Perthshire in bygone days

JOHN HASTEE. 215
made of the clippings of their own tails. His carts had
wooden axles working in wooden naves. With these he
would leave Whinnyburn at ten o'clock at night, and go
rumbling away up the western slope of Gleneagles to Blair -
ingone for coals. About noon next day he would return
with his two loads, each weighing 24 stones, or a little
more than 4 cwt. When his neighbour, James Neilson,
ventured to bring 48 stones on one of his better appointed
conveyances, John shook his head, and said, " Where is
all this to end?" When the fame of Wilkie's iron plough
and the drum-thrashing-machine reached him, he predicted
"the vengeance of heaven" on their heads, saying wrath-
fully, " Takin' the wark out o' the poor folks' hands.
' God made man upright, but he has found out many
inventions ! ' I want no iron about this toun but my
horses' shoon and my plough muntin, my huik, and the
teeth o' my rippling-kaim." Though thus generally carry-
ing matters high, John occasionally met with sharp re-
prisal. At the Martinmas term he got home two new
men-servants, a ploughman and a haflin. It was the
custom at Whinnyburn for the master and men to take
their meals together in the kitchen, and he made a point
of impressing all new comers with a full sense of their
very tenable position. The morning after the above
arrival, the buffet-stool was set out garnished with three
plates of porridge and one large bowl of sweet milk, into
which each dipped on mid-journey. The girls were moving
about ; but when the gudeman laid aside his bonnet all was
still. John expatiated at great length on the manifold
duties of life, and did not stop until he thought he had
sufficiently moulded the new comers to his purpose. When
the end came the spoons were lifted in solemn silence, and
the worthy farmer and his men felt subdued and contented.
But the hungry ploughman, unconscious of the latent
heat that slumbered under the smooth skin of the Whinny-
burn porridge, stuck his spoon into the savoury morsel, and
modestly avoiding the milk for the first round, plunged it
into his mouth. He gave a convulsive start, and, dashing
his spoon amongst the milk, met it half-way with this
agonised apostrophe, "Follow, ye devil, or I'm a dead
man." John saw his castle of cards demolished before it
was well built, and he was left to feel how very short way
sage counsel went in alleviating physical pain.