“Well, the Captain says you’re not to go now!” said Duncan; and off he went, and had half a dozen passengers’ trunks in confusion on deck before the lady had time to adjust her spectacles and see where he had vanished to.
Speaking of boats. Not long ago a couple of Highland farmers, recognised as folks of some importance in their own immediate neighbourhood, left Stornoway by steamer with the view of attending an important market in the South. The weather looked good at the start, and considering this in conjunction with the fact that it would be so much cheaper, and few, or none, of those on board would know them, they resolved on travelling steerage. So far so good. But they had not been long out on the billowy deep when it commenced to blow a perfect hurricane, and all on board became alarmed as to the safety of their lives, and there was running to and fro and many anxious inquiries concerning the vessel’s chances of weathering the storm. Not the least perturbed in spirit were the two farmers. “Oich! Oich!” said the one to the other, “it will be awful if anything happens, and we’ve only got steerage tickets in oor pockets.” “Indeed, and it’s very true what you say, Mr. M’Donald, and that’s what troubles me most of all,” responded the other, looking, if possible, more doleful than his friend. “But I’ll tell you what we’ll do. We’ll go abaft the bridge this moment, and if the worst comes, which the goodness forbid, we’ll fling awa’ our tickets, and gang doon as cabin passengers anyway.”
Another example here, in evidence of the Highlander’s peculiar powers of reasoning. Donald Macgregor, like his more illustrious namesake, Rob Roy, was a notorious sheep and cattle-lifter in the Highlands of Perthshire. At last he was overtaken by the grim tyrant of the human race, and was visited by the minister of the parish in which he resided. The holy man warmly exhorted the dying reiver to reflect upon the long and black catalogue of his sins before it was too late; otherwise, he would have a tremendous account to give at the great day of retribution, when all the crimes he had committed in the world would appear in dreadful array as evidence of his guilt.
“Och, sirse,” cried the dying man, “and will all ta sheeps and all ta cows and all ta things that Donald has helped hersel’ to, be there?”
“Undoubtedly,” replied the parson.
“Och, that will pe all right then; shust let every shentlemans took her own, and Donald Macgregor will be ta honest man again.”
And now, as the universal “Auld Lang Syne” has formed the parting-song of so many merry meetings at home and abroad, let the following clever set of verses, the reputed composition of a talented Perthshire divine of the “Auld Kirk,” afford the finishing touch to the present sederunt of anecdotal fun:—
AULD LANG SYNE, DONE UP IN TARTAN.
Should Gaelic speech be e’er forgot,
And never brocht to min’,