The patriarchal simplicity of manners which about the middle of last
century, so especially characterised the Scottish husbandmen of the
Lowlands, was calculated, in a high degree, to foster deep affections,
and a sober but manly earnestness both of principle and deportment; and
it may be fairly stated as one of the happy privileges of the Scottish
church, that so large a number of its ministers have sprung from this
virtuous and valuable order of men. The following brief description of
the mode of life and household discipline of a Scottish farmer of former
days, is a sketch, by an eye-witness, from early recollections of scenes
long gone by:--
“When old simplicity was yet in prime;
For now among our glens the faithful fail,
Forgetful of their sires in olden time;
That grey-haired race is gone, of look sublime,
Calm in demeanour, courteous, and sincere,
Yet stern when duty called them, as their clime,
When it flings off the autumnal foliage sere,
And shakes the shuddering woods with solemn voice severe.”
The habitation of a Scottish husbandman in the southern counties, sixty
or seventy years ago, was generally a plain, substantial stone building,
holding a middle rank between the residences of the inferior gentry and
the humble cottages of the labouring peasantry. The farm-house, with the
small windows of its second story often projecting through the thatched
roof, occupied for the most part, the one side of a quadrangle, in which
the young cattle were folded; the other three sides being enclosed and
sheltered by the barns, stables, and other farm offices. A
kitchen-garden stocked with the common potherbs then in use, and
sometimes with a few fruit trees, extended on one side, sheltered
perhaps by a hedge of boortree or elder, and often skirted by a few aged
forest trees; while the low, thatched dwellings of the hinds and cotters
stood at a little distance, each with its small cabbage-garden, or
_kail-yard_, behind, and its stack of peat, or turf fuel in front.
An upland farm, of the common average size, extending to three, four or
five hundred acres, partly arable and partly pastoral, usually employed
three or four ploughs; and the master’s household, exclusive of his own
family, consisted of six or seven unmarried servants, male and female.
The married servants--namely, a head shepherd, and a _hind_ or two (as
the married ploughmen were termed)--occupied cottages apart; as likewise
did the _cotters_, who were rather a sort of farm-retainers than
servants, being bound only to give the master, in lieu of rent, their
services in hay-time and harvest, and at other stated periods. The
whole, however, especially in remote situations, formed a sort of little
independent community in themselves, deriving their subsistence almost
exclusively from the produce of the farm. The master’s household alone
usually amounted to fifteen or twenty souls; and the whole population of
the farm, or _onstead_, to double or treble that number,--a number
considerably greater, perhaps, than will now be commonly found on a farm
of the same extent,--but maintained with much frugality, and always
industriously occupied, though not oppressed with labour.
Little of the jealous distinction of ranks which now subsists between
the farming class and their hired servants, was then known. The
connexion between master and servant had less of a commercial, and more
of a patriarchal character. Every household formed but one society. The
masters (at that time generally a sober, virtuous, and religious class)
extended a parental care over their servants, and the servants cherished
a filial affection for their masters. They sat together, they ate
together, they often wrought together; and after the labours of the day
were finished, they assembled together around the blazing fire in the
“farmer’s ha’,” conversing over the occurrences of the day, the floating
rumours of the country, or “auld warld stories;” and not unfrequently
religious subjects were introduced, or the memory of godly men, and of
those who, in evil times, had battled or suffered for the right, was
affectionately commemorated. This familiar intercourse was equally
decorous as it was kindly,--for decent order and due subordination were
strictly maintained. It was the great concern of masters and mistresses,
when new servants were required, to obtain such as were of sober and
religious habits: if one of a different character got in, his dismissal,
at the first term, was certain. Servants in those days never thought of
changing masters, unless something occurred which rendered the change
indispensable.
At ordinary meals, the master (or _good-man_, as he was termed) took his
seat at the head of the large hall table, the mistress sitting on his
right hand, the children on his left, the men-servants next in station,
and the maid-servants at the bottom,--one of the latter serving. The use
of tea was then unknown, except in the houses of the gentry. Porridge
was the constant dish at breakfast and supper; at dinner broth and meat,
milk, cheese, and butter. Twice in the year, exclusive of extraordinary
occasions, there was a farm festival, in which every inhabitant of the
place partook; namely, the _kirn_ or harvest-home, at the close of
autumn, and the celebration of the new year. On these occasions, an
abundant feast of baked and boiled cheered the heart of the humblest
labourer on the land, and was closed with decent hilarity by a cheerful
beaker or two of home-brewed ale.
But the religious order of the family was the distinguishing trait. The
whole household assembled in the hall (or kitchen) in the morning,
before breakfast, for family worship, and in the evening before supper.
The good-man, of course, led their devotions, every one having his Bible
in his hand. This was the stated course even in seed-time and harvest;
between five and six in the morning was the hour of prayer in these busy
seasons.
On Sabbath all went to church, however great the distance, except one
person, in turn, to take care of the house or younger children, and
others to tend the cattle. After a late dinner, on their return, the
family assembled around the master, who first catechised the children
and then the servants. Each was required to tell what he remembered of
the religious services in which they had joined; each repeated a portion
of the shorter catechism; and all were then examined on heads of
divinity, from the mouth of the master. Throughout the whole of the
Sabbath, all worldly concerns except such as necessity or mercy required
to be attended to, were strictly laid aside; and nothing was allowed to
enter into conversation save subjects of religion.
These homely details may perhaps seem, at first sight, calculated to
corroborate, in some respects, the exaggerated notions which prevail in
England, respecting the religious austerity of the old Presbyterians;
and readers, looking exclusively to the strictness of their discipline,
their alleged “proscription of all amusements,” the limited education,
the want of books, and, above all, the want of refinement which,
according to our modern notions, might be expected to be the necessary
result of familiar association with menial servants,--may possibly
picture to themselves a state of society altogether clownish,
melancholy, and monotonous. Yet this would be a very false estimate of
the real character and condition of the old Scottish tenantry.
The life of the husbandman and his dependents, in those days, were so
far from being unenlivened by mirth and enjoyment, that there was in
truth much more real enjoyment than is now often to be witnessed. They
had more _leisure_ to be merry than their descendants, and there was, in
reality, no proscription of _innocent_ amusements. Spring and autumn
were the only seasons that required _very_ arduous labour in the old
system of husbandry; and then those seasons came round with an air of
more festivity, and more of a heart-stirring aspect about them, and
their toils were encountered with a more grateful alacrity than in our
days:--at least so it appears to one who looks back upon them. At other
seasons of the year the labours were comparatively light. The _winning_
of peats and hay, ewe-milking, sheep-shearing, the dairy, and the
tending of the flocks and herds, chiefly occupied the jocund days of
summer. In winter their leisure was still greater, and their enjoyments
not less diversified. Field-sports were eagerly followed in the
intervals of labour, or when frost and snow had stopped the progress of
the plough; nor were the peasantry then restrained from such hardy
amusements by the enforcement of demoralizing game-laws. At other times,
the grave good-man would toss down to his sons and servant-lads the
foot-ball or the _kitticat_, and bid them take a bout to warm their
youthful blood. And in the long winter evenings, when seated around the
fire, harmless mirth and jocularity pleasantly alternated with more
grave and instructive conversation; nor did any puritanical sourness
forbid the recitation of the old romantic border ballads and legends, or
the singing of the sweet pastoral songs, of which both the poetry and
the music were, like the broom and birch of the braes around them, the
spontaneous and unsophisticated growth of their own beautiful country.
And thus, with very few books of mere amusement, and without any games
of chance, or stimulating liquors, our simple ancestors managed to
beguile their hours of leisure and relaxation cheerfully and innocently;
and, on the whole perhaps, quite as rationally, if not quite so
elegantly, as their more bustling and ambitious offspring. Amidst the
manifold improvements of more recent times, (the value of which, in many
respects, we are far from denying,) it may yet be considered very
questionable, whether _all_ that has been abandoned of former manners
has been equally well replaced, and whether even our progress in
refinement has not been but too dearly purchased by the sacrifice of
qualities still more valuable.
⁂ The preceding article is extracted from a ‘Memoir of the Rev. Dr.
Waugh,’ and has been furnished to us, with some alterations, by the
writer, himself the son of a Scottish farmer.
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