Untitled - Electric Scotland

8 LIFE OF ARCHBISHOP TAIT [CH. i.
the Forth. We secretly regretted that they never came, and we
rather grudged, as time went on,
*
that the caravan had nothing
nobler to do than perform the peaceful duty of carrying us all
to church on rainy days. Our family was Presbyterian, and our
Sundays were strict indeed, and terribly irksome to us children,
who were too lively to be content with reading grave books
which we could not understand. Yet we could not but receive
abiding impressions from our gentle mother. Each night, when
she knew her little ones were in bed, she would bend over us,
whispering the well-known verse-
This night I lay me down to sleep,
And give my soul to Christ to keep ;
Sleep I now : wake I never,
I give my soul to Christ for ever.
This became so fixed a habit with us all that in after years our
soldier brother used to tell that he never, even when sleeping
under arms on the ground, forgot to repeat this prayer.
"It was in 1811 that a heavy trouble came into our home.
We were now eight children in all, 1 the youngest being a little
black-eyed boy, Hay Campbell by name, who was just two
years old. He was the plaything of the house. One night he
was restless and ill ; in the morning it was found that in the
course of that night one limb had been completely paralysed.
The medical men said it was in consequence of cutting his
teeth. Our poor mother was grievously distressed. She could
not bear to think of the child s blighted life, for to her mind
the restoration of the withered limb seemed impossible; the
misfortune made too deep an impression on her, and cast a
shadow forwards.
1 Viz. :
John, born 11 Feb. 1796. [Died 22 May 1877. ]
Susan Murray (afterwards Lady Sitwell), born 2 March 1797. [Died 13 Mav
1880.]
James Campbell, born 29 October 1798. [Died 18 Jany. 1879.]
Charlotte Murdoch (afterwards Lady Wake), born 9 June 1800. [Died 31
March 1888.]
Anna Mary (afterwards Mrs. Wildman), born 15 Feb. 1804. [Died 22
Feb. 1879.]
Thomas Forsyth, born 20 Aug. 1805. [Died 16 March 1859.]
Craufurd, born 9 Sept. 1807. [Died 6 April 1828.]
Hay Campbell, born I June 1809. [Died 28 Feb. 1821.]