Folk ask me, whiles, hoo it comes that I dwell still sae far frae the centre o’ the world—­as they’ve a way o’ dubbin London!  I like London, fine, ye’ll ken.  It’s a grand toon.  I’d be an ungrateful chiel did I no keep a warm spot for the place that turned me frae a provincial comic into what I’m lucky enow to be the day.  But I’m no wishfu’ to pass my days and nichts always in the great city.  When I’ve an engagement there, in the halls or in a revue, ’tis weel enow, and I’m happy.  But always and again there’ll be somethin’ tae mak’ me mindfu’ o’ the Clyde and ma wee hoose at Dunoon, and ma thochts wull gae fleein’ back to Scotland.

It’s ma hame—­that’s ane thing.  There’s a magic i’ that word, for a’ it’s sae auld.  But there’s mair than that in the love I ha’ for Dunoon and all Scotland.  The city’s streets—­aye, they’re braw, whiles, and they’ve brocht me happiness and fun, and will again, I’m no dootin’.  Still—­oh, listen tae me whiles I speak o’ the city and the glen!  I’m a loon on that subject, ye’ll be thinkin’, maybe, but can I no mak’ ye see, if ye’re a city yin, hoo it is I feel?

London’s the most wonderfu’ city i’ the world, I do believe.  I ken ithers will be challenging her.  New York, Chicago—­braw cities, both.  San Francisco is mair picturesque than any, in some ways.  In Australia, Sydney, Melbourne, Adelaide—­I like them a’.  But old London, wi’ her traditions, her auld history, her wondrous palaces—­ and, aye, her slums!

I’m no a city man.  I’m frae the glen, and the glen’s i’ the blood o’ me to stay.  I’ve lived in London.  Whiles, after I first began to sing often in London and the English provinces, I had a villa at Tooting—­a modest place, hamely and comfortable.  But the air there was no the Scottish air; the heather wasna there for ma een to see when they opened in the morn; the smell o’ the peat was no in ma nostrils.

I gae a walkin’ in the city, and the walls o’ the hooses press in upon me as if they would be squeezing the breath frae ma body.  The stones stick to the soles o’ ma shoon and drag them doon, sae that it’s an effort to lift them at every step.  And at hame, I walk five miles o’er the bonny purple heather and am no sae tired as after I’ve trudged the single one o’er London brick and stone.

Ye ken ma song, “I love a lassie”?  Aweel, it’s sae that I think of my Scottish countryside.  London’s a grand lady, in her silks and her satins, her paint and her patches.  But the country’s a bonnie, bonnie lassie, as pure as the heather in the dell.  And it’s the wee lassie that I love.

There’s a sicht ye can see as oft in the city as in the country.  It’s that o’ a lover and his lass a walkin’ in the gloamin’.  And it’s a sicht that always tears at my heart in the city, and fills me wi’ sorrow and wi’ sympathy for the puir young creatures, that’s missin’ sae much o’ the best and bonniest time o’ their lives, and ne’er knowin’ it, puir things!