Duncan Polite, the Watchman of Glenoro. Mary Esther Miller MacGregor
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and swaying.
Silas was modest and never shouldered the task of leading the service until all hope of the preacher's appearing had been given up. On such occasions the congregation would assemble and sit quietly expectant; even the back row, who waited at the church shed until they were in sufficient numbers to brave an entry into the church, having flopped noisily into their places. The choir would whisper and the organist nervously turn over the leaves of the hymn book. Then the fathers of the church would confer, look through the window or tip-toe to the door, confer again, and once more gaze anxiously in the direction from which the preacher was expected to appear.
At this point there would arise from the Todd pew such a fluttering and twittering as can be heard in the nest when the mother-bird is encouraging her little ones to fly. Mrs. Todd, acting as monitor, would give Silas many pushes and nudges which he modestly resisted, until her efforts were augmented by those of his brother officials, when, yielding at last to their importunities, he would slowly rise and go shyly and lingeringly up to the pulpit desk. And the congregation would settle back with a resigned air to listen to the simple, good old fellow give a long and tedious recital of his spiritual experiences, punctuated by many sighs and tearful "Amens" from beneath the sympathetic Paisley shawl.
But in spite of much comfort afforded by the Methodists, Duncan Polite's heart was often heavy with foreboding. He could not help seeing that Andrew Johnstone must soon come to open war with the new party in the church. In his well-meant and vigorous efforts to make everyone tread the old paths the ruling elder produced a great amount of friction; for, though he feared God, he did not regard man, and woe betide the reckless youth who made himself too conspicuous in the reform movement.
The Sabbath school was his stronghold, for there he was superintendent and monarch absolute, and there he seized every opportunity to publicly rebuke anyone who dared transgress his rigid laws.
But the rising generation was not to be wholly deterred from rising by even the terrors of Splinterin' Andra; and, as Duncan Polite feared, the inevitable conflict ensued.
The immediate cause of the rupture was a church organ, merely a myth as yet, but real enough to arouse the apostle of ancient customs to his best fighting mood. The very mention of an instrument made by man to be used in the worship of God, was to the ruling elder the extreme of sacrilege. But in spite of his disapproval, the young people went so far as to hold a meeting at which to discuss the possibility of their purchasing the coveted instrument.
Miss Cotton, the chief dress and mischiefmaker in the village, although no longer absolutely young, was the leader of the rising generation, and she counselled just going ahead without Splinterin' Andra's advice.
There were not many, however, who were possessed of either her courage or her indiscretion. They all agreed, though, that Andrew Johnstone was the one insurmountable barrier to their hopes. Most of the other elders had been approached in a tentative way. Peter McNabb was a broad-minded man with such a passion for music that, though he looked askance at any innovation, yet he would have welcomed anything that would help the singing. Old Donald Fraser considered an organ an unmixed evil and remarked, when asked for his opinion on the subject, that it would be "clean defyin' o' the Almighty" to introduce one into the church. But he had a very ambitious wife and daughter, and as the latter had been taking music lessons and cherishing rosy dreams of one day playing in church, the organ party felt that Mr. Fraser would not be quite immovable. Old John Hamilton, of course, scarcely counted. He said "aye, aye," in a dazed way when his daughters clamoured for his consent, adding that "he'd see what Andra said." Peter Farquhar, they knew, might be difficult, as he belonged to the Oa and was, therefore, very old-fashioned; but they all agreed that if Andrew Johnstone could be moved, all the others would follow; so some one must ask his permission.
Miss Cotton suggested that Wee Andra, the son of old Andra, would be the proper person to carry their request to the elder. "Wee Andra" the young man had been called in his babyhood, to distinguish him from his father, and he still bore the anomalous title though he stood six-feet-four in his moccasins and was disproportionately broad. But in spite of these physical securities, the young giant flatly refused the doubtful honour of approaching his father on the sore subject; so, after much discussion, the delicate task devolved upon Mr. Watson, the schoolmaster. The master had "tack" and education, Miss Cotton explained, and was just the man for the position. So, fortified by this flattery, the young man went up over the hills one morning on his dangerous quest.
The schoolmaster was a young man who was born for agitation; he loved to throw himself heart and soul into some new enterprise, and upon this occasion he had the satisfaction at least of getting up plenty of excitement. What transpired in that fatal interview between him and the ruling elder could never be accurately learned from the former. When questioned upon the subject, he confined his remarks to dark hints regarding antediluvian pig-headedness and backwoods ignorance, but Wee Andra, who in his heart was rather proud of his sire's fighting qualities, spread the account of the schoolmaster's defeat over the whole neighbourhood, with the result that for a season the agitators left their common enemy to turn upon and rend each other.
On the evening after the encounter, Duncan Polite sat expectantly on his door-step. He knew that Andrew would be sure to come down to tell him of the affair, and he was waiting in some trepidation, hoping that his fiery old friend had not said something which would wreck forever the peace of Glenoro church.
Duncan scarcely felt equal to shouldering any more burdens that day, for only the morning before Donald had left for college. The old man had sent him away with high hopes for his future; but he missed his boy more than he could tell. For Donald had been as his own son ever since the Neil boys had been left fatherless. "The Neil boys" they were always called, for their father, as well as their mother, had been a McDonald and, of necessity, his sons used his first name only. Neil McDonald had died when Archie was an infant, and had left Donald at the head of the family, a circumstance which might have proved disastrous to both Donald and the family had it not been for Duncan Polite. For in his boyhood Donald had bade fair to inherit his father's fame, and in the good old fighting days when men used their axes in argument, Neil More was the fiercest warrior between the two lakes. But as manhood approached, discretion had tempered young Donald's valour; he had grown up under the gentle but potent influence of his uncle and had developed a character of which Duncan Polite was justly proud.
But now Donald was gone; and Duncan was sitting thinking sadly of his loss and of this coming trouble, when a sturdy, square figure came down the darkening road.
"Come away in, Andra," said Duncan Polite rising, while Collie bowed his respectful welcome, "come away in, for you will be finding it cool on the step, whatever."
But Andrew preferred to sit out of doors.
Duncan divined at once from his manner that he was in a very bad frame of mind, and so attempted to lead the conversation into a safe channel. "I hear we will be having a fine young man next Sabbath," he commenced hopefully, "Mr. Murray. I would be hearing Mr. Cameron speak of him often."
Andrew Johnstone grunted.
"Aye, mebby," he remarked sourly. "Whatever he's like he'll suit the young folk anyway, for he'll be new, an' that's a' they want. Man, Duncan, the youth o' this day are jist fair daft! The Athenians were naething to them, for their one desire is to possess some new thing. They've got a new church, an' they're goin' to hae a new meenister, an' they're wantin' them new bit tinklin' hymns; aye, an' they're wantin' new elders, Ah'm sure o' that. When you an' me an' a few more o' the auld buddies slip awa, they'll jist be gettin' a new God an' then Ah houp they'll be setisfied!"
"Och, och, Andra," said Duncan Polite soothingly. "Lads and lassies will be young, an' we would be that way ourselves once, and they will be better than you know. There's your own lad now, an' Sandy——"
"Andra! Oor Andra!" cried that young man's father. "The maist upsettin' scamp in the hale pack, an' it's his ain faither has to say it in shame an' humiliation! Him an' Sandy are jist gone fair daft. It's fleein' here to this tea-meetin' an stravagin' yonder to some bit choir practise, an' here awa, there awa, until Ah dinna ken what's to be the end o' it! Aye, an' the next thing they've gotten intill their bit heids is that they must get a