SKETCH OF THE AUTHOR'S LIFE. 1 1 



tures, full many a time and oft he was wont to bring ' 

 up at the annual convivial meeting, held at St Bos- 

 wells to this day, to commemorate the historic event, 

 and the story never grew tiresome in the telling. 



At twenty-five, John had settled in life, had a 

 wife, Agnes Riddle by name, and a house of his own, 

 shoemaking his trade, and St Boswells or Lessudden 

 his residence for life. In a notice of a man who, 

 spent his days in following one of the most plebeian 

 of occupations, it is difficult to find individual inci- 

 dents to make out the track of his existence. His 

 original thinking powers soon marked him off as one 

 who could not be invisible in the dead inertness of 

 rural life. On the north side of the village was a 

 picture of silvan and river scenery, in the winding 

 of the peerless Tweed, such as might have haunted 

 any man possessing less idealism than John, with 

 the pleasure which nature in her diviner glimpses 

 yields. There was Dry burgh, rearing its time- 

 stricken gables among the trees; but strange to 

 say such an object excited no pleasure in John. 

 These haunts of monks and their worn out super- 

 stitions he despised, as having formed part of the 

 imposture which had retarded freedom of ideas and 

 common sense among men. He had more true 

 delight in watching the motions of the water ousel 



