My father, as I said before, was the sport of strong passions; from that instance of rebellion he took a kind of dislike to me..." Burns was initiated into Freemasonry here in 1781.

[5] The tenth reads: "Every man proper for a member of this Society, must have a frank, honest, open heart; above anything dirty or mean; and must be a professed lover of one or more of the female sex.

No haughty, self-conceited person, who looks upon himself as superior to the rest of the club, and especially no mean spirited, worldly mortal, whose only will is to heap up money shall upon any pretence whatever be admitted."

"; "Suppose a young man, bred a farmer, but without any future, had it in his power to marry either of two women, the one a girl of large fortune, but neither handsome in person or agreeable in conversation but who can manage the household affairs of a farm well enough; the other of them a girl every way agreeable in person, conversation and behaviour, but without any fortune, which of them shall he choose?".

[8] A rare item of great interest held by the Bachelors' Club is a wooden instrument known as a 'Nocturnal', which means 'night time'.