THE MASON OF CROMARTY.

New Zealand Times, Volume LXXII, Issue 4824, 29 November 1902, Page 5 (Supplement)

THE MASON OF CROMARTY.

HUGH MILLER. (By By to Todd.) Fifty years ago ho namo Mood in higiier regard in .Scotland. U:an Hat ol ilugn Miller. “My Schools and Schooi-ma.-sler./* had just uppeaioL and all t!io world wa.s reading it. With Muguiar fascination it told its talc, .seLUng forth iu a manner us modest us it v.’as remarkable, the steps by v.diich a man, with only ti:e humblest advantages, had lu*wu iiis way to the jdaco of a Jeader of national thought. ,\U moii knew Jiugh Miller as probabj.v tho greatest loicc. imxt to J)r Chulmi-rs. In the uphonval which J.ad given b’rth to the .Free Cnurdi, They know him, too, as the champion who. trom the libs of tho world il«elf. had forged new weapons for the defence of the ancient faith. Now they were I. a'.mu into the* confidence of tho man himself, and they found his life slory more interesting than any romance. Tho mason of Cromarty wag at the climax of Ids nowers and of his farno in IT>:2. None dreamed then of tho terrible denouement which was so soon to draw a tragic curtain unon Ills career. Now, when other fifty years havo gone, and the centenary of his birth draws near, there is naturally a revival of interest in tho memory of Hugh Miller. Tho ]iUJo houso in tho quiet corner of Cromarty, where he was born, has never lacked pilgri ms, though for many a day the boards of its upper floors trembled and threatened to collapse under foot. Perhaps the charm of the house was 7tot less for the knowledge that these shaking boards wore the actual floors trodden by tho future author in tho days of his masterful boyhood and strenuous youth. Tfc was the house, moreover, birlt with Snanish gold by Jijq great grandfather, old John Feddes. one of the last of the buccaneers. In "Mv Schools and Schoolmasters” it is described as "a d : nrry oldfashioned house, throo rooms in length.

but with tho windows of its second storey half-buried in the eaves.” No great way off, the graveyard rises above the street, in connection with which Miller tells one of his most amusing tales, that of tho baker who, in order to forstall his rival with a complaint to Heaven on tho judgment Day, had himself buried to the eastward of him. outside the wall. Similarly in every direction about the little place lie scenes immortalised in Miller’s writings, and each of them, on account of the centenary, is likely to receive renewed attention now. HUGH MILLER’S FATHER, liko many along those northern coasts, is understood to have been of Scandinovian descent, and represented a family whoso men seldom died in their beds. His mother was a great-granddaughter of Donald Roy, the Celtic seer. The characteristics of both strains are to be strongly traced in their son. Born 10th October, 1802, he became acquainted early with tho hardships of a' sailor, for his father, owner and master of a trading sloop, went down with all Ills crow in the Moray Firth in 1807. As a child he found charm in shells and stones, which ho gathered and treasured in tho old house of the buccaneer. Far, however, from proving of the gentle type usually betokened by such pursuits, ho showed himself independent, impatient of restraint, and ready to use his hands when he thought his rights invaded. His career at tho burgh school ended in a pitched battle with the dominie, which achievement ho proceeded to satirise in versos of boyish scorn. After that performance ho seemed for a time to he in a fair way to emulate his ancestor, tho buccaneer, for ha set himself up among the wilder spirits of his acquaintance as captain of a band of orchard robbers. At the same time, as if to fulfil the other impulse in his blood, ho edited a few issues of a "Village Observer,” to which he got several of his hoy brigands to contribute-. All such tendencies to become a Francois Villon of the north came to an end. however, when at tho age of seventeen, he was apprenticed to a stone mason. With

the real labour of life opened to him he at once settled to it, and soon became an excellent workman.

From the first hia eye was quick to mark differences in the characters of those about him, and he had the healthy sense to appreciate tho elements wh:cn made for real usefulness ami honour. With tho same quick eye ho aiso begun oarlv to notice phenomena in tho natural uxTCumsiuiicea L»y v.'fiioq bo uas &UirounaeU. Fluid, iu tho first quarry iu which ho wrougnt ho noticed ripplen.arKs m the stone. liieso had been been ; n Uiou.-und times bv ins icJlow-workmeu, : but it was Lit to Miller to draw con- . ciu-dons winch weie to oo ol lar-rcaching consequence in the geological and religiou.s wo.lds. From that slight beginning lie dated his epoch-making study ot the Old Led fiundsUme rocks. Iu buck ways ii was that the quarry and me masons’ bothies, tho workmen slow ot thought and speech about him, and tho stones themselves with which he wrought —continued the “schools ami schoolmasters” from which leaching he built up his own character and career. Up to tho ago of 32 he pursued his first calling, and the roc d of his experiences in workmen’s L.-jacks in remote corners of the country, where ho might bo isolated with his follows for months at a time in the building » f mansion, steading, bridge, or church, reads like a narrative by Daniel Defee. In -succession, however, ho encountered three vital influences. each of which in turn was to have a signal effect upon his after life. Ho became strongly religious, and formed a lasting friendship with the minister of Cromarty, .Alexander Stewart. Ho made the acquaintance of Dr. Carrnthers, editor of the "Inverness Courier/* And HE FELL IX LOVE. Tho lady to whom he became attached was Lydia Falconer Frrscr. The daughter of a tradesman who b-d failed in Inverness and retired to Cromarty, she had boon educated in Edinburgh, and was possessed of considcraidc refinement ana literary taste. The character of the stone-mason attracted her. Beneath tho

rough workman's exterior she perceived the real worth and greatness, and, notwithstanding the opposition of her mother, who was disposed to look down ! on so humble a match, she became engaged to him. There can bo no doubt the attachment provided Miller with a strong stimulus and incentive. At a later day, as his wife, under the pseudonym of "Harriet Myrtle,” the lady became a considerable author of children's books, and at tho present hour her powers aro attested by the instalments of her autobiography which aro appearing in "Chambers's Journal.” Meanwhile, tho stone-mason had to earn his way to her hand, and this ho proceeded shortly to do. In 1829 ho published his first book. "Poems Written in the Leisure Hours of a Journeyman Mason.” The book possessed merit, but showed a certain stiffness of hand, and with tho columns of Hr Carruthers's paper open to him, tho author soon turned to prose as his more natural vehicle. The results of his quiet years of observation and culture were alj ready noted in his native place, and his first token of recognition came to him when, in 1834, ho was appointed accountant in the newly opened office of the Commercial Bank there. A year later lie made his first mark in letters by the publication of his "Scenes and Legends of tho North of Scotland.” Following the vein of those legends, ho contributed many '"Tales of the Borders'* to Mackay Wilson's famous collection. And he made the force of his non felt on such subjects of Northern interest as the conditions of the herring industry. These were the essays which prepared him for the struggle in which hs was to come to the front as a leader of thought in Scotland. Just then the great Church question of the century was beginning to rise in the Scottish mind. Moved by his strong religious feelings. Miller became at once deeply interested in the, efforts to free the Church of Scotland from tho incubus of patronage. On the momentous declaration by the House of Lords in 1339 that the rights of patronage were "inconsistent with the exercise of any volition

on the part of tho people, however expressed,” lie plunged into the strife. In two able pamphlets—“A Letter to Lord Brougham” and “The IVhiggism of tho Old School”—he supported the popular, or Free Church, side, and us an immediate result he was offered THU EDITORSHIP OF THE "WITNESS”

newspaper, then being founded us tho organ of tho anti-patronago party. Ac first ho hesitated to accept so responsible a post, but it was not long before his work proved his entire ability for the task. Twice a week his leading articles, brilliant and convincing, struck at the root of ecclesiastical abuses; his columns from issue to issue put forth the leading propaganda of the Free Church movenient.'and by the part ho played in bringing about the Disruption of 1813 bo must bo reckoned as one of the chief makers of the h’story of that momentous time. Nevertheless, during those exciting years he kept up ins studies of rock and fossil, and in 1810 published serially in his paper. “The Old lied Sandstone, or. Now Walks in an Old Field.” The work may bo held to hare marked'an era in tho study of geology, and it raised the old Red'formation to a place of importance which it had never before occupied. It was, however, no more than the steppingstone to a performance in which his scientific studies and strong religions convictions were to work together for a purpose of tho widest human interest. For a period after the excitement and effort of the Disruption

UIS HEALTH BROKE DOWN. Bv wav of holiday, in ISIS. ho crossed tho Border for the first time, and as a result, in the following year appeared his “First Impressions of England and, its People.” But this was merely an interlude. Just then tho religious world was much disturbed by the publication of Chambers’s "Vestiges of Creation.” Tho book has since been eclinsod bv the works of more purely scientific, men like Dunvin and Iluxlev. but as a pioneer of modern evolutionary theories of existence it was an epoch-making book in its day. The

trouble to orthodox minds of that timoj , was that it seemed to contradict the] teachings of Holy Writ, and to, upset the Biblical account of tho first beginnings of things. By way of answer, and in sup-' : port of the orthodox view. Miller, in 1847, published his "Footprints of the Creator, . or iuu Asieroiepib ol btroiuness.” His arguments were oaseu largely upon the lOasils. including tiiat named, in the title, in his favourite geological formation, tho Uld Bed Sandstone, and. in addition to his own collection, ho had tho use of many specimens gathered by his friend,’ • liobert Hick, of Thurso. The main lino of his argument has been that chiefly r used since his time. He strove to show that tho earliest fossils belonged to a stage of development as advanced as any-j thing In tho living world of to-day. i Alter all, however, tho most interesting' of his works, and the book by which his memory is most likely to survive in the > world of letters, is "My Schools and. • Schoolmasters.” Published in 1852, it ; remains the copostono of his achievement. It presents an individual yet typical por- ; trait of Scottish character, while it illustrates, as perhaps no other book does, the fact that education is not only, nor even mainly, a work of tho schoolroom or uni- j • varsity, but an affair of observation and • shrewdness in the outside world, depend- ; ing on a man's own powers, and the will • to uso thorn. Constantly throughout the hook tho reader is struck by tho author’s ■ sagacity and powers of foresight. Huxley i has remarked of his other works, on the : fossils of the Old Bed Sandstone, that without the complete knowledge of a later da\* Miller seems by an imaginative power . to have arrived conclusions which i wider research has merely passed correct. In the same way. in "My Schools and ’ Schoolmasters” he shows a peculiar i genius for fortelling tho issues of human • experiment. In discussing, for instance, • the first of these great "strikes” among > workmen, of which the world has since 5 seen so disastrous a development, it is • startling to find with what shrewdness > and certainty he foretold the working and • ultimate results of such combinations. It , would almost seem as if he had inherited!

! something of second-sight along with the blood of liis ancestor, THE CELTIC SEEK,

The book was described by Carlyle, himself another of Lko powers, as “ail wiiolc- ■. some, strong, and breezy, like tne Uid lied Sandstone mountains in a sunny summer day.” It must always romam | one of the very best boks to place in the : hands of a boy. Yet another book, however, he has given to the world. “The Testimony of the Hocks" followed the effort of his previous work. “The Footprints of the Creator,” is an endeavour to confirm the scientific accuracy of the Biblical account. In its pages' ho put forward the theory that the six davs of creation mentioned in the Book of Gened* were jn reality six geological periods. The public of a later <lnv have seen William Ewart Gladstone descend into the same arena, and light j much the same battle with much the ! same argument, in his /‘lmpregnable Hock of Holy Scripture.” Exactly what amount ox success has attended, either effort it is needless here to inquire. In its time, however, “The Testimony of the , Kooks/' seeming, as it did. to depart from the strict acceptance of the Biblical '‘days” as days, raised no little outcry against an author hitherto accounted a champion of the orthodox view. ! But the author's ears were beyond reach lof the outcry. Worn down by hard toil. 1 and depressed by lung troubles acquired 1 from his early trade, IBs mind at last . gave way, am? on the night of the day I on which h« finished correcting the last I proofs of his book, the 2nd December, 1856. he died by his mm hand. His wire ! survived him for 29 years, i Whatever position may finally b* assigned to his religions and scientific work, there can ho no doubt that Hugh Wilier will remain in the gallery cf the past • for whnfc Carlyle called him. n Man. and it is well that in this, his centenary year •something should ho done to recall and honour his memory.