“No that I mean to say I believe in fate,” said Lauderdale, when they
had finished their meal; “though there is little doubt in my mind that
what happens is ordained. I couldna tell why, for my part, though I
believe in the fact--for most things in life come to nothing, and the
grandest train of causes produce nae effect whatsoever; that’s my
experience. Indeed, it’s often a wonder to me,” said the homely
philosopher, who was not addressing himself particularly to Colin, “what
the Almighty took the trouble to make man for at a’. He’s a poor
creature at the best, and gives an awfu’ deal of trouble for very little
good. Considering all things, I’m of opinion that we’re little better
than an experiment,--and very likely we’ve been greatly improved upon in
mair recent creations. Are you pleased with your dinner? You’re young
now, and canna’ have much standing against you in the great books. Do
you ever think, laddie, of what you mean to be?”
“I mean to be a minister,” said Colin, with a furious blush. His
thoughts on the subject, if he could but have expressed them, were
magnificent enough, but nothing was more impossible to the shy country
lad, than to explain the ambition which glowed in his eager, visionary
mind. He would have sacrificed a finger at any time, rather than talk of
the vague but splendid intentions which were fermenting secretly in
absolute silence within his reserved Scotch bosom. His new friend looked
with a little curiosity at the subdued brightness of the boy’s eyes,
which spoke more emphatically than his words.
“They a’ mean to be ministers,” said Lauderdale, in his reflective way;
“half of them would do far better to be cobblers; but nae fool could
ever be persuaded. As for you, I think there’s something in you, or I
wouldna have fashed my head about you and your gown. You’ve got a fair
start, and nae drawbacks. I would like to see you go straight forward,
and be good for something in your generation. You needna look glum at
me; I’ll never be good for much mysel’. You see I’ve learnt to be fond
of talking,” he said, philosophically; “and a man that takes up that
line early in life seldom comes to much good; though I grant you there’s
exceptions, like Macaulay, for example. I was just entered at college,
when my father died,” he continued, falling into a historical strain, “I
was only a laddie like yoursel’, but I had to give up that thought, and
work to help the rest. Now they are all scattered, and my mother dead,
and I’m my own master. No that I’m much the better for that; but, you
see, after I got this situation”----
“What situation?” said Colin, quickly.
“Oh, an honourable occupation,” said his tall friend, with a gradually
brightening smile. “There’s ane of the same trade mentioned with
commendation in the Acts of the Apostles. Him and St. Paul were great
friends. But you see I’m free for the most part of the day; and, it
being a fixed idea in my mind that I was to go to the college some time
or other, it was but natural that I should enter mysel’ as soon as I was
able. I may go forward, and I may not; it depends on the world more than
on me. So your name’s Colin Campbell?--the same as Sir Colin; but, if
you’re to be a minister, you can never be anything mair than a minister.
In any other line of life a lad can rise if he likes, but there’s nae
promotion possible to _that_. If I were you, and fifteen, I would choose
another trade.”
“To this Colin answered nothing; the suggestion staggered him
considerably, and he was not prepared with anything to say. He looked
round the shabby room, and watched the shabby tavern-waiter carrying his
dinner to some other customer; and Colin’s new and unaccustomed eyes saw
something imposing even in the aspect of this poor place. He thought of
the great world which seemed to surge outside in a ceaseless roar,
coming and going--the world in which all sorts of honours and powers
seemed to go begging, seeking owners worthy to possess them: and he was
pursuing this splendid chain of possibilities, when Lauderdale resumed
his monologue:--
“The Kirk’s in a queer kind of condition a’thegither,” said the tall
student; “so are most Kirks. Whenever you hit upon a man that kens what
he wants, all’s well; but that happens seldom. It’s no my case for one.
And as for you, you’re no at the age to trouble your head about
doctrine. You’re a young prince at your years--you don’t know your
privileges; you believe everything you’ve been brought up to believe,
and are far more sure in your own mind what’s false and what’s true
than a college of doctors. I would rather be you than a’ the
philosophers in the world.”
“I’m no a fool to believe everything,” said Colin, angrily, rousing
himself up from his dreams.
“No,” said his companion, “far from a fool; it’s true wisdom if you
could but keep it. But the present temper of the world,” said the
philosopher calmly, “is to conclude that there’s nothing a’thegither
false, and few things particularly true. When you’re tired of the
dinners in Donaldson’s Land,” he continued, without any change of tone,
“and from the looks of the honest woman I would not say much for the
cookery, you can come and get your dinner here. In the meantime, I’ll
take ye up to Buchanan Street, if you like. It’s five o’clock, and the
shop-windows are lighted by this time. I’m very fond of the lights in
the shop-windows mysel’. When I’ve been a poor laddie about the streets,
the lights aye looked friendly, which is more than the folk within do
when you’ve no siller. Come along; it’s no trouble to me, and I like to
have somebody to talk to,” said Lauderdale.
Colin got up very reluctantly, feeling himself unable to resist the
strange personal fascination thus exercised over him. The idea of being
only somebody to talk to mortified the boy’s pride, but he could not
shake himself free from the influence which had taken possession of him.
He was only fifteen, and his companion was thirty; and he had no power
to enfranchise himself. He went after the tall figure into the street
with very mingled feelings. The stream of talk, which kept flowing on
above him, stimulated Colin’s mind into the most vigorous action. Such
talk was not incomprehensible to a boy who had been trained at Ramore;
but the philosophers of the Holy Loch were orthodox, and this specimen
of impartial thoughtfulness roused all the fire of youthful polemics in
Colin’s bosom. He set down his companion unhesitatingly, of course, as a
“sceptic,” perhaps an infidel; and was already longing to rush in upon
him, with arbitrary boyish zeal and disdain, to make an end on the spot
of his mistaken opinions. As for Colin himself, he was very sure of
everything, as was natural to his years, and had never entertained any
doubts that the Shorter Catechism was as infallible a standard of truth,
as it was a terrible infliction upon the youthful memory. Colin went
along the murky streets, by his companion’s side, thinking within
himself that, perhaps, his own better arguments and higher reason might
convert this mistaken man, and listened to him eagerly as they
proceeded together along the long line of the Trongate, much excited by
his own intentions, and feeling somehow, in his boyish heart, that this
universal stimulation of everything, within and without, was a real
beginning of life. For everything was new to the country boy, who had
never in his life before been out of doors at night, anywhere, save in
the silent country roads, through darkness lighted by the moon, or, when
there was no moon, by the pale glimmer of the loch. Now his eyes were
dazzled by the lights, and all his senses kept in exercise by the
necessity of holding his own way, and resisting the pressure of the
human current which flowed past him; while Lauderdale kept talking of a
hundred things which were opposed to his boyish belief, and which, amid
all this unaccustomed hubbub, he had to listen to with all his might
lest he should lose the thread of the argument--a loose thread enough,
certainly, but still with some coherence and connexion. All this made
Colin’s heart thrill with a warmer consciousness of life. He was only in
Glasgow, among floods of dusky craftsmen going home from their work; but
it appeared to his young eyes that he had suddenly fallen upon the most
frequented ways of life and into the heart of the vast world.
“I’m fond of a walk in the Trongate mysel’, especially when the lamps
are lighted,” said Lauderdale; “I never heard of a philosopher but was.
No that I am much of a philosopher, but--. It’s here ye see the real
aspect of human affairs. Here, take the shopwindows, or take the
passengers, there’s little to be seen but what’s necessary to life; but
yonder,” said the reflective student, pointing over Colin’s head to the
street they were approaching, “there’s nothing but luxury. We spend a
great deal of siller in Glasgow--we’re terrible rich, some of us, and
like the best of everything--but there’s no so much difference as you
would think. I have no pleasure in that side of wealth for my part;
there’s an awful suggestion of eating and drinking in everything about
there. Even the grand furniture and the pictures have a kind of haze
about them, as if ye could only see them through a dinner. I don’t
pretend to have any knowledge for my own part of rich men’s feasts; but
it’s no think pleasant to that Genius and Art, no to speak of a great
deal of skilful workmanship, should be all subservient to a man’s
pleasure in his dinner, and that _that’s_ what they’re here for. Hallo,
laddie, I thought you had no friends in Glasgow? there’s somebody yonder
waving their hands to you. What do you hang back for? it’s a lady in a
carriage. Have you no respect for yoursel’ that you’re so slow to
answer?” cried Colin’s monitor, indignantly. Colin would gladly have
sunk through the pavement, or darted up a friendly dark alley which
presented itself close by, but such an escape was not possible. It was
Lady Frankland who was making signals to him out of the carriage-window,
and with all his awkwardness, he was obliged to obey them.
As for Lauderdale, whose curiosity was considerably excited, he betook
himself to the window of a printshop to await his _protégé_, not without
some surprise in his mind. He knew pretty nearly as much about Colin by
this time as the boy himself did, though Colin was quite unaware of
having opened up his personal history to his new friend; but he had
heard nothing about young Frankland, that being an episode in his life
of which the country lad was not proud. Lauderdale stood at the
printshop-window with a curious kind of half-pathetic egotism mingling
with his kindly observation. No fair vision of women ever gleamed across
_his_ firmament. He was just about shaking hands with youth, and no
lady’s face had ever bent over him like a star out of the firmament, as
the gracious countenance of the English lady was just then bending over
the farmer’s son from Ramore. “It’s maybe the Duchess,” said Lauderdale
to himself, thinking of the natural feudal princess of the lochs; and he
looked with greater interest still, withdrawn out of hearing, but near
enough to see all that passed. Colin for his part did not know in the
least what to say or to do. He stood before the carriage looking sulky
in the excess of his embarrassment, and did not even take off his cap to
salute the lady, as country politeness and his anxious mother had taught
him. And, to aggravate the matter, there was a bewildering little girl
in the carriage with Lady Frankland--a creature with glorious curls over
her shoulders, and a wonderful perfection of juvenile toilette, which
somehow dazzled Colin’s unused and ignorant eyes. In the midst of his
awkwardness it occurred to the boy to note this little lady’s dress,
which was a strange thing enough for him, who did not know one article
of feminine attire from another. It was not her beauty so much as the
delicacy of all her little equipments which amazed Colin, and prevented
him from hearing what Lady Frankland had to say.
“So you have gone to the University?” said that gracious lady. “You are
ever so much further advanced than Harry, who is only a schoolboy as
yet; but the Scotch are so clever. You will be glad to hear that dear
Harry is quite well, and enjoying himself very much at Eton,” continued
Harry’s mother, who meant to be very kind to the boy who had saved her
son’s life. Now the very name of Harry Frankland had, he could not have
told how, a certain exasperating effect upon Colin. He said nothing in
answer to this satisfactory intelligence, but unconsciously gave a
little frown of natural opposition, which Lady Frankland’s eyes were not
sufficiently interested to see.
“He doesn’t care for Harry, aunt,” said the miniature woman by Lady
Frankland’s side, darting out of the dusky twilight a sudden flash of
perception, under which Colin stood convicted. She was about his own
age, but a world in advance of him in every other respect. A little
amusement and a little offence were in the voice, which seemed to Colin,
with its high-bred accent and wonderful “English,” like the voice of
another kind of creature from any he had encountered before. Was she a
little witch, to know what he was thinking? And then a little laugh of
triumph rounded off the sentence, and the unfortunate boy stood more
speechless, more awkward, more incapable than before.
“Nonsense, Matty; when you know we owe Harry’s life to him,” said bland
Lady Frankland. “You must come and dine with us to-morrow; indeed you
must. Sir Thomas and I are both so anxious to know more of you. Sir
Thomas would be so pleased to forward your views in any way; but the
Scotch are so independent,” she said, with her most flattering smile.
“Was that your tutor who was walking with you, that very tall man? I am
sure we should be delighted to see him too. I suppose he is something in
the University. Oh! here comes my husband. Sir Thomas, this is--Oh! I am
sure I beg your pardon; I forget your name--the dear, brave, excellent
boy who saved Harry’s life.”
Upon which Sir Thomas, coming out of one of the shops, in that radiance
of cleanness and neatness, perfectly brushed whiskers, and fresh face,
which distinguishes his class, shook hands heartily with the reluctant
Colin.
“To be sure, he must dine with us to-morrow,” said the good-humoured
baronet, “and bring his tutor if he likes; but I thought you had no
tutors at the Scotch Universities. I want to know what you’re about, and
what your ideas are on a great many subjects, my fine fellow. Your
father is tremendously proud, and so are you, I suppose; but he’s a
capital specimen of a man; and I hope you allow that I have a right to
recollect such an obligation. Good-bye, my boy,” said Sir Thomas.
“Seven to-morrow--but I’ll probably be at your college and see you in
the morning. And mind you bring the tutor,” he cried, as the carriage
drove off. Lady Frankland shed a perfect blaze of smiles upon Colin, as
she waved her hand to him, and the creature with the curls on the other
side gave the boy a little nod in a friendly condescending way. He made
a spring back into the shade the minute after, wonderfully glad to
escape, but dazzled and excited in spite of himself; and, as he retired
rapidly from the scene of this unexpected encounter, he came sharp up
against Lauderdale, who was coming to meet him, with his curiosity
largely excited.
“It was me he took for the tutor, I suppose?” said the strange Mentor
who had thus taken possession of Colin; and the tall student laughed
with a kind of quaint gratification. “And so I might have been if I had
been bred up at Oxford or Cambridge,” he added, after a moment; “that is
to say, if it had been my lot to be bred up anywhere; but they’ve a
grand system in these English universities. _That_ was not the Duke,” he
said interrogatively, looking at Colin, whose blood of clansman boiled
at the idea.
“_That_ the Duke!” exclaimed the boy with great disdain; “no more than I
am. It’s one of the English that are aye coming and making their jokes
about the rain; as if anybody wanted them to come,” said Colin, with an
outbreak of scorn; and then the boy remembered that Archie Candlish had
just bought a house in expectation of such visitors, and stopped
abruptly in full career. “I suppose the English are awfu’ fond of
grouse, or they wouldna’ come so far for two or three birds,” he
continued, in a tone of milder sarcasm. But his companion was not to be
so easily diverted from his questions.
“Grouse is a grand institution, and helps in the good government of this
country,” said Lauderdale, “and, through this country, of the
world--which is a fine thought for a bit winged creature, if it had the
sense to ken. Yon’s another world,” he said, after a little pause, “no
Paradise to be sure, but something as far removed from this as Heaven
itself; farther, you might say, for there’s many a poor man down below
here that’s hovering on the edge of heaven. And how came you to have
such grand friends?” asked the self-constituted guardian, stooping from
his lofty height to look straight into Colin’s eyes. After a time, he
extracted the baldest narrative that ever was uttered by a hero ashamed
of his prowess from the half-indignant boy, and managed to guess as
clearly as the wonderful little lady in the carriage the nature of
Colin’s sentiments towards the young antagonist and rival whom he had
saved.
“I wouldna have let a dog drown,” said the aggrieved Colin; “there was
nothing to make a work about. But you would have laughed to see that
fellow, with his boots like a lassie’s and feared to wet his feet. He
could swim, though,” added the boy, candidly; “and I would like to beat
him,” he said, after a moment; “I’d like to run races with him for
something, and win the prize over his head.”
This was all Colin permitted himself to say; but the vehement sentiment
thus recalled to his mind made him, for the moment, less attentive to
Lauderdale, who, for his part, was considerably moved by his young
companion’s excitement. “I’m not going to see your fine friends,” he
said, as he parted from the boy at the “stairfoot” which led to Colin’s
lodging; “but there’s many a true word spoken in jest, and, my boy, you
shall not want a tutor, though there’s no such thing in our Scotch
colleges.”
When he had said so much, hastily, as a man does who is conscious of
having shown a little emotion in his words, Colin’s new friend went
away, disappearing through the misty night, gaunt and lean as another
Quixote. “I should like to have something to do with the making of a new
life,” he said to himself, muttering high up in the air over the
ordinary passengers’ heads, as he mused on upon his way. And Colin and
his story had struck the rock in the heart of the lonely man, and drawn
forth fresh streams in that wilderness. He was more moved in his
imaginative, reflective soul, than he could have told any one, with,
half-consciously to himself, a sense of contrast, which was natural
enough, considering all things, and which coloured all his thoughts,
more or less, for that night.
As for Colin--naturally, too--he thought no more of Lauderdale, nor of
his parting words, and found himself in no need of any tutor or guide,
but fell asleep in the midst of his Greek, as was to be expected, and
dreamt of that creature with the curls nodding at him out of gorgeous
Lord Mayor’s coaches, in endless procession. And it was with this
wonderful little vision dancing about his fancy that the Scotch boy
ended his first day at the University, knowing no more what was to come
of it all than the saucy sparrow which woke him next morning by loud
chirping in the Glasgow dialect at his quaint little attic window. The
sparrow had his crumbs, and Colin had another exciting day before him,
and went out quite calmly to lay his innocent hands upon the edge-tools
which were to carve out his life.