DAVIE.
We have now seen Robert Murdoch's children all happily settled in life.
God's promises to the fatherless had not failed. Only Wullie's own son
Davie is left at home, and the years have rolled by till he is now
nearly as old as his father was when we first made his acquaintance.
School never had any charms for Davie. He could read and write, and he
possessed some knowledge of arithmetic. Beyond this he did not care to
go. But he did love hard work, and the harder the better. He loved to
drive the plough and put in the sickle. "He is honest Wullie over
again," was the unanimous verdict of the whole neighborhood.
Meanwhile the father's strength was failing. It often happened that when
Wullie was going to his work in the noonday heat Farmer Lindsay called
to him from the cool porch where he was sitting, "Come, sit ye doun and
crack a while wi' me, Wullie, and let younger men lead in the wark noo."
Davie, too, urged his father to take life more easily. "Ye hae lang
borne the burden and heat o' the day; sit doun noo and rest. I hae the
strength and the will to provide for a' the wants o' those wha hae
provided for me when I couldna do it for mysel."
Jamie with his annual remittance sent this message: "Make yourself and
mother comfortable, and do not go to your work on bad days. Save your
strength when you can; it will please me better if you do not work at
all. You have labored enough for a lifetime. I hope to supply many of
your wants myself; but you have also Davie to look after you."
"Ay, we hae Davie, and we hae mony freends and mony comforts. Truly, the
Lord is gude to all that put their trust in him," said Wullie to his
wife.
"Ay, Wullie; and yet I canna but wish that Davie was mair like Jamie. He
wouldna hae to wark sae hard," said the mother.
"Leave Davie to his ain choice, wifie. He canna be as Jamie is. Jamie
likes to gang oot in the warld, and muckle can be said in his praise,
for he is as gude a mon as I could wish, forbye his learning. But Davie
taks after his faither. He lo'es best the wild moorlands and crags, the
green hillocks, the scent o' the newly-turned sod, the lowing o' the
herds, the crawing o' the cocks, and the voice of the sang-birds. He is
a' that is left to us noo. How could we get on withoot Davie?"
Mrs. Murdoch, too, began to feel the approach of age. The noon of her
life was long past, and she had toiled unremittingly. She desired to sit
down now and rest a while in the evening shade. She thought it time that
Davie should bring a wife to the cottage.
But Davie seemed never seriously to think of such a thing,
notwithstanding various hints from his mother. Every year she felt less
able to do the work of the cottage; she was lonely also, for she liked
to have some one to talk to; but since Annie went away she spent most of
the day in solitude. She therefore made a direct appeal to Davie.
"Davie, I canna live always; why do ye no tak a wife to yoursel? I am
sure there is room eneuch here; and there is nae lack o' gear. Ye s'ould
hae a wife as weel as ony other man."
"I dinna see ony lass that I would care to tak to the parson wi' me. A'
the gude lassies hae been taen."
"There is aye gude fish in the sea!"
"But I canna hae the luck to catch them."
Weary of waiting for Davie to bring a wife, she sent to Wigtown for her
niece and namesake, Jeannie Craig, to come and live with her.
Whether this was a plot on the part of the mother is not known; but
certain it is that David married his cousin; and the neighbors said the
mother had done the courting. If this be so she did her son a very great
favor, for no one could have filled the place better or made him a
better wife.
"She minds me of oor Belle," Davie said aside to his mother the first
day she came to the cottage. And she was like Belle in her cheerful,
gentle ways.