Waverley; Or, 'Tis Sixty Years Since — Volume 1, Walter Scott [top ten books to read TXT] 📗

been commonly circulated, and sometimes perhaps rather hastily credited at home. NOTE 3

The attachment to this classic was, it is said, actually displayed in the manner mentioned in the text by an unfortunate Jacobite in that unhappy period. He escaped from the jail in which he was confined for a hasty trial and certain condemnation, and was retaken as he hovered around the place in which he had been imprisoned, for which he could give no better reason than the hope of recovering his favourite Titus Livius. I am sorry to add that the simplicity of such a character was found to form no apology for his guilt as a rebel, and that he was condemned and executed.

NOTE 4

Nicholas Amhurst, a noted political writer, who conducted for many years a paper called the Craftsman, under the assumed name of Caleb D'Anvers. He was devoted to the Tory interest, and seconded with much ability the attacks of Pulteney on Sir Robert Walpole. He died in 1742, neglected by his great patrons and in the most miserable circumstances.

'Amhurst survived the downfall of Walpole's power, and had reason to expect a reward for his labours. If we excuse Bolingbroke, who had only saved the shipwreck of his fortunes, we shall be at a loss to justify Pulteney, who could with ease have given this man a considerable income. The utmost of his generosity to Amhurst that I ever heard of was a hogshead of claret! He died, it is supposed, of a broken heart; and was buried at the charge of his honest printer, Richard Francklin.'—Lord Chesterfield's Characters Reviewed, p. 42.

NOTE 5

I have now given in the text the full name of this gallant and excellent man, and proceed to copy the account of his remarkable conversion, as related by Doctor Doddridge.

'This memorable event,' says the pious writer, 'happened towards the middle of July 1719. The major had spent the evening (and, if I mistake not, it was the Sabbath) in some gay company, and had an unhappy assignation with a married woman, whom he was to attend exactly at twelve. The company broke up about eleven, and, not judging it convenient to anticipate the time appointed, he went into his chamber to kill the tedious hour, perhaps with some amusing book, or some other way. But it very accidentally happened that he took up a religious book, which his good mother or aunt had, without his knowledge, slipped into his portmanteau. It was called, if I remember the title exactly, The Christian Soldier, or Heaven taken by Storm, and it was written by Mr. Thomas Watson. Guessing by the title of it that he would find some phrases of his own profession spiritualised in a manner which he thought might afford him some diversion, he resolved to dip into it, but he took no serious notice of anything it had in it; and yet, while this book was in his hand, an impression was made upon his mind (perhaps God only knows how) which drew after it a train of the most important and happy consequences. He thought he saw an unusual blaze of light fall upon the book which he was reading, which he at first imagined might happen by some accident in the candle, but, lifting up his eyes, he apprehended to his extreme amazement that there was before him, as it were suspended in the air, a visible representation of the Lord Jesus Christ upon the cross, surrounded on all sides with a glory; and was impressed as if a voice, or something equivalent to a voice, had come to him, to this effect (for he was not confident as to the words), "Oh, sinner! did I suffer this for thee, and are these thy returns?" Struck with so amazing a phenomenon as this, there remained hardly any life in him, so that he sunk down in the arm-chair in which he sat, and continued, he knew not how long, insensible.'

'With regard to this vision,' says the ingenious Dr. Hibbert, 'the appearance of our Saviour on the cross, and the awful words repeated, can be considered in no other light than as so many recollected images of the mind, which probably had their origin in the language of some urgent appeal to repentance that the colonel might have casually read or heard delivered. From what cause, however, such ideas were rendered as vivid as actual impressions, we have no information to be depended upon. This vision was certainly attended with one of the most important of consequences connected with the Christian dispensation—the conversion of a sinner. And hence no single narrative has, perhaps, done more to confirm the superstitious opinion that apparitions of this awful kind cannot arise without a divine fiat.' Doctor Hibbert adds in a note—'A short time before the vision, Colonel Gardiner had received a severe fall from his horse. Did the brain receive some slight degree of injury from the accident, so as to predispose him to this spiritual illusion?'—Hibbert's Philosophy of Apparitions, Edinburgh, 1824, p. 190.

NOTE 6

The courtesy of an invitation to partake a traveller's meal, or at least that of being invited to share whatever liquor the guest called for, was expected by certain old landlords in Scotland even in the youth of the author. In requital mine host was always furnished with the news of the country, and was probably a little of a humorist to boot. The devolution of the whole actual business and drudgery of the inn upon the poor gudewife was very common among the Scottish Bonifaces. There was in ancient times, in the city of Edinburgh, a gentleman of good family who condescended, in order to gain a livelihood, to become the nominal keeper of a coffee-house, one of the first places of the kind which had been opened in the Scottish metropolis. As usual, it was entirely managed by the careful and industrious Mrs. B—; while her husband amused himself with field sports, without troubling his head about the matter. Once upon a time, the premises having taken fire, the husband was met walking up the High Street loaded with his guns and fishing-rods, and replied calmly to someone who inquired after his wife, 'that the poor woman was trying to save a parcel of crockery and some trumpery books'; the last being those which served her to conduct the business of the house.

There were many elderly gentlemen in the author's younger days who still held it part of the amusement of a journey 'to parley with mine host,' who often resembled, in his quaint humour, mine Host of the Garter in the Merry Wives of Windsor; or Blague of the George in the Merry Devil of Edmonton. Sometimes the landlady took her share of entertaining the company. In either case the omitting to pay them due attention gave displeasure, and perhaps brought down a smart jest, as on the following occasion:

A jolly dame who, not 'Sixty Years Since,' kept the principal caravansary at Greenlaw, in Berwickshire, had the honour to receive under her roof a very worthy clergyman, with three sons of the same profession, each having a cure of souls; be it said in passing, none of the reverend party were reckoned powerful in the pulpit. After dinner was over, the worthy senior, in the pride of his heart, asked Mrs. Buchan whether she ever had had such a party in her house before. 'Here sit I,' he said, 'a placed minister of the Kirk of Scotland, and here sit my three sons, each a placed minister of the same kirk. Confess, Luckie Buchan, you never had such a party in your house before.' The question was not premised by any invitation to sit down and take a glass of wine or the like, so Mrs. B. answered drily, 'Indeed, sir, I cannot just say that ever I had such a party in my house before, except once in the forty-five, when I had a Highland piper here, with his three sons, all Highland pipers; and deil a spring they could play amang them.'

NOTE 7

There is no particular mansion described under the name of Tully- Veolan; but the peculiarities of the description occur in various old Scottish seats. The House of Warrender upon Bruntsfield Links and that of Old Ravelston, belonging, the former to Sir George Warrender, the latter to Sir Alexander Keith, have both contributed several hints to the description in the text. The House of Dean, near Edinburgh, has also some points of resemblance with Tully-Veolan. The author has, however, been informed that the House of Grandtully resembles that of the Baron of Bradwardine still more than any of the above.

NOTE 8

I am ignorant how long the ancient and established custom of keeping fools has been disused in England. Swift writes an epitaph on the Earl of Suffolk's fool—

Whose name was Dickie Pearce

In Scotland, the custom subsisted till late in the last century; at Glamis Castle is preserved the dress of one of the jesters, very handsome, and ornamented with many bells. It is not above thirty years since such a character stood by the sideboard of a nobleman of the first rank in Scotland, and occasionally mixed in the conversation, till he carried the joke rather too far, in making proposals to one of the young ladies of the family, and publishing the bans betwixt her and himself in the public church.

NOTE 9

After the Revolution of 1688, and on some occasions when the spirit of the Presbyterians had been unusually animated against their opponents, the Episcopal clergymen, who were chiefly nonjurors, were exposed to be mobbed, as we should now say, or rabbled, as the phrase then went, to expiate their political heresies. But notwithstanding that the Presbyterians had the persecution in Charles II and his brother's time to exasperate them, there was little mischief done beyond the kind of petty violence mentioned in the text.

NOTE 10

I may here mention that the fashion of compotation described in the text was still occasionally practised in Scotland in the author's youth. A company, after having taken leave of their host, often went to finish the evening at the clachan or village, in 'womb of tavern.' Their entertainer always accompanied them to take the stirrup-cup, which often occasioned a long and late revel.

The poculum potatorium of the valiant Baron, his blessed Bear, has a prototype at the fine old Castle of Glamis, so rich in memorials of ancient times; it is a massive beaker of silver, double gilt, moulded into the shape of a lion, and holding about an English pint of wine. The form alludes to the family name of Strathmore, which is Lyon, and, when exhibited, the cup must necessarily be emptied to the Earl's health. The author ought perhaps to be ashamed of recording that he has had the honour of swallowing the contents of the Lion; and the recollection of the feat served to suggest the story of the Bear of Bradwardine. In the family of Scott of Thirlestane (not Thirlestane in the Forest, but the place of the same name in Roxburghshire) was long preserved a cup of the same kind, in the form of a jack-boot. Each guest was obliged to empty this at his departure. If the guest's name was Scott, the necessity was doubly imperative.

When the landlord of an inn presented his guests with deoch an doruis, that is, the drink at the door, or the stirrup-cup, the draught was not charged in the reckoning. On this point a learned bailie of the town of Forfar pronounced a very sound judgment.

A., an ale-wife in Forfar, had brewed her 'peck of malt' and set the liquor out of doors to cool; the cow of B., a neighbour of A., chanced to come by, and seeing the good beverage, was allured to taste it, and finally to drink it up. When A. came to take in her liquor, she found her tub empty, and from the cow's staggering and staring, so as to betray her intemperance, she easily divined the mode in which her 'browst' had disappeared. To take vengeance on Crummie's ribs with a stick was her first effort. The roaring of the cow brought B., her master, who remonstrated with his angry neighbour, and received in reply a demand for the value of the ale which Crummie had drunk up. B. refused payment, and was conveyed before C., the bailie, or sitting magistrate. He heard the case patiently; and then demanded of the plaintiff A. whether the cow had sat down to her potation or taken it standing. The plaintiff answered, she had not seen the deed committed, but she supposed the cow drank the ale while standing on her feet, adding, that had she been near she would have made her use them to some purpose. The bailie, on this admission, solemnly adjudged the cow's drink to be deoch an doruis,