They have commonly pottage for dinner, composed of cale or
cole, leeks, barley or big, and butter; and this is reinforced
with bread and cheese, made of skimmed-milk -- At night they sup on
sowens or flummery of oat-meal -- In a scarcity of oats, they use
the meal of barley and pease, which is both nourishing and
palatable. Some of them have potatoes; and you find parsnips in
every peasant's garden -- They are cloathed with a coarse kind of
russet of their own making, which is both decent and warm -- They
dwell in poor huts, built of loose stones and turf, without any
mortar, having a fireplace or hearth in the middle, generally
made of an old mill-stone, and a hole at top to let out the
smoke.
These people, however, are content, and wonderfully sagacious --
All of them read the Bible, and are even qualified to dispute
upon the articles of their faith; which in those parts I have
seen, is entirely Presbyterian. I am told, that the inhabitants
of Aberdeenshire are still more acute. I once knew a Scotch
gentleman at London, who had declared war against this part of
his countrymen; and swore that the impudence and knavery of the
Scots, in that quarter, had brought a reproach upon the whole
nation.
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