ht, many a sage
observation. In this, likewise, I wrote rude rhymes on local
occurrences. But I have anticipated a little. On returning home from
Glencotha, and two years before I went to Buccleuch, a younger brother
and I had still another round at herding cattle, which pastured in a
park near by my father's cottage. Our part was to protect a meadow which
formed a portion of it; and the task being easy to protect that for
which the cattle did not much care, nor yet could skaithe greatly though
they should trespass upon it, we were far too idle not to enter upon and
prosecute many a wayward and unprofitable ploy. Our predilections for
taming wild birds--the wilder by nature the better--seemed boundless;
and our family of hawks, and owls, and ravens was too large not to cost
us much toil, anxiety, and even sorrow. We fished in the Ettrick and the
lesser streams. These last suited our way of it best, since we generally
fished with staves and plough-spades--thus far, at least, honourably
giving the objects of our pursuit a fair chance of escape. When the hay
had been won, we went to Ettrick school, at which we continued
throughout the winter, travelling to and from it daily, though it lay at
the distance of five miles. This we, in good weather, accomplished
conveniently enough; but it proved occasionally a serious and toilsome
task through wind and rain, or keen frost and deep snow, when winter
days and the mountain blasts came on.

"My father after being three years in Stanhopefoot, on the banks of the
Ettrick, went to Deloraineshiels, an _out-bye herding_, under the same
employer. In the winter season either I or some other of the family
assisted him; but so often as the weather was fine, we went to a school
instituted by a farmer in the neighbourhood for behoof of his own
family. When by and by I went to herd the _hirsel_ which my father
formerly tended, like most other regular shepherds I delighted in and
was proud of the employment. A considerable portion of another _hirsel_
lying contiguous, and which my elder brother herded, was for the summer
season of the year added to mine, so that this already large was made
larger; but exempted as I was from attending to aught else but my flock,
I had pleasant days, for I loved the wilds among which it had become
alike my destiny and duty to walk at will, and 'view the sheep thrive
bonnie.' The hills of Ettrick are generally wild and green, and those of
them on which I daily wa