YEAR 1792
WHEN the spring in this year began to brighten on the brae, the cloud of
dulness that had darkened and oppressed me all the winter somewhat melted
away, and I could now and then joke again at the never-ending toil and
trouble of that busiest of all bees, the second Mrs. Balwhidder. But
still I was far from being right: a small matter affected me, and I was
overly given to walking by myself, and musing on things that I could tell
nothing about—my thoughts were just the rack of a dream without form, and
driving witlessly as the smoke that mounteth up, and is lost in the airy
heights of the sky.
Heeding little of what was going on in the clachan, and taking no
interest in the concerns of any body, I would have been contented to die,
but I had no ail about me. An accident, however, fell out, that, by
calling on me for an effort, had the blessed influence of clearing my
vapours almost entirely away.
One morning as I was walking on the sunny side of the road, where the
footpath was in the next year made to the cotton-mill, I fell in with Mr.
Cayenne, who was seemingly much fashed—a small matter could do that at
any time; and he came up to me with a red face and an angry eye. It was
not my intent to speak to him; for I was grown loth to enter into
conversation with any body, so I bowed and passed on. “What,” cried Mr.
Cayenne, “and will you not speak to me?” I turned round, and said
meekly, “Mr. Cayenne, I have no objections to speak to you; but having
nothing particular to say, it did not seem necessary just now.”
He looked at me like a gled, and in a minute exclaimed, “Mad, by Jupiter!
as mad as a March hare!” He then entered into conversation with me, and
said, that he had noticed me an altered man, and was just so far on his
way to the manse, to enquire what had befallen me. So, from less to
more, we entered into the marrow of my case; and I told him how I had
observed the estranged countenances of some of the heritors; at which he
swore an oath, that they were a parcel of the damn’dest boobies in the
country, and told me how they had taken it into their heads that I was a
leveller. “But I know you better,” said Mr. Cayenne, “and have stood up
for you as an honest conscientious man, though I don’t much like your
humdrum preaching. However, let that pass; I insist upon your dining
with me to-day, when some of these arrant fools are to be with us, and
the devil’s in’t if I don’t make you friends with them.” I did not think
Mr. Cayenne, however, very well qualified for peacemaker, but,
nevertheless, I consented to go; and having thus got an inkling of the
cause of that cold back-turning which had distressed me so much, I made
such an effort to remove the error that was entertained against me, that
some of the heritors, before we separated, shook me by the hands with the
cordiality of renewed friendship; and, as if to make amends for past
neglect, there was no end to their invitations to dinner which had the
effect of putting me again on my mettle, and removing the thick and muddy
melancholious humour out of my blood.
But what confirmed my cure was the coming home of my daughter Janet from
the Ayr boarding-school, where she had learnt to play on the spinnet, and
was become a conversible lassie, with a competent knowledge, for a woman
of geography and history; so that when her mother was busy with the
weariful booming wheel, she entertained me sometimes with a tune, and
sometimes with her tongue, which made the winter nights fly cantily by.
Whether it was owing to the malady of my imagination throughout the
greatest part of this year, or that really nothing particular did happen
to interest me, I cannot say; but it is very remarkable that I have
nothing remarkable to record—further, than I was at the expense myself of
getting the manse rough-case, and the window cheeks painted, with roans
put up, rather than apply to the heritors; for they were always sorely
fashed when called upon for outlay.