Chronicles of the Canongate

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"Ower mony of them," raising the corner of her checked apron to
her eyes--"e'en ower mony of them, Mr. Croftangry. Och, ay.
'There is the puir Highland creatures frae Glenshee, that cam
down for the harvest, and are lying wi' the fever--five shillings
to them; and half a crown to Bessie MacEvoy, whose coodman, puir
creature, died of the frost, being a shairman, for a' the whisky
he could drink to keep it out o' his stamoch; and--"

But she suddenly interrupted the bead-roll of her proposed
charities, and assuming a very sage look, and primming up her
little chattering mouth, she went on in a different tone--"But
och, Mr. Croftangry, bethink ye whether ye will not need a' this
siller yoursel', and maybe look back and think lang for ha'en
kiven it away, whilk is a creat sin to forthink a wark o'
charity, and also is unlucky, and moreover is not the thought of
a shentleman's son like yoursel', dear. And I say this, that ye
may think a bit, for your mother's son kens that ye are no so
careful as you should be of the gear, and I hae tauld ye of it
before, jewel."

I assured her I could easily spare the money, without risk of
future repentance; and she went on to infer that in such a case
"Mr. Croftangry had grown a rich man in foreign parts, and was
free of his troubles with messengers and sheriff-officers, and
siclike scum of the earth, and Shanet MacEvoy's mother's daughter
be a blithe woman to hear it. But if Mr. Croftangry was in
trouble, there was his room, and his ped, and Shanet to wait on
him, and tak payment when it was quite convenient."

I explained to Janet my situation, in which she expressed
unqualified delight. I then proceeded to inquire into her own
circumstances, and though she spoke cheerfully and contentedly, I
could see they were precarious. I had paid more than was due;
other lodgers fell into an opposite error, and forgot to pay
Janet at all. Then, Janet being ignorant of all indirect modes
of screwing money out of her lodgers, others in the same line of
life, who were sharper than the poor, simple Highland woman, were
enabled to let their apartments cheaper in appearance, though the
inmates usually found them twice as dear in the long run.

As I had already destined my old landlady to be my house-keeper
and governante, knowing her honesty, good-nature, and, although a
Scotchwoman, her cleanliness and excellent temper (saving the
short and hasty expressions of anger which Highlanders call a
FUFF), I now proposed the plan to her in such a way as was likely
to make it most acceptable. Very acceptable as the proposal was,
as I could plainly see, Janet, however, took a day to consider
upon it; and her reflections against our next meeting had
suggested only one objection, which was singular enough.

"My honour," so she now termed me, "would pe for biding in some
fine street apout the town. Now Shanet wad ill like to live in a
place where polish, and sheriffs, and bailiffs, and sie thieves
and trash of the world, could tak puir shentlemen by the throat,
just because they wanted a wheen dollars in the sporran. She had
lived in the bonny glen of Tomanthoulick. Cot, an ony of the
vermint had come there, her father wad hae wared a shot on them,
and he could hit a buck within as mony measured yards as e'er a
man of his clan, And the place here was so quiet frae them, they
durst na put their nose ower the gutter. Shanet owed nobody a
bodle, but she couldna pide to see honest folk and pretty
shentlemen forced away to prison whether they would or no; and
then, if Shanet was to lay her tangs ower ane of the ragamuffins'
heads, it would be, maybe, that the law would gi'ed a hard name."

One thing I have learned in life--never to speak sense when
nonsense will answer the purpose as well. I should have had
great difficulty to convince this practical and disinterested
admirer and vindicator of liberty, that arrests seldom or never
were to be seen in the streets of Edinburgh; and to satisfy her
of their justice and necessity would have been as difficult as to
convert her to the Protestant faith. I therefore assured her my
intention, if I could get a suitable habitation, was to remain in
the quarter where she at present dwelt. Janet gave three skips
on the floor, and uttered as many short, shrill yells of joy.
Yet doubt almost instantly returned, and she insisted on knowing
what possible reason I could have for making my residence where
few lived, save those whose misfortunes drove them thither. It
occurred to me to answer her by recounting the legend of the rise
of my family, and of our deriving our name from a particular
place near Holyrood Palace. This, which would have appeared to
most people a very absurd reason for choosing a residence, was
entirely satisfactory to Janet MacEvoy.

"Och, nae doubt! if it was the land of her fathers, there was
nae mair to be said. Put it was queer that her family estate
should just lie at the town tail, and covered with houses, where
the King's cows--Cot bless them, hide and horn--used to craze
upon. It was strange changes." She mused a little, and then
added: "Put it is something better wi' Croftangry when the
changes is frae the field to the habited place, and not from the
place of habitation to the desert; for Shanet, her nainsell, kent
a glen where there were men as weel as there may be in
Croftangry, and if there werena altogether sae mony of them, they
were as good men in their tartan as the others in their
broadcloth. And there were houses, too; and if they were not
biggit with stane and lime, and lofted like the houses at
Croftangry, yet they served the purpose of them that lived there,
and mony a braw bonnet, and mony a silk snood and comely white
curch, would come out to gang to kirk or chapel on the Lord's
day, and little bairns toddling after. And now--Och, Och,
Ohellany, Ohonari! the glen is desolate, and the braw snoods and
bonnets are gane, and the Saxon's house stands dull and lonely,
like the single bare-breasted rock that the falcon builds on--the
falcon that drives the heath-bird frae the glen."

Janet, like many Highlanders, was full of imagination, and, when
melancholy themes came upon her, expressed herself almost
poetically, owing to the genius of the Celtic language in which
she thought, and in which, doubtless, she would have spoken, had
I understood Gaelic. In two minutes the shade of gloom and
regret had passed from her good-humoured features, and she was
again the little, busy, prating, important old woman, undisputed
owner of one flat of a small tenement in the Abbey Yard, and
about to be promoted to be housekeeper to an elderly bachelor
gentleman, Chrystal Croftangry, Esq.

It was not long before Janet's local researches found out exactly
the sort of place I wanted, and there we settled. Janet was
afraid I would not be satisfied, because it is not exactly part
of Croftangry; but I stopped her doubts by assuring her it had
been part and pendicle thereof in my forefather' time, which
passed very well.

I do not intend to possess any one with an exact knowledge of my
lodging; though, as Bobadil says, "I care not who knows it, since
the cabin is convenient." But I may state in general, that it is
a house "within itself," or, according to a newer phraseology in
advertisements, SELF-CONTAINED, has a garden of near half an
acre, and a patch of ground with trees in front. It boasts five
rooms and servants' apartments--looks in front upon the palace,
and from behind towards the hill and crags of the King's Park.
Fortunately, the place had a name, which, with a little
improvement, served to countenance the legend which I had imposed
on Janet, and would not, perhaps have been sorry if I had been
able to impose on myself. It was called Littlecroft; we have
dubbed it Little Croftangry, and the men of letters belonging to
the Post Office have sanctioned the change, and deliver letters
so addressed. Thus I am to all intents and purposes Chrystal
Croftangry of that Ilk.

My establishment consists of Janet, an under maid-servant, and a
Highland wench for Janet to exercise her Gaelic upon, with a
handy lad who can lay the cloth, and take care, besides, of a
pony, on which I find my way to Portobello sands, especially when
the cavalry have a drill; for, like an old fool as I am, I have
not altogether become indifferent to the tramp of horses and the
flash of weapons, of which, though no professional soldier, it
has been my fate to see something in my youth. For wet mornings
I have my book; is it fine weather? I visit, or I wander on the
Crags, as the humour dictates. My dinner is indeed solitary, yet
not quite so neither; for though Andrew waits, Janet--or, as she
is to all the world but her master and certain old Highland
gossips, Mrs. MacEvoy--attends, bustles about, and desires to see
everything is in first-rate order, and to tell me, Cot pless us,
the wonderful news of the palace for the day. When the cloth is
removed, and I light my cigar, and begin to husband a pint of
port, or a glass of old whisky and water, it is the rule of the
house that Janet takes a chair at some distance, and nods or
works her stocking, as she may be disposed--ready to speak, if I
am in the talking humour, and sitting quiet as a mouse if I am
rather inclined to study a book or the newspaper. At six
precisely she makes my tea, and leaves me to drink it; and then
occurs an interval of time which most old bachelors find heavy on
their hands. The theatre is a good occasional resource,
especially if Will Murray acts, or a bright star of eminence
shines forth; but it is distant, and so are one or two public
societies to which I belong. Besides, these evening walks are
all incompatible with the elbow-chair feeling, which desires some
employment that may divert the mind without fatiguing the body.

Under the influence of these impressions, I have sometimes
thought of this literary undertaking. I must have been the
Bonassus himself to have mistaken myself for a genius; yet I have
leisure and reflections like my neighbours. I am a borderer,
also, between two generations, and can point out more, perhaps,
than others of those fading traces of antiquity which are daily
vanishing; and I know many a modern instance and many an old
tradition, and therefore I ask--

"What ails me, I may not as well as they
Rake up some threadbare tales, that mouldering lay
In chimney corners, wont by Christmas fires
To read and rock to sleep our ancient sires?
No man his threshold better knows, than I
Brute's first arrival and first victory,
Saint George's sorrel and his cross of blood,
Arthur's round board and Caledonian wood."

No shop is so easily set up as an antiquary's. Like those of the
lowest order of pawnbrokers, a commodity of rusty iron, a bay or
two of hobnails, a few odd shoe-buckles, cashiered kail-pots, and
fire-irons declared incapable of service, are quite sufficient to
set him up. If he add a sheaf or two of penny ballads and
broadsides, he is a great man--an extensive trader. And then,
like the pawnbrokers aforesaid, if the author understands a
little legerdemain, he may, by dint of a little picking and
stealing, make the inside of his shop a great deal richer than
the out, and be able to show you things which cause those who do
not understand the antiquarian trick of clean conveyance to
wonder how the devil he came by them.

It may be said that antiquarian articles interest but few
customers, and that we may bawl ourselves as rusty as the wares
we deal in without any one asking; the price of our merchandise.
But I do not rest my hopes upon this department of my labours
only. I propose also to have a corresponding shop for Sentiment,
and Dialogues, and Disquisition, which may captivate the fancy of
those who have no relish, as the established phrase goes, for
pure antiquity--a sort of greengrocer's stall erected in front of
my ironmongery wares, garlanding the rusty memorials of ancient
times with cresses, cabbages, leeks, and water purpy.

As I have some idea that I am writing too well to be understood,
I humble myself to ordinary language, and aver, with becoming
modesty, that I do think myself capable of sustaining a
publication of a miscellaneous nature, as like to the Spectator
or the Guardian, the Mirror or the Lounger, as my poor abilities
may be able to accomplish. Not that I have any purpose of
imitating Johnson, whose general learning and power of expression
I do not deny, but many of whose Ramblers are little better than
a sort of pageant, where trite and obvious maxims are made to
swagger in lofty and mystic language, and get some credit only
because they are not easily understood. There are some of the
great moralist's papers which I cannot peruse without thinking on
a second-rate masquerade, where the best-known and least-esteemed
characters in town march in as heroes, and sultans, and so forth,
and, by dint of tawdry dresses, get some consideration until they
are found out. It is not, however, prudent to commence with
throwing stones, just when I am striking out windows of my own.

I think even the local situation of Little Croftangry may be
considered as favourable to my undertaking. A nobler contrast
there can hardly exist than that of the huge city, dark with the
smoke of ages, and groaning with the various sounds of active
industry or idle revel, and the lofty and craggy hill, silent and
solitary as the grave--one exhibiting the full tide of existence,
pressing and precipitating itself forward with the force of an
inundation; the other resembling some time-worn anchorite, whose
life passes as silent and unobserved as the slender rill which
escapes unheard, and scarce seen, from the fountain of his
patron saint. The city resembles the busy temple, where the
modern Comus and Mammon hold their court, and thousands sacrifice
ease, independence, and virtue itself at their shrine; the misty
and lonely mountain seems as a throne to the majestic but
terrible Genius of feudal times, when the same divinities
dispensed coronets and domains to those who had heads to devise
and arms to execute bold enterprises.

I have, as it were, the two extremities of the moral world at my
threshold. From the front door a few minutes' walk brings me
into the heart of a wealthy and populous city; as many paces from
my opposite entrance place me in a solitude as complete as
Zimmerman could have desired. Surely, with such aids to my
imagination, I may write better than if I were in a lodging in
the New Town or a garret in the old. As the Spaniard says,
"VIAMOS--CARACCO!"

I have not chosen to publish periodically, my reason for which
was twofold. In the first place, I don't like to be hurried, and
have had enough of duns in an early part of my life to make me
reluctant to hear of or see one, even in the less awful shape of
a printer's devil. But, secondly, a periodical paper is not
easily extended in circulation beyond the quarter in which it is
published. This work, if published in fugitive numbers, would
scarce, without a high pressure on the part of the bookseller, be
raised above the Netherbow, and never could be expected to ascend
to the level of Princes Street. Now, I am ambitious that my
compositions, though having their origin in this Valley of
Holyrood, should not only be extended into those exalted regions
I have mentioned, but also that they should cross the Forth,
astonish the long town of Kirkcaldy, enchant the skippers and
colliers of the East of Fife, venture even into the classic
arcades of St. Andrews, and travel as much farther to the north
as the breath of applause will carry their sails. As for a
southward direction, it is not to be hoped for in my fondest
dreams. I am informed that Scottish literature, like Scottish
whisky, will be presently laid under a prohibitory duty. But
enough of this. If any reader is dull enough not to comprehend
the advantages which, in point of circulation, a compact book has
over a collection of fugitive numbers, let him try the range of a
gun loaded with hail-shot against that of the same piece charged
with an equal weight of lead consolidated in a single bullet.

Besides, it was of less consequence that I should have published
periodically, since I did not mean to solicit or accept of the
contributions of friends, or the criticisms of those who may be
less kindly disposed. Notwithstanding the excellent examples
which might be quoted, I will establish no begging-box, either
under the name of a lion's head or an ass's. What is good or ill
shall be mine own, or the contribution of friends to whom I may
have private access. Many of my voluntary assistants might be
cleverer than myself, and then I should have a brilliant article
appear among my chiller effusions, like a patch of lace on a
Scottish cloak of Galashiels grey. Some might be worse, and then
I must reject them, to the injury of the feelings of the writer,
or else insert them, to make my own darkness yet more opaque and
palpable. "Let every herring," says our old-fashioned proverb,
"hang by his own head."

One person, however, I may distinguish, as she is now no more,
who, living to the utmost term of human life, honoured me with a
great share of her friendship--as, indeed, we were blood-
relatives in the Scottish sense--Heaven knows how many degrees
removed--and friends in the sense of Old England. I mean the
late excellent and regretted Mrs. Bethune Baliol. But as I
design this admirable picture of the olden time for a principal
character in my work, I will only say here that she knew and
approved of my present purpose; and though she declined to
contribute to it while she lived, from a sense of dignified
retirement, which she thought became her age, sex, and condition
in life, she left me some materials for carrying on my proposed
work which I coveted when I heard her detail them in
conversation, and which now, when I have their substance in her
own handwriting, I account far more valuable than anything I have
myself to offer. I hope the mentioning her name in conjunction
with my own will give no offence to any of her numerous friends,
as it was her own express pleasure that I should employ the
manuscripts which she did me the honour to bequeath me in the
manner in which I have now used them. It must be added, however,
that in most cases I have disguised names, and in some have added
shading and colouring to bring out the narrative.

Much of my materials, besides these, are derived from friends,
living or dead. The accuracy of some of these may be doubtful,
in which case I shall be happy to receive, from sufficient
authority, the correction of the errors which must creep into
traditional documents. The object of the whole publication is to
throw some light on the manners of Scotland as they were, and to
contrast them occasionally with those of the present day. My own
opinions are in favour of our own times in many respects, but not
in so far as affords means for exercising the imagination or
exciting the interest which attaches to other times. I am glad
to be a writer or a reader in 1826, but I would be most
interested in reading or relating what happened from half a
century to a century before. We have the best of it. Scenes in
which our ancestors thought deeply, acted fiercely, and died
desperately, are to us tales to divert the tedium of a winter's
evening, when we are engaged to no party, or beguile a summer's
morning, when it is too scorching to ride or walk.

Yet I do not mean that my essays and narratives should be limited
to Scotland. I pledge myself to no particular line of subjects,
but, on the contrary, say with Burns--

"Perhaps it may turn out a sang,
Perhaps turn out a sermon."

I have only to add, by way of postscript to these preliminary
chapters, that I have had recourse to Moliere's recipe, and read
my manuscript over to my old woman, Janet MacEvoy.

The dignity of being consulted delighted Janet; and Wilkie, or
Allan, would have made a capital sketch of her, as she sat
upright in her chair, instead of her ordinary lounging posture,
knitting her stocking systematically, as if she meant every twist
of her thread and inclination of the wires to bear burden to the
cadence of my voice. I am afraid, too, that I myself felt more
delight than I ought to have done in my own composition, and read
a little more oratorically than I should have ventured to do
before an auditor of whose applause I was not so secure. And the
result did not entirely encourage my plan of censorship. Janet
did indeed seriously incline to the account of my previous life,
and bestowed some Highland maledictions, more emphatic than
courteous, on Christie Steele's reception of a "shentlemans in
distress," and of her own mistress's house too. I omitted for
certain reasons, or greatly abridged, what related to her-self.
But when I came to treat of my general views in publication, I
saw poor Janet was entirely thrown out, though, like a jaded
hunter, panting, puffing, and short of wind, she endeavoured at
least to keep up with the chase. Or, rather, her perplexity made
her look all the while like a deaf person ashamed of his
infirmity, who does not understand a word you are saying, yet
desires you to believe that he does understand you, and who is
extremely jealous that you suspect his incapacity. When she saw
that some remark was necessary, she resembled exactly in her
criticism the devotee who pitched on the "sweet word Mesopotamia"
as the most edifying note which she could bring away from a
sermon. She indeed hastened to bestow general praise on what she
said was all "very fine;" but chiefly dwelt on what I, had said
about Mr. Timmerman, as she was pleased to call the German
philosopher, and supposed he must be of the same descent with the
Highland clan of M'Intyre, which signifies Son of the Carpenter.
"And a fery honourable name too--Shanet's own mither was a
M'Intyre."

In short, it was plain the latter part of my introduction was
altogether lost on poor Janet; and so, to have acted up to
Moliere's system, I should have cancelled the whole, and written
it anew. But I do not know how it is. I retained, I suppose,
some tolerable opinion of my own composition, though Janet did
not comprehend it, and felt loath to retrench those Delilahs of
the imagination, as Dryden calls them, the tropes and figures of
which are caviar to the multitude. Besides, I hate rewriting as
much as Falstaff did paying back--it is a double labour. So I
determined with myself to consult Janet, in future, only on such
things as were within the limits of her comprehension, and hazard
my arguments and my rhetoric on the public without her
imprimatur. I am pretty sure she will "applaud it done." and in
such narratives as come within her range of thought and feeling I
shall, as I first intended, take the benefit of her
unsophisticated judgment, and attend to it deferentially--that
is, when it happens not to be in peculiar opposition to my own;
for, after all, I say with Almanzor,--

"Know that I alone am king of me."

The reader has now my who and my whereabout, the purpose of the
work, and the circumstances under which it is undertaken. He has
also a specimen of the author's talents, and may judge for
himself, and proceed, or send back the volume to the bookseller,
as his own taste shall determine.

CHAPTER VI.

MR. CROFTANGRY'S ACCOUNT OF MRS. BETHUNE BALIOL.

The moon, were she earthly, no nobler. CORIOLANUS.

When we set out on the jolly voyage of life, what a brave fleet
there is around us, as, stretching our finest canvas to the
breeze, all "shipshape and Bristol fashion," pennons flying,
music playing, cheering each other as we pass, we are rather
amused than alarmed when some awkward comrade goes right ashore
for want of pilotage! Alas! when the voyage is well spent, and
we look about us, toil-worn mariners, how few of our ancient
consorts still remain in sight; and they, how torn and wasted,
and, like ourselves, struggling to keep as long as possible off
the fatal shore, against which we are all finally drifting!

I felt this very trite but melancholy truth in all its force the
other day, when a packet with a black seal arrived, containing a
letter addressed to me by my late excellent friend Mrs. Martha
Bethune Baliol, and marked with the fatal indorsation, "To be
delivered according to address, after I shall be no more." A
letter from her executors accompanied the packet, mentioning that
they had found in her will a bequest to me of a painting of some
value, which she stated would just fit the space above my
cupboard, and fifty guineas to buy a ring. And thus I separated,
with all the kindness which we had maintained for many years,
from a friend, who, though old enough to have been the companion
of my mother, was yet, in gaiety of spirits and admirable
sweetness of temper, capable of being agreeable, and even
animating society, for those who write themselves in the vaward
of youth, an advantage which I have lost for these five-and-
thirty years. The contents of the packet I had no difficulty in
guessing, and have partly hinted at them in the last chapter.
But to instruct the reader in the particulars, and at the same
time to indulge myself with recalling the virtues and agreeable
qualities of my late friend, I will give a short sketch of her
manners and habits.

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