ADVENTURE OF A SCOTCH MENDICANT.

Daily Southern Cross, Volume XVII, Issue 1378, 26 February 1861, Page 5

ADVENTURE OF A SCOTCH MENDICANT.

In the town of Bathgate there lately lived an old mendicant who was greatly famed for his retentive memory, and his uuconquerable aversion to work. His memory was so good, that although he could neither lead nor write, yet after once hearing a sermon pleached, he could lepeat it almost woid for woid ; and such was his laziness that he made his mother carry him on her back till he was nearly out of his "teens," and he was never known to do a haul day's woik in his life. When not engaged in his professional duties, he geneislly spent his time either in puffing or hunting, which wcie Ins two favorite amusements. With one end of an old piece of dirty clay in his mouth, he would kindle a rire m the other end, and take gieat delight in first drawing the smoke into his mouth, then puffing it slowly oub again, and at ceifcam intervals he would spit in a pecuhai manner as if to make loom in his mouth tor moie smoke. lie was a keen sportsman and huntsman, and although he kept neither seivants noi horses, dogs nor fiiearms, yet, m his preseives he kept a good stock of game, which, fOlf 01 ieai of poachers or some other leason he geneially earned about his person. He used to say, that when quite a child he had been left a veiy laige estate (of sin and ruiseiy') which was firmly entailed. When a young man, the piofessiou of which he was an honorable member was a highly Inciative one, but as years i oiled on, the tiade got overstocked, the people haidened then he-uts, and the state of his exchequei got exceedingly low In ouluto lcplenish the exhausted state ot his treaaiuy he occasionally tiavelled into neighbouimg pamlie.., whole he would display his ingenuity m a niOjt evtiaoulmaiy maunae When tiavelhtig on business 111 the neighbouring palish of Shotts, he invariably ■put up at a, place called the "Royal Beggaiee." a fashionable establishment that was lnghly patiomsed by the m uincd, the halt, the blind, ltineiant playact' >i?>, musicians, tiavelhng bUtiouei3,fish-meichaiifcs, pedlus, cutleis, chmiuey sweepers, besom inakcis, tmkeis, poachnien.general hawkeis of both sevsand alkges., lag and bone collectois, &c, &c , &c At this establishment sometimes a ucigkbouuug minister would Msit them in the mornings, when the wily mendicant on peiceivmg his appioach would with a wink evolaim to his confederates "let us pi ay ' Although the convcisation picviously going on was of a very different charactei By the time that the minister got to the door, he would be bawling out lustily, "And may the Lord abundantly bless our kind tiicnd over the way foi all his kindness unto us. May he be rewaided thirty, foity, fifty, aye, even a bundled fold, for he that giveth to the poor lendeth to the Lord ;" and all the fiaternity woidd exclaim "Amen'" On these occasions niter was sine to be foithcomiug On another occasion, after expoiieuomg great difficulty in "laisinc; the wind," being a few miles from home, the sturdy beggar veiy ingeniously contnved to get dead lame and was carried about fiom house to house on a hand-bariow. The tuck succeeded abmuably till one day he was being earned thiough a laige field to a farm-house, when an mfuiiated bull commenced to ioar. The lame man was now in a sad dilemma, the two men were both to leave their charge to be gored to death ; when, to their great astonishment, he suddenly jumped fioni the barrow, and exclaimed, "Doonwi'yoiu baiters ye devils, A the sooplest man fust oot o' the paik I" And in the lace, which there took place Between the bull and sinners three , The beggar man, so quickly ran, That clear of bull and men got he. Amictjs.

A Murder Clean AVAsriiD. — The San Fransißco correspondent of the New York Times, wnttingiu September last, describes with a keen professional f eehug the injurious restrictions placed on the press in that city :-— " To-day we are to hang a mna, but probably not one in a hundred of our citizens know it. * There has not a reporter been to see bun since he was sentenced. Nobody has asked whether he lias made * confession. Having requested that none but the priest and the Sisters of Mexcy be permitted to visit him, his request has been complied with. We don't worit up our sensations, you perceive, artistically. You remember we let off the same Japs out of whom you squeezed so much good reading, with only two or three dinners, a few rides, and the dedication of eight or ten columns each in our newspapers to their doings. This Whitford, jM-operly managed, might have been made quite a criminal hero. He owed a street contractor a few dollars, and not wishing to pay him called him out of his house one dark night and shot him. The jury found him guilty ; the prisoner made shaip brisk speech for his life j the judge sentenced him ; nobody asked pardon for him. Hot an extra paper will be sold on Ms account." A certain divine gave out a psalm to his choristere, who attempted to set it to a new tune ; but, having made a blunder, the oleigyman, whoa he came to that part of the Litany, " Loid have mercy on us miserable sinners," in his turn made another blunder, and read it as follows, ' ' ' Lord h.vvo mci cy on, us miserable smgeiV