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A RIVERSIDE BAPTISM

To this baptismal experience another may be added, where the rite was celebrated in the face of great natural obstacles. Dr. Hanna relates that a Highland minister once went to baptise a child in the house of one of his parishioners, near which ran a small burn or river. When he came to the stream it was so swollen with recent rains that he could not ford it in order to reach the house. In these circumstances he told the father, who was awaiting him on the opposite bank, to bring the child down to the burn-side. Furnished with a wooden scoop, the clergyman stood on the one side of the water, and the father, holding the infant as far out in his arms as he could, placed himself on the other. With the foaming torrent between the participants, the service went on, until the time came for sprinkling the babe, when the minister, dipping the scoop into the water, flung its contents across at the baby’s face. His aim, however, was not good, for he failed more than once, calling out to the father after each new trial: ‘Weel, has’t gotten ony yet?’ When he did succeed, the whole contents of the scoop fell on the child’s face, whereupon the disgusted parent ejaculated, ‘Ach, Got pless me, sir, but ye’ve trownt ta child.’ Dr. Chalmers, in telling this story, used to express his wonder as to what the great sticklers for form and ceremony in the sacraments would think of such a baptism by a burn-side, performed with a wooden scoop.7