On the morning which succeeded one of his periodical “bursts,” the minister happening to pass just as John was watering the cow at the burn a little beyond the door of his house, saw, as he thought, in the incident a fine opportunity for improving the occasion.
“Ah, John,” said he, “you see how Crummie does. She just drinks as much as will do her good, and not a drop more. You might take an example of the poor dumb brute.”
“Ah,” said John, “it’s easy for her.”
“Why more easy for her than you, John?”
“Oh, just because it is. Man, there’s nae temptation in her case.”
“Temptation, John? What do you mean?”
“Weel, you see, sir, it’s no the love o’ the drink a’thegether that gars a body get the waur o’t. It’s the conveeviality o’ the thing that plays the plisky. Ye see, sir, ye meet a freend on the street, an’ ye tak’ him in to gie him a dram, an’ ye crack awa’ for a while, an’ syne he ca’s in a dram, an’ there ye crack an’ ye drink, an’ ye drink an’ ye crack, an’ dod, ye just get fou afore ye ken whaur ye are. It’s easy for Crummie, as I said, she has naebody to lead her aff her feet, as ye may say. She comes oot here an’ tak’s her drink, an’ no anither coo says Crummie ye’re there. But, certes, sir, had Dauvit Tamson’s coo just come to the ither side o’ the burn a meenit syne, an’ as Crummie was takin’ her first toothfu’, had flappit hersel’ doon on her hunkers an’ said, ‘Here’s to ye, Crummie,’ I’ll eat my bonnet if she wadna hae flappit hersel’ doon on her hunkers an’ said, ‘Here’s to you, Hornie.’ An’ there the twa jauds wad hae sitten an’ drunken until they were baith blind fou. I tell you again, sir, it’s the conveeviality o’ the thing that plays the plisky.”
And yet there are instances to show that some of those old tipplers repented somewhat of their folly. The celebrated teetotaller, the Rev. Dr. Ritchie, of Potterrow, Edinburgh, once went to form a teetotal society at Peebles, and a man and wife who heard the speeches were conscience-smitten, and after they went home the wife said—
“’Od, John, I think we’ll hae to set doon our names to that thing yet.”
“We’ll gang to anither o’ the meetin’s yet afore we decide,” said the husband.