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Physical and intellectual greatness were so invariably combined in those days that the two were thought by many vulgar minds to go hand in hand; but even in the "Six Feet Club" there were few who presented in all respect a more distingué appearance than the subject of these remarks. Another of Bell's most intimate friends during these years was James Hogg, the "Ettrick Shepherd."
"You're between Gaisford and me," said Ettrick, detaching him for a cocktail and cigarette at the far end of the room. "I'm proposing your health, you'll have to reply; and that'll be all the speeches, unless we sit late. Manders has promised to come as soon as he can get away from the theatre, and that may start the ball again. By the way, is it official yet? I haven't seen any announcement."
"Gang into an Exhibition," says the Ettrick Shepherd, "and only look at a crowd o' cockneys, some with specs, and some wi' quizzing-glasses, and faces without ae grain o' meaning in them o' ony kind whatsomever, a' glowering, perhaps, at a picture o' ane o' Nature's maist fearfu' or magnificent warks!
Besides the Abbey of Melrose, we have seen many interesting places in this neighbourhood. To-day we have been a delightful drive through Ettrick Forest, and to the ruins of Newark the hall of Newark, where the ladies bent their necks of snow to hear the Lay of the Last Minstrel.
On one night, a large flock of lambs that were under the Ettrick Shepherd's care, frightened by something, scampered away in three different directions across the hills, in spite of all that he could do to keep them together. "Sirrah," said the shepherd, "they're a' awa!"
Weel, the first Sabbath day, we gaed to the auld Scotch kirk, and we were starvin' for the bread o' life. "Naethin' had we had but the bit sweeties o' the English kirk near by, wi' their confections an' ance we gaed to the Catholic, but it was a holiday. Weel, as I was sayin', we gaed to the Ettrick kirk an' the minister came into the pulpit wi' his goon an' bands fair graun it was.
Poor James Hogg, the Ettrick Shepherd, came to advise with me about his affairs, he is sinking under the times; having no assistance to give him, my advice, I fear, will be of little service. I am sorry for him if that would help him, especially as, by his own account, a couple of hundred pounds would carry him on. February 16. "Misfortune's gowling bark" comes louder and louder.
I'll engage that he was born between Ettrick and Liddel." "He kens!" Peter remarked with a twinkle. "My name's no' far frae Ettrick, sir." "My friend, Pete Scott," said Foster. "You have heard the ladies' names, Pete, but this is my partner, Mr. Featherstone, from the Garth." Pete lifted his hand to his forehead and the movement had a touch of dignity.
One summer evening they were returning from the fields together, the sun was sinking in the west, the Ettrick murmured along by their side, and the voice of the wood-dove was heard from the copse-wood which covered the hills. "Why are you so sad, brother Philip?" said Mary; "would you hide anything from your own sister?" "Do not call me brother, Mary," said he earnestly "do not call me brother!"
All life's apparent discord is harmony itself when He determines the departments and allots to every thing, and to every man, his work! "You speak of Ettrick! What know you of Ettrick? What is her name that lives there?" I heard Mr. Blake ask in a faltering whisper, unheard by the rigid worshippers.
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