Who closed the hole?
The other answered
If the rump-tail should break
Thy skull shall know that.[31]
Probably this tale was carried to Canada by some of the Highland emigrants and became naturalised and localised there, for it has come back in the following guise: Two Scotsmen in a mountainous part of the colony, climbed up a rocky slope to the mouth of a narrow cave, into which one of them crawled to discover what might be inside. The other contented himself by lighting his pipe and sitting down outside, but had not been there above a minute or two when a huge she-bear came rushing up the declivity and made straight for the cave. Seeing the danger to his friend he had presence of mind enough to seize the tail of the bear just as the animal had got within the entrance, and to plant his feet firmly against the rock on each side. Presently a voice from the inner recesses shouted out, ‘Donald, Donald, fat be darkenin’ the hole?’ To which Donald replied, ‘My faith, Angus, gin the tail break ye’ll fin’ fat be darkenin’ the hole.’[32]
CHAPTER XI.
Scottish shepherds and their dogs. A snow-storm among the Southern Uplands. Scottish inns of an old type. Reminiscences of some Highland inns. Revival of roadside inns by cyclists. Scottish drink. Drinking customs now obsolete.
The shepherds in the pastoral uplands of the south of Scotland are a strong, active, and intelligent race. I have spent many a happy day among them, living in their little shielings, on the friendliest footing with them, their families, and their dogs. The household at Talla Linnfoot, in Peeblesshire, was a typical sample of one of these families. Wattie Dalgleish, the shepherd there when I first went into the district, was becoming an elderly man, no longer able for the stiff climbs and long walks that were needed to look after the whole of his wide charge. His young and vigorous son was able to relieve him of the more distant ground, which was shared with another man, not of the family, who slept in one of the outhouses. Wattie’s active wife and daughter looked well after the domestic concerns of the household. His laugh had the clear, hearty ring of a frank, honest, and kindly nature. He delighted to recount his experiences of field and fell, and his Doric was pure and racy. One evening I had come up from Tweedsmuir and described to him a man whom I had seen at work there, planing a shutter which he had placed on tressels in the very middle of the road. This worthy wore large round-eyed spectacles, a tattered apron in front of him, and a red-tasselled blue bonnet on his head. The shepherd recognised the man from my description, and at once asked, ‘And did he speir (enquire) the inside out o’ ye?’ He had certainly put a good many questions. He turned out to be a kind of factotum down the valley of the Tweed—‘barber, cook, upholsterer, what you please’—of whom I afterwards heard much. As among his avocations was that of paper-hanging, he was once employed by a proprietor in Broughton parish to paper a bedroom. In the afternoon, when the master of the house came to see how the work was getting on, he found that the paper had been stuck on the walls just as it came, without the selvages being cut off. ‘Tammas, Tammas,’ exclaimed the laird, ‘what is the meaning of this? Why have you not cut off these ugly borders?’ Tammas looked at the laird for a moment through his great goggles, and then with a toss of his head remarked, ‘That may be your taste, sir, but on Tweedside we like it best this way,’ and went on with his pasting.
PAPER-HANGING ON TWEEDSIDE