112 JOHN DUNCAN, WEAVER AND BOTANIST. 



thinking and studying ; and to this chilly hole, without a 

 fire, and always in the dark in winter for a candle would 

 have been dangerous he retired nightly to rest. To make 

 it more tolerable in cold, frosty times, he used to carry 

 a bottle filled with hot water, supplied by a kindly neigh- 

 bour. While lying there, he could distinctly hear the 

 breathing and stamping of the horses, and the lowing of the 

 cows, in the double stable and byre below, the fumes of 

 which ascended through the crevices between the deals of 

 the thin partition that separated him from these his fellow- 

 creatures. Talk of Diogenes' tub ! That was airiness, 

 health, and comfort, compared to Duncan's " philosopher's 

 hall." 



John worked long hours, weaving at the mill. As the 

 house in which he boarded for his meals was small, com- 

 fortless, and swarming with children, he used to spend his 

 evenings in a quieter, more comfortable cottage next door, 

 where lived a kindly woman, called Janet Brown, now 

 gone, who filled his pirns and did his washing ; and he 

 retired at bedtime to his lonely crib. 



During his first residence at Auchleven, his chief study 

 was Astronomy, and it was here that he received the 

 appropriate and telling title of "Johnnie Meen." It was 

 along a dike at the back of the cottage ' in which he 

 boarded, that he used to set up dials and strings, at the 

 top of a high ground which commanded a good view of 

 the heavens all round, and in sight of Hermit's Seat on 

 Benachie. An ash-tree still stands just opposite "the 

 philosopher," into which he used to climb at nights, out 

 of sight of passers-by. Seated in its upper branches, 

 he would watch the wheeling constellations for hours, 



