The Entail. John GaltЧитать онлайн книгу.
one sacramental occasion to the other, and the dust being blown off, as on the Saturday night prior to the action sermon, she carried it to the kitchen to be more thoroughly wiped, and soon after returned with it followed by the servants. Claud, in the meantime, having drawn his elbow-chair close to the table, and placed his spectacles on his nose, was sitting, when the mistress laid the volume before him, ready to begin. As some little stir was produced by the servants taking their places, he accidentally turned up the cover, and looked at the page in which he had inserted the dates of his own marriage and the births of his children. Mrs. Walkinshaw observing him looking at the record, said, —
‘Atweel, Charlie need na been in sic a haste, he’s no auld enough yet to be the head o’ a family. How auld were ye, gudeman, when we were marriet? But he’s no blest wi’ the forethought o’ you.’
‘Will that tongue o’ thine, Girzy, ne’er be quiet? In the presence o’ thy Maker, wheest, and pay attention, while I read a chapter of His holy word.’
The accent in which this was uttered imposed at once silence and awe, and when he added, ‘Let us worship God, by reading a portion of the Scriptures of truth,’ the servants often afterwards said, ‘he spoke like a dreadfu’ divine.’
Not being, as we have intimated, much in the practice of domestic worship, Claud had avoided singing a Psalm, nor was he so well acquainted with the Bible, as to be able to fix on any particular chapter or appropriate passage from recollection. In this respect he was, indeed, much inferior to the generality of the Glasgow merchants of that age, for, although they were considerably changed from the austerity by which their fathers had incurred the vengeance of Charles the Second’s government, they were still regular in the performance of their religious domestic duties. Some excuse, however, might be made for Claud, on account of his having spent so many years on the English Borders, a region in no age or period greatly renowned for piety, though plentifully endowed, from a very ancient date, with ecclesiastical mansions for the benefit of the outlaws of the two nations. Not, however, to insist on this topic, instead of reverently waling a portion with judicious care, he opened the book with a degree of superstitious trepidation, and the first passage which caught his eye was the thirty-second verse of the twenty-seventh chapter of Genesis. He paused for a moment; and the servants and the family having also opened their Bibles, looked towards him in expectation that he would name the chapter he intended to read. But he closed the volume over upon his hand, which he had inadvertently placed on the text, and lay back on his chair, unconscious of what he had done, leaving his hand still within the book.
‘We’re a’ ready,’ said Mrs. Walkinshaw; ‘whare’s the place?’
Roused by her observation from the reverie into which he had momentarily sunk, without reflecting on what he did, he hastily opened the Bible, by raising his hand, which threw open the leaves, and again he saw and read, —
And Isaac his father said unto him, Who art thou? and he said, I am thy son, – thy first-born, Esau;
And Isaac trembled very exceedingly.
‘What’s the matter wi’ you, gudeman?’ said the Leddy; ‘are ye no weel?’ as he again threw himself back in his chair, leaving the book open before him. He, however, made no reply, but only drew his hand over his face, and slightly rubbed his forehead.
‘I’m thinking, gudeman,’ added the Leddy, ‘as ye’re no used wi’ making exercise, it may be as weel for us at the beginning to read a chapter intil oursels.’
‘I’ll chapse that place,’ said Walter, who was sitting opposite to his father, putting, at the same time, unobserved into the book a bit of stick which he happened to be sillily gnawing.
Claud heard what his wife suggested, but for about a minute made no answer: shutting the Bible, without noticing the mark which Walter had placed in it, he said, —
‘I’m thinking ye’re no far wrang, gudewife. Sirs, ye may gae but the house, and ilk read a chapter wi’ sobriety, and we’ll begin the worship the morn’s night, whilk is the Lord’s.’
The servants accordingly retired; and Walter reached across the table to lay hold of the big Bible, in order to read his chapter where he had inserted the stick; but his father angrily struck him sharply over the fingers, saying, —
‘Hast t’ou neither grace nor gumshion, that t’ou daurs to tak awa the word o’ God frae before my very face? Look to thy ain book, and mind what it tells thee, an t’ou has the capacity of an understanding to understand it.’
Walter, rebuked by the chastisement, withdrew from the table; and, taking a seat sulkily by the fireside, began to turn over the leaves of his pocket Bible, and from time to time he read mutteringly a verse here and there by the light of the grate. Mrs. Walkinshaw, with Miss Meg, having but one book between them, drew their chairs close to the table; and the mother, laying her hand on her daughter’s shoulder, overlooked the chapter which the latter had selected.
Although Claud had by this time recovered from the agitation into which he had been thrown, by the admonition he had as it were received from the divine oracle, he yet felt a profound emotion of awe as he again stretched his hand towards the sacred volume, which, when he had again opened, and again beheld the selfsame words, he trembled very exceedingly, insomuch that he made the table shake violently.
‘In the name of God, what’s that?’ cried his wife, terrified by the unusual motion, and raising her eyes from the book, with a strong expression of the fear which she then felt.
Claud was so startled, that he looked wildly behind him for a moment, with a ghastly and superstitious glare. Naturally possessing, however, a firm and steady mind, his alarm scarcely lasted a moment; but the pious business of the evening was so much disturbed, and had been to himself so particularly striking, that he suddenly quitted the table, and left the room.
CHAPTER XX
The Sabbath morning was calm and clear, and the whole face of Nature fresh and bright. Every thing was animated with glee; and the very flowers, as they looked up in the sunshine, shone like glad faces. Even the Leddy o’ Grippy partook of the gladdening spirit which glittered and frolicked around her; and as she walked a few paces in front of her husband down the footpath from the house to the highway leading to Glasgow, she remarked, as their dog ran gambolling before them, that
‘Auld Colley, wi’ his daffing, looks as he had a notion o’ the braw wissing o’ joy Charlie is to get. The brute, gudeman, ay took up wi’ him, which was a wonderfu’ thing to me; for he did nothing but weary its life wi’ garring it loup for an everlasting after sticks and chucky-stanes. Hows’ever, I fancy dogs are like men – leavened, as Mr. Kilfuddy says, wi’ the leaven of an ungrateful heart – for Colley is as doddy and crabbit to Watty as if he was its adversary, although, as ye ken, he gathers and keeps a’ the banes for’t.’
‘Wilt t’ou ne’er devaul’ wi’ thy havering tongue? I’m sure the dumb brute, in favouring Charlie, showed mair sense than his mother, poor fellow.’
‘Aye, aye, gudeman, so ye say; but every body knows your most unnatural partiality.’
‘Thy tongue, woman,’ exclaimed her husband, ‘gangs like the clatter-bane o’ a goose’s – ’
‘Eh, Megsty me!’ cried the Leddy; ‘wha’s yon at the yett tirling at the pin?’
Claud, roused by her interjection, looked forward, and beheld, with some experience of astonishment, that it was Mr. Keelevin, the writer.
‘We’ll hae to turn and gang back with him,’ said Mrs. Walkinshaw, when she observed who it was.
‘I’ll be damn’d if I do ony sic thing,’ growled the old man, with a fierceness of emphasis that betrayed apprehension and alarm, while it at the same time denoted a riveted determination to persevere in the resolution he had taken; and, mending his pace briskly, he reached the gate before the worthy lawyer had given himself admittance.
‘Gude day, Mr. Keelevin! – What’s brought you so soon afield this morning?’
‘I hae just ta’en a bit canter oure to see you, and