“There’s aye plenty fools in this world,” said bowed Jaaoob; “a’thing
else that’s human fails; but that commodity’s aye ready. I had my hopes
of that laddie Livingstone. He has nae discrimination, and hasna seen
the world, like some other folk, but for a’ that I thought I could
perceive a ring of the right metal in him, and I’m no’ often wrang. And
so Cosmo’s to be marriet! I dinna disapprove of his taste--that’s a
different matter. I even had a great notion of _her_ mysel’; but when
the lad’s married there’s an end of him. Wha ever heard tell of a man
coming to distinction with a wife at his tail?--na! I wash my hands of
Cosmo--he shall never mair be officer of mine.”
Jaacob did not address himself to any one in particular. The news with
which Kirkbride was ringing was great news in its way, and a little
crowd had collected in the corner, close by the smithy, to discuss it, a
crowd composed chiefly of women, chief among whom, in a flush of triumph
and importance, stood Marget of Norlaw. Jaacob did not often concern his
lofty intelligence with the babble of women, but the little giant was
interested in spite of himself, and had a warm corner in his heart for
both the heroes who were under present discussion. A lusty blacksmith
apprentice puffed at the great bellows within that ruddy cavern, and
Jaacob stood at the door, with one or two male gossips lingering near
him, which was a salve to his dignity; but Jaacob’s words were not
addressed even to his own cronies; they were a spontaneous effusion of
observant wisdom, mingled with benevolent regret.
“The man’s in a creel!” cried the indignant Marget--“an officer of
yours, Jaacob Bell?--_yours_, ye objeck! and I would just like to ken
wha gave the like of you ony right to ca’ _our_ son by his christened
name? Na, sirs, ye’re a’ wrang--it just shows how little folk ken about
onything out of their ain road; and canna haud their peace either, or
let them speak that have the knowledge. The auld lady--her that was Mary
of Melmar--would have given our Huntley baith the land and the bonnie
lass, if it had been _her_ will, for she’s a real sensible woman, as
it’s turned out, and kens the value of lads like ours. But Huntley
Livingstone, he said no. He’s no’ the lad, our Huntley, to be ony wife’s
man--and he has his awn yestate, and an aulder name and fame than
Melmar. There’s no’ an auld relick in the whole country-side like our
auld castle. I’ve heard it from them that ken; and our Huntley would no
mair part with the name than wi’ his right hand. Eh! if auld Norlaw,
puir man, had but lived to see this day! Our Cosmo is very like his
father. He’s just as like to be kent far and near for his poems and his
stories as Walter Scott ower yonder at Abbotsford. It’s just like a
story in a book itsel’. When he was but a laddie--no’ muckle bigger than
bowed Jaacob--he fell in with a bonnie bit wee French lady, in
Edinburgh. I mind him telling me--there’s never ony pride about our
sons--just as well as if it was yesterday. The callant’s head ran upon
naething else--and wha was this but just Miss Deseera! and he’s courted
her this mony a year, whaever might oppose; and now he’s won and
conquered, and there’s twa weddings to be in Kirkbride, baith in the
very same day!”
“In Kirkbride? but, dear woman, Miss Logan’s no’ here,” suggested one of
the bystanders.
“Wha’s heeding!” cried Marget, in her triumph, “if ane’s in Kirkbride,
and ane in anither kirk, is that onything against the truth I am
telling? Sirs, haud a’ your tongues--I’ve carried them a’ in my arms,
and told them stories. I’ve stood by them and their mother, just me and
no other person, when they were in their sorest trouble; and I would
like to hear wha daur say a word, if Norlaw Marget is just wild and out
of her wits for aince in her life to see their joy!”
“I never look for discretion at a woman’s hand mysel’,” said bowed
Jaacob, though even Jaacob paused a little before he brought the shadow
of his cynicism over Marget’s enthusiasm; “they’re easy pleased, puir
things, and easy cast down--a man of sense has aye a compassion for the
sex--it’s waste o’ time arguing with them. Maybe that’s a reason for
lamenting this lad Livingstone. A man, if he’s no’ a’ the stronger, is
awfu’ apt to fall to the level of his company--and to think of a
promising lad, no’ five-and-twenty, lost amang a haill tribe--wife,
mother, mother-in-law, sister-in-law, and gude kens how mony friends
forbye--it’s grievous--that’s just what it is; a man goes down, a man
comes to the calibre of the woman. For which cause,” said bowed Jaacob,
thrusting his cowl on one side of his head, twisting still higher his
high shoulder, and fixing a defiant gaze upon the admiring crowd with
his one eye; “in spite of mony temptations--for I’ll say that for the
women, that they ken a man of sense when they see him--I’m no’, and
never will be, a marrying man mysel’!”
“Eh, but Jaacob,” cried a saucy voice, “if you could have gotten her,
you might have put up with Miss Roche.”
“Humph--I had a great notion of the lassie,” said Jaacob, loftily; “men
at my years get above the delusion of looking for a woman as a
companion. It makes nae muckle matter whether she’s ca’ed a foolish
woman or a sensible ane; its naething but a question of degree; and when
a man finds that out, he has a right to please his e’e. When you hear of
me married, it’s a wife of sixteen, that’s what I’ll have gotten; but
you see, as for Miss Deeseera, puir thing, she may be breaking her
heart, for onything I ken. I’m a man of honor, and Cosmo’s a great
friend of mine--I wouldna, for twenty Melmars, come between my friend
and his love.”
And amid the laughter which echoed this magnanimous speech, bowed Jaacob
retired into the ruddy gloom of the smithy and resumed his hammer, which
he played with such manful might and intention upon the glowing iron,
that the red light illuminated his whole swarthy face and person, and
the red sparks flashed round him like the rays round a saint in an old
picture. He was not in the least a saintly individual, but Rembrandt
himself could not have found a better study for light and shade.
A little time sufficed to accomplish these momentous changes. The
Mistress gave up her trust of Norlaw, the cows and dairies which were
the pride of her heart, the bank-book, with its respectable balance, and
all the rural wealth of the farmsteading, to her son. And Huntley warned
the tenants to whom his mother had let the land that he should resume
the farming of it himself at the end of the year, when their terms were
out. Every thing about Norlaw began to wear signs of preparation. The
Mistress spoke vaguely of going with Patie, the only one of her sons who
still “belonged to his mother"--and making a home for him in Glasgow.
But Patie was an engineer, involved over head and ears in the Herculean
work of the new railways; he was scarcely three months in the year, take
them altogether, at the lodging which he called his head quarters--and
perhaps, on the whole, he rather discouraged the idea.
“At least, mother, you must wait to welcome Katie,” said this astute and
long-headed adviser of the family--and the Mistress, with her strong
sense of country breeding and decorum, would not have done less, had it
broken her heart. But she rather longed for the interval to be over, and
the matter concluded. The Mistress, somehow, could not understand or
recognize herself adrift from Norlaw.
“But I dinna doubt it would be best--it’s natural,” said the
Mistress--“they should have their good beginning to themselves,” and
with that she sighed, and grew red with shame to think it was a sigh,
and spoke sharply to Marget, and put the old easy chair which had been
“their father’s!” away into a corner, with a little momentary ebullition
of half resentful tears. But she never lost her temper to Huntley--it
was only Nature, and not her son who was to blame.
It was early in August when Katie came home. The Mistress stood at the
door waiting to receive her, on a night which was worthy such a
homecoming. Just sunset, the field-laborers going home, the purple flush
folded over the Eildons like a regal mantle, the last tender ray
catching the roofless wall of the Strength of Norlaw, and the soft hill
rising behind, with yellow corn waving rich to its summit, soon to be
ripe for the harvest. Tears were in the Mistress’s heart, but smiles in
her face; she led her new daughter in before even Huntley, brought her
to the dining-parlor, and set her in her own chair.
“This is where I sat first myself the day I came home,” said the
Mistress, with a sob, “and sit you there; and God bless my bairns, and
build up Norlaw--amen!”
But Katie said the amen too, and rose again, holding the Mistress fast
and looking up in her face.
“I have not said mother for ten years,” said Katie. “Mother! do you
think dispeace can ever rise between you and me, that you should think
once of going away?”
The Mistress paused.
“No dispeace, Katie--no, God forbid!” said Huntley’s mother, “but I’m a
hasty woman in my speech, and ever was.”
“But not to me,” said the Katie who was no more Katie Logan--“never to
me! and Huntley will be a lonely man if his mother goes from Norlaw, for
where thou goest I will go, and where thou dwellest I will dwell.
Mother, tell me! is it Patie or poor Huntley who is to have you and
me?”
The Mistress did not say a word. She suffered herself to be placed in
the chair where she had placed Katie, and then put her apron over her
face and wept, thinking strangely, all at once, not of a new
daughter-in-law and a changed place, but of him who lay sleeping among
the solemn ruins at Dryburgh, and all the sacred chain of years that
made dear this house of Norlaw.
The other marriage took place after that, with much greater glory and
distinction, to the pride of the Mistress’s heart. It was a great
festival when it came--which was not till the season of mourning was
over--to all of whom Madame Roche could reach. Even Joanna Huntley and
Aunt Jean were persuaded to come to gladden the wedding of Desirée and
Cosmo; and it is even said that Joanna, who is of a very scientific turn
of mind, and has a little private laboratory of her own, where she burns
her pupils’ fingers, was the finder of that strange little heap of dust
and cinders which revealed to Huntley the mineral wealth in the corner
of the Norlaw lands, which now has made him rich enough to buy three
Norlaws. At any rate, Joanna was put into perfect good humor by her
visit, and thenceforward, with the chivalry of a knight-errant,
worshiped above all loveliness the beautiful old face of Madame Roche.
This is about all there is to tell of the Livingstone family. They had
their troubles, and are having them, like all of us; but, like all of
us, have great joy-cordials now and then to make them strong; and always
Providence to work a clear web out of the tangled exertions which we
make without witting, and which God sorts into His appointed lot.
THE END.
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