Part 24

Mr Hope’s wife and daughters being left as heirs of Lady Grange, an action was raised in their name for the £1150 formerly awarded, and for three years additional of her annuity; and for this compound sum decreet was obtained, which was followed by steps for forcing payment. The Hopes were aware, however, of the dubious character of this claim, seeing that Mr Erskine, from whatever causes, had substituted an actual subsistence since 1732. They accordingly intimated that they aimed at no personal benefit from Lady Grange’s bequest; and the affair terminated in Mr Erskine reimbursing Mr Hope for all the expenses he had incurred on behalf of the lady, including that for the sloop which he had hired to proceed to St Kilda for her rescue.

It is humbly thought that this story casts a curious and faithful light upon the age of our grandfathers, showing things in a kind of transition from the sanguinary violence of an earlier age to the humanity of the present times. Erskine, not to speak of his office of a judge in Scotland, moved in English society of the highest character. He must have been the friend of Lyttelton, Pope, Thomson, and other ornaments of Frederick’s court; and as the brother-in-law of the Countess of Mar, who was sister of Lady Mary Wortley Montagu, he would figure in the brilliant circle which surrounded that star of the age of the second George. Yet he does not appear to have ever felt a moment’s compunction at leaving the mother of his children to pine and fret herself to death in a half-savage wilderness—

‘Placed far amidst the melancholy main;’

for in a paper which expresses his feelings on the subject pretty freely, he justifies the ‘sequestration’ as a step required by prudence and decency; and in showing that the gross necessaries of life were afforded to his wife, seems to have considered that his whole duty towards her was discharged. Such an insensibility could not be peculiar to one man: it indicates the temper of a class and of an age. While congratulating ourselves on the improved humanity of our own times, we may glance with satisfaction to the means which it places in our power for the proper treatment of patients like Mrs Erskine. Such a woman would now be regarded as the unfortunate victim of disease, and instead of being forcibly carried off under cloud of night by a band of Highlanders, and committed to confinement on the outskirts of the world, she would, with proper precautions, be remitted to an asylum, where, by gentle and rational management, it might be hoped that she would be restored to mental health, or, at the worst, enabled to spend the remainder of her days in the utmost comfort which her state admitted of.

* * * * *

[1868.—About the middle of Cant’s Close,[185] on the west side, there exists a remarkable edifice, different from all others in the neighbourhood. It is two stories in height, the second story being reached by an outside stone stair within a small courtyard, which had originally been shut in by a gate. The stone pillars of the gateway are decorated with balls at the top, as was the fashion of entrances to the grounds of a country mansion. The building is picturesque in character, in the style of the sixteenth century in Scotland. As it resembles a neat, old-fashioned country-house, one wonders to find it jammed up amidst tall edifices in this confined alley. Ascending the stair, we find that the interior consists of three or four apartments, with handsome panelled walls and elaborately carved stucco ceilings. The principal room has a double window on the west to Dickson’s Close.[186]

Daniel Wilson, in his _Memorials of Edinburgh_, speaks of this building in reference to Dickson’s Close. He says: ‘A little lower down the close on the same side, an old and curious stone tenement bears on its lower crow-step the Haliburton arms, impaled with another coat, on one shield. It is a singularly antique and time-worn edifice, evidently of considerable antiquity. A curious double window projects on a corbelled base into the close, while the whole stone-work is so much decayed as greatly to add to its picturesque character. In the earliest deed which exists, bearing date 1582, its first proprietor, Master James Halyburton—a title then of some meaning—is spoken of in indefinite terms as _umq^{le}_, or deceased; so that it is a building probably of the early part of the sixteenth century.’ It is known that the adjoining properties on the north once pertained to the collegiate church of Crichton; while those on the east, in Strichen’s Close, comprehended the town residence of the Abbot of Melrose, 1526.

The adjoining woodcut [p. 221] will give some idea of this strange old mansion in Cant’s Close, with its gateway and flight of steps. In looking over the titles, we find that the tenement was conveyed in 1735 from Robert Geddes of Scotstoun, Peeblesshire, to George Wight, a burgess of Edinburgh, since which period it has gradually deteriorated; every apartment, from the ground to the garret, is now a dwelling for a separate family; and the whole surroundings are most wretched. The edifice formed one of the properties removed under the Improvement Act of 1867.]

FOOTNOTES

[176] The Canongate seems to have been paved about the same time. In 1535 the king granted to the Abbot of Holyrood a duty of one penny upon every loaded cart, and a halfpenny upon every empty one, to repair and maintain the causeway.

[177] George Lockhart of Carnwath lived here in 1753. Afterwards he resided in Ross House, a suburban mansion, which afterwards was used as a lying-in hospital. The park connected with this house is now occupied by George Square. While in Mr Lockhart’s possession Ross House was the scene of many gay routs and balls.

The Lords Ross, the original proprietors of this mansion, died out in 1754. One of the last persons in Scotland supposed to be possessed by an evil spirit was a daughter of George, the second last lord. A correspondent says: ‘A person alive in 1824 told me that, when a child, he saw her clamber up to the top of an old-fashioned four-post bed like a cat. In her fits it was almost impossible to hold her. About the same time, a daughter of Lord Kinnaird was supposed to have the second-sight. One day, during divine worship in the High Church, she fainted away; on her recovery, she declared that when Lady Janet Dundas (a daughter of Lord Lauderdale) entered the pew with Miss Dundas, who was a beautiful young girl, she saw the latter as it were in a shroud gathered round her neck, and upon her head. Miss Dundas died a short time after.’

[178] Both facts from Moyses’s _Memoirs_.

[179] In the house to the north of this was a shop kept by an eccentric personage, who exhibited a sign bearing this singular inscription:

ORRA THINGS BOUGHT AND SOLD—

which signified that he dealt in odd articles, such as a single shoe-buckle, one of a pair of skates, a teapot wanting a lid, or perhaps, as often, a lid _minus_ a teapot; in short, any unpaired article which was not to be got in the shops where only new things were sold, and which, nevertheless, was now and then as indispensably wanted by householders as anything else.

[180] The present article is almost wholly from original sources, a fact probably unknown to a contemporary novelist, who has made it the groundwork of a fiction without any acknowledgment. Some additional particulars may be found in _Tales of the Century_, by John Sobieski Stuart (Edinburgh, 1846). In the _Spalding Miscellany_, vol. iii., are several letters of Lord Grange, containing allusions to his wife; and a production of his, which has been printed under the title of _Diary of a Senator of the College of Justice_ (Stevenson, Edinburgh, 1833), is worthy of perusal.

[181] Here and elsewhere a paper in Lord Grange’s own hand is quoted.

[182] ‘Then, and some time before and after, there was a stage-coach from hence to England.’ So says his lordship; implying that in 1751, when he was writing, there was no such public conveniency! It had been tried, and had failed.

[183] If we could believe Lord Lovat, however, he personally was innocent, and regretted he was innocent, of any association with the abduction of Lady Grange. ‘They said it was all my contrivance, and that it was my servants that took her away; but I defyed them then, as I do now, and do declare to you upon honour, that I do not know what has become of that woman, where she is or who takes care of her, but if I had contrived and assisted, and saved my Lord Grange from that devil, who threatened every day to murder him and his children, I would not think shame of it before God or man.’—Letter of Lord Lovat’s quoted in _Genealogie of the Hayes of Tweeddale_.

[184] About four gallons.

[185] Named after John Cant, a pious citizen of the sixteenth century, who, with his wife, Agnes Kerkettle, was a contributor to the foundation of the Convent of St Catherine of Siena on the south side of the Meadows. The district is now known as Sciennes—pronounced _Sheens_.

[186] Only fragments of the ancient buildings remain in Cant’s and Dickson’s Closes.

ABBOT OF MELROSE’S LODGING.

SIR GEORGE MACKENZIE—LADY ANNE DICK.

In Catholic times several of the great dignitaries of the Church had houses in Edinburgh, as the Archbishop of St Andrews at the foot of Blackfriars Wynd, the Bishop of Dunkeld in the Cowgate, and the Abbot of Cambuskenneth in the Lawnmarket.[187] The Abbot of Melrose’s ‘lodging’ appears from public documents to have been in what is now called Strichen’s Close, in the High Street, immediately to the west of Blackfriars Wynd. It had a garden extending down to the Cowgate and up part of the opposite slope.

A successor of the abbot in this possession was Sir George Mackenzie of Rosehaugh, king’s advocate in the reigns of Charles II. and James II., and author of several able works in Scottish law, as well as a successful cultivator of miscellaneous literature. He got a charter of the property from the magistrates in 1677. The house occupied by Sir George still exists,[188] and appears to have been a goodly enough mansion for its time. It is now, however, possessed by a brass-founder as a place of business. From Sir George the alley was called Rosehaugh’s Close, till, this house falling by marriage connection into the possession of Lord Strichen, it got the name of Strichen’s Close, which it still bears. Lord Strichen was a judge of the Court of Session for forty-five years subsequent to 1730. He was the direct ancestor of the present Lord Lovat of the British peerage.

Mackenzie has still a place in the popular imagination in Edinburgh as the _Bluidy Mackingie_, his office having been to prosecute the unruly Covenanters. It therefore happens that the founder of our greatest national library,[189] one whom Dryden regarded as a friend, and who was the very first writer of classic English prose in Scotland, is a sort of Raw-head and Bloody-bones by the firesides of his native capital. He lies in a beautiful mausoleum, which forms a conspicuous object in the Greyfriars Churchyard, and which describes him as an ornament to his age, and a man who was kind to all, ‘except a rebellious crew, from whose violence, with tongue and pen, he defended his country and king, whose virulence he stayed by the sword of justice, and whose ferocity he, by the force of reason, blunted, and only did not subdue.’ This monument was an object of horror to the good people of Edinburgh, as it was almost universally believed that the spirit of the persecutor could get no rest in its superb but gloomy tenement. It used to be ‘a feat’ for a set of boys, in a still summer evening, to march up to the ponderous doors, bedropt with white tears upon a black ground, and cry in at the keyhole:—

‘Bluidy Mackingie, come out if ye daur, Lift the sneck, and draw the bar!’

after which they would run away as if some hobgoblin were in chase of them, probably not looking round till they were out of the churchyard.

Sir George Mackenzie had a country-house called Shank, about ten miles to the south of Edinburgh,[190] now a ruin. One day the Marquis of Tweeddale, having occasion to consult him about some law business, rode across the country, and arrived at so early an hour in the morning that the lawyer was not yet out of bed. Soliciting an immediate audience, he was admitted to the bedroom, where he sat down and detailed the case to Sir George, who gave him all necessary counsel from behind the curtains. When the marquis advanced to present a fee, he was startled at the apparition of a female hand through the curtains, in an attitude expressive of a readiness to receive, while no hand appeared on the part of Sir George. The explanation was that Sir George’s lady, as has been the case with many a weaker man, took entire charge of his purse.[191]

Several of the descendants of this great lawyer have been remarkable for their talents. None, perhaps, possessed more of the _vivida vis animi_ than his granddaughter, Lady Anne Dick of Corstorphine (also granddaughter, by the father’s side, to the clever but unscrupulous ‘Tarbat Register,’ the first Earl of Cromarty).[192] This lady excited much attention in Edinburgh society by her eccentric manners and her droll pasquinade verses: one of those beings she was who astonish, perplex, and fidget their fellow-creatures, till at last the world feels a sort of relief when they are removed from the stage. She made many enemies by her lampoons; and her personal conduct only afforded them too good room for revenge. Sometimes she would dress herself in men’s clothes, and go about the town in search of adventures. One of her frolics ended rather disgracefully, for she and her maid, being apprehended in their disguise, were lodged all night in the Town Guard-house. It may be readily imagined that by those whom her wit had exasperated such follies would be deeply relished and made the most of. We must not, therefore, be surprised at Scandal telling that Lady Anne had at one period lain a whole year in bed, in a vain endeavour—to baffle _himself_.

Through private channels have oozed out at this late day a few specimens of Lady Anne’s poetical abilities; less brilliant than might be expected from the above character of her, yet having a certain air of dash and _espièglerie_ which looks appropriate. They are partly devoted to bewailing the coldness of a certain Sir Peter Murray of Balmanno, towards whom she chose to act as a sort of she-Petrarch, but apparently in the mere pursuit of whim. One runs in the following tender strain:

‘Oh, when he dances at a ball, He’s rarely worth the seeing; So light he trips, you would him take For some aërial being! While pinky-winky go his een, How blest is each bystander! How gracefully he leads the fair, When to her seat he hands her!

But when in accents saft and sweet, He chants forth _Lizzie Baillie_, His dying looks and attitude Enchant, they cannot fail ye. The loveliest widow in the land, When she could scarce disarm him, Alas! the belles in Roxburghshire Must never hope to charm him!

O happy, happy, happy she, Could make him change his plan, sir, And of this rigid bachelor, Convert the married man, sir: O happy, and thrice happy she, Could make him change his plan, sir, And to the gentle Benedick Convert the single man, sir,’ &c.

In another, tired, apparently, of the apathy of this sweet youth, she breaks out as follows:

‘Oh, wherefore did I cross the Forth, And leave my love behind me? Why did I venture to the north, With one that did not mind me?

Had I but visited Carin! It would have been much better, Than pique the prudes, and make a din For careless, cold Sir Peter!

I’m sure I’ve seen a better limb, And twenty better faces; But still my mind it ran on him, When I was at the races.

At night, when we went to the ball, Were many there discreeter; The well-bred duke, and lively Maule, Panmure behaved much better.

They kindly showed their courtesy, And looked on me much sweeter; Yet easy could I never be, For thinking on Sir Peter.

I fain would wear an easy air, But, oh, it looked affected, And e’en the fine ambassador Could see he was neglected.

Though Powrie left for me the spleen, My temper grew no sweeter; I think I’m mad—what do I mean, To follow cold Sir Peter!’

Her ladyship died, without issue, in 1741.

FOOTNOTES

[187] At the head of the Old Bank Close, to the westward; burned down in 1771.

[188] Only a small portion of this building now remains.

[189] The Advocates’ Library.

[190] In the parish of Borthwick.

[191] This anecdote was related to me by the first Lord Wharncliffe, grandson’s grandson to Sir George, about 1828.

[192] Cromarty, at seventy, contrived to marry ‘a young and beautiful countess in her own right, a widow, wealthy, and in universal estimation. The following distich was composed on the occasion:

Thou sonsie auld carl, the world has not thy like, For ladies fa’ in love with thee, though thou be ane auld tyke.’

C. K. Sharpe, Notes to _Law’s Memorials_, p. xlvii.

BLACKFRIARS WYND.

PALACE OF ARCHBISHOP BETHUNE—BOARDING-SCHOOLS OF THE LAST CENTURY—THE LAST OF THE LORIMERS—LADY LOVAT.

Those who now look into Blackfriars Wynd—passing through it is out of the question—will be surprised to learn that, all dismal and wretched as it is in all respects, it was once a place of some respectability and even dignity. On several of its tall old _lands_ may be seen inscriptions implying piety on the part of the founder—one, for example:

PAX INTRANTIBUS, SALUS EXEUNTIBUS;

another:

MISERERE MEI, DEUS;

this last containing in its _upper floor_ all that the adherents of Rome had forty years ago as a place of worship in Edinburgh—the chapel to which, therefore, as a matter of course, the late Charles X. resorted with his suite, when residing as Comte d’Artois in Holyrood House. The alley gets its name from having been the access to the Blackfriars’ Monastery on the opposite slope, and being built on their land.

PALACE OF ARCHBISHOP BETHUNE [OR BEATON].

At the foot of the wynd, on the east side, is a large mansion of antique appearance, forming two sides of a quadrangle, with a _porte-cochère_ giving access to a court behind, and a picturesque overhanging turret at the exterior angle.[193] This house was built by James Bethune, Archbishop of Glasgow (1508-1524), chancellor of the kingdom, and one of the Lords Regent under the Duke of Albany during the minority of James V. Lyndsay, in his _Chronicles_, speaks of it as ‘his owen ludging quhilk he biggit in the Freiris Wynd.’ Keith, at a later period, says: ‘Over the entry of which the arms of the family of Bethune are to be seen to this day.’ Common report represents it as the house of Cardinal Bethune, who was the nephew of the Archbishop of Glasgow; and it is not improbable that the one prelate bequeathed it to the other, and that it thus became what Maitland calls it, ‘the archiepiscopal palace belonging to the see of St Andrews.’

The ground-floor of this extensive building is arched over with strong stone-work, after the fashion of those houses of defence of the same period which are still scattered over the country. Some years ago, when one of the arches was removed to make way for a common ceiling, a thick layer of sand, firmly beaten down, was found between the surface of the vault and the floor above. Ground-floors thus formed were applied in former times to inferior domestic uses, and to the storing of articles of value. The chief apartments for living in were on the floor above—that is, the so-called _first floor_. And such is the case in all the best houses of an old fashion in the city of St Andrews at this day.

I shall afterwards have something to say of an event of the year 1517, with which Archbishop Bethune’s house was connected. It appears to have been occupied by James V. in 1528, while he was deliberating on the propriety of calling a parliament.[194]

The Bethune palace is now, like its confrères, abandoned to the humblest class of tenants. Eighty years ago, however, it must still have been a tolerably good house, as it was then the residence of Bishop Abernethy Drummond, of the Scottish Episcopal communion, the husband of the heiress of Hawthornden. This worthy divine occupied some space in the public eye in his day, and was particularly active in obtaining the repeal of the penal statutes against his church. Some wag, figuring the surprise in high places at a stir arising from a quarter so obscure, penned this epigram:

‘Lord Sydney, to the privy-council summoned, By testy majesty was questioned quick: “Eh, eh! who, who’s this Abernethy Drummond, And where, in Heaven’s name, is his bishopric?”’

BOARDING-SCHOOLS OF THE LAST CENTURY.

When the reader hears such things of the Freir Wynd, he must not be surprised overmuch on perusing the following advertisement from the _Edinburgh Gazette_ of April 19, 1703: ‘There is a Boarding-school to be set up in Blackfriars Wynd, in Robinson’s Land, upon the west side of the wynd, near the middle thereof, in the first door of the stair leading to the said land, against the latter end of May, or first of June next, where young Ladies and Gentlewomen may have all sorts of breeding that is to be had in any part of Britain, and great care taken of their conversation.’

I know not whether this was the same seminary which, towards the middle of the century, was kept by a distinguished lady named Mrs Euphame or Effie Sinclair, who was descended from the ancient family of Longformacus, in Berwickshire, being the granddaughter of Sir Robert Sinclair, first baronet of Longformacus, upon whom that dignity was conferred by King Charles II., in consideration of his services and losses during the civil war. Mrs Effie was allied to many of the best families in Scotland, who made it a duty to place their children under her charge; and her school was thus one of the most respectable in Edinburgh. By her were educated the beautiful Miss Duff, afterwards Countess of Dumfries and Stair, and, by a second marriage, lady of the Honourable Alexander Gordon (Lord Rockville); the late amiable and excellently well informed Mrs Keith, sister of Sir Robert Keith, commonly called, from his diplomatic services, _Ambassador Keith_;[195] the two Misses Hume of Linthill; and Miss Rutherford, the mother of Sir Walter Scott. All these ladies were Scottish cousins to Mrs Effie. To judge by the proficiency of her scholars, although much of what is called accomplishment might be then left untaught, she must have been possessed of uncommon talents for education; for all the ladies before mentioned had well-cultivated minds, were fond of reading, wrote and spelled admirably, were well acquainted with history and with _belles-lettres_, without neglecting the more homely duties of the needle and the account-book; and, while two of them were women of extraordinary talents, all of them were perfectly well-bred in society.