Little Rivers [33]
against evil--suffer us
a while longer to endure, and (if it may be) help us to do better.
Bless to us our extraordinary mercies; if the day come when these
must be taken, have us play the man under affliction. Be with our
friends, be with ourselves. Go with each of us to rest; if any
awake, temper to them the dark hours of watching; and when the day
returns to us--our sun and comforter--call us with morning faces,
eager to labour, eager to be happy, if happiness shall be our
portion, and, if the day be marked to sorrow, strong to endure it.
We thank thee and praise thee; and, in the words of Him to whom
this day is sacred, close our oblation."
The man who made that kindly human prayer knew the meaning of white
heather. And I dare to hope that I too have known something of its
meaning, since that evening when the Mistress of the Glen picked
the spray and gave it to me on the lonely moor. "And now," she
said, "you will be going home across the sea; and you have been
welcome here, but it is time that you should go, for there is the
place where your real duties and troubles and joys are waiting for
you. And if you have left any misunderstandings behind you, you
will try to clear them up; and if there have been any quarrels, you
will heal them. Carry this little flower with you. It's not the
bonniest blossom in Scotland, but it's the dearest, for the message
that it brings. And you will remember that love is not
getting, but giving; not a wild dream of pleasure, and a madness of
desire--oh no, love is not that--it is goodness, and honour, and
peace, and pure living--yes, love is that; and it is the best thing
in the world, and the thing that lives longest. And that is what I
am wishing for you and yours with this bit of white heather."
1893.
THE RISTIGOUCHE FROM A HORSE-YACHT
Dr. Paley was ardently attached to this amusement; so much so that
when the Bishop of Durham inquired of him when one of his most
important works would be finished, he said, with great simplicity
and good humour, 'My Lord, I shall work steadily at it when the
fly-fishing season is over.'--SIR HUMPHRY DAVY: Salmonia.
The boundary line between the Province of Quebec and New Brunswick,
for a considerable part of its course, resembles the name of the
poet Keats; it is "writ in water." But like his fame, it is water
that never fails,--the limpid current of the river Ristigouche.
The railway crawls over it on a long bridge at Metapedia, and you
are dropped in the darkness somewhere between midnight and dawn.
When you open your window-shutters the next morning, you see that
the village is a disconsolate hamlet, scattered along the track as
if it had been shaken by chance from an open freight-car; it
consists of twenty houses, three shops, and a discouraged church
perched upon a little hillock like a solitary mourner on the
anxious seat. The one comfortable and prosperous feature in the
countenance of Metapedia is the house of the Ristigouche Salmon
Club--an old-fashioned mansion, with broad, white piazza, looking
over rich meadow-lands. Here it was that I found my friend
Favonius, president of solemn societies, pillar of church and
state, ingenuously arrayed in gray knickerbockers, a flannel shirt,
and a soft hat, waiting to take me on his horse-yacht for a voyage
up the river.
Have you ever seen a horse-yacht? Sometimes it is called a scow;
but that sounds common. Sometimes it is called a house-boat; but
that is too English. What does it profit a man to have a whole
dictionary full of language at his service, unless he can invent a
new and suggestive name for his friend's pleasure-craft? The
foundation of the horse-yacht--if a thing that floats may be called
fundamental--is a flat-bottomed boat, some fifty feet long and ten
feet wide, with a draft of about eight inches. The deck is open
for fifteen feet aft of the
a while longer to endure, and (if it may be) help us to do better.
Bless to us our extraordinary mercies; if the day come when these
must be taken, have us play the man under affliction. Be with our
friends, be with ourselves. Go with each of us to rest; if any
awake, temper to them the dark hours of watching; and when the day
returns to us--our sun and comforter--call us with morning faces,
eager to labour, eager to be happy, if happiness shall be our
portion, and, if the day be marked to sorrow, strong to endure it.
We thank thee and praise thee; and, in the words of Him to whom
this day is sacred, close our oblation."
The man who made that kindly human prayer knew the meaning of white
heather. And I dare to hope that I too have known something of its
meaning, since that evening when the Mistress of the Glen picked
the spray and gave it to me on the lonely moor. "And now," she
said, "you will be going home across the sea; and you have been
welcome here, but it is time that you should go, for there is the
place where your real duties and troubles and joys are waiting for
you. And if you have left any misunderstandings behind you, you
will try to clear them up; and if there have been any quarrels, you
will heal them. Carry this little flower with you. It's not the
bonniest blossom in Scotland, but it's the dearest, for the message
that it brings. And you will remember that love is not
getting, but giving; not a wild dream of pleasure, and a madness of
desire--oh no, love is not that--it is goodness, and honour, and
peace, and pure living--yes, love is that; and it is the best thing
in the world, and the thing that lives longest. And that is what I
am wishing for you and yours with this bit of white heather."
1893.
THE RISTIGOUCHE FROM A HORSE-YACHT
Dr. Paley was ardently attached to this amusement; so much so that
when the Bishop of Durham inquired of him when one of his most
important works would be finished, he said, with great simplicity
and good humour, 'My Lord, I shall work steadily at it when the
fly-fishing season is over.'--SIR HUMPHRY DAVY: Salmonia.
The boundary line between the Province of Quebec and New Brunswick,
for a considerable part of its course, resembles the name of the
poet Keats; it is "writ in water." But like his fame, it is water
that never fails,--the limpid current of the river Ristigouche.
The railway crawls over it on a long bridge at Metapedia, and you
are dropped in the darkness somewhere between midnight and dawn.
When you open your window-shutters the next morning, you see that
the village is a disconsolate hamlet, scattered along the track as
if it had been shaken by chance from an open freight-car; it
consists of twenty houses, three shops, and a discouraged church
perched upon a little hillock like a solitary mourner on the
anxious seat. The one comfortable and prosperous feature in the
countenance of Metapedia is the house of the Ristigouche Salmon
Club--an old-fashioned mansion, with broad, white piazza, looking
over rich meadow-lands. Here it was that I found my friend
Favonius, president of solemn societies, pillar of church and
state, ingenuously arrayed in gray knickerbockers, a flannel shirt,
and a soft hat, waiting to take me on his horse-yacht for a voyage
up the river.
Have you ever seen a horse-yacht? Sometimes it is called a scow;
but that sounds common. Sometimes it is called a house-boat; but
that is too English. What does it profit a man to have a whole
dictionary full of language at his service, unless he can invent a
new and suggestive name for his friend's pleasure-craft? The
foundation of the horse-yacht--if a thing that floats may be called
fundamental--is a flat-bottomed boat, some fifty feet long and ten
feet wide, with a draft of about eight inches. The deck is open
for fifteen feet aft of the