LIFE AND REMAINS OF ALEXANDER BETHUNE. CHAPTER I. 6 INFANCY AND CHILDHOOD-DEVELOPMENT OF MIND AND ΤΟ ALEXANDER BETHUNE,* the subject of this memoir, was born at Upper Rankeillour, in the parish of Letham, and county of Fife, towards the end of the month of July, 1804. The exact day has not been ascertained. His parents were both servants, previous to their marriage and his father appears to have wrought in that capacity for a considerable time after that event, as he is spoken of in the life In some of his earlier letters, the name is written Beaton, but Bethune is the orthography uniformly adopted after the publication of Tales and Sketches of the Scottish Peasantry.' B of John, as having been a servant at the time of his birth, which was in 1811. They seem to have had always to struggle with poverty, but were distinguished for their sobriety and general excellence of character. Scotland, we fear, has got more credit than she deserves, for the high character of her peasantry; but in them certainly that character was strikingly displayed. The mother of the Bethunes, in particular, was a woman of superior mind. Her maiden name was Alison Christie. She was the daughter of Annie M'Donald, so distinguished for her piety and self-culture; a memoir of whom was given to the public several years ago, by the Rev. Mr. Brodie, then parochial minister of Monimail; and another, in a cheaper form, written by her grandson, John Bethune, and accompanied with extracts from her letters, was published by Alexander, in 1842. The following sketch of the character of Alison Christie has been furnished me by a lady, in whose father's house she long served. 'She was exceedingly fond of reading, and had a good voice and ear; and I well remember sitting on her knee, many an evening, while she was spinning, listening to "Sir James the Rose," "Babes of the Wood," "Chevy Chase," and some of Hamilton's songs which I still remember. * She had deep religious impressions, and a great abhorrence of wickedness, particularly deceit and ingratitude, combined with great independence of character, which I think helped to give the strong * * bent to the minds of the youths, particularly Alexander; while her benevolence and sympathy for others, in whatever shape their sufferings appeared, led to a faulty generosity that helped to keep them poor,-listening to every tale of woe, and helping others, when her own family had more need.' My friend gives an instance of this, equally characteristic of the subject of the following memoir, as of his mother:-'A neighbour had fallen behind in the world, and the mother of the family had been making her lamentation, that if money was not forthcoming that night, their cow would be taken away next morning. Alexander had four pounds which he had meant to get clothes with, but when he heard this tale of woe, he instantly took the money, and ran through the fields with it to the woman. Aily (his mother) said to me, she looked after him with more pride and joy, than if the king had made him a lord.' When remonstrated with on her excess of liberality, and told that she should remember her frail husband, she replied, in the words of scripture, Whoso hath this world's good, and seeth his brother have need, and shutteth up his bowels of compassion from him, how dwelleth the love of God in him?' It is a weakness, characteristic of not a few of the finer order of minds, that they are in danger of yielding too much to sympathy for others; and such appears to have been the case with Mrs. Bethune,-in the excess of her generosity, forgetting the claims of her own house 6 hold. Nor does she appear to have excelled in her domestic economy, but to have been rather defective in that neatness and promptitude which contribute so much to the comfort of a family. In the infancy of the sons, the household owed much to the provident attentions of Mrs. Bethune's sister, who yet survives, and who so sedulously watched over Alexander during his last illness. The virtues of Mrs. Bethune, however, appear to have had a striking adaptation to the circumstances of her family. They were always poor, and the education of the sons was almost entirely domestic. Alexander, if we except a short time he attended an evening class, taught by Mr. Adamson, after he was two or threeand-twenty, was never more than four or five months at school; and John, as the reader will find recorded in his life, but one day. A mother of such endowments and virtues is an inestimable blessing in any case, but more emphatically so, when, as in the present instance, almost the whole mental as well as moral training falls to her hand. A testimony to her mental and moral excellence, quite as high as that I have just adduced, the reader will find below, in a communication from a gentleman who knew her well, and was well qualified to judge. This remarkable woman adds another instance to the many already on record, that the precursors of distinguished genius and talent generally appear on the maternal side. During Alexander's infancy and childhood, ow INFANCY AND CHILDHOOD. 13 ing to his father's being a servant, the family seems to have had frequently to move from place to place. When he was about seven or eight years of age, and, shortly after the birth of his brother John, they came to Woodmill, in the parish of Abdie, and on the borders of that little lake,' close to which great part of his own, as well as of his brother's life was passed, and which, with its surrounding scenery he has described with so much beauty and felicity in the opening of The Covenanter's Grave.** 'In the parish of Abdie, and almost immediately under the church-yard wall, lies the little loch of Lindores, which in the calm twilight of a summer's evening, appears like the eye of nature looking up to its Maker in the spirit of meek and quiet devotion.' At Martinmas, 1813, they removed to a place about a quarter of a mile further north, called Lochend, where they continued to reside till 1837. The earliest notice of the feelings and occupations of his boyhood, I have met with, is in a paragraph near the beginning of a M. S. marked ، Original Sketch of the Life of John Bethune.' Though not inserted in the published memoir, I think it will not be uninteresting to the reader. 'During the summer of 1815, my father was employed in clearing the furze, or whins, from a piece of ground about to be improved on a neighbour * 7 Tales and Sketches of the Scottish Peasantry, |