“Winter hath many days most like to Spring;
Soft thawing winds, and rains like dew, and gleams
Of sweet inconstant sunshine.--I have seen
An old man’s heart that ne’er was done with seedtime,
Abiding in its gracious youth for ever.”
THE next morning very early, while Martha Muir, unable to rest, sat
at the window, carefully mending the torn coat which was poor Harry’s
only one, Cuthbert Charteris set out on the top of the coach for
Ayr. What he had seen on the previous night oppressed him heavily,
weighing down even the natural exhilaration which the morning sunshine
usually brought to a mind void of offence towards men, and walking by
faith humbly with God. Continually that scene rose up before him--the
hidden tears and trembling of Agnes and Rose--the stern agitation of
Martha--the fatuous smile upon poor Harry’s white conscious face. “Poor
Harry!” the stranger echoed with emotion, the sad tenderness of this
lamentation so familiar to Harry’s nearest friends.
Harry, meanwhile, was peacefully asleep, unconscious of the hopeless
musing of his sister, as she sat by the window not long after sunrise,
doing this sad piece of work for him, and of the gloom which he cast
over the happier mind of his friend; a common case--almost too common
to need recording.
It was the afternoon before Charteris left his inn to seek the house of
Alexander Muir. In the intermediate time he had been wandering about
the town, and hunting through one old churchyard which lay in his way
for the graves of the Allenders; but his search was not successful. The
afternoon was bright and warm, the month being now far advanced, and
he was directed easily to the residence of the old man whom everybody
seemed to know. It was in one of the quiet back streets of the town,
a narrow-causewayed lane, kept in a kind of constant twilight by the
shadows of tall houses. The house he sought was not tall--its low door
opened immediately from the rough stones of the street; and on either
side was a square window fortified with strong panes of greenish glass,
which gave a hue by no means delightful to the little checked-muslin
blinds within. The upper story was a separate house, and had an outside
stair ascending to it, which stair darkened the lower door, and served
as a sort of porch, supported on the further side by a rude pillar of
mason-work. Cuthbert thought it a very dim dusky habitation for the
gentle uncle of the Muirs.
A little maid-servant, with a striped red and black woollen petticoat
and “short gown” of bright printed cotton, opened the door for him.
Descending a single step, Cuthbert entered a narrow passage, at the
end of which was another open door, with a bright prospect of trees
and flowers, and sunshine beyond. The lobby was paved with brick, very
red and clean, which the little servant seemed just to have finished
scouring; and an open door on one side of it gave him a glimpse of a
trim bed-chamber, with flowers on its little dressing-table; on the
other side was another door (closed) of another bed-room; and, looking
to the garden, the kitchen and the little parlour occupied the further
side of the house.
“Will ye just gang in, sir,” said the girl, removing her pail out of
Cuthbert’s way; “ye’ll get him in the garden himsel.”
Cuthbert obeyed, and passed by himself to the other door.
A very singular scene awaited him there. The garden was a large one,
and formed the greatest possible contrast to the dusky front of the
house. Apple trees in full blossom, and a bright congregation of all
the flowers of spring, surrounded the more homely produce in which the
large enclosure seemed rich. The door was matted round with climbing
plants, roses, and honey-suckles, which, in a month or two, would be as
bright and fragrant as now they were green; and a splendid pear-tree,
flushed with blossom, covered one entire side of the house.
But the animate part of the picture was still more
remarkable--scattered through the garden in groups, but principally
here near the door where some fine trees sheltered, and the sun shone
upon them, were a number of girls, from fourteen to twenty, working
the Ayrshire work as it is called--to wit, the fine embroideries on
muslin, which the Muirs “opened”--and talking, as girls generally talk,
very happily and gaily--with snatches of song, and pleasant laughter.
They had all the average good looks, and were dressed becomingly, as
girls in their class, who maintain themselves by needlework, generally
are. Completely astonished at first, Cuthbert became amused and
interested in the scene as he stood a moment unperceived at the door,
especially when, through the embowering leaves, he caught a glimpse of
the person he had come to see.
He was a little spare man, with hair nearly white, and a hale ruddy
cheek. Seated in an arm-chair, in front of his parlour window, with
a book in his hand, it was very evident that the good man’s book had
very little share of his attention. At present he was telling a story
to his audience; and Cuthbert admired the natural eloquence, the
simple grace of language, in which he clothed it. His speech was quite
Scottish, and even a little provincial, but untainted with the least
mixture of vulgarity; and when he had rounded his tale with a quotation
from Burns, he opened the book in which he had been keeping his place
with his finger, only to close it again immediately, when a new demand
was made upon his attention.
“Eh, Mr. Muir,” said one of the girls, “what for have ye such lots of
horse-gowans yonder in the corner?”
“They’re no horse-gowans, Beatie, my woman--they’re camomile,” said the
old man.
“And what is’t for? is it for eating?” asked the curious Beatie.
“It’s for making drinks for no weel folk,” volunteered a
better-informed companion.
“It’s for selling to John Wilson, the man that has taken up physic at
his own hand,” said the chairman of this strange assembly. “They tell
me he’s a friend of Dr. Hornbook’s; you’ve all read of Dr. Hornbook in
Burns.”
There was a general assent; but some, among whom was the Beatie
aforesaid, looked wistful and curious, and had not heard of that
eminent personage.
“It’s a profane thing, a profane thing,” said Alexander Muir. “Keep to
the Cottar, like good bairns. Ye’ll get no ill out of it. But what ails
ye, Beatie, my woman?”
“Eh, sir, it’s a gentleman,” said Beatie, under her breath. Whereupon
there ensued a dead silence, and a fit of spasmodic industry came upon
the girls, occasionally interrupted by a smothered titter, as one
of the more mischievous, who sat with her back to the door, tempted
to laughter her companions, whose downcast faces were towards the
stranger.
Cuthbert introduced himself in a few words, and was heartily greeted by
the old man. “I have an obligation to you, sir, as well as the rest of
them, for your care of Harry,” said the uncle; “and ye left them well?
They are my family, these bairns, an old solitary man as I am, and
their friends are most welcome to me.”
“You seem to have another family round you here,” said Cuthbert,
looking with a smile on the demure group before him, some of whom were
painfully suppressing the laugh which they could not altogether conceal.
“Neighbours’ bairns,” said Alexander Muir; “bits of innocent things
that have not the freedom of a garden like mine at home. There is a
kind of natural kin between them and the spring. I like to see them
among my flowers, and I think their work gets on all the better, that
they are cheery in the doing of it; but to tell you the truth, I
cannot see, Mr. Charteris, how our own bairns should think themselves
better in Glasgow than with me, now that Harry has gotten a wife.”
“They wish to remain together, I fancy,” said Cuthbert, sadly
remembering the bitter tie which kept them beside poor Harry; “but both
for health and happiness, Mr. Muir, I should fancy they would be better
with you.”
“Say you so?” said the old man, eagerly, “for happiness; aye, say you
so?”
Cuthbert hastened to explain away, so far as he could, the painful
meaning of his words, leaving it to be inferred that it was only the
fresh air and freedom of this pleasant place, of which they stood in
need.
“I am going in for a while with this gentleman,” said uncle Sandy,
raising his voice as he turned to his little congregation; “but mind
there is no need for you turning idle because I am not here to look
after you; mind and be eident, as the cotter’s bairns were bidden to
be.”
The girls acknowledged the smiling speech addressed to them by great
demonstration of industry, and for a few minutes the blue stamped
leaves and branches of their muslin grew into white embroidery with
wonderful speed. The old man looked round upon them with a smile, as
they sat bending down their heads under the glistening sunshine over
their pretty work, and then, laying his book on his chair, he led the
way into the house.
The parlour was a very small one, considerably less than the best
bed-room, which occupied the front of the house, and which, by an
occupant of less poetic taste, would have been made the sitting-room.
But Alexander Muir did not like the dull prospect of the little back
street; he preferred to look out upon the garden in which so much of
his time was spent, and the little room was large enough for all his
quiet necessities.
His old easy chair had been removed from the fireside corner to
the window. It was a latticed window, furnished with a broad shelf
extending all the length of its deep recess, which seemed to have
been made for plants--but no plants interposed themselves between the
sun-shine and the books, which were the best beloved companions of
the old, gentle, solitary man. Cuthbert looked at them as they lay in
little heaps in the corner of the window. There was no dust about them,
but almost as little arrangement. They lay, as their contents lay in
the head of their good master, mingled in pleasant friendliness. The
Fourfold State and the Crook in the Lot embraced the royal sides of
Shakspere, and a much-used copy of Burns lay peacefully beside the
Milton, which, to tell truth, opened more easily at Comus or at Il
Penseroso than in either Paradise. Besides these there were Cowper and
Young, an odd volume of the Spectator, an old time-worn copy of the
Pilgrim, with Samuel Rutherford’s Letters, and Fleming, the interpreter
of prophecy, and the quaint Willison ballasting some volumes of Scott
and Galt. Daily friends and comrades were these, bearing marks of long
and frequent use, some of them encased in homely covers of green cloth,
which the old man’s own careful hands had endued them with; some half
bound, after his fashion, with stripes of uncultivated “calf” defending
their backs, and their boards gay with marbled paper. It was pleasant
to see them, in their disarrangement, upon the broad ledge of the
window, friends too intimate and familiar to be kept on ceremonious
terms.
“Take a seat, Mr. Charteris,” said uncle Sandy; “if you had come while
Harry was here it might have been pleasanter for you--for Harry, poor
man, is a blithe companion; maybe over blithe sometimes for his own
well-doing: And you think the bairns would be better with me?”
“Nay,” said Charteris, hastily, “except in so far as this house of
yours, Mr. Muir, is certainly a most pleasant contrast to the din and
haste of Glasgow, and your nieces, you know, like your young friends
yonder, are of kin to spring.”
The old man had seated himself in his easy chair, which Cuthbert
would not take. He took off his spectacles to wipe them with his
handkerchief, and shook his head. “There is Rose, to be sure, and
little Lettie; but my niece, Martha, Mr. Charteris--well, I cannot
tell--the spring may come to her yet after the summer has passed. I
would not put the bondage of common use about Martha, for the like
of me is little able to judge the like of her. It is a hard thing to
understand. It might have been a question in the days of the auld
philosophy--what for the mind that would have served a conqueror should
be put into her--a mind that can ill bow to the present yoke--when
there is even too much need of such in high places. It will be clear
enough some time--but it has aye been a wonder to me.”
“There may be difficulties in her way to conquer, more hopeless than
kingdoms,” said Cuthbert involuntarily.
“Young man, do you ken of any evil tidings,” asked Alexander Muir, with
sudden haste and energy.
“Nothing, nothing,” said Cuthbert, annoyed at himself for speaking
words from which inferences so painful could be drawn--“You must hear
my special mission to Ayr, Mr. Muir. Your niece has told me that the
name of her grandmother was Allenders--it is an unusual name--Could you
give me any information about the family.”
The old man looked considerably surprised. “They were strangers here,”
he said. “I mind of Mrs. Calder, very well, whose daughter Violet
married James Muir, my brother. He was ten years younger than me, and
so I mind of his good-mother, though she died long ago. They came from
London, Mr. Charteris. There was a father and two daughters in the
family. I will let you see all that remains of them--their grave.”
“And are there no papers--no way of tracing the family to their
origin,” said Cuthbert, with some uneasiness.
“We have never thought it of any importance,” said the old man,
smiling, “if it is, we may fall on some means maybe. It sharpens
folk’s wits to have something to find out--but what depends on it, Mr.
Charteris.”
“I have said nothing of it to our friends in Glasgow--fearing that the
name might have misled me,” said Cuthbert, “but there is, I am glad to
tell you, an estate depending upon it--not a great one, Mr. Muir--a
comfortable small estate producing some four hundred pounds a-year.”
Cuthbert wanted to be rather under than over the mark--four hundred
pounds a-year! the sum was princely and magnificent to the astonished
old man. He looked at Cuthbert in a mist of bewilderment. He took off
his spectacles and wiped their glasses again. He put up his hand to
his head, and rubbed his forehead in confused amazement. “Four hundred
pounds a-year!”
“So far as I have gone yet, it seems almost certain that your nephew
is the heir,” said Cuthbert. “The surname of itself is much, and the
Christian names confirm its evidence very strongly. If you think there
can be anything done to trace the origin of these Allenders, I should
be glad to proceed to it at once.”
The old man had bowed down his head--he was fumbling now with
nerveless fingers at his glasses, and suddenly he raised the
handkerchief with which he had been wiping them, up to his eyes. Some
sounds, Cuthbert heard, like one or two broken irrepressible sobs, “For
Harry--for the unstable callant--the Lord’s grace to save him from
temptation--that I should live to see this hope!”
The short broken sobs continued for a moment, and then he raised his
head. “I see, Sir,” said the old man, with natural dignity, “that to
thank you for troubling yourself in this way, with the humble concerns
of these orphans, who can render you little in return, would be to hold
you in less esteem than is your due. I take your service, as, if I
had been as young and well endowed as you, I think I could maybe have
rendered it--and now tell me what it is you want to discover--that I
may further it, if I can, without delay.”