The Seaboard Parish Vol. 2
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George MacDonald >> The Seaboard Parish Vol. 2
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As he spoke Percivale had continued packing his gear. He now led our party
up to the chapel, and thence down a few yards to the edge of the chasm,
where the water fell headlong. I turned away with that fear of high places
which is one of my many weaknesses; and when I turned again towards the
spot, there was Wynnie on the very edge, looking over into the flash
and tumult of the water below, but with a nervous grasp of the hand of
Percivale, who stood a little farther back.
In going home, the painter led us by an easier way out of the valley, left
his little easel and other things at a cottage, and then walked on in front
between my wife and daughter, while Turner and I followed. He seemed quite
at his ease with them, and plenty of talk and laughter rose on the way.
I, however, was chiefly occupied with finding out Turner's impression of
Connie's condition.
"She is certainly better," he said. "I wonder you do not see it as plainly
as I do. The pain is nearly gone from her spine, and she can move herself
a good deal more, I am certain, than she could when she left. She asked me
yesterday if she might not turn upon one side. 'Do you think you could?'
I asked.--'I think so,' she answered. 'At any rate, I have often a great
inclination to try; only papa said I had better wait till you came.' I do
think she might be allowed a little more change of posture now."
"Then you have really some hope of her final recovery?"
"I have _hope_ most certainly. But what is hope in me, you must not allow
to become certainty in you. I am nearly sure, though, that she can never
be other than an invalid; that is, if I am to judge by what I know of such
cases."
"I am thankful for the hope," I answered. "You need not be afraid of my
turning upon you, should the hope never pass into sight. I should do so
only if I found that you had been treating me irrationally--inspiring
me with hope which you knew to be false. The element of uncertainty is
essential to hope, and for all true hope, even as hope, man has to be
unspeakably thankful."
CHAPTER IX.
THE WALK TO CHURCH.
I was glad to be able to arrange with a young clergyman who was on a visit
to Kilkhaven, that he should take my duty for me the next Sunday, for that
was the only one Turner could spend with us. He and I and Wynnie walked
together two miles to church. It was a lovely morning, with just a tint of
autumn in the air. But even that tint, though all else was of the summer,
brought a shadow, I could see, on Wynnie's face.
"You said you would show me a poem of--Vaughan, I think you said, was
the name of the writer. I am too ignorant of our older literature," said
Turner.
"I have only just made acquaintance with him," I answered. "But I think I
can repeat the poem. You shall judge whether it is not like Wordsworth's
Ode.
'Happy those early days, when I
Shined in my angel infancy;
Before I understood the place
Appointed for my second race,
Or taught my soul to fancy ought
But a white, celestial thought;
When yet I had not walked above
A mile or two from my first love,
And looking back, at that short space,
Could see a glimpse of his bright face;
When on some gilded cloud or flower
My gazing soul would dwell an hour,
And in those weaker glories spy
Some shadows of eternity;
Before I taught my tongue to wound
My conscience with a sinful sound,
But felt through all this fleshly dress
Bright shoots of everlastingness.
O how I long to travel back----'"
But here I broke down, for I could not remember the rest with even
approximate accuracy.
"When did this Vaughan live?" asked Turner.
"He was born, I find, in 1621--five years, that is, after Shakspere's
death, and when Milton was about thirteen years old. He lived to the age of
seventy-three, but seems to have been little known. In politics he was on
the Cavalier side. By the way, he was a medical man, like you, Turner--an
M.D. We'll have a glance at the little book when we go back. Don't let me
forget to show it you. A good many of your profession have distinguished
themselves in literature, and as profound believers too."
"I should have thought the profession had been chiefly remarkable for such
as believe only in the evidence of the senses."
"As if having searched into the innermost recesses of the body, and not
having found a soul, they considered themselves justified in declaring
there was none."
"Just so."
"Well, that is true of the commonplace amongst them, I do believe. You will
find the exceptions have been men of fine minds and characters--not such as
he of whom Chaucer says,
'His study was but little on the Bible;'
for if you look at the rest of the description of the man, you will find
that he was in alliance with his apothecary for their mutual advantage,
that he was a money-loving man, and that some of Chaucer's keenest irony
is spent on him in an off-hand, quiet manner. Compare the tone in which he
writes of the doctor of physic, with the profound reverence wherewith he
bows himself before the poor country-parson."
Here Wynnie spoke, though with some tremor in her voice.
"I never know, papa, what people mean by talking about childhood in that
way. I never seem to have been a bit younger and more innocent than I am."
"Don't you remember a time, Wynnie, when the things about you--the sky and
the earth, say--seemed to you much grander than they seem now? You are old
enough to have lost something."
She thought for a little while before she answered.
"My dreams were, I know. I cannot say so of anything else."
I in my turn had to be silent, for I did not see the true answer, though
I was sure there was one somewhere, if I could only find it. All I could
reply, however, even after I had meditated a good while, was--and perhaps,
after all, it was the best thing I could have said:
"Then you must make a good use of your dreams, my child."
"Why, papa?"
"Because they are the only memorials of childhood you have left."
"How am I to make a good use of them? I don't know what to do with my silly
old dreams."
But she gave a sigh as she spoke that testified her silly old dreams had a
charm for her still.
"If your dreams, my child, have ever testified to you of a condition of
things beyond that which you see around you, if they have been to you the
hints of a wonder and glory beyond what visits you now, you must not call
them silly, for they are just what the scents of Paradise borne on the air
were to Adam and Eve as they delved and spun, reminding them that they must
aspire yet again through labour into that childhood of obedience which
is the only paradise of humanity--into that oneness with the will of the
Father, which our race, our individual selves, need just as much as if we
had personally fallen with Adam, and from which we fall every time we are
disobedient to the voice of the Father within our souls--to the conscience
which is his making and his witness. If you have had no childhood, my
Wynnie, yet permit your old father to say that everything I see in you
indicates more strongly in you than in most people that it is this
childhood after which you are blindly longing, without which you find that
life is hardly to be endured. Thank God for your dreams, my child. In him
you will find that the essence of those dreams is fulfilled. We are saved
by hope, Turner. Never man hoped too much, or repented that he had hoped.
The plague is that we don't hope in God half enough. The very fact that
hope is strength, and strength the outcome, the body of life, shows that
hope is at one with life, with the very essence of what says 'I am'--yea,
of what doubts and says 'Am I?' and therefore is reasonable to creatures
who cannot even doubt save in that they live."
By this time, for I have, of course, only given the outlines, or rather
salient points, of our conversation, we had reached the church, where, if I
found the sermon neither healing nor inspiring, I found the prayers full of
hope and consolation. They at least are safe beyond human caprice, conceit,
or incapacity. Upon them, too, the man who is distressed at the thought of
how little of the needful food he had been able to provide for his people,
may fall back for comfort, in the thought that there at least was what
ought to have done them good, what it was well worth their while to go to
church for. But I did think they were too long for any individual Christian
soul, to sympathise with from beginning to end, that is, to respond to,
like organ-tube to the fingered key, in every touch of the utterance of the
general Christian soul. For my reader must remember that it is one thing
to read prayers and another to respond; and that I had had very few
opportunities of being in the position of the latter duty. I had had
suspicions before, and now they were confirmed--that the present crowding
of services was most inexpedient. And as I pondered on the matter, instead
of trying to go on praying after I had already uttered my soul, which is
but a heathenish attempt after much speaking, I thought how our Lord had
given us such a short prayer to pray, and I began to wonder when or how the
services came to be so heaped the one on the back of the other as they now
were. No doubt many people defended them; no doubt many people could sit
them out; but how many people could pray from beginning to end of them I
On this point we had some talk as we went home. Wynnie was opposed to any
change of the present use on the ground that we should only have the longer
sermons.
"Still," I said, "I do not think even that so great an evil. A sensitive
conscience will not reproach itself so much for not listening to the whole
of a sermon, as for kneeling in prayer and not praying. I think myself,
however, that after the prayers are over, everyone should be at liberty
to go out and leave the sermon unheard, if he pleases. I think the result
would be in the end a good one both for parson and people. It would break
through the deadness of this custom, this use and wont. Many a young mind
is turned for life against the influences of church-going--one of the
most sacred influences when _pure_, that is, un-mingled with
non-essentials--just by the feeling that he _must_ do so and so, that he
must go through a certain round of duty. It is a willing service that the
Lord wants; no forced devotions are either acceptable to him, or other than
injurious to the worshipper, if such he can be called."
After an early dinner, I said to Turner--"Come out with me, and we will
read that poem of Vaughan's in which I broke down today."
"O, papa!" said Connie, in a tone of injury, from the sofa.
"What is it, my dear?" I asked.
"Wouldn't it be as good for us as for Mr. Turner?"
"Quite, my dear. Well, I will keep it for the evening, and meantime Mr.
Turner and I will go and see if we can find out anything about the change
in the church-service."
For I had thrown into my bag as I left the rectory a copy of _The
Clergyman's Vade Mecum_--a treatise occupied with the externals of the
churchman's relations--in which I soon came upon the following passage:
"So then it appears that the common practice of reading all three together,
is an innovation, and if an ancient or infirm clergyman do read them at two
or three several times, he is more strictly conformable; however, this is
much better than to omit any part of the liturgy, or to read all
three offices into one, as is now commonly done, without any pause or
distinction."
"On the part of the clergyman, you see, Turner," I said, when I had
finished reading the whole passage to him. "There is no care taken of the
delicate women of the congregation, but only of the ancient or infirm
clergyman. And the logic, to say the least, is rather queer: is it only in
virtue of his antiquity and infirmity that he is to be upheld in being more
strictly conformable? The writer's honesty has its heels trodden upon by
the fear of giving offence. Nevertheless there should perhaps be a certain
slowness to admit change, even back to a more ancient form."
"I don't know that I can quite agree with you there," said Turner. "If the
form is better, no one should hesitate to advocate the change. If it is
worse, then slowness is not sufficient--utter obstinacy is the right
condition."
"You are right, Turner. For the right must be the rule, and where _the
right_ is beyond our understanding or our reach, then _the better_, as
indeed not only right compared with the other, but the sole ascent towards
the right."
In the evening I took Henry Vaughan's poems into the common sitting-room,
and to Connie's great delight read the whole of the lovely, though unequal
little poem, called "The Retreat," in recalling which I had failed in the
morning. She was especially delighted with the "white celestial thought,"
and the "bright shoots of everlastingness." Then I gave a few lines from
another yet more unequal poem, worthy in themselves of the best of the
other. I quote the first strophe entire:
CHILDHOOD.
"I cannot reach it; and my striving eye
Dazzles at it, as at eternity.
Were now that chronicle alive,
Those white designs which children drive,
And the thoughts of each harmless hour,
With their content too in my power,
Quickly would I make my path even,
And by mere playing go to heaven.
* * * * *
And yet the practice worldlings call
Business and weighty action all,
Checking the poor child for his play,
But gravely cast themselves away.
* * * * *
An age of mysteries! which he
Must live twice that would God's face see;
Which angels guard, and with it play,
Angels! which foul men drive away.
How do I study now, and scan
Thee more than ere I studied man,
And only see through a long night
Thy edges and thy bordering light I
O for thy centre and midday!
For sure that is the _narrow way!_"
"For of such is the kingdom of heaven." said my wife softly, as I closed
the book.
"May I have the book, papa?" said Connie, holding out her thin white cloud
of a hand to take it.
"Certainly, my child. And if Wynnie would read it with you, she will feel
more of the truth of what Mr. Percivale was saying to her about finish.
Here are the finest, grandest thoughts, set forth sometimes with such
carelessness, at least such lack of neatness, that, instead of their
falling on the mind with all their power of loveliness, they are like a
beautiful face disfigured with patches, and, what is worse, they put the
mind out of the right, quiet, unquestioning, open mood, which is the only
fit one for the reception of such true things as are embodied in the poems.
But they are too beautiful after all to be more than a little spoiled
by such a lack of the finish with which Art ends off all her labours. A
gentleman, however, thinks it of no little importance to have his nails
nice as well as his face and his shirt."
CHAPTER X.
THE OLD CASTLE.
The place Turner had chosen suited us all so well, that after attending
to my duties on the two following Sundays at Kilkhaven, I returned on the
Monday or Tuesday to the farmhouse. But Turner left us in the middle of the
second week, for he could not be longer absent from his charge at home, and
we missed him much. It was some days before Connie was quite as cheerful
again as usual. I do not mean that she was in the least gloomy--that she
never was; she was only a little less merry. But whether it was that Turner
had opened our eyes, or that she had visibly improved since he allowed her
to make a little change in her posture--certainly she appeared to us to
have made considerable progress, and every now and then we were discovering
some little proof of the fact. One evening, while we were still at the
farm, she startled us by calling out suddenly,--
"Papa, papa! I moved my big toe! I did indeed."
We were all about her in a moment. But I saw that she was excited, and
fearing a reaction I sought to calm her.
"But, my dear," I said, as quietly as I could, "you are probably still
aware that you are possessed of two big toes: which of them are we to
congratulate on this first stride in the march of improvement?"
She broke out in the merriest laugh. A pause followed in which her face
wore a puzzled expression. Then she said all at once, "Papa, it is very
odd, but I can't tell which of them," and burst into tears. I was afraid
that I had done more harm than good.
"It is not of the slightest consequence, my child," I said. "You have had
so little communication with the twins of late, that it is no wonder you
should not be able to tell the one from the other."
She smiled again through her sobs, but was silent, with shining face, for
the rest of the evening. Our hopes took a fresh start, but we heard no more
from her of her power over her big toe. As often as I inquired she said she
was afraid she had made a mistake, for she had not had another hint of its
existence. Still I thought it could not have been a fancy, and I would
cleave to my belief in the good sign.
Percivale called to see us several times, but always appeared anxious not
to intrude more of his society upon us than might be agreeable. He grew
in my regard, however; and at length I asked him if he would assist me in
another surprise which I meditated for my companions, and this time for
Connie as well, and which I hoped would prevent the painful influences
of the sight of the sea from returning upon them when they went back to
Kilkhaven: they must see the sea from a quite different shore first. In a
word I would take them to Tintagel, of the near position of which they
were not aware, although in some of our walks we had seen the ocean in
the distance. An early day was fixed for carrying out our project, and
I proceeded to get everything ready. The only difficulty was to find a
carriage in the neighbourhood suitable for receiving Connie's litter. In
this, however, I at length succeeded, and on the morning of a glorious day
of blue and gold, we set out for the little village of Trevenna, now far
better known than at the time of which I write. Connie had been out every
day since she came, now in one part of the fields, now in another, enjoying
the expanse of earth and sky, but she had had no drive, and consequently
had seen no variety of scenery. Therefore, believing she was now thoroughly
able to bear it, I quite reckoned of the good she would get from the
inevitable excitement. We resolved, however, after finding how much she
enjoyed the few miles' drive, that we would not demand more, of her
strength that day, and therefore put up at the little inn, where, after
ordering dinner, Percivale and I left the ladies, and sallied forth to
reconnoitre.
We walked through the village and down the valley beyond, sloping steeply
between hills towards the sea, the opening closed at the end by the blue of
the ocean below and the more ethereal blue of the sky above. But when we
reached the mouth of the valley we found that we were not yet on the shore,
for a precipice lay between us and the little beach below. On the left a
great peninsula of rock stood out into the sea, upon which rose the ruins
of the keep of Tintagel, while behind on the mainland stood the ruins of
the castle itself, connected with the other only by a narrow isthmus. We
had read that this peninsula had once been an island, and that the two
parts of the castle were formerly connected by a drawbridge. Looking up
at the great gap which now divided the two portions, it seemed at first
impossible to believe that they had ever been thus united; but a little
reflection cleared up the mystery.
The fact was that the isthmus, of half the height of the two parts
connected by it, had been formed entirely by the fall of portions of the
rock and soil on each side into the narrow dividing space, through which
the waters of the Atlantic had been wont to sweep. And now the fragments
of walls stood on the very verge of the precipice, and showed that large
portions of the castle itself had fallen into the gulf between. We turned
to the left along the edge of the rock, and so by a narrow path reached and
crossed to the other side of the isthmus. We then found that the path led
to the foot of the rock, formerly island, of the keep, and thence in a
zigzag up the face of it to the top. We followed it, and after a great
climb reached a door in a modern battlement. Entering, we found ourselves
amidst grass, and ruins haggard with age. We turned and surveyed the path
by which we had come. It was steep and somewhat difficult. But the outlook
was glorious. It was indeed one of God's mounts of vision upon which we
stood. The thought, "O that Connie could see this!" was swelling in my
heart, when Percivale broke the silence--not with any remark on the glory
around us, but with the commonplace question--
"You haven't got your man with you, I think, Mr. Walton?"
"No," I answered; "we thought it better to leave him to look after the
boys."
He was silent for a few minutes, while I gazed in delight.
"Don't you think," he said, "it would be possible to bring Miss Constance
up here?"
I almost started at the idea, and had not replied before he resumed:
"It would be something for her to recur to with delight all the rest of her
life."
"It would indeed. But it is impossible."
"I do not think so--if you would allow me the honour to assist you. I think
we could do it perfectly between us."
I was again silent for a while. Looking down on the way we had come, it
seemed an almost dreadful undertaking. Percivale spoke again.
"As we shall come here to-morrow, we need not explore the place now.
Shall we go down at once and observe the whole path, with a view to the
practicability of carrying her up?"
"There can be no objection to that," I answered, as a little hope, and
courage with it, began to dawn in my heart. "But you must allow it does not
look very practicable."
"Perhaps it would seem more so to you, if you had come up with the idea in
your head all the way, as I did. Any path seems more difficult in looking
back than at the time when the difficulties themselves have to be met and
overcome."
"Yes, but then you must remember that we have to take the way back whether
we will or no, if we once take the way forward."
"True; and now I will go down with the descent in my head as well as under
my feet."
"Well, there can be no harm in reconnoitring it at least. Let us go."
"You know we can rest almost as often as we please," said Percivale, and
turned to lead the way.
It certainly was steep, and required care even in our own descent; but for
a man who had climbed mountains, as I had done in my youth, it could hardly
be called difficult even in middle age. By the time we had got again into
the valley road I was all but convinced of the practicability of the
proposal. I was a little vexed, however, I must confess, that a stranger
should have thought of giving such a pleasure to Connie, when the bare wish
that she might have enjoyed it had alone arisen in my mind. I comforted
myself with the reflection that this was one of the ways in which we were
to be weaned from the world and knit the faster to our fellows. For even
the middle-aged, in the decay of their daring, must look for the fresh
thought and the fresh impulse to the youth which follows at their heels in
the march of life. Their part is to _will_ the relation and the obligation,
and so, by love to and faith in the young, keep themselves in the line
along which the electric current flows, till at length they too shall once
more be young and daring in the strength of the Lord. A man must always
seek to rise above his moods and feelings, to let them move within him, but
not allow them to storm or gloom around him. By the time we reached home we
had agreed to make the attempt, and to judge by the path to the foot of the
rock, which was difficult in parts, whether we should be likely to succeed,
without danger, in attempting the rest of the way and the following
descent. As soon as we had arrived at this conclusion, I felt so happy
in the prospect that I grew quite merry, especially after we had further
agreed that, both for the sake of her nerves and for the sake of the lordly
surprise, we should bind Connie's eyes so that she should see nothing till
we had placed her in a certain position, concerning the preferableness of
which we were not of two minds.
"What mischief have you two been about?" said my wife, as we entered our
room in the inn, where the cloth was already laid for dinner. "You look
just like two schoolboys that have been laying some plot, and can hardly
hold their tongues about it."
"We have been enjoying our little walk amazingly," I answered. "So much so,
that we mean to set out for another the moment dinner is over."
"I hope you will take Wynnie with you then."
"Or you, my love," I returned.
"No; I will stay with Connie."
"Very well. You, and Connie too, shall go out to-morrow, for we have
found a place we want to take you to. And, indeed, I believe it was our
anticipation of the pleasure you and she would have in the view that made
us so merry when you accused us of plotting mischief."
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