All the Days of My Life: An Autobiography

“There are no such unfortunates. God is ‘not willing that any should perish, but that all should come to repentance.’ Once I heard my father quote that verse in the pulpit, and after a moment’s pause he cried out, ‘a great all that,’ and a very old man spoke out loudly, ‘Glory be to God! A great all. It covers every soul.’ Then Father quoted the words again, and there was a wonderful happiness, and the dull old chapel seemed to glow, and the faces of the people were lifted heavenward.”

And Robert called me a dear little Methodist, and drew me close to his side, and kissed me. “No wonder!” he continued, “my father felt no interest in you – but that was a strange dream, Milly.”

“Dreams are large possessions, Robert,” I answered; “they are an expansion of life, an enlightenment, and a discipline. I thank God for my dream life; my daily life would be far poorer, if it wanted the second sight of dreams. The dreams I have had during this movement of ours have kept me serene and satisfied. They have shown me what is appointed, and things appointed come to pass.”

“In three weeks we shall see if your dreams come to pass.”

“Yes, but three weeks is a long time.”

Indeed I felt it to be almost a cruel lengthening of suspense; for I did not understand at the time I was learning one of the most difficult lessons the soul has to master – that of “waiting patiently for the Lord.” It is easy to ask, but to wait patiently for the answer, is a far more difficult duty. However, when I had carefully arranged in the places indicated our household treasures of napery, clothing, silver, and so forth, I wished I could go to Kendal. But I saw Robert’s face change as soon as I mentioned Kendal.

“We made a plan for our movements, Milly,” he said, “and I do not wish a single point altered. It might disarrange all I have been working for.”

Then I declared I was quite content, but I was not always content. In spite of my undoubted confidence in the wisdom of the change we were making, I had days of utter weariness. My life, with all its orderly habits and duties, seemed to be the same; but I knew that its foundation was destroyed; reading had ceased to interest me; I had no more sewing to do; my soul often sank back upon itself, and sometimes even retired from sympathy and affection. All have had such hours, and know what they mean. As for me, when this dark mental and spiritual inertia attacked me, and I could not pray, I just told God so, and waited until some blessed wind of Heaven unlocked the mood, which bound me like a chain.

One afternoon, about a week before I was to go to Kendal, Robert’s mother called, and the moment she entered the room, a look of amazement and anger came over her face.

“Amelia!” she cried, “Amelia, what are you doing? Do stop that foolishness at once. It is fairly sinful, and nothing less.”

What I was doing, was spinning some half-crowns on the polished table for the amusement of Mary, who was sitting in her high chair and laughing with delight. I looked up at Mother, and explained how I had given Kitty a sovereign for some marketing, and she had brought the change in silver pieces, so I was just showing Mary how prettily the crowns and half-crowns could dance.

“Don’t you see that you are teaching the child, before she is two years old, that money is a thing to play with? And, what is more, suppose she puts one of those shilling bits in her mouth, and it gets into her throat; nothing could save her. And it would be your fault, and not God’s will, at all.”

“Thank you, Mother,” I said, as I rapidly gathered up the coins. “It was very thoughtless of me; I will never do the like again. Will you have a cup of tea, and will you stay all night?”

“No,” she answered, “I just came to see if Robert was at home. It is not possible to find him in his office lately, and I want a few words with him.”

“I have not seen him since early this morning,” I said; and I ordered her tea, and tried to introduce a more pleasant conversation. But the incident of the coins mortified me, and I could see Mother anxiously glancing at them, as they lay on the chimney-piece; so I carried them to my desk, locked the desk, and put the key in my pocket. As I was doing this, I was thinking that it might be the last time I should see her, and was trying to find some homely, sympathetic subject, that would bring us, at least for this hour, closer together.

But it was not a pleasant visit, and Robert was troubled and silent for a long time, after I told him about it. Then I was troubled, for I knew so little of Robert’s family affairs, that I was like a woman walking in the dark any step might be a false one; any moment I might stumble. But often, I had heard my father say, “When you do not know what to do, then stand still.” So I was still, and appeared to be puzzling over a new pattern of crochet work.

For I was determined that Robert should take the initiative, and after a little while he did so. “Milly,” he said, “I have been trying to discover what makes Mother and you always at swords’ points. If you do not quarrel, you come so near it, that you might as well, perhaps better, do so. You do not quarrel with any one else, why cannot you two agree?”

“The disagreement is probably behind, and beyond us, Robert,” I answered. “We are not responsible for it. You have heard me speak of Ann Oddy?”

“Yes.”

“Well, then, Ann would say, that your mother’s angel and my angel did not agree. I think Mother’s angel is probably a wise, stern spirit, who has made Mother look well after her own interests, and despise frivolities; and I am sure my angel is one easily entreated, and anxious to give me everything I want – when she can – but she cannot always manage it.”

Robert laughed and said, “Then I suppose your angel and mine are good friends.”

“Yes,” I answered; “they both approved our marriage, and did all they could to forward it.”

“Suppose they had not approved it?”

“Then your mother’s angel would have had her way, and we should have been separated.”

“If you hold such opinions, Milly, you must also believe that angels still retain human feelings?”

“Why not?” I answered. “They are not perfect. They are still going forward, even as we are.”

“Then they cannot be equal.”

“Far from it. Some are in authority, some under authority. Some are tidings bringers, others are invisible helpers of all kinds. Some minister to little children, others to men fainting in the van of a hard life, and many console the dying. I have heard it said that ‘we come into the world alone, and we die alone.’ We do neither. No, indeed!”

“You little preacher! Where do you get such ideas?” asked Robert.

“Ideas do not float about in the air, so then some intelligent being sends them to me. They are the fruits of some soul. A good message will always find a messenger.”

“Millions of spiritual creatures walk the earth,

Unseen, both when we wake and when we sleep.”

Every one knows that in times of great anxiety, conversation is sure to turn either on some trivial occurrence, or else on some speculative subject. It was so with Robert and myself. We did not talk more than was necessary about our own affairs; as long as they were in uncertainty and transition, they were at the mercy of contingencies, which we could neither alter nor hurry. A few words every evening informed me of any progress made and then I knew it was wise to turn the conversation upon some irrelevant subject, that would provoke argument.

But joyful or sorrowful time goes by, and at last it was the fifteenth of August. I saw the dawn breaking, and I whispered to myself, “Awake, Amelia! There is a charge for your shield today!” and with this cheerful exhortation I rose. After breakfast, I called Kitty, and she helped me to pack the trunk that was to go with me, wherever my destiny led. Kitty thought Kendal was its limit, and she made a remark about the quantity of the children’s clothing, and the small number and plainness of my own gowns. I made no explanation, but said,

“Now, Kitty, look after your own things. You must be ready to leave the house with me by ten o’clock tomorrow morning. After my train has left, you can then take the carriage direct to the Greenock Station for your own journey.”

There was very little more for me to do, and the day threatened to be sixty hours long. So about noon I resolved to take a walk up Argyle Street, go through the Arcade to Buchanan, and get my luncheon at McLaren’s. It was to be a kind of farewell walk over the well known pavements and I thought if I saw a pretty brooch or bracelet made of Scotch pebbles, I would buy it as a memorial of the happy days, I had spent in Glasgow. The unhappy ones, I was determined to forget. I went into a jeweler’s on Buchanan Street, and turned over a lot of those queer ornaments made of various colored agates set in silver. They were all heavy and ungraceful, but I paid a pound for a pair of bracelets, and I wonder even today what made me do it. I have no love for what is called jewelry, it always looks barbaric to me, and this Scotch jewelry is neither pretty nor rare, nor had I ever before thought of buying it. We do queer things in those hours of anxious suspense, that can find no natural outlet or relief.

As I came out of the jeweler’s with my purchase in my hand, I met Mrs. McIntosh face to face. She smiled, and put out her hand, and I could have cried with pleasure:

“Oh, how glad, how glad I am to see you!” I exclaimed. “Let us go into McLaren’s, and have a hot pie and a cup of tea, and talk about old times.”

So we did, and I told her how I had fretted over their desertion, and how pleasantly I remembered the dances with both old and young Peter, and that I never, never, had such happy evenings in any other house in Glasgow. We laughed, talked, recalled this and that, and ate our pies and drank our tea to delightful memories, that neither of us had forgotten. More than thirty-five years after this happy lunch, I was in Glasgow again, and I had a call from Mrs. McIntosh’s grandson, and an invitation from his family to come down to their seaside home to spend a few days with them. For an unavoidable reason I could not accept the invitation, but I was glad to think they had remembered me so long, because they were still young and fresh in my memory, and never will be old.

My meeting with Mrs. McIntosh made me very happy, and the day got over better than I expected, although Robert was half an hour later than usual. Every wife knows what that unusual half-hour means. It is as long as half a dozen hours; it is filled with fears and shadows of fears, about accidents possible and impossible. For it is not the troubles we are fighting, that weary and depress us; it is the ills we fear, and that never come, that give us our worst hours – the ills that have no message for us, that are passing by our dwelling even while we wait for them. I doubt if there lives a man or a woman who cannot say,

“Oh, the anxious hours I’ve spent,

For ills that never came!”

Indeed when Robert did come he was more cheerful than I expected, and after dinner he told me that he had sold the furniture just as it stood to the man who made it, adding, “he will not remove it until Monday, the twenty-second.”

I smiled faintly, but could not speak, and there was a little silence. Then Robert said, “Sing us a song, Milly.”

“I can not sing tonight, Robert.”

“Try ‘The Kail Brose of Old Scotland.’”

“No,” I answered, “there is only one song that fits tonight – ‘Lochaber No More.’”

“Sing it then.”

I shook my head, saying, “It’s overwhelming sadness, would be intolerable. You must be happy, if you dare to sing ‘Lochaber No More.’ If you are not, its broken-hearted melody will haunt you for weeks.”

Then we were silent again, until I suddenly looked up, and found Robert regarding me with eyes so full of love and pity, that I dropped my crochet and covered my face with my hands. I could not bear it. He tenderly took my hands in his, and with kisses and affectionate words, told me that he was not insensible to the generous manner with which I had surrendered all his gifts to me.