Miscellaneous. Grandmother Gray.

Waikato Times, Volume XXIV, Issue 1964, 7 February 1885, Page 2 (Supplement)

Miscellaneous. Grandmother Gray.

By Mrs. M. L. Rvvne.

I think Tommy Gray fully appreciated the fact that hi 3 bread was buttered on both sides for when he got into a street riot with Charlie Wilson, who threatened to tell Tommy's father and get him an "all-fired hckin'," Master Tommy just ran off saying : " Dassn't ! I've got a grandmother tew home." Tommy's grandmother was the kind of a woman who is all lire and flame in youth and all aahes-of-rose in old age. She bad been a beauty once, but there was nothing to show for it but " the tender grace of a day that was dead." Wrinkles had taken the place of dimples, her eyes had burned themselves out, her cheeks were shrivelled, and as for teeth she had only two in her head. " But, thank the Lord, they are opposite teach other," said Grandmother Gray. She had a lap for the children, too — moat grandmothers don't have any lap — and she sung them to sleep every night. Tommy had made her promise in an unguarded moment that she would rook him to sleep until he was 21. She seemed in a fair way to do it, but she reposed his overgrown feet and hmba on a ohair and fondled the curly head till he had just " awakeneas" left, after his grand matin vespers, to enable him to steer straight to bed. The songs she eung were very funny ones, or very sorrowful. They were either of the " ti-rooral-to-loo" order, or like " Hark, from the tombs a doleful sound." What Tommy liked most was the Scotch ministrelsy. He never tired of " Over the water and over the lea, And over the water to Charley. Oh, Charley loves good ale and wine And Charley lores good brandy, And Charley loves to kiss the girls As sweet as sugar candy. 1 ' Tommy thought there was an educational difference between him and Charley, but he made no comment for fear of being deprived of the music. On Sundays she sang : " I'm wearin' awa, Jean, Like snaw wreath in thaw, Jean, I'm wearin' awa To the land o' the leal." " An' what is • the leal,' grandmother ? " Tommy would ask. And the aged woman would fix her sad, tired, patient eyes on the blue beyond and make answer in her low, quavering voice : " It's aye to be true, ma boy, true to your king, true to your God, and owcr true to yoursel'." The old lady had some quaint ways. One of these was always to attend the grandest church in the parish, where a celebrated divine preached in the modern vernacular of amended theology. " Why do you go to hear so difficult a preacher ? "„* pomeone asked the old lady. " Do you understand him ? " " Na," she answered, " I dinna hear a word that lie says." " Then what pleasure can you get out of his sermons." " Child 1 " answered the old lady reverently, " can't I see the holy wag of his head?'"' "Is there a pot of gold at the end of the rainbow, grandmother ? " that graceless Tommy would ask. " Aye, child." " And anybody find it ? " •'Aye,' many. And they go far first. It's not in the flesh you'll find what lies hid at the end of the rainbow." She could tell time by the flowers and the sun. She had seen a ghost. She could find Job's coffin in the sky. She had a charm for bruises and cuts. It was like entertaining an angel unawares to have this dear old lady with them, for, under her little superstitions, lay a grand soul. One day she counted her years and aaid — 11 I'm getting old." " Nonsense, mother," they laughed at her. " You are only a girl of 80." " I remember when I was lft, and had roses on my cheeks," Bhe said. " I wonder when they will ever be there again.'' One night the children went into her room to be rocked. She sat in the twilight, and the lamp was unlit. She sent them away, first kissing them all around. She kissed Tommy twice ; he looked like his grandfather whose likeness she had worn in a breastpin for forty years. " I'm expoctin' company," she said to them. " Gang your ways, and God'a blessing go with ye." It was Tommy who jumped up in the night from a fearful dream and ran into grandmother's room for comfort. She still sat in the window. At least her figure was there, but Grandmother Gray had gone away with her company.