“I WONDER what grandma can be thinking about. Her knitting has fallen on to the hearthrug, and her eyes seem to be looking at something a long way off. I will run and pick up her sock, for if Carlo gets it to play with, all the stitches will be down."
And Helen Lee, suiting the action to the word, picked up the knitting and laid it on a table near her grandma. Her light step roused the old lady, for turning to the little girl she said, "It is more than sixty years since I was your age, Helen, and yet I remember many things about my childhood as well as if they had happened only a few weeks ago.”
“Please tell me all about the time when you were a little girl, grandma. It will be almost like reading a story, only better, because I shall know all you are telling me is true. But please tell me first something about the house you lived in.”
“Perhaps you would think, Helen, the Highland cottage in which I spent some of my early years only a poor place, but to me it was a very happy home, though it was little more than one large room with openings in its walls, something like cupboards, that served for bedrooms. A few outbuildings were at the back, while from the door we could see for miles over the moors, while in the distance a range of hills often looked in the sunset as if their tops were crowned with purple and gold. I was a very wee lassie when I used to go with my mother to fill her pail with water, at a little brook, or as we called it a burn, not far from our cottage. One day my father, who had been to a town several miles off, brought home a small pail for me, and I cannot tell you what a proud and happy child I was, as walking very carefully by my mother's side I carried home my tiny pailful of water. My grandfather was a shepherd; he was very kind to me; and I am sure you will like to hear about a present I once received from him. It was the evening of a bright May day, when he came to pay us a visit, carrying a lamb in his arms. Its fleece was quite white, and my aunt Agnes had tied a blue ribbon round its neck. I thought I had never seen anything so pretty; but when grandfather told me he was going to give it to me for my very own, I was almost wild with delight, and kissed and thanked him over and over again.
“'Be kind to the wee lambie, Maggie, my lass,' he said, with a nod and a smile, as he bade me Good-bye; and I, holding my new pet in my arms, stood to watch him cross the moor till he was lost to sight among the hills.
“All the candles we burnt were home made, and I used to quite enjoy what we called the dipping, and thought it was great fun. I must tell you how it was done.
“Mother always told us, that if we wanted our candles to burn well, they should be made when the snow was on the ground.
“When all was ready a large iron pot, half filled with tallow, was set over the fire. Into it the long cotton wicks, o which quite a number had been prepared the day before, were dipped. As each was lifted out of the boiling fat it had to be taken out of doors to harden in the clear frosty air, and as each wick had to be dipped several times before the candle was large enough to read or work by its light, you may be sure candle making in those days was quite a busy time.
“But when the work of the day was over, and while a bright fire burnt on the hearth, my mother, as she sat busy with her knitting or sewing, would often tell me stories of martyr times in Scotland, and in just such simple words as I could understand, explain to me how men and women too, had found such precious treasure in the Bible, that they were made willing to be sent to prison, or even to be put to death, rather than give up that blessed book; and then father would take down our dear old family Bible from the high shelf, where it lay, and read to us from its pages the glad tidings and good news of how by faith in the precious blood and finished work of the Lord Jesus Christ, sin is put away for all who really believe on Him.”