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A Boyhood in Scotland · The Story of My Boyhood and Youth

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Chapter one of the Story of My Boyhood and Youth. This is a LibriVox
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recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or
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to volunteer, please visit LibriVox dot org. Recording by Sue Anderson. The
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Story of My Boyhood and Youth by John Muir, Chapter one, A Boyhood
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in Scotland. Earliest recollections, the Dandie Doctor, Terror, Deeds of Daring,
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the savagery of boys school and fighting birds nesting. When I was a
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boy in Scotland, I was fond of everything that was wild, and all
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my life I've been growing fonder and fonder of wild places and wild creatures.
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Fortunately, around my native town of Dunbar, by the stormy North Sea,
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there was no lack of wildness, though most of the land lay in smooth
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cultivation, with red blooded playmates wild as myself. I loved to wander in
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the fields to hear the birds sing, and along the seashore to gaze and
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wonder at the shells and seaweeds, eels and crabs in the pools among the
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rocks when the tide was low, And best of all, to watch the
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waves in awful storms, thundering on the black headlands and craggy ruins of the
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old Dunbar Castle. When the sea and the sky, the waves and the
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clouds were mingled together as one, we never thought of playing truant. But
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after I was five or six years old, I ran away to the sea
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shore or the fields almost every Saturday and every day in the school vacations except
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Sundays, though solemnly warned that I must play at home in the garden and
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back yard, lest I should learn to think bad thoughts and say bad words,
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all in vain. In spite of the sure sore punishments that followed,
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like shadows, the natural inherited wildness in our blood ran true on its glorious
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course, as invincible and unstoppable as stars. My earliest recollections of the country
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were gained on short walks with my grandfather when I was perhaps not over three
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years old. On one of these walks, grandfather took me to Lord Lauderdale's
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gardens, where I saw figs growing against a sunny wall, and tasted some
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of them, and got as many apples to eat as I wished. On
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another memorable walk in a hay field, when we sat down to rest on
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one of the haycocks. I heard a sharp, prickly, stinging cry,
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and jumping up eagerly called grandfather's attention to it. He said he heard only
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the wind, but I insisted on digging into the hay and turning it over
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until we discovered the source of the strange, exciting sound, a mother field
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mouse with half a dozen naked young hanging to her teats. To me,
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this was a wonderful discovery. No hunter could have been more excited on discovering
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a bear and her cubs in a wilderness den. I was sent to school
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before I had completed my third year. The first school day was doubtless full
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of wonders, but I am not able to recall any of them. I
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remember the servant washing my face and getting soap in my eyes, and mother
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hanging a little green bag with my first book in it around my neck so
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I would not lose it, and its blowing back in the sea wind like
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a flag. But before I was sent to school, my grandfather, as
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I was told, had taught me my letters from shop signs across the street.
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I can remember distinctly how proud I was when I had spelled my way
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through the little first book into the second, which seemed large and important,
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and so on to the third. Going from one book to another formed a
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grand triumphal advancement, the memories of which still stand out in clear relief.
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The third book contained interesting stories as well as plain reading and spelling lessons.
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To me, the best story of all was Llewellyn's Dog, the first animal
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that comes to mind after the needle voiced field mouse. It so deeply interested
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and touched me and some of my classmates that we read it over and over
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with aching hearts, both in and out of school, and shed bitter tears
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over the brave, faithful dog Gellert, slain by his own master, who
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imagined that he had devoured his son because he came to him all bloody when
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the boy was lost. Though he had saved the child's life by killing a
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big wolf, we have to look far back to learn how great may be
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the capacity of a child's heart for sorrow and sympathy with animals as well as
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with human friends and neighbors. This old Langsyne's story stands out in the throng
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of old school day memories as clearly as if I had myself been one of
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that Welsh hunting party heard the bugles blowing. Seeing Gallard slain, joined in
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the search for the lost child, discovered it at last, happy and smiling
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among the grass and bushes beside the dead mangled wolf, and wept with Llewellyn
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over the sad fate of his noble, faithful dog friend. Another favorite in
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this book was Southey's poem The inch Cape Bell, a story of a priest
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and a pirate. A good priest, in order to warn seamen in dark,
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stormy weather, hung a big bell on the dangerous inch Cape Rock.
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The greater the storm and higher the waves, the louder rang the warning bell
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until it was cut off and sunk by wicked Ralph the Rover. One fine
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day, as the story goes, when the bell was ringing gently, the
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pirate put out to the rock, saying I'll sink that bell, and plagued
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the abbot of Aberberthock. So he cut the rope, and down went the
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bell with a gurgling sound. The bubbles rose and burst around, et cetera.
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Then Ralph the Rover sailed away. He scoured the seas for many a
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day, and now grown rich with plundered store, he steers his course were
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Scotland's shore. Then came a terrible storm, with cloud darkness and night darkness
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and high roaring waves. Now where we are, cried the pirate. I
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cannot tell, but I wish I could hear the inch Cape bell. And
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the story goes on to tell how the wretched rover tore his hair and cursed
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himself in his despair, when, with a shivering shock, the stout ship
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struck on the inch Cape rock and went down with Ralph and his plunder beside
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the good Priest's bell. The story appealed to our love of kind deeds and
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of wildness and fair play. A lot of terrifying experiences connected with these first
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school days grew out of crimes committed by the keeper of a low lodging house
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in Edinburgh, who allowed poor homeless wretches to sleep on benches or the floor
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for a penny or so a night, and when kind death came to their
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relief, sold the bodies for dissection to doctor Hare of the medical school.
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None of us children ever heard anything like the original story. The servant girls
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told us that Dandie doctors clad in long black cloaks and supplied with a store
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of sticking plaster of wondrous adhesiveness, prowled at night about the country lanes and
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even the town streets, watching for children to choke and sell. The Dandie
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Doctor's business method, as the servants explained, it was with lightning quickness to
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clap a sticking plaster on the face of a scholar, covering mouth and nose,
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preventing breathing or crying for help. Then pop us under his long black
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cloak and carry us to Edinburgh to be sold and sliced into small pieces for
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folk to learn how we were made. We always mentioned the name Dandie Doctor
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in a fear full whisper, and never dared venture out of doors after dark.
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In the short winter days, it got dark before school closed, and
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in cloudy weather, we sometimes had difficulty in finding our way home unless a
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servant with a lantern was sent for us. But during the Dandy Doctor period
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the school was closed earlier, for if detained until the usual hour, the
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teacher could not get us to leave the schoolroom. We would rather stay all
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night supperless than dare the mysterious doctors supposed to be lying in wait for us.
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We had to go up a hill called the Dovel Bray, that lay
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between the schoolhouse and the main street. One evening, just before dark,
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as we were running up the hill, one of the boys shouted a dandy
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doctor, a dandy doctor, and we all fled pell mell back into the
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schoolhouse, to the astonishment of Mungo Siddons, the teacher. I can remember
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to this day the amused look on the Good Dominie's face as he stared and
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tried to get guess what had got into us, until one of the older
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boys breathlessly explained that there was an awful, big dandy doctor on the bray
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and we couldn't go home. Others corroborated the dreadful news. Yes, we
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saw him, plain as anything, with his long black cloak to hide us
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in, and some of us thought we saw a sticking plaster ready in his
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hand. We were in such a state of fear and trembling that the teacher
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saw he wasn't going to get rid of us without going himself. As leader.
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He went only a short distance, however, and turned us over to
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the care of the two biggest scholars, who led us to the top of
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the bray and then left us to scurry home and dash into the door,
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like pursued squirrels diving into their holes. Just before school scaled closed, we
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all arose and sang the fine hymn Lord dismiss Us with Thy Blessing. In
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the spring, when the swallows were coming back from their winter home homes,
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we sang welcome, Welcome, little stranger, Welcome from a foreign shore.
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Safe escape from many a danger. And while singing we all swayed in rhythm
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with the music. The cuckoo that always told his name in the spring of
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the year was another favorite song. And when there was nothing in particular to
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call to mind any special bird or animal, the songs we sang were widely
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varied, such as the wail the whail is the beast for me plunging along
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through the deep deep sea. But best of all was Lord dismiss Us with
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Thy Blessing. Though at that time the most significant part I fear was the
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first three words. With my school lessons, father made me learn hymns and
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Bible verses. For learning Rock of Ages, he gave me a penny,
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and I thus became suddenly rich. Scotch boys are seldom spoiled with money.
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We thought more of a penny those economical days than the poorest American schoolboy thinks
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of a dollar. To decide what to do with that first penny was an
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extravagantly serious affair. I ran in great excitement up and down the street,
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examining the tempting goodies in the shop windows before venturing on so important an investment.
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My playmates also became excited when the wonderful news got abroad that Johnny Muir
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had a penny, hoping to obtain a taste of the orange apple or candy
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it was likely to bring forth. At this time, infants were baptized and
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vaccinated a few days after birth. I remembered very well a fight with the
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doctor when my brother David was vaccinated. This happened, I think, before
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I was sent to school. I couldn't imagine what the doctor, a tall,
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severe looking man in black, was doing to my brother, but as
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mother, who was holding him in her arms, offered no objection, I
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looked on quietly while he scratched the arm until I saw blood. Then,
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unable to trust even my mother, I managed to spring up high enough to
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grab and bite the doctor's arm yelling that I wasn't going to let him hurt
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my bonny brother, while to my utter astonishment, mother and the doctor only
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laughed at me. So far from complete at times is sympathy between parents and
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children, And so much like wild beasts our baby boys, little fighting,
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biting, climbing pagans. Father was proud of his garden and seemed always to
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be trying to make it as much like Eden as possible, And in a
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corner of it he gave each of us a little bit of ground for our
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very own, in which we planted what we best liked, wondering how the
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hard, dry seeds could change into soft leaves and flowers and find their way
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out to the light, and to see how they were coming on, we
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used to dig up the larger ones, such as peas and beans. Every
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day. My aunt had a corner assigned to her in our garden, which
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she filled with lilies, and we all looked with the utmost respect and admiration
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at that precious lily bed and wondered whether when we grew up we should ever
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be rich enough to own one anything like so grand. We imagined that each
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lily was worth an enormous sum of money, and never dared to touch a
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single leaf or pedal of them. We really stood in awe of them.
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Far far was I then, from the wild lily gardens of California that I
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was destined to see in their glory. When I was a little boy at
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Mungo Sydden's school, a flower show was held in Dunbar, and I saw
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a number of the exhibitors carrying large handfuls of Dahlia's, the first I had
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ever seen. I thought them marvelous in size and beauty, and, as
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in the case of my aunt's lilies, wondered if I should ever be rich
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enough to own some of them. Although I never dared to touch my aunt'scred
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lilies, I have good cause to remember stealing some common flowers from an apothecary,
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Peter Lawson, who also answered the purpose of a regular physician to most
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of the poor people of the town an adjacent country. He had a pony
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which was considered very wild and dangerous, and when he was called out of
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town, he mounted this wonderful beast, which, after standing long in the
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stable, was frisky and boisterous, and often, to our delight, reared
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and jumped and danced about from side to side of the street. Before he
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could be persuaded to go ahead. We boys gazed in awful admiration and wondered
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how the druggist could be so brave and able as to get on and stay
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on that wild beast's back. This famous Peter loved flowers and had a fine
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garden surrounded by an iron fence, through the bars of which, when I
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thought no one saw me, I oftentimes snatched a flower and took to my
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heels. One day Peter discovered me in this mischief, dashed out into the
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street and caught me. I screamed that I wouldn't steal any more if he
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would let me go. He didn't say anything, but just dragged me along
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to the stable where he kept the wild pony. Pushed me in right back
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of its heels and shut the door. I was screaming, of course,
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but as soon as I was imprisoned, the fear of being kicked quenched all
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noise. I hardly dared breathe. My only hope was in motionless silence.
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Imagine the agony I endured. I did not steal any more of his flowers.
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He was a good, hard judge of boy nature. I was in
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Peter's hand some time Before this, when I was about two and a half
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years old, the servant girl bathed a small folk before putting us to bed.
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The smarting, soapy scrubbings of the Saturday nights in preparation for the Sabbath
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were particularly severe, and we all dreaded them. My sister Sarah, the
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next older than me, wanted the long legged stool I was sitting on awaiting
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my turn, so she just tipped me off. My chin struck on the
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edge of the bath tub, and as I was talking at the time,
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my tongue happened to be in the way of my teeth when they were closed
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by the blow, and a deep gash was cut on the side of it,
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which bled profusely. Mother came running at the noise I made, wrapped
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me up, put me in the servant girl's arms, and told her to
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run with me through the garden and out by a back way to Peter Lawson
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to have something done to stop the bleeding. He simply pushed a wad of
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cotton into my mouth after soaking it in some brown, a stringent stuff,
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and told me to be sure to keep my mouth shut and all would soon
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be well. Mother put me to bed calmed my fears and told me to
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lie still and sleep like a good barn. But just as I was dropping
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off to sleep, I swallowed the bulky wad of medicated cotton, and with
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it, as I imagined, my tongue also my screams over so great a
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loss. But mother, and when she anxiously took me in her arms and
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inquired what was the matter, I told her that I had swallowed my tongue.
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She only laughed at me, much to my astonishment, when I expected
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that she would bewail the awful loss her boy had sustained. My sisters,
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who were older than I, oftentimes said, when I happened to be talking
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too much, It's a pity you hadn't swallowed at least half of that long
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tongue of yours when you were little. It appears natural for children to be
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fond of water, although the Scotch method of making every duty dismal contrived to
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make necessary bathing for health terrible to us. I well remember, among the
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awful experiences of childhood, being taken by the servant to the seashore when I
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was between two and three years old, Stripped at the side of a deep
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pool in the rocks, plunged into it among crawling crawfish and slippery, wriggling
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snakelike eels, and drawn up, gasping and shrieking, only to be plunged
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down again and again. As the time approached for this terrible bathing, I
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used to hide in the darkest corners of the house, and oftentimes a long
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search was required to find me. But after we were a few years older,
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we enjoyed bathing with other boys as we wandered along the shore, careful,
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however, not to get into a pool that had an invisible boy devouring
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monster at the bottom of it. Such pools, mintchure maelstroms were called sukn
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in goats and were well known to most of us. Nevertheless, we never
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ventured into any pool on strange parts of the coasts before we had thrust a
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stick into it. If the stick were not pulled out of our hands,
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we boldly entered and enjoyed plashing and ducking long ere we had learned to swim.
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One of our best playgrounds was the famous Old Dunbar castle to which King
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Edward fled after his defeat at Bannockburn. Was built more than a thousand years
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ago and though we know little of its history, we had heard many mysterious
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stories of the battles, fought about its walls, and firmly believed that every
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bone we found in the ruins belonged to an ancient warrior. We tried to
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see who could climb highest on the crumbling peaks and crags, and took chances
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that no cautious mountaineer would try that I did not fall and finish my rocks.
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Scrambling in those adventurous boyhood days seems now a reasonable wonder. Among our
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best games were running, jumping, wrestling, and scrambling. I was so
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proud of my skill as a climber that when I first heard of Hell from
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a servant girl who loved to tell its horrors and warn us that if we
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did anything wrong, we would be cast into it, I always insisted that
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I could climb out of it. I imagine it was only a sooty pit
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with stone walls like those of the castle, and I felt sure there must
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be chinks and cracks in the masonry for fingers and toes. Anyhow, the
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terrors of the horrible place seldom lasted long beyond the telling, for natural faith
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casts out fear. Most of the Scotch children believe in ghosts, and some,
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under peculiar conditions, continued to believe in them all through life. Grave
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ghosts are deemed particularly dangerous, and many of the most credulous will go far
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out of their way to avoid passing through or near a graveyard in the dark,
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after being instructed by the servants. In the nature looks and habits of
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the various black and white ghosts, boo wuzzies and witches, we often speculated
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as to whether they could run fast, and tried to believe that we had
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a good chance to get away from most of them. To improve our speed
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and wind, we often took long runs into the country. Tamla Shanter's mare
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outran a lot of witches at least until she reached a place of safety beyond
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the keystone of the bridge, and we thought perhaps we also might be able
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to outrun them. Our house formerly belonged to a physician, and a servant
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girl told us that the ghost of the dead doctor haunted one of the unoccupied
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rooms in the second story that was kept dark on account of a heavy window
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tax. Our bedroom was adjacent to the ghost room, which had in it
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a lot of chemical apparatus glass tubing, glass and brass retorts, test tubes,
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flasks, et cetera. And we thought that those strange articles were still
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used by the old dead doctor in compounding physic In the long summer days,
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David and I were put to bed several hours before sunset. Mother tucked us
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in, carefully drew the curtains of the big, old fashioned bed, and
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told us to lie still and sleep like good barons. But we were usually
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out of bed playing games of daring called scoochers, about as soon as our
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loving mother reached the foot of the stairs, for we couldn't lie still,
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however hard we might. Going into the ghost room was regarded as a very
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great scoocher. After venturing in a few steps and rushing back in terror,
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I used to dare David to go as far without getting caught. The roof
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of our house, as well as the crigs and walls of the old castle,
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offered fine mountaineering exercise. Our bedroom was lighted by a dormer window.
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One night I opened it in search of good scoochers, and hung myself out
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over the slates, holding on to the sill while the wind was making a
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balloon of my nightgown. I then dared David to try the adventure, and
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he did. Then I went out again and hung by one hand, and
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David did the same. Then I hung by one finger, being careful not
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to slip, and he did that too. Then I stood on the sill
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and examined the edge of the left wall of the window, crept up the
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slates along its side by slight finger holds, got astride of the roof,
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sat there a few minutes looking at the scenery over the garden wall, while
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the wind was howling and threatening to blow me off. Then managed to slip
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down, catch hold of the sill, and get safely back into the room.
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But before attempting this scoocher, recognizing its dangerous character, with commendable caution,
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I warned David that in case I should happen to slip, I would
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grip the rain trough when I was going over the eaves and hang on,
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and that he must then run fast downstairs and tell Father to get a ladder
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for me, and tell him to be quick, because I would soon be
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tired hanging dangling in the wind by my hands. After my return from this
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capital Scoocher David, not to be outdone, crawled up to the top of
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the window roof and got bravely astride of it, But in trying to return
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he lost courage and began to greet to cry, I cannot get down,
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I cannot get down. I leaned out of the window and shouted encouragingly Din,
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a great Dinn. Agreed, I'll help you down if if you greet
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father, we'll hear, and he'll give us an awful scalping. Then,
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standing on the sill and holding on by one hand to the window casing,
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I directed him to slip his feet down within reach, and after securing a
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good hold, I jumped inside and dragged him in by his heels. This
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finished scoocher scrambling for the night and frightened us into bed. In the short
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winter days, when it was dark even at our early bedtime, we usually
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spent the hours before going to sleep playing voyages around the world under the bed
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clothing. After mother had carefully covered us, bade us good night and gone
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downstairs, we set out on our travels, burrowing like moles. We visited
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France, India, America, Australia, New Zealand, and all the places
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we had ever heard of, our travels never ending until we fell asleep.
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When mother came to take a last look at us before she went to bed,
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to see that we were covered. We were oftentimes covered so well that
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she had difficulty in finding us, for we were. We were hidden in
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all sorts of positions where sleep happened to overtake us. But in the morning
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we always found ourselves in good order, lying straight like good bearings, as
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she said. Some fifty years later, when I visited Scotland, I got
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one of my Dunbar schoolmates to introduce me to the owners of our old home,
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from whom I obtained permission to go upstairs to examine our bedroom window and
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judge what sort of adventure getting on its roof must have been. And with
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all my after experience in mountaineering, I found that what I had done in
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daring boyhood was now beyond my skill. Boys are often at once cruel and
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merciful, thoughtlessly, hard hearted and tender hearted, sympathetic, pitiful and kind,
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in ever changing contrasts. Love of neighbors, human or animal grows up
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amid savage traits, coarse and fine. When Father made out to get us
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securely locked up in the back yard. To prevent our shore and field wanderings,
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we had to play away the comparatively dull time as best we could.
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One of our amusements was hunting cats without seriously hurting them. These sagacious animals
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knew, however, that though not very dangerous, boys were not to be
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trusted. One time in particular, I remember when we began throwing stones at
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an experienced old Tom, not wishing to hurt him much though he was attempting
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mark. He soon saw what we were up to, fled to the stable
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and climbed to the top of the haymannger. He was still within range,
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however, and we kept the stones flying faster and faster, but he just
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blinked and played possum without wincing, either at our best shots or at the
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noise we made. I happened to strike him pretty hard with a good sized
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pebble, but he still blinked and sat still, as if without feeling.
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He must be mortally wounded, I said, and now we must kill him
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to put him out of pain. The savage in us, rapidly growing with
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indulgence, all took heartily to this sort of cat mercy and began throwing the
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heaviest stones we could manage. But that old fellow knew what characters we were,
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and just as we imagined him mercifully dead, he evidently thought the play
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was becoming too serious and that it was time to retreat. For suddenly,
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with a wild horror and gurr of energy, he launched himself over our heads,
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rushed across the yard in a blur of speed, climbed to the roof
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of another building, and over the garden wall, out of pain and bad
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company, with all his lives wide awake and in good working order. After
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we had thus learned that Tom had at least nine lives, we tried to
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verify the common saying that no matter how far cats fell, they always landed
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on their feet, unhurt. We caught one in our back yard, not
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Tom, but a smaller one of manageable size, and somehow got him smuggled
27:49
up to the top story of the house. I don't know how in the
27:52
world we managed to let go of him, for as soon as we opened
27:56
the window and held him over the sill, he knew his danger and made
28:00
violent efforts to scratch and bite his way back into the room, but we
28:03
determined to carry the thing through and at last managed to drop him. I
28:07
can remember to this day how the poor creature, in danger of his life,
28:11
strained and balanced as he was falling, and managed to alight on his
28:15
feet. This was a cruel thing for even wild boys to do, and
28:19
we never tried the experiment again, for we sincerely pitied the poor fellow when
28:25
we saw him creeping slowly away, stunned and frightened, with a swollen black
28:29
and blue chin, again showing the natural savagery of boys. We delighted in
28:36
dog fights and even in the horrid red work of slaughter houses, often running
28:41
long distances and climbing over walls and roofs to see a pig killed. As
28:45
soon as we heard the desperately earnest squealing, and if the butcher was good
28:49
natured, we begged him to let us get a near view of the mysterious
28:52
insides, and to give us a bladder to blow up for a football.
28:57
But here is an illustration of the side of boy nature. In our backyard
29:02
there were three elm trees, and in the one nearest the house, a
29:06
pair of robin red breasts had their nest. When the young were almost able
29:11
to fly, A troop of the celebrated Scottish Grays visited Dunbar, and three
29:15
or four of the fine horses were lodged in our stable. When the soldiers
29:19
were polishing their swords and helmets, they happened to notice the nest, and
29:23
just as they were leaving, one of them climbed the tree and robbed it.
29:26
With sore sympathy, we watched the young birds as the hard hearted robber
29:30
pushed them one by one beneath his jacket. All but two that jumped out
29:34
of the nest and tried to fly, but they were easily caught as they
29:38
fluttered on the ground and were hidden away with the rest. The distress of
29:42
the bereaved parents as they hovered and screamed over the frightened, crying children they
29:48
so long had loved and sheltered and fed, was pitiful to see. But
29:52
the shining soldier rode grandly away on his big gray horse, caring only for
29:56
the few pennies the young songbirds would bring and the beer they would buy,
30:00
while we all sisters and brothers were crying and sobbing. I remember as if
30:06
it happened this day, how my heart fairly ached and choked me. Mother
30:10
put us to bed and tried to comfort us, telling us that the little
30:14
birds would be well fed and grow big and soon learned to sing in pretty
30:17
cages. But again and again we rehearsed the sad story of the poor bereafed
30:22
birds and their frightened children, and could not be comforted. Father came into
30:26
the room when we were half asleep and still sobbing, and I heard Mother
30:30
telling him that, ah, the baron's hearts were broken over the robbing of
30:36
the nest in the elm. After attaining the manly belligerent age of five or
30:41
six years, very few of my school days passed without a fistfight, and
30:45
half a dozen was no uncommon number. When any classmate of our own age
30:51
questioned our rank and standing as fighters, we always made haste to settle the
30:56
matter at a quiet place on the dovel bray. To be a good fighter
31:00
was our highest ambition, our dearest aim in life, in or out of
31:03
school. To be a good scholar was a secondary consideration. Though we tried
31:08
hard to hold high places in our classes and gloried in being ducks, we
31:15
fairly reveled in the battle stories of Glorious William Wallace and Robert the bruce with
31:19
which every breath of Scotch air is saturated, And of course we were all
31:25
going to be soldiers on the Double Bray battleground. We often managed to bring
31:30
on something like real war, greatly more exciting than personal combat. Choosing leaders,
31:36
we divided into two armies. In winter damp snow, furnished plenty of
31:41
ammunition to make the thing serious, and in summer sand and grass sods cheering
31:47
and shouting some battle cry such as bannock Burn, Bannockburn, Scotland Forever the
31:52
last war in India. We were led bravely on for heavy battery work.
31:56
We stuffed our Scotch blue bonnets with snow and sand, sometimes mixed with gravel,
32:02
and fired them at each other as cannon balls. Of course, we
32:07
always looked eagerly forward to vacation days and thought them slow in coming. Old
32:14
Mungo Siddons gave us a lot of Gooseberry's occurrents and wished us a happy time.
32:20
Some sort of special closing exercises, singing recitations, et cetera, celebrated
32:27
the great day. But I remember only the berries, freedom from school work,
32:31
and opportunities for running away rambles in the fields and along the wave beaten
32:37
seashore. An exciting time came when, at the age of seven or eight
32:43
years, I left the old Davelbray school for the Grammar school. Of course,
32:47
I had a terrible lot of fighting to do, because a new scholar
32:52
had to meet every one of his age who dared to challenge him, this
32:55
being the common introduction to a new school. It was very strenuous for the
33:00
first month or so, establishing my fighting rank, taking up new studies,
33:06
especially Latin and French, getting acquainted with new classmates and the master and his
33:12
rules. In the first few Latin and French lessons, the new teacher,
33:16
mister Lyon blandly smiled at our comical blunders, but pedagogical weather of the severest
33:23
kind quickly set in, when for every mistake, everything short of perfection,
33:30
the tause was promptly applied. We had to get three lessons every day in
33:37
Latin, three in French, and as many in English, besides spelling,
33:43
his story, arithmetic and geography word lessons. In particular, the woodst couldst
33:50
shouldst have loved kind were kept up with much warlike thrashing until I had committed
33:55
the whole of the French, Latin, and English grammars to memory, and
34:00
in connection with reading lessons, we were called on to recite parts of them
34:05
with the rules, over and over again, as if all the regular and
34:09
irregular, incomprehensible verb stuff was poetry. In addition to all this, Father
34:16
made me learn so many Bible verses every day that by the time I was
34:21
eleven years of age, I had about three fourths of the Old Testament and
34:25
all of the New by heart and by sore flesh, I could recite the
34:30
New Testament from the beginning of Matthew to the end of Revelation without a single
34:37
stop. The dangers of cramming and of making scholars study at home instead of
34:43
letting their little brains rest were never heard of. In those days. We
34:47
carried our school books home in a strap every night and committed to memory our
34:52
next day's lessons before we went to bed. And to do that we had
34:57
to bend our attention as closely on on our tasks as lawyers on great million
35:02
dollar cases. I can't conceive of anything that would now enable me to concentrate
35:08
my attention more fully than when I was a mere strippling boy. And it
35:14
was all done by whipping thrashing. In general, old fashioned Scotch teachers spent
35:20
no time in seeking short roads to knowledge, or in trying any of the
35:24
new fangled psychological methods so much in vogue nowadays. There was nothing said about
35:31
making the seats easy or the lessons easy. We were simply driven point blank
35:37
against our books like soldiers against the enemy, and sternly ordered up an adam,
35:44
commit your lessons to memory. If we failed in any part, however
35:49
slight, we were whipped. For the grand, simple, all sufficing Scotch
35:54
discovery had been made that there was a close connection between the skis skin and
36:00
the memory, and that irritating the skin excited the memory to any required degree.
36:07
Fighting was carried on still more vigorously in the high school than in the
36:13
common school. Whenever anyone was challenged, either the challenge was allowed or it
36:19
was decided by a battle on the seashore, where with stubborn enthusiasm we battered
36:23
each other, as if we had not been sufficiently battered by the teacher.
36:30
When we were so fortunate as to finish a fight without getting a black eye.
36:34
We usually escaped a thrashing at home and another next morning at school.
36:38
For other traces of the fray could be easily washed off at a well on
36:43
the church bray, or concealed or passed as results of playground accidents, but
36:47
a black eye could never be explained away from downright fighting, A good double
36:53
thrashing was the inevitable penalty, but all without avail. Fighting went on without
37:00
the slightest abatement, like natural storms, for no punishment less than death could
37:06
quench the ancient, inherited belligerents burning in our pagan blood. Nor could we
37:12
be made to believe it was fair that father and teacher should thrash us so
37:16
industriously for our good, while begrudging us the pleasure of thrashing each other for
37:22
our good. All these various thrashings, however, were admirably influential in developing
37:28
not only memory, but fortitude as well. For if we did not endure
37:32
our school punishments and fighting pains without flinching and making faces, we were mocked
37:38
on the playground, and public opinion on a Scotch playground was a powerful agent
37:44
in controlling behavior. Therefore, we at length managed to keep our features in
37:49
smooth repose while enduring pain that would try anybody but an American Indian, far
37:55
from feeling that we were called on to endure too much pain. One of
38:00
our playground games was thrashing each other with whips about two feet long, made
38:05
from the tough, wiry stems of a species of polygonum, fastened together in
38:10
a stiff, firm braid. One of us handing two of these whips to
38:15
a companion to take his choice. We stood up close together and thrashed each
38:21
other on the legs until one succumbed to the intolerable pain and thus lost the
38:25
game. Nearly all of our playground games were strenuous shin battering, shinny wrestling,
38:32
prisoner's base, and dogs and hares, all argumenting in no slight degree
38:37
our lessons in fortitude. Moreover, we regarded our punishments and pains of every
38:43
sort as training for war, since we were all going to be soldiers.
38:47
Besides single combats, we sometimes assembled on Saturdays to meet the scholars of another
38:52
school, and very little was required for the growth of strained relations and war.
39:00
The immediate cause might be nothing more than a saucy stare. Perhaps the
39:05
scholar stared at would insolently inquire, what are you glarin' at, Bob.
39:10
Bob would reply, I'll look where I have mined and hinder me if ye
39:15
dare well, Bob, the outraged, stared at scholar would reply, I'll
39:22
soon let ye see whether I dare or no, and give Bob a blow
39:24
on the face. This opened the battle, and every good scholar belonging to
39:30
either school was drawn into it. After both sides were sore and weary,
39:36
a strong, lunged warrior would be heard above the dinner battle shouting, I'll
39:40
tell you what we'd do with ye if ye let us alone, We'll let
39:45
ye alone. And the school war ended, as most wars between nations do,
39:51
and some of them begin in much the same way. Notwithstanding the great
39:54
number of harshly enforced rules, not very good order was kept in school.
40:00
In my time. There were two schools within a few rods of each other,
40:05
one for mathematics, navigation, et cetera, the other called the grammar
40:08
school that I attended. The masters lived in a big freestone house within eight
40:15
or ten yards of the schools, so that they could easily step out for
40:19
anything they wanted, or send one of the scholars. The moment our master
40:22
disappeared, perhaps for a book or a drink, every scholar left his seat
40:28
and his lessons jumped on top of the benches and desks, or crawled beneath
40:32
them, tugging, rolling, wrestling, accomplishing in a minute a depth of
40:37
disorder and din unbelievable save by a Scottish scholar. We even carried on war
40:44
class against class. In those wild precious minutes. A warcher gave the alarm
40:49
when the master opened his house door to return, and it was a great
40:52
feat to get into our places before he entered, adorned in awful majestic authority,
40:58
shouting silence and striking resounding blows with his cane on a desk or on
41:05
some unfortunate scholar's back. Forty seven years after leaving this fighting school, I
41:10
returned on a visit to Scotland and a cousin in Dunbar introduced me to a
41:15
minister who was acquainted with the history of the school and obtained for me an
41:21
invitation to dine with the new master. Of course I gladly accepted, for
41:24
I wanted to see the old place of fun and pain and the battleground on
41:30
the sands. Mister Lyon, our able teacher and thrasher, I learned,
41:35
had held his place as master of the school for twenty or thirty years after
41:39
I left it, and had recently died in London, after preparing many young
41:45
men for the English universities. At the dinner table, while I was recalling
41:50
the amusements and fights of my old school days, the Minister remarked to the
41:53
new master, now don't you wish that you had been teacher in those days
41:59
and gained the howe of walloping John Muir This pleasure, so merrily suggested,
42:05
showed that the Minister also had been a fighter in his youth. The old
42:08
freestone school building was still perfectly sound, but the carved ink stained desks were
42:15
almost whittled away. The highest part of our playground back of the school,
42:20
commanded a view of the sea, and we loved to watch the passing ships,
42:24
and, judging by their rigging, make guesses as to the ports they
42:29
had sailed from those to which they were bound, what they were loaded with,
42:34
their tonnage, et cetera. In stormy weather, they were all smothered
42:38
in clouds and spray, and showers of salt scud torn from the tops of
42:44
the waves came flying over the playground wall. In those tremendous storms, many
42:49
a brave ship foundered or was tossed and smashed on the rocky shore. When
42:54
a wreck occurred within a mile or two of the town, we often managed
42:59
by running fast to reach it and pick up some of the spoils. In
43:04
particular, I remember visiting the battered fragments of an unfortunate brig or schooner that
43:08
had been loaded with apples, and finding fine, unpitiful sport in rushing into
43:15
the spent waves and picking up the red cheeked fruit from the frothy, seething
43:20
foam. All our school books were extravagantly illustrated with drawings of every kind of
43:25
sailing vessel, and every boy owned some sort of craft whittled from a block
43:30
of wood and trimmed with infinite panes. Sloops, schooners, brigs and full
43:36
rigged ships with their sails and string ropes properly adjusted and named for us by
43:40
some old sailor. These precious toy craft with lead keels, we learned to
43:46
sail on a pond near the town. With the sails set at the proper
43:52
angle to the wind, they made fast, straight voyages across the pond to
43:55
boys on the other side, who readjusted the sails and started them back on
44:00
the returned voyages. Oftentimes fleets of half a dozen or more were started together
44:06
in exciting races. Our most exciting sport, however, was playing with gunpowder.
44:13
We made guns out of gas pipe, mounted them on sticks of any
44:16
shape, clubbed our pennies together for powder, gleamed pieces of lead here and
44:22
there, and cut them into slugs, and while one aimed, another applied
44:27
a match to the touch hole. With these awful weapons, we wandered along
44:30
the beach and fired at the gulls and sullen geese as they passed us.
44:36
Fortunately we never heard any of them that we knew of. We also dug
44:39
holes in the ground, put in a handful or two of powder, tamped
44:44
it well around a fuse made of a wheat stalk, and reaching cautiously forward,
44:49
touched a match to the straw. This we called making earthquakes. Ofttimes
44:54
we went home with singed hair and faces well peppered with powder grains, could
45:00
not be washed out, then, of course came a correspondingly severe punishment from
45:05
both father and teacher. Another favorite sport was climbing trees and scaling garden walls.
45:12
Boys eight or ten years of age could get over almost any wall by
45:15
standing on each other's shoulders, thus making living ladders. To make walls secure
45:22
against marauders. Many of them were finished on top with broken bottles embedded in
45:27
lime, leaving the cutting edges sticking up, but with bunches of grass and
45:32
weeds, we could sit or stand in comfort on top of the jaggedis of
45:37
them. Like squirrels that begin to eat nuts before they are ripe, we
45:40
began to eat apples about as soon as they were formed, causing, of
45:45
course, desperate gastric disturbances to be cured by castor oil. Serious were the
45:51
risks we ran in climbing and squeezing through hedges, and of course among the
45:55
country folk we were far from welcome. Farmers passing us on the roads often
46:00
shouted by way of greeting, oh you vagabonds, back to the town with
46:05
ye gang back where ye belong Europe to mischief, I's warrant, I can
46:09
see it. The gamekeeper will catchee and most like yella be hanged some day.
46:15
Breakfast in those old Langzine days was simple oatmeal porridge, usually with a
46:22
little milk or triacle, served in wooden dishes called luggies, formed of staves
46:27
hooped together like miniature tubs, about four or five inches in diameter. One
46:32
of the staves, the lug or ear a few inches longer than the others,
46:36
served as a handle, while the number of luggies ranged in a row
46:39
on a dresser indicated the size of the family. We never dreamed of anything
46:45
to come after the porridge, or of asking for more. Our portions were
46:49
consumed in about a couple of minutes, then off to school. At noon,
46:53
we came racing home ravenously hungry. The midday meal, called dinner,
46:59
was usually vegetable broth, a small piece of boiled mutton, and barley meal
47:04
scone. None of us liked the barley scone bread. Therefore we got all
47:07
we wanted of it, and in desperation, had to eat it, for
47:12
we were always hungry, about as hungry after as before meals. The evening
47:16
meal was called tea and was served on our return from school. It consisted
47:22
as far as we children were concerned, of half a slice of white bread
47:25
without butter, barley scone, and warm water with a little milk and sugar
47:30
in it, a beverage called content, which warmed but neither cheered nor inebriated.
47:37
Immediately after tea, we ran across the street with our books to Grandfather
47:40
Guilry, who took pleasure in seeing us and hearing us recite our next day's
47:45
lessons. Then back home to supper, usually a boiled potato and piece of
47:51
barley scone, then family worship and to bed. Our amusements on Saturday afternoons
47:58
and vacations depended mostly on getting away from home into the country, especially in
48:04
the spring when the birds were calling loudest. Father sternly forbade David and me
48:09
from playing truant in the fields with plundering wanderers like ourselves, fearing we might
48:15
go on from bad to worse, get hurt in climbing over walls, caught
48:19
by gamekeepers, or lost by falling over a cliff into the sea. Play
48:23
as much as you like in the back yard and garden, he said,
48:28
and mind what you'll get when you forget and disobey. Thus he warned us
48:32
with an awfully stern countenance, looking very hard hearted, while naturally his heart
48:37
was far from hard, though he devoutly believed in eternal punishment for bad boys,
48:43
both here and hereafter. Nevertheless, like devout martyrs of wildness, we
48:50
stole away to the sea shore or the green sunny fields with almost religious regularity,
48:55
taking advantage of opportunities. When Father was very busy to join our companions,
49:01
oftenest to hear the birds sing and hunt their nests, glorying in the
49:07
number we had discovered and called our own. A sample of our nest chatter
49:13
was something like this. Willie Chisholm would proudly exclaim, I can no seventeen
49:21
nests, and you, Johnny, can only fifteen. But I wouldn't give
49:25
my fifteen for year seventeen. For five of mine are larks and Mavis's you
49:31
can only three. Are the best singers, yes, Johnny, but I
49:37
can six goldies and you can only one. Most of yours are only sparrows
49:42
and lyntees and robin redbreasts. Then perhaps Bob Richardson would loudly declare that he
49:49
caned more nests than anybody for he can twenty three with about fifty eggs in
49:55
them, and more than fifty young birds, maybe a hundred, some of
50:00
them nothing but raw gourblings, but lots of them as big as their mithers
50:06
and ready to flee. And about fifty crows nests and three fox dens.
50:12
Oh, yes, Bob, but that's no fair, for nobody counts crows
50:15
nests and foxholes. And then you live in the country at Bellhaven, where
50:21
ye have the best chance. Yes, but I ken a lot of bumbies
50:25
nests, both the red legged and the yellow legged kind. Oh what cares
50:30
for bumbies nests? Well, but here's something. My father let me gang
50:37
to a fox hunt. An man, it was grand to see the hounds
50:40
and the long legged horses lopen the dikes and burns and hedges. The nests
50:47
I fear, with the beautiful eggs and young birds were prized quite as highly
50:52
as the songs of the glad parents. But no Scotch boy that I know
50:58
of ever failed to listen with enthusiasm to the songs of the skylarks. Oftentimes
51:05
on a broad meadow near Dunbar, we stood for hours enjoying their marvelous singing
51:09
and soaring from the grass where the nest was hidden. The male would suddenly
51:15
rise, as straight as if shot, up to a height of perhaps thirty
51:19
or forty feet, and, sustaining himself with rapid wing beats, poured down
51:23
the most delicious melody, sweet and clear and strong, overflowing all bounds.
51:30
Then suddenly he would soar higher again and again, ever higher and higher,
51:36
soaring and singing until lost to sight, even on perfectly clear days, and
51:40
oftentimes in cloudy weather, far in the downy cloud. As the poet says,
51:45
to test our eyes, we often watched a lark until he seemed a
51:51
faint speck in the sky and finally passed beyond the keenest sighted of us.
51:55
All I see him, yet, we would cry, I see him yet,
51:59
I see him yet, I see him yet, as he soared,
52:01
and finally only one of us would be left to claim that he still saw
52:06
him. At last, he too would have to admit that the singer had
52:09
soared beyond his sight, and still the music came pouring down to us in
52:15
glorious profusion from a height far above our vision, requiring marvelous power of wing
52:22
and marvelous power of voice, for that rich, delicious, soft and yet
52:27
clear music was distinctly heard long after the bird was out of sight. Then
52:32
suddenly ceasing, the glorious singer would appear, falling like a bolt, straight
52:38
down to his nest, where his mate was sitting on the eggs. It
52:44
was far too common a practice among us to carry off a young lark just
52:47
before it could fly, place it in a cage, and fondly laboriously feeded.
52:53
Sometimes we succeeded in keeping one alive for a year or two, and
52:58
when awakened by the spring, where whether it was pitiful to see the quivering
53:01
imprisoned soar of the heavens, rapidly beating its wings and singing as though it
53:07
were flying and hovering in the air like its parents. To keep it in
53:12
health, we were taught that we must supply it with a sod of grass
53:15
the size of the bottom of the cage, to make the poor bird feel
53:20
as though it were at home on its native meadow, a meadow perhaps a
53:23
foot or at most two feet square. Again and again it would try to
53:29
hover over that miniature meadow from its miniature sky just underneath the top of the
53:35
cage. At last, conscience stricken, we carried the beloved prisoner to the
53:38
meadow west of Dunbar where it was born, and blessing its sweet heart,
53:44
bravely set it free. And our exceeding great reward was to see it fly
53:49
and sing in the sky. In the winter, when there was but little
53:54
doing in the fields, we organized running matches. A dozen or so of
53:59
us would start out on races that were simply tests of endurance, running on
54:04
and on along a public road over the breezy hills like hounds, without stopping
54:08
or getting tired. The only serious trouble we ever felt in these long races
54:15
was an occasional stitch in our sides. One of the boys started the story
54:19
that sucking raw eggs was a sure cure for the stitches. We had hens
54:23
in our backyard, and on the next Saturday we managed to swallow a couple
54:28
of eggs apiece. A disgusting job, but we would do almost anything to
54:31
mend our speed, and as soon as we could get away after taking the
54:36
cure, we set out on a ten or twenty mile run to prove its
54:39
worth. We thought nothing of running right ahead ten or a dozen miles before
54:45
turning back for We knew nothing about taking time by the sun, and none
54:50
of us had a watch in those days. Indeed, we never cared about
54:53
time until it began to get dark. Then we thought of home and the
54:58
thrashing that awaited us late or early. The thrashing was sure unless Father happened
55:04
to be away. If he was expected to return soon, Mother made haste
55:07
to get us to bed before his arrival. We escaped the thrashing next morning,
55:13
for Father never felt like thrashing us in cold blood on the calm holy
55:16
Sabbath. But no punishment, however, sure and severe, was of any
55:22
avail against the attraction of the fields and woods. It had other uses,
55:27
developing memory, et cetera, But in keeping us at home it was of
55:31
no use at all. Wildness was ever sounding in our ears, and Nature
55:37
saw to it that besides school lessons and church lessons, some of her own
55:42
lessons should be learned, perhaps with a view to the time when we should
55:45
be called to wander in wildness to our heart's content. Oh, the blessed
55:52
enchantment of those Saturday runaways in the prime of the spring, How our young
55:57
wandering eyes reveled in the sunny, breezy glory of the hills and the sky.
56:01
Every particle of us thrilling and tingling with the bees and glad birds and
56:07
glad streams. Kings may be blessed. We were glorious. We were free.
56:14
School cares and scoldings, heart thrashings and flesh thrashings alike were forgotten in
56:20
the fullness of nature's glad wildness. These were my first excursions, the beginnings
56:27
of life long wanderings. End of chapter one