THE KEEPER'S HOME
While the preparations for supper were going on within doors, Jock went
out to have a "dauner", or saunter, but, in truth, from a modest wish to
appear as if not expecting to be asked to partake of supper with the
family.
The table was spread with a white home-made linen cloth, and deep plates
were put down, each with a horn spoon beside it. A large pot,
containing potatoes which had been pared before they were placed on the
fire, was now put on the floor, and fresh butter with some salt having
been added to its contents, the whole was beat and mashed with a heavy
wooden beetle worked by Hugh and his son--for the work required no small
patience and labour--into a soft mass, forming an excellent dish of
"champed potatoes", which, when served up with rich milk, is "a dainty
dish to set before a king", even without the four-and-twenty blackbirds.
Then followed a second course of "barley scones" and thick crisp oatmeal
cakes, with fresh butter, cheese, and milk.
Before supper was served Jock Hall was missed, and Johnnie sent in
search of him. After repeated shouts he found him wandering about the
woods, but had the greatest difficulty in persuading him to join the
family. Jock said, "It wasna for him tae gang ben",--"he had had eneuch
tae eat in the afternoon",--"he wad hae a bite efter hin", &c. But
being at last persuaded to accept the pressing invitation, he entered,
and without speaking a word seated himself in the place allotted to him.
"Tak' in yer chair, Maister Hall,"--Jock could hardly believe his
ears!--"and mak' what supper ye can," said Mrs. Hugh. "We're plain
kintra folk hereawa',"--an apology to Jock for their having nothing
extra at supper to mark their respect for a friend of the Sergeant's!
What were his thoughts? The character of an impostor seemed forced upon
him when he most desired to be an honest man.
Then the old man reverently took off his "Kilmarnock cool", a coloured
worsted night-cap, and said grace, thanking God for all His mercies, "of
the least of which," he added, "we are unworthy". After supper Mrs.
Hugh gave a long account of the labours of the day, and of the big
washing, and told how she had met Lady Mary, and Lady Caroline, and Lord
Bennock, and how they had been talking to the children, and "speering
for faither and grandfaither".
A happy family was that assembled under the keeper's roof. The youngest
child, a boy, was ever welcome on old John's knee, who never seemed able
to exhaust the pleasure he derived from his grandson's prattle. His
large watch, which approached in size to a house clock, with its large
pewter seal, was an endless source of amusement to the child; so also
was the splendid rabbit shadowed on the wall, with moving ears and
moving mouth, created by John's hands; and his imitation of dogs, cats,
and all other domestic animals, in which he was an adept;--nay, his very
crutches were turned to account to please the boy, and much more to
please himself. The elder daughters clung round their mother in a
group, frankly talking to her in mutual confidence and love. The boys
enjoyed the same liberty with their father, and indulged unchecked in
expressions of affection. All was freedom without rudeness, play without
riot, because genuine heartfelt affection united all.
Jock did not join in the conversation, except when he was asked
questions by Mrs. Hugh about Drumsylie, its shops and its people. On
the whole he was shy and reserved. Anyone who could have watched his
eye and seen his heart would have discovered both busy in contemplating
a picture of ordinary family life such as the poor outcast had never
before beheld. But Jock still felt as if he was not in his right
place--as if he would have been cast out into the darkness had his real
character been known. His impressions of a kind of life he never dreamt
of were still more deepened when, before going to bed, the large Bible
was placed on the table, and Hugh, amidst the silence of the family,
said, "We'll hae worship." The chapter for the evening happened to be
the fifteenth of St. Luke. It was as if written expressly for Jock.
Are such adaptations to human wants to be traced to mere chance? Surely
He who can feed the wild beasts of the desert, or the sparrow amidst the
waste of wintry snows, can give food to the hungry soul of a Prodigal
Son, as yet ignorant of the food he needs and of the Father who alone
can supply it.
They did not ask Jock if he would remain for evening worship. "The
stranger within the gate" was assumed to be, for the time, a member of
the household. It was for him to renounce his recognised right, not for
the family to question it. But Jock never even argued the point with
himself. He listened with head bent down as if ashamed to hold it up,
and following the example set to him by the family, knelt down--for the
first time in his life--in prayer. Did he pray? Was it all a mere
form? Was it by constraint, and not willingly? What his thoughts were
on such an occasion, or whether they were gathered up in prayer to the
living God, who can tell? But if the one thought even, for the first
time, possessed him, that maybe there was a Person beyond the seen and
temporal, to whom the world and man belonged, whose Name he could now
associate with no evil but with all good, who possibly knew him and
wished him to be good like Himself;--if there was even a glimmer in his
soul, as he knelt down, that he might say as well as others, and along
with them, "Our Father, which art in Heaven", then was there cast into
his heart, though he knew it not, the germ of a new life which might yet
grow into a faith and love which would be life eternal.
The prayer of Hugh the keeper was simple, earnest, and direct, a real
utterance from one person to another--yet as from a man to God, couched
in his own homely dialect to Him whom the people of every language and
tongue can worship. The prayer was naturally suggested by the chapter
which was read. He acknowledged that all were as lost sheep; as money
lost in the dust of earth; as miserable prodigals lost to their Father
and to themselves, and who were poor and needy, feeding on husks, having
no satisfaction, and finding no man to give unto them. He prayed God to
bring them all into the fold of the Good Shepherd, who had given His
life for the sheep, and to keep them in it; to gather them as the lost
coins into the treasury of Him who was rich, yet who for our sakes
became poor; he prayed God to help them all to say, "I will arise and go
to my Father", in the assured hope that their Father would meet them
afar off, and receive them with joy. After remembering the afflicted in
body and mind, the orphan and widow, the outcast and stranger, he asked
that God, who had mercy on themselves who deserved nothing, would make
them also merciful to others; and he concluded with the Lord's Prayer.
Had any one seen poor Hall that night as he lay in the hay-loft, a clean
blanket under him and more than one over him, they might have discovered
in his open eyes, and heard in his half-muttered expressions, and
noticed even from his wakeful tossings to and fro, a something stirring
in his soul the nature or value of which he himself could not comprehend
or fully estimate.