HIS EARLY LIFE AS A COUNTRY WEAVER. 79 



in vain. With several forcible expletives, he was told to 

 return the way he came. This, with seeming reluctance, 

 he at last did ; and then tripped along with a merry 

 heart in the very direction he wanted ! In after years, 

 when in high glee, he used to tell the story of how he had 

 been too much for " the sanshauch * crabbit bodie o' a 

 lairdie." 



On a similar occasion, in the same neighbourhood, he 

 was treated with more kindliness by the proprietor of 

 Monymusk, also a great game-preserver, but, moreover, a 

 lover of flowers. John was seeking for plants in a young 

 wood, through which ran an old footpath, recently shut up. 

 He thought himself secure from discovery in such a quiet 

 corner, and felt, no doubt, that science ought to cover a 

 multitude, if not of sins, at least of trespasses. But what 

 was his surprise, when raising himself after groping for 

 some herbs, to observe the very man he wished least to 

 meet there, approaching on horseback, and too close for 

 him to escape ! " What do you want here, sir ? " at once 

 greeted his ears. John replied that, seeing there was a road 

 that way, he thought he might follow it. The proprietor 

 told him that it was now shut up, as he might have known 

 from having to climb the fence. John replied that he 

 would be obliged if he would show him the way to such 

 and such a place, naming the one he wished to reach. This 

 the proprietor agreed to do, won over by his mild manner, 

 and, while conducting him, entered into conversation with 

 him regarding the plants he was carrying. When he learnt 

 the purpose of his trespass, the gentleman gave him full 



* Aberdeenshire for " proudly disdainful," said by Jamieson to be 

 from a Gaelic word of the same sound, meaning morose. 



