“Shortly after Mr. Kay had been inducted schoolmaster of Carluke (1790), the bederal called at the school, verbally announcing, proclamation-ways, that Mrs. So-and-So’s funeral would be on Fuirsday.  ‘At what hour?’ asked the dominie.  ‘Ou, ony time atween ten and twa.’  At two o’clock of the day fixed, Mr. Kay—­quite a stranger to the customs of the district—­arrived at the place, and was astonished to find a crowd of men and lads, standing here and there, some smoking, and all arglebargling[167] as if at the end of a fair.  He was instantly, but mysteriously, approached, and touched on the arm by a red-faced bareheaded man, who seemed to be in authority, and was beckoned to follow.  On entering the barn, which was seated all round, he found numbers sitting, each with the head bent down, and each with his hat between his knees—­all gravity and silence.  Anon a voice was heard issuing from the far end, and a long prayer was uttered.  They had worked at this—­what was called ’a service’—­during three previous hours, one party succeeding another, and many taking advantage of every service, which consisted of a prayer by way of grace, a glass of white wine, a glass of red wine, a glass of rum, and a prayer by way of thanksgiving.  After the long invocation, bread and wine passed round.  Silence prevailed.  Most partook of both rounds of wine, but when the rum came, many nodded refusal, and by and by the nodding seemed to be universal, and the trays passed on so much the more quickly.  A sumphish weather-beaten man, with a large flat blue bonnet on his knee, who had nodded unwittingly, and was about to lose the last chance of a glass of rum, raised his head, saying, amid the deep silence, ’Od, I daursay I wull tak anither glass,’ and in a sort of vengeful, yet apologetic tone, added, ‘The auld jaud yince cheated me wi’ a cauve’ (calf).”

At a farmer’s funeral in the country, an undertaker was in charge of the ceremonial, and directing how it was to proceed, when he noticed a little man giving orders, and, as he thought, rather encroaching upon the duties and privileges of his own office.  He asked him, “And wha are ye, mi’ man, that tak sae muckle on ye?” “Oh, dinna ye ken?” said the man, under a strong sense of his own importance, “I’m the corp’s brither[168]?”

Curious scenes took place at funerals where there was, in times gone by, an unfortunate tendency to join with such solemnities more attention to festal entertainment than was becoming.  A farmer, at the interment of his second wife, exercised a liberal hospitality to his friends at the inn near the church.  On looking over the bill, the master defended the charge as moderate.  But he reminded him, “Ye forget, man, that it’s no ilka ane that brings a second funeral to your house.”