OUR SCOTTISH LETTER

New Zealand Mail, Issue 1834, 1 May 1907, Page 45

OUR SCOTTISH LETTER

EDINBURGH, March 8. ARMY REORGANISATION. Long ere this reaches you the details of Mr Haldane’© army reorganisation scheme will have become stale news. But at the present moment it holds the field in Scotland to the exclusion of everything else. Indeed no other subject lias any chance of attention. The military spirit is much stronger here than m England. Volunteering is more popular, and Whigs and Tories alike- can talk with a fair amount of knowledge of military problems. It is interesting ho know therefore that among almost all parties it is agreed, that Mr Haldane s proposals are looked upon as the last word for tho voluntary system. lhe opinion even in ultra-Liberal circles is that if Mr Haldane cannot succeed there on.lv remains some form of compulsory, service. By far the most interesting marriage of the week was that of Miss Dorothy Muir-Maekenzie to Mr Mark Uambcurg. It is said to have been love at first eight and a six months' courtship. The bride is the daughter of Sir Kenneth MuirMackenzie, Permanent Secretary to the Lord Chancellor, and comes of a Perthshire family. The bridegroom is the celebrated pianist—-in some senses he ics perhaps the greatest pianist of the day. He is a Russian by birth, but is a natiu*alised Englishman. The marriage Was celebrated in a registrars office in Dondon, and a reception was afterwards held in Sir Kenneth's house. It is a commonplace to say that the ecclesiastical situation in Scotland is full of interest. It is always interesting' ;—to Scotsmen. Englishmen give ,it a wide berth. It is beyond tlieir understanding. It may be stated, however, that a movement has been started in Edinburgh by some young men who are in svmpathy with the idea of bringing about One United Church. Conferences I have been held on the subject, and a temporary committee has been at work with a view to formulating some definite scheme. Scotsman who are not young, c-r who at least have lost their youthful optimism, will bless those youthful reformer —yet with compassion. They know what the past lias been, and they have a shrewd idea of what will be in the future. An United Church in Scotland!—the idea is inconceivable. As. a first step, all the ministers would require to be banished. A Scotsman lives, ana moves, and lias his being in controversy,* and when he cannot raise a difference with his fellow Christian on Church polity he will have reached a pa'rlous state of decadence. Did you ever hear the story of the minister who called upon an aged man sick unto death. “Would von like niq to pray 'with you?'" said the clergyman. “Week sir,” was the reply given in a terms of gasps, “If it’s a' the same to you, I’d rather lia’e an argument:" Canada is making extraordinary bids for Scottish emigrant and the departures from the Clyde promise to be even more numerous than during the last three or four springs. A splendid class or voting fellows are going cut. The offcials express their willingness to take any man who can use a spade, so great is the demand for railway construction labour; but tlie emigrants as yet, are of a very superior class —young fellows who could make tlieir way, anywhere and at any time. From the look of the men I saw at the Booomielaw* the other day, I should say that the most of them were the sons of crofters or email farmers, and splendid raw material for a new country. Young women are also being asked for and got in large numbers—not only women who can do farm labour, but who would not be above becoming “mother's help"—as the agents phrase it. A SOCIAL SENSATION. We have had a social sensation during the past fortnight—an evening paper sensation it might be called —for our morning journals are too hopelessly respectable to do more than make a passing reference to such matters. It was the alleged discovery that the notorious Mrs Thaw was a Scotswoman, an Evelyn Nisbet, bora at Davidson's Mains, near Sain burgh. The story has been contradicted from New York; it is asserted that she comes from somewhere in the Alleghany Mountains; but the curious thing is that Evelyn Nisbet’s relatives in this country declare that she is Evelyn Thaw. An uncle who lives at Gran ton says that although he Juts no absolute proof, he has a firm belief that the girl who stood in the witness-box in New York and startled the world by her harrowing revelations. was no other than the “bonnie lassie wi' blue een" whom he knew so well some eleven years ago. Then David Niebet, the father of Evelyn, is a toreman platelayer on the North British Railway, and he states that from the beginning he has had a suspicion that the chief figure in the tragedy is his daughter. His account is . the old one, of domestic differences and the flight of a wife and family; they literally went "Off to Philadelphia; in the morning, as the detective who was investigating the case put it. The story, time or not, has served its purpose; it has filled many columns and made much talk. The village of Davidson's Main®, however, is not anxious to compete with the Alleghany Mountains for the birthplace of the un-fortunate-young* woman. Ailsa Craig, which guards the mouth of the Clyde as the Bass Rock keeps watch on the entrance to the Forth, has fallen upon evil days and is threatened with the hands of the desecrator. The "craggy ocean pyramid," as Keats called it, has been let to a contractor, who is of opinion that Providence intended the place to be a quarry for granite, it stands so conveniently tor shipping the stone to all parts of Great Britain. There lias been a,n outcry against the vandalism, of course, and not without reason; hut it will have as little effect as was the protest against harnessing the Falls of Foyers for; the purpose, of manufacturing aluminium. Verily, we live in an utilitarian age.' We are comforting ourselves, however, .that Ailsa . Craig contains €OO million tons of stone, and even with a boom in granite th© supply will last some

three thousand years. “Paddy's Milestone" is therefore safe for a few generations. „ T , The Hon. David Murray of London and Adelaide, South Australia, lias left s a fortune of over £200,000; and among his bequests is one of £4OOO to be applied towards the establishment of a library and reading-room “in my native town, the Royal Burgh of Anstruther, Fifeehire.” The deceased was the son of a Provost of An'ster, as the town is called in old song and story. Mr Edward Stanford has announced for early publication a new work on Australia and New Zealand. The volume is by Dr J. W. Gregory, of Glasgow University, whose work in connection with the Australian Colonies is well known. The agitation for the preservation of the Auld Brig o' Ayr has come to a satisfactory ocmclusHm. Mr Oswald, or Auchencruive, lias been able to inform the Town Council of the Burgh that the Public Committee of which he is chairman has £3500 in hand, and that as all the subscriptions from ,the colonies and elsewhere are not yet remitted, the £IO,OOO required is practically guaranteed. The Town Council will therefore hand the Brig over to the committee, and it is expected that all the necessary work of . restoration will be completed within tlie space of two yearn. Lord Roseberry has recovered to large extent from his throat attack—and by the way, lie has occupied a large part of the leisure of the sick room by writing letters on all sorts of subjects, including one oil the number of lunatic asylums established at Epsom. He is on his way to Italy, and will reside for several weeks at his beautifufl villa at Posilipo, near Naples, where ho was visited last AjiTl by the King and Queen. A SCOTTISH INVENTOR.

It will be news to most people that the reaping maohine was invented by a divinity student of the Church of Scotland, who was afterwards known as the Rev. Dr Patrick Bell, of Carmyllie near Arbroath. It i>3 now proposed to place two stained glass windows in the parish church as a memorial of his genius. The first workable and successful model was produced by Dr Bell at his father’s farm in the parish of Auchterhouse in the year 1827. An account of it speedily found its way across the Atlantic and started the making of a number of imitations and improvements. The present roai>em. however, are substantially on Bell of Carmyllie's model in regard to the most important item, the cutting apparatus. The suffragists have always had influential supporters in Scotland, including such names as Lady Aberdeen and Lady Frances Balfour. Lady Steel, the widow or an ex-Lord Provest of Edinburgh, has been one of the most pronounced leaders, and ©he has now initiated a campaign of passive resistance. In the month of January last, when speaking at a woman's suffrage demonstration in Edinburgh, she said that taxation without representation was tyranny, and if only women who paid taxes#would make up tlieir mind*- to be passive resist ere, and refuse to discharge the duties of citizens until they had been made citizens, they would get the vote vca*y quickly. Lady Steel has now shown she has the courage of her convictions. Some time ago. she wrote to the Inland Revenue authorities protesting against being called upon to pay taxes. As a consequence, the sheriff officers have called upon her and poinded certain articles of her furniture to the value of £lB for house aucl property-tax. It is understood that Lady Steel will allow the officers to carry out their warrant, a© she is not disposed to buy them back.

Dr Donald McAlister, of Cambridge, bids fail* to be a popular Principal of Glasgow University in succession to Dr Storv. Deeply versed in all the wisdom Of tlie banks,of the Cam. h© still remain© a Scot of the Scots and a Presbyterian of the Presbyterian©. It is told of him that he is never happier than when be meets eome one who can speak to him in the Gaelic of his childhood. A memorial hue been erected in the Parish Church of Sinailholm to Sir Walter Scott. In his youth, Scott spent some time with his grandfather at Sandy k nowee, near by the old Tower; and one of his earliest recollections was the whimsical attempt of the old farmer to cure the withering of hi© right leg. Scott writes of this time: —“Stripped, and swathed in the skin, warm as it was flayed from the carcase of the sheep, in this Tartar-like habiliment I well remember lying upon th© floor of the little parlour in the farmhouse." It was at Smailbolm, too. that Scott first heard the old Border ballad© and legends, and “At th© beginning of my literary career," he writes, “I pitched upon Sinailholm Tower and the crags on which it stands tor the scene of a ghost ballad called 'The,. Eye of St. John.' ” Principal Rainy had a great public funeral in Edinburgh—the greatest public funeral that lias been ©een in Scotland for many a long year. It was attended by town councils, public bodies, representatives of all the Churches, and officials of organisations of various lands. In fact, it wae a national demonstration of respect to one of the greatest Scotsmen of the generation now passing away. He may not have been much known furth of the Tweed, but within our boundaries lie was a great and outstanding power. And wherever there ar© Scotsmen and Presbyterians he wars honoured even by those who coiild not absolutely see eye to eye with limi on matters of Church policy. AMERICAN MEAT. There is at present a great distrust of the American meaU trade among theScottish working classes. Every now and then an ugly story gets abroad as to the canned anu chilled food; each on© of them has had it© effect; and there can be no doubt that people are more prepared than at anv previous time to give their support to another market. A feeling is growing quite apart from politics* indeed, in spire of polities—that a prefer-; enco should bo given to the* colonic,? if' for no other reason than that a more perfect system of 1 food inspection ©cnldtlierchv be 1 ,-r ; "’•av ©.jonv to; be a strange:. statement fallowing* eo;

A-Vse upon the heels of the last general g-.'jiction; but nevertheless it is an absolutely true one. “We voted for plenty of food last time," said a democratic leader the other day, “next time we 11 vote for good food." An unsatisfactory state of affairs ha s been revealed as regards the American, meat in a report by Mr A. M. Trotter, the veterinary surgeon for Glasgow. Ot» two occasions lately he seized as unfit for human food forelegs of chilled beef from the stance of one of the agents of a large meat exporter in the United States. The forelegs were marked “U.*w Inspected and Passed."' “These two cases,” says Mr Thomas, “reveal that the inspection is not in conformity with; the Government regulations, and they lend credence to the assertion made regarding tlie untrustworthiness-of the of-, fieial inspection which obtains in tho United States." The Government Agues support this view. In 1805 the animals slaughtered were 37,482 on eadh n orbing day, and the numbers of inspectors was forty. Each inspector would therefore require to inspect 937 animals daily—an utter impossibility. I was at two dinners in Glasgow lately. At the Glasgow Galloway; Brotherly Society, thcra were two toasts which smacked pleasantly cf the ©oil. The call of “Horn Corn, Wool, and Yarn," served as a concise enumeration of the staple indufi» tries of th© ancient free province. An- - other toast was “A' the Wives and Weans frae the Brig En' o’ Dumfries to the Braes q’ Glenapp.” There i«l reason to believe that this has been axstually pledged by the Glasgow Brotherhood since the inauguration of the Society in 1782. At the second dinner, that of the Glasgow Celtic Society, I heard another good toast, “The Bene, the Glena and the Heroes/’ Somehow these quaint “calls" gave a freshness to the usual toast list at dinners. A motor story comes from Ayrshire and tells of the adventures of a. bride*groom who lost his way while journeying from a Renfrewshire town to th© Land o' Bums. At noon he found him> self in the vicinity of Kilmarnock, som© seven miles from his destination. Meeting a pedestrian on the road, he addressed him as follows: —“For God's sak© man, tell me the road to I'm t# be married in half an hour!"