Читать книгу Chez Nous (Our Old Quebec Home) - Adjutor Rivard - Страница 6

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Others may have been larger, but surely none held a more welcoming aspect. The door, thrown wide to admit the sun’s earliest ray and the scent of the clover and standing open till the fall of night, the windows smiling with flowers, the easy steps, all proffered invitation. When your eye fell upon it from afar the house beckoned, and on nearer approach the summons was so imperative that you must enter. Crossing the threshold you were instantly at home.—‘Friend, sit a while and rest.’ Should work be doing—and there it never ceased—a moment was spared for greeting. Were you thirsty, behold the bench with its pails of water and the shining dipper always at hand. Should the table be set you were bidden, and the finest of the flowered plates was heaped with the best portion. If you arrived as darkness was falling and yet had far to go, the guest-chamber was yours—the largest room with the most comfortable bed. Who then would not be minded to drop in on the family, were it only to borrow an opinion from the elders as to next day’s weather? Doubtful and ill-disposed persons alone slipped by on the far side of the road with hastened step.

Perhaps other houses made a braver show, but not one was pleasanter for the eye to rest upon. Its four stout walls, solidly laid, soundly knit, gave an air of secure repose. The stones were old, but every spring they donned a new dress of whitewash, and the whole parish could not boast a house more shining white. How the green shutters stood forth in happy contrast with the dull warm background! A native creeper found holding for its tendrils in the rough masonry, climbed the front to the overhanging roof and ran beneath it to the gable where its leaves aspired boldly to the sky. The satisfied glance passed upward to the expanse of tarred shingles framed in white, the pointed dormer windows and the chimney of broad flat stones. A pipe carried the sweet and treasured rain-water to a hogshead at the corner. The yard in front was strewn with fine sand, and there was place in it for a bench, two lilac bushes and a few lime-washed boulders. Neat and clean and tidy it was, with everything in keeping. ... I close my eyes and again behold this house where our folks lived, standing white in the sunlight upon the king’s highway.

Its four stout walls ... gave an air of secure repose.

Some houses were louder in their mirth, but in none a deeper happiness reigned. Never a hymn nor a song but they knew it there, and they sang them all finely, with the prettiest twists and turns you could wish to hear. Not that life was easier for our people than for their neighbours; they too must toil and save to make ends meet, and the proof was to see in feet that trod more heavily with the passing years, in foreheads more deeply lined. Strong of spirit were these forbears of ours, and misfortune had no power to disturb their peace. For well they knew this life is naught, and, enduring the sadnesses of it with unshaken trust, reconciled alike with earth and heaven, their days slipped gently on towards the Great Hope. In the morning, at noon, and again at evening our people were wont to pray together; and by reason of their praying work seemed lighter, burdens less heavy, griefs the quicker healed. So it was that after each bereavement joy came stealing back into the house as a bird homes to her nest.

How good it was to live with our people! In an instant, as by miracle, you found yourself delivered from every care, remote from all harassment, sheltered from every worry. No evil thing could harbour under this roof whereon a blessing rested. The days passed in happy tranquillity, and peace entered the soul. One’s self was better.

And how good it were to come back at the last to this old roof to die!