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Updated: June 1, 2025
This fair, sunny-haired, blue-eyed woman was the wife he had dreamed about; and Tallisker told him he had at any rate done right in that matter. "The bonnie little Republican," as he called her, queened it over the dominie from the first hour of their acquaintance. He stayed a week in London, and during it visited Colin's studio.
It was not likely he would have listened to any urging, but it soothed him to think he would. And he greatly aggravated the dominie's trouble by saying, "Why did ye na mak me do right, Tallisker? You should hae been mair determined wi' me, dominie." During the next six weeks the dominie's efforts were almost superhuman. He saw every cottage whitewashed; he was nurse and doctor and cook.
At any rate he improved under her sway, for being thoroughly comfortable himself, he was inclined to have consideration for others. One afternoon, as he came from the works, it began to snow. He turned aside to the manse to borrow a plaid of Tallisker. He very seldom went to the manse, but in the keen, driving snow the cheerful fire gleaming through the window looked very inviting.
Still it must be acknowledged that Tallisker looked on the situation as a difficult one. The new workers to a man disapproved of the Established Church of Scotland. Perhaps of all classes of laborers Scotch colliers are the most theoretically democratic and the most practically indifferent in matters of religion.
This speech gave the laird time to think. It would never do to quarrel with Tallisker. If he should set himself positively against his scheme of sending his clan to Canada it would be almost a hopeless one; and then he loved and respected his friend.
He thought he would go in and take a cup of tea with Tallisker. "Come awa in, laird," cried old Janet, "come awa in. You are a sight good for sair e'en. The dominie will be back anon, and I'll gie ye a drap o' hot tay till he comes." So the laird went in, and the first thing he saw was Colin's picture of "The Clan's Farewell." It moved him to his very heart.
He was quite determined now to find Colin as soon as he returned from America. In rather less than six months there were a few lines from Colin, saying that the money sent had been applied to the proper purpose, and had nobly fulfilled it. The laird had said he wanted no explanations, and Colin gave him none. Tallisker read the letter with a half smile.
His tall, powerful frame and his dark, handsome face, all aglow with a passionate conviction of right, and an invincible determination to do it, commanded his thorough admiration. He clasped his hands behind his back and said calmly, "Tallisker, you'll be sorry enough for your temper erelong. You hae gien way mair than I did. Ye ken how you feel about it." "I feel ashamed o' mysel', laird.
As ambition and other motives died out, avarice usurped their places, and Tallisker saw with a feeling half angry, and half pitiful, the laird's life dwindling down to this most contemptible of all aims. He kept his duty as proprietor constantly before the laird, but he no longer seemed to care that people should say, "Crawford's men have the best laborers' cottages in Scotland."
The women had their children shoulder high to see him, the citizens, bonnets up, were pressing up to his bridle-rein. It stirred Tallisker like a peal of trumpets. With the tears streaming down his glowing face, he cried out, "How daur ye, sir! You are just the warst rebel between the seas! King George ought to hang you up at Carlisle-gate. And this is painting! This is artist's wark!
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