To Scotland and Love

Author’s NoteWHEREVER the Scots go, they take with them their tartans, their whisky – which can be made only in Scotland – the Haggis and the Reels. Reels were known throughout Scotland in the sixteenth century, but in the seventeenth the Presbyterian Church severely discouraged social dancing. By around 1700 the Reel seems to have survived, but only in the Highlands where the Presbyterian influence was the weakest. After 1700, when the Church became more tolerant of dancing, Reels reappeared in the Scottish Lowlands. At about 1770 the only specific Reel mentioned in Scottish literature is The Threesome, but seventy years later this was widely superseded by The Foursome Reel. Reels in a similar form did occur in England and Wales, while a rather different kind was known in Ireland. The Eightsome Reel, which is included in every kind of country dancing throughout the United Kingdom, does not conform to the earlier Reels. Composed in about 1870, it incorporates the figures of a Reel dating from about 1818. The Haggis is entirely and completely a part of Scotland and the Scots have introduced it all over the world. A real Haggis is made of sheep’s pluck (lungs, heart and liver), which is boiled with beef fat for three hours. It is then minced with oatmeal, onions and seasoning and a large Haggis is sewn into a sheep’s stomach. The Haggis has always been the most important dish at a Burns Supper that is steeped in tradition. It begins with The Selkirk Grace, which Robert Burns first used in 1793 at a dinner given by the Earl of Selkirk. Then to the cry of ‘Hail Great Chieftain of the Pudding race!’ and, with the skirl of the bagpipes, the Haggis is carried in. The Chairman reads out the Burns address, To a Haggis, during which a dirk is plunged through the skin of the Haggis. The proof of a successful Burns Supper is the intensity of the singing, the poetry reading, and the quality of the main tribute of the evening, known as The Immortal Memory.