WHAT a success the Spring Show was. Five thousand payers had plenty of room at the Thainstone Agricultural Centre. There was a fine show of livestock judged (among others) by John Jeffrey of Scotland, Kersknowe and the BBC. There was the usual show of enormous machines, none of which could get into any of the sheds at Little Ardo. The sun shone. Yes, Tuesday was a great day.

I can't think of anything good to say about Wednesday.

The trouble was that we had to attend the farewell party for Eddie the Eagle. The last of the gentleman bankers is taking early retirement after 40 years service. He is to be replaced by a computer screen which will refuse your application for any overdraft instantaneously, saving time and the expense of giving you coffee and biscuits, and it can measure you for a new suit at the same time.

I had been cruising, in a relatively restrained way, the various hospitality venues with the, Red Rooster and Mossie, until Eddie's do. At five o' clock the bank's blinds were drawn, so were the corks from too many bottles and the ball was well and truly on the slates.

It was a fitting sacrifice to honour that rarest of birds --- a popular banker.

And Eddie might well have been an eagle that never flew. His career might have ended when he was a teller of 17 years.

It was not a busy branch and the boy played little games to keep himself amused. One of those was to sit with his back to the door and guess by the sound of their step, which of his regular customers had just come in.

That was what he was up to this horrible winter's day. It was half day in Kemnay and he knew that both the general merchants and the shoemaker would be in as usual, but he would not have been surprised had no-one else come in on such a day.

But still, he did think it was odd when it came three o' clock and not one soul had come in. Still it was a bad day. That was it. There was no one coming so he went to lock up, only to find that he'd forgotten to unlock the door in the first place.

The poor lad suffered a sleepless night. What would the shop- keepers say when they came in with their money the next morning? And what about all the other customers who might have been turned away?

In the event not a word was said by anyone. From which Eddie concluded that everyone had been put off by the weather and that the good Lord was back in his heaven.

When Eddie started in the bank there was only one mechanical aid -a manual adding machine which could not even subtract. Everything had to be done with the fountain pen -not biro. So the job Eddie the Eagle, the low-flying banker, finished up doing bore no resemblance at all to the job he signed up for 40 years ago. Even the installation of the alarm system was a revolution.

It is said that the banker's inspector came to one of Eddie's charges and found it open but apparently unmanned. Idly he looked around, spied the alarm button and stood on it thinking "that'll make them sit up".

It certainly brought action. Within a minute a waitress from the hotel appeared with a smile, a nip and a half pint.

Then there is that other dehumanising innovation the hole-in-the-wall. Who would have thought 40 years ago that most of the cash would go out of the bank through a 24-hour hole-in-the-wall?

It hadn't occurred to me until Eddie told me at his leaving do, but the banker has to fill up the hole in the wall every now and then.

Well now, Eddie and one of the lassies had been doing just that one night and he, always looking for a new angle, had a peep out through the hole-in-the-wall. Behold here comes his cousin Jimmy to make a withdrawal. Eddie waited until his cousin had pushed in his card and then shouted out through the hole, "Get to hell oot o' there. You're gettin no money today."

Poor Jimmy took fright and ran away, and the manager and the girl had to run after him, return his card and explain. It can't have been easy.

Those were just some of the stories that were told at Eddie's farewell. But it was interesting to meet the modern bank managers. It is said that none of them really is a manager now. The man who used to advise on which bulls to put on your cows to get the best yielding heifers now thinks milk comes from a super-market. All he can do is refer you to someone else who'll turn your loan application down.

It is no wonder, for they are all so young. We met all the important computer screens at the do. And the astonishing thing was the higher up the bank you went the younger they got. The top boss doesn't look a day over 17.

Of course, Eddie made a speech and a thoughtful one. He said he got on well with people because he was a hopeless delegator and so had to see everyone himself. He also said that his customers had always been his friends and his friends had always been his customers.

I bet it won't be long before one of the computers comes up with that as good idea.

Bill: This is taken form Charlie Allan's article in the Herald of 4 March 1996 and is headed FAREWELL TO THE LAST GENTLEMAN BANKER.

Enjoy it, Duncan.