COL. ANSTRUTHER THOMSON n 



and on going home my uncle got his friend Phil 

 Williams to examine us, and found that we knew 

 nothing. 



One ceremony at Putney took place every half. 

 We were marched up to Carmalt's desk two and 

 two. Two glasses of a horrid compound of bark 

 were on the desk, and an usher stood on each side. 

 We had to drink the dose, turn to the usher, and put 

 out our tongues to show that we had swallowed it ! 

 This was charged in our account, " Wine, 55." 



We were removed from Putney. Willy Adam 

 was sent to Laleham, near Staines, and I went to 

 the Academy at Edinburgh. I was boarded at 

 Mr. Dyer's, the English master. He lived in Rae- 

 burn Place. There were eight of us in the house 

 Stewart McNaughton ; Dick Moubray, afterwards 

 Sir Richard Hussey ; Bigge, afterwards parson at 

 Stamfordham, in Northumberland ; Dykes, the 

 Hereditary Champion ; Dundas, whose sister was 

 Mrs. Farquharson of Invercauld ; Frank Johnstone, 

 brother of Johnstone of Alva ; Lumsden, Sam Dyer 

 and myself. 



The night I arrived my tutor was ill in bed. At 

 bedtime I made a " devil " of wet gunpowder on a 

 slate, and set the bed curtains on fire. I managed to 

 pull them down and put them out, but filled the 

 house with smoke. However, it was forgiven, being 

 a first fault. 



My brother Willie and Tom Erskine, Cambo, 

 were at school at Loretto, Musselburgh. A horse- 

 dealer, a great friend of my father's, Matthew Baird, 



