“Have you anything for me, Andrew?” Dawtie would say, in the strong
dialect which her sweet voice made so pleasant to those that loved her;
whereupon Andrew, perhaps without immediate answer more than a smile,
would turn into his room, and reappear with what he had got ready for
her to “chew upon” till they should meet again. Milton's sonnet, for
instance, to the “virgin wise and pure,” had long served her aspiration;
equally wise and pure, Dawtie could understand it as well as she for
whom it was written. To see the delight she took in it, would have been
a joy to any loving student of humanity. It had cost her more effort to
learn than almost any song, and perhaps therefore it was the more
precious. Andrew seldom gave her a book to learn from; in general he
copied, in his clearest handwriting, whatever poem or paragraph he
thought fit for Dawtie; and when they met, she would not unfrequently,
if there was time, repeat unasked what she had learned, and be rewarded
with his unfailing look of satisfaction.
There was a secret between them--a secret proclaimed on the house-tops,
a secret hidden, the most precious of pearls, in their hearts--that the
earth is the Lord's and the fullness thereof; that its work is the work
of the Lord, whether the sowing of the field, the milking of the cow,
the giving to the poor, the spending of wages, the reading of the Bible;
that God is all in all, and every throb of gladness His gift; that their
life came fresh every moment from His heart; that what was lacking to
them would arrive the very moment He had got them ready for it. They
were God's little ones in God's world--none the less their own that they
did not desire to swallow it, or thrust it in their pockets.
Among poverty-stricken Christians, consumed with care to keep a hold of
the world and save their souls, they were as two children of the house.
By living in the presence of the living One, they had become themselves
His presence--dim lanterns through which His light shone steady. Who
obeys, shines.
CHAPTER XIV.
SANDY AND GEORGE.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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