 district, were
usually well received both in the farmer's ha', and in the kitchens of the
country gentlemen. Martin, author of the Reliquiæ Divi Sancti Andreæ, written in
1683, gives the following account of one class of this order of men in the
seventeenth century, in terms which would induce an antiquary like Mr. Oldbuck
to regret its extinction. He conceives them to be descended from the ancient
bards, and proceeds: - »They are called by others, and by themselves, Jockies,
who go about begging; and use still to recite the Sloggorne (gathering-words or
war-cries) of most of the true ancient surnames of Scotland, from old experience
and observation. Some of them I have discoursed, and found to have reason and
discretion. One of them told me there were not now above twelve of them in the
whole isle; but he remembered when they abounded, so as at one time he was one
of five that usually met at St. Andrews.«
    The race of Jockies (of the above description) has, I suppose, been long
extinct in Scotland; but the old remembered beggar, even in my own time, like
the Baccoch, or travelling cripple of Ireland, was expected to merit his
quarters by something beyond an exposition of his distresses. He was often a
talkative, facetious fellow, prompt at repartee, and not withheld from
exercising his powers that way by any respect of persons, his patched cloak
giving him the privilege of the ancient jester. To be a gude crack, that is, to
possess talents for conversation, was essential to the trade of a »puir body« of
the more esteemed class; and Burns, who delighted in the amusement their
discourse afforded, seems to have looked forward with gloomy firmness to the
possibility of himself becoming one day or other a member of their itinerant
society. In his poetical works, it is alluded to so often, as perhaps to
indicate that he considered the consummation as not utterly impossible. Thus in
the fine dedication of his works to Gavin Hamilton, he says, -
 
And when I downa yoke a naig,
Then, Lord be thankit, I can beg.
 
Again, in his Epistle to Davie, a brother Poet, he states, that in their closing
career -
 
The last o't, the warst o't,
Is only just to beg.
 
And after having remarked, that
 
To lie in kilns and barns at e'en,
When banes are crazed and blude is thin,
Is doubtless great distress;
 
the bard reckons up, with true poetical
