Then you had to learn the tricks, the tricks among the dealing men. You saw it happening with them all, the things they got up to. The travellers in these days, only some could afford good horses, really good horses. When I mean a good horse, I mean one costing forty-five, fifty pound. Now I knew some travellers in these days who bought horses for twenty-five shillings, two pound ten and three pound ten. These were cast horses. Well, they got them off the pits, cast out the pits. And they got them off pig carts, men feeding pigs. Pigmen kept a lot of horses for carrying the swill. But you could never trust a pigman’s horse! It didn’t matter what kind of horse it was, he always kept it fat with feeding it the swill, cabbage leaves and everything he got. Even suppose it didn’t have a tooth, it was always fat. The travellers would get them from pigmen, and oh, a horse was in beautiful condition. But after the travellers had it for about three weeks or a month, it would go in like a balloon because it wasn’t getting the same meat. And it couldn’t eat grass.
They called some horses a ‘mummy’, meaning mouth, bad mouth. Well, their front teeth grew too long in the front with age, and the back ones couldn’t close. A horse’s back teeth grind. It pulls with the front ones and chews with the back. The mummy just half rumbled food around its mouth and tried to swallow the grass. It got poorer and poorer and poorer. Then they would take the horse to the blacksmith’s shop and get their teeth filed down. But it was a sore thing on a horse, filing the front teeth down. It wasn’t every smith would do it. It helped the horse a lot, but within another two or three month they just grew again. There wasn’t a cure for it. It was just old age. You’ve heard the expression, ‘You’re gettin kind o long in the tooth.’ That’s where it came from, the horse gettin up in years. You never got a horse with bad teeth from the North, Inverness or any part of the Highlands. They ran on the moors and ate the heather, which kept their front teeth short. They were always good horses.
Then the Aberdeenshire travellers used to bring horses down from Aberdeenshire, and they all came to the berries at Blairgowrie. Then the Inverness Stewarts used to bring horses down. And then you had travellers coming up from the Borders, up from Ayrshire and Dumfries, and they fetched horses. Then you had the Irish travellers coming across from Ireland. They fetched them across in the boats. And they bought them cheap in Ireland. I remember a man telling me he bought five donkeys for twelve and sixpence, half a crown each. That was all the price of a donkey in Ireland, two and six. That was dear for a donkey there in that time! And they took them to the market. I learned all these things at the Hoolet’s Neuk, went with the rest of the men and learned the trade. It was a great time.
Then it came the spring, about the middle of February, and the travellers wanted to shift, move on. I had been working at the turnips and managed to keep a few shillings by. I thought I would take a wee trip back to Furnace and see the old folk. I was nearly sixteen. I could have taken a bus or a train, but I didn’t bother. I said I was going to walk and make my way back the way I came. So I bade goodbye to my auntie whom I had stayed with all the time there, and the rest of the folk, I bade them all goodbye. They were shifting on. But I waited till everybody was packed up in the morning to go their own directions. Some going away by Forfar, some going away up by Broughty Ferry and up the length of Montrose, and some were going back by Perth. Charlie Reid and his mother said they were going there.
I said, ‘Well, I’ll get the length o Perth bi youse.’ So we all bade farewell to each other, and they all parted, said their good mornings and their goodbyes. They had their dealing and their swapping and they gave each other presents and things before they left, because travellers were very funny.
When they parted from each other they liked to part in good company. They believed they might never see each other again. And they wanted to remember the person – if they ever went to his funeral or somebody went to his funeral – they would remember him in good faith. I’ve seen it happen many’s a time! I’ve been in company with some folk and bade them good morning, and never had the pleasure of seeing them again. Old travellers, sometimes young ones and all, maybe through an accident or through some other means they met their end.
So we left the Hoolet’s Neuk. But first we cleaned up the place, shut all the gates, gathered up all the stones, gathered up all the rags. Because travellers had respect for the farmer there at that time. These were real good travellers. You wouldn’t have got as much paper about the place or a bit of rubbish that would have lighted my fag when they were finished! Heaped all their stones and packed up all their sticks, burned up all the old straw and every kind o rubbish. Left the place neat and tidy. They knew that the farmer would come in and check on that the minute they left. And if they’d have left any kind of mess or anything, they wouldn’t get back again. There were some crowds who would come in and just stay two nights, and move away. They never cleaned up the place. And it finally got closed through time.
THE TRAMP AND THE ANGEL
O the night been dark and the night been cold
And the rain’d been falling down
When an old beggarman lay down to die
Upon the cold, cold ground.
O he had no one to comfort him
No one who would understand
For he was just a lonely,
A dying old beggarman.
And then he saw a beautiful light
A-coming down from the sky
Such a beautiful light, such a wonderful light
To the bush where he did lie.
‘O who are you?’ the old beggar said,
‘And why do you trouble me?
For I am just a dying old beggarman
As you can surely see.’
‘O I have come,’ the Stranger said,
‘From my Father’s home far away
And this long, dark, cold winter’s night
I will keep you company.’
‘But I am a beggar,’ the old man said,
‘Just a dying old beggarman
And why you’d come to comfort me
I do not understand.’
‘In my Father’s home,’ the Stranger said,
‘In the place from where I came
For the tramp and the beggar and the poor and the rich
There everyone is the same.’
‘And I have come to comfort you
And with you I will stay
This long, dark, cold, wild winter’s night
I will keep you company.’
‘But I am a beggar,’ the old man said,
‘Just a lonely old beggarman
And why you’d come to comfort me
I do not understand.’
Next morning that old tramp was found
In the bush it’s where he lay
There were a happy smile upon his face
For his soul had passed away, away
For his soul had passed away.
Duncan Williamson
CHAPTER SEVEN
WHAT THE FAIRIES ARE PLAYING
I made my way back the journey I had come with my brother Sandy over the hill, up through to Crieff and Comrie. I walked up to Lochearnhead one night late and I slept in a haystack. I made my way up to Tyndrum, Dalmally and into Inveraray and down into Furnace. When I landed back at the old camp with the old folk, they weren’t very well off. My father wasn’t working at the time, and they were after having the flu. I had a few pound to help them out. The next day I went down to the shop to get my mother some messages. This is a good tale, a good laugh.
Now I had grown a bit by this time. In the shop was this bakery kept by an old man. And when I was wee I used to run about with my bare feet, nae arse in my trousers and my knees all bare, a few cuts on my legs. And he used to come up with a batch, used to make these tarts, biscuits and things, all these fancy cakes. He put them in the window. And we were awful hungry, you know, and there were these wee rhubarb pies. We used to come and stand at the window, keeking in, staring at the cakes, my nose
flat up against the pane. And he would come out. He wore one of these old white aprons, you know, a baker’s apron.
‘Get away ye wee tinkie fae there!’ he would say. ‘What are ye daein standin starin at my windae? Ye’re breathin on the window pane and people can’t see in with yir breath.’ So he’d come and take his apron, clean the window. This was when I was about five year old. And he’d always hunt you away from the window. If you had a penny you would go in.
You’d say, ‘I want a cake for my penny.’ And he’d pick the hardest ones he could get. He wouldn’t give you a fresh one. I didn’t know then, but I know now what he did. He felt them with his fingers and picked the hardest ones, those he couldn’t get sellt. He would give you that one for a penny or a ha’penny. But not would he give you anything unless you had a penny!
Now I land back. The same old man was still there. He was even still there when I was married with a couple of children. I get my mother’s messages in another shop a wee bit further up the street. And I walk down to the shop, and I had this great big Western hat on. I stand at the shop window. And there’s his tray, the same tray I saw when I was five year old. One of these wooden batches. It held about three dozen cakes.
I said to myself, ‘I’m going to have some fun!’ Well, I got the finest satisfaction – maybe it was a bad thing to do that day. But I walked in, I said, ‘Can I have some o your cakes?’
‘Oh yes, you can have some of the cakes,’ he said. I think by that time they were about twopence or threepence each, up a penny or two. ‘How many do you want?’
I said, ‘I’ll take the whole lot. Every single one.’
‘Are you wantin them all? he said.
I said, ‘I want them all.’ So he went to the window and got them all out. He got this big brown poke and he placed them in all tidy, you know. ‘Oh yes, I’ll give ye them,’ and he’s cracking away to me. Gave me the good patter, never even remembered anything about me, when he used to hunt me away from the window.
And across from the door there was a wee path going up to another house, and there was a bit o green grass. I walked out to the green grass and I stopped. It was about four yards from the front of the shop. I took everyone of these cakes in my two hands, and I crumbled them all up like that, one by one. And I was laughing to myself and flinging them up in the air. There were rhubarb cakes and cookies and buns, I was flinging them up! And all the sparrows and starlings were gathered round me. He came out. And he stood at the front of this window with this apron on him, the same old apron. He walked across.
He said, ‘What are ye doin?’
I said, ‘I’m feedin the birds. That’s yir cakes. But they’re mine, aren’t they?’
‘Oh yes.’
I said, ‘I paid for them didn’t I? I’m feedin the birds with them.’
He says, ‘What are you feeding the birds with them for?’
I said, ‘Because you wouldnae give me one when you used to chase me – I’m the wee tinkie you used to chase awa fae the window. I’ve bought yir cakes, I paid for them and I’m gettin my satisfaction noo. I’m feedin the birds wi them.’ And I had the best fun o my life! Because things were really bad for us back there when we were wee, back in those times. You remember, there were nine of us going to school at once. And my father wasn’t working most of the time. My mother had to just try and keep us alive. There was little we could do, because there were no jobs to get. The wee crofts didn’t have very much work on them. If we could have got sale for whelks, we’d have been all right. But all the sale we got for whelks was our stomachs, we had to just eat them. We lived on the shellfish. Times were very, very hard.
But I stayed back with my old folk for about a month. And I got the yearning to be on the road again. By this time my older brother Geordie had taken off. And it was just a case of the lassies and my youngest brother being left with my mother and my father.
So I took off again and this time took the bus to Glasgow. It was only six shillings. Now I’d seen many trains in Perthshire, but I’d never been inside one. I got to the train station in Glasgow and bought a ticket. I’d heard about first and second class. And I was walking up and down – the train’s ready to pull away and I’m standing with my ticket – I couldn’t get in, I didn’t know how. And this old woman came to me. I said I was looking to get into this train for Perth. She got me in anyway, so I sat and cracked to her all the way to Perth. Then I took the bus out to the Knock Camp. And when I landed, there were about fifteen camps in the Knock Camp, fifteen gellies!
There were some of the Highland Stewarts, and by sheer good luck, my mother’s cousin and her laddie Charlie were there. I stayed with them for a couple of days and then I made my way to Balbrogie. Because, mind, I had promised my brother Sandy I would pay him a visit.
I went up through Burrelton, Coupar Angus and went to Balbrogie. He stayed in an old mill and his wife, Betsy, was away in Campbeltown having a bairn. And, he was so glad to see me! He’d been there all that time since he’d left me at the Knock Camp the year before. He was just himself and the two kids there. Oh, it was just out of this world for me to come and visit him. Because I liked him an awful lot. And I stayed with him for nearly two months there at the farm. He and I had some great times. He wrestled with me, showed me how to fight and all this carry on. He was only a young man then, a hardy, great strong man. So he tellt many cracks and tales. Sandy was a good storyteller too.
When he was young like me he travelled among all the travellers before he got married. He kent all the roads, he kent all the travellers, but he made his living with a mouth organ. Well, he wasn’t the world’s champion but he was as good! And he kept this instrument wrapped up in a silk hankie and he played the houses. He played up in Skye. You never heard anybody in the world play a mouth organ like him. None of this classical stuff, but really good playing by ear. And he taught me. I never learned to play it very good but I could always get a bit tune out o it.
Sandy had this great big field of turnips he was shawing and I helped him. Sandy was a great cook. Oh, he could make anything. And he had the dog Jackie for fourteen years, reared Jackie as a pup. There never was a hare that rose Jackie couldn’t kill! It was just great for me! Sandy would say, ‘Well, brother, we’re needin something for the pot again.’
And I would say, ‘Come on, Jack!’ We’d just walk out to the field. The first hare that rose [kchkch] snick and he was dead. He only took one at a time, you know. Two rabbits and one hare. I’m tellin ye, we had some rabbit and tattie soup then! They were great times.
And then Betsy came back from Campbeltown on the bus. She had this wee fat baby girl. So by this time, it was the spring. Sandy said he wasn’t going to go away that summer. He was going to stay at the mill. He liked the farm. And they had this old shed, but he’d converted it into a rough shelter for himself and his family. Sandy liked these things, to be on his own by himself. He liked us coming about him for a while. But I knew by the time his wife had come back, he and the two kids were all right. He’d asked me all the questions about my mother and father and how it was at home. I told him about me shaking the old man’s cakes. He and I had a good laugh about this.
And Sandy told me tales what happened when he was with Granny and Grandfather in Tarbert years and years ago, my father’s mother and father, when he was a wee boy. He told me these tales about his experiences travelling though the North with a mouth organ. He always went on his own, never kept up with anybody. The only person he liked to stay with was Uncle Sandy Townsley, my mother’s cousin. Sandy learned the mouth organ from a wee buck gadgie16 called Holl, so named because the man sellt holly for a living. He was a tramp who went on the road, played a mouth organ and sang in a canister, in the side of a tin to make an echo. And he sang the houses, was a great street singer. Sandy had met up with him. This man never had a wife, and he’d taught Sandy to play the mouth organ right, how to vamp it. Sandy told me about his experiences in Skye and all these places.
Sandy never ha
d any interest in horses. But Jack, my other older brother, he was different. He was fond of a horse from the time he got married till whatever time his family grew up. He hardly ever went without a horse. But he wouldn’t keep an animal any time. He always thought somebody else’s horse was better. I’ve had many’s a good deal with him myself.
But anyway, I left Sandy there at the old mill. I promised him that if he wasn’t away by the harvest time, I’d come back about August or September and see him again. I said I was going into Aberdeenshire to see the country. And he tellt me what kind o places to look for, what kind o travellers there were, the good travellers from the bad ones, and how to conduct myself among them. You know, he was always that way, telling me how to take care of myself among the travellers – not to be too boastful, not to be too cheeky and all these kind of things – so I would get along with them and not cause any trouble. Oh, some of them were hard to get along with, aye. Sandy didn’t mean the old folk, he meant especially laddies about my own age. Sandy was feart o me getting into fights. Not that he thought I couldn’t take care of myself, but he was concerned about me getting into trouble and maybe falling in with bad company and stealing.
You know, my mother had sixteen of a family. Thirteen survived, and there were six brothers all alive together. Not one of these brothers ever got into trouble in their lives, except for camping. Just fined for camping. And none of the sisters were ever in trouble either. That was because of my father, discipline from him when we were young. So this is what Sandy was trying to knock into me when I was with him.
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