by Jess Smith
Davie’s Uncle Jimmy seldom visited us. For one thing, the stairs up to our flat were far too numerous, and for another, Jimmy only had time for cutting trees and horses. But I am not speaking here about nice old Uncle Jimmy—no, it was the tiny white puppy he brought upstairs with him, and deliberately failed to take away. I must say it had the most beautiful, cute face in the entire world, according to Johnnie and Stephen, who took it into their room to play with while I made Jimmy some tea. After he had finished it, he said he had a lot of work to do somewhere, and off he went. It took a minute to sink in that the ball of fluff my boys were frolicking with on their beds had been forgotten. I called out to Jimmy, but he didn’t seem bothered, so I called again, ‘Uncle, you forgot the wee dug!’
With a wave of his hand he set off down the road in his truck. Now do you ever get the feeling that you’re being conned? Yes, and so did I that day. The kids were over the moon with the dog, but I knew it was cruel keeping one in a flat. ‘No, that pup is going to Uncle Jimmy,’ I sternly told the boys, who replied, ‘Oh Mum, why? He’s nae bother, we’ll walk him.’
‘Oh, nae doubt when he’s a puppy you’ll even take turns letting him share your beds, but what happens when he’s older, a big dog? And that’s another thing, we don’t even know how much growth’s in him. No, the jugal goes back, that’s an end to the matter.’
The wee white ball of fluff moved his round head from side to side, and I could feel my icy heart melt. However, I had to be assertive. If I gave in now while the boys were nine and ten, what would I be like later on when they towered over me, telling me, their mother, what to do? No, I was the boss, and when I said no dog, I meant no dog!
Teatime brought the true head of the house home. I gave him that ‘you better speak to your kids about a certain animal’ look, as I pointed to what was belly-up at his feet.
‘Hello Daddy,’ they said, clambering over him with pleading eyes and whining voices, ‘can we keep the dog?’
‘Ye wee bisoms, I thought I said no! Now get your hands washed for tea, and if I hear another word there’s a box of raspberry icecream staying in the fridge.’
The boys at that moment would have forfeited ice cream for the rest of their lives if I had relented.
Davie, who I must admit looked a little guilty about his Uncle’s visit and the left-over dog, said, ‘Jess, my wee darling, I forgot to tell you that I got the pup last time I went down to Nottingham with Uncle Jimmy.’ He’d done a job woodcutting a week or two back, and at that stage the pups were too young to remove from their mother. ‘Uncle Jimmy promised to bring the one I chose up with him when he came back. I was going to tell you, but I didn’t think he’d bring it here until I had spoken to him. Sorry.’
‘Oh well, that makes everything hunky-dory! I have a jugal plus three weans in a top-floor flat—great!’ For the rest of the day I was the bogey man; avoided like a plague. However, you all know me and my mongrels, and that night before sleeping as I listened to my kids playing with the pup, I kind of decided to keep it. Next morning a tray was brought into my bedroom with a cup of hot water that slightly resembled tea, and burnt toast. I shall never forget them standing there at the foot of bed—Johnnie with a pair of pyjamas far too small for him, Stephen clutching his favourite toy, a big yellow tonka truck, and Barbara squeezing the breath from the pup. They had discussed its name while preparing my breakfast, and to this day I have no idea how or why they decided on the name Jip.
‘Well, good morning Jip with snowy coat and black eyes—welcome to the Smith household. I hope your stay with us will be a dog’s life.’ What else could I say under such lovable pressure? He became the fourth member of our family, and the best pal of every bairn who lived in the flats. Thankfully he never grew so big as to be a problem.
Each morning before breakfast, and, I may proudly say, without protest, the boys took turns walking him. Barbara was still too young to do it, and I far too busy. I had a part-time job with Morrison’s Academy, a big private boarding school in the upper area of Crieff. I was allowed to take Barbara with me until she was old enough for nursery school, which was a great help. I cleaned in Knox House, a girls’ boarding-house, and since it was a school, during holidays I was able to be at home for my ever-dependent, growing family. Davie had a succession of jobs, sometimes on building sites, but when a position came up as a wood-cutter on Drummond Estate, owned by Lady Willoughby de Eresby, he jumped at the chance.
It was about Jip’s ninth month when he let us know he’d a love for chasing rabbits. We had been for a drive down along the Broich Road. Davie suggested taking a walk to the river through farmer Simpson’s fields. Well, the first rabbit he saw, he took after it like a hare—what a stride on him. The lads, along with their father, whooped and shouted, while Barbara and I, who had no stomach for such wildness, went down to the river to watch some mallards and visiting goosanders swimming quietly in and out of the bullrushes.
Jip the wonder dog hadn’t caught his prey, but according to my menfolk he gave it a run for its life. However, although the dog seemed to have calmed down after his chase, he was still riled, and as Davie picked up speed on our road home, did Jip not spy a bunny on the verge. Before I could do a thing, he dived out of the half-open car window, hitting the gravel on the road with devastating results—half the skin on his jaw was hanging off, one eye-ball hanging by a thread. The vet’s bill was so big I had to write and ask the electricity board if they’d allow me to pay the next year’s account by instalments. In addition to the cost, it took a lot of nursing before Jip was fully recovered, and he had the scars to show for it.
At that time a beast with short stumpy legs and a long powerful spine was terrorising all the dogs in Crieff; he went by the outrageous name of Ganga. Many times he went for Jip, but our lad could run faster than him, apart from once when the beast gave him a terrible hammering. He tore lumps off him. We tried our best to keep the dogs apart, but one day, with his battle scars still hurting, Jip took off. I still remember neighbours screaming that Jip and Ganga were into each other for the kill. I half expected to be black-bagging our dog, and he appeared at the door with blood dripping from his white coat, but it wasn’t his blood, it was Ganga’s. From then on there never was another fight between the pair, just a growl and a snap.
Well, he grew through his first years, like any playful young dog, along with all the local youngsters. Whenever the lads, of whom there may have been around ten, ranging in age from nine to thirteen, took to exploring fields and hillocks around Crieff, Jip went along for adventure. They taught him to hunt rabbits, and by goodness could he chase the poor wee bunnies (so my boys excitedly informed me) from bush to burrows. He wasn’t a killer, though, and I mind a time when Stephen came home, cheeks reddened, hair all over the place, bursting to tell me about his wonderful dog.
‘Mum, honest, see that dug, he’s the greatest wee thing. Dae you know whit he done the day?’
‘Tell me, son, before these stovies go stone cold.’
‘He wis chasing a rabbit, right, and me and my pal could hardly keep up wi’ him, ’cause he wis going sae fast in an aroond the burrows.’
‘Stephen, son, what burrows?’
‘The ones roond the back o the Knock.’
Now, folks, the back of the Knock happens to be three miles from the flats, and I had told Stephen many times that was too far away. What if something went wrong? I scolded him, but in his eagerness to tell me about Jip he ignored the fact that I might ground him for disobeying me.
‘Listen, Mum, this will please you. We lost sight o’ the dug, right, and searched and better searched, but couldnae find him. I wis panic-struck, Mum, honest, ’cause I mind you telt us o’ your wee foxy Tiny, and him getting stuck doon a burrow, and Granddad digging him oot, and him near deid whin he wis fund.’ My son took in a great big breath, and went on ‘I thought Jip might be deid, when all o’ a sudden we hears this squealing, a rabbit squeal. So we ran ower tae where it wis, and ye ken this, Mum, that
dug had caught a baby rabbit, but instead o’ biting it and shaking it and killing it, he held it doon wi’ his paw. Mum, he didnae have the heart tae kill a wee yin. Now, Mum, whit dae ye think o’ that?’
I thought if my son didn’t eat his stovies he’d die of hunger, and told him so. After he’d sufficiently filled his belly I told him that no dog would kill baby animals, because there was no point. No eating in them, son, I told him to his disappointment. Better to come back when the prey has grown.
Next day, while they were up Callum’s Hill, another beauty spot by Crieff, the same thing happened, and when Stephen came home he was adamant that Jip did not kill baby rabbits because he hadn’t the heart to. So I let him believe what he wanted to. He has always been an animal-lover, has our Stephen, but I remember a time he got it wrong.
We’ll leave the Flats now and go back to Monteith Street to continue. I was coming home from work one day, when a massive black crow fell at my feet. The poor bird had obviously been stunned by flying into telephone cables above. I could see it was still breathing, and thought if I put it in a safe place it would recover and then fly away. So when I got home I duly laid it between two lilac trees in my garden. Stephen, on his way home from school, saw the bird in the process of stretching its wings. Now I’d reared my children never to let an animal suffer—if you think it’s in serious pain then put it out of its misery. So on seeing this crow, he thought it was dying, lifted a garden gnome and killed the poor bird stone dead. I hadn’t the heart to tell him the bird was recovering, and would probably have flown off.
Something that Mother Nature insists on, is ‘multiplying’, and always at the back of my mind was the question, when would Jip take off after that smell? Wee Tiny did it; many was the time Daddy left him to find us, rather than us trailing the streets in search of him. He was usually sat waiting at some poor body’s door for a poke at the bitch inside. So, being close to nature myself, I waited. And just as I thought, after his fourth year, the bisom’s senses kicked in and he was off. My kids were beside themselves with worry, wondering if he’d been kidnapped or murdered. It didn’t matter how many times I told them he would be trailing a bitch, and when he was finished he’d come home. When he did come home after his first conquest, he was bedraggled and slept for hours curled up behind the settee, avoiding my very angry foot.
It became so common, this trailing, that our boys forgot about Jip, taking their mother’s attitude, which was that if he comes home, good and well, and if not, that’s the way it goes. However, may I say my tinker attitude to dogs wasn’t acceptable in mainstream society. It was annoying to have a pesky dog hanging around one’s house. People with bitches in heat were followed by these droves of sex-starved dogs warring with each other for a sniff at their pooch, and who could blame them for objecting. Tinkers just allowed nature to take its course, and either sold pups or drowned them; there wasn’t a problem. With me being a thoroughbred tinker, that’s all I knew.
I can hardly bring myself to share this next escapade from Jip’s life with you, but my sons insist that I do.
Lizzie lived somewhere in Crieff, with her beautiful toffee-brown boxer bitch, and boy what a cracker! Everybody spoke about this creature; dog lovers said there had never been such a gorgeous boxer bitch, and that she should be proudly shown in kennel clubs etc. Her owner mentioned that when the time was right she was going to have her sired with a boxer having a pedigree the length of a policeman’s leg. One day I met a lady whilst out shopping who asked me if my dog had been sniffing about Lizzie’s bitch, because there was a dog pestering her, which coincidentally was white, and if Lizzie caught this dog she said she’d shoot the devil. It seems the poor woman had every right to be annoyed, because one day, rather than leave her boxer who was coming on heat at home, she’d taken her to Perth in the car. There were several dogs of different breeds hanging around the house, so rather than have her and her neighbour’s gardens trampled by slavering dogs she thought it best to keep the bitch with her. Now the distance between Crieff and Perth is seventeen miles; it’s a busy road, but it does have a speed limit of fifty miles per hour. Lizzie saw something in her rear window as she made to overtake a tractor—a white dog running behind her car. She began increasing her speed, trying to shake off the animal, but it too increased its speed. Becoming more and more incensed, she pushed her foot hard on the accelerator, watching her pursuer in her rear-view mirror. At last he gave in and stopped, but that may have been because of the flashing blue lights of a police car overtaking him on the A85, on their way to apprehend a speeding motorist.
Lizzie was seeking revenge and when I opened my door to the wide-eyed, pale-faced lady, she pushed by me and gave Jip a right wallop with her umbrella. It was funny, yes, but not to that poor mongrel. From then on I walked him on a lead.
Here’s another strange incident relating to our jugal.
My young sister Babsy had been visiting one night. She had her pet with her, a pedigree bitch called Goldie, a pretty-faced spaniel. Babsy warned us the dog was coming on heat, and maybe it would be better if we locked Jip in another room just in case. Well, she arrived earlier than planned, and before Jip could be put out of the way he was faced with the bitch. I was horrified, and had visions of throwing buckets of water over them to separate them, but the strangest thing happened, Jip looped his tail between his legs and began to shake, and when the wee dog sniffed him he shot under the kitchen table. Next day Babsy phoned to tell us her lovely dog had died. The vet’s examination showed a large tumour.
That was another thing that made me question whether Jip was a dog, or a man whose seeds had got misplaced while Mother Nature was having an off day.
I had been baking cakes and sweet-making for a church fete. At night I heaped bags of tablet, individually tied into quarter-pounds, on a tray. I’d wrapped cakes with cling film. In the morning I boxed everything and transported it to my car, but when I did a final count it was obvious one bag of tablet and a cake had gone missing. I blamed the family, who swore blind they hadn’t touched them. Days later, when I cleaned out Jip’s basket, there hidden under his cushion was one quarter-pound of softened tablet and a flattened sponge cake, both still wrapped.
The last incident I’ll share with you is when he came home after trailing for a week. I heard the bark and opened the door, to find he’d brought his bitch home. She was the scraggiest looking jugal ever I set eyes on, talk about a tramp; what a mangy cratur. I shooed her away, but each time I did so, he whined to get out after her, so eventually I opened the door and watched him go. It was strange that at the turning in the road he lingered, but only for a moment and then was gone. His eyes seemed to say thanks, Jess, but I’ll away now.
And that was the last time I ever saw our Jip. Well, from then on we searched and searched, days followed days, but not one sighting of our bold lad did we see. We took turns following in his usual footsteps, but there was no trace. Did a gamekeeper shoot him? Did a dog warden pack him off to a dogs’ home? Or did he decide himself it was time to move? Did the bitch belong to tinkers who offered him a home also? Yes, I think that might have made sense. I remember seeing a caravan out the Gilmerton way, and when I went searching for Jip they had gone.
Jip just vanished into thin air. He was six years old. Each one of us missed him in our own way, and the pain of not knowing was at times unbearable. Sometimes with the passing of time I get ideas in my head that he came with the blessings of my ancient ancestors to say, ‘Look, this is how us tinkers have finished up, vanishing from our favourite haunts like a trailing dog. One day we are a healthy, happy clan, the next we are gone, no more!’
I began this book with my son crying real tears for us, the tinkers, and I shall it end it in the same way, with me shedding tears for my long-gone culture. A culture that by now you’ll know has had me making a fool of my people in one chapter and then praising them the next. Like all societies we have our good and bad, our wise and mad, our sad and happy. There are class distinctions
among my people as there are in all races. To quote my father: ‘when people are low, they search for someone lower to make them feel better about themselves.’
Tinker, Traveller, Gypsy, we are all the same. Rome invaded and brought their slaves with them. When they came north they met more solid resistance from the Pictish warriors. Common sense suggests that a greater armoury was required, and so the early metal workers came to Scotland.
In the south of Britain, the Romans’ Egyptian slaves worked with horses, leather, basket weaving, and clay. Rome withdrew and left the slaves, who I believe were at that time drawn from bedouin tribes—wanderers of the desert. They were dark-skinned people forced upon the Britain of two thousand years ago. Some called them Romanies after their masters, who incidentally marked them with ear-rings.
But generally they were looked upon as foreigners, belonging to the underclass of slaves of the Romans, those evil conquerors. This was senseless, because by the time Rome left it had been in occupation for hundreds of years. Still, long ago time changed little. You accepted Rome’s calendar, its days of the week, months etc. Also its power as a mighty army, but you never offered a hand of acceptance to those wanderers who had been brought here against their will and who had spread throughout a hostile world, long, long ago. But blood mingles and intertwines. When you feel strong, that’s the Viking in you. When wise, that’s the Jew. When you yearn for the sun, that’s the African in you. When you look in the mirror and a twinkle in your eye meets your gaze, that’s the Gypsy winking back.
So if any of the tales and incidents scattered through these pages make you cry, then let them be tears of joy, because we are not gone; we are sitting beside you on a bus or a train. We lie in hospital beds and are healed by the same doctors who treat everyone. The earth will claim our limbs, and when we have climbed our mountain we will stand naked in the sun alongside you. As my sister Shirley wrote, ‘Ye cannae sleep us away, we’ll aye be there in the morning.’
