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"Athole Cameron arrived in Midlothian in January 1976 as headteacher of Howgate Primary School and looked after the school and its pupils in her own inimitable fashion until she took early retirement in 1982. "Her interest in people - and in children as people in their own right - was evident in her teaching. No narrow educationist she believed in opening doors for her pupils into the life of the community and, dearest of all to her heart, into the language, literature, and music of Scotland. "School-teaching was in the family. Athole was brought up in the school-house at Glenlyon where her mother, Christina Cameron, was sole teacher. After training at Dundee College of Education she had taught for many years in Perthshire schools before coming to Howgate. "But although teaching occupied a large part of her life, Athole found time for many other interests, in particular the Scots Language Society, the Saltire Society, the "Rural" (an enthusiasm she inherited from her mother), and the Scottish National Party. She stood for Parliament three times, and founded the party's Heritage Society. "Her own writing had to be wedged into whatever available spaces there might be in a busy and sociable life-style. She was so easily beguiled from writing by the counter claims of visiting a garden, chairing a meeting, talking to a friend or a stranger, proposing an Immortal Memory, spoiling her beloved cat, Huggy, or writing a letter (Athole's letters were like herself, full of humour and erudition). "Even in retirement, which she chose to spend in Penicuik, Athole found ways of avoiding writing. She took up a new career in television, participating in the first SuperScot quiz and becoming one of the most articulate members of the Scottish Women forum on Scottish Television. She even became a film extra in Restless Natives. "Fortunately for us Athole also possessed a strong competitive streak which was invariably activated by the prospect of a literary prize. Several of her best poems were written for competitions, including "Sixteen", "A Poem for Midlothian" and "Howgate". These three poems all won first prize in the annual writing competition held by Midlothian District Libraries. "Poetry was Athole's first and last love, but she was also an accomplished short-story writer and playwright, scripting plays for S.C.D.A. festivals. The Traverse Theatre in Edinburgh gave a public reading of her play, The Eve of Saint Paul, which was based on a true incident in Perth in 1544 when a woman was drowned in the Tay suspected of being a witch. "An enthusiastic member of Penicuik Historical Society and chairperson of Penicuik Community Arts Association, Athole was the inspiration behind the decision to commemorate Penicuik's blackest day, the day when the Mauricewood Pit went on fire. A stage presentation in Penicuik Town Hall in 1989 to mark the centenary of the disaster was based on material researched by Athole from contemporary newspaper reports..." [from Margaret Macaulay's introduction to The Tartan Chameleon: Selected writings of Athole Cameron, Midlothian District Library Service 1995: ISBN 9002 15 00 4] Athole Cameron on Howgate School "It's what everybody should be able to have, a human being school, not a factory with a conveyor belt. They're country kids and there's not many of the species left. Indeed the World Wildlife Fund is probably actively considering conserving them." [from The Tartan Chameleon 1995] Athole Cameron on Our Fifth Season: Nowadays, it seems, there are only four seasons in the Highland year, but when I was a child in the Glen Lyon of the Thirties, there were five: the four ordinary ones, which we shared with the rest of the country, and the extra one, known simply as The Season, when the Toffs came grouse shooting, deer stalking and salmon fishing. As daughter of the school-mistress, 1 belonged to the only glen family not dependent on the estate for its livelihood, but like everyone else, we were affected by The Season. A day or two before the hallowed Twelfth of August, Perth Station began to vibrate with the advance guard of a host of special trains, hauled, and sometimes double-hauled, by the massive engines of the time, thundering up to the flower-decked platforms under the high glass canopy and stopping in a hissing, clanking cloud of steam. For a roll-call of the rich and powerful in the land you needed only to consult the passenger lists of the first class sleepers. Here was the Prime Minister, bound for Rannoch to stay with his friend the playwright, J.M. Barrie; the Chancellor of the Exchequer, Neville Chamberlain, hoping for a quiet holiday with his wife and son, would be only a few miles away. Like a number of others, they would alight at Perth and finish the Journey, the jet-setters of their day, by private car. The cars, too, had probably come by train, a new service by the railway company which had realised that they were a necessity for people about to find themselves ten miles or more from anyone of sufficient status to be deemed a neighbour. Indeed, some dedicated motorists and dashing young bloods had tackled the whole journey from the south of England on their own wheels, in sports cars and tourers laden with guns and fishing rods. One daring, and rich, party of sportsmen had even intimated that they would do the journey by private plane, emulating the flying pioneers so much in the news at the time. However, most people preferred the infinitely more comfortable and less hazardous trains, even with the fairly frequent pauses for the refreshment of the locomotive's tender. Perth, however, was much more than a watering place for engines. The platforms were equipped with stalls supplying newspapers, paperbacks, sweets and fruit. Milling around these amenities was a swarm of porters with barrows, all eager, for a sixpenny tip, to transport your belongings to any corner of the station, including the Left Luggage with its fenced-in forecourt for the accommodation of bicycles. The Refreshment Room, like the Restaurant Car, offered solid set meals eaten with silver-plated cutlery off solid crockery decorated with the Company's crest. There were white linen tablecloths. The less hungry, and those unable to cope with such grandeur, could make do with the chocolate machines, confident that if the correct coin was inserted, chocolate could be trusted to come out. Now, however, all these services were stretched to capacity, for whole households were on the move, the family and its guests, the children with their nannies, nursemaids, governesses and tutors, the butler, the footmen, the cook, the kitchen maids, the tweeny and the odds and ends, not to mention the dogs, guns and the hampers containing luxuries unknown in the barbarian north. If the country house boasted the necessary generator for making electricity, some might even bring the Frigidaire, ideal for keeping grouse, salmon, trout, all kinds of game and ordinary foods in perfect condition for long periods. Thus, hauling its sheltering environment with it as a snail carries its shell, and heading for castles, ancestral homes or shooting lodges, owned or rented, Society in its Season poured into the Highlands like a richly-apparelled, loud-voiced tidal wave. It was not, however, heading for an empty desert. We were there, the permanent residents. Beyond Ballinluig Junction and the Aberfeldy Branch, beyond Coshieville and Fortingall and the narrow twisting Pass, in the Meggernie estate of Glen Lyon, we had seen the four ordinary seasons come and go since they left us the previous year. All through the four seasons, Miss Grant, the resident housekeeper, had lived alone at Meggernie Castle among the dust sheets, the tinkling chandeliers, and, so it was said, the ghosts. As The Season approached, windows were thrown open, rugs enthusiastically beaten over clothes lines, dust sheets folded away, beds made up for staff and family and guests, and a marathon of supplies laid in, consignments from grateful traders in Aberfeldy or Perth, making hay while their brief sun shone. On the wide lawns surrounding the castle and running down to the river, every inch of sward had been carefully policed by Mr Main or one of his eight assistant gardeners from the bothy in the stable block, so that no daisy dared to show its vulgar head. In the rose garden, massed buds were poised in a pre-sprint position awaiting the magic hour. Not for them the faulty timing of the rhododendrons that sheltered them and were a blaze of colour in early June when none of their owners were there to see it. More rhododendrons lined the age-old avenue that ran from the castle two miles to the lodge. Here below the turrets and balcony and sloping down to the river, was an intricately landscaped rock garden, all its rare Alpine plants, its little twisting paths and tiny bridges completely immaculate. No wonder I believed my second cousin Angus when he said they polished the goldfish. The lodge gates were symbolic. All through the four seasons they stood open, and people going up the glen used the avenue as a matter of course. Then one day, and you might easily have missed seeing it, the cavalcade of Toffs came up the main road, passed through the archway into the avenue, and the gates clanged behind them. From now on, all non Toffs must use the high road, the public one maintained by Mr MacLean the County roadman, with its steep climb up the Nurse's Brae. News of the rigorous life-style behind these closed gates trickled through, even to those of us not directly involved, if not by word of mouth by the detailed accounts of the fortunes of each estate in the local paper. Really spectacular bags might even hope for a mention in the nationals, but such glory was not always easily come by. Sportsmen, and ladies, too, often trudged in rain through the budding heather in baking sunshine, or squelched through soft ground on days when mist swathed the mountain tops and a host of unscheduled burns and waterfalls splashed down the hillsides. Grouse can be sadly uncooperative about allowing themselves to be shot. On special occasions, probably with guests invited, the guns would line up in ambush behind shooting butts, and then the local children would become significant. School holidays in those days were functional affairs, and we had ours late to allow us to earn an honest penny by acting as beaters. They said it was a simple enough job, involving merely walking towards the guns, striking the heather with sticks while emitting fierce cries. The simpleton birds would then take off in full flight and head straight for the line of fire. That was what they said. 1 never had any direct experience to measure it by. On only one occasion was 1 recruited for a drive and spent the night before, sleeplessly worrying, not about being shot, which Angus had assured me was a likely thing to happen to beaters, but about being unable to keep up with the others, and sinking, exhausted and alone, on some remote hillside. Next morning it was pouring rain, too wet for even a Toff to go out in, and 1 was never asked again. Pity for the poor wee birds was not a factor, though how 1 would have reacted if 1 had actually seen them being blasted out of the air might have been a different story. August wore on, the rowan trees in our playground were red with berries, and the flowering heather painted the hillsides as brightly as the shortbread tin pictures, incidentally providing much better cover for the grouse. In any case, the spotlight was moving off them. On the high tops, the stags were rubbing the last of the velvet from their new antlers, and, all unknowing, turning themselves into the preferred targets. By this point, The Season was getting into top gear. The King and Queen had arrived at Balmoral, to be joined by the Duke and Duchess of York, after their visit to Glamis. The Prince of Wales, alas, still lingered in Biarritz, but it was understood that he would arrive in time for the Braemar Games. Meantime the other Games, with their associated Balls, and the Flower Shows and Race Meetings were in full swing. The Balls provided the papers with some welcome variety, especially as the catalogues of slaughtered birds were becoming scarcer. Instead they could now list, under the name of each local estate, the names of the glamorous and distinguished guests who would accompany the laird and his wife to the revels. Like the grouse shooting, these affairs could be more stressful than may be immediately obvious. Motoring, for instance, demanded a greater degree of self-reliance when you were unlikely to meet another vehicle on the twisting narrow roads, and wayside houses almost certainly did not possess a telephone. The obvious answer to the hazards of travel was house parties, especially as they were part of normal week-end life at home in England. Sometimes 1 wondered how it must have seemed to Miss Grant, accustomed only to the whisper of the river, the cry of owls and the distant roaring of stags. The Season brought a butler to the pantry, housemaids giggling in the linen cupboard and a dozen contrasting savoury smells coming from the kitchen as enormous breakfasts were prepared. Alas, among all the covered dishes containing bacon, sausages, kidneys, kedgeree, kippers, trout, eggs cooked every possible way, and of course porridge, a new problem was arising. Some decadent female guests had taken to coming down not only late, but demanding nothing but a slice of toast and a small grapefruit, items not normally supplied. To compensate, however, those scheduled to go stalking would be up early, and, having done full honour to the food, would proceed to a side table to make up packed lunches for the bill. Stalking was not a gregarious sport like grouse shooting, and there would be no picnic baskets coming out from base with admiring camp followers. Instead the sportsman's sole companion would be a dauntingly expert professional stalker who must be followed dutifully. Not infrequently this entailed crawling on one's stomach over rocks, heather and peat bogs, if there was to be any hope of a shot at a stag. Being endowed with superlative hearing, sight and smell, the stags were very capable of looking after themselves, and besides, every Toff was anxious not just to shoot anything, but to kill a royal, a twelve-pointer at least. The trophy could then be sent off to a firm in Perth to be preserved and mounted, with a little plaque saying who had shot it, and where and when. Just what to do with it next, could be a problem. Some keepers hung coats on antlers mounted on their lobby wall, but that seemed inappropriate, for instance, in a London flat. Whatever the motive, they toiled manfully to the high tops, sometimes to return with nothing to show for their trek, sometimes coming down in triumph with a gillie and a Highland pony following, a carcase thrown across the deer saddle specially designed for the job. Then all concerned, except the pony, got an extra dram from the flask without which no Toff could go to the hill, and we, the general population who had put in none of the effort, might well also share in the spoils. It may have been the Hungry Thirties, but in September, we could count on regular presents of huge haunches of venison. We roasted it, stewed it, and made all kinds of savoury dishes with it, and if we did not appreciate that it was luxury fare, we knew it was delicious, though there was a story that by the end of The Season, the castle dogs had got so tired of the stuff that they refused to eat it. Then there was the dancing. The household staff who came up from the other estate in the south of England, including three laundry maids who had their own steamy premises in the stable block, burst upon us in a dazzle of fashion. They had coiffures created by permanent waving, wired up to a machine, and owing nothing to curling tongs heated in the fire. They had beautiful dresses far beyond the range of our mall order catalogues, much less Miss McRitchie's Ladies' Outfitters in Aberfeldy, and they had high-heeled shoes that would never have walked them three miles to the Rural, even if they had known what the Rural was, or been prepared to be seen dead at it. On the other hand, not being Toffs, they could not be expected to get by on the delights of the scenery and the slaughter of local wildlife, so there was a free dance every Wednesday in the Estate Ballroom, a converted granary in the stable block. Though they had strange accents, sometimes almost incomprehensible, they communicated with the glen's surfeit of young bachelors, though seldom to the point of matrimony. Like the Toffs, the roses and the venison dinners, they were strictly for The Season. This wasn't the only contact with the natives, for it was bursting out all over the place. Just across the hill in Kinloch Rannoch, Neville Chamberlain was practising appeasement in a task which required all his statesmanship, acting as chairman at the opening ceilidh of the local branch of An Comunn Gaidhealach. At Crathie, The King and Queen drove to church in an open horse-drawn carriage, and our Toffs dutifully attended the little white church at Innerwick, which must have slightly discomposed the Rev. George Drummond, at a time of peak agricultural activity on the glebe. Still, he did not suffer so much as his dog, Douglas, a large, hairy, amiable beast that assisted in his pastoral work with the sheep. One day in summer, Douglas had happened upon the sun-warmed surface of the glen road, and found that it was good. Thereafter, on fine days he usually took up residence in the centre of the carriageway, flat out, appreciating the heat, the scent of bog myrtle and pine trees, and the far-off whisper of a waterfall. Bicycles went round him. The mall car and the vans were stopping anyway at the Manse gate, and the occasional private car anticipated his presence and pulled up gently, allowing him to withdraw in a dignified manner. Suddenly, with the advent of The Season, all was chaos. Tyres shrieked, horns hooted, people used most un-Biblical language, and occasionally Douglas had to break into a run, in the face of threatened physical attack. The trouble was, Toffs were preoccupied with time. One Season, they decided that British Summer Time did not suit the stalking, so they abolished it within the confines of the estate. Our contacts with the world beyond, like the vans, mostly adapted quite readily to moving into a kind of Brigadoon once they were past Invervar, but it was a nuisance trying to remember that the wireless programmes were an hour out. The wireless was becoming more attractive for us children, as September wore on and the nights grew dark earlier. There was no longer the summer dilemma of whether to stay out and be eaten alive by the midges or go in and be sent to bed. School had started again with one extra pupil, Marion, the daughter of the Head Chauffeur. Clearly, however, her Highland days were now numbered, for stags were beginning to roar on the autumn hills. When the first frosts turn the foliage into a riot of glowing colour, romance enters the lives of the deer, and the stags come down from the high tops in search of hinds. The beginning of the rut intimated the end of The Season, since, as it proceeded, the venison became inedible. Besides, the weather was deteriorating, the days were growing shorter and doubtless some other Season was impatiently waiting to begin elsewhere. Before it was all over though, the feasting and dancing must reach its peak with the Gillies' Ball. Like the venison, this was for all the residents on the estate, and it was well known that free whisky flowed like water. My mother, in her schoolteacher's way, considered it no place for a child, and 1 was 11 before I made my debut, considerably later than most of my contemporaries. 1 should like to report that 1 was entranced by the music, an imported professional band, the tartans, the reels, the Paris dresses and fabulous jewels. Alas,1remember far more clearly the buffet in the gallery above the garage, the bewildering variety of cold meats and salad things, the trifles and gateaux in all kinds of unfamiliar gorgeous flavours, and never mind the whisky, the fizzy lemonade that flowed like water. All but the most energetic Toffs went home early, their duty done, but it was at least three in the morning before the locals, or those still capable of doing so, put on their coats and outdoor shoes and made their way down the High Road for the last time that year. By the end of the week, Toffs and staff would be gone, we would be using the avenue again, Miss Grant would have put dust sheets on the castle furniture, and The Season would be over. All was as it had been for nearly a century. The Toffs with their outlandish ways were the life-blood of our economy, as essential as, in other communities, a pit or fishing boats might be, yet they were only a brief episode in the continuing life of the place. No one, not even Angus could have concocted a tale so fantastic as this, that it would all come to an end, within the lifetime of the glen children. [from The Tartan Chameleon - these observations first appeared in The Scots Magazine] Athole Cameron's description of the Mauricewood pit disaster: "The Pit is On Fire!" appears under Penicuik past events
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