MISUNDERSTANDINGS UNDER WHICH HE LIVED. 331 



think ! " When Mr. Williams told John of this man's 

 conversion, he replied, " It's hard-won knowledge." 



Even at the Milton of Cushnie, where, in the houses of 

 Mr. Williams' father and uncle, the old weaver was more 

 appreciated than in many places, he and the other children 

 who liked and respected him, looked upon him as " a great 

 curiosity." Influenced by the common talk about the man, 

 they thought he invented new words for the plants as he 

 liked. On Sundays and other times when they walked 

 with him, they used to ask him the names of the same 

 plants " over and over," in order to test his consistency, like 

 the great little critics they were, as Dr. Williams tells. 

 These, nevertheless, John never tired of repeating to them, 

 " as solemnly and willingly the twentieth time as the first." 

 He seemed to think them earnest students, but anything 

 they did learn, they confessed, was " by mistake ; " and they 

 rather made fun of the big words and " threw them about 

 at each other," remembering such sonorous vocables as 

 Veronica beccabunga and Veronica chamcedrys long after 

 they had forgot the plants they designated. 



In his encounters with ignorance and prejudice, John 

 had most trouble with his farmer and ploughman neighbours, 

 for he lived amongst them and met them yearly in the 

 harvest field. The notorious tendency of their class to 

 play practical jokes and make fun of what they do not 

 understand, got abundant scope, as they thought, with the 

 odd weaver and his queer ways. From long intercourse 

 and not from mere prejudice, his opinion of his tormentors 

 was not very high, calling them generally " Johnnie Raws," 

 a description he first heard from Charles Black, who said it 

 was originally used by a curious beggar that wandered 



