IV.

SUPERSTITIOUS.

Unlike the Romantic, the Superstitious chapbook flourished vigorously in Scotland. Some one has said that the average Scot spoke to and of God as though He had been a next-door neighbour. This familiarity was not confined to the Divinity. A very material Devil held Scotland in fear and trembling, and, aided by numberless servants, kept the powers—both civil and ecclesiastical—in active employment. Many chapbooks went to the elucidation of “Satan’s Invisible World,” of which, one of 24 pages, published by C. Randall at Stirling in 1807, may be regarded as a typical specimen. It is entitled:—

“_Satan’s Invisible World Discover’d_: or, the History of Witches and Warlocks; containing The Wonderful Relation of Major Weir and His Sister; The Witches of Calder, Pittenweem, Borrowstounness, Bargarran and Culross; and a Remarkable Proclamation, which was heard at the Cross of Edinburgh at Twelve o’clock at night, in the Reign of King James the IV. of Scotland.”

The above may be said to be the ordinary chapbook version—and there were many more or less varied editions—of George Sinclair’s credulous work, a duodecimo, which was printed at Edinburgh by John Reid in 1685, and the full title of which is as follows:—

“_Satan’s Invisible World Discovered_; or A Choice Collection of Modern relations, proving evidently against the Sadducees and Atheists of this present Age that there are Devils, Spirits, Witches and Apparitions, from Authentick Records, Attestations of Famous Witnesses and undoubted Verity. To all which is added, That Marvellous History of Major Weir and His Sister. With two Relations of Apparitions at Edinburgh. By George Sinclair,[47] late Professor of Philosophy in the Colledge of Glasgow.”

This is not the place to refer at any length to that terrible condition of matters which led to so many innocents being sacrificed to the demands of a deluded people. The literature of witchcraft and devilry affords amusing reading in these days, but it is almost impossible to gauge the seriousness with which it must have been read by folks who found it difficult to distinguish an old woman from a witch. The stories are ludicrously absurd to a modern reader: they were doubtless very real to the simple Scots of a by-gone day. One is inclined for once to oppose Sydney Smith in his exclamation, “Thank God, I was born so late,” and wish that he could have met some of these children of the devil in the flesh. How exciting it would be, for example, if one could join Major Weir[48] in his fiery chariot at Edinburgh, and ride out with him as far as Dalkeith; or how comforting it would be if one could venture out with Luggy, the Zetland fisherman and wizard, knowing that he could cast out a line and, from the depths of the ocean, bring up “fish well boiled and roasted.” The chapbook says his companions “would make a merry meal thereof, not questioning who was cook,” and one would be prepared to be similarly silent if one could meet him on these terms. The marks of Peter’s finger and thumb, and the finding of the piece of money, lose something of the miraculous alongside Luggy’s wonderful feat. If the “chapman billies” of Burns’s day vended books of this kind, and were at all communicative as to the nature of their wares, the wonder is that “Tam o’ Shanter” did not witness something more infernal than “warlocks and witches in a dance” during that immortal ride from Ayr to the Shanter Farm.

Witchcraft formed a common subject for chapbook treatment. Among others there were _The Life and Transactions with the Trial and Burning of Maggie Lang, the Cardonald Witch_, who was executed at Paisley in 1697; _The History of Witches, Ghosts, and Highland Seers_; _Witchcraft Detected and Prevented, or the School of Black Art Newly Opened_; _Witchcraft Proven, Arraign’d and Condemned_, etc., by a Lover of the Truth; and _The Life and Transactions with the Trial and Burning of Maggie Osborne, the Ayrshire Witch_.

In the _Elegy in Memory of Sir Robert Grierson of Lag_, we are introduced to a Devil who is as remorseless as the creation of Milton, and who is in keeping with the superstition of the time. If there is a material Devil, there is also a material Hell, and Lag is there without even the privilege of Judas, who, according to a kindly legend, gets out to cool himself for one day in each year. The _Elegy_ is 24 pages of what is probably as ribald verse as ever was put forward in connection with religion. It is not lacking in point, and one or two impressive lines save it from being altogether commonplace. There is something striking in the idea that Satan cannot weep. The author says:—

“Could such a furious fiend as I Shed tears, my cheeks would never dry; But I could mourn both night and day, ’Cause Lag from earth is ta’en away.”

It is interesting to learn who have served the Devil. Beginning with Cain, he claims quite a host of notabilities—Saul, Doeg, Ahab, of early days; and Clavers, Middleton, Fletcher, King Charles, of Covenant times, are all

“Among the princes of my pit.”

None of these, however, not even

“My dear cousin, Provost Mill,”

is worthy to be named with Lag for his exertions on behalf of the Prince of Darkness. Nor in the hour of death was he forsaken by his master. “For,” says the Devil,

“when I heard that he was dead, A legion of my den did lead Him to my place of residence, Where still he’ll stay, and not go hence: For purgatory, I must tell, It is the lowest place in Hell: Well plenish’d with the Romish sort, Where thousands of them do resort. There many a prince and pope doth dwell, Fast fetter’d in that lower cell, And from that place they ne’er win free, Though greedy priests for gain do lie In making ignorants conceive They’ll bring them from the infernal cave. ... This Lag will know and all the rest Who of my lodging are possest, On earth no more they can serve me, But still I have their company; With this I must my grief allay, So I no more of Lag will say.”

It is interesting to note—though the authority is “The Father of Lies”—that according to this Presbyterian rhymer there is such a place as “purgatory.” As a rule, the Covenanter denied its existence, even as “the lowest pit of Hell.”

Superstitious literature of a different and slightly more respectable kind was that which treated of the prophetic utterances of Thomas the Rhymer, Alexander Peden, and Donald Cargill. Where a fulfilment of a prophecy is desired, it is sometimes an easy matter to find it, and the populace which enrolled Peden and Cargill among men of more than natural power would have sent them—a few years earlier or a few years later—to the stake to be burned as wizards endowed with powers from the Evil One.

There was yet another class of superstitious chapbooks—that which dealt with dreams and fortune-telling. Three which were common to Britain were, _The New Fortune Book; or, the Conjuror’s Guide_, which largely concerned itself with fortune-telling by cards; _Napoleon Bonaparte’s Book of Fate_, which is still on sale in various forms; and _Mother Bunch’s Golden Fortune-Teller_, which was perhaps the most popular of all. There were others that bore evidence of being more distinctly Scottish. Such, for example, was _The Spaewife, or Universal Fortune-Teller, wherein your future welfare may be known, by Physiognomy, Cards, Palmistry, and Coffee Grounds: Also, a Distinct Treatise on Moles_. The matter comprising this book is just the nonsense which, notwithstanding our School Boards, our vanity, and our superior intelligence, finds thousands of readers (shall we say believers?) at the present time. Two chapbooks—_The Golden Dreamer; or, Dreams Realised, containing the Interpretation of a Great Variety of Dreams_; and _The True Fortune Teller; or, The Universal Book of Fate_—deserve to be noticed for a different reason. Undated editions of these were issued at Glasgow, “printed for the Booksellers,” and appended to both there is a note “To the Reader” in the following terms:—

“The foregoing pages are published principally to show the superstitions which engrossed the mind of the population of Scotland during a past age, and which are happily disappearing before the progress of an enlightened civilization. It is hoped, therefore, that the reader will not attach the slightest importance to the solutions of the dreams as rendered above, as dreams are generally the result of a disordered stomach, or an excited imagination!”

It almost seems like a case of wilful fraud to ask a person to pay a penny for a dream-book which, when he has referred to it for the meaning of his yesternight’s dream, gives him a solution, and then—in effect—tells him that he had better consult a doctor, as his stomach is disordered. Still, one cannot but admire the candour of the old-world publisher. How many of the dream-books at present on sale are as honest?