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I WAS witness to a very
extraordinary scene that happened in the month of February or March
1736, which was the escape of Robertson, a condemned criminal, from
the Tolbooth Church in Edinburgh. In those days it was usual to
bring the criminals who were condemned to death into that church, to
attend public worship every Sunday after their condemnation, when
the clergyman made some part of his discourse and prayers to suit
their situation; which, among other circumstances of solemnity which
then attended the state of condemned criminals, had no small effect
on the public mind. Robertson and Wilson were smugglers, and had
been condemned for robbing a custom-house, where some of their goods
had been deposited; a crime which at that time did not seem, in the
opinion of the common people, to deserve so severe a punishment. I
was carried by an acquaintance to church to see the prisoners on the
Sunday before the day of execution. We went early into the church on
purpose to see them come in, and were seated in a pew before the
gallery in front of the pulpit. Soon after we went into the church
by the door from the Parliament Close, the criminals were brought in
by the door next the Tolbooth, and placed in a long pew, not far
from the pulpit. Four soldiers came in with them, and placed
Robertson at the head of the pew, and Wilson below him, two of
themselves sitting below Wilson, and two in a pew behind him.
The bells were
ringing and the doors were open, while the people were coming into
the church. Robertson watched his opportunity, and, suddenly
springing up, got over the pew into the passage ["Robertson,
crossing the church, passed close by the head of the pew where I
was."—Recollections.] that led in to the door in the Parliament
Close, and no person offering to lay hands on him, made his escape
in a moment—so much the more easily, perhaps, as everybody's
attention was drawn to Wilson, who was a stronger man, and who,
attempting to follow Robertson, was seized by the soldiers, and
struggled so long with them that the two who at last followed
Robertson were too late. It was reported that he had maintained his
struggle that he might let his companion have time. That might be
his second thought, but his first certainly was to escape himself,
for I saw him set his foot on the seat to leap over, when the
soldiers pulled him back. Wilson was immediately carried out to the
Tolbooth, and Robertson, getting uninterrupted through the
Parliament Square, down the back stairs, into the Cowgate, was heard
of no more till he arrived in Holland. This was an interesting
scene, and by filling the public mind with compassion for the
unhappy person who did not escape, and who was the better character
of the two, had probably some influence in producing what followed:
for when the sentence against Wilson came to be executed a few weeks
thereafter, a very strong opinion prevailed that there was a plot to
force the Town Guard, whose duty it is to attend executions under
the order of a civil magistrate.
There was a Captain
Porteous, who by his good behaviour in the army had obtained a
subaltern's commission, ["He was a common soldier in Queen Anne's
wars, but had got a commission for his courage."—Recollections.] and
had afterwards, when on half-pay, been preferred to the command of
the City Guard. This man, by his skill in manly exercises,
particularly the golf, and by gentlemanly behaviour, was admitted
into the company of his superiors, which elated his mind, and added
insolence to his native roughness, so that he was much hated and
feared by the mob of Edinburgh. When the day of execution came, the
rumour of a deforcement at the gallows prevailed strongly; and the
Provost and Magistrates (not in their own minds very strong) thought
it a good measure to apply for three or four companies of a marching
regiment that lay in the Canongate, to be drawn up in the Lawnmarket,
a street leading from the Tolbooth to the Grassmarket, the place of
execution, in order to overawe the mob by their being at hand.
Porteous, who, it is said, had his natural courage increased to rage
by any suspicion that he and his Guard could not execute the law,
and being heated likewise with wine—for he had dined, as the custom
then was, between one and two—became perfectly furious when he
passed by the three companies drawn up in the street as he marched
along with his prisoner. ["He was heard to growl as he passed down
the Bow [West Bow]: 'What ! was not he and his Guard fit to hang a
rascal without help! ' "—Recollections.]
Mr. Baillie had taken
windows in a house on the north side of the Grassmarket, for his
pupils and me, in the second floor, about seventy or eighty yards
westward of the place of execution, where we went in due time to see
the show; to which I had no small aversion, having seen one at
Dumfries, the execution of Jock Johnstone, which shocked me very
much. When we arrived at the house, some people who were looking
from the windows were displaced, and went to a window in the common
stair, about two feet below the level of ours. The street is long
and wide, and there was a very great crowd assembled. The execution
went on with the usual forms, and Wilson behaved in a manner very
becoming his situation. There was not the least appearance of an
attempt to rescue; but soon after the executioner had done his duty,
there was an attack made upon him, as usual on such occasions, by
the boys and blackguards throwing stones and dirt in testimony of
their abhorrence of the hangman. But there was no attempt to break
through the guard and cut down the prisoner. It was generally said
that there was very little, if any, more violence than had usually
happened on such occasions. Porteous, however, inflamed with wine
and jealousy, thought proper to order his Guard to fire, their
muskets being loaded with slugs ; and when the soldiers showed
reluctance, I saw him turn to them with threatening gesture and an
inflamed countenance. They obeyed, and fired; but wishing to do as
little harm as possible, many of them elevated their pieces, the
effect of which was that some people were wounded in the windows;
and one unfortunate lad, whom we had displaced, was killed in the
stair window by a slug entering his head. His name was Henry Black,
["Henry, being of a jocular humour, had been laughing at the people
who fell in the street, which he imagined was only through fear. On
the second fire his jokes were laid at once, when his companions
jogging him perceived his head was bleeding."—Recollections. In the
Caledonian Mercury appears the name of Henry Graham, tailor in the
Canongate, shot through the head while looking out at a window.] a
journeyman tailor, whose bride was the daughter of the house we were
in. She fainted away when he was brought into the house speechless,
where he only lived till nine or ten o'clock. We had seen many
people, women and men, fall on the street, and at first thought it
was only through fear, and by their crowding on one another to
escape. But when the crowd dispersed, we saw them lying dead or
wounded, and had no longer any doubt of what had happened. The
numbers were said to be eight or nine killed, and double the number
wounded ; but this was never exactly known.
This unprovoked slaughter irritated the
common people to the last ; and the state of grief and rage into
which their minds were thrown, was visible in the high commotion
that appeared in the multitude. Our tutor was very anxious to have
us all safe in our lodgings, but durst not venture out to see if it
was practicable to go home. I offered to go; went, and soon
returned, offering to conduct them safe to our lodgings, which were
only half -way down the Lawnmarket, by what was called the Castle
Wynd, which was just at hand, to the westward. There we remained
safely, and were not allowed to stir out any more that night till
about nine o'clock, when, the streets having long been quiet, we all
grew anxious to learn the fate of Henry Black, and I was allowed to
go back to the house. I took the younger Maxwell with me, and found
that he had expired an hour before we arrived. A single slug had
penetrated the side of his head an inch above the ear. The sequel of
this affair was, that Porteous was tried and condemned to be hanged;
but by the intercession of some of the Judges themselves, who
thought his case hard, he was reprieved by the Queen-Regent.
["Having been a golfing companion of President Forbes, Lord Drummore,
and other persons of rank and consequence, application was made for
a respite to Queen Caroline, then Regent."---Recollections.] The
Magistrates, who on this occasion, as on the former, acted weakly,
designed to have removed him to the Castle for greater security. But
a plot was laid and conducted by some persons unknown with the
greatest secrecy, policy, and vigour, to prevent that design, by
forcing the prison the night before, and executing the sentence upon
him themselves, which to effectuate cost them from eight at night
till two in the morning; and yet this plot was managed so
dexterously that they met with no interruption, though there were
five companies of a marching regiment lying in the Canongate.
This happened on the 7th of September
1736; and so prepossessed were the minds of every person that
something extraordinary would take place that day, that I, at
Prestonpans, nine miles from Edinburgh, dreamt that I saw Captain
Porteous hanged in the Grassmarket. I got up betwixt six and seven,
and went to my father's servant, who was thrashing in the barn which
lay on the roadside leading to Aberlady and North Berwick, who said
that several men on horseback had passed about five in the morning,
whom having asked for news, they replied there was none, but that
Captain Porteous had been dragged out of prison, and hanged on a
dyer's tree at two o'clock that morning.
This bold and lawless deed not only
provoked the Queen, who was Regent at the time, but gave some
uneasiness to Government. It was represented as a dangerous plot,
and was ignorantly connected with a great meeting of zealous
Covenanters, of whom many still remained in Galloway and the west,
which had been held in summer, in Pentland Hills, to renew the
Covenant. But this was a mistake; for the murder of Porteous had
been planned and executed by a few of the relations or friends of
those whom he had slain; who, being of a rank superior to mere mob,
had carried on their design with so much secrecy, ability, and
steadiness as made it be ascribed to a still higher order, who were
political enemies to Government. This idea provoked Lord Isla, [Lord
Islay was Archibald, brother of John, fourth Duke of Argyle, and
succeeded him in the Dukedom in 1743.] who then managed the affairs
of Scotland under Sir Robert Walpole, to carry through an Act of
Parliament in next session for the discovery of the murderers of
Captain Porteous, to be published by reading it for twelve months,
every Sunday forenoon, in all the churches in Scotland, immediately
after divine service, or rather in the middle of it, for the
minister was ordained to read it between the lecture and the sermon,
two discourses usually given at that time. This clause, it was said,
was intended to purge the Church of fanatics, for as it was believed
that most clergymen of that description would not read the Act, they
would become liable to the penalty, which was deposition. By
good-luck for the clergy, there was another party distinction among
them (besides that occasioned by their ecclesiastical differences),
viz., that of Argathelian and Squadrone, of which political
divisions there were some both of the high-flying and moderate
clergy. [The term "Argathelian" is new to the Editor, but the
meaning is obvious. "Argathelia" is the Latin name of the province
of Argyle, and the word doubtless applied to those who favoured that
unlimited influence in the affairs of Scotland exercised by the
family of Argyle before the ascendancy of Lord Bute. The name of "Squadrone"
had been long used to designate a public party professing entire
independence. The "ecclesiastical differences" concentrated
themselves in a dispute, of memorable importance to the Church of
Scotland, called "The Marrow Controversy," from one party standing
by, and the other impugning, Fisher's Marrow of Modern Divinity.—J.
H. B.] Some very sensible men of the latter class having discovered
the design of the Act, either by information or sagacity, convened
meetings of clergy at Edinburgh, and formed resolutions, and carried
on correspondence through the Church to persuade as many as possible
to disobey the Act, that the great number of offenders might secure
the safety of the whole. This was actually the case, for as one-half
of the clergy, at least, disobeyed in one shape or other, the idea
of inflicting the penalty was dropped altogether. In the mean time,
the distress and perplexity which this Act occasioned in many
families of the clergy, was of itself a cruel punishment for a crime
in which they had no hand. The anxious days and sleepless nights
which it occasioned to such ministers as had families, and at the
same time scruples about the lawfulness of reading the Act, were
such as no one could imagine who had not witnessed the scene.
The part my grandfather took was manly
and decided; for, not thinking the reading of the Act unlawful, he
pointedly obeyed. My father was very scrupulous, being influenced by
Mr. Erskine of Grange, and other enemies of Sir Robert Walpole. On
the other hand, the good sense of his wife, and the consideration of
eight or nine children whom he then had, and who were in danger of
being turned out on the world, pulled him very hard on the side of
obedience. A letter from my grandfather at last settled his mind,
and he read the Act.
What seemed extraordinary, after all the
anxiety of Government, and the violent means they took to make a
discovery, not one of those murderers was ever found. Twenty years
afterwards, two or three persons returned from different parts of
the world, who were supposed to be of the number ; but, so far as I
heard, they never disclosed themselves. [Charles Kirkpatrick Sharpe
has a characteristic bit of gossip to relate regarding the Porteous
mob: "People of high rank were concerned in the affair. My
great-grandfather, Lord Alva, told my grandfather that many of the
mob were persons of rank—some of them disguised as women. Lord
Haddington for one, in his cook-maid's dress."—Wilson's
Reminiscences of Old Edinburgh.]
In my second year at the College,
November 1736, besides attending M`Laurin's class for mathematics,
and Kerr's private class, in which he read Juvenal, Tacitus, etc.,
and opened up the beauties and peculiarities of the Latin tongue, I
went to the Logic class, taught by Mr. John Stevenson, who, though
he had no pretensions to superiority in point of learning and
genius, yet was the most popular of all the Professors on account of
his civility and even kindness to his students, and at the same time
the most useful; for being a man of sense and industry, he had made
a judicious selection from the French and English critics, which he
gave at the morning hour of eight, when he read with us Aristotle's
Poetics and Longinus On the Sublime. At eleven he read Heineccius'
Logic, and an abridgement of Locke's Essay; and in the afternoon at
two—for such were the hours of attendance in those times—he read to
us a compendious history of the ancient philosophers, and an account
of their tenets. On all these branches we were carefully examined at
least three times a-week. Whether or not it was owing to the time of
life at which we entered this class, being all about fifteen years
of age or upwards, when the mind begins to open, or to the
excellence of the lectures and the nature of some of the subjects,
we could not then say, but all of us received the same
impression—viz., that our minds were more enlarged, and that we
received greater benefit from that class than from any other. ["The
truth is, that it is universally known in this part of the country,
that no man ever held a Professor's chair in the University of
Edinburgh who had the honour of training up so many young men to a
love of letters, and who afterwards made so distinguished a figure
in the literary world as Dr. Stevenson. He died in 1775, and
bequeathed his library to the University."—Bower's history of
Edinburgh University.] With a due regard to the merit of the
Professor, I must ascribe this impression chiefly to the natural
effect which the subject of criticism and of rational logic has upon
the opening mind. Having learned Greek pretty well at school, my
father thought fit to make me pass that class, especially as it was
taught at that time by an old sickly man, who could seldom attend,
and employed substitutes.
This separated me from some of my
companions, and brought me acquainted with new ones. Sundry of my
class-fellows remained another year with Kerr, and Sir Gilbert
Elliot, John Home, and many others, went back to him that year. It
was this year that I attended the French master, one Kerr, who, for
leave given him to teach in a College room, taught his scholars the
whole session for a guinea, which was then all that the regents
could demand for a session of the College, from the 1st of November
to the 1st of June. During that course we were made sufficiently
masters of French to be able to read any book. To improve our
pronunciation, he made us get one of Molie're's plays by heart,
which we were to have acted, but never did. It was the Medecin
malgre lui, in which I had the part of Sganarelle.
Besides the young gentlemen who had
resided with us in the former year, there came into the lodging
below two Irish students of medicine, whose names were Conway and
Lesly, who were perfectly well-bred and agreeable, and with whom,
though a year or two older, I was very intimate. They were among the
first Irish students whom the fame of the first Monro [Dr. Monro was
appointed Professor of Anatomy in 1720. In the year referred to by
Dr. Carlyle his pupils numbered 131, the largest attendance since
his appointment.] and the other medical Professors had brought over;
and they were not disappointed. They were sober and studious, as
well as well-bred, and had none of that restless and turbulent
disposition, dignified with the name of spirit and fire, which has
often since made the youth of that country such troublesome members
of society. Mr. Lesly was a clergyman's son, of Scottish extraction,
and was acknowledged as a distant relation by some of the Eglintoun
family. Conway's relations were all beyond the Channel. I was so
much their favourite both this year and the following, when they
returned, and lived so much with them, that they had very nearly
persuaded me to be of their profession. At this time the medical
school of Edinburgh was but rising into fame. There were not so many
as twenty English and Irish students this year in the College. The
Professors were men of eminence. Besides Monro, Professor of
Anatomy, there were Dr. Sinclair,
I was in use of going to my father's on
Saturdays once a-fortnight, and returning on Monday ; but this
little journey was less frequently performed this winter, as Sir
Harry Nisbet's mother, Lady Nisbet, a sister of Sir Robert Morton's,
very frequently invited me to accompany her son and the Maxwells to
the house of Dean, within a mile of Edinburgh, where we passed the
day in hunting with the greyhounds, and generally returned to town
in the evening. Here I had an opportunity of seeing a new set of
company (my circle having been very limited in Edinburgh), whose
manners were more worthy of imitation, and whose conversation had
more the tone of the world. Here I frequently met with Mr. Baron
Dalrymple, [George Dalrymple of Dalmahoy, who married Euphame,
eldest daughter of Sir Andrew Myrton, Bart., of Gogar. He died in
1745.] the youngest brother of the then Earl of Stair, and
grandfather of the present Earl. He was hold to be a man of wit and
humour; and, in the language and manners of the gentlemen of
Scotland before the Union, exhibited a specimen of conversation that
was so free as to border a little on licentiousness, especially
before the ladies; but he never failed to keep the table in a roar.
Having passed the Greek class, I missed
many of my most intimate companions, who either remained one year
longer at the Latin class, or attended the Greek. But I made new
ones, who were very agreeable, such as Sir Alexander Cockburn of
Langton, who had been bred in England till now, and John Gibson, the
son of Sir Alexander Gibson of Addison, both of whom perished in the
war that was approaching. ["Gibson at the siege of Carthagena and
Cockburn at the battle of Fontenoy. Jenny Stewart, the beauty,
afterwards Lady Dundonald, was engaged to Gibson, but his father
forbade and sent him abroad."—Recollections.]
In summer 1737 I was at Prestonpans; and
in July, two or three days before my youngest sister Jenny was born,
afterwards Mrs. Bell, I met with an accident which confined me many
weeks, which was a shot in my leg, occasioned by the virole of a
ramrod having fallen into a musket at a review in Mussel-burgh
Links, part of which lodged in the outside of the calf of my leg,
and could not be extracted till after the place had been twice laid
open, when it came out with a dressing, and was about the size of
the head of a nail. This was the reason why I made no excursion to
Dumfriesshire this summer.
Early in the summer I lost one of the
dearest friends I ever had, who died of a fever. We had often
settled it between us, that whoever should die first, should appear
to the other, and tell him the secrets of the invisible world. I
walked every evening for hours in the fields and links of
Prestonpans, in hopes of meeting my friend; but he never appeared.
This disappointment, together with the knowledge I had acquired at
the Logic class, cured me of many prejudices about ghosts and
hobgoblins and witches, of which till that time I stood not a little
in awe. The
next session of the College, beginning in November 2737, I lodged in
the same house and had the same companions as I had the two
preceding years. Besides Sir Robert Stewart's Natural Philosophy
class, which was very ill taught, as he was worn out with age, and
never had excelled, [He became a regent in 1703. His father was Sir
Thomas Stewart of Coltness,] I attended M'Laurin's second class, and
Dr. Pringle's Moral Philosophy, besides two hours at the
writing-master to improve my hand, and a second attendance on Mr.
Kerr's private class. The circle of my acquaintance was but little
enlarged, and I derived more agreeable amusement from the two Irish
students, who returned to their former habitation, than from any
other acquaintance, except the Maxwells and their friends. illy
acquaintance with Dr. Robertson [Afterwards Principal of Edinburgh
University.] began about this time. I never was at the same class
with him, for, though but a few months older, he was at College one
session before me. One of the years, too, he was seized with a
fever, which was dangerous, and confined him for the greater part of
the winter. I went to see him sometimes when he was recovering, when
in his conversation one could perceive the opening dawn of that day
which afterwards shone so bright. I became also acquainted with John
Home [Author of Douglas and other plays.] this year, though he was
one year behind me at College, and eight months younger. He was gay
and talkative, and a great favourite with his companions.
I was very fond of dancing, in which I
was a great proficient, having been taught at two different periods
in the country, though the manners were then so strict that I was
not allowed to exercise my talent at penny-weddings, or any balls
but those of the dancing-school. Even this would have been denied
me, as it was to Robertson and Witherspoon, and other clergymen's
sons, at that time, had it not been for the persuasion of those
aunts of mine who had been bred in England, and for some papers in
the Spectator which were pointed out to my father, which seemed to
convince him that dancing would make me a more accomplished
preacher, if ever I had the honour to mount the pulpit. l\Iy mother
too, who generally was right, used her sway in this article of
education. But I had not the means of using this talent, of which I
was not a little vain, till luckily I was introduced to Madame
Violante, an Italian stage-dancer, who kept a much-frequented school
for young ladies, but admitted of no boys above seven or eight years
of age, so that she wished very much for senior lads to dance with
her grownup misses weekly at her practisings. I became a favourite
of this dancing-mistress, and attended her very faithfully with two
or three of my companions, and had my choice of partners on all
occasions, insomuch that I became a great proficient in this branch
at little or no expense. ["The partner I had for most part was Miss
Jenny Watson. She was a beautiful girl, who afterwards married
Alexander Rocheid, the brother of Sir David Kinloch. Jenny was a
fine dancer, and I was envied; but I would have rather had one of
the three or four Miss Cants. . . . Dame Janet was haughty and
reserved, and all the rest turned away from her."—Recollections.] It
must be confessed, however, that, having nothing to do at Stewart's
class, through the incapacity of the master, and M'Laurin's giving
me no trouble, as I had a great promptitude in learning mathematics,
I had a good deal of spare time this session, which I spent, as well
as all the money I got, at a billiard-table, which unluckily was
within fifty yards of the College. I was so sensible of the folly of
this, however, that next year I abandoned it altogether.
Dr. Pringle, afterwards Sir John, was an
agreeable lecturer, though no great master of the science he taught.
[The youngest son of Sir John Pringle of Stitchell, where he was
born in 1707. He practised as a physician in Edinburgh, while he
held the chair of Moral Philosophy, which he clearly considered a
secondary subject. He afterwards became well known in scientific
circles in London, and was President of the Royal Society.] His
lectures were chiefly a compilation from Lord Bacon's works; and had
it not been for Puffendorf's small book, which he made his text, we
should not have been instructed in the rudiments of the science.
Once a-week, however, lie gave us a lecture in Latin, in which
language he excelled, and was even held equal to Dr. John Sinclair,
Professor of the Theory of Medicine, the most eminent Latin scholar
at that time, except the great grammarian Ruddiman. The celebrated
Dr. Hutchison of Glasgow, who was the first that distinguished
himself in that important branch of literature, was now beginning
his career, and had drawn ample stores from the ancients, which lie
improved into system, and embellished by the exertions of an ardent
and virtuous mind. He was soon followed by Smith, who had been his
scholar, and sat for some years in his chair; by Ferguson at
Edinburgh; by Reid and Beattie, which last was more an orator than a
philosopher; together with David Hume, whose works, though dangerous
and heretical, illustrated the science, and called forth the
exertions of men of equal genius and sounder principles.
I passed the greater part of this summer
(1738) at my grandfather's, at Tinwald, near Dumfries, who had a
tolerably good collection of books, and where I read for many hours
in the day. I contracted the greatest respect for my grandfather,
and attachment to his family; and became well acquainted with the
young people of Dumfries, and afterwards held a correspondence by
letters with one of them, which was of use in forming my epistolary
style. A new
family came this year to Prestonpans; for Colin Campbell, Esq., the
brother of Sir James of Arbruchal [Aberuchill], had fallen in
arrears as Collector of the Customs, and was suspended. But his wife
dying at that very time, an excellent woman of the family of Sir
James Holburn, and leaving him eight or nine children, his situation
drew compassion from his friends, especially from Archibald, Earl of
Isla, and James Campbell of St. Germains, who were his securities,
and who had no chance of being reimbursed the sum of £800 or £1000
of arrears into which he had fallen, but by his preferment. He was
soon made a Commissioner of the Board of Customs, an office at that
time of £1000 per annum. This deprived us of a very agreeable
family, the sons and daughter s of which were my companions. Mr.
Campbell was succeeded by Mr. George Cheap, ["On the death of Mr.
George Cheap, Mr. Colin Campbell's youngest son, Archibald, who had
been a lieutenant in the 42nd Regiment, was appointed Collector at
Prestonpans." Recollections.] of the Cheaps of Rossie in Fife, whose
wife, an aunt of the Lord Chancellor Wedderburn, had just died and
left a family of eight children, two of them beautiful girls of
sixteen or eighteen, and six sons, the eldest of whom was a year
older than I, but was an apprentice to a Writer to the Signet in
Edinburgh. This family, though Iess sociable than the former, soon
became intimate with ours; and one of them very early made an
impression on me, which had lasting effects. ["The girls were both
as handsome as possible, especially the younger, who was born for my
perdition, for from the moment I saw her, I loved her with a
constancy of adoration which was not surpassed by that of Petrarch
for his Laura."—Recollections.]
In November 1738 I again attended the
College of Edinburgh ; and, besides a second year of the Moral
Philosophy, I was a third year at M'Laurin's class, who, on account
of the advanced age and incapacity of Sir Robert Stewart, not only
taught Astronomy, but gave us a course of experiments in Mechanics,
with many excellent lectures in Natural Philosophy, which fully
compensated the defects of the other class. About this time the
choice of a profession became absolutely necessary. I had thoughts
of the army and the law, but was persuaded to desist from any views
on them by my father's being unable to carry on my education for the
length of time necessary in the one, or to support me till he could
procure a commission for me, as he had no money to purchase; and by
means of the long peace, the establishment of the army was low. Both
these having failed, by the persuasion of Lesly and Conway, my Irish
friends, I thought of surgery, and had prevailed so far that my
father went to Edinburgh in the autumn to look out for a master in
that profession. ["I drew up with them [Leslie and Conway], and they
had almost induced me to be a doctor, had not the dissection of a
child, which they bought of a poor tailor for 6s., disgusted me
completely. The man had asked 6s. 6d., but they beat him down the
6d. by asserting that the bargain was to him worth more than 12s.,
as it saved him all the expense of burial. The hearing of this
bargain, together with that of the dialogue in which they carried it
on, were not less grating to my feelings than the dissection itself.
Before that I had been captivated by the sight of a handsome cornet
of the Greys, and would needs be a soldier; but my father having no
money to purchase a commission for me, and not being able, he said,
to spare as much money per day as would make me live like a
gentleman, although Colonel Gardiner said he would recommend me for
a cadet in a very good regiment, I desisted from this
also."—Recollections.]
In the mean time came a letter from my
grandfather, in favour of his own profession and that of my father,
written with so much force and energy, and stating so many reasons
for my yielding to the wish of my friends and the conveniency of a
family still consisting of eight children, of whom I was the eldest,
that I yielded to the influence of parental wishes and advice, which
in those days swayed the minds of young men much more than they do
now, or have done for many years past. I therefore consented that my
name should this year be enrolled in the list of students of
divinity, though regular attendance was not enjoined.
On the 13th of January 1739, there was a
total eclipse of the moon, to view which M`Laurin invited his senior
scholars, of whom I was one. About a dozen of us remained till near
one o'clock on the Sunday morning, when the greatest tempest arose
that I remember. Eight or ten of us were so much alarmed with the
fall of bricks or slates in the College Wynd, that we called a
council of war in a stair-foot, and got to the High Street safe by
walking in file down the Cowgate and up Niddry's Wynd.
I passed most of the summer this year in
Dumfriesshire, where my grandfather kept me pretty close to my
studies, though I frequently walked in the afternoons to Dumfries,
and brought him the newspapers from Provost Bell, his son-in-law,
who had by that time acquired the chief sway in the burgh, having
taken the side of the Duke of Queensberry, in opposition to Charles
Erskine of Tinwald, at that time the Solicitor. George Bell was not
a man of ability, but he was successful in trade, was popular in his
manners, and, having a gentlemanly spirit, was a favourite with the
nobility and gentry in the neighbourhood. He had a constant
correspondence with the Duke of Queensberry, and retained his
friendship till his death in 1757. What Bell wanted in capacity or
judgment was fully compensated by his wife, Margaret Robison, the
second of my mother's sisters, and afterwards still more by my
sister Margaret, whom they reared, as they had no children, and who,
when she grew up, added beauty and address to a very uncommon
understanding. During the period when I so much frequented Dumfries,
there was a very agreeable society in that town. They were not
numerous, but the few were better informed, and more agreeable in
society, than any to be met with in so small a town.
I returned home before winter, but did
not attend the College, though I was enrolled a student of divinity.
But my father had promised to Lord Drum-more, his great friend, that
I should pass most of my time with his eldest son, Mr. Hew H.
Dalrymple, who, not liking to live in Edinburgh, was to pass the
winter in the house of Walliford, adjacent to his estate of Drummore,
where he had only a farmhouse at that time, with two rooms on a
ground-floor, which would have ill agreed with Mr. Hew's health,
which was threatened with symptoms of consumption, the disease of
which he died five or six years afterwards, having been married, but
leaving no issue.
Mr. Hew H. Dalrymple had been intended
for the Church of England, and with that view had been educated at
Oxford, and was an accomplished scholar ; but his elder brother John
having died at Naples, he fell heir to his mother's estate. He was
five or six years older than I, and being frank and communicative, I
received much benefit from his conversation, which was instructive,
and his manners, which were elegant. With this gentleman I lived all
winter, returning generally to my father's house on Saturdays, when
Lord Drummore returned from Edinburgh, and went back again on
Monday, when I resumed my station. We passed great part of the day
in November and December planting trees round the enclosures at
Drummore, which, by their appearance at present, prove that they
were not well chosen, for they are very small of their age; but they
were too old when they were planted. After the frost set in about
Christmas, we passed our days very much in following the greyhounds
on foot or on horseback, and though our evenings were generally
solitary, between reading and talking we never tired. Mr. Hew's
manners were as gentle as his mind was enlightened. We had little
intercourse with the neighbours, except with my father's family,
with Mr. Cheap's (the Collector), where there were two beautiful
girls, and with Mr. Keith, afterwards ambassador, whose wife's
sister was the widow of Sir Robert Dalrymple, brother of Lord
Drummore. They were twins, and so like each other, that even when I
saw them first, when they were at least thirty, it was hardly
possible to distinguish them. In their youth, their lovers, I have
heard them say, always mistook them when a sign or watchword had not
been agreed on. Mr. Keith was a very agreeable man, had much
knowledge of modern history and genealogy, and, being a pleasing
talker, made an agreeable companion. Of him and his intimate friend,
Mr. Hepburn of Keith, it was said that the witty Lady Dick (Lord
Royston's daughter) said that Mr. Keith told her nothing but what
she knew before, though in a very agreeable manner, but that Hepburn
never said anything that was not new to her,—thus marking the
difference between genius and ability. Keith was a minion of the
great Mareschal Stair, and went abroad with him in 1743, when he got
the command of the army. But I observed that Lord Stair's partiality
to Keith made him no great favourite of the Dalrymples. Colonel
Gardiner had been another minion of Lord Stair, but being
illiterate, and considered as a fanatic, the gentlemen I mention had
no intimacy with him, though they admitted that he was a very honest
and well-meaning brave man.
My father had sometimes expressed a wish
that I should allow myself to be recommended to take charge of a
pupil, as that was the most likely way to obtain a church in
Scotland ; but he did not press me on this subject, for as he had
been four years in that station himself, though he was very
fortunate in his pupils, he felt how degrading it was. By that time
I had been acquainted with a few preceptors, had observed how they
were treated, and had contracted an abhorrence of the
employment—insomuch that, when I consented to follow out the
clerical profession, it was on condition I should never be urged to
go into a family, as it was called, engaging at the same time to
make my expenses as moderate as possible.
This was the winter of the hard frost
which commenced in the end of December 1739, and lasted for three
months. As there were no canals or rivers of extent enough in this
part of the country to encourage the fine exercise of skating, we
contented ourselves with the winter diversion of curling, which is
peculiar to Scotland, and became tolerable proficients in that manly
exercise. It is the more interesting, as it is usual for the young
men of adjacent parishes to contend against each other for a whole
winter's day, and at the end of it to dine together with much
jollity. I
passed the summer of this year, as usual, in the neighbourhood of
Dumfries, and kept up my connection with the young people of that
town as I had done formerly. I returned home in the autumn, and
passed some part of the winter in Edinburgh, attending the divinity
class, which had no attractions, as the Professor, [Dr. Goldie,
minister of Edinburgh, and in 1754 elected Principal of Edinburgh
University. It was during his Moderator-ship of the General
Assembly, and on his casting vote to "proceed" to inflict the higher
censure, that Ebenezer Erskine and other ministers were deposed and
formed the body of dissenters known as "Seceders."] though said to
be learned, was dull and tedious in his lectures, insomuch that at
the end of seven years he had only lectured half through Pictet's
Compend of Theology. I became acquainted, however, with several
students, with whom I had not been intimate, such as Dr. Hugh Blair,
and the Bannatines, and Dr. Jardine, all my seniors; Dr. John Blair,
afterwards Prebendary of Westminster; John Home, William Robertson,
George Logan, William Wilkie, etc. There was one advantage attending
the lectures of a dull professor—viz., that he could form no school,
and the students were left entirely to themselves, and naturally
formed opinions far more liberal than those they got from the
Professor. This was the answer I gave to Patrick, Lord Elibank, one
of the most learned and ingenious noblemen of his time, when he
asked me one day, many years afterwards, what could be the reason
that the young clergymen of that period so far surpassed their
predecessors of his early days in useful accomplishments and
liberality of mind—viz., that the Professor of Theology was dull,
and Dutch, and prolix. His lordship said he perfectly understood me,
and that this entirely accounted for the change.
In summer 1741 I remained for the most
part at home, and it was about that time that my old schoolmaster,
Mr. Hannan, having died of fever, and Mr. John Halket having come in
his place, I was witness to a scene that made a strong impression
upon me. This Mr. Halket had been tutor to Lord Lovat's eldest son
Simon, afterwards well known as General Fraser. Halket had remained
for two years with Lovat, and knew all his ways. But he had parted
with him on his coming to Edinburgh for the education of that son,
to whom he gave a tutor of a superior order, Mr. Hugh Blair,
afterwards the celebrated Doctor. [Lord Lovat was connected with Dr.
Patrick Cumming of St. Giles, and before fixing on Dr. Blair as his
son's tutor, had hoped to place him with Dr. Cumming. Writing in
1739, Lord Lovat says: "All this makes me resolve positively to have
my son educated after my own manner; that is a true Scotsman and a
Highlander. . . . And if I could prevail with you as my relative to
accept of him, that I would settle him with you; and, if you refused
to receive him, I would endeavour to settle him with Mr. Kerr,
Professor of Humanity, who is my friend."—Burton's Life of Lovat.]
But he still retained so much regard for Halket that he thought
proper to fix his second son, Alexander Fraser, with him at the
school of Preston-pans, believing that lie was a much more proper
hand for training an untutored savage than the mild and elegant Dr.
Blair. It was in the course of this summer that Lovat brought his
son Alexander to be placed with Halket, from whom, understanding
that I was a young scholar living in the town who might be useful to
his son, he ordered Halket to invite me to dine with him and his
company at Lucky Vint's, a celebrated village tavern in the west end
of the town.
His company consisted of Mr. Erskine of Grange, with three or four
gentlemen of the name of Fraser, one of whom was his man of
business, together with Halket, his son Alexander, and myself. The
two old gentlemen disputed for some time which of them should say
grace. At last Lovat yielded, and gave us two or three pious
sentences in French, which Mr. Erskine and I understood, and we
only. As soon as we were set, Lovat asked me to send him a whiting
from the dish of fish that was next me. As they were all haddocks, I
answered that they were not whitings, but, according to the proverb,
he that got a haddock for a whiting was not ill off. This saying
takes its rise from the superiority of haddocks to whitings in the
Firth of Forth. Upon this his lordship stormed and swore more than
fifty dragoons; he was sure they must be whitings, as he had bespoke
them. Halket tipped me the wink, and I retracted, saying that I had
but little skill, and as his lordship had bespoke them, I must
certainly be mistaken. Upon this he calmed, and I sent him one,
which he was quite pleased with, swearing again that he never could
eat a haddock all his life. The landlady told me afterwards that as
he had been very peremptory against haddocks, and she had no other,
she had made her cook carefully scrape out St. Peter's mark on the
shoulders, which she had often done before with success. We had a
very good plain dinner. As the claret was excellent, and circulated
fast, the two old gentlemen grew very merry, and their conversation
became youthful and gay. What I observed was, that Grange, without
appearing to flatter, was very observant of Lovat, and did
everything to please him. He had provided Geordy Sym, who was Lord
Drummore's piper, to entertain Lovat after dinner; but though he was
reckoned the best piper in the country, Lovat despised him, and said
he was only fit to play reels to Grange's oyster-women. He grew
frisky at last, however, and upon Kate Vint, the landlady's
daughter, coming into the room, he insisted on her staying to dance
with him. She was a handsome girl, with fine black eyes and an
agreeable person ; and though without the advantages of dress or
manners, she, by means of her good sense and a bashful air, was very
alluring. She was a mistress of Lord Drummore, who lived in the
neighbourhood; and though her mother would not part with her, as she
drew much company to the house, she was said to be faithful to him;
except only in the case of Captain Merry, who married her, and soon
after went abroad with his regiment. When he died she enjoyed the
pension. She had two sons by Drummore and one by Merry. One of the
first was a pretty lad and a good officer, for he was a master and
commander before he died. Lovat was at this time seventy-five, and
Grange not much younger ; yet the wine and the young woman
emboldened them to dance a reel, till Kate, observing Lovat's legs
as thick as posts, fell a-laughing, and ran off. She missed her
second course of kisses, as was then the fashion of the country,
though she had endured the first. This was a scene not easily
forgotten.
Lovat was tall and stately, and might have been handsome in his
youth, with a very flat nose. His manner was not disagreeable,
though his address consisted chiefly in gross flattery and in the
due application of money. He did not make on me the impression of a
man of a leading mind. His suppleness and profligacy were apparent.
The convivium was not over, though the evening approached. He
conveyed his son to the house where he was to be boarded, for Halket
had not taken up house ; and there, while we drank tea, he won the
heart of the landlady, a decent widow of a shipmaster, and of her
niece, by fair speeches, intermixed with kisses to the niece, who
was about thirty, and such advices as a man in a state of ebriety
could give. The coach was in waiting, but Grange would not yet part
with him, and insisted on his accepting of a banquet from him at his
house in Preston. Lovat was in a yielding humour, and it was agreed
to. The Frasers, who were on horseback, were sent to Edinburgh, the
boy was left with his dame, and Lovat and Grange, and Halket and I,
went up to Preston, only a quarter of a mile distant, and were
received in Grange's library, a cube of twenty feet, in a pavilion
of the house which extended into a small wilderness of not more than
half an acre, which was sacred to Grange's private walks, and to
which there was no entry but through the pavilion. This wilderness
was said to be his place of retreat from his lady when she was in
her fits of termagancy, which were not unfrequent, and were said by
his minions to be devoted to meditation and prayer. But as there was
a secret door to the fields, it was reported that he had
occasionally admitted fair maidens to solace him for his sufferings
from the clamour of his wife. This room had been well stored with
books from top to bottom, but at this time was much thinned, there
remaining only a large collection of books on damonologia, which was
Grange's particular study. In this room there was a fine collection
of fruit and biscuits, and a new deluge of excellent claret. At ten
o'clock the two old gentlemen mounted their coach to Edinburgh, and
thus closed a very memorable day. ["In 1748, Lord Grange was so much
reduced in London that he accepted of two guineas from Robert Keith,
then living with Marshall Lord Stair. By my lord's application, he
got a pension of £200. On his wife's death he married his old
mistress, Fanny Lindsay, and brought her down to Preston, when he
still had the house and about 5o acres of land. Lord Prestongrange's
lady and my mother were the only two ladies who visited her, having
been wheedled into it by the old gentleman, who to his other talents
added a very irresistible species of flattery. Fanny took pet on not
being visited, and made him return to London again, where in a year
he died in obscurity, not being then so much thought of as to be
despised or hated."—Recollections.]
In the following winter—viz., November
1741—I attended the Divinity Hall at Edinburgh again for three or
four months, and delivered a discourse, De Fide Salvifica, a very
improper subject for so young a student, which attracted no
attention from any one but the Professor, who was pleased with it,
as it resembled his own Dutch Latin.
The summer 1742 T passed at home, making
only a few excursions into East Lothian, where I had sundry
companions. My father, ever attentive to what he thought was best
for me, and desirous to ease himself as much as possible from the
expense of my education, availed himself of my mother's being a
relation of the Hon. Basil Hamilton—for their mothers were
cousins—and applied to the Duke of Hamilton for one of the bursaries
given by Duchess Ann of that family in the former century to
students in divinity to pass two winters in Glasgow College, and a
third in some foreign university, the salary for the first two
years, £100 Scots annually, and for the third, £400; which might
have been competent as far back as 1670, but was very far short of
the most moderate expense at which a student could live in 1742. [A
hundred pounds Scots are equivalent to £8, 6s. 8d. sterling. —J. H.
B.] But I was pleased with this plan, as it opened a prospect of
going abroad. The presentation was obtained, and my father and I set
out on horseback for Glasgow in the beginning of November, and
arrived there next forenoon, having stayed all night at Mr. Dundas's
of Castle Cary, on the old Roman wall. My father immediately
repaired to the College to consult with an old friend of his, Mr.
Dick, Professor of Natural Philosophy, how he was to proceed with
his presentation. I was surprised to see him return after in a great
flurry, Mr. Dick having assured him that there was no vacant
bursary, nor would be till next year. The next object was how to
secure it, in which we were both much interested—my father, to
prevent my deviating into some other employment; and I, for fear I
should have been forced to become tutor to some young gentleman, a
situation which, as I then observed it, had become an object of my
abhorrence. Several of my companions had the same turn of mind; for
neither Robertson, nor John Home, nor George Logan were ever tutors.
We thought we had observed that all tutors had contracted a certain
obsequiousness or bassesse, which alarmed us for ourselves. A little
experience corrected this prejudice, for I knew many afterwards who
had passed through that station, and yet had retained a manly
independency both in mind and manner.
After a hasty dinner, we took our horses
by four in the afternoon, and riding all night by the nearest road,
which was as bad as possible, we arrived in Edinburgh by eight in
the morning. My father dressed himself, and went down to the Abbey,
where, to his great joy, he found that Duke Hamilton was not set out
for London, as he was afraid he might have been, and obtained a
promise that the presentation should be renewed next year.
In compensation for this disappointment,
I passed the greatest part of this winter at my grandfather's, at
Tinwald, where I read for many hours of the day, and generally took
the weekly amusement of passing one day and night at Dumfries, where
I met with agreeable society, both male and female.
I returned to Edinburgh in March, and
attended the Divinity Hall for a few weeks. Living at Edinburgh
continued still to be wonderfully cheap, as there were ordinaries
for young gentlemen, at four-pence a-head for a very good dinner of
broth and beef, and a roast and potatoes every day, with fish three
or four times a-week, and all the small-beer that was called for
till the cloth was removed. In the summer I passed some time in East
Lothian, where by accident at that period there were no less than a
dozen young scholars, preachers, and students in divinity, who
generally met there on the presbytery day. For two or three times we
dined with the presbytery by invitation; but finding that we were
not very welcome guests, and that whatever number there were in
company they never allowed them more than two bottles of small
Lisbon wine, we bespoke a dinner for ourselves in another tavern;
and when the days were short, generally stayed all night. By this
time even the second tavern in Haddington (where the presbytery
dined, having quarrelled with the first) had knives and forks for
their table. But ten or twelve years before that time, my father
used to carry a shagreen case, with a knife and fork and spoon, as
they perhaps do still on many parts of the Continent. When I
attended, in 1742 and 1743, they had still but one glass on the
table, which went round with the bottle.
Very early in the afternoon, Mr.
Stedman, a minister in the town, and one or two more of the
clergymen, used to resort to our company, and keep up an enlightened
conversation till bedtime. The chief subjects were the deistical
controversy and moral philosophy, as connected with theology.
Besides Stedman, Murray and Glen almost always attended us. [Mr.
Edward Stedman was second minister of Haddington, and a man of very
superior understanding. He it was who first directed Dr. Robertson
how to obtain his leading in the Church, and who was the friend and
supporter of John Home, when he was in danger of being deposed for
writing the tragedy of Douglas. It was Stedman who, with the aid of
Hugh Bannatyne, then minister of Dirleton, and Robertson, conducted
the affairs of the presbytery of Haddington in such a manner that
they were never able to reach John Home, till it was convenient for
him to resign his charge.]
John Witherspoon was of this party, he
who was afterwards a member of the American Congress [After being
minister at Beith and Paisley, Witherspoon went to America, where he
became Principal of Princeton College, N.J., in 1768. He took part
in framing the first constitution of New Jersey in 1776, in which
year he was a member of Congress and was active in support of the
Declaration of Independence. He continued to hold political
positions till the settlement of American Independence in 1783, when
he resumed his duties in Princeton College. He died in 1794.] and
Adam Dickson, who afterwards wrote so well on Husbandry. They were
both clergymen's sons, but of very different characters; the one
open, frank, and generous, pretending only to what he was, and
supporting his title with spirit ; the other close, and suspicious,
and jealous, and always aspiring at a superiority that he was not
able to maintain. I used sometimes to go with him for a day or two
to his father's house at Gifford Hall, where we passed the day in
fishing, to be out of reach of his father, who was very sulky and
tyrannical, but who, being much given to gluttony, fell asleep
early, and went always to bed at nine, and, being as fat as a
porpoise, was not to be awaked, so that we had three or four hours
of liberty every night to amuse ourselves with the daughters of the
family, and their cousins who resorted to us from the village, when
the old man was gone to rest. This John loved of all things; and
this sort of company he enjoyed in greater perfection when he
returned my visits, when we had still more companions of the fair
sex, and no restraint from an austere father; so that I always
considered the austerity of manners and aversion to social joy which
he affected afterwards, as the arts of hypocrisy and ambition ; for
he had a strong and enlightened understanding, far above enthusiasm,
and a temper that did not seem liable to it. [Thomas Hepburn, a
distinguished minister, who died minister of Athelstaneford, and was
born and bred in the neighbourhood, used to allege that a Dr. Nisbet
of Montrose, a man of some learning and ability, which he used to
display with little judgment in the Assembly, was Witherspoon's son,
and that he was supported in this opinion by the scandalous
chronicle of the country. Their features, no doubt, had a strong
resemblance, but their persons were unlike, neither were their
tempers at all similar. Any likeness there was between them in their
sentiments and public appearances might be accounted for by the
great admiration the junior must have had for the senior, as he was
bred up under his eye, in the same parish, in which lie was much
admired. Whether or not he was his son, he followed his example, for
he became discontented, and Migrated to America during the
Rebellion, where he was Principal of Carlisle College, Pennsylvania,
for which he was well qualified in point of learning. But no
preferment nor climate can cure a discontented mind, for he became
miserable at one time because he could not return.]
It was this summer that my father
received from Mr. Keith (afterwards ambassador) a letter, desiring
that I might be sent over to him immediately. He had been sent for
by Lord Stair, and went to Germany with him as his private
secretary. This was after the battle of Dettingen. But I knew
nothing of it for some years, otherwise I might probably have broke
through my father's plan. When Lord Stair lost the command of the
army, Mr. Keith lived with him at London, and had a guinea a-day
conferred on him, till he was sent to Holland in 1746 or 1747 as
Resident. His knowledge of modern history, and of all the treaties,
etc., made him be valued. |
