Reminiscences of Scottish Life & Character Part 11

Another story gives a good idea of the Scottish matter-of-fact view of things being brought to bear upon a religious question without meaning to be profane or irreverent. Dr. Macleod was on a Highland loch when a storm came on which threatened serious consequences. The doctor, a large powerful man, was accompanied by a clerical friend of diminutive size and small appearance, who began to speak seriously to the boatmen of their danger, and proposed that all present should join in prayer. "Na, na," said the chief boatman; "let the _little_ ane gang to pray, but first the big ane maun tak an oar." Ill.u.s.trative of the same spirit was the reply of a Scotsman of the genuine old school, "Boatie" of Deeside, of whom I have more to say, to a relative of mine. He had been nearly lost in a squall, and saved after great exertion, and was told by my aunt that he should be grateful to providence for his safety. The man, not meaning to be at all ungrateful, but viewing his preservation in the purely hard matter-of-fact light, quietly answered, "Weel, weel, Mrs. Russell; Providence here or Providence there, an I hadna worked sair mysell I had been drouned."

Old Mr. Downie, the parish minister of Banchory, was noted, in my earliest days, for his quiet pithy remarks on men and things, as they came before him. His reply to his son, of whose social position he had no very exalted opinion, was of this cla.s.s. Young Downie had come to visit his father from the West Indies, and told him that on his return he was to be married to a lady whose high qualities and position he spoke of in extravagant terms. He a.s.sured his father that she was "quite young, was very rich, and very beautiful." "Aweel, Jemmy," said the old man, very quietly and very slily, "I'm thinking there maun be some _faut_." Of the dry sarcasm we have a good example in the quiet utterance of a good Scottish phrase by an elder of a Free Kirk lately formed. The minister was an eloquent man, and had attracted one of the town-council, who, it was known, hardly ever entered the door of a church, and now came on motives of curiosity. He was talking very grand to some of the congregation: "Upon my word, your minister is a very eloquent man. Indeed, he will quite convert me." One of the elders, taking the word in a higher sense than the speaker intended, quietly replied, "Indeed, Bailie, there's _muckle need_."

A kind correspondent sends me an ill.u.s.tration of this quaint matter-of-fact view of a question as affecting the sentiments or the feelings. He tells me he knew an old lady who was a stout large woman, and who with this state of body had many ailments, which she bore cheerfully and patiently. When asked one day by a friend, "How she was keeping," she replied, "Ou, just middling; there's _ower muckle o' me_ to be a' weel at ae time." No Englishwoman would have given such an answer. The same cla.s.s of character is very strongly marked in a story which was told by Mr. Thomas Constable, who has a keen appreciation of a good Scottish story, and tells it inimitably. He used to visit an old lady who was much attenuated by long illness, and on going up stairs one tremendously hot afternoon, the daughter was driving away the flies, which were very troublesome, and was saying, "Thae flies will eat up a'

that remains o' my puir mither." The old lady opened her eyes, and the last words she spoke were, "What's left o' me's guid eneuch for them."

The spirit of caution and wariness by which the Scottish character is supposed to be distinguished has given rise to many of these national anecdotes.

Certainly this cautious spirit thus pervaded the opinions of the Scottish architect who was called upon to erect a building in England upon the long-lease system, so common with Anglican proprietors, but quite new to our Scottish friend. When he found the proposal was to build upon the tenure of 999 years, he quietly suggested, "Culd ye no mak it a _thousand_? 999 years'll be slippin' awa'."

But of all the cautious and careful answers we ever heard of was one given by a carpenter to an old lady in Glasgow, for whom he was working, and the anecdote is well authenticated. She had offered him a dram, and asked him whether he would have it then or wait till his work was done--"Indeed, mem," he said, "there's been sic a power o' sudden deaths lately that I'll just tak it now." He would guard against contingency and secure his dram.

The following is a good specimen of the same humour:--A minister had been preaching against covetousness and the love of money, and had frequently repeated how "love of money was the root of all evil" Two old bodies walking home from church--one said, "An' wasna the minister strang upo' the money?" "Nae doubt," said the other, rather hesitatingly; and added, "ay, but it's grand to hae the wee bit siller in your haund when ye gang an errand."

I have still another specimen of this national, cool, and deliberative view of a question, which seems characteristic of the temperament of our good countrymen. Some time back, when it was not uncommon for challenges to be given and accepted for insults, or supposed insults, an English gentleman was entertaining a party at Inverness with an account of the wonders he had seen and the deeds he had performed in India, from whence he had lately arrived. He enlarged particularly upon the size of the tigers he had met with at different times in his travels, and by way of corroborating his statements, a.s.sured the company that he had shot one himself considerably above forty feet long. A Scottish gentleman present, who thought that these narratives rather exceeded a traveller's allowed privileges, coolly said that no doubt those were very remarkable tigers; but that he could a.s.sure the gentleman there were in that northern part of the country some wonderful animals, and, as an example, he cited the existence of a skate-fish captured off Thurso, which exceeded half-an-acre in extent. The Englishman saw this was intended as a sarcasm against his own story, so he left the room in indignation, and sent his friend, according to the old plan, to demand satisfaction or an apology from the gentleman, who had, he thought, insulted him. The narrator of the skate story coolly replied, "Weel, sir, gin yer freend will tak' a few feet aff the length o' his tiger, we'll see what can be dune about the breadth o' the skate." He was too cautious to commit himself to a rash or decided course of conduct. When the tiger was shortened, he would take into consideration a reduction of superficial area in his skate.

A kind correspondent has sent me about as good a specimen of dry Scottish quiet humour as I know. A certain Aberdeens.h.i.+re laird, who kept a very good poultry-yard, could not command a fresh egg for his breakfast, and felt much aggrieved by the want. One day, however, he met his grieve's wife with a nice basket, and very suspiciously going towards the market; on pa.s.sing and speaking a word, he was enabled to discover that her basket was full of beautiful white eggs. Next time he talked with his grieve, he said to him, "James, I like you very well, and I think you serve me faithfully, but I cannot say I admire your wife." To which the cool reply was, "Oh, 'deed, sir, I'm no surprised at that, for I dinna muckle admire her mysel'."

An answer very much resembling this, and as much to the point, was that of a gudewife on Deeside, whose daughter had just been married and had left her for her new home. A lady asked the mother very kindly about her daughter, and said she hoped she liked her new home and new relations.

"Ou, my lady, she likes the parish weel eneuch, but she doesna think muckle o' her _man_!"

The natives of Aberdeens.h.i.+re are distinguished for the two qualities of being very acute in their remarks and very peculiar in their language.

Any one may still gain a thorough knowledge of Aberdeen dialect and see capital examples of Aberdeen humour. I have been supplied with a remarkable example of this combination of Aberdeen shrewdness with Aberdeen dialect. In the course of the week after the Sunday on which several elders of an Aberdeen parish had been set apart for parochial offices, a knot of the paris.h.i.+oners had a.s.sembled at what was in all parishes a great place of resort for idle gossiping--the smiddy or blacksmith's workshop. The qualifications of the new elders were severely criticised. One of the speakers emphatically laid down that the minister should not have been satisfied, and had in fact made a most unfortunate choice. He was thus answered by another parish oracle--perhaps the schoolmaster, perhaps a weaver:--"Fat better culd the man dee nir he's dune?--he bud tae big's d.y.k.e wi' the feal at fit o't." He meant there was no choice of material--he could only take what offered.

By the kindness of Dr. Begg, I have a most amusing anecdote to ill.u.s.trate how deeply long-tried a.s.sociations were mixed up with the habits of life in the older generation. A junior minister having to a.s.sist at a church in a remote part of Aberdeens.h.i.+re, the parochial minister (one of the old school) promised his young friend a good gla.s.s of whisky-toddy after all was over, adding slily and very significantly, "and gude _smuggled_ whusky." His Southron guest thought it inc.u.mbent to say, "Ah, minister, that's wrong, is it not? you know it is contrary to Act of Parliament." The old Aberdonian could not so easily give up his fine whisky to what he considered an unjust interference; so he quietly said, "Oh, Acts o' Parliament lose their breath before they get to Aberdeens.h.i.+re."

There is something very amusing in the idea of what may be called the "fitness of things," in regard to snuff-taking, which occurred to an honest Highlander, a genuine lover of snees.h.i.+n. At the door of the Blair-Athole Hotel he observed standing a magnificent man in full tartans, and noticed with much admiration the wide dimensions of his nostrils in a fine upturned nose. He accosted him, and, as his most complimentary act, offered him his mull for a pinch. The stranger drew up, and rather haughtily said: "I never take snuff." "Oh," said the other, "that's a peety, for there's grand _accommodation_[15]!"

I don't know a better example of the sly sarcasm than the following answer of a Scottish servant to the violent command of his enraged master. A well-known coa.r.s.e and abusive Scottish law functionary, when driving out of his grounds, was shaken by his carriage coming in contact with a large stone at the gate. He was very angry, and ordered the gatekeeper to have it removed before his return. On driving home, however, he encountered another severe shock by the wheels coming in contact with the very same stone, which remained in the very same place.

Still more irritated than before, in his usual coa.r.s.e language he called the gatekeeper, and roared out: "You rascal, if you don't send that beastly stone to h---, I'll break your head." "Well," said the man quietly, and as if he had received an order which he had to execute, and without meaning anything irreverent, "aiblins gin it were sent to heevan _it wad be mair out o' your Lords.h.i.+p's way_."

I think about as cool a Scottish "aside" as I know, was that of the old dealer who, when exhorting his son to practise honesty in his dealings, on the ground of its being the "best policy," quietly added, "I _hae tried baith_"

In this work frequent mention is made of a cla.s.s of old _ladies_, generally residing in small towns, who retained till within the memory of many now living the special characteristics I have referred to. Owing to local connection, I have brought forward those chiefly who lived in Montrose and the neighbourhood. But the race is extinct; you might as well look for hoops and farthingales in society as for such characters now. You can scarcely imagine an old lady, however quaint, now making use of some of the expressions recorded in the text, or saying, for the purpose of breaking up a party of which she was tired, from holding bad cards, "We'll stop now, bairns; I'm no enterteened;" or urging more haste in going to church on the plea, "Come awa, or I'll be ower late for the 'wicked man'"--her mode of expressing the commencement of the service.

Nothing could better ill.u.s.trate the quiet pawky style for which our countrymen have been distinguished, than the old story of the piper and the wolves. A Scottish piper was pa.s.sing through a deep forest. In the evening he sat down to take his supper. He had hardly begun, when a number of hungry wolves, prowling about for food, collected round him.

In self-defence, the poor man began to throw pieces of his victuals to them, which they greedily devoured. When he had disposed of all, in a fit of despair he took his pipes and began to play. The unusual sound terrified the wolves, which, one and all, took to their heels and scampered off in every direction: on observing which, Sandy quietly remarked, "Od, an I'd kenned ye liket the pipes sae weel, I'd a gien ye a spring _afore_ supper."

This imperturbable mode of looking at the events of life is ill.u.s.trated by perhaps the _most_ cautious answer on record, of the Scotsman who, being asked if he could play the fiddle, warily answered, "He couldna say, for he had never tried." But take other cases. For example: One tremendously hot day, during the old stage-coach system, I was going down to Portobello, when the coachman drew up to take in a gentleman who had hailed him on the road. He was evidently an Englishman--a fat man, and in a perfect state of "thaw and dissolution" from the heat and dust.

He wiped himself, and exclaimed, as a remark addressed to the company generally, "D----d hot it is." No one said anything for a time, till a man in the corner slily remarked, "I dinna doubt, sir, but it may." The cautiousness against committing himself unreservedly to any proposition, however plausible, was quite delicious.

A more determined objection to giving a categorical answer occurred, as I have been a.s.sured, in regard to a more profound question. A party travelling on a railway got into deep discussion on theological questions. Like Milton's spirits in Pandemonium, they had

"Reason'd high Of providence, fore-knowledge, will, and fate-- Fix'd fate, free-will, fore-knowledge absolute; And found no end, in wand'ring mazes lost."

A plain Scotsman present seemed much interested in these matters, and having expressed himself as not satisfied with the explanations which had been elicited in the course of discussion on a particular point regarding predestination, one of the party said to him that he had observed a minister, whom they all knew, in the adjoining compartment, and that when the train stopped at the next station a few minutes, he could go and ask _his_ opinion. The good man accordingly availed himself of the opportunity to get hold of the minister, and lay their difficulty before him. He returned in time to resume his own place, and when they had started again, the gentleman who had advised him, finding him not much disposed to voluntary communication, asked if he had seen the minister. "O ay," he said, "he had seen him." "And did you propose the question to him?" "O ay." "And what did he say?" "Oh, he just said he didna ken; and what was mair he didna _care!_"

I have received the four following admirable anecdotes, ill.u.s.trative of dry Scottish pawky humour, from an esteemed minister of the Scottish Church, the Rev. W. Mearns of Kinneff. I now record them nearly in the same words as his own kind communication. The anecdotes are as follow:--An aged minister of the old school, Mr. Patrick Stewart, one Sunday took to the pulpit a sermon without observing that the first leaf or two were so worn and eaten away that he couldn't decipher or announce the text. He was not a man, however, to be embarra.s.sed or taken aback by a matter of this sort, but at once intimated the state of matters to the congregation,--"My brethren, I canna tell ye the text, for the mice hae eaten it; but we'll just begin whaur the mice left aff, and when I come to it I'll let you ken."

In the year 1843, shortly after the Disruption, a parish minister had left the manse and removed to about a mile's distance. His pony got loose one day, and galloped down the road in the direction of the old glebe. The minister's man in charge ran after the pony in a great fuss, and when pa.s.sing a large farm-steading on the way, cried out to the farmer, who was sauntering about, but did not know what had taken place--"Oh, sir, did _ye_ see the minister's shault?" "No, no," was the answer,--"but what's happened?" "Ou, sir, fat do ye think? the minister's shault's _got lowse_ frae his tether, an' I'm frichtened he's ta'en the road doun to the auld glebe." "Weel-a-wicht!"--was the shrewd clever rejoinder of the farmer, who was a keen supporter of the old parish church, "I wad _na_ wonder at _that_. An' I'se warrant, gin the minister was gettin' _lowse_ frae _his_ tether, he wad jist tak the same road."

An old clerical friend upon Speyside, a confirmed bachelor, on going up to the pulpit one Sunday to preach, found, after giving out the psalm, that he had forgotten his sermon. I do not know what his objections were to his leaving the pulpit, and going to the manse for his sermon, but he preferred sending his old confidential housekeeper for it. He accordingly stood up in the pulpit, stopped the singing which had commenced, and thus accosted his faithful domestic:--"Annie; I say, Annie, _we've_ committed a mistak the day. Ye maun jist gang your waa's hame, and ye'll get my sermon oot o' my breek-pouch, an' we'll sing to the praise o' the Lord till ye come back again." Annie, of course, at once executed her important mission, and brought the sermon out of "the breek-pouch," and the service, so far as we heard, was completed without further interruption.

My dear friend, the late Rev. Dr. John Hunter, told me an anecdote very characteristic of the unimaginative matter-of-fact Scottish view of matters. One of the ministers of Edinburgh, a man of dry humour, had a daughter who had for some time pa.s.sed the period of youth and of beauty. She had become an Episcopalian, an event which the Doctor accepted with much good-nature, and he was asking her one day if she did not intend to be confirmed. "Well," she said, "I don't know. I understand Mr. Craig always kisses the candidates whom he prepares, and I could not stand that." "Indeed, Jeanie," said the Doctor slily, "gin Edward Craig _were_ to gie ye a kiss, I dinna think ye would be muckle the waur."

Many anecdotes characteristic of the Scottish peasant often turn upon words and ideas connected with Holy Scripture. This is not to be considered as in any sense profane or irreverent; but it arises from the Bible being to the peasantry of an older generation their library--their only book. We have constant indications of this almost exclusive familiarity with Scripture ideas. At the late ceremonial in the north, when the Archbishop of Canterbury laid the foundation of a Bishop's Church at Inverness, a number of persons, amid the general interest and kindly feeling displayed by the inhabitants, were viewing the procession from a hill as it pa.s.sed along. When the clergy, to the number of sixty, came on, an old woman, who was watching the whole scene with some jealousy, exclaimed, at sight of the surplices, "There they go, the _whited_ sepulchres!" I received another anecdote ill.u.s.trative of the same remark from an esteemed minister of the Free Church: I mean of the hold which Scripture expressions have upon the minds of our Scottish peasantry. One of his flock was a sick nervous woman, who hardly ever left the house. But one fine afternoon, when she was left alone, she fancied she would like to get a little air in the field adjoining the house. Accordingly she put on a bonnet and wrapped herself in a huge red shawl. Creeping along the d.y.k.e-side, some cattle were attracted towards her, and first one and then another gathered round, and she took shelter in the ditch till she was relieved by some one coming up to her rescue. She afterwards described her feelings to her minister in strong language, adding, "And eh, sir! when I lay by the d.y.k.e, and the beasts round a' glowerin' at me, I thocht what Dauvid maun hae felt when he said--'Many bulls have compa.s.sed me; strong bulls of Bashan have beset me round.'"

With the plainness and pungency of the old-fas.h.i.+oned Scottish language there was sometimes a coa.r.s.eness of expression, which, although commonly repeated in the Scottish drawing-room of last century, could not now be tolerated. An example of a very plain and downright address of a laird has been recorded in the annals of "Forfars.h.i.+re Lairds.h.i.+p." He had married one of the Misses Guthrie, who had a strong feeling towards the Presbyterian faith in which she had been brought up, although her husband was one of the zealous old school of Episcopalians. The young wife had invited her old friend, the parish minister, to tea, and had given him a splendid "_four hours."_ Ere the table was cleared the laird came in unexpectedly, and thus expressed his indignation, not very delicately, at what he considered an unwarrantable exercise of hospitality at his cost:--"Helen Guthrie, ye'll no think to save yer ain saul at the expense of my meal-girnel!"

The answer of an old woman under examination by the minister to the question from the Shorter Catechism--"What are the _decrees_ of G.o.d?"

could not have been surpa.s.sed by the General a.s.sembly of the Kirk, or even the Synod of Dort--"Indeed, sir, He kens that best Himsell." We have an answer a.n.a.logous to that, though not so pungent, in a catechumen of the late Dr. Johnston of Leith. She answered his own question, patting him on the shoulder--"'Deed, just tell it yersell, _bonny_ doctor (he was a very handsome man); naebody can tell it better."

To pa.s.s from the answers of "persons come to years of discretion"--I have elsewhere given examples of peculiar traits of character set forth in the answers of mere _children_, and no doubt a most amusing collection might be made of very juvenile "Scottish Reminiscences." One of these is now a very old story, and has long been current amongst us:--A little boy who attended a day-school in the neighbourhood, when he came home in the evening was always asked how he stood in his own cla.s.s. The invariable answer made was, "I'm second dux," which means in Scottish academical language second from the top of the cla.s.s. As his habits of application at home did not quite bear out the claim to so distinguished a position at school, one of the family ventured to ask what was the number in the cla.s.s to which he was attached. After some hesitation he was obliged to admit: "Ou, there's jist me and _anither_ la.s.s." It was a very _practical_ answer of the little girl, when asked the meaning of "darkness," as it occurred in Scripture reading--"Ou, just steek your een." On the question, What was the "pestilence that walketh in darkness"? being put to a cla.s.s, a little boy answered, after consideration--"Ou, it's just _bugs_." I did not antic.i.p.ate when in a former edition I introduced this answer, which I received from my nephew Sir Alexander Ramsay, that it would call forth a comment so interesting as one which I have received from Dr. Barber of Ulverston. He sends me an extract from Matthew's _Translation of the Bible_, which he received from Rev. L.R. Ayre, who possesses a copy of date 1553, from which it appears that Psalm xci. 5 was thus translated by Matthew, who adopted his translation from Coverdale and Tyndale:--"So that thou shalt not need to be afrayed for any bugge by nyght, nor for the arrow that flyeth by day[16]." Dr. Barber ingeniously remarks--"Is it possible the little boy's mother had one of these old Bibles, or is it merely a coincidence?"

The innocent and unsophisticated answers of children on serious subjects are often very amusing. Many examples are recorded, and one I have received seems much to the point, and derives a good deal of its point from the Scottish turn of the expressions. An elder of the kirk having found a little boy and his sister playing marbles on Sunday, put his reproof in this form, not a judicious one for a child:--"Boy, do ye know where children go to who play marbles on Sabbath-day?" "Ay," said the boy, "they gang doun' to the field by the water below the brig." "No,"

roared out the elder, "they go to h.e.l.l, and are burned." The little fellow, really shocked, called to his sister, "Come awa', Jeanie, here's a man swearing awfully."

A Scotch story like that of the little boy, of which the humour consisted in the dry application of the terms in a sense different from what was intended by the speaker, was sent to me, but has got spoilt by pa.s.sing through the press. It must be Scotch, or at least, is composed of Scottish materials--the Shorter Catechism and the bagpipes. A piper was plying his trade in the streets, and a strict elder of the kirk, desirous to remind him that it was a somewhat idle and profitless occupation, went up to him and proposed solemnly the first question of the Shorter Catechism, "What is the chief end of man?" The good piper, thinking only of his own business, and supposing that the question had reference to some pipe melody, innocently answered, "Na, I dinna ken the tune, but if ye'll whistle it I'll try and play it for ye."

I have said before, and I would repeat the remark again and again, that the object of this work is _not_ to string together mere funny stories, or to collect amusing anecdotes. We have seen such collections, in which many of the anecdotes are mere Joe Millers translated into Scotch. The purport of these pages has been throughout to ill.u.s.trate Scottish life and character, by bringing forward those modes and forms of expression by which alone our national peculiarities can be familiarly ill.u.s.trated and explained. Besides Scottish replies and expressions which are most characteristic--and in fact unique for dry humour, for quaint and exquisite wit--I have often referred to a consideration of dialect and proverbs. There can be no doubt there is a force and beauty in our Scottish _phraseology_, as well as a quaint humour, considered merely _as_ phraseology, peculiar to itself. I have spoken of the phrase "Auld langsyne," and of other words, which may be compared in their Anglican and Scottish form. Take the familiar term common to many singing-birds.

The English word linnet does not, to my mind, convey so much of simple beauty and of pastoral ideas as belong to our Scottish word LINTIE.

I recollect hearing the Rev. Dr. Norman Macleod give a most interesting account of his visit to Canada. In the course of his eloquent narrative he mentioned a conversation he had with a Scottish emigrant, who in general terms spoke favourably and gratefully of his position in his adopted country. But he could not help making this exception when he thought of the "banks and braes o' bonny Doon"--"But oh, sir," he said, "there are nae _linties_ i' the wuds." How touching the words in his own dialect! The North American woods, although full of birds of beautiful plumage, it is well known have no singing-birds.

A worthy Scottish Episcopal minister one day met a townsman, a breeder and dealer in singing-birds. The man told him he had just had a child born in his family, and asked him if he would baptize it. He thought the minister could not resist the offer of a bird. "Eh, Maister Shaw," he said, "if ye'll jist do it, I hae a fine lintie the noo, and if ye'll do it, I'll gie ye the lintie." He quite thought that this would settle the matter!

By these remarks I mean to express the feeling that the word _lintie_ conveys to my mind more of tenderness and endearment towards the little songster than linnet. And this leads me to a remark (which I do not remember to have met with) that Scottish dialects are peculiarly rich in such terms of endearment, more so than the pure Anglican. Without at all pretending to exhaust the subject, I may cite the following as examples of the cla.s.s of terms I speak of. Take the names for parents--"Daddie"

and "Minnie;" names for children, "My wee bit lady" or "laddie," "My wee bit lamb;" of a general nature, "My ain kind dearie." "Dawtie,"

especially used to young people, described by Jamieson a darling or favourite, one who is _dawted_--_i.e._ fondled or caressed. My "joe"

expresses affection with familiarity, evidently derived from _joy_, an easy transition--as "My joe, Janet;" "John Anderson, my joe, John." Of this character is Burns's address to a wife, "My winsome"--_i.e._ charming, engaging--"wee thing;" also to a wife, "My winsome marrow"--the latter word signifying a dear companion, one of a pair closely allied to each other; also the address of Rob the Ranter to Maggie Lauder, "My bonnie bird." Now, we would remark, upon this abundant nomenclature of kindly expressions in the Scottish dialect, that it a.s.sumes an interesting position as taken in connection with the Scottish Life and _Character_, and as a set-off against a frequent short and _grumpy_ manner. It indicates how often there must be a current of tenderness and affection in the Scottish heart, which is so frequently represented to be, like its climate, "stern and wild." There could not be such _terms_ were the feelings they express unknown. I believe it often happens that in the Scottish character there is a vein of deep and kindly feeling lying hid under a short, and hard and somewhat stern manner. Hence has arisen the Scottish saying which is applicable to such cases--"His girn's waur than his bite:" his disposition is of a softer nature than his words and manner would often lead you to suppose.

There are two admirable articles in _Blackwood's Magazine,_ in the numbers for November and December 1870, upon this subject. The writer abundantly vindicates the point and humour of the Scottish tongue. Who can resist, for example, the epithet applied by Meg Merrilies to an unsuccessful probationer for admission to the ministry:--"a sticket stibbler"? Take the sufficiency of Holy Scripture as a pledge for any one's salvation:--"There's eneuch between the brods o' the Testament to save the biggest sinner i' the warld." I heard an old Scottish Episcopalian thus pithily describe the hasty and irreverent manner of a young Englishman:--"He ribbled aff the prayers like a man at the heid o'

a regiment." A large family of young children has been termed "a great sma' family." It was a delicious dry rejoinder to the question--"Are you Mr. So-and-so?" "It's a' that's o' me" (_i.e._ to be had for him.) I have heard an old Scottish gentleman direct his servant to mend the fire by saying, "I think, Dauvid, we wadna be the waur o' some coals."

There is a pure Scottish term, which I have always thought more expressive than any English word of ideas connected with manners in society--I mean the word to blether, or blethering, or blethers.

Jamieson defines it to "talk nonsense." But it expresses far more--it expresses powerfully, to Scottish people, a person at once shallow, chattering, conceited, tiresome, voluble.

There is a delicious servantgirlism, often expressed in an answer given at the door to an inquirer: "Is your master at home, or mistress?" as the case may be. The problem is to save the direct falsehood, and yet evade the visit; so the answer is--"Ay, he or she is at hame; but he's no _in_"

The transition from Scottish _expressions_ to Scottish Poetry is easy and natural. In fact, the most interesting feature now belonging to Scottish life and social habits is, to a certain extent, becoming with many a matter of reminiscence of _Poetry in the Scottish dialect_, as being the most permanent and the most familiar feature of Scottish characteristics. It is becoming a matter of history, in so far as we find that it has for some time ceased to be cultivated with much ardour, or to attract much popularity. In fact, since the time of Burns, it has been losing its hold on the public mind. It is a remarkable fact that neither Scott nor Wilson, both admirers of Burns, both copious writers of poetry themselves, both also so distinguished as writers of Scottish _prose_, should have written any poetry strictly in the form of pure Scottish dialect. "Jock o' Hazeldean" I hardly admit to be an exception. It is not Scottish. If, indeed, Sir Walter wrote the sc.r.a.p of the beautiful ballad in the "Antiquary"--

"Now haud your tongue, baith wife and carle, And listen, great and sma', And I will sing of Glenallan's Earl, That fought at the red Harlaw"--

one cannot but regret that he had not written more of the same.

Campbell, a poet and a Scotsman, has not attempted it. In short, we do not find poetry in the Scottish dialect at all _kept up_ in Scotland. It is every year becoming more a matter of research and reminiscence.

Nothing new is added to the old stock, and indeed it is surprising to see the ignorance and want of interest displayed by many young persons in this department of literature. How few read the works of Allan Ramsay, once so popular, and still so full of pastoral imagery! There are occasionally new editions of the _Gentle Shepherd_, but I suspect for a limited cla.s.s of readers. I am a.s.sured the boys of the High School, Academy, etc., do not care even for Burns. As poetry in the Scottish dialect is thus slipping away from the public Scottish mind, I thought it very suitable to a work of this character to supply a list of modern _Scottish dialect writers_. This I am able to provide by the kindness of our distinguished antiquary, Mr. David Laing--the fulness and correctness of whose acquirements are only equalled by his readiness and courtesy in communicating his information to others:--

SCOTTISH POETS OF THE LAST CENTURY.