The Ladies Lindores. Volume 2 of 3. Oliphant Margaret

of a reasonable age, and I'll have nane o' your rash opinions here."

      CHAPTER XVII

      "Oh yes, that's true – I'm an old Tory. I'm proud of the name," said Sir James, with his genial countenance. "If you'll believe me, my young friend, most changes are for the worse. When I remember, before I went to India, what a cheery world it was – none of those new-fangled notions were so much as thought of – we were all kindly one with another, as country neighbours should be. The parish school – that was good enough for me. I got the most of my schooling there. We had a grand dominie – there was not a more learned man out of St Andrews or Aberdeen. Old Robert Beatoun the blacksmith was at the school with me. We've been great friends ever since, but I cannot say that he ever took anything upon him in consequence. That's one of your new-fangled notions too – to part all the world into classes, and then, when their habits are formed and their ways of living settled, to proclaim they're all equal. No, no – they're not all equal; you may take my word for it, though I'm no Solomon."

      "I don't think so, either, Sir James; but pardon me, if you found no evil in going to the same school as the old blacksmith – "

      "Not a pin, sir – not a pin!" cried the old general. "We respected each other. We were great friends, but not associates. I had my own cronies, and he had his: but we always respected each other. And do you think to sit on the same bench with a wholesome country lad in corduroy breeks was worse for me than being packed up with a set of little dandies, taking care of their books and keeping their hands clean, and sent out of their own country till they're made strangers to it, as comes to pass with your Eton, and the rest of them – I ask your pardon, Erskine. I forgot you were there yourself – "

      "There is no offence," said John. "I think I agree with you so far; but, Sir James, your theory is far more democratic, far more levelling – "

      "Me democratic and levelling!" said Sir James. "That will be news. No, no; that was all in the course of nature. When a lad was to be pushed in the world, his friends pushed him. You cannot do that now. When you saw your friend with a houseful of children, you would say to him, 'What are you going to do with those fine lads of yours?' and if you knew a director, or had influence to hear of a writer-ship, or a set of colours. – Now, ye cannot help on your friend's boys, and ye cease to think of them. What little ye might do, ye forget to do it. Robert Beatoun's grandson, you'll tell me, got in high on the list for those competition-wallahs, as they call them. Well, I say nothing against it. The lad is a good lad, though he was never brought up in the way of having men under him, and he'll feel the want of that when he gets to India. The like of me – we were poor enough, but we had always been used to be of the officer kind. That makes a great difference; and if you think we did our work worse for having no bother about examinations – "

      "That has proved itself, Sir James. Nobody pretends to say it did not work well."

      "Then why change it?" said the old man. "And about your hospitals and things. When there was a poor natural, as they call it, in a village, everybody was good to the creature; and do you think the honest folk that had known it all its life would not put up with it, and feel for it, more than servants in an hospital? When we had a burden to bear, we bore it in those days, and did the best we could for our own. We didn't shuffle them off on the first person's shoulders that would take them up."

      All this John had brought upon himself by his reference to Lord Lindores's scheme. Whatever might be well with respect to the election, he had felt that there could be but one voice in respect to a hospital; but John had soon been convinced that in that respect also there certainly was more than one voice.

      "But I suppose," he said, feeling somewhat confused by this style of reasoning, for it was not a subject upon which the young man had thought for himself, – "I suppose, for the suffering and miserable – for those out of the common line of humanity, more badly off, less capable than their neighbours – hospitals are necessary."

      "Let those that belong to them care for them, sir," cried Sir James. "I'm saying it in no hard-hearted way. Do you not think that when a trouble is sent upon a family, it's far better for the family to make a sacrifice – to draw close together, to bear it, and take care of their own? That's always been my opinion – that was the practice long syne. If ye had a thorn in the flesh, ye supported it. When one was ill, the rest took care of him. There were no hired sick-nurses in those days. When ye had a fever, your mother nursed you. If you were blind or lame, every one would give you a little, and nobody grudged your meat or your drink. And that was how Scotland was kept so independent, and the poor folk hated debt and beggary. Once you give your own duty over to other folks, you sacrifice that," the old soldier said, with conviction. Sir James was of the class of men who are never more entirely at home than when they are exercising the duties of beneficence – the sort of men who manage hospitals and establish charities by nature. Had the county hospital been existing, he it was, and not Lord Lindores, who would have given time and trouble to it; but Sir James was as full of prejudices as a hearty, healthy old gentleman has a right to be. He would not give in to the new thing; and his arguments were shrewd, although he himself would have been the last to be bound by them. He would have taken the burden off a poor man's shoulders and carried it himself without a compunction. Saying is one thing and doing another, all the world over; only it is usual that people profess not less, but more, benevolent sentiments than are natural to them. Sir James took the other way.

      "You must excuse me saying," the old general went on, "that you must not trust too much to Lord Lindores. Part of it is political, there is no doubt about that. He's wanting to get a character for being public-spirited and a useful member of his party. They tell me he's thinking of bringing in his son in the case of an election, but that would never do – that is to say, from my point of view," said Sir James, laughing; "you're on the other side? – ah, to be sure, I had forgotten that. Well, I suppose we're all meaning the same thing, – the good of the country; but depend upon it, that's not to be procured in this way. The Lindores family are very excellent people – very worthy people; but they're new-fangled – they have lived abroad, and they have got foreign notions into their heads."

      "Benevolent institutions are, above all others, English notions – or so, at least, I have always heard," John said.

      This brought a slight flush on the old man's cheek. "Well, I believe you are right – I think you are right. I will not go against that. Still it is a great pity to bring foreign notions into a quiet country place."

      They were walking up and down the lawn at Chiefswood, where a party of country neighbours were about to assemble. It was a kind of gathering which had scarcely been acclimatised in the North; and the pleasure of sitting out, though the seats were comfortably arranged in the most sheltered spot, was at the best an equivocal one; but fortunately the drawing-room, with its large bright windows overlooking the scene of the gentle gaieties provided for, was behind, and there already some groups had collected. John Erskine, without being aware of it, was the hero of the feast. He was the new-comer, and everybody was willing to do him honour. It was expected that he was to be the chief performer in those outdoor games which were not yet very well known to the young people. And it was somewhat disconcerting that he should have chosen this moment to discourse with old Sir James upon the county hospital, and the poor lunatics and imbeciles of the district, for whose benefit Lord Lindores was so anxious to legislate. Had it been any other subject, the old general would have dismissed the young man to his peers, for Sir James had a great notion that the young people should be left to entertain each other. But as it happened, the theme was one which had disturbed his genial mind. He was vexed at once in his prejudices, and in his honest conviction that the county, to which he was so glad to get back after his long exile, was the best managed and most happy of districts. He had found nothing amiss in it when he came home. It had been welcome to him in every detail of the old life which he remembered so well. There were too many changes, he thought, already. He would have liked to preserve everything. And to have it suggested by a new gingerbread, half-English, half-foreign intruder, with all the light-minded ways that belonged to the unknown races on the Continent, that the beloved county wanted reorganisation, almost betrayed the old man into ill-humour. The guests kept arriving while he talked, but he talked on, giving forth his views loosely upon general questions. "We're going the wrong road," he said, "aye seeking after something that's new.