These were circumstances
that weighed with Mrs Murchison, and she called her son
after the Royal representative, feeling that she was
doing well for him in a sense beyond the mere bestowal
of a distinguished and a euphonious name, though that,
as she would have willingly acknowledged, was "well enough
in its place."
We must take this matter of names seriously; the Murchisons
always did. Indeed, from the arrival of a new baby until
the important Sunday of the christening. nothing was
discussed with such eager zest and such sustained interest
as the name he should get--there was a fascinating list
at the back of the dictionary--and to the last minute it
was problematical. In Stella's case, Mrs Murchison actually
changed her mind on the way to church; and Abby, who had
sat through the sermon expecting Dorothy Maud, which she
thought lovely, publicly cried with disappointment. Stella
was the youngest, and Mrs Murchison was thankful to have
a girl at last whom she could name without regard to her
own relations or anybody else's. I have skipped about a
good deal, but I have only left out two, the boys who
came between Abby and Stella. In their names the
contemporary observer need not be too acute to discover
both an avowal and to some extent an enforcement of Mr
Murchison's political views; neither an Alexander Mackenzie
nor an Oliver Mowat could very well grow up into anything
but a sound Liberal in that part of the world without
feeling himself an unendurable paradox.
Pages:
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25