168 Autobiographical Notes. 



I_.pndon with Mrs Johnston, in the capacity of lady's maid. 

 William was sent to Edinburgh, and maintained there at the 

 expense of Mr Murray, who also advanced about ^500 for his 

 outfit to Australia, and for a large supply of saddlery goods for 

 commercial purposes on his arrival ; acts of kindness quite 

 princely, and which we all duly appreciated. 



So much for my unlettered and humble ancestors. In a 

 remote parish persons of their rank of life, with nothing higher 

 than an ordinary education, seldom emigrate. This is parti- 

 cularly true of the period prior to my birth. They lived genera- 

 tion after generation in the same locality, and hence it was that 

 in my youth 1 lived as it were among my own people, being 

 acquainted not only with grandfathers and grandmothers, but 

 with grand-uncles and grand-aunts, and abundance of other 

 relatives. I had, for example, above twenty cousins or other 

 more distant relatives who attended the same school as myself. 

 Most of these, like their forefathers, settled in the neighbour- 

 hood where they were born; a few others, like my two brothers 

 and myself, left their native spot and pushed their fortune, with 

 different degrees of success, at a distance from home. Of my 

 own relatives 1 can most truh say that none of them ever dis- 

 appointed his parents' hopes, or ever deviated from the path of 

 virtue and integrity. This remark, which embraces a period of 

 sixty years, admits of no modification, and is correct to the very 

 letter. 



I well remember the dear years of 1799-1801. That my 

 father suffered much from the famine is not likely, as he had 

 his four stones of meal monthly, and besides had a large kitchen 

 garden, which generally supplied sufl^cient vegetables, including 

 potatoes, for the family. But the poor people lived on Indian 

 meal or flour, also on "reduced meal," or, in other words, on 

 meal reduced in price by the kindness of the Broughton family. 

 It was supplied at a very low figure to those recommended by 

 the parochial minister and his ses.sion. 



The first school I attended was at Girthon Kirk. A small 

 farmer named Mr John M'Geoch employed a teacher for his 

 family, and in order to meet the expense permitted the children 

 of the neighbourhood to attend at a certain rate of wages. In 

 this way the farmer got his own large family educated at a com- 

 paratively low rate. Such expedients in favour of education are 



