14

PLAN OF HIS JOURNEY.

need to be advertised. No way could he have better proved the perfect reality of his own belief.

"Edward is in excellent health," writes Mrs. Irving, on the 16th of May, from Kirkcaldy, to Mr. Story, of Rosneath. "He has gone to bear his testimony for the truth in his native town, and purposes being in Dumfries, if the Lord will, next week, and to commence his labours in Edinburgh on Thursday next. . . . His time is wholly occupied. His course of discourses will not be finished in Edinburgh until Wednesday the 4th of June, when he proposes starting immediately for Glasgow, and, if they choose, preaching there on the following day. Then at Paisley on Friday, at Greenock on the Saturday morning, and crossing to Rosneath and doing all service you may require on Sabbath and Monday. He desires much to preach for Mr. Campbell on Tuesday evening, again at Glasgow on Wednesday, at Bathgate (my brother's parish) on Thursday, and be here at the communion on Sabbath the 15th. All being well, on Tuesday after, we expect that your acquaintance, William Hamilton, will be united to my sister Elizabeth. After this, God willing, Edward visits Perth, Dundee, and Monimail."

Such was the course he had determined for himself before setting out from his labours in London; and when it is understood that he did this without inducement or stimulation, except that of the message with which he was bursting, something of the fervour of the spirit which could not keep silent may be apprehended. One joyful domestic incident the marriage of his sister-in-law to his bosom friend, a marriage quaintly suggested years ago, before the pair had ever met, to the present bridegroom- gave a point of tender human interest to the laborious journey; but such a holiday few labouring men, few workers errant in such an agitating

field as that of London, would have thought of, or could have carried out.

From the first point in these apostolic travels he writes as follows to his wife ::

"Annan, Saturday, 17th May, 1828.

“MY DEAR WIFE,—I arrived here on Wednesday night, and found all our friends well. Next morning I waited on the minister, who most graciously gave me my request to preach the three week nights as well as the Sabbath. This I published in the market, as I came down the street, and in the evening the church was thronged, as also last night. I opened the seventh chapter of Daniel, and the second and third of Acts, laying out the whole subject, and this night I open 2 Peter iii. and Romans xix. and xx. Indeed, I have been most favoured of the Lord to open these great truths first in Scotland to my own kindred and townsmen, and in the church where I was baptized. To-morrow I preach at Kirkpatrick, in a tent, I suppose, when I intend throwing all help aside, and preaching a regular sermon from Rom. viii. 1,2,3, trusting to Christ's own most helpful and blessed promise. In the evening I return and preach for the Sabbath Schools; I know not what sermon yet; perhaps, however, it may be a discourse of baptism, from Rom. vi., embodying the doctrine of the homilies, and this also extempore. On Monday I proceed for Dumfries, resting a few hours with our Margaret, and proceeding thence to Cargen, to meet some clergymen there; but finding the minister of the parish to be my nearest of kin, I wrote a letter to him enclosed to Cargen, to say, that if he would gather the people after their work, at seven o'clock, I would preach to them. On Tuesday, at one o'clock, I preach for the Society; and in the evening, at seven, for Mr. Kirkwood, at Holywood, if it please him; and then, on Wednesday morning, I proceed with Margaret to Edinburgh by the earliest coach. . . . . These things I write that you may remember me at those seasons when I am engaged in the Lord's service. For it is the strength yielded unto the prayers of His saints which is my strength. I am nothing but a broken reed. I desire to be still viler in my sight. I

16

HIS LABOURS AMONG HIS OWN PEOPLE.

am His worthless instrument, whom He will use for His own glory, either in saving me or in not saving me: and so that His glory is promoted I desire to be satisfied. Oft I have the feeling of the Apostle-lest I also be a castaway. God bless you and dear Margaret. . . . . The grace of the Lord Jesus Christ be upon thee, and upon all the house of thy. father. Farewell.

"Your affectionate husband,
"EDWARD IRVING."

Thus labouring, he made his way through Dumfriesshire. The wonderful apparition of that great figure, with which Annan had grown unfamiliar, pausing in the street where the weekly market of the country town was going on, and proclaiming with audible voice to all the rural crowd of farmers and cottagers and homely country-merchants the night's preaching, is a scene well worthy any painter's skill. There where, as his old companions boast, no man has ever had "an ill word" to say of Edward Irving, he appeared out of the halo of distant metropolitan grandeur, familiar, yet strange, a distinction to his native town. The countryside, stirred with an impulse warmer than mere curiosity, arose and went to hear the message he brought them. On the Sunday when he preached, neighbouring ministers shut up their churches, and went the long Sabbath-day's journey, across the Annandale moors, to hear him, along with their people. Such a scene as Tennyson touches, with one wistful stroke of his magic pencil, must have been common enough in those days in that southland country. Many a countryman, roused by the sound of his old schoolfellow's name, like him who

"In his furrow musing stands,

Does my old friend remember me?"

ARRIVAL IN GREAT KING STREET.

17

must have given his Sunday's leisure to listen to that voice which had no equal in Annandale. For once the proverb seems to have failed. He had honour in his own country, where gentle and simple flocked to hear him; and where, when the church would not contain his hearers, he preached in the open air from the little wooden pulpit, traditionally known as the "tent," to which, on extraordinary occasions, the rural ministers resorted. That he had been able to carry his message thus to his own people seems to have been a refreshment to Irving's heart.

Then he went on to Edinburgh, where he had already arranged to deliver twelve lectures on the Apocalypse. Here he was to live in the house of Mr. Bridges, now a friend of some years' standing, who lived in Great King Street, one of those doleful lines of handsome houses which weigh down the cheerful hill-side under tons of monotonous stone. The mistress of the house awaited in some trepidation the arrival of her distinguished guest, doubtful whether one, of whose eccentricities and solemnities everybody had heard, might be sufficiently of human mould to make him an agreeable visitor. She sent away her children hurriedly when she heard his arrival at the door, and listened with a little awe for his stately approach. But, while the mother stood palpitating by her drawing-room door, the children on the stairs encountered the stranger. He stood still immediately to greet them, to make himself acquainted with their names, and give them the blessing, without which he could not pass any head sufficiently low to have his hand of benediction laid upon it. I am not sure that

18 ST. ANDREW'S CHURCH BESIEGED BY THE CROWD.

one of them was not mounted aloft on the mighty altitude of his shoulder when he confronted the mother, alarmed no longer, and received the welcome, which came from no hesitating lip.

It was May, and the clergy of Scotland were all in Edinburgh. Of all times to deliver the message of Elias, this was the best time for the Presbyterian nation; and it was on that special account that Irving had chosen it. He began his lectures in St. Andrew's Church at the extraordinary hour of six in the morning, in order to make sure of the ecclesiastical audience, busied all day in the affairs of the Church, which he particularly sought. In the sweet but chilly freshness of those spring mornings, a dense crowd filled the area of George Street. I have heard a clergyman of the mildest aspect and most courtly manners describe how, roused by the idea that favoured persons were being admitted by another entrance, he, despite all the proprieties of his clerical character and the suavities of his individual disposition, was so far roused as to threaten an official in attendance with a personal assault, and descent over the besieged railing, if admittance was not straightway afforded. Nothing in our day seems fit to be compared with that wonderful excitement. Half of the audience would, on ordinary occasions, have been peacefully reposing in their beds at the hour which saw them, all animated and anxious, pressing into the gloomy church. The very accompaniments which would have repelled them from another-his indifference to ordinary comforts and regulations- his selection of an hour, of all others least likely to tempt forth the crowd. seem