82 JOHN DUNCAN, WEAVER AND BOTANIST. 



said, fifty million trees in fifty years a wise sower who has 

 enriched his children by the superabundant harvest. Not 

 far from Paradise, on the way to Monymusk, are the 

 picturesque ruins of Pitfichie Castle, often passed by the 

 brave little weaver in the dark, as he returned from herb- 

 seeking rambles, despite its howlet cries and haunted 

 chambers. Many a time, under the tall trees, did he watch 

 the stars, brighter from the deepened blue of the sky as 

 seen through the dense foliage, while he moved homewards 

 to Milldourie ; these bright celestial letters being, as we shall 

 see, as familiar to him as those of books, for he was now an 

 ardent star-gazer. It was as sweet a secluded spot to live in 

 as could well be found or imagined, dear to a solitary thinker 

 like him ; and it has long been cherished by the tourist 

 and the pleasure-seeker as a retreat of unusual silvan and 

 mountain beauty. It shelters, as such a spot is certain to 

 do, not a few of our rarer plants ; but at that period, John 

 sought for plants merely for their secret virtues, though he 

 returned to its botanical treasures a few years later, when 

 his vision had been purged to clearer sight after meeting 

 with Charles Black, at the other side of Cairn William. 



One of his employers here, who had a weaving shop in 

 connection with the farm, not unusual then, was a miserly 

 old farmer, notorious in the district for his excessive greed. 

 To save a bawbee, he was ready not only to scrimp his 

 men, but to pinch himself to a degree incredible even in 

 the annals of parsimony. He used to serve his ploughmen 

 with the sourest of buttermilk, and when it was so far gone 

 as to be refused by them with no muttered curses, his like- 

 spirited housekeeper would come to her master, saying, 

 " We'll better gae that buttermilk to the weyvers, for our 



