With the gaiety and naivete of the Frenchwoman, Catharine
possessed, when occasion called it into action, a thoughtful and
well-regulated mind, abilities which would well have repaid the care of
mental cultivation; but of book-learning she knew nothing beyond a little
reading, and that but imperfectly, acquired from her father's teaching. It
was an accomplishment which he had gained when in the army, having been
taught by his colonel's son, a lad of twelve years of age, who had taken a
great fancy to him, and had at parting given him a few of his school-books,
among which was a Testament, without cover or title-page. At parting, the
young gentleman recommended its daily perusal to Duncan. Had the gift been
a Bible, perhaps the soldier's obedience to his priest might have rendered
it a dead letter to him, but as it fortunately happened, he was unconscious
of any prohibition to deter him from becoming acquainted with the truths of
the Gospel. He communicated the power of perusing his books to his children
Hector and Catharine, Duncan and Kenneth, in succession, with a feeling of
intense reverence; even the labour of teaching was regarded as a holy duty
in itself, and was not undertaken without deeply impressing the obligation
he was conferring upon them whenever they were brought to the task.
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