Lauchie MacLean Lauchie had the next farm. He lived with his mother, Anna Bhean (a Gaelic word pronounced 'Van' mean¬ ing "an old woman"). Anna Van never bothered to learn the English language. She talked Gaelic until she died as an old woman. My mother used to go there as Anna had a knitting machine, and she could knit the legs of the long socks that went to the knees. My mother would knit the feet on by hand. These socks were good in the deep snow. I can still hear my mother spinning the yarn from rolls of wool from our own sheep. I remember the man in Cardigan who carded the wool. His house burned and he made a house of clay, shaped liked an Eskimo snow house. I never met Anna Van as she never seemed to leave home, but many including my mother and father could talk Gaelic quite freely. Lauchie talked with a droll manner and had many witty sayings. He did not seem to be much of a farmer. He used to catch a few lobsters in a small dory which he rowed along the shore. He would gather stones to put in the Little Sands wharf when the south winds would blow away a piece of the wharf. Lauchie worked some in building the railway in Nova Scotia . He worked with the man who used dynamite to blast through the rocky area. When that man left, work was about to stop. Lauchie was not interested in taking 79