FROM NORTH OF TWEED

Otago Witness, Issue 3527, 18 October 1921, Page 7

FROM NORTH OF TWEED

A LETTER TO SCOTTISH EXILES. Written for the Otago Daily Times by Robert S. Angus' EDIXBCRGH, August 25. I am sorry to hear that Sir Janies Dodds, K.C.8.. the Permanent Under-secretary for Scotland, has resigned at the age of about 60, owing to failing eyesight. He has been off duty for some months in the hope that a long rest would effect a cure, but although he is better and his general health is excellent, his doctor has warned him that he cannot resume work except at the risk of total blindness. Since he left his native Corstorphinc—where his father was parish Minister —to go to Oxford, Sir James has spent little time in his native country, hut for five and twenty years he has had tiie largest share in its government. As a permanent official with a knowledge that none of his political chiefs, except perhaps Lord Balfour, could rival, he has had a big say in Scottish policy, and no man ever gave abler and more assiduous service. liis successor will likelv be Mr John Lamb, a member of the well-known Brechin family of that name, who has been assistant I nder-seeretary for ten years, a member of the Scottish Bar, a thoroughly good and competent' fellow, who prides himself on. the fact that he rarely takes a holiday—and he a civil servant ! Mr Munro is not announcing the vacancy until he has filled if, as ho wants to escape the deluge of outside applications. TIIE SECRETARY FOR SCOTLAND. By tiie way, I hear in the strictest confidence of an interesting report about the Ee rotary for Scotland. By the time these lines reach my readers the secret will prooably be out. It will be such as to give the greatest pleasure to all his friends. In the meantime Mr Munro is on holiday at Harrogate, and I have never heard thatho is under any necessity to take the waters there. A LONG TRIAL. A Per a trial which has not been exceeded in length since that which followed the Ardlamont mystery, 12 Sinn Reiners, who were accused of having been concerned in a conspiracy to rescue a prisoner from the Glasgow police—an inspector was shot dead in the course of the fracas in > athe Iral square —have got off, some of them on being found not guilty and the others on a verdict of Yd proven.” The distinction between these verdicts is well understood in Scotland. Lord Scott Dickson was the judge, and the prosecution was. conducted with great skill and fairness by Charlie Murray, the Solicitor-general. It is the tradition cf counsel for the Crown in Scotland that they should not press for a _ convict ion, but merely lay tiie facts before the court. 1 lore was a host of witnesses, but the incidents to which they could speak wanted fitting more closely together than the Crown could do, while the evidence in support of the alibis set up by the prisoners was exceedingly positive. Incidentally it.may be remarked that, there was evidently no lack of money for the defence, for the counsel included Mr Sandernan, Mr A. M. Mackay, and others whose fees are heavy. It says something for the sense of fairness of a Scottish jury t hat even at a time when feeling runs high they should have given the prisoners the benefit of the doubt. On the other hand, two men in Glasgow who were found in illegal possession of firearms and inciiminating documents got 10 years each. GUID BRAID SCOTS. It is a little pathetic, though perhaps not surprising that it should have been left tc the members of tiie Burns Club of Londoi to head the movement for the preservation —or should I say the revival —of the Scot' tidi done. Exiles in London, poor souls they have little chance of practising theii n live tongue, and if they tiicd it they ‘ be as unintelligible as if they spolci Dutch. A London friend of mine importer; a tscots housemaid, some years ago, and she went to hc r mistress one day with the ex planation that : here was a ltuin at tin door, ‘‘But I dinna ken what he's savin’.' And the mistress had to act ;m interpreter 1 fear that the influence of our education;! system is all against the use of Scots li en here in Edinburgh tiie tendency is l< speak v.hat is < lied ‘‘CV.ire English. 1 j mv own ca-e, when I go on holiday amour the farmers and farm .servants of my nativi e,cuter 1 find it an effort for the first fev days to speak tiie broad So, is in which v. is reared. But th<- complaint that the use of Scots is dying out, is not. a new one. i ■ t Duke of Argyll in *"1 he Heart of Midlothian” deplores it. The best hope for the tongue lies in the appearance of poets and writers of genius. Now that Sir Jam - Barrie has given up his tales in the Id rie in favour of the more lucrative business of writing phan tasios for the London stage, we have no writer of the first rank in prose. But in poetry wo have the matchless Charles

Murray in the Aberdeenshire dialect, with his . “Hamevvith.” and Mrs Violet Jacob (one of the Erskines of Dun), whose “Songs of Angus” are treasured by all natives of Forfarshire. Is it a mere accident that both are exiles? ; THE REVIVAL EFFORT. { When I said that he had no first-class | writer of Scots I forgot the name of Air ; John Buchan, who is keenly interested in the new movement. He can write anything : he likes, and if he were to set himself to ; the production of a romance in which the j fccots tongue would be wholly or largely j used it would do more good than all the . schemes for school and university prizes ; put together. But those efforts are by no j means to be despised. Sir William Noble j has offered an annual prize of 10 guineas to Aberdeen University, and Mr L. G. • Sloan, a past president of the Burns Club j of London, has given £SOO to Edinburgn j and St. Andrews Universities for a similar j purpose —the rewarding of meritorious j efforts in the writing of Scots in prose and j verse. On the scientific side of the business 1 we are well equipped in having-Professor j W. A. Craigie, of Oxford University, who ] knows more about our dialects than any ! man living. He is going to the United j States and India next winter, and has ! undertaken to address any gatherings of 1 Scotsmen interested in the subject. The vernacular circle of the London Burns Club is taking steps to form similar circles in | Canada, New Zealand, Australia, and India —wherever, in fact, Scotsmen congregate. Here is a promising field for the Caledonian societies to be found all over the world. j SCOTTISH PREACHERS FOR THE I j STATES. ; In connection with the meeting of the ■ World Alliance Presbyterian Conference at j Pittsburg next month, our two leading j churches are sending some of their best ! known preachers. I have already men- i tionod Dr Norman Maclean, of St. Cuthbert’s, who has, I believe, gone already. : The others from the Church of Scotland include Professor Curtis, of Edinburgh: Professor Fulton, Aberdeen; the Rev. John ; Al‘Gilchrist, of Goran ; and the Row Mar- : shal 15. Lang, of Whittinghame. The United Free Church party has, among others, the Rev. Dr Drummond, of Edin- j burgh; the Rev. Dr Hutton, of Glasgow; the Rev. Robert Forgan, of Aberdeen; and the Rev. Dr Sloan, of St. Andrews. They are sure of a warm welcome from their fellow countrymen, and our only fear at home is that some of them may be induced . not to come back. UNIVERSITY FEES. i I mentioned some weeks ago that the fees : of our Scottish universities were about io be increased. Slid, they are moderate. It will in future cost £7 17s 6d to sit for the examination for ALA., and 33 guineas for the double medical degree. And the matriculation five of one guinea a session is to be doubled. The fact is that the universities are threatened with bankruptcy unless they ! can get more revenue. j SHALE MINERS’ DISTRESS. j The Marchioness of Linlithgow has issued an appeal for the Shale miners, among whom she lives. To the number of over 2000, they have been idle for exactly four months, partly owing to the stoppage of the coal miners, on whom they depend, and partly owing to the dullness of trade, in ; consequence of the competition of cheaper : oil .from overseas. The Scottish shale oil trade is now under the control of the AngloPersian Oil Company—the concern in which the Government are largely interested, —and i the arrangement, promised to be a boon, j since the company brought home much of j its crude oil io be refined at Broxburn and | neighbourhood. But when shale minim* is : at a standstill unemployment is the fate of a large proportion of the local workers. They have kept themselves going by means ; of a communal kitchen, and it is for that that money is now required, the men’s own : ! funds being exhausted. UN EM I*I,() YM EXT DISTRESS. The authorities are exceedingly anxious aliout the prospect of unemployment dis- ! tress. It is true that the number of men idle is showing a considerable decline, owing to the revival ol trade,*but by next week most of them will l>, no longer entitled to unemployment benefit from the State. In England the situation can be partially met by tho Poor Law authorities, but in Scotland it is illegal to give parochial relief to the able-bodied. The settlement of the long strike of the ship joiners will help a little on the Civile, and there is hope that next month tho coal trade will show its Jongdelayed rivivd. But oven so, we are in for a thin time this winter.