YEAR 1783
THIS was another Sabbath year of my ministry. It has left me nothing to
record but a silent increase of prosperity in the parish. I myself had
now in the bank more than a thousand pounds, and every thing was thriving
around. My two bairns, Gilbert, that is now the merchant in Glasgow, was
grown into a sturdy ramplor laddie, and Janet, that is married upon Dr.
Kittleword, the minister of Swappington, was as fine a lassie for her
years as the eyes of a parent could desire to see.
Shortly after the news of the peace, an event at which all gave
themselves up to joy, a thing happened among us that at the time caused
much talk; but although very dreadful, was yet not so serious, some how
or other, as such an awsome doing should have been. Poor Jenny Gaffaw
happened to take a heavy cold, and soon thereafter died. Meg went about
from house to house, begging dead-clothes, and got the body straighted in
a wonderful decent manner, with a plate of earth and salt placed upon
it—an admonitory type of mortality and eternal life that has
ill-advisedly gone out of fashion. When I heard of this, I could not but
go to see how a creature that was not thought possessed of a grain of
understanding, could have done so much herself. On entering the door, I
beheld Meg sitting with two or three of the neighbouring kimmers, and the
corpse laid out on a bed. “Come awa’, sir,” said Meg; “this is an
altered house. They’re gane that keepit it bein; but, sir, we maun a’
come to this—we maun pay the debt o’ nature—death is a grim creditor, and
a doctor but brittle bail when the hour of reckoning’s at han’! What a
pity it is, mother, that you’re now dead, for here’s the minister come to
see you. Oh, sir! but she would have had a proud heart to see you in her
dwelling, for she had a genteel turn, and would not let me, her only
daughter, mess or mell wi’ the lathron lasses of the clachan. Ay, ay,
she brought me up with care, and edicated me for a lady: nae coarse wark
darkened my lily-white hands. But I maun work now; I maun dree the
penalty of man.”
Having stopped some time, listening to the curious maunnering of Meg, I
rose to come away; but she laid her hand on my arm, saying, “No, sir, ye
maun taste before ye gang! My mother had aye plenty in her life, nor
shall her latter day be needy.”
Accordingly, Meg, with all the due formality common on such occasions,
produced a bottle of water, and a dram-glass, which she filled and
tasted, then presented to me, at the same time offering me a bit of bread
on a slate. It was a consternation to everybody how the daft creature
had learnt all the ceremonies, which she performed in a manner past the
power of pen to describe, making the solemnity of death, by her strange
mockery, a kind of merriment, that was more painful than sorrow; but some
spirits are gifted with a faculty of observation, that, by the strength
of a little fancy, enables them to make a wonderful and truthlike
semblance of things and events, which they never saw, and poor Meg seemed
to have this gift.
The same night, the session having provided a coffin, the body was put
in, and removed to Mr. Mutchkin’s brewhouse, where the lads and lassies
kept the late-wake.
Saving this, the year flowed in a calm, and we floated on in the stream
of time towards the great ocean of eternity, like ducks and geese in the
river’s tide, that are carried down without being sensible of the speed
of the current. Alas! we have not wings like them, to fly back to the
place we set out from.