"... When Rosamund was six months old we left Kirkcaple. It was a
great uprooting. You don't live thirteen years in a place in close
touch with the people without becoming deeply attached both to the
place and people--and in the last year of our stay at Kirkcaple we had
a wonderful experience. There was a great awakening of interest in
spiritual things--a revival--and we saw many enter into life...."
Mrs. Douglas stopped abruptly and regarded her daughter.
"Ann," she said, "why do you begin to look abashed and miserable if I
mention the word revival? Does conversion seem to you an improper
subject?"
Ann screwed her face uncomfortably. "Oh, I don't know, but I confess I
do dislike to hear people talking glibly about that sort of thing. It
somehow seems rather indecent. You didn't realise, you and Father, how
miserable it was for us children going to so many evangelistic
meetings. We liked shouting Sankey's hymns, and the addresses were all
right, but oh! those 'after-meetings,' when we sat sick with fright,
watching earnest young men working their way down the church to speak
personally to us. How could we say we were on the road to heaven? And
we were too honest--at least the boys were too honest--simply to say
Yes, when asked if we were saved. I shall never think it right or
proper that any casual person should leap on one and ask questions
about one's soul. I should object to anyone, other than a doctor or
intimate friend, asking me questions about my bodily health, and why
should I be less select about my immortal soul? And it seemed to us so
dreadful that they should count the converts. I remember with what
abhorrence we once heard Mrs. Macfarlane tell how she and her husband
had both talked to a young man about his soul. 'And when we had shown
him the light'--you remember the sort of simper she gave--'and he had
gone on his way rejoicing, I said to Mr. Macfarlane, "George dear, is
it your soul or mine?"' In other words, 'My bird, sir.' I suppose she
was out for stars in her crown, but I would rather have none than cadge
for them like that."
"Oh, Ann," cried her mother, "you don't know what you are saying. It
hurts me to hear you talk in that flippant way about----"
"Mother, you needn't make a mournful face at me." Ann's face was
flushed, and she looked very much in earnest. "You've simply no idea
how difficult it is for a minister's family to be anything but mere
formalists. You see, we hear so much about it all. From our infancy
we are familiar with all the shibboleths, until they almost cease to
have any meaning. I used to think as a child that it was most unfairly
easy for the heathen. I pictured myself hearing for the very first
time the story of Jesus Christ, and I thought with what gratitude and
love I would have fallen on my knees to thank Him.... As it was, we
knew the message so well that our attention was chiefly directed to the
messengers, and you must admit, Mother, we had some very queer ones.
You can't have forgotten the big, red-haired evangelist, as rough as
the heather, who told us a story of a pump being 'off the fang,' and
finished remarkably with 'Ah, my friends, God's pump's never off the
fang.' I think it was the same man who said we were just like faggots,
'fit for the burning.' Oh, but do you remember the man in Glasgow who
illustrated the shortness of life with a story about 'Gran'papaw' who
..."
"_Ann!_"
Mrs. Douglas had finished her daily reading and sat with the pile of
devotional books on her knee, eyeing her daughter with a mixture of
disapproval and unwilling amusement. "Ann, you turn everything into
ridicule."
Ann protested. "There's no ridicule about it. It is a very good
serious tale. 'Gran'papaw he gae two...'"
Again her mother interrupted her.
"I'm sure your father would be sorry to hear you laughing at
evangelists. He revelled in evangelistic work."
Ann gave a squeal of rage. "_Mother_! D'you know what sort of picture
of Father you would give to anyone who didn't know him? Someone with a
smug face and a soapy manner, and a way of shaking hands as if he had a
poached egg in the palm. Could there be anything less like my father?
There was nothing unctuous about him, nothing of the professional
religionist. He was like a Raeburn portrait to look at...
'A face filled with a fine old-fashioned grace,
Fresh-coloured, frank----'
and he never thought that because he was virtuous there should be no
more cakes and ale. He was a minister simply because the great fact of
his life was Christ, and he desired above everything to bring men to
Him. I never read of Mr. Standfast but I think of Father, for he, too,
loved to hear his Lord spoken of, and coveted to set his feet in his
Master's footprints...."
Ann stopped and looked in a shamefaced way at her mother.
"And now I'm preaching! It's in my blood--well, you were beginning to
tell me about the revival in Kirkcaple when I started to blaspheme.
Please go on."
"Well, you may laugh at evangelists..."
"_Who's_ laughing?" cried Ann.
Her mother went on calmly. "But I assure you that was a wonderful time
in Kirkcaple. Night after night the church was crowded, and girls and
young men went as blithely to those meetings as ever they went to a
dance. You may talk as you like of 'emotionalism' and 'the excitement
of the moment,' but remember, this all happened nearly thirty years
ago, and the young people who decided for Christ then are the chief
support of the Church to-day. I am very certain they have never
regretted staying to the after-meeting and throwing in their lot with
Christ. How easy the church work was that winter! The Wednesday
prayer-meeting overflowing from the hall into the church, money
forthcoming for everything--you may know conversion is real when it
touches the pocket. We had a series of special meetings more or less
all through that winter, and, of course, all the speakers stayed with
us. Marget never grumbled at the extra work. One night, at a meeting
where testimonies were asked for, to my utter amazement she got up and
stammered out a few words. Long afterwards, in Glasgow, when she lost
her temper about something, she said, 'Eh, I say, I'll need to be
speakin' in the kirk again.' She had evidently found it beneficial.
We had all sorts of ministers and evangelists staying with us, some
delightful, others rather difficult. One week-end the great Dr.
Bentley came to preach, a very godly but a very austere man. Your
father was preaching somewhere, and I had to bear the brunt of him
alone. Immediately he had had tea he suggested that we should have a
little Bible-reading and prayer. It was a dreadful ordeal for me, for
he kept asking me what passage I should like read, and my mind went
blank and I couldn't think of any! Finally I managed to slip out of
the room, leaving him to rest, and not noticing that Robbie was playing
quietly behind the sofa. Shortly after that we heard an uproar in the
study, Dr. Bentley's voice in trumpet notes and yells of rage from
Robbie. With Ellie Robbie at my heels, I rushed to the rescue.... Dr.
Bentley met me with the words: 'I have had dealings with your son.' It
turned out that, seeing the old man sitting alone, Robbie had gone to
the bookcase, pulled out as large a volume as he could manage, and
carried it to him. Dr. Bentley told him to put the book back on the
shelf and bring no more. Robbie brought another and another, and Dr.
Bentley whipped him. Full of fury at the results of his well-meant
efforts to entertain him, Robbie kicked Dr. Bentley--kicked the great
Dr. Bentley--and was carried out of the room in Ellie Robbie's arms
quite unrepentant, shouting as he went, 'Abominable gentleman!'"
Ann laughed with much enjoyment. "It isn't one of the duties of a
guest to beat his host's children, but he met his match in Robbie. You
must have had a dreadful week-end, poor Mother!"
"Oh, dreadful! Everything went wrong. Dr. Bentley told me that he
didn't like a fire in his bedroom, but that he liked a fire in his bed.
This, he explained very solemnly, meant two hot-water cans and six
pairs of blankets. Marget put in one hot-water can (a 'pig' one) and
had gone to fill an india-rubber one, when Ellie Robbie, wishful to
help, and unaware of one 'pig' in the bed, slapped in another. They
met, and each halved neatly in two. The bed was a sea, and we were
looking despairingly at it when Dr. Bentley appeared in the doorway and
announced that he would like to retire for the night! ... Some time
afterwards Dr. Bentley was again in the neighbourhood and called, but
found no one at home. Marget, telling us about his visit, said, 'It
was thon auld man, I dinna mind his name; the yin the mistress is
fear't for.'"
"With reason, I think," said Ann. "What an orgy of meetings you must
have had that winter!"
"Yes, but I can't remember that there were any bad effects, or that we
sank into indifference when the stimulus of the meetings was removed.
Rather we went on resolved to do better than we had ever done, for the
Lord had done great things for us.... Then came the call to Glasgow,
and it was very difficult to decide what was for the best. We didn't
love cities, and we had no friends in the West; on the other hand, we
had to think about the education of you children. Your father was
going on for forty, and he felt, if he ever meant to take a call, now
was the time. You children were delighted. Any change seems a change
for the better to a child; you never gave a thought to the big, sunny
garden you were leaving, or the Den, or the familiar friendly house, or
the kind people. The day your father and I went to Glasgow to look for
a house you all stood on the doorstep and shouted after us, 'Be sure
and get one near a coal-pit.'"
"Yes," Ann said; "the thought of a flitting enchanted us, and we began
at once to pack. Where was it Robbie had inflammation of the lungs?
Before we went to Glasgow, wasn't it?"
"The year before--in spring. He had got hot playing football and stood
in the east wind. He was very ill, poor darling, and for long he
needed great care. I got to know my wild boy in a different way in
those days and nights of weakness."
Ann left her writing-table and sat on the fender-stool. She pushed the
logs together and made them blaze, and, reaching over to the big basket
that stood by the fireplace, she threw on log after log until the whole
room was filled with the dancing light.
"Now, that's something like a fire," she said. "A dull fire makes one
feel so despairing.... Robbie was so very proud of having had an
illness; he always called it 'my inflammation,' and when he broke his
arm his conceit knew no bounds. I'm afraid I broke it for him by
falling off the seesaw on to the top of him. We didn't know what had
happened, but we saw that his arm looked very queer, and Mark and I
brought him home and helped him to take off his boots, and were quite
unusually attentive to him. He didn't say a word about it hurting
until he heard that it was broken, when he began to yell at once, and
said, 'Will I die?--will I die?' Reassured on that point, he was very
pleased about his broken arm."
"Two days later," said Robbie's mother, "he escaped from the nursery
and was found on the rafters of an unfinished house (how he managed to
climb with his arm in splints, I know not) singing 'I'm the King of the
Castle.'"
Ann laughed softly. "He never let us forget his achievements, dear
lamb. If we quarrelled about the possession of anything, Robbie was
sure to say, 'Give it to me, for I've had the inflammation.' Mark made
a poem about him, which ran:
'And if in any battle I come to any harm,
Why, I've had the inflammation, I've had a broken arm.'
It must have been no light task to remove us all from Kirkcaple to
Glasgow."
Mrs. Douglas shook her head. "A terrible undertaking. But we were
young and strong. Mrs. Peat came up one day and found me crying as I
packed. 'Eh, my dear,' she said, 'you're vexed to go, and I'm glad to
see you're vexed to leave us all, but you're taking all your own with
you. You don't know what it means to leave a grave....' Everybody
made farewell parties for us, and we departed in a shower of presents
and good wishes. That was nearly thirty years ago, and only the other
day I met one of our Kirkcaple people in Edinburgh, and she said to me,
with tears in her eyes, 'Hardly a day passes in our house without a
mention of your name, and never a Sabbath comes but we say, "If only we
could hear Mr. Douglas' voice again!" Who says the ministry is not a
repaying job?' Well, we got to Glasgow--I think you children all went
to Etterick, didn't you?"
"Only the boys," said Ann. "I went straight to Glasgow with you and
Baby Rosamund. It was a great experience for me. I boasted about it
for long. I was allowed to attend the Induction Soirée, and heard you
and Father praised by everyone. It was my first experience of Glasgow
humour, and very funny I thought it. I remember one old elder who
spoke told us of what a fine speech he had made the night before in his
bed. 'My,' he said, beaming round on the company, 'what grand speeches
ye can make in yer bed!' but it turned out he had forgotten it on the
platform. I thought the Glasgow accent fascinating, and I liked to be
told that I was a 'good wee Miss.' I began to like Glasgow people that
night, and I've gone on liking them better and better ever since."