My father was dying!
Then I said he must now be gone. How dreadful the thought, and I not to know. He waiting and watching for me, and I never to come!
Next morning I hurried off to Aberdeen. The train goes no farther on Sunday, but I was in time to catch the mail gig that starts from near the very door of my father’s house, and returns in the evening.
The mail man knew me well, but during all that weary sixteen-mile drive I never had courage to ask him how the old man my father was. I dreaded the reply.
Arrived at my destination, I sprang from the car and rushed to the house, to find my dear father—better. And some days afterwards—thank God for all His mercies—I bade him good-bye as he sat by the fire.
No quieter meadow was ever I in than that at Chryston, so I determined to spend a whole week here and write up the arrears of my literary work, which had drifted sadly to leeward. Except the clergyman of the place, and a few of the neighbouring gentry, hardly any one ever came near the Wanderer.
If an author could not work in a place like this, inspired by lovely scenery and sunny weather, inhaling health at every breath, I should pity and despise him.
I never tired of the view from the Wanderer’s windows, that wondrous valley, with its fertile farms and its smiling villas, and the great Campsie range of hills beyond. Sometimes those hills were covered with a blue haze, which made them seem very far away; but on other days, days of warmth and sunshine, they stood out clear and close to us; we could see the green on their sides and the brown heath above it, and to the left the top of distant Ben Ledi was often visible.
Thunderstorm at Chryston.