On Sunday morning I wake to find that it has rained steadily all night, and that it is raining still. Mrs. Gamp intimates that life “is a wale o’ tears.” Oban seems to be such emphatically. This is awkward, as I hear the refined and accomplished lady who shares with us the perils and the dangers of the deep intimates that in Scotland people are not expected to laugh on the Sabbath-day. It rains all breakfast; it rains as we descend the _Elena’s_ side, and are rowed ashore; it rains as we make our way to the Established Church, in which that popular minister, the Rev. Mr. Barclay, of Greenock, is to preach. His sermon is on the death of Moses. He glides lightly over the subject, telling us that his text, which is Deut. xxxv. 5, teaches the incompetency of the noblest life, the penal consequences of sin, the mercy mingled with the Divine judgment, and the uniformity of God’s method of dealing. Mr. Barclay is listened to with attention. In his black gown, his tall, dark figure looks well in the pulpit, and there must be some eight or nine hundred people present. There is a collection after, but I see no gold coin in the plate, though the bay is full of yachts, and there must be many wealthy people there. Perhaps, however, they patronise the small Episcopalian church close by. After the sermon, we are rowed back in the heavy rain to the yacht, and “it is regular Highland weather” is all the consolation that I get, as I dry myself in the stoke-hole, while the Doctor philosophically smokes.
In the evening we are rowed again on shore, and seek out the Free Church, where Professor Candlish, the son of the far-famed Doctor of that name, is to preach. He has the reputation of being a remarkably profound divine, and certainly reputation has not done him injustice in this respect. His sermon is a great contrast to that I heard in the morning. It is full fifty minutes long, and is an argumentative defence of the text, “Being justified freely by His grace through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus.” The preacher proposed to deal with the objection, which he admitted might be fairly made, that if Jesus paid the debt, our salvation was not a matter of grace at all; and for this purpose we had line upon line in thoroughly old Scotch fashion, the hearers all the while looking out the passages of Scripture referred to in their Bibles. The sermon was old-fashioned as to thought, but the language was modern. I was glad I went to hear it. The congregation was not above half the size of that which appeared in the Established Church, and a great deal less fashionable. There you saw a good deal of the tourist element. Here we had the real natives, as it were; and I must own that I saw more men than I should have seen in a congregation of the same size at home. At the church in the morning we had, in addition to the Scotch Psalms, such hymns as “I lay my sins on Jesus,” and “Lord of the worlds above.” In the evening we had no novelties of that kind. Indeed, the whole service was dry and severe to a degenerate Southern. Mr. Barclay quoted a good deal of Mrs. Alexander’s fine poem on the death of Moses. Professor Candlish did nothing of the kind. His sermon was, in fact, quite in accordance with the day and the _genius loci_. I felt it was such a sermon as I had a right to expect. As I leave the church, I wonder to myself how the tourists manage. It is too wet to walk, and if they do take a walk it is not considered the correct thing in these northern latitudes, where, to make matters worse, the Sunday is nearly an hour longer than it is in London. I am afraid, however, some of the townsfolk find the time hang heavily on their hands. It seemed to me that there was an unusually large number of female faces at the window, and when the boat comes to fetch us on board the _Elena_ all the windows are full of, I fear, frivolous spectators. It is true that I am adorned with a genuine Highland bonnet, and would make my fortune in London as a Guy on the fifth of November; but here Highland bonnets are common. It is true my companion is a great divine from town, and one well known in Exeter Hall; but here you would take him for a skipper, and nautical men are as common as Highland bonnets. I fear it is for very weariness that Oban ladies sit staring out of the windows on the empty streets and silent bay this dull and watery Sabbath night. I can almost fancy I hear them sing—