orphan,
but clapped his head and said he was a fine boy.

The Captain was to vote for the Bill if he got in, the which he did.
It was the Captain was to give the ale and porter in the square like a
true gentleman. My father gave a kind of laugh when I let him see my
shilling, and said he would keep care of it for me; and sorry I was I
let him get it, me never seeing the face of it again to this day. Me
and James was much annoyed with the women, especially Kitty Davie,
always pushing in when there was tossing, and tearing the very ha'pence
out of our hands: us not caring so much about the money, but humiliated
to see women mixing up in politics. By the time the topmost barrel was
on the bonfire there was a great smell of whisky in the quarry, it
being a confined place. My father had been against the bonfire being
in the quarry, arguing that the wind on the hill would have carried off
the smell of the whisky; but Peter Tosh said they did not want the
smell carried off; it would be agreeable to the masons for weeks to
come. Except among the women there was no fighting nor wrangling at
the quarry but all in fine spirits.

I misremember now whether it was Mr. Scrimgour or the Captain that took
the fancy to my father's pigs; but it was this day, at any rate, that
the Captain sent him the gamecock. Whichever one it was that fancied
the litter of pigs, nothing would content him but to buy them, which he
did at thirty shillings each, being the best bargain ever my father
made. Nevertheless I'm thinking he was windier of the cock. The
Captain, who was a local man when not with his regiment, had the
grandest collection of fighting-cocks in the county, and sometimes came
into the town to try them against the town cocks. I mind well the
large wicker cage in which they were conveyed from place to place, and
never without the Captain near at hand. My father had a cock that beat
all the other town cocks at the cock fight at our school, which was
superintended by the elder of the kirk to see fair play; but the which
died of its wounds the next day but one. This was a great grief to my
father, it having been challenged to fight the Captain's cock.
Therefore it was very considerate of the Captain to make my father a
present of his bird; father, in compliment to him, changing its name
from the "Deil" to the "Captain."

During the forenoon, and I think until well on in the day, James and me
was busy with the pitcher and the f