he was
called) to whip round the square.

It is nearly twenty years since the gardeners had their last "walk" in
Thrums, and they survived all the other benefit societies that walked
once every summer. There was a "weavers' walk" and five or six others,
the "women's walk" being the most picturesque. These were processions
of the members of benefit societies through the square and wynds, and
all the women walked in white, to the number of a hundred or more,
behind the Tilliedrum band, Thrums having in those days no band of its
own.

From the north-west corner of the square a narrow street sets off,
jerking this way and that as if uncertain what point to make for. Here
lurks the post-office, which had once the reputation of being as
crooked in its ways as the street itself.

A railway line runs into Thrums now. The sensational days of the
post-office were when the letters were conveyed officially in a
creaking old cart from Tilliedrum. The "pony" had seen better days
than the cart, and always looked as if he were just on the point of
succeeding in running away from it. Hooky Crewe was driver; so-called
because an iron hook was his substitute for a right arm: Robbie
Proctor, the blacksmith, made the hook and fixed it in. Crewe suffered
from rheumatism, and when he felt it coming on he stayed at home.
Sometimes his cart came undone in a snowdrift; when Hooky, extricated
from the fragments by some chance wayfarer, was deposited with his
mail-bag (of which he always kept a grip by the hook) in a farm-house.
It was his boast that his letters always reached their destination
eventually. They might be a long time about it, but "slow and sure"
was his motto. Hooky emphasized his "slow and sure" by taking a snuff.
He was a godsend to the post-mistress, for to his failings or the
infirmities of his gig were charged all delays.

At the time I write of, the posting of the letter took as long and was
as serious an undertaking as the writing. That means a good deal, for
many of the letters were written to dictation by the Thrums
schoolmaster, Mr. Fleemister, who belonged to the Auld Kirk. He was
one of the few persons in the community who looked upon the despatch of
his letters by the postmistress as his right, and not a favour on her
part; there was a long-standing feud between them accordingly. After a
few tumblers of Widow Stables's treacle-beer--in the concoction of
which she was the acknowledged mistress for mile