290 JOHN DUNCAN, WEAVER AND BOTANIST. 



that John lived a greatly repressed life in the house, kept 

 himself more and more apart, and seldom or never 

 blossomed out at Droughsburn as he always did in more 

 congenial society. With Mrs. Allanach alone did he feel 

 in any way at ease, or have any confidences ; and he 

 would talk at meals for a little, chat for some time by 

 the kitchen fire after early supper, and occasionally read 

 some of his books and show his plants. In other houses in 

 the valley of the Leochel, he was much more at home, as at 

 Mrs. Inverarity's at Droughsbridge, and Charles Birse the 

 merchant's, who lived up the glen at Skuttery. 



But nowhere was his silent reserve more thawed and 

 his heart more opened out than in the home of a crofter 

 who also lived at Droughsbridge. Mrs. Webster, the good 

 genius there, is a pleasant, couthy, warm-hearted little 

 woman. She understood and appreciated Duncan more 

 than most of his neighbours, and possessed the geniality 

 and tact that won his confidence. Her husband is plain, 

 practical, hard-working, and kindly. To their cosy fireside, 

 John came more frequently than to any other in the 

 neighbourhood. There he would read and talk for hours 

 together about current events, his wanderings and his 

 plants, and relate incidents in his past history confided to 

 few. He would take the children on his knee, and tell 

 them stories of his mother and his own childhood, which he 

 seldom told to any. To Mrs. Webster, he came for many 

 years to get his hair cut, and even when they removed 

 nearer to Alford, he continued the old habit, in the notion 

 that she alone could do it properly, and that her kindly 

 fingers were pleasanter than those of others. For this bit 

 of service, he brought his own comb and scissors, which 



