Flora Lyndsay Volume I Part 28

"Perhaps it is the best way to confide ourselves entirely to His care, and to think as little about it as we possibly can. All our precautions remind me of the boy who hid up in the cellar during a terrible thunderstorm, in the hope that the lightning would never find him there, little dreaming, that his place of safety exposed him to as much danger as a stand on the house-top. A man may run away from a battle, and escape from a fire, but it seems to me of little use attempting to fly from a pestilence which lurks in the very air we breathe, the water we drink, and the food we take to nourish us. Faith in the mercy of G.o.d, and submission to His will appear to me the only remedies at all likely to avert the danger we shrink from with so much fear."

"It comes like a thief in the night," said Mr. Gregg; "and it behoves us all to mind the warning o' the Saviour, to watch an' pray, for we know not at what hour the Master of the house cometh."

After the good Greggs had made their adieus, Flora felt so much recovered that she accompanied her husband in a coach, to bid the rest of their kind friends in Edinburgh farewell.

They drove first to the house of Mr. W., where Flora had spent many happy days during her sojourn in Leith. Mr. W. had an only son, who held an official situation at the Cape of Good Hope. Lyndsay had been on intimate terms with this gentleman during his residence in the colony; and on his return to Scotland, he was always a welcome visitor at the house of his parents. They loved to talk of Willie to Lyndsay, and treasured up as household words any little anecdotes they could collect of his colonial life. Mrs. W. and her two daughters were highly accomplished, elegant women. They took a deep interest in the fate of the emigrants, and were always devising plans for their future comfort.

As to the father of the family, he was a perfect original-shrewd, sarcastic, clever, and _very ugly_. The world called him morose and ill-natured; but the world only judged from his face, and most certainly he should have indicted it for bringing false witness against him. It was a libellous face, which turned the worst aspect to the world; its harsh lines and exaggerated features magnifying mental defects, while they concealed the good qualities of the warm, generous heart that shone like some precious gem within that hard rough case.

Mr. W. loved opposition, and courted it. He roused himself up to an argument, as a terrier dog rouses himself to kill rats; and, like the said terrier, when he got the advantage of his opponent, he loved to worry and tease, to hold on till the last, till the vanquished was fain to cry aloud for mercy; and then his main object in quitting the dispute was to lie in wait for a fresh tussel. Flora laughed at all his blunt speeches, and enjoyed his rude wit, and opposed him, and argued with him to his heart's content, until they became the best friends in the world.

Their first meeting was so characteristic, that we must give it here.

Flora had accepted an invitation to dine, with her husband, at Mr. W.'s house. It was only a family party, and they were to come early. On their arrival, they found that Mr. W. had been called away on business, but was expected back to dinner. After chatting awhile to Mrs. W. and her daughters, Flora's attention was strongly directed to an oil-painting which hung above the drawing-room mantelpiece. It was the portrait of an old man, as large as life. The figure was represented in a sitting posture, his head leaning upon his hand, or rather the chin supported in the open palm. The eyes glanced upward with a sarcastic, humorous expression, as if the original were in the act of asking some question which a listener might find it no easy matter to answer; and a smile of mischievous triumph hovered about the mouth. It was an extraordinary countenance. No common every-day face, to which you could point and say, "Does not that put you in mind of Mr. So-and-So?" Memory could supply no duplicate to this picture. It was like but one other face in the world, the one from which it had been faithfully copied. It was originally meant for a handsome face, but the features were exaggerated until they became grotesque and coa.r.s.e in the extreme, and the thick, bushy, iron-grey hair and whiskers, and clay-coloured complexion, put the finishing strokes to a portrait, which might be considered the very _ideal of ugliness_.

While Flora sat looking at the picture, and secretly wondering how any person with such a face could bear to see it transferred to canvas, she was suddenly roused from her reverie by the pressure of a heavy hand upon her shoulder, and a gentleman in a very gruff, but by no means an ill-natured or morose voice, thus addressed her.

"Did you ever see such a d--d ugly old fellow in your life before?"

"Never," returned Flora, very innocently. Then, looking up in his face, she cried out with a sudden start, and without the least mental reservation, "It is the picture of yourself!"

"Yes, it is my picture. An excellent likeness-half bulldog, half terrier. Judging from that ugly, crabbed old dog over the mantelpiece, what sort of a fellow ought I to be?"

He said this with a malicious twinkle in his clear, grey eyes, which glanced like sparks of fire from under his thick bushy eyebrows.

"Better than you look," said Flora, laughing. "But your question is not a fair one, Mr. W.; I was taken by surprise, and you must not press me too hard."

"A clear admission, young lady, that you would rather avoid telling the truth."

"It is the portrait of a plain man."

"Pshaw! You did not qualify it as such in your own mind. Plain-is only one degree worse than good-looking. You thought it-"

"Ugly-if you insist upon it."

"Nothing worse?"

"Eccentric-pugnacious-satirical."

"G.o.d's truth! But that was not all?"

"Good heavens! what am I to say?"

"Don't swear; 'tis not fashionable for ladies. I do it myself; but 'tis a bad habit. Now shall I tell you what you _did think_ of the picture?"

"I would rather have your opinion than mine."

"To relieve you from the horns of the dilemma? Well then; you thought it the ugliest, most repulsive, and withal the oddest phiz you ever saw; and you wondered how any one with such a hideous, morose countenance, could ever sit for the picture?"

"Indeed I did."

"Good!" cried her tormentor, clapping his hands. "You and I must be friends. You wonder how I came to guess your thoughts; I know them by my own. Had any one asked my opinion of the picture of another man as ugly as that, I should have spoken out plainly enough. Fortunately the qualities of the mind do not depend upon the beauty of the face; though personal beauty is greatly increased by the n.o.ble qualities of the mind; and I know my inner man to be as vastly superior to its outer case, as the moon is to the cloud she pierces with her rays. To mind, I am indebted for the greatest happiness I enjoy,-the confidence and affection of my wife and children.

"Mrs. W. was reckoned pretty in her youth; I think her so still. She was of a good family too; with a comfortable independence, and had lovers by the score. Yet, she fell in love with the ugly fellow, and married him, though he had neither fame nor fortune to offer her in exchange. Nothing but the mental treasures he had hid away from the world in this rough casket. My daughters are elegant, accomplished girls; not beauties, to be sure, but pleasing enough to be courted and sought after. Yet, they are proud of being thought like their ugly old father. That picture must be a likeness; it is pourtrayed by the hand of love. My dear girl there drew it with her own pencil, and rejoiced that she had caught the very expression of my face. To her, my dear lady, it is beautiful-for love is blind. She does not heed the ugly features; she only sees the mind she honours and obeys, looking through them."

"Ah, dear papa, who that knows you, as we know you, could ever think you ugly?" said Mary W., laying her hand on the old man's shoulder, and looking fondly and proudly in his face. "But I have forgotten all this time to introduce you to Mrs. Lyndsay."

"My old friend Lyndsay's wife? I ought not to be pleased with you, madam, for you disappointed a favourite scheme of mine."

"How could that possibly be?" said Flora.

"I loved that man of yours; I wanted him for a son-in-law. Of course, neither I nor the girls hinted such a wish to him. But had he asked, he would not have been refused."

"Mrs. Lyndsay!" broke in Mary W., "you must not mind papa's nonsense. He will say just what he likes. Mr. Lyndsay was always a great favourite with us all; and papa would have his joke at our expense."

"Well, my young friend has thought fit to please himself, and I am so well pleased with his wife, that she shall sit by the ugly old man; 'an'

I will ha' a spate o' clatter wi' her to mine ain sel.'"

The more Flora saw of the eccentric old man, the more she admired and respected him. In a little time, she ceased to think him ugly-he was only plain and odd-looking; till at length, like all the rest of Mr.

W.'s friends, she almost believed him handsome. When did genius ever fail to leave upon the rudest clay, an impress of its divine origin?

It was with feelings of mutual regret that our emigrants took leave, and for ever, of this talented family. Before the expiration of one short year, that happy group of kind faces had pa.s.sed out of the world! The sudden death of the younger Mr. W., who was the idol of the family, brought his mother in sorrow to the grave. The girls, by some strange fatality, only survived her a few weeks; and the good old man, bereft of every kindred tie, pined away and died of a broken heart!

Some years after Flora had been settled in Canada, a gentleman from Scotland, who had been acquainted with the W. family, told her that he called upon the old gentleman on a matter of business, a few days after the funeral of his youngest daughter. The old man opened the door: he was shrunk to a skeleton, and a perfect image of woe. When he saw who his visitor was, he shook his thin, wasted hand at him, with a melancholy, impatient gesture, exclaiming, "What brings you here, P--?

Leave this death-doomed house! I am too miserable to attend to anything but my own burden of incurable grief." He called again the following morning. The poor old man was dead!

The next day the emigrants bade farewell to the beautiful capital of Scotland. How gladly would Flora have terminated her earthly pilgrimage in that land of poetry and romance, and spent the rest of her days among its truthful, high-minded, hospitable people! But vain are regrets. The inexorable spirit of progress points onward; and the beings she chooses to be the parents of a new people, in a new land, must fulfil their destiny.

On the 1st of July, 1832, the Lyndsays embarked on board the brig _Anne_, to seek a new home beyond the Atlantic, and friends in a land of strangers.

CHAPTER XXVII.

A NEW SCENE AND STRANGE FACES.

Four o'clock P.M. had been tolled from all the steeples in Edinburgh, when Flora stood upon the pier "o' Leith," watching the approach of the small boat which was to convey her on board the ugly black vessel which lay at anchor at the Berwick Law. It was a warm, close, hazy afternoon; distant thunder muttered among the hills, and dense clouds floated around the mountain from base to summit, shrouding its rugged outline in a mysterious robe of mist. Ever and anon, as the electrical breeze sprang up and stirred these grey ma.s.ses of vapour, they rolled up in black shadowy folds which took all sorts of Ossianic and phantom-like forms-spirits of bards and warriors, looking from their grey clouds upon the land their songs had immortalised, or their valour saved.

Parties of emigrants and their friends were gathered together in small picturesque groups on the pier. The cheeks of the women were pale and wet with tears. The words of blessing and farewell, spoken to those near and dear to them, were often interrupted by low wailing and heart-breaking sobs.

Flora stood apart waiting for her husband, who had been to the ship, and was in the returning boat now making its way through the water to take her off. Sad she was, and pale and anxious, for the wide world was all before her, a world of new scenes and strange faces. A future as inscrutable and mysterious almost as that from which humanity instinctively shrinks, which leads so many to cling with expiring energy to evils with which they have grown familiar, rather than launch alone into that unknown sea which never bears upon its bosom a returning sail.

Ah! well is it for the poor trembling denizens of earth that-

"Heaven from all creatures hides the book of fate,"

or how could they bear up from day to day against the acc.u.mulated ills which beset them at every turn along the crooked paths of life?