章节正文
of choice, and why you need have pitched upon Pettybaw, and brought
me here, when it is only five miles from Inchcaldy, and a lovely
road besides, is more than I can understand!"
"In what way has Inchcaldy been so unhappy as to offend you?" I
asked.
"It has not offended me, save that it chances to be Ronald
Macdonald's parish--that is all."
"Ronald Macdonald's parish!" we repeated automatically.
"Certainly--you must have heard him mention Inchcaldy; and how queer
he will think it that I have come to Pettybaw, under all the
circumstances!"
"We do not know `all the circumstances,'" quoted Salemina somewhat
haughtily; "and you must remember, my dear, that our opportunities
for speech with Mr. Macdonald have been very rare when you were
present. For my part, I was always in such a tremor of anxiety
during his visits lest one or both of you should descend to blows
that I remember no details of his conversation. Besides, we did not
choose Pettybaw; we discovered it by chance as we were driving from
Strathdee to St. Rules. How were we to know that it was near this
fatal Inchcaldy? If you think it best, we will hold no
communication with the place, and Mr. Macdonald need never know you
are here."
I thought Francesca looked rather startled at this proposition. At
all events she said hastily, "Oh, well, let it go; we could not
avoid each other long, anyway, although it is very awkward, of
course; you see, we did not part friends."
"I thought I had never seen you on more cordial terms," remarked
Salemina.
"But you weren't there," answered Francesca unguardedly.
"Weren't where?"
"Weren't there."
"Where?"
"At the station."
"What station?"
"The station in Edinburgh from which I started for the Highlands."
"You never said that he came to see you off."
"The matter was too unimportant for notice; and the more I think of
his being here, the less I mind it after all; and so, dull care,
begone! When I first meet him on the sands or in the loaning, I
shall say, `Dear me, is it Mr. Macdonald! What brought you to our
quiet hamlet?' (I shall put the responsibility on him, you know.)
`That is the worst of these small countries,--fowk are aye i' the
gait! When we part for ever in America, we are able to stay parted,
if we wish.' Then he will say, `Quite so, quite so; but I suppose
even you, Miss Monroe, will allow that a minister may not move his
church to please a lady.' `Certainly not,' I shall reply,
`especially when it is Estaiblished!' Then he will laugh, and we
shall be better friends for a few moments; and then I shall tell him
my latest story about the Scotchman who prayed, `Lord, I do not ask
that Thou shouldst give me wealth; only show me where it is, and I
will attend to the rest.'"
Salemina moaned at the delightfulprospectopening before us, while
I went to the piano and carolled impersonally--
"Oh, wherefore did I cross the Forth,
And leave my love behind me?
Why did I venture to the north
With one that did not mind me?
I'm sure I've seen a better limb
And twenty better faces;
But still my mind it runs on him
When I am at the races!"
Francesca left the room at this, and closed the door behind her with
such energy that the bust of Sir Walter rocked on the hall shelf.
Running upstairs she locked herself in her bedroom, and came down
again only to help us receive Jane Grieve, who arrived at eight
o'clock.
In times of joy Salemina, Francesca, and I occasionally have our
trifling differences of opinion, but in hours of affliction we are
as one flesh. An all-wise Providence sent us Jane Grieve for fear
that we should be too happy in Pettybaw. Plans made in heaven for
the discipline of sinful human flesh are always successful, and this
was no exception.
We had sent a `machine' from the inn to meet her, and when it drew
up at the door we went forward to greet the rosy little Jane of our
fancy. An aged person, wearing a rusty black bonnet and shawl, and
carrying what appeared to be a tin cake-box and a baby's bath-tub,
descended rheumatically from the vehicle and announced herself as
Miss Grieve. She was too old to call by her Christian name, too
sensitive to call by her surname, so Miss Grieve she remained, as
announced, to the end of the chapter, and our rosy little Jane died
before she was actually born. The man took her grotesque luggage
into the kitchen, and Salemina escorted her thither, while Francesca
and I fell into each other's arms and laughed hysterically.
"Nobody need tell me that she is Mrs. M'Collop's sister's husband's
niece," she whispered, "although she may possibly be somebody's
grand-aunt. Doesn't she remind you of Mrs. Gummidge?"
Salemina returned in a quarter of an hour, and sank dejectedly on
the sofa.
"Run over to the inn, Francesca" she said, "and order bacon and eggs
at eight-thirty to-morrow morning. Miss Grieve thinks we had better
not breakfast at home until she becomes accustomed to the
surroundings."
"Shall we allow her to become accustomed to them?" I questioned.
"She came up from Glasgow to Edinburgh for the day, and went to see
Mrs. M'Collop just as our telegram arrived. She was living with an
`extremely nice family' in Glasgow, and only broke her engagement in
order to try Fifeshire air for the summer; so she will remain with
us as long as she is benefited by the climate."
"Can't you pay her for a month and send her away?"
"How can we? She is Mrs. M'Collop's sister's husband's niece, and
we intend returning to Mrs. M'Collop. She has a nice ladylike
appearance, but when she takes her bonnet off she looks seventy
years old."
"She ought always to keep it off, then," returned Francesca, "for
she looked eighty with it on. We shall have to soothe her last
moments, of course, and pay her funeral expenses. Did you offer her
a cup of tea and show her the box-bed?"
"Yes; she said she was muckle obleeged to me, but the coals were so
poor and hard she couldna batter them up to start a fire the nicht,
and she would try the box-bed to see if she could sleep in it. I am
glad to remember that it was you who telegraphed for her, Penelope."
"Let there be no recriminations," I responded; "let us stand
shoulder to shoulder in this calamity,--isn't there a story called
Calamity Jane? We might live at the inn, and give her the cottage
for a summer residence, but I utterly refuse to be parted from our
cat and the 1602 lintel."
After I have once described Miss Grieve I shall not suffer her to
begloom these pages as she did our young lives. She is so exactly
like her kind in America she cannot be looked upon as a national
type. Everywhere we go we see fresh, fair-haired, sonsie lasses;
why should we have been visited by this affliction, we who have no
courage in a foreign land to rid ourselves of it?
She appears at the door of the kitchen with some complaint, and
stands there talking to herself in a depressing murmur until she
arrives at the next grievance. Whenever we hear this, which is
whenever we are in the sitting-room, we amuse ourselves by chanting
lines of melancholypoetry which correspond to the sentiments she
seems to be uttering. It is the only way the infliction can be
endured, for the sitting-room is so small that we cannot keep the
door closed habitually. The effect of this plan is something like
the following:-
She. "The range has sic a bad draft I canna mak' the fire draw!"
We. `But I'm ower auld for the tears to start,
An' sae the sighs maun blaw!'
She. "The clock i' the hall doesna strike. I have to get oot o' my
bed to see the time."
We. `The broken hairt it kens
Nae second spring again!'
She. "There's no' eneuch jugs i' the hoose."
We. `I'm downright dizzy wi' the thought--
In troth I'm like to greet!'
She. "The sink drain isna recht."
We. `An' it's oh! to win awa', awa',
An' it's oh! to win awa'!'
She. "I canna thole a box-bed!"
We. `Ay waukin O
Waukin O an' weary.
Sleep I can get nane,
Ay waukin O!'
She. "It's fair insultin' to rent a hoose wi' so few convenience."
We. `An' I'm ower auld to fish ony mair,
An' I hinna the chance to droon.'
She. "The work is fair sickenin' i' this hoose, an' a' for ane puir
body to do by her lane."
We. `How can ye chant, ye little birds,
An' I sae weary, fu' o' care?'
She. "Ah, but that was a fine family I lived wi' in Glasgy; an' it's
a wearifu' day's work I've had the day."
We. `Oh why was I spared to cry, Wae's me!'
She. "Why dinna they leave floo'rs i' the garden makin' a mess i'
the hoose wi' `em? It's not for the knowin' what they will be after
next!"
We. `Oh, waly waly up the bank,
And waly waly doon the brae!'
Miss Grieve's plaints never grow less, though we are sometimes at a
loss for appropriate quotations to match them. The poetic
interpolations are introduced merely to show the general spirit of
her conversation. They take the place of her sighs, which are by
their nature unprintable. Many times each day she is wont to sink
into one low chair, and, extending her feet in another, close her
eyes and murmur undistinguishable plaints which come to us in a kind
of rhythmic way. She has such a shaking right hand we have been
obliged to give up coffee and have tea, as the former beverage
became too unsettled on its journey from the kitchen to the
breakfast-table. She says she kens she is a guid cook, though salf-
praise is sma' racommendation (sma' as it is she will get nae
ither!); but we have little opportunity to test her skill, as she
prepares only our breakfasts of eggs and porridge. Visions of home-
made goodies had danced before our eyes, but as the hall clock
doesna strike she is unable to rise at any exact hour, and as the
range draft is bad, and the coals too hard to batter up wi' a
hatchet, we naturally have to content ourselves with the baker's
loaf.
And this is a truthfulportrait of `Calamity Jane,' our one Pettybaw
grievance.
Chapter XVI. The path that led to Crummylowe.
`Gae farer up the burn to Habbie's Howe,
Where a' the sweets o' spring an' simmer grow:
Between twa birks, out o'er a little lin,
The water fa's an' mak's a singan din;
A pool breast-deep, beneath as clear as glass,
Kisses, wi' easy whirls, the bord'ring grass.'
The Gentle Shepherd.
That is what Peggy says to Jenny in Allan Ramsay's poem, and if you
substitute `Crummylowe' for `Habbie's Howe' in the first line, you
will have a lovely picture of the farm-steadin'.
You come to it by turning the corner from the inn, first passing the
cottage where the lady wishes to rent two rooms for fifteen
shillings a week, but will not give much attendance, as she is
slightly asthmatic, and the house is always as clean as it is this
minute, and the view from the window looking out on Pettybaw Bay
me here, when it is only five miles from Inchcaldy, and a lovely
road besides, is more than I can understand!"
"In what way has Inchcaldy been so unhappy as to offend you?" I
asked.
"It has not offended me, save that it chances to be Ronald
Macdonald's parish--that is all."
"Ronald Macdonald's parish!" we repeated automatically.
"Certainly--you must have heard him mention Inchcaldy; and how queer
he will think it that I have come to Pettybaw, under all the
circumstances!"
"We do not know `all the circumstances,'" quoted Salemina somewhat
haughtily; "and you must remember, my dear, that our opportunities
for speech with Mr. Macdonald have been very rare when you were
present. For my part, I was always in such a tremor of anxiety
during his visits lest one or both of you should descend to blows
that I remember no details of his conversation. Besides, we did not
choose Pettybaw; we discovered it by chance as we were driving from
Strathdee to St. Rules. How were we to know that it was near this
fatal Inchcaldy? If you think it best, we will hold no
communication with the place, and Mr. Macdonald need never know you
are here."
I thought Francesca looked rather startled at this proposition. At
all events she said hastily, "Oh, well, let it go; we could not
avoid each other long, anyway, although it is very awkward, of
course; you see, we did not part friends."
"I thought I had never seen you on more cordial terms," remarked
Salemina.
"But you weren't there," answered Francesca unguardedly.
"Weren't where?"
"Weren't there."
"Where?"
"At the station."
"What station?"
"The station in Edinburgh from which I started for the Highlands."
"You never said that he came to see you off."
"The matter was too unimportant for notice; and the more I think of
his being here, the less I mind it after all; and so, dull care,
begone! When I first meet him on the sands or in the loaning, I
shall say, `Dear me, is it Mr. Macdonald! What brought you to our
quiet hamlet?' (I shall put the responsibility on him, you know.)
`That is the worst of these small countries,--fowk are aye i' the
gait! When we part for ever in America, we are able to stay parted,
if we wish.' Then he will say, `Quite so, quite so; but I suppose
even you, Miss Monroe, will allow that a minister may not move his
church to please a lady.' `Certainly not,' I shall reply,
`especially when it is Estaiblished!' Then he will laugh, and we
shall be better friends for a few moments; and then I shall tell him
my latest story about the Scotchman who prayed, `Lord, I do not ask
that Thou shouldst give me wealth; only show me where it is, and I
will attend to the rest.'"
Salemina moaned at the delightfulprospectopening before us, while
I went to the piano and carolled impersonally--
"Oh, wherefore did I cross the Forth,
And leave my love behind me?
Why did I venture to the north
With one that did not mind me?
I'm sure I've seen a better limb
And twenty better faces;
But still my mind it runs on him
When I am at the races!"
Francesca left the room at this, and closed the door behind her with
such energy that the bust of Sir Walter rocked on the hall shelf.
Running upstairs she locked herself in her bedroom, and came down
again only to help us receive Jane Grieve, who arrived at eight
o'clock.
In times of joy Salemina, Francesca, and I occasionally have our
trifling differences of opinion, but in hours of affliction we are
as one flesh. An all-wise Providence sent us Jane Grieve for fear
that we should be too happy in Pettybaw. Plans made in heaven for
the discipline of sinful human flesh are always successful, and this
was no exception.
We had sent a `machine' from the inn to meet her, and when it drew
up at the door we went forward to greet the rosy little Jane of our
fancy. An aged person, wearing a rusty black bonnet and shawl, and
carrying what appeared to be a tin cake-box and a baby's bath-tub,
descended rheumatically from the vehicle and announced herself as
Miss Grieve. She was too old to call by her Christian name, too
sensitive to call by her surname, so Miss Grieve she remained, as
announced, to the end of the chapter, and our rosy little Jane died
before she was actually born. The man took her grotesque luggage
into the kitchen, and Salemina escorted her thither, while Francesca
and I fell into each other's arms and laughed hysterically.
"Nobody need tell me that she is Mrs. M'Collop's sister's husband's
niece," she whispered, "although she may possibly be somebody's
grand-aunt. Doesn't she remind you of Mrs. Gummidge?"
Salemina returned in a quarter of an hour, and sank dejectedly on
the sofa.
"Run over to the inn, Francesca" she said, "and order bacon and eggs
at eight-thirty to-morrow morning. Miss Grieve thinks we had better
not breakfast at home until she becomes accustomed to the
surroundings."
"Shall we allow her to become accustomed to them?" I questioned.
"She came up from Glasgow to Edinburgh for the day, and went to see
Mrs. M'Collop just as our telegram arrived. She was living with an
`extremely nice family' in Glasgow, and only broke her engagement in
order to try Fifeshire air for the summer; so she will remain with
us as long as she is benefited by the climate."
"Can't you pay her for a month and send her away?"
"How can we? She is Mrs. M'Collop's sister's husband's niece, and
we intend returning to Mrs. M'Collop. She has a nice ladylike
appearance, but when she takes her bonnet off she looks seventy
years old."
"She ought always to keep it off, then," returned Francesca, "for
she looked eighty with it on. We shall have to soothe her last
moments, of course, and pay her funeral expenses. Did you offer her
a cup of tea and show her the box-bed?"
"Yes; she said she was muckle obleeged to me, but the coals were so
poor and hard she couldna batter them up to start a fire the nicht,
and she would try the box-bed to see if she could sleep in it. I am
glad to remember that it was you who telegraphed for her, Penelope."
"Let there be no recriminations," I responded; "let us stand
shoulder to shoulder in this calamity,--isn't there a story called
Calamity Jane? We might live at the inn, and give her the cottage
for a summer residence, but I utterly refuse to be parted from our
cat and the 1602 lintel."
After I have once described Miss Grieve I shall not suffer her to
begloom these pages as she did our young lives. She is so exactly
like her kind in America she cannot be looked upon as a national
type. Everywhere we go we see fresh, fair-haired, sonsie lasses;
why should we have been visited by this affliction, we who have no
courage in a foreign land to rid ourselves of it?
She appears at the door of the kitchen with some complaint, and
stands there talking to herself in a depressing murmur until she
arrives at the next grievance. Whenever we hear this, which is
whenever we are in the sitting-room, we amuse ourselves by chanting
lines of melancholypoetry which correspond to the sentiments she
seems to be uttering. It is the only way the infliction can be
endured, for the sitting-room is so small that we cannot keep the
door closed habitually. The effect of this plan is something like
the following:-
She. "The range has sic a bad draft I canna mak' the fire draw!"
We. `But I'm ower auld for the tears to start,
An' sae the sighs maun blaw!'
She. "The clock i' the hall doesna strike. I have to get oot o' my
bed to see the time."
We. `The broken hairt it kens
Nae second spring again!'
She. "There's no' eneuch jugs i' the hoose."
We. `I'm downright dizzy wi' the thought--
In troth I'm like to greet!'
She. "The sink drain isna recht."
We. `An' it's oh! to win awa', awa',
An' it's oh! to win awa'!'
She. "I canna thole a box-bed!"
We. `Ay waukin O
Waukin O an' weary.
Sleep I can get nane,
Ay waukin O!'
She. "It's fair insultin' to rent a hoose wi' so few convenience."
We. `An' I'm ower auld to fish ony mair,
An' I hinna the chance to droon.'
She. "The work is fair sickenin' i' this hoose, an' a' for ane puir
body to do by her lane."
We. `How can ye chant, ye little birds,
An' I sae weary, fu' o' care?'
She. "Ah, but that was a fine family I lived wi' in Glasgy; an' it's
a wearifu' day's work I've had the day."
We. `Oh why was I spared to cry, Wae's me!'
She. "Why dinna they leave floo'rs i' the garden makin' a mess i'
the hoose wi' `em? It's not for the knowin' what they will be after
next!"
We. `Oh, waly waly up the bank,
And waly waly doon the brae!'
Miss Grieve's plaints never grow less, though we are sometimes at a
loss for appropriate quotations to match them. The poetic
interpolations are introduced merely to show the general spirit of
her conversation. They take the place of her sighs, which are by
their nature unprintable. Many times each day she is wont to sink
into one low chair, and, extending her feet in another, close her
eyes and murmur undistinguishable plaints which come to us in a kind
of rhythmic way. She has such a shaking right hand we have been
obliged to give up coffee and have tea, as the former beverage
became too unsettled on its journey from the kitchen to the
breakfast-table. She says she kens she is a guid cook, though salf-
praise is sma' racommendation (sma' as it is she will get nae
ither!); but we have little opportunity to test her skill, as she
prepares only our breakfasts of eggs and porridge. Visions of home-
made goodies had danced before our eyes, but as the hall clock
doesna strike she is unable to rise at any exact hour, and as the
range draft is bad, and the coals too hard to batter up wi' a
hatchet, we naturally have to content ourselves with the baker's
loaf.
And this is a truthfulportrait of `Calamity Jane,' our one Pettybaw
grievance.
Chapter XVI. The path that led to Crummylowe.
`Gae farer up the burn to Habbie's Howe,
Where a' the sweets o' spring an' simmer grow:
Between twa birks, out o'er a little lin,
The water fa's an' mak's a singan din;
A pool breast-deep, beneath as clear as glass,
Kisses, wi' easy whirls, the bord'ring grass.'
The Gentle Shepherd.
That is what Peggy says to Jenny in Allan Ramsay's poem, and if you
substitute `Crummylowe' for `Habbie's Howe' in the first line, you
will have a lovely picture of the farm-steadin'.
You come to it by turning the corner from the inn, first passing the
cottage where the lady wishes to rent two rooms for fifteen
shillings a week, but will not give much attendance, as she is
slightly asthmatic, and the house is always as clean as it is this
minute, and the view from the window looking out on Pettybaw Bay
- unhappy [ʌn´hæpi]
a.不幸的；不快乐的 (初中英语单词) - offend [ə´fend] v.犯错误；违犯；犯罪 (初中英语单词)
- descend [di´send] v.下来，下降 (初中英语单词)
- hastily [´heistili] ad.急速地；草率地 (初中英语单词)
- responsibility [ri,spɔnsə´biliti] n.责任(心)；职责；任务 (初中英语单词)
- minister [´ministə] n.部长；大臣 v.伺候 (初中英语单词)
- wealth [welθ] n.财富，财产 (初中英语单词)
- delightful [di´laitful] a.讨人喜欢的 (初中英语单词)
- prospect [´prɔspekt, prəs´pekt] n.景色；境界 v.勘察 (初中英语单词)
- opening [´əupəniŋ] n.开放；开端 a.开始的 (初中英语单词)
- venture [´ventʃə] n.投机 v.冒险；敢于 (初中英语单词)
- energy [´enədʒi] n.活力，精力；能力 (初中英语单词)
- grieve [gri:v] v.&n.(使)悲痛；哀悼 (初中英语单词)
- occasionally [ə´keiʒənəli] ad.偶然地；非经常地 (初中英语单词)
- discipline [´disiplin] n.纪律；训练 (初中英语单词)
- actually [´æktʃuəli] ad.事实上；实际上 (初中英语单词)
- thither [´ðiðə] ad.到那里 a.那边的 (初中英语单词)
- remind [ri´maind] vt.提醒；使记(想)起 (初中英语单词)
- telegram [´teligræm] n.电报 (初中英语单词)
- engagement [in´geidʒmənt] n.婚约；雇用；受聘 (初中英语单词)
- funeral [´fju:nərəl] n.葬礼，丧葬；困难 (初中英语单词)
- residence [´rezidəns] n.居住(期间)；住宅 (初中英语单词)
- complaint [kəm´pleint] n.抱怨；叫屈 (初中英语单词)
- whenever [wen´evə] conj.&ad.无论何时 (初中英语单词)
- poetry [´pəuitri] n.诗；诗意 (初中英语单词)
- unable [ʌn´eibəl] a.不能的；无能为力的 (初中英语单词)
- repeated [ri´pi:tid] a.反复的；重复的 (高中英语单词)
- proposition [,prɔpə´ziʃən] n.提议；主张；陈述 (高中英语单词)
- awkward [´ɔ:kwəd] a.笨拙的；为难的 (高中英语单词)
- cordial [´kɔ:diəl] a.热忱的；亲切的 (高中英语单词)
- bonnet [´bɔnit] n.无边女帽；童帽 (高中英语单词)
- soothe [su:ð] vt.安慰；镇定；减轻 (高中英语单词)
- batter [´bætə] v.乱轰；磨损(家具等) (高中英语单词)
- melancholy [´melənkəli] n.忧郁 a.忧郁的 (高中英语单词)
- correspond [,kɔri´spɔnd] vi.符合；相当；通信 (高中英语单词)
- appropriate [ə´prəupri-it, ə´prəuprieit] a.适宜的 vt.私占；拨给 (高中英语单词)
- portrait [´pɔ:trit] n.肖像；相片；雕像 (高中英语单词)
- edinburgh [´edinbərə] n.爱丁堡 (英语四级单词)
- unimportant [ʌnim´pɔ:tənt] a.不重要的，平凡的 (英语四级单词)
- wherefore [´weəfɔ:] ad.为什么；因此 (英语四级单词)
- upstairs [,ʌp´steəz] ad.在楼上 a.楼上的 (英语四级单词)
- providence [´prɔvidəns] n.天意，天命，上帝 (英语四级单词)
- vehicle [´vi:ikəl] n.车辆；媒介物 (英语四级单词)
- grotesque [grəu´tesk] a.奇异的，想象中的 (英语四级单词)
- glasgow [´glɑ:sgəu] n.格拉斯哥 (英语四级单词)
- grievance [´gri:vəns] n.不平；冤情；抱怨 (英语四级单词)
- affliction [ə´flikʃən] n.痛苦，苦恼；折磨 (英语六级单词)
- surname [´sə:neim] n.姓氏 (英语六级单词)
- habitually [hə´bitjuəli] adv.习惯地 (英语六级单词)
- downright [´daunrait] a.直率的 ad.彻底 (英语六级单词)
- truthful [´tru:θfəl] a.诚实的；真实的 (英语六级单词)
- simmer [´simə] v.煨，炖；内心充满 (英语六级单词)
文章标签:名著
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