Saturday, June 29th

Burn's monument, Clayton, D.S. Burgess, Freddie, Mr. Strawbridge, Charles Brown, Ayr, 1912.

Clayton, Freddie, Mr. Strawbridge, Charles Brown, D.S. Burgess, Burn's birthplace, 1912.

June 29th
    All aboard for Ayr. The valleys and hills, distant mountains and occasional glimpses of the sea, made our trip up delightful. At Ayr, we stopped for a snap shot around the base of the Burn’s Monument, then started afoot for Alloway. The day was bright and cool and clear, so we sauntered along most happily, stopping to gaze upon the genial landscape and neat houses along the way, while Mr. Strawbridge told the boys of the strange happenings that Tam O' Shanter fell into. We did homage to (18) the birth place of Scotland's pride, the beloved Bobby, and then on to Alloway Auld Kirk, where Burns' father lies buried. All around the Auld Brig O' Doon we wandered, and then down into the Gardens for lunch along the full watered Doon. Saturday afternoon was a holiday for the folk thereabouts, and a happy outing they were having, our party apparently the only odd fellows mixed in with the crowd. We were quickly entertained by a tenor soloist a Mr. Hilton who encored with "Annie Laurie" - a song originating north of Dumfries, at Maxwelltown.

D.S.Burgess in Auld Kirk Cemetery, 1912.

     I left my pocket-book, having in it only travelers checks, on a tomb-stone at the Auld Kirk, having used it to prop my camera for a time-exposure. Hastening back there, we found it in the hands of a good Scotsman who had once spent some years in New England. (19)

D.S.Burgess in Auld Kirk Cemetery, 1912.

So I was possessed of my money again, - with the resolve to use a less valuable "camera rest" thereafter. All those places were well remembered from that glorious trip with Prof. S. We walked back to Ayr, visited the old ale-house where Souter Johnny and Tam O'S spent gay hours, and then to train for Glasgow.
    After dinner we set out for some vaudeville, the boys having clamored for some such amusement at every city in which we stopped. The way to the theatre led through streets jammed by a Saturday night throng, lamentably full of drunken men and women, the women not so much intoxicated for the moment, as besotted.
    The vaudeville had some good features. The audience was made up of working folk, and the house was blue with smoke.
    As we left, whom should I meet by the most unexpected chance, but M. Demolins, a master for two summers at Marienfeld, now located as agent for several French firms in London, who (20) was in Glasgow only for the day. He returned to the hotel with me, and we chatted till well past midnight, of friends in America, politics and Teddy R., etc. Also, Mr. D. spoke of a new theory, or definition of social divisions that he had evolved from the long studies of his father's life work.