The Silver Maple Part 7

"Aye," he was saying, "a dictionary 's a graund inst.i.tution; aye, jist a graund inst.i.tution, like. When me an' the master now meets a word we dinna ken, we jist run him doon in the dictionary, an' there he is, ye see!"

"Oh, books will be fine things," said Big Malcolm, "but that Hamish of ours will jist be no use when he will be getting his nose into one, whatever. And he will be making the wee man jist as bad. Eh, it's him that'll make the reader!" His eyes shone as they always did at any mention of his grandson.

"Aye, Hamish is the man for the books!" cried Store Thompson enthusiastically. "How is he gettin' on wi' Ivanhoe?"

"Och, he would be finishing it the night after he brought it home, indeed; and now the little upstart will be trying his hand at it whatever."

"Feenishin' it in twa nichts!" cried Store Thompson, aghast at such extravagance. "Hut, tut! yon's no way to use a book. When me an' the wife read Ivanhoe last winter, we jist read a wee bit at a time for fear it wouldna last; it wes that interestin'. Aye, books is too scarce to be used yon way."

"And what will you and the master be reading, this winter, James?"

inquired Long Lauchie, who had just returned from one of his mental excursions.

Store Thompson's face beamed. "Eh, it's a graund book this time, Lauchie, jist an Astronomy, like."

"Eh, losh, an' what would it be about?"

"All aboot the stars, aye an' the moon an' the constellations, like."

"Eh, eh!" Long Lauchie was very much impressed. "And would it be telling about the comets, whatever?"

Store Thompson stood erect and put his finger tips together.

"A comet," he declared solemnly, "a comet, Lauchlan, so far as Ah can mak' oot frae the book, is jist naething more nor less than an indestructible, incomprehensible combustion o' matter; aye, jist that, like."

There was an impressive silence. When Store Thompson took his flights through the vast s.p.a.ces of knowledge he was always hard to follow, but when he soared to the heights of astronomy the district fathers felt him to be unapproachable.

"'Seek Him that maketh the seven stars and Orion.'" The silence was broken by a deep, rolling voice; a voice so powerful that even when softened, as it now was, it gave the impression of vast possibilities.

The speaker was like his voice, huge and strong; the thick, waving hair covering his ma.s.sive head, and his bushy beard were a dark iron-grey, which, with his strong features and bristling eyebrows, gave him the appearance of a man carved from iron. It was Praying Donald, the earliest pioneer of the Oa, and the most pious man in many settlements.

"'Seek Him that maketh the seven stars and Orion,' that will be the word of the Holy Book, and it will be a poor thing to be seeking the stars first."

Every eye was turned upon the speaker. Praying Donald was a man who spoke seldom, but when he did everyone listened.

"Yes, indeed, it is the Word of Jehovah we should be reading," he continued, "for I would be reading last night, and the Lord would be speaking to me through the Word, and it was, 'Blow ye the trumpet in Zion.... Let all the inhabitants of the land tremble, for the day of the Lord cometh, for it is nigh at hand; a day of darkness and gloominess and of thick darkness.' And it will be this land that it will be coming upon. For there will be the drink and the fighting, and there will be no minister, and no house of the Lord, for we will be in the gall of bitterness and in the bonds of iniquity.

"Yes, we must be praying, praying night and day, and maybe that the Lord in His mercy will be sending us a minister; for if He will not be visiting us in His mercy, He will be coming in His wrath, and who shall stand in the day of His judgment?"

Weaver Jimmie flung one leg over the other nervously. Long Lauchie sighed, and Store Thompson murmured, "Undeniable, undeniable." But Big Malcolm sat staring at the speaker as if fascinated. Praying Donald's life of stern piety, and his knowledge of the laws governing human action, had often enabled him to foresee events, and had given him the reputation of a prophet. The memory of the scene in which he had so lately taken part came over Big Malcolm with overwhelming force.

"It is the true word," he whispered, as though smitten with a sudden fear. "Och, and it will be Malcolm MacDonald that will be visited in wrath for his sins, whatever!"

"Ye're richt, Donald," said Store Thompson, at length, "what wi' the whuskey an' the wild goin's on this place is jist in a bad state. But it's thae Eerish. Man," he continued emphatically, "thae Eerish, whether Catholic or Protestant, are jist a menace to the country, aye, jist yon, jist a menace, like!"

"It is the Oa that will be as bad as the Flats," said Praying Donald relentlessly. "They will be forsaking their G.o.d and be following after their own evil desires!"

Long Lauchie suddenly opened his eyes. He was in the habit of seizing upon a remark and retiring with it slowly, repeating it over and over in a lessening whisper until he was lost in the echoing caverns of imagination, and was wont to emerge from these absent fits suddenly with the air of a diver who comes to the surface with a great treasure.

He came to life at this moment, his eyes wide open, his manner alert; "Eh, it will be a fulfilment o' the prophecy o' Jeremiah, 'Out of the north an evil shall break forth upon all the inhabitants of the land.'

Eh, eh, out o' the north--the north--it would perhaps be meaning the Oa," he whispered fearfully to Weaver Jimmie. "Out of the north--the north----" His voice gradually died away and he was lost in meditation.

"This place is not like the auld land," said old Sandy Hamilton, moodily. "Man, we werna bothered wi' ony Fenians, nor Orangemen, nor sik like there!"

"Times'll be better now the Murphys know their place," said Weaver Jimmie confidently, pitching one leg over the other. "Callum led a fine charge. The Fenians may take Canady, but they'll not----"

"Hooch!" Big Malcolm broke in fiercely. Weaver Jimmie did not properly belong either by age or sentiments to this gathering, and his remark regarding Callum was very much out of place. "Yon son o' mine will jist be a breeder o' mischief in this place, James MacDonald!" he cried, "an' it's little check you will be on him, whatever. It is high time, indeed, that ye were both settlin' down an' stoppin' such doings!

But och, och," he added with a sudden change of tone, "it is myself will be the worst of them all."

Weaver Jimmie heaved a sentimental sigh. "It will not be any fault of mine that I will not be settled down," he muttered gloomily.

Praying Donald's rumbling voice had arisen again. "Yes, oh yes, the evil will be growing; and the Judge will be coming in His wrath and we will jist be like Sodom and Gomorrah!"

"Oh, indeed," broke in Store Thompson, "the good Lord is slow to anger and of great mercy, Donald, ye mind!"

"Mercy!" roared Praying Donald. "Eh, James, do not be deceiving yourselves! He will be just. We must be reaping what we sow. This place is sowing the wind and it will be reaping the whirlwind. 'For I the Lord thy G.o.d am a jealous G.o.d, visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children unto the third and fourth generation of them that hate me.'"

Long Lauchie came suddenly to the surface, this time with a precious pearl: "And showing mercy unto thousands," he continued softly. "Oh, yes, indeed and indeed, unto thousands, mercy unto thousands!" He sank again into the ocean of his imagination, and the tide of conversation flowed over him unheeded.

"'Visiting the sins of the father upon the children,'" repeated Big Malcolm bitterly. He dropped his head into his hands and groaned.

There was a long silence. These men were facing a great problem in the building up of this new nation, one which presented graver difficulties than they had met even in the toil and stress of breaking the forest.

In the early days the social problem had not arisen; the settler had been too busy to permit of its troubling him. He needed all his time and strength to battle with this new land and compel her to give him his due of bread and shelter. But now, the stern young stepmother was yielding to those whom she recognised as worthy to be her sons, and was rewarding them with wider pasture-lands and waving fields of grain.

Now the pioneer found time to draw breath and look about him. All through the years of weary hardship, homesickness for the old land had been heavy on his heart and his love for it had grown. And now, with some time for sentiment and reflection, he found his thoughts turning thither; old loves were re-awakened, old traditions revived, old enmities fanned into flame. The still wild stretches of forest called on all sides for wild, free action; the wind swept down over the Oro hills, straight from the vast expanse of the Great Lakes, setting the blood leaping for vigorous action. Little wonder, then, that in their first days of leisure men should go a few steps farther back towards the savage stage from which we are all such a short distance removed.

And little wonder, too, that the wiser ones trembled lest their new land of promise, now so smiling, so prodigal of her favours, might be scarred with the marks of evil.

And so, these simple seers, these men, ignorant in the world's wisdom, but many of them secure in the knowledge of One, whom to know is life eternal, turned in their fear and perplexity to the fountain-head of righteousness.

"We must be having a prayer meeting, lads," said Praying Donald at length. "We could be having them all this winter, once a week, and maybe the good Lord will be sending us a minister."

"Eh, if we could get a meenister like auld Angus McGregor!" said Store Thompson. "Ah jist heerd him once, but it was a veesitation, aye, jist a veesitation, like. D'ye mind yon sermon, Lauchie, on 'Simon Peter, lovest thou me'?"

Long Lauchie awoke from his reverie with a start. The mention of the great Scottish preacher set going a train of tender memories. "Eh, Mr.

McGregor!" he cried, "Mr. McGregor,--eh, there will not be such men nowadays I will be fearing. He was the man of G.o.d, indeed--yes--oh, yes----"

And as he faded away into the distance, the others made the necessary arrangements. They would hold a series of prayer meetings in the Oa and the Glen to last during the winter. Store Thompson made a feeble suggestion that they might join the Methodists, Tom Caldwell's faction in the Flats. For Tom, who was as active at wrestling in prayer as in any other sphere, in company with the population of the Tenth, had secured the services of a primitive Methodist preacher, and was holding nightly meetings in the schoolhouse, where much good was done. But the noisy devotions of the Flats met with little favour in the sight of the Oa. Praying Donald, conscious of the purity of their motive, had visited the Methodists once, and had now little to say in commendation.

"They will be doing the best they know, James," he declared, "but the Lord will be taking no pleasure in tumult and confusion, and we will jist be holding our meetings at the neighbours' houses, whatever."

And so the first meeting was arranged to be held at Long Lauchie's, and, before parting, the little group knelt about the boxes and bales, and in low, solemn tones like the breaking of waves on a rocky sh.o.r.e, Praying Donald besought the Eternal Father for a blessing on this new land and an instilling of the righteousness that exalteth a nation.

The news of the meeting was spread through the community, chiefly by Weaver Jimmie; and was received with much thankfulness by most of the people, who had been longing all the days of their exile for something resembling the church services of the old land.

When the night of the first meeting arrived, Scotty was in a state of carefully subdued excitement. He knew by his grandfather's manner that the occasion was one calling for solemnity of demeanour; but he could not help feeling very much worked up over the thought of going away from home after dark; it made one feel almost as big and important as Callum. He could scarcely believe his senses when they covered the fire, closed the door and all drove away in the big sleigh. Granny sat on the front seat beside Grandaddy, another strange circ.u.mstance, for Granny never went anywhere either by day or by night, except when a neighbour was sick. Scotty further emphasised his grown-up feeling by sitting behind with the boys; they conversed in low tones, and Callum said he'd "a good mind to skedaddle off into the bush." But they were unusually quiet. Rory even forbore to whistle, and the boy found he had to amuse himself by peering into the silent blackness of the pine forest, or gazing up at the strip of clear star-spangled heavens that shone between the lines of trees.

Long Lauchie's house, which stood on a hill at the end of a very long lane, was brightly lighted and very silent. This last fact was worthy of note, for what with the misdemeanours of Long Lauchie's own sons, and the a.s.sistance they received from Big Malcolm's boys, the place had long been a rival of Pete Nash's establishment for noise, though, happily, it was of a much more innocent character.

The room they entered, kitchen, dining-room and living-room, was furnished, like all the pioneers' homes, with the plainest necessities; but Long Lauchie's family had grown-up girls in it, and the place showed the touch of their fingers; a few bright rugs on the floor, and on the wall some pictures in homemade frames. Then there were some oil lamps, replacing the candles, and the house was so far in the van of progress as to possess a stove, which added not a little to the comfort, and detracted much from the picturesqueness, of the room.

The family consisted of a troop of boys and girls, all ages and sizes, from big, six-foot Hector to little tangle-haired Betty. They were already gathered, and several of the neighbours' families had arrived and were seated on the improvised benches along the wall. There were Praying Donald's family, Store Thompson and his wife, several others representative of the Oa and the Glen, and, of course, Weaver Jimmie.

Jimmie's face shone with soap and excitement, and his manner was a series of embarra.s.sed convulsions; for Kirsty John, the cruel object of his hopeless love, was there. A fine, big, strapping young woman she was, with a strong face, and a pair of fearless, black eyes. She sat bolt upright against the log wall, talking to Mary Lauchie, a sweet, pale-faced girl; and occasionally casting a withering glance in the direction of the bench behind the stove, where the Weaver was alternately striving to efface himself and to attract her attention.