Part 21
When the craft of shoemakers used, in former times, to parade the High Street, West Bow, and Grassmarket, with inverted tin kettles on their heads and schoolboys’ rulers in their hands, Joseph—who, though a leader and commander on every other public occasion, was not admitted into this procession on account of his being only a cobbler—dressed himself in his best clothes, with a royal crown painted and gilt and a wooden truncheon, and marched pompously through the city till he came to the Netherbow, where he planted himself in the middle of the street to await the approach of the procession, which he, as a citizen of Edinburgh, proposed to welcome into the town. When the royal shoemaker came to the Netherbow Port, Joseph stood forth, removed the truncheon from his haunch, flourished it in the air, and pointing it to the ground, with much dignity of manner, addressed his paste-work majesty in these words: ‘O great King Crispianus! what are we in thy sight but a parcel of puir slaister-kytes—creeshy cobblers—sons of bitches?’ And I have been assured that this ceremony was performed in a style of burlesque exhibiting no small artistic power.
Joseph had a wife, whom he would never permit to walk beside him, it being his opinion that women are inferior to the male part of creation, and not entitled to the same privileges. He compelled his spouse to walk a few paces behind him; and when he turned, she was obliged to make a circuit so as to maintain the precise distance from his person which he assigned to her. When he wished to say anything to her, he whistled as upon a dog, upon which she came up to him submissively and heard what he had to say; after which she respectfully resumed her station in the rear.
After he had figured for a few years as an active partisan of the people, his name waxed of such account with them that it is said he could in the course of an hour collect a crowd of not fewer than ten thousand persons, all ready to obey his high behests, or to disperse at his bidding. In collecting his troops he employed a drum, which, though a general, he did not disdain to beat with his own hands; and never, surely, had the fiery cross of the Highland chief such an effect upon the warlike devotion of his clan as Bowed Joseph’s drum had upon the spirit of the Edinburgh rabble. As he strode along, the street was cleared of its loungers, every close pouring forth an addition to his train, like the populous glens adjacent to a large Highland strath giving forth their accessions to the general force collected by the aforesaid cross. The Town Rats, who might peep forth like old cautious snails on hearing his drum, would draw in their horns with a Gaelic execration, and shut their door, as he approached; while the _Lazy Corner_ was, at sight of him, a lazy corner no longer; and the West Bow ceased to resound as he descended.
It would appear, after all, that there was a moral foundation for Joseph’s power, as there must be for that of all governments of a more regular nature that would wish to thrive or be lasting. The little man was never known to act in a bad cause, or in any way to go against the principles of natural justice. He employed his power in the redress of such grievances as the law of the land does not or cannot easily reach; and it was apparent that almost everything he did was for the sake of what he himself designated _fair-play_. Fair-play, indeed, was his constant object, whether in clearing room with his brawny arms for a boxing-match, insulting the constituted authorities, sacking the granary of a monopolist, or besieging the Town-council in their chamber.
An anecdote which proves this strong love of fair-play deserves to be recorded. A poor man in the Pleasance having been a little deficient in his rent, and in the country on business, his landlord seized and rouped his household furniture, turning out the family to the street. On the poor man’s return, finding the house desolate and his family in misery, he went to a neighbouring stable and hanged himself.[158] Bowed Joseph did not long remain ignorant of the case; and as soon as it was generally known in the city, he shouldered on his drum, and after beating it through the streets for half-an-hour, found himself followed by several thousand persons, inflamed with resentment at the landlord’s cruelty. With this army he marched to an open space of ground now covered by Adam Street, Roxburgh Street, &c., named in former times Thomson’s Park, where, mounted upon the shoulders of six of his lieutenant-generals, he proceeded to harangue them, in Cambyses’s vein, concerning the flagrant oppression which they were about to revenge. He concluded by directing his men to sack the premises of the cruel landlord, who by this time had wisely made his escape; and this order was instantly obeyed. Every article which the house contained was brought out to the street, where, being piled up in a heap, the general set fire to them with his own hand, while the crowd rent the air with their acclamations. Some money and bank-notes perished in the blaze, besides an eight-day clock, which, sensible to the last, calmly struck ten just as it was consigned to the flames.
On another occasion, during a scarcity, the mob, headed by Joseph, had compelled all the meal-dealers to sell their meal at a certain price per peck, under penalty of being obliged to shut up their shops. One of them, whose place of business was in the Grassmarket, agreed to sell his meal at the price fixed by the general, for the good of the poor, as he said; and he did so under the superintendence of Joseph, who stationed a party at the shop-door to preserve peace and good order till the whole stock was disposed of, when, by their leader’s command, the mob gave three hearty cheers, and quietly dispersed. Next day, the unlucky victualler let his friends know that he had not suffered so much by this compulsory trade as might be supposed; because, though the price was below that of the market, he had taken care to use a measure which gave only about three-fourths instead of the whole. It was not long ere this intelligence came to the ears of our tribune, who, immediately collecting a party of his troops, beset the meal-dealer before he was aware, and compelled him to pay back a fourth of the price of every peck of meal sold; then giving their victim a hearty drubbing, they sacked his shop, and quietly dispersed as before.
Some foreign princes happening to visit Edinburgh during Joseph’s administration, at a period of the year when the mob of Edinburgh was wont to amuse itself with an annual burning of the pope, the magistrates felt anxious that this ceremony should for once be dispensed with, as it might hurt the feelings of their distinguished visitors. The provost, in this emergency, resolved not to employ his own authority, but that of Joseph, to whom, accordingly, he despatched his compliments, with half a guinea, begging his kind offices in dissuading the mob from the performance of their accustomed sport. Joseph received the message with the respect due to the commission of ‘his friend the Lord Provost,’ and pocketed the half-guinea with a complacent smile; but standing up to his full height, and resolutely shaking his rough head, he gave for answer that ‘he was highly gratified by his lordship’s message; but, everything considered, the pope _must be burnt_!’ And so the pope, honest man, _was_ burnt with all the honours accordingly.
Joseph was at last killed by a fall from the top of a Leith stage-coach, in returning from the races, while in a state of intoxication, about the year 1780. It is to be hoped, for the good of society, that ‘we ne’er shall look upon his like again.’[159]
FOOTNOTES
[157] What is said to be the original Blue Blanket is still preserved in the National Museum of Antiquities of Scotland.
[158] _Scots Magazine_, June 1767.
[159] The skeleton of this singular being exists entire in the class-room of the professor of anatomy in the College.
BICKERS.
Amongst the social features of a bygone age in Edinburgh were the _bickers_ in which the boys were wont to indulge—that is, street conflicts, conducted chiefly with stones, though occasionally with sticks also, and even more formidable weapons. One cannot but wonder that, so lately as the period when elderly men now living were boys, the powers for preserving peace in the city should have been so weak as to allow of such battles taking place once or twice almost every week. The practice was, however, only of a piece with the general rudeness of those old days; and, after all, there was more appearance than reality of danger attending it. It was truly, as one who had borne a part in it has remarked, ‘only a rough kind of play.’[160]
The most likely time for a bicker was Saturday afternoon, when the schools and hospitals held no restraint over their tenants. Then it was almost certain that either the Old Town and New Town boys, the George Square and Potterrow boys, the Herioters and the Watsoners, or some other parties accustomed to regard themselves as natural enemies, would meet on some common ground, and fall a-pelting each other. There were hardly anywhere two adjoining streets but the boys respectively belonging to them would occasionally hold encounters of this kind; and the animosity assumed a darker tinge if there was any discrepancy of rank or condition between the parties, as was apt to be the case when, for instance, the Old Town lads met the children of the aristocratic streets to the north. Older people looked on with anxiety, and wondered what the Town-guard was about, and occasionally reports were heard that such a boy had got a wound in the head, while another had lost a couple of his front teeth; it was even said that fatal cases had occurred in the memory of aged citizens. Yet, to the best of my recollection—for I do remember something of bickers—there was little likelihood of severe damage. The parties somehow always kept at a good distance from each other, and there was a perpetual running in one direction or another; certainly nothing like hand-to-hand fighting. Occasionally attempts were made to put down the riot, but seldom with much success; for it was one of the most ludicrous features of these contests that whenever the Town-guard made its appearance on the ground, the belligerent powers instantly coalesced against the common foe. Besides, they could quickly make their way to other ground, and there continue the war.
Bickers must have had a foundation in human nature: from no temporary effervescence of the boy-mind did they spring; pleasant, though wrong, had they been from all time. Witness the following act of the Town-council so long ago as 1529: ‘_Bikkyrringis betwix Barnis_.—It is statut and ordainit be the prouest ballies and counsall Forsamekle as ther has bene gret bikkyrringis betwix barnis and followis in tymes past and diuerse thar throw hurt in perell of ther lyffis and gif sik thingis be usit thar man diuerse barnis and innocentis be slane and diuisione ryse amangis nychtbouris theirfor we charge straitlie and commandis in our Souerane Lord the Kingis name the prouest and ballies of this burgh that na sic bykkyrringis be usit in tymes to cum. Certifing that and ony persone be fund bykkyrrand that faderis and moderis sall ansuer and be accusit for thar deidis and gif thai be vagabondis thai to be scurgit and bannist the toune.’
An anecdote which Scott has told of his share in the bickers which took place in his youth between the George Square youth and the plebeian fry of the neighbouring streets is so pat to this occasion that its reproduction may be excusable. ‘It followed,’ he says, ‘from our frequent opposition to each other, that, though not knowing the names of our enemies, we were yet well acquainted with their appearance, and had nicknames for the most remarkable of them. One very active and spirited boy might be considered as the principal leader in the cohort of the suburbs. He was, I suppose, thirteen or fourteen years old, finely made, tall, blue-eyed, with long fair hair, the very picture of a youthful Goth. This lad was always first in the charge and last in the retreat—the Achilles, at once, and Ajax, of the Crosscauseway. He was too formidable to us not to have a cognomen, and, like that of a knight of old, it was taken from the most remarkable part of his dress, being a pair of old green livery breeches, which was the principal part of his clothing; for, like Pentapolin, according to Don Quixote’s account, Green Breeks, as we called him, always entered the battle with bare arms, legs, and feet.
‘It fell that, once upon a time, when the combat was at the thickest, this plebeian champion headed a sudden charge, so rapid and furious that all fled before him. He was several paces before his comrades, and had actually laid his hands on the patrician standard, when one of our party, whom some misjudging friend had entrusted with a _couteau de chasse_, or hanger, inspired with a zeal for the honour of the corps worthy of Major Sturgeon himself, struck poor Green Breeks over the head with strength sufficient to cut him down. When this was seen, the casualty was so far beyond what had ever taken place before that both parties fled different ways, leaving poor Green Breeks, with his bright hair plentifully dabbled in blood, to the care of the watchman, who (honest man) took care not to know who had done the mischief. The bloody hanger was flung into one of the Meadow ditches, and solemn secrecy was sworn on all hands; but the remorse and terror of the actor were beyond all bounds, and his apprehensions of the most dreadful character. The wounded hero was for a few days in the Infirmary, the case being only a trifling one. But though inquiry was strongly pressed on him, no argument could make him indicate the person from whom he had received the wound, though he must have been perfectly well known to him. When he recovered, and was dismissed, the author and his brother opened a communication with him, through the medium of a popular gingerbread baker, of whom both parties were customers, in order to tender a subsidy in name of smart-money. The sum would excite ridicule were I to name it; but sure I am that the pockets of the noted Green Breeks never held as much money of his own. He declined the remittance, saying that he would not sell his blood; but at the same time reprobated the idea of being an informer, which he said was _clam_—that is, base or mean. With much urgency he accepted a pound of snuff for the use of some old woman—aunt, grandmother, or the like—with whom he lived. We did not become friends, for the bickers were more agreeable to both parties than any more pacific amusement; but we conducted them ever after under mutual assurances of the highest consideration for each other.’[161]
FOOTNOTES
[160] Notes to _Waverley_.
[161] _Waverley Annotations_, i. 70.
SUSANNA, COUNTESS OF EGLINTOUNE.
The house on the west side of the Old Stamp-office Close, High Street, formerly Fortune’s Tavern, was, in the early part of the last century, the family mansion of Alexander, Earl of Eglintoune. It is a building of considerable height and extent, accessible by a broad scale stair. The alley in which it is situated bears great marks of former respectability, and contained, till the year 1821, the Stamp-office, then removed to the Waterloo Buildings.[162]
The ninth Earl of Eglintoune[163] was one of those patriarchal peers who live to an advanced age—indefatigable in the frequency of their marriages and the number of their children—who linger on and on, with an unfailing succession of young countesses, and die at last leaving a progeny interspersed throughout the whole of Douglas’s _Peerage_, two volumes, folio, re-edited by Wood. His lordship, in early life, married a sister of Lady Dundee, who brought him a large family, and died just about that happy period when she could not have greatly increased it. His next wife was a daughter of Chancellor Aberdeen, who only added one daughter to his stock, and then paused, in a fit of ill-health, to the great vexation of his lordship, who, on account of his two sons by the first countess having died young, was anxious for an heir. This was a consummation to his nuptial happiness which Countess Anne did not seem at all likely to bring about, and the chagrin of his lordship must have been increased by the longevity which her very ill-health seemed to confer upon her; for her ladyship was one of those valetudinarians who are too well acquainted with death, being always just at his door, ever to come to closer quarters with him. At this juncture the blooming Miss Kennedy was brought to Edinburgh by her father, Sir Archibald, the rough old cavalier, who made himself so conspicuous in _the Persecution_ and in Dundee’s wars.
Susanna Kennedy, though the daughter of a lady considerably under the middle size—one of the three co-heiresses of the Covenanting general, David Leslie (Lord Newark), whom Cromwell overthrew at Dunbar—was six feet high, extremely handsome, elegant in her carriage, and had a face and complexion of most bewitching loveliness. Her relations and nurses always anticipated that she was to marry the Earl of Eglintoune, in spite of their disparity of age;[164] for, while walking one day in her father’s garden at Culzean, there alighted upon her shoulder a hawk, with his lordship’s name upon its bells, which was considered an infallible omen of her fate. Her appearance in Edinburgh, which took place about the time of the Union, gained her a vast accession of lovers among the nobility and gentry, and set all the rhyming fancies of the period agog. Among her swains was Sir John Clerk of Penicuik, a man of learning and talent in days when such qualities were not common. As Miss Kennedy was understood to be fond of music, he sent her a flute as a love-gift; from which it may be surmised that this instrument was played by females in that age, while as yet the pianoforte was not. When the young lady attempted to blow the instrument, something was found to interrupt the sound, which turned out to be a copy of verses in her praise:
‘Harmonious pipe, I languish for thy bliss, When pressed to Silvia’s lips with gentle kiss! And when her tender fingers round thee move In soft embrace, I listen and approve Those melting notes which soothe my soul in love. Embalmed with odours from her breath that flow, You yield your music when she’s pleased to blow; And thus at once the charming lovely fair Delights with sounds, with sweets perfumes the air. Go, happy pipe, and ever mindful be To court bewitching Silvia for me; Tell all I feel—you cannot tell too much— Repeat my love at each soft melting touch— Since I to her my liberty resign, Take thou the care to tune her heart to mine.’
Unhappily for this accomplished and poetical lover, Lord Eglintoune’s sickly wife happened just about this time to die, and set his lordship again at large among the spinsters of Scotland. Admirers of a youthful, impassioned, and sonnet-making cast might have trembled at his approach to the shrine of their divinity; for his lordship was one of those titled suitors who, however old and horrible, are never rejected, except in novels and romances. It appears that poor Clerk had actually made a declaration of his passion for Miss Kennedy, which her father was taking into consideration, a short while before the death of Lady Eglintoune. As an old friend and neighbour, Sir Archibald thought he would consult the earl upon the subject, and he accordingly proceeded to do so. Short but decisive was the conference. ‘Bide a wee, Sir Archy,’ said his lordship; ‘my wife’s very sickly.’ With Sir Archibald, as with Mrs Slipslop, the least hint sufficed: the case was at once settled against the elegant baronet of Penicuik. The lovely Susanna accordingly became in due time the Countess of Eglintoune.
Even after this attainment of one of the greatest blessings that life has to bestow,[165] the old peer’s happiness was like to have been destroyed by another untoward circumstance. It was true that he had the handsomest wife in the kingdom, and she brought him as many children as he could desire. One after another came no fewer than seven daughters. But then his lordship wanted a male heir; and every one knows how poor a consolation a train of daughters, however long, proves in such a case. He was so grieved at the want of a son that he threatened to divorce his lady. The countess replied that he need not do that, for she would readily agree to a separation, provided he would give back what he had with her. His lordship, supposing she alluded only to pecuniary matters, assured her she should have her fortune to the last penny. ‘Na, na, my lord,’ said she, ‘that winna do: return me my youth, beauty, and virginity, and dismiss me when you please.’ His lordship, not being able to comply with this demand, willingly let the matter drop; and before the year was out her ladyship brought him a son, who established the affection of his parents on an enduring basis. Two other male children succeeded. The countess was remarkable for a manner quite peculiar to herself, and which was remembered as the _Eglintoune air_, or the _Eglintoune manner_, long after her death. A Scottish gentleman, writing from London in 1730, says: ‘Lady Eglintoune has set out for Scotland, much satisfied with the honour and civilities shown her ladyship by the queen and all the royal family: she has done her country more honour than any lady I have seen here, both by a genteel and a prudent behaviour.’[166] Her daughters were also handsome women. It was a goodly sight, a century ago, to see the long procession of sedans, containing Lady Eglintoune and her daughters, devolve from the close and proceed to the Assembly Rooms, where there was sure to be a crowd of plebeian admirers congregated to behold their lofty and graceful figures step from the chairs on the pavement. It could not fail to be a remarkable sight—eight beautiful women, conspicuous for their stature and carriage, all dressed in the splendid though formal fashions of that period, and inspired at once with dignity of birth and consciousness of beauty! Alas! such _visions_ no longer illuminate the dark tortuosities of Auld Reekie!
Many of the young ladies found good matches, and were the mothers of men more or less distinguished for intellectual attainments. Sir James Macdonald, the Marcellus of the Hebrides, and his two more fortunate brothers, were the progeny of Lady Margaret; and in various other branches of the family talent seems to be hereditary.