he Millers also. My
father's losses by bad debts were fully L10,000 in all. John Thom of
Uras, Stonehaven, was also one of the firm that lost heavily, and has
always, to his credit, paid 20s. in the pound. It was a saying of an
old friend of mine that no great breeder or great cattle-dealer ever
died rich; and this has held good in the great majority of cases. John
Elliot and William Brown bought largely of our Aberdeen cattle, and
attended Aikey Fair as well as Falkirk. Brown, who was very clever, had
raised himself from being an Irish drover. He rented a farm in the
neighbourhood of Carlisle, and died a few years ago much respected.
Elliot was a Carlisle man, and so were the Millers. Elliot latterly
became a Smithfield salesman, but died many years ago. But Robert
M'Turk stood, in my estimation, at the top of the tree. I have known
him buy seventy score of Highlanders at the October Falkirk Tryst
without dismounting from his pony. I have seen seventy-five score of
Galloways belonging to him in one drove passing through Carlisle to
Norfolk. I have known him buy from a thousand to two thousand of our
large county cattle at Falkirk, sweeping the fair of the best lots
before other buyers could make up their minds to begin. He rented large
grazings in Dumfriesshire, where he wintered and grazed the
Highlanders, and which, I believe, his relatives still retain. He was a
warm friend, and very kind to me when I was almost a boy, and on a busy
day he trusted me to cull the beasts he had bought from myself. I shall
never see his like again at Falkirk or any other place. I have a vivid
recollection of the stout-built man upon his pony, buying his cattle by
the thousand; his calm and composed demeanour was a striking contrast
to the noise made by some jobbers at our fairs in even the buying of an
old cow. Although plain in manner, he was a thorough gentleman, devoid
of slang and equivocation. He was the Captain Barclay of Dumfriesshire,
and furnished an exception to my friend's remark, for he died in
independent circumstances. He paid for all his cattle ready money.

The Carmichaels were another extensive firm of English dealers; they
bought largely at Falkirk, Aikey Fair, and in the north. Robert
Carmichael, of Ratcliffe Farm, near Stirling, was many years appointed
a judge of Highlanders at the Highland Society's shows. But we had also
the Hawick Club, a set of giants--Halliburton, Scott, and Harper--a
very wealthy firm; and Ja