John's gives universal satisfaction--a
great ornament to our ponds and ditches."
[5] Mrs. Forbes, the sister and aunt of so many Burnetts and Ramsays,
lived the latter part of her life at Banchory Lodge, in the middle of
that "Deeside" country, where the future Dean spent many of his happy
holidays, and learned much of the peculiar ways of that peculiar people.
There were no two ladies in Scotland more esteemed and beloved than the
Dean's aunts on both sides--Mrs. Russell, his aunt and mine, living in
widowhood at Blackhall, and Mrs. Forbes at Banchory Lodge, three miles
apart, on the opposite banks of Dee. Mrs. Forbes died 1st February 1838.
[6] His dwelling near Frome.
II.
The Dean was passionately fond of Deeside. Let me indulge myself in
looking back upon that district such as he knew it, such as I remember
it sixty years ago.
The natural features of Deeside are not changed. The noble river pours
down its brown flood as of old, hurrying from its wooded rocky
highlands. On the prettiest part of its bank stands Crathes, the finest
of Aberdeenshire castles, the immemorial seat of the Burnetts, where
Edward Ramsay, himself a Burnett, was received with all the love of
kindred, as well as the hearty respect for his sacred profession. I
daresay Crathes was not to him quite what I remember it. But we were of
different professions and habits.
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