Warlock o' Glenwarlock, George MacDonald [ebook reader browser txt] 📗

to Aggie, who regarded the two with a strange look.

"Grizzie!" cried Cosmo, in no little astonishment, "what on earth gars ye luik like that at the mention o' ane wha has this moment helpit us oot o' the warst strait ever we war in!"

"Gien there had been naebody nearer hame to help ye oot o' waur straits, it's waur straits ye wad be in. An' it's waur ye'll be in yet, gien that man gets his wull o' ye!"

"He's a fine, honest chiel'! An' for waur straits, Grizzieare na ye at the verra last wi' yer meal?"

As he spoke he turned, and, in bodily reference to fact, went to the chest into which he had looked but a few minutes before. To his astonishment, there was enough in it for a good many meals! He turned again, and stared at Grizzie. But she had once more seated herself in his father's chair, with her back to him, and before he could speak she went on thus:

"Shame fa' him, say I,'at made his siller as a flesher i' the wast wyn' o' Howglen, to ettle at a gentleman o' a thoosan' year for ane o' his queans! But, please the Lord, we's haud clear o' 'im yet!"

"Hootoot, Grizzie! ye canna surely think ony sic man wad regaird the like o' me as worth luikin' efter for a son-in-law! He wadna be sic a gowk!"

"Gowk here, gowk there! he kens what ye are an' what ye're worthweel that! Hasna he seen ye at the scythe? Disna he ken there's ten times mair to be made o' ae gentleman like you, wi'siller at his back, nor ten common men sic as he's like to get for his dothers? Weel kens he it's nae faut o' you or yours 'at ye're no freely sae weel aff as some 'at oucht an' wull be waur, gien it be the Lord's wull, or a' be dune! Disna he ken 'at Castle Warlock itsel' wad be a warl's honour to ony leddyno to say a lass broucht up ower a slauchter-hoose? Shame upo' him an' his!"

"Weel, Grizzie," rejoined Cosmo, "ye may say 'at ye like, but I dinna believe he wad hae dune what he has dune"

"Cha!" interrupted Grizzie; "what has he dune? Disna he ken the word o' a Warlock's as guid as gowd? Disna he ken your wark, what wi' yer pride an' what wi' yer ill-placed graititude,'ill be worth til 'im that o' twa men? The man's nae coof! He kens what he's aboot! Haith, ye needna waur ( spend ) muckle graititude upo' sic benefactions!"

"To show you, Grizzie, that you are unfair to him, I feel bound to tell you that he pressed on me the loan of fifty pounds."

"I tell ye sae!" screamed Grizzie, starting again to her feet. "God forbid ye took 'im at his offer!"

"I did not," answered Cosmo; "but all the same"

"The Lord be praised for his abundant an' great mercy!" cried Grizzie, more heartily than devoutly. "We may contrive to win ower the twa poun', even sud ye no work it oot; but fifty! the Lord be aboot us frae ill! so sure's deith, ye wad hae had to tak the lass!Cosmo, ye canna but ken the auld tale o' muckle-moo'd Meg?"

"Weel that," replied Cosmo. "But ye'll alloo, Grizzie, times are altert sin' the day whan the laird cud gie a ch'ice atween a wife an' the wuddie! Mr. Hen'erson canna weel hang me gien. I sud say NO."

"Say ye NO, come o' the hangin' what like," rejoined Grizzie.

"But, Grizzie," said Cosmo, "I wad fain ken whaur that meal i' the kist cam frae. There was nane intil 't an hoor ago."

With all her faults of temper and tongue, there was one evil word Grizzie could not speak. In the course of a not very brief life she had tried a good many times to tell a lie, but had never been able; and now, determined not to tell where the meal had come from, she naturally paused unprepared. It was but for a moment. Out came the following utterance.

"Some fowk says, sir,'at the age o' mirracles is ower. For mysel' I dinna preten' to ony opingon; but sae lang as the needcessity was the same, I wad be laith to think Providence wadna be consistent wi' itsel'. Ye maun min' the tale, better nor I can tell't ye, concernin' yon meal-girnelmuckle sic like, I daursay, as oor ain, though it be ca'd a barrel i' the Buikhit 'at never wastit, ye ken, an'the uily-pig an' a'ye'll min' weelthough what ony wuman in her senses cud want wi' sic a sicht o' ile's mair nor I ever cud faddom! Eh, but a happy wuman was she 'at had but to tak her bowl an' gang to the girnel, as I micht tak my pail an' gang to the wall! An' what for michtna the Almighty mak a meal-wall as weel's a watter-wall, I wad like to ken! What for no a wall 'at sud rin ileor say milk, which wad be mair to the purpose? Ae thing maun be jist as easy to him as anitherjist as ae thing's as hard to us as anither! Eh, but we're helpless creturs!"

"I' your w'y, Grizzie, ye wad keep us as helpless as ever, for ye wad hae a' thing hauden to oor han', like to the bairnie in his mither's lap! It's o' the mercy o' the Lord 'at he wad mak men an' women o' 'sno haud's bairns for ever!"

"It may be as ye say, Cosmo; but whiles I cud maist wuss I was a bairn again, an' had to luik to my mither for a' thing."

"An' isna that siclike as the Lord wad hae o' 's, Grizzie? We canna aye be bairns to oor mithersan' for me I wasna ane langbut we can an' maun aye be bairns to the great Father o' 's."

"I hae an ill hert, I doobt, Cosmo, for I'm unco hard to content. An' I'm ower auld noo, I fear, to mak muckle better o'. But maybe some kinily body like yersel' 'ill tak me in han' whan I'm deid, an' put some sense intil me!"

"Ye hae sense eneuch, Grizzie, an' to spare, gien only ye wad"

"Guide my tongue a wee better, ye wad say! But little ye ken the temptation o' ane 'at has but ae solitary wapon, to mak use o' that same! An' the gift ye hae ye're no to despise; ye maun turn a' til acoont."

Cosmo did not care to reason with her further, and went back to his father.

Grizzie had gained her point; which was to turn him aside from questions about the meal.

For a little while they had now wherewith to live; and if it seem to my reader that the horizon of hope was narrowing around them, it does not follow that it must have seemed so to them. For what is the extent of our merely rational horizon at any time? But for faith and imagination it would be a narrow one indeed! Even what we call experience is but a stupid kind of faith. It is a trusting in impetus instead of in love. And those days were fashioning an eternal joy to father and son, for they were loving each other a little more ere each day's close, and were thus putting time, despite of fortune, to its highest use.


CHAPTER XLVIII

A COMMON MIRACLE.


Until he was laid up, Cosmo had all the winter, and especially after his old master was taken ill, gone often to see Mr. Simon. The good man was now beginning, chiefly from the effects of his complaint, to feel the approach of age; but he was cheerful and hopeful as ever, and more expectant. As soon as he was able Cosmo renewed his visits, but seldom stayed long with him, both because Mr. Simon could not bear much talking, and because he knew his father would be watching for his return.

One day it had rained before sunrise, and a soft spring wind had been blowing ever since, a soothing and persuading wind, that seemed to draw out the buds from the secret places of the dry twigs, and whisper to the roots of the rose-trees that their flowers would be wanted by and by. And now the sun was near the foot of the western slope, and there was a mellow, tearful look about earth and sky, when Grizzie, entering the room where Cosmo was reading to his father, as he sat in his easy chair by the fireside, told them she had just heard that Mr. Simon had had a bad night and was worse. The laird begged Cosmo to go at once and inquire after him.

The wind kept him company as he walked, flitting softly about him, like an attendant that needed more motion than his pace would afford, and seemed so full of thought and love, that, for the thousandth time, he wondered whether there could be anything but spirit, and what we call matter might not be merely the consequence of our human way of looking at the wrong side of the golden tissue. Then came the thought of the infinitude of our moods, of the hues and shades and endless kinds and varieties of feeling, especially in our dreams; and he said to himself "how rich God must be, since from him we come capable of such inconceivable differences of conscious life!"

"How poor and helpless," he said to himself, "how mere a pilgrim and a stranger in a world over which he has no rule, must he be who has not God all one with him! Not otherwise can his life be free save as moving in loveliest harmony with the will and life of the only Freedomthat which wills and we are!"

"How would it be," he thought again, "if things were to come and go as they pleased in my mind and brain? Would that not be madness? For is it not the essence of madness, that things thrust themselves upon one, and by very persistence of seeming, compel and absorb the attention, drowning faith and will in a false conviction? The soul that is empty, swept, and garnished, is the soul which adorns itself, where God is not, and where therefore other souls come and go as they please, drawn by the very selfhood, and make the man the slave of their suggestions. Oneness with the mighty All is at the one end of life; distraction, things going at a thousand foolish wills, at the other. God or chaos is the alternative; all thou hast, or no Christ!"

And as he walked thinking thus, the stream was by his side, tumbling out its music as it ran to find its eternity. And the wind blew on from the moist west, where the gold and purple had fallen together in a ruined heap over the tomb of the sun. And the stars came thinking out of the heavens, and the things of earth withdrew into the great nest of the dark. And so he found himself at the door of the cottage, where lay one of the heirs of all things, waiting to receive his inheritance.

But the news he heard was that the master was better; and the old woman showed him at once to his room, saying she knew he would be glad to see him. When he entered the study, in which, because of his long illness and need of air, Mr. Simon lay, the room seemed