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CONTENTS
Electric Scotland News
Electric Canadian
Roughing it in the Bush
How Canada is leveraging its PPP expertise worldwide
The Flag in the Wind
Electric Scotland
Northern Notes and Queries
Robert Burns Lives!
A Significant Scot - William Sharp
The Little White Bird by James Barrie
The House of Green Shutters
A Hundred Years in the Highlands
For Puir Auld Scotland's Sake
Songs from John Henderson
Sir David Brewster
Clan Munro of Australia
Durness from Earliest Times
The Social Progress of the Highlands since 1800
Gaelic Incantations
Electric Scotland News
I have just noticed that Google is now doing regional analysis for the UK. Almost 25% of our total traffic comes from the UK and that means of that 25% England accounts for 58% of it and Scotland accounts for 38%. So in rough terms Scotland accounts for 10% of our total visitors. I remember in the first 5 years of our operation the highest the UK came was 4% of our total traffic.
The top 10 visiting cities in the UK are...
1. London
2. Edinburgh
3. Glasgow
4. Aberdeen
5. Belfast
6. Falkirk
7. Dundee
8. Birmingham
9. Manchester
10. Newcastle upon Tyne
-----
I have now deployed the Comment system throughout the Electric Scotland and Electric Canadian web sites. You will find this at the foot of every page of the site apart from the index page of Electric Scotland.
There are many ways in which this can be used. For example visitors have emailed in to say some information on a page is incorrect and have given details of the error. Well now they can add that information to the page by way of our comment system. Likewise they can also add additional information that they may have thus sharing it with our visitors.
Where you are a member of a clan you might visit our clan pages and add information about an event that is coming up and even provide a report on how it went.
As I have mentioned before you do need to be logged in to leave a message and due to these nasty spammers every comment will be moderated before appearing as a public comment.
You can also upload an image to go with your comment and add an appropriate link to a web site or blog. In some cases you might end up having a conversation with another visitor as you can reply to another persons comment thus creating your own thread.
-----
I got out my first newsletter for the Grand Priory of Canada so have added a pdf version of it to our Knights Templar forum in our Community. You can read it at http://www.electricscotland.org/foru...iory-of-Canada
-----
And I have now completed my Christmas shopping by purchasing some tins of that excellent whisky cake from Glenora Distillery in Cape Btreton along with a couple of miniatures to go with each one. I also purchased some excellent Scottish Cheese from the Scottish Store. I also did my quarterly visit to the British Store in London, Ontario and now have supplies of haggis, black pudding, potato scones, Ayrshire bacon and Irish sausages as well as square sausage and other delicacies. I even found a bag of Haggis and Black Pepper crisps which I've yet to try but they sure tweaked my interest.
Electric Canadian
Roughing it in the Bush
or Forrest Life in Canada by Susanna Moodie (1871). A new book we're starting.
Added the following chapters this week...
Uncle Joe and His Family
John Monaghan
Phoebe R-, And our Second Moving
Brian, The Still-Hunter
The Charivari
A Journey to the Woods
The Wilderness and our Indian Friends
You can read these chapters at http://www.electriccanadian.com/pion...hing/index.htm
How Canada is leveraging its PPP expertise worldwide
Early experience with public-private partnerships have enabled this nation’s deal makers and builders to exploit the global trend.
See this article at http://www.electriccanadian.com/transport/ppp.htm
The Flag in the Wind
This weeks edition was Compiled by Jim Lynch. As always a good mix of articles all from a Scottish Independence point of view.
You can read this weeks issue at http://www.scotsindependent.org
Electric Scotland
Northern Notes and Queries
This weeks issue is for January 1898 and can be found at the foot of the page at:
http://www.electricscotland.com/hist...hern/index.htm
I extracted one article from this issue which you can read at http://www.electricscotland.com/hist...niontracts.htm as I found it a most interesting commentary on the Union of the Crowns of England and Scotland. It's basically 3 letters from 3 different people with different perspectives on the Union.
Robert Burns Lives!
Edited by Frank Shaw
Robert Burns’s “The Twa Dogs”: ideological aspects of translation into Russian By Natalia Kaloh Vid
Dr. Natalia Kaloh Vid is our guest writer today. This is her second contribution to the pages of Robert Burns Lives! and it is hard to believe that it’s been nearly two years (February 2011) since her first article appeared on our web site. It seems like yesterday! Her first was entitled “Ideological Adaptations of Robert Burns in the Soviet Union”, and you can find it on the index page under Chapter 107.
Since 2011 three great events have happened in her life. First, she published a book on the subject of the above mentioned article, and I was pleased to write a blurb for the back of the publication. Then she successfully defended her second Ph.D. thesis on Modern Russian Literature. Third and most importantly, she gave birth to a beautiful daughter named Zhenia which, Natalia tells me, is a shorter version of the Russian name Evgenia. Yes, it has been a busy time for Dr. Vid, and I am grateful she is allowing another of her articles to grace these pages. To do so, she sought and received permission for the article to be shared with our readers from the Scottish Literary Review (see Spring/Summer 2011, Vol. 3, No. 1, Str. 1 – 20 where the article first appeared). Thanks are also extended to the Association for Scottish Literary Studies which publishes the journal.
Even though she is busy being mother to Zhenia, she has lots of help from husband Dejan and her grannies. It is good to learn that Natalia is back at work three days a week and that she will begin working on her second book on Mikhail Bulgakov. It really is a treat to have Dr. Vid share her thoughts and research in the article below, and I feel confident you will find it of interest. (FRS: 12.5.12)
You can read this article at http://www.electricscotland.com/fami...s_lives160.htm
Other articles in this series can be read at http://www.electricscotland.com/fami...rank/burns.htm
A Significant Scot - William Sharp
Scottish poet, literary biographer, and romantic story-teller.
We've now added...
Chapter 7 Dominion of Dreams
Chapter 8 The Devine Adventure
You can read these at http://www.electricscotland.com/hist...rp_william.htm
The Little White Bird by James Barrie
We've decided to serialize this book as part of the reason is that his famous Peter Pan first appeared in it which led to the play.
We've now added the next 3 chapters...
Chapter XXII - Joey
Chapter XXIII - Pilkington's
Chapter XXIV - Barbara
You can read these chapters at http://www.electricscotland.com/hist...rrie_james.htm
House of Green Shutters
Journalist, Teacher, Novelist, Short Story Writer, Critic
We've now added more chapters to the "House of Green Shutters" and now up to chapter XIX.
You can read these at http://www.electricscotland.com/hist...n_george_d.htm
A Hundred Years in the Highlands
By Osgood Hanbury MacKenzie of Inverewe (1921)
We are now up to chapter XII and here is how it starts...
Now I want to say something about my grandfather, Sir Hector Mackenzie, the fourth baronet, generally spoken of among Highlanders as An tighearna Storach (the buck-toothed laird). My uncle writes:
"I always think of my father as well on in life perhaps because we never saw him excited about anything, but always going about quietly, as if thinking deeply. If a dog pointed at a covey, he of course shot a bird with each barrel, but he never showed a trace of anxiety as to whether we picked them up or not, or where the other birds went. He was as quiet and composed as if it were none of his business, but only ours. I never heard of his having gone deer-stalking or taken part in any exciting work, but, though so quiet, he was always ready for a *twa-handed crack" and was bright and cheery about past, present and future. He enjoyed his meals and was a good hand at breakfast, being especially fond of smoked salmon and venison collops, at which none alive could match Kate Archy. If a dish met him with pepper in it, which he detested, he would quietly give it up, saying, perhaps, "I wish pepper was a guinea an ounce" or *The Lord sent us meat; we know where the cooks come from." On the sideboard there always stood before breakfast a bottle of whisky, smuggled of course, with plenty of camomile flowers, bitter orange-peel, and juniper berries in it—‘bitters' we called it—and of this he had a wee glass always before we sat down to breakfast, as a fine stomachic.
“It is impossible to imagine him mixed up with any jolly, rackety ploy, but I can see him now plainly standing on the edge of a drain for hours, directing every spadeful of earth thrown out or stone put in—for tiles were long after his day. He always held in his hand his double Joe Manton with flint-locks, in case of some vermin showing itself or a hare asking for a sudden shot; and as he was never in a hurry to fire and never fired till the animal was covered by the gun-button, the distance at which his gun killed seemed incredulous. At other times he would be busy directing the gardener about some plant, or would sit at his desk going over his rental ledgers, or listening to some complaint from a tenant. About Martinmas-time he would ride of! to Gairloch from Conon on his pony to collect rents, with saddle-bags behind him, but no valet, groom, factor, or clerk to help, and before Mackintosh's waterproof days, with no better waterproof cloak than a camlet. What a blessing it would be to landlord and tenant were all lairds now as well acquainted with their tenants and their circumstances as he was! He was the only son of his mother, and, I may add, the only child, and was left an orphan when a mere infant. His Uncle Mackenzie of Millbank, near Dingwall, had charge of him, and he seems to have grown up anyhow, till he fell into the hands of a tutor —the only one he ever had—the Rev. Mr. Robertson (afterwards Dr.), Minister of Eddleston in Peeblesshire.
You can read the rest of this chapter at http://www.electricscotland.com/hist.../chapter12.htm
You can read the other chapters at http://www.electricscotland.com/hist...dred/index.htm
For Puir Auld Scotland's Sake
A Book of Prose Essays on Scottish Literary and Rural Subjects by Hugh Haliburton (1887)
We have added the following chapters this week...
The Birth of Burns at Kilmarnock
The Old Harvest-Field
A Weet Hairst
Plea for Scottish Literature at the Universities
Lament for the Language
Scottish Proverbs
Here is how the chapter on The Old Harvest Field starts...
‘In hairst at the shearin'
Nae youngsters are jeerin';
At e’en i’ the gloamin’
Nae swankies are roamin’
’Bout stacks wi’ the lasses at bogle to play.’
WE have it on the word of an ancient annalist that the harvest was collected in some parts of Gaul nineteen hundred years ago, by a decapitating machine propelled through the standing corn. The propeller was a bullock, the machine an open box placed on wheels, with a toothed apparatus horizontally fitted to the fore part of it, and the modus operandi was a sort of heckling. The projecting comb caught the stalks just under the heads, and, as the machine moved forward, the precious heads were torn off between the close-set spikes and fell into the receiving box. The whole of the straw crop was, of course, lost where such a system of reaping was in use. It seems to have been sacrificed to a greedily expeditious method of appropriating the grain. The haste which recommended such a method, and the waste which it involved, make such a harvest seem to us, with our traditions and associations of the stooky field, a thieves’ harvest rather than that of thankful men.
It was hardly likely that a method of reaping at once so rude and so wasteful should to any considerable extent supersede the hook and antiquate the primeval traditions of the harvest-field. It was thought by its inventor, no doubt, to be an improvement on the old-established method ; and it cannot be denied that it contained some idea of the modern mechanical reaper, which is threatening, with every probability of fulfilling the threat, to revolutionise the harvest-field, and to antiquate the ancient services of the hook, and the hand. In this view of the subject, that old Gaulish engine of ox, box, and heckle, may claim in the achievements of its modern representative, a long-delayed victory over the primitive but popular hook. But in spite of its disuse and disappearance, the hook will remain to all time coming the symbol of work in the harvest-field. The rising and later generations may have no personal knowledge of its services, but the sickle lives for ever endeared to the imagination in our popular literature. There it suggests a condition of life which is fancied to have been perennial in the world’s golden age, but which is with each pursuing autumn less and less likely to recur in human history. Art with her hurry and her hundred hands is rapidly removing from our waking life the fragmentary memory of the age of gold in those rural felicities which the sickle symbolises.
You can read the rest of this chapter at http://www.electricscotland.com/hist.../chapter08.htm
The other chapters can be read at http://www.electricscotland.com/history/puir/index.htm
Songs from John Henderson
Global Recession – December, 2012
Some have Euros, some have Dollars, some have Pounds,
But their cost of living ups by leaps and bounds,
So the majority then borrow just as if there is no morrow
That in its turn all economic sense confounds.
Those with nothing in their pockets but a hole,
Live off welfare if by luck they're on the dole;
But those penniless and homeless feel their fates are worse than hopeless
As their cardboard boxes don't ward off the cold -
Oh, No! ....
Their cardboard bedrooms don't ward off the cold.
For our planet Earth the message is quite clear,
Our accelerating birth-rates cost us dear;
So each and ev'ry state must promise soon to take much greater notice,
And then minimise these threats when they appear.
There is only so much air for all to use,
And so many other things we still abuse;
But if sheer common sense prevails and few if any measure fails
Then we'll be sure for more a pleasant life ensues,
Oh, Yes! ...
Quite sure for more a worthwhile life ensues.
JH
Pretty well every week John sends us in at least one of his songs most of which are in the Doric language of the Aberdeenshire area of Scotland which you can read at http://www.electricscotland.com/poetry/doggerels.htm
Sir David Brewster
BREWSTER, a surname originally English, which in the present century has become distinguished in Scotland by its being borne by one who has acquired for himself a high place both in literature and science – Sir David Brewster, F.R.S., and corresponding member of the National Institute of France, born December 11th, 1781, the son of James Brewster, Esq., rector of the grammar school, Jedburgh. He was educated for the Church of Scotland, and was licensed to preach the gospel. In 1800, he received the honorary degree of M.A. from the university of Edinburgh, and, in 1807, that of LL.D. from the university of Aberdeen. In 1808, he was elected a fellow of the Royal Society of Edinburgh, and in the same year he undertook the editorship of the ‘Edinburgh Encyclopedia,’ which was only finished in 1830. Between 1801 and 1912, he devoted his attention chiefly to the study of optics; and in 1813, he published the results in a ‘Treatise on New Philosophical Instruments.’ In 1815, he received the Copley medal of the Royal Society for one of his discoveries in optical science; and soon after was admitted a Fellow of that body.
The following year he invented the Kaleidoscope, the patent right of which was evaded, so that the inventor gained little beyond fame, though the large sale of the instrument must have produced considerable profit. The same year, the Institute of France adjudged to him half of the physical prize of 3,000 francs, awarded for two of the most important discoveries made in Europe, in any branch of science, during the two preceding years. In 1819, Dr. Brewster received from the Royal Society the Rumford gold and silver medals, for his discoveries on the polarization of light. In the latter year, in conjunction with Professor Jamieson, he established ‘The Edinburgh Philosophical Journal,’ and subsequently commenced ‘The Edinburgh Journal of Science,’ of which 16 volumes appeared. In 1825, the Institute of France elected Dr. Brewster a corresponding member, and he received the same honour from the Royal Academies of Russia, Prussia, Sweden, and Denmark. In 1831, he proposed the meeting at York, which led to the establishment of the British Association for the advancement of Science.
The same year he received the decoration of the Hanoverian Guelphic Order; and, in 1832, the honour of knighthood from William IV. Besides contributing largely to the ‘Edinburgh Review,’ the ‘Transactions of the British Association,’ and other scientific societies, and the ‘North British Review,’ Sir David is the author of the following, among other popular works, viz.: ‘A Treatise on the Kaleidoscope;’ ‘A Treatise on Optics;’ ‘Letters on Natural Magic;’ ‘Life of Sir Isaac Newton;’ ‘More Worlds than One,’ in reply to Professor Whewell’s ‘Plurality of Worlds.’ He is one of the editors of ‘The London and Edinburgh Philosophical Magazine.’ In 1838 he was appointed, by the crown, principal of the united colleges of St. Salvator and St. Leonard, St. Andrews. On January 2, 1849, he was elected one of the eight Foreign Associate Members of the National Institute of France, vacant by the death of the celebrated chemist. M. Berzelius, and in 1855, the emperor of the French conferred on him the decoration of an officer of the legion of honour. The eight associate members of the Institute are generally regarded as the eight greatest celebrities in the learned world. Sir David has a pension from government of £300 a-year. He married 1st, a daughter of Macpherson, the translator of ‘Ossian’s Poems,’ and by her had several children; and 2dly, in 1857, Jane, daughter of Thomas Purcell, Esq. of Scarborough. In 1859 he was elected principal and vice-chancellor of the university of Edinburgh.
We are now working on a Memoir of him published by his daughter and this can be read at:
http://www.electricscotland.com/hist...n/brewster.htm
Clan Munro of Australia
We got in a copy of their December 2012 newsletter which you can read at:
http://www.electricscotland.com/fami...sletters/munro
Durness from Earliest Times
I have extracted this article from the Transactions of the Gaelic Society and the first section of this article starts...
I.—THE ABORIGINES.
As yet indeed the past history of our own land is made to tell its tale but stubbornly; for a dense cloud hangs over the early movements of man everywhere. Far back as we can go with any degree of certainty we find a race in our island-home anterior to our Celtic forefathers; a small-boned, black-haired, puny race of men who lived in the winter months in caves, and in wattled huts in summer. These were not our ancestors, though I should hesitate to say that we are altogether free from all traces of this pigmy race. They are made to speak a language which philologists in the main identify as Iberian ; and the student of place-names finds this language often a convenience by relegating to this unknown tongue any word which he cannot otherwise decipher. The part they played in our early history is hidden from our view by the mists of antiquity ; for they possessed the land at a time when the lion and tiger prowled in jungles over spots where stately domes now rear their heads. Their ways of life were rude and primitive; without flocks or herds, without skill or union, theirs was the pure barbaric life which is content with the present fare, and is careless of the future.
They made little impression upon the wildness of nature around them; for they knew not how to “subdue the earth and make it fruitful,” and by the working of that inexorable law, the survival of the fittest, they were destined soon to give way to a healthier, braver, stouter race. But have they left any traces behind them—any footprints to show the way by which they have travelled? Traces of their occupation indeed are few; besides one or two idioms in the Celtic language which are not of Aryan origin, and some half-dozen words which may find their explanation in this old tongue, we have no literary remains of this pre-historic race. There are, however, other monuments of antiquity in our midst which may, very possibly, be the work of this early tribe. These are the underground dwellings scattered over the land from the southernmost country in Scotland to Maeshow, in Orkney. These abodes are sometimes large and roomy; and the probable theory is that they were made to accommodate, during the storms of winter or the dangers of war, the leading families of these wandering savages. It is interesting to note that one of the largest in the land is in this Parish—on the western shore of Loch Eriboll, the demensions of which, as given in the Old Statistical Account, are 40 feet long, 6 feet high by 6 feet wide.
You can read this article at http://www.electricscotland.com/hist...es/durness.htm
The Social Progress of the Highlands since 1800
Another article from the Transactions of the Gaelic Society which was awarded the Prize Essay...
The prize of ten guineas offered by The Mackintosh of Mackintosh, under the auspices of the Society, for the best essay on “The Social Progress of the Highlands since 1800” was won by Mr A. Poison, teacher, Dunbeath.
You can read this essay at http://www.electricscotland.com/hist...les/social.htm
Gaelic Incantations
I extracted this article from an old copy of the Transactions of the Gaelic Society. As there are a lot of Gaelic words in it I decided to make it a pdf file but have provided a wee bit of the introduction here for you to read.
INTRODUCTORY
The belief in incantations, like that in the evil eye, is world-wide and world-old. An incantation consists of a formula of words which is recited to bring about certain physical results to which the meaning of the words has some correspondence more or less direct. Thus, in Scotland, a sprain is cured in this way. A black woollen thread, with nine knots made upon it, is tied round the sprained limb, and while the thread is being put on, the operator mutters these words :—
The Lord rade
And the foal slade;
He lighted,
And he righted,
Set joint to joint,
Bone to bone,
And sinew to sinew,
Heal in the Holy Ghost’s name!
The principle underlying this spell is that of analogy—the recital of what the Lord did, with a call for, or expectation of, similar healing, is supposed to effect the healing process
You can read this at http://www.electricscotland.com/hist...cantations.htm
And finally...
Nun's Story
An old nun who was living in a convent next to a Brooklyn construction site noticed the coarse language of the workers and decided to spend some time with them to correct their ways. She decided she would take her lunch, sit with the workers and talk with them. She put her sandwich in a brown bag and walked over to the spot where the men were eating. She walked up to the group and with a big smile said: "Do you men know Jesus Christ?"
They shook their heads and looked at each other. One of the workers looked up into the steelwork and yelled, "Anybody up there know Jesus Christ?"
One of the steelworkers yelled down a "Why"?
The worker yelled back, "His wife's here with his lunch."
-----
Democracy!
A bus-load of foreign visitors touring the Highlands stopped for lunch at an hotel. After eating, they adjourned to the lounge where the waitress addressed them.
"Raise your hands if you want coffee. And now, if you prefer tea."
Hands were raised accordingly to which the waitress announced: "The coffees have it."
She then swept out of the dining room to the kitchen.
And that's it for now and hope you all have a grand weekend.
Alastair
Electric Scotland News
Electric Canadian
Roughing it in the Bush
How Canada is leveraging its PPP expertise worldwide
The Flag in the Wind
Electric Scotland
Northern Notes and Queries
Robert Burns Lives!
A Significant Scot - William Sharp
The Little White Bird by James Barrie
The House of Green Shutters
A Hundred Years in the Highlands
For Puir Auld Scotland's Sake
Songs from John Henderson
Sir David Brewster
Clan Munro of Australia
Durness from Earliest Times
The Social Progress of the Highlands since 1800
Gaelic Incantations
Electric Scotland News
I have just noticed that Google is now doing regional analysis for the UK. Almost 25% of our total traffic comes from the UK and that means of that 25% England accounts for 58% of it and Scotland accounts for 38%. So in rough terms Scotland accounts for 10% of our total visitors. I remember in the first 5 years of our operation the highest the UK came was 4% of our total traffic.
The top 10 visiting cities in the UK are...
1. London
2. Edinburgh
3. Glasgow
4. Aberdeen
5. Belfast
6. Falkirk
7. Dundee
8. Birmingham
9. Manchester
10. Newcastle upon Tyne
-----
I have now deployed the Comment system throughout the Electric Scotland and Electric Canadian web sites. You will find this at the foot of every page of the site apart from the index page of Electric Scotland.
There are many ways in which this can be used. For example visitors have emailed in to say some information on a page is incorrect and have given details of the error. Well now they can add that information to the page by way of our comment system. Likewise they can also add additional information that they may have thus sharing it with our visitors.
Where you are a member of a clan you might visit our clan pages and add information about an event that is coming up and even provide a report on how it went.
As I have mentioned before you do need to be logged in to leave a message and due to these nasty spammers every comment will be moderated before appearing as a public comment.
You can also upload an image to go with your comment and add an appropriate link to a web site or blog. In some cases you might end up having a conversation with another visitor as you can reply to another persons comment thus creating your own thread.
-----
I got out my first newsletter for the Grand Priory of Canada so have added a pdf version of it to our Knights Templar forum in our Community. You can read it at http://www.electricscotland.org/foru...iory-of-Canada
-----
And I have now completed my Christmas shopping by purchasing some tins of that excellent whisky cake from Glenora Distillery in Cape Btreton along with a couple of miniatures to go with each one. I also purchased some excellent Scottish Cheese from the Scottish Store. I also did my quarterly visit to the British Store in London, Ontario and now have supplies of haggis, black pudding, potato scones, Ayrshire bacon and Irish sausages as well as square sausage and other delicacies. I even found a bag of Haggis and Black Pepper crisps which I've yet to try but they sure tweaked my interest.
Electric Canadian
Roughing it in the Bush
or Forrest Life in Canada by Susanna Moodie (1871). A new book we're starting.
Added the following chapters this week...
Uncle Joe and His Family
John Monaghan
Phoebe R-, And our Second Moving
Brian, The Still-Hunter
The Charivari
A Journey to the Woods
The Wilderness and our Indian Friends
You can read these chapters at http://www.electriccanadian.com/pion...hing/index.htm
How Canada is leveraging its PPP expertise worldwide
Early experience with public-private partnerships have enabled this nation’s deal makers and builders to exploit the global trend.
See this article at http://www.electriccanadian.com/transport/ppp.htm
The Flag in the Wind
This weeks edition was Compiled by Jim Lynch. As always a good mix of articles all from a Scottish Independence point of view.
You can read this weeks issue at http://www.scotsindependent.org
Electric Scotland
Northern Notes and Queries
This weeks issue is for January 1898 and can be found at the foot of the page at:
http://www.electricscotland.com/hist...hern/index.htm
I extracted one article from this issue which you can read at http://www.electricscotland.com/hist...niontracts.htm as I found it a most interesting commentary on the Union of the Crowns of England and Scotland. It's basically 3 letters from 3 different people with different perspectives on the Union.
Robert Burns Lives!
Edited by Frank Shaw
Robert Burns’s “The Twa Dogs”: ideological aspects of translation into Russian By Natalia Kaloh Vid
Dr. Natalia Kaloh Vid is our guest writer today. This is her second contribution to the pages of Robert Burns Lives! and it is hard to believe that it’s been nearly two years (February 2011) since her first article appeared on our web site. It seems like yesterday! Her first was entitled “Ideological Adaptations of Robert Burns in the Soviet Union”, and you can find it on the index page under Chapter 107.
Since 2011 three great events have happened in her life. First, she published a book on the subject of the above mentioned article, and I was pleased to write a blurb for the back of the publication. Then she successfully defended her second Ph.D. thesis on Modern Russian Literature. Third and most importantly, she gave birth to a beautiful daughter named Zhenia which, Natalia tells me, is a shorter version of the Russian name Evgenia. Yes, it has been a busy time for Dr. Vid, and I am grateful she is allowing another of her articles to grace these pages. To do so, she sought and received permission for the article to be shared with our readers from the Scottish Literary Review (see Spring/Summer 2011, Vol. 3, No. 1, Str. 1 – 20 where the article first appeared). Thanks are also extended to the Association for Scottish Literary Studies which publishes the journal.
Even though she is busy being mother to Zhenia, she has lots of help from husband Dejan and her grannies. It is good to learn that Natalia is back at work three days a week and that she will begin working on her second book on Mikhail Bulgakov. It really is a treat to have Dr. Vid share her thoughts and research in the article below, and I feel confident you will find it of interest. (FRS: 12.5.12)
You can read this article at http://www.electricscotland.com/fami...s_lives160.htm
Other articles in this series can be read at http://www.electricscotland.com/fami...rank/burns.htm
A Significant Scot - William Sharp
Scottish poet, literary biographer, and romantic story-teller.
We've now added...
Chapter 7 Dominion of Dreams
Chapter 8 The Devine Adventure
You can read these at http://www.electricscotland.com/hist...rp_william.htm
The Little White Bird by James Barrie
We've decided to serialize this book as part of the reason is that his famous Peter Pan first appeared in it which led to the play.
We've now added the next 3 chapters...
Chapter XXII - Joey
Chapter XXIII - Pilkington's
Chapter XXIV - Barbara
You can read these chapters at http://www.electricscotland.com/hist...rrie_james.htm
House of Green Shutters
Journalist, Teacher, Novelist, Short Story Writer, Critic
We've now added more chapters to the "House of Green Shutters" and now up to chapter XIX.
You can read these at http://www.electricscotland.com/hist...n_george_d.htm
A Hundred Years in the Highlands
By Osgood Hanbury MacKenzie of Inverewe (1921)
We are now up to chapter XII and here is how it starts...
Now I want to say something about my grandfather, Sir Hector Mackenzie, the fourth baronet, generally spoken of among Highlanders as An tighearna Storach (the buck-toothed laird). My uncle writes:
"I always think of my father as well on in life perhaps because we never saw him excited about anything, but always going about quietly, as if thinking deeply. If a dog pointed at a covey, he of course shot a bird with each barrel, but he never showed a trace of anxiety as to whether we picked them up or not, or where the other birds went. He was as quiet and composed as if it were none of his business, but only ours. I never heard of his having gone deer-stalking or taken part in any exciting work, but, though so quiet, he was always ready for a *twa-handed crack" and was bright and cheery about past, present and future. He enjoyed his meals and was a good hand at breakfast, being especially fond of smoked salmon and venison collops, at which none alive could match Kate Archy. If a dish met him with pepper in it, which he detested, he would quietly give it up, saying, perhaps, "I wish pepper was a guinea an ounce" or *The Lord sent us meat; we know where the cooks come from." On the sideboard there always stood before breakfast a bottle of whisky, smuggled of course, with plenty of camomile flowers, bitter orange-peel, and juniper berries in it—‘bitters' we called it—and of this he had a wee glass always before we sat down to breakfast, as a fine stomachic.
“It is impossible to imagine him mixed up with any jolly, rackety ploy, but I can see him now plainly standing on the edge of a drain for hours, directing every spadeful of earth thrown out or stone put in—for tiles were long after his day. He always held in his hand his double Joe Manton with flint-locks, in case of some vermin showing itself or a hare asking for a sudden shot; and as he was never in a hurry to fire and never fired till the animal was covered by the gun-button, the distance at which his gun killed seemed incredulous. At other times he would be busy directing the gardener about some plant, or would sit at his desk going over his rental ledgers, or listening to some complaint from a tenant. About Martinmas-time he would ride of! to Gairloch from Conon on his pony to collect rents, with saddle-bags behind him, but no valet, groom, factor, or clerk to help, and before Mackintosh's waterproof days, with no better waterproof cloak than a camlet. What a blessing it would be to landlord and tenant were all lairds now as well acquainted with their tenants and their circumstances as he was! He was the only son of his mother, and, I may add, the only child, and was left an orphan when a mere infant. His Uncle Mackenzie of Millbank, near Dingwall, had charge of him, and he seems to have grown up anyhow, till he fell into the hands of a tutor —the only one he ever had—the Rev. Mr. Robertson (afterwards Dr.), Minister of Eddleston in Peeblesshire.
You can read the rest of this chapter at http://www.electricscotland.com/hist.../chapter12.htm
You can read the other chapters at http://www.electricscotland.com/hist...dred/index.htm
For Puir Auld Scotland's Sake
A Book of Prose Essays on Scottish Literary and Rural Subjects by Hugh Haliburton (1887)
We have added the following chapters this week...
The Birth of Burns at Kilmarnock
The Old Harvest-Field
A Weet Hairst
Plea for Scottish Literature at the Universities
Lament for the Language
Scottish Proverbs
Here is how the chapter on The Old Harvest Field starts...
‘In hairst at the shearin'
Nae youngsters are jeerin';
At e’en i’ the gloamin’
Nae swankies are roamin’
’Bout stacks wi’ the lasses at bogle to play.’
WE have it on the word of an ancient annalist that the harvest was collected in some parts of Gaul nineteen hundred years ago, by a decapitating machine propelled through the standing corn. The propeller was a bullock, the machine an open box placed on wheels, with a toothed apparatus horizontally fitted to the fore part of it, and the modus operandi was a sort of heckling. The projecting comb caught the stalks just under the heads, and, as the machine moved forward, the precious heads were torn off between the close-set spikes and fell into the receiving box. The whole of the straw crop was, of course, lost where such a system of reaping was in use. It seems to have been sacrificed to a greedily expeditious method of appropriating the grain. The haste which recommended such a method, and the waste which it involved, make such a harvest seem to us, with our traditions and associations of the stooky field, a thieves’ harvest rather than that of thankful men.
It was hardly likely that a method of reaping at once so rude and so wasteful should to any considerable extent supersede the hook and antiquate the primeval traditions of the harvest-field. It was thought by its inventor, no doubt, to be an improvement on the old-established method ; and it cannot be denied that it contained some idea of the modern mechanical reaper, which is threatening, with every probability of fulfilling the threat, to revolutionise the harvest-field, and to antiquate the ancient services of the hook, and the hand. In this view of the subject, that old Gaulish engine of ox, box, and heckle, may claim in the achievements of its modern representative, a long-delayed victory over the primitive but popular hook. But in spite of its disuse and disappearance, the hook will remain to all time coming the symbol of work in the harvest-field. The rising and later generations may have no personal knowledge of its services, but the sickle lives for ever endeared to the imagination in our popular literature. There it suggests a condition of life which is fancied to have been perennial in the world’s golden age, but which is with each pursuing autumn less and less likely to recur in human history. Art with her hurry and her hundred hands is rapidly removing from our waking life the fragmentary memory of the age of gold in those rural felicities which the sickle symbolises.
You can read the rest of this chapter at http://www.electricscotland.com/hist.../chapter08.htm
The other chapters can be read at http://www.electricscotland.com/history/puir/index.htm
Songs from John Henderson
Global Recession – December, 2012
Some have Euros, some have Dollars, some have Pounds,
But their cost of living ups by leaps and bounds,
So the majority then borrow just as if there is no morrow
That in its turn all economic sense confounds.
Those with nothing in their pockets but a hole,
Live off welfare if by luck they're on the dole;
But those penniless and homeless feel their fates are worse than hopeless
As their cardboard boxes don't ward off the cold -
Oh, No! ....
Their cardboard bedrooms don't ward off the cold.
For our planet Earth the message is quite clear,
Our accelerating birth-rates cost us dear;
So each and ev'ry state must promise soon to take much greater notice,
And then minimise these threats when they appear.
There is only so much air for all to use,
And so many other things we still abuse;
But if sheer common sense prevails and few if any measure fails
Then we'll be sure for more a pleasant life ensues,
Oh, Yes! ...
Quite sure for more a worthwhile life ensues.
JH
Pretty well every week John sends us in at least one of his songs most of which are in the Doric language of the Aberdeenshire area of Scotland which you can read at http://www.electricscotland.com/poetry/doggerels.htm
Sir David Brewster
BREWSTER, a surname originally English, which in the present century has become distinguished in Scotland by its being borne by one who has acquired for himself a high place both in literature and science – Sir David Brewster, F.R.S., and corresponding member of the National Institute of France, born December 11th, 1781, the son of James Brewster, Esq., rector of the grammar school, Jedburgh. He was educated for the Church of Scotland, and was licensed to preach the gospel. In 1800, he received the honorary degree of M.A. from the university of Edinburgh, and, in 1807, that of LL.D. from the university of Aberdeen. In 1808, he was elected a fellow of the Royal Society of Edinburgh, and in the same year he undertook the editorship of the ‘Edinburgh Encyclopedia,’ which was only finished in 1830. Between 1801 and 1912, he devoted his attention chiefly to the study of optics; and in 1813, he published the results in a ‘Treatise on New Philosophical Instruments.’ In 1815, he received the Copley medal of the Royal Society for one of his discoveries in optical science; and soon after was admitted a Fellow of that body.
The following year he invented the Kaleidoscope, the patent right of which was evaded, so that the inventor gained little beyond fame, though the large sale of the instrument must have produced considerable profit. The same year, the Institute of France adjudged to him half of the physical prize of 3,000 francs, awarded for two of the most important discoveries made in Europe, in any branch of science, during the two preceding years. In 1819, Dr. Brewster received from the Royal Society the Rumford gold and silver medals, for his discoveries on the polarization of light. In the latter year, in conjunction with Professor Jamieson, he established ‘The Edinburgh Philosophical Journal,’ and subsequently commenced ‘The Edinburgh Journal of Science,’ of which 16 volumes appeared. In 1825, the Institute of France elected Dr. Brewster a corresponding member, and he received the same honour from the Royal Academies of Russia, Prussia, Sweden, and Denmark. In 1831, he proposed the meeting at York, which led to the establishment of the British Association for the advancement of Science.
The same year he received the decoration of the Hanoverian Guelphic Order; and, in 1832, the honour of knighthood from William IV. Besides contributing largely to the ‘Edinburgh Review,’ the ‘Transactions of the British Association,’ and other scientific societies, and the ‘North British Review,’ Sir David is the author of the following, among other popular works, viz.: ‘A Treatise on the Kaleidoscope;’ ‘A Treatise on Optics;’ ‘Letters on Natural Magic;’ ‘Life of Sir Isaac Newton;’ ‘More Worlds than One,’ in reply to Professor Whewell’s ‘Plurality of Worlds.’ He is one of the editors of ‘The London and Edinburgh Philosophical Magazine.’ In 1838 he was appointed, by the crown, principal of the united colleges of St. Salvator and St. Leonard, St. Andrews. On January 2, 1849, he was elected one of the eight Foreign Associate Members of the National Institute of France, vacant by the death of the celebrated chemist. M. Berzelius, and in 1855, the emperor of the French conferred on him the decoration of an officer of the legion of honour. The eight associate members of the Institute are generally regarded as the eight greatest celebrities in the learned world. Sir David has a pension from government of £300 a-year. He married 1st, a daughter of Macpherson, the translator of ‘Ossian’s Poems,’ and by her had several children; and 2dly, in 1857, Jane, daughter of Thomas Purcell, Esq. of Scarborough. In 1859 he was elected principal and vice-chancellor of the university of Edinburgh.
We are now working on a Memoir of him published by his daughter and this can be read at:
http://www.electricscotland.com/hist...n/brewster.htm
Clan Munro of Australia
We got in a copy of their December 2012 newsletter which you can read at:
http://www.electricscotland.com/fami...sletters/munro
Durness from Earliest Times
I have extracted this article from the Transactions of the Gaelic Society and the first section of this article starts...
I.—THE ABORIGINES.
As yet indeed the past history of our own land is made to tell its tale but stubbornly; for a dense cloud hangs over the early movements of man everywhere. Far back as we can go with any degree of certainty we find a race in our island-home anterior to our Celtic forefathers; a small-boned, black-haired, puny race of men who lived in the winter months in caves, and in wattled huts in summer. These were not our ancestors, though I should hesitate to say that we are altogether free from all traces of this pigmy race. They are made to speak a language which philologists in the main identify as Iberian ; and the student of place-names finds this language often a convenience by relegating to this unknown tongue any word which he cannot otherwise decipher. The part they played in our early history is hidden from our view by the mists of antiquity ; for they possessed the land at a time when the lion and tiger prowled in jungles over spots where stately domes now rear their heads. Their ways of life were rude and primitive; without flocks or herds, without skill or union, theirs was the pure barbaric life which is content with the present fare, and is careless of the future.
They made little impression upon the wildness of nature around them; for they knew not how to “subdue the earth and make it fruitful,” and by the working of that inexorable law, the survival of the fittest, they were destined soon to give way to a healthier, braver, stouter race. But have they left any traces behind them—any footprints to show the way by which they have travelled? Traces of their occupation indeed are few; besides one or two idioms in the Celtic language which are not of Aryan origin, and some half-dozen words which may find their explanation in this old tongue, we have no literary remains of this pre-historic race. There are, however, other monuments of antiquity in our midst which may, very possibly, be the work of this early tribe. These are the underground dwellings scattered over the land from the southernmost country in Scotland to Maeshow, in Orkney. These abodes are sometimes large and roomy; and the probable theory is that they were made to accommodate, during the storms of winter or the dangers of war, the leading families of these wandering savages. It is interesting to note that one of the largest in the land is in this Parish—on the western shore of Loch Eriboll, the demensions of which, as given in the Old Statistical Account, are 40 feet long, 6 feet high by 6 feet wide.
You can read this article at http://www.electricscotland.com/hist...es/durness.htm
The Social Progress of the Highlands since 1800
Another article from the Transactions of the Gaelic Society which was awarded the Prize Essay...
The prize of ten guineas offered by The Mackintosh of Mackintosh, under the auspices of the Society, for the best essay on “The Social Progress of the Highlands since 1800” was won by Mr A. Poison, teacher, Dunbeath.
You can read this essay at http://www.electricscotland.com/hist...les/social.htm
Gaelic Incantations
I extracted this article from an old copy of the Transactions of the Gaelic Society. As there are a lot of Gaelic words in it I decided to make it a pdf file but have provided a wee bit of the introduction here for you to read.
INTRODUCTORY
The belief in incantations, like that in the evil eye, is world-wide and world-old. An incantation consists of a formula of words which is recited to bring about certain physical results to which the meaning of the words has some correspondence more or less direct. Thus, in Scotland, a sprain is cured in this way. A black woollen thread, with nine knots made upon it, is tied round the sprained limb, and while the thread is being put on, the operator mutters these words :—
The Lord rade
And the foal slade;
He lighted,
And he righted,
Set joint to joint,
Bone to bone,
And sinew to sinew,
Heal in the Holy Ghost’s name!
The principle underlying this spell is that of analogy—the recital of what the Lord did, with a call for, or expectation of, similar healing, is supposed to effect the healing process
You can read this at http://www.electricscotland.com/hist...cantations.htm
And finally...
Nun's Story
An old nun who was living in a convent next to a Brooklyn construction site noticed the coarse language of the workers and decided to spend some time with them to correct their ways. She decided she would take her lunch, sit with the workers and talk with them. She put her sandwich in a brown bag and walked over to the spot where the men were eating. She walked up to the group and with a big smile said: "Do you men know Jesus Christ?"
They shook their heads and looked at each other. One of the workers looked up into the steelwork and yelled, "Anybody up there know Jesus Christ?"
One of the steelworkers yelled down a "Why"?
The worker yelled back, "His wife's here with his lunch."
-----
Democracy!
A bus-load of foreign visitors touring the Highlands stopped for lunch at an hotel. After eating, they adjourned to the lounge where the waitress addressed them.
"Raise your hands if you want coffee. And now, if you prefer tea."
Hands were raised accordingly to which the waitress announced: "The coffees have it."
She then swept out of the dining room to the kitchen.
And that's it for now and hope you all have a grand weekend.
Alastair
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