In a year after the departure of the clan, the clachans of Crawford
and Traquare had lost almost all traces of their old pastoral
character. The coal pit had been opened, and great iron furnaces built
almost at its mouth. Things had gone well with Crawford; the seam had
proved to be unusually rich; and, though the iron had been found, not
on his land, but on the extreme edge of Blair, he was quite satisfied.
Farquharson had struck hands with him over it, and the Blair iron ore
went to the Crawford furnaces to be smelted into pig iron.
Crawford had grown younger in the ardent life he had been leading. No
one would have taken him to be fifty-five years old. He hardly thought
of the past; he only told himself that he had never been as strong and
clear-headed and full of endurance, and that it was probable he had
yet nearly half a century before him. What could he not accomplish in
that time?
But in every earthly success there is a Mordecai sitting in its gate,
and Colin was the uncomfortable feature in the laird's splendid hopes.
He had lounged heartlessly to and from the works; the steady,
mechanical routine of the new life oppressed him, and he had a
thorough dislike for the new order of men with whom he had to come in
contact. The young Crawfords had followed him about the hills with an
almost canine affection and admiration. To them he was always "the
young laird." These sturdy Ayrshire and Galloway men had an old
covenanting rebelliousness about them. They disputed even with Dominie
Tallisker on church government; they sang Robert Burns' most
democratic songs in Crawford's very presence.
Then Colin contrasted them physically with the great fellows he had
been accustomed to see striding over the hills, and he despised the
forms stunted by working in low seams and unhealthy vapors and the
faces white for lack of sunshine and grimy with the all-pervading coal
dust. The giants who toiled in leather masks and leather suits before
the furnaces suited his taste better. When he watched them moving
about amid the din and flames and white-hot metal, he thought of
Vulcan and Mount Ætna, and thus threw over them the enchantments of
the old Roman age. But in their real life the men disappointed him.
They were vulgar and quarrelsome; the poorest Highland gillie had a
vein of poetry in his nature, but these iron-workers were painfully
matter of fact; they could not even understand a courtesy unless it
took the shape of a glass of whiskey.
It was evident to the laird that the new life was very distasteful to
his heir; it was evident to the dominie that it was developing the
worst sides of Colin's character. Something of this he pointed out to
Helen one morning. Helen and he had lately become great friends,
indeed, they were co-workers together in all the new labors which the
dominie's conscience had set him. The laird had been too busy and
anxious about other matters to interfere as yet with this alliance,
but he promised himself he would do so very soon. Helen Crawford was
not going to nurse sick babies and sew for all the old women in the
clachan much longer. And the night-school! This was particularly
offensive to him. Some of the new men had gone there, and Crawford was
sure he was in some way defrauded by it. He thought it impossible to
work in the day and study an hour at night. In some way he suffered by
it.
"If they werna in the schoolroom they would be in the Change House,"
Tallisker had argued.
But the laird thought in his heart that the whiskey would be more to
his advantage than the books. Yet he did not like to say so; there was
something in the dominie's face which restrained him. He had opened
the subject in that blustering way which always hides the white
feather somewhere beneath it, and Tallisker had answered with a solemn
severity,
"Crawford, it seems to be your wark to mak money; it is mine to save
souls. Our roads are sae far apart we arena likely to run against each
other, if we dinna try to."
"But I don't like the way you are doing your wark; that is all,
dominie."
"Mammon never did like God's ways. There is a vera old disagreement
between them. A man has a right to consider his ain welfare, Crawford,
but it shouldna be mair than the twa tables o' the law to him."
Now Tallisker was one of those ministers who bear their great
commission in their faces. There was something almost imperial about
the man when he took his stand by the humblest altar of his duty.
Crawford had intended at this very time to speak positively on the
subject of his own workers to Tallisker. But when he looked at the
dark face, set and solemn and full of an irresistible authority, he
was compelled to keep silence. A dim fear that Tallisker would say
something to him which would make him uncomfortable crept into his
heart. It was better that both the dominie and conscience should be
quiet at present.
Still he could not refrain from saying,
"You hae set yoursel' a task you'll ne'er win over, dominie. You could
as easy mak Ben-Cruchan cross the valley and sit down by Ben-Appin as
mak Gael and Lowlander call each other brothers."
"We are told, Crawford, that mountains may be moved by faith; why not,
then, by love? I am a servant o' God. I dinna think it any presumption
to expect impossibilities."
Still it must be acknowledged that Tallisker looked on the situation
as a difficult one. The new workers to a man disapproved of the
Established Church of Scotland. Perhaps of all classes of laborers
Scotch colliers are the most theoretically democratic and the most
practically indifferent in matters of religion. Every one of them had
relief and secession arguments ready for use, and they used them
chiefly as an excuse for not attending Tallisker's ministry. When
conscience is used as an excuse, or as a weapon for wounding, it is
amazing how tender it becomes. It pleased these Lowland workers to
assert a religious freedom beyond that of the dominie and the shepherd
Gael around them. And if men wish to quarrel, and can give their
quarrel a religious basis, they secure a tolerance and a respect which
their own characters would not give them. Tallisker might pooh-pooh
sectional or political differences, but he was himself far too
scrupulous to regard with indifference the smallest theological
hesitation.
One day as he was walking up the clachan pondering these things, he
noticed before him a Highland shepherd driving a flock to the hills.
There was a party of colliers sitting around the Change House; they
were the night-gang, and having had their sleep and their breakfast,
were now smoking and drinking away the few hours left of their rest.
Anything offering the chance of amusement was acceptable, and Jim
Armstrong, a saucy, bullying fellow from the Lonsdale mines, who had
great confidence in his Cumberland wrestling tricks, thought he saw in
the placid indifference of the shepherd a good opportunity for
bravado.
"Sawnie, ye needna pass the Change House because we are here. We'll no
hurt you, man."
The shepherd was as one who heard not.
Then followed an epithet that no Highlander can hear unmoved, and the
man paused and put his hand under his plaid. Tallisker saw the
movement and quickened his steps. The word was repeated, with the
scornful laugh of the group to enforce it. The shepherd called his
dog--
"Keeper, you tak the sheep to the Cruchan corrie, and dinna let are o'
them stray."
The dumb creature looked in his face assentingly, and with a sharp
bark took the flock charge. Then the shepherd walked up to the group,
and Jim Armstrong rose to meet him.
"Nae dirks," said an old man quietly; "tak your hands like men."
Before the speech was over they were clinched in a grasp which meant
gigantic strength on one side, and a good deal of practical bruising
science on the other. But before there was an opportunity of testing
the quality of either the dominie was between the men. He threw them
apart like children, and held each of them at arm's length, almost as
a father might separate two fighting schoolboys. The group watching
could not refrain a shout of enthusiasm, and old Tony Musgrave jumped
to his feet and threw his pipe and his cap in the air.
"Dugald," said the dominie to the shepherd, "go your ways to your
sheep. I'll hae nae fighting in my parish.
"Jim Armstrong, you thrawart bully you, dinna think you are the only
man that kens Cumberland cantrips. I could fling you mysel' before you
could tell your own name;" and as if to prove his words, he raised an
immense stone, that few men could have lifted, and with apparent ease
flung it over his right shoulder. A shout of astonishment greeted the
exploit, and Tony Musgrave--whose keen, satirical ill-will had
hitherto been Tallisker's greatest annoyance--came frankly forward and
said, "Dominie, you are a guid fellow! Will you tak some beer wi' me?"
Tallisker did not hesitate a moment.
"Thank you, Tony. If it be a drink o' good-will, I'll tak it gladly."
But he was not inclined to prolong the scene; the interference had
been forced upon him. It had been the only way to stop a quarrel which
there would have been no healing if blood had once been shed. Yet he
was keenly alive to the dignity of his office, and resumed it in the
next moment. Indeed, the drinking of the glass of good-will together
was rather a ceremonial than a convivial affair. Perhaps that also was
the best. The men were silent and respectful, and for the first time
lifted their caps with a hearty courtesy to Tallisker when he left
them.
"Weel! Wonders never cease!" said Jim Armstrong scornfully. "To see
Tony Musgrave hobnobbing wi' a black-coat! The deil must 'a' had a
spasm o' laughing."
"Let the deil laugh," said Tony, with a snap of his grimy fingers.
Then, after a moment's pause, he added, "Lads, I heard this morning
that the dominie's wheat was spoiling, because he couldna get help to
cut it. I laughed when I heard it; I didna ken the man then. I'm
going to-morrow to cut the dominie's wheat; which o' you will go wi'
me?"
"I!" and "I!" and "I!" was the hearty response; and so next day
Traquare saw a strange sight--a dozen colliers in a field of wheat,
making a real holiday of cutting the grain and binding the sheaves, so
that before the next Sabbath it had all been brought safely home.