Collingwood--Colonel Morton--Maguffin Engaged--Stepping
Westward--Wild Thyme and a Bath--The Shale-works--Muggins and the
Clergymen--Durham Mustard, and Marjorie--The Squire--The Grinstun
Man--Lunch, Wordsworth and Original Poetry--Two Old People on the
Blue Mountains.
At supper they had, for their vis-a-vis, a tall, aristocratic-looking
man, attired airily in a mixture of jean and silk. His nose was
aquiline, his eyes grey and piercing withal, his hair grey, but
abundant, and his clean shaved mouth and chin mingled delicacy with
strength of character.
"The weathah has been wahm, gentlemen," he remarked; to which statement
they assented.
"I obsehved you entah the ho-tel, and pehceived that you are travelling
for pleasuhe by yo-ah knapsacks. I also am travelling, partly foh
pleasuhe, partly foh mattahs of family business. My ideahs, gentlemen,
are old fashioned, too much so foh railyoads. The Mississippi is ouah
natuhal highway from the South, but, unfohtunately, the to me unpleasant
railyoad had to connect its head watahs with Lake Michigan, by which
route I find myself heah, on my way to a city called To-hon-to. You know
it, I pehsume?"
Wilkinson's geographical lore was now unfolded. He discussed the
Mississippi, although he had not been on that river, exhibited an
intimate acquaintance with cities and routes which had never seen him in
the flesh, and, by his quiet, gentlemanly, and, to the much older man,
deferential tone, was admitted to the confidence of Colonel Morton, of
Louisiana, South American trader, ship-owner and the possessor of a fine
estate, which, although it had suffered greatly during the war, in which
the colonel commanded a cavalry regiment, was yet productive and
remunerative.
"I am a widowah, suh, and a childless old man," continued the colonel;
"my only boy fell in the wah ah, and it broke his mother's heaht. Pahdon
me," he said, as his voice shook a little, and the least glimmer of a
tear stood in his eye, "I rahely talk of these mattahs of a puhely
pehsonal kind, but, as you are kind enough to be intehested in my
affaiahs, I say this much by way of explanation."
"I am sure, Colonel Morton, we deeply sympathize with you in so great a
double bereavement," interposed the dominie.
"Indeed we do, sir, most sincerely," added the lawyer.
"I thank you, gentlemen," answered the courteous Southerner. "I was
going to remahk that the only pehson in whom I feel a family intehest is
my lamented wife's sistah, a Madame Du Plessis, who has resided foh many
yeahs in yoah city of To-hon-to. May I enquiah, gentlemen, if you have,
either of you, heahd the name befoah?"
Coristine replied that, incidentally, he had heard the names of both
Madame Du Plessis and her daughter.
"I am awaah, suh, that my wife's sister has a daughtah. Can you tell me
of my sister-in-law's suhcumstances, and what her daughtah, my niece, is
like in appeahance?"
"Only from hearsay, Colonel. Madame Du Plessis is said to be in
straightened circumstances, and I learn, from several quarters, that
Miss Du Plessis is an attractive and amiable young lady; 'illigant' is
what a countryman of mine, who served under her father, termed his young
mistress."
"And her baptismal name, suh?"
"Is Cecile, I think."
"Ah, to be suah, my deah wife's name, Cecilia, gallicized. She and
Madame Du Plessis were Castilians of Lima. Du Plessis was theah in the
ahmy, I in commehcial puhsuits, and we mahhied the sistahs, the belles
of the Rimac.
Que' es la vida? Un frenesi
Que' es la vida? Una ilusion,
Una sombra, una ficcion.
You read Spanish, Mr. Wilkinson?"
"A little, sir; I think I recognize Calderon in these lines."
"Right, Mr. Wilkinson; I thank you, suh, foh yoah pleasing
companionship. Good evening, gentlemen!" With a courtly bow, the colonel
retired from the table.
At the coloured barber's the pedestrians met Mr. Maguffin, who greeted
Coristine, saying:--
"Hopes yoh doan feel none the wuhse ob yoh ride on the po-ul," adding:
"Mistah Poley, what runs this yeah stablishment, he's my nuncle's oldes'
boy, and he abstracks a cohnah ob the same ter my disposhul foh ohfice
pupposes, supposin' I'm wahnted by folks as cahn't find me."
"That's very convenient," replied the lawyer, as he settled down in the
barber's chair.
"It am, sah. I doan' tote ox teams no moah, po-ul nor no po-ul, when I
kin drive and ride the fasses and sassies hawses that is made; no, sah,
not much!"
"You are tired of teaming, then?"
"I am wohn out, sah, wif bein' called Toby and a po-ul-cat. I doan find
no Scripcher reffunce foh Tobias, and yoh know what a po-ul-cat is; it's
nuffin moah no less nor a skink."
The victims of the barber and his assistant kept the soap out of their
mouths with difficulty. As his tormentor deserted him for a moment, the
schoolmaster remarked that the Iroquois about the Lake of the Two
Mountains called the Trappist monks there by the same savoury name, on
account of some fancied resemblance between their dress and the coat of
the _Mephitis Americana_.
Mr. Maguffin was listening intently, thinking the conversation was meant
for his edification, and politely interposed:--
"No, sah, I ain't no Mefferdis. I was bawn and raised a Baktis. Poley,
now, he's a Mefferdis, and I ain't a gwine ter speak no harm of no
Crishtchun bruddern what's tryin' ter do right accordin' ter they
lights. But ter be called Toby and Poul-cat by low down white tresh,
that trial ob the flesh and speerut is a fohgone conclusion, sah."
The shaving operation completed, the travellers returned to the hotel,
and found Colonel Morton on what he called the piazza, smoking a good
Havana cigar. He opened his case for his companions of the supper table,
and Coristine accepted, while Wilkinson courteously declined.
"I tell you what I want to do, Mr. Cohistine. I want to puhchase two
saddle hawses, a good one foh myself, and not a bad one foh my sehvant.
Unfohtunately, my boy took sick on the way, and I had to send him home
on the Mississippi steamah. That means, I must get me a new sehvant,
able to ride well and handle hawses. I pehsume it will be hahd to find a
cullahed boy, a niggro, in these pahts, so I must take whateveh can be
got that will suit."
"Not at all, Colonel," replied Coristine, with effusion. "I think I can
get you a negro who is out of place, is a good rider, and, I imagine, a
good judge of horses. If you like, I'll go after him at once and tell
him to report to you to-morrow morning."
"My deah suh, you are altogethah too kind."
"Not a bit of it; when will I tell him to call upon you?"
"Would seven o'clock be too eahly? Plantation and ahmy life have made me
a light sleepah, so that I am up befoh the genehality of hotel guests."
"The very time. Excuse me for running away, I want to bag my man."
So Coristine left the colonel to parade the piazza with Wilkinson, and
resought the barber shop.
The shop was closed, but a light still burned within. Coristine knocked,
and Tobias opened the door. "You're the very man I want," cried the
lawyer.
"Anything done gwine wrong, boss?" asked Mr. Maguffin.
The lawyer explained the circumstances to him at length, eulogized
Colonel Morton, and told the negro to make his best appearance at the
hotel, sharp at seven next morning.
"Do yoh say the gemman'll gib me thirty dollars a munf and cloves ter
boot, and me ridin' behine him all ober the roads on hawseback!" asked
Tobias.
"Yes, I think I can promise those terms," replied the legal go-between.
"Then, yoh say foh me, if he's please foh ter hab me Maguffin, not
Tobias, but Maguffin is his man, and I kin pick him out two lubby
hawses, cheap as a po-ul-caht, and I cahn't say no cheapah. My respecs
and humble expreshun ob gracious apprecherashun ter yoh, Mistah
Kerosene."
The lawyer rushed back to the veranda, and found the colonel and Wilks
still in conversation, and, wonder of wonder, Wilkinson was actually
smoking a cigar, which he occasionally inserted between his lips, and
then held away at arm's length, while he puffed out the smoke in a thin
blue cloud. Wisely, he did not express astonishment at this unheard of
feat of his friend, but informed the colonel that he had seen the
coloured man, whose name was Tobias, but preferred to be called
Maguffin, that he was willing to engage for thirty dollars a month and
his clothes, and that he could put his new master in the way of getting
two suitable horses. "I think, Colonel, you can reckon on his being here
punctually at seven to-morrow."
"I shall nevah cease, Mr. Cohistine, to be sensible of yoah great
kindness to an entiah styangah, suh. Oblige me by smoking anothah cigah,
if they are to yoah liking."
So Corry lit a fresh cigar, and the three paraded the verandah till it
was very late, engaging in all manner of pleasant conversation. When the
stumps were thrown away, the colonel invited the comrades to visit his
rooms for a moment before retiring. Entering his private sitting-room,
he produced a quaintly-shaped but large glass bottle, which he flanked
with three tumblers and a carafe of water. "Help yohselves, gentlemen,"
he said, courteously; "this old Bourbon is good foh countehacting the
effects of the night aiah. Some prefer Monongahela, but good old Bourbon
in modehation cahn't be suhpahssed." The pedestrians filled up, and
bowed to their host as they drank, and the colonel, doing the same,
said, "My thanks to yoh, gentlemen, foh yoah kindness to a styangah--to
yoah good health and ouah futhah pleasant acquaintance!" Then they
severally retired, and the hotel closed for the night.
The next morning Coristine, whose room was just over the main entrance,
was awakened by a loud discussion in the hall of the hotel. "Clare out
now," cried the porter, "the bar's not opind yit, an' we don't want
naygurs round whin the guests do be comin' down the stairs; clare, now,
I tell yeez."
"I'se heah, Mike, on bisness wif Cunnel Morting," said a well-known
voice; and continued, "yoh go and tell the cunnel that Mistah Maguffin
is waitin' foh to pay his respecs."
"Go along wid yeez, Oi say, ye black scum av the airth, wid yer Cornel
Mortins, the loikes av you! Faix, Oi'll tache yeez who's yer betthers
wid this broom-handle."
"Gently, my good man, gently!" said the colonel, soothingly, as he laid
his hand on Mike's shoulder. "This boy has business with me. Come in
heah, Maguffin."
Tobias went in, with a triumphant glance at Mike, and, arrangements
being completed, was soon at work, blacking his master's boots. Then he
had a second breakfast at the servant's table, after which the colonel
sallied forth with him, to provide him with a befitting suit of clothes,
and to inspect the horses he had deemed suitable for the use of his new
employer and himself. While they were gone, Wilkinson and his friend
descended to a late breakfast, during which the hotel clerk handed the
lawyer a telegram, signed Tylor, Woodruff, and White, and containing the
words, "Look up Colonel Morton, Madame Du Plessis, 315 Bluebird Avenue,
Parkdale." So the colonel had been corresponding with his firm, and he
must either wait till that worthy returned, or leave a note for him.
"Bawderashin, anyway, when a man's out for a holiday, can't he be left
alone a bit!" Then, turning to his friend, he asked, "And, are they
troubling you with letters and telegrams, too, Wilks, my darling?" The
dominie replied, "I have only one letter about a poor lady teacher, who
is in consumption, I fear. They want an extension of holidays for her,
which is rather hard to get."
"But you'll get it for her, Wilks, my dear?"
"Of course I will, if I have to do her work as well as my own."
"I knew it, Wilks, I knew it. You're as soft hearted as a girl, for all
your adamant exterior. God bless you, my dear boy!"
"Corry, Corry, what allowances must be made for your exaggerated Irish
language! What is there like adamant about me, I should like to know?"
"Good mawnin, gentlemen," said the soft voice of the colonel, "I am
delighted to see you looking so well. I envy you Canadian gentlemen yoah
fine fyesh complexions and yoah musical voices. We have sawft voices in
the south, but it is a soht of niggro sawftness, gained by contact I
pehsume. My sehvant and I byeakfasted some time ago."
"I trust he is to your liking, Colonel?" enquired Coristine.
"Suh, you have found me a jewel in Maguffin, and he has found me two
splendid roadsters that are now being fitted with saddles. We staht for
To-hon-to in an houah, gentlemen."
"By the bye, Colonel, I have a telegram from my firm that concerns you.
It says 'Look up Colonel Morton, Madame Du Plessis, 315 Bluebird Avenue,
Parkdale."
"But wheah is Pahkdale?"
"It is a suburb of Toronto. You had better keep the telegram."
"So, Mr. Cohistine, you are a lawyeh?"
"Yes; of the firm of Tylor, Woodruff, and White, but I'm not that now,
I'm a gentleman out on a grand stravague."
"You may be a lawyeh, suh, but you are a gentleman as well, and I hope
to meet you befoah many days are past. Good mawnin, my kind friends!"
The knapsacks were put on boldly, in the very parlour of the hotel, and
their bearers strode along the lake road into the west, as coolly as if
they were doing Snowden or Windermere. It was a glorious morning, and
they exulted in it, rejoicing in the joy of living. The dominie had
written his letter to the vulgar school-trustees, and felt good, with
the approbation of a generous conscience. He recited with feeling:--
"_What, you are stepping westward?_" "_Yea_"--
'Twould be a wildish destiny,
If we, who thus together roam
In a strange land, and far from home,
Were in this place the guests of chance;
Yet who would stop, or fear t' advance,
Though home or shelter he had none,
With such a sky to lead him on.
The dewy ground was dark and cold;
"Faith, 'tis nothing of the kind, Wilks," interrupted Coristine; but the
dominie went on unheeding.
Behind, all gloomy to behold,
And stepping westward seemed to be
A kind of heavenly destiny:
I liked the greeting; 'twas a sound
Of something without place or bound
And seemed to give me spiritual right
To travel through that region bright.
The voice was soft, and she who spake
Was walking by her native lake;
The salutation had to me
The very sound of courtesy;
Its power was felt; and while my eye
Was fix'd upon the glorious sky,
The echo of the voice enwrought
A human sweetness with the thought
Of travelling through the world that lay
Before me in my endless way.
"O Wilks, but you're the daisy. So you're going to travel through the
world with the human sweetness of the soft voice of courtesy? You're a
fraud, Wilks, you're as soft-hearted as a fozy turnip."
"Corry, a little while ago you called me adamant. You are
inconsequential, sir."
"All right, Wilks, my darling. But isn't it a joy to have the colonel
taking the bad taste of the Grinstun man out of your mouth?"
"The colonel, no doubt, is infinitely preferable. He is a gentleman,
Corry, and that is saying a good deal."
"Hurroo for a specimen! look at that bank on your left, beyond that wet
patch, it's thyme, it is. _Thymus serpyllum_, and Gray says it's not
native, but adventitious from Europe. Maccoun says the same; I wonder
what my dear friend, Spotton, says? But here it is, and no trace of a
house or clearing near. It's thyme, my boy, and smells sweet as honey:--
Old father Time, as Ovid sings,
Is a great eater up of things,
And, without salt or mustard,
Will gulp you down a castle wall,
As easily as, at Guildhall,
An alderman eats custard."
"Drop your stupid Percy anecdote poems, Corry, and listen to this,"
cried the dominie, as he sang:--
I know a bank whereon the wild thyme grows,
I know a bank whereon the wild thyme grows,
Where oxlips and the nodding violets blow,
Where oxlips linger, nodding violets blow,
I know a bank whereon the wild thyme grow-ow-ow-ow-ows!!!
The lawyer joined in the chorus, encored the song, and trolled "ow ow ow
ow ows" until the blood vessels over his brain pan demanded a rest.
"Wilks," he said, "you're a thing of beauty and a joy forever."
Soon the road trended within a short distance of the lake shore. The
blue waves were tumbling in gloriously, and swished up upon the shelving
limestone rocks. "What is the time, Corry?" asked Wilkinson. "It's
eleven by my repeater," he answered. "Then it is quite safe to bathe;
what do you say to a dip?" The lawyer unstrapped his knapsack, and
hastened off the road towards the beach. "Come on, Wilks," he cried,
"we'll make believe that it's grampusses we are."
"What is a grampus?" enquired the dominie.
"Dad, if I know," replied his friend.
"A grampus, sir, etymologically is 'un grand poisson,' but,
biologically, it is no fish at all, being a mammal, mid-way between a
dolphin and a porpoise."
"So you got off that conundrum a porpoise to make a fool of me, Wilks?"
"O, Corry, you make me shudder with your villainous puns."
"That's nothing to what I heard once. There were some fellows camping,
and they had two tents and some dogs for deerhunting. As it was raining,
they let the hounds sleep in one of the tents, when one of the fellows
goes round and says: 'Shut down your curtains.' 'Were you telling them
that to keep the rain out?' asked one, when the rascal answered: 'To all
in tents and purp houses.' Wasn't that awful, now?"
The water was cold but pleasant on a hot day, and the swimmers enjoyed
striking out some distance from shore and then being washed in by the
homeward-bound waves. They sat, with their palms pressed down beside
them, on smooth ledges of rock, and let the breakers lap over them. The
lawyer was thinking it time to get out, when he saw Wilkinson back into
the waves with a scared face. "Are you going for another swim, Wilks, my
boy?" he asked. "Look behind you," whispered the schoolmaster. Coristine
looked, and was aware of three girls, truly rural, sitting on the bank
and apparently absorbed in contemplating the swimmers. "This is awful!"
he ejaculated, as he slid down into deep water; "Wilks, it's scare the
life out of them I must, or we'll never get back to our clothes. Now,
listen to me." Dipping his head once more under water till it dripped,
he let out a fearful sound, like "Gurrahow skrrr spat, you young
gurruls, an' if yeez don't travel home as fast as yer futs'll taake
yeez, it's I'll be afther yeez straight, och, garrahow skrr spat
whishtubbleubbleubble!" The rural maidens took to their heels and ran,
as Coristine swam into shore. In a minute the swimmers were into their
clothes and packs, and resumed their march, much refreshed by the cool
waters of the Georgian Bay.
"And where is it we're bound for now, Wilks?"
"For the abandoned shale-works at the foot of the Blue Mountains."
"Fwhat's that, as Jimmie Butler said about the owl?"
"The Utica formation, which crops out here, consists largely of
bituminous shales, that yield mineral oil to the extent of twenty
gallons to the ton. But, since the oil springs of the West have been in
operation, the usefulness of these shales is gone. The Indians seem to
have made large use of the shale, for a friend of mine found a hoe of
that material on an island in the Muskoka lakes. Being easily split and
worked, it was doubtless very acceptable to the metal wanting
aborigines."
"But, if the works are closed up, what will we see?"
"We shall meet with fossils in the shale, with trilobites, such as the
_Asaphus Canadensis_, a crustacean, closely allied to the wood-louse,
and occasionally found rolled up, like it, into a defensive ball,
together with other specimens of ancient life."
"Wilks, my son, who's doing Gosse's Canadian Naturalist, now, I'd like
to know? Pity we hadn't the working geologist along for a lesson."
"I am sorry if I have bored you with my talk, but I thought you were
interested in science. Does this suit you better?
Many a little hand
Glanced like a touch of sunshine on the rocks,
Many a light foot shone like a jewel set
In the dark crag; and then we turn'd, we wound
About the cliffs, the copses, out and in,
Hammering and clinking, chattering stony names
Of shale and hornblende, rag and trap and tuff,
Amygdaloid and trachyte, till the sun
Grew broader towards his death and fell, and all
The rosy heights came out above the lawns."
"That's better, avic. Tennyson's got the shale there, I see. But rag and
trap and tuff is the word, and tough the whole business is. Just look at
that living blue bell, there, it's worth all the stony names of rock and
fossil.
Let the proud Indian boast of his jessamine bowers,
His garlands of roses and moss-covered dells,
While humbly I sing of those sweet little flowers,
The blue bells of Scotland, the Scottish blue bells.
We'll shout in the chorus forever and ever,
The blue bells of Scotland, the Scottish blue bells."
"You are a nice botanist, Mr. Coristine, to confound that campanula with
the Scottish blue-bell, which is a scilla, or wild hyacinth."
"Poetic license, my dear friend, poetic license! Hear this now:--
Let the Blue Mountains boast of their shale that's bituminous,
Full of trilobites, graptolites and all the rest,
It may not be so learned, or ancient, or luminous,
But the little campanula's what I love best.
So we'll shout in the chorus forever and ever,
The little campanula's worth all the rest.
Whew! What do you think of that for an impromptu song, Wilks?"
"I think that you are turning your back upon your own principle that
there is no best, or no one best, and that everything is best in its
place."
"Barring old Nick and the mosquitoes, Wilks, come now?"
"Well, an exception may be made in their favour, but what says the
poet:--
O yet we trust that somehow good
Will be the final goal of ill.
Come, along, though, for we have much to see before sunset."
"You don't think that good is going to come out of the devil and
mosquitoes?"
"Yes I do; not to themselves, perhaps, but to humanity."
"I saw a book once with the title "Why Doesn't God Kill the Devil?" and
sympathized with it. Why doesn't He?"
"Because man wants the devil. As soon as the world ceases to want him,
so soon is his occupation gone."
"Wilks, my dear, that's an awful responsibility lying on us men, and I
fear what you say is too true. So here's for the shale works."
The pedestrians ceased their theological discussion and went towards the
deserted buildings, where, in former days, a bad smelling oil had been
distilled from the slaty-looking black stones, which lay about in large
numbers. Wilkinson picked up fossils enough, species of trilobites
chiefly, with a few graptolites, lingulas and strophomenas, to start a
museum. These, as Coristine had suggested in Toronto, he actually tied
up in his silk handkerchief, which he slung on the crook of his stick
and carried over his shoulder. The lawyer also gathered a few, and
bestowed them in the side pocket of his coat not devoted to smoking
materials. The pair were leaving the works for the ascent of the
mountain, when barks were heard, then a pattering of feet, and soon the
breathless Muggins jumped upon them with joyous demonstrations.
"Where has he been? How came we not to miss him?" asked the dominie, and
Coristine answered rather obliquely:--
"I don't remember seeing him since we entered Collingwood. Surely he
didn't go back to the Grinstun man."
"It is hard to be poetical on a dog called Muggins," remarked Wilkinson;
"Tray seems to be the favourite name. Cowper's dogs are different, and
Wordsworth has Dart and Swallow, Prince and Music, something like
Actaeon's dogs in 'Ovid.' Nevertheless, I like Muggins."
"Oh, Tray is good, Wilks:--
To my dear loving Shelah, so far, far away,
I can never return with my old dog Tray;
He's lazy and he's blind,
You'll never, never find
A bigger thief than old dog Tray."
"Corry, this is bathos of the worst description. You are like a
caterpillar; you desecrate the living leaf you touch."
"Wilks, that's hard on the six feet of me, for your caterpillar has a
great many more. But that dog's gone back again."
As they looked after his departing figure, the reason was obvious. Two
lightly, yet clerically, attired figures were coming up the road, and on
the taller and thinner of the twain the dog was leaping with every sign
of genuine affection.
"I'm afraid, Wilks, that Muggins is a beastly cur, a treacherous 'ound,
a hungrateful pup; look at his antics with that cadaverous curate,
keeping company with his sleek, respectable vicar. O Muggy, Mug, Mug!"
The pedestrians waited for the clergy, who soon came up to them, and
exchanged salutations.
"My dawg appears to know you," said the tall cassocked cleric in a
somewhat lofty, professional tone.
"He ought to," replied Wilkinson, "seeing that he was given to me by a
Mr. Rawdon, a working geologist, as he calls himself."
"Ow, really now, it seems to me rather an immoral transaction for your
ah friend, Mr. Rawdon, to give away another man's property."
"Mr. Rawdon is no friend of mine, but his dog took a fancy to us, and
followed us from Dromore to Collingwood."
"Allow me to assure you that Muggins is not this ah Mr. Rawdon's dawg at
all. I trained him from a puppy at Tossorontio. The Bishop ordered me
from there to Flanders, and, in the hurry of moving, the dawg was lost;
but now, I should rather say stowlen. My friend, the Reverend Mr. Errol
and myself, my name is Basil Perrowne, Clerk, had business in
Collingwood last night, when Muggins, most opportunely, met us, and went
howme with me."
"Well, Mr. Perrowne, I am very glad you have recovered your dog, which I
was only too glad to rescue from a somewhat inhuman master. My name is
Wilkinson, of the Toronto schools, my friend is Mr. Coristine, of
Osgoode Hall, barrister."
The gentlemen exchanged formal salutations, and proceeded on their way,
Wilkinson with Perrowne, and Coristine with Erroll. Muggins was in the
seventh heaven of delight.
"You belong to Tossorontio, Mr. Perrowne?" asked Wilkinson, by way of
starting the conversation.
"Ow, now! I said I had trained Muggins from a pup there, but that ownly
extends owver a few years. Durham is my university, which you may have
heard of."
"I am familiar by name with the university and the cathedral, although
the juvenile geography books say that Durham is famous for its mustard."
"Ow, now, really, they down't, do they? Ow dear, mustard! We Durham men
can serve it out pretty hot, you know. You belong to the Church, of
course, Mr. Wilkinson?"
"I was brought up in the Church of England, and educated in what are
called Church principles; I am fond of the Prayer Book and the Service,
but, to my way of thinking, the Church is far more extensive than our
mere Anglican communion."
"Ow, yes, there are Christian people, who, I howpe, will get to heaven
some way through the uncovenanted mercies, in spite of their horrid
schism from the True Body. There is Errol, now, whom, out of mere
courtesy, I call reverend, but he is no more reverend than Muggins. His
orders are ridiculous, not worth a farthing candle."
"Come, come, Mr. Perrowne, his orders are as good as those of St.
Timothy, which were laid on him by the hands of the Presbytery."
"That is precisely what the cheeky dissenter says himself. We have
dropped that line of controversy now, for one ever so much more
practical."
"I hope you don't take off your coats and fight it out? You have the
advantage in height and youth, but Mr. Errol seems a strong and active
man."
"Now, we down't fight. I have set a cricket club a-gowing, and he has
turned a neglected field into a golf links. My club makes Churchmen, and
his makes Scotch dissenters."
"I thought the Presbyterian Church was established in Scotland?"
"Ow, down't you see, we are not in Scotland."
"Then, in Canada, there is no established church, unless it be the Roman
Catholic in the Province of Quebec."
"Ow, well, drop that, you know; we are the Church, and all the outside
people are dissenters. I down't antagonize him. He helped me to make my
crease, and joined my club, and I play golf with him every fine Monday
morning. But the young fellows have now true English spirit here. Errol
has twenty golfers to my six cricketers. When he and I are added, that
makes eight, not near enough, you know. As a mission agency, my club has
not succeeded yet, but every time I make a cricketer, I make a
Churchman."
"I have known some very good cricketers that were not Anglicans."
"Now you haven't, my dear sir; you thought you have, but you haven't;
that's the trouble with those who reject Church authority. The Methodist
plays rounder, what you call base-ball; the Independents and Baptists
played croquet and lawn tennis after other people stopped playing them;
the Presbyterian plays golf; and the Churchman plays cricket."
"To argue with one who sweeps all experience aside with a wave of his
hand," said the schoolmaster, indignantly, "is not to argue at all. It
is a case of _Roma locuta_."
"Ow, yes, just sow, you know, we down't argue, we simply assert the
truth."
"How d'ye like the Durham mustard, Wilks, my boy?" put in Coristine from
the rear, where he and Mr. Errol were laughing amusedly; "it's hot,
isn't it, not much solid food, but lots of flavour? It reminds me of The
Crew, when he said what was, is, and ever shall be, Amen. Mr. Perrowne
is the owner of a splendid dog, and he is a splendid dogmatist. What he
doesn't know isn't worth knowing."
"Ow, thanks awfully, Mr. Coristine, you are really too flattering!"
gravely and gratefully replied the parson. Wilkinson was afraid that his
friend's banter might become too apparent, as the simple egotism of the
graduate of Durham led him on, so, he changed the subject, and soon had
the cleric quoting Virgil and Mrs. Hemans.
Meanwhile Coristine and Mr. Errol were taking one another's measure. The
lawyer recited to his companion the conversation between Marjorie and
himself relative to Timotheus. He found that Errol knew Marjorie, who
had often been in his church and Sunday school in Flanders. "She's a
comical little piece," he said; "her Sunday school teacher asked her who
killed Goliath? and what do you think was her reply!"
"Give it up."
"It was 'Jack,' no less than Jack the Giant-Killer."
"The darlin'!" cried the lawyer, with admiration, and straightway won
the minister's heart.
"Marjorie has a cousin stopping at the house of Mr. Carruthers, one of
my elders, since last Tuesday night, as blithe and bonnie a young leddy
as man could wish to see. While she's here, she's just the light of the
whole country side."
Mr. Coristine did not care for this turn in the conversation.
"Tell me some more about little Marjorie," he said.
"Ah," replied the minister, "then you know that her cousin is called
Marjorie, too! Little Marjorie went to church once with Miss Du Plessis,
whom Perrowne had got to sing in the choir, that was last summer, if I
mind right, and, when the two rideeclus candles on the altar were
lighted, and the priest, as he calls himself, came in with his surplice
on, she put her face down in Miss Cecile's lap. 'What's the trouble,
Marjorie?' asked Miss Du Plessis, bending over her. 'He's going to kiss
us all good-night,' sobbed the wee thing. 'No he is not, Marjorie; he's
on his knees, praying,' replied the young leddy, soothingly. 'That's
what papa always does, when he's dressed like that, before he kisses me
good-night, but he takes off his boots and things first,' and she sobbed
again, for fear Perrowne was coming to kiss them all, put out the
candles, and go to bed. If Miss Du Plessis had not been a sober-minded
lass, she would have laughed out in the middle of the choir. As it was,
she had to hand Marjorie over to a neighbour in a back seat, before the
bit lassie would be comforted."
"Ah! did you ever now? the little innocent!"
"It's not that improbable that there'll be a marriage in the church
before long. Perrowne's just clean daft and infatuated with his
occasional soprano. He's sent her the 'Mirror of Devotion' and the
'Soul's Questioner,' and a lot of nicely bound trash, and walks home
with her whenever he has the chance, to the scandal and rage of all his
farmers' daughters. It's very injudeecious o' Perrowne, and has dreeven
two of his best families to the Kirk. Not that she's no a braw looking
lass, stately and deegnified, but she has na the winsomeness of Miss
Marjorie."
"Is that your quarter, Mr. Errol?"
"Hech, sirs, I'm an old bachelor that'll never see five and forty again;
but, as we say in Scotch or the vernacular Doric, 'an auld carle micht
dae waur.' There's not a more sensible, modest, blithesome, bonnie
lassie in all the land. It's a thousand peeties some young, handsome,
well to do steady, God-fearing man has na asked at her to be 'the light
o' his ain fireside.' Gin I were as young as you, Mr. Coristine, I would
na think twice about it."
"Avaunt, tempter!" cried the lawyer, "such a subject as matrimony is
strictly tabooed between me and my friend."
"I'll be your friend, I hope, but I cannot afford to taboo marriages.
Not to speak of the fees, they're the life of a well-ordered, healthy
congregation."
A neat turn-out, similar to that of Mrs. Thomas, came rattling along the
road. "That's John Carruthers' team," remarked the minister, and such it
turned out to be.
"Maister Errol," said its only occupant, a strong and honest-faced man
with a full brown beard, "yon's a fine hanky panky trick to play wi'
your ain elder an' session clerk."
"Deed John," returned the minister, relapsing into the vernacular; "I
didna ken ye were i' the toon ava, but 'oor bit dander has gien us the
opportunity o' becomin' acquent wi' twa rale dacent lads." Then, turning
to the lawyer, "excuse our familiar talk, Mr. Coristine, and let me
introduce Squire Carruthers, of Flanders." The two men exchanged
salutations, and Perrowne, having turned back with Wilkinson, the same
ceremony was gone through with the latter. They were then all
courteously invited to get into the waggon. Errol and Perrowne sprang
in with an air of old proprietorship, but the two pedestrians
respectfully declined, as they were especially anxious to explore the
mountain beauties of this part of the country on foot and at their
leisure.
"Aweel, gentlemen," cried the squire, "gin ye'll no come the noo, we'll
just expect to see ye before the Sawbath. The Church and the Kirk'll be
looking for the wayfarers, and my house, thank Providence, is big eneuch
to gie ye a kindly welcome."
The parsons ably seconded Mr. Carruthers' peculiar mixture of English
and Lowland Scotch, on the latter of which he prided himself, but only
when in the company of someone who could appreciate it. Wilkinson looked
at Coristine, and the lawyer looked at the dominie, for here they were
invited to go straight into the jaws of the lion. Just then, they
descried, climbing painfully up the hill, but some distance behind them,
the Grinstun man; there was no mistaking him. "Hurry, and drive away,"
cried Coristine, in an under tone; "that cad there, the same that stole
Muggins, is going to your house, Squire. For any sake, don't facilitate
his journey."
"I'll no stir a hoof till ye promise to come to us, Mr. Coristine, and
you, Mr. Wilkins, tae."
"All right, many thanks, we promise," they cried together, and the
waggon rattled away.
"Now, Wilks, over this ditch, sharp, and into the brush, till this thief
of the world goes by. We've deprived him of a ride, and that's one good
thing done."
Together they jumped the ditch, and squatted among the bushes, waiting
for the Grinstun man. They heard him puffing up the rising ground, saw
his red, perspiring face in full view, and heard him, as he mopped
himself with a bandanna, exclaim: "Blowed if I haint bin and lost the
chance of a lift. Teetotally blawst that hold hass of a driver, and them
two soft-'eaded Tomfools of hamateur scientists ridin' beside 'im. I
knew it was Muggins, the cur I stole, and guv a present of to that there
guy of a Favosites Wilkinsonia. I don't trust 'im, the scaly beggar, for
hall 'is fine 'eroic speeches. 'E'll be goin' and splittin' on me to
that gal, sure as heggs. And that Currystone, six feet of 'ipocrisy and
hinsolence, drat the long-legged, 'airy brute. O crikey, but it's 'ot;
'owever, I must 'urry on, for grinstuns is grinstuns, and a gal, with a
rich hold huncle, ridin' a fine 'orse, with a nigger behind 'im carryin'
his portmantle, haint to be sneezed hat. Stre'ch your pegs, Mr. Rawdon,
workin' geologist hand minerologist!"
"By Jove!" cried Coristine, when the Grinstun man was out of sight;
"that cad has met the colonel, and has been talking to him."
"A fine nephew-in-law he will get in him!" growled Wilkinson; "I have
half a mind--excuse me Corry."
"I thought you were very much taken with the old Southerner."
"Yes, that is it," and the dominie relapsed into silence.
"It's about lunch time, Wilks, and, as there's sure to be no water on
the top of the hill, I'll fill my rubber bag at the spring down there,
and carry it up, so that we can enjoy the view while taking our
prandial."
Wilkinson vouchsafed no reply. He was in deep and earnest thought about
something. Taking silence for consent, Coristine tripped down the hill a
few yards, with a square india rubber article in his hand. It had a
brass mouthpiece that partly screwed off, when it was desirable to
inflate it with air, as a cushion, pillow, or life-preserver, or to fill
it with hot water to take the place of a warming-pan. Now, at the spring
by the roadside, he rinsed it well out, and then filled it with clear
cold water, which he brought back to the place where the schoolmaster
was leaning on his stick and pondering. Replacing the knapsack, out of
which the india rubber bag had come, the lawyer prepared to continue the
ascent. In order to rouse his reflective friend, he said, "Wilks, my
boy, you've dropped your fossils."
"I fear, Corry, that I have lost all interest in fossils."
"Sure, that Grinstun man's enough to give a man a scunner at fossils for
the rest of his life."
"It is not exactly that, Corry," replied the truthful dominie; "but I
need my staff and my handkerchief, and I think I will leave the
specimens on the road, all except these two Asaphoi, the perplexing,
bewildering relics of antiquity. This world is full of perplexities
still, Corry." So saying, the dominie sighed, emptied his bandanna of
all but the two fossils, which he transferred to his pocket, and, with
staff in hand, recommenced the upward journey. In ten minutes they were
on the summit, and beheld the far-off figure of the working geologist on
the further slope. In both directions the view was magnificent. They sat
by the roadside on a leafy bank overshaded with cool branches, and,
producing the reduplication of the Barrie stores procured the night
before at Collingwood, proceeded to lunch _al fresco_. The contents of
the india rubber bag, qualified with the spirit in their flasks, cheered
the hearts of the pedestrians and made them more inclined to look on the
bright side of life. Justice having been done to the biscuits and
cheese, Coristine lit his pipe, while the dominie took a turn at
Wordsworth.
With musical intonation, Wilkinson read aloud:--
Some thought he was a lover, and did woo:
Some thought far worse of him, and judged him wrong:
But verse was what he had been wedded to;
And his own mind did like a tempest strong
Come to him thus, and drove the weary wight along.
With him there often walked in friendly guise,
Or lay upon the moss by brook or tree,
A noticeable man with large grey eyes,
And a pale face that seemed undoubtedly
As if a blooming face it ought to be;
Heavy his low-hung lip did oft appear,
Depress'd by weight of musing phantasy;
Profound his forehead was, though not severe;
Yet some did think that he had little business here.
He would entice that other man to hear
His music, and to view his imagery.
And, sooth, these two did love each other dear,
As far as love in such a place could be;
There did they dwell--from earthly labour free,
As happy spirits as were ever seen:
If but a bird, to keep them company,
Or butterfly sate down, they were, I ween,
As pleased as if the same had been a maiden queen.
"That's the true stuff, Wilks, and has the right ring in it, for we love
each other dear, and are as happy spirits as were ever seen, but not a
large grey eye, pale face, or low-hung lip between us. Just hear my
music now, and view my imagery with your mind's eye:--
Far down the ridge, I see the Grinstun man,
Full short in stature and rotund is he,
Pale grey his watery orbs, that dare not scan
His interlocutor, and his goatee,
With hair and whiskers like a furnace be:
Concave the mouth from which his nose-tip flies
In vain attempt to shun vulgarity.
O haste, ye gods, to snatch from him the prize,
And send him hence to weep--and to geologize!"
"The rhythm is all right, Corry, and the rhyme, but I hope you do not
call that poetry?"
"If that isn't superior to a good many of Wordsworth's verses, Wilks,
I'll eat my hat, and that would be a pity this hot weather. Confess now,
you haythen, you," cried the lawyer, making a lunge at his companion
with his stick, which the latter warded off with his book.
"There are some pretty poor ones," the schoolmaster granted grudgingly,
"but the work of a great poet should not be judged by fragments."
"Wilks, apply the rule; I have only given you one stanza of the
unfinished epic, which unborn generations will peruse with admiration
and awe, 'The Grinstun Quarry Restored':--
I have striven hard for my high reward
Through many a changing year
Now, the goal I reach; it is mine to teach.
Stand still, O man, and hear!
I shall wreathe my name, with the brightness of fame,
To shine upon history's pages;
It shall be a gem in the diadem
Of the past to future ages!
Oh, Wilks for immortality!" cried the light-hearted lawyer, rising with
a laugh.
Looking back towards the ascent, he perceived two bowed figures
struggling up the hill under largish, and, apparently, not very light
burdens.
"Wilks, my dear, we're young and vigorous, and down there are two poor
old grannies laden like pack mules in this broiling sun. Let us leave
our knapsacks here, and give them a hoist."
The schoolmaster willingly assented, and followed his friend, who flew
down the hill at breakneck speed, in a rapid but more sober manner. The
old couple looked up with some astonishment at a well-dressed city man
tearing down the hill towards them like a schoolboy, but their
astonishment turned to warmest gratitude, that found vent in many
thankful expressions, as the lawyer shouldered the old lady's big
bundle, and, as, a minute later, the dominie relieved her partner of
his. They naturally fell into pairs, the husband and Wilkinson leading,
Coristine and the wife following after. In different ways the elderly
pair told their twin burden-bearers the same story of their farm some
distance below the western slope of the mountain, of their son at home
and their two daughters out at service, and mentioned the fact that they
had both been schoolteachers, but, as they said with apologetic
humility, only on third-class county certificates. Old Mr. Hill insisted
on getting his load back when the top of the mountain was reached, and
the pedestrians resumed their knapsacks and staves, but the lawyer
utterly refused to surrender his bundle to the old lady's entreaties.
The sometime schoolteachers were intelligent, very well read in Cowper,
Pollock, and Sir Walter Scott, as well as in the Bible, and withal
possessed of a fair sense of humour. The old lady and Coristine were a
perpetual feast to one another. "Sure!" said he, "it's bagmen the
ignorant creatures have taken us for more than once, and it's a genuine
one I am now, Mrs. Hill," at which the good woman laughed, and recited
the Scotch ballad of the "Wee Wifukie coming frae the fair," who fell
asleep, when "by came a packman wi' a little pack," and relieved her of
her purse and placks, and "clippit a' her gowden locks sae bonnie and
sae lang." This she did in excellent taste, leaving out any
objectionable expressions in the original. When she repeated the words
of the Wifukie at the end of each verse, "This is nae me," consequent on
her discovery that curls and money were gone, the lawyer laughed
heartily, causing the pair in front, who were discussing educational
matters, to look round for the cause of the merriment. "I'm the man,"
shouted Coristine to them, "the packman wi' a little pack." Then Mr.
Hill knew what it was.