Boswell's Bus Pass Read online

  *

  Whatever the cause – euthanasia, eugenics or social engineering – the demographic composition of the Strichen to Banff bus was markedly different from any so far encountered. There were many more young people, all of whom had gravitated to the furthest reaches of the bus. This is something of an unwritten law. There is a direct correlation between age and choice of seats. When someone leaves the bus a subtle realignment occurs whereby the older folk will quietly move to whatever seat more closely reflects their age. This manoeuvre is partly determined by a Darwinian principle that the frailest will need to be closer to the door to minimise death-by-lurching when they attempt to move along a slowing vehicle prior to departure.

  The stability of this particular bus must have been jeopardised by the sheer volume of rampant uncontainable adolescent hormones sloshing around the rear seats. A Babel of simultaneous mobile phone conversations – possibly to each other – threw up some unwanted comments, ‘She started the shit and expects other people to fight her battles … she looks like a, like a …’ All those English lessons devoted to simile and metaphor were about to deliver … ‘A bug!’ This was the cue for shouts of cruel recognition from her peers.

  There were few sights to distract me from the stream of bitchery at the back apart from a JCB dredging aimlessly up to its oxters in a river at Luncardy, a compact triangle of migrating geese thousands of feet in the sky and several stupidly overdressed hopping pheasants at ground level.

  The coastal route meandered through Macduff where a trawler squatted in its dry dock like a smug fat hen. The local cemetery had the highest proportion of fresh flowers of any observed so far. Ancestor worship must give the local Brethren a run for their money.

  It was growing dark as I entered Banff of which Johnson observed, ‘I remember nothing that particularly claimed my attention. The ancient towns of Scotland have generally an appearance unusual to Englishmen. The houses, whether great or small, are for the most part built of stones. Their ends are now and then next the streets, and the entrance into them is very often by a flight of steps, which reaches up to the second storey.’

  They dined at an ‘indifferent inn’ which was almost certainly The Ship Inn which still slouches towards the harbour.

  The barman was distinctly nonplussed at the news that the famous travellers had dined there. He seemed in no great rush to commission a heritage site plaque and promptly served me with probably the worst pint I have ever tasted. On correctly interpreting my disbelieving grimace he apologised and said the beer had lain for a long while in the pipes, possibly since 1773.

  A sign on the bar captured the inn’s mission statement, BE NICE OR LEAVE. How long had it been there?

  ‘Roight James, Oi think we should slingg our ’ook and leave the premises now.’ ‘Whatever you say, Doctor.’

  The barman did point out that the interior of his pub had been used for scenes from Local Hero and invited me to browse through some curling newspaper cuttings. I was distracted from fully digesting this momentous coincidence by one of the residents who seemed to be talking in parrot language into his phone. After dismissing the possibility that he was in the grip of a manic episode, I gave in and enjoyed the totally surreal performance. He milked his audience well, lowping over furniture as the one-sided parrot monologue reached its absurd climax. Several brightly coloured feathers lay on the carpet.

  It was in Banff that Johnson started ranting again about Scottish windows.

  ‘The art of joining squares of glass with lead is little used in Scotland, and in some places is totally forgotten. The frames of their windows are all of wood. They are more frugal of their glass than the English, and will often, in houses not otherwise mean, compose a square of two pieces, not joining like cracked glass, but with one edge laid perhaps half an inch over the other. Their windows do not move upon hinges, but are pushed up and drawn down in grooves. He that would have his window open must hold it with his hand, unless what may be sometimes found among good contrivers, there be a nail which he may stick into a hole to keep it from falling.’

  Who cares? Johnson suffered from frequent errors of editorial judgement. Perhaps his obsession with non-existent trees meant that he could only ever see the wood. This from a man who could describe a casement in excruciating detail but doesn’t even give a grudging mention to crossing the Spey described by Wesley, a later traveller, as ‘the most rapid river, next the Rhine, he had ever seen’.

  One more bus would take me to meet my friend John who was putting me up for the night before accompanying me on the next leg. There was only one other passenger on the 305, a woman in her late 70s who was presumably talking on her phone to an errant partner. Her words were those of a lovelorn contrite teenager. ‘I’m missing you … we’ll have to sort things out … I’ll just do whit am telt in the future … You’ll have to eat, dinnae pit aa yer guilt oan t’me … But you were picking on things for na reason.’ I made myself miserable trying to picture the earlier falling out. We should all reach an age where the living is easy, if only for a tiny while between the kids leaving and ill-health lodging permanently.

  On the horizon a wind turbine was slowly winding up for the night shift; lots of small zephyrs and dark gusts to be harvested and tamed.

  That evening John explained that he was soon to retire from his job as head teacher of a local school, tired of assuming a consistently jovial, managerial persona which was light years from his real, essentially antisocial and thrawn self.

  He told me that for one day every year he would revert to his real identity. This transformation would occur when he acted as quiz master for an annual event at the Dallas (pop. 138) community hall. Oddly his performance had attracted something of a cult following over the years and in a packed hall the previous week he had heard himself asking the attentive family audience. ‘Question number 23, can you tell me the average duration of a pig’s orgasm? Is it 3 seconds, 30 seconds, 3 minutes or 33 minutes?’ (The correct answer, Dear Reader, might induce the unfamiliar emotion of pig envy). The farmers took the question very seriously. One of them subsequently thanked John for giving him the perfect opportunity to explain the facts of life to his now curious children. Another couple had a conspiratorial word as they left and asked for his views on a recent tabloid article which identified a celebrity who allegedly pleasured pigs.

  I had the difficult thought that I know several very large men whose unfortunate partners know the feeling only too well.

  I was woken during the night by a rook banging its beak against the bedroom window. The neurotic bird has done this for years and has successfully avoided retribution by poison, shotgun and lasso. Given his nervous – if not cowardly – disposition Boswell would have had a fit of the staggers if he had been similarly disturbed. He would have endowed the intrusion with all manner of spurious superstitious significance before scuttling into the bed of his surrogate father.

  In the morning a deer was peering in at me through the same window.

  The Ship Inn Banff Wednesday 25th August

  My Dearest Margaret,

  Another week that I have not seen you. My heart is tied with a rope. I spend most days in the chaise try to sleep but as you know I am tall and my body will not fit well in the seat, so I listen to my master who talk and talk and talk. Sometimes I want to grab him by the throat and shout in his face, ‘Just keep words in, do not speak all the time, in my country this is mark of very empty man!’ But I bite my tongue. If he dismiss me from his service I no longer stay in same house as my lovely Margaret with the beautiful bosoms.

  When he stops talking he write down every word that the Doctor say. He scribble and scribble. If the Doctor farts – no Margaret, you must learn, it too is not bad word – (1) which he often do, being a big man who eat mutton many times a day, my master will write it down in his black book. I tell you Margaret as to priest, I take black book and look when master and doctor sleep. He write very boring things, no one buy this book. I use my memory to show
you, he write ‘When we returned we found coffee and tea in the drawing-room. My lady was not with us. There is a window in the drawing room.’(2) This is not good writing. This put people to sleep and make them want poison to not wake up. Joseph is better writer.

  We spend one night in big castle, I think I king of Bohemia but the sea is all around, and I hate roaring sea. The birds shout like dying babies all the time. I cover my ears but still hear them and think of bad devils flying from the walls of my church in home village. Sometimes I want to be there so much. But even more I want to be with my Margaret. Already you see, I write better than master, bad devils flying is good writing. You keep these Joseph letters and show them the bookseller by James Court.(3) He print them and we have money to run away for new life!

  We go for walk along cliff to horrid place where sea is a long way down. I do not like it but I do not behave like coward like my master. He shake like a child, and hold my arm and plead to me to take him away from edge. I think for small moment of pushing him into the pit and leave him to the birds. But I know that make you sad.

  We go to see stones in field. I know you find this not easy to believe but they are stones, and they stand in field. That all they do. Even the Doctor only grunt and wants back in chaise. But my master he talk about old people called druid. In my village when old building fall down we do not visit and stand round it.

  We stay in cold place called Banff, I think it made up name. The inn is worse than worse inn in Bohemia but my master he hear girl singing and leave table to find her. It is lovely song in strange language and it make me very sad. To hide my tears from the doctor I too leave table and go upstairs to find my master and girl who sing like soft angel. My Margaret I do not like to hurt you but my master he hold the girl in strong grip, she is at spinning wheel and wool all on ground. She try to stop master from kissing her but he gives her some money and she lets go of her wool wheel. I go back to table and say nothing to doctor.(4)

  Later the doctor get very cross when his window not open. He sound like strangling man as he push window and catch his breathing.(5) If he have history of my country he be not so happy to have open window!(6)

  My food come up when I see maggot moving in my meat, I know this not nice to hear my Margaret but this tells you how sorry is Joseph and how much he miss you. Give Veroni – I almost say my child! – embrace from poor me.

  Joseph,

  King of maggot.

  (1) Johnson’s definition is ‘To break wind behind’. He then quotes Swift, ‘As when we a gun discharge/Although the bore be ne’erso large,/Before the flame from muzzle burst,/Just at the breech it flashes first;/So from my lord his passion broke,/He farted first, and then he spoke.’

  (2) This would appear to be a fairly accurate transcription of a passage in which Boswell describes their stay at Slaines castle.

  (3) Although contemporary records do not identify particular book sellers in the vicinity of James Court it is difficult to believe that they did not have a presence in the High Street.

  (4) Boswell claims the town was Nairn, Joseph says it was Banff. Either way Johnson was convinced that the girl was singing one of the songs of Ossian.

  (5) Boswell records Johnson’s near obsession with fresh air ‘Here unluckily the windows had no pulleys; and Dr Johnson, who was constantly eager for fresh air, had much struggling to get one of them kept open.’

  (6) This somewhat obscure allusion may be an oblique reference to the defenestration of Prague. In 1621 several unloved noblemen met an untimely death when pushed from an upper window.

  STAGE FIVE

  INTO THE HIGHLANDS

  A Dubious Driver – A Lunatic Asylum – An Innkeeper’s Revenge – Forbidden Fruit in a Biblical Garden – Several mentions of Shakespeare – An Errant Gnome – Profound observations on the Nature of Grief – Llamas and Kangaroos – Disturbing Memories of a Battle

  Banff – Cullen – Portknockie – Findochty – Portessie – Buckpool – Buckie – Fochabers – Elgin

  John is the only person I know who was awarded a university degree without attending a single lecture, tutorial or seminar. He graduated with joint first class honours in sloth and outrageous behaviour. He nevertheless spent several happy years writing regularly to the pope and various members of the royal family keeping them informed of his progress. He specialised in a nice line of apoplexy-inducing letters of application whenever a public school headship was advertised and also achieved a respectable fifth place when he stood for election as Rector at Aberdeen University in the late 1960s.

  He joined me in the bus shelter in Banff Low Road which is guarded by an eighteenth century cannon which points for no apparent reason at the queue. As a deterrent to vandalism the strategy has manifestly failed judging by the foul graffiti scribbled on the adjacent public building.

  For the first time on this journey a bus was late. When it arrived the driver drew up and said that he couldn’t take on board any more passengers as the bus was about to break down and would manage to limp to the depot in Macduff but no further. He promised to return with a spanking new vehicle.

  As good as his word he confided that this was in fact the fifth bus he had driven so far – it was only 9.30 in the morning, all of the others had developed mechanical defects of some sort. When pressed he listed their various faults including one errant bus on which the doors refused to open. This explained the ashen demeanour of the surviving passengers. At some point in the early morning they would have pressed their sad clown faces and hands against the windows desperate to escape as the bus careered away from their homes, friends and family into an uncertain future in an alien land.

  Questions had to be asked of the driver. Was he suffering from some bus-related Munchhausen syndrome by proxy that led to him secretly disabling the very vehicles on which his livelihood depended?

  Keeping an eye on him throughout the trip we could only glance towards the domain of Lord Findlater between the road and the coast. Johnson had also declined the opportunity to survey the lavishly landscaped gardens declaring that ‘he was not come to Scotland to see fine places, of which there were enough in England, but wild objects – mountains, waterfalls, peculiar manners: in short, things which he had not seen before’.

  John, a comfortingly large travelling companion, has always revelled in showing off his local knowledge. What he doesn’t know he makes up. On the Cullen road we passed the outbuildings of the Ladybridge Hospital, formally the Banff Lunatic Asylum. John pointed out the former site of the railway station whose sole function had been to transport inmates.

  A subsequent internet search confirmed he was right, and led to images of the institution compiled by Decayed Scotland. Adherents of this dubious organisation specialise in entering abandoned buildings and photographing, in this instance, a solitary wheelchair and a strange, haunting statue of four children apparently staring into a Reich-inspired future. Integration into the community would not have been the preferred option for the mentally unwell whose numbers would have included not only those designated idiots, morons, imbeciles and cretins but also women suffering from PMT, young unmarried mothers, inarticulate persistent poachers, unwanted relatives and annoying eccentrics.

  All his days Samuel Johnson feared he might go mad. Boswell claimed that his mentor ‘Felt himself overwhelmed with a horrible melancholia, with perpetual irritation, fretfulness, and impatience; and with a dejection, gloom, and despair, which made existence misery’.

  Adam Smith described how Johnson would ‘bolt up in the midst of a mixed company; and, without any previous notice, fall upon his knees behind a chair, repeat the Lord’s Prayer and then resume his seat at table. He has played this freak over and over, perhaps five or six times in the course of an evening. It is not hypocrisy but madness.’

  Hester Thrale described Johnson as ‘her friend who feared an apple should intoxicate him’.

  I also feared for my sanity on observing in a field on the outskirts of Cullen a full-sized Flowerpot
Man from my childhood. Was it Bill or …?

  Boswell too had profound bouts of depression or hypochondria from which he sought relief not only in travel but also promiscuity, drink, visiting the sites of executions and military fantasies. His Highland jaunt provided ample opportunity for all of these remedies.

  While in Cullen Boswell took the opportunity to introduce Johnson to William Robertson who had recently travelled to France to meet Memmie le Blanc, the central figure in his translation An Account of a Savage Girl caught Wild in the Woods of Champagne.

  Chambers Edinburgh Journal also ran with the story.

  ‘One evening the people of the village of Songi were alarmed by the entrance into the street of a girl, seemingly nine or ten years old, covered with rags and skins, and having a face and hands as black as those of a negro. She also had a gourd leaf on her head, and was armed with a short baton. So strange was her aspect, that those who observed her took to their heels, ran indoors, exclaiming, “The Devil! The Devil!’’ Bolts were drawn in on all quarters, and one man thought to ensure safety by letting loose a large bull-dog. The little savage flinched not as the animal advanced in a fury, grasping her club with both hands, she discharged a blow at the head of the dog with such force and celerity as to kill it on the spot. Elated with her victory, she jumped several times on the carcass; after which she tried in vain to enter a house, and then ran back to the wood where she mounted a tree and fell asleep.’

  The article becomes increasingly hysterical describing how she could fly from tree to tree, swim like a duck, eat raw frogs, not to mention the rumour that on one notable occasion she killed and ate her sister.

  I asked John if he had encountered any wild girls during his long career in teaching. In his head he wearily surveyed a line of errant adolescents stretching across several decades and into infinity. Surly, pouting, eyes raised heavenwards, petulant, bored, chewing, disrespectful, downright rude, permanently angry, dismissive, yawning, yearning, defiant, condescending, loud, sulky, rebellious, unruly, disengaged, disinterested. Yes, all of the above but he had not yet encountered any dog killers or caught anyone eschewing school meals in favour of cannibalism. But he did have several months to go before retirement.