70 



the inn, went out in the rain and put a penny in her 

 hand. After a few pennies had been collected the 

 music would stop, and the singer disappear, to drink 

 up her gains, I half suspect, but do not know. I 

 noticed that she was never treated with rudeness or 

 disrespect. The boys would pause and regard her 

 occasionally, but made no remark, or gesture, or 

 grimace. One afternoon a traveling show pitched 

 its tent in the broader part of the street, and by 

 diligent grinding of a hand-organ summoned all the 

 children of the place to see the wonders. The ad- 

 mission was one penny, and I went in with the rest, 

 and saw the little man, the big dog, the happy fam- 

 ily, and the gaping, dirty-faced, but orderly crowd of 

 boys and girls. The Ecclefechan boys, with some 

 of whom I tried, not very successfully, to scrape an 

 acquaintance, I found a sober, quiet, modest set, shy 

 of strangers, and, like all country boys, incipient 

 naturalists. If you want to know where the birds'- 

 nests are, ask the boys. Hence, one Sunday after- 

 noon, meeting a couple of them on the Annan road, 

 I put the inquiry. They looked rather blank and 

 unresponsive at first ; but I made them understand I 

 was in earnest, and wished to be shown some nests. 

 To stimulate their ornithology I offered a penny for 

 the first nest, twopence for the second, threepence for 

 the third, etc., a reward that, as it turned out, 

 lightened my burden of British copper considerably ; 

 for these boys appeared to know every nest in the 

 neighborhood, and I suspect had just then been mak- 



