"Yes," said the Reverend Gordon Laird; "yes, I guess that's it—yes, investment."
This somewhat enigmatical conversation was terminated by the advent of the other members of the family, all quite ready for the supper that was waiting. And a decidedly animated circle it was that surrounded our well-laden board. Uncle was in fine spirits, as he ever was when he had congenial company, and the honours of his attention were pretty evenly divided between the Scotchman and the Southerner.
It was delightful to watch the interest and surprise of our clerical guest, so new and different did everything appear to him. For our dear Southland has fashions all its own, each one of them more delicious than another. Perhaps this is especially true of what we eat, and of how we go about it. We had a coloured boy with a long feather fan whose duty it was to guard us from the flies. This amused him vastly; especially once when my aunt motioned him to look—the dusky Washington was almost asleep, leaning against the wall. And so many of our dishes seemed to strike the foreigner as the newest and most palatable things on earth. We had the savoury rock in little fish-shaped dishes—they looked all ready to swim—and sweet potatoes and corn bread and fried chicken, and hot biscuits too, and a lot of other things Scotchmen never see. It was lovely to watch Aunt Agnes' face, brightening with every recurring exclamation of surprise or pleasure from our visitor.
On the other hand he was hardly less interesting to us. A really new type is something to which a little Southern town is seldom treated—we are so fearfully native-born. And Gordon Laird (the Reverend can't be always used) seemed to bring with him the flavour of the world without. His accent was so different, as I have said; and many of his terms were so unfamiliar to us. For instance, we soon remarked that he referred to the Episcopal church as the Church of England; and once or twice he spoke of the "Kirk Session," which had to be explained; and he rarely used the term "pastor," or "preacher," as we did—it was always "minister" with him. It was most interesting, too, to hear him talk of Edinburgh, of its castle, its Holyrood, its Princes Street, its Scott's monument, its haunts of Knox and memories of Burns.
"Fo' de Lawd, Miss Helen, dat new preacher, he's got a heap o' learnin'," Lyddie said one day, "an' he knows how to let it out, dat's sho'."
That very first night, that first supper, I mean, found us all listening with great intentness to his description of much we had hardly ever heard of before. I remember he spoke of higher criticism, giving the names of two or three great Scottish scholars, and he seemed a little disappointed to find we had never heard of the latter and but little more than heard of the former. He spoke, it seemed to me, as if this higher criticism were a matter of great importance, almost as if it were troubling his own soul—but this I did not understand till long after.
The discussion ran so steadily along church lines that even Charlie, who was not very strong on matters ecclesiastical, contributed a question.
"What church does your Queen belong to, Mr. Laird?" he asked.
"To the Presbyterian," replied our guest, looking very candidly at the questioner; "when she is in Scotland, that is."
"Oh," said Charlie, "I always thought she belonged to the State church."