The Heather-Moon
"No. Those of us Scots who were meant to be dour were always dour," Sir.
S argued, "since the days of John Knox, and long before. It was partly
climate--partly persecution. Both agreed with our constitutions. But
look, here's the little house where one of the greatest geniuses who
ever saw the light in Scotland first opened his eyes. I dare say he
didn't get much light--but he spent most of his life in giving it to
other people, out of his own gloom. Wouldn't Burns have been interested,
passing that house (as he must have, in the 'uproarious time' at
Ecclefechan), if his prophetic soul had said, 'Here, in this little
dwelling as humble as your own birthplace, will be born a man as great
as you--and one of your keenest critics?'"
I didn't answer, because no answer was needed, and because we were both
gazing hard at a small, whitewashed, double house made into one by an
archway joining the two parts together. Coming from Gretna Green it was
on our left in the midst of a gray and white village which would have
looked commonplace if it had not been framed by an immense sky. It was
as if this vast blue crystal case had been set down over Carlyle's
birthplace to protect and mark it out from other places. There was the
narrow, high-banked brook--"the gentle Kuhbach kindly gushing by" (as
Sir S. quoted)--which had made music in Carlyle's childish ears, to echo
through them all his life. Perhaps he paddled in the brook on hot summer
days, just as little boys were paddling when our Gray Dragon suddenly
broke the respectable silence of Ecclefechan; and I know that he must
have seen stormy sun-rises and fiery sunsets reflected in it as in a
mirror, just as the Lady of Shalott saw all the things that really
mattered passing in her looking-glass.
It is the kind of village, and the gray or whitewashed houses with their
red door-sills are the kind of houses, where you would say, rushing
through in a motor, "Nothing can possibly happen." Yet Carlyle happened;
and he was an event for the whole world, which now makes pilgrimages to
his birthplace. And I think that when his memory travelled back to
Ecclefechan, he would not have changed it for a garden of palaces and
flowers and fountains. Even the wee bairns playing in the road where
Carlyle played, knew why we stopped our car. They pointed out the
Carlyle house, gazing at us in solemn pity because we were poor
tourist-bodies, who couldna bide the rest of our lives in the best
village in a' the wurlld.
For my part, I pitied them, because their feet were bare, whereas the
poorest children in my native Carlisle have wonderfully nice shoes,
bound in brass. But all the Scot--and perhaps the crofter--rose in Sir
S. when I mourned over the little dusty feet. "Do you think they go
barefoot because they've no shoes?" he asked. "You're wrong. You don't
know your own country-folk yet. They've as good shoes as those Carlisle
kids, and better, maybe. It's because they don't like the feel of the
shoes when they play, and they're saving them for Sundays. I did the
same myself. Not a pair of shoes did I have on my feet, except on the
Sabbath day, till I was turned eleven."
It seemed to me that suddenly he had quite a Scotch burr in his voice,
and I did like him for it!
An apple-cheeked old body opened the door. On it was a brass plate which
would have told us, if we hadn't known already, that in this house
Thomas Carlyle was born. Remembering what he grew to be and to mean in
the big world, the three tiny rooms and the few simple relics were a
thousand times more pathetic than if we'd been led through apartment
after apartment of a palace, seeing christening cups and things under
glass cases. They did not seem sad to me, only a little dour in a
wholesome way, as porridge is dour compared to plum-cake. But the
cemetery which we went to after we had seen the house made me want to
cry. I didn't like to think that, coming back here to sleep after all
those many years, Carlyle had not his wife to rest beside him. Lying
with his ain folk behind grim iron railings couldn't have consoled him
for her absence. This is the only graveyard I ever saw except the one
where my father is buried; and somehow, it doesn't seem respectful to
the dead to go and criticise their graves, unless you are their friends,
bringing them flowers--pansies for thoughts and rosemary for
remembrance. It's like walking into people's houses and opening their
doors to look at them in bed when they're asleep, and can't resent your
intrusion, though they would hate it if they knew. I said this to Sir
S., and he partly agreed with me on principle; but he warned me that
there are cemeteries I must visit in Scotland unless I want to miss the
last volumes of several interesting human documents. I don't know
exactly what a human document is; still, I suppose I shall go to the
graveyards for the sake of finding out what he means.
He spoke as if I were likely to go to these places with him, and said
that he would enjoy showing me Carlyle's house in Chelsea, which is
"more full of the man's heart and soul than Ecclefechan is." But, of
course, he said this without stopping to think. He will go back to
America and forget the forlorn little princess he happened to rescue
from a neighbouring dragon. Yet never mind, I shan't be forlorn after
this! I shall have my mother, and mothers are more important to
princesses than the most glittering knights. I shall, of course, travel
about with her wherever she goes, so I can never be lonely or sad. I
ought to be even more impatient than I am for the day to come when she
is due in Edinburgh, and I can surprise her there: but I suppose, having
lived without her so long, it is difficult to realize that I'm actually
to see her at last. However, I think of her every minute--or perhaps
every other minute; and I haven't fully realized until to-day how much
there is for which I have to thank her: the gayety and hopefulness she
must have kept in her heart, and handed down to me. Without gayety and
hopefulness neither of us would have dared or cared to run away from
Hillard House.
I think, far-fetched as it seems, it was seeing Carlyle's birthplace,
and feeling the influence of his parents upon him, which made me
understand. Great genius as he was, I wonder if he might not have been
even greater if his mother or father had taught him that it was right to
be happy and wrong to be sad? Sir S. says that Jenny his wife could have
taught him all that, if he had chosen to learn; but he was grown up
then, and so it was too late. The sunshine must be in your blood when
you are a child, and then no shadows can ever quite darken the gold--or
at least, that is the thought which has come into my mind to-day.
It was the right thing to turn southward off the Glasgow highway after
Ecclefechan, to go to Annan and see the place where Carlyle got his
schooling. The Gray Dragon, travelling slowly (for it, or "her," as Sir
S. and Vedder always say), came to the end of the journey in a few
minutes; but when Carlyle walked along that pleasant shadowy road,
carrying his school books, he must have had plenty of time for
day-dreams. Now and then he could have seen the Solway gleaming, and I
can imagine how the beautiful, winding river must have given that grave,
wise boy thoughts of the great river of life, running to and from
eternity. We passed close to Hoddam Hill, where--Sir S. and Mrs. James
told me--the Carlyle family lived for a while when Thomas was grown up,
he translating German romances, and his brother working on the farm.
At Annan, looking at the statue of Carlyle's friend, Edward Irving, in
the broad High Street, we came back to the subject of Doctor James, and
I heard for the first time the real truth at the bottom of the bad
gossip.
We had got down from the car to look at the statue, and read what it
said on the pedestal. We were not thinking at first about the doctor,
but only of Edward Irving, and Sir S. was saying to Mrs. James how Annan
was only one of many towns where statues are put up to the memory of men
once misunderstood and cruelly persecuted in the very place where they
are afterward honoured. It seems that Edward Irving (who loved Mrs.
Carlyle when she was Jenny Welsh) had to come back to his native town to
be tried for heresy by the presbytery, after a brilliant career in
London as a fashionable preacher and founder of a new faith. All the
theologians of Scotland and crowds of other people (Sir S. says all true
Scots are theologians at heart) came pouring into Annan by coach and
chaise on the great day of the trial; and in spite of Irving's
passionate appeal, he was found guilty by a unanimous vote.
Talking of the trial, and of the preacher's death the next year, took
Mrs. James's mind to the subject which is never farther away than at the
back of her head. She found a likeness between Edward Irving's fate and
her husband's. "Richard was born in Carlisle and loved the place, but
they believed evil of him and persecuted him," she said. "Some day he
will come back and make Carlisle proud of her son. That's what I expect.
That's what I live for." And she gazed up at the statue of Irving the
preacher with quite the look of a prophetess in her eyes.
I was afraid that Sir S. would think her mad; but he seemed interested,
as before, and asked if she had in her mind any particular kind of
success her husband might be working to obtain. Was there something,
apart from his profession, and the unfinished volume of history, which
had occupied the thoughts of Doctor James in old days?
The little woman answered this question almost reluctantly, and I soon
guessed why. There was a serum which the doctor had been trying to
perfect. It was to be used instead of chloroform or ether, for people
with weak hearts, or when for other reasons anaesthetics were dangerous.
A patient in peril of death had begged Doctor James to try it upon him.
The doctor had consented. The patient had died, and though it was not
really because of the serum, but because the man couldn't possibly have
lived in any case, the doctor's enemies had blamed him. "That was what
broke his heart," Mrs. James explained, still staring at the statue with
wide-open eyes, to keep the tears from falling. "That is why he died to
the world which misjudged him."
"And do you think, if he can perfect this serum, he will come back?"
asked Sir Somerled.
"_When_, not 'if.' But I always knew it would take a long time, because
unless some rich person or people had faith and helped him, he would
have to get together a good deal of money for a laboratory before he
could make a great success or a great name. And he went away almost
without a penny."
"I see," said Sir S., thoughtfully. "Well, such faith as yours is enough
to inspire a man with courage to push the stone of Sisyphus to the top
of the hill. And it deserves a high reward. I hope the reward may come,
and that I may see the day. Now, we must go on, for this afternoon won't
last as long as I could wish."
He helped Mrs. James to her place with extra kindness, almost
tenderness, tucking behind her back the gray silk-covered air-cushion
which she says makes her feel she is leaning against a nice pudding.
Neither of us had asked Sir S. what we were to see next, for we trusted
him to choose; but when we were ready to leave Annan and go back to the
high road, he said that the thought of Galloway was haunting him. "We
can spin on to Glasgow by way of Moffat and see a lot of interesting
places; or we can turn west from Carlyle country, for a run through
Crockett country," he explained. "Which, shall it be?"
I was ashamed to confess that I didn't know why he called Galloway
"Crockett country"; but Mrs. James saw my sheepish look, and excused me.