"What for do you call papa Doctor? He don't carry saddle-bags."
To the quiet, staid man himself it was a wholly indifferent matter. In
the solitude of his study, however, it recalled a neglected duty, and in
so far seemed a blessing. By such paltry threads are the colors woven
into our life! It recalled his friend Maverick and his jaunty
prediction; and upon that came to him a recollection of the promise
which he had made to Rachel, that he would write to Maverick.
So the minister wrote, telling his old friend what grief had stricken
his house,--how his boy and he were left alone,--how the church, by
favor of Providence, had grown under his preaching,--how his sister had
come to be mistress of the parsonage,--how he had wrought the Master's
work in fear and trembling; and after this came godly counsel for the
exile.
He hoped that light had shone upon him, even in the "dark places" of
infidel France,--that he was not alienated from the faith of his
fathers,--that he did not make a mockery, as did those around him, of
the holy institution of the Sabbath.
"My friend," he wrote, "God's word is true; God's laws are just; He will
come some day in a chariot of fire. Neither moneys nor high places nor
worldly honors nor pleasures can stay or avert the stroke of that sword
of divine justice which will 'pierce even to the dividing asunder of the
joints and marrow.' Let no siren voices beguile you. Without the gift of
His grace who died that we might live, there is no hope for kings, none
for you, none for me. I pray you consider this, my friend; for I speak
as one commissioned of God."
Whether these words of the minister were met, after their transmission
over seas, with a smile of derision,--with an empty gratitude, that
said, "Good fellow!" and forgot their burden,--with a stitch of the
heart, that made solemn pause and thoughtfulness, and short, in struggle
against the habit of a life, we will not say; our story may not tell,
perhaps. But to the mind of the parson it was clear that at some great
coming day it _would_ be known of all men where the seed that he had
sown had fallen,--whether on good ground or in stony places.
The cross-ocean mails were slow in those days; and it was not until
nearly four months after the transmission of the Doctor's letter--he
having almost forgotten it--that Reuben came one day bounding in from
the snow in mid-winter, his cheeks aflame with the keen, frosty air, his
eyes dancing with boyish excitement:--
"A letter, papa! a letter!--and Mr. Troop" (it is the new postmaster
under the Adams dynasty) "says it came all the way from Europe. It's got
a funny post-mark."
The minister lays down his book,--takes the letter,--opens
it,--reads,--paces up and down the study thoughtfully,--reads again, to
the end.
"Reuben, call your Aunt Eliza."
There is matter in the letter that concerns her,--that in its issues
will concern the boy,--that may possibly give a new color to the life of
the parsonage, and a new direction to our story.