Transactions. 103 
placing the less distinguished at the bottom of the class. The best 
man having picked out the bride, it next became her turn to throw 
the handkerchief to whomsoever she chose. The happy swain 
knelt as she stooped. The fiddlers shrieked a minuendo, and the 
last kiss that ever alien lips should secure was wrested from the 
bride. 
Funerals were well attended, and the custom of having a 
service prevailed, and only began to thin out after I entered the 
parish. I was told by a well-wisher to get acquainted with the 
people, and to attend all the sheep shearings and funerals to 
which I was invited. The attendance at funerals is diminish- 
ing, and generally a few gigs now pick up all the mourners. 
The exodus of young men and daughters into the large towns 
reacts on provincial simplicity. I witnessed wreaths of flowers 
heaped on the coffin of an old Cameronian, whose opinion, I am 
certain, had never been taken on the matter. The humblest 
family must have a memorial stone. 
I shall pass over gatherings in connection with sheep, killing 
pigs, &c., and remark that the kurn, or harvest home, is no longer 
celebrated. St. Valentine’s Day is forgotten, and the Candlemas 
bleeze has given way to a Christmas present. Even the 
Hallowe’en described by Burns—the turnip lantern and the 
pulling of kail stocks—is away, the only survival being that 
on Hallowe’en mummers with false faces enter your kitchen 
expecting an obolus, and highly gratified when you are puzzled 
and unable to guess their names or even their sex. 
The gradual decrease in our rural population, consequent on 
the increase of factories in towns, and the turning of Britain into a 
manufacturing centre for the whole world, is evident in Tynron. 
In 1801 the pop. was ... 563 | In 1871 the pop. was ad ass) 
PL SOL aes ss 4340 ou) nen Sleiman ... 416 
Plot y. Vit 2) STAR, SO OS a vee BOD 
SG) Meta} ... 446 
That is, at last census, the reduction in population compared 
to 1801 was 204 persons. The former considerable population 
has left on our hills and dales some traces of itself in a few stones 
of former bourocks overgrown with nettles, and here and there a 
few wild gooseberries and some plants, such as monks’ rhubarb 
and masterwort, of no use now, but formerly used in poor people’s 
broth. On the hills also, 200 ft. above any arable ground, there 
are at present to be noticed the furrows once caused by the 
ploughshare. Dividing the results of the last four decennial 
