Sinclair had intended to allow the subject to drop when he saw that for some reason his hostess held very pronounced views on it, different from his own. But her quoting Carteret as an authority on the sincerity or reality of religious beliefs touched him to the quick. He answered very quietly but firmly:
"All over the south of Scotland, from the Atlantic to the North Sea, in churchyard or hillside or lonely moor, are to be found flat slabs or tall monuments, marking the spots where the Covenanters of two hundred years ago were slain or where their bodies were laid to rest. Some of them were gentlemen of birth. Some were cultured ministers. But the great majority were plain people, sometimes ignorant people; just ordinary hard-working, unlearned Scottish peasants. Yet the places where they died are sacred to-day. Monuments are erected to them. Books are written about them. They are held up before us as the martyrs and heroes of our Church. Why? Because they died rather than deny their faith.
"Less than a month ago and less than twenty miles from here, some plain people—merchants, farmers, artisans—were asked to deny their faith. They refused. They were beaten. They were tortured. They were hanged by the hair of the head. Two of them were drowned. Their religion was the same as that of the Scottish Covenanters. They died for it just as willingly as the Covenanters did. They were Chinese. If we say that the Scottish sufferers were martyrs and heroes, I do not know how we can refuse to say the same of the Chinese."
He had spoken quietly, in a low tone of voice. But the very quietness of his manner had deepened the impression of tense feeling, of emotion kept under firm control. His words had grown eloquent in spite of himself.
When he ceased there was perfect silence for some minutes. Miss MacAllister was looking wonderingly at him. He had always seemed so good-humoured, so easy-going that she had sometimes asked herself if he was really capable of deep, passionate feeling. At an unexpected moment she had got her answer. There was no mistaking the passion of admiration for a heroic deed which possessed him, the indignant protest against an injustice. It was all the more impressive because it was so restrained. For reasons which perhaps she could not explain to herself she felt a thrill of pleasure at recognizing this note of passion in his voice.
Mrs. MacAllister also sat silent for a time. Then she said in a very different tone from that which she had used before:
"Perhaps you are right, Dr. Sinclair. I had not looked at it in that light."
"It is not easy for any one of us to be entirely just to peoples so unlike us as are the Chinese," said her husband. "Yet, when we get down to the mainsprings of their conduct, we find that they are pretty much the same as our own."
XXI
THE LANGUAGE OF SONG