Auld Licht Idyls

Auld Licht Idyls

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Title: Auld Licht Idyls
Author: J.M. Barrie
Release Date: July, 2005 [EBook #8590] [Yes, we are more than one
year ahead of schedule] [This file was first posted on July 25, 2003]
Edition: 10

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LICHT IDYLS ***

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AULD LICHT IDYLS
BY
J.M. BARRIE

TO
FREDERICK GREENWOOD

CONTENTS

CHAPTER
I. THE SCHOOL-HOUSE II. THRUMS III. THE AULD LICHT
KIRK IV. LADS AND LASSES V. THE AULD LICHTS IN ARMS
VI. THE OLD DOMINIE VII. CREE QUEERY AND MYSY
DROLLY VIII. THE COURTING OF T'NOWHEAD'S BELL IX.
DAVIT LUNAN'S POLITICAL REMINISCENCES X. A VERY OLD
FAMILY XI. LITTLE RATHIE'S "BURAL" XII. A LITERARY
CLUB

AULD LICHT IDYLS.

CHAPTER I.
THE SCHOOL-HOUSE.

Early this morning I opened a window in my school-house in the glen
of Quharity, awakened by the shivering of a starving sparrow against
the frosted glass. As the snowy sash creaked in my hand, he made off
to the waterspout that suspends its "tangles" of ice over a gaping tank,
and, rebounding from that, with a quiver of his little black breast,
bobbed through the network of wire and joined a few of his fellows in a
forlorn hop round the henhouse in search of food. Two days ago my
hilarious bantam-cock, saucy to the last, my cheeriest companion, was
found frozen in his own water-trough, the corn-saucer in three pieces
by his side. Since then I have taken the hens into the house. At
meal-times they litter the hearth with each other's feathers; but for the
most part they give little trouble, roosting on the rafters of the
low-roofed kitchen among staves and fishing-rods.
Another white blanket has been spread upon the glen since I looked out
last night; for over the same wilderness of snow that has met my gaze
for a week, I see the steading of Waster Lunny sunk deeper into the
waste. The school-house, I suppose, serves similarly as a snow-mark
for the people at the farm. Unless that is Waster Lunny's grieve
foddering the cattle in the snow, not a living thing is visible. The
ghostlike hills that pen in the glen have ceased to echo to the sharp
crack of the sportsman's gun (so clear in the frosty air as to be a
warning to every rabbit and partridge in the valley); and only giant
Catlaw shows here and there a black ridge, rearing his head at the
entrance to the glen and struggling ineffectually to cast off his shroud.
Most wintry sign of all I think, as I close the window hastily, is the
open farm-stile, its poles lying embedded in the snow where they were
last flung by Waster Lunny's herd. Through the still air comes from a
distance a vibration as of a tuning-fork: a robin, perhaps, alighting on
the wire of a broken fence.
In the warm kitchen, where I dawdle over my breakfast, the widowed
bantam-hen has perched on the back of my drowsy cat. It is needless to
go through the form of opening the school to-day; for, with the
exception of Waster Lunny's girl, I have had no scholars for nine days.
Yesterday she announced that there would be no more schooling till it
was fresh, "as she wasna comin';" and indeed, though the smoke from

the farm chimneys is a pretty prospect for a snowed-up school-master,
the trudge between the two houses must be weary work for a bairn. As
for the other children, who have to come from all parts of the hills and
glen, I may not see them for weeks. Last year the school was practically
deserted for a month. A pleasant outlook, with the March examinations