Mother Church cast her spell over his imagination.
What an absurdity was this revery, and Carmichael laughed aloud at himself. Twice he had met Miss Carnegie—on one occasion she had found him watering strange dogs out of his hat, and on the other he had given her to understand that women were little removed from fools. He had made the worst of himself, and this young woman who had lived with smart people must have laughed at him. Very likely she had made him into a story, for as a raconteur himself he knew the temptation to work up raw material, or perhaps Miss Carnegie had forgotten long ago that he had called. Suppose that he should call to-morrow on his way home and say, "General Carnegie, I think it right to tell you that I admire your daughter very much, and should like your permission to pay my addresses. I am Free Church minister in Drumtochty, and my stipend is 200 pounds a year" … his laugh this time was rather bitter. The Carnegies would be at once admitted into the county set, and he would only meet them at a time … Lord Hay was a handsome and pleasant young fellow. He would be at Glen Urtach House for the shooting in a few days … that was a likely thing to happen … the families were old friends … there would be great festivities in the Glen … perhaps he would be asked to propose the bride's health … It really seemed a providence that Saunderson should come along the road when he was playing the fool like a puling boy, for if any man could give a douche to love-sickness it was the minister of Kilbogie.
Carmichael was standing in the shadow as Saunderson came along the road, and the faint light was a perfect atmosphere for the dear old bookman. Standing at his full height he might have been six feet, but with much poring over books and meditation he had descended some three inches. His hair was long, not because he made any conscious claim to genius, but because he forgot to get it cut, and with his flowing, untrimmed beard, was now quite grey. Within his clothes he was the merest skeleton, being so thin that his shoulder-blades stood out in sharp outline, and his hands were almost transparent. The redeeming feature in Saunderson was his eyes, which were large and eloquent, of a trustful, wistful hazel, the beautiful eyes of a dumb animal. Whether he was expounding doctrines of an incredible disbelief in humanity or exalting, in rare moments, the riches of a divine love in which he did not expect to share, or humbly beseeching his brethren to give him information on some point in scholarship no one knew anything about except himself, or stroking the hair of some little child sitting upon his knee, those eyes were ever simple, honest, and most pathetic. Young ministers coming to the Presbytery full of self-conceit and new views were arrested by their light shining through the glasses, and came in a year or two to have a profound regard for Saunderson, curiously compounded of amusement at his ways, which for strangeness were quite beyond imagination, admiration for his knowledge, which was amazing for its accuracy and comprehensiveness, respect for his honesty, which feared no conclusion, however repellent to flesh and blood, but chiefly of love for the unaffected and shining goodness of a man in whose virgin soul neither self nor this world had any part. For years the youngsters of the Presbytery knew not how to address the minister of Kilbogie, since any one who had dared to call him Saunderson, as they said "Carmichael" and even "MacWheep," though he was elderly, would have been deposed, without delay, from the ministry—so much reverence at least was in the lads—and "Mister" attached to this personality would be like a silk hat on the head of an Eastern sage. Jenkins of Pitrodie always considered that he was inspired when he one day called Saunderson "Rabbi," and unto the day of his death Kilbogie was so called. He made protest against the title as being forbidden in the Gospels, but the lads insisted that it must be understood in the sense of scholar, whereupon Saunderson disowned it on the ground of his slender attainments. The lads saw the force of this objection, and admitted that the honourable word belonged by rights to MacWheep, but it was their fancy to assign it to Saunderson—whereat Saunderson yielded, only exacting a pledge that he should never be so called in public, lest all concerned be condemned for foolishness. When it was announced that the University of Edinburgh had resolved to confer the degree of D. D. on him for his distinguished learning and great services to theological scholarship, Saunderson, who was delighted when Dowbiggin of Muirtown got the honour for being an ecclesiastic, would have refused it for himself had not his boys gone out in a body and compelled him to accept. They also purchased a Doctor's gown and hood, and invested him with them in the name of Kilbogie two days before the capping. One of them saw that he was duly brought to the Tolbooth Kirk, where the capping ceremonial in those days took place. Another sent a list of Saunderson's articles to British and foreign theological and philological reviews, which filled half a column of the Caledonian, and drew forth a complimentary article from that exceedingly able and caustic paper, whose editor lost all his hair through sympathetic emotion the morning of the Disruption, and ever afterwards pointed out the faults of the Free Kirk with much frankness. The fame of Rabbi Saunderson was so spread abroad that a great cheer went up as he came in with the other Doctors elect, in which he cordially joined, considering it to be intended for his neighbour, a successful West-end clergyman, the author of a Life of Dorcas and other pleasing booklets. For some time after his boys said "Doctor" in every third sentence, and then grew weary of a too common title, and fell back on Rabbi, by which he was known unto the day of his death, and which is now engraved on his tombstone.
The Rabbi was tasting some morsel of literature as he came along, and halted opposite Carmichael, whom he did not see in the shadow, that he might enjoy it aloud.
"That is French verse, Rabbi, I think, but it sounds archaic; is it from a Huguenot poet?"
"Assuredly," replied the Rabbi, not one whit astonished that a man should come out from a hedge on Kilbogie road and recognise his quotation; "from Clement Marot, whom, as you remember, there is good evidence Queen Mary used to read. It is you, John Carmichael." The Rabbi awoke from the past, and held Carmichael's hand in both of his. "This was very mindful. You were going home from Pitscowrie and turned aside to visit me.
"It is unfortunate that I am hastening to a farm called the Mains, on the border of Pitscourie parish, to expound the Word; but you will go on to the Manse and straitly charge Barbara to give you food, and I will hasten to return." And the Rabbi looked forward to the night with great satisfaction.
"No, I am not coming from Pitscowrie, and you are not going there, as far as one can see. Why, you are on your way to Tochty woods; you are going west instead of east; Rabbi, tell the truth, have you been snuffing?"
This was a searching question, and full of history. When the Rabbi turned his back against the wind to snuff with greater comfort, he was not careful to resume his original position, but continued cheerfully in the new direction. This weakness was so well known that the school bairns would watch till he had started, and stand in a row on the road to block his progress. Then there would be a parley, which would end in the Rabbi capitulating and rewarding the children with peppermints, whereupon they would see him fairly off again and go on their way—often looking back to see that he was safe, and somehow loving him all the more for his strange ways. So much indeed was the Rabbi beloved that a Pitscowrie laddie, who described Saunderson freely as a "daftie" to Mains' grandson, did not see clearly for a week, and never recovered his lost front tooth.
"That," remarked young Mains, "'ll learn Pitscowrie tae set up impidence aboot the minister."
"There is no doubt, that I snuffed—it was at Claypots steading—but there was no wind that I should turn. This is very remarkable, John, and … disconcerting.
"These humiliations are doubtless a lesson," resumed the Rabbi as they hurried to Mains, "and a rebuke. Snuffing is in no sense a necessity, and I have long recognised that the habit requires to be restricted—very carefully restricted. For some time I have had fixed times—once in the forenoon, once in the afternoon, and again in the evening. Had I restrained myself till my work was over and I had returned home this misadventure would not have occurred, whereby I have been hindered and the people will have been kept waiting for their spiritual food.
"It is exactly twenty years to-night since I began this meeting in Mains," the Rabbi explained to Carmichael, "and I have had great pleasure in it and some profit. My subject has been the Epistle to the Romans, and by the goodness of God we are approaching the last chapters. The salutations will take about a year or so; Rufus, chosen in the Lord, will need careful treatment; and then I thought, if I were spared, of giving another year to a brief review of the leading points of doctrine; eh?"
Carmichael indicated that the family at Mains would almost expect something of the sort, and inquired whether there might not be a few passages requiring separate treatment at fuller length than was possible in this hurried commentary.
"Quite so, John, quite so; no one is more bitterly conscious of the defects of this exposition than myself—meagre and superficial to a degree, both in the patristic references and the experimental application; but we are frail creatures, John, and it is doubtful whether the exposition of any book should extend unto a generation. It has always caused me regret that Mains—I mean the father of the present tenant—departed before we had come to the comfort of the eighth chapter."
The Rabbi's mind was much affected by this thought, and twice in the kitchen his eye wandered to the chair where his friend had sat, with his wife beside him. From Priscilla and Aquila he was led into the question of hospitality, on which he spoke afterwards till they came to the Manse, where he stationed Carmichael on the doorstep till he secured a light.
"There is a parcel of books on the floor, partially opened, and the way of passing is narrow and somewhat dangerous in the darkness."
CHAPTER XII.
KILBOGIE MANSE.
inisters there were in the great strath so orderly that they kept their sealing-wax in one drawer and their string in another, while their sermons were arranged under the books of the Bible, and tied with green silk. Dr. Dowbiggin, though a dull man and of a heavy carriage, could find in an instant the original draft of a motion on instrumental music he made in the Presbytery of Muirtown in the year '59, and could also give the exact page in the blue-books for every word he had uttered in the famous case when he showed that the use of a harmonium to train MacWheep's choir was a return to the bondage of Old Testament worship. His collection of pamphlets was supposed to be unique, and was a terror to controversialists, no man knowing when a rash utterance on the bottomless mystery of "spiritual independence" might not be produced from the Doctor's coat-tail pocket. He retired to rest at 10.15, and rose at six, settling the subject of his next sermon on Sabbath evening, and finishing the first head before breakfast on Monday morning. He had three hats—one for funerals, one for marriages, one for ordinary occasions—and has returned from the Presbytery door to brush his coat. Morning prayers in Dr. Dowbiggin's house were at 8.05, and the wrath of the Doctor was so dangerous that one probationer staying at the manse, and not quite independent of influence, did not venture to undress, but snatched a fearful doze sitting upright on a cane-bottomed chair, lest he should not be in at the psalm. Young ministers of untidy habits regarded Dr. Dowbiggin's study with despair, and did not recover their spirits till they were out of Muirtown. Once only did this eminent man visit the manse of Kilbogie, and in favourable moments after dinner he would give his choicer experiences.
"It is my invariable custom to examine the bed to see that everything is in order, and any one sleeping in Kilbogie Manse will find the good of such a precaution. I trust that I am not a luxurious person—it would ill become one who came out in '43—but I have certainly become accustomed to the use of sheets. When I saw there were none on the bed, I declined to sleep without them, and I indicated my mind very distinctly on the condition of the manse.
"Would you believe it?" the Doctor used to go on. "Saunderson explained, as if it were a usual occurrence, that he had given away all the spare linen in his house to a girl that had to marry in … urgent circumstances, and had forgotten to get more. And what do you think did he offer as a substitute for sheets?" No one could even imagine what might not occur to the mind of Saunderson.
"Towels, as I am an honourable man; a collection of towels, as he put it, 'skilfully attached together, might make a pleasant covering.' That is the first and last time I ever slept in the Free Church Manse of Kilbogie. As regards Saunderson's study, I will guarantee that the like of it cannot be found within Scotland," and at the very thought of it that exact and methodical ecclesiastic realised the limitations of language.
His boys boasted of the Rabbi's study as something that touched genius in its magnificent disorderliness, and Carmichael was so proud of it that he took me to see it as to a shrine. One whiff of its atmosphere as you entered the door gave an appetite and raised the highest expectations. For any bookman can estimate a library by scent—if an expert he could even write out a catalogue of the books and sketch the appearance of the owner. Heavy odour of polished mahogany, Brussels carpets, damask curtains and tablecloths; then the books are kept within glass, consist of sets of standard works in half calf, and the owner will give you their cost wholesale to a farthing. Faint fragrance of delicate flowers, and Russia leather, with a hint of cigarettes; prepare yourself for a marvellous wall-paper, etchings, bits of oak, limited editions, and a man in a velvet coat. Smell of paste and cloth binding and general newness means yesterday's books and a man racing through novels with a paper knife. Those are only book-rooms by courtesy, and never can satisfy any one who has breathed the sacred air. It is a rich and strong spirit, not only filling the room, but pouring out from the door and possessing the hall, redeeming an opposite dining-room from grossness, and a more distant drawing-room from frivolity, and even lending a goodly flavour to bedrooms on upper floors. It is distilled from curious old duodecimos packed on high shelves out of sight, and blows over folios, with large clasps, that once stood in monastery libraries, and gathers a subtle sweetness from parchments that were illuminated in ancient scriptoriums, that are now grass grown, and is fortified with good old musty calf. The wind was from the right quarter on the first day I visited Kilbogie Manse, and as we went up the garden walk the Rabbi's library already bade us welcome, and assured us of our reward for a ten miles' walk.
Saunderson was perfectly helpless in all manner of mechanics—he could not drive a tack through anything except his own fingers, and had given up shaving at the suggestion of his elders—and yet he boasted, with truth, that he had got three times as many books into the study as his predecessor possessed in all his house. For Saunderson had shelved the walls from the floor to the ceiling, into every corner and over the doors, and above the windows, as well as below them. The wright had wished to leave the space clear above the mantelpiece.
"Ye 'll be hanging Dr. Chalmers there, or maybe John Knox, and a bit clock 'll be handy for letting ye ken the 'oors on Sabbath."
