“Well, what do you mean to do, Turkey?” I asked. “Why does she do it, do you suppose? It’s not for the sake of saving my father’s meal, I should think.”
“No, she does something with it, and, I suppose, flatters herself she is not stealing--only saving it off the poor, and so making a right to it for herself. I can’t help thinking that her being out that same night had something to do with it. Did you ever know her go to see old Betty?”
“I’m not so sure. She pretends perhaps. But we’ll have a try. I think I can outwit her. She’s fair game, you know.”
“How? What? Do tell me, Turkey,” I cried, right eagerly.
As I returned to the house I met my father.
“Well, Ranald, what are you about?” he said, in his usual gentle tone.
“Nothing in particular, father,” I answered.
“Well, I’m going to see an old man--John Jamieson--I don’t think you know him: he has not been able to come to church for a long time. They tell me he is dying. Would you like to go with me?”
“Not if you will walk with me. It’s only about three miles.”
“Very well, father. I should like to go with you.”
My father talked about various things on the way. I remember in particular some remarks he made about reading Virgil, for I had just begun the Æneid. For one thing, he told me I must scan every line until I could make it sound like poetry, else I should neither enjoy it properly, nor be fair to the author. Then he repeated some lines from Milton, saying them first just as if they were prose, and after that the same lines as they ought to be sounded, making me mark the difference. Next he did the same with a few of the opening lines of Virgil’s great poem, and made me feel the difference there.
“The sound is the shape of it, you know, Ranald,” he said, “for a poem is all for the ear and not for the eye. The eye sees only the sense of it; the ear sees the shape of it. To judge poetry without heeding the sound of it, is nearly as bad as to judge a rose by smelling it with your eyes shut. The sound, besides being a beautiful thing in itself, has a sense in it which helps the other out. A psalm tune, if it’s the right one, helps you to see how beautiful the psalm is. Every poem carries its own tune in its own heart, and to read it aloud is the only way to bring out its tune.”