One warm Sunday evening in the moon of golden-rod, we all, grown-ups and
children, were sitting in the orchard by the Pulpit Stone singing sweet
old gospel hymns. We could all sing more or less, except poor Sara Ray,
who had once despairingly confided to me that she didn’t know what she’d
ever do when she went to heaven, because she couldn’t sing a note.
That whole scene comes out clearly for me in memory--the arc of primrose
sky over the trees behind the old house, the fruit-laden boughs of the
orchard, the bank of golden-rod, like a wave of sunshine, behind the
Pulpit Stone, the nameless colour seen on a fir wood in a ruddy sunset.
I can see Uncle Alec’s tired, brilliant, blue eyes, Aunt Janet’s
wholesome, matronly face, Uncle Roger’s sweeping blond beard and red
cheeks, and Aunt Olivia’s full-blown beauty. Two voices ring out for
me above all others in the music that echoes through the halls of
recollection. Cecily’s sweet and silvery, and Uncle Alec’s fine tenor.
“If you’re a King, you sing,” was a Carlisle proverb in those days. Aunt
Julia had been the flower of the flock in that respect and had become a
noted concert singer. The world had never heard of the rest. Their music
echoed only along the hidden ways of life, and served but to lighten the
cares of the trivial round and common task.
That evening, after they tired of singing, our grown-ups began talking
of their youthful days and doings.
This was always a keen delight to us small fry. We listened avidly to
the tales of our uncles and aunts in the days when they, too--hard fact
to realize--had been children. Good and proper as they were now, once,
so it seemed, they had gotten into mischief and even had their quarrels
and disagreements. On this particular evening Uncle Roger told many
stories of Uncle Edward, and one in which the said Edward had preached
sermons at the mature age of ten from the Pulpit Stone fired, as the
sequel will show, the Story Girl’s imagination.
“Can’t I just see him at it now,” said Uncle Roger, “leaning over
that old boulder, his cheeks red and his eyes burning with excitement,
banging the top of it as he had seen the ministers do in church. It
wasn’t cushioned, however, and he always bruised his hands in his
self-forgetful earnestness. We thought him a regular wonder. We loved to
hear him preach, but we didn’t like to hear him pray, because he
always insisted on praying for each of us by name, and it made us feel
wretchedly uncomfortable, somehow. Alec, do you remember how furious
Julia was because Edward prayed one day that she might be preserved from
vanity and conceit over her singing?”
“I should think I do,” laughed Uncle Alec. “She was sitting right there
where Cecily is now, and she got up at once and marched right out of the
orchard, but at the gate she turned to call back indignantly, ‘I guess
you’d better wait till you’ve prayed the conceit out of yourself before
you begin on me, Ned King. I never heard such stuck-up sermons as you
preach.’ Ned went on praying and never let on he heard her, but at the
end of his prayer he wound up with ‘Oh, God, I pray you to keep an
eye on us all, but I pray you to pay particular attention to my sister
Julia, for I think she needs it even more than the rest of us, world
without end, Amen.’”
Our uncles roared with laughter over the recollection. We all laughed,
indeed, especially over another tale in which Uncle Edward, leaning too
far over the “pulpit” in his earnestness, lost his balance altogether
and tumbled ingloriously into the grass below.
“He lit on a big Scotch thistle,” said Uncle Roger, chuckling, “and
besides that, he skinned his forehead on a stone. But he was determined
to finish his sermon, and finish it he did. He climbed back into the
pulpit, with the tears rolling over his cheeks, and preached for
ten minutes longer, with sobs in his voice and drops of blood on his
forehead. He was a plucky little beggar. No wonder he succeeded in
life.”
“And his sermons and prayers were always just about as outspoken as
those Julia objected to,” said Uncle Alec. “Well, we’re all getting on
in life and Edward is gray; but when I think of him I always see him
a little, rosy, curly-headed chap, laying down the law to us from
the Pulpit Stone. It seems like the other day that we were all
here together, just as these children are, and now we are scattered
everywhere. Julia in California, Edward in Halifax, Alan in South
America, Felix and Felicity and Stephen gone to the land that is very
far off.”
There was a little space of silence; and then Uncle Alec began, in a
low, impressive voice, to repeat the wonderful verses of the ninetieth
Psalm--verses which were thenceforth bound up for us with the beauty
of that night and the memories of our kindred. Very reverently we all
listened to the majestic words.
“Lord, thou hast been our dwelling place in all generations. Before the
mountains were brought forth, or ever thou hadst formed the earth and
the world, even from everlasting to everlasting thou art God.... For a
thousand years in thy sight are but as yesterday when it is past, and as
a watch in the night.... For all our days are passed away in thy wrath;
we spend our years as a tale that is told. The days of our years are
threescore and ten; and if by reason of strength they be fourscore years
yet is their strength, labour and sorrow; for it is soon cut off and we
fly away.... So teach us to number our days that we may apply our hearts
unto wisdom.... Oh, satisfy us early with thy mercy; that we may rejoice
and be glad all our days.... And let the beauty of the Lord our God be
upon us; and establish thou the work of our hands upon us; yea, the work
of our hands establish thou it.”
The dusk crept into the orchard like a dim, bewitching personality. You
could see her--feel her--hear her. She tiptoed softly from tree to
tree, ever drawing nearer. Presently her filmy wings hovered over us and
through them gleamed the early stars of the autumn night.
The grown-ups rose reluctantly and strolled away; but we children
lingered for a moment to talk over an idea the Story Girl broached--a
good idea, we thought enthusiastically, and one that promised to add
considerable spice to life.
We were on the lookout for some new amusement. Dream books had begun to
pall. We no longer wrote in them very regularly, and our dreams were not
what they used to be before the mischance of the cucumber. So the Story
Girl’s suggestion came pat to the psychological moment.
“I’ve thought of a splendid plan,” she said. “It just flashed into my
mind when the uncles were talking about Uncle Edward. And the beauty of
it is we can play it on Sundays, and you know there are so few things it
is proper to play on Sundays. But this is a Christian game, so it will
be all right.”
“It isn’t like the religious fruit basket game, is it?” asked Cecily
anxiously.
We had good reason to hope that it wasn’t. One desperate Sunday
afternoon, when we had nothing to read and the time seemed endless,
Felix had suggested that we have a game of fruit-basket; only instead
of taking the names of fruits, we were to take the names of Bible
characters. This, he argued, would make it quite lawful and proper to
play on Sunday. We, too desirous of being convinced, also thought so;
and for a merry hour Lazarus and Martha and Moses and Aaron and sundry
other worthies of Holy Writ had a lively time of it in the King orchard.
Peter having a Scriptural name of his own, did not want to take another;
but we would not allow this, because it would give him an unfair
advantage over the rest of us. It would be so much easier to call
out your own name than fit your tongue to an unfamiliar one. So Peter
retaliated by choosing Nebuchadnezzar, which no one could ever utter
three times before Peter shrieked it out once.
In the midst of our hilarity, however, Uncle Alec and Aunt Janet came
down upon us. It is best to draw a veil over what followed. Suffice it
to say that the recollection gave point to Cecily’s question.
“No, it isn’t that sort of game at all,” said the Story Girl. “It is
this; each of you boys must preach a sermon, as Uncle Edward used to
do. One of you next Sunday, and another the next, and so on. And whoever
preaches the best sermon is to get a prize.”
Dan promptly declared he wouldn’t try to preach a sermon; but Peter,
Felix and I thought the suggestion a very good one. Secretly, I believed
I could cut quite a fine figure preaching a sermon.
“Who’ll give the prize?” asked Felix.
“I will,” said the Story Girl. “I’ll give that picture father sent me
last week.”
As the said picture was an excellent copy of one of Landseer’s stags,
Felix and I were well pleased; but Peter averred that he would rather
have the Madonna that looked like his Aunt Jane, and the Story Girl
agreed that if his sermon was the best she would give him that.
“But who’s to be the judge?” I said, “and what kind of a sermon would
you call the best?”
“The one that makes the most impression,” answered the Story Girl
promptly. “And we girls must be the judges, because there’s nobody else.
Now, who is to preach next Sunday?”
It was decided that I should lead off, and I lay awake for an extra hour
that night thinking what text I should take for the following Sunday.
The next day I bought two sheets of foolscap from the schoolmaster, and
after tea I betook myself to the granary, barred the door, and fell
to writing my sermon. I did not find it as easy a task as I had
anticipated; but I pegged grimly away at it, and by dint of severe
labour for two evenings I eventually got my four pages of foolscap
filled, although I had to pad the subject-matter not a little with
verses of quotable hymns. I had decided to preach on missions, as being
a topic more within my grasp than abstruse theological doctrines
or evangelical discourses; and, mindful of the need of making an
impression, I drew a harrowing picture of the miserable plight of the
heathen who in their darkness bowed down to wood and stone. Then I urged
our responsibility concerning them, and meant to wind up by reciting,
in a very solemn and earnest voice, the verse beginning, “Can we whose
souls are lighted.” When I had completed my sermon I went over it very
carefully again and wrote with red ink--Cecily made it for me out of an
aniline dye--the word “thump” wherever I deemed it advisable to chastise
the pulpit.
I have that sermon still, all its red thumps unfaded, lying beside my
dream book; but I am not going to inflict it on my readers. I am not so
proud of it as I once was. I was really puffed up with earthly vanity
over it at that time. Felix, I thought, would be hard put to it to beat
it. As for Peter, I did not consider him a rival to be feared. It was
unsupposable that a hired boy, with little education and less experience
of church-going, should be able to preach better than could I, in whose
family there was a real minister.
The sermon written, the next thing was to learn it off by heart and then
practise it, thumps included, until I was letter and gesture perfect. I
preached it over several times in the granary with only Paddy, sitting
immovably on a puncheon, for audience. Paddy stood the test fairly well.
At least, he made an adorable listener, save at such times as imaginary
rats distracted his attention.
Mr. Marwood had at least three absorbed listeners the next Sunday
morning. Felix, Peter and I were all among the chiels who were taking
mental notes on the art of preaching a sermon. Not a motion, or glance,
or intonation escaped us. To be sure, none of us could remember the text
when we got home; but we knew just how you should throw back your head
and clutch the edge of the pulpit with both hands when you announced it.
In the afternoon we all repaired to the orchard, Bibles and hymn books
in hand. We did not think it necessary to inform the grown-ups of what
was in the wind. You could never tell what kink a grown-up would take.
They might not think it proper to play any sort of a game on Sunday,
not even a Christian game. Least said was soonest mended where grown-ups
were concerned.
I mounted the pulpit steps, feeling rather nervous, and my audience sat
gravely down on the grass before me. Our opening exercises consisted
solely of singing and reading. We had agreed to omit prayer. Neither
Felix, Peter nor I felt equal to praying in public. But we took up
a collection. The proceeds were to go to missions. Dan passed the
plate--Felicity’s rosebud plate--looking as preternaturally solemn as
Elder Frewen himself. Every one put a cent on it.
Well, I preached my sermon. And it fell horribly flat. I realized that,
before I was half way through it. I think I preached it very well; and
never a thump did I forget or misplace. But my audience was plainly
bored. When I stepped down from the pulpit, after demanding passionately
if we whose souls were lighted and so forth, I felt with secret
humiliation that my sermon was a failure. It had made no impression at
all. Felix would be sure to get the prize.
“That was a very good sermon for a first attempt,” said the Story Girl
graciously. “It sounded just like real sermons I have heard.”
For a moment the charm of her voice made me feel that I had not done so
badly after all; but the other girls, thinking it their duty to pay
me some sort of a compliment also, quickly dispelled that pleasing
delusion.
“Every word of it was true,” said Cecily, her tone unconsciously
implying that this was its sole merit.
“I often feel,” said Felicity primly, “that we don’t think enough about
the heathens. We ought to think a great deal more.”
Sara Ray put the finishing touch to my mortification.
“It was so nice and short,” she said.
“What was the matter with my sermon?” I asked Dan that night. Since he
was neither judge nor competitor I could discuss the matter with him.
“It was too much like a reg’lar sermon to be interesting,” said Dan
frankly.
“I should think the more like a regular sermon it was, the better,” I
said.
“Not if you want to make an impression,” said Dan seriously. “You
must have something sort of different for that. Peter, now, HE’LL have
something different.”
“Oh, Peter! I don’t believe he can preach a sermon,” I said.
“Maybe not, but you’ll see he’ll make an impression,” said Dan.
Dan was neither the prophet nor the son of a prophet, but he had the
second sight for once; Peter DID make an impression.