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1. Scotland
- Wilfrid Laurier University Press
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. . . O Life! how pleasant in thy morning, Young Fancy’s rays the hills adorning! —Robert Burns, “To James Smith” CHAPTER ONE Scotland This page intentionally left blank [52.91.255.225] Project MUSE (2024-03-28 22:45 GMT) M My name is David Forteath Caldow. My family lived in Dundrennan, a little village near the big town of Kirkcudbright (we pronounced it “Kircoobrie”), the capital of the shire. Kirkcudbright wasn’t really a big town, but we thought it was big. We were proud of the fact it was known as the place where Robbie Burns died. The fact that someone died there may seem an odd motive for town pride, but if you’re Scottish, anything to do with Robbie Burns makes you proud. I was born at home in Gatehouse, Scotland on August 15, 1903, one of the middle children. Of the five of us, I was the only one fed by bottle, cared for mostly by my sister, Mary. My mother couldn’t nurse me because, I’m told, she had “beelin’ breasts,” what we’d now call “infection.” Later, my father Joe Caldow, my mother Jane Maltman Caldow, my five brothers and sisters, and I shared a three-bedroom house, located about three miles outside of Dundrennan. With only three bedrooms, you’d expect the house was cramped, but we were never all of us in it at the same time. You see, as each of us reached fourteen years old, we were automatically out of school and off to work. Often we boarded where we worked, which was usual in those days. Our wee house was surrounded by a big vegetable garden that my father had tilled using plough and horses. As well as vegetables, we grew red and green gooseberries, lots of rhubarb, and big fruit 5 6 CHASING THE COMET trees. I remember sometimes our apples were spotted, but we ate them gratefully anyway. If any of us children were caught picking and eating without permission, we got a good going over because all produce not eaten fresh was slotted for jams or preserves. Those of us small enough to live at home always had a job to do when we weren’t in school, even on Saturdays. It was then we went into the surrounding countryside picking wild gooseberries, raspberries, and sloes. When the season wasn’t right for picking, there were other jobs found. We gathered the eggs of birds we called peeseweeps, or lapwings, selling them for maybe a silver shilling apiece. The eggs were valued for their use in making medicine. Sometimes, we’d walk the fields finding wool, shed naturally from the sheep. Mother took this wool to the local wool mill, to be made into rough cloth for our trousers and jackets. We all worked hard and were proud of our achievements. Mother took us to church every Sunday morning, then to Bible class at night. I didn’t understand much at church, especially when the preacher ranted about the glories of heaven and the fires of hell. Comments and spankings had already convinced me I was bad, so for a while the preacher’s sermons made it seem certain I’d be going to hell. Scottish storms seemed a form of this hell to me. I was terrified of the roar of thunder when I was small, even though mother and father told me not to be afraid, there was nothing to it. We little ones told each other it was God making thunder because He wasn’t pleased with what we were doing, and we believed our own stories. When I grew a little older and observed the “goings on” of some of those considered pious, I’d say to myself, Well, if they’re going to heaven, so am I. Then I began to feel better about myself. (Nowadays, I don’t go to church. I believe people have to be good to one another, but I don’t like all the “politics” that comes with churches.) When I was about ten, I had a job walking the big stallions for “The Banks,” a farm owned by Drew Montgomery, one of the most famous breeders of Clydesdale horses in Scotland. His Clydesdales [52.91.255.225] Project MUSE (2024-03-28 22:45 GMT) Scotland 7 were selectively bred. The desired characteristics are similar to those modelled by a Shetland pony: nice flat bones, hair on the legs, an ideal body shape, but...