I have been concerned this week by the peasant's duty of care for his land and his desire to hand the land on to the next generation and make sure they are ready to look after their heritage properly.

Two things have prompted these profound musings. The first is the discovery, in his own words, of my father's wishes for Little Ardo. The second is the struggle of an old university colleague to get back his property, which was taken over by the communists.

John R Allan's parents left him with his grandparents at Bodachra farm just outside Aberdeen when he was born in 1906. Things could not have worked out better. His grandfather's grandfather had come first to Bodachra, and the old couple were able to give the boy a loving home as well as their feeling for the land.

Sadly, that was more than they managed with their own family, all but one daughter of which went away to the Empire and never came back.

With the family gone, the old couple gave up the farm and died leaving their grandson enough, just, to see him through college and away to work for the Glasgow Herald.

Left by parents and now bereft of his grandparents, John Allan clung on to the farm from which he had also been cast adrift. He wrote about it under the guise of "Dungair" in Farmer's Boy and "Lendrum" in Green Heritage, where he talked about the peasant's need to have a place "that would always be their place".

Knowing that history, I was touched this week to come across this in his diary for December 10, 1946. John Allan had been home from the war for less than a year to what had been his wife's family farm since 1837.

"Why do we think that a son will carry on our work as we plan it? If I couldn't give Little Ardo to Charles, I think of Jackie Large (a nephew) having it and it is not the same. Why should I think Charles would be good to LA? I feel now as if it were the old family holding. It's taken the place of Bodachra. It's not wholly sentiment. I do feel a kind of duty to the place."

It hadn't taken long for him to feel that Little Ardo was his place. It placed a heavy burden on me to see it passed on to someone who could be good to the land so that it can always be our place.

So, you see how lucky the Farmer feels that Potions came along, with no other idea in his head but to be a farmer, and married the Elder Investment.

And what about Ljubo Sirc? When I think of my friend I feel something like shame at the bland life I have had. He is from Slovenia, until 1991 part of Yugoslavia. He fought against the Germans and opposed the takeover by Tito's communists, maintaining friendships with westerners even after the takeover. He was eventually arrested, given a famous show trial and condemned to death. The sentence was commuted to imprisonment and he served seven-and-a-half years, including two years in solitary confinement.

His father had founded a successful factory. He lost everything during the war, first to the Nazis who burned down the factory and then to the communist state. He was arrested along with his son as an enemy of the people, though Franjo Sirc had not played any part in politics.

Eventually, young Ljubo escaped over the Alps to Italy and, cutting an epic story to the bone, ended up a lecturer in international economics at the University of St Andrews.

That was where we met in 1964. Sirc went on to a brilliant academic career culminating in his founding the Centre for Research into Post-Communist Economies linked to the Institute of Economic Affairs, a very highly-thought-of market economists' ginger group.

He had made a good life for himself in the West with his wife, a fellow academic called Sue. Not much chance of him passing his Slovenian heritage on to their daughter Nadia, though. Until the fall of communism in the 1990s. Part of the Slovenian deal was that they would return property or compensate all those who had had their possessions appropriated. My friend was to be able to reconnect with his heritage.

However, it hasn't worked out that way. Despite the apparent straightforwardness of his case, and firm establishment of his rights, proceedings have dragged on for 15 years. He eventually got the family home back but, so far, neither compensation nor the site of his father's factory have been forthcoming.

My friend was given the freedom of his native city, Kranje, in 2003 but he cannot get the justice he seeks.

He seeks it for his daughter and for his father, who died in prison.

He also seeks it on behalf of European democracy. The communists who jailed him are still in powerful positions and still dominate the Slovenian judiciary. Next year, when the presidency of the European Union passes to Slovenia, these people, who have ignored the rule of law in the case of Ljubo Sirc, will have a central role in the laws that govern the entire union.

Dr Sirc, 87 years old and still fighting, believes it was his struggle for democracy and the rule of law that led to his award in 2002 by the British government of a CBE.

Meanwhile, the Farmer - 19 years his junior - subsides meekly below the parapet.