that could not be washed out. Then, of course, came a correspondingly
severe punishment from both father and teacher.

Another favorite sport was climbing trees and scaling garden-walls.
Boys eight or ten years of age could get over almost any wall by
standing on each other's shoulders, thus making living ladders. To
make walls secure against marauders, many of them were finished on top
with broken bottles imbedded in lime, leaving the cutting edges
sticking up; but with bunches of grass and weeds we could sit or stand
in comfort on top of the jaggedest of them.

Like squirrels that begin to eat nuts before they are ripe, we began
to eat apples about as soon as they were formed, causing, of course,
desperate gastric disturbances to be cured by castor oil. Serious were
the risks we ran in climbing and squeezing through hedges, and, of
course, among the country folk we were far from welcome. Farmers
passing us on the roads often shouted by way of greeting: "Oh, you
vagabonds! Back to the toon wi' ye. Gang back where ye belang. You're
up to mischief, Ise warrant. I can see it. The gamekeeper'll catch ye,
and maist like ye'll a' be hanged some day."

Breakfast in those auld-lang-syne days was simple oatmeal porridge,
usually with a little milk or treacle, served in wooden dishes called
"luggies," formed of staves hooped together like miniature tubs about
four or five inches in diameter. One of the staves, the lug or ear, a
few inches longer than the others, served as a handle, while the
number of luggies ranged in a row on a dresser indicated the size of
the family. We never dreamed of anything to come after the porridge,
or of asking for more. Our portions were consumed in about a couple of
minutes; then off to school. At noon we came racing home ravenously