Erchie, My Droll Friend. Munro Neil

pavement, “Man,” he said, “it was a puir turn-oot yon—hardly worth puttin’ on fires for. It’s aye the wye; when I mak’ the kirk a wee bit fancy, and jalouse there’s shair to be twa pound ten in the plate, on comes a blash o’ rain, and there’s hardly whit wid pay for the starchin’ o’ the Doctor’s bands.

      “Christmas! They ca’t Christmas, but I could gie anither name for’t. I looked it up in the penny almanac, and it said, ‘Keen frost; probably snow,’ and I declare-to if I hadna nearly to soom frae the hoose.

      “The almanacs is no’ whit they used to be; the auld chaps that used to mak’ them maun be deid.

      “They used to could do’t wi’ the least wee bit touch, and tell ye in January whit kind o’ day it wad be at Halloween, besides lettin’ ye ken the places whaur the Fair days and the ‘ool-markets was, and when they were to tak’ place-a’ kind o’ information that maist o’ us that bocht the almanacs couldna sleep at nicht wantin’. I’ve seen me get up at three on a cauld winter’s mornin’ and strikin’ a licht to turn up Orr’s Penny Commercial and see whit day was the Fair at Dunse. I never was at Dunse in a’ my days, and hae nae intention o’ gaun, but it’s a grand thing knowledge, and it’s no’ ill to cairry. It’s like poetry-’The Star o’ Rabbie Burns’ and that kind o’ thing-ye can aye be givin’ it a ca’ roond in your mind when ye hae naething better to dae.

      “Oh, ay! A puir turn-oot the day for Kenti-gern’s; that’s the drawback o’ a genteel congregation like oors-mair nor half o’ them’s sufferin’ frae Christmas turkey and puttin’ the blame on the weather.”

      “The bubbly-jock is the symbol o’ Scotland’s decline and fa’; we maybe bate the English at Bannockburn, but noo they’re haein’ their revenge and underminin’ oor constitution wi’ the aid o’ a bird that has neither a braw plumage nor a bonny sang, and costs mair nor the price o’ three or four ducks. England gave us her bubbly-jock and took oor barley-bree.

      “But it’s a’ richt; Ne’erday’s comin’; it’s begun this year gey early, for I saw Duffy gaun up his close last nicht wi’ his nose peeled.

      “ ‘Am I gaun hame, or am I comin’ frae’t, can ye tell me?’ says he, and he was carryin’ something roond-shaped in his pocket-naipkin.

      “ ‘Whit’s wrang wi’ ye, puir cratur?’ I says to him.

      “ ‘I was struck wi’ a sheet o’ lichtnin’,’ says he, and by that I ken’t he had been doon drinkin’ at the Mull o’ Kintyre Vaults, and that the season o’ peace on earth, guid-will to men was fairly started.

      “ ‘MacPherson,’ he says, wi’ the tear at his e’e, ‘I canna help it, but I’m a guid man.’

      “ ‘Ye are that, Duffy,’ I says, ‘when ye’re in your bed sleepin’; at ither times ye’re like the rest o’ us, and that’s gey middlin’. Whit hae’ye in the naipkin?’

      “He gied a dazed look at it, and says, ‘I’m no shair, but I think it’s a curlin’-stane, and me maybe gaun to a bonspiel at Carsbreck.’

      “He opened it oot, and found it was a wee, roond, red cheese.

      “ ‘That’s me, a’ ower,’ says he—‘a Christmas for the wife,’ and I declare there was as much drink jaupin’ in him as wad hae done for a water-’shute.’

      “Scotland’s last stand in the way o’ national customs is bein’ made at the Mull o’ Kintyre Vaults, whaur the flet half-mutchkin, wrapped up in magenta tissue paper so that it’ll look tidy, is retreatin’ doggedly, and fechtin’ every fit o’ the way, before the invadin’ English Christmas caird. Ten years ago the like o’ you and me couldna’ prove to a freen’ that we liked him fine unless we took him at this time o’ the year into five or six public-hooses, leaned him up against the coonter, and grat on his dickie. Whit dae we dae noo? We send wee Jennie oot for a shilling box o’ the year afore last’s patterns in Christmas cairds, and show oor continued affection and esteem at the ha’penny postage rate.

      “Instead o’, takin’ Duffy roon’ the toon on Ne’erday, and hurtin’ my heid wi’ tryin’ to be jolly, I send him a Christmas caird, wi’ the picture o’ a hayfield on the ootside and ‘Wishin’ you the Old, Old Wish, Dear,’ on the inside, and stay in the hoose till the thing blaws bye.

      “The shilling box o’ Christmas cairds is the great peace-maker; a gross or twa should hae been sent oot to Russia and Japan, and it wad hae stopped the war.’ Ye may hae thocht for a twelvemonth the MacTurks were a disgrace to the tenement, wi’ their lassie learnin’ the mandolin’, and them haein’ their gas cut aff at the meter for no’ payin’ the last quarter; but let them send a comic caird to your lassie—‘Wee Wullie to Wee Jennie,’ and they wad get the len’ o’ your wife’s best jeely-pan.

      “No’ but whit there’s trouble wi’ the Christmas caird. It’s only when ye buy a shillin’ box and sit doon wi’ the wife and weans to consider wha ye’ll send them to that ye fin’ oot whit an awfu’ lot o’ freen’s ye hae. A score o’ shillin’ boxes wadna gae ower half the kizzens I hae, wi’ my grandfaither belangin’ to the Hielan’s, so Jinnet an’ me jist let’s on to some o’ them we’re no’ sendin’ ony cairds oot this year because it’s no’ the kin’ o’ society go ony langer. And ye have aye to keep pairt o’ the box till Ne’erday to send to some o’ the mair parteeclar anes ye forgot a’ thegither were freen’s o’ yours till they sent ye a caird.

      “Anither fau’t I hae to the Christmas cairds is that the writin’ on them’s generally fair rideeculous.

      “ ‘May Christmas Day be Blythe and Gay, and bring your household Peace and Joy,’ is on the only caird left ower to send to Mrs. Maclure; and when ye’re shearin’ aff the selvedges o’t to mak’ it fit a wee envelope, ye canna but think that it’s a droll message for a hoose wi’ five weans lyin’ ill wi’ the whoopin’-cough, and the man cairryin’ on the wye Maclure does.

      “ ‘Old friends, old favourites, Joy be with you at this Season,’ says the caird for the MacTurks, and ye canna but mind that every third week there’s a row wi’ Mrs. MacTurk and your wife aboot the key o’ the washin’-hoose and lettin’ the boiler rust that bad a’ the salts o’ sorrel in the Apothecaries’ll no tak’ the stains aff your shirts.

      “Whit’s wanted is a kin’ o’ slidin’ scale o’ sentiment on Christmas cairds, so that they’ll taper doon frae a herty greetin’ ye can truthfully send to a dacent auld freen’ and the kind o’ cool ‘here’s to ye!’ suited for an acquaintance that borrowed five shillin’s frae ye at the Term, and hasna much chance o’ ever payin’t back again.

      “If it wasna for the Christmas cairds a lot o’ us wad maybe never jalouse there was onything parteecular merry aboot the season. Every man that ye’re owin’ an accoont to sends it to ye then, thinkin’ your hert’s warm and your pouches rattlin’. On Christmas Day itsel’ ye’re aye expectin’ something; ye canna richt tell whit it is, but there’s ae thing certain—that it never comes. Jinnet, my wife, made a breenge for the door every time the post knocked on Thursday, and a’ she had for’t at the end o’ the day was an ashet fu’ o’ whit she ca’s valenteens, a’ written on so that they’ll no even dae for next year.

      “I used to wonder whit the banks shut for at Christmas, but I ken noo; they’re feart that their customers, cairried awa’ wi’ their feelin’ o’ guid-will to men, wad be makin’ a rush on them to draw money for presents, and maybe create a panic.

      “Sae far as I can judge there’s been nae panic at the banks this year.”

      “Every Ne’erday for the past fifty years I hae made up my mind I was gaun to be a guid man,” he went on. “It jist wants a start, they tell me that’s tried it, and I’m no’ that auld. Naething bates a trial.

      “I’m gaun to begin