CHAPTER IV

I GO TO ALVA

It hath often been a matter of surprise to me, as well as of great thankfulness, that a beneficent Providence should have cast my lot with friends so large-hearted and generous as Sir John Erskine and his dear lady. I might so easily have been compelled to find a home with people of a very different type, kind and excellent no doubt, but ignorant, narrow and obscure. It might have been my fate to live with a family of austere manners, of rigid life, of homely interests, like so many families at that time in Scotland, which indeed would have ill-accorded with my own disposition, and who knows what disastrous results might have ensued? With such people, and I have met with many in my life, ’twould have been scarce possible for me to live happily, nor, I suppose, would they have found me to their taste any more than I them. For looking back upon my early life and character I know that I was but an undisciplined girl, needing firm but gentle guiding, spoiled by indulgence no doubt, impulsive, hot-headed, and rash, inheriting from my mother a strain of gaiety and light-heartedness calculated to lead me into temptation, and withal impatient of control. Still to be just to myself, I must allow that I was affectionate, honest, and fearless, and so capable of strong attachment to one whom I admired and loved as I did my Cousin Catherine, that any sacrifice made for her or hers seemed easy, and her simplest word was enough to check me, so eager was I at all times for her approbation.

My dear husband, who knows me, I think, as no other human being ever did, tells me sometimes that one of my chief characteristics (he is too kind to call it a fault), is to idealise where I love. I believe he is right; but though it lays me open now and then to his friendly ridicule, I would not have it otherwise. It is a power (though some regard it as a weakness), which raises the standard of life for those who possess it. It closes their eyes to the mean side of human nature, for except where love and admiration are possible they take little concern; it gives wings to the hopeful heart that lift it high above the quagmires of despair, and it opens to faithful eyes a secret window in Heaven that lets a little of the holy light shine forth upon the dark things of the earth. And if we seldom realise our ideals, what then? Are we any the worse for having sought them? No more than is the lark, who, having mounted half a mile towards the sun, sinks back singing to his lowly nest, only to rise again to-morrow.

I had no sooner set eyes upon Sir John Erskine, than I understood, in a dim and girlish way, the meaning of that light which I had seen upon his wife’s face when she spoke of him to me. There was that in his big and burly form, as he stood at the door of his house to welcome us, in the kindly lines of his face and the humorous gleam of his eye, in the hearty tones of his great manly voice that had yet a thrill of tenderness in them, that caused me to realise, as far as a young maid may, that here was a man that no woman and very few men could dislike. I have heard since that day, God knows, many evil things about Sir John, not one half of which I believe. I know him to have been a careless liver, gay, reckless and imprudent, more witty than wise, and as wild in his speculations and inventions as any foolish gambler. I know what misfortunes his conduct brought to his family, and I cannot but blame him for many things that he did, and yet with it all he was a much loved man, one whom his friends excused even while they accused him, a man who never did a cowardly action, nor, I firmly believe, ever spoke an unkind word--in short, a man of genius wanting ballast, but possessing a most generous nature, and a charm of manner that won all hearts, even those that were fain to reprove him.

To me, Barbara Stewart, the orphan girl who had but little claim upon him, he was kind beyond all telling, and if my lenient view of his character be somewhat inspired by grateful remembrance, who can blame me?

I can see him now as he appeared to me on that late winter afternoon, lifting his wife over the snow-sprinkled threshold into the lighted hall, and kissing her hands with tender courtesy while she clung to his arm for a moment, her sweet face raised to his. But before I had time to do more than cast a glance of timid curiosity round, she turned and drew me forward.

“And this is Mistress Barbara Stewart,” cried Sir John, holding out his hand in kindest greeting. “I bid you welcome to Alva, my dear young lady, and trust you will find with us a happy home. Our family and yours have intermarried more than once in by-gone years, so I beg of you to look upon me now and always as your loving kinsman and faithful servant.”

With that he made me a very low bow, which I answered with a deep but modest curtsey, trying in faltering, girlish words to express my thanks for his goodness. But the strangeness of my surroundings and perhaps the fatigues of the long, cold journey well-nigh overcame my composure, and I cast my eyelids down to hide the rising tears. My lady came to my rescue, and taking my hand in hers, began to lead me towards the staircase.

“Poor Barbara,” said she, “is quite exhausted; her very lips are stiff with cold. She will answer your courteous speeches better, my life, when she hath drunk a cup of hot wine, and sat awhile beside the fire; and here are our little lads waiting to kiss her hand.”

Looking up, I saw descending slowly towards us two of the bonniest boys it had ever been my lot to meet. The elder, whose fair face was lighted up with eager excitement, looked ready to fly to his mother’s arms, had it not been that his steps were hampered by the less active movements of his younger brother whose hand he carefully held. Golden-haired and blue-eyed, with strong and sturdy limbs, little Charles appeared to me a child to rejoice the hearts of parents and friends alike; but charming as he was, it was to the pretty baby, Hal, that my whole heart went out upon our first meeting. He looked at me from a pair of eyes so large and dark that I named him “Harold Beaux-yeux” on the spot, and after a moment’s grave contemplation of me, his little face broke into a winning and bewitching smile, and he suffered me, stranger as I was, to take him in my arms, with the most gracious air of dignity in the world.

You may judge if Barbara did not speedily forget her loneliness and fatigue as she pressed the lovely child to her heart, and how soon the happy prattle of both the little lads gave her the blessed sense of feeling perfectly at home.

Limited as my experience was, I very quickly discovered that the manner of living at Alva House was greatly in advance of the general rule in Scotland at that time. Not only was the restless genius of Sir John continually engaged in schemes for beautifying and embellishing his estate, but the appointments inside the house showed culture and refinement which could only have been acquired by contact with the world beyond our narrow borders. The walls of the public rooms were set in panels and hung with pictures, there were carpets and rugs upon the floors--a luxury by no means common even in the houses of the rich--curtains of foreign tapestry hung over the doorways and before the windows, and silken cushions and pieces of rich embroidery added beauty to the furnishings. My lady drank her tea at “the four hours” out of dainty chinay cups brought from overseas, and the house was full of beautiful and curious objects fetched home by Sir John and others from Paris, Holland and London, or things of stranger, wider interest sent by Doctor Robin Erskine from his far-off home in Moscow.

The winter months went swiftly, and, when in the middle of February the snow had left the ground, Sir John was constantly employed with his men at the work so dear to his heart, namely: making walks and terraces about the house, improving the garden, and laying out the policies to the best advantage. Having gathered some small interest in such matters from my dear grandfather, I was ever ready to accompany my kind host in his tours of inspection, especially as my lady, having contracted a cold in the latter end of January which still confined her to the house, was unable to be his companion, a source of grief at all times to her whose happiest moments were those spent by her husband’s side.

“Go you with him, Barbara!” she would cry with a smile. “Oh, go, and listen to his talk, but don’t forget the lonely and jealous wife who would fain be taking your place!”

To say truth, Sir John proved himself an entertaining comrade, and since he was pleased to remark that I had an intelligence for outdoor matters beyond my years, he would discourse to me about his plans and schemes for hours together.

“You must understand, Barbara,” he said one day, “that although I have little liking for the English or their manners, and, so far as seeking good company goes, would infinitely rather take ship and sail to France than step into my coach and be carried to London, yet I cannot but allow that in matters of agriculture and husbandry, in farming, forestry, and all country lore, our southern neighbours are many years ahead of us.”

“Will you please to tell me about England, Sir John,” I said, partly from genuine interest in his talk, and partly, I doubt not, with unconscious feminine guile because I saw that it pleased him to have a listener.

“Since 1707,” he went on, “the year, as you are aware, of the political union of the two countries, a union which has scarce yet proved very happy for Scotland, but which I have strong hopes may yet be the making of her commercial fortune, and aid greatly in the general amelioration of her people--well, since the Union, I and many others, as members of Parliament have been obliged to ride yearly to London; and passing as I do, so many of the seats of the nobility and gentry, I was at first struck with amazement, then with shame, and finally with envy that gave birth to emulation, to think that within a few hundred miles of these, our land--with far greater natural beauty to boast of--should be left so wild, so bare, so uncultivated. My kinsman and neighbour, the Earl of Mar, has indeed shown a noble example at his house at Alloa, and it will give my lady pleasure to take you there one day to see his gardens. They are laid out in the Dutch taste, and are modelled on those at Hampton Court, which, as you know, was the favourite residence of King William. My lord gives constant employment to something like a dozen men under a master-gardener, and he has of late years planted a large number of forest-trees. But though his zeal for this sort of work is great, and his taste remarkable, he cannot be persuaded to take so much interest in the enclosing of pastures, or the dressing and enriching of his fields, as I could wish.”

“Is the cultivation in England finer than ours?” I asked.

“Oh, beyond all comparison!” quoth Sir John. “It would astonish you, my dear Barbara, to see upon a June day, the rich waving foliage of trees that stretch for miles along the smooth and pleasant highways, the well-tilled fields divided by blossoming hedges, the comfortable inns, the neat cottages with their little gardens well filled with flowers and fruit. One receives an impression of peace, comfort and prosperity which is very pleasing, and as I said before, it seems strange to think that the two countries lie close to each other, and that their climates are not so very different. It irks me the more,” he went on, “in that Scotsmen themselves are acknowledged by all foreigners to be more learned, wise and polite than the English, and where many an English country squire would be barbarous, ignorant and rude, a Scotsman of the same station displays all the accomplishments of a well-bred gentleman. Yet in matters of such importance as those I have mentioned our country is not to be compared with theirs.”

“Pray, Sir John,” cried I, “are not the farmers very grateful to you for instructing them in more civilised methods?”

He laughed, a great merry laugh. “Indeed, my dear, they are not. They would fain dig up my trees and burn my hedges, as hath been done already on some estates, only I believe the love they bear to my lady holds them back. They grumble monstrously at ‘Sir John’s new-fangled ways,’ and say that the trees do but eat the good out of the land, and the hedges harbour birds that devour their grain. For some winters back I have fed my beasts on clover-grass, red clover made into hay, which the creatures relish and fatten on; but my tenants call it English weeds, and prefer their old method of crushed whin and dried bracken for winter fodder. Great and powerful is the old devil, Ignorance, Barbara, and most devoutly do some folk cling to his feet and worship him.”

“And what, Sir John, will enlighten them?” said I.

“Nothing but intercourse with the outside world, which, by degrees, will become easier and more general. Only by seeing others living in better condition than himself will the Scots peasant be moved to try to improve his own lot.”

“I am glad you are planting trees,” cried I. “They are lovely and lovable, and their shelter and shade are most pleasant.”

“Ay,” said Sir John, “but all do not think alike on this subject, for one of my tenants said to me but yesterday, ‘If the Lord had ettled tae hae trees in the carse, Sir John, wad He no’ hae planted them there Himsel’?’ And when I made answer that, as the Lord had not caused us to be born with houses on our backs like the snail, doubtless He meant us to dwell upon the bare hillside, the good old man looked at me sorrowfully, and humbly begged my honour not to blaspheme. Now, what,” said Sir John, with a shrug of his shoulders, “can you make of a mind like that, Barbara?”