Did ye ken the red bloom at the bend o' the crag?
That's the rose in the cheek o' my bairnie.
Did ye hear the gay lilt o' the lark by the burn?
That's the voice of my bairnie, my dearie.
Did ye smell the wild scent in the green o' the wood?
That's the breath o' my ain, o' my bairnie.
Sae I'll gang awa' hame, to the shine o' the fire,
To the cot where I lie wi' my bairnie.'
"These words came crooning over the grass of that little garden at
Balmore which was by my mother's home. There I was born one day in
June, though I was reared in the busy streets of Glasgow, where my
father was a prosperous merchant and famous for his parts and
honesty.
"I see myself, a little child of no great strength, for I was,
indeed, the only one of my family who lived past infancy, and
my mother feared she should never bring me up. She, too, is in
that picture, tall, delicate, kind yet firm of face, but with a
strong brow, under which shone grave gray eyes, and a manner so
distinguished that none might dispute her kinship to the renowned
Montrose, who was lifted so high in dying, though his gallows was
but thirty feet, that all the world has seen him there.
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