“Before he was twelve years of age he went to college; and his mother accompanied him to pass the winter in the city. Two small rooms she took near the cathedral; and while he was at the classes, or reading alone, she was not idle, but strove to make a small sum to help to defray their winter’s expenses. To her that retired cell was a heaven when she looked upon her pious and studious boy. His genius was soon conspicuous; for four winters he pursued his studies in the university, returning always in summer to this hut, the door of which during their absence was closed. He made many friends, and frequently during the three last summers, visitors came to pass a day at Braehead, in a rank of life far above his own. But in Scotland, thank God, talent and learning, and genius and virtue, when found in the poorest hut, go not without their admiration and their reward. Young as he is, he has had pupils of his own—his mother’s little property has not been lessened at this hour by his education; and besides contributing to the support of her and himself, he has brought neater furniture into that lonely hut, and there has he a library, limited in the number, but rich in the choice of books, such as contain food for years of silent thought to the poor scholar—if years indeed are to be his on earth.”
We rose to proceed onwards to the hut, across one smooth level of greenest herbage, and up one intervening knowe, a little lower than the mount on which it stood. Why, thought I, has the old man always spoken of the poor scholar as if he had been speaking of one now dead? Can it be, from the hints he has dropped, that this youth, so richly endowed, is under the doom of death, and the fountain of all those clear and fresh-gushing thoughts about to be sealed? I asked, as we walked along, if Isaac Blane seemed marked out to be one of those sweet flowers “no sooner blown than blasted,” and who perish away like the creatures of a dream? The old man made answer that it was even so, that he had been unable to attend college last winter, and that it was to be feared he was now far advanced in a hopeless decline. “Simple is he still as a very child; but with a sublime sense of duty to God and man—of profound affection and humanity never to be appeased towards all the brethren of our race. Each month—each week—each day, has seemed visibly to bring him new stores of silent feeling and thought—and even now, boy as he is, he is fit for the ministry. But he has no hopes of living to that day—nor have I. The deep spirit of his piety is now blended with a sure prescience of an early death. Expect, therefore, to see him pale, emaciated, and sitting in the hut like a beautiful and blessed ghost.”
We entered the hut, but no one was in the room. The clock ticked solitarily, and on a table, beside a nearly extinguished peat fire, lay the open Bible, and a small volume, which, on lifting it up, I found to be a Greek Testament.
“They have gone out to walk, or to sit down for an hour in the warm sunshine,” said the old man. “Let us sit down and wait their return. It will not be long.” A long, low sigh was heard in the silence, proceeding, as it seemed, from a small room adjoining that in which we were sitting, and of which the door was left half open. The minister looked into that room, and, after a long earnest gaze, stepped softly back to me again, with a solemn face, and taking me by the hand, whispered to me to come with him to that door, which he gently moved. On a low bed lay the poor scholar, dressed as he had been for the day, stretched out in a stillness too motionless and profound for sleep, and with his fixed face up to heaven. We saw that he was dead. His mother was kneeling, with her face on the bed, and covered with both her hands. Then she lifted up her eyes and said, “O merciful Redeemer, who wrought that miracle on the child of the widow of Nain, comfort me—comfort me, in this my sore distress. I know that my son is never to rise again until the great judgment day. But not the less do I bless Thy holy name, for Thou didst die to save us sinners.”
She arose from her knees, and, still blind to every other object, went up to his breast. “I thought thee lovelier, when alive, than any of the sons of the children of men, but that smile is beyond the power of a mother’s heart to sustain.” And, stooping down, she kissed his lips, and cheeks, and eyes, and forehead, with a hundred soft, streaming, and murmuring kisses, and then stood up in her solitary hut, alone and childless, with a long mortal sigh, in which all earthly feelings seemed breathed out, and all earthly ties broken. Her eyes wandered towards the door, and fixed themselves with a ghastly and unconscious gaze for a few moments on the gray locks and withered countenance of the holy old man, bent towards her with a pitying and benignant air, and stooped, too, in the posture of devotion. She soon recognised the best friend of her son, and leaving the bed on which his body lay, she came out into the room, and said, “You have come to me at a time when your presence was sorely needed. Had you been here but a few minutes sooner you would have seen my Isaac die!”
Unconsciously we were all seated; and the widow, turning fervently to her venerated friend, said, “He was reading the Bible—he felt faint—and said feebly, ‘Mother, attend me to my bed, and when I lie down, put your arm over my breast and kiss me.’ I did just as he told me; and, on wiping away a tear or two vainly shed by me on my dear boy’s face, I saw that his eyes, though open, moved not, and that the lids were fixed. He had gone to another world. See—sir! there is the Bible lying open at the place he was reading—God preserve my soul from repining!—only a few, few minutes ago.”
The minister took the Bible on his knees, and laying his right hand, without selection, on part of one of the pages that lay open, he read aloud the following verses:—
“Blessed are the poor in spirit: for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.
“Blessed are they that mourn: for they shall be comforted.”
The mother’s heart seemed to be deeply blest for a while by these words. She gave a grateful smile to the old man, and sat silent, moving her lips. At length she again broke forth:—