My grandfather loaded the cart with goods and travelled around the country to sell the goods to the villagers who wanted to buy goods. He ran his business successfully but he worked very hard and long hours and frequently came home very late. They left Thornhill and moved to Doune and soon settled down there.

    They had a lovely big house with a big yard. When the children grew up between seven and eight years old, they were woken up early in the morning, 5am in the morning, and sent up to the workshop. There were many dead rabbits dangling from the wooden beam and they were told to sew them up with string. They finished with their job at 6pm and went straight to bed. They sold some iron metal and some hides from rabbits to a bib company and made a fortune.

    They sent two of the three deaf children to Donaldson's Hospital for the Deaf School in Edinburgh, but they would not send their young daughter Mary Ainslie. She was my aunt and I was sorry for her because she had not been educated. I miss them all, for they are now all disappeared and dead. My uncle ran his butcher shop and sold it and became an antique dealer.

    My late mother used to take us to Stirling by bus from St Andrew Square in Edinburgh to see her relatives numerous times when we were children. I miss them all.They always talked to me with their finger spelling.