HIS BIRTHPLACE AND EARLY TRAINING. 3 



government. It was, and still is, mal-odour and its causes 

 notwithstanding, a picturesque place, recalling Old Edin- 

 burgh in many respects, with its crowded streets, narrow 

 lanes and wide pends, revealing pretty peeps for the 

 painter, and its old houses, with the family crests of the 

 once titled inmates above the doorways. The old pier was 

 then sufficient for the growing trade ; the new harbour not 

 being formed till 1812. The present great Flemish- 

 looking steeple had only been built ten years when the 

 century closed. Before its erection, there was no public 

 clock for the regulation of the business of the quiet-going 

 burgh. The march of time was indicated, to the eye, by a 

 quaint old dial, that had stood for eighty years near the 

 quay, and, to the ear, by a bell, simply hung in sight of 

 the lieges at the top of three tall posts near the cross, 

 and rung at stated intervals, and on occasions of public 

 moment. 



Into this quiet, pleasant, old town, in the mid-winter of 

 1794, there walked, with sad countenance and heavy step, 

 a good-looking young woman, named Ann Caird. She 

 had travelled that day eight weary miles, from the upland 

 village of Drumlithie, where her parents dwelt ; and she 

 carried a burden which should only be borne under the 

 happy sunshine of wedded love. The want of this 

 accounted for the slow pace and dejected air of what 

 should have been a happy maiden of twenty-one. She 

 took refuge in a house not far from the Old Tolbooth, 

 at the end of the pier ; and soon after, on the igth of 

 December, gave birth to a son. This boy, who was named 

 John Duncan, after his father, a weaver in his mother's 

 village, and who was thus ushered into the world under a 



