hungry. The midday meal, called dinner, was usually vegetable broth, a
small piece of boiled mutton, and barley-meal scone. None of us liked
the barley scone bread, therefore we got all we wanted of it, and in
desperation had to eat it, for we were always hungry, about as hungry
after as before meals. The evening meal was called "tea" and was
served on our return from school. It consisted, as far as we children
were concerned, of half a slice of white bread without butter,
barley scone, and warm water with a little milk and sugar in it, a
beverage called "content," which warmed but neither cheered nor
inebriated. Immediately after tea we ran across the street with our
books to Grandfather Gilrye, who took pleasure in seeing us and
hearing us recite our next day's lessons. Then back home to supper,
usually a boiled potato and piece of barley scone. Then family
worship, and to bed.

Our amusements on Saturday afternoons and vacations depended mostly on
getting away from home into the country, especially in the spring when
the birds were calling loudest. Father sternly forbade David and me
from playing truant in the fields with plundering wanderers like
ourselves, fearing we might go on from bad to worse, get hurt in
climbing over walls, caught by gamekeepers, or lost by falling over a
cliff into the sea. "Play as much as you like in the back yard and
garden," he said, "and mind what you'll get when you forget and
disobey." Thus he warned us with an awfully stern countenance, looking
very hard-hearted, while naturally his heart was far from hard, though
he devoutly believed in eternal punishment for bad boys both here and
hereafter. Nevertheless, like devout martyrs of wildness, we stole
away to the seashore or the green, sunny fields with almost religious
regularity, taking advantage of opportunities when father was very
busy, to join our companions, oftenest to hear the birds sing and hunt