The Ayrshire Legatees
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John Galt >> The Ayrshire Legatees
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You will give to auld Mizy Eccles ten shillings. She's a careful
creature, and it will go as far with her thrift as twenty will do
with Effy Hopkirk; so you will give Effy twenty. Mrs. Binnacle, who
lost her husband, the sailor, last winter, is, I am sure, with her
two sickly bairns, very ill off; I would therefore like if you will
lend her a note, and ye may put half-a-crown in the hand of each of
the poor weans for a playock, for she's a proud spirit, and will
bear much before she complain. Thomas Dowy has been long unable to
do a turn of work, so you may give him a note too. I promised that
donsie body, Willy Shachle, the betherel, that when I got my legacy,
he should get a guinea, which would be more to him than if the
colonel had died at home, and he had had the howking of his grave;
you may therefore, in the meantime, give Willy a crown, and be sure
to warn him well no to get fou with it, for I'll be very angry if he
does. But what in this matter will need all your skill, is the
giving of the remaining five pounds to auld Miss Betty Peerie; being
a gentlewoman both by blood and education, she's a very slimmer
affair to handle in a doing of this kind. But I am persuaded she's
in as great necessity as many that seem far poorer, especially since
the muslin flowering has gone so down. Her bits of brats are sairly
worn, though she keeps out an apparition of gentility. Now, for all
this trouble, I will give you an account of what we have been doing
since my last.
When we had gotten ourselves made up in order, we went, with Andrew
Pringle, my son, to the counting-house, and had a satisfactory vista
of the residue; but it will be some time before things can be
settled--indeed, I fear, not for months to come--so that I have been
thinking, if the parish was pleased with Mr. Snodgrass, it might be
my duty to my people to give up to him my stipend, and let him be
appointed not only helper, but successor likewise. It would not be
right of me to give the manse, both because he's a young and
inexperienced man, and cannot, in the course of nature, have got
into the way of visiting the sick-beds of the frail, which is the
main part of a pastor's duty, and likewise, because I wish to die,
as I have lived, among my people. But, when all's settled, I will
know better what to do.
When we had got an inkling from Mr. Argent of what the colonel has
left,--and I do assure you, that money is not to be got, even in the
way of legacy, without anxiety,--Mrs. Pringle and I consulted
together, and resolved, that it was our first duty, as a token of
our gratitude to the Giver of all Good, to make our first outlay to
the poor. So, without saying a word either to Rachel, or to Andrew
Pringle, my son, knowing that there was a daily worship in the
Church of England, we slipped out of the house by ourselves, and,
hiring a hackney conveyance, told the driver thereof to drive us to
the high church of St. Paul's. This was out of no respect to the
pomp and pride of prelacy, but to Him before whom both pope and
presbyter are equal, as they are seen through the merits of Christ
Jesus. We had taken a gold guinea in our hand, but there was no
broad at the door; and, instead of a venerable elder, lending
sanctity to his office by reason of his age, such as we see in the
effectual institutions of our own national church--the door was kept
by a young man, much more like a writer's whipper-snapper-clerk,
than one qualified to fill that station, which good King David would
have preferred to dwelling in tents of sin. However, we were not
come to spy the nakedness of the land, so we went up the outside
stairs, and I asked at him for the plate; "Plate!" says he; "why,
it's on the altar!" I should have known this--the custom of old
being to lay the offerings on the altar, but I had forgot; such is
the force, you see, of habit, that the Church of England is not so
well reformed and purged as ours is from the abominations of the
leaven of idolatry. We were then stepping forward, when he said to
me, as sharply as if I was going to take an advantage, "You must pay
here." "Very well, wherever it is customary," said I, in a meek
manner, and gave him the guinea. Mrs. Pringle did the same. "I
cannot give you change," cried he, with as little decorum as if we
had been paying at a playhouse. "It makes no odds," said I; "keep
it all." Whereupon he was so converted by the mammon of iniquity,
that he could not be civil enough, he thought--but conducted us in,
and showed us the marble monuments, and the French colours that were
taken in the war, till the time of worship--nothing could surpass
his discretion.
At last the organ began to sound, and we went into the place of
worship; but oh, Mr. Micklewham, yon is a thin kirk. There was not
a hearer forby Mrs. Pringle and me, saving and excepting the relics
of popery that assisted at the service. What was said, I must,
however, in verity confess, was not far from the point. But it's
still a comfort to see that prelatical usurpations are on the
downfall; no wonder that there is no broad at the door to receive
the collection for the poor, when no congregation entereth in. You
may, therefore, tell Mr. Craig, and it will gladden his heart to
hear the tidings, that the great Babylonian madam is now, indeed,
but a very little cutty.
On our return home to our lodgings, we found Andrew Pringle, my son,
and Rachel, in great consternation about our absence. When we told
them that we had been at worship, I saw they were both deeply
affected; and I was pleased with my children, the more so, as you
know I have had my doubts that Andrew Pringle's principles have not
been strengthened by the reading of the Edinburgh Review. Nothing
more passed at that time, for we were disturbed by a Captain Sabre
that came up with us in the smack, calling to see how we were after
our journey; and as he was a civil well-bred young man, which I
marvel at, considering he's a Hussar dragoon, we took a coach, and
went to see the lions, as he said; but, instead of taking us to the
Tower of London, as I expected, he ordered the man to drive us round
the town. In our way through the city he showed us the Temple Bar,
where Lord Kilmarnock's head was placed after the Rebellion, and
pointed out the Bank of England and Royal Exchange. He said the
steeple of the Exchange was taken down shortly ago--and that the
late improvements at the Bank were very grand. I remembered having
read in the Edinburgh Advertiser, some years past, that there was a
great deal said in Parliament about the state of the Exchange, and
the condition of the Bank, which I could never thoroughly
understand. And, no doubt, the taking own of an old building, and
the building up of a new one so near together, must, in such a
crowded city as this, be not only a great detriment to business, but
dangerous to the community at large.
After we had driven about for more than two hours, and neither seen
lions nor any other curiosity, but only the outside of houses, we
returned home, where we found a copperplate card left by Mr. Argent,
the colonel's agent, with the name of his private dwelling-house.
Both me and Mrs. Pringle were confounded at the sight of this thing,
and could not but think that it prognosticated no good; for we had
seen the gentleman himself in the forenoon. Andrew Pringle, my son,
could give no satisfactory reason for such an extraordinary
manifestation of anxiety to see us; so that, after sitting on thorns
at our dinner, I thought that we should see to the bottom of the
business. Accordingly, a hackney was summoned to the door, and me
and Andrew Pringle, my son, got into it, and told the man to drive
to second in the street where Mr. Argent lived, and which was the
number of his house. The man got up, and away we went; but, after
he had driven an awful time, and stopping and inquiring at different
places, he said there was no such house as Second's in the street;
whereupon Andrew Pringle, my son, asked him what he meant, and the
man said that he supposed it was one Second's Hotel, or Coffee-
house, that we wanted. Now, only think of the craftiness of the
ne'er-da-weel; it was with some difficulty that I could get him to
understand, that second was just as good as number two; for Andrew
Pringle, my son, would not interfere, but lay back in the coach, and
was like to split his sides at my confabulating with the hackney
man. At long and length we got to the house, and were admitted to
Mr. Argent, who was sitting by himself in his library reading, with
a plate of oranges, and two decanters with wine before him. I
explained to him, as well as I could, my surprise and anxiety at
seeing his card, at which he smiled, and said, it was merely a sort
of practice that had come into fashion of late years, and that,
although we had been at his counting-house in the morning, he
considered it requisite that he should call on his return from the
city. I made the best excuse I could for the mistake; and the
servant having placed glasses on the table, we were invited to take
wine. But I was grieved to think that so respectable a man should
have had the bottles before him by himself, the more especially as
he said his wife and daughters had gone to a party, and that he did
not much like such sort of things. But for all that, we found him a
wonderful conversible man; and Andrew Pringle, my son, having read
all the new books put out at Edinburgh, could speak with him on any
subject. In the course of conversation they touched upon politick
economy, and Andrew Pringle, my son, in speaking about cash in the
Bank of England, told him what I had said concerning the alterations
of the Royal Exchange steeple, with which Mr. Argent seemed greatly
pleased, and jocosely proposed as a toast,--"May the country never
suffer more from the alterations in the Exchange, than the taking
down of the steeple." But as Mrs. Pringle is wanting to send a bit
line under the same frank to her cousin, Miss Mally Glencairn, I
must draw to a conclusion, assuring you, that I am, dear sir, your
sincere friend and pastor,
ZACHARIAH PRINGLE.
The impression which this letter made on the auditors of Mr.
Micklewham was highly favourable to the Doctor--all bore testimony
to his benevolence and piety; and Mrs. Glibbans expressed, in very
loquacious terms, her satisfaction at the neglect to which prelacy
was consigned. The only person who seemed to be affected by other
than the most sedate feelings on the occasion was the Rev. Mr.
Snodgrass, who was observed to smile in a very unbecoming manner at
some parts of the Doctor's account of his reception at St. Paul's.
Indeed, it was apparently with the utmost difficulty that the young
clergyman could restrain himself from giving liberty to his risible
faculties. It is really surprising how differently the same thing
affects different people. "The Doctor and Mrs. Pringle giving a
guinea at the door of St. Paul's for the poor need not make folk
laugh," said Mrs. Glibbans; "for is it not written, that whosoever
giveth to the poor lendeth to the Lord?" "True, my dear madam,"
replied Mr. Snodgrass, "but the Lord to whom our friends in this
case gave their money is the Lord Bishop of London; all the
collection made at the doors of St. Paul's Cathedral is, I
understand, a perquisite of the Bishop's." In this the reverend
gentleman was not very correctly informed, for, in the first place,
it is not a collection, but an exaction; and, in the second place,
it is only sanctioned by the Bishop, who allows the inferior clergy
to share the gains among themselves. Mrs. Glibbans, however, on
hearing his explanation, exclaimed, "Gude be about us!" and pushing
back her chair with a bounce, streaking down her gown at the same
time with both her hands, added, "No wonder that a judgment is upon
the land, when we hear of money-changers in the temple." Miss Mally
Glencairn, to appease her gathering wrath and holy indignation, said
facetiously, "Na, na, Mrs. Glibbans, ye forget, there was nae
changing of money there. The man took the whole guineas. But not
to make a controversy on the subject, Mr. Snodgrass will now let us
hear what Andrew Pringle, 'my son,' has said to him":- And the
reverend gentleman read the following letter with due
circumspection, and in his best manner:-
LETTER X
Andrew Pringle, Esq., to the Reverend Charles Snodgrass
My Dear Friend--I have heard it alleged, as the observation of a
great traveller, that the manners of the higher classes of society
throughout Christendom are so much alike, that national
peculiarities among them are scarcely perceptible. This is not
correct; the differences between those of London and Edinburgh are
to me very striking. It is not that they talk and perform the
little etiquettes of social intercourse differently; for, in these
respects, they are apparently as similar as it is possible for
imitation to make them; but the difference to which I refer is an
indescribable something, which can only be compared to peculiarities
of accent. They both speak the same language; perhaps in classical
purity of phraseology the fashionable Scotchman is even superior to
the Englishman; but there is a flatness of tone in his accent--a
lack of what the musicians call expression, which gives a local and
provincial effect to his conversation, however, in other respects,
learned and intelligent. It is so with his manners; he conducts
himself with equal ease, self-possession, and discernment, but the
flavour of the metropolitan style is wanting.
I have been led to make these remarks by what I noticed in the
guests whom I met on Friday at young Argent's. It was a small
party, only five strangers; but they seemed to be all particular
friends of our host, and yet none of them appeared to be on any
terms of intimacy with each other. In Edinburgh, such a party would
have been at first a little cold; each of the guests would there
have paused to estimate the characters of the several strangers
before committing himself with any topic of conversation. But here,
the circumstance of being brought together by a mutual friend,
produced at once the purest gentlemanly confidence; each, as it
were, took it for granted, that the persons whom he had come among
were men of education and good-breeding, and, without deeming it at
all necessary that he should know something of their respective
political and philosophical principles, before venturing to speak on
such subjects, discussed frankly, and as things unconnected with
party feelings, incidental occurrences which, in Edinburgh, would
have been avoided as calculated to awaken animosities.
But the most remarkable feature of the company, small as it was,
consisted of the difference in the condition and character of the
guests. In Edinburgh the landlord, with the scrupulous care of a
herald or genealogist, would, for a party, previously unacquainted
with each other, have chosen his guests as nearly as possible from
the same rank of life; the London host had paid no respect to any
such consideration--all the strangers were as dissimilar in fortune,
profession, connections, and politics, as any four men in the class
of gentlemen could well be. I never spent a more delightful
evening.
The ablest, the most eloquent, and the most elegant man present,
without question, was the son of a saddler. No expense had been
spared on his education. His father, proud of his talents, had
intended him for a seat in Parliament; but Mr. T- himself prefers
the easy enjoyments of private life, and has kept himself aloof from
politics and parties. Were I to form an estimate of his
qualifications to excel in public speaking, by the clearness and
beautiful propriety of his colloquial language, I should conclude
that he was still destined to perform a distinguished part. But he
is content with the liberty of a private station, as a spectator
only, and, perhaps, in that he shows his wisdom; for undoubtedly
such men are not cordially received among hereditary statesmen,
unless they evince a certain suppleness of principle, such as we
have seen in the conduct of more than one political adventurer.
The next in point of effect was young C- G-. He evidently
languished under the influence of indisposition, which, while it
added to the natural gentleness of his manners, diminished the
impression his accomplishments would otherwise have made. I was
greatly struck with the modesty with which he offered his opinions,
and could scarcely credit that he was the same individual whose
eloquence in Parliament is by many compared even to Mr. Canning's,
and whose firmness of principle is so universally acknowledged, that
no one ever suspects him of being liable to change. You may have
heard of his poem "On the Restoration of Learning in the East," the
most magnificent prize essay that the English Universities have
produced for many years. The passage in which he describes the
talents, the researches, and learning of Sir William Jones, is
worthy of the imagination of Burke; and yet, with all this oriental
splendour of fancy, he has the reputation of being a patient and
methodical man of business. He looks, however, much more like a
poet or a student, than an orator and a statesman; and were
statesmen the sort of personages which the spirit of the age
attempts to represent them, I, for one, should lament that a young
man, possessed of so many amiable qualities, all so tinted with the
bright lights of a fine enthusiasm, should ever have been removed
from the moon-lighted groves and peaceful cloisters of Magdalen
College, to the lamp-smelling passages and factious debates of St.
Stephen's Chapel. Mr. G- certainly belongs to that high class of
gifted men who, to the honour of the age, have redeemed the literary
character from the charge of unfitness for the concerns of public
business; and he has shown that talents for affairs of state,
connected with literary predilections, are not limited to mere
reviewers, as some of your old class-fellows would have the world to
believe. When I contrast the quiet unobtrusive development of Mr.
G-'s character with that bustling and obstreperous elbowing into
notice of some of those to whom the Edinburgh Review owes half its
fame, and compare the pure and steady lustre of his elevation, to
the rocket-like aberrations and perturbed blaze of their still
uncertain course, I cannot but think that we have overrated, if not
their ability, at least their wisdom in the management of public
affairs.
The third of the party was a little Yorkshire baronet. He was
formerly in Parliament, but left it, as he says, on account of its
irregularities, and the bad hours it kept. He is a Whig, I
understand, in politics, and indeed one might guess as much by
looking at him; for I have always remarked, that your Whigs have
something odd and particular about them. On making the same sort of
remark to Argent, who, by the way, is a high ministerial man, he
observed, the thing was not to be wondered at, considering that the
Whigs are exceptions to the generality of mankind, which naturally
accounts for their being always in the minority. Mr. T-, the
saddler's son, who overheard us, said slyly, "That it might be so;
but if it be true that the wise are few compared to the multitude of
the foolish, things would be better managed by the minority than as
they are at present."
The fourth guest was a stock-broker, a shrewd compound, with all
charity be it spoken, of knavery and humour. He is by profession an
epicure, but I suspect his accomplishments in that capacity are not
very well founded; I would almost say, judging by the evident traces
of craft and dissimulation in his physiognomy, that they have been
assumed as part of the means of getting into good company, to drive
the more earnest trade of money-making. Argent evidently understood
his true character, though he treated him with jocular familiarity.
I thought it a fine example of the intellectual tact and superiority
of T-, that he seemed to view him with dislike and contempt. But I
must not give you my reasons for so thinking, as you set no value on
my own particular philosophy; besides, my paper tells me, that I
have only room left to say, that it would be difficult in Edinburgh
to bring such a party together; and yet they affect there to have a
metropolitan character. In saying this, I mean only with reference
to manners; the methods of behaviour in each of the company were
precisely similar--there was no eccentricity, but only that distinct
and decided individuality which nature gives, and which no acquired
habits can change. Each, however, was the representative of a
class; and Edinburgh has no classes exactly of the same kind as
those to which they belonged.--Yours truly,
ANDREW PRINGLE.
Just as Mr. Snodgrass concluded the last sentence, one of the Clyde
skippers, who had fallen asleep, gave such an extravagant snore,
followed by a groan, that it set the whole company a-laughing, and
interrupted the critical strictures which would otherwise have been
made on Mr. Andrew Pringle's epistle. "Damn it," said he, "I
thought myself in a fog, and could not tell whether the land ahead
was Plada or the Lady Isle." Some of the company thought the
observation not inapplicable to what they had been hearing.
Miss Isabella Tod then begged that Miss Mally, their hostess, would
favour the company with Mrs. Pringle's communication. To this
request that considerate maiden ornament of the Kirkgate deemed it
necessary, by way of preface to the letter, to say, "Ye a' ken that
Mrs. Pringle's a managing woman, and ye maunna expect any
metaphysical philosophy from her." In the meantime, having taken
the letter from her pocket, and placed her spectacles on that
functionary of the face which was destined to wear spectacles, she
began as follows:-
LETTER XI
Mrs. Pringle to Miss Mally Glencairn
My Dear Miss Mally--We have been at the counting-house, and gotten a
sort of a satisfaction; what the upshot may be, I canna take it upon
myself to prognosticate; but when the waur comes to the worst, I
think that baith Rachel and Andrew will have a nest egg, and the
Doctor and me may sleep sound on their account, if the nation doesna
break, as the argle-barglers in the House of Parliament have been
threatening: for all the cornal's fortune is sunk at present in the
pesents. Howsomever, it's our notion, when the legacies are paid
off, to lift the money out of the funds, and place it at good
interest on hairetable securitie. But ye will hear aften from us,
before things come to that, for the delays, and the goings, and the
comings in this town of London are past all expreshon.
As yet, we have been to see no fairlies, except going in a coach
from one part of the toun to another; but the Doctor and me was at
the he-kirk of Saint Paul's for a purpose that I need not tell you,
as it was adoing with the right hand what the left should not know.
I couldna say that I had there great pleasure, for the preacher was
very cauldrife, and read every word, and then there was such a
beggary of popish prelacy, that it was compassionate to a Christian
to see.
We are to dine at Mr. Argent's, the cornal's hadgint, on Sunday, and
me and Rachel have been getting something for the okasion. Our
landlady, Mrs. Sharkly, has recommended us to ane of the most
fashionable millinders in London, who keeps a grand shop in Cranburn
Alla, and she has brought us arteecles to look at; but I was
surprised they were not finer, for I thought them of a very inferior
quality, which she said was because they were not made for no
costomer, but for the public.
The Argents seem as if they would be discreet people, which, to us
who are here in the jaws of jeopardy, would be a great confort--for
I am no overly satisfeet with many things. What would ye think of
buying coals by the stimpert, for anything that I know, and then
setting up the poker afore the ribs, instead of blowing with the
bellies to make the fire burn? I was of a pinion that the
Englishers were naturally masterful; but I can ashure you this is no
the case at all--and I am beginning to think that the way of leeving
from hand to mouth is great frugality, when ye consider that all is
left in the logive hands of uncercumseezed servans.
But what gives me the most concern at this time is one Captain Sabre
of the Dragoon Hozars, who come up in the smak with us from Leith,
and is looking more after our Rachel than I could wish, now that she
might set her cap to another sort of object. But he's of a
respectit family, and the young lad himself is no to be despisid;
howsomever, I never likit officir-men of any description, and yet
the thing that makes me look down on the captain is all owing to the
cornal, who was an officer of the native poors of India, where the
pay must indeed have been extraordinar, for who ever heard either of
a cornal, or any officer whomsoever, making a hundred thousand
pounds in our regiments? no that I say the cornal has left so meikle
to us.
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