DOI article:
Balfour, Marie Clothilde: "Sub tegmine fagi"
DOI Page / Citation link:https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.26393#0210
206
“ Sub Tegmine Fagi ”
curling on a white forehead, and eyelids that trembled when you
looked at them, but were never lifted ; and flowers lay over the
mouth and chin that had met the horse’s hoof. .... And the
mother moved about the room, and cooked at the fireside, and set
meals on the small table for the others of them ; and the children
ate and lived and some of them slept, within the same four walls
as the open coffin on the white bed. And their father sat on the
settle, with tears glittering in the tangle of his grey beard, and
whispered to them hoarsely, “ Be canny noo ! ” when he saw his
wife’s dull sad eyes, and the unspeakable sorrows hanging on her
lips.
When they took the coffin away, and all the town followed
Jacky to the churchyard, Martha wandered aimlessly about the
empty room and sought, sought, for something that she missed ;
and at last, when the groping fingers touched the edge of madness,
they closed on a whistle—a sugar whistle that had been Jacky’s,
and which was half sucked and dirty, as it had been taken from
his pocket when they brought him home. And Martha found
her tears, and the seal upon her eyes was lifted, and she came
back to a whole mind and a broken heart. But often now, in the
midst of her stalwart boys and her pretty hard-working daughters,
if you ask her which is the best of them, she smiles and says
softly, “ The one that does not grow any older and never leaves
my side,” and her eyes look over their shoulders to the yellow
head she sees always near her, and the father whispers hoarsely to
the others, “ Be canny noo.”
It was he I remember and big Tom Jamieson who told us of
the Macara affair—a small thing which none troubled much about.
Big Tom and decent, gentle John Elliott were coming home one
night from the slakes, where they had been shooting wild duck
together ; and as they came up North Street, they heard loud
noises
“ Sub Tegmine Fagi ”
curling on a white forehead, and eyelids that trembled when you
looked at them, but were never lifted ; and flowers lay over the
mouth and chin that had met the horse’s hoof. .... And the
mother moved about the room, and cooked at the fireside, and set
meals on the small table for the others of them ; and the children
ate and lived and some of them slept, within the same four walls
as the open coffin on the white bed. And their father sat on the
settle, with tears glittering in the tangle of his grey beard, and
whispered to them hoarsely, “ Be canny noo ! ” when he saw his
wife’s dull sad eyes, and the unspeakable sorrows hanging on her
lips.
When they took the coffin away, and all the town followed
Jacky to the churchyard, Martha wandered aimlessly about the
empty room and sought, sought, for something that she missed ;
and at last, when the groping fingers touched the edge of madness,
they closed on a whistle—a sugar whistle that had been Jacky’s,
and which was half sucked and dirty, as it had been taken from
his pocket when they brought him home. And Martha found
her tears, and the seal upon her eyes was lifted, and she came
back to a whole mind and a broken heart. But often now, in the
midst of her stalwart boys and her pretty hard-working daughters,
if you ask her which is the best of them, she smiles and says
softly, “ The one that does not grow any older and never leaves
my side,” and her eyes look over their shoulders to the yellow
head she sees always near her, and the father whispers hoarsely to
the others, “ Be canny noo.”
It was he I remember and big Tom Jamieson who told us of
the Macara affair—a small thing which none troubled much about.
Big Tom and decent, gentle John Elliott were coming home one
night from the slakes, where they had been shooting wild duck
together ; and as they came up North Street, they heard loud
noises