Chapter 15
The lesson from all this is, Attend to your bodies, study their structure, functions, and laws. This does not at all mean that you need be an anatomist, or go deep into physiology, or the doctrines of prevention and cure. Not only has each organism a resident doctor, placed there by Him who can thus heal all our diseases; but this doctor, if watched and waited on, informs any man or woman of ordinary sense what things to do, and what things not to do. And I would have you, who, I fear, not unfrequently sin in the same way, and all our ardent, self-sacrificing young ministers, to reflect whether, after destroying themselves and dying young, they have lost or gained. It is said that God raises up others in our place. God gives you no title to say this. Men--such men as I have in my mind--are valuable to God in proportion to the time they are here. They are the older, the better, the riper and richer, and more enriching. Nothing will make up for this absolute loss of life. For there is something which every man who is a good workman is gaining every year just because he is older, and this nothing can replace. Let a man remain on his ground, say a country parish, during half a century or more--let him be every year getting fuller and sweeter in the knowledge of God and man, in utterance and in power--can the power of that man for good over all his time, and especially towards its close, be equalled by that of three or four young, and, it may be, admirable men, who have been succeeding each other's untimely death, during the same space of time? It is against all spiritual, as well as all simple arithmetic, to say so.
You have spoken of my father's prayers. They were of two kinds; the one, formal, careful, systematic, and almost stereotyped, remarkable for fulness and compression of thought; sometimes too manifestly the result of study, and sometimes not purely prayer, but more of the nature of a devotional and even argumentative address; the other, as in the family, short, simple, and varied. He used to tell of his master, Dr. Lawson, reproving him, in his honest but fatherly way, as they were walking home from the Hall. My father had in his prayer the words, "that through death he might destroy him that had the power of death,--that is, the devil." The old man, leaning on his favorite pupil, said, "John, my man, you need not have said '_that is the devil_;' you might have been sure that _He_ knew whom you meant." My father, in theory, held that a mixture of formal, fixed prayer, in fact, a liturgy, along with _extempore_ prayer, was the right thing. As you observe, many of his passages in prayer, all who were in the habit of hearing him could anticipate, such as "the enlightening, enlivening, sanctifying, and comforting influences of the good Spirit," and many others. One in especial you must remember; it was only used on very solemn occasions, and curiously unfolds his mental peculiarities; it closed his prayer--"And now, unto Thee, O Father, Son, and Holy Ghost, the one Jehovah and our God, we would--as is most meet--with the church on earth and the church in heaven, ascribe all honor and glory, dominion and majesty, as it was in the beginning, is now, and ever shall be, world without end. Amen." Nothing could be liker him than the interjection, "as is most meet." Sometimes his abrupt, short statements in the Synod were very striking. On one occasion, Mr. James Morison having stated his views as to prayer very strongly, denying that a sinner _can_ pray, my father, turning to the Moderator, said--"Sir, let a man feel himself to be a sinner, and, for anything the universe of creatures can do for him, hopelessly lost,--let him feel this, sir, and let him get a glimpse of the Saviour, and all the eloquence and argument of Mr. Morison will not keep that man from crying out, 'God be merciful to me a sinner.' That, sir, is prayer--that is acceptable prayer."
There must be, I fear, now and then an apparent discrepancy between you and me, especially as to the degree of mental depression which at times overshadowed my father's nature. _You_ will understand this, and I hope our readers will make allowance for it. Some of it is owing to my constitutional tendency to overstate, and much of it to my having had perhaps more frequent, and even more private, insights into this part of his life. But such inconsistency as that I speak of--the co-existence of a clear, firm faith, a habitual sense of God and of his infinite mercy, the living a life of faith, as if it was in his organic and inner life, more than in his sensational and outward--is quite compatible with that tendency to distrust himself, that bodily darkness and mournfulness, which at times came over him. Any one who knows "what a piece of work is man;" how composite, how varying, how inconsistent human nature is, that each of us are
"Some several men, all in an hour,"
--will not need to be told to expect, or how to harmonize these differences of mood. You see this in that wonderful man, the apostle Paul, the true typical fulness, the _humanness_, so to speak, of whose nature comes out in such expressions of opposites as these--"By honor and dishonor, by evil report and good report: as deceivers, and yet true; as unknown, and yet well known; as dying, and, behold, we live; as chastened, and not killed; as sorrowful, yet alway rejoicing; as poor, yet making many rich; as having nothing, and yet possessing all things."
I cannot, and after your impressive and exact history of his last days, I need not say anything of the close of those long years of suffering, active and passive, and that slow ebbing of life; the body, without help or hope, feeling its doom steadily though slowly drawing on; the mind mourning for its suffering friend, companion, and servant; mourning also, sometimes, that it must be "unclothed," and take its flight all alone into the infinite unknown; dying daily, not in the heat of fever, or in the insensibility or lethargy of paralytic disease, but having the mind calm and clear, and the body conscious of its own decay,--dying, as it were, in cold blood. One thing I must add. That morning when you were obliged to leave, and when "cold obstruction's apathy" had already begun its reign--when he knew us, and that was all, and when he followed us with his dying and loving eyes, but could not speak--the end came; and then, as through life, his will asserted itself supreme in death. With that love of order and decency which was a law of his life, he deliberately composed himself, placing his body at rest, as if setting his house in order before leaving it, and then closed his eyes and mouth, so that his last look--the look his body carried to the grave and faced dissolution in--was that of sweet, dignified self-possession.
I have made this letter much too long, and have said many things in it I never intended saying, and omitted much I had hoped to be able to say. But I must end.
Yours ever affectionately,
J. BROWN.
"_MYSTIFICATIONS._"[32]
[32] Edinburgh: printed privately, 1859.
"_Health to the auld wife, and weel mat she be, That busks her fause rock wi' the lint o' the lee (_lie_), Whirling her spindle and twisting the twine, Wynds aye the richt pirn into the richt line._"
Those who knew the best of Edinburgh society eight-and-thirty years ago--and when was there ever a better than that best?--must remember the personations of an old Scottish gentlewoman by Miss Stirling Graham, one of which, when Lord Jeffrey was victimized, was famous enough to find its way into _Blackwood_, but in an incorrect form.
Miss Graham's friends have for years urged her to print for them her notes of these pleasant records of the harmless and heart-easing mirth of bygone times; to this she has at last assented, and the result is this entertaining, curious, and beautiful little quarto, in which her friends will recognize the strong understanding and goodness, the wit and invention, and fine _pawky_ humor of the much-loved and warmhearted representative of Viscount Dundee--the terrible Clavers.[33] They will recall that blithe and winning face, sagacious and sincere, that kindly, cheery voice, that rich and quiet laugh, that mingled sense and sensibility, which all met, and still, to our happiness, meet in her, who, with all her gifts and keen perception of the odd, and power of embodying it, never gratified her consciousness of these powers, or ever played
"Her quips and cranks and wanton wiles,"
so as to give pain to any human being.
[33] Miss Graham's genealogy in connection with Claverhouse--the same who was killed at Killiecrankie--is as follows:--John Graham of Claverhouse married the Honorable Jean Cochrane, daughter of William Lord Cochrane, eldest son of the first Earl of Dundonald. Their only son, an infant, died December 1689. David Graham, his brother, fought at Killiecrankie, and was outlawed in 1690--died without issue--when the representation of the family devolved on his cousin, David Graham of Duntrune. Alexander Graham of Duntrune died 1782; and on the demise of his last surviving son, Alexander, in 1804, the property was inherited equally by his four surviving sisters, Anne, Amelia, Clementina, and Alison. Amelia, who married Patrick Stirling, Esq., of Pittendreich, was her mother. Clementina married Captain Gavin Drummond of Keltie; their only child was Clementina Countess of Airlie, and mother of the present Earl.
The title of this memorial is _Mystifications_, and in the opening letter to her dear kinswoman and life-long friend, Mrs. Gillies, widow of Lord Gillies, she thus tells her story:--
DUNTRUNE, _April 1859._
MY DEAREST MRS. GILLIES,
_To you and the friends who have partaken in these "Mystifications," I dedicate this little volume, trusting that, after a silence of forty years, its echoes may awaken many agreeable memorials of a society that has nearly passed away._
_I have been asked if I had no remorse in ridiculing singularities of character, or practising deceptions;--certainly not._
_There was no personal ridicule or mimicry of any living creature, but merely the personation or type of a bygone class, that had survived the fashion of its day._
_It was altogether a fanciful existence, developing itself according to circumstances, or for the amusement of a select party, among whom the announcement of a stranger lady, an original, led to no suspicion of deception. No one ever took offence: indeed it generally elicited the finest individual traits of sympathy in the minds of the dupes, especially in the case of Mr. Jeffrey, whose sweet-tempered kindly nature manifested itself throughout the whole of the tiresome interview with the law-loving Lady Pitlyal._
_No one enjoyed her eccentricities more than he did, or more readily devised the arrangement of a similar scene for the amusement of our mutual friends._
_The cleverest people were the easiest mystified, and when once the deception took place, it mattered not how arrant the nonsense or how exaggerated the costume. Indeed, children and dogs were the only detectives._
_I often felt so identified with the character, so charmed with the pleasure manifested by my audience, that it became painful to lay aside the veil, and descend again into the humdrum realities of my own self._
_These personations never lost me a friend; on the contrary, they originated friendships that cease only with life._
_The Lady Pitlyal's course is run; she bequeaths to you these reminiscences of beloved friends and pleasant meetings._
_And that the blessing of God may descend on "each and all of you," is the fervent prayer of her kinswoman and executrix,_
_CLEMENTINA STIRLING GRAHAM._
I now beg to "convey," as Pistol delicately calls it, or as we on our side the Border would say, to "lift," enough of this unique volume to make my readers hunger for the whole.
MRS. RAMSAY SPELDIN.
Another evening Miss Guthrie requested me to introduce my old lady to Captain Alexander Lindsay, a son of the late Laird of Kinblethmont, and brother to the present Mr. Lindsay Carnegie, and Mr. Sandford, the late Sir Daniel Sandford.
She came as a Mrs. Ramsay Speldin, an old sweetheart of the laird's, and was welcomed by Mrs. Guthrie as a friend of the family. The young people hailed her as a perfectly delightful old lady, and an original of the pure Scottish character, and to the laird she was endeared by a thousand pleasing recollections.
He placed her beside himself on the sofa, and they talked of the days gone by--before the green parks of Craigie were redeemed from the muir of Gotterston, and ere there was a tree planted between the auld house of Craigie and the Castle of Claypotts.
She spoke of the "gude auld times, when the laird of Fintry widna gie his youngest dochter to Abercairney, but tell'd him to tak them as God had gien them to him, or want."
"And do you mind," she continued, "the grand ploys we had at the Middleton; and hoo Mrs. Scott of Gilhorn used to grind lilts out o' an auld kist to wauken her visitors i' the mornin'.
"And some o' them didna like it sair, tho' nane o' them had courage to tell her sae, but Anny Graham o' Duntrune.
"'Lord forgie ye,' said Mrs. Scott, 'ye'll no gae to heaven, if ye dinna like music;' but Anny was never at a loss for an answer, and she said, 'Mrs. Scott--heaven's no the place I tak it to be, if there be auld wives in 't playing on hand-organs.'"
Many a story did Mrs. Ramsay tell. The party drew their chairs close to the sofa, and many a joke she related, till the room rung again with the merriment, and the laird, in ecstasy, caught her round the waist, exclaiming "Oh! ye are a canty wifie."
The strangers seemed to think so too; they absolutely hung upon her, and she danced reels, first with the one, and then with the other, till the entrance of a servant with the newspapers produced a seasonable calm.
They lay, however, untouched upon the table till Mrs. Ramsay requested some one to read over the claims that were putting in for the King's coronation, and see if there was any mention of hers.
"What is your claim?" said Mr. Sandford.
"To pyke the King's teeth," was the reply.
"You will think it very singular," said Mr. Guthrie, "that I never heard of it before; will you tell us how it originated?"
"It was in the time of James the First," said she, "that monarch cam to pay a visit to the monks of Arbroath, and they brought him to Ferryden to eat a fish dinner at the house o' ane o' my forefathers. The family name, ye ken, was Spelden, and the dried fish was ca'd after them.
"The king was well satisfied wi' a' thing that was done to honor him. He was a very polished prince, and when he had eaten his dinner he turned round to the lady and sought a preen to pyke his teeth.
"And the lady, she took a fish bane and wipit it, and gae it to the king; and after he had cleaned his teeth wi' it, he said, '_They're weel pykit._'
"And henceforth, continued he, the Speldins of Ferryden shall pyke the king's teeth at the coronation. And it shall be done wi' a fish-bone, and a pearl out o' the Southesk on the end of it. And their crest shall be a lion's head wi' the teeth displayed, and the motto shall be _weel pykit_."
Mr. Sandford read over the claims, but there was no notice given of the Speldins.
"We maun just hae patience," said Mrs. Ramsay, "and nae doubt it will appear in the next newspaper."
Some one inquired who was the present representative?
"It's me," replied Mrs. Ramsay Speldin; "and I mean to perform the office mysel'. The estate wad hae been mine too, had it existed; but Neptune, ye ken, is an ill neighbor, and the sea has washed it a' away but a sand bunker or twa, and the house I bide in at Ferryden."
At supper every one was eager to have a seat near Mrs. Ramsay Speldin. She had a universal acquaintance, and she even knew Mr. Sandford's mother, when he told her that her name was Catherine Douglas. Mr. Sandford had in his own mind composed a letter to Sir Walter Scott, which was to have been written and despatched on the morrow, giving an account of this fine specimen of the true Scottish character whom he had met in the county of Angus.
We meant to carry on the deception next morning, but the laird was too happy for concealment. Before the door closed on the good-night of the ladies, he had disclosed the secret, and before we reached the top of the stairs, the gentlemen were scampering at our heels like a pack of hounds in full cry.
Here are at random some extracts from the others:--
Mr. Jeffrey now inquired what the people in her part of the country thought of the trial of the Queen. She could not tell him, but she would say what she herself had remarked on siclike proceedings: "Tak' a wreath of snaw, let it be never so white, and wash it through clean water, it will no come out so pure as it gaed in, far less the dirty dubs the poor Queen has been drawn through."
Mr. Russell inquired if she possessed any relics of Prince Charles from the time he used to spin with the lasses:--
"Yes," she said, "I have a _flech_ that loupit aff him upon my aunty, the Lady Brax, when she was helping him on wi' his short-gown; my aunty rowed it up in a sheet of white paper, and she keepit it in the tea canister, and she ca'd it aye the King's Flech; and the laird, honest man, when he wanted a cup of gude tea, sought aye a cup of the _Prince's mixture_." This produced peals of laughter, and her ladyship laughed as heartily as any of them. When somewhat composed again, she looked across the table to Mr. Clerk, and offered to let him see it. "It is now set on the pivot of my watch, and a' the warks gae round the _flech_ in place of turning on a diamond."
Lord Gillies thought this flight would certainly betray her, and remarked to Mr. Clerk that the flea must be painted on the watch, but Mr. Clerk said he had known of relics being kept of the Prince quite as extraordinary as a flea; that Mr. Murray of Simprim had a pocket-handkerchief in which Prince Charles had blown his nose.
The Lady Pitlyal said her daughter did not value these things, and that she was resolved to leave it as a legacy to the Antiquarian Society.
Holmehead was rather amused with her originality, though he had not forgotten the attack. He said he would try if she was a real Jacobite, and he called out, "Madam, I am going to propose a toast for ye!
"May the Scotch Thistle choke the Hanoverian Horse."
"I wish I binna among the Whigs," she said.
"And whare wad ye be sae weel?" retorted he.
"They murdered Dundee's son at Glasgow."
"There was nae great skaith," he replied; "but ye maun drink my toast in a glass of this cauld punch, if ye be a true Jacobite."
"Aweel, aweel," said the Lady Pitlyal; "as my auld friend Lady Christian Bruce was wont to say, 'The best way to get the better of temptation is just to yield to it;'" and as she nodded to the toast and emptied the glass, Holmehead swore exultingly--"_Faith, she's true!_"
Supper passed over, and the carriages were announced. The Lady Pitlyal took her leave with Mrs. Gillies.
Next day the town rang with the heiress of Pitlyal. Mr. W. Clerk said he had never met with such an extraordinary old lady, "for not only is she amusing herself, but my brother John is like to expire, when I relate her stories at second-hand."
He talked of nothing else for a week after, but the heiress, and the flea, and the rent-roll, and the old turreted house of Pitlyal, till at last his friends thought it would be right to undeceive him; but that was not so easily done, for when the Lord Chief-Commissioner Adam hinted that it might be Miss Stirling, he said that was impossible, for Miss Stirling was sitting by the old lady the whole of the evening.
Here is a bit of Sir Walter--
Turning to Sir Walter, "I am sure you had our laird in your e'e when you drew the character of Monkbarns."
"No," replied Sir Walter, "but I had in my eye a very old and respected friend of my own, and one with whom, I daresay you, Mrs. Arbuthnott, were acquainted--the late Mr. George Constable of Wallace, near Dundee."
"I kenned him weel," said Mrs. Arbuthnott, "and his twa sisters that lived wi' him, Jean and Christian, and I've been in the blue-chamber of his _Hospitium_; but I think," she continued, "our laird is the likest to Monkbarns o' the twa. He's at the Antiquarian Society the night, presenting a great curiosity that was found in a quarry of mica slate in the hill at the back of Balwylie. He's sair taken up about it, and puzzled to think what substance it may be; but James Dalgetty, wha's never at a loss either for the name or the nature of onything under the sun, says it's just Noah's auld wig that blew aff yon time he put his head out of the window of the ark to look after his corbie messenger."
James Dalgetty and his opinion gave subject of much merriment to the company, but Doctor Coventry thought there was nothing so very ludicrous in the remark, for in that kind of slate there are frequently substances found resembling hairs.
Lord Gillies presented Doctor Coventry to Mrs. Arbuthnott, as the well-known professor of agriculture, and they entered on a conversation respecting soils. She described those of Balwylie, and the particular properties of the _Surroch Park_, which James Dalgetty curses every time it's spoken about, and says, "it greets a' winter, and girns a' simmer."
The doctor rubbed his hands with delight, and said that was the most perfect description of cold wet land he had ever heard of; and Sir Walter expressed a wish to cultivate the acquaintance of James Dalgetty, and extorted a promise from Mrs. Arbuthnott that she would visit Abbotsford, and bring James with her. "I have a James Dalgetty of my own," continued Sir Walter, "that governs me just as yours does you."
Lady Ann and Mr. Wharton Duff and their daughter were announced, and introduced to Mrs. Arbuthnott.
At ten, Sir Walter and Miss Scott took leave, with a promise that they should visit each other, and bending down to the ear of Mrs. Arbuthnott, Sir Walter addressed her in these words: "Awa! awa! the deil's ower grit wi' you."
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