BURNS BY THE WAY.

Waikato Times, Volume 103, Issue 17367, 31 March 1928, Page 13 (Supplement)

BURNS BY THE WAY.

STONE-BREAKER’B READING.

(By The Traveller.) Where the Mennock Pass crosses for the last time its own stream, perhaps a quarter of a mile before it joins the high road from Dumfries and the south to Glasgow at the tiny village of Mennock itself, there is wha. is called in the West Country a lie-by, where is a heap of stones always ready fnr cracking and $ man breaking them who is a well-known literary character in Galloway and Dumfries-shire. We bad spent a fruitless night at the top of the pass, in the village of LeadSRs where Allan Ramsay was born, and where a copy of the first edition of his “Gentle Shepherd’’ is reputed to be housed. It may be so, but it is locked up, and the key had gone to work in the trousers pocket of the librarian long before hotel hie had joined the village day, and we perforce iC Pass is the most open of all those which lead from the Annan roadway to the far more picturesqu. Nithsdale road, and the broad be P* e ™ her sunlight made it appear more open still. All the way down the pass v, met no one, though the flashing of the sun along polished rods spoke of company not far away. In Scotland a way side greeting Is U>c exception rathe than the rule, at any rale in the south west and wc were surprised when the stone-breaker at the foot of the pass returned our nod with the words, fin day.” '

An Invitation. This was obviously an invitation, and we stopped. “A fine day for the time of yeere, he affirmed, and then, with a glance at our haversacks, . “Ye’ll hae come frac Allan Ramsay s We told him of our disappointment and he nodded. ... “It’ s a peety,” he said, but yell ken his. great poem of Roger and JPcitic ? 11 Seeing our slightly mystified look, and fancying it to be more mystified than it was, he hastened to explain : “ ‘The Gentle Shepherd’ it’s called, but it’s always ‘Roger and Patie’ to smaller bodies like oorsclves.” We admitted having read bcotland s great pastoral poem and the old man was pleased. “He died just twac yeercs after Robert Burns was borru,” he said. "An Rabbic was a bigger man than Allan for ail bis sins.” He shot a hungry glance at our a “Ye’ll perhaps no’ hae a copy of his poetry' in y r ’rc wee bags?” he asked, and, as we produced a very tattered copy, his eyes glistened. “My memory’s no’ sac guid as it was,” he said. “But 1 can mind well enough when I didn’d need a book o. a worrd, to recite all his poems by hairt.” Wc foreborc to challenge this statement and suggested that be should read something to us.

That Word “Dirl.” He turned on us a doubtful look. “Ye'll maybe not understand his language,” lie said. “Not beins Scots bodies. But-—,” he brightened up, “I could just expound the harrdest of expressions,” he said, and, upon our assuring him that we were at least half Scottish blood, he took heart. Rapidly turning over the pages, with a certain care which spoke of an intimacy with books, be announced bis choice of a part of “Tam o’ Shantcr,” and began, after a preliminary sketch of the wellknown scene: — There sat auld Nick, in shape o beast; A towsie tyke, black, grim, and laige, To gie them music was his charge: He screwed the pipes, and gart them skirl, Till roof and rafters a' did dirl lie paused, his finger on the word. “Ye’ll maybe no ken,” he said, looking at us questioningly, “just what’s the exact meaning o’ the woM ‘dirl.’ There’s nane -like it in the Englis.i vocabulary. ‘Dirl,’ now, llicrc s nac word in English fit for it. Suppose, now, yourself in a thunderstorm, and y’r hairt wae on account of the thundering and thg. lightenings, and for wondering will the house be stricket. Ye’ll hear maybe the wind strike the windows so that they shake like wild things. Or if ye’ve a barn outside the hoose with one of those tin roofs on it and the wind gets under that and rattles it—well, that would he the meaning of ‘dirl.’ ” He turned back a page or two. “He was a grand philosopher too,” he said, and recited, with only, a glance at the print, with perfect simplicity and deep earnestness:

But pleasures are like poppies spread; You seize the flow’rc, its bloom is

shed; Or like the snowfall in the river, A moment white—then melts for

ever; Or like the borealis race, That flit e’er you can point Ihci:

place; Or like the rainbow's lovely form Evanishing amid the storm —’

Nae man can tether Time nor Tidc-

“He was a beautiful writer, and many a mon’s been the better for Rahbic Burns.”

A Trio of Books.

W'c asked if he read much and he replied that he had only three books: The Bible, Burn’s Poems and “Roger and Patie.”

“And I doubt if a mon needs e’er another," he added. “Ramsay was a great man, but Burns was a grander than all, except perhaps y’r Shakespeare. Well,” he said, as he returned the book, “It’s been a pleasure to me to meet with you, and I’ve been proud to read Burns to ye. I generally give a lecture on him or on Ra'msay at the Burn’s Nicht Club in Dumfries, or in Annan, an’ now I’ve gi’en one to you, and I hope ye’ll never forget him when ye get back to England.” And he took up his hammer and bent himself again to the cracking of stones.