which he took as if it were a condescension to an inferior creature; and then, without saying anything more to Mr Keith or me, lighted his candle and went away. Flora sighed as she looked after him, and Mr Keith looked at her as if he felt for her.

“I shall be glad to get him home,” said Flora, answering Mr Keith’s look, I think. “If he can only get back to Father, then, perhaps—”

“Aye,” said Mr Keith, meaningly, “it is all well, when we do get back to the Father.”

Flora shook her head sorrowfully. “Not that!” she answered. “O Duncan, I am afraid, not that, yet! I feel such terrible fear sometimes lest he should never come back at all, or if he do, should have to come over sharp stones and through thorny paths.”

“‘So He bringeth them unto their desired haven,’” was Mr Keith’s gentle answer.

“I know!” she said, with a sigh. “I suppose I ought to pray and wait. Father does, I am sure. But it is hard work!”

Mr Keith did not answer for a moment; and when he did, it was by another bit of the Bible. At least I think it was the Bible, for it sounded like it, but I should not know where to find it.

“‘Wait on the Lord; be of good courage, and He shall strengthen thine heart; wait, I say, on the Lord.’”

Castleton, April the sixth.

Mr Keith left us so early this morning that there was not time for anything except breakfast and good-bye. I feel quite sorry to lose him, and wish I had a brother like him. (Not like Angus—dear me, no!) Why could we four girls not have had one brother?About half an hour after Mr Keith was gone, the Scots gentleman with whom we were to travel—Mr Cameron—came in. He is a man of about fifty, bald-headed and rosy-faced, pleasant and chatty enough, only I do not quite always understand him. By six o’clock we were all packed into his chaise, and a few minutes later we set forth from the inn door. The streets of Carlisle felt like home; but as we left them behind, and came gradually out into the open country, it dawned upon me that now, indeed, I was going out into the great world.We sleep here to-night, where Flora and I have a little bit of a bed-chamber next door to a larger one where Mr Cameron and Angus are. On Monday we expect to reach Abbotscliff. I am too tired to write more.

About half an hour after Mr Keith was gone, the Scots gentleman with whom we were to travel—Mr Cameron—came in. He is a man of about fifty, bald-headed and rosy-faced, pleasant and chatty enough, only I do not quite always understand him. By six o’clock we were all packed into his chaise, and a few minutes later we set forth from the inn door. The streets of Carlisle felt like home; but as we left them behind, and came gradually out into the open country, it dawned upon me that now, indeed, I was going out into the great world.

We sleep here to-night, where Flora and I have a little bit of a bed-chamber next door to a larger one where Mr Cameron and Angus are. On Monday we expect to reach Abbotscliff. I am too tired to write more.

Abbotscliff Manse, April the ninth.

I really could not go on any sooner. We reached the manse—what an odd name for a vicarage!—about four o’clock yesterday afternoon. The church (which Flora calls the kirk) and the manse, with a few other houses, stand on a little rising ground, and the rest of the village lies below.But before I begin to talk about the manse, I want to write down a conversation which took place on Monday morning as we journeyed, in which Mr Cameron told us some curious things that I do not wish to forget. We were driving through such a pretty little village, and in one of the doorways an old woman sat with her knitting.“Oh, look at that dear old woman!” cries Flora. “How pleasant she looks, with her clean white apron and mutch!”“Much, Flora?” said I. “What do you mean?” I thought it such an odd word to use. What was she much?Flora looked puzzled, and Mr Cameron answered for her, with amusement in his eyes.“A mutch, young lady,” said he, “is what you in the South call a cap.”“The South!” cried I. “Why, Mr Cameron, you do not think we live in the South?”I felt almost vexed that he should fancy such a thing. For all that Grandmamma and my Aunt Dorothea used to say, I always look down upon the South. All the people I have seen who came from the South seemed to me to have a great deal of wiliness and foolishness, and no commonsense. I suppose the truth is that there are agreeable people, and good people, in the South, only they have not come my way.When I cried out like that, Mr Cameron laughed.“Well,” said he, “north and south are comparative terms. We in Scotland think all England ‘the South,’—and so it is, if you will think a moment. You in Cumberland, I suppose, draw the line at the Trent or the Humber; lower down, they employ the Thames; and a Surrey man thinks Sussex is the South. ’Tis all a matter of comparison.”“What does a Sussex man call the South?” said Angus.“Spain and Portugal, I should think,” said Mr Cameron.“But, Mr Cameron,” said I, “asking your pardon, is there not some difference of character or disposition between those in the North and in the South—I mean, of England?”“Quite right, young lady,” said he. “They are different tribes; and the Lowland Scots, among whom you are now coming, have the same original as yourself. There were two tribes amongst those whom we call Anglo-Saxons, that peopled England after the Britons were driven into Wales—namely, as you might guess, the Angles and the Saxons. The Angles ran from the Frith of Forth to the Trent; the Saxons from the Thames southward. The midland counties were in all likelihood a mixture of the two. There are, moreover, several foreign elements beyond this, in various counties. For instance, there is a large influx of Danish blood on the eastern coast, in parts of Lancashire, in Yorkshire and Lincolnshire, and in the Weald of Sussex; there was a Flemish settlement in Lancashire and Norfolk, of considerable extent; the Britons were left in great numbers in Cumberland and Cornwall; the Jutes—a variety of Dane—peopled Kent entirely. Nor must we forget the Romans, who left a deep impress upon us, especially amongst Welsh families. ’Tis not easy for any of our mixed race to say, I am this, or that. Why, if most of us spoke the truth (supposing we might know it), we should say, ‘I am one-quarter Saxon, one-eighth British, one-sixteenth Iberian, one-eighth Danish, one-sixteenth Flemish, one-thirty-secondth part Roman,’—and so forth. Now, Miss Caroline, how much of that can you remember?”“All of it, I hope, Sir,” said I; “I shall try to do so. I like to hear of those old times. But would you please to tell me, what is an Iberian?”“My dear,” said Mr Cameron, smiling, “I would gladly give you fifty pounds in gold, if you could tell me.”“Sir!” cried I, in great surprise.He went on, more as if he were talking to himself, or to some very learned man, than to me.“What is an Iberian? Ah, for the man who could tell us! What is a Basque?—what is an Etruscan?—what is a Magyar?—above all, what is a Cagot? Miss Caroline, my dear, there are deep questions in all arts and sciences; and, without knowing it, you have lighted on one of the deepest and most interesting. The most learned man that breathes can only answer you, as I do now (though I am far from being a learned man)—I do not know. I will, nevertheless, willingly tell you what little I do know; and the rather if you take an interest in such matters. All that we really know of the Iberii is that they came from Spain, and that they had reached that country from the East; that they were a narrow-headed people (the Celts or later Britons were round-headed); that they dwelt in rude houses in the interior of the country, first digging a pit in the ground, and building over it a kind of hut, sometimes of turf and sometimes of stone; that they wore very rude clothing, and were generally much less civilised than the Celts, who lived mainly on the coast; that they loved to dwell, and especially to worship, on a mountain top; that they followed certain Eastern observances, such as running or leaping through the fire to Bel,—which savours of a Phoenician or Assyrian origin; and that it is more than likely that we owe to them those stupendous monuments yet standing—Stonehenge, Avebury, the White Horse of Berkshire, and the White Man of Wilmington.”“But what sort of a religion had they, if you please, Sir?” said I; for I wanted to get to know all I could about these strange fathers of ours.“Idolatry, my dear, as you might suppose,” answered Mr Cameron. “They worshipped the sun, which they identified with the serpent; and they had, moreover, a sacred tree—all, doubtless, relics of Eden. They would appear also to have had some sort of woman-worship, for they held women in high honour, loved female sovereignty, and practised polyandry—that is, each woman had several husbands.”“I never heard of such queer folks!” said I. “And what became of them, Sir?”“The Iberians and Celts together,” he answered, “made up the people we call Britons. When the Saxons invaded the country, they were driven into the remote fastnesses of Wales, Cumberland, and Cornwall. Some antiquaries think the Picts had the same original, but this is one of the unsettled points of history.”“I wish it were possible to settle all such questions!” said Flora.“So do the antiquaries, I can assure you,” returned Mr Cameron, with a smile. “But it is scarce possible to come to a conclusion with any certainty as to the origin of a people of whom we cannot recover the language.”“If you please, Sir,” said I, “what has the language to do with it?”“It has everything to do with it, Miss Caroline. You did not know that languages grew, like plants, and could be classified in groups after the same manner?”“Please explain to us, Mr Cameron,” said Flora. “It all sounds so strange.”“But it is very interesting,” I said. “I want to know all about it.”“If you want to knowallabout it,” answered our friend, “you must consult some one else than me, for I do not know nearly all about it. In truth, no one does. For myself, I have only arrived at the stage of knowing that I know next to nothing.”“That’s easy enough to know, surely,” said Angus.“Not at all, Angus. It is one of the most difficult things to ascertain in this world. No man is so ready to give an off-hand opinion on any and every subject, as the man who knows absolutely nothing. But we must not start another hare while the young ladies’ question remains unanswered. Languages, my dears, are not made; they grow. The first language—that spoken in Eden—may have been given to man ready-made, by God; but I rather imagine, from the expressions of Holy Writ, that what was granted to Adam was the inward power of forming a tongue which should be rational and consistent with itself; and, if so, no doubt it was granted to Eve that she should understand him—perhaps that she should possess a similar power.”“The woman made the language, Sir, you may be sure,” said Angus. “They are shocking chatterers.”“Unfortunately, my boy, Scripture is against you. ‘Whatsoever Adam’—not Eve—‘called the name of every living creature, that was the name thereof.’ To proceed:—The confusion of tongues at Babel seems, from what we can gather, to have called into being a number of languages quite separate from each other, yet all having a certain affinity. The structure differs; but some of the words are alike, or at least so nearly alike that the resemblance can be traced. Take the word for ‘father’ in all languages: cut down to its root, there is the same root found in all. Ab in Hebrew, abba in Syriac, pater in Greek and Latin, vater in Low Dutch, père in French, padre in Spanish and Italian, father in English—ay, even the child’s papa and the infant’s daddy—all come from one root. But this cutting away of superfluities to get at the root, is precisely what a ’prentice hand should not attempt; like an unskilled gardener, he will prune away the wrong branches.”“Then, Sir,” I asked, “what are the languages which belong to the same class as ours?”“Ours, young lady, is a composite language. It may almost be said to be made up of bits of other languages. German or Low Dutch is its mother, and the Scandinavian group—Swedish, Danish, and so forth—may be termed its aunts. It belongs mostly to what is called the Teutonic group; but there are in it traces of Celtic, and though more dimly perceptible, even of Latin and Oriental tongues. We are altogether a made-up nation—to which fact some say that we owe those excellences on which we are so fond of priding ourselves.”“Please, Sir, what are they?” I asked.Mr Cameron seemed much amused at the question.“What are the excellences we have?” said he; “or, what are those on which we pride ourselves? They are often not the same. And—notice it, young ladies, as you go through life—the virtue on which a man plumes himself the most highly is very frequently one which he possesses in small measure. (I do not say, in no measure.) Well, I suppose the qualities on which we English—”“We are not English!” cried Angus, hotly.“For this purpose we are,” was Mr Cameron’s answer. “As I observed before, the Lowland Scots and the northern English are one tribe. But I was going to say, when you were so rude as to interrupt me, English and Scots, young gentleman.”Angus growled out, “Beg your pardon.”“Take it,” said Mr Cameron, pleasantly. “Now for the question. On what good qualities do we plume ourselves? Well, I think, on steadiness, independence, loyalty, truthfulness, firmness, honesty, and love of fair play. How far we are justified in doing so, perhaps other nations are the better judges. They, I believe, generally regard us as a proud and surly race—qualities on which there is no occasion to plume ourselves.”“Much loyalty we have got to glory in!” said Angus.“We have always tried,” replied Mr Cameron, “to run loyalty and liberty together; and when the two pull smoothly, undoubtedly the national chaise gets along the best. Unhappily, when harnessed to the same chariot, one of those steeds is very apt to kick over the traces. But we will not venture on such delicate ground, seeing that our political colours differ; nor is this the time to do it, for here is the inn where we are to dine.”When we drove up to the manse on Wednesday, the floor stood open, and in the doorway was Helen Raeburn, who had evidently seen our chaise, and was waiting for us. Flora was out the first, and she and Helen flew into one another’s arms, and hugged and kissed each other as if they could never leave off. I was surprised to find Helen so old. I thought Elspie’s niece would have been between thirty and forty; and she looks more like sixty. Then Flora flew into the house to find her father, and Helen turned to me.“You’re vara welcome, young leddy,” said she, “and the Lord make ye a blessin’ amang us. Will ye come ben the now? Miss Flora, she’s aff to find the minister, bless her bonnie face!—but if ye’ll please to come awa’ wi’ me, I’ll show ye the way.—Maister Angus, my laddie, welcome hame!—are ye grown too grand to kiss your auld nursie, my callant?”Angus gave her a kiss, but not at all like Flora; rather as if he had it to do, and wanted to get it over.“Well, Helen!” said Mr Cameron, as he came down from the chaise, “and how goes the world with you, my woman?”“I wish ye a gude evening, Mr Alexander,” said she. “The warld gaes vara weel wi’ me, thanks to ye for speirin’. No that the warld’s onie better, but the Lord turns all to gude for His ain. The minister’s in his study, and he’ll be blithe to see ye. Now, my lassie—I ask your pardon, but ye see I’m used to Miss Flora.”“Please call me just what you like,” I said, and I followed Helen up a little passage paved with stone, and into a room on the right hand, where I found Flora standing by a tall fine-looking man, who had his arm round her shoulders, and who was so like her that he could only be her father. Flora’s face was lighted up as I had seen it but once before—so bright and happy she looked!“And here is our young guest, your cousin,” said my Uncle Drummond, turning to me with a very kind smile. “My dear, may your stay be profitable and pleasant among us,—ay, and mayest thou find favour in the eyes of the God of Israel, under whose wings thou art come to trust!”It sounded very strange to me. Did these people pray about everything? I had heard Father speak contemptuously of “praying Presbyters,” and I thought Uncle Drummond must be one of that sort. But I could not see that a minister looked at all different from a clergyman. They seemed to me very much the same sort of creature.Mr Cameron was to stay the night at the manse, and to go on in the morning to his own home, which is about fourteen miles further. Flora carried me off to her chamber, where she and I were to sleep, and we changed our travelling dresses, and had a good wash, and then came down to supper. During the evening Mr Cameron said, laughingly,—“Well, my fair maid who objects to the South, have you digested the Iberii?”“I think I have remembered all you told us, Sir,” said I; “but if you please, I am very sorry, but I am afraid we do come from the South. Our family, I mean. My father’s father, I believe, belonged Wiltshire; and his father, who was a captain in the navy, was a Courtenay of Powderham, whatever that means. My sister Fanny knows all about it, but I don’t understand it—only I am afraid we must have come from the South.”Mr Cameron laughed, and so did my Uncle Drummond and Flora.“Don’t you, indeed, young lady?” said the first. “Well, it only means that you have half the kings of England and France, and a number of emperors of the East, among your forefathers. Very blue blood indeed, Miss Caroline. I do not see how, with that pedigree, you could be anything but a Tory. Mr Courtenay is rather warm that way, I understand.”“Oh, Father is as strong as he can be,” said I. “I should not dare to talk of the Elector of Hanover by any other name if he heard me.”“Well, you may call that gentleman what you please here,” said Mr Cameron; “but I usually style him King George.”“Nay, Sandy, do not teach the child to disobey her father,” said my Uncle Drummond. “The Fifth Command is somewhat older than the Brunswick succession and the Act of Settlement.”“A little,” said Mr Cameron, drily.“Little Cary,” said my uncle, softly, turning to me, “do you know that you are very like somebody?”“Like whom, Uncle?” said I.“Somebody I loved very much, my child,” he answered, rather sadly; “from whom Angus has his blue eyes, and Flora her smile.”“You mean Aunt Jane,” said I, speaking as softly as he had done, for I felt that she had been very dear to him.“Yes, my dear,” he replied; “I mean my Jeannie. You are very like her. I think we shall love each other, Cary.”I thought so too.Mr Cameron left us this morning. To-day I have been exploring with Flora, who wants to go all over the house and garden and village—speaks of her pet plants as if they were old friends, and shakes hands with everyone she meets, and pats every dog and cat in the place. And they all seem so glad to see her—the dogs included; I do not know about the cats. As we went down the village street, it was quite amusing to hear the greetings from every doorway.“Atweel, Miss Flora, ye’ve won hame!” said one.“How’s a’ wi’ ye, my bairn?” said another.“A blessing on your bonnie e’en, my lassie!” said a third.And Flora had the same sort of thing for all of them. It was, “Well, Jeannie, is your Maggie still in her place?” or, “I hope Sandy’s better now?” or, “Have you lost your pains, Isabel?” She seemed to know all about each one. I was quite diverted to hear it all. They all appeared rather shy with me, only very kindly; and when Flora introduced me as “her cousin from England,” which she did in every cottage, they had all something kind to say: that they hoped I was well after my journey, or they trusted I should like Scotland, or something of that sort. Two told me I was a bonnie lassie. But at last we came to a shut door—most were open—and Flora knocked and waited for an answer. She said gravely to me,—“A King’s daughter lies here, Cary, waiting for her Father’s chariot to take her home.”A fresh-coloured, middle-aged woman came to the door, and I was surprised to hear Flora say, “How is your grandmother, Elsie?”“She’s mickle as ye laft her, Miss Flora, only weaker; I’m thinkin’ she’ll no be lang the now. But come ben, my bonnie lassie; you’re as welcome as flowers in May. And how’s a’ wi’ ye?”Flora answered as we were following Elsie down the chamber and round a screen which boxed off the end of it. Behind the screen was a bed, and on it lay, as I thought, the oldest woman on whom I ever set my eyes. Her face was all wrinkled up, yet there was a fresh colour in her cheeks, and her eyes, though much sunk, seemed piercingly bright.“Ye’re come at last,” she said, in a low clear voice, as Flora sat down on the bed, and took the wrinkled brown hand in hers.“Yes, dear Mirren, come at last,” said she. “I’m very glad to get home.”“Ay, and that’s what I’ll be the morn.”“So soon, Mirren?”“Ay, just sae soon. I askit Him to let me bide while ye came hame. I ay thocht I wad fain see ye ance mair—my Miss Flora’s lad’s lassie. He’s gi’en me a’ that ever I askit Him—but ane thing, an’ that was the vara desire o’ my heart.”“You mean,” said Flora, gently, “you wanted Ronald to come home?”“Ay, I wanted him to come hame frae the far country!” said old Mirren with a sigh. “I’d ha’e likit weel to see him come hame to Abbotscliff—vara weel. But I longed mickle mair to see him come hame to the Father’s house. It’s no for his auld minnie to see that. But if it’s for the Lord to see some ither day, I’m content. And He has gi’en me sae monie things that I ne’er askit Him wi’ ane half the longing that I did for that, I dinna think He’ll say me nay the now.”“Is He with you, Mirren dear?”I could not imagine how Flora thought Mirren was to know that. But she answered, with a light in those bright eyes,—“Ay, my doo. ‘His left haun is under my heid, and His richt haun doth embrace me.’”I sat and listened in wonder. It all sounded so strange. Yet Flora seemed to understand. And I had such an unpleasant sense of being outside, and not understanding, as I never felt before, and I did not like it a bit. I knew quite well that if Father had been there, he would have said it was all stuff and cant. But I did not feel so sure of my Aunt Kezia. And suppose it were not cant, but was something unutterably real,—something that I ought to know, and must know some day, if I were ever to get to Heaven! I did not like it. I felt that I was among a new sort of people—people who lived, as it were, in a different place from me—a sort of whom I had never seen one before (that did not come from Abbotscliff) except my Aunt Kezia, and there were differences between her and them. My Uncle Drummond and Flora, and Mr Keith, and this old Mirren, and I thought Helen Raeburn and Mr Cameron, all belonged this new sort of people. The one who did not seem to belong them was Angus. Yet I did not like Angus nearly so well as the rest. And yet he belonged my sort of people. It was a puzzle altogether, and not a pleasant puzzle. And how anybody was to get out of the one set into the other set, I could not tell at all.Stop! I did know one other person at Brocklebank who belonged this new sort of people. It was Ephraim Hebblethwaite. He was not, I thought—well, I don’t know how to put it—he did not seem so far on the road as the others; only he was on that road, and not on this road. And then it struck me, too, whether old Elspie, and perhaps Sam, were not on the road as well. I ran over in my mind, as I was walking back to the manse with Flora, who was very silent, all the people I knew; and I could not think of one other who might be on Flora’s road. Father and my sisters, Esther Langridge, the Catteralls, the Bracewells, Cecilia—oh dear, no!—Mr Digby, Mr Bagnall (yet they were parsons), Mr Parmenter—no, not one. At all the four I named last, my mind gave a sort of jump as if it were quite astonished to be asked the question. But where did the roads lead? Flora and her sort, I felt quite sure, were going to Heaven. Then where were Angus and I and all the rest going?And I did not like the answer at all.But I felt that the two roads led in opposite ways, and they could not both go to one place.As we walked up the path to the manse, Helen came out to meet us.“My lassie,” she said to Flora, “there’s Miss Annas i’ the garden, and Leddy Monksburn wad ha’e ye gang till Monksburn for a dish o’ tea, and Miss Cary wi’ ye.”Flora’s face lighted up.“Oh, how delightful!” she said. “Come, Cary—come and see Annas Keith.”I was very curious to see Annas, and I followed willingly. Under the old beech at the bottom of the garden sat a girl-woman—she was not either, but both—in a gown of soft camlet, which seemed as if it were part of her; I do not mean so much in the fit of it, as in the complete suitableness of it and her. Her head was bent down over a book, and I could not see her face at first—only her hair, which was neither light nor dark, but had a kind of golden shimmer. Her hat lay beside her on the seat. Flora ran down the walk with a glad cry of “Annas!” and then she stood up, and I saw Annas Keith.A princess! was my first thought. I saw a tall, slight figure, a slender white throat, a pure pale face, dark grey eyes with black lashes, and a soul in them. Some people have no souls in their eyes, Annas Keith has.Yet I could not have said then, and I cannot say now, when I try to recall her picture in my mind’s eye, whether Annas Keith is beautiful. It does not seem the right word to describe her: and yet “ugly” would be much further off. She is one of those women about whose beauty or want of beauty you never think unless you are trying to describe them, and then you cannot tell what to say about it. She takes you captive. There is a charm about her that I cannot put into words. Only it is as different from the spell that Cecilia Osborne threw over me (at first) as light differs from darkness. The charm about Annas feels as if it lifted me higher, into a purer air. Whenever I had been long with Cecilia, my mind felt soiled, as if I had been breathing bad air.When Flora introduced me, Miss Keith turned and kissed me, and I felt as if I had been presented to a queen.“We want to know you,” she said. “All Flora’s friends are our friends. You will come, both of you?”“I thank you, Miss Keith,” said I. “I should like to come very much.”“Annas, please,” she said quietly, with that sweet smile of hers. It is only when she smiles that she reminds me of her brother.“And how are the Laird and Lady Monksburn?” said Flora.I did not know that the Laird (as they always seem to call the squires here) had been a titled gentleman: and I said so. Annas smiled.“Our titles will seem odd to you,” said she. “We call a Scots gentleman by the name of his estate, and every laird’s wife is ‘Lady’—only by custom and courtesy, you understand. My mother really is only Mrs Keith, but you will hear everybody call her Lady Monksburn.”“Then if my father were here, they would call him—” I hesitated, and Flora ended the sentence for me.“The Laird of Brocklebank; and if you had a mother she would be Lady Brocklebank.”I thought it sounded rather pleasant.“And when is Duncan coming home?” asked Flora.“To-morrow, or the day after, we hope,” said Annas.I noticed that she had less of the Scots accent than Flora; and Mr Keith has it scarcely at all. I found after a while that Lady Monksburn is English, and that Annas has spent much of her life in England. I wanted to know what part of England it was, and she said, “The Isle of Wight.”“Why, then you do really come from the South!” cried I. “Do tell me something about it. Are there any agreeable people there?—I mean, except you.”Annas laughed. “I hope you have seen few people from the South,” said she, “if that be your impression of them.”“Only two,” said I; “and I did not like either of them one bit.”“Well, two is no large acquaintance,” said Annas. “Let me assure you that there are plenty of agreeable people in the South, and good people also; though I will not say that they are not different from us in the North. They speak differently, and their manners are more polished.”“But it is just that polish I feel afraid of,” I replied. “It looks to me so like a mask. If we are bears in the North, at least we mean what we say.”“I do not think you need fear a polished Christian,” said Annas. “A worldly man, polished or unpolished, may do you hurt.”“But are we not all Christians?” said I. And the words were scarcely out of my lips when the thoughts came back to me which had been tormenting me as we walked up from old Mirren’s cottage. Those two roads! Did Annas mean that only those were Christians who took the higher one? Only, what was there in the air of Abbotscliff which seemed to make people Christians? or in that of Brocklebank, which seemed unfavourable to it?“Those are Christians who follow Christ,” said Annas. “Do you think they who do not, have a right to the name?”“I should like to think more about it,” I answered. “It all looks strange to me.”“Do think about it,” replied Annas.When we came to Monksburn, which is about a mile from the manse, I found it was a most charming place on the banks of the Tweed. The lawn ran sloping down to the river; and the house was a lovely old building of grey stone, in some places almost lost in ivy. Annas said it had been the Abbots grange belonging to the old Abbey which gives its name to Abbotscliff and Monksburn, and several other estates and villages in the neighbourhood. Here we found Lady Monksburn in the drawing-room, busied with some soft kind of embroidered work; and I thought I could have guessed her to be the mother of Mr Keith. Then when the Laird came in, I saw that his grey eyes were Annas’s, though I should not call them alike in other respects.Lady Monksburn is a dear old lady; and as she comes from the South, I must never say a word against Southerners again. She took both my hands in her soft white ones, and spoke to me so kindly that before I had known her ten minutes I was almost surprised to find myself chattering away to her as if she were quite an old friend—telling her all about Brocklebank, and my sisters, and Father, and my Aunt Kezia. I could not tell how it was,—I felt so completely at home in that Monksburn drawing-room. Everybody was so kind, and seemed to want me to enjoy myself, and yet there was no fuss about it. If those be southern manners, I wish I could catch them, like small-pox. But perhaps they are Christian manners. That may be it. And I don’t suppose you can catch that like the small-pox. However, I certainly did enjoy myself this afternoon. Mr Keith, I find, can draw beautifully, and they let me look through some of his portfolios, which was delightful. And when Annas, at her mother’s desire, at down to the harpsichord, and sang us some old Scots songs, I thought I never heard anything so charming—until Flora joined in, and then it was more delicious still.I think it would be easy to be good, if one lived at Monksburn!Those grey eyes of Annas’s seem to see everything. I am sure she saw that Flora would like a quiet talk with Lady Monksburn, and she carried me to see her peacocks and silver pheasants, which are great pets, she says; and they are so tame that they will come and eat out of her hand. Of course they were shy with me. Then we had a charming little walk on the path which ran along by the side of the river, and Annas pointed out some lovely peeps through the trees at the scenery beyond. When we came in, I saw that Flora had been crying; but she seemed so much calmer and comforted, that I am sure her talk had done her good. Then came supper, and then Angus, who had cleared up wonderfully, and was more what he used to be as a boy, instead of the cross, gloomy young man he has seemed of late. Lady Monksburn offered to send a servant with arms to accompany us home, but Angus appeared to think it quite unnecessary. He had his dirk and a pistol, he said; and surely he could take care of two girls! I am not sure that Flora would not rather have had the servant, and I know I would. However, we came safe to the manse, meeting nothing more terrific than a white cow, which wicked Angus tried to persuade us was a lady without a head.

But before I begin to talk about the manse, I want to write down a conversation which took place on Monday morning as we journeyed, in which Mr Cameron told us some curious things that I do not wish to forget. We were driving through such a pretty little village, and in one of the doorways an old woman sat with her knitting.

“Oh, look at that dear old woman!” cries Flora. “How pleasant she looks, with her clean white apron and mutch!”

“Much, Flora?” said I. “What do you mean?” I thought it such an odd word to use. What was she much?

Flora looked puzzled, and Mr Cameron answered for her, with amusement in his eyes.

“A mutch, young lady,” said he, “is what you in the South call a cap.”

“The South!” cried I. “Why, Mr Cameron, you do not think we live in the South?”

I felt almost vexed that he should fancy such a thing. For all that Grandmamma and my Aunt Dorothea used to say, I always look down upon the South. All the people I have seen who came from the South seemed to me to have a great deal of wiliness and foolishness, and no commonsense. I suppose the truth is that there are agreeable people, and good people, in the South, only they have not come my way.

When I cried out like that, Mr Cameron laughed.

“Well,” said he, “north and south are comparative terms. We in Scotland think all England ‘the South,’—and so it is, if you will think a moment. You in Cumberland, I suppose, draw the line at the Trent or the Humber; lower down, they employ the Thames; and a Surrey man thinks Sussex is the South. ’Tis all a matter of comparison.”

“What does a Sussex man call the South?” said Angus.

“Spain and Portugal, I should think,” said Mr Cameron.

“But, Mr Cameron,” said I, “asking your pardon, is there not some difference of character or disposition between those in the North and in the South—I mean, of England?”

“Quite right, young lady,” said he. “They are different tribes; and the Lowland Scots, among whom you are now coming, have the same original as yourself. There were two tribes amongst those whom we call Anglo-Saxons, that peopled England after the Britons were driven into Wales—namely, as you might guess, the Angles and the Saxons. The Angles ran from the Frith of Forth to the Trent; the Saxons from the Thames southward. The midland counties were in all likelihood a mixture of the two. There are, moreover, several foreign elements beyond this, in various counties. For instance, there is a large influx of Danish blood on the eastern coast, in parts of Lancashire, in Yorkshire and Lincolnshire, and in the Weald of Sussex; there was a Flemish settlement in Lancashire and Norfolk, of considerable extent; the Britons were left in great numbers in Cumberland and Cornwall; the Jutes—a variety of Dane—peopled Kent entirely. Nor must we forget the Romans, who left a deep impress upon us, especially amongst Welsh families. ’Tis not easy for any of our mixed race to say, I am this, or that. Why, if most of us spoke the truth (supposing we might know it), we should say, ‘I am one-quarter Saxon, one-eighth British, one-sixteenth Iberian, one-eighth Danish, one-sixteenth Flemish, one-thirty-secondth part Roman,’—and so forth. Now, Miss Caroline, how much of that can you remember?”

“All of it, I hope, Sir,” said I; “I shall try to do so. I like to hear of those old times. But would you please to tell me, what is an Iberian?”

“My dear,” said Mr Cameron, smiling, “I would gladly give you fifty pounds in gold, if you could tell me.”

“Sir!” cried I, in great surprise.

He went on, more as if he were talking to himself, or to some very learned man, than to me.

“What is an Iberian? Ah, for the man who could tell us! What is a Basque?—what is an Etruscan?—what is a Magyar?—above all, what is a Cagot? Miss Caroline, my dear, there are deep questions in all arts and sciences; and, without knowing it, you have lighted on one of the deepest and most interesting. The most learned man that breathes can only answer you, as I do now (though I am far from being a learned man)—I do not know. I will, nevertheless, willingly tell you what little I do know; and the rather if you take an interest in such matters. All that we really know of the Iberii is that they came from Spain, and that they had reached that country from the East; that they were a narrow-headed people (the Celts or later Britons were round-headed); that they dwelt in rude houses in the interior of the country, first digging a pit in the ground, and building over it a kind of hut, sometimes of turf and sometimes of stone; that they wore very rude clothing, and were generally much less civilised than the Celts, who lived mainly on the coast; that they loved to dwell, and especially to worship, on a mountain top; that they followed certain Eastern observances, such as running or leaping through the fire to Bel,—which savours of a Phoenician or Assyrian origin; and that it is more than likely that we owe to them those stupendous monuments yet standing—Stonehenge, Avebury, the White Horse of Berkshire, and the White Man of Wilmington.”

“But what sort of a religion had they, if you please, Sir?” said I; for I wanted to get to know all I could about these strange fathers of ours.

“Idolatry, my dear, as you might suppose,” answered Mr Cameron. “They worshipped the sun, which they identified with the serpent; and they had, moreover, a sacred tree—all, doubtless, relics of Eden. They would appear also to have had some sort of woman-worship, for they held women in high honour, loved female sovereignty, and practised polyandry—that is, each woman had several husbands.”

“I never heard of such queer folks!” said I. “And what became of them, Sir?”

“The Iberians and Celts together,” he answered, “made up the people we call Britons. When the Saxons invaded the country, they were driven into the remote fastnesses of Wales, Cumberland, and Cornwall. Some antiquaries think the Picts had the same original, but this is one of the unsettled points of history.”

“I wish it were possible to settle all such questions!” said Flora.

“So do the antiquaries, I can assure you,” returned Mr Cameron, with a smile. “But it is scarce possible to come to a conclusion with any certainty as to the origin of a people of whom we cannot recover the language.”

“If you please, Sir,” said I, “what has the language to do with it?”

“It has everything to do with it, Miss Caroline. You did not know that languages grew, like plants, and could be classified in groups after the same manner?”

“Please explain to us, Mr Cameron,” said Flora. “It all sounds so strange.”

“But it is very interesting,” I said. “I want to know all about it.”

“If you want to knowallabout it,” answered our friend, “you must consult some one else than me, for I do not know nearly all about it. In truth, no one does. For myself, I have only arrived at the stage of knowing that I know next to nothing.”

“That’s easy enough to know, surely,” said Angus.

“Not at all, Angus. It is one of the most difficult things to ascertain in this world. No man is so ready to give an off-hand opinion on any and every subject, as the man who knows absolutely nothing. But we must not start another hare while the young ladies’ question remains unanswered. Languages, my dears, are not made; they grow. The first language—that spoken in Eden—may have been given to man ready-made, by God; but I rather imagine, from the expressions of Holy Writ, that what was granted to Adam was the inward power of forming a tongue which should be rational and consistent with itself; and, if so, no doubt it was granted to Eve that she should understand him—perhaps that she should possess a similar power.”

“The woman made the language, Sir, you may be sure,” said Angus. “They are shocking chatterers.”

“Unfortunately, my boy, Scripture is against you. ‘Whatsoever Adam’—not Eve—‘called the name of every living creature, that was the name thereof.’ To proceed:—The confusion of tongues at Babel seems, from what we can gather, to have called into being a number of languages quite separate from each other, yet all having a certain affinity. The structure differs; but some of the words are alike, or at least so nearly alike that the resemblance can be traced. Take the word for ‘father’ in all languages: cut down to its root, there is the same root found in all. Ab in Hebrew, abba in Syriac, pater in Greek and Latin, vater in Low Dutch, père in French, padre in Spanish and Italian, father in English—ay, even the child’s papa and the infant’s daddy—all come from one root. But this cutting away of superfluities to get at the root, is precisely what a ’prentice hand should not attempt; like an unskilled gardener, he will prune away the wrong branches.”

“Then, Sir,” I asked, “what are the languages which belong to the same class as ours?”

“Ours, young lady, is a composite language. It may almost be said to be made up of bits of other languages. German or Low Dutch is its mother, and the Scandinavian group—Swedish, Danish, and so forth—may be termed its aunts. It belongs mostly to what is called the Teutonic group; but there are in it traces of Celtic, and though more dimly perceptible, even of Latin and Oriental tongues. We are altogether a made-up nation—to which fact some say that we owe those excellences on which we are so fond of priding ourselves.”

“Please, Sir, what are they?” I asked.

Mr Cameron seemed much amused at the question.

“What are the excellences we have?” said he; “or, what are those on which we pride ourselves? They are often not the same. And—notice it, young ladies, as you go through life—the virtue on which a man plumes himself the most highly is very frequently one which he possesses in small measure. (I do not say, in no measure.) Well, I suppose the qualities on which we English—”

“We are not English!” cried Angus, hotly.

“For this purpose we are,” was Mr Cameron’s answer. “As I observed before, the Lowland Scots and the northern English are one tribe. But I was going to say, when you were so rude as to interrupt me, English and Scots, young gentleman.”

Angus growled out, “Beg your pardon.”

“Take it,” said Mr Cameron, pleasantly. “Now for the question. On what good qualities do we plume ourselves? Well, I think, on steadiness, independence, loyalty, truthfulness, firmness, honesty, and love of fair play. How far we are justified in doing so, perhaps other nations are the better judges. They, I believe, generally regard us as a proud and surly race—qualities on which there is no occasion to plume ourselves.”

“Much loyalty we have got to glory in!” said Angus.

“We have always tried,” replied Mr Cameron, “to run loyalty and liberty together; and when the two pull smoothly, undoubtedly the national chaise gets along the best. Unhappily, when harnessed to the same chariot, one of those steeds is very apt to kick over the traces. But we will not venture on such delicate ground, seeing that our political colours differ; nor is this the time to do it, for here is the inn where we are to dine.”

When we drove up to the manse on Wednesday, the floor stood open, and in the doorway was Helen Raeburn, who had evidently seen our chaise, and was waiting for us. Flora was out the first, and she and Helen flew into one another’s arms, and hugged and kissed each other as if they could never leave off. I was surprised to find Helen so old. I thought Elspie’s niece would have been between thirty and forty; and she looks more like sixty. Then Flora flew into the house to find her father, and Helen turned to me.

“You’re vara welcome, young leddy,” said she, “and the Lord make ye a blessin’ amang us. Will ye come ben the now? Miss Flora, she’s aff to find the minister, bless her bonnie face!—but if ye’ll please to come awa’ wi’ me, I’ll show ye the way.—Maister Angus, my laddie, welcome hame!—are ye grown too grand to kiss your auld nursie, my callant?”

Angus gave her a kiss, but not at all like Flora; rather as if he had it to do, and wanted to get it over.

“Well, Helen!” said Mr Cameron, as he came down from the chaise, “and how goes the world with you, my woman?”

“I wish ye a gude evening, Mr Alexander,” said she. “The warld gaes vara weel wi’ me, thanks to ye for speirin’. No that the warld’s onie better, but the Lord turns all to gude for His ain. The minister’s in his study, and he’ll be blithe to see ye. Now, my lassie—I ask your pardon, but ye see I’m used to Miss Flora.”

“Please call me just what you like,” I said, and I followed Helen up a little passage paved with stone, and into a room on the right hand, where I found Flora standing by a tall fine-looking man, who had his arm round her shoulders, and who was so like her that he could only be her father. Flora’s face was lighted up as I had seen it but once before—so bright and happy she looked!

“And here is our young guest, your cousin,” said my Uncle Drummond, turning to me with a very kind smile. “My dear, may your stay be profitable and pleasant among us,—ay, and mayest thou find favour in the eyes of the God of Israel, under whose wings thou art come to trust!”

It sounded very strange to me. Did these people pray about everything? I had heard Father speak contemptuously of “praying Presbyters,” and I thought Uncle Drummond must be one of that sort. But I could not see that a minister looked at all different from a clergyman. They seemed to me very much the same sort of creature.

Mr Cameron was to stay the night at the manse, and to go on in the morning to his own home, which is about fourteen miles further. Flora carried me off to her chamber, where she and I were to sleep, and we changed our travelling dresses, and had a good wash, and then came down to supper. During the evening Mr Cameron said, laughingly,—

“Well, my fair maid who objects to the South, have you digested the Iberii?”

“I think I have remembered all you told us, Sir,” said I; “but if you please, I am very sorry, but I am afraid we do come from the South. Our family, I mean. My father’s father, I believe, belonged Wiltshire; and his father, who was a captain in the navy, was a Courtenay of Powderham, whatever that means. My sister Fanny knows all about it, but I don’t understand it—only I am afraid we must have come from the South.”

Mr Cameron laughed, and so did my Uncle Drummond and Flora.

“Don’t you, indeed, young lady?” said the first. “Well, it only means that you have half the kings of England and France, and a number of emperors of the East, among your forefathers. Very blue blood indeed, Miss Caroline. I do not see how, with that pedigree, you could be anything but a Tory. Mr Courtenay is rather warm that way, I understand.”

“Oh, Father is as strong as he can be,” said I. “I should not dare to talk of the Elector of Hanover by any other name if he heard me.”

“Well, you may call that gentleman what you please here,” said Mr Cameron; “but I usually style him King George.”

“Nay, Sandy, do not teach the child to disobey her father,” said my Uncle Drummond. “The Fifth Command is somewhat older than the Brunswick succession and the Act of Settlement.”

“A little,” said Mr Cameron, drily.

“Little Cary,” said my uncle, softly, turning to me, “do you know that you are very like somebody?”

“Like whom, Uncle?” said I.

“Somebody I loved very much, my child,” he answered, rather sadly; “from whom Angus has his blue eyes, and Flora her smile.”

“You mean Aunt Jane,” said I, speaking as softly as he had done, for I felt that she had been very dear to him.

“Yes, my dear,” he replied; “I mean my Jeannie. You are very like her. I think we shall love each other, Cary.”

I thought so too.

Mr Cameron left us this morning. To-day I have been exploring with Flora, who wants to go all over the house and garden and village—speaks of her pet plants as if they were old friends, and shakes hands with everyone she meets, and pats every dog and cat in the place. And they all seem so glad to see her—the dogs included; I do not know about the cats. As we went down the village street, it was quite amusing to hear the greetings from every doorway.

“Atweel, Miss Flora, ye’ve won hame!” said one.

“How’s a’ wi’ ye, my bairn?” said another.

“A blessing on your bonnie e’en, my lassie!” said a third.

And Flora had the same sort of thing for all of them. It was, “Well, Jeannie, is your Maggie still in her place?” or, “I hope Sandy’s better now?” or, “Have you lost your pains, Isabel?” She seemed to know all about each one. I was quite diverted to hear it all. They all appeared rather shy with me, only very kindly; and when Flora introduced me as “her cousin from England,” which she did in every cottage, they had all something kind to say: that they hoped I was well after my journey, or they trusted I should like Scotland, or something of that sort. Two told me I was a bonnie lassie. But at last we came to a shut door—most were open—and Flora knocked and waited for an answer. She said gravely to me,—

“A King’s daughter lies here, Cary, waiting for her Father’s chariot to take her home.”

A fresh-coloured, middle-aged woman came to the door, and I was surprised to hear Flora say, “How is your grandmother, Elsie?”

“She’s mickle as ye laft her, Miss Flora, only weaker; I’m thinkin’ she’ll no be lang the now. But come ben, my bonnie lassie; you’re as welcome as flowers in May. And how’s a’ wi’ ye?”

Flora answered as we were following Elsie down the chamber and round a screen which boxed off the end of it. Behind the screen was a bed, and on it lay, as I thought, the oldest woman on whom I ever set my eyes. Her face was all wrinkled up, yet there was a fresh colour in her cheeks, and her eyes, though much sunk, seemed piercingly bright.

“Ye’re come at last,” she said, in a low clear voice, as Flora sat down on the bed, and took the wrinkled brown hand in hers.

“Yes, dear Mirren, come at last,” said she. “I’m very glad to get home.”

“Ay, and that’s what I’ll be the morn.”

“So soon, Mirren?”

“Ay, just sae soon. I askit Him to let me bide while ye came hame. I ay thocht I wad fain see ye ance mair—my Miss Flora’s lad’s lassie. He’s gi’en me a’ that ever I askit Him—but ane thing, an’ that was the vara desire o’ my heart.”

“You mean,” said Flora, gently, “you wanted Ronald to come home?”

“Ay, I wanted him to come hame frae the far country!” said old Mirren with a sigh. “I’d ha’e likit weel to see him come hame to Abbotscliff—vara weel. But I longed mickle mair to see him come hame to the Father’s house. It’s no for his auld minnie to see that. But if it’s for the Lord to see some ither day, I’m content. And He has gi’en me sae monie things that I ne’er askit Him wi’ ane half the longing that I did for that, I dinna think He’ll say me nay the now.”

“Is He with you, Mirren dear?”

I could not imagine how Flora thought Mirren was to know that. But she answered, with a light in those bright eyes,—

“Ay, my doo. ‘His left haun is under my heid, and His richt haun doth embrace me.’”

I sat and listened in wonder. It all sounded so strange. Yet Flora seemed to understand. And I had such an unpleasant sense of being outside, and not understanding, as I never felt before, and I did not like it a bit. I knew quite well that if Father had been there, he would have said it was all stuff and cant. But I did not feel so sure of my Aunt Kezia. And suppose it were not cant, but was something unutterably real,—something that I ought to know, and must know some day, if I were ever to get to Heaven! I did not like it. I felt that I was among a new sort of people—people who lived, as it were, in a different place from me—a sort of whom I had never seen one before (that did not come from Abbotscliff) except my Aunt Kezia, and there were differences between her and them. My Uncle Drummond and Flora, and Mr Keith, and this old Mirren, and I thought Helen Raeburn and Mr Cameron, all belonged this new sort of people. The one who did not seem to belong them was Angus. Yet I did not like Angus nearly so well as the rest. And yet he belonged my sort of people. It was a puzzle altogether, and not a pleasant puzzle. And how anybody was to get out of the one set into the other set, I could not tell at all.

Stop! I did know one other person at Brocklebank who belonged this new sort of people. It was Ephraim Hebblethwaite. He was not, I thought—well, I don’t know how to put it—he did not seem so far on the road as the others; only he was on that road, and not on this road. And then it struck me, too, whether old Elspie, and perhaps Sam, were not on the road as well. I ran over in my mind, as I was walking back to the manse with Flora, who was very silent, all the people I knew; and I could not think of one other who might be on Flora’s road. Father and my sisters, Esther Langridge, the Catteralls, the Bracewells, Cecilia—oh dear, no!—Mr Digby, Mr Bagnall (yet they were parsons), Mr Parmenter—no, not one. At all the four I named last, my mind gave a sort of jump as if it were quite astonished to be asked the question. But where did the roads lead? Flora and her sort, I felt quite sure, were going to Heaven. Then where were Angus and I and all the rest going?

And I did not like the answer at all.

But I felt that the two roads led in opposite ways, and they could not both go to one place.

As we walked up the path to the manse, Helen came out to meet us.

“My lassie,” she said to Flora, “there’s Miss Annas i’ the garden, and Leddy Monksburn wad ha’e ye gang till Monksburn for a dish o’ tea, and Miss Cary wi’ ye.”

Flora’s face lighted up.

“Oh, how delightful!” she said. “Come, Cary—come and see Annas Keith.”

I was very curious to see Annas, and I followed willingly. Under the old beech at the bottom of the garden sat a girl-woman—she was not either, but both—in a gown of soft camlet, which seemed as if it were part of her; I do not mean so much in the fit of it, as in the complete suitableness of it and her. Her head was bent down over a book, and I could not see her face at first—only her hair, which was neither light nor dark, but had a kind of golden shimmer. Her hat lay beside her on the seat. Flora ran down the walk with a glad cry of “Annas!” and then she stood up, and I saw Annas Keith.

A princess! was my first thought. I saw a tall, slight figure, a slender white throat, a pure pale face, dark grey eyes with black lashes, and a soul in them. Some people have no souls in their eyes, Annas Keith has.

Yet I could not have said then, and I cannot say now, when I try to recall her picture in my mind’s eye, whether Annas Keith is beautiful. It does not seem the right word to describe her: and yet “ugly” would be much further off. She is one of those women about whose beauty or want of beauty you never think unless you are trying to describe them, and then you cannot tell what to say about it. She takes you captive. There is a charm about her that I cannot put into words. Only it is as different from the spell that Cecilia Osborne threw over me (at first) as light differs from darkness. The charm about Annas feels as if it lifted me higher, into a purer air. Whenever I had been long with Cecilia, my mind felt soiled, as if I had been breathing bad air.

When Flora introduced me, Miss Keith turned and kissed me, and I felt as if I had been presented to a queen.

“We want to know you,” she said. “All Flora’s friends are our friends. You will come, both of you?”

“I thank you, Miss Keith,” said I. “I should like to come very much.”

“Annas, please,” she said quietly, with that sweet smile of hers. It is only when she smiles that she reminds me of her brother.

“And how are the Laird and Lady Monksburn?” said Flora.

I did not know that the Laird (as they always seem to call the squires here) had been a titled gentleman: and I said so. Annas smiled.

“Our titles will seem odd to you,” said she. “We call a Scots gentleman by the name of his estate, and every laird’s wife is ‘Lady’—only by custom and courtesy, you understand. My mother really is only Mrs Keith, but you will hear everybody call her Lady Monksburn.”

“Then if my father were here, they would call him—” I hesitated, and Flora ended the sentence for me.

“The Laird of Brocklebank; and if you had a mother she would be Lady Brocklebank.”

I thought it sounded rather pleasant.

“And when is Duncan coming home?” asked Flora.

“To-morrow, or the day after, we hope,” said Annas.

I noticed that she had less of the Scots accent than Flora; and Mr Keith has it scarcely at all. I found after a while that Lady Monksburn is English, and that Annas has spent much of her life in England. I wanted to know what part of England it was, and she said, “The Isle of Wight.”

“Why, then you do really come from the South!” cried I. “Do tell me something about it. Are there any agreeable people there?—I mean, except you.”

Annas laughed. “I hope you have seen few people from the South,” said she, “if that be your impression of them.”

“Only two,” said I; “and I did not like either of them one bit.”

“Well, two is no large acquaintance,” said Annas. “Let me assure you that there are plenty of agreeable people in the South, and good people also; though I will not say that they are not different from us in the North. They speak differently, and their manners are more polished.”

“But it is just that polish I feel afraid of,” I replied. “It looks to me so like a mask. If we are bears in the North, at least we mean what we say.”

“I do not think you need fear a polished Christian,” said Annas. “A worldly man, polished or unpolished, may do you hurt.”

“But are we not all Christians?” said I. And the words were scarcely out of my lips when the thoughts came back to me which had been tormenting me as we walked up from old Mirren’s cottage. Those two roads! Did Annas mean that only those were Christians who took the higher one? Only, what was there in the air of Abbotscliff which seemed to make people Christians? or in that of Brocklebank, which seemed unfavourable to it?

“Those are Christians who follow Christ,” said Annas. “Do you think they who do not, have a right to the name?”

“I should like to think more about it,” I answered. “It all looks strange to me.”

“Do think about it,” replied Annas.

When we came to Monksburn, which is about a mile from the manse, I found it was a most charming place on the banks of the Tweed. The lawn ran sloping down to the river; and the house was a lovely old building of grey stone, in some places almost lost in ivy. Annas said it had been the Abbots grange belonging to the old Abbey which gives its name to Abbotscliff and Monksburn, and several other estates and villages in the neighbourhood. Here we found Lady Monksburn in the drawing-room, busied with some soft kind of embroidered work; and I thought I could have guessed her to be the mother of Mr Keith. Then when the Laird came in, I saw that his grey eyes were Annas’s, though I should not call them alike in other respects.

Lady Monksburn is a dear old lady; and as she comes from the South, I must never say a word against Southerners again. She took both my hands in her soft white ones, and spoke to me so kindly that before I had known her ten minutes I was almost surprised to find myself chattering away to her as if she were quite an old friend—telling her all about Brocklebank, and my sisters, and Father, and my Aunt Kezia. I could not tell how it was,—I felt so completely at home in that Monksburn drawing-room. Everybody was so kind, and seemed to want me to enjoy myself, and yet there was no fuss about it. If those be southern manners, I wish I could catch them, like small-pox. But perhaps they are Christian manners. That may be it. And I don’t suppose you can catch that like the small-pox. However, I certainly did enjoy myself this afternoon. Mr Keith, I find, can draw beautifully, and they let me look through some of his portfolios, which was delightful. And when Annas, at her mother’s desire, at down to the harpsichord, and sang us some old Scots songs, I thought I never heard anything so charming—until Flora joined in, and then it was more delicious still.

I think it would be easy to be good, if one lived at Monksburn!

Those grey eyes of Annas’s seem to see everything. I am sure she saw that Flora would like a quiet talk with Lady Monksburn, and she carried me to see her peacocks and silver pheasants, which are great pets, she says; and they are so tame that they will come and eat out of her hand. Of course they were shy with me. Then we had a charming little walk on the path which ran along by the side of the river, and Annas pointed out some lovely peeps through the trees at the scenery beyond. When we came in, I saw that Flora had been crying; but she seemed so much calmer and comforted, that I am sure her talk had done her good. Then came supper, and then Angus, who had cleared up wonderfully, and was more what he used to be as a boy, instead of the cross, gloomy young man he has seemed of late. Lady Monksburn offered to send a servant with arms to accompany us home, but Angus appeared to think it quite unnecessary. He had his dirk and a pistol, he said; and surely he could take care of two girls! I am not sure that Flora would not rather have had the servant, and I know I would. However, we came safe to the manse, meeting nothing more terrific than a white cow, which wicked Angus tried to persuade us was a lady without a head.

Chapter Six.New Ideas for Cary.“O Jesu, Thou art pleading,In accents meek and low,I died for you, My children,And will ye treat Me so?O Lord, with shame and sorrow,We open now the door:Dear Saviour, enter, enter,And leave us never more!”Bishop Walsham How.As we drank our tea, this evening, I said,—“Uncle, will you please tell me something?”“Surely, my dear, if I can,” answered my Uncle Drummond kindly, laying down his book.“Are all the people at Abbotscliff going to Heaven?”I really meant it, but my Uncle Drummond put on such a droll expression, and Angus laughed so much, that I woke up to see that they thought I had said something very queer. When my uncle spoke, it was not at first to me.“Flora,” said he, “where have you taken your cousin?”“Only into the cottages, Father, and to Monksburn,” said Flora, in a diverted tone, as if she were trying not to laugh.“Either they must all have had their Sabbath manners on,” said my Uncle Drummond, “or else there are strange folks at Brocklebank. No, my dear; I fear not, by any means.”“I am afraid,” said I, “we must be worse folks at Brocklebank than I thought we were. But these seem to me, Uncle, such a different kind of people—as if they were travelling on another road, and had a different end in view. Nearly all the people I see here seem to think more of what they ought to do, and at Brocklebank we think of what we like to do.”I did not, somehow, like to say right out what I really meant—to the one set God seemed a Friend, to the other He was a Stranger.“Do you hear, Angus, what a good character we have?” said my Uncle Drummond, smiling. “We must try to keep it, my boy.”Of course I could not say that I did not think Angus was included in the “we.” But the momentary trouble in Flora’s eyes, as she glanced at him, made me feel that she saw it, as indeed I could have guessed from what I had heard her say to Mr Keith.“Well, my lassie,” my Uncle Drummond went on, “while I fear we do not all deserve the compliment you pay us, yet have you ever thought what those two roads are, and what end they have in view?”“Yes, Uncle, I can see that,” said I. “Heaven is at the end of one, I am sure.”“And of the other, Cary?”I felt the tears come into my eyes.“Uncle, I don’t like to think about that. But do tell me, for that is what I want to know, what is the difference? I do not see how people get from the one road to the other.”I did not say—but I feel sure that my Uncle Drummond did not need it—that I felt I was on the wrong one.“Lassie, if you had fallen into a deep tank of water, where the walls were so high that it was not possible you could climb out by yourself, for what would you hope?”“That somebody should come and help me, I suppose.”“True. And who is the Somebody that can help you in this matter?”I thought, and thought, and could not tell. It seems strange that I did not think what he meant. But I had been so used to think of our Lord Jesus Christ as a Person who had a great deal to do with going to church and the Prayer-book, but nothing at all to do with me, that really I did not think what my uncle meant me to say.“There is but one Man, my child, who can give you any help. And He longed to help you so much, that He came down from Heaven to do it. You know who I mean now, Cary?”“You mean our Lord Jesus Christ,” I said. “But, Uncle, you say He longed to help? I never knew that, I always thought—”“You thought He did not wish to help you at all, and that you would have very hard work to persuade Him?”“Well—something like it,” I said, hesitatingly Flora had left the room a moment before, and now she put her head in at the door and called Angus. My Uncle Drummond and I were left alone.“My dear lassie,” said he, as tenderly as if I had been his own child, “you would never have wished to be helped if He had not first wished to help you. But remember, Cary, help is not the right word. The true word is save. You are not a few yards out of the path, and able to turn back at any moment. You are lost. Dear Cary, will you let the Lord find you?”“Can I hinder Him?” I said.“Yes, my dear,” was the solemn answer. “He allows Himself to be hindered, if you choose the way of death. He will not save you against your will. He demands your joining in that work. Take, again, the emblem of the tank: the man holds out his hands to you; you cannot help yourself out; but you can choose whether you will put your hands in his or not. It will not be his fault if you are drowned; it will be your own.”“Uncle, how am I to put my hands inHis?”“Hold them out to Him, Cary. Ask Him, with all your heart, to take you, and make you His own. And if He refuse, let me know.”“I will try, Uncle,” I answered. “But you said—does Godneversave anybody against his will?”My Uncle Drummond was silent for a moment.“Well, Cary, perhaps at times He does. But it is not His usual way of working. And no man has any right to expect it in his own case, though we may be allowed to hope for it in that of another.”I wonder very much now, as I write it all down, how I ever came to say all this to my Uncle Drummond. I never meant it at all when I began. I suppose I got led on from one thing to another. When I came to think of it, I was very grateful to Flora for going away and calling Angus after her.“But, Uncle,” I said, recollecting myself suddenly, “how does anybody know when the Lord has heard him?”He smiled. “If you were lifted out of the tank and set on dry ground, Cary, do you think you would have much doubt about it?”“But I could see that, Uncle.”“Take another emblem, then. You love some people very dearly, and there are others whom you do not like at all. You cannot see love and hate. But have you any doubt whom you love, or whom you dislike?”“No,” said I,—“at least, not when I really love or dislike them very much. But there are people whom I cannot make up my mind about; I neither like nor dislike them exactly.”“Those are generally people of whom you have not seen much, I think,” said my Uncle Drummond; “or else they are those colourless men and women of whom you say that they have nothing in them. You could not feel so towards a person of decided character, and one whom you knew well.”“No, Uncle; I do not think I could.”“You may rest assured, my dear, that unless He be an utter Stranger, you will never feel so towards the Lord. When you come to know Him, you must either love or hate Him. You cannot help yourself.”It almost frightened me to hear my Uncle Drummond say that. It must be such a dreadful thing to go wrong on that road!“Cary,” he added suddenly, but very softly, “would you find it difficult to love a man who was going to die voluntarily instead of you?”“I do not see how I could help it, Uncle,” cried I.“Then how is it,” he asked in the same tone, “that you have any difficulty in loving the Man who has died in your stead?”I thought a minute.“Uncle,” I said, “it does not seem real. The other would.”“In other words, Cary—you do not believe it.”“Do not believe it!” cried I. “Surely, Uncle, I believe in our Lord! Don’t I say the Creed every Sunday?”“Probably you do, my dear.”“But I do believe it!” cried I again.“You do believe—what?” said my Uncle Drummond.“Why, I believe that Christ came down from Heaven, and was crucified, dead, and buried, and rose again, and ascended into Heaven. Of course I believe it, Uncle—every bit of it.”“And what has it to do with you, my dear? It all took place a good while ago, did it not?”I thought again. “I suppose,” I said slowly, “that Christ died to save sinners; and I must be a sinner. But somehow, I don’t quite see how it is to be put together. Uncle, it seems like a Chinese puzzle of which I have lost a piece, and none of the others will fit properly. I cannot explain it, and yet I do not quite know why.”“Listen, Cary, and I will tell you why.”I did, with both my ears and all my mind.“Your mistake is a very common one, little lassie. You are trying to believe what, and you have got to believe whom. If you had to cross a raging torrent, and I offered to carry you over, it would signify nothing whether you knew where I was born, or if I were able to speak Latin. But it would signify a great deal to you whether you knew me; whether you believed that I would carry you safe over, or that I would take the opportunity to drop you into the water and run away. Would it not?”“Of course it would,” I said; “the whole thing would depend on whether I trusted you.”My Uncle Drummond rose and laid his hand on my head—not as Mr Digby used to do, as though he were condescending to a little child; but as if he were blessing me in God’s name. Then he said, in that low, soft, solemn tone which sounds to me so very high and holy, as if an angel spoke to me:—“Cary, dear child, the whole thing depends—your soul and your eternity depend—on whether you trust the Lord Jesus.” Then he went out of the room, and left me alone, as if he wanted me to think well about that before he said anything more.I think something is coming to help me. My Uncle Drummond was late for supper last night—a thing which I could see was very unusual. And when he did come, he was particularly silent and meditative. At length, when supper was over, as we turned our chairs round from the table, and were sitting down again to our work, my Uncle Drummond, who generally goes to his study after supper, sat down among us.“Young people,” said he, with a look on his face which it seemed to me was partly grave and partly diverted, “considering that you are more travelled persons than I, I come to you for information. Have you—any of you—while in England, either seen or heard anything of one Mr George Whitefield, a clergyman of the Church of England, who is commonly reckoned a Methodist?”Angus made a grimace, and said, “Plenty!”Flora was doubtful; she thought she had heard his name.I said, “I have heard his name too, Uncle; but I do not know much about him, only Father seemed to think it a good joke that anybody should fancy him a wise man.”“Angus appears to be the best informed of you,” said my uncle. “Speak out, my boy, and tell us what you know.”“Well, he is a queer sort of fellow, I fancy,” said Angus. “He was one of the Methodists; but they say those folks have had a split, and Whitefield has broken with them. He travels about preaching, though, as they do; and they say that the reason why he took to field-preaching was because no church would hold the enormous congregations which gathered to hear him. He has been several times to the American colonies, where they say he draws larger crowds than John Wesley himself.”“A good deal of ‘They say’,” observed Uncle Drummond, with a smile. “Do ‘they say’ that the bishops and clergy are friendly to this remarkable preacher, or not?”“Well, I should rather think not,” answered Angus. “There is one bishop who has stuck to him through thick and thin—the Bishop of Gloucester, who gave him his orders to begin with; but the rest of them look askance at him over their shoulders, I believe. It is irregular, you know, to preach in fields—wholly improper to save anybody’s soul out of church; and these English folks take the horrors at anything irregular. The women like him because he makes them cry so much.”“Angus!” cried Flora and I together.“That’s what I was told, I assure you, young ladies,” returned Angus, “I am only repeating what I have heard.”“Well, that you may shortly have an opportunity of judging,” said my Uncle Drummond; “for this gentleman has come to Selkirk, and has asked leave of the presbytery to preach in certain kirks of this neighbourhood. There was some demur at first to the admission of a Prelatist; but after some converse with him this was withdrawn, and he will preach next Sabbath morning at Selkirk, and in the afternoon at Monks’ Brae. You can go to Monks’ Brae to hear him, if you will; I, of course, shall not be able to accompany you, but I trust to find an opportunity when he preaches in the fields, if there be one. I should like to hear this great English preacher, I confess. What say you?”“They’ll go, you may be sure, Sir,” said Angus, before we could answer. “Trust a lassie to gad about if she has the chance. Mind you take all the pocket-handkerchiefs you have with you. They say ’tis dreadful the way this man gars you greet. ’Tis true, you English are more given that way than we Scots; but folks say you cannot help yourself,—you must cry, whether you will or no.”“I should like to go, I think, Uncle,” said I. “Only—I suppose he is a real clergyman?”“There goes a genuine Englishwoman!” said Angus. “If Paul himself were to preach, she would not go to hear him till she knew what bishop had ordained him.”“Yes, Cary,” answered my Uncle Drummond, smiling; “he is a real clergyman. More ‘real’ than you think me, I fear.”“Oh, you are different, Uncle,” said I; “but I am sure Father would not like me to hear any preacher who was not—at least—I don’t know—he did not seem to think this Mr Whitefield all right, somehow. Perhaps he did not know he was a proper person.”“‘A proper person!’” sighed Angus, casting up his eyes.“My dear,” said my Uncle Drummond, kindly, “you are a good lassie to think of your father’s wishes. Never mind Angus; he is only making fun, and is a foolish young fellow yet. Of course, not having spoken with your father, I cannot tell so well as yourself what his wishes are; and ’tis quite possible he may think, for I hear many do, that this gentleman is a schismatic, and may disapprove of him on that account only. If so, I can tell you for certain, ’tis a mistake. But as to anything else, you must judge for yourself, and do what you think right.”“You see no objection to our going, Father?” asked Flora, who had not spoken hitherto.“Not at all, my dear,” said my Uncle. “Go by all means, if you like it. You may never have another opportunity, and ’tis very natural you should wish it.”“Thank you,” answered Flora. “Then, if Angus will take me, I will go.”“Well, I don’t know,” said Angus. “I am afraid some of my handkerchiefs are at the wash. I should not like to be quite drowned in my tears. I might wash you away, too; and that would be a national calamity.”“Don’t jest on serious subjects, my boy,” said Uncle; and Angus grew grave directly. “I am no enemy to honest, rational fun; ’tis human, and natural more especially to the young. But never, never let us make a jest of the things that pertain to God.”“I beg your pardon, Father,” said Angus, in a low voice. “I’ll take you, Flora. What say you, Cary?”“Yes, I should like to go,” I said. And I wondered directly whether I had said right or wrong. But I do so want to hear something that would help me.I found that Monks’ Brae was on the Monksburn road, but nearly two miles further on. ’Tis the high road from Selkirk to Galashiels, after you leave Monksburn, and pretty well frequented; so that Angus was deemed guard enough. But last night the whole road was so full of people going to hear Mr Whitefield, that it was like walking in a crowd all the way. The kirk was crammed to the very doors, and outside people stood looking in and listening through the doors and the open windows. Mr Lundie, the minister of Monks’ Brae, led the worship (as they say here); and when the sermon came, I looked with some curiosity at the great preacher who did such unusual things, and whom some people seemed to think it so wrong to like. Mr Whitefield is not anything particular to look at: just a young man in a fair wig, with a round face and rosy cheeks. He has a most musical voice, and he knows how to put it to the best advantage. Every word is as distinct as can be, and his voice rings out clear and strong, like a well-toned bell. But he had not preached ten minutes before I forgot his voice and himself altogether, and could think of nothing but what he was preaching about. And I never heard such a sermon in my life. My Uncle Drummond’s are the only ones I have heard which even approach it, and he does not lift you up and carry you away, as Mr Whitefield does.All the other preachers I ever heard, except those two, are always telling you to do something. Come to church, and say your prayers, and take the Sacrament; but particularly, do your duty. Now it always seems to me that there are two grand difficulties in the way of doing one’s duty. The first is, to find out what is one’s duty. Of course there is the Bible; but, if I may say it with reverence, the Bible has never seemed to have much to do with me. It is all about people who lived ever so long ago, and what they did; and what has that to do with me, Cary Courtenay, and what I am doing? Then suppose I do know what my duty is—and certainly I do in some respects—I am not sure that I can express it properly, but I feel as if I wanted something to come and make me do it. I am like a watch, with all the wheels and springs there, ready to go, but I want somebody to come and wind me up. And I do not know how that is to be done. But Mr Whitefield made me wish, oh so much! that that unknown somebody would come and do it. I never thought much about it before, until that talk with my Uncle Drummond, and now it feels to be what I want more than anything else.I cannot write the sermon down: not a page of it. I think you never can write down on paper the things that stir your very soul. It is the things which just tickle your brains that you can put down in elegant language on paper. When a thing comes close to you, into your real self, and grapples with you, and leaves a mark on you for ever hereafter, whether for good or evil, you cannot write or talk about that,—you can only feel it.The text was, “What think ye of Christ?”Mr Whitefield saith any man that will may have his sins forgiven, and may know it. I have heard Mr Bagnall speak of this doctrine, which he said was shocking and wicked, for it gave men licence to live in sin. Mr Whitefield named this very thing (whereby I saw it had been brought as a charge against him), and showed plainly that it did not tend to destroy good works, but only built them up on a safer and surer foundation. We work, saith he, not for that we would be saved by our works, but out of gratitude that we have been saved by Christ, who commands these works to such as would follow Him. And he quoted an Article of the Church, (Note 4) saying that he desired men to see that he was no schismatic preaching his own fancies, but that the Church whereof he was a minister held the same doctrine. I wonder if Mr Bagnall knows that, and if he ever reads the Articles.He spoke much, also, of the new birth, or conversion. I never heard any other preacher, except Uncle, mention that at all. I know Mr Digby thought it a fanatical notion only fit for enthusiasts. But certainly there are texts in the Bible that speak plainly of it. And Mr Whitefield saith that we do not truly believe in Christ, unless we so believe as to have Him dwelling in us, and to receive life and nourishment from Him as the branch does from the vine. And Saint John says the same thing. How can it be enthusiasm to say what the Bible says?People seem so dreadfully frightened of what they call enthusiasm (Note 1). Grandmamma used to say there was nothing more vulgar. But the queer thing is that many of these very people will let you get as enthusiastic as ever you like about a game of cards, or one horse coming in before another in a race, or about politics, or poaching, and things of that sort that have to do with this world. It is about the things of real consequence—things which have to do with your soul and the next world—that you must not get enthusiastic!May one not have too little enthusiasm, I wonder, as well as too much? Would it not be reasonable to be enthusiastic about things that really signify, and cool about the things that do not?I want to write down a few sentences which Mr Whitefield said, that I may not forget them. I do not know how they came in among the rest. They stuck to me just as they are. (Note 2). He says:—“Our senses are the landing-ports of our spiritual enemies.”“We must take care of healing before we see sinners wounded.”“The King of the Church has all its adversaries in a chain.”“If other sins have slain their thousands of professing Christians, worldly-mindedness has slain its ten thousands.”“How can any say, ‘Lead us not into temptation,’ in the morning, when they are resolved to run into it at night?”“How many are kept from seeing Christ in glory, by reason of the press!” (That is, he explained, that people are ashamed of being singularly good (Note 3), unless their acquaintances are on the same side.)“Christ will thank you for coming to His feast.”When Mr Whitefield came near the end of his sermon, I thought I could see why people said he made them cry so much. His voice sank into a soft, pleading, tender accent, as if he yearned over the souls before him. His hands were held out as if he were just holding out Jesus Christ to us, and we must take Him or turn away and be lost. And he begged us all so pitifully not to turn away. I saw tears running down the cheeks of many hard-looking men and women. Flora cried, and so did I. But Angus did not. He did not look as though he felt at all inclined to do it.This is one of the last sermons, we hear, that Mr Whitefield will preach on this side the sea. He sails for the American colonies next month. He is said to be very fond of his American friends, and very much liked by them. (Note 5).As we were coming away, we came upon our friends from Monksburn, whom we had not seen before.“This is preaching!” said Annas, as she clasped our hands.“Eh, puir laddie, he’ll just wear himself out,” said the Laird. “I hope he has a gude wife, for sic men are rare, and they should be well taken care of while they are here.”“He has a wife, Sir,” observed Angus, “and the men of his own kidney think he would be rather better off if he had none.”“Hoots, but I’m sorry to hear it,” said the Laird. “What ails her, ken ye, laddie?”“As I understood, Sir, she had three grave drawbacks. In the first place, she is a widow with a rich jointure.”“That’s a queer thing to call a drawback!” said the Laird.“In the second place, she is a widow with a temper, and a good deal of it.”“Dinna name it!” cried the Laird, lifting up his hands. “Dinna name it! Eh, puir laddie, but I’m wae for him, gin he’s fashed wi’ ane o’ that sort.”“And in the third place,” continued Angus, “I have been told that he may well preach against worldly-mindedness, for he gets enough of it at home. Mrs Whitefield knows what are trumps, considerably better than she knows where to look in the Bible for her husband’s text.”“Dear, dear!” cried Lady Monksburn in her soft voice. “What could the good man be thinking of, to bind such a burden as that upon his life?”“He thought he had converted her, I believe,” said Angus, “but she came undone.”“I should think,” remarked Mr Keith, “that he acted as Joshua did with the Gibeonites.”“How was that?” said Angus.“It won’t hurt you to look for it,” was the answer.I don’t know whether Angus looked for it, but I did as soon as I got in, and I saw that Mr Keith thought there had been too much hastiness, and perhaps a little worldly-mindedness in Mr Whitefield himself. That may be why he preaches so earnestly against it. We know so well where the slippery places are, when we have been down ourselves. And when we have been down once, we are generally very, very careful to keep off that slide for the future.Mr Whitefield said last night that it was not true to say, as some do, “that a man may be in Christ to-day, and go to the Devil to-morrow.” Then if anybody is converted, how can he, as Angus said, “come undone”? I only see one explanation, and it is rather a terrible one: namely, that the conversion was not real, but only looked like it. And I am afraid that must be the truth. But what a pity it is that Mr Whitefield did not find it out sooner!“Well, Helen, and how did you like the great English preacher?” I said to Flora’s nurse.“Atweel, Miss Cary, the discourse was no that ill for a Prelatist,” was the answer.And that was as much admiration as I could get from Helen.There was more talk about Mr Whitefield this morning at breakfast. I cannot tell what has come to Angus. Going to hear Mr Whitefield preach at Monks’ Brae seems to have made him worse instead of better. Flora and I both liked it so much; but Angus talks of it with a kind of bitter hardness in his voice, and as if it pleased him to let us know all the bad things which had been said about the preacher. He told us that they said—(I wish they would give over saying!)—that Mr Whitefield had got his money matters into some tangle, in the business of building his Orphan House in Georgia; and “they said” he had acted fraudulently in the matter. My Uncle Drummond put this down at once, with—“My son, never repeat a calumny against a good man. You may not know it, but you do Satan’s very work for him.”Angus made a grimace behind his hand, which I fancy he did not mean his father to see. Then, he went on, “‘They say’ that Mr Whitefield is so fanatical and extravagant in preaching against worldliness, that he counts it sinful to smell to a rose, or to eat anything relishing.”“Did he say so?” asked my Uncle: “or did ‘they’ say it for him?”“Well, Sir,” answered Angus with a laugh, “I heard Mr Whitefield had said that he would give his people leave to smell to a rose and a pink also, so long as they would avoid the appearance of sin: and, quoth he, ‘if you can find any diversion which you would be willing to be found at by our Lord in His coming, I give you free licence to go to it and welcome.’”“Then we have disposed of that charge,” saith my Uncle. “What next?”“Well, they say he hath given infinite displeasure to the English gentry by one of his favourite sayings—that ‘Man is half a beast and half a devil.’ He will not allow them to talk of ‘passing the time’—how dare they waste the time, saith he, when they have the devil and the beast to get out of their souls? Folks don’t like, you see, to be painted in those colours.”“No, we rarely admire a portrait that is exactly like us,” saith my Uncle Drummond.“Pray, Sir, think you that is a likeness?” said Angus.“More like, my son, than you and I think. Some of us have more of the one, and some of the other: but in truth I cannot contradict Mr Whitefield. ’Tis a just portrait of what man is by nature.”“But, Sir!” cried Angus, “do you allow nothing for a man’s natural virtues?”“What are they?” asked my Uncle. “I allow that ‘there is none that doeth good, no, not one.’ You were not taught, Angus, that a man had virtues natural to him, except as the Spirit of God implanted them in him.”“No, Sir; but when I go forth into the world, I cannot help seeing that it is so.”“I wish I could see it!” said my Uncle. “It would be a much more agreeable sight than many things I do see.”“Well, Sir, take generosity and good temper,” urged Angus. “Do you not see much of these in men who, as Mr Whitefield would say, are worldly and ungodly?”“I often see the Lord’s restraining grace,” answered my Uncle, quietly; “but am I to give the credit of it to those whom He restrains?”“But think you, Sir, that it is wise—” Angus paused.“Go on, my boy,” said my Uncle. “I like you to speak out, like an honest man. By all means have courage to own your convictions. If they be right ones, you may so have them confirmed; and if they be wrong, you stand in better case to have them put right.”I did not think Angus looked quite comfortable. He hesitated a moment, and then, I suppose, came out with what he had meant to say.“Think you not, Sir, that it is wise to leave unsaid such things as offend people, and make them turn away from preaching? Should we not be careful to avoid offence?”“Unnecessary offence,” saith my Uncle. “But the offence of the cross is precisely that which we are warned not to avoid. ‘Not with wisdom of words,’ saith the Apostle, ‘lest the cross of Christ should be made of none effect.’ In his eyes, ‘then is the offence of the cross ceased,’ was sufficient to condemn the preaching whereof he spoke. And that policy of keeping back truth is the Devil’s policy; ’tis Jesuitical. ‘Will ye speak wickedly for God, and talk deceitfully for Him?’ ‘Shall the throne of iniquity have fellowship withThee?’ Never, Angus: never!”“But our Lord Himself seems to have kept things back from His disciples,” pleaded Angus, uneasily.“Yes, what they were not ready for and could not yet understand. But never that which offended them. He offended them terribly when He told them that the Son of Man was about to be crucified. So did the Jesuits to the Chinese: and when they found the offence, they altered their policy, and said the story of the crucifixion was an invention of Christ’s enemies. Did He?”Angus made no answer: and breakfast being over, we separated to our several work.Note 1. “Enthusiasm” was the term then usually applied to the doctrines of grace, when the word was used in a religious sense.Note 2. These sentences are not taken from any one of Whitefield’s sermons exclusively, but are gathered from the gems of thought scattered through his works.Note 3. Singular still meant alone in Whitefield’s day.Note 4. Articles twelve and thirteen. All the members of the Church of England ought to be perfectly familiar with the Articles and Homilies, as the Reformers intended them to be. How else can they know what they profess to hold, when they call themselves members of the Church? If they do not share her opinions, they have no right to use her name.Note 5. He died at Newbury Port, in New England, in September 1770. America has no nobler possession than the grave of George Whitefield.

“O Jesu, Thou art pleading,In accents meek and low,I died for you, My children,And will ye treat Me so?O Lord, with shame and sorrow,We open now the door:Dear Saviour, enter, enter,And leave us never more!”Bishop Walsham How.

As we drank our tea, this evening, I said,—

“Uncle, will you please tell me something?”

“Surely, my dear, if I can,” answered my Uncle Drummond kindly, laying down his book.

“Are all the people at Abbotscliff going to Heaven?”

I really meant it, but my Uncle Drummond put on such a droll expression, and Angus laughed so much, that I woke up to see that they thought I had said something very queer. When my uncle spoke, it was not at first to me.

“Flora,” said he, “where have you taken your cousin?”

“Only into the cottages, Father, and to Monksburn,” said Flora, in a diverted tone, as if she were trying not to laugh.

“Either they must all have had their Sabbath manners on,” said my Uncle Drummond, “or else there are strange folks at Brocklebank. No, my dear; I fear not, by any means.”

“I am afraid,” said I, “we must be worse folks at Brocklebank than I thought we were. But these seem to me, Uncle, such a different kind of people—as if they were travelling on another road, and had a different end in view. Nearly all the people I see here seem to think more of what they ought to do, and at Brocklebank we think of what we like to do.”

I did not, somehow, like to say right out what I really meant—to the one set God seemed a Friend, to the other He was a Stranger.

“Do you hear, Angus, what a good character we have?” said my Uncle Drummond, smiling. “We must try to keep it, my boy.”

Of course I could not say that I did not think Angus was included in the “we.” But the momentary trouble in Flora’s eyes, as she glanced at him, made me feel that she saw it, as indeed I could have guessed from what I had heard her say to Mr Keith.

“Well, my lassie,” my Uncle Drummond went on, “while I fear we do not all deserve the compliment you pay us, yet have you ever thought what those two roads are, and what end they have in view?”

“Yes, Uncle, I can see that,” said I. “Heaven is at the end of one, I am sure.”

“And of the other, Cary?”

I felt the tears come into my eyes.

“Uncle, I don’t like to think about that. But do tell me, for that is what I want to know, what is the difference? I do not see how people get from the one road to the other.”

I did not say—but I feel sure that my Uncle Drummond did not need it—that I felt I was on the wrong one.

“Lassie, if you had fallen into a deep tank of water, where the walls were so high that it was not possible you could climb out by yourself, for what would you hope?”

“That somebody should come and help me, I suppose.”

“True. And who is the Somebody that can help you in this matter?”

I thought, and thought, and could not tell. It seems strange that I did not think what he meant. But I had been so used to think of our Lord Jesus Christ as a Person who had a great deal to do with going to church and the Prayer-book, but nothing at all to do with me, that really I did not think what my uncle meant me to say.

“There is but one Man, my child, who can give you any help. And He longed to help you so much, that He came down from Heaven to do it. You know who I mean now, Cary?”

“You mean our Lord Jesus Christ,” I said. “But, Uncle, you say He longed to help? I never knew that, I always thought—”

“You thought He did not wish to help you at all, and that you would have very hard work to persuade Him?”

“Well—something like it,” I said, hesitatingly Flora had left the room a moment before, and now she put her head in at the door and called Angus. My Uncle Drummond and I were left alone.

“My dear lassie,” said he, as tenderly as if I had been his own child, “you would never have wished to be helped if He had not first wished to help you. But remember, Cary, help is not the right word. The true word is save. You are not a few yards out of the path, and able to turn back at any moment. You are lost. Dear Cary, will you let the Lord find you?”

“Can I hinder Him?” I said.

“Yes, my dear,” was the solemn answer. “He allows Himself to be hindered, if you choose the way of death. He will not save you against your will. He demands your joining in that work. Take, again, the emblem of the tank: the man holds out his hands to you; you cannot help yourself out; but you can choose whether you will put your hands in his or not. It will not be his fault if you are drowned; it will be your own.”

“Uncle, how am I to put my hands inHis?”

“Hold them out to Him, Cary. Ask Him, with all your heart, to take you, and make you His own. And if He refuse, let me know.”

“I will try, Uncle,” I answered. “But you said—does Godneversave anybody against his will?”

My Uncle Drummond was silent for a moment.

“Well, Cary, perhaps at times He does. But it is not His usual way of working. And no man has any right to expect it in his own case, though we may be allowed to hope for it in that of another.”

I wonder very much now, as I write it all down, how I ever came to say all this to my Uncle Drummond. I never meant it at all when I began. I suppose I got led on from one thing to another. When I came to think of it, I was very grateful to Flora for going away and calling Angus after her.

“But, Uncle,” I said, recollecting myself suddenly, “how does anybody know when the Lord has heard him?”

He smiled. “If you were lifted out of the tank and set on dry ground, Cary, do you think you would have much doubt about it?”

“But I could see that, Uncle.”

“Take another emblem, then. You love some people very dearly, and there are others whom you do not like at all. You cannot see love and hate. But have you any doubt whom you love, or whom you dislike?”

“No,” said I,—“at least, not when I really love or dislike them very much. But there are people whom I cannot make up my mind about; I neither like nor dislike them exactly.”

“Those are generally people of whom you have not seen much, I think,” said my Uncle Drummond; “or else they are those colourless men and women of whom you say that they have nothing in them. You could not feel so towards a person of decided character, and one whom you knew well.”

“No, Uncle; I do not think I could.”

“You may rest assured, my dear, that unless He be an utter Stranger, you will never feel so towards the Lord. When you come to know Him, you must either love or hate Him. You cannot help yourself.”

It almost frightened me to hear my Uncle Drummond say that. It must be such a dreadful thing to go wrong on that road!

“Cary,” he added suddenly, but very softly, “would you find it difficult to love a man who was going to die voluntarily instead of you?”

“I do not see how I could help it, Uncle,” cried I.

“Then how is it,” he asked in the same tone, “that you have any difficulty in loving the Man who has died in your stead?”

I thought a minute.

“Uncle,” I said, “it does not seem real. The other would.”

“In other words, Cary—you do not believe it.”

“Do not believe it!” cried I. “Surely, Uncle, I believe in our Lord! Don’t I say the Creed every Sunday?”

“Probably you do, my dear.”

“But I do believe it!” cried I again.

“You do believe—what?” said my Uncle Drummond.

“Why, I believe that Christ came down from Heaven, and was crucified, dead, and buried, and rose again, and ascended into Heaven. Of course I believe it, Uncle—every bit of it.”

“And what has it to do with you, my dear? It all took place a good while ago, did it not?”

I thought again. “I suppose,” I said slowly, “that Christ died to save sinners; and I must be a sinner. But somehow, I don’t quite see how it is to be put together. Uncle, it seems like a Chinese puzzle of which I have lost a piece, and none of the others will fit properly. I cannot explain it, and yet I do not quite know why.”

“Listen, Cary, and I will tell you why.”

I did, with both my ears and all my mind.

“Your mistake is a very common one, little lassie. You are trying to believe what, and you have got to believe whom. If you had to cross a raging torrent, and I offered to carry you over, it would signify nothing whether you knew where I was born, or if I were able to speak Latin. But it would signify a great deal to you whether you knew me; whether you believed that I would carry you safe over, or that I would take the opportunity to drop you into the water and run away. Would it not?”

“Of course it would,” I said; “the whole thing would depend on whether I trusted you.”

My Uncle Drummond rose and laid his hand on my head—not as Mr Digby used to do, as though he were condescending to a little child; but as if he were blessing me in God’s name. Then he said, in that low, soft, solemn tone which sounds to me so very high and holy, as if an angel spoke to me:—“Cary, dear child, the whole thing depends—your soul and your eternity depend—on whether you trust the Lord Jesus.” Then he went out of the room, and left me alone, as if he wanted me to think well about that before he said anything more.

I think something is coming to help me. My Uncle Drummond was late for supper last night—a thing which I could see was very unusual. And when he did come, he was particularly silent and meditative. At length, when supper was over, as we turned our chairs round from the table, and were sitting down again to our work, my Uncle Drummond, who generally goes to his study after supper, sat down among us.

“Young people,” said he, with a look on his face which it seemed to me was partly grave and partly diverted, “considering that you are more travelled persons than I, I come to you for information. Have you—any of you—while in England, either seen or heard anything of one Mr George Whitefield, a clergyman of the Church of England, who is commonly reckoned a Methodist?”

Angus made a grimace, and said, “Plenty!”

Flora was doubtful; she thought she had heard his name.

I said, “I have heard his name too, Uncle; but I do not know much about him, only Father seemed to think it a good joke that anybody should fancy him a wise man.”

“Angus appears to be the best informed of you,” said my uncle. “Speak out, my boy, and tell us what you know.”

“Well, he is a queer sort of fellow, I fancy,” said Angus. “He was one of the Methodists; but they say those folks have had a split, and Whitefield has broken with them. He travels about preaching, though, as they do; and they say that the reason why he took to field-preaching was because no church would hold the enormous congregations which gathered to hear him. He has been several times to the American colonies, where they say he draws larger crowds than John Wesley himself.”

“A good deal of ‘They say’,” observed Uncle Drummond, with a smile. “Do ‘they say’ that the bishops and clergy are friendly to this remarkable preacher, or not?”

“Well, I should rather think not,” answered Angus. “There is one bishop who has stuck to him through thick and thin—the Bishop of Gloucester, who gave him his orders to begin with; but the rest of them look askance at him over their shoulders, I believe. It is irregular, you know, to preach in fields—wholly improper to save anybody’s soul out of church; and these English folks take the horrors at anything irregular. The women like him because he makes them cry so much.”

“Angus!” cried Flora and I together.

“That’s what I was told, I assure you, young ladies,” returned Angus, “I am only repeating what I have heard.”

“Well, that you may shortly have an opportunity of judging,” said my Uncle Drummond; “for this gentleman has come to Selkirk, and has asked leave of the presbytery to preach in certain kirks of this neighbourhood. There was some demur at first to the admission of a Prelatist; but after some converse with him this was withdrawn, and he will preach next Sabbath morning at Selkirk, and in the afternoon at Monks’ Brae. You can go to Monks’ Brae to hear him, if you will; I, of course, shall not be able to accompany you, but I trust to find an opportunity when he preaches in the fields, if there be one. I should like to hear this great English preacher, I confess. What say you?”

“They’ll go, you may be sure, Sir,” said Angus, before we could answer. “Trust a lassie to gad about if she has the chance. Mind you take all the pocket-handkerchiefs you have with you. They say ’tis dreadful the way this man gars you greet. ’Tis true, you English are more given that way than we Scots; but folks say you cannot help yourself,—you must cry, whether you will or no.”

“I should like to go, I think, Uncle,” said I. “Only—I suppose he is a real clergyman?”

“There goes a genuine Englishwoman!” said Angus. “If Paul himself were to preach, she would not go to hear him till she knew what bishop had ordained him.”

“Yes, Cary,” answered my Uncle Drummond, smiling; “he is a real clergyman. More ‘real’ than you think me, I fear.”

“Oh, you are different, Uncle,” said I; “but I am sure Father would not like me to hear any preacher who was not—at least—I don’t know—he did not seem to think this Mr Whitefield all right, somehow. Perhaps he did not know he was a proper person.”

“‘A proper person!’” sighed Angus, casting up his eyes.

“My dear,” said my Uncle Drummond, kindly, “you are a good lassie to think of your father’s wishes. Never mind Angus; he is only making fun, and is a foolish young fellow yet. Of course, not having spoken with your father, I cannot tell so well as yourself what his wishes are; and ’tis quite possible he may think, for I hear many do, that this gentleman is a schismatic, and may disapprove of him on that account only. If so, I can tell you for certain, ’tis a mistake. But as to anything else, you must judge for yourself, and do what you think right.”

“You see no objection to our going, Father?” asked Flora, who had not spoken hitherto.

“Not at all, my dear,” said my Uncle. “Go by all means, if you like it. You may never have another opportunity, and ’tis very natural you should wish it.”

“Thank you,” answered Flora. “Then, if Angus will take me, I will go.”

“Well, I don’t know,” said Angus. “I am afraid some of my handkerchiefs are at the wash. I should not like to be quite drowned in my tears. I might wash you away, too; and that would be a national calamity.”

“Don’t jest on serious subjects, my boy,” said Uncle; and Angus grew grave directly. “I am no enemy to honest, rational fun; ’tis human, and natural more especially to the young. But never, never let us make a jest of the things that pertain to God.”

“I beg your pardon, Father,” said Angus, in a low voice. “I’ll take you, Flora. What say you, Cary?”

“Yes, I should like to go,” I said. And I wondered directly whether I had said right or wrong. But I do so want to hear something that would help me.

I found that Monks’ Brae was on the Monksburn road, but nearly two miles further on. ’Tis the high road from Selkirk to Galashiels, after you leave Monksburn, and pretty well frequented; so that Angus was deemed guard enough. But last night the whole road was so full of people going to hear Mr Whitefield, that it was like walking in a crowd all the way. The kirk was crammed to the very doors, and outside people stood looking in and listening through the doors and the open windows. Mr Lundie, the minister of Monks’ Brae, led the worship (as they say here); and when the sermon came, I looked with some curiosity at the great preacher who did such unusual things, and whom some people seemed to think it so wrong to like. Mr Whitefield is not anything particular to look at: just a young man in a fair wig, with a round face and rosy cheeks. He has a most musical voice, and he knows how to put it to the best advantage. Every word is as distinct as can be, and his voice rings out clear and strong, like a well-toned bell. But he had not preached ten minutes before I forgot his voice and himself altogether, and could think of nothing but what he was preaching about. And I never heard such a sermon in my life. My Uncle Drummond’s are the only ones I have heard which even approach it, and he does not lift you up and carry you away, as Mr Whitefield does.

All the other preachers I ever heard, except those two, are always telling you to do something. Come to church, and say your prayers, and take the Sacrament; but particularly, do your duty. Now it always seems to me that there are two grand difficulties in the way of doing one’s duty. The first is, to find out what is one’s duty. Of course there is the Bible; but, if I may say it with reverence, the Bible has never seemed to have much to do with me. It is all about people who lived ever so long ago, and what they did; and what has that to do with me, Cary Courtenay, and what I am doing? Then suppose I do know what my duty is—and certainly I do in some respects—I am not sure that I can express it properly, but I feel as if I wanted something to come and make me do it. I am like a watch, with all the wheels and springs there, ready to go, but I want somebody to come and wind me up. And I do not know how that is to be done. But Mr Whitefield made me wish, oh so much! that that unknown somebody would come and do it. I never thought much about it before, until that talk with my Uncle Drummond, and now it feels to be what I want more than anything else.

I cannot write the sermon down: not a page of it. I think you never can write down on paper the things that stir your very soul. It is the things which just tickle your brains that you can put down in elegant language on paper. When a thing comes close to you, into your real self, and grapples with you, and leaves a mark on you for ever hereafter, whether for good or evil, you cannot write or talk about that,—you can only feel it.

The text was, “What think ye of Christ?”

Mr Whitefield saith any man that will may have his sins forgiven, and may know it. I have heard Mr Bagnall speak of this doctrine, which he said was shocking and wicked, for it gave men licence to live in sin. Mr Whitefield named this very thing (whereby I saw it had been brought as a charge against him), and showed plainly that it did not tend to destroy good works, but only built them up on a safer and surer foundation. We work, saith he, not for that we would be saved by our works, but out of gratitude that we have been saved by Christ, who commands these works to such as would follow Him. And he quoted an Article of the Church, (Note 4) saying that he desired men to see that he was no schismatic preaching his own fancies, but that the Church whereof he was a minister held the same doctrine. I wonder if Mr Bagnall knows that, and if he ever reads the Articles.

He spoke much, also, of the new birth, or conversion. I never heard any other preacher, except Uncle, mention that at all. I know Mr Digby thought it a fanatical notion only fit for enthusiasts. But certainly there are texts in the Bible that speak plainly of it. And Mr Whitefield saith that we do not truly believe in Christ, unless we so believe as to have Him dwelling in us, and to receive life and nourishment from Him as the branch does from the vine. And Saint John says the same thing. How can it be enthusiasm to say what the Bible says?

People seem so dreadfully frightened of what they call enthusiasm (Note 1). Grandmamma used to say there was nothing more vulgar. But the queer thing is that many of these very people will let you get as enthusiastic as ever you like about a game of cards, or one horse coming in before another in a race, or about politics, or poaching, and things of that sort that have to do with this world. It is about the things of real consequence—things which have to do with your soul and the next world—that you must not get enthusiastic!

May one not have too little enthusiasm, I wonder, as well as too much? Would it not be reasonable to be enthusiastic about things that really signify, and cool about the things that do not?

I want to write down a few sentences which Mr Whitefield said, that I may not forget them. I do not know how they came in among the rest. They stuck to me just as they are. (Note 2). He says:—

“Our senses are the landing-ports of our spiritual enemies.”

“We must take care of healing before we see sinners wounded.”

“The King of the Church has all its adversaries in a chain.”

“If other sins have slain their thousands of professing Christians, worldly-mindedness has slain its ten thousands.”

“How can any say, ‘Lead us not into temptation,’ in the morning, when they are resolved to run into it at night?”

“How many are kept from seeing Christ in glory, by reason of the press!” (That is, he explained, that people are ashamed of being singularly good (Note 3), unless their acquaintances are on the same side.)

“Christ will thank you for coming to His feast.”

When Mr Whitefield came near the end of his sermon, I thought I could see why people said he made them cry so much. His voice sank into a soft, pleading, tender accent, as if he yearned over the souls before him. His hands were held out as if he were just holding out Jesus Christ to us, and we must take Him or turn away and be lost. And he begged us all so pitifully not to turn away. I saw tears running down the cheeks of many hard-looking men and women. Flora cried, and so did I. But Angus did not. He did not look as though he felt at all inclined to do it.

This is one of the last sermons, we hear, that Mr Whitefield will preach on this side the sea. He sails for the American colonies next month. He is said to be very fond of his American friends, and very much liked by them. (Note 5).

As we were coming away, we came upon our friends from Monksburn, whom we had not seen before.

“This is preaching!” said Annas, as she clasped our hands.

“Eh, puir laddie, he’ll just wear himself out,” said the Laird. “I hope he has a gude wife, for sic men are rare, and they should be well taken care of while they are here.”

“He has a wife, Sir,” observed Angus, “and the men of his own kidney think he would be rather better off if he had none.”

“Hoots, but I’m sorry to hear it,” said the Laird. “What ails her, ken ye, laddie?”

“As I understood, Sir, she had three grave drawbacks. In the first place, she is a widow with a rich jointure.”

“That’s a queer thing to call a drawback!” said the Laird.

“In the second place, she is a widow with a temper, and a good deal of it.”

“Dinna name it!” cried the Laird, lifting up his hands. “Dinna name it! Eh, puir laddie, but I’m wae for him, gin he’s fashed wi’ ane o’ that sort.”

“And in the third place,” continued Angus, “I have been told that he may well preach against worldly-mindedness, for he gets enough of it at home. Mrs Whitefield knows what are trumps, considerably better than she knows where to look in the Bible for her husband’s text.”

“Dear, dear!” cried Lady Monksburn in her soft voice. “What could the good man be thinking of, to bind such a burden as that upon his life?”

“He thought he had converted her, I believe,” said Angus, “but she came undone.”

“I should think,” remarked Mr Keith, “that he acted as Joshua did with the Gibeonites.”

“How was that?” said Angus.

“It won’t hurt you to look for it,” was the answer.

I don’t know whether Angus looked for it, but I did as soon as I got in, and I saw that Mr Keith thought there had been too much hastiness, and perhaps a little worldly-mindedness in Mr Whitefield himself. That may be why he preaches so earnestly against it. We know so well where the slippery places are, when we have been down ourselves. And when we have been down once, we are generally very, very careful to keep off that slide for the future.

Mr Whitefield said last night that it was not true to say, as some do, “that a man may be in Christ to-day, and go to the Devil to-morrow.” Then if anybody is converted, how can he, as Angus said, “come undone”? I only see one explanation, and it is rather a terrible one: namely, that the conversion was not real, but only looked like it. And I am afraid that must be the truth. But what a pity it is that Mr Whitefield did not find it out sooner!

“Well, Helen, and how did you like the great English preacher?” I said to Flora’s nurse.

“Atweel, Miss Cary, the discourse was no that ill for a Prelatist,” was the answer.

And that was as much admiration as I could get from Helen.

There was more talk about Mr Whitefield this morning at breakfast. I cannot tell what has come to Angus. Going to hear Mr Whitefield preach at Monks’ Brae seems to have made him worse instead of better. Flora and I both liked it so much; but Angus talks of it with a kind of bitter hardness in his voice, and as if it pleased him to let us know all the bad things which had been said about the preacher. He told us that they said—(I wish they would give over saying!)—that Mr Whitefield had got his money matters into some tangle, in the business of building his Orphan House in Georgia; and “they said” he had acted fraudulently in the matter. My Uncle Drummond put this down at once, with—

“My son, never repeat a calumny against a good man. You may not know it, but you do Satan’s very work for him.”

Angus made a grimace behind his hand, which I fancy he did not mean his father to see. Then, he went on, “‘They say’ that Mr Whitefield is so fanatical and extravagant in preaching against worldliness, that he counts it sinful to smell to a rose, or to eat anything relishing.”

“Did he say so?” asked my Uncle: “or did ‘they’ say it for him?”

“Well, Sir,” answered Angus with a laugh, “I heard Mr Whitefield had said that he would give his people leave to smell to a rose and a pink also, so long as they would avoid the appearance of sin: and, quoth he, ‘if you can find any diversion which you would be willing to be found at by our Lord in His coming, I give you free licence to go to it and welcome.’”

“Then we have disposed of that charge,” saith my Uncle. “What next?”

“Well, they say he hath given infinite displeasure to the English gentry by one of his favourite sayings—that ‘Man is half a beast and half a devil.’ He will not allow them to talk of ‘passing the time’—how dare they waste the time, saith he, when they have the devil and the beast to get out of their souls? Folks don’t like, you see, to be painted in those colours.”

“No, we rarely admire a portrait that is exactly like us,” saith my Uncle Drummond.

“Pray, Sir, think you that is a likeness?” said Angus.

“More like, my son, than you and I think. Some of us have more of the one, and some of the other: but in truth I cannot contradict Mr Whitefield. ’Tis a just portrait of what man is by nature.”

“But, Sir!” cried Angus, “do you allow nothing for a man’s natural virtues?”

“What are they?” asked my Uncle. “I allow that ‘there is none that doeth good, no, not one.’ You were not taught, Angus, that a man had virtues natural to him, except as the Spirit of God implanted them in him.”

“No, Sir; but when I go forth into the world, I cannot help seeing that it is so.”

“I wish I could see it!” said my Uncle. “It would be a much more agreeable sight than many things I do see.”

“Well, Sir, take generosity and good temper,” urged Angus. “Do you not see much of these in men who, as Mr Whitefield would say, are worldly and ungodly?”

“I often see the Lord’s restraining grace,” answered my Uncle, quietly; “but am I to give the credit of it to those whom He restrains?”

“But think you, Sir, that it is wise—” Angus paused.

“Go on, my boy,” said my Uncle. “I like you to speak out, like an honest man. By all means have courage to own your convictions. If they be right ones, you may so have them confirmed; and if they be wrong, you stand in better case to have them put right.”

I did not think Angus looked quite comfortable. He hesitated a moment, and then, I suppose, came out with what he had meant to say.

“Think you not, Sir, that it is wise to leave unsaid such things as offend people, and make them turn away from preaching? Should we not be careful to avoid offence?”

“Unnecessary offence,” saith my Uncle. “But the offence of the cross is precisely that which we are warned not to avoid. ‘Not with wisdom of words,’ saith the Apostle, ‘lest the cross of Christ should be made of none effect.’ In his eyes, ‘then is the offence of the cross ceased,’ was sufficient to condemn the preaching whereof he spoke. And that policy of keeping back truth is the Devil’s policy; ’tis Jesuitical. ‘Will ye speak wickedly for God, and talk deceitfully for Him?’ ‘Shall the throne of iniquity have fellowship withThee?’ Never, Angus: never!”

“But our Lord Himself seems to have kept things back from His disciples,” pleaded Angus, uneasily.

“Yes, what they were not ready for and could not yet understand. But never that which offended them. He offended them terribly when He told them that the Son of Man was about to be crucified. So did the Jesuits to the Chinese: and when they found the offence, they altered their policy, and said the story of the crucifixion was an invention of Christ’s enemies. Did He?”

Angus made no answer: and breakfast being over, we separated to our several work.

Note 1. “Enthusiasm” was the term then usually applied to the doctrines of grace, when the word was used in a religious sense.

Note 2. These sentences are not taken from any one of Whitefield’s sermons exclusively, but are gathered from the gems of thought scattered through his works.

Note 3. Singular still meant alone in Whitefield’s day.

Note 4. Articles twelve and thirteen. All the members of the Church of England ought to be perfectly familiar with the Articles and Homilies, as the Reformers intended them to be. How else can they know what they profess to hold, when they call themselves members of the Church? If they do not share her opinions, they have no right to use her name.

Note 5. He died at Newbury Port, in New England, in September 1770. America has no nobler possession than the grave of George Whitefield.

Back to Index Next