Kate Carnegie and Those Ministers

I >> Ian Maclaren >> Kate Carnegie and Those Ministers

Pages:
1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 10 | 11 | 12 | 13 | 14 | 15 | 16 | 17 | 18 | 19 | 20 | 21

The Rabbi was tasting some morsel of literature as he came along, and
halted opposite Carmichael, whom he did not see in the shadow, that he
might enjoy it aloud.

"That is French verse, Rabbi, I think, but it sounds archaic; is it
from a Huguenot poet?"

"Assuredly," replied the Rabbi, not one whit astonished that a man
should come out from a hedge on Kilbogie road and recognise his
quotation; "from Clement Marot, whom, as you remember, there is good
evidence Queen Mary used to read. It is you, John Carmichael." The
Rabbi awoke from the past, and held Carmichael's hand in both of his.
"This was very mindful. You were going home from Pitscowrie and turned
aside to visit me.

"It is unfortunate that I am hastening to a farm called the Mains, on
the border of Pitscourie parish, to expound the Word; but you will go
on to the Manse and straitly charge Barbara to give you food, and I
will hasten to return." And the Rabbi looked forward to the night with
great satisfaction.

"No, I am not coming from Pitscowrie, and you are not going there, as
far as one can see. Why, you are on your way to Tochty woods; you are
going west instead of east; Rabbi, tell the truth, have you been
snuffing?"

This was a searching question, and full of history. When the Rabbi
turned his back against the wind to snuff with greater comfort, he was
not careful to resume his original position, but continued cheerfully
in the new direction. This weakness was so well known that the school
bairns would watch till he had started, and stand in a row on the road
to block his progress. Then there would be a parley, which would end
in the Rabbi capitulating and rewarding the children with peppermints,
whereupon they would see him fairly off again and go on their
way--often looking back to see that he was safe, and somehow loving him
all the more for his strange ways. So much indeed was the Rabbi
beloved that a Pitscowrie laddie, who described Saunderson freely as a
"daftie" to Mains' grandson, did not see clearly for a week, and never
recovered his lost front tooth.

"That," remarked young Mains, "'ll learn Pitscowrie tae set up
impidence aboot the minister."

"There is no doubt, that I snuffed--it was at Claypots steading--but
there was no wind that I should turn. This is very remarkable, John,
and . . . disconcerting.

"These humiliations are doubtless a lesson," resumed the Rabbi as they
hurried to Mains, "and a rebuke. Snuffing is in no sense a necessity,
and I have long recognised that the habit requires to be
restricted--very carefully restricted. For some time I have had fixed
times--once in the forenoon, once in the afternoon, and again in the
evening. Had I restrained myself till my work was over and I had
returned home this misadventure would not have occurred, whereby I have
been hindered and the people will have been kept waiting for their
spiritual food.

"It is exactly twenty years to-night since I began this meeting in
Mains," the Rabbi explained to Carmichael, "and I have had great
pleasure in it and some profit. My subject has been the Epistle to the
Romans, and by the goodness of God we are approaching the last
chapters. The salutations will take about a year or so; Rufus, chosen
in the Lord, will need careful treatment; and then I thought, if I were
spared, of giving another year to a brief review of the leading points
of doctrine; eh?"

Carmichael indicated that the family at Mains would almost expect
something of the sort, and inquired whether there might not be a few
passages requiring separate treatment at fuller length than was
possible in this hurried commentary.

"Quite so, John, quite so; no one is more bitterly conscious of the
defects of this exposition than myself--meagre and superficial to a
degree, both in the patristic references and the experimental
application; but we are frail creatures, John, and it is doubtful
whether the exposition of any book should extend unto a generation. It
has always caused me regret that Mains--I mean the father of the
present tenant--departed before we had come to the comfort of the
eighth chapter."

The Rabbi's mind was much affected by this thought, and twice in the
kitchen his eye wandered to the chair where his friend had sat, with
his wife beside him. From Priscilla and Aquila he was led into the
question of hospitality, on which he spoke afterwards till they came to
the Manse, where he stationed Carmichael on the doorstep till he
secured a light.

"There is a parcel of books on the floor, partially opened, and the way
of passing is narrow and somewhat dangerous in the darkness."

CHAPTER XII.

KILBOGIE MANSE.

Ministers there were in the great strath so orderly that they kept
their sealing-wax in one drawer and their string in another, while
their sermons were arranged under the books of the Bible, and tied with
green silk. Dr. Dowbiggin, though a dull man and of a heavy carriage,
could find in an instant the original draft of a motion on instrumental
music he made in the Presbytery of Muirtown in the year '59, and could
also give the exact page in the blue-books for every word he had
uttered in the famous case when he showed that the use of a harmonium
to train MacWheep's choir was a return to the bondage of Old Testament
worship. His collection of pamphlets was supposed to be unique, and
was a terror to controversialists, no man knowing when a rash utterance
on the bottomless mystery of "spiritual independence" might not be
produced from the Doctor's coat-tail pocket. He retired to rest at
10.15, and rose at six, settling the subject of his next sermon on
Sabbath evening, and finishing the first head before breakfast on
Monday morning. He had three hats--one for funerals, one for
marriages, one for ordinary occasions--and has returned from the
Presbytery door to brush his coat. Morning prayers in Dr. Dowbiggin's
house were at 8.05, and the wrath of the Doctor was so dangerous that
one probationer staying at the manse, and not quite independent of
influence, did not venture to undress, but snatched a fearful doze
sitting upright on a cane-bottomed chair, lest he should not be in at
the psalm. Young ministers of untidy habits regarded Dr. Dowbiggin's
study with despair, and did not recover their spirits till they were
out of Muirtown. Once only did this eminent man visit the manse of
Kilbogie, and in favourable moments after dinner he would give his
choicer experiences.

"It is my invariable custom to examine the bed to see that everything
is in order, and any one sleeping in Kilbogie Manse will find the good
of such a precaution. I trust that I am not a luxurious person--it
would ill become one who came out in '43--but I have certainly become
accustomed to the use of sheets. When I saw there were none on the
bed, I declined to sleep without them, and I indicated my mind very
distinctly on the condition of the manse.

"Would you believe it?" the Doctor used to go on. "Saunderson
explained, as if it were a usual occurrence, that he had given away all
the spare linen in his house to a girl that had to marry in . . .
urgent circumstances, and had forgotten to get more. And what do you
think did he offer as a substitute for sheets?" No one could even
imagine what might not occur to the mind of Saunderson.

"Towels, as I am an honourable man; a collection of towels, as he put
it, 'skilfully attached together, might make a pleasant covering.'
That is the first and last time I ever slept in the Free Church Manse
of Kilbogie. As regards Saunderson's study, I will guarantee that the
like of it cannot be found within Scotland," and at the very thought of
it that exact and methodical ecclesiastic realised the limitations of
language.

His boys boasted of the Rabbi's study as something that touched genius
in its magnificent disorderliness, and Carmichael was so proud of it
that he took me to see it as to a shrine. One whiff of its atmosphere
as you entered the door gave an appetite and raised the highest
expectations. For any bookman can estimate a library by scent--if an
expert he could even write out a catalogue of the books and sketch the
appearance of the owner. Heavy odour of polished mahogany, Brussels
carpets, damask curtains and tablecloths; then the books are kept
within glass, consist of sets of standard works in half calf, and the
owner will give you their cost wholesale to a farthing. Faint
fragrance of delicate flowers, and Russia leather, with a hint of
cigarettes; prepare yourself for a marvellous wall-paper, etchings,
bits of oak, limited editions, and a man in a velvet coat. Smell of
paste and cloth binding and general newness means yesterday's books and
a man racing through novels with a paper knife. Those are only
book-rooms by courtesy, and never can satisfy any one who has breathed
the sacred air. It is a rich and strong spirit, not only filling the
room, but pouring out from the door and possessing the hall, redeeming
an opposite dining-room from grossness, and a more distant drawing-room
from frivolity, and even lending a goodly flavour to bedrooms on upper
floors. It is distilled from curious old duodecimos packed on high
shelves out of sight, and blows over folios, with large clasps, that
once stood in monastery libraries, and gathers a subtle sweetness from
parchments that were illuminated in ancient scriptoriums, that are now
grass grown, and is fortified with good old musty calf. The wind was
from the right quarter on the first day I visited Kilbogie Manse, and
as we went up the garden walk the Rabbi's library already bade us
welcome, and assured us of our reward for a ten miles' walk.

Saunderson was perfectly helpless in all manner of mechanics--he could
not drive a tack through anything except his own fingers, and had given
up shaving at the suggestion of his elders--and yet he boasted, with
truth, that he had got three times as many books into the study as his
predecessor possessed in all his house. For Saunderson had shelved the
walls from the floor to the ceiling, into every corner and over the
doors, and above the windows, as well as below them. The wright had
wished to leave the space clear above the mantelpiece.

"Ye 'll be hanging Dr. Chalmers there, or maybe John Knox, and a bit
clock 'll be handy for letting ye ken the 'oors on Sabbath."

[Illustration: "Ye 'll be hanging Dr. Chalmers there."]

The Rabbi admitted that he had a Knox, but was full of a scheme for
hanging him over his own history, which he considered both appropriate
and convenient. As regards time, it was the last thing of which that
worthy man desired to be reminded--going to bed when he could no longer
see for weariness, and rising as soon as he awoke, taking his food when
it was brought to him, and being conducted to church by the beadle
after the last straggler was safely seated. He even cast covetous eyes
upon the two windows, which were absurdly large, as he considered, but
compromised matters by removing the shutters and filling up the vacant
space with slender works of devotion. It was one of his conceits that
the rising sun smote first on an A Kempis, for this he had often
noticed as he worked of a morning.

Book-shelves had long ago failed to accommodate Rabbi's treasures, and
the floor had been bravely utilised. Islands of books, rugged and
perpendicular, rose on every side; long promontories reached out from
the shore, varied by bold headlands; and so broken and varied was that
floor that the Rabbi was pleased to call it the Aegean Sea, where he
had his Lesbos and his Samos. It is absolutely incredible, but it is
all the same a simple fact, that he knew every book and its location,
having a sense of the feel as well as the shape of his favourites.
This was not because he had the faintest approach to orderliness--for
he would take down twenty volumes and never restore them to the same
place by any chance. It was a sort of motherly instinct by which he
watched over them all, even loved prodigals that wandered over all the
study and then set off on adventurous journeys into distant rooms. The
restoration of an emigrant to his lawful home was celebrated by a feast
in which, by a confusion of circumstances, the book played the part of
the fatted calf, being read afresh from beginning to end. During his
earlier and more agile years the Rabbi used to reach the higher levels
of his study by wonderful gymnastic feats, but after two falls--one
with three Ante-Nicene fathers in close pursuit--he determined to call
in assistance. This he did after an impressive fashion. When he
attended the roup at Pitfoodles--a day of historical prices--and
purchased in open competition, at three times its value, a small stack
ladder, Kilbogie was convulsed, and Mains had to offer explanations.

"He 's cuttit aff seevin feet, and rins up it tae get his tapmaist
bukes, but that's no a'," and then Mains gave it to be understood that
the rest of the things the minister had done with that ladder were
beyond words. For in order that the rough wood might not scar the
sensitive backs of the fathers, the Rabbi had covered the upper end
with cloth, and for that purpose had utilised a pair of trousers. It
was not within his ability in any way to reduce or adapt his material,
so that those interesting garments remained in their original shape,
and, as often as the ladder stood reversed, presented a very impressive
and diverting spectacle. It was the inspiration of one of Carmichael's
most successful stories--how he had done his best to console a woman on
the death of her husband, and had not altogether failed, till she
caught sight of the deceased's nether garments waving disconsolately on
a rope in the garden, when she refused to be comforted. "Toom (empty)
breeks tae me noo," and she wept profusely, "toom breeks tae me."

One of the great efforts of the Rabbi's life was to seat his visitors,
since, beyond the one chair, accommodation had to be provided on the
table, wheresoever there happened to be no papers, and on the ledges of
the bookcases. It was pretty to see the host suggesting from a long
experience those coigns of vantage he counted easiest and safest,
giving warnings also of unsuspected danger in the shape of restless
books that might either yield beneath one's feet or descend on one's
head. Carmichael, however, needed no such guidance, for he knew his
way about in the marvellous place, and at once made for what the boys
called the throne of the fathers. This was a lordly seat, laid as to
its foundation in mediaeval divines of ponderous content, but
excellently finished with the Benedictine edition of St. Augustine,
softened by two cushions, one for a seat and another for a back. Here
Carmichael used to sit in great content, smoking and listening while
the Rabbi hunted an idea through Scripture with many authorities, or
defended the wildest Calvinism with strange, learned arguments; from
this place he would watch the Rabbi searching for a lost note on some
passage of Holy Writ amid a pile of papers two feet deep, through which
he burrowed on all fours, or climbing for a book on the sky-line, to
forget his errand and to expound some point of doctrine from the top of
the ladder.

"You 're comfortable, John, and you do not want to put off your boots
after all that travelling to and fro? then I will search for Barbara,
and secure some refreshment for our bodies," and Carmichael watched the
Rabbi depart with pity, for he was going on a troublous errand.

Housekeepers are, after beadles, the most wonderful functionaries in
the ecclesiastical life of Scotland, and every species could be found
within a day's journey of Drumtochty. Jenkins, indeed, suggested that
a series of papers on Church Institutions read at the clerical club
should include one on housekeepers, and offered to supply the want,
which was the reason why Dr. Dowbiggin refused to certify him to a
vacancy, speaking of him as "frivolous and irresponsible." The class
ranged from Sarah of Drumtochty, who could cook and knew nothing about
ecclesiastical affairs, to that austere damsel, Margaret Meiklewham of
Pitscowrie, who had never prepared an appetising meal in her life, but
might have sat as an elder in the Presbytery.

Among all her class, Barbara MacCluckie stood an easy worst, being the
most incapable, unsightly, evil-tempered, vexatious woman into whose
hands an unmarried man had ever been delivered. MacWheep had his own
trials, but his ruler saw that he had sufficient food and some comfort,
but Barbara laid herself out to make the Rabbi's life a misery. He
only obtained his meals as a favour, and an extra blanket had to be won
by a week's abject humiliation. Fire was only allowed him at times,
and he secured oil for his lamp by stratagems. Latterly he was glad to
send strange ministers to Mains, and his boys alone forced lodgment in
the manse. The settlement of Barbara was the great calamity of the
Rabbi's life, and was the doing of his own good nature. He first met
her when she came to the manse one evening to discuss the unlawfulness
of infant baptism and the duty of holding Sunday on Saturday, being the
Jewish Sabbath. His interest deepened on learning that she had been
driven from twenty-nine situations through the persecution of the
ungodly; and on her assuring him that she had heard a voice in a dream
bidding her take charge of Kilbogie Manse, the Rabbi, who had suffered
many things at the hands of young girls given to lovers, installed
Barbara, and began to repent that very day. A tall, bony, forbidding
woman, with a squint and a nose turning red, as she stated, from
chronic indigestion, let it be said for her that she did not fall into
the sins of her predecessors. It was indeed a pleasant jest in
Kilbogie for four Sabbaths that she allowed a local Romeo, who knew not
that his Juliet was gone, to make his adventurous way to her bedroom
window, and then showed such an amazing visage that he was laid up for
a week through the suddenness of his fall. What the Rabbi endured no
one knew, but his boys understood that the only relief he had from
Barbara's tyranny was on Sabbath evening, when she stated her
objections to the doctrine, and threatened henceforward to walk into
Muirtown in order to escape from unsound doctrine. On such occasions
the Rabbi laid himself out for her instruction with much zest, and he
knew when he had produced an impression, for then he went supperless to
bed. Between this militant spirit and the boys there was an undying
feud, and Carmichael was not at all hurt to hear her frank references
to himself.

[Illustration: A tall, bony, forbidding woman.]

"What need he come stravagin' doon frae Drumtochty for? it wud set him
better tae wait on his ain fouk. A licht-headed fellow, they say as
kens; an' as for his doctrine--weel, maybe it 'll dae for Drumtochty.

"Tea? Did ye expect me tae hae biling water at this 'oor o' the nicht?
My word, the money wud flee in this hoose gin a' wesna here. Milk 'll
dae fine for yon birkie: he micht be gled tae get onything, sorning on
a respectable manse every ither week."

"You will pardon our humble provision"--this is how the Rabbi prepared
Carmichael; "we have taken my worthy Abigail unawares, and she cannot
do for us what in other circumstances would be her desire. She has a
thorn in the flesh which troubles her, and makes her do what she would
not; but I am convinced that her heart is right."

That uncompromising woman took no notice of Drumtochty, but busied
herself in a search for the Rabbi's bag, which he insisted had been
brought home from Muirtown that morning, and which was at last found
covered with books.

"Do not open it at present, Barbara; you can identify the contents
later if it be necessary, but I am sure they are all right," and the
Rabbi watched Barbara's investigations with evident anxiety.

"Maybe ye hae brocht back what ye started wi', but gin ye hev, it's the
first time a' can mind. Laist sacrament at Edinburgh ye pickit up twal
books, ae clothes brush, an' a crochet cover for a chair, an' left
a'thing that belonged tae ye."

"It was an inadvertence; but I obtained a drawer for my own use this
time, and I was careful to pack its contents into the bag, leaving
nothing." But the Rabbi did not seem over-confident.

"There 's nae question that ye hev filled the pack," said Barbara, with
much deliberation and an ominous calmness; "but whether wi' yir ain
gear or some ither body's, a'll leave ye tae judge yirsel'. A 'll
juist empty the bag on the bukes;" and Barbara selected a bank of
Puritans for the display of her master's spoil.

"Ae slipbody (bodice), well hemmed and gude stuff--ye didna tak' that
wi' ye, at ony rate; twa pillow slips--they 'll come in handy, oor ain
are wearin' thin; ae pair o' sheets--'ll juist dae for the next trimmie
that ye want tae set up in her hoose; this 'll be a bolster slip, a 'm
judgin'--"

"It must be the work of Satan," cried the poor Rabbi, who constantly
saw the hand of the great enemy in the disorder of his study. "I
cannot believe that my hands packed such garments in place of my own."

"Ye 'll be satisfied when ye read the name; it's plain eneuch; ye
needna gang dodderin' aboot here and there lookin' for yir glasses;
there's twa pair on your head already;" for it was an hour of triumph
to Barbara's genial soul.

"It's beyond understanding," murmured the Rabbi. "I must have mistaken
one drawer for another in the midst of meditation;" and then, when
Barbara had swept out of the room with the varied linen on her arm,
"this is very humiliating, John, and hard to bear."

"Nonsense, Rabbi; it's one of the finest things you have ever done.
Half a dozen journeys of that kind would refurnish the manse; it's just
a pity you can't annex a chair;" but he saw that the good man was
sorely vexed.

"You are a good lad, John, and it is truly marvellous what charity I
have received at the hands of young men who might have scorned and
mocked me. God knows how my heart has been filled with gratitude, and
I . . . have mentioned your names in my unworthy prayers that God may
do to you all according to the kindness ye have shown unto me."

It was plain that this lonely, silent man was much moved, and
Carmichael did not speak.

"People consider that I am ignorant of my failings and weaknesses, and
I can bear witness with a clear conscience that I am not angry when
they smile and nod the head; why should I be? But, John, it is known
to myself only and Him before whom all hearts are open how great is my
suffering in being among my neighbours as a sparrow upon the housetop.

"May you never know, John, what it is to live alone and friendless till
you lose the ways of other men and retire within yourself, looking out
on the multitude passing on the road as a hermit from his cell, and
knowing that some day you will die alone, with none to . . . give you a
draught of water."

"Rabbi, Rabbi"--for Carmichael was greatly distressed at the woe in the
face opposite him, and his heart was tender that night--"why should you
have lived like that? Do not be angry, but . . . did God intend . . .
it cannot be wrong . . . I mean . . . God did give Eve to Adam."

"Laddie, why do ye speak with fear and a faltering voice? Did I say
aught against that gracious gift or the holy mystery of love, which is
surely the sign of the union betwixt God and the soul, as is set forth
after a mystical shape in the Song of Songs? But it was not for
me--no, not for me. I complain not, neither have I vexed my soul. He
doeth all things well."

"But, dear Rabbi"--and Carmichael hesitated, not knowing where he stood.

"Ye ask me why"--the Rabbi anticipated the question--"and I will tell
you plainly, for my heart has ever gone forth to you. For long years I
found no favour in the eyes of the Church, and it seemed likely I would
be rejected from the ministry as a man useless and unprofitable. How
could I attempt to win the love of any maiden, since it did not appear
to be the will of God that I should ever have a place of habitation?
It consisted not with honour, for I do hold firmly that no man hath any
right to seek unto himself a wife till he have a home."

"But . . ."

"Afterwards, you would say. Ah, John, then had I become old and
unsightly, not such a one as women could care for. It would have been
cruel to tie a maid for life to one who might only be forty years in
age, but was as seventy in his pilgrimage, and had fallen into unlovely
habits."

Then the Rabbi turned on Carmichael his gentle eyes, that were shining
with tears.

"It will be otherwise with you, and so let it be. May I live to see
you rejoicing with the wife of your youth."

So it came to pass that it was to this unlikely man Carmichael told his
new-born love, and he was amazed at the understanding of the Rabbi, as
well as his sympathy and toleration.

"A maid of spirit--and that is an excellent thing; and any excess will
be tamed by life. Only see to it that ye agree in that which lieth
beneath all churches and maketh souls one in God. May He prosper you
in your wooing as He did the patriarch Jacob, and far more abundantly."

Pages:
1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 10 | 11 | 12 | 13 | 14 | 15 | 16 | 17 | 18 | 19 | 20 | 21