The Story of My Boyhood and Youth | Page 6

belonged to a physician, and a servant girl told us
that the ghost of the dead doctor haunted one of the unoccupied rooms
in the second story that was kept dark on account of a heavy
window-tax. Our bedroom was adjacent to the ghost room, which had
in it a lot of chemical apparatus,--glass tubing, glass and brass retorts,
test-tubes, flasks, etc.,--and we thought that those strange articles were
still used by the old dead doctor in compounding physic. In the long
summer days David and I were put to bed several hours before sunset.
Mother tucked us in carefully, drew the curtains of the big
old-fashioned bed, and told us to lie still and sleep like gude bairns; but
we were usually out of bed, playing games of daring called
"scootchers," about as soon as our loving mother reached the foot of the
stairs, for we couldn't lie still, however hard we might try. Going into
the ghost room was regarded as a very great scootcher. After venturing
in a few steps and rushing back in terror, I used to dare David to go as
far without getting caught.
The roof of our house, as well as the crags and walls of the old castle,
offered fine mountaineering exercise. Our bedroom was lighted by a
dormer window. One night I opened it in search of good scootchers and
hung myself out over the slates, holding on to the sill, while the wind
was making a balloon of my nightgown. I then dared David to try the
adventure, and he did. Then I went out again and hung by one hand,
and David did the same. Then I hung by one finger, being careful not to
slip, and he did that too. Then I stood on the sill and examined the edge
of the left wall of the window, crept up the slates along its side by
slight finger-holds, got astride of the roof, sat there a few minutes
looking at the scenery over the garden wall while the wind was howling

and threatening to blow me off, then managed to slip down, catch hold
of the sill, and get safely back into the room. But before attempting this
scootcher, recognizing its dangerous character, with commendable
caution I warned David that in case I should happen to slip I would grip
the rain-trough when I was going over the eaves and hang on, and that
he must then run fast downstairs and tell father to get a ladder for me,
and tell him to be quick because I would soon be tired hanging
dangling in the wind by my hands. After my return from this capital
scootcher, David, not to be outdone, crawled up to the top of the
window-roof, and got bravely astride of it; but in trying to return he lost
courage and began to greet (to cry), "I canna get doon. Oh, I canna get
doon." I leaned out of the window and shouted encouragingly, "Dinna
greet, Davie, dinna greet, I'll help ye doon. If you greet, fayther will
hear, and gee us baith an awfu' skelping." Then, standing on the sill and
holding on by one hand to the window-casing, I directed him to slip his
feet down within reach, and, after securing a good hold, I jumped inside
and dragged him in by his heels. This finished scootcher-scrambling for
the night and frightened us into bed.
In the short winter days, when it was dark even at our early bedtime,
we usually spent the hours before going to sleep playing voyages
around the world under the bed-clothing. After mother had carefully
covered us, bade us good-night and gone downstairs, we set out on our
travels. Burrowing like moles, we visited France, India, America,
Australia, New Zealand, and all the places we had ever heard of; our
travels never ending until we fell asleep. When mother came to take a
last look at us, before she went to bed, to see that we were covered, we
were oftentimes covered so well that she had difficulty in finding us,
for we were hidden in all sorts of positions where sleep happened to
overtake us, but in the morning we always found ourselves in good
order, lying straight like gude bairns, as she said.
Some fifty years later, when I visited Scotland, I got one of my Dunbar
schoolmates to introduce me to the owners of our old home, from
whom I obtained permission to go upstairs to examine our bedroom
window and judge what sort of adventure getting on its roof must have
been, and with all my after experience in mountaineering, I found that

what I had done in daring boyhood was now beyond my skill.
Boys are often at once cruel and merciful, thoughtlessly hard-hearted
and tender-hearted,