The woman said: My mother was always at work, by day helping my father on the croft, and by night at wool and at spinning, at night clothes and at day clothes for the family. My mother would be beseeching us to be careful in everything, to put value on time and to eschew idleness. If we were dilatory in putting on our clothes, and made an excuse for our prayers, my mother would say that God regarded heart and not speech, the mind and not the manner; and that we might clothe our souls with grace while clothing our bodies with raiment. My mother taught us what we should ask for in the prayer, as she heard it from her own mother, and as she again heard it from the one who was before her.
My mother would be asking us to sing our morning song to God as Mary’s lark was singing it up in the clouds, and as Christ’s mavis was singing it yonder in the tree, giving glory to the God of the creatures for the repose of the night, for the light of the day, and for the joy of life. She would tell us that every creature on earth here below and in the ocean beneath and in the air above was giving glory to the great God of the creatures and the worlds, of the virtues and the blessings, and would we be dumb!
From Catherine Maclennan, nee MacDonald, crofter, Achadh nam Breac, Moydart.
Printed in Celtic Prayers. Selected by Avery Brooke from the collection of Alexander Carmichael with calligraphy by Laurel Casazza. The Seabury Press. New York. 1981.
