The days of auld lang syne

Front matter

THE DAYS OF AULD LANG SYNE

A POSTER AT THE KIRK GATE,

Copyright, 1895, By John Watson.

Contents

PAGE

I. A TRIUMPH IN DIPLOMACY .... 5

II. FOR CONSCIENCE SAKE

II

It was known in the Glen that Burnbrae must choose on Monday between his farm and his conscience, and the atmosphere in the Free Church on Sabbath was such as might be felt. When he arrived that morning, with Jean and their three sons — the fourth was in a Highland regiment on the Indian frontier — the group that gathered at the outer gate opened to let them pass, and the elders shook Burnbrae by the hand in serious silence; and then, instead of waiting to discuss the prospects of the Sustentation Fund with Netherton, Burnbrae went in with his family, and sat down in the pew where they had worshipped God since the Disruption.

The cloud of the coming trial fell on the elders, and no man found his voice for a space. Then Donald Menzies's face suddenly lightened, and he lifted his head.

" * With persecutions' wass in the promise, and the rest it will be coming sure."

"You hef the word, Donald Menzies," said Lachlan ; and it came to this handful of Scottish peasants that they had to make that choice that

THE AULD TOCHTV BRIDGE has been offered unto every man since the world began.

Carmichael's predecessor was minister of the Free Church in those days, who afterwards got University preferment — he wrote a book on the Greek particles, much tasted in certain circles — and is still called "the Professor" in a hushed voice by old people. He was so learned a scholar that he would go out to visit without his hat, and so shy that he could walk to Kildrummie with one of his people on the strength of two observations, the first at Tochty bridge and the other at the crest of the hill above the station. Lachlan himself did not presume at times to understand his sermons, but the Free Church loved their scholar, for they knew the piety and courage that dwelt in the man.

The manse housekeeper, who followed Cunningham with his hat and saw that he took his food at more or less regular intervals, was at her wit's end before that Sabbath.

" A'vc hcd chairge o' him," she explained to the clachan, "since he wes a laddie, an' he 's a fine bit craiturie ony wy ye tak' him.

"Ye juist hammer at his door in the morning till

ye 're sure he 's up, an' bring him oot o' the study

when denner 's ready, an' watch he hesna a buke

hoddit aboot him — for he's tricky- — an' come in on

him every wee whilie till ye think he 's heel eneuch,

an' tak' awa his lamp when it 's time for him tae

gang tae bed, an' it 's safer no tae lat him hae mair than a can'le end, or he wud set tae readin' in his bed. Na, na, he 's no ill tae guide.

"But keep 's a', he 's been sae crouse this week that he 's fair gae'n ower me. He 's been speakin' tae himsel' in the study, an' he '11 get up in the middle o' his denner an' rin roond the gairden.

THE MANSE OF THE FREE KIRK

"Ye ken the minister hardly ever speaks gin ye dinna speak tae him, though he's aye canty; bit this week if he didna stop in the middle o' his denner an' lay aff a story aboot three hunder lads that held a glen wi' their swords till the laist o' them wes killed — a'm dootin' they were Hielan' caterans — an' he yokit on the auld martyrs ae nicht tae sic an extent that I wes near the greetin'.

"Ye wudna ken him thae times — he 's twice his size, an' the langidge poors frae him. A' tell ye Burnbrae \s on his brain, and ye '11 hae a sermon worth hearin' on Sabbath. Naebody kens the spirit 'at 's in ma laddie when he 's roosed," concluded Maysie, with the just pride of one who had tended her scholar since childhood.

" What shall it profit a man," was the text, and in all the sermon there was not one abusive word, but the minister exalted those things that endure for ever above those that perish in the using, with such spiritual insight and wealth of illustration — there was a moral resonance in his very voice which made men's nerves tingle — that Mrs. Macfadyen, for once in her life, refused to look at heads, and Donald Menzies could hardly contain himself till the last psalm.

It was the custom in the Free Kirk for the minister to retire first, facing the whole "congregation on his way to the vestry at the back of the church, and Cunningham confided to a friend that he lost in weight during the middle passage; but on this Sabbath he looked every man in the face, and when he came to Burnbrae' s pew the minister paused, and the two men clasped hands. No word was spoken, not a person around moved, but the people in front felt the thrill, and knew something had happened.

No one was inclined to speak about that sermon on the way home, and Netherton gave himself with ostentation to the finger-and-toe disease among the turnips. But the Free Kirk had no doubt what answer Burnbrae would give the factor, and each man resolved within his heart that he would do likewise in his time.

"It 's michty," was Jamie Soutar's comment, who had attended the Free Kirk to show his sympathy, "what can be dune by speech. Gin there wes a

ON THE WAY HOME

juitlin', twa-faced wratch in the kirk, yon sermon hes straichtened him oot an' made a man o' him.

" Maister Cunningham 's no muckle tae look at an' he 's the quietest body a' ever saw; but he 's graund stuff every inch o' him, and hes the courage o' a lion."

Burnbrae and Jean walked home that Sabbath alone, and the past encompassed their hearts. The road they had walked since childhood, unchanged save for the gap where the old beech fell in the great storm, and the growth of the slowly maturing oaks; the burns that ran beneath the bridges with the same gurgling sound while generations came and went ; the fields that had gone twelve times through the rotation of grass, oats, turnips, barley, grass since they remembered ; the farmhouses looking down upon the road with familiar kindly faces — Gormack had a new window, and Clay what another room above the kitchen — awoke sleeping memories and appealed against their leaving.

When they came below Woodhead, the two old people halted and

looked up the track where the hawthorn hedges, now bright with dogroses, almost met, and a cart had to force its way through the sweet -smelling greenery. It was in Woodhead that Jean had been reared, and a brother was still living there with her only sister.

"Div ye mind the nicht, Jean, that ye cam doon

A BRIDGE ON THE ROAD the road wi' me and a' askit ye tae be ma wife? it wes aboot this time."

" It 'ill be forty-five year the mornin's nicht, John, and a' see the verra place fra here. It wes at the turn o' the road, and there 's a rosebush yonder still.

WOODHEAD FARM

" Ye pluckit me a rose afore we pairtit, an' a' hae the leaves o't in the cover of ma Bible, an' the rose at oor gairden gate is a cuttin' that a' took."

The old schoolhouse was not visible from the road, but on sight of the path that turned upwards to its wood, Jean looked at Burnbrae with the inextinguishable roguery of a woman in her eyes, and he understood.

" Aye, ye were a hempie o' a lassie, Jean, making faces at me as often as a' lookit at ye, an' crying,

'Douce John Baxter/ till a' wes near the greetin' on the wy hame. "

"But a' likit ye a' the time better than ony laddie in the schule; a' think a' hived ye frae the beginning John. "

"Wes 't luve gared ye dad ma ears wi' yir bukes at the corner, and shute me in amang the whins? but ye '11 hae forgotten that, wumman. "

"Feint a bit o' me; it wes the day ye took Meg Mitchell's pairt, when we fell oot ower oor places in the class. A' didna mind her bein' abune me, but a' cudna thole ye turnin' against me."

" Hoo lang is that ago, Jean? "

"Sax and fifty year ago laist summer."

The auld kirk stood on a bluff overlooking the Tochty, with the dead of the Glen round it; and at the look on Jean's face, Burnbrae turned up the kirk road along which every family went some day in sorrow.

The Baxters' ground lay in a corner, where the sun fell pleasantly through the branches of a beech in the afternoon and not far from the place where afterwards we laid Domsie to rest. The gravestone was covered on both sides with names, going back a century, and still unable to commemorate all the Baxters that had lived and died after an honest fashion in Drnmtochty. The last name was that of a child :

Jean, the daughter of John Baxter, Farmer of Burnbrae, Aged 7 years.

There was no "beloved" nor any text, but each spring the primroses came out below, and all summer a bunch of pinks touched the "Jean" with their fragrant blossoms.

Her mother stooped to pluck a weed from among the flowers and wipe the letters of the name where the moss was gathering, then she bent her head on the grey, worn stone, and cried, "Jeannie, Jeannie, ma bonnie lassie."

"Dinna greet, Jean, as though we hed nae lassie," said Burnbrae, "for there's naethin' here but the dust. Ye mind what the minister read that day, ' He shall gather the lambs with His arm, and carry them in His bosom. '

"Be thankfu' we have the fower laddies spared, a' daein' weel, an' ane near ready for a kirk, an' you an' me thegither still. We 've hed mony mercies, Jean. "

"A'm no denyin' that, John, an' a'm prood o' the laddies; but there 's no' a day a' dinna miss ma lassie, an' a' can hear her sayin' 'mither' still when ye 're a' in the fields and a'm alane. "

"Wae's me, wha will care for her grave when we 're far awa an' no a Baxter left in the Glen? It 's no lichtsome to leave the hoose whar we 've livit sae lang, an' the fields ye 've lookit at a' yir days, but it's sairest tae leave yir dead."

The past with the tender associations that make a woman's life was tightening its hold on Jean, and when they looked down on the Glen from the height of Burnbrae, her voice broke again :

"It's a bonnie sicht, John, an' kindly tae oor eyes; we 'ill never see anither tae sateesfy oor auld age."

" A've seen nae ither a' ma days," said Burnbrae, "an' there can be nane sae dear tae me noo in this warld; but it can be boucht ower dear, lass," and when she looked at him, "wi' oor souls, Jean, wi' oor souls."

No Drumtochty man felt at ease on Sabbath, or spoke quite like himself at home, till he had escaped from his blacks and had his tea. Then he stretched himself with an air of negligence, and started on a survey of his farm, which allowed of endless meditation, and lasted in summer time unto the going down of the sun. It was a leisurely progress, in which time was of no importance, from field to field and into every corner of each field, and from beast to beast and round every beast to the completion of as many circles as there were beasts. The rate was about one and a half miles an hour, excluding halts, and the thumbs were never removed from the armholes except for experimental observations. No one forgot that it was Sabbath, and there were things no right-thinking man would do. Drumsheugh might sample a head of oats in his hand, in sheer absence of mind, but he would have been ashamed to lift a shaw of potatoes; and although Hillocks usually settled the price he would ask for his fat cattle in the midst of these reveries, he always felt their ribs on a Saturday. When the gudeman came in, he had taken stock with considerable accuracy, but he was justly horrified to find his wife asleep, with her head uncomfortably pillowed on the open family Bible.

With the more religious men these Sabbath evening walks had in them less of this world and more of that which is to come. Donald Menzies had seen strange things in the fading light as he wandered among the cattle, and this evening the years that were gone came back to Burnbrae. For a townsman may be born in one city, and educated in a second, and married in a third, and work in a fourth. His houses are but inns, which he uses and forgets; he has no roots, and is a vagrant on the face of the earth. But the countryman is born and bred, and marries and toils and dies on one farm, and the scene he looks at in his old age is the same he saw in his boyhood. His roots are struck deep into the soil, and if you tear them up, his heart withers and dies. When some townsman therefore reads of a peasant being cast out of his little holding, he must not consider that it is the same as a tenant going from one street to another, for it is not a house this farmer leaves: it is his life.

Burnbrae passed through the kitchen on his way out, and an old chair by the fireside made him a laddie again, gathered with the family on a winter Sabbath evening, and he heard his father asking the "chief end of man." The first gate on the farm swung open at a touch, and he remembered this was his father's idea, and he found the wedge that changed the elevation of the hinge. That was a dyke he built in his youth, and there was the stone he blasted out of the field, for the hole was still open. Down in that meadow there used to be a pond where he was almost drowned nearly seventy years ago, but he had drained it, and the corn upon the place was growing rank. This was the little bridge he had mended for the home-coming of his bride, and from that rock his old father had directed him with keen interest, and in that clump of trees, alone before the Eternal, the great event of his soul had come to pass. He had often thought that some day he would be carried over that bridge, and trusted he was ready, but he hoped he might be spared to see the Black Watch come home, and to hear his youngest son preach in Drumtochty Free Kirk. The agony of leaving came upon him, and Burnbrae turned aside among the trees.

He sought out Jean on his return, and found her in a little summer-house, which he had made the first year of their marriage. As they sat together in silence, each feeling for the other, Burnbrae's eyes fell on a patch of annuals, and it seemed to him as if they made some letters.

Burnbrae looked at his wife.

" Is that oor lassie's name? "

"Aye, it is. A've sown it mony a year, but this is the first summer a' cud read it plain, and the last a'll sow it in oor gairden ; an' yon 's the apple-tree we planted the year she wes born, an' the blossom never wes sae bonnie as this year.

"Oh, John, a' ken we oucht tae dae what 's richt, an' no deny oor principles; but a' canna leave, a' canna leave.

"It 's no siller or plenishing a'm thinkin' aboot; it 's the hoose ye brocht me tae that day, an' the room ma bairns were born in, an' the gairden she played in, an' whar a' think o' her in the gloamin'.

" It 's mair than a' can bear tae pairt wi' ma hame, an' the kirkyaird, an' gang into a strange place where a' ken naebody and naebody kens us. It 'ill brak ma hert.

"Are ye fixed aboot this maitter, John? . . . there 's no muckle difference aifter a'. . . . Dr. Davidson's a fine man, an' a've herd ye praise him yersel ... if ye promised tae gang at a time, maybe. ..." And Jean touched Burnbrae timidly with her hand.

" A' want tae dee here and be beeried wi' Jeannie. "

"Dinna try me like this," Burnbrae cried, with agony in his voice, "for the cross is heavy eneuch already withoot the wccht o' yir pleadin'.

"Ye dinna see the nicht what ye are askin', for yir een are blind wi' tears. If a' gied in tae ye and did what ye ask, ye wud be the sorriest o' the twa, for nane hes a truer hert than ma ain wife.

" If it wes ony thing else ye askit, ye wud hae it, Jean, though it cost me a' my gear, but a' daurna deny my Lord, no even for yir dear sake. . . . He died for us . . . an' this is a' He asks. . . .

"A' maun sae no tae the factor the mornin', an' if ye 're against me it 'ill be hard on flesh and blood. . . . Say yir wullin', an' a' fear nae evil, Jean."

" A'm tryin' hard, John," and they spoke together with a. low voice, while the kindly darkness fell as a sacred cover round about them; and when they came into the light of the kitchen, where the family was waiting, there was victory on the face of Burnbrae and Jean his wife.

"Well Baxter," said the factor in his room next day, "your offer is all right in money, and we 'ill soon settle the building. By the way, I suppose you 've thought over that kirk affair, and will give your word to attend the Established Church, eh? "

"Ye may be sure that a've gien a' ye said ma best judgment, an' there 's naething I wudna dae to be left in Burnbrae, but this thing ye ask a' canna grant."

"Why not? " and the factor, lounging in his chair, eyed Burnbrae contemptuously as he stood erect before him. " My groom tells me that there is not a grain of difference between all those kirks in Scotland, and that the whole affair is just downright bad temper, and I believe he's right."

"A' wudna say onything disrespectfu', sir, but it 's juist possible that naither you nor your groom ken the history o' the Free Church ; but ye may be sure sensible men and pair fouk dinna mak sic sacrifices for bad temper."

"Come along, then," and the factor allowed himself to be merry, "let 's hear a sermon. You Scotchmen are desperate fellows for that kind of thing. Does the Free Kirk sing Psalms one way and the Established Kirk another? It 's some stark nonsense, I know. "

" It may be to you, but it is not to us; and at ony rate, it is the truth accordin' tae ma licht, an' ilka man maun gae by that as he sail answer at the Judgment. "

"Don't stand canting here. Do you mean to say that you will lose your farm, and see your family at the door for a kirk? You can't be such a drivelling fool ; and a fellow of your age too ! Yes or no ? "

"A' hae nae choice, then, but tae say No; an' that's ma laist word."

"Then you and the rest of your friends will march, d' you understand? You may take this for notice at once — and I '11 get some tenants that have respect for — ah — for — in fact, for law and order."

"Ye may clear the Free Kirk fouk oot o' Drumtochty, an' get new tenants o' some kind; but when ye hae filled the Glen wi' greedy time-servers his lordship 'ill miss the men that coonted their conscience mair than their fairms. "

"If you have quite finished, you may go," said the factor ; " leaving your farm does not seem to touch you much."

" Sir," replied Burnbrae with great solemnity, " I pray God you may never have such sorrow as you have sent on my house this day."

Jean was waiting at the top of the brae for her man, and his face told her the event.

" Ye maunna be cast jean waiting

doon, Jean," and his

voice was very tender, "an' a' ken weel ye 'ill no be angry wi' me."

"Angry?" said Jean; "ma hert failed last nicht for a whilie, but that 's ower noo an' for ever. John, a' luvit ye frae the time we sat in the schule thegither, an' a' wes a happy wumman when ye mairried me.

"A've been lifted mony a time when a' saw how

fouk respeckit ye, and abune a' when ye gaed doon the kirk with the cups in yir hands at the Saicrament, for a' kent ye were worthy.

"Ye 're dearer tae me ilka year that comes and gaes, but a' never luvit ye as a' dae this nicht, an' a' coont sic a husband better than onything God cud gie me on earth. "

And then Jean did what was a strange thing in Drumtochty — she flung her arms round Burnbrae's neck and kissed him.

Ill

Drumtochty, hoeing the turnips for the second time on a glorious day in early August, saw the Kildrummie auctioneer go up the left side of the Glen and down the right like one charged with high affairs. It was understood that Jock Constable could ride anything in the shape of a horse, and that afternoon he had got ten miles an hour out of an animal which had been down times without number, and whose roaring could be heard from afar. Jock was in such haste that he only smacked his lips as he passed our public-house, and waved his hand when Hillocks shouted, " Hoo 's a' wi' ye?" from a neighbouring field. But he dismounted whenever he saw a shapely gate-post, and spent five minutes at the outer precincts of the two churches.

"It 'ill be a roup," and Hillocks nodded to his foreman with an air of certitude; "a' wunner wha 's it is; some Kildrummie man, maist likely."

When the advertising disease first broke out in the country, a Muirtown grocer with local connections disfigured our main road with his list of prices, till in a moment of incredible audacity he affixed a cheap tea advertisement to the Parish Kirk door, and was understood to have escaped penal servitude by offering an abject apology to Doctor Davidson, and contributing ten pounds for the poor of the parish. Constable's announcements were the only mural literature afterwards allowed in the Glen, and

HOEING TURNIPS

Jock prided himself on their grandeur. They were headed in large type " Displenishing Sale," and these imposing words, which had never been heard in the ordinary speech of the Glen within the memory of man, were supported in the body of the document by "heifers," "fat oxen," "draught horses," "agricultural implements," and "dairy apparatus." Jock had "cereals" in one bill, but yielded to public feeling, and returned to "oats and barley" as a concession to the condition of a semieducated people.

Persons without imagination used to carp at the grand style and demand explanations, but short of "cereals," Jock carried the community.

" What gars Jock aye say ' Displenishing Sale ' ? " inquired Hillocks one day, after he had given ten minutes to a bill and done the more ambitious words in syllables. "An' what dis he mean by ' heifer ' ? A' ken the beasts on Milton as weel as ma ain, an' a' never heard tell o' ' heifer' ootside o' the Bible."

"Ye 're a doited (stupid) body, Hillocks," said Jamie Soutar, who was always much tickled by Jock's efforts; "ye wudna surely expeck an unctioneer tae speak aboot roups, and div ye think yersel that quey soonds as weel as heifer? Gin ye hed naething but oor ain words on a post, naebody wud look twice at it, but this kind o' langidge solemnises ye an' maks ye think."

"Man Jamie, a' never thocht o' that," for this argument touched Hillocks closely, "an' a'm no sayin' but ye 're richt. Jock 's a gabby body an' no teared 0' words."

Constable made a point of publishing on Saturday as late as light would allow, so that his literature might burst upon the Glen on Sabbath morning with all the charm of a surprise. Whether a man came east or west, he had the benefit of three bills before he reached the kirk and settled down quietly to the one on the right-hand pillar of the kirkyard gate. Less than this number of wayside editions would not have served the purpose, because there was a severe etiquette in reading. When Whinnie emerged on the main road and caught sight of " Displenishing Sale," he would have been ashamed to cross or show any indecent curiosity. He only nodded and proceeded to settle the farm in his mind. The second bill, whose geography he mastered without stopping, verified his conclusion and left him free to run over in his mind the stock and crops that would be offered. A pause not exceeding one minute was allowed for the head of the house at the third bill to detect any gross mistake in his general review, but the examination of minute details was reserved for the large paper edition at the kirkyard. This was studied from the first word to the last in profound silence, but was rigidly excluded from direct quotation on Sabbath. When Whinnie joined the fathers he only referred to Milton's roup as a rumour that had reached his ears and might have been discussed at length on any other day. Drumsheugh, waking, as it were, from a reverie: " A' wudna wunner gin the Milton roup did come aff sune . . . there 's twa acre mair neeps than a' expeckit. "

Then Hillocks would casually remark, as one forced into a distasteful conversation, "The gude wife keeps ae coo, a' hear; she 'ill be taking a pendicle at Kildrummie, a'm judgin'," but any thorough treatment was hindered by circumstances.

The kirkyard was only once carried beyond itself by Jock's bills, and that was when he announced Burnbrae's sale.

"Keep 's a' fouk, this is no lichtsome, " was all Whinnie could say as he joined the group, and the boxes were passed round without speech.

"Weel, weel," Hillocks said at last, in the tone consecrated to funerals, "he 'ill be sair missed."

It was felt to be an appropriate note, and the mouths of the fathers were opened.

"A graund fairmer," continued Hillocks, encouraged by the sympathetic atmosphere; "he kent the verra day tae sow an' ye cudna find a thistle on Burnbrae, no, nor a docken. Gin we a' keepit oor land as clean it wud set us better," and Hillocks spoke with the solemnity of one pointing the moral of a good man's life.

"He hed a fine hert tae," added Whinnie, feeling that Hillocks's eulogy admitted of expansion; "he cam up laist summer when George wes lying in the decline, and he says tae me, " ' Whinnie, yir pasture is fair burnt up ; pit yir coos in ma second cutting : George maun hae gude milk, ' an' they fed a' the summer in Burnbrae's clover. He didna like sic things mentioned, but it disna maitter noo. Marget wes awfu' touched."

"But ye cudna ca' Burnbrae a shairp business man," said Jamie Soutar critically; "he keepit Jess Stewart daein' naethin' for five year, and gared her believe she wes that usefu' he cudna want her, because Jess wud suner hae deed than gaen on the pairish.

" As for puir fouk, he wes clean redeeklus ; there wesna a weedow in the Glen didna get her seed frae him in a bad year. He hed abeelity in gaitherin', but he wes wastefu' in spendin'.

" Hooever, he 's gone noo, an' we maunna be sayin' ill o' the dead; it's no what he wud hae dune himsel'. Whatna day 's the beerial ? " inquired Jamie, anxiously.

"Beerial? Losh preserve 's, Jamie," began Hillocks, but Drumsheugh understood.

"Jamie hes the richt o't; if Burnbrae hed slippit awa', yir faces cudna be langer. He 's no oot o' the Glen yet, and wha kens gin he mayna beat the factor yet?

"It 's no muckle we can dae in that quarter but there 's ae thing in oor poor. We can see that Burnbrae hes a gude roup, an' gin he maun leave us that he carries eneuch tae keep him an' the gude wife for the rest o' their days.