But as the story is pretty well known, and its truth vouched for on high authority, I venture to give it, as affording a proof that, in those days, no consideration, not even the most awful that affects human nature, could be made to outweigh the claims of a determined conviviality.

It may, I think, be mentioned also, in the way of warning men generally against the hardening and demoralising effects of habitual drunkenness.

The story is this:--At a prolonged drinking bout, one of the party remarked, "What gars the laird of Garskadden look sae gash[39] ?" "Ou," says his neighbour, the laird of Kilmardinny, "deil meane him! Garskadden's been wi' his Maker these twa hours; I saw him step awa, but I didna like to disturb gude company[40]!" Before closing this subject of excess in _drinking_, I may refer to another indulgence in which our countrymen are generally supposed to partake more largely than their neighbours:--I mean snuff-taking.

The popular southern ideas of a Scotchman and his snuff-box are inseparable.
Smoking does not appear to have been practised more in Scotland than in England, and if Scotchmen are sometimes intemperate in the use of snuff, it is certainly a more innocent excess than intemperance in whisky.

I recollect, amongst the common people in the north, a mode of taking snuff which showed a determination to make the _most_ of it, and which indicated somewhat of intemperance in the enjoyment; this was to receive it not through a pinch between the fingers, but through a quill or little bone ladle, which forced it up the nose.