unworldly wisdom. I think that Carlyle may be called a son of the soil, and he sometimes did a kind deed very tenderly. I suppose most of us know the following touching anecdote of him, which was published after his death.

A young girl who lived with her grandmother wrote to the Sage of Chelsea, and told him that she had yielded to a sudden temptation (for what cause I cannot recall), and had pawned grannie's best silver spoons, for such and such a sum. She had read his (Carlyle's) works, and had determined to trust him and to ask his advice. Then the author of "Sartor

Resartus" wrote her a wise and kindly letter, and in it he enclosed the money with which to redeem the silver.

These are the actions which help to keep "the memory green."

Now just recently a son of the soil, who was an unknown hero, has passed over to the majority. I will tell you of his passing. He was an outdoor worker, a labourer, and lived in a green arcadian spot near the Silent Pools in Shakespeare-land. He lived an honest and industrious life, brought his large family up well, and bore his burden manfully.

His youngest son was an incurable invalid, owing to an accident in early youth; but our labourer bent his back for this cross likewise, made the "best of a sorry job" as he expressed it.

When he came in wet and tired, he still had a cheery word for sonnie. He taught sonnie to read in the book of Nature, too-to watch the swallows build, and the squirrels climb; and sometimes he would hoard up his pennies and bring him home a book from the town. Some sympathising friends bought the youth an invalid carriage, in which his father drew him out when he could. Now one night this July, he drew him through the streets of a little country town close by, for the sake of a change, and as he did so, the silent-footed angel came to the other side of the chair, and said: "Come to the patient man." Out of a house close by ran a poor little child, and in her randoin haste would have fallen under some wheels, had not the son of the soil pushed her on one side, and met the peril himself.

Well, there's not much more to tell. They took him to the nearest hospital, but he was past all help. He died there

as the chimes were playing, with silver-haired Joan beside him, glad (to use his own words) "that he had saved the little wench."

He was poor himself was this son of the soil, and the child for whom he gave his life was the same. So there will be no painted window or marble-tablet erected to his memory; but I think that some of us will raise a monument in our hearts.

CHIMNEY-CORNER TIME.

When I was a schoolgirl, I used to visit a small cottage in which there was a fireplace with an oaken seat at one side. This made me curious, and I asked the smock-frocked owner: "What it was for?"

"To sit in, of course," said he. "It's for chimney-corner time."

"What is chimney-corner time?" I asked.

Why, the time when the candle's lit, of course, and we all draw round the fire. The time of leaf falling, and of gettin' together," was the reply.

Then I saw. And I can see that autumn or chimneycorner time is coming to us fast. We shall loiter at old bookstalls, sing the old songs, gather the "old familiar faces " round us very soon. The old folks will tell the old stories, the young ones whisper the old, old story to each other. King Coal will reign, and I hope peace and plenty also.

CULROSS AND SAINT MUNGO.

BY FELIX ANDERS.

HERE are few small towns in Scotland as quaint and old

Tworld-like in their appearance as the picturesque little

town of Culross on the north bank of the Forth, some four miles east of the old town of Kincardine, and almost exactly opposite Bo'ness. Resting on the steep hillside, up which its

narrow and tortuous streets, hemmed in on either side by curious old-fashioned houses, seem to climb to the imposing Abbey Church and Abbey mansion, and the many interesting venerable ruins around them, it presents a picture which carries us back to a distant past. In some aspects the town has almost a continental appearance. Threading its ancient streets and examining its quaint old houses, we are at once transported to an age that knew not steam or electricity, railway train or motor car. The nearest railway communication, indeed, to it, is East Grange, some two miles inland, a small station midway between Alloa and Dunfermline. It is scarcely possible, however, that Culross will long escape railway invasion; indeed we understand a railway scheme is at present under consideration. As yet, however, it is undisturbed by the shriek of the iron-horse; the only peculiarly modern mode of conveyance to be seen passing through its causewayed streets being the bicycle, and of bicycles in the holiday season there are plenty; for to the bicyclist Culross has become a favourite haunt. To those who desire to see an interesting survival of ancient Scotland we would strongly recommend a visit to Culross; and that at no distant date, ere the inevitable wheel of time shall have brought round such changes as will effectively destroy its old-world appearance. For the benefit of those who may be inclined to take our advice, it may enhance the pleasure of their visit to provide them with a few notes on the past associations of this highly interesting and picturesque old town. And to those who may desire to make a more extended study of the subject, we would refer them to a highly erudite and interesting history, in two large volumes, of Culross and the adjoining parish of Tulliallan, written by Mr. David Beveridge and published by Blackwood in 1885, to which the present writer would take this opportunity of acknowledging his indebtedness.

The word Culross-pronounced Cooross-is of Gaelic origin, and means "back peninsula," the peninsula being that between the Forth and Tay. Till quite recently-indeed, till within the last year or two-,Culross and the adjoining parish of Tulliallan were in the county of Perth, a fact which is probably unknown to most people, who are in the habit of regarding Perthshire as a compact county. The early history of Culross

carries us back to the fourth century. One of its earliest associations is that with the famous patron saint of Glasgow, St. Mungo or St. Kentigern. According to the life of that famous saint, written in Latin by Jocelyn, a monk of Furness in Lancashire, and who lived at the end of the twelfth century, St. Mungo was born at Culross under circumstances of the most romantic nature. He was the son of a British prince, Eugenius, Eufuren, or Ewen, King of the Kingdom of Strathclyde, and Thenew or Thametis, daughter of Loth or Lothus, King of Lothian. Thenew, having formed, illicit connection with Eugenius, found herself exposed to disgrace and the furious indignation of her father, who ordered her to be put to death by being placed in a waggon and hurled down the precipitous descent from the top of Dunpelder Law, in East Lothian. Having survived this ordeal, however, uninjured she was then placed, the legend continues, in a leaky boat and driven out to sea from the port of Aberlady. "Solitary and desolate, without the aid of either oar or rudder, and followed from the shore by the lamentations of many persons, she was first carried by the wind and waves to the Isle of May, and from thence, in a westerly direction, up the Firth of Forth accompanied by a wonderful shoal of fishes." At length her boat touched the shore at Culross at a spot subsequently hallowed as the landing-place of St. Thenew and the birthplace of St. Mungo, where, in after times, a chapel was raised, which in its turn was succeeded by St. Mungo's chapel, erected by Archbishop Blackadder, Archbishop of Glasgow. The ruins of this last-mentioned chapel, which are now almost level with the ground, are immediately on the roadside to the east of the town. Weary and exhausted, Thenew, or, as she was afterwards designated, St. Thenew, landed, and, finding the embers of a fire which had been lit by some shepherds, managed to rekindle it and spent the night by its side, during which period she gave birth to St. Mungo. Here mother and son were found by the holy St. Serf or Servanus, a saint who lived in a hermitage on the hill, supposed to have been on the site of the Abbey, and who afterwards became titular saint of Culross. The young St. Mungo was henceforth taken charge of by St. Serf, whose favourite pupil he became, and, in due course, performed many miracles. The coat of arms of the city of

Glasgow, which consists of a tree, with a bell suspended from one of the boughs, and a bird perched on another of the branches with the representation of a fish with a ring in its mouth, described by the popular rhyme :—

"This is the tree that never grew,
This is the bird that never flew,
This is the bell that never rang,
This is the fish that never swam,"

is illustrative of several of St. Mungo's most notable miracles. The tree is the hazel bush miraculously kindled to supply St. Mungo with light for the church lamps of Culross monastery; the bird is the robin red-breast which the saint restored to life to flutter round and caress its master, St. Serf; the bell represents that specially got by St. Mungo from Rome; while the fish refers to the following legend -"The Queen of Cadzow, a district in the middle ward of Lanarkshire, though a wedded wife, had cast eyes of affection on a certain knight, and had given him a ring which her own husband had presented her with as a sacred token of affection. The scandal came to be bruited abroad; and the king, hearing of it, invited the knight to hunt with him. Taking advantage of an opportunity when the knight was asleep he withdrew the ring from his finger and cast it into the Clyde. Returning home he demanded the ring from the Queen, threatening her with death in the event of her not producing it. She applied to the knight, but not receiving it was reduced to despair. Then she had recourse to St. Mungo, professing contrition and promising that she would never misconduct herself again if he would help her to recover the ring. The saint sent one of his disciples to the river and ordered him to cast his rod and line and bring alive to his master the first fish that he caught. He did so, and on opening the fish's mouth the ring was found, and the Queen escaped from the impending punishment." When grown up, St. Mungo left his faithful tutor and master good St. Serf, and starting off without any warning or leavetaking he traversed the banks of the Forth till he arrived at a spot where it is now joined by the Teith, a stream which in these days, instead of flowing into the river, flowed by a