A carrier, who plied his trade between Aberdeen and a village considerably to the north of it, was asked by one of the villagers, "Fan are ye gaen to the toon" (Aberdeen).

To which he replied, "I'll be in on Monanday, God willin' and weather permitting an' on Tiseday, _fither or no_." It is a curious subject the various shades of Scottish dialect and Scottish expressions, commonly called Scotticisms.

We mark in the course of fifty years how some disappear altogether; others become more and more rare, and of all of them we may say, I think, that the specimens of them are to be looked for every year more in the descending classes of society.

What was common amongst peers, judges, lairds, advocates, and people of family and education, is now found in humbler ranks of life.
There are few persons perhaps who have been born in Scotland, and who have lived long in Scotland, whom a nice southern ear might not detect as from the north.

But far beyond such nicer shades of distinction, there are strong and characteristic marks of a Caledonian origin, with which some of us have had practical acquaintance.