But it wasna only the Scots turned oot to meet me.  There were any number of Americans.  And the American reporters!  Unless you’ve come into New York and been met by them you’ve no idea of what they’re like, yon.  They made rare sport of me, and I knew they were doing it, though I think they thought, the braw laddies, they were pulling the wool over my een!

There was much that was new for me, and you’ll remember I’m a Scot.  When I’m travelling a new path, I walk cannily, and see where each foot is going to rest before I set it doon.  Sae it was when I came to America.  I was anxious to mak’ friends in a new land, and I wadna be saying anything to a reporter laddie that could be misunderstood.  Sae I asked them a’ to let me off, and not mak’ me talk till I was able to give a wee bit o’ thought to what I had tae say.

They just laughed at one another and at me.  And the questions they asked me!  They wanted to know what did I think of America?  And o’ this and o’ that that I’d no had the chance tae see.  It was a while later before I came to understand that they were joking wi’ themselves as well as wi’ me.  I’ve learned, since then, that American reporters, and especially those that meet the ships that come in to New York, have had cause to form impressions of their ain of a gude many famous folk that would no be sae flattering to those same folk as what they usually see written aboot themselves.

Some of my best friends in America are those same reporters.  They’ve been good tae me, and I’ve tried to be fair wi’ them.  The American press is an institution that seems strange to a Briton, but to an artist it’s a blessing.  It’s thanks to the papers that the people learn sae much aboot an artist in America; it’s thanks tae them that they’re sae interested in him.

I’m no saying the papers didn’t rub my fur the wrang way once or twice; they made mair than they should, I’m thinking, o’ the jokes aboot me and the way I’d be carfu’ wi’ ma siller.  But they were aye good natured aboot it.  It’s a strange thing, that way that folk think I’m sae close wi’ my money.  I’m canny; I like to think that when I spend my money I get its value in return.  But I’m no the only man i’ the world feels sae aboot it; that I’m sure of.  And I’ll no hand oot siller to whoever comes asking.  Aye, I’ll never do that, and I’d think shame to masel’ if I did.  The only siller that’s gude for a man to have, the only siller that helps him, i’ the end, is that which he’s worked hard to earn and get.

Oh, gi’e’n a body’s sick, or in trouble o’ some sair sort, that’s different; he deserves help then, and it’s nae the same thing.  But what should I or any other man gie money to an able bodied laddie that can e’en work for what he needs, the same as you and me?  It fashes me to ha’ such an one come cadging siller frae me; I’d think wrong to encourage him by gi’e’n it the him.