The McBrides

The McBrides, by John Sillars

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Title: The McBrides A Romance of Arran
Author: John Sillars

Release Date: October 22, 2007 [eBook #23152]
Language: English
Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1
***START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE MCBRIDES***
E-text prepared by Al Haines

THE McBRIDES
A Romance of Arran
by
JOHN SILLARS
Fifth Impression

The Ryerson Press, Toronto William Blackwood and Sons Edinburgh and London 1922

TO
MY MOTHER

LIST OF GAELIC NAMES AND EXPRESSIONS.
Crotal, lichen. "A traill," you sluggard. Cleiteadh mor, big ridge of rocks. Bothanairidh, summer sheiling. Birrican, a place name. Rhuda ban, white headland. Bealach an sgadan, Herring slap. Skein dubh, black knife. Crubach, lame. Mo ghaoil, my darling. Direach sin, (just that), (now do you see). Lag 'a bheithe, hollow of the birch. Mo bhallach, my boy. Ceilidh, visit (meeting of friends); ceilidhing; ceilidher. Cha neil, negative, no. Mo leanabh, my child. Cailleachs, old women. Og, young. Mhari nic Cloidh, Mary Fullarton.

CONTENTS.
PART I.
CHAP.
I. WHICH TELLS OF THE COMING OF THE GIPSY II. MAKES SOME MENTION OF ONE JOCK McGILP, AND TELLS HOW BELLE BROUGHT THE WEAN IN THE TARTAN SHAWL INTO THE HOUSE OF NOURN III. IN WHICH I CHASE DEER AND SEE STRANGE HORSEMEN ON THE HILL, AND A LIGHT FLASHING ON THE SEA IV. I MEET JOCK McGILP AND HIS MATE McNEILAGE AT THE TUBS' INN, AND LEARN WHAT HAS BECOME OF THE WEAN IN THE TARTAN SHAWL V. MIRREN STUART'S ERRAND VI. WE TRAMP THROUGH THE SNOW TO McKELVIE'S INN VII. WE SAIL IN McKELVIE'S SKIFF TO THE HOLY ISLAND VIII. THE DEATH OF McDEARG, THE RED LAIRD IX. MIRREN STUART BIDS HER DOG LIE DOWN X. DOL BEAG IS FLUNG INTO A FIRE XI. THE BLAZING WHINS XII. McALLAN'S LOCKER XIII. DAN McBRIDE SAILS FROM LOCH BANZA XIV. WE RETURN XV. THE STRANGER ON THE MOORS XVI. I HAVE SOME TALK WITH McGILP IN McKINNON'S KITCHEN
PART II.
XVII. I TURN SCHOOLMASTER XVIII. THE FIRST MEETING XIX. THE RIDERS ON THE MOOR XX. "THE LOVE SECRET" XXI. DOL BEAG LAUGHS XXII. THE SHAMELESS LASS XXIII. HELEN AND BRYDE McBRIDE REST AT THE FOOT OF THE URIE XXIV. THE HALFLIN'S MESSAGE XXV. I RIDE AGAIN TO McALLAN'S LOCKER XXVI. A WEDDING ON THE DOORSTEP XXVII. MARGARET McBRIDE KISSES HELEN XXVIII. IN WHICH BETTY COMPLAINS OF GROWING-PAINS XXIX. THE RAKING BLACK SCHOONER XXX. TELLS WHERE BRYDE MET HAMISH OG XXXI. BRYDE AND MARGARET XXXII. BRYDE AND HELEN XXXIII. HOW JOHN McCOOK HEARS OF THE PLOY AT THE CLATES XXXIV. WHAT CAME OF THE PLOY XXXV. DOL BEAG LAUGHS AGAIN

THE McBRIDES.
PART I.
CHAPTER I.
WHICH TELLS OF THE COMING OF THE GIPSY.
It was April among the hills, waes me, the far-away days of my youth, when the hills were smiling through the mists of their tears, and the green grasses thrusting themselves through the withered mat of the pasture like slender fairy swords. April in the hills, with the curlews crying far out on the moorside, past the Red Ground my grandfather wrought, and where again the heather will creep down, rig on rig, for all the stone dykes, deer fences, and tile drains that ever a man put money in. I never knew why it was they called it "Red Ground," for it was mostly black peaty soil, but my grandfather would be saying, "It will be growing corn. Give it wrack, and it will be growing corn for evermore."
They tell me he was a great farmer for all he was laird, and never happier than at his own plough tail, breaking a colt to work in chains; and he it was who improved the stock in cattle and horse in our glens, for he would be aye telling the young farmers, "Gie the quey calves plenty o' milk, as much as they'll lash into themselves. Be good to them when the baby flesh is on them, and they'll grow and thrive, and your siller'll a' come back in the milking."
The countryside clavered and havered when he bought his pedigree bulls and his pedigree mares. "It's money clean wasted," said the old farmers, "for a calf's a calf no odds what begets it, and a horse that can work in chains and take its turn on the road is horse enough for any man, without sinking money in dumb beasts, and a' this sire-and-dam pother." It would anger the old man that talk, ay, even when he was the old frail frame of what once he was,--like a dead and withered ash-tree, dourly awaiting the death gale to send it crashing down, to lie where once its shade fell in the hot summer days of