46 Sent to his Second School. [CHAP. IL. 
ing their backs to Bell. At this movement the kae became 
fractious. He could not accommodate himself to the altered 
position. But seeing a little light overhead, he made for 
it. He projected his beak through the opening between 
the trousers and the vest. He*pushed his way upward; 
Tom squeezed him downward to where he was before. But 
this only made the kae furious. He struggled, forced his 
way upward, got his bill through the opening, and then his 
head. 
The kae immediately began to cre-waw! cre-waw! 
“The Lord preserv’s a’! Fat’s this, noo?” cried Bell, start- 
ing to her feet. “It’s Tam Edward again,” shouted the 
scholars, ‘‘ wi a craw stickin’ oot o’ his breeks!” Bell went 
up to him, pulled him up by his collar, dragged him to the 
door, thrust him out, and locked the door after him. Ed- 
ward never saw Bell Hill again. 
The next school to which he was sent was at the Den- 
burn side, near by the venerable Bow brig, the oldest bridge 
in Aberdeen,* but now swept away to make room for mod- 
ern improvements. This school consisted wholly of boys. 
The master was well stricken in years. He was one of the 
old school, who had great faith in “the taws,”+ as an instru- 
ment of instruction. Edward would have learned much 
more at this school than at Bell Hill’s, had he not been 
* The Rev. James Gordon, in ‘his “Description of both Towns of 
Aberdeen” (1661), says: “The bruike called the Den Burne runs be- 
neath the west side of the citie; upon the brink quhairoff a little stone 
bridge, at that pairt wher the brooke entereth the river Dee, the 
Carmelites of old had a convert, whoes church and quholl precinct 
of building wer leveled with the ground that very day that the rest of 
the churches and convents of New Aberdeen wer destroyed. There 
remayneth now onlie ane kilne, which standeth in ‘the outmost south 
corner of the citie, known this day by the name of the Freer Kilne.” 
+ The “taws” consist of a leather strap about three fect long, cut 
into tails at the end. Sometimes the ends are burned, to make them 
hit hard. They are applied to the back, or the “ palmies ”—that is, 
the palm of the hand. 
