Since feeding-bottles were not then in use, the motherless infant was passed around to the care of aunts and cousins, who had children of like age. Two aunts in particular, Catharine McIver and Margaret McNeill, and a cousin, Effie McIver, always claimed a share in me for their motherly ministrations till, at last, I could be turned over to my sister Mary. She, though but six years my senior, was old beyond her years; and the motherly care with which she watched over her little charge was long remembered and spoken of in the family.
When I was four years old, my father married his second wife, Miss Nancy McIntosh. The next nine years, till my father’s death, June 8th, 1841, were spent in the uneventful routine of a godly family in a country home. My father’s rigid ideas of family discipline were inherited from his Presbyterian ancestors in Scotland, and his own piety was of a distinctly old-school type. He was a ruling elder in the church at Buffalo, Fayetteville Presbytery, in which office he was succeeded by my brother, Evander, and three others of his sons became elders in other churches. No pressure of business was ever allowed to interfere with family worship night and morning. A psalm or hymn from the old village hymnbook always formed part of the service. My father was an early riser, and, in the winter time, family worship was often over before the dawn. Almost every spare moment of his time he spent in reading Scott’s Family Bible, the Philadelphia Presbyterian, or one of the few books of devotion which composed the family library. The special treasure of the book-case was the great quarto Illustrated Family Bible, with the Apocrypha and Brown’s Concordance, published by M. Carey, Philadelphia, 1815. It was the only pictorial book in the library, and its pictures were awe-inspiring to us children—especially those in the Book of Revelation:—The Dragon Chained, The Beast with Seven Heads and Ten Horns, and the Vision of the Four Seals. These and the solemn themes of Russell’s Seven Sermons—which on rainy days I used to steal away by myself to read—made a profound impression on me.
Scottish folk always carry the school with the kirk. Free schools were unknown; but after the crops were “laid by,” we always had a subscription school, in which my father, with his large family, had a leading interest. The teacher “boarded around” with the pupils. Our regular night-task was three questions and answers in the Shorter Catechism—no small task for boys of ten or twelve years. My memory of the Catechism once stood me in good stead in after-life. When examined for licensure by the Orange Presbytery, I was asked, “What is man’s state by nature?” In reply I gave the answers to the nineteenth and twentieth questions in the Catechism. A perceptible smile passed over the faces of many of the presbyters, and Father Lynch said, “He is right on the Catechism. He will pass.” In those days to be “right on the Catechism” would atone for many failures in Hodge or Turretin.
The church was at the village of Buffalo, four miles from our home, but no one of the family was expected to be absent from the family pew on “the Sabbath.” Carriages were a later luxury in that region. Our two horses carried father and mother, with the youngest of the little folks mounted behind, till he should be able to walk with the rest.
The great event of the year was the camp-meeting at the Fall Communion. It served as an epoch from which the events of the year before and after it were dated. For weeks before it came, all work on the farm was arranged with reference to “Buffalo Sacrament”—pronounced with long a in the first syllable. It was accounted nothing for people to come fifteen, twenty, or even forty miles to the meetings. Every pew-holder had a tent, and kept open house. No stranger went away hungry. Neighbouring ministers were invited to assist the pastor. Services began on Friday, and closed on Monday, unless some special interest suggested the wisdom of protracting them further. The regular order was: A sunrise prayer-meeting, breakfast, a prayer-meeting at nine, a sermon at ten, an intermission, and then another sermon. The sermons were not accounted of much worth if they were not an hour long. The pulpit was the tall old-fashioned boxpulpit with a sounding-board above. For want of room in the church, the two sermons on Sunday were preached from a stand in the open air. At the close of the second sermon the ruling elders, stationed in various parts of the congregation, distributed to the communicants the “tokens,”[[1]] which admitted them to the sacramental table. Then, in solemn procession, the company marched up the rising ground to the church, singing as they went:
“Children of the Heavenly King,
As ye journey sweetly sing.”
[1]. The “token” was a thin square piece of lead stamped with the initial letter of the name of the church.
It was a beautiful sight, and we boys used to climb the hill in advance to see it. When the audience was seated, there was a brief introductory exercise. Then a hymn was sung, while a group of communicants filled the places about the communion table. There was an address by one of the ministers, during the progress of which the bread and the wine were passed to the group at the table. Then there was singing again, while the first group retired, and a second group took its place. The same ceremony was repeated for them, and again for others, until all communicants present had participated. The communion service must have occupied nearly two hours. One thing I remember well—when the children’s dinner-time came (which was after all the rest had dined), the sun was low in the heavens, and there was still a night service before us. Notwithstanding some inward rebellion, it seemed all right then. But the same thing nowadays would drive all the young people out of the church.
With some diffidence I venture to make one criticism on our home life. The “Sabbath” was too rigidly observed to commend itself to the judgment and conscience of children—too rigidly, perhaps, for the most healthy piety in adults. It is hard to convince boys that to whistle on Sunday, even though the tune be “Old Hundred,” is a sin deserving of censure. An afternoon stroll in the farm or the orchard might even have clarified my father’s vision for the enjoyment of his Scott’s Bible at night. It would surely have been a means of grace to his boys. But such was the Scottish type of piety of those days, and it was strongly held. The family discipline was of the reserved and dignified type, rather than of the affectionate. Implicit obedience was the law for children. My father loved his children, but never descended to the level of familiarity with them when young, and could not sympathize with their sports.