he range draft is bad,
and the coals too hard to batter up wi' a hatchet, we naturally have to
content ourselves with the baker's loaf.

And this is a truthful portrait of 'Calamity Jane,' our one Pettybaw
grievance.

Chapter XVI. The path that led to Crummylowe.

'Gae farer up the burn to Habbie's Howe,
Where a' the sweets o' spring an' simmer grow:
Between twa birks, out o'er a little lin,
The water fa's an' mak's a singan din;
A pool breast-deep, beneath as clear as glass,
Kisses, wi' easy whirls, the bord'ring grass.'

The Gentle Shepherd.

That is what Peggy says to Jenny in Allan Ramsay's poem, and if you
substitute 'Crummylowe' for 'Habbie's Howe' in the first line, you will
have a lovely picture of the farm-steadin'.

You come to it by turning the corner from the inn, first passing the
cottage where the lady wishes to rent two rooms for fifteen shillings a
week, but will not give much attendance, as she is slightly asthmatic,
and the house is always as clean as it is this minute, and the view from
the window looking out on Pettybaw Bay canna be surpassed at ony money.
Then comes the little house where Will'am Beattie's sister Mary died in
May, and there wasna a bonnier woman in Fife. Next is the cottage with
the pansy-garden, where the lady in the widow's cap takes five-o'clock
tea in the bay-window, and a snug little supper at eight. She has for
the first, scones and marmalade, and her tea is in a small black teapot
under a red cosy with a white muslin cover drawn over it. At eight she
has more tea, and generally a kippered herring, or a bit of cold mutton
left from the noon dinner. We note the changes in her bill of fare as we
pass hastily by, and feel admitted quite into the family secrets. Beyond
this bay-window, which is so redolent of simple peace and comfort that
we long to go in and sit down, is the cottage with the double white
tulips, the cottage with the collie on the front steps, the doctor's
house with the yellow laburnum tree, and then the house where the
Disagreeable Woman lives. She has a lovely baby, which, to begin with,
is somewhat remarkable, as disagreeable women rarely have babies; or
else, having had them, rapidly lose their disagreeableness--so rapidly
that one has not time to notice it. The Disagreeable Woman's house is at
the end of the row, and across the road is a wicket-gate leading--Where
did it lead?--that was the very point. Along the left, as