Robert BurnsLimited World Federation Limited www.rbwf.org.uk 1987 The digital conversion of this Burns Chronicle was sponsored by Jan Boydol & Brian Cumming The digital conversion service was provided by DDSR Document Scanning by permission of the Robert Burns World Federation Limited to whom all Copyright title belongs. www.DDSR.com BURNS CHRONICLE 1987 BURNS CHRONICLE AND CLUB DIRECTORY INSTITUTED 1891 FOURTH SERIES: VOLUME XII PRICE: Paper £6.50, Cl oth £10.00. (Members £4.50 and £7.00 respecti ve ly). CONTENTS D. Wilson Ogilvie 4 From the Editor 6 Obituaries 8 Burns and Loreburn Irving Miller 10 Sixth Annual Scots County Ball R. 0. Aitken 12 Burns, Jean Lorimer and James Hogg David Groves 13 Ae Paisley Prenter's Greeting T.G.11 13 The Subscribers' Edition J. A. M. 14 Gordon Mackley 15 West Sound Burns Supper Joe Campbell 16 Exotic Burns Supper William Adair 16 Henley and Henderson G. Ross Roy 17 Book Reviews 28 Sir James Crichton-Browne Donald R. Urquhart 46 Elegy Geoffrey Lund 48 The Star o' Robbie Burns Andrew E. Beattie 49 Junior Chronicle 51 Dumfries Octocentenary Celebrations David Smith 64 Frank's Golden Touch George Anderson 66 And the Rains Came! David McGregor 68 Burns and Co. David Smith 71 Burns in Glass ... James S. Adam 72 Wauchope Cairn 73 Alexander Findlater James L. Hempstead 74 Burns Alive in the USA! Robert A. Hall 86 Fraternal Greetings from Greenock Mabel A. Irving 89 Federation Centenary Celebration in Toronto Jim Hunter 90 Random Reflections from Dunedin William Brown 92 Steam Trains o the Sou-west Ronnie Crichton 93 We Made a Film about Rabbie James M. Crawford 95 Burns Statue, Ayr 98 The Burns Federation Office Bearers 100 List of Districts 106 Annual Conference Reports, 1985 113 Club Notes 128 Numerical List of Clubs on the Roll 216 Alphabetical List of Clubs on the Roll 265 Published by the Burns Federation, Kilmarnock. Printed by Wm. Hodge & Co. Ltd, Glasgow ISBN 0307 8957 J DAVID WILSON OGILVIE, M.A., F.S.A., Scot Born in 1935 in Huntly, Aberdeenshire, Wilson Ogilvie is the son of a Glasgow man who was a bank manager and became Provost of Huntly. His mother was a Wilson with Sanquhar and Kirkconnel connections, so that at least a part of his roots may be said to have been in the Burns country. Wilson was educated at the Gordon Schools, Huntly and after two years National Service in the RAF Regiment he worked as an uncertificated teacher for two and a half years. In 1960 he matriculated as a mature student at Aberdeen University and read English, history, geography and biblical studies. After graduation in 1963 he spent a year at Aberdeen College of Education and took his diploma in religious studies. A keen sportsman, he represented the RAF regiment in field and track events, and played basketball for Aberdeen University. He also served on the Students' Representative Council and was an officer in the Boys' Brigade. He married his wife, Irene, whi"le at university, and in 1964 they took up their appointments as teacher-missionary and district nurse respectively on the remote Shetland island of Fetlar. In addition to his duties, lay and spiritual, Wilson was appointed an assessor to the Crofters' Commission. In his spare time he studied the bird-life of the island. Four years later they moved to Crudie on the Aberdeenshire­ Banffshire border and Wilson became part-time reporter for the Turriff Advertiser and developed a reputation as a lecturer and public-speaker on a wide range of topics. He was also a football linesman and a junior referee for the Highland League. Although no longer a missionary he still preached regularly-a role which he fulfils to this day. Subsequently he was appointed head teacher at Dunnottar, Stonehaven. During his four years in this district he became session clerk of Kinneff Parish, a Rotarian and a Fellow of the Society of Antiquaries. He wrote two booklets for the Tourist Board, about walks and drives in the Lewis Grassie Gibbon country and in the area whence the Burnes family had come. In this manner he came within the orbit of the Burns movement. In 1976 he was appointed head teacher of Lincluden School, Dumfries, and in the past decade has considerably strengthened his Burns connections. In 1984 he became President of Dumfries Burns Club and Junior-Vice President of the Burns Federation. He has also served as Schools Convener for the Southern Scottish Counties Burns Association and Literature Convener of the Burns Federation. More recently he has also been President of the Dumfries and Galloway Natural History and Antiquarian Society. He contributes articles to various periodicals and the local press and is a frequent broadcaster on local radio and Border Television. Sportsman, ornithologist, antiquarian, journalist, broadcaster, preacher, education­ alist and raconteur extraordinaire-where does he go from here? Perhaps the West Indian who accosted Wilson in the Thames Embankment Gardens last September was more prophetic than he realised. Addressing our President, resplendent in kilt and chain of office, the Cockney gentleman enquired 'Heh man-is you the Lawd Mayor of Scotland?' FROM THE EDITOR They say that the world's mightiest roller-coaster stretches in a crazy, rollicking ride from Guayaquil to Quito, a literally breathtaking journey of 288 miles that generally takes two days to accomplish in relative comfort. The autoferro is a one-class, 30-seater which may well be a school-bus mounted on a railway bogie. The tiny seats are hard and non-reclining, the noise is unbearable and the lack of food or heating enough to tax the constitution of the hardiest traveller. The ride is bumpy in the extreme, while the vertiginous overhangs and hairpin bends would take the breath away from an experienced mountaineer. Between Milagro and Naranjita the track climbs over 10,000 feet in fifty miles-an average gradient of 5.5 per cent along such engineering masterpieces as the Devil's Nose, a double switchback zigzag cut out of solid rock. Some 309 bridges and tunnels later you emerge to the most spectacular railway view to be found anywhere in the world-Mount Cotopaxi, at 19,200 feet the world's highest volcano, looming against the clear, vivid blue mountain sky. You have to be a raving lunatic or an absolutely obsessive railway buff to do this trip, but the memory of majestic Cotopaxi lingers on long after the terrifying discomfort is forgotten. From Ambato the railway line skirts the base of the volcano to Latacunga. Cotopaxi is eighteen miles from this city, yet its perfectly symmetrical cone dwarfs everything in sight. Hamlets of Quechua Indians, the descendants of the once-mighty Incas, still live in these high sierras, tending their herds of llama, vicuna and alpaca-hardly the 'hunters wild on Ponotaxi' referred to by Burns in his Dedication to Gavin Hamilton with which the Kilmarnock Edition was originally supposed to end. Its curious position within that volume, whose Bicentenary we have so recently been celebrating, is explained by the fact that Burns added several poems while the book was going through the press. Just how Burns came to garble the name of the famous volcano, or where he got it from in the first place, I know not. In 'The Vision', however, he not only refers to 'Thomson's landscape glow' but was clearly influenced by the lines in that poet's 'Seasons': Ah! what avail their treasures, hid Deep in the bowels of the pitying earth Golconda's gems, and sad Potosi's mines. In the antepenultimate stanza he wrote: Then never murmur nor repine; Strive in thy humble sphere to shine; And trust me, not Potosi's mine ... Potosi in its heyday was one of the largest and wealthiest cities of South America; even in Burns's time its fabulous riches must have made it virtually a household word. Its fame stems from El Cerro Rico (literally 'the rich hillock') which looms eerily over the chipped tiles and faded splendour of the old colonial buildings to this day. In 1545 silver was discovered in this hill and in spite of its inaccessibility it was rapidly developed. Potosi was a fine baroque city of 150,000 inhabitants but economically it was never more than a shanty town. Billions of dollars worth of silver were pumped out of the hillside, refined on the spot and villianously struck into crude pesos that were promptly shipped off to Spain to prop up that country's shaky economy. When the silver ran out, early in the eighteenth century, Spain was hit by appalling inflation and soon went bankrupt. In more recent times Bolivia's economy was based on a somewhat humbler metal, but since the collapse of the world's tin market the country seems to be heading the same way as eighteenth 6 century Spain. While I was there last March the black marketeers on 'Wall Street', a dingy alley running off the Avenida 16 de Julio, were giving 1,900,000 pesos for every dolar Yanqui and overnight the postal rates were hiked by a massive 50 per cent. Inflation last year ran at a horrendous 30,000 per cent, but strict control of the economy has got it down to a mere 2,700 per cent. Not Potosi's mine, or any other mineral windfall is likely to solve Bolivia's problems. There could be a moral here for ourselves, as oil prices continue to slump. Shortly before I got there, Lima was celebrating the 450th anniversary of its foundation by Francisco Pizarro.