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From Chapter 1
Many lives have been
written, and Lord Neaves has sung, of the ‘sons of the manse,’ so often
found pre-eminent in their several professions; and none more
distinguished than the minister-sons. But this book seeks to perpetuate
the memory of a son of the school-house, which also has made many
notable contributions to the ranks of the Scottish ministry. It would be
strange were it otherwise. Since the day of Knox, and universally since
the Scottish Act of Parliament 1696, the goodly vision of the parish
school, standing as a rule in close proximity to the parish church, and
administered till 1872 by the parish minister and heritors, symbolised
the indissoluble link between religion and education, by whose joint
influence Scottish character has been built up in all its most vital,
precious, solid, and enduring elements.
Archibald Hamilton Charteris was born at
Wamphray on 13th December 1835,
in Wamphray school-house, where his father was schoolmaster. These two
facts are the key to his whole life. To his last day he was a son of the
school-house; and, if it were possible, he was also even more devotedly
a son of Wamphray; nothing ever took the place of his native parish in
his loyal heart. Its simple ways, its isolated ideas, its primitive
opinions were all dear to him. Impressions drawn from his early
surroundings, his parentage and upbringing, were interwoven with his
very nature; no one who knew him and knew Wamphray but felt that he
remained all through his life a Wamphray boy. Those who do not know may
be tempted to ask what was the great difference between Wamphray and any
other quiet little Scottish parish. Situated in Upper Annandale,
Dumfriesshire, the parish of Wamphray in those days contained a
population of about four hundred and fifty, now reduced to three hundred
and sixty-nine. It consists of a fine wide strath or dale, at the bottom
of which flows the river Annan. Its eastern boundary is a mountain range
whose summits possess elevations of from 800 to 2000 feet. Another ridge
not much lower runs parallel to the higher along the centre of the
parish, but is cloven by the vale of Wamphray Water debouching to the
west. The slopes are beautifully wooded; while three cascades bearing
the namc9 of the Pot, the Washing Pan, and Dubb's Caldron give character
to the little glen. Such were its outward features. What was it which
gave it individuality of another kind?
For one thing, in Dr. Charteris’ youth almost everybody was related to
everybody else. An ‘incomer,' a person who neither by birth nor
marriage belonged to Wamphray, was nearly unknown. And for another
thing, in these early days there was in Wamphray no deep distinction
between landlord and tenant. Their laird was indeed their chief, loved
and revered, but he was also kinsman to many of the inhabitants, largely
one in blood, and certainly one in interest and aim with the people. It
was well that young Charteris was born and reared under a fine example
of the old regime, where scenery and atmosphere, tales and ballads of
the old freebooting times, and traditions of the Covenanters and their
persecutions had become part and parcel of the very being of the
inhabitants, and combined to give to Wamphray its altogether
indescribable old-world charm.
Then, again, none who had known it could ever forget the warm-hearted,
simple yet dignified courtesy of the parishioners; whether it were at a
winter reunion, when they went happily home through the dark, holding
each others’ hands, one of the party—often the schoolmaster—
chivalrously walking all the way in the 'sheugh' or ditch with a light
to keep the others straight; or whether, in tho lovely summer evenings,
they wandered up the glen, listening to Border songs, till they came on
the green slopes of the high rounded hills where the sheep were feeding.
The old farm-houses and cottages are still there with all the old
friendly hospitality ; the old names are now borne by sons and
grandsons. Wamphray is little changed compared with most places. Yet
Moffat, the metropolis of the district, is only seven miles off; and
even to Wamphray every now and then along the highway (which follows the
lines of a Roman road) comes thundering a motor-car, alarming and
scandalising the neighbourhood.
The Wamphray estate has passed since the twelfth century to many
different lines of proprietors. There were successively the families of
Avenel, Graham, Carlyle, Corrie, Kirkpatrick, Boyle, Scott, and
Crichton. The Johnstons owned it from 1476 to 1747. After the Johnstone era the Earls of Hopetoun were the lairds for fifty years; Sir W. Fettes, whose money built Fettes College, Edinburgh, was the
proprietor for about a dozen years; the Rogersons owned the place for
seventy-three years; and the Jardines since 1883. The ancient days of
raids by our *auld enemy' from England are happily ended. Only the
ballad entitled ‘The Lads of Wamphray' keeps alive the memory of ‘The
Galliard gay’ done to death by the Crichtons, and the terrible revenge
taken by his clan in 1593. Civil war no longer troubles the parish, as
when Charles it. halted and dined at Poldean beside the great monolith
when marching into England before the defeat of Worcester Field; or as
when the laird of Wamphray espoused the Jacobite cause in 1715, and had
to skulk in hiding till his escapade was forgotten; or as when Lord
George Murray and Prince Charlie’s Highland followers sought from
sympathetic hands refreshment for man and beast upon their march.
Sir Walter Scott has represented their gentle sway in the Fair Maid of
Perth, when the typical freebooter, who dealt so harshly with poor, vain
Oliver Proudfute, exclaims: ‘You want to know my name! My name is the
Devil’s Dick of Hellgarth, well known in Annandale for a gentle
Johnstone. I follow the stout laird of Wamphray, who rides with his
kinsman the redoubtable Lord of Johnstone.'
John Charteris in Broomhills, Wamphray, who married Margaret Murray, and
died in 1810. Their third son was Matthew Charteris, who married Jean
Learmonth, and died in 1811. He had two sons and three daughters. The
elder son was John Charteris, schoolmaster of Wamphray, who married Jean
Hamilton. They were the parents of the subject of this memoir, Archibald
Hamilton Charteris, and of two other children—Matthew, born 4th
September 1840, M.D., Edinburgh, 1863, and Professor of Materia Medica
and Therapeutics in the University of Glasgow from 1880 until his death
in 1897; and Mary, who died at Edinburgh in 1906.
Archibald Hamilton, the maternal grandfather, hailed from Torthorwald,
came to Broomhills Farm in 1814, belonged to the Preston branch of the
Hamiltons, a Covenanting family, and used to relate with pride how he
rode knee to knee with the poet Robert Burns in the Dumfries Yeomanry.
His younger brother James, afterwards minister of New Abbey, was one of
the squad who fired over the poet’s grave at his burial, in St.
Michael’s churchyard, Dumfries.
John Charteris was generally called ‘the master’ (pronounced ‘maister’),
never the ‘Dominie.’ All accounts agree on two points, that he was a
splendid specimen of the highest type of the old parochial teacher, a
class to which Scotland owed (but seldom paid) an immense debt; and that
he was utterly devoid of selfish personal ambition. He might have said
with the Shunammite: 'I dwell among mine own people.' Seeing that his
son has limned his portrait, the present writer will confine himself to
a few pertinent gleanings. Having drunk in all the instruction which
Wamphray school provided in his boyhood, John Charteris then attended
Applegarth school, where, under a University man, he greatly extended
the range of his subjects of study. The beginning of his life-work was
made at Kirkmichal; but Wamphray school fell vacant in 1823, and he was
appointed assistant and successor. His predecessor retired upon an
allowance of £16 a year, deducted from the minimum statutory salary of
£23, to Derby. Law and order have done their work, with the Reformed
Religion for their weighty sanction; and the Wamphray lads have settled
down
To plough the heath, uproot the weed.
Enrich the soil, and drain the mead,
Till flocks and herds in plenty feed
In fertile flowery Annandale.’
The church, which was rebuilt in 1835, stands at a pretty bend above the
left bank of Wamphray Water, probably upon an ancient site, and is
supposed to cover part of the precincts of a Druidical circle. Two of
its parish ministers are specially worth remembering. ‘John Brown of
Wamphray’ was ordained in 1655, but suffered banishment to Holland in
1662. He ordained Richard Cameron, the celebrated Covenanter, and was a
noted divine, critic, and linguist. Thomas Douglas, the preacher at
Drumclog Conventicle, when the dragoons of Claverhouse were put to
flight with serious loss, led a charmed life till the Revolution of
1690, and passed his last five years as minister here in peace. These
facts throw a significant light on the deep vein of Covenanting feeling
latent or patent in Dr. Charteris’ nature.
His lineage must not escape our notice. He never alluded to it,
following in this respect the admonition of his father, who used to say:
‘If you do not add further lustre to your name and pedigree, do not
mention either.' With the help, however, of a recent edict issued by the
Lyon King of Arms to a descendant, who went to Canada and often told her
grandson 'there was no better blood in Scotland,’ we can trace his
pedigree to an ancestor. Sir John Charteris of Amisfield, in the county
of Dumfries, who died in 1615. The family intermarried with the Maxwells
and the Douglases of Drumlanrig. Sir John's second son was Robert
Charteris of Kelwood, Bodisbeck, and Duchray, who married Barbara,
daughter of Robert Maxwell of Dinwoodie. Their son was William Charteris
of Duchray, who died in 1684. His son was Alexander Charteris in Mickle
Duchray; his eldest son again was which left the magnificent
remuneration of the remaining £7, the school fees (probably amounting to
£25), and a house and garden. In addition he had the privilege of taking
boarders, but no extra accommodation was provided.
By 1834 the £7 salary had risen to £18, the statutory minimum having
been raised to £34. Not till 1839 did Mr. Charteris receive that salary.
He was repeatedly offered better paid situations, notably through
Professor Pillans, but he deliberately elected to remain in his native
parish, where we are told the pupils all appeared very much alive to the
benefits of education. Well they might be, for in that little hive of
industry all willing workers received an education not inferior to that
of any High School or Academy in the land. It is not suggested that the
standard of Wamphray prevailed in all the parish schools of Scotland,
but it did in many. All the children were thoroughly drilled in the
‘three R’s,’ and were likewise taught the Bible and the Shorter
Catechism; while those who were fit for the higher branches received
such instruction as is impossible now under the burdensome restrictions
of the present code. They went forth thoroughly equipped for University
studies, and often achieved marvellously successful careers in the wide
world. Of course the personal equation counted for much. As Dr. John
Pagan, a grateful scholar, has said :—
‘The special interest of Mr. Charteris’ life was the work of his school.
Any personal or pecuniary advantage to himself from continuance of
attendance at school to qualify for the University or other openings in
life had not the slightest influence with him. He would have given his
time and his work as cordially and ungrudgingly to any of his pupils,
without fee or reward, who gave promise of gifts for professional or
commercial life, as be would have given to those who possessed ample
means to recognise whatever service he rendered. It seems in these times
very wonderful that from a parish with so limited a population, for the
fee of five shillings a quarter, pupils could be prepared to pass direct
to the University, and at once take a position as good as those who came
from the amply endowed and staffed educational institutions in the
leading centres of population. He never professed to teach what he did
not know, and no gratification was deeper to him than to conduct others
into the paths over which he himself had gone.’
Mr. Charteris held advanced views on the higher education of girls. He
was a quiet, unassuming man, yet of a strong personality, manifestly
pervading the life of the parish for good. Realising that education was
not finished when a boy left school at twelve or fourteen, he instituted
a Debating Society—locally styled ‘The Gabbing School'— which was
attended by all classes, and which greatly elevated the standard of
local intelligence among farmers, shepherds, tradesmen, and labourers,
who were all active members. It became a centre of social life, and may
be said to have antedated the Young Men's Guild. The master's
temperament was cool, but he joked heartily and was very witty. He had
many laughs, from hearty to satirical. Nobody ‘got the tawse' in school
after being promoted to the Latin class. Kindly persuasion was the rule.
Above all things the master hated a tale-bearer. He was the inspirer,
often the participant, in games, such as football and swimming. His
favourite hobby was gardening combined with bee-keeping. An amusing
example given of his martyrdom to supposed duty is that on his marriage
day he drove to Broomhills after school hours, when the rite was
solemnised, and he resumed work in school next morning!
It would be unpardonable to overlook the fact that the many qualities
which in his narrow sphere proved Mr. Charteris to be a born leader of
men were deeply rooted in personal religion of the old-fashioned
Scottish type. That was the main factor in his character. Religious
instruction is a very different thing from mere historical and literary
teaching about the Bible. It was the former added to the latter which
the youth of Wamphray so long enjoyed. Holding the offices of Inspector
of Poor and Session Clerk, then almost invariably held by the parish
schoolmaster, Mr. Charteris was also an elder of the Parish Church. The
Rev. Charles Dickson was minister from 1823 to 1853, a fine preacher, a
scholar, and a good business man. He espoused the side of the
Non-Intrusion. party, but did not leave the Church of Scotland in 1813,
adopting the policy of the middle party, nicknamed by their opponents,
from their number, ‘The Forty Thieves.' No doubt his attitude was
largely due to a numerously signed petition, framed and promoted by Mr.
Charteris, entreating him to consider well the ecclesiastical situation
on constitutional lines, and not to be carried away by secession fever
or fear of reproach.
Full statistics regarding the success in life of old pupils of the
school are not available, but it is known that in Mr. Charteris' time it
turned out no fewer than ten ministers, nineteen doctors, eleven
teachers, as well as many most successful business men. One wonders
whether this record has ever been beaten from so small a population. It
is believed that on the benches of no other school in Scotland could
there have been found simultaneously seated three boys destined in turn
to preside as Moderator over the General Assembly.
Dr. John Pagan of Bothwell, whole-hearted and zealous, was the first;
Dr. John Gillespie of Mouswald, ‘the Minister of Agriculture for
Scotland,' was the second, equally honoured and admired by king and
peasant. His eldest brother David came to Wamphray school after being
dux of Dumfries Academy. Dr. Gillespie always warmly acknowledged the
gifts of his old schoolmaster, whose son comically records: 'He once
made an eloquent speech in the Assembly about my father, in order to
contrast me with him!' The third moderator is the subject of this
memoir.
His impressions of youthful school-days will be welcome:
‘Until I was six years old I had no regular lessons from my father, but
was taught in snatches of time by the elder pupils in the school. At six
I began Latin, which I liked, and also English grammar, which I hated.
It was a very simple grammar too. It was almost impossible for a child
running in and out of the school-room at will to avoid picking up some
bits of instruction, and I have beard that I could read the New
Testament to my dying grandfather when I was three years old. In later
years I have constantly regretted that I was taught so early. My
knowledge, such as it is, has always been unsystematic and fragmentary:
just miscellaneous “bits."
My remembrances of school are very distinct, and are no doubt compounded
of impressions received at various dates. I can see the scene
distinctly. My father, always eager and energetic, sometimes in the
desk, sometimes moving about, organising classes, or hearing how they
got on with the monitors. There were about a dozen “Latin Boys” sitting
in a row along from the desk to the stove, who had two lessons from the
master every day, and who helped him as monitors for several hours.
Their second lesson was partly prepared in school, and they worked at
arithmetic and wrote their copy-books at stated hours. 1 do not remember
that any of them usurped or claimed any authority. They were recognised
as the master’s delegates, and the chief effect on them of their being
in some power was that they tried, and were expected, to live up to
their responsible positions. All the school was proud of their
attainments, and as one by one they went off to College they carried
with them the good wishes of all the rest. It may well be supposed that
a small school-room with one hundred and twenty pupils of all ages, from
the child of six to the young farmer who had come back to fill up some
of the gaps in his previous education, and every one doing
something—several classes going on at the same time—was not a demurely
dull or silent place! I should say there never was a school-room less
dull. It was full of energy, suggested and regulated by the master, who
scorned the idea of sparing himself, and whose energy was infectious.
Some educational theorists say that to have advanced pupils prevents a
master from attending to beginners and young children. They do uot take
into account the effect of spirit in causing activity. There was no
child who was not proud of the prowess of boys and girls who could read
Latin and Greek, and who was not willing to find some of those pundits
occupied part of every day in giving him some of his lessons. There is
an immense loss of such spirit when the teacher does all, or has only
professional assistants. The pupil teacher is quite another thing from
the teacher pupil. I have seen many schools, and I have never seen one
where the average pupil made quicker progress, or where the dull child
was more stimulated and helped to do his best, than in Wamphray school
when I was a pupil.
Of course most of this was due to “The Master.” It would be absurd in
me to try to write of my father as though I were a calm observer of his character and labour; though he was unconscious of his character, and
his labours he never felt to be a burden. His whole heart and soul were
in his school; his sympathy united him to every one. No man ever brought
on small or stupid pupils so well. The little girl who had come to learn
the alphabet felt that he loved her, and wanted to help her in her
struggles to put names to letters, and the letters together; and she did
not think it a hard thing to learn where every one was learning. The big
lad, all but ready for College next November, was proudly conscious of
the master's gratification when he gave a vigorous translation of Homer,
or did not let all the felicity of Horace slip away without imitation.
The school was full of working pupils, and the longest day was never
tedious. Nothing that could brighten us was forgotten; every comical
thing was greeted happily; and through all the day’s work ran a
prevailing sense of duty. The work was always closed with prayer: a
prayer in simple (frequently scriptural) words, which we could
understand; and then there was a rush to the football field, which the
kindness of the farmer of Wamphray Gate made us welcome to use. It was
true football—only the foot might touch the ball, unless, indeed, some
lucky fellow caught it full in the air, and then he had one kick, for
which the rest were honourably bound to give him room and no
disturbance. He was bound to fling it up and catch it on his toe as it
came down.
We were the strongest school in the country parishes of Upper Annandale,
and we beat every school in the big matches which were played every
winter. Keen objections were sometimes taken by our opponents to
Wamphray school reckoning on its lists big lads who bad been “hired"
during the previous summer, and were only regular pupils for the winter
half-year; but scrupulous correctness was observed in only counting
those as “real scholars" for the match who were actually in regular
attendance for a term. Our prowess became so famous that other schools
sometimes shied at the contest. I remember one day when we were to meet
Kirkpatrick Juxta in Poldcan Holm beside the Roman Stone, and at the
appointed hour we were there eager for the fray, but no opponent
appeared. At last one solitary scout came, who said that they had seen
and counted us from among the bushes on the brae at the opposite side of
Annan Water, and fearing our strength had gone home. He was asked to
join us in a friendly game among ourselves, and did so. During the game,
however, he said or did something wrong, and one big boy took him and
held him by the waistband of his trousers over the Annan, until he said
in a loud voice, while we all crowded round, “Of a’ the lads that I do
ken, the Wamphray lads are kings o’ men." And after reciting this
braggart motto from the old Border ballad the discomfited scout was sent
away to publish over his parish the prowess and the pride of the
Wamphray lads. The master himself was afterwards told, and his verdict
was that it would have been better to treat the poor stranger more
kindly.
But I am wandering from the school. John Paterson’s book of “Wamphray"
[Wamphray has been described in a careful book by my cousin and
class fellow, John Paterson, who has said much I might have liked to say.
He, with the help of Dr. Pagan, has traced the history of the 'Latin'
boys who entered professions. (Published by Halliday, Lockerbie, 1906,
now out of print.)] tells of the wide curriculum of a Wamphray boy in the
school. Before we left school we had read as much Latin and Greek and
Mathematics as made it easy for us to pass the junior and enter the
second class at the University; though many took the junior from modest
diffidence. We could have passed any ordinary examination in Virgil,
Livy, and Horace in Latin; on Homer, Anacreon, and several plays of
Euripides in Greek. With Euclid we were quite familiarly acquainted, and
with Algebra up to the Binomial Theorem. French we could read easily.
All the clever girls learned it also; but, although my father had been
the favourite pupil of Surenne (a noted teacher in those days, whose
books were in wide circulation), the pronunciation which our Annandale
tongues made to do duty for French left much to be desired. We read
German fairly well. We went through a course of Navigation. We were
taught to measure fields and draw plans of the farm we treasured. One of
us, having been thoroughly grounded in Mensuration in this way, but with
no other training, became the able surveyor of the land of a wide and
populous British colony.
It was a great day when the Presbytery came to examine the school. The
master gave them books, and, as a rule, left us to our fate, unless some
sympathetic minister begged him to show what a class could do. Admiring
parents sat round the school-room, and saw how brightly their bairns
acquitted themselves. It was a great thing for a school like ours to be
governed and examined by educated men. Parish school boards are unable
to examine the school; and the government inspector's visit makes
naturally a dull, quiet day.
It may be asked where and when my father had learned all that he taught
us. I do not know. His early days must have been days of hard work, and
his extraordinary memory seemed to let nothing pass away. When we were
reading Homer or Euripides or Livy, I, who was beside him in the house
and school all day, never once saw him prepare our lesson in Latin or
Greek beforehand. Algebra and arithmetic were as natural to him as
spelling English words. Our simple faith that he could show us how to
work out the geometrical problems that had beaten us in Euclid, how to
solve the Quadratic Equations with Surds that had fairly beaten us in
Algebra, or how to translate the queer sentences in Horace’s Epistles or
in Tacitus, was always justified. I don’t think he ever saw a "crib,"
unless perhaps in German composition. He was an unassuming scholar and a
wonderful teacher, and the parish was proud of him: so well it might be.
When the day came that the parish minister (Mr. Wight) told him he was
dying, I heard him say: “Well, I have had a healthy and happy life, and
if God calls me away I am ready."
If I were asked wherein lay his power as a teacher, I would say — first,
in his knowledge; secondly, in his sympathy, for be sympathised with
every one in the school, young and old, and every one knew it; and
thirdly, in his abundant humour. Not only good humour, but sense of fun
which gave him a due regard for proportion, as well as a keen and
killing power of exposing absurdity.
It is not mine to analyse my father’s character; but I wish to record my
conviction of what his native parish owed to his devoted life. On his
grave near the church, where his ancestors had been elders since soon
after the Reformation, is a beautiful Iona Cross erected by his pupils,
with an inscription written by one of the ablest of them, Dr. John Pagan
of Bothwell.
My friend, Mr. John Wight, architect, designed the monument, and made it
a link with local memories as well as a Christian symbol, by directing
the sculptor to copy at its base a quaint design of the Tree of Life
springing from the wounded and chained body of The Serpent. This
symbolic carving is on an old stone above the belfry door of Wamphray
Parish Church, and was brought there from the old Pre-Reformation Church
up the glen.
Among intimate friends Dr. Charteris used to tell of a characteristic
counsel given him by his own father on his death-bed, which he never
forgot. Perhaps mindful of a kind of preaching that magnified and
harshly interpreted the terror of the Lord, while it failed adequately
to mirror forth the kindness of His mercy, the old man said: ‘Make it
easy for them, Archie! — as easy as you can — when they wish to enter
the kingdom.’ ‘The master' did not mean to lower the standard which
through life he had himself held so high, or to recommend the Mohammedan
excuse: ‘God is minded to make His religion light unto you, for man was
created weak.' Rather was he echoing Christ’s words about the easy yoke
and the light burden, and hinting at tho omission of man-made
commandments, then not seldom insisted on, as of equal Divine authority
and obligation.
Like so many men who come to distinction, Dr. Charteris was singularly
fortunate in his mother. Called, by her own mother's death, early to
play an eldest daughter’s part in hor father's household, superintend
servants, cook food, and attend to thorough cleanliness in matters of
dairy work and produce, she acquired, and she plainly required, the
qualities of the virtuous woman who ’ looketh well to the way of her
household, and eateth not the bread of idleness.’ She was pre-eminently
what is called a good manager, perhaps the greater power in guiding the
family. She added prudence and reticence to her faculty of decision; was
above mixing in parochial gossip or taking part in passing squabbles,
could laugh quietly at the funny side of storms in a tea-cup, and ably
seconded her husband’s dictum that ‘n professional man should keep all
doors open, and when occasion served give a serious advice always to
make for peace.’ But she was not a wife and mother merely providing for
physical needs: she first impressed on her son's young mind the saving
truths of religion and the meaning of the Church of God. The greater
part of her reading was about the Church and its ministers; and the gist
of her serious conversation, if it did not begin, generally ended on
that subject. She first instilled the truth about the duty and privilege
of helping Missions into Archibald's heart, and one can picture the
pair—the mother and the little boy of six—expectantly trudging the seven
miles to Moffat to hear the fervent Dr. Duff tell in glowing language
the story of heathen India’s needs, and his great Missionary Institution
at Calcutta. Warmly did she welcome the day when a missionary work party
was commenced in Wamphray, and gladly did she open her two parlours in
the new school-house to receive willing follow-workers. It was the joy
and glory of his mother’s life that her son should be a minister and
leader in the Kingdom of Jesus Christ.
A. H. Charteris was baptized in the school, where the Sunday services
were held while the Parish Church was being rebuilt. He is described in
early days as a most interesting child, rather small for his age, not
shy, but very sensitive. He could read a French fable at five. When
about eight he tackled from choice Gibbon's Decline and Fall of the
Roman Empire. One who first knew him then remarked the slight occasional
hesitation in his speech which in after-years helped to make his sermons
so very effective in delivery, and noticed a certain sedate gravity
which gave promise that he would be an earnest student. But we must not
imagine him as one of those prodigies of goodness who live with
difficulty and die young. He is described as full of animal spirits,
fond of running in the Glen barefooted; and with a strong spice of
mischief and human frolic; a bright, active youngster who took a leading
part in football and other games. He was also a fine swimmer and a
plucky rider. His happy and healthy boyhood was passed in a climate
favourable to the cultivation of flowers. His cousin and he used to take
their Latin books into the garden and learn their lessons there, a
liberty conditioned, at times, by the promise to report to the master
when tho bees were 'casting' (swarming).
About his future profession he was never in doubt; he always said he
would be a minister, and his highest early ambition soared only to being
minister of Wamphray. In due course he excelled in the Debating Society,
his chief rival there being David Gillespie.
The old school by the roadside, if beautiful for situation, and having
the Glen for its playground, was indeed of modest dimensions, when
contrasted with the spacious dwelling-house and excellent class-rooms
provided in the 'sixties of last century; but it was in the humbler
edifice that Mr. Charteris did his great work. That consists of two
orthodox cottages solidly built in line, with a small addition added
later for boarders. The box-bed, where two professors were born, is
proudly pointed out by the worthy blacksmith and his wife who inhabit
the ‘but and ben.’ For the old school-room is now the parish smithy, and
in the mind of any visitor who recalls the long procession of those whom
in other days it sent forth thoroughly equipped for life's warfare, it
may well conjure up the lines of Robert Louis Stevenson, peacefully
construed concerning home - leavers and homekeepers:—
And as the fervent smith of yore
Beat out the glowing blade.
Nor wielded in the front of war
The weapons that he made,
But in the tower at home
Still plied his ringing trade;
So like a sword the son shall roam
On nobler missions sent;
And as the smith remained at home
In peaceful turret pent,
So sits the while at home
The mother well content.'
It was a first principle with the son through his whole life that
everything pertaining to the old home and its dear inmates had the first
call, and must be attended to whatever happened. Leisure for many a year
he had none to give; but if time were needed it must be found or made,
he himself might be absent, a wandering planet, but home was the centre
round which he revolved, and to which all his thoughts tended. To his
father and mother while they lived there could be no more dutiful son;
and when his father died on 11th September 1871—failing sight came upon
him before then — Archibald still more was everything to his mother —
husband, son, factor, nurse, all in one. Clever active woman though she
was, it was her delight to lean upon him for everything. ‘We’ll see what
Archibald says,’ was generally her final decision. It was a family joke
that never a nail was knocked into the wall between his short though
frequent visits.
Mrs. Charteris was very proud of her cottage, which her son had built
chiefly to be ready for them when the 'master’ should retire from his
school. Alas! it was only just ready for roofing in, when they had to
send down to tell the men to stop working the day the ‘master’ died. He
had taken a keen delight in watching its erection from his bedroom in
the handsome modern school-house, and one day he pathetically said: ‘Oh,
Archibald, I would have liked to sleep just one night in the house you
are building for me!' But that was not to be. In the spring of the
following year Mrs. Charteris and Mary moved into the beautifully
situated ‘Trinlen Cottage,’ which henceforth represented home to the
whole family circle.
In regard to the spiritual experiences of the lad, on the subjective
side little is known, and nothing can here be said about any time in
particular when he began to be consciously religious. It would appear
that his piety was of that wholesome type which ought to be considered
normal in the case of those who have been trained with wise
discrimination in spiritual things. There was nothing precocious about
it, only the opening and expanding of his whole nature in mind, heart,
and soul, and a continual deepening and development under the impression
of the great spiritual realities of life here and hereafter. He speaks
of the Rev. Charles Dickson’s sermons as 'only formal and far-away
discourses, though from an admirable man.' Evidently they did not
greatly appeal to him, and at times, perhaps, that active mind and quick
eye were counting the cobwebs in Wamphray church. He welcomed the coming
of the Rev. George Wight to be assistant in 1853 — he was ordained and
became minister of the parish in March 1854—and continued to regard that
respected and still surviving minister as a life-long friend. It was
during Mr. Wight’s assistantship, at the age of eighteen, that A. H.
Charteris ratified his religious choice and received his first
communion.
His student friend, Dr. J. Oswald Dykes, the distinguished preacher of
Regent Square, London, and first Principal of Westminster (Presbyterian)
College, Cambridge, has noted: ‘Dr. Charteris, although at no time a
narrow ecclesiastic, and whose personal friendships were unaffected by a
difference in Church connection, remained through life a strong National
Churchman. In some measure I have thought this might bo traced to the
surroundings of his earlier years. Whatever argument maturer reflection
brought to sustain his attachment to the Church of Scotland, he probably
drew it, to begin with, from sentiments in part hereditary, in part
inspired by the spot where he spent his youth. When I chanced, a good
many years ago, to pay a hurried visit to Wamphray (a visit which was
for me a sort of pious pilgrimage), I took it, in its peaceful,
unchanged isolation, for the ideal of an upland Scottish village of the
olden time. Withdrawn from traffic, and grouped about its parish kirk,
manse, and school-house — the symbol at once and the centre of its
higher life — it spoke of higher influences which once bred in the
peasantry of Lowland Scotland the best type of their old-fashioned piety
and intelligence. I thought I understood better, on seeing the place of
his upbringing, a certain cheerful, unspoilt simplicity which to the
last made the character as well as demeanour of my friend specially
attractive. But I also thought 1 could understand how a strong charm had
grown up, associated in his mind with the ancient National Kirk of his
native land — a charm inseparable from the traditions of its soil, and
drawn from days before the advent of ecclesiastical dissent or division,
while as yet the Kirk stood alone to mould the thinking and the manners
of her rural parishioners.
You can read the whole
book...
The
life of Archibald Hamilton Charteris D.D., LL.D.
by Gordon, Arthur (1912) (pdf) |
