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"It's o' nae use tellin' ye how I gaed back in the farm. In the year
sixteen my crops warna worth takin' aff the ground, and I had twa score
o' sheep smothered the same winter. I fell behint wi' my rent; and
household furniture, farm-stock, and everything I had, were to be sold
off. The day before the sale, wi' naething but a bit bundle carrying in
my hand, I took Jeannie on my ae arm and her puir auld mither on the
other, and wi' a sad and sorrowfu' heart we gaed out o' the door o' the
hame where our bairns had been brought up, and a sheriff's officer
steeked it behint us. Weel, we gaed to Coldstream, and we took a bit
room there, and furnished it wi' a few things that a friend bought back
for us at our sale. We were very sair pinched. Margaret's gudeman ne'er
looked near us, nor rendered us the least assistance, and she hadna it
in her power. There was nae ither alternative that I could see; and I
was just gaun to apply for labouring wark when we got a letter frae
Andrew, enclosing a fifty-pound bank-note. Mony a tear did Jeannie and
me shed ower that letter. He informed us that he had been appointed mate
o' an East Indiaman, and begged that we would keep ourselves easy; for
while he had a sixpence, his faither and mither should hae the half o't.
Margaret's husband very soon squandered away the money he had got frae
me, as weel as the property he had got frae his faither; and, to escape
the jail, he ran off, and left his wife and family. They cam to stop wi'
me; and for five years we heard naething o' him. We had begun a shop in
the spirit and grocery line, and really we were remarkably fortunate. It
was about six years after I had begun business, ae night just after the
shop was shut, Jeannie and her mother, wha was then about ninety, and
Margaret and her bairns, and mysel', were a' sittin' round the fire,
when a rap cam to the door; ane o' the bairns ran and opened it, and twa
gentlemen cam in. Margaret gied a shriek, and ane o' them flung himsel'
at her feet. 'Mother! faither!' said the other, 'do ye no ken me?' It
was our son Andrew, and Margaret's gudeman! I jamp up, and Jeannie jamp
up; auld grannie raise totterin' to her feet, and the bairns screamed,
puir things. I got haud o' Andrew, and his mother got haud o' him, and
we a' grat wi' joy. It was such a night o' happiness as I had never
kenned before. Andrew had been made a ship captain. Margaret's husband
had repented o' a' his follies, and was in a good wa