I am bound to add, of my
own experience, that Maybole is tumbledown and dreary. Prosperous
enough in reality, it has an air of decay; and though the population
has increased, a roofless house every here and there seems to protest
the contrary. The women are more than well-favoured, and the men
fine tall fellows; but they look slipshod and dissipated. As they
slouched at street corners, or stood about gossiping in the snow, it
seemed they would have been more at home in the slums of a large city
than here in a country place betwixt a village and a town. I heard a
great deal about drinking, and a great deal about religious revivals:
two things in which the Scottish character is emphatic and most
unlovely. In particular, I heard of clergymen who were employing
their time in explaining to a delighted audience the physics of the
Second Coming. It is not very likely any of us will be asked to
help. if we were, it is likely we should receive instructions for the
occasion, and that on more reliable authority. And so I can only
figure to myself a congregation truly curious in such flights of
theological fancy, as one of veteran and accomplished saints, who
have fought the good fight to an end and outlived all worldly
passion, and are to be regarded rather as a part of the Church
Triumphant than the poor, imperfect company on earth.
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