The Stickit Minister's Wooing/Jaimsie

I drove home the other day I saw that old lazybones Jacob Irving seated in the sun with a whole covey of boys round him. He had his pocket-knife in his hand, and was busy mending a "gird." The "gird," or wooden hoop, belonged to Will Bodden, and its precedence in medical treatment had been secured by Will's fists. There was quite a little hospital ward behind, of toys all awaiting diagnosis in strict order of primacy.

Here was Dick Dobie with a new blade to put into his shilling knife. A shilling knife, Jacob assured him, is not fitted for cutting down fishing rods. It is however, excellent as a saw when used on smaller timber. Next came Peter Cheesemonger, who was in waiting with a model schooner, the rising of which had met with an accident. And there hurrying down from the cottage on the Brae, was one of the younger Allan lasses with her mother's "wag-at-the-wa'" clock. The pendulum had wagged to such purpose that it had swung itself out of its right mind.

After I had left behind me this vision of old Jacob Irving seated on the wall of the boys' playground at the village school, I fell into a muse upon the narrowness of the line which in our Scottish parishes, divides the "Do-Everythings" from the "Do-Nothings."

I could give myself the more completely to this train of thought that I had finished my rounds for the day, and had now nothing to do except to look forward to seeing Nance, and to the excellent dinner for which the shrewd airs of the moorland were providing internal accommodation of quite a superior character.

The conditions of Scottish life are generally so strenuous, and the compulsions of "He that will not work, neither shall he eat" so absolute that we cannot afford more than one local Do-Nothing in a village or rural community. Equally certainly, however, one is necessary. The business of the commonwealth could not be carried on without him. Besides, he is needed to point the indispensable moral.

"There's that guid-for-naething Jacob Irvin' sittin' wi' a' the misleared boys o' the neighbourhood aboot him!" I can hear a douce goodwife say to her gossip. "Guid peety his puir wife and bairns! Guidman, lay ye doon that paper an' awa' to your wark, or ye'll sune be nae better—wi' your Gledstane and your speeches and your smokin'! Think shame o' yersel', guidman."

As the community grows larger, however, there is less and less room for the amiable Do-Nothing. He is, indeed, only seen to perfection in a village or rural parish. In Cairn Edward, for instance which thinks itself quite a town, he does not attain the general esteem and almost affectionate reprobation which, in my native Whinnyliggate, follow Jacob Irving about like his shadow.

In a town like Cairn Edward a local Do-Nothing is apt to attach himself to a livery stable, and there to acquire a fine coppery nose and a permanent "dither" about the knees. He is spoken of curtly and even disrespectfully as "that waister Jock Bell." In cities he becomes a mere matter for the police, and the facetious reporter chronicles his two-hundredth appearance before the magistrate.

But in Whinnyliggate, in Dullarg, in Crosspatrick, and in the surrounding parishes, the conditions for the growth of the Do-Nothing approach as near perfection as anything merely mundane can be expected to do. Jacob Irving is hardly a typical specimen, for he has a trade. The genuine Do-Nothing should have none. It is true that Jacob's children might reply, like the boy when asked if his father were a Christian, "Yes, but he does not work at it much!"

Jacob is a shoe-maker—or rather shoe-mender. For I have never yet been able to trace an entire pair of Jacob's foot-gear on any human extremities. It does not fit his humour to be so utilitarian. He has, however, made an excellent toy pair for the feet of little Jessie Lockhart's doll, with soles, heels, uppers, tongues, and lacing gear all complete. He spent, to my personal knowledge, an entire morning in showing her (on the front step of her father's manse) how to take them off and put them on again. And in the future he will never meet Jessie on the King's highway without stopping and gravely asking her if any repairs are yet requisite. When such are necessary they will, without doubt, receive his best attention.

I had not, however, made a study of Jacob Irving for any considerable period without exploding the vulgar opinion that the parish Do-Nothing is an idle or a lazy man. Nay, to repeat my initial paradox, the Do-Nothing is the only genuine Do-Everything.

When on a recent occasion I gave Jacob, in return for the pleasure of his conversation, a "lift" in my doctor's gig, he talked to me very confidentially of his "rounds." At first I imagined in my ignorance that, like the tailors of the parishes round about, he went from farm to farm prosecuting his calling and cobbling the shoes of half the countryside. I was buttressed in this opinion by his expressed pity or contempt for wearers of "clogs."

"Here's anither puir body wi' a pair o' clogs on his feet," Jacob would say; "and to think that for verra little mair than the craitur paid for them, I wad fit him wi' as soond a pair o' leather-soled shoon as were ever ta'en frae amang tanners' bark!"

I had also seen him start out with a thin-bladed cobbler's knife and the statutory piece of "roset" or resin wrapped in a palm's-breadth of soft leather. But, alas, all was a vain show. The knife was to be used in delicate surgical work upon the deceased at a pig-killing, and the resin was for splicing fishing-rods.

After a while I began by severe study to get to the bottom of a Do-Nothing's philosophy. To do the appointed task for the performance of which duty calls, man waits, and money will be paid, that is work to be avoided by every means—by procrastination, by fallacious promise, by prevarication, and (sad to have to say it) by the plainest of plain lying.

Whatever brings in money in the exercise of a trade, whatever must be finished within a given time, that needs the co-operation of others or prolonged and consecutive effort on his own part, is merely anathema to the Do-Nothing.

On the other hand, no house in the parish is too distant for him to attend at the "settin' o' the yaird" (the delving must, however, be done previously). On such occasions the Do-Nothing revels in long wooden pins with string wrapped mysteriously about them. He can turn you out the neatest shaped bed of "onions" and "syboes," the straightest rows of cabbages, and potato drills so level that the whole household feels that it must walk the straight path in order not to shame them. The wayfaring man though a fool, looks over the dyke, and says: "Thae dreels are Jacob's—there's nane like them in the countryside!"

This at least is Jacob's way of it.

But though all this is by the way of introduction to the particular Do-Nothing I have in my eye, it is not of Jacob that I am going to write. Jacob is indeed an enticing subject, and from the point of view of his wife, might be treated very racily. But, though I afterwards made Margate Irving's acquaintance (and may one day put her opinions on record), I have other and higher game in my mind.

This is none other than the Reverend James Tacksman, B.A., licentiate of the Original Marrow Kirk of Scotland. In fact, a clerical Do-Nothing of the highest class.

Now, to begin with, I will aver that there is no scorn in all this. "Jaimsie" is more to me than many worthy religious publicists, beneficed, parished, churched, stipended, and sustentationed to the eyes. He was not a very great man. He was in no sense a successful man, but—he was "Jaimsie."

I admit that my zeal is that of the pervert. It was not always thus with me when "Jaimsie" was alive, and perhaps my enthusiasm is so full-bodied from a sense that it is impossible for the gentle probationer to come and quarter himself upon Nance and myself for (say) a period of three months in the winter season, a thing he was quite capable of doing when in the flesh.

In the days before I was converted to higher views of human nature as represented in the person of "Jaimsie," I was even as the vulgar with regard to him. I admit it. I even openly scoffed, and retailed to many the story of Jamie and my father, Saunders McQuhirr of Drumquhat, with which I shall conclude. I used to tell it rather well at college, the men said. At least they laughed sufficiently. But now I shall not try to add, alter, amend, or extenuate, as is the story-teller's wont with his favourites. For in sackcloth and ashes I have repented me, and am at present engaged in making my honourable amend to "Jaimsie."

For almost as long as I can remember the Reverend James Tacksman, B.A., was in the habit of coming to my father's house, and the news that he was in view on the "far brae-face" used to put my mother into such a temper that "dauded" heads and cuffed ears were the order of the day. The larger fry of us cleared out promptly to the barn and stackyard till the first burst of the storm was over. Even my father, accustomed as he was to carry all matters ecclesiastical with a high hand, found it convenient to have some harness to clean in the stable, or the lynch-pin of a cart to replace in the little joiner's shop where he passed so much of his time.

"I'll no hae the craitur aboot the hoose," my mother would cry; "I telled ye sae the last time he was here—sax weeks in harvest it was—and then had maist to be shown the door. (Haud oot o' my road, weans! Can ye no keep frae rinnin' amang my feet like sae mony collie whaulps? Tak' ye that!) Hear ye this, guidman, if ye willna speak to the man, by my faith I wull. Mary McQuhirr is no gaun to hae the bread ta'en oot o' the mooths o' her innocent bairns (Where in the name o' fortune, Alec, are ye gaun wi' that soda bannock? Pit it doon this meenit, or I'll tak' the tings to ye!). Na, nor I will be run aff my feet to pleesure ony sic useless, guid-for-naething seefer as Jaimsie Tacksman!"

At this moment a faint rapping made itself audible at the front door, never opened except on the highest state occasions, as when the minister called, and at funerals.

My mother (I can see her now) gave a hasty "tidy" to her gray hair and adjusted her white-frilled "mutch" about her still winsome brow.

"And hoo are ye the day, Maister Tacksman, an' it's a lang, lang season since we've had the pleasure o' a veesit frae you!"

Could that indeed be my mother's voice, so lately upraised in denunciation over a stricken and cowering world? I could not understand it then, and to tell the truth I don't quite yet. I have, however, asked her to explain, and this is what she says:

"Weel, ye see, Alec, it was this way" (she is pleased when I require any points for my "scribin'," though publicly she scoffs at them and declares it will ruin my practice if the thing becomes known), "ye see I had it in my mind to the last minute to deny the craitur. But when I gaed to open the door, there stood Jaimsie wi' his wee bit shakin' hand oot an' his threadbare coatie hingin' laich aboot his peetifu' spindle shanks, and his weel-brushit hat, an' the white neck-claith that wanted doin' up. And I kenned that naebody could laundry it as weel as me. My fingers juist fair yeukit (itched) to be at the starchin' o't. And faith, maybes there was something aboot the craitur too—he was sae cruppen in upon himsel', sae wee-bookit, sae waesome and yet kindly aboot the e'en, that I juist couldna say him nay."

That is my mother's report of her feelings in the matter. She does not add that the ten minutes or quarter of an hour in which she had been able to give the fullest and most public expression to her feelings had allowed most of the steam of indignation to blow itself off. My father, who was a good judge, gave me, early in my married life, some excellent advice on this very point, which I subjoin for the edification of the general public.

"Never bottle a woman up, Alec," he said, meditatively. "What Vesuvius and Etna and thae ither volcanoes are to this worl', the legeetimate exercise o' her tongue is to a woman. It's a naitural function, Alec. Ye may bridle the ass or the mule, but—gie the tongue o' a woman (as it were) plenty o' elbow-room! Gang oot o' the hoose—like Moses to the backside o' the wilderness gin ye like, and when ye come in she will be as quaite as pussy; and if ever ye hae to contradick your mairried wife, Alec, let it be in deeds, no in words. Gang your road gin ye hae made up your mind, immovable like the sun, the mune, and the stars o' heeven in their courses—but, as ye value peace dinna be aye crying' 'Aye,' when your wife cries 'No'!"

Which things may be wisdom. But to the tale of our Jaimsie.

Sometimes, moreover, even the natural man in my kindly and long-suffering father uprose against the preacher. Jaimsie knew when he was comfortable, and no mere hint of any delicate sort would make him curtail his visit by one day. I can remember him creeping about the farm of Drumquhat all that summer, a book in his hand, contemplating the works of God as witnessed chiefly in the growth of the "grosarts." (We always blamed him—quite unjustly, I believe—for eating the "silver-gray" gooseberries on the sly.) Now he would stand half an hour and gaze up among the branches of an elm, where a cushat was tirelessly coorooring to his mate. Anon you would see him apparently deeply engaged in counting the sugar-plums in the orchard. After a little he would be found seated on the red shaft of a cart in the stackyard, jotting down in a shabby note-book ideas for the illustrations of sermons never to be written; or if written, doomed never to be preached. His hat was always curled up at the back and pulled down at the front, and till my mother made down an old pair of my father's Sunday trousers for him (and put them beside his bed while he slept), you could see in a good light the reflection of your hand on the knees of his "blacks." It is scarcely necessary to say that Jaimsie never referred to the transposition, nor, indeed, in all probability, so much as discovered it.

Jaimsie was used to conduct family worship morning and evening in the house of his sojourn, as a kind of quit-rent for his meal of meat and his prophet's chamber. To the ordinary reading of the Word he was wont to subjoin an "exposeetion" of some disputed or prophetical passage. The whole exercises never took less than an hour, if Jaimsie were left to the freedom of his own will—which, as may be inferred, was extremely awkward in a busy season when the corn was dry in the stock or when the scythes flashed rhythmically like level silver flames among the lush meadow grass.

Finally, therefore, a compromise had to be effected. My father took the morning diet of worship, but Jaimsie had his will of us in the evening. I can see them yet—those weariful sederunts, when even my father wrestled with sleep like Samson with the Philistines, while my mother periodically nodded forward with a lurch, and, recovering herself with a start, the next moment looked round haughtily to see which of us was misbehaving. Meanwhile the kitchen was all dark, save where before Jaimsie the great Bible lay open between two candles, and on the hearth the last peat of the evening glowed red.

Many is the fine game of draughts I have had with my brother Rob and Christie Wilson our herd lad, by putting the "dam-brod" behind the chimney jamb where my father and mother could not see it, and moving the pieces by the light of the red peat ash. I am ashamed to think on it now, but then it seemed the only thing to do which would keep us from sleep.

And meantime Jaimsie prosed on, his gentle sing-song working its wicked work on mother like a lullaby, and my father sending his nails into the palms of his hands that he might not be shamed before us all.

I remember particularly how Jaimsie addressed us for a whole week on his favourite text in he Psalms, "The hill of God is as the hill of Bashan—an high hill, as the hill of Bashan."

And in the pauses of crowning our men and scuffling for the next place at the draught-board, we could catch strange words and phrases which come to me yet with a curious wistful thrilling of the heart. Such are "White as snow on Salmon"—"That mount Sinai in Arabia"—"Ye mountains of Gilboa, let there be no dew, neither let there be rain upon you, nor fields of offering."

And as a concluding of the whole matter we sang this verse out of Francis Roos's psalter:

It was all double-Dutch to me then, but now I can see that Jaimsie must have been marshalling the mountains of Scripture to bear solemn witness against an evil and exceedingly somnolent generation.

Once when my mother snored audibly Jaimsie looked up, but at that very moment she awoke, and with great and remarkable presence of mind promptly cuffed Rob, who in his turn knocked the draught-board endways, just as I had his last man cornered, to our everlasting disgrace.

My mother asked us next day pointedly where we thought we were going to, and if we were of opinion that there would be any dam-brods in hell. I offered no remarks, but Rob—who was always an impudent boy—got on the other side of the dyke from my mother and answered that there would be no snorers there either.

From an early age he was a lad of singularly sound judgments, my brother Rob. He stayed out in the barn till after my mother was asleep that night.

At last, however, even my father grew tired of Jaimsie. He stayed full three months on this occasion. Autumnal harvest fields were bared of stooks, the frost began to glisten on the stiff turnip shaws, the wreathed nets were put up for the wintering sheep, and still the indefatigable Jaimsie stayed on.

I remember yet the particular morning when, at long and last, Jaimsie left us. All night almost there had been in the house the noise as of a burn running over hollow stones, with short solid interruptions like the sound of a distant mallet stricken on wood. It came from my father's and mother's room. I knew well what it meant. The sound like running water was my mother trying to persuade my father to something against his will, and the far-away mallet thuds were his mono-syllabic replies.

This time it was my mother who won.

After the harvest bustle was over, Jaimsie had resumed his practice of taking worship in the mornings, but any of us who had urgent work on hand could obtain, by proper representation, a dispensing ordinance. These were much sought after, especially when Jaimsie started to tackle the Book of Daniel "in his ordinary," as he phrased it.

But this Monday morning, to the general surprise, my father sat down in the chair of state himself and reached the Bible from the shelf.

"I will take family worship this morning, Mr. Tacksman," he said, with great sobriety.

Then we knew that something extraordinary was coming, and I was glad I had not "threeped" to my mother that I had seen some of the Nether Neuk sheep in our High Park—which would have been quite true, for I had put them there myself on purpose the night before.

It was during the prayer that the blow fell. My father had a peculiarly distinct and solemn way with him in supplication; and now the words fell distinct as hammer strokes on our ear.

He prayed for the Church of God in all covenanted lands; for all Christian peoples of every creed (here Jaimsie, faithful Abdiel, always said "Humph"); for the heathen without God and without hope; for the family now present and for those of the family afar off. Then, as was his custom, he approached the stranger (who was no stranger) within our gates.

"And do Thou, Lord, this day vouchsafe journeying mercies to Thy servant who is about to leave us. Grant him favourable weather for his departure, good speed on his way, and a safe return to his own country!"

A kind of gasping sigh went all about the kitchen. I knew that my mother had her eye on my father to keep him to his pledged word of the night season. So I dared not look round.

But we all ached to know how Jaimsie would take it, and we all joined fervently in the supplication which promised us a couple of hours more added to our day.

Then came the Amen, and all rose to their feet. Jaimsie seemed a little dazed, but took the matter like a scholar and a gentleman.

He held out his hand to my father with his usual benevolent smile.

"I did not know that I had mentioned it," he said, "but I was thinking of leaving you to-day."

And that was all he said, but forthwith went upstairs to pack his shabby little black bag.

My father stood a while as if shamed; then, when we heard Jaimsie's feet trotting overhead, he turned somewhat grimly to my mother. On his face was an expression as if he had just taken physic.

"Well," he said, "you will be easier in your mind now, Mary." This he said, well knowing that the rat of remorse was already getting his incisors to work upon his wife's conscience. She stamped her foot.

"Saunders McQuhirr," she said in suppressed tones, "to be a Christian man, ye are the maist aggrevatin'"

But at that moment my father went out through the door, saying no further word.

My mother shooed us all out of the house like intrusive chickens, and I do not know for certain what she did next. But Rob, looking through the blind of the little room where she kept her house-money, saw her fumbling with her purse. And when at last Jaimsie, having addressed his bag to be sent with the Carsphairn carrier into Ayrshire (where dwelt the friends next on his visiting list), came out with his staff in one hand, he was dabbing his eyes with a clean handkerchief.

Then, after that, all that I remember is the pathetic figure of the little probationer lifting up a hand in silent blessing upon the house which had sheltered him so long; and so taking his lonely way over the hillside towards the northern coach road.

When my father came in from the sheep at mid-day, he waited till grace was over, and then, looking directly at my mother, he said: "Weel, Mary, how mony o' your pound notes did he carry away in his briest-pocket this time?"

I shall never forget the return and counter retort which followed. My mother was vexed—one of the few times that I can remember seeing her truly angered with her husband.

"I would give you one advice, Saunders McQuhirr," she said, "and that is, from this forth, to be mindful of your own business."

"I will tak' that advice, Mary," he answered slowly; "but my heart is still sore within me this day because I took the last advice you gied me!"

And it was destined to be yet sorer for that same cause. Jaimsie never was within our doors again. He abode in Ayrshire and the Upper Ward all that winter and spring, and it was not till the following back-end, and in reply to a letter and direct invitation from my conscience-stricken father, that he announced that, all being well and the Lord gracious, he would be with us the following Friday.

But on the Thursday night a great snow storm came on, and the drift continued long unabated. We all said that Jaimsie would doubtless be safely housed, and we did not look for him to arrive upon the day of his promise. However, by Monday, when the coach was again running, my mother began to be anxious, and all the younger of us went forth to try and get news of him. We heard that he had left Carsphairn late on the Thursday forenoon, meaning to stop overnight at the shepherd's shieling at the southern end of Loch Dee. But equally certainly he had never reached it.

It was not till Tuesday morning early that Jaimsie was found under a rock near the very summit of the Dungeon hill, his plaid about him and his frozen hand clasping his pocket Bible. It was open, and his favourite text was thrice underscored.

"The hill of God is as the hill of Bashan—an high hill, as the hill of Bashan."

Well, there is no doubt that the little forlorn "servant of God" has indeed gotten some new light shed upon the text, since the dark hour when he sat down to rest his weary limbs upon the snow-clad summit of the Dungeon of Buchan.