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 MEMOIR 
 
 OF 
 
 WILLIAM AND ROBERT CHAMBERS 
 
 WILLIAM CHAMBERS, LL.D. 
 
 ^tDclfth (Eiiition 
 
 WITH SUPPLEMENTARY CHAPTER 
 
 >.-^ 
 
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 House at Peebles in which William and Rubi-.ki Ciiami;l]v.s weie boii 
 
 W. & R. CHAMBERS 
 
 EDINBURGH AND LONDON 
 
 1883
 
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 PREFATORY NOTE. 
 
 On the death of my brother, Dr Robert Chambers, 
 numerous Biographic sketches of him appeared in 
 Great Britain and the United States, all of them kind 
 and complimentary, but in many cases imperfect or 
 >• erroneous as regards certain leading details. It seemed 
 
 ^ to me that, while still spared life and opportunity, I 
 
 3J might try to do justice to the memory of the deceased, 
 by giving a correct history of his life and principal 
 
 ^ writings. 
 
 *^ The attempt, however, involved a difficulty. 
 
 o Having been intimately associated with my brother, not 
 only in early life, but in literary enterprises, it was 
 scarcely possible to relate the story of one without 
 
 G> frequent reference to the other. I have so far yielded 
 
 v; to this necessity, as to ofter some Autobiographic 
 
 ft Reminiscences, in connection with the principal object 
 
 ^^ in view. To this extent only is the Memoir that of two 
 
 ii individuals. 
 
 5 The retrospect of some early events, which could 
 
 not well be omitted, has not been unaccompanied with 
 poignant recollections ; but if a perusal of the narrative 
 
 4G1H77
 
 VI PREFATORY NOTE. 
 
 serves in any degree to inspire youth with notions of 
 self-reliance, along with a hopeful dependence on 
 Providence when pressed by adverse circumstances, I 
 shall be more than recompensed. W. C. 
 
 Janicary, 1872. 
 
 SEVENTH EDITION. 
 
 From the favourable manner in which the Memoir has 
 been received — the work having been carried through 
 six large editions in less than twelve months — I have 
 endeavoured to render it still more acceptable by a 
 careful revision, and more especially by giving a few 
 additional particulars concerning my brother's early life 
 (including an account of his introduction to Sir Walter 
 Scott), gathered chiefly from a volume of memoranda 
 recently found in his library. W. C. 
 
 January, 1873. 
 
 PREFACE TO TWELFTH EDITION. 
 
 To this edition a Supplementary Chapter has been 
 added, giving an account of the closing years of the 
 writer of this Memoir, and concluding with some notes 
 on the personal characteristics of the two brothers. 
 
 The Publishers. 
 July, 1883.
 
 CONTENTS. 
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 
 PAGB 
 
 EARLY YEARS— 1800 TO 1813 5 
 
 CHAPTER II. 
 EARLY YEARS CONTINUED— 180O TO 1813 30 
 
 CHAPTER III. 
 
 SETTLING IN EDINBURGH — 1813-1814 74 
 
 CHAPTER IV. 
 
 MY APPRENTICESHIP — 1814 TO 1819 85 
 
 CHAPTER V. 
 ROBERT'S EARLY DIFFICULTIES — 1814 TO 1819 123 
 
 CHAPTER VI. 
 MY OWN COMMENCEMENT IN BUSINESS— 1819 TO 1821...139 
 
 CHAPTER VII. 
 
 ROBERT'S WRITINGS — 1822 TO 1832 190
 
 viii CONTENTS. 
 
 CHAPTER VIII. 
 
 PAGB 
 
 SOME REMINISCENCES — 1822 TO 1832 220 
 
 CHAPTER IX. 
 
 CHEAP LITERATURE MOVEMENT OF 1832 228 
 
 CHAPTER X. 
 
 THE CONDUCTING OF ' CHAMBERS'S JOURNAL' 237 
 
 CHAPTER XI. 
 
 RETROSPECT OF GENERAL WORK DONE 253 
 
 CHAPTER XII. 
 
 ROBERT'S LATER WORKS — 1842 TO 1865 273 
 
 CHAPTER XIII. 
 
 A SKELETON IN THE HOUSE, AND OTHER MATTERS... 31O 
 
 CHAPTER XIV. 
 
 ROBERT'S CLOSING YEARS, DEATH, AND CHARACTER... 324 
 
 SUPPLEMENTARY CHAPTER. 
 
 LATER YEARS AND DEATH OF WILLIAM CHAMBERS, 
 
 1865-1883 347 
 
 INDEX 395
 
 MEMOIR. 
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 
 EARLY YEARS — 1800 TO 1813. 
 
 A /T Y brother and I were born and spent our early 
 years in a small country town in the south of 
 Scotland, situated amidst beautiful scenery, and had 
 therefore the advantage of being acquainted from 
 infancy with some of the noble works of nature, along 
 with rural objects and circumstances. The place of 
 our birth was Peebles, an ancient royal burgh on the 
 upper part of the Tweed, where our ancestors had dwelt 
 from time immemorial — the tradition among them being, 
 that they were descended from a personage inscribed as 
 ' William de la Chaumbre, Bailif e Burgois de Pebles,' 
 in the list of those who signed bonds of allegiance to 
 Edward I. at Berwick-on-Tweed, 1296. However that 
 might be, I was born in this little old burgh, i6th April 
 1800; and Robert, coming next in order in the family, 
 was born loth July 1802.
 
 6 MEMOIR. 
 
 For the place of birth and early associations almost 
 every one has a peculiar affection ; and among the 
 Scotch, as is well known, this feeling is a marked 
 national characteristic. It will not seem surprising, 
 therefore, that through life Robert cherished kindly 
 remembrances of the scenes of his infancy. A few 
 years previous to his decease, he began notes of what 
 may have been intended as a memoir of himself, but 
 which were not carried farther than reminiscences 
 from the dawn of intelligence to about his tenth year. 
 Fragmentary as are these memoranda, they abound in 
 the geniality of sentiment for which the writer was 
 remarkable, and serve to illustrate the state of things 
 in certain by -corners of Scotland sixty to seventy 
 years since. The following portions may accordingly be 
 acceptable, supplemented here and there by such par- 
 ticulars from my own remembrance as may help to 
 complete the picture : 
 
 * In the early years of this century,' he proceeds, 
 ' Peebles was little advanced from the condition in 
 which it had mainly rested for several hundred years 
 previously. It was eminently a quiet place — " As quiet 
 as the grave or as Peebles," is a phrase used by Cock- 
 burn. It was said to be a finished town, for no new 
 houses (exceptions to be of course allowed for) were 
 ever built in it. Situated, however, among beautiful 
 pastoral hills, with a singularly pure atmosphere, and 
 with the pellucid Tweed running over its pebbly bed 
 close beside the streets, the town was acknowledged to 
 be, in the fond language of its inhabitants, a bonny 
 place. An honest old burgher was enabled by some 
 strange chance to visit Paris, and was eagerly questioned,
 
 PEEBLES. 7 
 
 when he came back, as to the character of that capital 
 of capitals ; to which, it is said, he answered that 
 " Paris, a'thing considered, was a wonderful place — but 
 still, Peebles for pleesure!" and this has often been 
 cited as a ludicrous example of rustic prejudice and 
 narrowness of judgment. But, on a fair interpretation 
 of the old gentleman's words, he was not quite so 
 benighted as at first appears. The " pleesures " of 
 Peebles were the beauties of the situation and the 
 opportunities of healthful recreation it afforded, and 
 these were certainly considerable. 
 
 ' There was an old and a new town in Peebles — each 
 of them a single street, or little more ; and as even the 
 new town had an antique look, it may be inferred that 
 the old looked old indeed. It was indeed chiefly com- 
 posed of thatched cottages, occupied by weavers and 
 labouring people — a primitive race of homely aspect, in 
 many instances eking out a scanty subsistence by having 
 a cow on the town common, or cultivating a rig of 
 potatoes in the fields close to the town. Rows of 
 porridge luggies (small wooden vessels) were to be seen 
 cooling on window-soles ; a smell of peat smoke per- 
 vaded the place ; the click of the shuttle was everywhere 
 heard during the day ; and in the evening, the gray old 
 men came out in their Kilmarnock night-caps, and 
 talked of Bonaparte, on the stone seats beside their 
 doors. The platters used in these humble dwellings 
 were all of wood, and the spoons of horn ; knives and 
 forks rather rare articles. The house was generally 
 divided into two apartments by a couple of box-beds, 
 placed end to end — a bad style of bed prevalent in 
 cottages all over Scotland ; they were so close as almost 
 to stitle the inmates. Among these humble people, all
 
 8 MEMOIR. 
 
 costumes, customs, and ways of living smacked of old 
 times. You would see a venerable patriarch making 
 his way to church on Sunday, with a long-backed, swing- 
 tailed, light-blue coat of the style of George II., which 
 was probably his marriage coat, and half a century old. 
 His head-gear was a broad-brimmed blue bonnet. The 
 old women came out on the same occasions in red 
 scarfs, called cardinals, and white mutches (caps), bound 
 by a black ribbon, with the gray hair folded back on the 
 forehead. There was a great deal of drugget, and 
 huckaback, and serge in that old world, and very litde 
 cotton. One almost might think he saw the humbler 
 Scotch people of the seventeenth century before his eyes. 
 * In this old-town population, there survived two or 
 three aged persons who professed an adherence to 
 the Covenant and covenanted work of Reformation. 
 One of these, designated Laird Baird, remains clearly 
 daguerreotyped on my memory — a tall, bony, grim old 
 man with blue rig-and-fur stockings rolled half way up 
 his thighs, and a very umbrageous blue bonnet. His 
 secular business consisted in thatching houses ; his inner 
 life was a constant brooding over the sins of a perjured 
 and sinful nation, and the various turns of public affairs, 
 in which he traced the punishments inflicted upon us 
 by an outraged Deity, for our laying aside the Solemn 
 League and Covenant. He came up to my mother one 
 summer evening, as she was standing at her door with 
 her first-born in her arms. " Ye 're mickle pleased wi' 
 that bairn, woman," said the laird gruffly. " If the 
 French come, what will ye do wi' him ? I trow ye '11 be 
 fleeing wi' him to the tap o' the Pentland Hills. But 
 ye should rather pray that they may come. Ye should 
 pray for judgments, woman — ^judgments on a sinfu' land.
 
 EARLIEST RECOLLECTIONS. 9 
 
 Pray that the Lord may pour out the vials of His wrath 
 upon us — it would be for our guid." And then he went 
 on his way, leaving the pretty young mother heart- 
 chilled by his terrible words. Having known some- 
 thing of old-town worthies of this kind, there was no 
 novelty or surprise to me, a few years thereafter, 
 when I read of Habakkuk Mucklewrath in Scott's Old 
 Mortality. 
 
 ' I had reason to know the old town in my earliest 
 years, for our family then dwelt in it, though in a 
 modem-slated house, which my father had had built for 
 him by his father when about to be married. Our 
 ancestors had been woollen manufacturers, substantial 
 and respectable people, although living in a very plain 
 style. My father growing up at the time when the 
 cotton manufacture was introduced into Glasgow, had 
 there studied it, and now conducted it on a pretty 
 extensive scale at Peebles, having sometimes as many 
 as a hundred looms in his employment. My earliest 
 recollections bring before me a neat small mansion, 
 fronting to the Eddleston Water ; a tastefully furnished 
 sitting-room, containing a concealed bed, one or two 
 other little rooms, and a kitchen ; a ground-floor full ot 
 looms, and a garret full of webs and weft. Games at 
 marbles played with my elder brother on the figures of 
 the parlour carpet, when recovering from an illness, 
 come back upon me as among the pleasantest things I 
 have experienced in life ; or wandering into the work- 
 shop below, it was a great entertainment to sit beside 
 one of the weavers, and watch the movements of the 
 heddles and treddles, and hear the songs and the 
 gossip of the man. Weavers were topping operatives in 
 those days, for they could realise two pounds a week,
 
 lo MEMOIR. 
 
 sometimes even more, and many young men of good 
 connections had joined the trade. My father, as agent 
 for several manufacturers in Glasgow, realised a good 
 income, which enabled him to live on an equality with 
 the best families of the place. 
 
 ' The farthest retrogression which any one can make 
 in memory presents him a few obscure little matters start- 
 ing out, as it were, from a back-ground of clouds and 
 darkness. I can recall the little parlour, and a few of 
 its decorations ; an alabaster time-piece and three round 
 alabaster-framed pictures to match — a present from my 
 mother's brother, William Gibson, an officer in the army. 
 The prominent living figure in the parlour was a young 
 woman, of elegant shape, and delicately beautiful small 
 features, having a white cambric handkerchief crossing on 
 her bosom, with a lozenge-shaped gold brooch at the cross- 
 ing, and another thin cambric handkerchief tied loosely 
 round her neck \ a being of lady-like grace and expres- 
 sion, and scarcely yet in her twenty-fourth year, though 
 already the mother of three children, of whom I was the 
 second. Next to her in distinctness as a figure of the 
 memory was the husband of this lady, a neatly made, 
 rather short man in the prime of life, with a handsome 
 cast of face and an intelligent look ; much given to 
 reading and to music, being a tolerable performer on 
 the German flute, fond of scientific conversation, kindly 
 to children, and to everybody. There was but one 
 servant — dear, kind, clever Jeanie Forbes, who used to 
 charm my infant years with Scottish songs in wonderful 
 abundance, and sang with a melodiousness that I have 
 never heard surpassed. It was a delightful atmosphere 
 for me, for of my father's music and of Jeanie's songs 
 I never could tire.
 
 WTLFJE PA TERSON'S BOO TS. t i 
 
 * To a child, of course, all things are new, and the 
 first occurrence of anything to his awakened senses 
 never fails to make a deep impression. I think I yet 
 remember the first time I observingly saw the swelling 
 green hills around our little town. I am sure I could 
 point to within ten yards of the spot where I saw the 
 first gowan and the first buttercup ; first heard the hum ■ 
 of the mountain bee; first looked with wonder into a 
 hedge-sparrow's nest, with its curious treasure of blue 
 eggs. A radius of half a mile would have described the 
 entire world of my infancy : of that world every minute 
 feature remains deeply stamped within me, and will 
 while life and consciousness endure. There is a great 
 deal of studious observation in a child. Casual, trivial, 
 and thoughtless words spoken by his seniors in his 
 presence go into him, to be afterwards estimated and 
 judged of; so it is a great mistake to speak indecorously 
 before children. 
 
 ' At the time when I was coming upon the stage of 
 the world, a number of old things were going out of it. 
 The Rev. Dr Dalgliesh, the minister of the parish, still 
 wore a cocked hat. He died in 1808; and I can just 
 remember seeing him one Sunday, as he walked home 
 from church, with that head-gear crowning his tall and 
 dignified figure. There were still a few men with pig- 
 tails whisking constantly over the collars of their coats. 
 Spencers also still lingered in use. 
 
 * Boots, formerly used only in riding and travelling, 
 were in vogue with men who desired to be smartly 
 dressed. One could either have top-hoots, that is, boots 
 with a movable cincture of pale leather at top, or tassel- 
 boots, by which was meant what were afterwards called 
 Hessians, terminating in a wavy line under the knee,
 
 12 MEMOIR. 
 
 with a tassel hanging out over the middle in front. A 
 buckish weaver, called Willie Paterson, had got a pair 
 of tassel-boots, on which he could fasten tops, and thus 
 enjoy tops or tassels at his pleasure. People meeting 
 him when he went to church would say : " Willie, I see 
 this is top-day with you." Top-day or tassel-day for 
 Willie Paterson 's boots was a favourite joke. As an 
 alternative for boots were gaiters to the knee, originally 
 tight, but latterly lax, with vertical foldings. 
 
 " Lax in their gaiters, laxer in their gait," 
 
 is a line in the Rejected Addresses, which strongly recalls 
 to me the year 1812. 
 
 ' The minister's chief elder in my early days was a cart 
 and mill wright, a substantial citizen, related by marriage 
 to our family, and with whose domestic life I was con- 
 sequently well acquainted. Language fails me in express- 
 ing my sense of the goodness and worth of this old 
 man, though, from the narrowness of his sphere of life, 
 he had never learned to temper his piety with any great 
 share of liberality. He afforded a perfect example of 
 the religious practice of a former age, and would have 
 been considered rather stern by the bulk of his contem- 
 poraries. Tammas, as he was familiarly called, had a 
 large family of sons and daughters, whom he governed 
 with relentless austerity. Any approach to gaiety of spirit 
 was deemed highly improper, and dancing was positively 
 sinful. This over-repressive policy — as in the case of 
 Davie Deans — had no beneficial effect. Prevented from 
 attending a respectably conducted dancing-school, his 
 daughters stole out clandestinely in the evening to 
 dances of not a very reputable character — a practice 
 which led to some far from fortunate marriages. 
 
 ' I could forgive everything in Tammas but the
 
 OUR FIRST FLA V. 13 
 
 Sternness. In the hands of men of his kind, Christianity 
 did not appear as a religion of love ; it seemed almost 
 wholly to consist in an imposition of irksome duties, 
 and an abstinence from all natural and allowable enjoy- 
 ments. A company of strolling players came to Peebles, 
 and the manager went to Tammas, who was acting 
 chief-magistrate in the absence of the provost, to 
 negotiate for permission to use the town-hall as a 
 theatre. When the suppliant approached, Tammas 
 was hewing at a log out of doors, and stood with his 
 axe suspended over his head while listening to the 
 request. 
 
 " I '11 oppose it with all the means in my poo'er, sir !" 
 e.xclaimed Tammas fiercely. 
 
 " Not with the hatchet, I hope, sir," responded the 
 son of Thespis. 
 
 ' The poor man had to set up his scenes in the upper 
 room of a public-house, used as a mason lodge, and met 
 with fair encouragement. Thither my brother and I were 
 taken to see /;d'/t' and Yarico. It was our first play.' 
 
 In his picturesque reminiscence of Tammas, my 
 brother has failed to mention a somewhat curious fact. 
 The old worthy underwent a considerable softening of 
 character in the last few years of his life ; and the con- 
 version was all the more remarkable as being the result 
 of reading a novel, Thaddeus of Warsaw, which an aged 
 lady of kindly feeling persuaded him to peruse. The 
 noble and pathetic sentiments of Miss Porter, in nar- 
 rating the afflictions of her fictitious hero, touched the 
 heart of the old Puritan, and did what no power on 
 earth had been able to effect. What a pity that Tammas 
 did not go to see Tnklc and Yarico ! 
 
 IJ
 
 14 MEMOIR. 
 
 'The new town was a smarter place than the old; 
 yet it contained many homely old thatched houses, and 
 few of any elegance. The shops were for the most part 
 confined and choky places, with what were called half- 
 doors, a bell being generally rung by customers to sum- 
 mon the worthy trader. The shop of the candle-maker 
 was provided with a bell-pull consisting of an old key 
 dangling at the end of a cord, which was put in requisi- 
 tion to summon "Candle Nell," as the female in 
 charge of the establishment was familiarly called. No 
 attempt was made to keep up an appearance of business. 
 All was quiet and sombre by day, and in the evenings a 
 dim candle on the counter made the only difference. A 
 favourite position of the shop-keeper was to lean on his 
 arms over the half-door, gazing abroad into the vacant 
 street, or chatting with a casual by-stander. I do not 
 think there were more than three traders in the town 
 who had any apprentice or hired assistant. If the hus- 
 band was out for a forenoon's fishing in the Tweed, his 
 wife was his sufficient lieutenant. It seems to me 
 remarkable that, small as the concerns generally were, 
 the family life of these people was of a somewhat refined 
 character. The tone of the females was far from being 
 vulgar. Accomplishments, such as are now so common, 
 were unknown; but all had a good education in English, 
 and their conversation was not deficient in intelligence.' 
 
 The mention of Candle Nell suggests that it was a 
 common practice in the town to call people by their 
 profession — as, for example. Baker Turnbull, Cooper 
 Gibson — and such designations were extended to the 
 wives, or it might be the sisters, of those personages. 
 The wife of the cooper was styled Cooper Jean. A
 
 CANDLE NELL. 15 
 
 government official charged with the duty of taxing the 
 windows throughout the county, was sarcastically dis- 
 tinguished as Window Willie. A wildish lad, son of the 
 cauper (maker of caups or wooden dishes), was never 
 called anything but Cauper Jock. In some cases the 
 prefixes were given from the locality. An ingenious 
 blacksmith, who made a business of mending locks and 
 guns, was known only as Vennel John. The county 
 gave employment to a professional hunter of tods, 
 or foxes, who, known generally as Tod-hunter Will, 
 might, from his erratic character, have served as not a 
 bad prototype of 'Tod Gabbie' in Guy Mannering. In 
 the ' Tod Gabbie ' and ' Goose Gibbie ' of Scott, and 
 the *Souter Johnnie' of Burns, we see that the Peebles 
 people of past times were not exceptional in their 
 system of nomenclature. 
 
 Considering how little business was done, and also 
 the easy way in which things were conducted, one would 
 scarcely be prepared for the genteel interior of many of 
 the dwellings, or for the tasteful dresses and courteous 
 manners of the wives of the tradesmen. Though a trifle 
 too obese, Candle Nell herself, when the shop was shut, 
 could receive company in style, and addressed in her 
 proper name, do the honours of her brother's household. 
 A considerable number of persons kept a cow. The 
 going forth of the town cows to their pasturage on a 
 neighbouring hill, and their return, constituted leading 
 and interesting events of the day. Early in the summer 
 mornings, the inhabitants were roused by inharmonious 
 sounds blown from an ox-horn by the town-herd, who 
 leisurely ])erambulated the streets with a gray plaid 
 twisted around his shoulders. Then came forth the 
 cows, deliberately, one by one, from their respective
 
 ir, MEMOIR. 
 
 quarters, and took their way instinctively by the bridge 
 across the Tweed, their keeper coming up behind, to 
 urge forward the loiterers. Before taking the ascent to 
 the hill, the cows, in picturesque groups, might have 
 been seen standing within the margin of the Minister's 
 Pool, a smooth part of tlie river, which reflected on its 
 glistening surface the figures of the animals in various 
 attitudes, along with the surrounding scenery; the whole 
 — river, cows, and trees — forming a tableau such as 
 would have been an appropriate study for Berghem or 
 Wouvermans. 
 
 There was much pleasant intercourse among families 
 at a small cost. Scarcely any gave ceremonious dinners. 
 Invitations to tea at six o'clock were common. After 
 tea there were songs, with perhaps a round of Scottish 
 proverbs — a class of sayings which, from their agreeable 
 tartness, found scope for exercise in ordinary transac- 
 tions, and were more especially useful in snubbing 
 children, and keeping them in remembrance of theii 
 duty. 
 
 The Peebles people were not behind their neighbours 
 in the art of applying these maxims. As, for example, 
 if a fastidious youth presumed to complain that his por- 
 ridge was not altogether to his mind, he would have for 
 reply: 'Lay your wame to your vvinnin" — that is, 'Suit 
 your stomach to your earnings' — a staple observation in 
 all such cases ; — Or, if one of unsettled habits got into 
 a scrape, such as ' slumping ' in the ice, and coming 
 home half-drowned, instead of being commiserated, he 
 would be coolly reminded that ' An unhappy fish gets 
 an unhappy bait;' — Or, if one hinted that he was 
 hungry, and would not be the worse of something to eat, 
 he would, if the application was inopportune, be favoured
 
 SCOTTISH PRO VERBS. x 7 
 
 with the advice in dietetics : 'You'll be the better o' 
 findin' the grunds o' your stamick ; ' — Or, if he, on the 
 other hand, asked for a drink of water shortly after 
 dinner, he would be told that ' Mickle meat taks mickle 
 weet ; ' by which wholesome rebuke he was instructed 
 in the excellent virtue of moderation in eating ; — Or, if 
 one, when put to some kind of difficult task, said he 
 wanted assistance, he would get the proverb pitched at 
 him : * Help yoursel', and your friends will like you the 
 better ; ' — Or, if, on being sent an errand, he ventured 
 to complain of the distance, he would be told : 'It will 
 be lang before' you wear to the knee-lids ; ' — Or, when 
 a family of children quarrelled among themselves, and 
 appealed to their mother for an edict of pacification, she 
 would console them with the remark : ' You 'U all agree 
 better when ye gang in at different kirk doors.' A 
 capital thing were these proverbs and sayings for 
 stamping out what were called notions of ' uppishness ' 
 in children, or hopes of having everything their own way. 
 It must not, however, be inferred, from a proficiency 
 in hurling these repressive maxims, that there was any 
 actual deficiency in the affections. Along with a singu- 
 lar absence of demonstrativeness, there was often a spirit 
 of true kindness. At that period, and till comparatively 
 recent times, there was no demoralising poor-law, such 
 as now exists, to steel the hearts of the people, and 
 create paupers by wholesale. Those in easy circum- 
 stances helped, and gave some little personal attention 
 to, their poorer neighbours ; and I can remember that, 
 on the occasion of a sudden death by a distressing 
 accident in the family of a labouring man, the feelings 
 of the whole community were munificently stirred up 
 in compassion.
 
 1 8 MEMOIR. 
 
 The country was still haunted by mendicants of 
 various orders, including old decrepit women, who were 
 carried about on hand-barrows from door to door, 
 begging meal or halfpence. The town, also, was never 
 without two or three natural idiots, generally harmless 
 in character. The most interesting and amusing of 
 these was Daft Jock Grey — or, to give him his proper 
 title, ' Daft Jock Grey of Gilmanscleugh ' — a wanderer 
 through Roxburgh, Selkirk, and Peebles shires, who was 
 known to Sir Walter Scott, and possessed qualities not 
 unlike those assigned to the character of Davie Gellatley. 
 Jock, a simple good-natured being, was a kind of genius, 
 had a great command of songs, and composed a ballad, 
 which, commencing with an allusion to his own infirmity, 
 recited, in jingling rhymes, the names and qualities of 
 a number of persons whose houses he frequented in his 
 extensive rambles. 
 
 Hogmanay, the last day of the year, was the grand 
 festival of all varieties of mendicants, daft folk, and 
 children generally; for there was a 'universal distribu- 
 tion of oat-cakes, cheese, shortbread, and buns at the 
 doors of the inhabitants. Among those who secured a 
 respectable dole on such occasions was the town-piper, 
 dressed in a red uniform and cocked hat, as befitted 
 a civic official. Piper Ritchie, for such was his name, 
 enjoyed the munificent salary of a pound a year from the 
 corporation, along with a pair of shoes ; and it was 
 understood that, besides his dole at Hogmanay, he was 
 entitled to receive at least a groat annually from all well- 
 disposed householders. His emoluments were com- 
 pleted by certain small fees for playing at weddings. In 
 escorting a marriage-party, he marched with becoming 
 importance in front, playing with might and main a tune
 
 LAIRD GRIEVE. 19 
 
 called Welcome hame, my Dearie. It was part of his duty 
 to march through the town every evening between nine 
 and ten o'clock playing on his pipes, as a warning to 
 the inhabitants to go to their beds. The poor piper 
 died an aged man in July 1807. Robert, as recorded 
 in his juvenile memoir, attended the piper's funeral, 
 having had his first pair of trousers put on for the 
 occasion. 
 
 On Hogmanay day, tradesmen called personally with 
 their yearly accounts, of which they received payment, 
 along with some appropriate refreshment. There was 
 first-footing on New-year's morning. And Handsel 
 Monday — the first Monday in the year — was marked by 
 tossing a profusion of ballads and penny chap-books 
 from windows among a crowd of clamorous youngsters. 
 New-year was also signalised by various domestic festiv- 
 ities. The severity of manners of a hundred years earlier 
 had worn off. There was unrebuked joviality at births 
 and marriages, and even in a solemn way at deaths. In 
 the house of the deceased, on the evening before the 
 funeral, there was a Lyke-wake, consisting of a succes- 
 sion of services of refreshments, presided over by an 
 undertaker, one of whose professional recommendations 
 consisted in saying a fresh grace to each batch of 
 mourners. Laird Grieve, an aged and facetious car- 
 penter, carried off the chief business in coffin-making, 
 in consequence of being able to say seven graces of 
 considerable length without repetition. The consump- 
 tion of whisky at these lugubrious entertainments was 
 incredible, and sometimes encroached seriously on the 
 means of families. After the funeral, there was an 
 entertainment called the Dredgy, which was a degree 
 more cheerful than the preceding potations.
 
 20 MEMOIR. 
 
 Laird Grieve was the only representative of the fine 
 arts in Peebles. In the town there was a house-painter, 
 who could manage to paint the lettering of a sign-board, 
 but was unable to execute anything pictorial. When 
 a vintner, therefore, wished to embellish his sign with 
 the alluring representation of a punch-bowl, a pint- 
 stoup, or a few wine-glasses, flanked with two tobacco- 
 pipes crosswise ; or, if more ambitious, he desired to 
 have the figure of a black bull passant, a red lion 
 rampant, or some other heraldic object stuck up over 
 his door, the laird was applied to, and gave uncommon 
 satisfaction — like Dick Tinto, taking payment in kind, 
 for when the work was finished, the painter had already 
 eaten and drunk out its value. In his old days, 
 when the poor laird was less able for these artistic 
 performances, and means fell short, he depended 
 mainly on turning peg-tops for the school-boys, besides 
 which handicraft, he resorted to the ingenious arti- 
 fice of composing doggerel verses, to repeat in making 
 a round of calls among friends. Any incident occurring 
 in the town would answer as a theme. On repeating 
 his verses, some slight refection was produced — and 
 exit the laird satisfied. 
 
 I may be excused offering this tribute of recollection 
 to an aged man, who in his time meritoriously per- 
 formed the useful part of town-carpenter, undertaker, 
 artist, peg-top maker, and versifier; and who, from his 
 facetious humours, kept the burgh in a degree of amuse- 
 ment for more than half a century. 
 
 Although the belief in witchcraft had died out gener- 
 ally, it was still entertained in a limited way by the less 
 enlightened classes. I have a recollection of a poor 
 old woman being reputed as a witch, and that it was
 
 OLD SUPERSTlTfO.VS. 21 
 
 not safe to pass her cottage, without placing the thumb 
 across the fourth finger, so as to form the figure of the 
 cross. This species of exorcism I practised under 
 instructions from boys older than myself I likewise 
 remember seeing salt thrown on the fire, as a guard 
 against the evil-eye, when aged women, suspected of 
 not being quite canny, happened to call at a neigh- 
 bour's dwelling. The aged postman, as was confidently 
 reported, never went on his rounds with the letters 
 without a sprig of rowan-tree (mountain-ash) in his 
 pocket, as a preservative against malevolent influences. 
 There was no police. Offenders against the law were 
 usually captured by a town-officer, at the verbal 
 command of the provost, who administered justice in an 
 off-hand way behind his counter, amidst miscellaneous 
 dealings with customers, and ordered off alleged delin- 
 quents to prison without keeping any record of the 
 transaction. Dismission from confinement took place 
 in the like abrupt and arbitrary manner. 
 
 As will be observed, there was still much of an old- 
 world air about Peebles. The transit to and from it 
 was tedious and expensive. In winter, when the roads 
 were snowed up, the inhabitants were put to great 
 straits. On one occasion, the town was without salt for 
 a fortnight. Frequently, the carriers could not get for- 
 ward until parties of men went to clear tlie way. Of this 
 snowing-up I retain vivid recollections, for, there being 
 no bank in the town, my father could not pay his work- 
 men their weekly wages until the arrival of the carrier, 
 who was fixed in a snow-wreath ten miles distant. On 
 such occasions, there was a dearth of fuel, causing the 
 poorer classes to rely for warmth on that species of 
 deposit from cows, mixed with coal-culm and baked in
 
 22 MEMOIR. 
 
 the sun, which was used as fuel in various parts of 
 England after the middle of last century. 
 
 Although the town had existed for a thousand years oi 
 more, it possessed no printing-press. Only two or three 
 newspapers came to it in the course of a week, and these 
 were handed about till they were in tatters. Advertise- 
 ments were made by tuck of drum ; the official employed 
 for the purpose being an old soldier, a tough little man 
 with a queue, known as ' Drummer Will.' It was told 
 of him that he had gallantly beat a drum at the battle 
 of Quebec until the whole regiment had perished, he 
 alone being the survivor, and still vigorously beating 
 his drum like a hero amidst fire and shot. Now settled 
 down as an officer of the civic corporation. Drummer 
 Will usually performed the triple duty of acting as 
 jailer, constable, and agent for advertisements, which, 
 after collecting an audience, he read by means of a 
 pair of Dutch spectacles, and always pronounced 
 adverteesements. 
 
 Robert describes the way that the more affluent 
 burghers often spent their evenings. 
 
 ' The absence of excitement in the ordinary life of a 
 small town, made it next to impossible for a man of social 
 spirit to avoid convivial evening meetings, and these were 
 frequent. The favourite hoiVj^'w^s an old-fashioned inn 
 kept by a certain Miss Ritchie, a clever sprightly woman 
 of irreproachable character, who, so far from the obse- 
 quiousness of her profession, required to be treated by 
 her guests with no small amount of deference, and, in 
 especial, would never allow them to have liquor after 
 a decent hour. When that hour arrived — I think it 
 was the Forbes-Mackenzie hour of eleven — it was vain
 
 ^rISS RTTCHIES. 23 
 
 for them to ask a fresh supply. " Na, na ; gang hame to 
 your wives and bairns," was her dictum, and it was 
 impossible for them to sit much longer. "Meg Dods" in 
 Si Ronatis Well is what I would call a rough and strong 
 portraiture of Miss Ritchie — a Miss Ritchie of a lower 
 sphere of life — and, if I may judge from a conversation 
 I once had with Sir Walter Scott regarding the supposed 
 prototype, I think he knew little about her. The totit- 
 ense/fible of the actual inn — a laird's town-house of the 
 seventeenth centur}-, with a grandc cour in front, acces- 
 sible by an arched gate surmounted by a dial — Avith the 
 little low-ceiled rooms, and Miss Ritchie herself, ruling 
 house, and servants, and guests with her clear head and 
 ready tongue, jocosely sharp with everybody, forms a 
 picture in my mind to which I should now vainly seek 
 to find a parallel. 
 
 ' Our neighbour, Laird Grieve, the aged joiner and 
 undertaker, had a son, " Tam," who succeeded to his 
 business. Tam was a blithe, hearty man, with an old- 
 fashioned gentility in his aspect, and was a general 
 favourite in the town, which he served for many years in 
 the capacity of a bailie. He had a small carpenter's 
 shop, and a saw-pit, and an appearance of uncut logs 
 about his premises ; but I never could connect the idea 
 of either work or business with Bailie Grieve. He 
 continued, however, all through life to have a kind of 
 eminence as a maker of fishing-rods ; and as a sort of 
 stand-by in his pinched circumstances, he followed his 
 father's profession of making peg-tops, or peeries, for the 
 school-boys. His dingy little workshop — a low thatched 
 building in which there was a strange confusion of work- 
 benches, turning-lathes, bits of wood, and shavings — 
 was therefore an interesting resort for youth. Tam was
 
 24 MEMOIR. 
 
 also an excellent angler, in which capacity he was well 
 known to the late Professcw Wilson. 
 
 ' It used to be very pleasant, in returning to Peebles 
 as a visitor, to call upon Tarn at his neat, small, white 
 house, near the bottom of the old town, where, in a 
 miniature terraced garden with a neat white railing, I 
 saw tulips for the first time, and thought them the 
 prettiest objects in creation. Being a widower and 
 without children, the bailie had an old woman. Bet, for 
 a general servant and housekeeper ; and her reception 
 of us, as she opened the door, and shewed us into her 
 master's little, low-ceiled parlour, was always of an 
 enthusiastic character. Presently there would be a gust 
 of kindly and somewhat vociferous talk, Bet standing 
 within the door (but holding it by the handle) all the 
 time, and lending in her word whenever she had occa- 
 sion. Dear traits of the old simple world, how delight- 
 ful to recall you in these scenes of comparative refinement 
 and comparative stiftness and frigidity!' 
 
 In Robert's reminiscences of the town in our boyish 
 days, he omits to notice some traits of character essen- 
 tially Scotch, which I should imagine are now so 
 entirely obliterated as to be unknown even by the 
 living generation. 
 
 Among that considerable part of the population who 
 lived down closes and in old thatched cottages, news 
 circulated at third or fourth hand, or was merged in 
 conversation on religious or other topics. My brother 
 and I derived much enjoyment, not to say instruction, 
 from the singing of old ballads, and the telling of 
 legendary stories, by a kind old female relative, the 
 wife of a decayed tradesman, who dwelt in one of
 
 TJM FLECK. 25 
 
 the ancient closes. At her humble fireside, under 
 the canopy of a huge chimney, where her half-bhnd and 
 superannuated husband sat dozing in a chair, the battle 
 of Corunna and other prevailing news was strangely 
 mingled with disquisitions on the Jewish wars. The 
 source of this interesting conversation was a well-worn 
 copy of L'Estrange's translation of Josephus, a small 
 folio of date 1720. The envied possessor of the work 
 was Tarn Fleck, ' a flichty chield,' as he was considered, 
 who, not particularly steady at his legitimate employ- 
 ment, struck out a sort of profession by going about in 
 the evenings with his Josephus, which he read as the 
 current news ; the only light he had for doing so being 
 usually that imparted by the flickering blaze of a piece 
 of parrot coal. It was his practice not to read more 
 than from two to three pages at a time, interlarded with 
 sagacious remarks of his own by way of foot-notes, and 
 in this way he sustained an extraordinary interest in the 
 narrative. Retailing the matter with great equability in 
 different households, Tarn kept all at the same point of 
 information, and wound them up with a corresponding 
 anxiety as to the issue of some moving event in Hebrew 
 annals. Although in this way he went through a course 
 of Josephus yearly, the novelty somehow never seemed 
 to wear off. 
 
 *WeeI, Tam, what's the news the nicht?' would old 
 Geordie Murray say, as Tam entered with his Josephus 
 under his arm, and seated himself at the family fireside. 
 
 * Bad news, bad news,' replied Tam. ' Titus has 
 begun to besiege Jerusalem — it 's gaun to be a terrible 
 business ;' and then he opened his budget of intelligence, 
 to which all jtaid the most reverential attention. The 
 protracted and severe famine which was endured by the
 
 26 MEMOIR. 
 
 besieged Jews, was a theme which kept several families 
 in a state of agony for a week ; and when Tarn in his 
 readings came to the final conflict and destruction of 
 the city by the Roman general, there was a perfect 
 paroxysm of horror. At such seances my brother and I 
 were delighted Hsteners. All honour to the memory of 
 Tam Fleck. 
 
 In the old-town community, where he often figured, 
 our more immediate paternal ancestors, as enjoying the 
 fruits of uninterrupted frugality and industry for centuries, 
 had attained to a somewhat enviable position. My 
 grandfather, William Chambers, continuing the occupa- 
 tion of his predecessors, carried on the manufacture of 
 woollen and linen cloths, on what would now be called 
 an antiquated and meagre scale, in a long thatched 
 building at the corner of a quadrangle which in old 
 times had formed the market-place of the town. One 
 end of this homely structure was his dwelling, consisting 
 of two apartments ; and in the other were several hand- 
 looms and warping machines. All the family laboured 
 according to their ability, and the whole arrangements 
 were of a thrifty kind, not absolutely enjoined by the 
 pressure of daily wants, but conformable to the ordinary 
 usages of the period. 
 
 The whole establishment might be taken as a type of a 
 state of society once common in the smaller provincial 
 towns of Scotland; and contrasting it with the present 
 state of things, we may observe the remarkable advances 
 which have been made in the country since the latter part 
 of the eighteenth centur}'. Here was a man of some 
 consideration — an independent manufacturer, so to 
 speak — and in no respect penurious, living in a style 
 inferior to that of any mechanic in the present day
 
 MARGARET KERR. 27 
 
 with a wage of only twenty shillings a week. No 
 elegances, nor what we now deem indispensable com- 
 forts. When people are inclined to grumble with their 
 accommodations, and to speak of the dearth of luxuries, 
 would it not be well for them, in however small a degree, 
 to compare their condition with that of their grand- 
 fathers three-quarters of a century ago ? 
 
 Upright, pious, and benevolent, my grandfather very 
 acceptably held the office of an elder of the church for 
 the last thirty years of his existence. To the poor and 
 wretched he was an ever-ready friend, adviser, and 
 consoler. I have heard it related that on Sunday 
 evenings he would return exhausted with his religious 
 peregrinations and exercises — having, in the course of a 
 few hours, visited perhaps as many as a dozen sick or 
 dying persons, and oftcred up an extempore and suitable 
 prayer with each. At his death, in 1799, this worthy 
 man left his widow and second son, William, to carry 
 on the business; my father James, the elder son, having 
 about the same period begun his cotton-manufacturing 
 concern. 
 
 Of this widow, my grandmother, I retain some recol- 
 lections. According to an old custom in Scotland, she 
 was, though married, known only by her maiden name, 
 which was Margaret Kerr. Margaret was a little woman, 
 of plain appearance, a great stickler on points of con- 
 troversial divinity, a rigorous critic of sermons, and a 
 severe censor of what she considered degenerating 
 manners. She possessed a good deal of ' character,' and 
 might almost be taken for the original of Mause Head- 
 rigg. As the wife of a ruling elder, she possibly 
 imagined that she was entitled to exercise a certain 
 authority in ecclesiastical matters. An anecdote is told
 
 28 MEMOIR. 
 
 of her having once taken the venerable Dr DalgHesh, 
 the parish minister, through hands. In presence of a 
 number of neighbours, she thought fit to lecture him on 
 that particularly delicate subject, his wife's dress : ' It 
 was a sin and a shame to see sae mickle finery.' 
 
 The minister did not deny the charge, but dexterously 
 encountered her with the Socratic method of argument : 
 'So, Margaret, you think that ornament is useless and 
 sinful in a lady's dress?' 
 
 ' Certainly I do.' 
 
 ' Then, may I ask why you wear that ribbon around 
 your cap ? A piece of cord would surely do quite as 
 well.' 
 
 Disconcerted with this unforeseen turn of affairs, 
 Margaret determinedly rejoined in an under-tone : 
 * Ye '11 no hae lang to speer sic a Hke question.' 
 
 Next day her cap was bound with a piece of white 
 tape ; and never afterwards, till the day of her death, 
 did she wear a ribbon, or any morsel of ornament. I 
 am doubtful if we could match this out of Scotland. 
 For a novelist to depict characters of this kind, he would 
 require to see them in real life ; no imagination could 
 reach them. Sir Walter Scott both saw and talked with 
 them, for they were not extinct in his day. 
 
 The mortifying rebuff about the ribbon perhaps had 
 some influence in making my ancestress a Seceder. 
 As she lived near the manse, I am afraid she must have 
 been a good deal of a thorn in the side of the parish 
 minister, notwithstanding all the palliatives of her good- 
 natured husband, the elder. At length an incident 
 occurred, which sent her abruptly off to a recently 
 erected meeting-house, to which a promising young 
 preacher, Mr Leckie, had been appointed.
 
 IVAUR THAN THE COO DEW. 29 
 
 It was a bright summer morning about five o'clock, 
 when Margaret left her husband's side as usual, and 
 went out to see her cow attended to. Before three 
 minutes had elapsed, her husband was aroused by her 
 coming in with dismal cries : ' Eh, sirs ! eh, sirs ! did I 
 ever think to live to see the day? O man, O man, 
 O William — this is a terrible thing indeed ! Could I 
 ever have thought to see't?' 
 
 'Gracious, woman!' exclaimed the worthy elder, by 
 this time fully awake, ' what is 't? Is the coo deid?' 
 for it seemed to him that no greater calamity could have 
 been expected to produce such doleful exclamations. 
 
 ' The coo deid ! ' responded Margaret ; ' waur, waur, 
 ten times waur. There 's Dr Dalgliesh only now gaun 
 hame at five o'clock in the morning. It's awfu', it's 
 awfu' ! What will things come to ?' 
 
 The elder, though a pattern of propriety himself, is 
 not recorded as having taken any but a mild view of 
 the minister's conduct, more particularly as he knew 
 that the patron of the jjarish was at Miss Ritchie's inn, 
 and that the reverend divine might have been detained 
 rather late with him against his will. The strenuous 
 Margaret drew no such charitable conclusions. She 
 joined the Secession congregation next day, and never 
 again attended the parish church.
 
 CHAPTER II. 
 
 EARLY YEARS CONTINUED 1 8oO TO 1 8 I 3. 
 
 "DEFORE introducing my mother to the modest 
 ■^-^ mansion, the first home of her married hfe, 
 situated on the north bank of the Eddleston Water, a 
 small tributary of the Tweed, something characteristic 
 of old Scotland may be said of her parentage : and 
 here we return to Robert's manuscript. 
 
 ' In the middle of the last century, the farm of Jedder- 
 field, situated on the hill-face above Neidpath Castle, a 
 mile from Peebles, the property of the Earl of March, was 
 occupied, at the rent of eighteen pounds, by an honest 
 man named David Grieve. While the noble proprietor 
 was pursuing his career of sport and debauchery in 
 London — the course which was consummated by him 
 many years after, under the title which he finally 
 acquired of Duke of Queensberry (familiarly 0/d Q.), 
 the tenant, David Grieve, reared on that small bit of 
 his lordship's domains a family of fourteen children, 
 most of whom floated on by their own merits to much 
 superior positions in life — one to be a merchant in 
 Manchester, two to similar positions in Edinburgh, one 
 to be a surgeon in the East India Company's service,
 
 NEWBY. 31 
 
 and so forth. This family afforded an example of the 
 virtuous frugal life of the rural people of Scotland 
 previous to that extension of industry which brought 
 wealth and many comforts into our country. The 
 breakfast was oatmeal porridge; the supper, a thinner 
 farinaceous composition named sowens ; for the dinner, 
 there was seldom butcher-meat : the ordinary mess was 
 a thin broth called Lenten kail, composed of a ball of 
 oatmeal kneaded up with butter, boiled in an infusion 
 of cabbage, and eaten with barley or pease-meal 
 bannocks. Strange as it may seem, a people of many 
 fine qualities were reared in this plain style, a people of 
 bone and muscle, mentally as well as physically — 
 " buirdly chiels and clever hizzies," as Burns says. 
 There was not a particle of luxury in that Sabine life ; 
 hardly a single article of the kinds sold in shops was 
 used. The food was all obtained from the farm, and 
 the clothing was wholly of homespun. I cannot be 
 under any mistake about it, for I have often heard the 
 household and its ways described by my maternal grand- 
 mother, who was David Grieve's eldest daughter. Even 
 the education of the children was conducted at home, 
 the mother giving them lessons while seated at her 
 spinning-wheel. 
 
 * Janet, the eldest girl, was wedded at eighteen by a 
 middle-aged farmer, named William Gibson, who rented a 
 large tract of pasturage belonging to Dr Hay of Haystoun. 
 This farm, called Newby, was not less than seven miles 
 long; it commenced near Haystoun, about two miles 
 from Peebles, and at the other extremity bordered on 
 Blackhouse, in Selkirkshire, where the Ettrick Shepherd 
 spent his youthful days. The Gibsons were a numerous 
 clan in Tweeddale, and some of them, including the
 
 32 MEMOIR. 
 
 tenant of Newby, were comparatively wealthy.' In 
 marrying William Gibson, Janet Grieve was thought to 
 make an enviable match, and of this there were some 
 outward tokens. The marriage took place in 1768. 
 On the day preceding the event, Janet's * providing,' 
 which was sumptuous, was despatched in a cart from 
 Jedderfield to what was to be her new home ; the load 
 of various articles being conspicuously surmounted by 
 a spinning-wheel, decorated with ribbons of different 
 colours. In the present day, we should in vain look 
 for this old farm-establishment, for every vestige of it is 
 gone ; and we only discover the spot, which is the edge 
 of a bank overhanging Haystoun Burn, by a decayed 
 tree that flourished in the comer of the small garden. 
 
 'There was a much less frugal style of life at 
 Newby than at Jedderfield. Although the homestead 
 consisted of only a cottage, containing a kitchen and 
 parlour, with the appendages of a barn, &c., it gave 
 shelter every night to groups of vagrant people, the multi- 
 tude of whom was a matter of remark and lamentation a 
 few years before to Fletcher of Salton and other patriots. 
 On a Saturday night there would be as many as twenty 
 of these poor creatures received by the farmer for food 
 and lodging till Monday morning. Some of them, who 
 had established a good character, were entertained in 
 the farmer's hcC, where himself, his wife, and servants 
 ordinarily sat, as was the fashion of that time. The 
 family rather relished this society, for from hardly any 
 other source did they ever obtain any of the news of the 
 country. One well-remembered guest of this order was 
 a robust old man named Andrew Gemmells, who had 
 been a dragoon in his youth, but had long assumed the 
 blue gown and badge of a kings bedesman, or licensed
 
 ANDREW GEMMELLS. 33 
 
 beggar, together with the meal-pocks and long staff. 
 A rough and ready tongue, and a picturesque if not 
 venerable aspect, had recommended Andrew in many 
 households superior to my grandfather's. 
 
 ' Sir Walter Scott, who commemorates him under the 
 name of Edie Ochiltree, tells how a laird was found one 
 day playing at draughts with Gemmells, the only mark of 
 distinction of rank presented in the case being that the 
 laird sat in his parlour, and the blue-gown in the court 
 outside, the board being placed on the sill of the open 
 window between. I can corroborate the view which we 
 thus acquire of the old beggar's position by stating that 
 tlie guidwife of Newby learned the game of draughts 
 — commonly called in Scotland the dam-brod — from 
 Andrew Gemmells, and often played with him at her hall 
 fireside. Somewhat to his disgust, the pupil became in 
 time the equal of the master, and a visitor one day 
 backed her against him for a guinea, which the old man 
 did not scruple to stake, and which he could easily have 
 paid if unsuccessful, as he carried a good deal of money 
 about his person. When it appeared, however, that she 
 was about to gain the game, Andrew lost his temper, or 
 affected to do so, and, hastily snatching up the board, 
 threw the " men " into the ash-pit. Andrew circulated 
 all through the counties of Peebles, Selkirk, and Rox- 
 burgh, going from house to house, and getting an awmos 
 (alms), with lodging if necessary, at each, appreciated 
 as an original wherever he came — everywhere civilly 
 and even kindly treated. It must have been on the 
 whole a pleasant life for the old man, but one that 
 could only be so while the primitive simple style of 
 farm-life subsisted — that is, while the farmer, his wife, 
 and children, still herded in the same room with their
 
 34 MEMOIR. 
 
 servants, and were not above holding converse with the 
 remembered beggar. Perhaps poor Andrew found at 
 last that things were taking an unfavourable turn for 
 him, for he died in an out-house at a farm in the parish 
 of Roxburgh, in the month of February too (1794)- 
 
 ' My grandmother and her maids were generally up at 
 an early hour in the morning to attend to the ewes, and 
 their time for going to rest must have consequently been 
 an early one. There was always, however, a period, 
 called " between gloaming and supper-time," during 
 which another industry was practised. Then it was that 
 the wheels were brought out for the spinning of the yarn 
 which was to constitute the clothing of the family. And 
 I often think that it must have been a pleasing sight in 
 that humble hall — the handsome young mistress amidst 
 her troop of maidens, all busy with foot and finger, 
 while the shepherds and their master, and one or two 
 favoured gaberlunzies, would be telling stories or cracking 
 jokes for the general entertainment, or some one with 
 a good voice would be singing the songs of Ramsay and 
 Hamilton. At a certain time of the year, the guidwife 
 had to lay aside the ordinary little wheel, by which lint 
 was spun, and take to the " muckle wheel," which was 
 required for the production of woollen thread, the 
 material of the goodman's clothes, or else the " reel," on 
 which she reduced the product of the little wheel to 
 hanks for the weaver. Even the Misses Hay were great 
 lint spinners, and I suspect that their familiar acquaint- 
 ance with the guidwife of Newby depended somewhat 
 on their common devotion to the wheel. 
 
 ' It was on this farm of Newby, while in the posses- 
 sion of Mr Gibson, in the year 1772, that there occurred 
 a case of the sagacity of the shepherd's dog, which has
 
 THE SHEPHERD'S DOG. 35 
 
 often been adverted to in books, but seldom with correct- 
 ness as to the details. A store-farmer, in another part of 
 the county, had commenced a system of sheep-stealing, 
 which he was believed to have practised without detec- 
 tion for several years. At length, a ewe which had 
 been taken amongst other sheep from Newby, reappeared 
 on the farm, bearing a bini (Anglice, brand) on her face 
 in addition to that of her true owner. The animal was 
 believed to have been attracted to her former home by 
 the instinct of affection towards the lamb from whom 
 she had been separated, and her return was the more 
 remarkable as it involved the necessity of her crossing 
 the river Tweed. The shepherd, James Hislop, did 
 not fail to report the reappearance of the ewe to his 
 master, and it was not long before they ascertained 
 whose brand it was which had been impressed over Mr 
 Gibson's. As many sheep had been for some time 
 missed out of the stock, it was thought proper that 
 Hislop should pay a visit to Mr Murdison's farm, where 
 he quickly discovered a considerable number of sheep 
 bearing Mr Gibson's brand O, all having Mr Murdison's, 
 the letter T, superimposed. In short, Murdison and 
 his shepherd Miller were apprehended, tried, convicted, 
 and duly hanged in the Grassmarket — a startling exhibi- 
 tion, considering the position of the sufferers in life, and 
 made the more so by the humbler man choosing to 
 come upon the scaffold in his '• dead-cluthes." The 
 long-continued success of the crime of these wrel( iied 
 men was found to have depended on the wonderful 
 human-like sense of Miller's dog Wtrroiv. Aecompanietl 
 by Yarrow, the man would take an opportunity of 
 visiting a neighbouring farm and looking through the 
 flocks. He had there only to point out certain sheep
 
 36 MEMOIR. 
 
 to his sagacious companion, who would come that night, 
 select each animal so pointed out, bring them together, 
 and drive them across country, and, moreover, across 
 the Tweed, to his master's farm, never once undergoing 
 detection. The story ran that the dog was hanged 
 soon after his master, as being thought a dangerous 
 creature in a country full of flocks ; but I would hope 
 that this was a false rumour, and my grandmother, who 
 might have known all the circumstances connected with 
 the case, never affirmed its truth.' 
 
 About 1780, Mr Gibson retired with a moderate 
 competency to Peebles, where he concluded his days. 
 Here were born to him a girl and boy, who at his death 
 were left in charge of their mother and several appointed 
 guardians. Unfortunately, as regards these children, 
 their mother made a second marriage with a teacher, 
 Mr Robert Noble, and in the short space of two to 
 three years she was again left a widow, with an addition 
 of two boys, Robert and David, without any provision 
 whatever from this new connection. To the two young 
 Gibsons, Jean and her brother William, this affair led 
 to much domestic unhappmess, along with a desire to 
 escape from it in the best way possible. Jean grew up 
 an uncommonly beautiful girl, and being in some small 
 degree an heiress, had a number of admirers, one of 
 them being my father, to whom she was married ; and 
 the young pair began housekeeping in the neat mansion 
 already described. 
 
 This marriage took place in May 1799. I was born 
 in less than a year afterwards, and, as has been said, 
 Robert was born in 1802. My furthest stretch of 
 memory pictures my motiier as that gentle ladylike
 
 JEANIE GIBSON. 37 
 
 person already alluded to by Robert ; punctiliously 
 tasteful in dress, and beautiful in features, but with an 
 expression of blended pensiveness and cheerfulness, 
 indicative of the position into which she had been 
 brought. Even as a child I could see she had sorrows 
 — perhaps regrets. It might have been safe to say that 
 her union had been ' ill fated.' 
 
 It is not, however, to be assumed from this circum- 
 stance that my father was undeserving of regard. He 
 possessed numerous estimable qualities, but in asso- 
 ciation with these, a pliancy of disposition, which, 
 according to the language of the world, renders a 
 man ' his own worst enemy.' He was inconsiderate, 
 easily misled, wanted fortitude, and was constantly 
 exposed to imposition. Aspiring in his tastes and 
 notions, with a fund of humour, and an immense love 
 for music, he may be said to have taken a lead in 
 the town for his general knowledge. He made 
 some progress in scientific attainments. Aft'ected 
 like others at the time with the fascinating works of 
 James Ferguson on astronomy, he had a kind of 
 rage for that branch of study, which he pursued by 
 means of a tolerably good telescope, in company 
 with Mungo Park, the African traveller, who had 
 settled as a surgeon in Peebles, and one or two other 
 acquaintances. 
 
 He often lamented that his parents had not followed 
 out a design of bestowing on him a liberal education. 
 Supposing him to have been under some delusion in 
 this respect, it could, I think, have been nothing but a 
 sincere love of literature that induced him to acquire 
 a copy of the Encydopicdia Britatniua, at a time when 
 works of this expensive nature were purchased only by 
 
 461877
 
 38 MEMOIR. 
 
 the learned and aflkient. The possession of this volu- 
 minous mass of knowledge in no small degree helped 
 to create a taste for reading in my own, and more par- 
 ticularly my brother's mind ; at all events, a familiarity 
 with the volumes of this great work is among the oldest 
 of my recollections. Nor can I omit to mention other 
 agreeable reminiscences of these early days. My father, 
 as stated, was a tolerable, and certainly untiring performer 
 on the German flute, an instrument which shared his 
 affections with his telescope. Seated at the open window 
 of his little parlour in calm summer gloamings, he would 
 play an endless series of Scottish airs, which might be 
 heard along the Eddleston Water ; then, as the clear 
 silvery moon and planets arose to illumine the growing 
 darkness, out would be brought his telescope, which 
 being planted carefully on its stand on my mother's 
 tea-table, there ensued a critical inspection of the firma- 
 ment and its starry host. From circumstances of this 
 kind, discussions about the satellites of Jupiter and the 
 belts of Saturn are embedded in reminiscences of my 
 early years. 
 
 Once or twice a year my father had occasion to go 
 to Glasgow in connection with business arrangements. 
 The journey, upwards of forty miles, w^as performed on 
 foot, in company with Jamie Hall, a stocking-manu- 
 facturer, who was somewhat of an oddity. They were 
 usually two days on the road. Hall made a ])oint of 
 paying his way in pairs of stockings, of which he 
 carried a choice stock on his back, calculated to settle 
 all the reckonings till he arrived at the Spoutmouth in 
 the Gallowgate. In one of these visits to Glasgow, my 
 father, through his love of music, purchased a spinet, 
 which, arriving on the top of the carrier's cart, created
 
 MUSICAL INDULGENCES. 39 
 
 some perturbation in the household. It was a heedless 
 acquisition, for there was no place to put it, except in 
 the garret, among heaps of warps and bundles of weft. 
 There, accordingly, where there was barely standing- 
 room, the unfortunate spinet was deposited, and became 
 an object of musical indulgence sometimes for hours, in 
 which enjoyment all sublunary cares were forgot. 
 
 His musical accomplishments rendered my father's 
 society peculiarly attractive. He had a good voice, 
 and sung the Scottish songs with considerable effect ; 
 consequently, he was much in request at convivialities, 
 to which, from a fondness for lively conversation, he 
 had no particular objection. There, indeed, lay my 
 father's weakness — too slight a regard for personal 
 responsibilities. His indifference in this respect could 
 not fail to throw additional obligations on my mother, 
 whose destiny it was to confront and overcome in- 
 numerable embarrassments. Acquainted with only the 
 elementary branches of education, and unskilled in 
 any fashionable accomplishments, she nevertheless 
 possessed a strong understanding. I might truly say 
 that, both in appearance and manners, she was by 
 nature a lady, and circumstances made her a heroine. 
 Delicate in frame, and with generally poor health, she 
 was ill adapted for the fatigues and anxieties which she 
 had to encounter ; but such was her tact and dexterity, 
 as well as her determined resolution, that she bore and 
 overcame trials which I feel assured would have sunk 
 many in like circumstances to the ikplhs of despair. 
 What she did may afterwards a[)i)ear. Meanwhile, a 
 number of young children demanded her care. 
 
 Robert and I had a strange congenital malformation. 
 We were sent into the world with six fingers on each
 
 40 MEMOIR. 
 
 hand, and six toes on each foot. By the neighbours, as 
 I understand, this was thougJit particularly lucky ; but 
 it proved anything but lucky for one of us. In my own 
 case, the redundant members were easily removed, 
 leaving scarcely a trace of their presence; but in the 
 case of Robert, the result was very different. The 
 supernumerary toes on the outside of the foot were 
 attached to, or formed part of, the metatarsal bones, 
 and were so badly amputated as to leave delicate 
 protuberances, calculated to be a torment for life. This 
 unfortunate circumstance, by producing a certain degree 
 of lameness and difficulty in walking, no doubt exerted 
 a permanent influence over my brother's habits and 
 feelings. Indisposed to indulge in the boisterous exercise 
 of other boys — studious, docile in temperament, and 
 excelling in mental qualifications — he shot ahead of me 
 in all matters of education. Though dissimilar in various 
 ways, we, however, associated together from our earliest 
 years. It almost seemed as if a difference of tastes and 
 aptitudes produced a degree of mutual reliance and 
 co-operation. With a more practical and exigent tone 
 of mind than Robert, I might possibly have made a 
 decent progress at school, had my teachers at all sym- 
 pathised with me. As it happened, I look back upon 
 my school experiences with anything but satisfaction. 
 A very few particulars will suffice. 
 
 My first school was one kept by a poor old widow, 
 Kirsty Cranston, who, according to her own account, 
 was qualified to carry forward her pupils as far as 
 reading the Bible ; but to this proficiency there was the 
 reasonable exception of leaving out difficult words, 
 such as Maher-shalal-hash-baz. These, she told the 
 children, might be made ' a pass-over,' and accordingly
 
 CRATS SCHOOL. 4> 
 
 it was the rule of the establishment to let them alone. 
 From this humble seminary, I was in time transferred 
 to the burgh school, then under the charge of Mr James 
 Gray, author of a popular treatise on arithmetic. The 
 fee, here, was two shillings and twopence per quarter 
 for reading and writing, and sixpence additional for 
 arithmetic. The pupils were the children of nearly all 
 classes in the town and rural districts around. They 
 numbered about a hundred and fifty boys and girls. 
 Probably, a third of them in summer were barefooted, 
 but this was less a necessity than a choice \ at anyrate, 
 it well suited the locality. In front of the school-house 
 lay the town green, and beside it was the Tweed, in 
 which the school-boys were constantly paddling. 
 
 Gray was a man of mild temperament, and a good 
 teacher, but his pupils entertained little respect for his 
 abilities. Yielding, like too many others at the time, 
 to over-indulgence, he sometimes went off on a carouse, 
 and entered the school considerably inebriated, which 
 was deemed vastly amusing. Nor did this sort of con- 
 duct incur any public censure. The magistrates and 
 council, whose duty it was to call him to account, were 
 associates in his revels, and appreciated him as a boon- 
 companion. When elevated to a certain pitch, he sung 
 a good song about Nelson and his brave British tars ; 
 and this in itself, in the heat of the French war, 
 extenuated many shortcomings. At this school too, as 
 is usual with such seminaries in Scotland, the Bible was 
 read as a class-book, but with no kind of reverence, or 
 even decorum. The verses were bawled out at the 
 pitch of the voice, without the slightest regard to 
 intonation or elocutionary efiect. When the teacher 
 was temporarily absent, there took place a battle of the
 
 42 MEMOIR. 
 
 books — one side of the school against the other. On 
 such occasions, the girls, not choosing to be belligerents, 
 discreetly retired under the tables, leaving the boys to 
 carry on the war, in which dog-eared Bibles without 
 boards, resembling bunches of leaves, handily flew about 
 as missiles. To have to look back on this as a place of 
 youthful instruction ! 
 
 There was another stage in my educational career. 
 I was advanced to the grammar-school, as it is called, 
 a superior burgh establishment, of which Mr James 
 Sloane was head-master. Here, I was introduced to 
 Latin, for which the fee was five shillings a quarter. 
 My progress was very indifferent. Of course it was 
 very stupid of me not intuitively appreciating this 
 branch of learning, and likewise in feeling that its 
 acquisition was a cheerless drudgery. Like others 
 perhaps in like circumstances, I have lived to regret 
 my inattention, or call it, incapacity ; for even the 
 small knowledge of Latin which I did acquire during 
 two years of painful study, has not failed to be of 
 considerable service in various respects. 
 
 Mr Sloane was held in general esteem, and justly 
 reputed as an excellent teacher. He grounded well, and 
 apt scholars got on famously with him. My brother, 
 who, like myself, was advanced from the burgh to the 
 grammar school, became a proficient and favourite 
 pupil ; his mind, as it were, taking naturally to instruc- 
 tion in the classics. The healthy locality of the school 
 was much in its favour, and attracted boarders from 
 Edinburgh, the colonies, and elsewhere. The associa- 
 tion of town scholars with boys from a distance was 
 a pleasing feature in the establishment, and proved 
 mutually advantageous. I could have nothing to say
 
 SLOAN'S SCHOOL. 43 
 
 derogatory of the method of culture, but for the severity 
 of discipline which was heedlessly pursued, according 
 to what, unfortunately, was too common at the period. 
 
 The truth is, violence held rule almost everywhere — 
 the desperate warlike struggle in which the country was 
 engaged, apparently postponing all pacific and humane 
 notions. Boys — the boy-nature being neither studied 
 nor understood — were flogged and buffeted unmerci- 
 fully, both at home and at school ; and they in turn 
 beat and domineered over each other according to their 
 capacity, harried birds' nests, pelted cats, and exercised 
 every other species of cruelty within their power. A 
 coarse bustling carter in Peebles, known by the face- 
 tious nickname of ' Puddle Michty,' used to leave 
 his old worn-out and much-abused horses to die on 
 the public green, and there, without incurring reproba- 
 tion, the boys amused themselves by, day after day, 
 battering the poor prostrate animals with showers 
 of stones till life was extinct. In the business of 
 elementary instruction, the law of kindness was as yet 
 scarcely thought of Orders were sometimes given to 
 teachers not by any means to spare the rod. ' I've 
 brought you our Jock, mind ye lick him weel !' would a 
 mother of Spartan temperament say to Mr Gray, at the 
 same time dragging forward a struggling young savage 
 to be entered as a pupil ; and so Jock was formally 
 resigned to the dominion of the tawse. 
 
 I can never forget a scene which took place in Mr 
 Sloane's seminary one summer afternoon. In the 
 morning of that day, a sensation had been created by 
 the intelligence that two of the boarders, gentlemen's 
 sons from Edinburgh, had absconded, and that two 
 town-constables — one of them Drummer Will — had
 
 44 MEMOIR. 
 
 been despatched in search of them. The youths were 
 caught, brought back in disgrace, and were now to 
 suffer a punishment adequate to the gravity of the 
 offence. Sullen and terrified, the two culprits stood 
 before the assembled school; the two town-officers in 
 their scarlet coats sitting as a guard within the door- 
 way. The usual hum ceased. There was a deathlike 
 stillness. First reproaching the offenders with their 
 highly improper conduct, the teacher ordered them 
 instantly to strip for flogging. The boys resisted, and 
 were seized by an assistant and the two officers. With 
 clothes in disorder, they were laid across a long desk- 
 like table, the rise of which in the middle offered that 
 degree of convexity which was favourable to the 
 application of the tawse. Kicking and screaming, they 
 suffered the humiliating infliction, and the school was 
 forthwith dismissed for the day. Such things at the 
 period were matters of course, even of approbation, and 
 therefore it would be wrong to condemn teachers who 
 fell in with the general fashion. Teaching, it was 
 imagined, could not be conducted otherwise — school, 
 like army, flogging was an authorised national in- 
 stitution. 
 
 Unless for the purpose of throwing light on past 
 times, I should not think of further alluding to Mr 
 Sloane's course of school discipline, which I have reason 
 to believe did not greatly differ from what prevailed 
 elsewhere. Force was in the ascendant, as it had been 
 a hundred years previously in schools high and low 
 everywhere. A character in one of the stories of Field- 
 ing, coarsely but facetiously observes in allusion to his 
 instruction in the classics, that he still bears the marks 
 oi Homo on his person. I can quite believe it An
 
 SLOANE'S SCHOOL. 45 
 
 old friend resident in London avows, that after a long 
 period of years he still bears about his person marks 
 of the castigations to which, for very trifling short- 
 comings in his lessons, he was inhumanly subjected at 
 Sloane's school at Peebles ; that he looks back on his 
 educational career in his native town with horror. 
 
 I would not for a moment aver that Mr Sloane acted 
 on a principle of deliberate brutality. He fell in with 
 the common usages of his craft, and at the time referred 
 to, yielded too frequently to impulses of temper, which 
 I have no doubt he lived to regret — perhaps to 
 mourn over in the final dreams of retributive memory. 
 Although the tawse formed the authorised weapon 
 of punishment in his seminary, I have known Sloane 
 in the heat of passion to use a ruler when it came 
 readily to hand. On one occasion, for failing to answer 
 a question in Latin grammar concerning a particular 
 noun, I received a vengeful blow on the head with a 
 ruler, which raised a lump that did not disappear for a 
 fortnight. This was mere wantonness of tyranny over 
 children who had no power of defence. The strange 
 thing, as it now appears, is how such coarse chastise- 
 ments should have been publicly tolerated. The expla- 
 nation is easy. The complaints of those who suffered 
 from the violence of teachers were not listened to by 
 parents, whose notions of discipline generally lay in 
 the same direction. As yet, the power of kindness and 
 gentle suasion was scarcely understood. Appeals to 
 the higher sentiments, along with encouraging explana- 
 tions regarding the disciplinary and etymological value 
 of Latin, did not seem to be thought of by teachers. 
 No doubt, such personal assaults as I have seen at 
 school would now be viewed very gravely at common- 
 
 I)
 
 46 MEMOIR. 
 
 law. At the time I speak of, however, there was prac- 
 tically neither recourse nor sympathy. On all hands 
 magistrates connived at cruelties in schools. At Peebles, 
 they lent the town officers to assist. Let no one speak 
 to me of the 'good old times.' They were times 
 marked by the most odious barbarity. Education was 
 carried on in an atmosphere of tears. 
 
 As Sloane's pupils were numerous and of different 
 ages, the juniors fell to the charge of an assistant, hired 
 for the purpose. The assistants were usually a poor 
 set ; who seemingly, like the unhappy usher facetiously 
 pictured by Goldsmith, were fain to put up with 
 drudgeries for the sake of a meagre salary along with 
 the comforts of board and lodging. For the most 
 part they had some distressing bodily infirmity which 
 excluded them from ordinary occupations. In my 
 recollection, one of these dilapidated beings, named 
 Howey, stands before me, wearing a second-hand 
 black coat much too big for his figure. Howey excelled 
 in the art of flogging, and was kept in no restraint. 
 With a fierce glare, he eyed boys as if they had been 
 made only to be thrashed. Roaming over the depart- 
 ment under his charge, his right arm SA\'ung strangely 
 backwards and forwards, apparently from some imper- 
 fection in the shoulder-joint In his hand he carried 
 very formidable tawse, the points of which were har- 
 dened by burning to give them due efficacy, and 
 inspire additional terror. So provided, his loose arm, 
 in its pendulum-like motions, was ever ready to inflict a 
 shower of blows on the head and shoulders of any 
 unhappy urchin who incurred his displeasure. This 
 wretch was discharged in consequence, I believe, of 
 some impropriety. The boys over whom he had
 
 ROBBIE BALLANTYNE. 47 
 
 exerted his mean tyranny, rejoiced in his dismissal, 
 and were disposed to pelt him on quitting the town, 
 but he got away unobserved. 
 
 Another assistant whom I recollect was of a different 
 stamp. He was a young man named Robbie Eallan- 
 tyncj from somewhere in Selkirkshire, and while a good 
 scholar, was of a placid disposition. Robbie laboured 
 under the infirmity of a short leg and a long one ; the 
 short one being supplemented to the proper length by a 
 wooden stump fastened by straps to the leg. My chief 
 recollection of Robbie concerns a particular Sunday 
 morning, when all the boys in the school were assembled 
 in Mr Sloane's dining-room, to be put through their 
 facings in the Shorter Catechism, preliminary to being 
 marched in double file to the parish church. This was 
 an old institution in the business of teaching. School- 
 masters charged themselves with giving a certain degree 
 of religious instruction to their pupils, which was gene- 
 rally acceptable ; for as yet there was no great diversity 
 of opinion on spiritual matters. As in other branches 
 of culture, Sloane came up to the mark as a catechisL 
 
 There was one pleasant peculiarity in the Sunday 
 morning meeting. The tawse were laid aside, and there 
 l)revailed that kind of subdued quietness which char- 
 acterised all the proceedings of the day. The boys 
 hardly spoke above their breath. In making his rounds, 
 with a copy of the Catechism in his hand, Sloane dis- 
 covered that I with another boy, Walter Turnbull, 
 could not properly answer one of those subtle questions 
 for which this venerable compendium of divinity has 
 been renowned. Memory had for the moment failed. 
 What was to be done ? The offence was unpardonable, 
 but corporal punishment could not, in respect for the
 
 48 MEMOIR. 
 
 day, be inflicted. Our schoolmaster got over the diffi- 
 culty. The t\vo culprits were condemned to remain 
 imprisoned in the dining-room under charge of Robbie 
 Ballantyne, while all the other boys went to church. 
 We two accordingly remained in durance, occasionally 
 thrumming at the Catechism, and at other times wist- 
 fully looking out of window towards the Tweed and 
 the Newby hills towering up beyond in the glowing 
 light of a summer day — Robbie, our jailor, stumping 
 about as sentinel on guard, and not disposed to take 
 a severe view of our delinquency. On the return of 
 the long train of boys from church, Turnbull and I were 
 able to give a correct answer to the question that had 
 puzzled us, and were graciously dismissed. I think 
 Sloane was a little ashamed of the affair. He had acted 
 under one of his ungovernable outbursts of temper. 
 Keeping boys from church was certainly original in the 
 way of penal discipline. 
 
 Laying aside any consideration of the elementary 
 branches and the classics, the amount of instruction 
 at the schools at Peebles was exceedingly slender. At 
 not one of them was there taught any history, geography, 
 or physical science. There was not in my time a map 
 in any of the schools — a fact not very creditable either 
 to the teachers or the inhabitants. There was, how- 
 ever, nothing singular in this deficiency. As yet, not- 
 Avithstanding the number of burgh and parish schools, 
 there was a general meagreness in the routine of educa- 
 tion throughout the country. The people had not 
 awakened to the advantages to be derived from a 
 knowledge of the higher branches of instruction. Pos- 
 sibly, I have said more than enough of my school 
 remembrances ; and I finish with stating that my
 
 ROBERTS SCHOOL EXPERIENCES. 49 
 
 entire education, which terminated when I was thirteen 
 years of age, cost, books included, somewhere about 
 six pounds. So little was taught, that my education, 
 properly speaking, began only when I was left to pick 
 it up as opportunities offered in after-life. 
 
 There are a few circumstances of a pleasing nature 
 mixed up with these dismal recollections. I refer to 
 rural rambles and books. I spent many hours on the 
 picturesque banks of the Tweed at Neidpath, and in 
 angling excursions to Manor Water. 
 
 Though not disposed to be so sedentary as my 
 brother, I had scarcely a less ardent attachment to 
 books. These, however, I possessed no means of 
 purchasing. To procure the objects of my desire, I 
 executed with a knife various little toys, which I 
 exchanged for juvenile books with my better provided 
 companions. The room occupied by my brother and 
 myself was more like a workshop than a sleeping apart- 
 ment, on account of the disorder which was caused by 
 these mechanical operations. 
 
 In the notes left by my brother, he corroborates 
 my reminiscences of the school discipline at Peebles, 
 but as feeling much indebted to Mr Sloane's instructions, 
 he refrains from specifying incidents such as came 
 under my notice. Robert gives the following account 
 of his early school-days. 
 
 * My first two years of schooling were spent amidst 
 the crowd of children attending Mr Gray's seminary. 
 On the easy terms of two shillings and twopence per 
 quarter, I was well grounded by the master and his 
 helper in English. The entire expense must have been 
 only about eighteen shillings — a fact sufficient to
 
 50 MEMOIR. 
 
 explain how Scotch people of the middle class appear 
 to be so well educated in comparison with their 
 southern compatriots. It was prior to the time when 
 the intellectual system was introduced. We were taught 
 to read the Bible and Barrie's Collection, and to spell 
 words. No attempt was made to enlighten us as to the 
 meaning of any of the lessons. It was a strange, rough, 
 noisy, crowded scene this burgh school. No refine- 
 ment of any kind appeared in it. Nothing kept the 
 boys in any sort of order but flagellation with the 
 tawse. Many people thought the master did not 
 punish enough. This idea, in fact, was the cause of an 
 act of wild justice, which I saw executed one day in the 
 school. 
 
 * The reader must imagine the school-hum going on 
 in a dull monotone, when suddenly the door burst open, 
 and in walked a middle-aged woman of the humbler 
 class, carrying something in her right hand under her 
 apron. The school sunk into silence in an instant. 
 With flashing eyes and excited visage, she called out : 
 "Where is Jock Forsyth?" Jock had maltreated a son 
 of hers on the green, and she had come to inflict 
 vengeance upon him before the whole school. Jock's 
 conscious soul trembled at the sight, and she had 
 no difficulty in detecting him. Ere the master had 
 recovered from the astonishment which her intrusion 
 had created, the fell virago had pounced upon the 
 culprit, had dragged him into the middle of the floor, 
 and there began to belabour him with the domestic 
 tawse, which she had brought for the purpose. The 
 screams of the boy, the anxious entreaties of the master, 
 with his constant " Wifie, wifie, be quiet, be quiet," and 
 the agitated feeling which began to pervade the school,
 
 VALUE OF GRAMMAR SCHOOLS. 5» 
 
 formed a scene which defies words to paint it. Nor did 
 Meg desist till she had given Master Forsyth reason to 
 remember her to the latest day of his existence. She 
 then took her departure, only remarking to Mr Gray, as 
 she prepared to close the door : " Jock Forsyth will no' 
 meddle with my Jamie again in a hurry." 
 
 ' Boys for whom a superior education was desired 
 were usually passed on at the beginning of their third 
 year to the grammar-school — the school in which 
 the classics were taught, but which also had one or two 
 advanced classes for English and writing. This was an 
 example of an institution which has affected the fortunes 
 of "Scotsmen not much less than the parish schools. 
 Every burgh has one, partly supported out of public 
 funds. For a small fee (in the Peebles grammar-school 
 it was only five shillings a quarter), a youth of the 
 middle classes gets a good grounding in Latin and 
 Greek, fitting him for the university ; and it is mainly, 
 I believe, through this superior education, so easily 
 attained, that so many of the youth of our northern 
 region are inspired with the ambition which leads them 
 upwards to professional life in their own country, or 
 else sends them abroad in quest of the fortune hard to 
 find at home. I observe, while writing these pages, the 
 advertisement of an academy in England, where, besides 
 sixty pounds by way of board, the fees for tuition 
 amount to twenty-five. For this twenty-five pounds, a 
 Scottish burgher of my young days could have five sons 
 carried through a complete classical course. The differ- 
 ence is overwhelmingly in favour of the Scotch grammar- 
 school, as far as the money matter is concerned. And 
 thus it will appear that the good education which has 
 enabled me to address so much literature, of whatever
 
 52 
 
 MEMOIR. 
 
 value, to the public during the last forty-five years, never 
 cost my parents so much as ten pounds. 
 
 ' There was a bookseller in Peebles : a great fact 
 There had not always been one \ but some years before 
 my entrance upon existence, a decent man named 
 Alexander Elder had come to the town and established 
 himself as a dealer in intellectual wares. He was a 
 very careful and sober man, and in the end, as was 
 fitting, became rich in comparison with many of 
 his neighbours. It seems a curious reminiscence of my 
 first bookseller's shop, that, on entering it, one always 
 got a peep of a cow, which quietly chewed her cud 
 close behind the book-shelves, such being one of Sandy's 
 means of providing for his family. Sandy was great in 
 Shorter Catechisms, and what he called spells, and 
 school Bibles and Testaments, and in James Lumsden's 
 (of Glasgow) halfpenny coloured pictures of the " World 
 Turned Upside Down," the " Battle of Trafalgar," &c., 
 and in penny chap-books of an extraordinary coarseness 
 of language. He had stores, too, of school slates and 
 skeely, of paper for copies, and of pens, or rather quills, 
 for " made " pens were never sold then — one of which 
 he would hand us across his counter with a civil glance 
 over the top of his spectacles, as if saying : " Now, 
 laddie, see and mak' a guid use o't." But Sandy was 
 enterprising and enlightened beyond the common range 
 of booksellers in small country towns, and had added a 
 circulating library to his ordinary business. My father, 
 led by his strong intellectual tastes, had early become a 
 supporter of this institution, and thus it came about 
 that by the time we were nine or ten years of age, my 
 brother and I had read a considerable number of the 
 classics of English literature, or heard our father read
 
 SANDY ELDER. 53 
 
 them; were familiar with the comicalities of Gulliver, 
 Don Quixote, and Peregrine Pickle; had dipped into 
 the poetry of Pope and Goldsmith, and indulged our 
 romantic tendencies in books of travel and adventure, 
 which were to us scarcely less attractive than the works 
 of pure imagination. When lately attending the Wells 
 of Homburg, I had but one English book to amuse 
 me, Pope's translation of the Iliad, and I felt it as 
 towards myself an affecting reminiscence, that exactly 
 fifty years had elapsed since I perused the copy from 
 Elder's library, in a little room looking out upon the 
 High Street of Peebles, where an English regiment 
 was parading recruits raised for Wellington's Peninsular 
 campaign. 
 
 * There was certainly something considerably superior 
 to the common book-trader in my friend Alexander 
 Elder, for his catalogue included several books striking 
 far above the common taste, and somewhat costly 
 withal. There was, for example, a copy of a strange 
 and curious book of which Sir Walter Scott speaks on 
 several occasions with great interest, a metrical history 
 of the clan Scott, written about the time of the Revolu- 
 tion by one Walter Scott, a retired old soldier of the 
 Scottish legions of Gustavus Adolphus, who describes 
 himself unnecessarily as " no scholar," for in its rhyme, 
 metre, and entire frame of language it is truly wretched, 
 while yet interesting on account of the quaintness of its 
 ideas and the information it conveys. Another of 
 Sandy's book treasures — and the money value of them 
 makes the term appropriate — was the ^neidos of Vm^l, 
 translated into Scottish verse by Gavin Douglas, bishop 
 of Dunkeld, well known as a most interesting product 
 of the literary mind of Scotland at the beginning of the
 
 54 MEMOIR. 
 
 sixteenth century, and gratifying to our national vanity 
 as prior to any translations of Virgil into English. 
 
 * In a fit of extraordinary enterprise, Sandy had taken 
 into his library the successive volumes of the fourth 
 edition of the Encydopczdia Britannica, and had found 
 nobody but my father in the slightest degree interested 
 in them. My father made a stretch with his moderate 
 means, and took the book off Sandy's hands. It was a 
 cumbrous article in a small house ; so, after the first 
 interest in its contents had subsided, it had been put 
 into a chest (which it filled), and laid up in an attic 
 beside the cotton wefts and the meal ark. Roaming 
 about there one day, in that morning of intellectual 
 curiosity, I lighted upon the stored book, and from that 
 time for weeks all my spare time was spent beside the 
 chest. It was a new world to me. I felt a profound 
 thankfulness that such a convenient collection of human 
 knowledge existed, and that here it was spread out like 
 a well-plenished table before me. What the gift of a 
 whole toy-shop would have been to most children, this 
 book was to me. I plunged into it. I roamed through 
 it like a bee. I hardly could be patient enough to read 
 any one article, while so many others remained to be 
 looked into. In that on Astronomy, the constitution of 
 the material universe was all at once revealed to me. 
 Henceforth I knew — what no other boy in the town 
 then dreamed of — that there were infinite numbers of 
 worlds besides our own, which was by comparison a 
 very insignificant one. From the zoological articles, I 
 gathered that the animals, familiar and otherwise, were 
 all classified into a system through which some faint 
 traces of a plan were discernible. Geography, of which 
 not the slightest elements were then imparted at school,
 
 ELDER'S LIBRARY. 55 
 
 here came before me in numberless articles and maps, 
 expanding my narrow village world to one embracing 
 the uttermost ends of the earth. I pitied my com- 
 panions who remained ignorant of what became to me 
 familiar knowledge. Some articles were splendidly 
 attractive to the imagination — for example, that entitled 
 Aerostation, which illustrated all that had been done in 
 the way of aerial travelling from Montgolfier down- 
 wards. Another paper interested me much — that 
 descriptive of the inquiries of Dr Saussure regarding 
 the constitution and movement of glaciers. The 
 biographical articles, introducing to me the great men 
 who had laid up these stores of knowledge, or other^vise 
 affected the destinies of their species, were devoured in 
 rapid succession. What a year that was to me, not 
 merely in intellectual enjoyment, but in mental forma- 
 tion ! I believe it was my eleventh, for before I was 
 twelve, misfortune had taken the book from us to help 
 in satisfying creditors. It appears to me somewhat 
 strange that, in a place so remote, so primitive, and 
 containing so little wealth, at a time when the move- 
 ment for the spread of knowledge had not yet been 
 thought of, such an opportunity for the gratification 
 of an inquiring young mind should have been pre- 
 sented. It was all primarily owing to the liberal spirit 
 of enterprise which animated this cow-keeping country 
 bookseller. 
 
 'The themes first presented to the young mind cer- 
 tainly sink into it the deepest. The sciences of which 
 I obtained the first tracings through tlie Encyclopccdia, 
 have all through life been endeared to me above the 
 rest. The books of imagination which I first read from 
 Elder's library have ever borne a preference in my
 
 56 MEMOIR. 
 
 heart, whatever may be the judgment of modem taste 
 regarding them. It pains me to this day to hear severe 
 remarks made upon Fielding and Sterne. I should feel 
 myself to be a base ingrate if I could join in condemning 
 men who first gave me views of social life beyond my 
 natal village sphere, and who, by their powers of enter- 
 tainment, lent such a charm to years during which 
 material enjoyments were few. These intellectual "loves 
 of life's young day " sometimes lead literary men in the 
 choice of themes for their own pens. It was from such 
 a feeling regarding Smollett, that I was induced to make 
 an effort to set his life in a more respectful light before 
 the world than it had previously enjoyed, while, assuredly, 
 invited to other tasks in several respects more promising. 
 It strikes me that gratitude to an author — also to a 
 teacher — to any one who has benefited us intellectually 
 — is as desirable a form of the feeling as any. I raise 
 statues in my heart to the fictionists above named, and 
 to many others who nowhere have statues of bronze or 
 marble, and I likewise deem it not unfitting that there 
 should be flower-crowned miniatures in my bosom of 
 James Sloane and Sandy Elder.' 
 
 I can unite in these commendations. With Elder's 
 field of literature laid open to us, Robert and I read at 
 a great rate, going right through the catalogue of books 
 without much regard to methodised study. In fact, we 
 had to take what we could get and be thankful. Per- 
 mitted to have only one volume at a time, we made up 
 for short allowance by reading as quickly as possible, 
 and, to save time, often read together from the same 
 book; one having the privilege of turning over the 
 leaves. Desultory as was this course of reading, it
 
 THE OLD GLOBES. 57 
 
 undoubtedly widened the sphere of our ideas ; and it 
 would be ungrateful not to acknowledge that some of 
 my own success, and not a few of the higher pleasures 
 experienced in life, are due to Elder's library in the 
 little old burgh. 
 
 My brother and I had another source of self-education 
 when we were boys, on which it is agreeable to reflect. 
 The schools we attended, as has been said, were devoid 
 of maps, and no instruction whatsoever was given on 
 physical geography. Nor did the parents of the pupils 
 seem to make any complaint on the subject. By a 
 fortunate circumstance Robert and I were able to make 
 up for the deficiency. When I was about ten years of 
 age, Mr Oman, an old and retired keeper of a boarding- 
 school, died. He had, in his day, been a good teacher, 
 with enlarged scientific views, and left no successor of a 
 like quality in the town. At his decease, his effects were 
 sold off by auction. Among other articles offered to 
 public competition were a pair of school-globes, twelve 
 inches in diameter, which my father was lucky in 
 securing for the modest sum of five shillings. 
 
 I can remember the delight with which the globes 
 were received in the family circle, and exhibited on a 
 table for general admiration. Old and dingy in the 
 colours, they had not the polished sprightly look of 
 modem globes, but when cleaned and brushed up, no 
 fault was found with them. We did not even care 
 much about a severe injury that had been sustained 
 by the terrestrial globe, consisting of a hole the size 
 of a crown-piece in the middle of the Antarctic Ocean. 
 There were, like\vise, shortcomings on the score of 
 recent discoveries. Of Australia, tliere were only a few 
 fragmentary outlines, with large intervening spaces,
 
 58 MEMOIR. 
 
 marked 'unknown country.' It was satisfactory, how- 
 ever, to see the track of Columbus in his discovery 
 of America, and the routes respectively pursued by 
 Anson and Cook in their memorable circumnaviga- 
 tions. 
 
 Robert and I flew with avidity on these poor old 
 globes. By poring over them, we learned how to find 
 out the latitude of places, to comprehend the signs of 
 the zodiac and their relative positions, and to attain a 
 correct idea of the ecliptic or great circle in the heavens, 
 round which the sun seems to travel in the course of a 
 year. From the celestial sphere, that had been less 
 injured, we gained a knowledge of the constellations 
 and situation of the principal fixed stars, of which, along 
 with the planetary bodies, we had already received some 
 information from my father in his observations with the 
 telescope. Mostly engaged at school during the day, 
 we occupied ourselves in a study of the two globes early 
 in the morning, or in the evening when candles were 
 lighted in the parlour. My mother was glad to see us 
 interested in these recreations, instead of rambling idly 
 about the street at night, and suggested that we should 
 begin to fix the leading facts in geography and astron- 
 omy in our minds, by means of notes. The advice was 
 taken. Having no money wherewith to buy paper, I 
 was permitted to make a note-book from a number 
 of blank leaves torn from an old ledger. To give the 
 little book a decent exterior, I covered it with strips of 
 marble paper pasted together, that Elder had pared off in 
 his binding operations, and which he kindly allowed me 
 to carry home. The note-book so formed was somewhat 
 miscellaneous in contents, for we wrote doAvn all sorts 
 of useful facts that came in our way — an exercise in
 
 RECRUITING FOR THE MILITIA. 59 
 
 composition, if nothing else, and which could scarcely 
 fail to be beneficial in connection with the subsequent 
 duties of Hfe. 
 
 Passing from these reminiscences of boyish days, 
 something may now be said of the circumstances which, 
 in a strangely unexpected manner, sent my brother and 
 myself adrift into the world that lay beyond our hitherto 
 limited horizon. 
 
 The calm tenor of my father's affairs was at length 
 abruptly ruffled. The introduction of the power-loom 
 and other mechanical appliances had already begun to 
 revolutionise the cotton trade. Down and down sank 
 hand-loom weaving, till it was threatened with extinction, 
 and ultimately the trade was followed only as a desperate 
 necessity. Happy were those who gave it up in time, 
 and betook themselves to something else. Moved by 
 the declining aspect of his commission business, my 
 father bethought himself of commencing as a draper. 
 For this purpose, he alienated the small property in 
 which my brother and I were bom, and removed to 
 a central part of the town. Here he began his new 
 line of business, for which, excepting his obliging 
 manners, he had no particular qualification. As, how- 
 ever, there was then little of that eager striving which 
 is now conspicuous everywhere, matters would per- 
 haps have gone on pretty well, but for one untoward 
 circumstance, shortly to be mentioned. 
 
 At this period — 180S to 18 12 — the country at large 
 was in the heat of the French war. My reminiscences 
 bring up the picture of universal soldiering, marching 
 to and fro of regiments, drums beating, colours flying, 
 news of victories, and general illuminations. There 
 was an active demand for recruits for the regular army,
 
 6o MEMOIR. 
 
 and hardly less eagerness in procuring men to fill up 
 the militia regiments. Of various regiments of this 
 class stationed at Peebles I have some interesting 
 recollections. The officers gave an intellectual fillip to 
 the place. Some of them were good artists. Others 
 brought with them books of a superior class, about 
 which they conversed in the houses they visited. They 
 received London newspapers, which were prized for 
 their original and copious news of the war, also for 
 comments on public affairs not to be found in the 
 timid provincial press of that day. The militia officers 
 were still more popular in making the natives acquainted 
 with Enghsh outdoor sports, until then unknown. I 
 first saw cricket played by officers of the Cambridge- 
 shire militia on the green margin of the Tweed- 
 Melodies, which few had heard of, were introduced 
 at private evening parties. Some of these I listened 
 to with ravished ears — one in particular, the charming 
 air, Cease your Funning, which was exquisitely played 
 on the octave flute by Carnaby, a young and accom- 
 plished officer in the Ross-shire militia. In wakeful 
 nights, even at this long-distant time, I think of Carnaby 
 and his flute. 
 
 The militia, as is well known, consisted of men 
 drawn by ballot — a kind of modified conscription; for 
 substitutes were accepted. By paying a small sum 
 annually to an insurance club, a substitute was provided 
 from the general fund. In the fiercest period of the 
 war, the pressure for substitutes grew intense. The 
 bounty to be dispensed for one was occasionally as 
 large, if not larger than the bounty paid by government 
 for enlisting into the army. On a particular occasion, 
 I knew of fifty pounds being given for a substitute.
 
 SANDY NOBLE. 6l 
 
 There were some interesting circumstances which 
 impressed it on my recollection. 
 
 A substitute was in urgent demand. Advertisements 
 were issued. Nobody would go. Thirty pounds were 
 offered. Forty pounds were offered. At length the 
 offer rose to fifty. A poor man of middle age pre- 
 sented himself. Sandy Noble, for .such was the name 
 of this true-hearted person, was by trade a cotton- 
 weaver. He was a widower, with a grown-up family, 
 but they had left him to pursue their own course in 
 life ; so he was in a sense alone in the world. The 
 wages realised by his peculiar species of labour had 
 materially declined, and he was now only able to make 
 both ends meet. Not even that. He had become 
 responsible for a number of petty debts, caused by the 
 long and expensive illness of his lately deceased wife. 
 These debts hung round his neck like a millstone. 
 The thought of never being able to liquidate them 
 was acutely distressing. 
 
 One day, as he sat on his loom, meditating on the 
 state of his affairs, a neighbour came in to announce 
 the intelligence that fifty pounds had just been offered 
 for a substitute. Making no remark on this piece of 
 news, Sandy, when alone, took a slate, and calculated 
 that fifty pounds would clear him. His mind was 
 instantly made up. For two days and a night he 
 worked with desperation to finish the web he was 
 engaged upon. Having executed his task, and settled 
 with my father, his employer, he walked off to the 
 secretary of the insurance club, and coming in the nick 
 of time, was thankfully accepted as the required substi- 
 tute. The militia authorities were in a fume at the 
 delay, and a sergeant had been despatched to bring
 
 62 MEMOIR. 
 
 the man who had been balloted for, otherwise he 
 would be treated as a deserter. As the recognised 
 substitute, Sandy, in a few quiet words, pacified the 
 sergeant. * Just gie me half an hour,' said he, ' and 
 I '11 be ready to gang wi' ye.* The half-hour was given, 
 and devoted to a noble act of integrity, such as, we 
 fear, is rarely presented in matters of this nature. With 
 the fifty pounds in his pocket, Sandy went from one 
 end of the town to the other, paying debt after debt 
 as he went along — fifteen and sixpence to one, three 
 pounds eleven and threepence to another, and so on, 
 not leaving a single shilling undischarged. When all 
 was over, he mounted a small bundle on the end of 
 a stick, and, in a calm, self-satisfied mood, he trudged 
 away with the sergeant to headquarters. The name 
 of Sandy Noble deserves to go do^vn in the roll of 
 honour with many of greater distinction. 
 
 The war, as we see, with its innumerable horrors, 
 was not all bad. It evoked endurance, courage, man- 
 liness, a disposition to make a sacrifice of even life 
 itself for the public good. To take the obscure inci- 
 dent just recorded, there was a grandeur in the honesty 
 and disinterestedness of Sandy Noble, that gives dignity 
 to human nature. The very knowledge that there was 
 such a true-hearted being in humble life is gratifying, 
 though, no doubt, many similar cases could be men- 
 tioned. 
 
 As an out-of-the-way country town, Peebles had been 
 selected by government as a place suitable for the 
 residence of prisoners of war on parole, shortly after 
 the recommencement of hostilities in 1803. Not more, 
 however, than twenty or thirty of these exiles arrived 
 at this early period. They were mostly Dutch and
 
 PRISO?^ERS OF WAR. 63 
 
 Walloons, with afterwards a few Danes — unfortunate 
 mariners seized on the coast of the Netherlands, and 
 sent to spend their lives in an inland Scottish town. 
 These men did not repine. They nearly all betook 
 themselves to learn some handicraft, to eke out their 
 scanty allowance. At leisure hours, they might be seen 
 fishing in long leather boots, as if glad to procure a few 
 trouts and eels, and at the same time satisfy the desire 
 to dabble in the water. Two or three years later came 
 a detenu of a different class. He was seemingly the 
 captain of a ship from the French West Indies, who 
 brought with him his wife and a negro servant-boy 
 named Jack. Black Jack, as we called him, was sent 
 to the school, where he played with the other boys on 
 the town green, and at length read and spoke like a 
 native. He was a good-natured creature, and became a 
 general favourite. Jack was the first pure negro whom 
 the boys at that time had ever seen. 
 
 None of these classes of prisoners broke his parole, 
 nor ever gave any trouble to the authorities. They had 
 not, indeed, any appearance of being prisoners, for they 
 were practically free to live and ramble about, within 
 reasonable bounds, where they liked. In 18 10, there 
 was a large accession to this original body of prisoners 
 on parole, to whom I must specially refer. 
 
 Memory carries me back to a particular Sunday evening. 
 Having gone through the day in a perfectly constitu- 
 tional manner, the inhabitants of the town felt that, 
 towards evening, they might, in a mild and quiet way, 
 indulge in a little recreation — not amusement by any 
 means, only a smell of the fresh air. All depended on 
 slowness and quietness. Anything like laughing, whistling, 
 singing, walking hurriedly, or boisterous behaviour, was
 
 64 MEMOIR. 
 
 proscribed. You might do almost what you liked, pro- 
 vided it was done slowly and quietly, as if you were 
 not doing it. The impropriety consisted in making a 
 noise. 
 
 On Sunday evenings, from the proceedings of the 
 day, everything was agreeably calmed down to an 
 unchallengeable quietude. People who had gardens 
 walked out quietly — if by back-doors so much the 
 better — and with their hands in their pockets made 
 their observations quietly on the growth of the cab- 
 bages and gooseberries. Others took a sauntering 
 sort of walk quietly to the river, and in a manner 
 not to provoke discussion, spoke of the prospects 
 of fishing for the season ; perhaps introducing a some- 
 what playful anecdote about catching a salmon, but 
 always in a subdued tone of voice, and never venturing 
 beyond a smile. Some took a fancy for going a little 
 more afield, and leaning over gateways, made remarks 
 quietly on the crops, and threw out speculations as to 
 the probable price of meal and potatoes after next 
 harvest. A number, otherwise bent, took a fancy for 
 visiting the churchyard, where an hour was quietly and 
 pleasantly spent in making observations on 'the poor 
 inhabitant below,' in the respective newly made graves. 
 To all this there may be fault-finders. As long as 
 human nature is what it is, I can imagine nothing more 
 decorous or reverential than these modest and leisurely 
 Sunday evening musings. 
 
 My father had no garden to speak of. His tastes did 
 not lie in that direction. At all odd hours he fastened 
 on books, reviews, and newspapers. The only news- 
 paper of which I have any familiar remembrance at this 
 early period, was The Edinburgh Star. It was a twice-
 
 A SUNDA Y EVENING. 6$ 
 
 a-week journal, and, as things went, had a good circula- 
 tion. My father could not aftbrd to subscribe for The 
 Star. All he could do was to be a member of a club 
 to take in the paper, which was handed about to one 
 after the otlier, each member being allowed to have 
 it in turn for a certain number of hours. Such, in the 
 days of taxed and dear newspapers, was an almost 
 universal practice, and in our community it was no way 
 singular. 
 
 By some chance, which I am unable to explain, 
 my father's tenure of the Friday's Star began on 
 Sunday evening, at six o'clock, when the natives gener- 
 ally were out on their quietly sauntering perambula- 
 tions. For three days he had heard nothing satisfac- 
 tory of the war, and in his anxiety had watched the 
 face of the alabaster timepiece on the wall of our little 
 parlour, to see when the paper could with propriety 
 be sent for. The hands on the dial having at length 
 pointed to a quarter to six, I am requested to go for 
 The Star. At the time, I am seated at a window 
 trying to commit to memory that Scripture paraphrase 
 of matchless beauty, which my mother prescribed to me 
 as a study : 
 
 ' Few arc thy days, and full of woe, 
 O man, of woman born.' 
 
 Laying the book aside, I obey the command to go 
 for The Star, and, on the whole, being glad to get into 
 tlie open air, I hurry off with a leather cap on my 
 head, and a crisply plaited frill down my back, in quest 
 of the paper. I knew all about the mission, for it was 
 not the first time I had been so employed. 
 
 The person to whom I was sent was a respectable
 
 66 MEMOIR. 
 
 candlemaker — his surname of no consequence. He 
 was a short, stoutish man, who filled the office of 
 Dean of Guild, which contributed to give him a certain 
 dignified position in the town. Ordinarily, however, he 
 was best known as ' Candle Andrew.' As a bachelor, 
 though advanced in life, Andrew lived with his sister, 
 who acted as housekeeper and shopwoman, and was 
 usually, as already mentioned, called ' Candle Nell.* 
 It was altogether a successful arrangement. The brother 
 and sister made no sort of show. The business was 
 conducted cheaply and quietly. 
 
 On the present occasion, being Sunday, the shop 
 was shut, and entrance to the premises was by a side- 
 door, the first on the right-hand in going down the 
 close as you went to the candle-work. To that door 
 I proceeded. It was opened by Nell, and I was 
 ushered into the kitchen until she announced the object 
 of my visit. All was quiet and decorous. I was invited 
 to step into the room. Here sat Candle Andrew in 
 his Sunday's best, with an under red-silk waistcoat, and 
 his bald head lightly powdered. Before him, lay a 
 large open folio volume of Matthew Henry's Bible, 
 covering nearly the whole table. Above it, and just 
 about the same size, lay The Star. Candle Andrew, 
 whom I esteemed to be a great man, as Dean of Guild, 
 with his powdered head and red under-waistcoat, was 
 so kind as speak to me, and what he said (while folding 
 up the newspaper) was momentous. ' Great news, Willie, 
 my man — terrible battles in Spain — thousands o' French 
 prisoners — a number o' them brought to Leith, and I 
 shouldn't wonder if some were sent here. However, 
 there's The Star ; and please to give my compliments 
 to your mother.' Little did I think that what Candle
 
 FRESH ARRIVAL OF FRENCH PRISONERS. 67 
 
 Andrew had hinted at, was destined to shape the whole 
 existence of my brother and myself, indeed the whole 
 family, father and motlier included. 
 
 Inspired by the notion that there was something 
 important in the intelligence, I hastened home, but 
 before I arrived, my father had received a glimmering 
 of the news. A neighbour had called to say that there 
 was to be immediately a great accession to the present 
 French prisoners of war on parole. As many as a 
 hundred and eleven were already on their way to the 
 town, and might be expected in perhaps a day or two. 
 
 There was speedily a vast sensation in the place. The 
 local militia had been disbanded. Lodgings of all sorts 
 were vacant The new arrivals would on all hands be 
 heartily welcomed. On Tuesday, the expected French 
 prisoners in an unceremonious way began to drop in. 
 As one of several boys, I went out to meet these new 
 prisoners of war on the road from Edinburgh. They 
 came walking in twos and threes — a itw of them lame. 
 Their appearance was startling, for they were in military 
 garb, in which they had been captured in Spain. Some 
 were in light blue hussar dresses, braided, with marks 
 of sabre-wounds. Others were in dark-blue uniform. 
 Several wore large cocked-hats, but the greater number 
 had undress caps. All had a gentlemanly air, notwith- 
 standing their generally dishevelled attire, their soiled 
 boots, and their visible marks of fatigue. 13cfore night, 
 they had all arrived ; and through the activity of the 
 agent appointed by the Transport Board, they had been 
 provided with lodgings suitable to their slender allowance. 
 
 This large batch of prisoners on parole were, of 
 course, all in the rank of naval or military officers. 
 Some had been pretty high in the service, and seen a
 
 68 MEMOIR. 
 
 good deal of fighting. Several were doctors, or, as they 
 called themselves, officiers de saute. Among the whole 
 there were, I tliink, about a dozen midshipmen. A strange 
 thing was their varied nationality. Though spoken of 
 as French, there was in the party a mixture of Italians, 
 Swiss, and Poles ; but this we found out only after some 
 intercourse. Whatever their origin, they were warm 
 adherents of Napoleon, whose glory at this time was at 
 its height. Lively in manner, their minds were full of 
 the recent struggles in the Peninsula. 
 
 Through the considerateness of an enterprising grocer, 
 the prisoners were provided with a billiard-table, at which 
 they spent much of their time. So far well. But how did 
 these unfortunate exiles contrive to live — how did they 
 manage to feed and clothe themselves, and pay for 
 lodgings ? Thereby hangs a tale, which we will by-and- 
 by come to. The allowance from government was on a 
 moderate scale. I doubt if it was more than a shilling a 
 head per diem. In various instances two persons lived 
 in a single room, but even that cost at least half-a-crown 
 a week, which made a considerable inroad on revenue. 
 The truth is, they must have been half-starved, but for 
 the fortunate circumstance of a number of them having 
 brought money — foreign gold pieces — concealed about 
 their person, which stores were supplemented by remit- 
 tances from France ; and in a friendly way, at least as 
 regards the daily mess, or table d'Mte, the richer helped 
 the poorer, which was a good trait in their character. 
 The messing together was the grand resource, and took 
 place in a house hired for the purpose, in which the 
 cookery was conducted under the auspices of M. 
 Lavoche, one of the prisoners, who, as is not unusual 
 with Frenchmen, was skilled in cuisine. My brother
 
 THE FRENCHMEN'S THEATRE. 69 
 
 and I had some dealings with Lavoche. We cultivated 
 rabbits in a hutch built by ourselves in a back-yard, and 
 sold them for the Frenchmen's mess ; the money got for 
 them, usually eightpence a pair, being employed in the 
 purchase of books. 
 
 Billiards were indispensable, but something more was 
 wanted. Without a theatre, life was felt to be unendur- 
 able. But how was a theatre to be secured? There 
 was nothing of the kind in the place. The more eager 
 of the prisoners managed to get out of the difficulty. 
 There was an old and disused ballroom. It was rather 
 of confined dimensions, and low in the roof, with a 
 gallery at one end, over the entrance, for the musi- 
 cians. In the days of yore, however, what scenes of 
 gaiety had it not witnessed 1 Walter Scott's mother, 
 when a girl, I was told, had crossed Minchmoor, a 
 dangerously high hill, in a chaise from the adjacent 
 county, to dance for a night in that little old ballroom. 
 Now set aside as unfashionable, the room was at 
 anybody's service, and came quite handily to the 
 Frenchmen. They fitted it with a stage at the inner 
 end, and cross-benches to accommodate a hundred 
 and twenty persons, independently of perhaps twenty 
 more in the musicians' gallery. The thing was neatly 
 got up, with scenery painted by M. Walther and M. 
 Ragulski, the latter a young Pole with artistic tastes. 
 No licence was required for the theatre, for it was 
 altogether a private undertaking. Money was not 
 taken at the door, and no tickets were sold. Admis- 
 sion was gained by complimentary billets, distributed 
 chietly among persons with whom the actors had estab- 
 lished an intimacy. 
 
 Among these favoured individuals was my father, who,
 
 70 MEMOIR. 
 
 carrying on a mercantile concern, occupied a prominent 
 position. lie felt a degree of compassion for these 
 foreigners, constrained to live in exile, and besides 
 welcoming them to his house, gave them credit in 
 articles of drapery of which they stood in need; and 
 through which circumstance they soon assumed an 
 improved appearance in costume. Introduced to the 
 family circle, their society was agreeable and in a 
 sense instructive. Though with imperfect speech, a 
 sort of half-French, half-English, they related inter- 
 esting circumstances in their career. Robert and I, 
 desperately keen to learn, but with poor opportunities 
 of doing so, listened with greedy ears to the discourse 
 of the Frenchmen, which had the double advantage 
 of increasing our stock of facts and improving us in 
 the knowledge of the French tongue. 
 
 How performances in French should have had any 
 general attraction may seem to require explanation. 
 There had grown up in the town, among young 
 persons especially, a knowledge of familiar French 
 phrases ; so that what was said, accompanied with 
 appropriate gestures, was pretty well guessed at. But, 
 as greatly contributing to remove difficulties, a worthy 
 man of an obliging turn, and genial humour, volun- 
 teered to act as interpreter. Moving in humble cir- 
 cumstances as a hand-loom weaver, he had let lodg- 
 ings to the French captain and his wdfe, and from being 
 for years in domestic intercourse with them, he became 
 well acquainted with their language. William Hunter — 
 for such was his name — besides being of ready wit, 
 partook of a lively musical genius. I have heard him 
 sing Malbrouk s'en va-t-en guerre, with amazing correct- 
 ness and vivacity. His services at the theatre were
 
 WILLIAM HUNTER. 71 
 
 therefore of value to the natives in attendance. Seated 
 conspicuously at the centre of what we may call the 
 pit, eyes were turned to him inquiringly when any- 
 thing particularly funny was said that needed explana- 
 tion, and for general use, he whisperingly communi- 
 cated the requisite interpretation. So put up to the joke, 
 the natives heartily joined in the laugh, though rather 
 tardily. Dear old William Hunter, with his ready demon- 
 strations of Scottish humour, how my brother and I in 
 later years regretted his loss ! As for the French plays, 
 which were performed with perfect propriety, they were 
 to us not only amusing but educational. Life, to be 
 worth anything, is made up of happy recollections. The 
 remembrance of these dramatic efforts of the French 
 prisoners of war has been through life a continual treat. 
 It is curious for me to look back on the performance of 
 pieces of Moli^re, in circumstances so very remarkable. 
 My mother, even while lending her dresses and caps to 
 enable performers to represent female characters, never 
 liked the extraordinary intimacy which had been formed 
 between the French officers and my father. Against his 
 giving them credit, she constantly remonstrated in vain. 
 It was a tempting but perilous trade. For a time, by 
 the resources just mentioned, they paid wonderfully well. 
 With such solid inducements, my father confidingly gave 
 extensive credit to these strangers — men who, by their 
 position, were not amenable to the civil law, and whose 
 obligations, accordingly, were altogether debts of honour. 
 The consequence was what might have been anticipated. 
 An order suddenly arrived from the government, com- 
 manding the whole of the prisoners to quit Peebles, and 
 march chiefly to Sanquhar in Dumfriesshire ; the cause 
 of the movement being the prospective arrival of a
 
 72 MEMOIR. 
 
 militia regiment. The intelligence came one Sunday 
 afternoon. What a gloom prevailed at several firesides 
 that fatal evening ! 
 
 On their departure, the French prisoners made many 
 fervid promises that, should they ever return to their 
 own country, they would have pleasure in discharging 
 their debts. They all got home at the peace in 1814, 
 but not one of them ever paid a farthing. A list of 
 their names, debts, and official position in the army of 
 Napoleon, remains as a curiosity in my possession. 
 It is not unlikely that a number of these returned 
 exiles found a grave on the field of Waterloo. 
 Whatever became of them, there was soon a crisis 
 in my father's affairs. The pressure might have been 
 got over, for with patience there were means to 
 satisfy all demands ; but the possibility of rectifying 
 affairs was defeated by weakly taking the advice of an 
 interested party, a relative of my mother, who recom- 
 mended a sequestration. The result was that the sage 
 adviser, as trustee, managed everything so adroitly for 
 his own benefit, that the creditors received but a small 
 dividend, and the family lost almost everything. It is 
 hateful to refer to this piece of folly and villainy, because 
 it reminds me of poignant distresses ; but it is necessary 
 to give it some degree of prominence, for it forms the 
 pivot on which the present narrative turns. 
 
 By various shifts, the family continued to struggle on 
 for a year or two in Peebles after this catastrophe. The 
 penury which was endured was less painful than the 
 acute sense of social degradation. My mother looked 
 for some sympathy and assistance from her brother, and 
 also from other relatives at a distance, but without avail. 
 Feeling, with a too keen susceptibility, that he had lost
 
 REMOVAL TO EDINBURGH. 73 
 
 caste, my father never quite held up his head after this 
 event ; yet, deplored at the time, it really proved a for- 
 tunate circumstance. Like a wholesome though un- 
 pleasant storm in a stagnating atmosphere, it cleared 
 the way for a new and better order of things. A 
 seemingly great misfortune ultimately proved to be no 
 misfortune at all ; it was, in fact, a blessing, for which 
 my brother and I, as well as other members of the 
 family, could not be sufficiently thankful. 
 
 The wise resolution was adopted of quitting Peebles. 
 My mother, animated by keen anxiety and foresight, 
 was particularly solicitous to remove, with a view to 
 procure means of advancement for her sons. Accord- 
 ingly, impelled alike by necessity and inclination, the 
 family removed to Edinburgh ; Robert being alone left 
 to pursue his education for a short time longer. Crowded 
 into the Fly, then the only engine of public conveyance 
 to the Scottish capital, we crossed the Kingside-Edge, 
 as a high ridge of land is called, on a bleak day in 
 December 1813 — my mother with an infant daughter on 
 her knee, and a heart full of mingled hopes and fears of 
 the future. It was a five hours' journey, of which one 
 entire hour was spent at Venturefair to rest the horses. 
 Here the party were hospitably entertained with warm 
 kail by Jenny Wilson, who kept the small inn along 
 with her brother William. So rcinvigorated, we drove 
 on in somewhat better spirits, entering Edinburgh by 
 the Causewayside — my mother with but a few shillings 
 in her pocket; there was not a halfpenny in mine.
 
 CHAPTER III. 
 
 SETTLING IN EDINBURGH — 1813-1814. 
 
 "CpAMILIES falling by misfortune into straitened 
 •*- circumstances, of course lose many old friends 
 and acquaintances, at least as far as familiar personal 
 intercourse is concerned. This loss, though often the 
 subject of sorrowful and angry remark, is not an unmiti- 
 gated evil. Sympathy is doubtless due throughout all 
 perplexing social distinctions; gracious are the acts of 
 a true friend ; kindness to the unfortunate will ever 
 command approbation ; but let us not forget that it is 
 better for personal intimacies to suffer some modification, 
 than for the impoverished to lose self-respect and 
 become dependent on a system of habitual condescen- 
 sion. It seems hard to take this view of the matter, 
 but I fear that on no other basis can the indigent 
 aspire to be the associates of the affluent. Could 
 matters be seen rightly, they would appear to be as well 
 ordered in this as in other things which concern our 
 welfare. 
 
 Happily, the defection, real or apparent, of old friends 
 is not uncompensated. Sinking into a lower sphere, a 
 new and hitherto undiscovered region is disclosed. A 
 higher class, as we are apt to feel, has cruelly turned
 
 SETTLING IN EDINBURGH. 75 
 
 its back on us ; but we are received with open arms by 
 a very good and agreeable sort of people, in whose 
 moderate incomes, and, it may be, misfortunes and 
 struggles, we feel the pleasures of fellowship. The 
 Vicar of Wakefield, it will be recollected, did not find 
 the jail such a bad thing after all. 
 
 My parents, on settling in Edinburgh, may be pre- 
 sumed to have found consolations of this nature. 
 According to immemorial usage, families with limited 
 means from the southern counties of Scotland, who seek 
 a home in the capital, sagaciously pitch on one of the 
 second-rate streets in the southern suburbs. There, 
 sprinkled about in common stairs, they form a kind of 
 colony, possessing a community of south-country recol- 
 lections and gossip. 
 
 Following the established rule, our first home was a 
 floor entering from a common stair in West Nicolson 
 Street. Beneath us, level with the ground, resided a poor 
 widow, who drew a scanty living from a small huxtery 
 concern. Immediately above us dwelt the widow of a 
 Roxburghshire clergyman, a motherly person, with two 
 grown-up daughters. Over this respectable family, and 
 highest of all, was a tailor, who, working in the window- 
 sole of his apartment, had the reputation of doing things 
 cheaply. On a level with us, next tenement, but enter- 
 ing by a different stair, was a family of some distinction, 
 consisting of the two ladies. Miss Betty and Miss Ailie 
 Hay, already spoken of by my brother. The kitchen 
 fireplaces of both dwellings being back to back, with a 
 thin and imperfect wall between, the servant-girls of 
 the two families, both exiles from Tweedside, were able 
 to carry on comforting conversations by removing a 
 brick at pleasure in the chimney ; through which
 
 76 MEMOIR. 
 
 irregular channel much varied intelligence from Peebles- 
 shire was interchanged between the two families. Here 
 we lived till Whitsunday 1814, when we removed to a 
 floor of a like quality in Hamilton's Entry, Bristo Street 
 — the back windows of the house overlooking the small 
 court in which was situated a little old building that 
 had been Walter Scott's first school in Edinburgh — 
 since removed in the course of city improvements. 
 
 If anything, the families hereabout were more hard- 
 up, and, to be plain, we were more hard-up too. Our 
 dwelling was on the second floor of the stair, and on 
 the flat immediately beneath resided Ebenezer Picken, 
 a scholarly gentleman in reduced circumstances, who, 
 after trying various shifts to secure a living for himself 
 and family, now professed to teach languages, and 
 endeavoured to sell by subscription one or two volumes 
 of poems, which, I fear, did not do much for him. He 
 died in 1816. His son, Andrew, who was also a poetic 
 genius, and about my own age, became affected with 
 the mania concerning Poyais, and emigrated with a 
 number of others to that pestilential marsh, where most 
 of the settlers died shortly after landing — Andrew kindly 
 acting as chaplain, with a shirt for, surplice, and reading 
 the funeral service. From a fellow-feeling in circum- 
 stances, we formed an intimacy with our neighbours 
 the Pickens, while residing in the same tenement; and 
 the friendship was extended over a series of years, until 
 the remaining members of the family went to America. 
 
 As regards ways and means. On coming to Edin- 
 burgh, my father had resumed his commission business 
 from Glasgow cotton-manufacturers, but this trade had 
 long been declining, and was but a meagre dependence. 
 To aggravate his difficulties, he was not qualified by
 
 THE DARK AGES. 77 
 
 knowledge of the world to deal with the class of work- 
 men to whom he furnished employment. Some of them 
 were decent enough old sinewy men, sufficiently trust- 
 wbrthy; but others, accustomed to go on the tramp, 
 used artifices that bafiled his ingenuity. Carrying on 
 their handicraft in obscure recesses in Fountainbridge, 
 St Ann's Yards, the Back of the Canongate, or Abbey 
 Hill, it was sometimes as difficult to trace them out as 
 to get any right clue to their manoeuvres. It was by no 
 means unusual to find that the materials intrusted to 
 them were dishonestly pawned, and that sums of money 
 advanced for half-done work on piteous appeals of 
 distress were irrecoverable. In short, my father was 
 much too soft for this kind of business; and the result 
 was what might have been expected. With resources 
 on the verge of exhaustion, there ensued privations 
 against which it required no small degree of composure 
 to bear up. The old German flute, preserved as a 
 precious relic throughout the recent disasters of the 
 family, was sometimes resorted to as a solace, although 
 the favourite airs, such as Corn Rigs, did not sound half 
 so sweetly, it was thought, in the dingy atmosphere of 
 Hamilton's Entry, as they had done along the Eddleston 
 Water. 
 
 The Dark Ages, as we have since jestingly called 
 them, had begun, and for a number of successive years 
 an acquaintance was contracted with families and indi- 
 viduals, who, if not experiencing a similar depression, 
 occupied an unpretending position in society. I can 
 recollect some of them, and also the shifty schemes to 
 which they were less or more impelled, by the necessities 
 of their situation. Widows of decayed tradesmen, who 
 were moving heaven and earth to get their sons into 
 
 V
 
 78 MEMOIR. 
 
 hospitals, and their daughters taught to be governesses. 
 Teachers in the decHne of hfe, like poor Picken, 
 endeavouring to draw a subsistence from the fees of 
 most-difficult-to-be-procured pupils. Licensed preachers 
 to whom fate had not assigned a kirk, and who, after 
 years of pining, now made a livelihood by preparing 
 young men for university degrees. Genteel unmarried 
 women, left destitute by improvident fathers, who con- 
 trived to maintain themselves by colouring maps, or by 
 sewing fine needle-work for the Repository — a benevo- 
 lent and useful institution, to which be all praise. Why 
 continue the catalogue ? 
 
 There was some use in knowing, and being known 
 to, these kinds of people. I speak not of the value to 
 myself, as having an opportunity of studying some of 
 the humbler and more characteristic phases of society. 
 To my father and mother, these persons, with their 
 varied experience, could furnish hints as to how petty 
 difficulties incidental to their condition might be over- 
 come. One or two things they seem to have made 
 their special study. They knew the proper methods of 
 applying for situations in public offices, and what 
 expedients could be attempted to elude the payment 
 of rates and taxes. For the most part, they entertained 
 a high respect for, and duly stood in awe of, magistrates, 
 ministers, and great men generally; for it was only 
 through such distinguished authorities that certificates 
 of character and help in various ways could be obtained 
 in cases of emergency. Far be it from me to impute 
 dishonesty to these ingeniously struggling and scheming 
 classes. On the whole, in the darkest of their days, so 
 far as I knew, they maintained a wonderful deter- 
 mination to keep square with the world. It must be
 
 THE DARK AGES. 79 
 
 admitted, however, that the classes to which I allude 
 too frequently entertained loose notions concerning 
 taxes. Demands of this nature seemed to be little 
 better than asking money for nothing. Rates and 
 taxes might be right in the abstract; that they did not 
 question. But the collector who came periodically to 
 your door with a portentous pocket-book, and made 
 point-blank demands for sums of money — such as fifteen 
 shillings and ninepence halfpenny, or one pound eleven 
 and threepence — which it was exceedingly inconvenient 
 to pay, was clearly a nuisance; and with no stretch of 
 conscience, he might be coaxed, wheedled, put off, and 
 told to call again as long as it was safe to do so. 
 
 In the midst of the straits to which these remarks 
 refer, my father, through congeniality of taste, made 
 the acquaintance of several persons possessed of 
 musical and poetical acquirements. One of these was 
 Mr John Hamilton, author of the song. Up in the 
 Morning Early, who, drawing to the conclusion of his 
 days, lived in a stair at the south end of Lothian Street, 
 and in good weather might be seen creeping feebly 
 along the walks in the Meadows, deriving pleasure 
 from the sunshine, to which he was soon to bid adieu. 
 Another was Mr William Clarke, noted for his musical 
 genius, who acted as organist of the Episcopal Chapel 
 in the Cowgate, the services of which place of public 
 worship were at that time conducted by the Rev. 
 Archibald Alison, author of the Essay on Taste, and 
 Sermons on the Seasons, and whose son was the late 
 Sir Archibald Alison, author of the History of Europe. 
 As music was my father's overwhelming passion, his 
 introduction to the church-organ under the auspices of 
 Clarke was a matter of extreme exultation. Entranced
 
 8o MEMOIR. 
 
 with the performances of the organ and choir, he 
 became a frequent attender on the ministrations of 
 Mr AHson, whose persuasive piety, refined sentiments, 
 and elegant diction, possessed, as is well known, an 
 indescribable charm. 
 
 Charged more especially with family cares, my 
 mother had other considerations than church-music. 
 What was to be done with me, was a primary concern. 
 I was in my fourteenth year. Further schooling was 
 out of the question. Robert might go on with his 
 education as long as seemed expedient, but it was time 
 I should get to work. What would I be? My tastes 
 lay in the direction of books ; any department would 
 do. A friend put on the scent, reported that on 
 inquiry at a leading member of the profession, book- 
 selling was a poor business ; at best, it was very 
 precarious, and could not be recommended. Not 
 discouraged, I still thought my vocation lay towards 
 literature in some shape or other. 
 
 Since our arrival in town, I had read all that could 
 be read for nothing at the booksellers' windows, and 
 at the stalls which were stuck about the College and 
 High School Wynds. I had also become a great 
 frequenter of the evening book-auctions. The prin- 
 cipal were Carfrae's in Drummond Street, and that 
 of Peter Cairns in the Agency Office, opposite the 
 University. At present, book-auctions are only during 
 the day; then, they took place in the evening, and 
 were a favourite resort. The sales were indicated by 
 a lantern, with panes of white calico, at the door, on 
 which was inscribed 'Auction of Books.' My attend- 
 ance, punctual on the hanging out of the lantern, was 
 a new and delightful recreation. The facetiae of the
 
 PETER CAIRNS. 8i 
 
 auctioneers, their observations on books and authors, 
 and the competitions in the biddings, were all inter- 
 esting to a lad fresh from the countiy. Carfrae's was 
 the more genteel and dignified. Cairns' was the more 
 amusing of these lounges, wherefore it suited best for 
 those who went for fun, and not for buying, on which 
 account it chiefly secured my patronage. 
 
 Peter was a dry humorist, somewhat saturnine from 
 business misadventures. Professedly, he was a book- 
 seller in South College Street, and exhibited over his 
 door a huge sham copy of Virgil by way of sign. His 
 chief trade, however, was the auctioning of books and 
 stationery at the Agency Office ; a place with a strong 
 smell of new furniture, amidst which it was necessary 
 to pass before arriving at the saloon in the rear where 
 the auctions were habitually held. Warm, well lighted, 
 and comfortably fitted up with seats within a railed 
 enclosure environing the books to be disposed of, this 
 place of evening resort was as good as a reading-room. 
 It was, indeed, rather better, for there was a constant 
 fund of amusement in Peter's caustic jocularities — as 
 when he begged to remind his audience that this was a 
 place for selling, not for reading books — sarcasms which 
 always provoked a round of ironical applause. His 
 favourite author was Goldsmith, an edition of whose 
 works he had published, which pretty frequently figured 
 in his catalogue. On coming to these works, he always 
 referred to them with profound respect — as, for 
 example : ' The next in the catalogue, gentlemen, is 
 the works of Oliver GooUsmith, the greatest writer that 
 ever lived, except Shakspeare ; what do you say for 
 it? — I'll put it up at ten shillings.' Some one would 
 perhaps audaciously bid twopence, which threw liim
 
 82 MEMOIR. 
 
 into a rage, and he would indignantly call out: 
 * Tippence, man ; keep that for the brode^ meaning 
 the plate at the church-door. If the same person 
 dared to repeat the insult with regard to some other 
 work, Peter would say : ' Dear me, has that poor man 
 not yet got quit of his tippence?' which turned the 
 laugh, and effectually silenced him all the rest of the 
 evening. Peter's temper was apt to get ruffled when 
 biddings temporarily ceased. He then declared that he 
 might as well try to auction books in the poor-house. 
 On such occasions, driven to desperation, he would try 
 the audience with a bunch of quills, a dozen black-lead 
 pencils, or a ' quare ' of Bath-post, vengefully knocking 
 which down at the price bidden for them, he would 
 shout to 'WuUy,' the clerk, to look after the money. 
 Never minding Peter's querulous observations further 
 than to join in the general laugh, I, like a number of 
 other penniless youths, got some good snatches of 
 reading at the auctions in the Agency Office. I there 
 saw and handled books which I had never before 
 heard of, and in this manner obtained a kind of notion 
 of bibliography. My brother, who, like myself, became 
 a frequenter of the Agency Office, relished Peter highly, 
 and has touched him off in one of his essays. 
 
 Inquiries for the situation of apprentice in a book- 
 seller's shop not proving successful, and time wearing 
 on, I relinquished my preconceived fancies, and stated 
 that I should be glad to be put to any line of business 
 whatever. No sooner had this been concluded on than 
 an opening seemed to cast up in a grocer's shop 
 situated in the Tolbooth Wynd, Leith. Unfortunately, 
 Leith was two miles distant, but it was announced that 
 the grocer munificently imparted board and lodging to
 
 A BOY WANTED. %t, 
 
 his apprentices, and that, in present circumstances, was 
 of some importance. It was resolved I should look 
 after the place. Accordingly, I one day went off to 
 Leith, trudging down from Edinburgh towards the 
 Tolbooth Wynd, not greatly elated with the prospect 
 before me, but determined not to be nice in accepting 
 terms. A friend of the family, resident in Leith, was 
 to introduce me. 
 
 On reaching the spot with him, nearly opposite the 
 public fountain, I paused a moment outside to recon- 
 noitre the grocer's premises, before proceeding. The 
 windows exhibited quantities of raw sugar in different 
 varieties of brownness, hovering over which were swarms 
 of flies, in a state of frantic enjoyment. Sticks of black 
 liquorice leaned coaxingly on the second row of panes, 
 flanked by tall glass jars of sweeties and peppermint 
 drops ; behind tliese outward attractions, there were 
 observable yellow-painted barrels of whisky, rows of 
 bottles of porter, piles of cheeses of varied complexions, 
 firkins of salt butter, and boxes of soap. At the counter 
 were a number of women and children buying articles, 
 such as quarter-ounces of tea and ounces of sugar ; and 
 the floor was battered with dirt and debris. 
 
 I was not much pleased with the look of the place, 
 but I had no choice. Entering, somewhat timidly, 
 with my conductor, I was described as the boy who had 
 been recommended as an apprentice, and was ushered 
 into the back-room to be examined as to my capabilities. 
 It was immediately seen that I was physically incom- 
 petent to fill the situation. The chief qualification in 
 demand was muscular vigour. The boy wanted would 
 have to draw a truck loaded with several hundredweights 
 of goods, to be delivered to customers, it might be miles
 
 84 MEMOIR. 
 
 distant. Instead of an apprentice, it was in reality a 
 horse that might have been advertised for, or at the least 
 an able-bodied porter. I was at once pronounced to 
 be unfit for this enviable post — a much too delicately 
 made youth — a day's work with the barrow or the bottle- 
 basket would finish me — I had better abandon the idea 
 of being a grocer. With these remarks pronounced for 
 doom, I retired, not a little downcast at the unfortunate 
 issue of the expedition, and sorrowfully returned up the 
 Walk to Edinburgh.
 
 CHAPTER IV. 
 
 MY APPRENTICESHIP — 1814 TO 18 I 9. 
 
 T T 0\V little are we able to penetrate the future ! The 
 journey to Leith was not thrown away. In 
 returning homewards, I had occasion to pass the shop 
 of Mr John Sutherland, bookseller, Calton Street, an 
 establishment opposite the Black Bull Hotel, the starting- 
 place of the mail-coaches for London. In the window 
 was the announcement, 'An Apprentice Wanted.' Here 
 was the right thing at last. I did not lose time in com- 
 municating this piece of intelligence. 
 
 Having in the first place narrated the failure of the 
 Leith affair, I proceeded to describe the discovery 1 
 had made in Calton Street. There was forthwith a 
 family cogitation on the subject, and it was resolved 
 that next day I should accompany my mother on a tour 
 of investigation into the nature of the place. Next 
 morning, accordingly, after being brushed up for the 
 occasion, I set out for Sutherland's. Our reception was 
 gratifyingly polite. The bookseller expressed himself 
 satisfied with my appearance and the extent of my 
 education. He said that in all respects I should be 
 perfectly qualified for the situation. My principal duties
 
 86 MEMOIR. 
 
 for two or three years would be very easy. I should only 
 have to light the fire, take off and put on the shutters, 
 clean and prepare the oil-lamps, sweep and dust the 
 shop, and go all the errands. When I had nothing else 
 to do, I was to stand behind the counter, and help in 
 any way that was wanted ; and talking of that, it would 
 be quite contrary to rule for me ever to sit down, or to 
 put off time reading. 
 
 In laying down the law, Sutherland admitted that at 
 first the duties, though no way burdensome, might not 
 perhaps be very pleasant, but the routine was sanctioned 
 by immemorial usage. Constable and all the other 
 great booksellers had begun in this way. Every one 
 who aspired to take a front rank in the profession, must 
 begin by being a junior apprentice. The period of 
 service was five years at four shillings a week ; not high 
 pay, to be sure, but it was according to universal rule, 
 from which he could see no departure. 
 
 My mother, who conducted the negotiation, found 
 no fault with the proposed duties and terms \ still she 
 had her misgivings, and ventured to remark that her 
 son was surely wrong in wishing to follow the business. 
 ' We may manage,' she said, ' to get him through his 
 apprenticeship, but I have serious fears of what is to 
 follow. We cannot set him up in business, and how' 
 (looking around) ' can he ever be able to get a stock 
 of books like that?' 
 
 The bookseller endeavoured to allay her apprehen- 
 sions, and his remarks are worth repeating : ' There is 
 no fear of any one getting forward in the world, if he 
 be only steady, obliging, attentive to his duties, and 
 exercise a reasonable degree of patience. I can assure 
 you, when I was the age of your son, I had as poor
 
 MV APrJ7ENT/C£SmF—iSi4 to 1S19. 87 
 
 prospects as any one ; yet, I have so far got on toler- 
 ably well. In the outset of life, it is needless to look 
 too far in advance. We must just do the best we can 
 in the meantime, and hope that all will turn out rightly 
 in the end.' These sensible observations left nothing 
 further to be said. The bargain was struck. I was to 
 come next Monday morning to be initiated by an elder 
 apprentice. And so, on the 8th of May 18 14, I was 
 launched into the business world. 
 
 In August the following year, the family quitted 
 Edinburgh. In his desperation, my father accepted the 
 situation of commercial manager of a salt manufactory, 
 called Joppa Pans, a smoky odorous place, consisting of 
 a group of sooty buildings, situated on the sea-shore 
 half-way between Portobello and Musselburgh ; and 
 thither, to a small dwelling amidst the steaming salt- 
 pans, they all removed except myself. Robert, who 
 had now come from Peebles, and been some time at an 
 academy in Edinburgh, accompanied them ; the arrange- 
 ment being that he should walk to and from town 
 daily. I was left to pursue my business, being for this 
 puq^ose consigned to a lodging that may merit some 
 notice. 
 
 Until this disruption, I had no occasion to rely on 
 myself Now matters were changed. I was to have 
 an opportunity of learning practically how far my weekly 
 earnings would go in defraying the cost of board and 
 lodging. In short, at little above fifteen years of age, 
 I was thrown on my own resources. From necessity, 
 not less than from choice, 1 resolved at all hazards to 
 make the weekly four shillings serve for everything. I 
 cannot remember entertaining the slightest despondency 
 on the subject. But what may not any one with the
 
 88 MEMOIR. 
 
 buoyancy of youth dare to encounter ? Inspired by my 
 mother's advices, animated by her noble example of un- 
 complaining meekness, all difficulties were overlooked. 
 
 As favourable for carrying out my aims at an inde- 
 pendent style of living, I had the good-fortune to be 
 installed in the dwelling of a remarkably precise and 
 honest widow, a Peebles woman, who, with two grown- 
 up sons, occupied the top story of a building in the 
 West Port. My landlady had the reputation of being 
 excessively parsimonious, but as her honesty was of 
 importance to one in my position, and as she consented 
 to let me have a bed, cook for me, and allow me to sit 
 by her fireside — the fire, by the way, not being much 
 to speak of — for the reasonable charge of eighteen- 
 pence a week, I was thought to be lucky in finding her 
 disposed to receive me within her establishment. To 
 her dwelling, therefore, I repaired with my all, consisting 
 of a few articles of clothing and tvvo or three books, 
 including a pocket Bible — the whole contained in a 
 small blue-painted box, which I carried on my shoulder 
 along the Grassmarket. 
 
 This abode, the uppermost floor in Boak's Land, was 
 more elevated than airy. The back of the tall edifice 
 overhung a tannery and a wild confusion of mean 
 enclosures, with an outlook beyond to the castle, perched 
 on its dark precipitous rock. The thoroughfare in 
 front was then, as it is* still, one of the most crowded 
 and wretched in the city. The apartment assigned to 
 me was a bed-closet, with a narrow window fronting 
 the street. Yet this den was not all my own. For 
 a time, it was shared with a student of divinity, a 
 youth of my own age from the hills of Tweeddale ; and 
 afterwards with my brother Robert, when it was found
 
 TAMMIE TOD. 89 
 
 inexpedient for him to live in the country, and go to 
 and from town daily. 
 
 Being all of us from Peeblesshire, there was much 
 to speak of in common, though with no great cordiality 
 of intercourse. In the evenings, when mason and car- 
 penter lads dropped in, the conversation turned chiefly 
 on sermons. Each visitor brought with him experiences 
 as to how texts had been handled on the preceding 
 Sunday ; on which there ensued discussions singularly 
 characteristic of a well-known phase in the Scotch mind. 
 
 * Weal, Tammie,' inquired the widow one evening at 
 Tammie Tod, a journeyman mason lately arrived from 
 the country, ' what was the doctor on last Sabbath after- 
 noon?' 
 
 * He was on the Song ' — meaning the Song of Solomon. 
 ' Eh, the Song ! that would be grand. He 's a 
 
 wonderfu' man the doctor : and what was his text?' 
 
 * It was a real fine text,' said Tammie, ' the deepest 
 ever I heard — " For my head is filled with dew, and my 
 locks with the drops of the night ;" fifth chapter, second 
 verse, the second clause of the verse.' 
 
 * I ken that text weel,' responded the widow. ' I 
 heard a capital discourse on it thirty years syne ; but 
 how did the doctor lay it out ? ' 
 
 ' He divided it into five heads, ending with an appli- 
 cation, which it would be weel for us a' to tak' to heart.' 
 
 And so Tammie, who had a proficiency in dissect- 
 ing and criticising sermons, proceeded to describe with 
 logical precision the manner in which his minister had 
 handled the very intricate subject; his definitions being 
 listened to and commented on with extraordinary relish. 
 
 Let no one hastily conclude that there was anything 
 to ridicule in these searching, though perhaps too
 
 90 MEMOIR. 
 
 speculative and familiar disquisitions; for apart from 
 any religious consideration, they bore evidence of that 
 spirit of inquiry and love of reasoning on momentous 
 topics which may be, said to have made Scodand what 
 it is. I may not have been the better, but was by no 
 means the worse, for hearing Tammie Tod's sermon 
 experiences in that little upper floor in the West Port, 
 and have often compared what there came under my 
 observation with the unideaed sotting and want of all 
 mental culture which unhappily mark certain depart- 
 ments of the population in different parts of the United 
 Kingdom. 
 
 On market-days, my landlady was usually visited 
 about dinner-time by some horny-fisted old acquaint- 
 ance from about Leithen or Gala Water, with a 
 shepherd's plaid around his shoulders ; and who, after 
 being treated to a share of the bannocks and kail, 
 would finish off with a blast on the widow's tobacco- 
 pipe ; for, with all her saving habits, our worthy hostess 
 indulged — moderately, I must say — in this luxury. The 
 conversation of these worthies ran still on controversial 
 divinity. They talked of the Hind Let Loose, Boston's 
 Marrow, the Crook in the Lot, and the Fourfold State 
 — standard topics among the class to which they 
 belonged; and if I did not quite apprehend or was 
 not improved by the discussions, they at least afforded 
 an amusing study of character. 
 
 The charge made for my accommodation in these 
 quarters left some scope for financiering as regards the 
 remaining part of my wages. It was a keen struggle, 
 but, like Franklin, whose autobiography I had read 
 with avidity, I faced it with all proper resolution. My 
 contrivances to make both ends meet were in some
 
 LIFE IN THE WEST PORT. 91 
 
 degree amusing. As a final achievement in the art 
 of cheap Hving, I was able to make an outlay of a 
 shilling and ninepence suffice for the week. Below that 
 I could not well go. Reaching this point, I had nine- 
 pence over for miscellaneous demands, chiefly in the 
 department of shoes, which constituted an awkwardly 
 heavy item. On no occasion did I look to parents for 
 the slightest pecuniary subsidy. 
 
 If any one is so complimentary as to think that I had 
 some merit in devising how to live on so low a figure as 
 a shilling and ninepence a week, he may be disposed to 
 modify his surprise on my stating that the expenditure 
 did not include Sunday, on which day I was at home ; 
 so that, after all, the one-and-ninepence weekly inferred 
 as much as threepence-halfpenny a day. How it 
 was practicable to subsist on a sum apparently so 
 diminutive, is only to be explained by two things — a 
 resolute abstinence from all articles of luxury, and a 
 union for eating purposes among the different members 
 in the establishment. On tea, coffee, sugar, and 
 some other articles of ordinary consumption, not a 
 farthing was expended. I did not even attempt to 
 buy new milk. My landlady had her own notions 
 regarding food. As some consolation for plain- 
 ness of fare, she declared, that ' eating is just a use,' 
 meaning that you may accustom yourself to, and be 
 satisfied with, anything. She thought it wasteful and 
 ridiculous to consult the palate. It came all to the same 
 thing, after the food got through the mouth. An 
 excellent philosophy this for those who, like myself, 
 had to consult the spending capacity of threepence-half- 
 penny on daily subsistence. 
 
 The practice of the little woman was as admirable as
 
 92 MEMOIR. 
 
 her reasoning. She was the general caterer, an office to 
 which she did great justice. Tlie principal reliance was 
 on oatmeal, of which, at the cheapest shops, she bought 
 for each lodger a peck at a time. With a row of bags 
 ranged on the table, she drew a handful from each 
 corresponding to the quantity of porridge required ; so 
 that every one got his due. For her own share, she 
 had that amount of the mess which adhered to the 
 inside of the pot. The only liquid relish taken with the 
 porridge was butter-milk, purchased in large quantities 
 from farmers' carts weekly, and divided with the same 
 scrupulous accuracy. Sometimes the fluid became more 
 acrid than was at all pleasant, but this was partly 
 remedied by a process of beating up, which had a 
 modifying effect that would require some chemistry 
 to explain. Good or bad, the choice lay betwixt it 
 and nothing. Such was the staple — porridge with this 
 species of milk, for breakfast and supper. As for 
 dinner, a single pound of meat boiled in an immense 
 quantity of water, with a profusion of barley and vege- 
 tables, and allocated according to pecuniary contribution, 
 answered the purpose, along with a piece of bread. 
 There was the whole affair. My daily expenditure, like 
 that of most of the lodgers, stood thus : 
 
 Breakfast — porridge, three farthings ; butter -milk, one 
 
 farthing £q o i 
 
 Dinner— broth, three farthings; bread, three farthings... o o \\ 
 
 Supper, same as breakfast o o I 
 
 ;^o o 3^ 
 Our landlady had a high opinion of the filling 
 qualities of broth, usually spoken of as kail, and only at 
 odd times prepared a dinner for us of salt fish, or some- 
 thing equally cheap. That the dietetic arrangements
 
 LTFE IN THE WEST PORT. 
 
 93 
 
 occasionally failed to avert the sensation of a certain 
 internal vacuum, I may not deny. Sometimes, in the 
 course of my long walks, I acknowledge to having 
 felt a little hungry, and perhaps also to having looked 
 too wistfully at the contents of the bakers' windows. 
 But on the whole, I suftered no injury to health, and 
 made the best of circumstances which, by involving 
 the inventive faculty, kept the mind wholesomely on the 
 alert. It is something to have practically realised the 
 pleasures and advantages of the temperance so highly 
 recommended by the famed Louis Cornaro. 
 
 Was there none, all this time, to lend a helping-hand / 
 to the struggling bookseller's apprentice? I did not 
 put any one to the test. My mother had some 
 relations in town moving in respectable circles ; but ' 
 I felt disinclined to court their intimacy. Admitting 
 that I may in this respect have acted with unreasonable 
 shyness, I am inclined to think that the policy of 
 keeping aloof was the most advantageous in the end. 
 Isolation was equivalent to independence of thought 
 and action. Contact with the relatives I speak of 
 would have been subjection. 
 
 High principle, however, hardly entered into my 
 calculations. Pursuing my course from a resolute 
 feeling of self-reliance, I just went on without troubling 
 myself about anybody; trusting that things somehow 
 would come right in the long-run. I should say, from 
 my own observation, that young persons often chafe 
 unnecessarily at being neglected by those whom they 
 imagine should take notice of them. On the contrary, 
 as a general rule, they ought to be thankful for being 
 let alone, with a clear stage whereon they can act their 
 part, alike unencumbered with advice or disheartened 
 
 C
 
 94 MEMOIR. 
 
 by adverse criticism. To be always pining to be 
 noticed, brought forward, taken by the hand, and done 
 for, is anything but wise or manly. There are, doubt- 
 less, instances where the deserving are entitled to such 
 assistance as can be safely or conveniently extended 
 towards them. But in too many cases the visionary 
 expectation of aid paralyses exertion, and consumes 
 valuable time that might very properly be devoted to 
 individual effort. At anyrate, I do not doubt that I 
 should have suffered injury at this critical period, by 
 getting entangled with fine people, invited to fine 
 houses, and led to mix in fine evening-parties. Pro- 
 ceedings of that seductive kind would have been 
 distinctly at variance with my condition. What was I 
 but one of a thousand nameless lads, whom in passing 
 no one knew or cared for ? Shrouded by insignificance, 
 I could fortunately, like others in a similar situation, 
 work my way on in silence and obscurity, without 
 any provocation to false shame, which almost more 
 than anything else is the stumbling-block of youth. 
 The very circumstance of my having come from the 
 country, and of being little kno^^^l to young men of my 
 own standing, was a point in my favour. 
 
 It nevertheless, I o^vn, required some fortitude to 
 bear up against the hardships incidental to my situation 
 as a junior apprentice, literally the slave of the lamp, 
 and the drudge of the establishment. Though not 
 beaten and dragooned as I had been at school, it was 
 my destiny to experience no very gentle treatment. 
 My employer, a stern disciplinarian, took the work out 
 of his apprentices. He seemed to have no regard for 
 the number of miles he caused them to walk in a day 
 in the way of business. In addition to his trade as a
 
 THE STATE LO TTER V. 95 
 
 bookseller, he kept a circulating library, and also 
 acted as an agent for the State Lottery. Independently, 
 therefore, of a multitude of errands with parcels of 
 books and stationery, I was charged with the delivery 
 of vast quantities of circular letters eulogising the suc- 
 cessive lotteries, which, in reason, ought to have been 
 despatched through the post-office. Frequently I was 
 sent on my travels with as many as three hundred 
 letters, sorted and tied in bundles in the manner of a 
 postman ; and as my circuit took me up dozens of long 
 stairs over miles of thoroughfares, I had an opportunity 
 of acquiring a knowledge of the town and the names of 
 its inhabitants. 
 
 In all this I was inconsiderately treated, and can 
 never cease to think so. But there was something 
 likewise to be thankful for. Sutherland enforced 
 habits of punctuality and order, which happily stuck 
 to me through life, along with a due appreciation of 
 such morsels of time as can be spared from ordinary 
 pursuits. My apprenticeship, like that of many 
 others, was my drill ; a harsh drill, no doubt, but it is 
 difficult to see how, without some kind of vigorous 
 training, youth is to grow into manhood with a proper 
 conception of a number of common -place but im- 
 portant obligations. Certainly, old injunctions say as 
 much. 
 
 My heaviest grievance was the delivery of those 
 odious piles of lottery circulars, a species of labour that 
 in no shape advanced my professional knowledge. To 
 what hand, however, could I turn to rid myself of this 
 slavery? The choice lay between suffering and nu'n. 
 It was my safest course to submit. Over the doorway 
 of an old house in tho West Bow, which I passed
 
 96 MEMOIR. 
 
 several times daily, was the inscription carved in 
 stone, 
 
 'he that tholes overcomes.' 
 
 I made up my mind to thole — a pithy old Scottish word 
 signifying to bear with patience ; the whole inscription 
 reminding us of a sentiment in Virgil : ' Whatever may 
 happen, every kind of fortune is to be overcome by 
 bearing it.'* 
 
 After all, the drudgery I had in connection with the 
 lotteries is not utterly to be condemned. It afforded 
 an amusing insight into the weaknesses of human 
 nature. I could scarcely have learned what I did by 
 sitting with composure in the lap of ease and luxury. 
 As regards the state lottery, it is interesting for me to 
 remember that I was once a humble minister in that 
 gigantic national concern. And what a queer, strugg- 
 ling, whimsical set of people came under notice ! Some 
 would buy only odd numbers of five figures, such as 
 17,359; some eagerly sought for numbers which they 
 had dreamt of being prizes, and would have no other ; 
 some brought children to select a number from the 
 quantity offered — a degree of weakness which was out- 
 done by those who superstitiously brought the seventh 
 son of a seventh son to make the selection for them ; 
 some, more whimsical still, would only purchase at the 
 last moment what everybody else had rejected. Few were 
 so extravagant as to buy whole tickets, or even halves, 
 quarters, or eighths. The great majority contented 
 themselves with a sixteenth, the price of which was 
 usually about a guinea and a half; and as the fortunate 
 holder of the sixteenth of a twenty-thousand-pound 
 
 * ' Quidquid erit, superanda omnis fortuna ferendo est.' — ^neid, v.
 
 THE SANCTUARY OF HOLYROOD. 97 
 
 prize would realise above twelve hundred pounds, the 
 temptation to this species of gambling was enormous. 
 
 It would be an error to imagine that the dispersion of 
 those myriads of lottery circulars in the obscurest quarters 
 had no practical efficacy. The chief buyers of sixteenths 
 were persons connected with the markets, hackney-coach- 
 men, waiters at hotels, female housekeepers, small 
 tradesmen, and those of limited means generally, wlio 
 hoped to become rich by a happy turn of the wheel. 
 Inmates of the Sanctuary of Holyrood and the debtors' 
 prisons were numbered among the steady customers of 
 the state lottery. Both, therefore, as a messenger with 
 lottery intelligence, and as an errand-boy with j^arcels 
 of books, I had frequent occasion to visit and become 
 less or more acquainted with these places. 
 
 The Sanctuary, which embraced a cluster of decayed 
 buildings in front and on both sides of Holyrood 
 Palace, was at that time more resorted to by refugee 
 debtors than it is in this improved age. It was seldom 
 without distinguished characters from England — some 
 of them gaunt, oldish gentlemen, seemingly broken- 
 down men of fashion, wearing big gold spectacles, who 
 now drew out existence here in defiance of creditors. 
 To this august class of persons, who stood in need of 
 supplies of books from the circulating library, I paid 
 frecjuent visits ; and conscious, perhaps, that they gave 
 me some extra trouble, they were so considerate as to 
 present me with an occasional sixpence, which I could 
 not politely refuse. 
 
 Customers in the Canongate jail, anil in the Old 
 Tolbooth, renowned as the ' Heart of Mid-Lothian,' 
 were less munificent, but considerably more hearty in 
 tlicir intercourse. Tlie greater number of them were
 
 98 MEMOIR. 
 
 third-rate shopkeepers, who, after struggling for years 
 against debts, rents, and taxes, had finally succumbed 
 to the sheriff-officer, and been drifted to a safe anchor- 
 age, which they did not seem to think particularly 
 unpleasant. The law had done its worst upon them, 
 and for a time they were at rest. 
 
 The chief of these prisons, the Old Tolbooth, was a 
 tall black building in the High Street, noted in the 
 national annals : That Tolbooth on the lofty pinnacle of 
 which was ignominiously stuck the head of the gallant 
 Marquis of Montrose, in 1650, and whence, after 
 bleaching for ten years, it was taken down and replaced 
 by the head of the Marquis of Argyll : That Tolbooth 
 which Byron has referred to with unjustifiable bitterness 
 in his English Bards and Scotch Revieiuers : 
 
 ' Arthur's steep summit nodded to its base, 
 The surly Tolbooth scarcely kept her place. 
 The Tolbooth felt — for marble sometimes can, 
 On such occasions, feel as much as man — 
 The Tolbooth felt defrauded of her charms, 
 If Jeffrey died except within her arms.' 
 
 After undergoing various mutations, this gloomy struc- 
 ture now served the double purpose of a jail for debtors 
 and criminals. The two departments were quite dis- 
 tinct, the apartments for criminals being in the east end, 
 and those for debtors being in the west. But all entered 
 by the same door — that portal where the rioters of the 
 Porteous Mob thundered in 1736. This doorway, 
 situated at the foot of the south-eastern turret, was 
 opened by a turnkey who was seated outside, or in a 
 small adjoining vault on the ground-floor of the building. 
 Level with it, facing the north, and occupying the 
 remainder of the street-floor, was the office of the
 
 THE OLD TOLBOOTII. 99 
 
 Town-guard, who were ready at hand in case of any emer- 
 gency. Having gained an access by the outer portal of 
 the Tolbooth, you ascended a flight of about twenty 
 steps to an inner door, whicli was opened on the ringing 
 of a bell by the outer turnkey. You were now in the 
 Hall, a spacious apartment, with a sanded stone floor, 
 and seats along the sides. It was well lighted by a large 
 stanchioned window facing the south. Fbced on the 
 wall nearly opposite the doorway, there was a black 
 board, on which was painted the following admonitory 
 inscription, that is said to have been originally and 
 specially designed for the King's Bench Prison : 
 
 ' A prison is a house of care, 
 
 A place where none can thrive, 
 A touchstone true to try a friend, 
 
 A grave for men alive — 
 Sometimes a house of right, 
 
 Sometimes a house of wrong, 
 Sometimes a place for jades and thieves, 
 
 And honest men among.' 
 
 The Hall was a common vestibule, whence an entrance 
 was gained to the two departments. While the criminals 
 were confined to their rooms in the East End, the 
 prisoners under civil process, who were lodged in the 
 West End, moved about at pleasure during the day 
 from the Hall to the several apartments on two upper 
 stories ; and, accordingly, for them there was almost the 
 freedom of a lodging-house. The place of public 
 execution was the flat roof of a low building attached 
 to the western gable, and, to reach it, convicts were 
 conducted across the Hall. 
 
 My knowledge of this strange old jail needs a word 
 of explanation. Among the debtors whom 1 visited in
 
 loo MEMOIR. 
 
 the way of business, there was one, a young man, who 
 had been previously known to our family. Having 
 failed in business under circumstances which led to an 
 unusually long imprisonment, I frequently saw him, and 
 was able to learn numerous particulars concerning the 
 VVest-Enders and their ways of living, which would 
 otherwise have been beyond my reach. As the Tolbooth 
 was removed in 1817, it was my fortune to be its visitor 
 during the last three years of its existence, and to 
 become fomiliarised with a condition of things of which 
 there is now no parallel. My experiences of Tolbooth 
 life were in the days of free-and-easy prison arrange- 
 ments. As yet, neither county prison boards nor prison 
 inspectors had been heard of. The magistrates and 
 council undertook the responsibility of cost and manage- 
 ment, also appointed the officials, the chief of whom, 
 honoured with the designation of Captain, was ordinarily 
 some old citizen who stood well with the corporation. 
 There was a simplicity about the whole system, which 
 is now difficult to be realised by any description. So 
 far as the debtors were concerned, the prison was little 
 else than a union of lodging-house and tavern, under 
 lock and key. Acquaintances might call as often and 
 stay as long as they pleased. The inmates and their 
 visitors, if they felt inclined, could treat themselves to 
 refreshments in a cosy little apartment, half-tavern, half- 
 kitchen, superintended by a portly female, styled Lucky 
 Laing, whence issued pretty frequently the pleasant 
 sounds of broiling beef-steaks, and the drawings of corks 
 from bottles of ale and porter. 
 
 Much of the cordiality that prevailed was due to the 
 governor, Captain Sibbald, a benevolently disposed little 
 man, with a merry twinkle in his eyes, dressed in a
 
 THE OLD TOLBOOTH. loi 
 
 sober pepper-and-salt coloured suit. I heard no end of 
 his acts of kindness to debtors as well as criminals, or 
 of putting poor youths in the way of well-doing who had 
 passed through his hands. Although his salary was no 
 more than a hundred and fifty pounds a year, he was 
 known to take on himself the obligation of guaranteeing 
 the payment of a debt, rather than retain in custody a 
 poor man with a large family, brought to him for 
 imprisonment. In the East End, he had almost con- 
 stantly a male or female convict under sentence of 
 death ; and though not able to mitigate their unhappy 
 doom, he always endeavoured to assuage their jnesent 
 sufferings. Until his time, they had been literally fed 
 on bread and water, during the six weeks that elapsed 
 between sentence and execution. He generously broke 
 through this harsh rule, not a little to the dissatisfaction 
 of the Lord Advocate of the day ; but in the contest his 
 humanity prevailed, and the rule was ever after practi- 
 cally relaxed. I heard it approvingly said of him, that 
 at his own expense he procured a dentist to draw a 
 tooth which so tortured a convict that he could not 
 sleep ; it was further reported that he always saw that 
 the men were comfortably shaved on the morning of 
 the day they were to be hanged, and that he uniformly 
 pressed a glass of wine on the women on their being 
 conducted through the Hall to execution. Such was 
 the gossip of the prison. 
 
 One of the strange things told of the Tolbooth is, 
 that on various occasions it gave a secure retreat to 
 persons who lied from justice. A gentleman alleged to 
 have been concerned in the Rye-House Plot, in the 
 reign of Charles II., and of whom the civil authorities 
 were in search, received protection from a friend in the
 
 102 MEMOIR. 
 
 Tolbooth, where no one thought of looking for him ; 
 and whence he eventually escaped to the continent. 
 In 1746, there was a similar case of protection to a 
 gentleman who was sought after ineffectually for his 
 concern in the Rebellion. 
 
 I can realise the truth of these traditions, by having 
 found a voluntary resident in the Tolbooth, who was 
 not recognised as a prisoner, or as being there at all. 
 This was a gifted but erratic genius, known by his 
 familiar Christian name, Davie, who, after suffering a 
 variety of disasters, received sympathy and succour 
 among his friends in the West End. Of course, for 
 this indulgence, he was indebted to the good-hearted 
 governor, who, like his predecessors, did not find it 
 to be consistent with his duty to be too particular. In 
 making his last round at night, and ascending the spiral 
 staircase, which was provided with a rope that performed 
 the part of a hand-rail, he would considerately, as if by 
 accident, jingle the bunch of well-worn keys, by way of 
 announcing his approach. In casting a look around 
 the apartment to see that all strangers were gone, and 
 saying 'Good-night, gentlemen,' he might have known, 
 had he cared to know, that one of the inmates shared 
 his bed with Davie, who was at that very moment — 
 thanks to the jingle of the keys — ensconced upright in 
 a tight-fitting wall-press at the corner of the apartment. 
 
 I had often occasion to meet and interchange cour- 
 tesies with Davie, who was an essential adjunct of the 
 prison fraternity. Having lost means, character, and 
 friends in the outer world, he was duly qualified by his 
 obliging manners, his accom[)lishments, and his poverty, 
 to be an acceptable guest of the West-Enders. The 
 Tolbooth was his home by choice. He lived in it for
 
 DA VIE. ,03 
 
 years, seeing out successive groups of debtors, but always 
 as much esteemed by the new-comers as by the older 
 residents. How they could have done without him, it 
 is painful to consider. He was a general fiictotum — 
 went out and made purchases for them, carried messages 
 to law-agents, posted letters, and, on great occasions, 
 ordered in dinners from Mrs Ferguson's, a noted tavern 
 in the neighbourhood. His jocularities, his singing, 
 and his ability to take a hand at whist, were, of course, 
 recommendations of a high order. There were other 
 reasons for thinking well of Davie. He was modest as 
 regards his own wants. Debtors of the better class, on 
 quitting the prison, would make him a present of a few 
 articles of dress, and perhaps kindly leave half-a-crown 
 in one of the pockets. Davie could not be said to have 
 any regular meals. He lived principally on odd crusts 
 of bread, pieces of biscuits, drams, and drops of ale or 
 porter. Talking of drams, it was against rule to intro- 
 duce spirits into the prison, but, through the agency of 
 Davie, there never was any particular scarcity of the 
 article. As a scout serviceable in this as in other things, 
 he stood well with Peter, the keeper of the door in the 
 Hall, rather a good-humoured Cerberus. Peter was 
 blind of an eye, which some might think an advantage ; 
 he wore a woollen cap on his bald head, and always 
 walked softly about the sanded stone floor in carpet- 
 shoes. 
 
 The West End was two rooms in breadth, one entering 
 from the other. The windows in these apartments 
 looked only south and north, but the inmates had a 
 device for extending the prospect in other directions. 
 They had only to hold out a mirror beyond the 
 stanchions to calcli a glimpse of who was at the jiorlal
 
 I04 MEMOIR. 
 
 near the north-west corner of St Giles, or of what was 
 going on in the street. By means of this kind, they 
 were able to see the remnant of the 420! Regiment 
 as it marches towards the castle on its return from 
 Waterloo. The method of looking directly westwards 
 up the Lawnmarket was still more ingenious. In the 
 gable of the building there was a hole or slit into which 
 the beam of the gallows was inserted for public execu- 
 tions. So intruded, the beam projected about two feet 
 into one of the debtors' apartments, where it made its 
 appearance near the foot of the bed in which Davie 
 participated. I remember paying a visit to the prison 
 on the day after an execution, while it was still a subject 
 of conversation. Confined to their rooms during the 
 tragical ceremony, one of the debtors, along with Davie, 
 I was told, had jocularly seated themselves on the inner 
 end of the beam at the time the miserable culprit was 
 in the course of being suspended from the other. The 
 hole in the gable was already closed, but as execu- 
 tions, according to the heartless policy of the period, 
 were then frequent, the building was performed in a 
 superficial way. In the centre of the masonry, a cork 
 was introduced by particular request, and this being 
 pulled out at pleasure, a view was obtained in the 
 required direction — a convenience this of no small con- 
 sequence to the West-Enders, which the obliging 
 governor of the establishment did not notice or call in 
 question. 
 
 Besides Davie, who became a naturalised inhabitant 
 of tlie Tolbooth, tliere were other hangers-on in whose 
 society the inmates found a degree of solace. For the 
 greater part, the debtors were attempting to carry through 
 the legal process of liberation known as the cessio, and
 
 THE OLD TO LB 00 TIL 105 
 
 accordingly required the assistance of law-practitioners. 
 Professional aid in these and other matters was usually 
 rendered by a class of persons who it would be hazardous 
 to say were on the roll of authorised attorneys. A kind 
 of supernumeraries in the profession, and with a know- 
 ledge of forms, they hung about the prisons for jobs ; 
 modestly, as it were, keeping on the outskirts of society, 
 in order to gather up the defiled cnmibs which the 
 notabilities of the law disdained to recognise. For the 
 services which they rendered to the poorer order of 
 clients, it is not clear that payment was made in coin. 
 Seemingly, they had the run of the prison. When half- 
 a-mutchkin was smuggled in through Davie's valuable 
 assistance, they came in for a tasting, and at various hours 
 of the day — not being particular as to time of luncheon 
 — they held deeply interesting conferences in Lucky 
 Laing's tavern, over smoking dishes of steaks and 
 creaming tumblers of porter. Talking plentifully between 
 mouthfuls, and winking knowingly with one eye, they 
 held out such sanguine hopes of getting things carried 
 through cheaply — no expense to speak of but the office 
 fees — as could not fail to raise the drooping spirits of 
 the poor wives who came to hold council with their 
 imprisoned husbands. 
 
 The law-agents of this stamp who frequented the 
 West End had for coadjutor a medical practitioner, 
 not less necessary than themselves in carrying on 
 operations. I am not aware that in the present day 
 the doctor who haunted the Tolbooth has any dis- 
 tinct representative. He had at one time occupied a 
 respectable position as a medical practitioner, but now, 
 broken down by intemperance, he confined his profes- 
 sional services to the inmates of the West End, to
 
 io6 MEMOIR. 
 
 whom he made himself presentable by blacking the 
 white edges of his button-moulds with ink, and keeping 
 a band of faded crape on his hat, as if always in deep 
 mourning. It was fortunate for the doctor that the 
 law had considerately instituted the cessio. He lived 
 upon it. Without it, there was no visible refuge but 
 the work-house. His function consisted in granting 
 sick certificates — fee, five shillings, with a dram as a 
 matter of course, and a biscuit to give the refection 
 an air of respectability. In virtue of a certificate of 
 this nature, fortified by a warrant from the court, the 
 ailing debtor was allowed to go home to his sorrowing 
 family, and his prescribed thirty days' imprisonment 
 became a sort of legal fiction. At all events, the law 
 was satisfied, which was what the West-Enders alone 
 cared for. I lost sight of the doctor after the Tolbooth 
 was pulled down in 1817. He then disappeared from 
 the visible creation, as a result of one of the many 
 statutory enactments that have latterly rubbed out our 
 social eccentricities. 
 
 As an eddy comer of the world's tumultuous current, 
 into which light floating wreck was naturally swept, 
 the Old Tolbooth, with its scenes of grief and drollery, 
 might not be supposed to be quite an appropriate resort 
 for a lad who had to make his way in the sober track of 
 life. All I can summon to remembrance in the matter 
 is, that I here incidentally saw do\vn into the depths of 
 society, to which the affluent classes have little oppor- 
 tunity of penetrating. My experiences among the shifty 
 sub-middle classes, here as elsewhere, proved by no 
 means the least valuable part of my training for the 
 career into which I was ultimately drifted. Nor has the 
 recollection of the Old Tolbooth and its inmates ever
 
 EFFOR 7:9 A T SELF-INSTRUCTION. 107 
 
 ceased to afford a fund of entertainment. In the 
 Memoirs of a celebrated duchess, we are favoured 
 with the contrast which Her Grace draws between her 
 present grand dull routine of existence, and the times 
 long past, when, skirmishing with pecuniary difficulties, 
 she pursued the life of an actress ; her preference being 
 decidedly given for * lang syne,' with its sparkling wit, 
 glee, and poverty, unburdened with the vapid solemnities 
 of etiquette. The duchess, however, had no wish to 
 return to these delightful early pursuits. 
 
 I made such attempts as were at all practicable, 
 while an apprentice, to remedy the defects of my 
 education at school. Nothing in that way could be 
 done in the shop, for there reading was proscribed. 
 But allowed to take home a book for study, I gladly 
 availed myself of the privilege. The mornings in 
 summer, when light cost nothing, were my chief 
 reliance. Fatigued with trudging about, I was not 
 naturally inclined to rise, but on this and some other 
 points I overruled the will, and forced myself to get 
 up at five o'clock, and have a spell at reading until it 
 was time to think of moving off — my brother, when he 
 was with me, doing the same. In this way I made 
 some progress in French, with the pronunciation of 
 which I was already familiar from the speech of tlie 
 French prisoners of war at Peebles. I likewise dii)ped 
 into several books of solid worth — such as Smith's 
 Wealth of Nations, Locke's Human Understanding, 
 Paley's Moral FJiilosophy, and Blair's Bellcs-Lettres — 
 fixing the leading facts and theories in my memory by 
 a note-book for the purpose. In another book, I kept 
 for years an accurate account of my expenses, not 
 allowing a single halfpenny to escape record.
 
 io8 MEMOIR. 
 
 In the winter of 1815-16, when the cold and cost of 
 candle-light would have detained me in bed, I was so 
 fortunate as to discover an agreeable means of spending 
 my mornings. The sale of lottery tickets, I have said, 
 formed a branch of my employer's business. Besides 
 distributing the lottery circulars, it fell to my lot to 
 paste all the large show-boards with posters of glaring 
 colours, bearing the words ' Lucky Office,' ' Twenty 
 Thousand Pounds still in the Wheel,' and such-like 
 seductive announcements. The board-carriers — shilling- 
 a-day men — were usually a broken-down set of charac- 
 ters ; as, for example, old waiters and footmen, with 
 pale flabby faces and purple noses ; discharged soldiers, 
 who had returned in a shattered condition from the 
 wars ; and tattered operatives of middle age, ruined by 
 dram-drinking. 
 
 Among the last-named class of board-carriers, there 
 was a journeyman baker who had an eye irretrievably 
 damaged by some rough, but possibly not unprovoked, 
 usage in a king's birthday riot. What from the bad 
 eye, and wliat from whiskey, this unfortunate being had 
 fallen out of regular employment. Now and then, when 
 there was a push in the trade, as at the New-year, he 
 got a day's work from his old employer, a baker in 
 Canal Street. He was not at all nice as to occupa- 
 tion : he would deliver hand-bills, perambulate the 
 streets with a lottery-board at the top of a pole over 
 his shoulder, or anything else that cast up — only he 
 needed a little watching, for, when out on a job with 
 the relics of the previous day's shilling in his pocket, he 
 was prone to thirstiness in passing a dram-shop, 
 into which he would dive, board and all, regardless of 
 consequences.
 
 THE LITER ARY BAKER. 109 
 
 From this hopeful personage, whom it was my duty 
 to look after, I one day had a proposition, which he 
 had been charged to communicate. If I pleased, he 
 would introduce me to his occasional employer, the 
 baker in Canal Street, who, he said, was passionately 
 fond of reading, but without leisure for its gratification. 
 If I would go early — very early — say five o'clock in the 
 morning, and read aloud to him and his two sons, 
 while they were preparing their batch, I should be 
 regularly rewarded for my trouble with a penny roll 
 newly drawn from the oven. Hot rolls, as I have 
 since learned, are not to be recommended for the 
 stomach, but I could not in these times afford to be 
 punctilious. The proposal was too captivating to be 
 resisted. 
 
 Behold me, then, quitting my lodgings in the West 
 Port, before five o'clock in the winter mornings, and 
 pursuing my way across the town to the cluster of 
 sunk streets below the North Bridge, of which Canal 
 Street was the principal. The scene of operations was 
 a cellar of confined dimensions, reached by a flight of 
 steps descending from the street, and possessing a small 
 back window immediately beyond the baker's kneading- 
 board. Seated on a folded-up sack in the sole of the 
 window, with a book in one hand and a penny candle 
 stuck in a bottle near the other, I went to work for the 
 amusement of the company. The baker was not 
 particular as to subject. All he stipulated for was 
 something comic and laughable. Aware of his tastes, I 
 tried him first with the jocularities oi Roderick Random, 
 which was a great success, and produced shouts of 
 laughter. I followed this up with other works of 
 Smollett, also with the novels of Fielding, and with
 
 no MEMOIR. 
 
 Gil Bias ; the tricks and grotesque rogueries in this 
 last-mentioned work of fiction giving the baker and his 
 two sons unquaUfied satisfaction. My services as a 
 reader for two and a half hours every morning were 
 unfailingly recompensed by a donation of the antici- 
 pated roll, with which, after getting myself brushed 
 of the flour, I went on my way to shop-opening, lamp- 
 cleaning, and all the rest of it, at Calton Street. It 
 would be vain in the present day to try to discover the 
 baker's work-shop, where these morning performances 
 took place, for the whole of the buildings in this quarter 
 have been removed to make way for the North British 
 Railway station. 
 
 Such, with minor variations, was my mode of life for 
 several years — an almost ceaseless drudgery. At that 
 period, there were no public institutions of a popular 
 kind to stimulate and regulate plans of self-culture. 
 The School of Arts, the precursor of mechanics' insti- 
 tutions, was not set on foot until 182 1. Young persons 
 in humble circumstances were still left to grope their 
 way. They might spend their spare hours in study, if 
 they had a mind ; nobody cared anything at all about 
 it. Neither were young men, by the usages of business, 
 allowed any time to carry out fancies as to mental 
 improvement. Shop-hours extended from half-past 
 seven o'clock in the morning till nine at night, with no 
 abatement on Saturdays. Notions of mere amusement 
 I did not dare to entertain. The Theatre Royal had 
 its attractions, but expense, if nothing else, stood in the 
 way. I had as yet been only once in the theatre. A 
 friend of our family had treated me to the shilling- 
 gallery, shortly after coming to Edinburgh ; it was to see 
 John Kemble, who played Rollo — a subject of absorbing
 
 JAMES AND GEORGE KING. m 
 
 interest — and not for a number of years afterwards 
 could I venture on any species of theatrical indulgence. 
 In gracefully submitting to this self-denial, perhaps I 
 had no great merit. So far as spare time was con- 
 cerned, my mind had become occupied not only in the 
 morning readings and study, but in sundry scientific 
 experiments, to which I was led by James King, who 
 was an apprentice to a seedsman next door. 
 
 King was two to three years my senior, and I looked 
 up to him on that account as well as for his general 
 ability. He came from Fife, which is noted for the 
 saliency and genius of its people. Our proximity to 
 each other, and similarity of tastes, brought us into 
 acquaintance. He had a younger brother, George, an 
 apprentice to Mr Crombie, a well-known dyer, with 
 whom I also became acquainted ; and when my brother 
 Robert came to town to lodge with me, he was intro- 
 duced to the circle. We formed, so to speak, a club of 
 four lads, devoted to some species of scientific inquiry 
 and recreation. The Kings were great upon chemistry. 
 Their talk was of retorts, alkalies, acids, combustion, 
 and oxygen gas, all which gave me a favourable opinion 
 of their learning. They likewise spoke so familiarly 
 of electricity, Leyden jars, and the galvanic pile, as to 
 excite in me a desire to know something of these 
 marvels. Chemistry and electricity became accordingly 
 the subject of discussion and experiment; but the diffi- 
 culty was to know where experiments could be con- 
 ducted. My lodgings were out of the question. So 
 were those of the Kings. They lived in a garret, 
 situated immediately behind the well on the south side 
 of the Grassmarket, which it was inexpedient to con- 
 stitute a hall of science, and the notion of resorting to
 
 112 MEMOIR. 
 
 it was given up. In this dilemma, a friendly and 
 every way suitable retreat, which remains vividly in 
 my recollections, presented itself, and was gratefully 
 accepted. 
 
 As you go up a narrow and steep road to the Calton 
 Hill, at the foot of Leith Street, a covered passage 
 descends and strikes off to the left, and conducts you 
 to a confined court, wherein stood — and perhaps still 
 stands — a small cottage with a tiled roof, that had to 
 all appearance existed long before the streets with which 
 it was environed. The back window in Calton Street, 
 where I used to clean the lamps, looked into the court, 
 and I could notice that the little old-fashioned cottage 
 was occupied by a thin and aged personage with a 
 bright-brown scratch-wig, who, in fine weather, made his 
 appearance on the pavement as a common street-porter. 
 The name by which he was kno\vn in the neighbourhood 
 was Jamie Alexander. As voucher for his respectability, 
 he wore on the left breast of his coat a pewter badge, 
 marked No. 3, indicative of the early period at which he 
 had been enrolled by the magistrates in the fraternity of 
 porters ; and of this antiquity of his emblem of office 
 he felt naturally proud; all other porters, however 
 old, being boys in comparison, and not possessing that 
 distinction of rank which he did. 
 
 Jamie was a Highlander by birth, and in his youth, 
 long ago, had been a servant to a Mr Tytier, a gentle- 
 man of literary and scientific attainments, with whom 
 he had travelled and seen the world, and in whose 
 company he had picked up a smattering of learned 
 ideas and words. With this grounding, and naturally 
 handy, Jamie was a kind of Jack-of-all-trades. It was 
 in his capacity of porter that King and I had become
 
 JAMIE ALEXANDER. 113 
 
 acquainted with him, but at his advanced age he relied 
 more distinctly on less toilsome pursuits. The versa- 
 tility of his talents rendered him peculiarly acceptable 
 as an acquaintance, and his house was well adapted 
 for our meetings. This ancient mansion consisted of 
 only a single apartment : it was kitchen, parlour, bed- 
 room, and workshop all in one — a queer and incongruous 
 jumble, like the mind of the occupant 
 
 Usually, at night, we found Jamie seated at one side 
 of his fire, and his wife Janet, a more common-place 
 character, at the other. Behind the old man was his 
 work-bench, loaded with a variety of tools and odds 
 and ends adapted to a leading branch of employment, 
 which consisted in clasping broken china and crystal 
 for the stoneware shops. This operation he performed 
 with a neatness that surprised most persons, who knew 
 that he had lost the sight of one of his eyes. It did not 
 seem to be generally understood that Jamie had a 
 contrivance satisfactory to himself for remedying this 
 ocular deficiency. In his old pair of spectacles he fixed 
 two glasses for the seeing eye, and he maintained that 
 by this arrangement of a double lens, his single eye was 
 as good to him as two — a point we did not think fit to 
 contest. 
 
 To vary the routine of employment, and at the same 
 time enjoy a little outdoor recreation, Jamie at times 
 took a job from the undertakers. Dressed in a thread- 
 bare black suit, he walked as a saulie before the higher 
 class of funerals, with his hat under his arm, and the 
 black velvet cap of a running-footman covering his 
 brown wig. In connection with his profession of saulie, 
 he related numerous traditionary anecdotes illustrative 
 of the festivities of deceased saulie and gumfler men in
 
 114 MEMOIR. 
 
 the servants-hall of great houses,* while waiting in 
 lugubrious habiliments to head the funeral solemnity — 
 his stories reminding one of the interspersal of scenes 
 of drollery throughout the tragedies of Shakspeare, and 
 I doubt not, true to nature. Besides these diverting 
 reminiscences of grand funerals, he gave his experiences 
 of grave-digging in the Calton burying-ground, where he 
 often assisted. He confidendy stated that the digging 
 of graves was a wonderfully exhilarating and healthful 
 occupation, if executed with proper skill and leisure. 
 Nothing, in his opinion, was so efficacious in assuaging 
 a rheumatism in the back, or securing long life ; and to 
 hear him on this subject, you would have thought it 
 would be a good thing in the way of health and amuse- 
 ment to take to regular exercise in grave-digging. It 
 appeared that independently of payment for this kind 
 of labour according to tariff, Jamie seldom left the 
 ground without a few bits of old coffin in good 
 condition, which had been thrown to the siuface in the 
 course of excavation. Such pieces of wood, improved 
 by seasoning in the earth, he said, excelled for some 
 purposes of art. From them he made a common kind 
 of fiddles, and also cheap wooden clocks. 
 
 With much oddity of character, there was a fine spirit 
 of industry, cheerfulness, and contentment in the old 
 man. As a Highlander, he spoke Gaelic, and from him I 
 learned to be tolerably proficient in pronouncing that test 
 in the language, laogh, the word for calf. With a love of 
 the ancient music of the hills, he played the bagpipe, 
 but this instrument, from deficiency of breath, he had 
 
 * Mutes bearing tall poles shrouded in black drapery are called 
 in Scotland gumtler-men ; such being a corruption of gonfalonier, 
 the bearer of a gonfalon, or standard, in old ceremonial processions.
 
 ELECTRICAL EXPERIMENTS. 115 
 
 latterly laid aside, and taken to the Irish pipes, which are 
 played by means of bellows under the arm. His pipes lay 
 conveniently on a shelf over his work-bench, and taking 
 them down, he, at our request, would favour us with a 
 pibroch. Having finished the tune, he ordinarily delivered 
 some oracular remarks on pipe-music in general, and 
 of the operatic character of the pibroch in particular 
 — the only time, by the way, I ever heard the thing 
 explained. 
 
 Janet, the mistress of the mansion, did not greatly 
 encourage our visits. Her chief concern in life seemed 
 to consist in nursing a small and ingeniously made-up 
 fire, which was apt to be seriously deranged by King's 
 chemical experiments — such as the production of coal- 
 gas in a blacking-bottle, used by way of retort — the 
 proposal of lighting the city with gas having suggested 
 this novel experiment. For a special reason, this old 
 woman was not more favourable to electric science. 
 Under King's advice and directions, my brother and I 
 contrived, out of very poor resources, to procure a 
 cylindrical electrifying-machine, with some apparatus to 
 correspond. Having one night given Janet an electric 
 shock, slily conveyed to her through a piece of damp 
 tobacco, she ever after viewed the machine witli the 
 darkest suspicions. In these apprehensions her gray cat 
 had some reason to join ; when the Leyden jars were 
 placed on the table, she fled to the roof of the bed, and 
 there kept eyeing us during our mysterious incantations. 
 
 Sunday, with its blessed exemption from a dull round 
 of duties, came weekly with its soothing influences ; and 
 this leads to a little explanation. I have already men- 
 tioned that I was at home on Sunday. Through the week, 
 I toiled at my proper duties. On the Sabbath, I was an
 
 Ii6 MEMOIR. 
 
 independent being ; and to this day of rest I habitually 
 looked forward, not only as an interval of repose, but 
 for the opportunity it afforded of seeing and holding 
 converse with my mother, betwixt whom and myself 
 there was an attachment which has been the solace of 
 my existence. Nothing was allowed to detain me in town. 
 For several years, I walked home to the country every 
 Saturday night. Between nine and ten o'clock, in all 
 states of the weather, summer and winter, I might have 
 been found making the best of my way down the North 
 Back of the Canongate, past Holyrood, across the King's 
 Park by Muschet's Cairn, and so on through Portobello. 
 It was necessary not to loiter by the way, for, with a 
 somewhat limited wardrobe, a few things which I carried 
 with me had to be washed and otherwise prepared before 
 midnight. In these night-travels, my brother Robert, 
 while he remained in town, accompanied me. 
 
 The Sundays spent on the shore of the Firth of 
 Forth formed a refreshing change on the ordinary course 
 of life. The salt-pans had ceased to send up their 
 nauseous vapours and clouds of smoke. A pleasant and 
 not uninstructive calm was experienced amidst the shell 
 and tangle covered rocks, against which the pellucid 
 waves of the sea dashed in unremitting murmurs. 
 Usually, I went to Inveresk Church with other members 
 of the family, and so became acquainted with Mussel- 
 burgh and its environs. Sometimes I walked by a 
 footpath across the fields by Brunstain and Millerhill 
 to Dalkeith, to visit my grandmother, Mrs Noble, and 
 her younger son David, who had recently been settled 
 there (Robert, the elder son, having gone to Nova 
 Scotia), and enjoyed the variety of accompanying them 
 to the antique parish church of that pretty country town.
 
 SABBA TH-DA Y MUSINGS. \ 1 7 
 
 There was an immense charm in these occasional 
 Sabbath-day walks to Dalkeith, in which I usually 
 carried a French New Testament in my pocket for 
 lingual exercise. The sunshine, the calm that prevailed, 
 the fresh air, the singing of birds, the green leafy trees, 
 and the blossoming wild-flowers by the way-side, all 
 filled my heart with gladness, for they renewed my 
 recollections of the country. The fields, stuck about 
 with coal-pits, at which the gin-horses had intermitted 
 their accustomed toil, were not such pretty fields as 
 I had seen on Tweedside ; still, they were environed 
 with hedgerows, and formed a pleasing contrast to the 
 huge rows of dingy buildings among which I pursued my 
 ordinary employment. As a boy, I had passionately culti- 
 vated flowers in a little garden assigned to me, and now 
 rejoiced to see a few growing by the side of the pathway. 
 The Mid-Lothian primroses, I imagined — considering 
 the neighbourhood of the coal-pits — had not the fresh- 
 ness and bloom of the primroses which I had gathered 
 in the woods and dells at Neidpath ; but still they were 
 primroses, and, as the best within reach, I plucked and 
 carried home a handful as a gift to my mother in 
 her dreary residence at the Pans, and was pleased to see 
 her put them in a glass with a little water, to preserve 
 as a souvenir of my weekly visit. 
 
 The small smoke-dried community at these salt-pans 
 was socially interesting. Along with the colliers in the 
 neighbouring tiled hamlets, the salt-makers — at least 
 the elderly among them — had at one time been serfs, 
 and in that condition they had been legally sold along 
 with the property on which they dwelt. I conversed 
 with some of them on the subject. They and their 
 children had been heritable fixtures to the spot They
 
 u8 MEMOIR. 
 
 could neither leave at will nor change their profession. 
 In short, they were in a sense slaves. I feel it to be 
 curious that I should have seen and spoken to persons 
 in this country who remembered being legally in a state 
 of serfdom; and such they were until the year 1799, 
 when an act of parliament abolished this last remnant 
 of slavery in the British Islands. Appreciating the 
 event, they set aside one day in the year as a festival 
 commemorative of their liberation. Perhaps the custom 
 of celebrating the day still exists. 
 
 After these Sunday communings with the family, I 
 was on Monday morning off again for Edinburgh to 
 have a fresh tug at the shop-shutters — carrying away 
 wth me, I need hardly say, all kinds of admonitory 
 hints from my mother ; the burden of her recommenda- 
 tions being to avoid low companions, to mind whom 
 I was come of, and ' aye to baud forrit.' What was to 
 become of me was, as she said, a perfect mystery ; still 
 there was nothing like securing a good character in the 
 meanwhile — that was clear, at all events. 
 
 My mother, however, had more cause for uneasiness 
 on her own than my account. The aspect of family 
 affairs was acquiring additional gloom. My father was 
 not the man for the situation he filled. In fact, he 
 detested situations of all kinds. His rough and irri- 
 table spirit of independence gave him a dislike to be 
 ordered by anybody. His feelings at this period were 
 in a morbid condition, the result of circumstances 
 already adverted to, and therefore not to be judged 
 severely. Having unfortunately failed in the means of 
 acting an independent part, he was perhaps on that 
 account the more anxious that his sons should be 
 successful in making the attempt. At anyrate, he
 
 PATERNAL DISQUISITIONS. 119 
 
 endeavoured to impress on rae the vast necessity and 
 advantage of, in all things, thinking for myself, and 
 taking, as far as possible, an independent course. He 
 objected to my ever entertaining the notion of con- 
 tinuing to serve any one after my apprenticeship had 
 expired. No amount of salary was to tempt me ; no 
 prospect of ease to seduce me. I should strike out ) \ 
 for myself, if it were only to sell books in a basket : I 
 from door to door. There might be suffering and 1 
 humiliation in the meantime ; but I would be daily 1 
 gaining experience, and, with prudence, accumulating I 
 means. If I behaved myself properly, a few years I 
 would set all to rights. 
 
 These disquisitions amused and probably had some 
 effect in inspiring me. My father had strong convic- 
 tions as to the propriety of allowing children to think 
 and struggle for themselves ; such, as he conveniently 
 thought, being true kindness, and anything else little 
 better than cruelty — and strictly speaking, he was right 
 Seated in his arm-chair at the Pans, with two or three 
 of us about him, he would discourse in a pleasant way, 
 mingling anecdote \vith philosophy — the purport of tlie 
 whole being that I should continue to cultivate a spirit 
 of independence, to learn to act and think for myself, 
 and, in short, to be thankful that nothing was done 
 for me. 
 
 Such was the run of my father's disquisitions. Unfor- 
 tunately, his extreme views of independence did not 
 comport with his functions as manager of the salt-works, 
 where he suff"ered a species of ignominious banishment 
 Among the near neighbours were a few excise-ofiiccrs 
 set to watch over the works and give permits to pur- 
 chasers. One of these officials was a Mr Stobie, in
 
 I20 MEMOIR. 
 
 whom there was a degree of interest ; for, while in the 
 position of an expectant of Excise, he had done duty 
 for Robert Burns in his last illness, April 1796, when, 
 as the poet says in a letter to Thomson : ' Ever since I 
 wrote you last, I have only known existence by the 
 pressure of the heavy hand of sickness, and have 
 counted time by the repercussions of pain.' It redounded 
 to the honour of Stobie that he acted gratuitously for 
 Burns at this melancholy crisis, and it was pleasing for 
 our family to make his acquaintance, and hear some 
 particulars of the greatest among Scottish poets. 
 
 Beyond such acquaintanceships, there was little to 
 compensate for the smoke, dirt, and misery that were 
 endured at the Pans. The business in itself violated 
 all my father's notions of propriety. It consisted 
 almost wholly in supplying material for a contraband 
 trade across the Border to England ; the high duties 
 on salt in the latter country rendering this a profitable 
 traffic. Purchased in large quantities at Joppa and 
 other salt-works, the bags were transferred in carts to 
 Newcastleton in Liddesdale, where the article was 
 stored by a dealer, and sold by him to be smuggled 
 across the fells during the night. For years, this was 
 a great trade. Perhaps it did not pertain to the Scotch 
 salt-makers to urge the extinction of so flourishing a 
 traffic ; but neither could any one of susceptible feelings 
 look on it with perfect complacency. 
 
 Whatever were the precise causes of discord, a dis- 
 ruption was precipitated by my father having the mis- 
 fortune to be waylaid and robbed of some money which 
 he had collected in the way of business in Edinburgh. 
 Knocked down and grievously bruised about the head, 
 he was found late at night lying helpless on the road,
 
 A FRESH FA MIL Y DISASTER. 1 2 1 
 
 and brought home by some good Samaritan. The pain- 
 ful circumstances connected with this untoward affair 
 led to his being discharged from his office. In his now 
 hapless state, gready disabled by the injuries which he 
 had received, and without means, the consideration of 
 everything fell on my mother. Her mind rose to the 
 occasion. Removing from the sooty precinct to one of 
 a row of houses near Magdalene Bridge, on the road to 
 Musselburgh, she prepared to set on foot a small busi- 
 ness, and was not without hope of meeting with general 
 sympathy and support, for, by her agreeable manners 
 and exemplary conduct under various difficulties, she 
 had made some good friends of different classes in the 
 neighbourhood. 
 
 With something like dismay, I heard of this fresh 
 disaster — the climax, it was to be hoped, of a series 
 of agonising misfortunes. The house at the Pans had 
 been about the most revolting of human habitations, 
 but it at least gave shelter, and bore with it some means 
 of livelihood. Now, all that was at an end. The future 
 was to be a matter of new contrivance. Of course, I 
 hastened from town to condole over present distresses, 
 and share in the family counsels. On my unexpected 
 arrival near midnight — cold, wet, and wayworn — all was 
 silent in that poor home. In darkness by my mother's 
 bed-side, I talked with her of the scheme she had 
 projected. It was little I could do. Some insignificant 
 savings were at her disposal, and so was a windfLill over 
 which I had cause for rejoicing. By a singular piece of 
 good fortune, I had the previous day been presented 
 with half a guinea by a good-hearted tradesman, 
 on being sent to him with the agreeable intelligence 
 that he had got the sixteenth of a twenty thousand
 
 £22 MEMOIR. 
 
 pound prize in the state lottery. The little bit of gold 
 was put into my mother's hand. With emotion too 
 great for words, my own hand was pressed gratefully in 
 return. The loving pressure of that unseen hand in 
 the midnight gloom, has it not proved more than the 
 ordinary blessing of a mother on her son? 
 
 ' All this, still legible in memory's page, 
 And still to be so to my latest age, 
 Adds joy to duty, makes me glad to pay 
 Such honours to thee as my numbers may ; 
 Perhaps a frail memorial, but sincere — 
 Not scorned in heaven, though little noticed here.' 
 
 Early in the following morning, I was back to busi- 
 ness in Calton Street. My mother's ingenious efforts, 
 conducted with consummate tact, and wholly regardless 
 of toil, were successful. Her only embarrassment was 
 my father, prematurely broken down in body and mind. 
 It is not the purpose, however, of the present memoir 
 to pursue the family history. Let us revert to the 
 leading object in hand.
 
 CHAPTER V. 
 
 Robert's early difficulties — 1814 to 1819. 
 
 TT will be necessary to go back a little, in order to 
 ■*■ trace the difficulties that were encountered by 
 Robert in the early part of his career, while I was still 
 following out the duties of an apprentice. 
 
 The family depression during this gloomy period was 
 felt more acutely by my brother than by myself, for, 
 besides being more susceptible in feelings, he was, from 
 his gentle and retiring habits, less able to face the stern 
 realities with which we were unitedly environed. Left, 
 as has been said, for a time in Peebles to pursue his 
 studies at the grammar-school, he was finally brought to 
 Edinburgh, and placed at a noted classical academy — 
 that of Mr Benjamin Mackay, in West Register Street, 
 preparatory to being (if possible) sent to the university. 
 There was an understanding in the family that, as the 
 most suitable professional pursuit, he was to be prepared 
 for the church. The expenses attending on this course 
 of education were considerably beyond present capa- 
 bilities, but all was to be smoothed over by a bur- 
 sary, of which a distant relative held out some vague 
 expectations.
 
 124 MEMOIR. 
 
 When the family quitted Edinburgh, Robert accom- 
 panied them, but shortly afterwards, with a considerable 
 strain on finances, he was associated with me in my 
 West Port lodgings. Here, from the uncongenial habits 
 with which he was brought in contact, he felt consider- 
 ably out of place. I was fortunately absent during the 
 greater part of the day in my accustomed duties ; but 
 he, after school hours, had to rely on such refuge as 
 could be found at the unattractive fireside of our land- 
 lady, who, though disposed to be kind in her way, was 
 so chilled by habits of penury as to give little consider- 
 ation for the feelings of the poor scholar. He spoke to 
 me of his sufferings and the efforts he made to assuage 
 them. The want of warmth was his principal dis- 
 comfort. Sometimes benumbed with cold, he was glad 
 to adjourn to that ever hospitable retreat, the Old 
 Tolbooth, where, like myself, he was received as a 
 welcome visitor by the West-Enders; and it is not 
 unworthy of being mentioned, that the oddities of char- 
 acter among these unfortunate, though on the whole 
 joyous, prisoners, and their professional associates — 
 not forgetting Davie — formed a fund of recollection on 
 which he afterwards drew for literary purposes. That 
 strange old prison, with its homely arrangements, was 
 therefore to him, as to me, identified with early asso- 
 ciations — a thing the remembrance of which became 
 to both a subject of life-long amusement. There was 
 also some exhilaration for him in occasionally attending 
 the nightly book auctions, where, favoured with light 
 and warmth, seated in a by-comer, he could study his 
 lessons, as well as derive a degree of entertainment from 
 the scene which was presented. A further source of 
 evening recreation, but not till past nine o'clock, and
 
 MACKA TS A CADE MY. 125 
 
 then only for an hour, was found in those meetings with 
 the brothers King and myself for mutual scientific 
 instruction. 
 
 Viewed apart from these solacements, his life was 
 dreary in the extreme. Half-starved, unsympathised 
 with, and looking for no comfort at home, he probably 
 would have lost heart but for the daily exercises at 
 school, where he stood as rival and class-fellow of 
 Mackay's best pupils. A good Latinist considering his 
 years, and appreciative of wit and humour, he had an 
 immense love of the odes and satires of Horace, nor 
 was he scarcely a less admirer of the classic myths of 
 Virgil, for they touched on that chord of romance and 
 legendary lore which vibrated in his own mental con- 
 stitution. Besides studying these classics, he took a 
 fancy for the metamorphoses and fluent versification of 
 Ovid, and was entranced ^vith the story-telling power of 
 Livy, the most illustrious of the Roman historians. In 
 Greek he made only a small progress. 
 
 At this time he began to compose verses both in 
 English and Latin, a kind of exercise which, not 
 being required in the routine of study, was altogether 
 a work of supererogation. The taste for Latin versifi- 
 cation was due to a somewhat strange cause. Con- 
 ceiving an enthusiasm for Ovid's poetical theories of 
 the metempsychosis, he endeavoured to emulate the 
 original by writing verses similarly fanciful ; and not 
 only so, but he fervently embraced the principle of the 
 Pythagoreans, as regards the impropriety of using animal 
 food — a principle very unnecessary to insist upon while 
 residing in our West Port lodgings. The notion was, of 
 course, a boyish freak, which in due time wore off; but 
 that he entertained it at school with the vehemence of 
 
 I
 
 126 MEMOIR. 
 
 an ancient disciple of Pythagoras, indicates the intensity 
 of his early convictions. In his efforts at Latin versi- 
 fication in the Ovidian style, he was sorely hampered by 
 the want of books of reference, to which his better 
 provided companions had access. He was in particular 
 put to considerable straits for want of an English-Latin 
 dictionary, in order to ascertain the best Latin equiva- 
 lents for certain words in his own language. The 
 difficulty was in a degree ingeniously got over by visiting 
 a book-stall, on which conveniently lay for sale a copy 
 of Ainsworth's dictionary. This, without challenge, he 
 continued to consult several times a day, and was 
 delighted to find the Latin words he stood in need of. 
 From the benefit derived by these investigations he in 
 after-years never saw the stall-keeper without feeling 
 how much he was indebted to him for the use of his 
 Ainsworth. 
 
 With all this plodding industry, Robert found time to 
 indulge in another kind of explorations. Ever since 
 his arrival in Edinburgh, and without suggestion from 
 any one, he had taken a pleasure in examining, at fitting 
 times, what was ancient and historically interesting in 
 the Old Town, which, for tastes of this kind, presents 
 a peculiarly comprehensive field of inquiry. Once 
 crowded within defensive walls, the older part of the 
 city remained a dense cluster of tall dark buildings, 
 lining the central street and diverging lanes, or closes, 
 with comparatively little change in exterior aspect. 
 However altered as regards the quality of the dwellers 
 on the difterent floors, the tenements still exhibited 
 innumerable artistic and heraldic tokens of the past ; 
 nor were the environs of the town less illustrative of 
 moving incidents of the olden time. To this huge
 
 ANTIQUARIAN PURSUITS. 127 
 
 antiquarian preserve, as it might be called, with its varied 
 legends, my brother immediately attached himself with 
 the fervour of a first love, for so enduring was it as 
 materially to tinge the rest of his existence. 
 
 Patiently ranging up one close and down another, 
 ascending stairs, and poking into obscure courts, he 
 took note of carvings over doorways, pondered on the 
 structure of old gables and windows, examined risps — 
 the antique mechanism which had answered the purpose 
 of door-knockers ; and extending the scoi)e of his 
 researches, scarcely a bit of Arthur's Seat or the Braid 
 Hills was left unexplored. The Borough-moor, where 
 James IV. marshalled his army before marching to the 
 fatal field of Flodden ; the ' bore-stone,' in which, on 
 that occasion, was planted the royal standard — 
 
 'The staff, a pine tree, strong and stiaiglit, 
 Pitched deeply in a massive stone. 
 Which still in memory is she^vn, 
 
 Yet bent beneath the standard's weight 
 Whene'er the western wind unrolled, 
 With toil, the huge and cumbrous fold, 
 And gave to view the dazzling field, 
 Where in proud Scotland's royal shield. 
 The ruddy lion ramped in gold.' 
 
 — Marmion. 
 
 Royston, where the Earl of Hertford landed with an 
 English army, and proceeded to set fire to and destroy 
 Edinburgh; the spot at the Kirk of Field, where Darnley 
 was blown up; the tomb of the Earl of Murray; the 
 grassy mounds in Bruntsfield Links, which formed the 
 relics of Cromwell's batteries when besieging the castle 
 after the victory of Dunbar ; the grave-stone in the 
 Grcyfriars Churchyard on which, in 1638, was signed 
 the National Covenant ; the adjoining enclosure, in
 
 128 MEMOIR. 
 
 which, for a time, was pent up, like cattle, the crowd of 
 prisoners taken at the battle of Bothwell Bridge; the 
 closed-up postern of the castle surmounting the pre- 
 cipitous rocks up which Claverhouse, Viscount Dundee, 
 clambered to confer with the governor (and how he got 
 either up or down no one can tell), when setting out 
 for his last field, Killiecrankie ; these, and such like 
 historical memorials, became all familiar to my brother 
 by making good use of intervals that could be spared 
 from his daily attendance at the academy. 
 
 Though only twelve months had elapsed since he 
 came from the country, and not yet fourteen years of 
 age, he already possessed a knowledge of things con- 
 cerning the old city and its romantic history which many, 
 it may be supposed, do not acquire in the course of a 
 lifetime. While most other youths, his school-mates, 
 gave themselves up to amusements not unbecoming to 
 their age, his recreations had in them all something of 
 the nature of instruction. And such were his extra- 
 ordinary powers of memory, that whatever he saw or 
 learned, he never forgot; everything which could 
 interest the mind being treasured up as a fund of 
 delightful recollections, ready to be of service when 
 wanted. 
 
 At the academy were a few boys, the sons of citizens, 
 who indulged in fancies not unlike his own, and with 
 whom he formed a lasting friendship. They could tell 
 legendary stories of marvellous events in the city annals, 
 connected with reputed wizards, noted eccentric char- 
 acters, and remarkable criminals, to which he listened 
 with avidity — as, for example, the story of Major Weir, 
 who, for the commission of a series of atrocities, was 
 condemned and executed in 1670, and whose house in
 
 LEGEND A R Y STORIES. 1 29 
 
 the West Bow enjoyed the reputation of being so much 
 under the dominion of evil spirits, that no person would 
 live in it for more than a hundred years afterwards ; — Or 
 the story of Deacon Brodie, a man moving in a good 
 position, who, having long secretly carried on a system 
 of depredations, was ultimately condemned and executed 
 for committing a burglary on the Excise Office, 1788; — 
 Or the still more curious story of a lad who, while under 
 sentence of death in the Old Tolbooth, escaped by a 
 clever device of his father, and lay for weeks concealed 
 in the mausoleum of the 'Bluidy Mackenyie,' where he 
 was secretly supplied with food by the boys of Heriot's 
 Hospital, till he escaped from the country. 
 
 By these varied means in his early youth, in the midst 
 of difficulties, Robert laid the foundation of much that 
 was afterwards of value in literature; although at the 
 time he was only satisfying a natural craving for what 
 was traditionally curious. Looking back to the days 
 when we lived together in the West Port, I cannot 
 recollect that he ever spent a moment in what was 
 purely amusing, or of no practical avail. Nor was this 
 a sacrifice. The acquisition of knowledge was with him 
 the highest of earthly enjoyments. It was well for him 
 that he had these soothing resources. What his trials 
 were at this time may be learned from the following 
 passages in a letter written by him, in 1829, to the 
 young lady to whom he was shortly afterwards married : 
 
 ' My brother William and I lived in lodgings together. 
 Our room and bed cost three shilHngs a week. It was 
 in the West Port, near Burke's place. I cannot under- 
 stand how I should ever have lived in it. The woman 
 who kept the lodgings was a Peebles woman, who knew 
 and wished to be kind to us. She was, however, of a
 
 I30 MEMOIR. 
 
 very narrow disposition, partly the result of poverty. I 
 used to be in great distress for want of fire. I could 
 not afibrd either that or candle myself. So I have often 
 sat beside her kitchen fire — if fire it could be called, 
 which was only a little heap of embers — reading Horace 
 and conning my dictionary by a light which required me 
 to hold the books almost close to the grate. What a 
 miserable winter that was ! Yet I cannot help feeling 
 proud of my trials at that time. My brother and I — 
 he then between fifteen and sixteen, I between thirteen 
 and fourteen — had made a resolution together that we 
 would exercise the last degree of self-denial. My brother 
 actually saved money off his income. I remember 
 seeing him take five-and-twenty shillings out of a closed 
 box which he kept to receive his savings; and that was 
 the spare money of only a twelvemonth. I daresay the 
 Potterrow itself never sheltered two divinity students of 
 such abstinent habits as ours. My father's prospects 
 blackened towards the end of the winter; and even the 
 small cost of my board and lodging at length became 
 too much for him. I then for some time spent the 
 night at Joppa Pans, and regularly every morning walked, 
 lame as I was, to Edinburgh to attend school. Through 
 all these distresses, I preserved the best of health, 
 though perhaps my long fasts at so critical a period of 
 life repressed my growth. A darker period than even 
 this ensued : my father lost his situation, and I was 
 withdrawn from a course of learning which it was seen 
 I should never be able to complete.' 
 
 Such is a fair account of the termination of Robert's 
 educational career. It can be supplemented from my 
 own recollections, as well as from some memoranda 
 which he wrote regarding this early period. When,
 
 DARKENING PROSPECTS. 131 
 
 after a due preparation at the academy of Mr ISIackay 
 (whose kindness was ever gratefully remembered by 
 my brother), the time came for attending the univer- 
 sity, for which a bursary had been vaguely antici- 
 pated, expectations of the bursary came to naught, 
 and all pecuniary means were now in a state of lament- 
 able exhaustion. Yet, to the last, Robert was buoyed 
 up with a hope that he would somehow be advanced to 
 the Humanity class in the college. His awakening from 
 this fond dream was correspondingly disapi)ointing. 
 The way in which, as an enthusiastic scholar, he was 
 restrained by poverty from going through a university 
 course is painfully depicted : 
 
 'Till the college opened, it was fully intended that I 
 should go to it ; and accordingly, when the day arrived, I 
 proceeded to that illustrious seminary of learning, along 
 with other boys who ranked with me at Mackay's, and 
 was present at the inaugural meeting of the Humanity 
 class for the season. The fees, however, were found an 
 insurmountable difficulty; and with feelings I shall not 
 ailcmpt to describe, I was obliged to turn back from a 
 course in which I saw so many of my companions about 
 to start, with every advantage in their favour, though I 
 was sensible that hardly any of them cared so much for 
 the pleasure of the race, or w^as so ambitious of its 
 eventual honours as myself.' Continuing for a short time 
 at the academy, he adds: 'At length, in the month of 
 April or May 1S16, I (quitted school for ever, my 
 parents having perceived that, since I was not to go 
 forward in a learned ])rofessional career, it was neces- 
 sary that 1 should ai)ply decidedly and inmiediately to 
 something else.' 
 
 At this sad downcome, there was mourning over the
 
 132 MEMOIR. 
 
 ruin of long-cherished hopes; and yet the circumstance 
 ought in reahty to have been a cause for rejoicing. I 
 greatly doubt if my brother would, according to ordinary 
 expectations, ever have excelled as a clergyman. He 
 was deficient in oratorical qualities, nor did he possess 
 to a sufficient degree that self-possession which is 
 indispensable to a successful public speaker. Nature 
 had destined him to wield the pen, not to live by 
 exercise of the tongue. In the meanwhile, he was 
 gready downcast. Returning home, his privations were 
 now greater than my own, for they were aggravated by 
 the spectacle of domestic troubles, from which, except at 
 weekly intervals, I was happily exempt. 
 
 Depressed, and it might be said friendless, with only 
 his Horace and a few other Latin books, over which he 
 would pore lovingly for hours, he was at this painful 
 juncture not unconscious that he should make some 
 sort of effort at self-reliance. He could arrive at no 
 other conviction. In the picturesque language of the 
 Psalmist, his 'kinsmen stood afar off,' a circumstance 
 which unhappily roused feelings much more bitter than 
 any experienced in my own less delicately framed 
 mental system. Sometimes wandering about with a 
 sense of desolation, he abandoned himself to an agony 
 of grief and despair. 
 
 For a brief space, he procured a little private teaching 
 at Portobello. Afterwards, a place was procured for him 
 in the counting-house of a merchant, who resided in 
 Pilrig Street, situated between Edinburgh and Leith; 
 but this involved a journey on foot to and fro daily of 
 altogether ten miles, with the poorest possible requital. 
 At the end of six months this employment came to 
 an end, and for a icw weeks he filled a similar
 
 A CRITICAL MOMENT IN LIFE. 133 
 
 situation in Mitchell Street, Leith. * From that place,' 
 he says, in the letter above referred to, * I was discharged, 
 for no other reason that I can think of but that my 
 employer thought me too stupid to be likely ever to do 
 him any good. I was now in the miserable situation of 
 a youth betwixt fifteen and sixteen, who, having passed 
 the proper period without acquiring the groundwork of 
 a profession, is totally hors de combat, and has the 
 prospect of evermore continuing so. I was now, how- 
 ever, at the bottom of the wheel. Now came the time 
 to rise. You have already some notion of my self- 
 denial and fortitude of mind. Now came the time to 
 exert all my faculties.' He then alludes to circum- 
 stances of which I am able to give a more explicit 
 detail. 
 
 At this dismal period, when, as he says, he was ' at 
 the bottom of the wheel,' I saw him only on Sundays, 
 and it was on such occasions alone that we had an 
 opportunity for private consultation. On one of these 
 Sabbath evenings, we sat down together in deep cogita- 
 tion on a grassy knoll overlooking the Firth and the 
 distant shores of Fife. The scene, placid and beautiful, 
 befitting the calm which seemed appropriate to the 
 day of rest, assorted ill with the pressure of those 
 personal necessities that demanded immediate and fur 
 from pleasant consideration. Jeremy Taylor has con- 
 solingly remarked, that ' there is no man but hath 
 blessings enough in present possession to outweigh the 
 evils of a great afiliction.' It may be so. I have no 
 doubt it is so. How the blessings are to be recog- 
 nised and brought into practical application, is some- 
 times the difficulty. In Robert's case, the blessings 
 might have been stated as consisting of youth, healtli,
 
 134 MEMOIR. 
 
 a fair education, moral and intellectual culture, and 
 aspirations which embraced an earnest resolution to 
 outweigh by honest industry the misfortunes into which 
 he had been plunged by no fault of his own. Evidently, 
 all depended on his being put on the right path. The 
 great question for solution was what he should do, not 
 only for his own subsistence, but to disembarrass the 
 family, in which he acutely felt himself to be in the light 
 of an encumbrance. 
 
 This was the critical moment that determined my 
 brother's career. I had for some days been pondering 
 on a scheme which might possibly help him out of his 
 difficulties, provided he laid aside all ideas of false shame, 
 and unhesitatingly followed my directions. The project 
 was desperate, but nothing short of desperate measures 
 was available. My suggestion was, that, abandoning 
 all notions of securing employment as a clerk, teacher, 
 or anything else, and stifling every emotion which had 
 hitherto buoyed him up, he should, in the humblest 
 possible style, begin the business of a bookseller. The 
 idea of such an enterprise had passed through his own 
 mind, but had been laid aside as wild and ridiculous, 
 for he possessed neither stock nor capital, nor could he 
 have recourse to any one to lend him assistance. ' I 
 have thought of all that,' I said, ' and will shew you how 
 the thing is to be done.' I now explained that in the 
 family household there were still a number of old books, 
 which had been dragged about from place to place, and 
 were next to useless. The whole, if ranged on a shelf, 
 would occupy about twelve feet, with perhaps a foot 
 additional by including Horace and other school-books. 
 They were certainly not much worth, but, if oftered for 
 sale, they might, as I imagined, form the foundation on
 
 ROBERT BEGINS AS A BOOKSELLER. 135 
 
 which a business could be constructed. I added that 
 there was at the time an opening for the sale of cheap 
 pocket Bibles, respecting which I could aid by my 
 knowledge of the trade, and even go the length of 
 starting him with one or two copies out of my slender 
 savings. 
 
 The project being turned over and over and canvassed, 
 proved acceptable. My father, so far from having any 
 objections, assented to the scheme. The old books, 
 Horace and all, were collected and carried off, the only 
 one left being an old tattered black-letter Bible, of the 
 date 1606, that had been in the family for two hundred 
 years, and which, with scribblings on the blank pages, 
 formed a kind of register of births, deaths, and mar- 
 riages during that lengthened period. Too sacred to be 
 ruthlessly made an article of commerce, it was fortu- 
 nately reserved, and in due time became my only 
 patrimony. 
 
 With the few old books so collected, Robert began 
 business in 18 18, when only sixteen years of age, from 
 which time he became self-supporting, as I had been 
 several years earlier. I should have hesitated to men- 
 tion these particulars of my brother's early career, but 
 for the fact of his having, in a letter to his friend Hugh 
 Miller, dated March i, 1854, and published in the Life 
 and Letters of that person (1871), given an account, 
 which, as a candid revelation of his own feelings, is fully 
 more painful. 
 
 Writing to Miller, he says : * Your autobiography has 
 set me a-thinking of my own youthful clays, which were 
 like yours in point of hardship and humiliation, tliough 
 different in many important circumstances. My being 
 of the same age with you, to exactly a cjuarter of a year,
 
 136 MEMOIR. 
 
 brings the idea of a certain parity more forcibly upon 
 me. The differences are as curious to me as the resem- 
 blances. Notwithstanding your wonderful success as a 
 writer, I think my literary tendency must have been a 
 deeper and more absorbing peculiarity than yours, seeing 
 that I took to Latin and to books both keenly and 
 exclusively, while you broke down in your classical 
 course, and had fully as great a passion for rough sport 
 and enterprise as for reading, that being again a passion 
 of which I never had one particle. This has, however, 
 resulted in making you, what I never was inclined to 
 be, a close observer of external nature — an immense 
 advantage in your case. Still I think I could present 
 against your hardy field observations by firth and 
 fell, and cave and cliff, some striking analogies in the 
 finding out and devouring of books, making my way, 
 for instance, through a whole chestful of the Eficyclo- 
 pcedia Britannica, which I found in a lumber garret 
 I must also say, that an unfortunate tenderness of feet, 
 scarcely yet got over, had much to do in making me 
 mainly a fireside student. As to domestic connections 
 and conditions, mine being of the middle classes, were 
 superior to yours for the first twelve years. After that, 
 my father being unfortunate in business, we were 
 reduced to poverty, and came down to even humbler 
 things than you experienced. I passed through some 
 years of the direst hardship, not the least evil being a 
 state of feeling quite unnatural in youth — a stern and 
 burning defiance of a social world in which we were 
 harshly and coldly treated by former friends, difl'ering 
 only in external respects from ourselves. In your life 
 there is one crisis where I think your experiences must 
 have been somewhat like mine ; it is the brief period at
 
 ROBERT BEGINS AS A BOOKSELLER. 137 
 
 Inverness. Some of your expressions there bring all 
 my own early feelings again to life. A disparity 
 betAveen the internal consciousness of powers and 
 accomplishments and the external ostensible aspect, 
 led in me to the very same wrong methods of setting 
 myself forward as in you. There, of course, I meet 
 you in warm sympathy. I have sometimes thought of 
 describing my bitter painful youth to the world, as 
 something in which it might read a lesson; but the 
 retrospect is still too distressing. I screen it from the 
 mental eye. The one grand fact it has impressed is 
 the very small amount of brotherly assistance there is 
 for the unfortunate in this world. . . . Till I proved 
 that I could help myself, no friend came to me. 
 Uncles, cousins, &c., in good positions in life — some of 
 them stoops of kirks, by-the-bye — not one offered, or 
 seemed inclined to give, the smallest assistance. The 
 consequent defying, self-relying spirit in which, at 
 sixteen, I set out as a bookseller, with only my own 
 small collection of books as a stock — not worth more 
 than two pounds, I believe — led to my being quickly 
 independent of all aid ; but it has not been all a gain, 
 for I am now sensible that my spirit of self-reliance 
 too often manifested itself in an unsocial, unamiable 
 light, while my recollections of " honest poverty " may 
 have made me too eager to attain and secure worldly 
 prosperity.' 
 
 The place at whicli Robert attempted the adventurous 
 project of selling the wreck of the family library, along 
 with his own small parcel of school-books, was Leith 
 Walk, where a shop of a particularly humble kind, at a 
 yearly rent of six pounds, with space for a stall in front, 
 was procured for the purpose. The situation of this
 
 138 MEMOIR. 
 
 unpretending place of business was opposite Pilng 
 Avenue. Here he may be said to have set up house, 
 for, provided with a few articles of furniture, and exer- 
 cising a rigorous frugality, he proposed to live in his 
 very limited establishment. To keep him company, 
 and aid by my professional advice, as well as lessen his 
 expenses, I went to reside with him — quitting, with my 
 blue painted box, my quarters in the West Port, for 
 which I entertained no special attachment. Unless for 
 the pleasure of associating with my brother, and talking 
 over our plans, the change did not immediately bring 
 any assuagement of condition. So miserably was the 
 place furnished, that the first night we had no bed, but ■ 
 lay on the floor, with a rug for covering, and a bundle 
 of books for pillow. Afterwards, a bed stuffed with 
 chaff made things a little easier, and, rolled up during 
 the day, the bed with its rug answered as a convenient 
 sofa. Rather a hard kind of life this ! In one sense it 
 was so, but I cannot remember ever caring much about 
 the hardship. The whole affair was treated as an 
 amusing adventure. The very shifts we were put to 
 had in them something to laugh at. There was likewise 
 an undefined but comforting feeling that by endurance 
 matters would mend, and so with modest trust, as 
 yielding to our lot, we cheerfully submitted to present 
 privations. The time was near at hand when I should 
 more than ever have to exercise a thoughtful degree of 
 self-reliance.
 
 CHAPTER VI. 
 
 MY OWN COMMENCEMENT IN BUSINESS — 1819 TO l82t. 
 
 T ATE on a Saturday evening in May 181 9, my 
 ^-^ apprenticeship came to a close, and I walked 
 away with five shillings in my pocket — to which sum 
 my weekly wages had been latterly and considerately 
 advanced. My employer, to do him every justice, 
 offered to retain me as assistant at a reasonable salary; 
 but I liked as little to remain as to try my luck else- 
 where as a subordinate. Whether influenced by my 
 father's harangues about indei)en(lcnce, or by my own 
 natural instincts, I had formed the resolution to be my 
 own master, and concluded that the sooner I was so the 
 better. And so, at nineteen years of age, I was left to 
 my shifts. 
 
 The exploit was somewhat hazardous, and unless on 
 special grounds, I would not recommend it to be 
 followed. Society is composed of employers and 
 employed. All cannot be masters. The employed may 
 happen to be the best off of the two ; at all events, they 
 are burdened with less responsibility. My resolution, 
 therefore, to fight my way, inch by inch, entirely on my 
 own account, was, I acknowledge, an eccentricity. Yet, 
 who can lay down any precise rule on this point ?
 
 140 MEMOIR. 
 
 Looking at all available circumstances, every one must 
 think for himself, and take the consequences. In the 
 ordinary view of affairs, my prospects were not particu- 
 larly cheering. Exclusive of the five shillings in ray 
 pocket, I was without any pecuniary reliance whatsoever. 
 There were, however, some things in my favour. As in 
 my brother's case, I had youth, health, hope, resolution, 
 and was as free from expensive habits and tastes as 
 from any species of embarrassing obligation. There 
 was nothing to keep me back, unless it might be the 
 comparatively narrow scope for individual exertion in 
 our northern capital. At that time, however, I knew 
 nothing personally of London and its illimitable field of 
 operation. The best had to be made of what was 
 within reach. Fortunately, I continued still to have 
 no acquaintances whom it was necessary to consult — 
 had no giddy companions, who would have been ready 
 enough to jeer me out of schemes of humble self- 
 reliance. I had no dread of losing caste, because I had 
 no artificial position to lose; and as for losing self- 
 respect, that entirely depends on conduct and the 
 motives by which it is influenced. It will be seen that 
 I was not without the kind of ambition which is indis- 
 pensable to success. On that very account, I treated all 
 immediate difficulties, or humiliations, as of no moment. 
 Circumstances concurred to get me over the first step, 
 which is always the most difficult. The success of my 
 brother in his enterprise pointed out a line of business 
 that might with advantage be followed. As Leith Walk 
 happens to be identified in an amusing way with his as 
 well as my own early career, I may say a few words 
 respecting it, although at the risk of teUing what may be 
 generally known.
 
 LETTH WALK. 141 
 
 Leith Walk may be described as a broad kind of 
 Boulevard, stretching nearly a mile in length between 
 Edinburgh and the seaport, and as being constantly used 
 as a thoroughfare by merchants, clerks, strangers, and sea- 
 faring people. In the early years of the present century, 
 it was the daily resort of a multiplicity of odd-looking 
 dependents on public charity — such as old blind fiddlers, 
 seated by the wayside ; sailors deficient in a leg or an 
 arm, with long queues hanging down their backs, who 
 were always singing ballads about sea-fights ; and cripples 
 of various sorts, who contrived to move along in wooden 
 bowls, or in low-wheeled vehicles drawn by dogs — all 
 which personages reckoned on reaping a harvest of 
 coppers in the week of Leith races — that great annual 
 festival of the gamins of Edinburgh, which has been 
 commemorated in the humorous verses of Robert 
 Fergusson. Besides its hosts of mendicants, the Walk 
 was garnished with small shops for the sale of shells, 
 corals, and other foreign curiosities. It was also pro- 
 vided with a number of petty public-houses ; but its 
 greatest attraction was a show of wax-work, at the 
 entrance of which sat the figure of an old gentleman 
 in a court-dress, intently reading a newsjmper, which, 
 without turning over the leaves, had occupied him for 
 the last ten years. 
 
 The oddest thing about the Walk, however, was an 
 air of pretension singularly inconsistent with the reality. 
 The signboards oft'ercd a study of the definite article — 
 The Comb Manufactory, The Chair Manufactory, The 
 Marble Work, and so forth, appearing on the fronts of 
 buildings of the most tnimpery character. At the time 
 I became acquainted with the Walk, it owned few 
 edifices that were much wortla. Here and there, with 
 
 J
 
 142 MEMOIR. 
 
 intervening patches of nursery-grounds and gardens, 
 there was a detached villa or a row of houses with 
 flower-plots in front. But the majority of the buildings 
 were of a slight fabric of brick and plaster, with tiled 
 roofs, as if the whole were removable at a day's notice. 
 There being no edifices, however mean and incon- 
 venient, which do not find inhabitants, these frail tene- 
 ments were in demand by a needy order of occupants, 
 whose ultimate limit in the article of rent was ten to 
 twelve pounds a year — fifteen a little beyond the thing 
 — twenty not to be thought of. 
 
 It was one of these temporary and unattractive build- 
 ings situated, as has been said, opposite Pilrig Avenue, 
 that had been rented by my brother, and it was there I 
 joined him in housekeeping, with nothing to keep but 
 the disconsolate walls and about ten shillings worth of 
 furniture, and at first, as has been said, scarcely a bed to 
 lie on. In 1819, Robert had to quit, in consequence of 
 the proprietor making repairs on the row of buildings, 
 and he removed farther down the Walk, to the street- 
 floor of a pile of buildings of a superior class, with 
 families of a respectable kind dwelling in the floors 
 above. 
 
 The alterations on Giles's Buildings, as they were 
 called, which Robert had quitted, were just completed 
 when I stood in need of some place where I could make 
 my first venture in business. Such a place I found 
 almost on the spot my brother had vacated. It was on 
 the east side of the Walk, immediately opposite the 
 avenue to Pilrig House, a fine double row of old trees 
 now superseded by a street. The changes that had 
 been effected partook of the usual character of the 
 neighbourhood — shabby pretension. The proprietor, a
 
 BEGINNING BUSINESS. 143 
 
 builder in Edinburgh, had accumulated a number of old 
 shop-doors and windows, which, dismissed as unfashion- 
 able and out of date, suited the locality, and gave a 
 genteel finish to the new fronts that were stuck up along 
 the row of mean brick edifices. Here was the shop I 
 selected — a place of very moderate dimensions, not 
 more than twelve feet square. For it I was to pay an 
 annual rent of ten pounds ; the possibility of my paying 
 any such sum being, I own, somewhat visionary. Hope, 
 however, was in the ascendant. 
 
 Without stock, capital, or shop furniture, my attempt 
 at beginning business would almost seem like trymg to 
 make something out of nothing. I admit, the problem 
 was difficult of solution. In one respect, it was fortu- 
 nate in the way of example that Robert had begun first, 
 but in another it was a disadvantage. In setting up, 
 he had cleared my father's house of all its old books, 
 which, though not many in number, or of great value, 
 still bore bulk so far, and, giving a face to things, served 
 for a not positively bad beginning. Coming later into 
 the field, nothing was left for me to lay hands on in the 
 like predatory fashion. I should doubtless, as a last 
 resource, have procured a portion of Robert's stock of 
 books, which, in the course of a year, had increased by 
 his industry to be worth above twenty pounds, but, by a 
 remarkably happy turn of events, I did not need to 
 encroach on his painfully accumulated property. 
 
 During the first week of my freedom, there arrived 
 in Edinburgh a travelling agent for an enterprising 
 publisher in London. He had come to exhibit to the 
 Scottish booksellers specimens of cheap editions of 
 standard and popular works. Until within a short time 
 previously, editions of the works of Johnson, Gibbon,
 
 144 MEMOIR. 
 
 Robertson, Blair, Hume and Smollett, Bums, and other 
 standard writers, had been a monopoly of certain pub- 
 lishers, who united to publish them, and gave them the 
 imposing name of 'Trade Editions.' Long out of copy- 
 right, these works were public property, and could legally 
 be printed and issued by any one, but not until now 
 had any one had the audacity and enterprise to disregard 
 the assumed etiquette of the profession, and print and 
 sell editions on his own account. In daring to break 
 down this monopoly, the publisher I refer to encountered 
 some abuse, which, however, did not deter him in his 
 operations. His editions, as a rule, were not so highly 
 finished as those issued under the auspices of the trade ; 
 but as they were sold at about half the price, they were 
 correspondingly appreciated by that portion of the book- 
 buying world who are not scrupulously nice as to 
 typographical elegance. 
 
 This active personage (Mr Thomas Tegg, Cheapside) 
 had another and quite as successful a branch of business. 
 It consisted in purchasing, wholesale, the remainders of 
 editions which hung on the hands of publishers, and of 
 issuing copies at a cheap price under new attractions, 
 such as a portrait frontispiece and a fresh exterior, by 
 which means two important ends were served — the 
 shelves of the publishers were relieved of much dead 
 stock, and the public were satisfied. 
 
 It was Richard Griffin, the agent of this tradesman, 
 who, by a singular accident, fell in my way. In con- 
 cluding his business tour, he had arrived in Edinburgh 
 to hold a trade-sale previous to proceeding to London. 
 A trade-sale, as it may be known, comprehends a dinner 
 at some noted tavern. A large number of booksellers 
 are invited to attend, and immediately after the cloth
 
 A TRADE-SALE. i45 
 
 is withdrawn, and the \v\ne decanters put in circula- 
 tion, the sale begins. All the guests are provided with 
 catalogues of the books for disposal, and as each work 
 is offered in turn at a specified price, copies are handed 
 about as specimens. The inducement to make pur- 
 chases is a certain reduction on the ordinary allowance, 
 and, in addition, thirteen copies are usually given 
 for the price of twelve. At the period to which I am 
 referring, trade-sales of this festive description were 
 more common than they are in these sober-minded days, 
 and at them such large quantities of books were ordin- 
 arily disposed of, that the seller, who acted as host, and 
 sat at the top of the table, did not find occasion to 
 grudge the expense of the entertainment. The business 
 was conducted with a blending of fun and conviviality. 
 There was occasionally a toast, with the honours, as an 
 interlude, and it was not unusual for one or two of the 
 guests to be called on for a song. 
 
 The sale on the present occasion took place in the 
 Lord Nelson Hotel, Adam Square. Mr Griffin requir- 
 ing some one acquainted with the handling and 
 arranging of books, previous to the dinner, heard of 
 me from a bookseller as being unemployed and likely 
 to suit his purpose. I agreed to assist him as far as was 
 in my power, and did so without any notion of requital. 
 
 The trade-sale was well attended, and went off with 
 uncommon klat. Mr Robert Miller, of Manners and 
 Miller, told his drollest anecdotes, whistled tunes with 
 the delicacy of a flageolet, and sung his best songs as 
 few men can sing them. There was a large sale effected; 
 for it was the first time that a variety of standard works 
 had been offered at considerably reduced prices. On 
 the day succeeding this bibliopolic festival, I attended
 
 146 MEMOIR. 
 
 to assist in packing up, in the course of which I was 
 questioned regarding my plans. I stated to the friendly 
 inquirer that I was about to begin business, but that I 
 had no money ; if I had, I should take the opportunity 
 of buying a few of his specimens, for I thought I could 
 sell them to advantage. ' Well,' he replied, ' I like that 
 frankness; you seem an honest lad, and have been 
 useful to me ; so do not let the want of money trouble 
 you : select, if you please, ten pounds worth of my 
 samples, and I will let you have the usual credit' 
 
 That was a turning-point in my life. In a strange 
 and unforeseen manner, I was to be put in possession 
 of a small collection of saleable books, sufficient to 
 establish me in business. Gladly embracing the offer, 
 I selected a parcel of books great and small, to the 
 value of ten pounds, which I proceeded to pack into 
 an empty tea-chest, and carry off without incmring the 
 aid or expense of a porter. Borrowing the hotel truck, 
 I wheeled the chest to my shop in Leith Walk ; elated, 
 it may be supposed, in no ordinary degree at this 
 fortunate incident, and not the least afraid of turning the 
 penny long before the day of payment came round. 
 
 Though furnished in this extraordinary manner with 
 a stock, I was still unprovided with any kind of fixtures, 
 such as counter or shelving. But this deficiency gave 
 me little concern. It was not my design to sell books 
 inside a shop. That, I knew, would never do. My 
 plan, like that of my brother, and also many illustrious 
 predecessors, was to expose my wares on a stall outside 
 the door. I had years previously read the Autobiog- 
 raphy of James Lackington, who mentions that he 
 began business as a bookseller in 1774, the whole of his 
 stock of old books, laid out on a stall, not amounting to
 
 STALL PUT OUT. 147 
 
 five pounds in value; that in 1792, when he retired into 
 private Hfe, the profits of his business amounted to 
 ;^5ooo a year; and that he had reaUsed all he was 
 possessed of, by 'small profits, bound by industry, and 
 clasped by economy.'' I could not possibly expect to 1 
 reach anything like this marvellous success of Lacking- 
 ton, but at anyrate there was an example offered in his 
 small beginning, which it was my resolution to follow. 
 
 There is an old saying, that ' we should not leave till 
 to-morrow what can be done to-day.' On this maxim, 
 I made the improvement of ' not leaving till the next 
 five minutes what can be done in the present,' and so 
 hastened to get to work with as little delay as the cir- 
 cumstances permitted. With the five shillings which 
 I had received as my last week's wages, I purchased a 
 few deals at a neighbouring wood-yard, and from these, 
 with a saw, hammer, and nails, I soon constructed all 
 the shop furniture which I required ; the most essential 
 articles being a pair of stout trestles, on which was 
 laid a board, whereupon to exhibit my wares to the 
 public. 
 
 Having at length prepared everything to my mind, 
 I was able one day, at the beginning of June, when 
 the weather happened to be good, to commence my 
 small business. Picture me, on a fine sunny morning, 
 planting a pair of trestles on the broad sideway in front 
 of my little shop, then laying on them a board ; and last 
 of all carrying out my stock of books and arranging 
 them in three rows — the smaller ones in front, and 
 the larger ones behind, with pamphlets embellished with 
 plates stuck alluringly between. The whole, I fancied, 
 made a respectable appearance, with a certain air of 
 originality. Hitherto, the book-stalls about Edinburgh
 
 148 MEMOIR. 
 
 had exhibited Httle else than old books, mostly purchased 
 at the nightly auctions. The best of the stalls was one 
 set up in the Grassmarket on Wednesdays for the 
 market-people, and there were likewise some attractive 
 establishments of this kind near the College and High 
 School, with which I had early become acquainted. 
 But, on the whole, including those on the Walk, the 
 staple commodities were books bound in leather, which 
 had suffered more or less from years of rough usage. 
 Whereas, all my books being new, and done up in 
 boards with white back-titles, as was then the prevailing 
 fashion, their appearance was suggestive of tempting 
 bargains. 
 
 Like an angler who eagerly watches his bait, I am to 
 be supposed as waiting patiently at my door ready to 
 be spoken to by intending purchasers — not obtrusively 
 so, for fear of scaring away the timid ; just hanging about 
 in an easy indifferent sort of way, within hail; but 
 nervously anxious when a passenger, after glancing 
 cogitatingly over my wares, took heart to ask the price 
 of any book that happened to strike his fancy. I enter- 
 tain a pleasant recollection of my first business trans- 
 action. It was the sale of a copy of Robertson's 
 History of Charles V., in five volumes duodecimo, a 
 rather neat but not fine edition of the work. At night, 
 I carried it home to the purchaser. My other sales 
 during the day were of less moment. They consisted 
 of a copy of Hervey's Meditations and a sixpenny song- 
 book. Altogether, I cleared a profit of nine shillings 
 and threepence the first day, which put me in high 
 spirits, notwithstanding some exhaustion of stomach ; 
 for I had been too anxious to think about any regular 
 dinner, and contented myself with a little bread and
 
 A SPECULATION IN FLUTES. 149 
 
 milk. In this self-sacrificing assiduity, however, I claim 
 no special merit. It is what every youth who has to win 
 his way can do if he likes. 
 
 Daily, the contents of the stall disappeared, and I was 
 able to introduce variety by buying parcels of books at 
 Carfrae's, which I regularly attended with my brother. 
 At this evening auction, I speedily became known to 
 the fraternity of stall-keepers, and was graciously acknow- 
 ledged by them as one of * the trade,' in which Robert 
 was already a recognised member. As regards the 
 account I had incurred, I discharged it when it became 
 due, and continued for some time to order and pay for 
 regular supplies. I added the sale of stationery to my 
 business, but the population around was limited, and 
 that came to little. I felt some pleasure in keeping 
 up a correspondence with Mr Griftin, through whose 
 considerate kindness I had been enabled to make 
 a commencement. Presuming on this intimacy, I 
 requested him to purchase for me three pounds' worth 
 of a cheap kind of flutes, which were sometimes inquired 
 for by seafaring men. The flutes, which were procured 
 from a maker of musical instruments in London, in 
 due time arrived, and the sale of them helped me a 
 little onward. Within six months, the most critical 
 part of my struggle was over. In a small but encourag- 
 ing way, I may be considered as having been fairly 
 established. 
 
 By studying to sell cheaply, my profits in the aggregate 
 were not great ; but along with Robert, I lived frugally. 
 Our united daily expenses in housekeeping did not exceed 
 a shilling. For years after beginning business, the cost of 
 my own living was limited to sixpence a day, and all that 
 was over I laid out in adding to my stock. As my sales
 
 150 MEMOIR. 
 
 were to a large extent new books in boards, I felt that 
 the charge made for the boarding of them was an item 
 that pressed rather heavily upon me. Why, thought I, 
 should I not buy the books in sheets, and put them in 
 boards myself? It is true, I had not been taught the 
 art of bookbinding, but I had seen it executed in ray 
 frequent visits to a bookbinder's workshop, and was 
 confident that if I had the proper apparatus I could at 
 least put books in boards; for that was but a rudi- 
 mentary department of the craft. The articles available 
 for the purpose at length fell in my way. After this, I 
 procured my books in sheets, which I forthwith folded, 
 sewed, and othenvise prepared to my satisfaction, 
 thereby saving on an average threepence to fourpence a 
 volume, my only outlay being on the material employed; 
 for my labour was reckoned as nothing. 
 
 In this droll scheming way, I tried to make the best 
 of my lot. The condition of the weather was an 
 important element of consideration. In fine days, the 
 Walk was thronged with foot-passengers, a number of 
 whom found some recreation in lounging for a few 
 minutes over my stall. If there was a prospect of rain, 
 they hurried on ; and when it became determinedly wet, 
 business was over for the day. I might as well bring in 
 my books at once, and try to find something to do 
 indoors. When the stall was not in operation, sales 
 were almost at a stand-still. Hundreds, I found, as 
 Lackington had done before me, would buy books from 
 a stall, who would not purchase them equally cheap in 
 a shop. The advantageous peculiarity of the stall is, 
 that it secures those who have formed no deliberate 
 intention to buy. Lying invitingly with their backs 
 upward, the books on a stall solicit just as much
 
 BOOK-STALLS. 151 
 
 attention as you are pleased to give them. You may 
 look at them, or let them alone. You may, as if by 
 chance, take up and set down volume after volume 
 without getting compromised. The bookseller, however, 
 is perfectly aware of what is likely to ensue. When he 
 observes that the lounger over his stall is not satisfied 
 with a casual glance, but goes on examining book after 
 book, he is pretty certain there is to be a purchase. 
 Continued inspection excites an interest in the mind. 
 There is perhaps no intention at first to buy, but 
 gradually the feelings are warmed up, and it is then 
 scarcely possible to resist asking the price of some book 
 which more particularly strikes the fancy. Asking the 
 price is equivalent to passing the Rubicon. After that, 
 the desire for purchasing becomes nearly irresistible. 
 Going into shops to buy books in cold blood is quite a 
 different thing. Before entering, there must in general 
 be a distinct intention to purchase. 
 
 Stall-keepers of all varieties know the value of the 
 obtrusive principle ; and it may be doubted if the 
 modern shop system is in most cases an improvement 
 on the old practice of exposing wares in open booths 
 along the sides of the thoroughfare. The original 
 Stationarii, who exposed their books at the gateways 
 of universities, immediately after the invention of 
 printing — what were they but stall-keepers? Did not 
 also many booksellers of good repute last century set 
 up stalls for the sale of their wares on market-days? 
 One does not read without interest the anecdote of 
 Michael Johnson, bookseller at Lichfield, who, being 
 unable from illness to set up his stall as usual at 
 Uttoxeter, requested his son Samuel to do so in his 
 stead, which request was refused, from a feeling of false
 
 152 MEMOIR. 
 
 pride; and how this act of fiHal disobedience, having 
 preyed in after-hfc on the morbidly susceptible mind 
 of the great lexicographer, he, by way of expiation, went 
 to Uttoxeter on a market-day, and stood in a drenching 
 rain on the site of his father's stall, amidst the jeering 
 remarks of the bystanders. There is something, there- 
 fore, like a classic authority for book-stalls. They remind 
 us of the infancy of printed literature and the usages of 
 an olden time. 
 
 The Walk offered uncommon facilities for the traffic 
 in which I was engaged. Long stretches of the. foot- 
 way from thirty to forty feet wide, admitted of stalls 
 being set outside the doors without obstructing the 
 thoroughfare. Some might think that they were an 
 attraction to what was otherwise a pleasant promenade. 
 The book-stalls were four in number — those belonging 
 to my brother and myself, and two others. They were 
 all situated on the shady side of the road, forming at 
 proper distances from each other a series of literary 
 lures, likely to be visited en suite. Interesting from the 
 diversity of their wares, they to a certain extent were 
 mutually helpful. There was nothing like a feeling of 
 rivalry among us. Accustomed to discuss professional 
 matters, we were able to cultivate a few jocularities as 
 a seasoning to a too frequent dullness. We learned 
 how to distinguish habitual nibblers, who never bought, 
 but only gave trouble, from those on whom we could 
 reasonably reckon for a purchase, and knew how to act 
 accordingly. The stall offered a study of character. 
 There was not a little perversity or stupidity to be 
 amused with. Some stall frequenters would buy 
 nothing but books which had been used. Defective in 
 judgment, they could not imagine the possibility of
 
 CALIGRAPHY. 153 
 
 getting a new book as cheaply as an old one. The 
 stall-keepers on the Walk found it necessary to humour 
 purchasers of this sort. It was not difficult to do so ; 
 they had only to cut up the leaves, and soil the outside 
 of a book, in order to make it thoroughly acceptable. 
 
 With all the diligence tliat could be exercised, there 
 was little scope for expansion in my small trade. With 
 every effort, time hung heavy on my hands. I fretted 
 at inaction. To relieve the monotony of the long dull 
 hours during bad weather, I took to copying poems and 
 various prose trifles in a fine species of penmanship, in 
 the hope of selling them for albums. It was assuredly 
 a weak resource, but what could I do ? If I spent days 
 over the manufacture of a few verses, which sold for 
 only a single shilling — it was employment — better than 
 sitting vaguely idle. 
 
 The notion of attempting to write in a style closely 
 resembling the delicate print-like lettering on copper- 
 plate engravings, occurred to me two or three years 
 previously. A retired naval officer in poor circum- 
 stances had written an account of his captivity in 
 France during the war, and raffled it for five pounds. 
 The penmanship was exceedingly elegant, and I felt 
 desirous to attempt something that might prove equally 
 tasteful. From time to time, I made attempts at 
 imitation, but never came up to the original. I had, 
 however, acquired a facility in the art. The work was 
 executed with a finely jjointed crow-pen on smooth 
 paper, ruled with lines for the purpose, and cost pro 
 digious care and patience, because any blunder would 
 have been fatal. Occupying any spare hours when the 
 stall could not be put out, and poring over a desk, I 
 was able to realise a few shillings by these laborious
 
 154 MEMOIR. 
 
 transcriptions. Wliat was of much greater value, these 
 little pieces of penmanship helped to bring me more 
 into notice, and to procure me the friendship of some 
 estimable persons. 
 
 A gentleman (Mr James Dallas) who happened to 
 see one of my specimens of caligraphy, was pleased to 
 think better of it than it deserved, and without solicita- 
 tion patronised my humble business establishment. He 
 was about to be married, and wished to procure a 
 quantity of books of a superior kind in the finest bind- 
 ings for his library. One day, he called to inquire as 
 to the practicability of my supplying his wants. Satis- 
 fied with the information, he gave an order of such mag- 
 nitude as astonished me, and raised serious doubts as to 
 how, with my miserable resources, it was to be executed. 
 Apprehending some difificulty on this score, he relieved 
 all anxieties by stating that I should bring the books 
 in parcels from time to time, and that each parcel 
 would be paid for on delivery. 
 
 This fortunate transaction gave me a lift onward, and 
 stimulated to new efiforts. The fact that I had un- 
 expectedly benefited in a large degree by a gentleman 
 seeing one of my small pieces of penmanship, suggests 
 the reflection, that in business, as in human affairs 
 generally, incidents which are seemingly insignificant 
 often lead to important results. Young men are apt 
 to treat what appears a small matter with indifference, 
 if not disdain, without being conscious that in commerce 
 nothing is small or to be passed over as of no moment. 
 I once heard a merchant who had risen to great wealth 
 say, that civility in serving a woman in humble cir- 
 cumstances with a pennyworth of tape, had led, by a 
 remarkable chain of circumstances, to dealings to the
 
 MINOR POETS. 155 
 
 extent of hundreds of pounds. In my o\rci case, as 
 just stated, a small piece of transcription with a crow- 
 pen had, by an unforeseen current of events, terminated 
 in a manner much more advantageous than I had any 
 reason to expect. 
 
 The progress I had made during the first year rendered 
 it expedient to procure an enlargement of my premises. 
 This being effected, I was able to appropriate a small 
 back-room as a dwelling, so as to be near my work — 
 the furniture as meagre as might be, for I could not 
 indulge in the luxury of a carpet, and was fain to 
 enclose my bed with a drapery of brown paper in place 
 of curtains. I was also enabled in various ways to 
 extend my business operations, and accommodate those 
 who did me the honour to call. Among these visitors 
 were several literary aspirants who hung about the out- 
 skirts of society. Few are aware of the great number 
 of poets in Scotland. Those whose names become 
 generally known are insignificant in number to tlie host 
 who are never heard of beyond the limited locality in 
 which they move. My brother's and my own literary 
 tastes, to say nothing of our connection with books, 
 made us acquainted with several poets of this order. 
 Among these, the oddest was George Galloway, an 
 aged shoemaker, who, deserting his last, had taken to 
 the writing of poems and dramas. His standard pro- 
 duction was The Battle of Lu near iy, vihxch. his admirers 
 thought 'almost' as good as Shakspeare. William Knox, 
 author of The Lonely Hearth and other Poems, was an 
 enthusiast of a different kind, but succumbed at an early 
 age to what were mildly termed his 'genial propensities.* 
 
 We were more happy in knowing intimately Robert 
 Gilfillan, still a young man, writer of some pleasing and
 
 156 MEMOIR. 
 
 popular Scottish songs, who had been bred in Leith as 
 an apprentice to a grocer, and had therefore undergone 
 that routine of duties which I had narrowly escaped. 
 He was a person of amiable temperament, simple in his 
 habits, with whom it was a pleasure to interchange 
 courtesies. I may say the same of Henry Scott Riddell, 
 who was numbered among our early friends, and has 
 left some singularly touching lyrics and other pieces. 
 
 There was still another of these geniuses, John C. 
 Denovan, an excitable being, who lived in a world of 
 romance strangely at variance with his actual circum- 
 stances. I first knew Denovan when he was a porter to 
 a tea-dealer at the foot of Leith Street Terrace, directly 
 opposite the spot where I had been an apprentice. He 
 was the child of misfortune. His father had procured 
 for him the position of midshipman, in which capacity 
 he made a single voyage and acquired notions of life at 
 sea. Then he was somehow deserted, and left to his 
 shifts \vith his mother, a poor abject being, to whom he 
 stuck to the last. In his reduced condition, he acquitted 
 himself honestly, but his wayward fancies did not square 
 with the difficulties with which he had to struggle. He 
 was always overflowing with allusions to Wordsworth, 
 Byron, Keats, and Leigh Hunt. A little crazy on 
 poetical subjects, he, by an easy transition, became half 
 mad on pohtics, and edited a weekly periodical called 
 The Patriot, which was desperately Radical in character. 
 One of its leading articles, I remember, began with the 
 portentous words : ' Day follows day, and chain follows 
 chain.' Yet Denovan was a harmless creature. His 
 poetical pieces were noticed with some approbation by 
 Sir Walter Scott, who, while visiting Ballantyne's printing- 
 office at Paul's Work, now and tlien, in a kindly way,
 
 PRINTING APPARATUS ACQUIRED. 157 
 
 looked in upon him at his den in Leith Wynd, where 
 he latterly made a livelihood by coftee-roasting, and 
 where he died in 1827. There was a little exhilaration 
 in having an occasional conversation on literary topics 
 with these writers. To a higher region we did not yet 
 aspire. 
 
 I still at odd times continued my labours with the 
 crow-pen, but at best this was a trivial art, and I had 
 secret yearnings to procure a press and t}'pes, in order 
 to unite printing with my other branches of business. I 
 partly formed this desire by having employed a printer 
 to execute a small volume, purporting to be an account 
 of David Ritchie, the original of the Black Dwarf, whom 
 I had seen when a boy in Peeblesshire. The success of 
 this enterprise, commercially, led to the conclusion that 
 if I could print as well as write my poor productions, I 
 might add to my available means. It would be enough 
 if I could procure an apparatus sufficient for executing 
 small pamphlets, and the humbler varieties of job- 
 printing. 
 
 For some time my inquiries failed to discover what 
 would be within the compass of my means, until at 
 length a person who had begun business in a way not 
 unlike my own, and constructed a press for his own use, 
 intimated his desire of selling off, in order to remove to 
 a distant part of the country. The whole apparatus, 
 including some types, was to be disposed of cheaply 
 by private bargain. The price sought could not be 
 considered excessive. It was only three pounds. To 
 set up as a printer on a less capital than this was surely 
 impossible. I paid the money, and became the happy 
 possessor. From that time, I troubled myself no more 
 with imitative print-writing. That branch of art was
 
 158 MEMOIR. 
 
 taken up and followed for a time by my brother, who so 
 greatly excelled in it as to leave my efforts far behind. 
 
 I hesitate to think that I acted properly in directing 
 my mind towards letterpress printing, while deficient in 
 capital to pursue the profession with any solid advantage. 
 My best excuse was the wish to occupy idle time. In 
 the mornings when the sun was up, I endeavoured to 
 make use of the daylight by reading and study, as I 
 had done formerly. Perusing the Spectator, I carefully 
 scrutinised the papers of Addison and other writers, 
 sentence by sentence, in order to familiarise myself 
 with their method of construction and treatment. But 
 beyond this I had little patience. I felt that the time 
 had come for action, and that every hour spent in doing 
 nothing was so much time wasted. Yet, with every 
 excuse, I have never ceased to be amazed at my pre- 
 sumption in trying, without any knowledge of the 
 typographic art, to set up with such miserable mechan- 
 ical appliances. Nothing more primitive had been 
 attempted since Guttenberg made his rudimentary efforts 
 in the art of printing. 
 
 At the risk of being tiresome, let me endeavour to 
 give an idea of this wonderful apparatus. The press, 
 which was constructed to stand on a table, consisted 
 of a wooden sole, with a carriage, on which the form 
 of types was to be laid ; and this carriage, or movable 
 part, required to be pushed forward and drawn out as 
 you would push and draw out a drawer. The power 
 consisted of an iron screw hung on a cross beam, sus- 
 tained by two upright supports. The handle was 
 attached to the upper and projecting end of the screw, 
 and had to be turned about twice with a smart jerk 
 before the pressure could be effected. The working
 
 MV PRESS AMD TYPES. 159 
 
 of the machine was slow and imperfect Owing to the 
 unsteadiness of the structure, the impression was far 
 from perfect. The extent of the pressing surface was 
 eighteen inches by twelve, equal to four octavo pages. 
 When the screw was brought to the pull, a jangling and 
 creaking noise was produced, like a shriek of anguish, 
 that might have been heard two houses off. The 
 impression being so effected, the screw had to be 
 whisked back to a state of repose. I had no table on 
 which to fix this frail machine, and placed it on a stout 
 wooden chest turned on its side, which in former and 
 more prosperous days had been used in my father's 
 house as a 'meal-ark.' 
 
 As regards my fount of types, it consisted of about 
 thirty pounds-weight of brevier, dreadfully old and worn, 
 having been employed for years in the printing of a 
 newspaper, and, in point of fact, only worth its value as 
 metal. Along with the fount, I had a pair of cases, in 
 which the letters were assorted. My bargain did not 
 embrace a frame or stand for the cases. That I supplied 
 by the ordinary resource of wood bought from a timber- 
 yard, and the application of my carpenter's tools. For 
 a small additional outlay, I procured a brass composing- 
 stick, some quoins and other pieces of furniture, an iron 
 chess, and a roller, along with a pound-weight of 
 printing-ink, I was now complete. 
 
 As soon as I had arranged all parts of my apparatus, 
 I looked abroad over the field of literature to see which 
 work should first engage my attention. My best plan, 
 as I thought, would be to begin by printing a small 
 volume on speculation ; sell the copies, and with the 
 proceeds buy a variety of types for executing casual jobs 
 which might drop in. A small volume I must print,
 
 i6o MEMOIR. 
 
 and finish in a marketable style, that is clear, in order 
 to raise funds. Fixed in this notion, I selected for my 
 first venture a pocket edition of the songs of Robert 
 Burns. This speculation was suggested by the fact that 
 a small-sized edition of these popular songs, executed 
 by an Edinburgh printer, had sold remarkably well on 
 the stalls, and had already become scarce. There was 
 room, I thought, for a little book of the kind. I 
 accordingly commenced to set up a volume of a similar 
 size; going to work on the songs of our national bard 
 with all the enthusiasm which these beautiful lyrics are 
 calculated to inspire — the very pleasure I experienced 
 in setting up song after song being a little detrimental, for 
 I hung delightedly over the verses, and could not help 
 singing them as I went on with the manual operations. 
 
 I had never been taught the art of the compositor; 
 but just as I had casually gleaned some knowledge of 
 bookbinding, so I had picked up the method of setting 
 types. When an apprentice, I had been frequently 
 sent errands to the printing-office of Mr Ruthven, in 
 Merchant's Court; the premises which, two centuries 
 previously, had formed the town mansion of Thomas 
 Hamilton, first Earl of Haddington, jocosely styled by 
 James VI. ' Tam o' the Cowgate.' In the fine old dining- 
 hall where * Tam ' had entertained royalty, I was, while 
 waiting for proofs, favoured with an opportunity of 
 seeing the compositors pursue their ingenious art, and 
 learning how types were arranged in lines and pages. 
 Recollections of what I had thus seen of compositor- 
 ship were now revived, and I began to set up my song- 
 book without receiving any special instruction ; my 
 composing-frame being placed in such a situation that I 
 was ready to attend to other matters of business. While
 
 PROGRESS IN COMPOSITORSHIP. i6i 
 
 SO occupied, I was visited by my old friend James King, 
 whom I had for some time lost sight of His taste for 
 chemistry had brought him into the employment of a 
 glass-manufacturer; and now, in connection with that 
 line of business, he was about to sail for Australia, 
 where a useful career was before him. He was amused 
 with, and, I think, compassionated, my feeble efforts. 
 We parted — not to meet until both were in different 
 circumstances, many years afterwards. 
 
 My progress in compositorship was at first slow. I 
 had to feel my way. A defective adjustment of the 
 lines to a uniform degree of tightness was my greatest 
 trouble, but this was got over. The art of working my 
 press had next to be acquired, and in this there was no 
 difficulty. After an interval of fifty years, I recollect 
 the delight I experienced in working oft" my first impres- 
 sion ; the pleasure since of seeing hundreds of thousands 
 of sheets pouring from machines in which I claim an 
 interest being nothing to it ! If the young and thought- 
 less could only be made to know this — the happiness, 
 the dignity of honest labour conducted in a spirit of 
 self-reliance — the insignificance and probably temporary 
 character of untoward circumstances while there is 
 youth, along with a willing heart — the proud satisfaction 
 of acquiring by persevering industry instead of by com- 
 passionate donation — how differently would they art ! 
 
 I think there was a degree of infatuation in my 
 attachment to that jangling, creaking, wheezing little 
 press. Placed at the only window in my a[)artment, 
 within a few feet of my bed, I could see its outlines in 
 the silvery moonlight when I awoke ; and there, at the 
 glowing dawn did its figure assume distinct proportions. 
 When daylight came fully in, it was impossible to resist
 
 i62 MEMOIR. 
 
 the desire to rise and have an hour or two of exercise 
 at the Httle machine. 
 
 With an imperfect apparatus, the execution of my 
 song-book was far from good. Still, it was legible in 
 the old ballad and chap-book style, and I was obliged 
 to be content. Little by little, I got through the small 
 volume. It was a tedious drudgery. With my limited 
 fount, I could set up no more than eight small pages, 
 forming the eighth part of a sheet. After printing the 
 first eight, I had to distribute the letter and set up the 
 second eight, and so on throughout a hundred pages. 
 Months were consumed in the operation. The number 
 of copies printed was seven hundred and fifty, to effect 
 which I had to pull the press many thousand times. 
 But labour, as already hinted, cost nothing. I set the 
 types in the intervals of business, particularly during 
 wet weather, when the stall could not be put out, and 
 the press-work was executed late at night or early in the 
 morning. The only outlay worth speaking of for the 
 little volume was that incurred for paper, which I was 
 unable to purchase in greater quantities than a few 
 quires at a time, and therefore at a considerable dis- 
 advantage in price, but this was only another exemplifi- 
 cation of the old and too well-known truth, that 'the 
 destruction of the poor is their povert)^,' about which it 
 was useless to repine. 
 
 When completed, the volume needed some species 
 of embellishment, and fortune helped me at this con- 
 juncture. There dwelt in the neighbourhood a poor 
 but ingenious man, advanced in life, named Peter Fyfe, 
 with whom I had already had some dealings. Peter — 
 a short man, in a second-hand suit of black clothes, and 
 wearing a white neckcloth, which he arranged in loose
 
 PETER FYFE. 163 
 
 folds so as effectually to cover the breast of his shirt — 
 was from the west country. He had been a weaver's 
 reed-maker in Paisley, but having been unfortunate in 
 business, he had migrated to Edinburgh, in the hope of 
 procuring some kind of employment. Necessitous and 
 clever, with an inexhaustible fund of humour, he was 
 ready for anything artistic that might come in his way. 
 Peter did not want confidence. I am not aware of any 
 department in the fine or useful arts of which he would 
 have confessed himself ignorant. At this period, when 
 few knew anything of lithography, and he knew nothing 
 at all, he courageously undertook, in answer to an 
 advertisement, to organise and manage a concern of that 
 kind, and by tact and intuition gave unqualified satis- 
 faction. Peter was just the man I wanted. Although 
 altogether unacquainted with copperplate engraving, he 
 executed, from the descriptions I gave him, a portrait 
 of the Black Dwarf, for my account of that singular 
 personage — which sketch has ever since been accepted 
 as an authority. 
 
 I now applied to this genius for a wood-engraving 
 for my song-book, which he successfully produced, and 
 for a few shillings additional, he executed a vignette 
 representing some national emblems. Invested with 
 these attractions, the song-book was soon put in boards, 
 and othenvise prepared for disposal. I sold the whole 
 either in single copies at a shilling, or wholesale to other 
 stall-keepers at a proper reduction, and, after paying all 
 expenses, cleared about nine pounds by the transaction. 
 
 Nine pounds was not a large sum, but it served an 
 inipoi-lunl end. I was able to make some additions to 
 my scanty stock of types, which I procured from an aged 
 printer with a decaying business. To be prepared for
 
 1 64 MEMOIR. 
 
 executing posting-bills, I cut a variety of letters in wood 
 with a chisel and pen-knife. For such bold headings, 
 therefore, as ' Notice,' ' Found,' or ' Dog Lost,' I was 
 put to no straits worth mentioning. One of my most 
 successful speculations was the cutting in wood of the 
 words 'To Let,' in letters four inches long, an edition 
 of which I disposed of by the hundred at an enormous 
 profit, to dealers who sold such things to stick on the 
 fronts of houses to be let. 
 
 Since the acquisition of a back-room, I lived entirely 
 by myself. The few articles of furniture with which my 
 dwelling was provided required no special care. Like 
 Robinson Crusoe, I contrived to live without any per- 
 sonal assistance ; but from previous experience, this did 
 not involve any sacrifice. I continued to live on the 
 plainest fare; used no tobacco, and neyer_tasted beer, 
 wine, or spirits ; nor did I feel the want of these articles. 
 There was no doubt a certain air of vacuity about my 
 poor domicile, but it was scrupulously clean and orderly ; 
 and, at all events, there was nobody to find fault with it. 
 There was one unpleasant drawback in domestic arrange- 
 ments. No water could be procured except from a cart 
 laden with a barrel from St Margaret's Well, which passed 
 along the Walk every morning, the driver blowing a 
 long tin horn to give note of his approach. The water 
 was sold at a halfpenny the pitcher. As may be sup- 
 posed, I was my own water-carrier. My brother, with 
 whom I had some pleasant consultations every evening, 
 on business and other afiairs, lived precisely as I did, in 
 his separate dwelling. 
 
 With enlarged accommodation, I commenced to keep 
 a circulating library, which, owing to the frequent issues 
 of the Waverley Novels, was tolerably successful. My
 
 PAINTmC THE SIGNBOARD. 165 
 
 first counter, which consisted of some rudely put 
 together deals, pasted over with pink blotting-paper, to 
 give it a look of mahogany, was now dismissed with 
 thanks for its services, and was replaced by a counter 
 of a more substantial and respectable character, which 
 I purchased for twenty shillings at a sale of effects. 
 About the same time, I bought a second-hand sign- 
 board of considerable dimensions. It had belonged to 
 a vintner, and required to be painted anew. This I 
 effected at a very small cost — little more than eightecn- 
 pence. My practice in writing letters to resemble print 
 rendered the painting a matter of no difficulty ; accord- 
 ingly, with some oil-paint and bnishes procured for 
 the purpose, I painted the sign-board in well-defined 
 letters in chrome yellow on a black ground. With a 
 presumption characteristic of the Walk, the inscription 
 announced that I was a ' Bookseller and Printer,' and 
 with this bold intimation, the huge sign-board was 
 hoisted to the tiled roof which covered my small 
 establishment, A great step in advance this. On the 
 whole, things were looking up. 
 
 All young men entering business are, I suppose, 
 haunted by advisers and gossips, who, leading an idle 
 kind of life, are glad to kill time in any quarter they get 
 encouragement. Loungers of this class were inclined to 
 honour me with their company, but I was too busy and 
 too anxious to make use of every moment of time to 
 greatly cultivate their acquaintance. Among them, there 
 was the aged military pensioner who pops about, and has 
 reminiscences of Walcheren ; the decayed ship-captain, 
 who, after being some time in the Oporto trade, has for 
 the last five years been ineftectually trying to get a post as 
 harbour-master 3 the broken-down merchant, who lives
 
 1 66 MEMOIR. 
 
 across the way (in dependence on his sons), and who, 
 being a determined humorist, has a faculty for making 
 satirical remarks on the by-passers. I can recollect 
 that one of this host of idlers was a habitual grumbler, 
 who, alarmed at the political aspect of affairs, prognosti- 
 cated the certain and speedy ruin of the country, and 
 earnestly and confidentially advised me to emigrate to 
 IHinois, or anywhere. I knew better than to apprehend 
 national ruin — and stuck on. 
 
 Through the agency of book-hawkers who purchased 
 quantities of my Burns's Songs, I procured some orders 
 for printing ' Rules ' for Friendly and Burial Societies. 
 These answered me very well. The Rules were 
 executed in my old brevier, leaded, on the face of half 
 a sheet of foolscap, and were therefore within the 
 capacity of my fount. A person who was a lessee of 
 several toll-bars in the neighbourhood of the city, found 
 me out as a cheap printer, and gave me a job in 
 printing toll-tickets, which I executed to his satisfaction. 
 Another piece of work of a similar character which 
 came in my way was the printing of tickets for pawn- 
 brokers. My principal employer in this line was a 
 lady whose establishment was a second floor in High 
 Street. She was a short, plump, laughing, good-natured 
 woman, turned of fifty years of age. Her family con- 
 sisted of a niece, who attended to business, and an 
 aged female domestic, who went by the name of 
 * Pawkie Macgouggy.' Pawkie, who had been a servant 
 in the family for upwards of twenty years, received me 
 when I called with a package of tickets, and kindly gave 
 me a seat in the kitchen till her mistress could be 
 communicated with. 
 
 The lady was so obliging as to shew me some
 
 
 ^f. 
 
 PA WKIE MA CGO UGG Y. 167 
 
 politeness, and then, as well as a few years later, I 
 learned a part of her history. She had tnnelled abroad, 
 and brought with her to Edinburgh a knowledge of con- 
 tinental cookery. With this useful acquirement, she set 
 up a tavern business in South Bridge Street, and there 
 she laid the foundation of her fortune by a dexterous 
 hit in the culinary art. This consisted in the invention 
 of a savoury dish possessing an odour which, it was 
 said, no human being could resist. To this marvellously 
 fascinating dish she gave the name of Golli-Gosperado. 
 The way she attracted customers was ingenious. Her 
 tavern was down a stair, and was lighted by windows 
 to the street, protected by iron gratings, over which 
 the passengers walked. Having prepared her Golli- 
 Gosperado, she put a smoking dish of it underneath 
 the gratings in the pavement. According to her own 
 account, the odour was overpowering. Gentlemen in 
 passing were instantly riveted to the spot. They 
 declared they must have some of that astonishing dish, 
 whatever it was, and at whatever cost, and down-stairs 
 they rushed accordingly. For a time, there was quite 
 a furor in the town about the Golli-Gosperado. The 
 happy inventor retired from the trade with so much 
 money that she was able to set up as a pawnbroker. 
 In that profession she was likewise successful, and 
 ultimately retired altogether from business to a villa in 
 the neighbourhood, where she died, being attended in 
 her last moments by the fiiithful and sorrowing Pawkie 
 Macgouggy. 
 
 A still better order than a batch of pawn-tickets 
 awaited me. A draper on a considerable scale, who 
 had known my father when in business, and sympathised 
 in his misfortunes, having learned thai I was carrying
 
 1 68 MEMOIR. 
 
 on a small printing trade, one day sent for mc. On 
 calling, I was introduced to this worthy old citizen 
 (John Clapperton) — a small-sized man of advanced age, 
 wearing hair-powder. After a little conversation regard- 
 ing my prospects, he gave me an order to execute 10,000 
 shop-bills, bearing at the top the words, in large Italics, 
 Fresh and Cheap. It was imperative that there should be 
 no alteration in the typography. For many years, the 
 bill had been distinguished by Fresh a?id Cheap, in this 
 style of letter, and I must on no account make any 
 change. I undertook the job on these conditions. 
 Before returning home, I went to my friend the old 
 printer, and bought the types of Fresh and Cheap for 
 a shilling. An ordinary printer would have set up 
 four sets of type, and executed the four together, which 
 for 10,000 copies would have required only 2500 pulls. 
 Having only one Fj-esh and Cheap, and no great stock 
 of letter otherwise, I threw off only one at a time, and 
 therefore had to pull the whole 10,000 in separate 
 impressions. I look back with satisfaction to having 
 carried home my work in bundles, and in receiving 
 payment from the venerable head of the firm. He 
 dismissed me with a few complimentary remarks, stating 
 1 p that there would be no fear of me if I kept steady and 
 I clear of debt. Kindly words of this kind from a man 
 - '-. who had himself surmounted early difficulties, helped to 
 fortify my resolution. I could not see into tlie future, 
 but it was obvious there were principles by which alone 
 I could reckon on any chance of success. 
 \ My means being somewhat improved, it did not 
 appear unreasonable that I should enlarge my stock 
 of letter, by ordering a moderate fount of longprimer 
 adapted for pamphlet-work, from an aged type-founder,
 
 AN AGED TYPEFOUNDER. 169 
 
 named Matthewson, who carried on business at St 
 Leonard's, and with whom I had become acquainted. 
 In his walks, he occasionally called to rest in passing, 
 and hence our business dealings. His cut of letter was 
 not particularly handsome, but in the decline of life 
 and in easy circumstances, he did not care for new 
 fashions. 
 
 Disposed to be familiar, Matthewson gave me an 
 outline of his history. He had, he said, been originally 
 a shepherd boy, but from his earliest years had possessed 
 a taste for carving letters and figures. One day, while 
 attending his master's sheep, he was accidentally observed 
 by the minister of the parish to be carving some words 
 on a block of wood with a pocket-knife. The clergy- 
 man was so pleased with his ingenuity, that he interested 
 himself in his fate, and sent him to Edinburgh to pursue 
 the profession of a printer. Shortly after\vards, he 
 began to make himself useful by cutting dies for letters 
 of a particular description required by his employer ; 
 there being then no typefounder in the city. While .so 
 occupied, he attracted the notice of Benjamin Franklin 
 on his second visit to Scotland. This was about 177 1. 
 Franklin was pleased with the skill of the young printer, 
 and offered to take him to Philadelphia, and there assist 
 him in establishing a letter-foundry. Matthewson was 
 grateful for the disinterested offer, of which, unfortu- 
 nately, for family reasons, he could not take advantage. 
 He set up the business of letter-founding in Edinburgh, 
 which he had all to himself until the commencement of 
 establishments with higher claims to taste in execution. 
 
 To vary the monotony of my occupation, I had for 
 some time been making efforts at literary composition. 
 It was litde I dared to attempt in that way, for anxiety
 
 I70 MEMOIR. 
 
 concerning ways and means impelled me to disregard 
 every species of employment that partook of recreation, 
 or which was not immediately advantageous. With a 
 view to publication at the first favourable opportunity, 
 I wrote an account of the Scottish Gipsies, for which 
 I drew on my recollection of that picturesque order of 
 vagrants in the south of Scotland, and also the traditions 
 I had heard regarding them. It was a trifle — nothing 
 worth speaking of; but being now provided with a 
 tolerably good fount of longprimer, also some new 
 brevier suitable for foot-notes, I thought it might be 
 made available. I accordingly set up the tract as a 
 sixpenny pamphlet ; and for this small brochure a coarse 
 copper-plate engraving was furnished by that versatile 
 genius, Peter Fyfe. It represented a savage gipsy-fight 
 at a place called Lowrie's Den, on the top of Soutra 
 Hill. The edition was sold rapidly off, and I cleared 
 a few pounds by the adventure. What was of greater 
 service, I felt encouraged to put my thoughts on paper, 
 and to endeavour to study correctness and fluency of 
 expression. The tract on the Gipsies also procured me 
 the acquaintance of a few persons interested in that 
 wayward class of the community. 
 
 My enlarged typographical capabilities led to new 
 aspirations. Robert, who had made corresponding 
 advances in business, but exclusively in connection with 
 bookselling, was occupying his leisure hours in literary 
 composition, which came upon him like an inspiration 
 at nineteen years of age. His tastes and powers in this 
 respect suggested the idea of a small periodical which we 
 might mutually undertake. He was to be the editor and 
 principal writer. I was to be the printer and publisher, 
 and also to contribute articles as far as time permitted.
 
 THE KALEIDOSCOPE. 171 
 
 The periodical was duly announced in a limited way, 
 and commenced. A name was adopted from the optical 
 toy invented by Sir David Brewster, about which all 
 classes were for a time nearly crazy. It was called 
 the Kaleidoscope, or Edinburgh Literary Amusement. In 
 size, it was sixteen pages octavo — the price threepence 
 — and it was to appear once a fortnight. The first 
 number was issued on Saturday, October 6, 182 1. The 
 mechanical execution of this literary serial sorely tested 
 the powers of my poor little press, which received sundry 
 claspings of iron to strengthen it for the unexpectctl 
 duty. My muscular powers likewise underwent a trial. 
 I had to print the sheet in halves, one after the other, 
 and then stitch the two together. I set all the types, 
 and worked off all the copies, my younger brother 
 James, a fair-haired lad, rolling on the ink, and otherwise 
 rendering assistance. 
 
 This was the hardest task 1 had yet undergone ; for, 
 being pressed by time, there was no opportunity for rest. 
 Occupied with business, the composing-frame, and the 
 press, also with some literary composition, I was in 
 harness sixteen hours a day; took no more than a 
 quarter of an hour to meals ; and never gave over work 
 till midnight. Sometimes I had dreadful headaches. 
 Of course, I do not justify this excessive application. It 
 was clearly wrong. I was acting in violation of the laws 
 of health. Enthusiasm alone kept me up — certainly no 
 material stimulus. My only excuse for this ardently 
 pursued labour, which must have been troublesome to 
 quietly disposed neighbours, was what at the same 
 period might have been offered by my brother for his 
 incessant self-sacrificing exertions — a desire to overcome 
 a condition that provoked the most stinging recollections.
 
 172 MEMOIR. 
 
 I should probably have broken clown but for the weekly 
 repose and fresh air of Sunday, when, after attending 
 church, I had an exhilarating ramble on the sands and 
 links. 
 
 Robert wrote nearly the whole of the articles in the 
 Kaleidoscope, verse as well as prose. My contributions 
 consisted of only three or four papers. The general 
 tone of the articles, by whomsoever produced, may be 
 acknowledged to have been unnecessarily caustic and 
 satirical. There was also a certain crudeness of ideas, 
 such as might be expected from young and wholly 
 inexperienced writers. Nevertheless, there was that in 
 the Kaleidoscope which was indicative of Robert's future 
 skill as an essayist; for here might be found some of 
 the fancies which were afterwards developed in his 
 more successful class of articles. In particular, may be 
 mentioned the paper styled the ' Thermometer of Mis- 
 fortune,' in which occur the ideas that were in after- 
 years expanded into the essay on the luckless class of 
 intemperates popularly known as ' Victims.' 
 
 This little periodical also contained a few articles 
 descriptive of a wayward class of authors in the lower 
 walks of life, written from personal knowledge, and 
 marked by that sympathy for the unfortunate which 
 characterised my brother through life. I feel tempted 
 to give one of these sketches. It refers to Stewart 
 Lewis, a hapless being Avith whom Robert had become 
 acquainted, when he himself was in straits previous to 
 commencing his small business. 
 
 STEWART LEWIS. 
 
 'It was towards the end of 1816, when I lived in a cottage 
 on one of the great roads which lead to this metropolis,
 
 STEWART LEWIS. 1 73 
 
 that I was engaged in a mercantile concern in the city, and 
 travelled thither every morning, and after the duties of the 
 day were performed, came back in the evening. I was one 
 evening, after my return, entertained by my mother with 
 an account of two extraordinary persons, who had called 
 during my absence ; and who afterwards proved to be 
 Stewart Lewis and his wife, travelling on an expedition to 
 Haddington, selling a small volume of poems which he had 
 just published. 
 
 *The appearance and singular manners of these visitants 
 were described to me in such terms of respect, as made me 
 regret my absence when they called ; and the volume of 
 poems which they had left, increased my desire to see their 
 author : for the acquaintance of a poet, and one who had 
 actually printed his productions, was at that time an object 
 of very great interest, and even curiosity. 
 
 ' On the very next evening, however, my curiosity was 
 destined to be gratified, for who should drop in upon us but 
 poor Lewis with his wife ! They had, to use the wife's 
 expression, " never been off their feet " since early in the 
 morning, and were very much fatigued accordingly. I was 
 then introduced to the poet ; and in the course of five 
 minutes, we were engaged in as sincere a friendship as if 
 we had lived together from infancy. Whether it was from 
 the naturally ardent enthusiasm of his temper, or a secret 
 instinctive discovery that I was afterwards to become one 
 of his own brotherhood, I will not, cannot, determine. From 
 what I can recollect of his appearance and countenance, 
 he was dressed in a suit of shabby clothes, mostly of a gray 
 colour ; his person was slender ; his face interesting, and 
 bearing peculiar marks of genius and intelligence ; his 
 forehead was high, his hair g^ay and thin, and he had 
 a countenance wrinkled with care, and squalid with poverty. 
 He never spoke but under the influence of a sort of furor ; 
 and he even did not return thanks for the favour of another 
 cup of tea without an excitation of feeling and expression, 
 which had in it something of poetic fervour. 
 
 I,
 
 174 MEMOIR. 
 
 'His wife was a little old woman, with no remains of 
 that beauty which had captivated the high-toned heart of 
 Stewart Lewis thirty years before. He had thus addressed 
 her, on the thirtieth anniversary of their marriage : 
 
 " Though roses now have left thy cheek, 
 And dimples now in vain I seek ; 
 Thy placid brow, so mild and meek, 
 Proclaims I still should love thee. 
 
 How changed the scene since that blest day ! 
 My hair's now thin and silver gray ; — 
 Though all that 's mortal soon decay, 
 My soul shall live to love thee." 
 
 She spoke in a low querulous voice, subdued in its tones by 
 a long course of misery. They addressed each other by 
 terms of endearment as strong, and spoke with as great an 
 affection, as they had done on their marriage day. An 
 instance of conjugal attachment has seldom been found 
 like that of Stewart Lewis and his sorrow-broken spouse. 
 He had addressed several poems to her, even in her old age, 
 some of which are eminently beautiful, and breathe the 
 spirit of as fond an affection as if they had still been the 
 accents of a first love, unbroken and unproved. 
 
 'They were much fatigued when they arrived ; but a 
 refreshment of tea soon revived their spirits ; and though 
 the success of their journey had been very limited, the poor 
 bard was soon elevated to a state of rapturous excitement ; 
 while yet in the intervals of his joy, the wife, who had less 
 of a poetic temperament, and whom misfortune had taught 
 the very habit of sorrow, would interfere, with a voice 
 mournfully soothing, and warn him of his inevitable griefs 
 to-morrow. 
 
 'After this, we had frequent visits of Stewart Lewis ; but 
 as these were generally through the day, when I was engaged 
 in the duties of my profession, I had little opportunity of 
 seeing him. He had left several copies of his poems with 
 us ; and I afterwards succeeded in disposing of a few to the
 
 STE WAR T LE WIS. 1 75 
 
 most poetical of the neighbourhood, which raised a small 
 sum. I then resolved to pay him a visit. My father accom- 
 panied me in this adventure, out of curiosity to see his 
 dwelling. After searching all the closes at the west end of 
 the Cowgate for his habitation, we were at length directed 
 to it by an old woman, who appeared like a corpse from the 
 grave, rising out of a low cellar in a very dark close — such 
 a pallid and wrinkled crone as I have seen full oft in my 
 antiquarian researches through the ancient lanes of the 
 town, emerging from her dark dungeon at mid-day to taste 
 one breath of a somewhat purer atmosphere than that of 
 her own subterranean domicile. With her shrivelled arm 
 she pointed up a narrow crazy stair which winded above 
 her head, and told us that the object of our search lived 
 there. We thanked her, and ascended. At the second 
 landing-place, we entered a dark narrow passage, from 
 which a number of doors seemed to diverge, the habitations 
 of miserables, and in one of which dwelt Stewart Lewis. 
 
 * On entering this wretched abode, we found the unfortu- 
 nate bard, with his son, a lad of seventeen, sitting at a table, 
 and employed in stitching up various copies of his poems 
 in blue paper covers. At our entrance, he started up with 
 an exclamation of surprise, and welcomed us to his humble 
 shed. I perceived, however, that his countenance presently 
 lost that bold smile of welcome, and his tongue that vehement 
 gush of poetical, enthusiastic language, habitual to him in 
 even the lowest occurrences of common life ; while his mind 
 seemed engaged in recollecting whether there was anything 
 in the house with which he might entertain us. I soon 
 eased him of his fear on that account, by laying in his hand 
 the small sum which I had collected for his benefit from the 
 sale of his poems. His face immediately assumed its former 
 smile, and after thanking me, he sent away his son with two- 
 thirds of the money to purchase whiskey — an act of improvi- 
 dent extravagance which I could not help condemning with 
 perhaps too great vehemence for a guest. He did not seem 
 offended by my remonstrances. It was obvious, however,
 
 176 MEMOIR. 
 
 that the cause of his miserable and hopeless condition had 
 been disclosed. 
 
 'After this interview, I never saw Stewart Lewis more. 
 His wife died shortly after, and he came to my father's 
 house in my absence, in a state of distraction for his loss. 
 He waited many hours for my return, but at last went away 
 without seeing me. The depth of his sorrow was intimated 
 to me in a way perhaps more affecting than any personal 
 interview might have been. He left a letter, in which was 
 written, in a hand which I could scarcely decipher, and in 
 characters which strayed over the whole page : 
 
 " My dear Sir, 
 
 I AM MAD. 
 
 Stewart Lewis." 
 
 'The affection which this poor man entertained for the 
 benign being who, for upwards of thirty years, had shared 
 with him a constant train of sorrow and poverty without 
 ever repining, had in it something truly romantic. She was 
 the first and only woman he had ever loved, and he always 
 declared that he could not survive her loss. Their love was 
 mutual, and her devotion to him had been often shewn by 
 more substantial proofs than words. 
 
 ' She had frequently, even when they were in a state of 
 starvation, worked a whole day at some coarse millinery 
 work to earn a sixpence, that she might, with mistaken 
 kindness, supply her husband with spirits. The unfortunate 
 habit of drinking intoxicating liquors, which he had acquired 
 after an early disappointment in life, never afterwards left 
 him ; and whether to drown reflections on his own misery 
 and blasted prospects, or to inspire him with the faculty of 
 versification, he found the indulgence of that propensity, as 
 he imagined, necessary to his existence. But never was the 
 brow of this woman clouded with a reproof of the cause of 
 all her sorrows, and a word of remonstrance against his 
 foibles was never heard to escape her lips. He has com- 
 memorated his unutterable affection in several beautiful
 
 STEWART LEWIS. 177 
 
 songs. In one, which he calls his "Address to his Wife," I 
 find the following pathetic verses : 
 
 "In youthful life's ecstatic days, 
 
 I 've rapt'rous kissed thae lips o' thine ; 
 And fondly yet, with joy I gaze 
 On thee, auld canty wife o' mine. 
 
 When fortune's adverse winds did blaw, 
 
 And maist my senses I wad tine, 
 Thy smilin' face drove ill awa', 
 
 Thou ever dear auld wife o' mine. 
 
 Lang round the ingle's heartsome hlazc. 
 
 Thy thrifty hand made a' to shine ; 
 Thou 'st been my comfort a' my days, 
 
 Thou carefu' dear auld wife o' mine. 
 
 When life must leave our hoary head. 
 
 Our genial souls will still be kin', 
 We '11 smile and mingle wi' the dead, 
 
 Thou canty dear auld wife o' mine." 
 
 After the death of his wife, he wandered all over Scotland 
 and the northern counties of England, reckless of his fate. 
 He lamented her death in ceaseless complaints, and seemed 
 careless of life. The remainder of the copies of his poems 
 which he had left with us — a considerable number — were 
 sent to him while he was at Inverness, and he subsisted 
 entirely on what the sale of them provided for upwards of a 
 twelvemonth. When weary of existence, and worn out with 
 fatigue, he died at an obscure village in Dumfriesshire, 
 about the end of 181 8. He left three daughters, none of 
 whom I ever saw, and one son, who had latterly been the 
 companion of his wanderings — a youth unfortunately weak 
 in his intellects, and of whose fate I have been able to learn 
 nothing.' 
 
 My brother's poetical i)ieccs were the best. Some 
 of tliem were toucliing and beautiful, particularly the
 
 178 MEMOIR. 
 
 address ' To the Evening Star,' which has been often 
 reprinted by compilers of vokimes of poetry without 
 intimating its origin, which is not surprising, for who 
 knows that the obscure periodical in which it first made 
 its appearance ever existed ? It may be given as a speci- 
 men of his powers of versification at nineteen years of 
 age. 
 
 TO THE EVENING STAR. 
 
 Soft star of eve, whose trembling light 
 
 Gleams through the closing eye of day, 
 Where clouds of dying purple bright 
 
 Melt in the shades of eve away, 
 And mock thee with a fitful ray. 
 
 Pure spirit of the twilight hour. 
 Till forth thou blazest to display 
 
 The splendour of thy native power, 
 
 'Twas thus, when earth from chaos spnmg. 
 
 The smoke of forming worlds arose, 
 And, o'er thine infant beauty hung, 
 
 Hid thee awhile in dark repose ; 
 Till the black veil dissolved away, 
 , Drunk by the universal air, 
 
 And thou, sweet star, with lovely ray, 
 
 Shone out on paradise so fair. 
 
 When the first eve the world had known 
 
 Fell blissfully on Eden's bowers. 
 And earth's first love lay couched upon 
 
 The dew of Eden's fairest flowers ; 
 Then thy first smile in heaven was seen 
 
 To hail the birth of love divine, 
 And ever since that smile hath been 
 
 The sainted passion's hallowed shrine : 
 Can lover yet behold the beam 
 
 Unmoved, unpassioned, unrefined ? 
 While there thou shin'st the brightest gem, 
 
 To Night's cerulean crown assigned.
 
 / 7^ 
 
 DESERTION OF THE WALK. 179 
 
 Since then how many gentle eyes 
 
 That love and thy pure ray made bright, 
 Have gazed on thee with blissful sighs — 
 
 Now veiled in everlasting night ! 
 Oh, let not love or youth be vain 
 
 Of present bliss, and hope more high ; 
 The stars — the very clods remain — 
 
 Love, they, and all of theirs must die. 
 
 Now throned upon the western wave, 
 
 Thou tremblest coyly, star of love I 
 And dip'st beneath its gleamy heave 
 
 Thy silver foot, the bath to prove. 
 And though no power thy course may stay. 
 
 Which nature's changeless laws compel, 
 To thee a thousand hearts shall say — 
 
 Sweet star of love, farewell, farewell 1 
 
 The Kaleidoscope did not last. It sold pretty well 
 but only to the extent of paying expenses, yielding no 
 reward whatever for literary effort. Yet it was not an 
 absolutely valueless undertaking. It was a trial of one's 
 wings, and encouraged to higher flights in more favour- 
 able times and circumstances. The concluding number 
 appeared on 12th January 1822. 
 
 From about this time, new and enlarged views began 
 to predominate. Through a fervid earnestness of pur- 
 pose, and the endurance of privations which were never 
 felt to be of any serious consequence, early difficulties 
 had been successfully mastered. Three to four years of 
 a funny, scheming, struggling, tolerably hard-working 
 existence — to be remembered like a dream or chapter of 
 a romance — had fulfilled every reasonable anticipation. 
 The Walk, we thought, had fairly served its day. With 
 sentiments somewhat akin to those of Tom Tug, in the 
 Waterman, when bidding a pathetic farewell to his
 
 I So MEMOIR. 
 
 * trim-built wherry,' we were disposed to bid an affecting 
 and grateful adieu to stall and trestles, and bequeath to 
 others the advantages, the drolleries, and classic associa- 
 tions of open-air traffic. Migration was accordingly 
 resolved on, and we had sundry communings as regards 
 where we should respectively attempt to establish our- 
 selves in Edinburgh. 
 
 The step was adventurous, but not unjustifiable. We 
 had, each in his own way, gained a footing, along with 
 some experience. Robert had not been disciplined to 
 business, as I had the fortune to be during an apprentice- 
 ship ; but he was tractable, open to advice, and through 
 sheer necessity he had allowed no opportunity to slip of 
 improving his condition by diligent attention to details 
 of a very humble kind. His accuracy was exemplified 
 by punctiliously keeping a regular account of his 
 business transactions, which has happily survived, and 
 can be referred to as an evidence of the way in which 
 he, little by little, accumulated means through a course 
 of self-denial and painstaking industry. It is vastly 
 interesting, at this distant day, to peruse the faithful 
 record of each day's sale of a few old books, with the 
 profit on each carefully noted, and the amount summed 
 up at the end of the week, during a space of several 
 years. The penmanship is neat; and the calculations 
 are executed with a precision which might ofier an 
 example to such beginners in business as are apt to take 
 a loose view of the relationship which should subsist 
 between income and expenditure. 
 
 An additional interest is given to the record by the 
 occasional entry of sums realised for ' Writing,' from a 
 single shilling to sometimes as much as ten to twelve 
 shillings. These entries signify that so much was gained
 
 A TASK IN PENMANSHIP. iSi 
 
 by executing small quantities of visiting-cards, inscrip- 
 tions on books, petitions, and poetic pieces in the minute 
 kind of caligraphy in which my brother excelled ; the 
 larger sums so specified being, of course, for what, 
 in the intervals of ordinary business, had involved the 
 labour of several days. The writing of ' petitions ' was 
 the most profitable of this kind of work, only it did not 
 come very often. On one occasion, we see an entry of 
 a pound for * Writing a petition,' the profit on which is 
 candidly set down at nineteen shillings and sixpence. 
 A great day that ! With such valuable extraneous aids, 
 Robert's general earnings were raised, as he takes care 
 to calculate by working out an arithmetical question at 
 the end of the book, to an average of one pound eight 
 shillings and threepence-halfpenny weekly in the first 
 half-year of 182 1. 
 
 An evidence of his painstaking assiduity at this period, 
 or shortly afterwards, has lately been presented in .a 
 communication to a Fifeshire newspaper, which I give 
 in an abbreviated form : ' Among the books required 
 for a public librar}' set on foot at Dysart, was Travels in 
 Italy, by Dr John Moore, a cheap second-hand copy of 
 which was found at the small establishment of Robert 
 Chambers, in Leith Walk. Unfortunately, the book 
 was incomplete. Four leaves at the centre of the volume 
 were missing. Anxious to effect a sale, Mr Chambers 
 engaged to complete the work. And neatly, too, he 
 did it. With a crow pen he ^v^ote in a manner to 
 resemble print the missing eight pages, and rebound the 
 book. The pages supplied by him are quite as easily 
 read as the rest of the text, and the whole transaction 
 offers a good example of the energy of purpose and 
 perseverance which characterised his successful career.*
 
 1 82 MEMOIR. 
 
 The volume which had been so ingeniously completed 
 to render it a marketable commodity, has been kindly 
 presented to me by the gentleman whose property it ulti- 
 mately became. It may be reckoned a 'curiosity in 
 literature.' The work of reparation must have cost 
 several days of diligent application with the pen, while 
 the entire price realised would at most be only two or 
 three shillings. 
 
 In the autumn of 1822 we had both a spurt onwards 
 from a wholly unforeseen cause, the value of which it 
 would be difficult to estimate. The extraordinary event 
 was the visit of George IV. to Edinburgh. How this 
 royal excursion should in any manner have influenced 
 the fortunes of two such humble individuals may appear 
 unaccountable. The explanation is simple. Taking 
 advantage of the general excitement, I worked night 
 and day printing off broadsides, popular songs, and 
 programmes of the royal processions, which sold 
 immensely. Robert participated in the windfall by 
 being employed by several public bodies to write 
 addresses to His Majesty in the peculiarly captivating 
 style of penmanship for which he was now in some 
 degree celebrated, through the recommendations of Sir 
 Walter Scott — the recognised mainspring of this exciting 
 national saturnalia. 
 
 The explanation so far, is, no doubt, simple enough, 
 but how did my brother, immersed in obscurity in Leith 
 Walk, become personally known to the author of 
 Waverley ? That needs to be cleared up. The inci- 
 dent has a tinge of romance, and curiously illustrates 
 how one thing may unexpectedly lead to another. At 
 this time there dwelt in Leith a good-natured middle- 
 aged man, a shipbuilder, by name Mr Alexander Sime.
 
 INTRODUCTION TO SIR WALTER SCOTT. 1S3 
 
 He had been educated at Peebles, and retained some 
 vivid recollections of the old burgh and its inhabitants. 
 One of his agreeable remembrances related to the 
 dancing-school, at which shone a pretty and lady-like 
 girl, Jeanie Gibson, the noonday of whose married life 
 had been clouded by a series of misfortunes in saddening 
 contrast with the bright anticipations of her early morn- 
 ing; and now, as he learned, her two elder sons were 
 pushing their way on as booksellers in Leith WalL 
 Sime's best feelings were interested. He made himself 
 known to us, and a cordial intimacy ensued. Through 
 him we became acquainted with Mr William Reid, a well- 
 known bookseller in Leith, and a person of singularly 
 genial disposition. Reid acted as a true friend. He 
 occasionally looked in upon us to ofier a word of advice 
 and encouragement, and was much pleased with my 
 brother's specimens of writing, one of which con- 
 sisted of a large sheet of extracts of Sir Walter Scott's 
 poetry. Desirous to be useful to the struggling youth, 
 Reid carried off the specimen to shew to his friend 
 Constable, then in the zenith of his power. This cir- 
 cumstance immediately led to an interview between the 
 great publisher and my brother. The following is the 
 account of what occurred, as given by Robert in the 
 memoranda which have been latterly recovered : 
 
 *It was proposed that I should wTite something of 
 the same kind in the shape of a volume, which I should 
 present to Sir Walter, with a letter of introduction from 
 the publisher. The matter proposed by Mr Constable 
 was the songs in the Lady of the Lake, which he seemed 
 to indicate as being the poet's pet compositions. In the 
 course of a few months 1 had finished my little volume
 
 i84 MEMOIR. 
 
 with a neat title-page, and it was sent to Mr Constable 
 at his own request, in order to be bound. It was not 
 till February 1822 it was returned, along with the 
 promised letter of introduction. Furnished with that 
 document, I proceeded next day to the poet's residence 
 in Castle Street, where I had the good-fortune to find 
 him in his study. He received me, as he received every 
 one who approached him, with a homely kindness of 
 manner which at once placed me at my ease ; and 
 having had the volume in his possession for some hours, 
 he was able to express his surprise, and also that of his 
 wife — for so he designated Lady Scott — at the extreme 
 neatness and minuteness of the writing. He said he 
 would place the book in his library at Abbotsford, and 
 he was sure it would be considered as not the least 
 curious of the many curiosities there deposited. He 
 then made inquiries respecting my occupations, and 
 having been informed that I dealt partly in old books, 
 requested that I would let him know when I happened 
 to possess any of particular rarity or value. After some 
 further conversation I took my leave, astonished at the 
 gentle and easy manners of a man whom I had been 
 accustomed to regard as a superior order of being, and 
 delighted with the reflection that I would ever have it to 
 say, perhaps many years after he should be dead and 
 gone, that I had seen and talked with him.' 
 
 For Mr Constable's kindness in introducing him to 
 Sir Walter Scott, my brother was peculiarly grateful, as 
 may be gathered from a letter addressed to him, dated 
 'Leith Walk, 25th February 1821.' The letter is 
 embraced in the interesting work on his father by Mr 
 Thomas Constable. After some enthusiastic expressions 
 of gratitude, he adds :
 
 VISIT TO SIR WALTER SCOTT. 185 
 
 ' I took the letter of introduction which you so kindly 
 transmitted by Mr Reid, to Sir Walter Scott on Tuesday 
 last, and was received by that gentleman in a manner so 
 flattering, so condescending, so truly polite (and his polite- 
 ness is the very essence of benevolence), that I could 
 scarcely believe that I was the real object of so much 
 attention, but rather that I was only acting some imaginary 
 part in the pageant of a dream ! He praised my penman- 
 ship so highly that I almost grew ashamed to hear one who 
 is himself so far removed above all minute ingenuities 
 become the flatterer of a merely tasteful curiosity. He had 
 also shewn it to Lady Scott and to several of his friends, 
 who all honoured it with the same commendation. I am 
 now somewhat afraid that I stayed too long, for he rose 
 first, as a signal for breaking up the interview, though I was 
 not with him more than a quarter of an hour. I hope, 
 however, if I have been guilty there, that really my excuse 
 will readily be found in my only having endeavoured to take 
 as long a draught as possible of the rich and bewitching 
 bowl of his presence. In this interview, the enthusiastic 
 wish of several years has been gratified — I have seen and 
 spoken to Sir Walter Scott, and, like the comet which travels 
 to the sun once in a thousand years, and lays in such a stock 
 of heat and blazing glories as serves it in all its wander- 
 ings through the coldest bounds of its orbit, I have received 
 so much reflected greatness from my own near approach to 
 this centre of the literary system, that the experience of a 
 century of mere common prose life could scarcely expend it. 
 
 * I hope, sir, that you will give me willing credit for my 
 feelings when I declare that all the gratification of pride 
 and ambition of distinction as an artist, and all the gracious 
 circumstance of being noticed by the kindness of Sir 
 Walter Scott, scarcely brought me half so satisfying and 
 sincere a pleasure as the way in which my mother was 
 elated by my honours, and participated in my feelings on the 
 occasion. The first was a pleasure peculiarly of the soul, 
 but this was a pleasure of the heart. Of all friends, a
 
 1 86 MEMOIR. 
 
 mother is the most sympathising, whether in adversity or 
 
 prosperity ; there is nothing could make her so happy as 
 
 the honourable distinction of her son, and nothing so 
 miserable as his debasement.' 
 
 Some few additional particulars of the acquaintanceship 
 with Sir Walter, so begun, are gathered from a letter 
 which Robert wrote to Thomas Scott, a humble friend, 
 a native of Roxburghshire, who had come about him 
 at his small place of business, and to whom he afterwards 
 freely communicated his thoughts on literary subjects. 
 In the letter, which is dated from '32 Leith Walk, 14th 
 July 1822, opposite the Botanic Gardens,' to which he 
 had lately removed in order to be nearer Edinburgh, he 
 mentions being visited by Alexander Campbell, editor 
 of Albyn's Anthology, who had called at the request of 
 Sir Walter — perhaps not alone to pay a compliment, 
 but to see the nature of the young bookseller's establish- 
 ment. Campbell, a worthy man, seems to have been 
 saddened with the aspect of affairs — a mean low-roofed 
 building with a book-stall at the door ; in the meagre 
 interior, a modest and light-haired youth, poorly clad, 
 apparently friendless so far as any substantial benefit 
 was concerned, diligently exerting himself to eke out a 
 slender means of subsistence by executing a scrap of 
 ornamental caligraphy with a crow pen, the paper being 
 laid on a shop shutter which was propped up to answer 
 the purpose of a desk on the small counter. The old 
 man's feelings were touched. The ingenuous youth, 
 so tasking himself, surely deserved something better. 
 Looking around him, and entering into conversation, 
 Mr Campbell ventured to hint that by a proper appli- 
 cation to Sir Walter, my brother could easily procure a 
 means of livelihood superior to that which he now
 
 A BUSINESS MISSIVE. 187 
 
 possessed. In a spirit of that delicacy and independ- 
 ence for which he was signahsed, the hint was gently 
 but firmly repudiated. He says, in describing the scene : 
 * I declined the well-meant proposal. I feel that 
 degradation and misery would be preferable to demean- 
 ing myself in the eyes of so great a man. Sir Walter 
 Scott has so many claimants on his generosity, and is 
 troubled by so many unreasonable requests, that I, with 
 all my necessities, would feel degraded to invite his assist- 
 ance, or even to anticipate by one moment the desire he 
 might conceive for favouring me. The thought would 
 be truly intolerable.' 
 
 In short, Robert was resolved to fight on and trust to 
 circumstances, in preference to putting himself in the 
 light of a petitioner. He would drudge, labour, sufifer 
 — almost starve, as some might think — but even in the 
 gloom which shrouded him, he was too proud to petition 
 for special favour. He venerated Sir Walter Scott almost 
 to adoration, but he disdained to trouble him with his 
 necessities, or to encroach on his beneficence. What a 
 lesson to the young, who are inconsiderately prone to be 
 on the outlook for patrons, it may be at the sacrifice of 
 personal independence along with a lifelong feeling of 
 abasement 1 We shall see that the self-reliant policy 
 proved quite as successful as it was commendable. 
 
 Following on the account of the interview with 
 Campbell, Robert narrates what took place at a busi- 
 ness mission to Sir Walter Scott, at his town residence, 
 39 Castle Street. ' I called,' he says, ' on Sir Walter 
 last Wednesday, with the purpose of shewing him a few 
 curious old books, and a catalogue of more which I 
 happened to have the power of selling. He made an 
 apology for never having come down the Walk to see
 
 1 88 MEMOIR. 
 
 me as he promised ; and bought the two volumes I had 
 taken with me ; besides desiring me to bring up some, 
 which he pointed out in the hst, next morning at nine 
 o'clock. I was punctual, you may be sure, to my 
 appointment ; and had the happiness of seeing him 
 again in his own study. I stood within two feet of a 
 sheet of paper, which he had written about half down 
 the page. Perhaps it was the next new novel ! He 
 bought other three volumes, giving me an excellent 
 price. I paste a small piece of a bank-note which I got 
 out of his own hand upon the present letter. \Here a 
 stnall trians;ular piece of dingy paper cut from the cor7ier of 
 a Scotch poujid-note is stuck by wax on the letter^ I need 
 not tell you to regard it with veneration, and to preserve 
 it with reverence. It would be a loss of twenty shillings 
 to me, if I were to confer the same favour upon other 
 thirty of my poetical, enthusiastic friends ! The most 
 important and remarkable circumstance of this interview, 
 was Sir Walter saying very kindly : " I shall always be 
 very happy to hear from you, Mr Chambers, and to take 
 an interest in your welfare." After which he good- 
 morningised me out of the room. He seems confused 
 in speaking, and forgets by the end of a topic what he 
 said at the beginning ; as if he were fretting with impa- 
 tience to get people away, and to sit down to his eternal 
 task again. I did not see him above seven or eight 
 minutes.' 
 
 These are trivial but not uninteresting memorials of 
 an opening intercourse which ripened into an intimacy 
 with the greatest of modern Scotsmen. The worst part 
 of Robert's early struggle was about over. The dark 
 cloud was passing away. The visit of George IV. to 
 Edinburgh in August 1822, brought a windfall, as has
 
 MOVING TOWARDS THE FRONT. 1S9 
 
 been stated, to the painstaking youth. Sir Walter 
 Scott, remembering his ability as a penman, zealously 
 promoted his interests in this direction. For a time, 
 he was kept busily employed in writing addresses to 
 the king ; besides which he was commissioned by Sir 
 Walter to transcribe into a volume, similar to the 
 So7igs in the Lady of the Lake, the best of the poetical 
 effusions that had been poured out on the occasion. 
 By these several means his position was so materially 
 improved, that his originally small stock had now 
 increased to be worth about two hundred pounds; 
 and, thanks to the superhuman work at the hand-press, 
 I had made a similar, if not greater advance. There 
 were, accordingly, some grounds for our resolving to 
 move a little towards the front. In 1S23, my brother 
 removed to India Place ; and about the same time 
 I removed to Broughton Street; both places, as we 
 diffidently ventured to hope, being intermediate to 
 something better.
 
 CHAPTER VII. 
 
 Robert's writings — 1822 to 1832. 
 
 A /f Y brother's literary efforts had hitherto been on a 
 ^ ^ hmited scale. He had composed some pieces, 
 remarkable, perhaps, for his years and the untoward 
 circumstances in which he was placed ; but, except by 
 a few acquaintances, none augured that he would make 
 any progress as an author. His first production, not a 
 very high flight, was entitled Illustraiions of the Author 
 of Waverley. It consisted of short sketches of several 
 individuals, chiefly connected with the south of Scot- 
 land, popularly believed to have been the originals of 
 characters in the earlier fictions of Sir Walter Scott, 
 as, for example, Davie Gellatley, Dominie Sampson, 
 Meg Merrilies, and Dandie Dinmont. The south- 
 country people who came about us formed a convenient 
 source of information on the subject. 
 
 As in the case of young writers with their first pro- 
 ductions, Robert was in a difiiculty about a publisher 
 for his Illustrations. He or I in our humble way 
 of business could scarcely be thought of. Interested in 
 all we were about, and anxious for our advancement, my 
 mother was of opinion that Mr Constable, for whom
 
 ROBERTS FIRST WORK. 191 
 
 she entertained a high opinion, should be applied to. 
 Robert, accordingly, after having matured his plan, 
 ventured to write to that eminent bookseller, asking 
 his advice and assistance. The letter, dated from 
 Leith Walk, 13th May 1822, affords a good idea of that 
 earnestness of purpose which animated my brother 
 at the outset of his literary career, and which indeed 
 carried him tlirough life. Addressing Mr Constable, 
 he says : 
 
 * Since I concluded the long task of writing the songs 
 in the Lady of the Lake which, through your kind means, 
 I am proud to acknowledge, has turned out so happily for 
 me, I have again resumed the literary pursuits which had 
 been then, and frequently before, interrupted by the less 
 favourite practice of ornamental penmanship ; and have 
 now nearly finished a work which, in my opinion, would 
 excite a pretty high interest in the world, if ushered forth 
 in the proper manner, which it would require either your 
 interfering attention to assist, or your name to render 
 respectable. 
 
 ' I have myself employed much labour of research, and 
 have engaged in the same cause many friends in the coimtr)^, 
 who have better opportunities in discovering the originals of 
 characters supposed to be fictitiously described in the works 
 of the author of Wavcrley j and I have already prepared a 
 considerable number of notices and anecdotes of such as I 
 have been so fortunate as to find, which are certainly of a 
 very amusing and humorous nature. I include in the design 
 descriptions of real scenes, manners, and incidents, intro- 
 duced into these glorious productions, and historical sketches 
 of remarkable personages, upon whose actions some of them 
 have been so interestingly founded. 
 
 'The performance of this work I will execute with such 
 an absolute abstraction from all catchpenny or invidious 
 intents, that none of its information can ever at all tend to 
 deteriorate the fame or character of our national novelist in
 
 192 MEMOIR. 
 
 regard to his being an author oi purely original conceptions, 
 but will rather appear as a series of entertaining stories and 
 anecdotes, which derive their chief and most immediate 
 interest from their reference to these works, and are other- 
 wise wholly abstract, independent, and relying on their own 
 deserts. . . . 
 
 * I had proposed the printing of this work to my brother, 
 who has lately, with an ingenuity that does him honour, 
 taken up that trade at his own hand ; and he so far encour- 
 aged my design as to agree to throw off a thousand copies 
 for the consideration of a third part of the impression. 
 But upon second, or rather I should say sixtieth thoughts, I 
 found out that to print it at such an obscure place as Leith 
 Walk, and to publish it at the shop of such an unheard-of 
 bookseller as your humble servant, would be at once to 
 stamp it with ignominy, or what is precisely the same thing, 
 obscurity. Wherefore, I have now, by the advice of my 
 mother — who wonders, good woman, what can have set me 
 upon such high designs against the world — to go at once 
 to the fountain-head of respectability, and proffer the fruits 
 of my industry to you. 
 
 ' I do not myself entertain the slightest doubt that you 
 could bring my intentions to a profitable issue ; but objec- 
 tions may perhaps occur to you which I am too nearly 
 interested to observe. You may perhaps, however, be able 
 to favour me with your advice in the affair, at all events, if 
 with that alone I am to be content. 
 
 ' You will do me infinite happiness by writing to me as 
 soon as convenient. Should you be so kind as desire it, I 
 can hand you a specimen of any of my manuscript imme- 
 diately ; and I could have the whole work ready for the 
 press in two, or at farthest three months from this date. — In 
 the meanwhile, I remain, sir, your most humble servant, 
 
 Robert Chambers.' 
 
 The attempt to induce Mr Constable to launch the 
 Illustrations, failed, and Robert was left no other resource
 
 ILLUSTRATIONS OF AUTHOR OF WAVERLEY. i93 
 
 than to engage me as publisher as well as printer, and I 
 may add bookbinder ; for, after setting the types (in my 
 best long-primer), and working off the impression, con- 
 sisting of a thousand copies, I put the whole in boards 
 with a pinkish paper cover and white back-title. The 
 small volume was embellished with a likeness of Rob 
 Roy, produced from a copper-plate bought cheap from 
 an engraver. Such was my brother's first book, the 
 Illustrations of the Author of Waverley. Though far from 
 being attractive in appearance, it was well received. 
 The copies printed were sold off to some pecuniary 
 advantage, and the writer won that amount of reputation 
 which encouraged him to persevere in his etilbrts. He 
 had fortunately brought himself into the notice of an 
 Edinburgh publisher, who undertook to bring out the 
 book in better style. A second and more extended 
 edition was therefore issued in 1824, and it helped 
 materially to improve Robert's chances as an author. 
 In this new edition of the Illustrations, the likeness of 
 Rob Roy was dismissed ; its place as a frontispiece being 
 taken by an engraving of Sir Walter Scott, but with the 
 face hid by a curtain — a hint as to who was the Great 
 Unknown. 
 
 In a book which speculated on the identification of 
 actual scenes, incidents, and characters with what had 
 given rise to the fictions of the novelist, it would have 
 been strange if the writer had not sometimes gone a 
 little wide of the mark. According to the Introduction 
 to tlie annotated edition of the Monastery, an erroneous 
 conjecture had been hazarded respecting Captain 
 Clutterbuck, who, not a little to the surprise uf Sir 
 Walter, was identified with a friend and neighbour of 
 his own. Apart, however, from misapprehensions of
 
 194 MEMOIR. 
 
 this kind, the TUustrations pointed, in a wonderfully 
 correct manner, at the originals of some of the principal 
 characters in the earlier novels, and contained some 
 amusing sketches, the result of observation. 
 
 Among the persons by whom my brother was aided 
 in gathering together materials for the Illustrations was 
 Thomas Scott, already mentioned as being a native of 
 Roxburghshire, who came about him while in Leith Walk, 
 and to whom he afterwards wrote a number of letters, 
 which were long fondly cherished, and have latterly and 
 unexpectedly come into my possession. In one of these 
 letters, dated 1820, he speaks of a widow lady and her 
 daughters who inhabited the floor immediately over his 
 place of business, and with whom, through kindred 
 musical tastes, he happened to become acquainted. The 
 young ladies, as we learn, sang and played on the piano- 
 forte beautifully, and their singing was listened to by 
 my brother as if coming from a choir of angels. The 
 performances of Lilias, one of these youthful divinities — 
 there is always 07ie who reaches perfection — conveyed 
 the most delightful sensations. When at night, he lay 
 down in his dingy back-room, and heard the warbling 
 of Lilias overhead, he could scarcely do less than give 
 utterance to his feelings in a poetical effusion, a copy of 
 which appears in his letter to Scott: 
 
 LINES ON HEARING A LADY SINGING. 
 
 When balmy sleep, in gloom of night, 
 
 My life from all it was redeemed, 
 I dreamed a dream of fond delight. 
 
 For scarce a waking bliss it seemed. 
 I heard a voice that softly sung 
 
 A strain I knew, but could not nnnae, 
 And aye, methought, I knew the tongue 
 
 From whence the mellow music came.
 
 STORY OF LEILA. i95 
 
 It rose, it fell, it died away 
 
 Upon the rapture-feasted ear. 
 But still the breeze that murmured by, 
 
 Came fraught with sounds I strained to hear. 
 It rose again, a gentle swell 
 
 Of Nature's purest melody ; 
 And every former sound was still, 
 
 Save that alone so dear to me. 
 
 Robert's acquaintance with this accompHshed musical 
 family was not broken off by his removal to Edinburgh- 
 It continued for some time, during which Lilias was the 
 inspiring heroine of a poetical effusion more tender than 
 the preceding, and a copy of which is procured from his 
 correspondence with William Wilson, another early 
 acquaintance. Wilson was a young man of about his 
 own age, who had similar poetical and archKological 
 tastes, and for a time edited a literary periodical in 
 Dundee. Between the two there sprung up an extra- 
 ordinary friendship, which was not weakened by Wilson 
 some years later emigrating to America, and setting up 
 as a bookseller at Poughkeepsie, a pretty town on the 
 Hudson, in the state of New York. The letters which 
 passed between them bring into view a number of 
 particulars concerning my brother's literary aims and 
 efforts. The poetical effusion just referred to was as 
 follows. For the sake of euphony, Robert calls the 
 heroine Leila : 
 
 FAIR I.EILA'S eyes. 
 
 Fair Leila's eyes, fair Leila's eyes, 
 Oft (ill my breast with glad surprise — 
 Surprise and love, and hope and pride, 
 With many a glowing thought beside. 
 
 The light that lies in Leila's eyes, 
 No trick of vain allurement tries,
 
 196 MEMOIR. 
 
 But sheds a soft and constant beam, 
 Like moonlight on the tranquil stream ; 
 Yet as the seas from pole to pole 
 Move at yon gentle orb's control, 
 So tumults in my bosom rise 
 Beneath the charm of Leila's eyes. 
 Fair Leila's eyes, fair Leila's eyes, &c. 
 
 For Leila's eyes I 'd gladly shun 
 The flaunting glare of Fortune's sun, 
 And to the humble shade betake. 
 Which they a brighter heaven could make. 
 The wildfire lights I once pursued 
 Should ne'er again my steps delude : 
 I 'd fix my faith, and only prize 
 The steadfast light of Leila's eyes. 
 / s 1 / ^'^vc Leila's eyes, fair Leila's eyes, &c. 
 
 Notwithstanding an ardent and mutual affection, 
 Leila was not destined to be my brother's wife. Her 
 mother, from extreme prudential considerations, abruptly 
 terminated the intimacy. Robert was not supposed to 
 be in the category of an eligible ; and it was rashly 
 assumed that he might never possibly be so. It was 
 a hapless decision, to which, considering his still 
 comparatively humble circumstances, he refrained from 
 offering any opposition; nor did he by any indirect 
 means try to influence the feelings of Leila. He would 
 do nothing to bring her down from the sphere in which 
 she moved under the parental administration. Acqui- 
 escing, perhaps with a sigh, in her mother's notions of 
 what was right and commendable, Leila was in due 
 time wedded to another. Her marriage, as will after- 
 wards appear, proved particularly unfortunate, and 
 became the source of acutely painful recollections. 
 With a little patience and foresight, things would have
 
 TRADITIONS OF EDINBURGH. 197 
 
 ended otherwise ; for Robert's literary successes soon 
 placed him in a position which had not been at all 
 anticipated. 
 
 After being settled in India Place, he carried out the 
 design of writing the Traditiofis of Edinburgh, a work for 
 which he was in a degree prepared by those youthful 
 explorations already adverted to, as well as by his having 
 meditated over the subject. Professedly, the book was 
 to consist of amusing particulars concerning old houses, 
 distinguished characters, and curious incidents, such as 
 could be picked up from individuals then still living, 
 who had some remembrance of the Scottish capital 
 in the early part of the reign of George III., when 
 persons of rank were as yet dwellers in the tall 
 tenements and dingy closes of the Old Town. One 
 gentleman in the decline of life remembered as many as 
 fifty titled personages, some of them of historical note, 
 who dwelt in the Canongate (formerly the Court end of 
 the town) as lately as 1769. There were others whose 
 recollections did not extend so far back, but who in 
 youth had been acquainted with interesting public 
 characters who had disappeared. By procuring infor- 
 mation from these various individuals regarding a past 
 state of things, traditions were gathered together which 
 in a few years later would have entirely vanished. 
 
 The Traditions, thus happily thought of while there 
 were still living memories to draw upon, well suited the 
 antiquarian and historical tastes of my brother, and 
 he entered on the work with the keenest possible 
 relish. Yet, in a business point of view, he and I 
 were alike diffident as to the undertaking. Neither of 
 us being able to risk the loss of even a few pounds, 
 we announced that the work would be issued in
 
 1 98 MEMOIR. 
 
 numbers as soon as a hundred subscribers were obtained. 
 The requisite subscribers were in no long time pro- 
 cured ; the work was put to press ; and the first 
 number pubhshed in March 1824. It met with such 
 success, that it had to be reprinted, and the sale of 
 the book increased until all the numbers were issued, 
 forming when complete two volumes post octavo. I 
 was, of course, the printer and publisher, the whole 
 case and press work being, as hitherto, executed with 
 my own hands — a piece of duty of which I entertain a 
 pleasant remembrance. 
 
 There was much family exultation over Robert's 
 successful achievement, regarding which there were 
 sundry congratulations from persons whose good opinion 
 it was important to obtain. Writing to his friend Wilson, 
 whom he always addressed as his ' dear Willie,' he refers 
 gratifyingly to the Traditions, and the manner in which 
 the book had brought him into notice : ' This little work 
 is taking astonishingly, and I am getting a great deal of 
 credit by it. It has also been the means of introducing 
 me to many of the most respectable leading men of the 
 town, and has attracted to me the attention of not a few 
 of the most eminent literary characters. What would 
 you think, for instance, of the venerable author of the 
 ATan of Feeling calling on me in his carriage to con- 
 tribute his remarks in manuscript on my work ! The 
 value of the above two great advantages is incalculable 
 to a young tradesman and author like me. It saves me 
 twenty years of mere laborious plodding by the common 
 walk, and gives me at twenty-two all the respectability 
 which I could have expected at forty.' 
 
 To Mr Constable, to whom the project of the 
 Traditions had been confided, he writes, July 15, 1S24:
 
 A VISIT TO CONSTABLE. 199 
 
 *In fulfilment of your sanguine predictions, the work 
 has taken in a most astonishing manner.' Elated by 
 this remarkable success, and with overwrought expecta- 
 tions as to further sales, a new and inconsiderately large 
 edition was executed, which led to some inconvenience. 
 Perceiving when it was too late that the thing was 
 overdone, my brother in a dejected mood wrote to Mr 
 Constable, who had been most friendly throughout, 
 asking for his counsel on the subject. His letter is 
 dated April 6, 1825. *I want,' says he, 'your advice: 
 the vastness of the edition is too much for my slender 
 and ill-formed capital, and I begin to feel the distresses 
 of premature and ill-judged speculation. No doubt, the 
 thing will ultimately pay, and well, but then, how am I 
 to keep afloat till I reach thr^ ahore ? Come weal, come 
 woe, I have therefore made up my mind to extricate 
 myself from the miseries of publication, so that I can only 
 get anything like a fair remuneration for the literary part 
 of the property. I shall try to see you to-morrow, and 
 hope your goodness will unite with your sense and 
 experience in pointing out the path I should choose.' 
 
 Arising out of these perplexities, and as wished by 
 my brother, I waited on Mr Constable at his place of 
 business in Princes Street. It was the only time I had the 
 honour of conversing with this distinguished bookseller ; 
 the interview taking place at the period of an impending 
 crisis in his affairs, of which, however, I was ignorant, 
 I was received with the urbanity for which Mr Constable 
 was noted. On my giving explanations regarding the 
 work, he advised the transmission of a large portion 
 of the superfluous edition to Messrs Hurst, Robinson, 
 and Company, his correspondents in London, to whom 
 he would write recommending the book to tlieir
 
 200 MEMOIR, 
 
 attention as publishers. Some large packages were 
 accordingly sent. But after a little time, the adventure 
 seemed so unsatisfactory, that I went to London to see 
 after matters. 
 
 It was on a fine summer evening in 1825, that, arriving 
 by a steamer in the Thames, I first visited the metropoHs. 
 The circumstance is to be specially remembered by me. 
 It being too late to pursue my business mission, I 
 bethought myself of calling on Mr John Clark, of 
 Westminster, an artist whom I had accidentally met 
 hi Scotland the previous year, when taking views of 
 the principal towns. A long walk brought me to Mr 
 Clark's door. It was opened by a sprightly young lady, 
 his daughter, whom I had never seen before. The inter- 
 view with the family was agreeable. An intimacy ensued. 
 And some years afterwards, when the fates were pro- 
 pitious, the sprightly young lady who had chanced to 
 open the door became my wife. 
 
 Turning from this romantic episode. On the day after 
 my arrival in London, I visited the publishing concern 
 in Cheapside to which the Traditions had been con- 
 signed, and concluding that things looked ill, I ordered 
 the whole stock to be returned. The decision was 
 fortunate ; for Hurst, Robinson, and Company shortly 
 afterwards succumbed in the general storm of bankruptcy 
 in which Sir Walter Scott, the Ballantynes, and Archibald 
 Constable were lucklessly involved. We lost nothing. 
 To wind up the affair, the stock and copyright of the 
 Traditions were disposed of to W^illiam Tait, for a sum 
 of between three and four hundred pounds. In this 
 way, everything terminated happily. What became 
 of the money, will afterwards appear. In better days, 
 when circumstances permitted, we were able to purchase
 
 DISPOSAL OF THE TRADITIONS. 201 
 
 back the copyright, and execute fresh and improved 
 editions of the work. In an introductoiy notice to a 
 new edition in 1868, Robert, at my request, gave the 
 following account of the manner in which the book was 
 produced and received : 
 
 * I am about to do what very few could do without 
 emotion — revise a book which I wrote forty-five years 
 ago. This little work came out in the Augustan days 
 of Edinburgh, when Jeffrey and Scott, Wilson and the 
 Ettrick Shepherd, Dugald Stewart and Alison, were 
 daily giving the productions of their minds to the public, 
 and while yet Archibald Constable acted as the un- 
 questioned emperor of the publishing world. I was 
 then an insignificant person of the age of twenty ; yet, 
 destitute as I was both of means and friends, I formed 
 the hope of writing something which would attract 
 attention. The subject I proposed was one lying readily 
 at hand, the romantic things connected with Old Edin- 
 burgh. If, I calculated, a fivstj>arf ox .nmnber could be 
 issued, materials for others might be expected to come 
 in, for scores of old inhabitants, even up perhaps to the 
 very " oldest," would then contribute their reminiscences. 
 
 ' The plan met with success. Materials almost 
 unbounded came to me, chiefly from aged professional 
 and mercantile gentlemen, who usually, at my first 
 introduction to them, started at my youthful appearance, 
 having formed the notion that none but an old person 
 would have thought of writing such a book. A friend 
 gave me a letter to Mr Charles Kirkpatrick Sharpe, who, 
 I was told, knew the scandal of the time of Charles II. 
 as well as he did the merest gossip of the day, and had 
 much to say regarding the good society of a hundred 
 years ago.
 
 202 MEMOIR. 
 
 ' Looking back from the year 1868, 1 feel that C. K. S. 
 has himself become, as it were, a tradition of Edin- 
 burgh. His thin effeminate figure, his voice pitched m 
 alt. — his attire, as he took his daily walks on Princes 
 Street, a long blue frock-coat, black trousers, rather 
 wide below, and sweeping over white stockings and neat 
 shoes — something like a web of white cambric round 
 his neck, and a brown wig coming down to his eye- 
 brows — had long established him as what is called a 
 character. He had recently edited a book containing 
 many stories of diablerie, and another in which the 
 original narrative of ultra-presbyterian church history 
 had to bear a series of cavalier notes of the most 
 mocking character. He had a quaint biting wit, which 
 people bore as they would a scratch from a provoked 
 cat. Essentially, he was good-natured, and fond of 
 merriment. He had considerable gifts of drawing, and 
 one caricature portrait by him of Queen Elizabeth 
 dancing, "high and disposedly," before the Scotch 
 ambassadors, is the delight of everybody who has seen 
 it He was intensely aristocratic, and cared nothing 
 for the interests of the great multitude. He complained 
 that one never heard of any gentlefolks committing 
 crimes now-a-days, as if that were a disadvantage to 
 them or the public. Any case of a Lady Jane 
 stabbing a perjured lover would have delighted him. 
 While the child of whim, Mr Sharpe was generally 
 believed to possess respectable talents, by which, with 
 a need for exerting them, he might have achieved 
 distinction. His ballad of the " Murder of Caerlave- 
 rock," in the Minstrelsy, is a masterly production ; and 
 the concluding verses haunt one like a beautiful strain 
 of music :
 
 CHARLES KIRKPA TRICK SHARPE. 203 
 
 " To sweet Lincluden's haly cells 
 Fu' dowie I '11 repair ; 
 There Peace wi' gentle Patience dwells, 
 Nae deadly feuds are there. 
 
 In tears I 'II wither ilka charm, 
 
 Like draps o' balefu' yew ; 
 And wail the beauty that could harm 
 
 A knight sae brave and true." 
 
 * After what I had heard and read of Charles Sharpe, 
 I called upon him at his mother's house, No. 93 Princes 
 Street, in a somewhat excited frame of mind. His 
 servant conducted me to the first floor, and shewed me 
 into what is generally called aniongst us the back 
 drawing-room, which I found carpeted with green cloth, 
 and full of old family portraits, some on the walls, but 
 many more on the floor. A small room leading off 
 this one behind, was the place where Mr Sharpe gave 
 audience. Its diminutive space was stufted full of old 
 curiosities, cases with family bijouterie, &c. One petty 
 object was strongly indicative of the man — a calling- 
 card of Lady Charlotte Campbell, the once adored 
 beauty, stuck into the frame of a picture. He must 
 have kept it at that time about thirty years. On 
 appearing, Mr Sharpe received me very cordially, telling 
 me he had seen and been pleased with my first two 
 numbers. Indeed, he and Sir Walter Scott had talked 
 together of writing a book of the same kind in company, 
 and calling it Reekiana, which plan, however, being 
 anticipated by me, the only thing that remained for him 
 was to cast any little matters of the kind he possessed 
 into my care. I expressed myself duly grateful, and 
 took my leave. The consequence was, the appearance 
 of notices regarding the eccentric Lady Anne Dick, tlie
 
 204 MEMOIR. 
 
 beautiful Susanna, Countess of Eglintoune, the Lord 
 Justice-clerk Alva, and the Duchess of Queensberry (the 
 " Kitty " of Prior), before the close of my first volume. 
 Mr Sharpe's contributions were all of them given in 
 brief notes, and had to be written out on an enlarged 
 scale, with what I thought a regard to literary effect as 
 far as the telling was concerned. 
 
 ' By an introduction from Dr Chalmers, I visited a 
 living lady who might be considered as belonging to 
 the generation at the beginning of the reign of George 
 III. Her husband, Alexander Murray, had, I believe, 
 been Lord North's solicitor-general for Scotland. She 
 herself, born before the Porteous Riot, and well re- 
 membering the Forty-five, was now within a very brief 
 space of the age of a hundred. Although she had not 
 married in her earlier years, her children, Mr Murray 
 of Henderland and others, were all elderly people. I 
 found the venerable lady seated at a window in her 
 drawing-room in George Street, with her daughter, Miss 
 Murray, taking the care of her which her extreme age 
 required, and with some help from this lady, we had a 
 conversation of about an hour. She spoke with due 
 reverence of her mother's brother, the Lord Chief- 
 justice Mansfield ; and when I adverted to the long 
 pamphlet against him written by Mr Andrew Stuart at 
 the conclusion of the Douglas Cause, she said that, to 
 her knowledge, he had never read it, such being his 
 practice in respect of all attacks made upon him, lest 
 they should disturb his equanimity in judgment. As 
 the old lady was on intimate terms with Boswell, and 
 had seen Johnson on his visit to Edinburgh — as she 
 was the sister-in-law of Allan Ramsay the painter, and 
 had hved in the most cultivated society of Scotland all
 
 OLD EDINBURGH CHARACTERS. 205 
 
 her long life — there were ample materials for conversa- 
 tion with her ; but her small strength made this shorter 
 and slower than I could have wished. When we came 
 upon the poet Ramsay she seemed to have caught new 
 vigour from the subject : she spoke with animation of 
 the child-parties she had attended in his house on 
 the Castlehill during a course of ten years before his 
 death — an event which happened in 1757. He was 
 " charming," she said ; he entered so heartily into the 
 plays of children. He, in particular, gained their hearts 
 by making houses for their dolls. How pleasant it was 
 to learn that our great pastoral poet was a man who, 
 in his private capacity, loved to sweeten the daily life 
 of his fellow-creatures, and particularly of the young ! 
 At a warning from Miss Murray, I had to tear myself 
 away from this delightful and never-to-be-forgotten 
 interview. 
 
 ' I had, one or two years before, when not out of my 
 teens, attracted some attention from Sir Walter Scott, 
 by writing for him and presenting (through Mr Con- 
 stable) a transcript of the songs of the Lady of the Lake, 
 in a style of peculiar caligraphy, which I practised for 
 want of any better way of attracting the notice of people 
 superior to myself. When George IV. some months 
 nfterwards came to Edinburgh, good Sir Walter re- 
 membered me, and procured for me the business of 
 writing the address of the Royal Society of Edinburgh 
 to his Majesty, for which I was handsomely paid. 
 Several other learned bodies followed the example, for 
 Sir Walter Scott was the arbiter of everything during 
 that frantic time, and thus I was substantially benefited 
 by his means. 
 
 'According to what Mr Constable told me, the great 
 
 N
 
 2o6 MEMOIR. 
 
 man liked me, in part because he understood I was 
 from Tvveedside. On seeing the eariier numbers of the 
 Traditions, he expressed astonishment as to " where the 
 boy got all the information." But I did not see or hear 
 from him till the first volume had been completed. He 
 then called upon me one day, along with Mr Lockhart. 
 I was overwhelmed with the honour, for Sir Walter 
 Scott was almost an object of worship to me. I 
 literally could not utter a word. While I stood silent, 
 I heard him tell his companion that Charles Sharpe was 
 a writer in the Traditio7is, and taking up the volume, 
 he read aloud what he called one of his quai?it bits. 
 " The ninth Earl of Eglintoune was one of those 
 patriarchal peers who live to an advanced age — 
 indefatigable in the frequency of their marriages and 
 the number of their children — who linger on and on, 
 with an unfailing succession of young countesses, and 
 die at last leaving a progeny interspersed throughout 
 the whole of Douglas's Peerage, two volumes, folio, re- 
 edited by Wood." And then both gentlemen went on 
 laughing for perhaps two minutes with interjections : 
 " How like Charlie !" — " What a strange being he is !" 
 — " Two volumes, folio, re-edited by Wood — ha, ha, ha ! 
 There you have him past all doubt ;" and so on. I was 
 too much abashed to tell Sir Walter that it was only an 
 impudent little bit of writing of my own, part of the 
 solution into which I had diffused the actual notes of 
 Sharpe. But, having occasion to write next day to Mr 
 Lockhart, I mentioned Sir Walter's mistake ; and he 
 was soon after good enough to inform me that he had 
 set his friend right as to the authorship, and they had 
 had a second hearty laugh on the subject. 
 
 ' A very few days after this visit, Sir Walter sent me,
 
 DA VID BRIDGES. 2fyj 
 
 along with a kind letter, a packet of manuscript, con- 
 sisting of sixteen folio pages, in his usual close hand- 
 writing, and containing all the reminiscences he could 
 at the time summon up of old persons and things in 
 Edinburgh. Such a treasure to me ! And such a gift 
 from the greatest literaiy man of the age to the 
 humblest ! Is there a literary man of the present age 
 who would scribble as much for any humble aspirant? 
 Nor was this the only act of liberality of Scott to me. 
 When I was preparing a subsequent work, The Popular 
 Rhymes of Scotla?i(i, he sent me whole sheets of his 
 recollections, with appropriate explanations. For years 
 thereafter, he allowed me to join him in his walks home 
 from the Parliament House, in the course of which he 
 freely poured into my greedy ears anything he knew 
 regarding the subjects of my studies. His kindness and 
 good-humour on these occasions were untiring. I have 
 since found, from his journal, that I had met him on 
 certain days when his heart was overladen with woe. 
 Yet his welcome to me was the same. After 1826, 
 liowever, I saw him much less frequently than before, 
 for I knew he grudged every moment not spent in 
 thinking and working on the fatal tasks he had assigned 
 to himself for the redemption of his debts. 
 
 ' All through the preparation of this book, I was 
 indebted a good deal to a gentleman who was neither a 
 literary man nor an artist himself, but hovered round 
 the outskirts of both professions, and might be con- 
 sidered as a useful adjunct to both. Every votary of 
 pen or pencil amongst us knew David Bridges at his 
 drapery establishment in the Lawnmarket, and many 
 had been indebted to his obliging disposition. A quick, 
 dark-eyed little man, with lips full of sensibility and a
 
 2o8 MEMOIR. 
 
 tongue xmloving of rest, such a man in a degree as one 
 can suppose Garrlck to have been, he held a sort of 
 court every day, where wits and painters jostled with 
 people wanting coats, jerkins, and spotted handkerchiefs. 
 The place was small, and had no saloon behind ; so, 
 whenever David had got some '' bit " to shew you, he 
 dragged you down a dark stair to a packing-place, 
 lighted only by a grate from the street, and there, amidst 
 plaster-casts numberless, would fix you with his glittering 
 eye, till he had convinced you of the fine handling, the 
 " buttery touches " (a great phrase with him), the 
 admirable "scummling" (another), and so forth. It was 
 in the days prior to the Royal Scottish Academy and its 
 exhibitions ; and it was left in a great measure to David 
 Bridges to bring forward aspirants in art. Did such a 
 person long for notice, he had only to give David one 
 of his best "bits," and in a short time he would find 
 himself chattered into fame in that profound, the grate 
 of which I never can pass without recalling something 
 of the buttery touches of those old days. The Black- 
 wood wits, who laughed at everything, fixed upon our 
 friend the title of " Director-general of the Fine Arts," 
 which was, however, too much of a truth to be a jest. 
 To this extraordinary being I had been introduced 
 somehow, and, entering heartily into my views, he 
 brought me information, brought me friends, read and 
 criticised my proofs, and would, I daresay, have written 
 the book itself if I had so desired. It is impossible to 
 think of him without a smile, but at the same time a 
 certain melancholy, for his life was one which, I fear, 
 proved a poor one for himself. 
 
 ' Before the Traditions were finished, I had become 
 favourably acquainted with many gentlemen of letters
 
 HENRY MACKENZIE. 7109 
 
 and others, who were pleased to think that Old Edin- 
 burgh had been chronicled. Wilson gave me a laudatory 
 sentence in the Nodes Ambrosiatm. The Eard of Ettrick, 
 viewing my boyish years, always spoke of and to me as 
 an unaccountable sort of person, but never could be 
 induced to believe otherwise than that I had written all 
 my traditions from my own head. I had also the 
 pleasure of enjoying some intercourse with the venerable 
 Henry Mackenzie, who had been bom in 1745, but 
 always seemed to feel as if the Maji of Feeling had been 
 written only one instead of sixty years ago, and as if 
 there was nothing particular in antique occurrences. 
 The whole affair was pretty much of a triumph at the 
 time. Now, when I am giving it a final revision, I 
 reflect with touched feelings, that all the brilliant men of 
 the time when it was written are, without an exception, 
 passed away, while, for myself, I am forced to claim the 
 benefit of Horace's humanity : 
 
 *• Solve senescentem mature sanus equum, ne 
 Peccet ad extremum ridendus, et ilia ducat." ' * 
 
 In this recent edition of the Traditions are compre- 
 hended a variety of particulars gathered since the first 
 appearance of the work, and calculated to heighten the 
 legendary picture of Old Edinburgh. A great propor- 
 tion of this new matter was drawn from a small work 
 which my brother wrote under the title of Reekiana^ 
 which appeared some years later. The new edition of 
 the Traditions is therefore a considerable improvement 
 on the old. 
 
 Contemporaneously with the issue of the Traditions, 
 
 * Discreetly unharness in good time a liurse growing old, lest iu 
 Ihc end he make a miserable break-down.
 
 2IO MEMOIR. 
 
 my brother produced a small work to help the fund 
 raised on behalf of the sufferers by a series of calamitous 
 fires in Edinburgh, in November 1824. It consisted of 
 a popular account of the chief Fires which have occurred 
 in Edinburi^h since the beginning of the eighteenth century. 
 In the excitement of the moment, it had a considerable 
 sale, and was so far useful. 
 
 The success of the Traditions encouraged the prepara- 
 tion of a companion to that work, applying to the 
 general features of the city, and pardy devoted to the 
 service of strangers. It was styled IVaiks in Edinbwgh, 
 and was issued in 1S25. From the pleasing anecdotic 
 style in which the book was written, it was well received, 
 and added to the literary repute of the -writer. 
 
 Diligent, painstaking, and with a love of what was 
 old and characteristic, Robert had for some time been 
 collecting a variety of familiar sayings in rhyme, and 
 these appeared early in 1826, under the title oi Popular 
 Rhymes of Scotland. As has been already mentioned. 
 Sir Walter Scott, with his accustomed kindness, forwarded 
 some contributions to the work, which has passed 
 through three editions. As regards the purport of this 
 collection of national rhymes, the following explanation 
 is given in the preface to the third and considerably 
 extended edition : 
 
 * Reared amidst friends to whom popular poetry 
 furnished a daily enjoyment, and led by a tendency of 
 my own mind to delight in whatever is quaint, whimsical, 
 and old, I formed the wish, at an early period of life, 
 to complete, as I considered it, the collection of the 
 traditionary verse of Scotland, by gathering together 
 and publishing all that remained of a multitude of 
 rhjTiies and short snatches of verse applicable to places,
 
 PICTURE OF SCOTLAND. 211 
 
 families, natural objects, amusements, &c., wherewith, 
 not less than by song and ballad, the cottage fireside 
 was amused in days gone past, while yet printed books 
 were only familiar to comparatively few. This task was 
 executed as well as circumstances would permit, and a 
 portion of the Popular Rhymes of Scotland was pub- 
 lished in 1826. Other objects have since occupied 
 me, generally of a graver kind ; yet amidst them all, I 
 have never lost my wish to complete the publication 
 of these relics of the old ?iaiural literature of my native 
 country.' 
 
 Next in succession after the Popular Rhytnes, he, in 
 1826, produced the Picture of Scotland, a work in two 
 volumes, the materials for which had been gathered 
 together by a succession of toilsome peregrinations over 
 a large part of the country, exclusively of previous his- 
 torical studies. An ardent attachment to Scotland had 
 led him to undertake the work; for, as he said: 'Instead 
 of the pilgrim's scallop in my hat, I took for motto the 
 glowing expression of Burns — " I have no dearer aim 
 than to make leisurely journeys through Caledonia; to 
 sit on the fields of her battles ; to wander on the roman- 
 tic banks of her streams ; and to muse by the stately 
 towers of venerable ruins, once the homesteads of her 
 heroes.'" In the main topographical, the book compre- 
 hended an interlarding of native anecdote and humour, 
 along with illustrations of the manners of a ^^ast age. 
 ' The reclamation of that which is altogether poetry — 
 the wonderful, beautiful past,' he adds, was a primary 
 object of the book, being ' conscious and certain that, 
 though many of his own generation may not give him 
 credit for so exalted a purpose, the people who shall 
 afterwards inherit this romantic land will appreciate
 
 212 MEMOIR. 
 
 what could not have been preserved but with a view to 
 their gratification.' 
 
 The Picture of Scotland was followed in rapid suc- 
 cession by several works which still further extended 
 Robert's popularity as a writer. The quantity of literary 
 work of one kind or other which he went through 
 during some years at this period was astonishing, more 
 particularly when we know that he continued to give a 
 certain degree of attention daily to business. Indeed, 
 with all his love of letters, he by no means relied on his 
 efforts with the pen. He used to repeat a sage remark 
 of Scott, that literature is a good cane to walk with, but 
 not a staff to lean upon — an observation too apt to be 
 neglected by young and inexperienced wTiters. 
 
 Archibald Constable, in his attempts to revive a 
 publishing business after the catastrophe of 1825, 
 happily carried out a project which he had already 
 conceived and initiated. This was the publication of a 
 series of cheap and handy volumes in popular literature, 
 specially Avritten by persons of tried ability for the 
 undertaking, and designated Constable^ s Miscellany. In 
 a letter to Mr Constable dated April 19, 1827, Robert 
 offered to become a contributor. He says — * Observ- 
 ing in your Prospectus that you intend to publish 
 an account of the Rebellion of 1745, I beg to state 
 that I have made considerable collections for such 
 a work, and would be glad to get it a place among 
 the "troops of the jMiscellany." My design is simply to 
 give a popular narrative, with all the characteristic 
 anecdotes, and I think the whole might go into one of 
 your volumes. An Edinburgh bookseller, with whom 
 I have already had some literary transactions, is 
 inclined to think that my work might succeed in the
 
 WORKS FOR CONSTABLES MISCELLANY. zit, 
 
 extended and independent form of two volumes octavo ; 
 but with deference to his opinion, which I feel to be 
 highly flattering, I think the subject, interesting as it is, 
 would scarcely warrant so massive a publication, nor 
 could I give it a value sufficient to insure even the 
 chance of success. . . . My work would be a good 
 warrior, but one who could act to advantage only when 
 forming an individual in a regular army, and under the 
 command of an independent leader.' 
 
 The work so proposed was accepted, and appeared 
 in Constables Miscella?iy in 1828, as a History of the 
 Rebellion of 1745, in two volumes. It was followed in 
 the Miscellany at the close of the same year by 2l History 
 of the Jvebellions i?i Seotland under the Marquis of 
 Montrose and others from 1638 to 1660, in two volumes; 
 this was followed, in 1829, by a History of the Rebellions 
 in Scotland under Visco^mt Dundee and the Earl of Mar 
 in 1689 and 1715, in one volume; and finally, in 
 1830, Robert contributed the Life of James /, in two 
 volumes. Such, however, was not the entire amount of 
 his literary labour. He edited Scottish Ballads and 
 Songs, three volumes (1829), and the Biographical Dic- 
 tionary of Eminent Scotsmen, four volumes (1832-1834) ; 
 besides which, he furnished Mr Lockhart with a variety 
 of valuable notes for his Life of Robert Burns. With 
 improved prospects by these and other means, my 
 brother removed his bookselling business to Hanover 
 Street, where the conducting of his establishment fell 
 partly on James, who had been reared as a coadjutor. 
 
 Of all the works which he so produced immediately 
 after the Iraditions, that which attained the greatest 
 and most enduring popularity was the History of the 
 Rebellion of i-j^^, the materials fur which were gathered
 
 214 MEMOIR. 
 
 from the principal sources of information available in 
 1827. Several families, whose ancestors had been 
 compromised in the insurrection, obligingly furnished 
 traditional anecdotes for the work, which thereby 
 assumed a character considerably different from one 
 consisting of dry historical annals. While received with 
 general approbation, the History of the Rebellion, from 
 \.\\Q feeling with which it was written, led to a notion 
 that it was the work of a Jacobite. Such seems to have 
 been the opinion of a writer in the Quarterly Review, 
 who, in reviewing Lord Mahon's History of Erigland 
 (1839), refers to the 'many curious details, gleaned mth 
 exemplary diligence, and presented in a lively enough 
 style,' in the histories of the rebellions of 17 15 and 
 1745, by 'Mr Robert Chambers, a bookseller and 
 antiquary of Edinburgh,' adding : ' His Jacobitism 
 seems that of a rampant Highlander 3 and we doubt 
 not, had he flourished at the proper time, he would 
 have handled his claymore gallantly ; nor are we at all 
 surprised to hear that he enjoys considerable popularity 
 among certain classes in Scotland; but we cannot 
 anticipate that these historical performances will ever 
 obtain a place in the English library.' 
 
 To conclusions as to his supposed Jacobitism, my 
 brother made some demur. He declared that he ' dis- 
 approved of the insurrection of 1745, and held that it 
 undoubtedly was a crime to disturb with war, and to 
 some extent with rapine, a nation enjoying internal 
 peace under a settled government. But, on the other 
 hand, it was evident that those who followed Charles 
 Edward acted according to tlieir lights, with heroic self- 
 devotion, and were not fairly liable to the vulgar ridicule 
 and vituperations thrown upon them by those whose
 
 HISTORY OF THE REBELLION. 215 
 
 duty it was to resist and punish them. Accordingly, it 
 was just that the adventures of the persons concerned 
 should be detailed with impartiality, and their unavoid- 
 able misfortunes be spoken of with humane feeling.' 
 Such is the vindicatory remark he makes in a prefatory 
 note to the seventh edition of the work, issued as 
 lately as 1869 ; and in the present day, few will be 
 disposed to challenge the accuracy of this view of 
 the matter. Whether this historical performance has 
 obtained a place in what the reviewer is pleased to call 
 * the English library,' I am not prepared to say, further 
 than that, without adventitious aid, it has been very 
 extensively diffused in all parts of Great Britain, and 
 remains, to appearance, a generally received work on 
 the subject. 
 
 The new edition of the History just referred to has 
 been so greatly extended as to be almost a new work. 
 The prolific source of the fresh information that was 
 obtained, was a collection of ten volumes in manuscript, 
 styled on the title-pages the Lyon in Mourning, which 
 had been prepared by the anxious care of the Right 
 Rev. Bishop Forbes, of the Scottish Episcopal Church, 
 and who was settled as a minister of that communion in 
 Leith at the middle of the eighteenth century. Labouring 
 under the suspicion that he was a Jacobite dangerous 
 to the reigning dynasty, he was confined in Edinburgh 
 Castle during the rebellion, and only liberated in 1746. 
 By this means he was saved from the disasters of the 
 falling cause, and brought into leisurely communication 
 with a number of the insurgents, who were seized at 
 various times and placed in confinement along with him. 
 After regaining his liberty. Bishop Forbes prosecuted 
 the design of collecting from the mouths and pens of the
 
 2i6 MEMOIR. 
 
 survivors of the late enterprise such narratives, anec- 
 dotes, and memorabilia as they could give from their 
 own knowledge, or as eye-witnesses, respecting this 
 extraordinary historical episode. The whole of the 
 trustworthy information so acquired was written on 
 octavo sheets, which in the end fonned volumes ; and 
 nothing can exceed the neatness, distinctness, and 
 accuracy with which the whole task appears to have 
 been performed. In allusion to the woe of Scotland for 
 her exiled race of princes, the ten volumes composing 
 the work were bound in black, and styled the Lyon in 
 Mourning. The poor bishop died in 1776, leaving the 
 collection to his widow, who, after many years, sold it 
 to Sir Henry Steuart of AUanton, who had been induced 
 to turn his attention to the subject; and he commenced 
 a work designed to present a historical review of the 
 different attempts made to restore the Stewart family to 
 the throne. The work had been carried a certain length, 
 when it was interrupted by ill-health, and permanently 
 laid aside. On a visit to Allanton House in 1832, my 
 brother first heard of the Lyon, and was so fortunate as 
 to have it assigned to him for literary purposes. The 
 result (1834) was i\\e Jacob He Memoirs of the Rebellion of 
 1745. But from the widespread information contained 
 in the collection, were draw^n innumerable particulars of 
 a deeply interesting kind for the revised edition of the 
 History. 
 
 Betw'een 1823 and 1835, Robert amused himself, and 
 gave relief to his feelings, by occasionally writing poetical 
 pieces, which he collected and printed in a volume for 
 private circulation. His poetical powers did not aspire 
 to be of a high or very original character, but there was 
 a touching delicacy of sentiment and also much humour
 
 SCO TTISII JES TS. 217 
 
 in some of his performances that gained the approbation 
 of his friends. One of his eftusions purported to be 
 written July 1829, in reference to the young lady, Miss 
 Anne Kirkwood, to whom he was married in December 
 of that year. 
 
 Towards the close of 1831, he made what many 
 may think a bold attempt in literature. It was, by a 
 collection of sayings and anecdotes, * to vindicate, for 
 the first time, the pretensions of the Scottish nation to 
 the character of a witty and jocular, as they are already 
 allowed to be a painstaking and enlightened, race.' 
 The book, styled Scottish Jests and Anecdotes, certainly 
 contained a prodigious array of good things, collected 
 from all imaginable sources, including personal expe- 
 rience in general society. It being the first attempt of 
 the kind, the editor says he felt as if * entitled to some 
 share of that praise which is so liberally bestowed upon 
 discoverers like Cook and Parry, and might expect to 
 be celebrated in after-ages as the first man who extended 
 the geography of Fun beyond the Tweed.' That my 
 brother had any merit in discovering that the Scotch 
 are a * witty ' people, will be doubted by those who 
 think them incapable of getting beyond a certain 
 species of dry and caustic humour. One thing cer- 
 tainly remarkable in all works purporting to be collec- 
 tions of Scottish jests and anecdotes, is the abundance 
 of droll sayings and doings of parish ministers, beadles, 
 and old serving-men. With a number of amusing jocu- 
 larities of this kind, the Scottish Jests and Anecdotes 
 was pretty well received, and went through two editions ; 
 after which, dropping out of notice, it was left for the 
 late Very Rev. Dean Ramsay to take up the subject in 
 that more earnest spirit which has insured a great share 
 of public approbation.
 
 2i8 MEMOIR. 
 
 We have not yet completed the review of literary 
 work in which Robert was engaged from about 1829 
 to 1832. Busied as he was, he undertook the editor- 
 ship of the Edinburgh Advertiser, a newspaper of old 
 standing, as well as an old style of politics, that has 
 been latterly discontinued. In this line of duty, which 
 was new to him, he gave much satisfaction by his 
 assiduity and the tastefulness of his writing. 
 
 Between Sir Walter Scott and my brother personal 
 intercourse had now ceased, for the great novelist was 
 a confirmed invalid at Abbotsford. Letters, however, 
 passed between them, as is observable from Robert's 
 private papers, sometimes in reference to literary 
 matters, and on other occasions concerning the intro- 
 ductions of strangers. A Miss MacLaughlin, with 
 musical acquirements, having visited Edinburgh, be- 
 sought for herself and her mother an introduction to Sir 
 Walter, which being granted, the following letter was 
 shortly afterwards received, dated from Abbotsford, 
 March 7, 1831. 
 
 ' My dear Mr Chambers — I was quite happy to see 
 Miss MacLaughlin, who is a fine enthusiastic girl, and very, 
 very pretty withal. They — that is, her mother and she — 
 breakfasted with me, though I had what is unusual at 
 Abbotsford, no female assistance. However, we got on 
 very well ; and I prepared the young lady a set of words to 
 the air of Crochallan. But although Miss M. proposed to 
 leave me a copy of the Celtic harmonies, I suppose the 
 servant put it in her carriage. Purdie is the publisher. 
 Will you get me a copy of the number containing Crochallan, 
 with a prose translation by a competent person, and let me 
 know the expense ? 
 
 * I fear I cannot be of use to you in the way you propose, 
 though I sincerely rejoice in your success, and would gladly 
 promote it ; but Dr Abercrombie threatens me with death
 
 LE TTERS FR OM SCO TT. 219 
 
 if I write so much. I must assist Lockhart a little, for you 
 are aware of our connection, and he has always shewn me 
 the duties of a son ; but except that, and my own necessary 
 work at the edition of the Waverley Novels, as they call 
 them, I can hardly pretend to be a contributor, for, after 
 all, that same dying is a ceremony one would put off as long 
 as he could. ... I am, dear Mr Chambers, very faithfully 
 yours, Walter Scott.' 
 
 The next letter received, which has the date Abbots- 
 ford, August 2, 1 83 1, bears a melancholy record of Sir 
 Walter's growing bodily weakness. 
 
 'Dear Mr Chambers — I received your letter through 
 Mr Cadell. It is impossible for a gentleman to say no to a 
 request whicli flatters him more than he deserves. But 
 even although it is said in the newspapers, I actually am 
 far from well. I am keeping my head as cool as I can, and 
 speak with some difficulty ; but I am unwilling to make a 
 piece of work about nothing, and instead of doing so, I 
 ought rather to receive the lady as civilly as I can. I am 
 much out, riding, or rather crawling about my plantations 
 in the morning, when the weather will permit ; but a card 
 from Miss Eccles will find me at home, and happy to see 
 her, although the effect is like to be disappointment to the 
 lady. I am your faithful, humble servant. 
 
 ' I have owed you a letter longer than I intended ; but I 
 write with pain, and generally use the hand of a friend. I 
 sign with my initials, as enough to represent the poor half 
 of me that is left, but am still much yours, W. S.' 
 
 This appears to have been the last letter received by 
 my brother from Sir Walter Scott.
 
 CHAPTER VTII. 
 
 SOME REMINISCENCES — 1822 TO 1832. 
 
 "D O BERT'S success with the Traditions, and my owti 
 -'-^ progress in the new field I had selected, left 
 nothing to regret. The * Dark Ages ' had vanished into 
 the dim past. The medieval period had da-\vned. 
 There was no longer a fierce skirmishing with diffi- 
 culties, but there was much less drollery. As men get 
 up in the world they, as a rule, take on the gravity 
 which by immemorial usage pertains to what are called 
 the respectable classes. They are likewise apt to part 
 convoy with a number of individuals who have hitherto 
 kept within hail. The reason is plain. Each, fiom 
 choice, pursues his own peculiar course. Mankind 
 are roughly divided, in unequal proportions, into two 
 sets — those who consume day by day all they can lay 
 their hands on, thinking no more of what is to be their 
 fate in a year or ten years hence than the lower animals ; 
 others — a much less numerous body — who are always 
 looking ahead and acting with less or more regard to 
 the future. What impressive examples one could 
 produce of these differences of taste ! Two young men, 
 of good education, start in life with pretty equal chances 
 of success. One of them rises by gradations to be
 
 5<9.1/^ REMiyiSCENCES. 221 
 
 Lord Chancellor : where do we find the other ? Seated 
 with his back to the wall, drawing figures in red and 
 white chalk on a smooth piece of pavement, in the 
 hope of retiring to his evening haunt with the sum of 
 half-a-crown in sixpences and halfpence, to be spent 
 probably in the felicity of a carouse. That, we may 
 presume, is the line of life he has deliberately preferred. 
 ■ He had worked for beggary, and he has got it. When 
 a man will make no sacrifice of his pleasures, but sets 
 his heart on freshly beginning the world every day, or 
 every week, it is not difficult to do so. The facility 
 with which the thing can be done explains much of 
 what seems to perplex society and drive it almost to its 
 wits' end. 
 ^ In the strange complication of human affairs, luck, no 
 doubt, counts for something ; but have we properly con- 
 sidered what is luck ? Surely, the business of life cannot 
 be said to be conducted on the hap-hazard principles ' , 
 of a game of roulette ! Is there no pre-arrangement — 
 no Providential design — leading by a series of circum- 
 stances to^ results wliich have been hitherto shrouded 
 from our finite intelligence? To be lucky, as it is 
 called, one requires to make some reasonably strenuous 
 exertion — probably to make some unpleasant sacri- 
 fices. Erskine might not, perliaps, have risen to be 
 Lord Chancellor but for the fortunate sprain which 
 caused him to relinquish an intended visit, and return 
 home; a circumstance which brought him under the 
 notice of a maritime gentleman, whose case he took up, 
 mastered, and carried through triumphantly. But wc 
 must bear in mind that he had, by previous and toilsome 
 exertion, and no little self-sacrifice, prepared himself 
 to^benefit by the fortunate accident ~which brought
 
 ^ 
 
 >ju 
 
 222 ' MEMOIR. 
 
 I him into notice. It is a pity that one has to make so 
 
 many sacrifices of inclinations — to thole a good deal — 
 
 possibly to relinquish some amusements — in order to 
 
 ^A^t \ attain anything like permanent comfort; but so it is, and 
 
 ever will be. When my brother and I got emancipated 
 
 from the Dark Ages, it was our fate to proceed on a 
 
 course wholly different from that which several persons 
 
 we had known were pleased to pursue. Their policy 
 
 . being to live all for the present, and not for the future, 
 
 C y vve went naturally in opposite directions. Apparently 
 
 ; wishing to end as they began, they spent daily or weekly 
 
 all they earned, and were ever at the same point of 
 
 progress. They doubtless, however, enjoyed themselves 
 
 to their own satisfaction, and there we must leave them. 
 
 ^ *vC Relaxing no effort, five to six years had effected a 
 
 beneficial change of circumstances. We were both, in 
 
 a sense, raised to a higher platform, and had, indeed, -S" 
 
 » -t reached that social status, if not something above it, 
 
 which had been lost by the family calamity of 1812. 
 
 It seemed as if the gales of fortune were at length about 
 
 to blow steadily in our favour, without disturbance O 
 
 #j^-»^ from any cross-current. We were not, however, to be « 
 
 let off so easily. Fate had one more trial in reserve. , ^ — 
 
 /i' My father, who had come to live in Edinburgh, began "^"^ 
 
 to take a lively interest in his sons, whose success was ~*^ 
 so clearly imputable to the adroit way in which he had ^ 
 thrown them on their own resources, and obliged them^^-?^ 
 to think and act for themselves, that he had, as he thought, ~^ 
 established a fair claim on their good offices. With this 
 agreeable notion, and wholly reckless of consequences, [j, 
 he plunged into a litigation, which I can refer to with ^ 
 any degree of patience, only from the insight that ^ 
 y was afforded of new and diverting phases of character. 1 
 
 ^ K^ <}xA^t^ _ U l^kiJL u^jLc 'K^^ uw^ ;i^ 
 
 j 
 
 >M. 
 
 CL.
 
 A LEGAL ORACLE. 223 
 
 Among his dreams of the past, he raked up the fancy 
 of trying to recover a piece of property, which had long 
 ago belonged to the family, but had somehow been 
 suffered to drift, improperly, as was alleged, into other 
 hands. The property in question was a wretched 
 old house, perhaps not worth ;^2oo, and the pro- 
 posal of fighting for it in the Court of Session was 
 repugnant alike to my brother's feelings and my own. 
 Unfortunately, any remonstrances on our part, and 
 also strong objections urged by my mother, were 
 unavailing. The suit was commenced, and its his- 
 tory might almost furnish materials for a tragi-comic 
 drama. 
 
 The prime adviser in the case was a person who, from 
 his reputed knowledge of law, was held in high esteem 
 by certain classes of people. He was a neat little man, 
 in drab breeches and white woollen stockings, who 
 laboured under the infirmity of a stiff" crooked knee, on 
 which account he walked very oddly, by successive 
 jerks, with the help of a stick. Having been bred in 
 the office of a country solicitor, this erudite person had 
 formed an acquaintance with legal forms and techni- 
 calities, and adding to this a theoretic knowledge of 
 Scotch law from Erskine's Institutes, he was qualified, as 
 many thought, for acting as counsel to those who stood 
 in need of legal advice. With his acquirements, it was 
 perhaps only as an act of considerable condescension 
 that he made his living as a dealer in certain liquid exhil- 
 arants, in an inferior part of the city. Under the inspiring 
 counsels of this genius, the case ran its tourse tlirough 
 the court, producing the most agonising anticipations 
 of what was to be the result. As we had all foreseen, 
 my father lost his suit Then came the matter of costs.
 
 224 MEMOIR. 
 
 and my brother and I were (as was thought reasonable) 
 looked to for payment. It was a thing we had nothing 
 to do with, but that made no difference. As many too 
 well know, there is in family relationship a power of 
 moral torture which reaches far beyond the bounds of 
 legal, or any other, obligation. Money that I could 
 ill spare was swept away, and Robert lost a large part 
 of what he had realised by selling the copyright and 
 stock of the Traditions to Mr Tait — a dismal outcome 
 of hopes, anxieties, and exertions, but not beyond what 
 has often to be endured. These losses kept us back one 
 or two years. 
 
 Now came a domestic tragedy, on which it would 
 be painful to linger. My unfortunate father went from 
 bad to worse after the loss of his lawsuit. The flute 
 which cheered him in the spring-tide of life was laid 
 aside, as too simple a means of exhilaration. Under 
 his accumulation of disasters and cankering reminis- 
 cences, ascribable in a great degree to his inconsid- 
 erateness and want of moral courage, he died — a 
 wreck — in November 1824, in the week of those 'con- 
 flagrations of which Robert has given some account. 
 
 Shortly after the issue of the Traditions, it became 
 expedient for me to relinquish printing, and to adhere 
 more exclusively to other branches of business, including 
 some undertakings of a literary nature. The parting 
 with my poor little press, which had latterly been super- 
 seded by newer mechanism, was not unaccompanied 
 with that kind of regret with which one bids farewell to 
 an old and cherished companion. It is pleasing, how- 
 ever, to know that it did not suffer destruction, but was 
 purchased by a person in Glasgow, who aspired to begin 
 as a printer in a way similar to myself; and for any-
 
 GAZETTEER OF SCOTLAND. 225 
 
 thing I know to the contrary, this little machine may 
 still be creaking and wheezing on the banks of the 
 Clyde, for, like many wlio are afflicted with asthma, it 
 possessed a wonderful degree of vitality. 
 
 Partly with the design of furnishing a companion to 
 the Picture of Scotland, I commenced a work, purporting 
 to describe the institutions, secular and religious, peculiar 
 to our northern kingdom, and which I styled the Book 
 of Scot/and. The work required considerable research 
 as well as personal knowledge, and the task was one 
 for which I avow myself to have been ill qualified. 1 
 sold it to a publisher for thirty pounds. It is now very 
 properly forgotten. IndependenUy of its imperfections, 
 the subjects treated of would now stand in need of a 
 new elucidation, in consequence of innumerable recent 
 legislative alterations. Poor as was this production, it 
 procured me the honour of being employed along with 
 Robert to prepare the Gazetteer of Scotland lor a pub- 
 lisher; the price to be paid for it being a hundred 
 pounds. It was to be a compilation from all available 
 and trustworthy sources, along with such original matter 
 as could reasonably be infused into it. To impart a 
 sufficient degree of freshness, I made several pedestrian 
 journeys to different parts of the country, gathering 
 here and there particulars which I thought would be of 
 value. 
 
 In these excursions I had necessarily to husband time 
 and exercise a pretty rigorous economy. Lodging at 
 the humbler class of inns, my expenses did not exceed 
 a few shillings a day. My object was to see as many 
 l)laces as possible, and fix their situation and appearance 
 in my mind. I took notes only of dates, inscriptions, 
 and other matters demanding great precision. I now
 
 226 MEMOIR. 
 
 found the value of cultivating the memory, and of having 
 learned to rely on recollections of places which I had 
 seen. From practice, I acquired the art of summoning 
 up the remembrance of scenes and places which I had 
 visited, and persons I had seen, even to very minute 
 particulars. Gathering and storing up observations in 
 this way, I traversed Fife and the lower parts of Perth 
 and Forfar shires. My longest stretch in one day 
 was from the neighbourhood of Cupar to Edinburgh, 
 by Lochleven, Kinross, Dunfermline, Inverkeithing, and 
 Queensferry, a stretch of forty miles, varied by the 
 passage of the ferry. It was a delightful ramble in a 
 long day in June, which left the most pleasing recol- 
 lections, notwithstanding that I was a little foot-sore 
 on reaching home. By such means as this I was able 
 to impart some originality to the ordinary descriptions 
 in the Gazetteer. 
 
 Although my brother was ostensibly associated with 
 me in this production, his duties were chiefly those 
 of final supervisor of the press. As the work was a 
 thick octavo volume, double columns, in small type, 
 the mere penmanship of it extended to ten thousand 
 pages, many of which I wrote twice or thrice over, to 
 insure accuracy. My share of the price of copyright 
 was seventy pounds. This book was a great literary 
 exercise, and as such, remuneration was of inferior con- 
 sequence. I wrote the whole of it, as I had previous 
 productions, behind the counter, amidst the involve- 
 ments and interruptions of ordinary business ; by which 
 means I acquired a kind of facility of dropping and 
 resuming a subject at a moment's notice, which proved 
 of considerable value. To finish the work at the 
 appointed time, I was frequently compelled to remain
 
 LITER A R Y EXERCISES. 227 
 
 at the desk for two to three hours after closing uj) lor 
 the night. The labour incurred by so much thinking 
 and writing, together with close application otherwise, 
 unameliorated with any sort of recreation, brought on 
 an illness which for some time assumed a threatening 
 appearance. But this was happily got over without any 
 permanently bad effects. 
 
 The publication of the Gazetteer helped perhaps to 
 bring me a little more into notice ; but if local notoriety 
 was desirable, that was incidentally effected by writing 
 a series of letters in an Edinburgh newspaper, concern- 
 ing that species of civic administration which terminated 
 shortly afterwards in a financial collapse. These letters 
 bore my name, for it has been with me a rule in life 
 never to write an anonymous letter. If ever there was 
 an instance of the value of this species of candour, it 
 was on the present occasion. The letters engaged 
 public attention, and when issued in a collected fomi in 
 a small pamphlet, the sale was immense. On looking 
 back to this exploit, I feel that the strictures were much 
 too severe, and visited on individuals that which pro- 
 perly belonged to a system. 
 
 Though these and some other literary exercises were 
 of no pecuniary advantage adequate to the time and 
 trouble spent upon them, they were immensely service- 
 able as a training, preparatory to the part which it was 
 my destiny to take in the cheap literature movement of 
 modern times. It is regarding that movement, and the 
 change which it wrought in my brother's as well as in 
 my own course of life, that something is now to be said.
 
 CHAPTER IX. 
 
 CHEAP LITERATURE MOVEMENT OF 1 83 2. 
 
 A LTHOUGH, towards the close of the eighteenth 
 and in the early part of the present century, 
 books, chiefly reprints, were in time cheapened, and 
 greatly popularised by a series of enterprising pub- 
 lishers, and although books of all kinds were rendered 
 generally accessible by circulating libraries, the more 
 aspiring of the humbler orders, particularly those at a 
 distance from towns, still experienced great difficulty 
 in procuring works to improve their knowledge or 
 entertain their leisure hours. Perusing the memoirs of 
 Robert Burns, James Ferguson, Thomas Telford, George 
 Stephenson, and others who, by dint of genius and 
 painstaking study, raised themselves from obscurity to 
 distinction, we perceive what were their difficulties in 
 getting hold of books; such as they did procure being 
 mostly borrowed from kindly disposed neighbours. 
 
 Usually, in these untoward circumstances, the mind 
 of the rustic youth of Scotland took the direction of 
 rh)aning in the style of Ramsay and Robert Fergusson. 
 This was specially observable in the case of Telford, 
 who, while still a journeyman mason in his native Esk- 
 dale, contributed verses to Ruddiman's Weekly Maga- 
 zine, under the signature of ' Eskdale Tani.' In one 
 of these compositions, which was addressed to Burns,
 
 CHE A P LITER A TURE. 229 
 
 he sketched his own character, and the efforts he made 
 to improve his stock of knowledge by jjoring over 
 a borrowed volume, with no better light than what was 
 afforded by the cottage fire : 
 
 ' Nor pass the tcntie curious lad, 
 Who o'er the ingle hangs his head, 
 And begs of neighbours books to read ; 
 
 For hence arise 
 Thy country's sons, who far are spread, 
 
 Baith bold and wise.' 
 
 So matters remained ; the protracted French war and 
 its immediate consequences postponing any substantial 
 improvement, at least as regarded the less affluent classes. 
 From 1815 till 1S20, while the marvellous fictions of 
 Scott and the poems of Byron were issuing with rapidity 
 from the press, low-priced and scurrilous prints, minister- 
 ing to the fancies of the seditious and depraved, were 
 also produced in vast numbers. The whole were 
 suppressed by a statute, imposing a stamp, in 1820. 
 
 No cheap unstamped paper could be safely attempted 
 immediately after this, unless it were purely literary^ 
 and abstained from any comment on public affairs. Of 
 this class was the obscure periodical attempted by my 
 brother and myself in 182 1. In 1822, a cheap weekly 
 sheet, styled the Mirror, was begun in London by John 
 Limbird, but with litde pretension to original writing. 
 It was illustrated with wood-engravings, was generally 
 amusing, and so far might be defined as a step in the 
 right direction. 
 
 From about this time, benevolently disposed anil 
 thoughtful men set about devising methods for improv- 
 ing the intelligence and |)rofessit>nal skill of artisans. 
 The School of Arts, the earliest of its class, was founded
 
 230 MEMOIR. 
 
 in Edinburgh in 182 1. Two years later, Dr Birkbeck 
 founded a Mechanics' Institution in London, and another 
 in Glasgow. Coeval with this movement, tlie Society 
 for the Diffusion of Useful Knowledge was founded in 
 1825. Viewed as a distinct and imposing effort to 
 stimulate the popular understanding, this association, 
 with all the mistakes which marked its short career, is 
 never to be spoken of without respect. The object of 
 the Society was to issue a series of cheap treatises on 
 the exact sciences, and on various branches of know- 
 ledge. In 1827, Archibald Constable, a man of bold 
 conceptions, commenced the issue of his Miscellany of 
 volumes of a popular kind ; and others catching the con- 
 tagion, for a time there was a perfect deluge of works, 
 at a moderate price, designed for the instruction and 
 amusement of the multitude. 
 
 It is interesting to look back on those times, and note 
 the progressive steps towards a thoroughly cheap yet 
 original and wholesome literature. There was merit in 
 the very shortcomings and failures, for, with their tempo- 
 rary or partial success, they shewed that the public were 
 not indisposed to support that in which they could have 
 reason to place confidence. Some mistakes had been 
 committed. The prints suppressed in 1820 had dealt 
 principally in invective, of which no good can come. 
 
 The reign of William IV. was the true era of the 
 revival of cheap periodical literature. So far as the 
 humbler orders were concerned, it almost appeared as 
 if the art of printing, through certain mechanical appli- 
 ances — particularly the paper-making machine and the 
 printing-machine— was only now effectually discovered. 
 
 To meet the popular demand, a number of low-priced 
 serials, of a worthless, or at least ephemeral kind, were
 
 THE CORNUCOPIA. 231 
 
 issued in London in 1831. At the same time, there 
 were several set on foot in Edinburgh. The forerunner 
 and best of these was styled the Cornucopia, which 
 consisted of four pages, folio, and was sold for three- 
 halfpence. The editor and proprietor of this popular 
 sheet was George Mudie, a clever but erratic being, who, 
 I believe, had been a compositor. As the Cornucopia 
 contained a quantity of amusing matter, and in point of 
 size resembled a newspaper, it was deemed a marvel of 
 cheapness ; for at this time the ordinary price of a 
 newspaper was sevenpence. Eminently successful as a 
 commercial undertaking, Mr Mudie's sheet, if properly 
 conducted, could not have failed to be permanently 
 successful. 
 
 As a bookseller, I had occasion to deal in these cheap 
 papers. One thing was greatly against them. Tliey 
 were frequently behind time on the day of publication ; 
 and any irregularity in the appearance of periodicals is 
 generally fatal. It was also obvious that they were con- 
 ducted on no definite plan. They consisted for the most 
 part of disjointed and unauthorised extracts from books, 
 clippings from floating literature, old stories, and stale 
 jocularities, ^^■ith no purpose but to furnish temporary 
 amusement, they were, as it appeared to me, the per- 
 version of what, if rightly conducted, might become a 
 powerful engine of social improvement. Pondering on 
 this idea, I resolved to take advantage of the evidently 
 growing taste for cheap literature, and lead it, as far as 
 was in my power, in a proper direction. 
 
 It is, I think, due to myself and others to offer this 
 explanation. I have never aspired to the reputation of 
 being the originator of low-priced serials ; but only, as 
 far as I can judge, the first to make a deteniiined atlenipl
 
 232 MEMOIR. 
 
 to impart such a character to these productions in our 
 own day, as might tend to instruct and elevate inde- 
 pendently of mere passing amusement. Professionally, 
 I considered that the attempt was a noble and fair 
 venture — one for which I might not be disqualified by 
 previous literary experiences, humble as these had been. 
 The enterprise promised to be at least in concord with 
 my feelings. 
 
 Before taking any active step, I mentioned the matter 
 to Robert. Let us, I said, endeavour to give a reput- 
 able literary character to what is at present mostly mean 
 or trivial, and of no permanent value ; but he, thinking 
 only of the not very creditable low-priced papers then 
 current, did not entertain a favourable opinion of my 
 projected undertaking, was shocked even at the very pro- 
 posal. With all affection, however, he promised to give 
 me what literary assistance was in his power, and in this 
 I was not disappointed. Consulting no one else, and 
 in that highly wrought state of mind which overlooks all 
 but the probability of success, I at length, in January 
 1832, issued the prospectus of Chambers's Edinburgh 
 Journal^ a weekly sheet at three-halfpence. Announcing 
 myself as editor, I stated that ' no communications in 
 verse or prose were wanted.' In this, there was an air 
 of self-confidence, not perhaps to be justified, but, as 
 shewing that my periodical was not to be composed of 
 the contributions of anonymous and irresponsible corres- 
 pondents, the effect was on the whole beneficial. 
 
 The first number appeared on Saturday, the 4th of 
 February 1S32. It contained an opening address 
 written in a fervid state of feeling, as may be judged by 
 the following passages. 
 
 ' The principle by which I have been actuated, is to
 
 CHAMBERS'S JOURNAL BEGUN. 233 
 
 take advantage of the universal appetite for instruction 
 which at present exists ; to supply to that appetite food 
 of the best kind, in such form and at such price as 
 must suit the convenience of every man in the British 
 dominions. Every Saturday, when the poorest labourer 
 in the country draws his humble earnings, he shall have 
 it in his power to purchase with an insignificant portion 
 of even that humble sum, a meal of healthful, useful, 
 and agreeable mental instruction. Whether I succeed 
 in my wishes, a brief space of time will determine. I 
 throw myself on the good sense of my countrymen 
 for support; all I seek is a fair field wherein to exer- 
 cise my industry in their service. It may perhaps be 
 considered an invidious remark, when I state as my 
 humble conviction, that the people of Great Britain and 
 Ireland have never yet been properly cared for, in the 
 way of presenting knowledge under its most cheering 
 and captivating aspect, to their immediate observation. 
 The scheme of diffusing knowledge has certainly been 
 more than once attempted by associations established 
 under peculiar advantages. Yet, the great end has not 
 been gained. The dearth of the publications, official 
 inflexibility, and above all, the plan of attaching the 
 interests of political or ecclesiastical parties to the 
 course of instruction or reading, have separately or 
 conjunctly circumscribed the limits of the operation ; so 
 that the world, on the whole, is but little the wiser with 
 all the attempts which have been made. The strong- 
 holds of ignorance, though not unassailcd, remain to be 
 carried. Carefully eschewing the errors into which 
 these praiseworthy associations have fallen, I take a 
 course altogether novel. Whatever may be my political 
 principles, neither these nor any other which would be
 
 234 MEMOIR. 
 
 destructive of my present views, shall ever mingle in 
 my observations on the arrangements of civil society.' 
 I concluded by notifying the species of subjects which 
 would receive particular attention. 
 
 High as were my expectations, the success of the 
 work exceeded them. In a few days there was, 
 for Scotland, the unprecedented sale of thirty thousand 
 copies ; and shortly afterwards, when copies were con- 
 signed to an agent in London for dispersal through 
 England, the sale rose to upwards of fifty thousand, at 
 which it long remained. Some years afterwards, the cir- 
 culation exceeded eighty thousand. To the best of my 
 recollection, all the other cheap papers issued in Edin- 
 burgh immediately disappeared. In London, some also 
 were dropped, but others sprung up in their stead. For 
 a time, indeed, there was not a week which had not a new 
 serial ; but few of these candidates for public approval 
 outlived the second or third number. So many began 
 and never went farther, that a gentleman whom we hap- 
 pened to hear of possessed a large pile of first numbers 
 of periodicals of which a second never appeared. 
 
 On the 31st of March 1832, being eight weeks 
 after the commencement of Chambers's Journal, ap- 
 peared the first number of the Fetmy Magazine of 
 the Society for the Diffusion of Useful Knowledge. We 
 learn from Mr Charles Knight, its publisher, that the 
 Fetmy Magazine was suggested to him on a morning 
 in March, and that the Lord Chancellor (Brougham), 
 who was waited on, cordially entered into the project, 
 which was forthwith sanctioned by the Committee of 
 the Society. The Fenny Magazine, begun under such 
 distinguished auspices, and which, as is understood, had 
 a very large circulation, terminated unexpectedly in
 
 THE PENNY MAGAZINE. 235 
 
 1845 ; though not without having exerted, during its 
 comparatively brief career, an influence, along with 
 similar publications, in stimulating the growth of that 
 cheap and wholesome literature which has latterly 
 assumed such huge proportions. 
 
 Why the Penny Magazine, with its alleged success 
 as regards circulation, its large array of artists and 
 writers, and its body of distinguished patrons, should 
 have perished so prematurely, while there were still 
 considerable strongholds of ignorance to be attacked, 
 no one has ever ventured to explain. A silence equally 
 mysterious hangs over the close of the Useful Know- 
 ledge Society, the proceedings of which were so vigor- 
 ously heralded and sustained by articles in the Edin- 
 burgh Review, that no one could say the association failed 
 for want of recommendation from the highest literary 
 quarters. In the absence of any explanations on the 
 subject, it may be conjectured that with all the ability 
 displayed, and the best intentions of every one con- 
 cerned, the treatises of the Society were on the whole too 
 technical and abstruse for the mass of operatives ; they 
 made no provision for the culture of the imaginative 
 faculties ; and, in point of fact, were purchased and 
 read chiefly by persons considerably raised above the 
 obligation of toiling witli their hands for their daily 
 bread. In a word, they may be supposed to have been 
 distasteful to the poi)ular fancy. If any other reason 
 be wanted, it probably lay in the fact that a society 
 cannot, as a rule, compete with private enterprise. 
 
 It is not my duty to sit as critic on aims and efforts 
 not unlike my own. There are different ways of doing 
 things, and it may happen that one is as good as 
 another. All that need be said is, that it has been
 
 236 MEMOIR. 
 
 a matter of congratulation, that Chambers's Journal 
 owed nothing, in its inception or at any part of its 
 career, to the special patronage or approval of any sect, 
 party, or individual. And the same thing may be confi- 
 dently afiirmed of the numerous publications of one 
 kind or other which we were afterwards enabled to 
 prepare and issue in furthering the cause we had espoused. 
 It is something to say with excusable pride, that in the 
 whole proceedings of my brother and myself, we never 
 courted the countenance or recommendation of any 
 person or persons, or of any body of people, civil or 
 religious ; and after an experience of forty years, cir- 
 cumstances would point to the conclusion that this has 
 not been the worst, besides being the least obsequious, 
 line of policy.
 
 CHAPTER X. 
 
 THE CONDUCTING OF ' CHAMBERS'S JOURNAL.' 
 
 A S in the case of a dissolving view, when, as if by 
 ■^ ^ magic, a bleak wintry scene is transformed into a 
 landscape glowing with the warmth and verdant garni- 
 ture of summer, so, by the appearance of "Oat Journal, 
 and the wide popularity it secured, was there effected an 
 agreeable and wholly unforeseen change on my own 
 condition, and that of others connected with me. The 
 revolution was abrupt, and of a kind not to be treated 
 with indifference. The moderate and not very con- 
 spicuous business in which I had been engaged was 
 immediately relinquished, in consequence of the absorb- 
 ing and prospectively advantageous literary enterprise 
 in which I had embarked ; and removing to a central 
 part of the town, new and enlarged premises were 
 acquired. Until the fourteenth number of the work, 
 Robert was only in the position of contributor. Then 
 abandoning his separate professional relations, he 
 became joint-editor, and also without pecuniary obli- 
 gation was associated with me in the firm of VV. & R. 
 Chambers. 
 
 Had Chambers' s Jourml been commenced in London, 
 no mechanical difficulty would have been experienced. 
 The case was very different in Edinburgh, where, at the
 
 2:,8 MEMOIR. 
 
 time, there were obstructions as regards both paper and 
 printing. John Johnstone, a genial old man, husband 
 of the authoress of Clati Albyn, and other novels, was a 
 printer, and by him the work was for a time executed, 
 as well as it could be in the circumstances. Other 
 printers were afterwards employed, but their hand- 
 presses, even with relays of men toiling night and day, 
 proved altogether inadequate for the large impressions 
 that were required. At length, a set of stereotype plates 
 of each number was sent weekly to London, from which 
 copies were printed for circulation in England ; while 
 from another set impressions were executed in Edinburgh 
 by machines which we procured for the purpose. Steam 
 settled the difficulty. The work was at first a sheet 
 folio, subsequently the size was reduced to a quarto, and 
 at last to an octavo form. 
 
 Entering on the comprehensive design of editing, 
 printing, and publishing works of a popularly instructive 
 and entertaining tendency, Robert and I were for a 
 considerable length of time alone — our immediately 
 younger brother, James, having, to our distress, died in 
 February 1833 — and such was the degree of mutual 
 confidence between us, that not for the space of twenty- 
 one years was it thought expedient to execute any 
 memorandum of agreement. 
 
 Though unusual, the combination of literary labour 
 with the business of printing and publishing is not 
 without precedent. We may call to mind the examples 
 set by Edward Cave, Samuel Richardson, and Robert 
 Dodsley last century. We might, indeed, point to Sir 
 Walter Scott in our o^vn times ; the only thing to be 
 deplored in the case of that great man being, that he 
 kept his connection with the printing establishment
 
 DIVISION OF LABOUR. 239 
 
 of the Ballantynes a profound secret, through an 
 apprehension of losing caste among his law friends, 
 instead of avowedly, like Richardson, becoming the 
 printer, as well as holder of the copyrights, of his own 
 productions. 
 
 A happy difference, yet some resemblance, in char- 
 acter, proved of service in the literary and commercial 
 union of Robert and myself Mentally, each had a 
 little of the other, but with a wide divergence in matters 
 requisite as a whole. One could not have well done 
 without the other. With mutual help there was mutual 
 strength. All previous hardships and experiences seemed 
 to be but a training in strict adaptation for the course 
 of life opened up to us in 1832. Nothing could have 
 happened better — a circumstance which may perhaps go 
 a little way towards inspiring hopes and consolations 
 among those who may be destined to pass through a 
 sim.ilar ordeal. 
 
 The permanent hold on the public mind which the 
 Jotiriial fortunately obtained, was undoubtedly owing, in 
 a very great degree, to the leading articles, consisting of 
 essays, moral, familiar, and humorous, from the pen of 
 my brother. My own more special duties were con- 
 fined for the most part to papers having in view some 
 kind of popular instruction, particularly as regards 
 the young, whom it was attempted to stimulate in the 
 way of mental improvement. There likewise fell to my 
 share the general administration of a concern which 
 was ever increasing in dimensions. In conducting the 
 /ourtial, the object never lost sight of was not merely 
 to enlighten, by presenting information on matters 
 of interest, and to harmlessly amuse, but to touch 
 the heart — to purify the affections; thus, if possible,
 
 240 MEMOIR. 
 
 imparting to the work a character which would render it 
 universally acceptable to families. 
 
 At no time was there any attempt to give pictorial 
 illustrations of objects in natural history, the fine arts, 
 or anything else. Without undervaluing the attractions 
 of wood-cut engravings, the aims of the editors were in 
 a different direction. Their desire, it will be perceived, 
 was to cultivate the feelings as much as the under- 
 standing. Hence the endeavour to revive, in a style 
 befitting the age, the essay system of last century. In 
 this effort, it may be allowable to say that Robert was 
 eminently successful. His own explanations on the 
 subject, embraced in the preface to a collection of his 
 essays (published in 1847), are worthy of being quoted: 
 
 ' It was in middle life that I was induced to become an 
 essayist, for the benefit of a well-known periodical work 
 established by my elder brother. During fifteen years I 
 have laboured in this field, alternately gay, grave, senti- 
 mental, philosophical, until not much fewer than four 
 hundred separate papers have proceeded from my pen. 
 These papers were written under some difiiculties, parti- 
 cularly those of a provincial situation, and a life too studious 
 and recluse to afi"ord much opportunity for the observation 
 of social characteristics. Yet perhaps these restraints have 
 had some good effect on the other hand, in making the 
 treatment of subjects less local and less liable to the acci- 
 dents of fashion than it might otherwise have been. One 
 ruling aim of the author must be taken into account : it was 
 my design from the first to be the essayist of the middle 
 class — that in which I was born, and to which I continued 
 to belong. I therefore do not treat their manners and 
 habits as one looking de hmit en bas, which is the usual 
 style of essayists, but as one looking round among the 
 firesides of my friends. For their use I shape and sharpen
 
 DEATH OF SIR WALTER SCOTT. ii,\ 
 
 my apothegms ; to their comprehension I modify any 
 philosophical disquisitions on which I have entered. Every- 
 where I have sought less to attain elegance or observe 
 refinement, than to avoid that last of literary sins — dullness. 
 I have endeavoured to be brief — direct ; and I know I have 
 been earnest. As to the sentiment and philosophy, I am 
 not aware that any particular remark is called for. The 
 only principles on which I have been guided are, as far as 
 I am aware, these : whatever seems to me just, or true, or 
 useful, or rational, or beautiful, I love and honour — 
 wherever human woe can be lessened, or happiness in- 
 creased, I would work to that end — wherever intelligence 
 and virtue can be promoted, I would promote them. These 
 dispositions will, I trust, be traced in my writings.' 
 
 The year that saw the beginning of Chambers^ s Jour- 
 nal, brought gloom over the literary world. After an 
 unavailing search for health in the south of Europe, Sir 
 Walter Scott returned to Abbotsford in the course of 
 the summer — to die. The scene was gently closed on 
 the 2ist September 1832. The funeral of this illustrious 
 Scotsman was appointed to take place on Wednesday 
 the 26th. Among the very few mourners from Edin- 
 burgh who attended were my brother and myself. In 
 a vehicle procured for the purpose, we followed in the 
 long funereal procession from Abbotsford, through the 
 villages of Damick and Melrose, and along the pictur- 
 esque road which, amidst hedgerows, conducts to the 
 umbrageous precincts of Dryburgh. All business was sus- 
 pended in the neighbourhood. At every side-avenue and 
 opening, stood a group of villagers, all apparently 
 impressed with a proper sense of the occasion. We felt 
 as if taking part in a historical pageant, amidst scenery for 
 ever embalmed in ballad and legend. At every successive 
 turn of the way appeared some object which Scott had
 
 242 MEMOIR. 
 
 either loved because it was the subject of former song, 
 or rendered memorable by his own immortal verse. On 
 reaching the vicinity of Smailholm Tower, the scene of 
 his childhood was brought, after all the transactions of 
 a mighty and glorious life, into the same prospect as 
 his grave. The spectacle presented at the final solem- 
 nity — the large concourse of mourners clustered under 
 the trees and near the ruins of the abbey, the sonorous 
 reading of the funeral-service amidst the silent crowd, 
 and the gloomy atmosphere overhead — is one never 
 to be forgotten. Few among those present felt more 
 acutely than my brother; and when the coffin was 
 lowered into the tomb, his heart swelled with uncon- 
 trollable emotion. 
 
 Indebted to Sir Walter for so many kindnesses some 
 years previously, and in correspondence with him till 
 the close of 183 1, my brother felt that he had lost his 
 most honoured friend. Almost immediately, he pro- 
 ceeded to write a memoir of the deceased, from such 
 materials as were within reach, as well as from personal 
 recollections. The memoir was issued by us in a 
 popular form, and had an extraordinary sale — as many 
 as a hundred and eighty thousand copies.* It is referred 
 to in the following correspondence which my brother 
 opened with Allan Cunningham. 
 
 ' 19 Waterloo Place, Edinburgh, 
 October ii, 1832. 
 
 * Sir — Conceiving that a proper opportunity has at length 
 arrived, I venture thus to break the charm — for such it 
 almost seems — which has so long kept you and me un- 
 
 * This memoir has been revised and reissued — Life of Sir Walter 
 Scott, by Robert Chambers, LL.D., with 'Abbotsford Notanda,' 
 by Robert Carruthers, LL.D. (1871).
 
 LETTER TO ALLAN CUNNINGHAM. 243 
 
 acquainted with each other. Permit me, upon the strength 
 of our common regard for Scotland and her native literature, 
 to introduce myself to you, as the writer of a life of Sir 
 Walter Scott, just published in London and Edinburgh, 
 in connection with the journal conducted by my elder brother 
 and myself, and which, I am afraid, must interfere a little 
 with the success of your similar attempt in the AtJiaiccum. 
 However these publications may jostle each other, there is 
 no necessity for the authors being spited at each .other on 
 that account. I yield to your work the palm of eloquent 
 writing and poetical feeling, but my superior opportunities 
 have consoled me a little for that on the score of more 
 information, and also, perhaps, correctness as to facts. I 
 shall direct a copy of a second edition, in which there are 
 a few corrections, to be enclosed for you, so that you may 
 have the means of correcting your own work by it, in the 
 event of its appearing in any other shape. I also shall either 
 now send, or send soon, a volume of which I shall beg your 
 acceptance, as a mark of my esteem and admiration. It is 
 a selection of the Scottish ballads, in which many new ones 
 are made out by piecing fragments together, and here and 
 there adding a line or a verse. I look upon this work as 
 my best out of some five-and-twenty volumes ; but such 
 is the apathy of the public to this beautiful kind of poetry, 
 that no work of mine has been so little heard of. It cost me 
 exactly a month's work, though of course I could not have 
 done it in so short a time, if I had not been a profound 
 student of the native legendary poetry from my youth up. 
 Permit me to take this opportunity of expressing my 
 admiration of your numerous efforts in this branch of 
 composition. I think there is no kind of poetry that 
 could make such an impression on youthful minds as your 
 early ballads, which are published by Cromek. I have 
 often regretted that you conlincd yourself to such a limited 
 set of ideas and localities. You know you have quite tired 
 me of Criffel and Solway, but you know best how your 
 bonnet fits you. Still, 1 cannot but wonder that you have
 
 244 MEMOIR. 
 
 not attempted to make something of modem society, and 
 of the scene in which you have spent so many of the latter 
 years of your life. — Believe me, sir, though personally un- 
 known to you, your sincere friend and fellow-countryman, 
 
 Robert Chambers. 
 'Allan Cunningham, Esq. 
 London.' 
 
 To this letter came the following genial reply : 
 
 ' 27 Lower Belgrave Place, 
 I'jth October 1832. 
 
 ' My dear Sir — Your letter was a welcome one. It is 
 written with that frank openness of heart which I like, and 
 contains a wish, which was no stranger to my own bosom, 
 that we should be known to each other. You must not 
 suppose that I have been influenced in my wish by the 
 approbation with which I know your works have been 
 received by your country. It is long since I took to judging 
 in all matters for myself, and the Pictu7-e of Scotland and 
 the Traditions of Edinburgh, both of which I bought, 
 induced me to wish Robert Chambers among my friends. 
 There was, perhaps, a touch or so of vanity in this — your 
 poetic, ballad-scrap, aitld-world, neiv-world, Scottish tastes 
 and feelings seemed to go side for side with my own. Be 
 so good, therefore, as send me your promised Book of 
 Ballads, and accept in return, or rather in token of future 
 regard, active and not passive, my Rustic Maid of Elvar, 
 who has made her way through reform pamphlets and other 
 rubbish, like a lily rising through the clods of the spring. 
 There 's a complimentary simile in favour of myself and my 
 book ! You must not, however, think ill of it because I 
 praise it ; but try and read it, and tell me Avhat you feel 
 about it. 
 
 ' I have been much pleased with your account of Sir 
 Walter Scott : it wears such an air of truth, that no one can 
 refuse credence to it, and is full of interesting facts and just 
 observations. I have no intention of expanding, or even of
 
 LETTER FROM ALLAN' CUNNLNGHAM. 245 
 
 correcting, my own hasty and inaccurate sketch. Mr Lock- 
 hart will soon give a full and correct life of that wonderful 
 man to the world. The weed which I have thrown on his 
 grave — for I cannot call it a flower — may wither as better 
 things must do. Some nine thousand copies were sold ; 
 this we consider high, though nothing comparable, I know, 
 to the immense sale of Chajnbers's yotirnal. I am truly 
 glad of your great circulation ; your work is by a thousand 
 degrees the best of all the latter progeny of the press. It is 
 an original work, and while it continues so must keep the 
 lead of the paste and scissors productions. My wife, who 
 has just returned from Scotland, says that your Journal 
 is very popular among her native hills of Galloway. The 
 shepherds, who are scattered there at the rate of one to 
 every four miles square, read it constantly, and they circu- 
 late it in this way : the first shepherd who gets it reads it, 
 and at an understood hour places it under a stone on a 
 certain hill-top ; then shepherd the second in his own time 
 finds it, reads it, and carries it to another hill, where it is 
 found like Ossian's chief under its own gray stone by shep- 
 herd the third, and so it passes on its way, scattering 
 information over the land. 
 
 ' My songs, my dear sir, have all the faults you find with 
 them, and some more. The truth is, I am unacquainted 
 with any other nature save that of the Nith and the 
 Solway, and I must make it do my turn. I am like a bird 
 that gathers materials for its nest round its customary bush, 
 and who sings in his own grove, and never thinks of moving 
 elsewhere. The affectations of London are as nothing to 
 me ; in my Lives of the Painters, I have, however, escaped 
 from my valley, and on other contemplated works I hope to 
 shew that though I sing in the charmed circle of Nithsdale, 
 I can make excursions in prose out of it, and write and 
 think like a man of the world and its ways. — I remain, my 
 dear sir, with much regard, yours always, 
 
 Allan Cunningham. 
 
 'To Robert Chambkrs, Esq.'
 
 246 MEMOIR. 
 
 It was gratifying for us, as editors of Chambers's 
 Journal, to receive the approbation and good wishes of 
 so prodigious a popular favourite as * Honest Allan/ for, 
 independently of the wide circulation of the work, his 
 good word was an assurance that the principles on which 
 it had been started and inflexibly maintained, were 
 commendable. It will now seem strange to mention, 
 that the success of this unassuming periodical led to a 
 species of persecution. On all hands we were beset 
 with requests to give it the character of a ' religious pub- 
 lication.' It was in vain for us to state that that was 
 not our role ; that our work was addressed to persons 
 of all shades of thinking, religious and secular, and that 
 we could not, without violation of our original profession, 
 take a side with any one in particular. We only got 
 abused, and were called names. The era of this species 
 of persecution, for such it was, however grotesque and 
 ridiculous, extended for nearly twenty years after the 
 commencement of the work ; and we had often cause to 
 be amused with the unreasonableness of the demands 
 which were preferred, also to wonder if others in like 
 circumstances were similarly assailed. 
 
 On one occasion we were impelled to address our 
 readers, partly in explanation of the reasons for main- 
 taining the principles on which the Journal was estab- 
 lished. Some passages may be quoted as specifying the 
 literary charter of the work : 
 
 * With so many good results before us, it would surely 
 be unwise were we to alter our plans in order to please 
 the fancies of any sect, party, or individual. It is our 
 firm conviction that any attempt to do so would be 
 attended by failure. The many would be lost for the 
 sake of the few who would be gained, and the work
 
 LEIGH HUNTS JOURNAL. 247 
 
 would soon dwindle into deserved insignificance. So 
 much we say in all friendliness to those who seem 
 inclined to fasten upon us functions for which we have 
 no vocation. No, no; we must dechne usurping the 
 mission of the politician and the divine ; we must leave 
 the newspaper and the evangelical magazine to follow 
 out their respective aims. To us, be it enough that 
 we hold by the original charter of our constitution. 
 Chambers's Journal shall never be written for this or 
 that country, nor to meet this or that fashion of opinion, 
 but remain to the end what it has been from the 
 beginning — a Literary Miscellany, aspiring to inculcate 
 the highest order of morals, universal brotherhood, and 
 charity ; to present exalted views of Creative Wisdom 
 and Providential Care ; and to impart correct, or, at all 
 events, earnest and carefully formed, ideas on subjects of 
 economic or general concern ; endeavouring at the same 
 time to raise no false expectations, to outrage no indi- 
 vidual opinion, and to keep out of sight everything that 
 would set mankind by the ears.' 
 
 While resolutely holding to our appointed course, the 
 establishment of rival publications less or more differing 
 from our own in character — some of them religious, 
 or colourably so — was so far from giving us uneasiness, 
 that we ever hailed them as coadjutors, all labouring 
 for the public good in their respective vocations ; 
 for it is only by such varied means that every depart- 
 ment of the community can be reached. In April 
 1834, Leigh Hunt set on foot the London Jourtial , which 
 the editor, in his address, spoke of as being * similar 
 in point of size and variety to Chambers's Edinburgh 
 Journal, but with a character a little more southern and 
 Uterary.' Now that Mr Hunt and my brother have both
 
 -48 MF.MOTR. 
 
 passed away, it is more than ever pleasing to peruse 
 the correspondence that took place between them on 
 the subject of this new claimant for popular favour. 
 My brother wrote as follows : 
 
 'Edinburgh, April 15, 1834- 
 'Dear Sir — I take leave to address you in this familiar 
 manner for several reasons. The chief is your kind nature, 
 as exemplified in your writings, which prove you the friend 
 of all mankind ; the lesser are, your allusions, on more 
 occasions than one, to writings of mine, when you did not 
 perhaps know the exact name of the author. My purpose is 
 to congratulate you on the first number of your Jourtial, 
 which I have just seen, and to express my earnest and 
 sincere hope that it will repay your exertions, and render 
 the latter part of your life more prosperous than you say the 
 earlier has been. You will perhaps appreciate my good 
 wishes the more that they proceed from an individual who, 
 according to vulgar calculations, might expect to be injured 
 by your success. I assure you, so far from entertaining any 
 grudge towards your work on that score, I am as open to 
 receive pleasurable impressions from it as I have ever been 
 from your previous publications, or as the least literary of 
 your readers can be ; and as hopeful that it will succeed 
 and prove a means of comfort to you, as the most ancient 
 and familiar of your friends. I know that your work can 
 never do, by a tenth part, so much ill to my brother and 
 myself as it may do good to you — for every book, however 
 similar to others, finds in a great measure new channels for 
 itself; and still more certain am I, that the most jealous and 
 unworthy feelings we could entertain, would be ineffectual in 
 protecting us from the consequences of your supplanting our 
 humble sheets in the public favour. My brother and I feel 
 much pleasure in observing that a writer so much our senior, 
 and so much our superior, should have thought our plan to 
 such an extent worthy of his adoption, and hope your doing 
 so will only furnish additional proof of the justice of our
 
 LETTER TO LEIGH HUNT. 249 
 
 calculations. This leads me to remark, that, while I acknow- 
 ledge the truth of your pretensions to having been the reviver 
 of the periodical literature of a former age, and have looked 
 to your manner of treating light subjects as in part the 
 model of our own, I must take this and every other proper 
 opportunity of asserting my elder brother's merit, as the 
 originator of cheap respectable publications, of the class to 
 which your yournal is so important an addition. In the 
 starting of Chainberis Edinburgh youriial, in February 
 1832, he was unquestionably the first to develop this new 
 power of the printing-press ; and considering that we had 
 some little character (at least in Scotland) to lose, and 
 encountered feelings in our literary brethren little less apt, I 
 may say, to deter us from our object than the terrors which 
 assailed Rodolph in the Witch's Glen (a simile more 
 expressive than it is apt), I humbly conceive that, when the 
 full utility of my brother's invention shall have been per- 
 ceived by the world, as I trust it will in time, he will be fully 
 entitled to have his claims allowed without dispute. 
 
 ' That we have regretted to find ourselves the objects of 
 so many of the meaner order of feelings among our brethren, 
 it would be vain to deny. I must say, however, that we 
 would have been ill to satisfy indeed, if the admission of our 
 weekly sheet into almost every family of the middle rank, 
 and many of the lower throughout the country, had not 
 more than compensated us for that affliction. Our labours, 
 moreover, are profitable beyond our hopes, beyond our 
 wants, besides yielding to us a ceaseless revenue of pleasure, 
 in the sense they convey to us of daily and hourly improving 
 the hearts and understandings of a large portion of our 
 species. That you may aim as heartily at this result, and 
 be as successful in obtaining it, is the wish of, dear sir, your 
 sincere friend and servant, 
 
 Robert CuAMiiKRS. 
 
 'To Leigh Hunt, Esq.' 
 
 There was a reply, lively and characteristic, a copy of
 
 250 MEMOIR. 
 
 which appeared in the fourth number of the London 
 Journal, being introduced with some compUmentary 
 remarks : 
 
 '4 Upper Cheynf, Row, Chelsea, 
 April 21, 1834. 
 
 'Mv DEAR Sir — I should have sooner acknowledged the 
 receipt of your kind and flattering letter, had I not, in the 
 midst of a great press of business, been answering it in 
 another manner through the medium of the London Journal^ 
 in the columns of which I have taken the liberty of putting 
 it. I hope you will excuse this freedom, which I could not 
 have taken with you had I respected you less ; and I trust 
 I have anticipated any delicacies you might have had on 
 the point, by stating to the reader that you had given me 
 no intimation as to whether I might so use it or not. But 
 setting aside other reasons for this step — injurious, I trust, 
 to neither of us — it appeared to me too good a thing for the 
 public to lose, as an evidence of the new and generous good- 
 will springing up among reflecting people, and specially fit 
 to be manifested by those who make it their business to 
 encourage reflection. It would have been like secreting a 
 sunbeam — a new warmth — a new smile for the world. Nor 
 will you think this image hyperbolical, when you consider 
 the effect which such evidence must have upon the world, 
 however your modesty might incline you to deprecate it 
 personally. Mankind, in ignorance of the sweet and bright 
 drop of benevolence which they all more or less carry in 
 their hearts, ready to bathe and overflow it in good time, 
 have been too much in the habit of returning mistrust for 
 mistrust, and doubting ever}' one else because each of them- 
 selves was doubted. Hence a world of heart-burnings, 
 grudgings, jealousies, mischiefs, &c., till some even of the 
 kindest people were ashamed to seem kind or to have better 
 opinions of things than their neighbours. Think what a 
 fine thing it is to help to break up this general ice betwixt 
 men's hearts, and you will no longer have any doubt of the
 
 L E TTER FROM L ETGH IIU.VT. 2 5 1 
 
 propriety of the step I have taken, even supposing you to 
 have had any before — which I hope not. I forgot to say 
 one thing in my pubhc remarks on your letter, which was, 
 to express my hearty agreement with you as to the opinion 
 that pubhcations of this kind do no injury to one another. 
 But this was imphed in my address to the pubhc in the first 
 number, and I hope is self-evident. Most unaffectedly do I 
 rejoice at hearing your own words confirm, and in so 
 pleasant and touching a manner, the report of the great 
 success of you and your brother in your speculation. I 
 cannot pretend, after all that I have suffered, not to be glad 
 to include a prospect of my own success in it, however it 
 may fall short of its extent. Any kind of a bit of nest of 
 retreat, with powers to send forth my young comfortably 
 into the world, and to keep up my note of cheerfulness and 
 encouragement to all ears while I have a voice left, is all 
 that I desire for myself, or ever did. But in consequence 
 of what I have suffered, and conscientiously suffered too, 
 I claim a right to be believed when I say that I could rejoice 
 in the success of other well-wishers to their species, apart 
 from my own, and have often done so ; and in this spirit, as 
 well as the other, I congratulate you. That you and your 
 brother may live long to see golden harvests of all sorts 
 spring up from the seed you have sown, and to reap in 
 consequence that "revenue of pleasure" you speak of, as 
 well as the more ordinary one, is the cordial wish of, dear 
 sir, yours faithfully, 
 
 Leigh Hunt. 
 'To Robert Chambers, Esq.' 
 
 No one could more regret than we did that Mr 
 Hunt's literary venture was not permanently successful 
 At the sixty-second number, he united with his journal 
 a periodical called the Priniing Machine, at the same 
 time raising the price from three-halfpence to twopence, 
 and altering the day of publication. Changes of this
 
 252 MEMOIR. 
 
 kind are hazardous, if not usually injurious. From 
 whatever cause, the publication, as far as can be remem- 
 bered, did not reach its hundredth number, although, 
 from the quality of its contents, it merited a much 
 longer existence. 
 
 How Chambers's Journal should have been so fortu- 
 nate as secure a lasting success, while so many con- 
 temporary publications came prematurely to an end, is 
 a point I can scarcely be expected to elucidate, further 
 than by referring to the long series of popular essays by 
 my brother, and to the sustained zeal with which the 
 work was conducted. Robert and I had come through 
 too many tribulations, and seen too vividly the conse- 
 quence of lost chances of well-doing among those about 
 us, now to trifle with the opportunity of honourable 
 advancement which had been fortunately placed in our 
 way. Week after week, year after year, there was with 
 us, I may safely aver, no relaxation of vigilance — no 
 treating of serious duties in the light of an amusement 
 to be taken up and laid down at pleasure. And need 1 
 make the remark, after all that has been written first and 
 last on the subject, that without this persistent earnest- 
 ness of purpose, and it may be self-denial, no permanent 
 success can be reckoned in any undertaking, whether 
 literary or commercial ?
 
 CHAPTER XL 
 
 RETROSPECT OF GENERAL WORK DONE. 
 
 T OOKING back to 1S33, memory brings up recol- 
 ^-^ lections of Robert living in the bosom of a young 
 family, in a home noted for its genial hospitality, as 
 well as for certain evening parties, in which were found 
 the most enjoyable society and music : his wife seated 
 at the harp or pianoforte, which he accompanied with 
 his flute — the old flute which had long ago sounded 
 along the Eddleston Water, and had been preserved 
 through many vicissitudes; the entertainment being 
 sometimes varied by the tasteful performances of worthy 
 old George Thomson — Burns's Thomson — on the violin: 
 my mother living with the junior members of the family 
 in the composure and comfort which she had so meri- 
 toriously earned : and I settled in my newly-married life. 
 Such was the position of afl'airs. All the surroundings 
 agreeable. 
 
 The sad thing in these recollections is, that so many 
 who composed our general society, and figured among 
 the notables of the period, have passed from the stage 
 of existence. A lady with whom we formed an intimacy, 
 and who greatly enjoyed these evening parties, was Mrs 
 Maclghose, the celebrated 'Clarinda' of Robert Burns. 
 Q
 
 254 MEMOIR. 
 
 Now a widow in the decline of life, short in stature, and 
 of a plain appearance, with the habit of taking snuff, 
 which she had inherited from the fashions of the 
 eighteenth century, one could hardly realise the fact 
 of her being that charming Clarinda who had taken 
 captive the heart of ' Sylvander,' and of whom he 
 frenziedly wrote, on being obliged to leave her : 
 
 ' She, the fair sun of all her sex, 
 Has blest my glorious day ; 
 And shall a glimmering planet fix 
 My worship to its ray ? ' 
 
 Vastly altered since she was the object of this ador- 
 ation, Clarinda still possessed a singular sprightliness 
 in her conversation, and, what interested us, she was 
 never tired speaking of Burns, whose unhappy fate she 
 constantly deplored. 
 
 Another of our acquaintances, but seen only at times 
 when he came to town, was James Hogg, the Ettrick 
 Shepherd. I saw him first at my brother's house in 
 1830, and was amused with his blunt simplicity of 
 character and good-nature. It did not seem as if he 
 had the slightest veneration for any one more than 
 another whom he addressed, no matter what was their 
 rank or position ; and I could quite believe that he 
 sometimes took the liberty, as is alleged of him, of 
 familiarly addressing Sir Walter Scott as * Watty,' and 
 Lady Scott as ' Charlotte.' The Shepherd, however, 
 was a gepuinely good creature and agreeable acquaint- 
 ance. On one occasion, he invited my brother and 
 myself to what he called ' a small evening party,' at his 
 inn in the Candlemaker Row, intimating, in an easy 
 way, that we might bring any of our friends with us. 
 We went accordingly. Some time afterwards, when
 
 THE ETTRICK SHEPHERD. 25^ 
 
 poor Hogg was no more, Robert gave an account, not 
 in the least exaggerated, of this extraordinary entertain- 
 ment, which may here be introduced as a specimen of 
 the lighter class of articles in the early years of the 
 Journal. 
 
 THE CANDLEMAKER-ROW FESTIVAL. 
 
 * The late James Hogg was accustomed, in his latter 
 days, to leave his pastoral solitude in Selkirkshire once 
 or twice every year, in order to pay a visit to Edinburgh. 
 He would stay a week or a fortnight in the city, profes- 
 sedly lodging at Watson's Selkirk and Peebles Inn in 
 the Candlemaker Row, but in reality spending almost 
 the whole of his time in dining, supping, and breakfast- 
 ing with his friends ; for, from his extreme good-nature, 
 and other agreeal)le qualities as a companion, not to 
 speak of his distinction as a lion, his society was much 
 courted. The friends whom he visited were of all kinds, 
 from men high in standing at the bar to poor poets and 
 slender clerks ; and amongst all the Shepherd was the 
 same plain, good-humoured, unsophisticated man as he 
 had been thirty years before, when tending his flocks 
 amongst his native hills. In the morning, perhaps, he 
 would breakfast with his old friend Sir Walter Scott, at 
 his house in Castle Street, taking with him some friend 
 upon whom he wished to confer the advantage of an 
 acquaintance with that great man. The forenoon would 
 be spent in calls, and in lounging amongst the back- 
 shops of such booksellers as he knew. He would dine 
 with some of the wits of B/ackwooifs Magazine, whom 
 he would keep in a roar till ten o'clock ; and then, re- 
 collecting another engagement, off he would set to some
 
 256 MEMOIR. 
 
 fifth story in the Old Town, where a young tradesman 
 of literary tastes had collected six or eight lads of his 
 own sort to enjoy the humours of the great genius of the 
 Nodes Amhrosia7ia. In companies of this kind, he was 
 treated with such homage and kindness, that he usually 
 got into the highest spirits, sang as many of his own 
 songs as his companions chose to listen to, and told 
 such droll stories that the poor fellows were like to go 
 mad with happiness. After acting as the life and soul 
 of the fraternity for a few hours, he would proceed to 
 his inn, where it was odds but he would be entangled 
 in some further orgies by a few of the inmates of the 
 house. 
 
 ' The only uneasiness which the poet felt in conse- 
 quence of his being so much engaged in visiting, was 
 that it rendered his residence at Watson's little better 
 than a mere affair of lodging, so that, in his reckoning, 
 the charge for his bed bore much the same proportion 
 to that for everything else which the sack bore to the 
 bread in Falstafif's celebrated tavern bill. To remedy 
 this in some degree, the honest Shepherd was accus- 
 tomed to signalise the last night of his abode in the inn 
 by collecting a vast crowd of his Edinburgh friends, of all 
 ranks and ages and coats, to form a supper-party for the 
 benefit of the house. In the course of the forenoon, he 
 would make a round of calls, and mention, in the most 
 incidental possible way, that two or three of his acquaint- 
 ances were to meet that night in the Candlemaker 
 Row at nine, and that the addition of this particular 
 friend whom he was addressing, together with any of his 
 friends he chose to bring along with him, would by no 
 means be objected to. It may readily be imagined that, 
 if he gave this hint to some ten or twelve individuals.
 
 CANDLEMAKER-R IV FESTIVA L. 257 
 
 the total number of his visitors would not probably be 
 few. In reality, it used to bring something like a High- 
 land host upon him. Each of the men he had spoken 
 to came, like a chief, with a long train of friends, most 
 of them unknown to the hero of the evening, but all of 
 them eager to spend a niglit with the Ettrick Shepherd. 
 He himself stood up at the corner of one of Watson's 
 largest bedrooms to receive the company as it poured 
 in. Each man, as he brought in his train, would en- 
 deavour to introduce each to him separately, but would 
 be cut short by the lion with his bluff good-humoured 
 declaration: " Ou ay, we'll be a' weel acquent by 
 and by." 
 
 ' The first two clans would perhaps find chairs, the 
 next would get the bed to sit upon ; all after that, had 
 to stand. This room being speedily filled, those who 
 came subsequently would be shewn into another bed- 
 room. When it was filled too, another would be thrown 
 open, and still the cry was : "They come !" At length, 
 about ten o'clock, when nearly the whole house seemed 
 "panged" with people, as he would have himself 
 expressed it, supper would be announced. Then such 
 a rushing and thronging through the passages, up-stairs 
 and down-stairs, such a tramping, such a crushing, and 
 such a laughing and roaring withal — for, in the very 
 anticipation of such a supper, there was more fun than 
 is experienced at twenty ordinary assemblages of the 
 same kind. All the warning Mr Watson had got from 
 Mr Hogg about this affair was a hint, in passing out 
 that morning, that iwae-t/irce lads had been speaking of 
 sui)i)ing there that night. Watson, however, knew of 
 old what was meant by twac-thrcc, and had laid out his 
 largest room with a double range of tables, sufficient tu
 
 2S8 MEMOIR. 
 
 accommodate some sixty or seventy people. Certain 
 preliminaries have in the meantime been settled in the 
 principal bedroom. Mr Taylor, commissioner of police 
 for the ward which contains the Candlemaker Row, is 
 to take the chair — for a commissioner of police in his 
 own ward is greater than the most eminent literary or 
 professional person present who has no office connected 
 with the locality. Mr Thomson, bailie of Easter Ports- 
 burgh, and Mr Gray, moderator of the Society of High 
 Constables, as the next most important local officials 
 present, are to be croupiers. Mr Hogg is to support 
 Mr Taylor on the right, and a young member of the 
 bar is to support him on the left. 
 
 ' In then gushes the company, bearing the bard of 
 Kilmeny along like a leaf on the tide. The great men 
 of the night take their seats as arranged, while others 
 seat themselves as they can. Ten minutes are spent in 
 pushing and pressing, and there is after all a cluster of 
 Seatless, who look very stupid and nonplussed till all 
 is put to rights by the rigging out of a table along the 
 side of the room. At length all is arranged \ and then, 
 what a strangely miscellaneous company is found to 
 have been gathered together ! Meal-dealers are there 
 from the Grassmarket, genteel and slender young men 
 from the Parliament House, printers from the Cowgate, 
 and booksellers from the New Town. Between a couple 
 of young advocates sits a decent grocer from Bristo 
 Street ; and amidst a host of shop-lads from the Lucken- 
 booths, is perched a stiffish young probationer, who 
 scarcely knows whether he should be here or not, and 
 has much dread that the company will sit late. Jolly, 
 honest-like bakers, in pepper-and-salt coats, give great 
 uneasiness to squads of black coats in juxtaposition with
 
 CANDLEMAKER-ROW FESTIVAL. 259 
 
 them ; and several dainty-looking youths, in white neck- 
 cloths and black silk eye-glass ribbons, are evidently 
 much discomposed by a rough tyke of a horse-dealer 
 who has got in amongst them, and keeps calling out 
 all kinds of coarse jokes to a crony about thirteen men 
 off on the same side of the table. Many of Mr Hogg's 
 Selkirkshire store-farming friends are there, with their 
 well-oxygenated complexions and Dandie-Dinmont-likc 
 bulk of figure ; and in addition to all comers, Mr Watson 
 himself, and nearly the whole of the people residing in 
 his house at the time. If a representative assembly had 
 been made up from all classes of the community, it 
 could not have been more miscellaneous than this 
 company, assembled by a man to whom, in the sim- 
 plicity of his heart, all company seemed alike acceptable. 
 * When supper was finislied, the chairman proceeded 
 to the performance of his arduous duties. After the 
 approved fashion in municipal and other public con- 
 vivialities, he proposed, with all the honours, the King, 
 the Royal Family, the Navy and Army, and all the 
 other loyal a7id patriotic toasts, before he judged it fit 
 to introduce the toast of the evening. He then rose and 
 called for a real — a genuine bumper. *' Gentlemen," 
 said he, " we are assembled here this evening in honour 
 of one who has distinguished himself in the poetical 
 line ; and it is now my pleasing duty to propose his 
 health. Gentlemen, I could have wished to escape this 
 duty, as I feel myself altogether incapable of doing 
 justice to it ; it is my only support in the trying circum- 
 stances in which I have been placed, that little can be 
 required to recommend the toast to you. (Cheers.) 
 Mr Hogg is an old acquaintance of mine, and I have 
 reail his works. He has had the merit of raising him-
 
 26o MEMOIR. 
 
 self from a humble station to a high place amongst the 
 literary men of his country. You have all felt his 
 powers as a poet in his Queen's Wake. When I look 
 around me, gentlemen, at the respectable company here 
 assembled — when I see so many met to do honour to 
 one who was once but a shepherd on a lonely hill — I 
 cannot but feel, gentlemen, that much has been done 
 by Mr Hogg, and that it is something fine to be a poet. 
 (Great applause.) Gentlemen, the name of Hogg has 
 gone over the length and breadth of the land, and 
 wherever it is known, it is held as one of those which 
 do our country honour. It is associated with the names 
 of Burns and Scott, and, like theirs, it will never die. 
 Proud I am to see such a man amongst us, and long 
 may he survive to reap his fame, and to gratify the 
 world with new effusions of his genius ! Gentlemen, 
 the health of Mr Hogg, with all the honours." The 
 toast was accordingly drunk with great enthusiasm, 
 amidst which the Sliepherd rose to make his usual 
 acknowledgment : " Gentlemen, I was ever proud to 
 be called a poet, but I never was so proud as I am 
 this nicht," &c. 
 
 ' This part of the business over, the chairman and 
 croupiers began to do honour to civic matters. The 
 chairman gave the Magistrates of Edinburgh, to which 
 Mr Thomson, one of the croupiers, felt himself bound 
 to return thanks. Mr Thomson then gave the Com- 
 missioners of Police, which brought the chairman upon 
 his legs. " Messrs Croupiers and Gentlemen," said he, 
 " I rise, as a humble member of the body just named, 
 to thank you, in the name of that body, and my own, 
 for this unexpected honour. I believe I may say for 
 this body, that they do the utmost in their power to
 
 CANDLEMAKER-ROW FESTIVAL. z6i 
 
 merit the confidence of their constituents, and that, 
 if they ever fail in anything to give satisfaction, it is 
 not for want of a desire to succeed. But let arithmetic 
 speak for us. You all know that the police aflairs of 
 the city were formerly administered at an expense to 
 you of no less than one-and-sixpence a pound on the 
 valued rental. And you all know what a system it 
 was, how negligent, inefficient, and tyrannical. Now, 
 gentlemen, our popularly elected commission has 
 been seven years in existence, during all which 
 time we have watched, and lighted, and cleaned you 
 at thirteenpence-halfpenny 1 " (Great and prolonged 
 cheering.) 
 
 ' There is now for two hours no more of Hogg. The 
 commissioners, bailies, and moderators have the ball 
 at their foot, and not another man can get in a word. 
 Every imaginable public body in the city, from the 
 University to the Potterrow Friendly Society, is toasted, 
 most of them with the honours. Then they come to 
 individuals. A croupier proposes the chairman, and 
 the chairman proposes the croupiers. One of the latter 
 gentlemen has a gentleman in his eye, to whom the 
 public has been much indebted, and whose presence 
 is always acceptable, and after a long preamble of 
 panegyric, out comes the name — the honoured name 
 of Mr John Jaap, ex-resident commissioner of police 
 for the next ward. It is all in vain for Mr Hogg's 
 literary or professional friends to raise their voices 
 amidst such a host of bourgeoisie. The spirit of the 
 Candlemaker Row and Bristo Street rules the hour, 
 and all else must give way, as small minorities ought to 
 do. Amidst the storm of civic toasts, a little thickish 
 man, in a faded velvet waistcoat and strong-ale nose,
 
 262 MEMOIR. 
 
 rises with great solemnity, and, addressing the chair, 
 begs leave to remind the company of a very remarkable 
 omission which has been made. " Gentlemen," said 
 he, " I am sure, when I mention my toast, you will 
 all feel how much we have been to blame in delaying 
 it so long. It is a toast, gentlemen, which calls in a 
 peculiar manner for the sympathies of us all. It is 
 a toast, gentlemen, which I am sure needs no recom- 
 mendation from me, but which only requires to be 
 mentioned in order to call up all that feeling which 
 such a toast ever ought to call up — a toast, gentlemen, 
 a toast such as seldom occurs. Some, perhaps, are 
 not aware of an incident of a very interesting nature 
 which has taken place in the family of one of our 
 worthy croupiers this morning. It has not yet been 
 announced in the papers, but it probably will be so 
 to-morrow. In the meantime I need only say — ' Mrs 
 Gray, of a daughter.' (Cheering from all parts of the 
 house.) On such an occasion, gentlemen, you will 
 not think me unreasonable if I ask you to get up, and 
 drink, with all the honours, a bumper to Mrs Gray and 
 her sweet and interesting charge." (Drunk with wild 
 joy by all present.) 
 
 ' About two o'clock in the morning, after the second 
 reckoning has been called and paid by general contri- 
 bution, Mr Taylor leaves the chair, which is taken by 
 the young advocate. Other citizenly men, including 
 the croupiers, soon after glide off, not liking to stay 
 out late from their families. As the company diminishes 
 in number, it increases in mirth, and at last the ex- 
 tremities of the table are abandoned, and the thinned 
 host gathers in one cluster of intense fun and good- 
 fcllowism around the chair. Hogg now shines out for
 
 CANDLEMAKER-ROW FESTIVAL. 263 
 
 the first time in all his lustre, tells stories, sings, and 
 makes all life and glee. The Laird d Lamington, the 
 Womeft Folk, and Faddy CRafferty, his three most 
 comic ditties, are given with a force and fire that 
 carries all before it. About this time, however, the 
 reporters withdraw, so that it is not in our power to 
 state any further particulars of the Candlemaker-Row 
 Festival. 
 
 * The Shepherd now reposes beneath the sod of his 
 native Ettrick, all the sorrows and joys of his checkered 
 career hushed with his own breath, and not a stone 
 to point pale Scotia's way, to pour her sorrows o'er 
 her poet's dust.* While thus recalling, for the amuse- 
 ment of an idle hour, some of the whimsical scenes 
 in which we have met James Hogg, let it not be sup- 
 posed that we think of him only with a regard to the 
 homely manners, the social good-nature, and the un- 
 important foibles, by which he was characterised. The 
 world amidst which he moved was but too apt, espe- 
 cially of late years, to regard him in these lights alone, 
 forgetting that, beneath his rustic plaid, there beat 
 one of the kindest and most unperverted of hearts, 
 while his bonnet covered the head from which had 
 sprung Kilmeny and Donald Macdonald. Hogg, as 
 an untutored man, was a prodigy, much more so than 
 Burns, who had had comparatively a good education ; 
 and now that he is dead and gone, we look around in 
 vain for a living hand capable of awaking the national 
 
 * Since ihis was wriUcn, a inonuincnt to James Hogg has been 
 creeled in the Vale of Yarrow, at the head of St Mary's Loch, a 
 few miles from wliat had latterly been his residence.
 
 264 MEMOIR. 
 
 lyre. The time will probably come when this inspired 
 rustic will be more justly appreciated.' 
 
 Sketches of this kind in a small unpretentious 
 periodical which affected no connection with the celeb- 
 rities of literature were unusual, and came upon the 
 public in the nature of a surprise. On very ordinary 
 topics, Robert, happily, brought to bear humour and 
 pathos in a way to excite the interest as well as the sym- 
 pathy of readers ; even when treating of what was repre- 
 hensible, he considerately made allowance for human 
 failings, and leant to the side of gentle forbearance. 
 
 The continued and very extraordinary success of 
 Chambers' s Journal brought on, as if by natural sequence, 
 fresh enterprises, to which, with some assistance, we could 
 give proper attention. In 1833, we projected and issued 
 the work styled Chambers's Information for the People. 
 It consisted of a series of sheets, on subjects in which 
 distinct information is of importance among the people 
 generally — such as the more interesting branches of 
 science, physical, mathematical, and moral ; natural 
 history, political history, geography, and literature \ 
 together with papers on fireside amusements and miscel- 
 laneous topics considered to be of popular interest. 
 As latterly improved, the work is comprehended in two 
 octavo volumes illustrated with wood-engravings. First 
 and last, its sale has amounted to upwards of a hundred 
 and seventy thousand sets — very nearly two millions of 
 sheets. How far the diffusion of this enormous quan- 
 tity of popularised knowledge at a small price may have 
 proved beneficial, it is not for us to say. The work 
 was reprinted in the United States, but with what 
 success we never heard. With some changes of subject,
 
 EDUCATIONAL COURSE. 265 
 
 a translation appeared in Paris under the title of Instruc- 
 tion pour le Feuple. There was also a translation of a 
 portion of the work into Welsh by Ebenezer Thomas, or 
 Eben the Bard, a person of no mean celebrity in Wales. 
 
 Next, in 1835, was announced and begun a literary 
 undertaking very much more onerous and elaborate. 
 This was Chambers's Educational Course, consisting of 
 a series of treatises and school-books, constructed 
 according to the most advanced views of education, 
 both as a science and an art. In the series of books 
 which followed, was comprehended a section on physical 
 science, the first time, as far as we were aware, of any- 
 thing of the kind having been attempted in a form 
 addressed to common understandings. Of the series 
 of books my brother wrote several, including History of 
 the British Einpire, and History of the Ettg/ish Language 
 a?id Literature, this being the first time that anything of 
 the kind had been attempted as a class-book. The 
 series now extends to upwards of a hundred volumes, 
 the diffusion of which has been greater than I care to 
 particularise. 
 
 To ac([uire some knowledge of the state of educa- 
 tion, and the nature of the treatises employed, in the 
 kingdom of the Netherlands, I made a deliberate journey 
 through that country in 1838, visiting the schools in the 
 principal towns. What fell under notice was described 
 in a Tour in Holland and the RJiine Countries (1839), and 
 it vindicated the j)lan which had been adopted in con- 
 structing our Educational Course free of matter that could 
 lead to controversy. No more need be said of the Course 
 than that it met with a friendly reception at home and in 
 the colonies, and that this acceptability is still increasing. 
 
 Writing to his old friend Wilson at Poughkeepsic in
 
 266 MEMOIR. 
 
 1835, my brother says : ' I am continuing to pursue that 
 course of regular plodding industry which you have 
 witnessed since its commencement. Personally, I have 
 now hardly anything to do with business, but I partici- 
 pate with my elder brother in the great advantage of 
 uniting the duties of a publisher with those of an author. 
 Of \he Journal, about sixty thousand are now sold; and 
 in England the circulation is steadily rising. That work 
 seems now indeed received and sanctioned as a powerful 
 moral engine for the regeneration of the middle and 
 lower orders of society. We have just commenced the 
 publication of a series of educational works, designed to 
 embrace education — physical, moral, and intellectual — 
 according to the most advanced views. To all appear- 
 ance, this will also be a successful undertaking. While 
 my brother has been married two years without any 
 surviving children, I have now no fewer than four. . . . 
 We all enjoy good health ; and I often think I realise 
 in my domestic circle that happiness which authors have 
 endeavoured to represent as visionary. Men, it is 
 allowed, are apt to speak of things as they find them ; 
 and, for my part, I would say that it is possible to lead 
 the life of a literary man without any of those grievances 
 and evil passions which others picture as inseparable 
 from the profession. I envy none, despise none, but, 
 on the contrary, yield due respect to all, whether above 
 or beneath me. I am but little disposed to pine for 
 higher honours than I possess : they come steadily, and 
 
 \ I am content to wait till they come. The result is, that 
 hardly such a thing as an annoyance ever breaks the 
 calm tenor of my life, and that there is not one person 
 
 I with whom I was ever acquainted whom I cannot meet 
 as a friend.'
 
 LETTER FROM HUGH MILLER. 267 
 
 From 1835 to 1837, as is seen by my brother's papers, 
 he was in pretty frequent communication with Hugh 
 Miller on literary subjects. Settled at Cromarty as an 
 assistant in a bank, Miller had some spare time on his 
 hands, which he wished to devote to writing stories and 
 other articles for Chambers's Journal ; the reading of 
 that periodical having apparently been to him a means 
 of mental stimulus. Limits, unfortunately, do not admit 
 of the insertion of Miller's letters in full. In one, 
 dated 19th March 1835, he refers to the difficulties 
 he had encountered in acquiring a facility in writing 
 for the press : 
 
 'Oblige me by accepting the accompanying volume. It 
 contains, as you will find, a good many heavy pieces, and 
 abounds in all the faults incident to juvenile productions, 
 and to those of the imperfectly taught ; but you may here 
 and there meet with something to amuse you. I have heard 
 of an immensely rich trader who used to say he had more 
 trouble in making his first thousand pounds than in making 
 all the rest. I have experienced something similar to this 
 in my attempts to acquire the art of the writer — but I have 
 not yet succeeded in making my first thousand. My forth- 
 coming volume, which I trust I shall be able to send you 
 in a few weeks, will, I hope, better deserve your perusal. 
 And yet I am aware it has its heavy pieces too — dangerous- 
 looking sloughs of dissertation in which I well-nigh lost 
 myself, and in which I had no small risk of losing my 
 readers. One who sits down to write for the public at a 
 distance of two hundred miles from the capital, has to labour 
 under sad disadvantages in his attempts to catch the tone 
 which chances to be popular at the time ; more especially, 
 if, instead of having formed his literary tastes in that tract 
 of study which all the educated classes have to pass through, 
 he has had to pick them up by himself in nooks and by- 
 corners where scarcely any one ever picked them up before.
 
 268 MEMOIR. 
 
 Among educated men, the starting-note, if I may so express 
 myself, is nearly the same all the world over, and what 
 wonder if the after-tones should harmonise ; but alas for 
 his share of the concert who has to strike up on a key of his 
 own. . . . All my young friends here, and I have a great 
 many, are highly delighted with your volume of Ballads.' 
 
 Some years later, Mr Miller made distinct overtures to 
 be a contributor. Under date 14th September 1837, he 
 writes : 
 
 * I have been a reader of your Journal for the last five 
 years — a pleased and interested reader ; and a few days ago 
 the thought struck me that, so far at least as one contributor 
 goes, I might also be a writer for it. . . . I have been 
 writing a good deal of late — mostly stories ; but the vehicle 
 in which I have given them to the public ' [a collection of 
 tales] ' does not c^uite satisfy me. Some of my brother- 
 contributors are rather more stupid than is agreeable in 
 one's associates ; and besides, there is less pleasure in 
 writing sense in the name of another than in one's own. 
 Every herring should hang by its own head. May I ask 
 you, without presuming too far on your good-nature and the 
 kindness you have already shewn me, to read one or two of 
 my stories, and say at your convenience whether I might 
 not find some way of disposing of such to better advantage. 
 .... I send you also a copy of verses which I addressed 
 about two years ago to a lady, who has since become my 
 wife. I do not know that they have much else besides their 
 sincerity to recommend them, but sincerity they have. It 
 is, I believe, Cowper who tells us that " the poet's lyre should 
 be the poet's heart."' 
 
 The articles sent were duly acknowledged and 
 inserted. Others followed in 1838, chiefly of familiar 
 papers on geology. It is one of the things to look 
 back upon with gratification, that Hugh Miller had
 
 CHAMBERS'S ENCYCLOPEDIA. 260 
 
 been, not only an early reader of, but a contributor of 
 interesting papers to, Chambers's Journai. 
 
 Shortly after this period, considerable additions were 
 made to our establishment, to meet the requirements 
 of an ever-growing business. It is not the purpose, 
 however, of the present Memoir to diverge into any 
 account of the various enterprises in which we happened 
 to engage. Only two may be mentioned as peculiarly 
 furthering the distribution of a cheap, and, as it was 
 hoped, useful species of publications among tlie less 
 affluent classes in the community. One of these under- 
 takings was Chambers's Miscellany of Useful and Enter- 
 taining Tracts, a work completed in twenty volumes, 
 adapted for parish, school, regimental, prison, and similar 
 libraries. The circulation was immense; and to keep 
 the work abreast of the age, it has recently undergone 
 considerable revision. 
 
 The other of these enterprises was one which exceeded 
 all former efforts. This was Chambers's Encyclopcedia^ 
 a Dictionary of Universal Knowledge for the People — a 
 work begun in 1859, and which continued to be issued 
 till its completion in ten volumes in 1868. Unless with 
 the assistance of a large and varied body of contributors, 
 a book of this comprehensive nature could not have 
 been attempted. This assistance was procured, and 
 what was of greater importance, Dr Andrew Findlater 
 entered with much spirit into our views, and brought 
 his erudition and habits of assiduous literary labour into 
 exercise as acting editor. For all parties, however, the 
 task was herculean. In commencing the work, my 
 brother and I felt excusable in describing it as our 
 'crowning effort in cheap and instructive literature.' 
 
 When we entered on the undertaking, it was 
 
 R
 
 270 MEMOIR. 
 
 considerably more than a hundred years since Ephrairn 
 Chambers gave to the world his Cydopcedia or Universal 
 Dictionary of Knoivledge — the prototype, as it proved to 
 be, of a number of similar works in Britain as well as 
 in other countries, which must have contributed in no 
 small measure to increase the sum of general intelli- 
 gence. In nearly all these works there was a tendency 
 to depart from the plan of their celebrated original, as 
 concerns some of the great departments of science, 
 literature, and history; these being usually presented, 
 not under a variety of specific heads, as they commonly 
 occur to our minds when information is required, but 
 aggregated in large and formal treatises, such as in them- 
 selves form books of considerable bulk. By such a 
 course, it is manifest that the serviceableness of an 
 encyclopsedia as a dictionary of reference is greatly 
 impaired, whatever be the advantages which on other 
 points are gained. The Germans, in their Conversatioiis 
 Lexicon, were the first to bring back the encyclopaedia to 
 its original purpose of a dictionary. The Penny Cyclo- 
 pcedia was another effort in the same direction, but it 
 was extended to such dimensions as to put it out of the 
 reach of the very classes for whom it was designed. 
 Our object was to give a comprehensive yet handy and 
 cheap Dictionary of Universal Knowledge; no subject 
 being treated at greater length than was absolutely 
 necessary. As now completed, it will be for the world 
 to judge whether the work realises the object aimed at. 
 
 It would have been impossible to give concentrated 
 attention to the various works mentioned, as well as to 
 those of which Robert was exclusively the author or 
 editor, without a proper organisation in one large 
 establishment. As regards Charnbcrs's Journal, we were
 
 ANNUAL SOIREES. 271 
 
 fortunate in having a succession of able and zealous 
 literary assistants, to whom be every acknowledgment. So 
 aided, and with twelve printing-machines and a variety 
 of other apparatus set to work, there was at length a fair 
 average produce of fifty thousand sheets of one kind 
 or other daily. The concern might be called a great 
 book factory, or perhaps more properly, a literary 
 organisation, somewhat original in character. Under 
 one roof were combined the operations of editors, com- 
 positors, stereotypers, wood-engravers, printers, book- 
 binders, and other labourers — all engaged in the 
 preparation and dispersal of books and periodicals. 
 The assemblage of so many individuals in various 
 departments, actuated by a common purpose, suggested 
 the idea of annual entertainments to all in our employ- 
 ment The first of these entertainments, which had 
 for its express object the promotion of a good feeling 
 between employers and employed, took place in the 
 summer of 1838. The meeting was in the form of a 
 temperance soiree, with some slight refreshments and 
 music. It was held in one of the large apartments of 
 our printing-office ; and to grace the assemblage, some 
 persons of local distinction were invited. Among the 
 notabilities who attended on the occasion were Lords 
 Murray and Cunningham, also Mr James Simpson, a 
 keen educationist, but best remembered for his amusing 
 account of a visit to the field of Waterloo, shortly after 
 the battle. Usually at these soirees there were about 
 two hundred of all classes, and of both sexes, present — 
 all in evening dress, and joyous for the occasion. In 
 the intervals of the instrumental music, addresses were 
 delivered, and songs were sung; on one occasion, as 
 I have pleasure in remembering, George Thomson
 
 272 MEMOIR. 
 
 dcliglited the company with the song of the * Posie,' the 
 warbling of which sent the mind back to 1792, when 
 our national bard was pouring forth his matchless lyrics. 
 The addresses on both sides were of that friendly nature 
 which was calculated to promote a spirit of mutual 
 amity not to be forgotten. 
 
 The presence of my mother was a pleasing feature 
 at the earlier of these annual soire'es. Now at an 
 advanced age, but retaining her buoyancy of feelings, 
 she entered sympathisingly into the spirit of the occa- 
 sion. Grateful for many unexpected blessings, her 
 existence drew placidly to a close. She died in 1843, 
 having exemplified in her life the brightest virtues that 
 can adorn the matronly character.
 
 CHAPTER XII. 
 
 Robert's later works — 1842 to 1865. 
 
 A LTHOUGH diligently engaged in conducting 
 ■^^- Chambers^s Jourtial, and aiding me in considering 
 matters requiring joint consideration, Robert did not 
 desist from miscellaneous literary undertakings. With 
 only intervals of indulgence in his cheerful social circle, 
 he was constantly occupied — sometimes on papers for 
 our periodical, sometimes on a book of an educa- 
 tional nature, and sometimes on miscellaneous works 
 involving much thought and labour. Going off occa- 
 sionally on an excursion to the west of Scotland, he 
 completed, in conjunction with Professor Wilson, an 
 elaborate work on the Land of Bur }is, which, extending 
 to two highly embellished quarto volumes, is understood 
 to have rewarded the enterprise of the publishers by 
 whom it had been undertaken. 
 
 The success of his small educational book on English 
 literature, led to the conception of a work vastly more 
 comprehensive. He projected a Cyclopccdia of Em^Iish 
 Literature, that should form a history, critical and 
 biographical, of British authors, from the earliest to the 
 present times, accompanied with a systematised series 
 of extracts — a concentration of the best productions of
 
 274 MEMOIR. 
 
 English intellect, headed by Chaucer, Shakspeare, 
 Milton — by More, Bacon, Locke — by Hooker, Taylor, 
 Barrow — by Addison, Johnson, Goldsmith — by Hume, 
 Robertson, Gibbon — and more lately by Byron and 
 Scott — set in a biographical and critical history of the 
 literature itself. This was certainly no mean enterprise. 
 The end which, if possible, was to be attained, was the 
 training of an entire people to venerate the thoughtful 
 and eloquent of the past and present times. ' These 
 gifted beings,' it was justly observed, 'may be said to 
 have endeared our language and institutions — our 
 national character, and the very scenery and artificial 
 objects which mark our soil — to all who are acquainted 
 with, and can appreciate their writings.' 
 
 The work to be executed was the first of its kind. 
 There existed various collected specimens from the 
 writings of eminent British authors, with and without 
 critical remarks, but until now nothing of a cyclopedic 
 character had been attempted. It being impossible, 
 with all my brother's self-sacrificing diligence, to execute 
 so onerous a task single-handed, he besought and 
 received the aid of his friend, Dr Robert Carruthers of 
 Inverness, who, both by his literary tastes and profes- 
 sional pursuits, was eminently qualified to co-operate in 
 the undertaking. Completed in two volumes octavo, 
 and issued in 1844, the Cydopcedia of English Literature 
 had a most successful career, and continues to be 
 popular, not only for private reading, but as a book for 
 the higher class of students. A new edition, consider- 
 ably extended, was lately prepared by. Dr Carruthers, 
 and is now published. 
 
 In the framework of this work may be recognised 
 the deep aftection with which Robert regarded the
 
 CYCLOPAEDIA OF LITERATURE. 275 
 
 compositions of many of our popular writers. Speaking 
 of these productions in a paper styled, ' What English 
 Literature gives us,' he says truly : * English literature 
 gives all who can enjoy it a fund of pleasure, of the 
 great amount of which we are not apt to be quite aware 
 till we run over a few of the items. There are the 
 Waverley Novels — in direct contemplation, only the 
 talk of an old-fashioned Scotch gentleman, who died a 
 few years ago — or, in a still more gross consideration, 
 but a few masses of printed paper. Yet, in effect, what 
 are they ! To how many thousands upon thousands 
 has hfe been made less painful or more delightful by 
 these charming tales ! The world would have gone on 
 without them, no doubt, but it would not have gone on 
 so agreeably. There would have been an infinite deal 
 less happiness in it during the last twenty-five years, if 
 they had not been written. How much has been done 
 for our enjoyment even by one or two of the characters 
 — Caleb Balderstone, for instance, or Dugald Dalgetty, 
 or Dominie Sampson. These are ideal beings, but do 
 we not feel positively richer by knowing them — by having 
 it in our power at any time to call them up before our 
 minds, and inwardly smile at what is ludicrous about 
 them ? In like manner, is it not a luxurious sympathy 
 which we feel respecting the fortunes of Ravenswood, 
 all imaginary as he is. These beings take their place 
 among our acquaintance, and the most delightful of all 
 acquaintance they are. We have only to take up a 
 book, and lo ! we mingle at once in their society, as if 
 unconsciously carried into it through the air. Such 
 books are as show-holes in the walls of this common 
 world, through which to look into one full of the gay, 
 the romantic, and the beautiful. The blind may be
 
 276 MEMOIR. 
 
 slipped aside, and our eye applied, in the smokiest of 
 cottages, as in the most gorgeous of palaces, and the 
 fairy scene will be the same in each case. And we 
 command the show at any time. It will lull us after the 
 excitement and fatigues of labour, and it will beguile us 
 of the languor of monotonous retirement and solitude. 
 We may be sad or joyous, eager and full of hope, or 
 mistrustful of all the good things of life ; but our acci- 
 dental mood is of no consequence when we have once 
 fixed ourselves at the raree-show of the Waverley fictions, 
 for then all of ourselves sinks, except the consciousness 
 of great enjoyment.' And so on he runs over many of 
 our popular prose and poetic fictions, pointing out their 
 value as an imperishable inheritance. 
 
 Of Scottish songs and ballads, Robert had a volumi- 
 nous collection, which he esteemed as a literary treasure. 
 In 1844, while engaged on the Cyclopcedia, he took a 
 fancy for securing the airs to those Border ballads which 
 were still uncollected. In this object he was aided by 
 the singing of various ballads by persons acquainted 
 with Liddesdale — one of them, the late John Shortrede 
 of Jedburgh, a son of Sir Walter Scott's friend of that 
 name. The result was the printing for private circulation 
 of Twelve Romantic Scottish Ballads, with the Original 
 Airs — a brochure now exceedingly scarce. 
 
 A general desire being expressed to possess my 
 brother's essays and some other productions in a separate 
 form, they were collected and published, 1847, under 
 the title of Select Writings, in seven volumes, for which 
 several characteristic illustrations were furnished by 
 David Roberts, R.A., and others. A copy having been 
 presented by the author to his friend, D. M. Moir — the 
 * Delta ' of Blackiuood — it was acknowledged as follows :
 
 SELECT WRITINGS. 277 
 
 * Allow me to congratulate you on the publication of your 
 Select Writings — a thing which you owe to yourself and your 
 family, and of which both will have reason to be proud. . . . 
 In these days of flash and fury, when a certain class of 
 writers seem to think that a work is valuable only in as far 
 as it departs from the regions of good taste and common 
 sense, the essays will stand forth as a beacon to the unwary, 
 and as a token that some minds have escaped the infection. 
 Nor can I doubt that they will attain a large degree of 
 popularity, which they deserve. In last night glancing 
 through the volumes, I have again made myself more 
 intimate with many old acquaintances — highly characteristic 
 of Scotland and the author, and equally creditable to our 
 " auld respectit mother," and to her son.' 
 
 It will probably be allowed that the essays compre- 
 hended in three volumes of these Select Writings were 
 the most original of my brother's productions. In them 
 were seen his depth of thought on moral and economic 
 subjects, also his sense of humour, with power of dis- 
 criminating character. Readers of Chambers's Journal 
 will remember the recurring weekly pleasure of reading 
 these essays : ' General Invitations,' ' The Pleasures of 
 Unhapijiness,' ' The House of Numbers,' * The Uncon- 
 fined,' ' Danger of Appearing Ill-used,' ' The Down- 
 draught,' &c. In a preceding chapter, a specimen of 
 the more humorous class of papers is given in 'The 
 Candlemaker-Row Festival.' 
 
 The essay on the ' Danger of Appearing Ill-used,' was 
 partly suggested by personal experiences. My brother 
 and I had early discovered the advantage of taking 
 everything in a placid, or at least unresentful spirit of 
 endurance. Often we had occasion to laugh at, as well 
 as compassionate, men who seriously injured themselves 
 in general esteem by iterating troublesome complaints
 
 278 MEMOTR. 
 
 of misusage ; and felt convinced that, ill possibly as such 
 persons had been treated, it would on the whole have 
 been better for them to remain discreetly silent — a cir- 
 cumstance reminding us, that in the injunction, 'whoso- 
 ever shall smite thee on thy right cheek, turn to him the 
 other also,' there is wrapt up a sound philosophy which 
 the world has been slow to recognise. Conversations 
 with Robert on this subject, led him to write the essay 
 in question, from which, for the sake of the advices it 
 offers, a few passages may be quoted. 
 
 DANGER OF APPEARING ILL-USED, 
 'It is extremely dangerous for any one who wishes to 
 make his way in the world, to appear ill-used — it is so sure 
 to afford some presumption not quite favourable to him. 
 The clever, the well-born, the wealthy, the agreeable — all 
 whom nature or accident has placed in a situation to be 
 looked up to or courted by their fellow-creatures — rarely 
 have any occasion to describe themselves as ill-used. It is 
 the opposite classes in general who are not well used by 
 their fellow-creatures — the stupid and troublesome, because 
 nobody can endure them ; the poor and lowly, because no- 
 body cares anything about them. Such has been the way 
 of the world since its beginning, and all our associations 
 are formed accordingly. Hence, when any one is heard 
 complaining of being ill-used, he is more apt to be set down 
 as one of the latter than of the former classes — a circum- 
 stance which may be in no respect discreditable to him, but 
 which, nevertheless, is not likely to be favourable to his 
 prospects. No matter how real may be the wrongs he has 
 suffered, or how eminently entitled they may be to sympathy. 
 Few have opportunities of becoming satisfied of their 
 reality ; and even if sympathy be extended, it does no good. 
 The general impression is bad, and he finds too late that, 
 by complaining of ill-usage, he has only put himself in the 
 way of continuing to be ill-used.
 
 \ 
 
 ILL-USED PEor^pig 279 
 
 * Of all the evils which arise from litiga.-on, decidedly the 
 worst is the effect which it sometimes has /"' putting vcvcn 
 into the position of ill-used people. Most men who think 
 themselves wronged by law and lawyers have the good 
 sense to absorb the injury, and appear as if they felt it nOw 
 But there are a few natures which do not easily brook wrong. 
 These persons, foolishly thinking to avenge or redress them- 
 selves by an appeal to the world, trumpet forth their injuries 
 wherever they go, and make themselves intolerable to all 
 around them, by long recitals of their case in all its details. 
 They take on the character of ill-used people, and soon ex- 
 perience the natural consequences in the cold regards of 
 their fellow-creatures. It is of course horridly base for those 
 who once smiled upon them in prosperity, now to shun 
 them in their adversity ; but the plain truth is, that it is not 
 in human nature long to endure a man who is always telling 
 how ill he has been used. 
 
 ' Let no one, then, who wishes to attain or prescr\'e a 
 respectable place in the world, ever appear as if he had been 
 ill-used. If a young man of business, let him never tell that 
 he has been cheated or worsted in any sort of way, for then 
 he will appear as having been ill-used. If a young artist, 
 let him never breathe a word as to the prejudice or ill-will 
 of "that hanging committee," in putting his pictures up at 
 the ceiling or down at the floor, for then he will be con- 
 fessing that he has been ill-used. If a candidate for an 
 office or place of any kind, let him carefully avoid all 
 complaint as to the suppression of his testimonials, or the 
 start allowed to his rivals in the canvass, for then he 
 will be owning to ill-usage. If a wooer, let him utter no 
 whisper of jilting or rejection, unless he be able to tell 
 at the same moment with a cheerful face, that, while 
 ill-used by one lady, he has been well-used by another. 
 In short, let no man who values his prospects in this 
 world, ever, by word, deed, or sigh, allow it to be supposed 
 that he has ever been, is now, or believes he ever can be, 
 ill-used.'
 
 28o MEMOTR. 
 
 Whatever wa'^ the deptli of thought required in the 
 compositior; of Robert's essays, they were for the most 
 part Ayritten at a sitting, and needed scarcely any 
 correction. Many were composed at spare intervals in 
 the course of a journey. One of his best articles was 
 written off-hand in an inn at Dundee, while waiting an 
 hour for a stage-coach to take him up the Carse of 
 Gowrie. Perhaps in the whole round of his four to 
 five hundred essays and sketches, none was more 
 appreciated for the delicacy of its conceptions than one 
 which he designated ' Idea of an English Girl.' It 
 might almost be conjectured that his fanciful notions on 
 this idyllic theme, had been partly suggested by the 
 unaffected manners and happy looks of one or other of 
 his own daughters. Essentially what is called a * family 
 man,' he experienced immense delight in the society of 
 his children, who were treated with the utmost tender- 
 ness and consideration. Ultimately, he had eight 
 daughters and three sons — the daughters charming girls, 
 most of them with flaxen ringlets, all with pet names, and 
 so merry and entertaining, that their presence shed a 
 continual sunshine through the dwelling. Clustered 
 round their mother, Mrs R. Chambers, a woman of 
 brilliant musical powers, much vivacity, and of literary 
 tastes — the ' Mrs Balderston ' of a number of amusing 
 essays — the evening musical parties were now more 
 enjoyable than ever ; for, by way of variety, the girls in 
 their childish glee would sing together some droll and 
 lively ditty, to the delight of the company. For some 
 purpose connected with his young family, my brother 
 removed to St Andrews ; his residence being a villa 
 called Abbey Park, prettily situated outside the town. 
 While here in 1843, he interspersed his usual literary
 
 CONVERSAZIONES. 281 
 
 occupations with writing pieces of verse concerning his 
 children — the daughters, of course, coining in for the 
 largest share of these rhyming fancies. 
 
 In 1840, Robert was elected a member of the Koyal 
 Society of Edinburgh, from which time to 185O he 
 carried on an extensive epistolary correspondence \vitil 
 men of literary and scientific repute ; and at this period 
 he often visited London, where he mingled in the 
 society of men of letters. His mind had become 
 occupied with speculative theories which brought him 
 into communication mth Sir Charles Bell, George 
 Combe, his brother Dr Andrew Combe, Dr Neil 
 Amott, Professor Edward Forbes, Dr Samuel Brown, 
 and other thinkers on physiology and mental philosophy. 
 Of Sir Charles Bell, he says in a note, on hearing of the 
 sudden death of that eminent surgeon and physiologist 
 (1842) : 'Sir Charles was my father at the Royal Society 
 — a most ingenious, excellent man.' He had likewise, in 
 a more particular manner, acquired a fancy for geo- 
 logical investigations, which introduced him to another 
 class of inquirers. Returning to Edinburgh, and resid- 
 ing at Doune Terrace, his house was open to all 
 strangers of literary or scientific tastes who were pleased 
 to visit him ; and he now may be said to have acquired 
 a wide circle of acquaintances. His conversaziones at 
 this period will still be remembered. Often they had 
 some specific object, such as shewing antiquities of 
 historical interest, and saying something regarding them 
 for the amusement of the guests ; or of discussing some 
 curious point in geology that had lately been exciting 
 remark — for example, the traces of glacial action dis- 
 closed on the face of a huge boulder by the cutting 
 of the Queen's Drive on Arthur's Seat. AV^ith sucli
 
 282 MEMOIR. 
 
 phenomena a^ this he was familiar, as is seen by his 
 communications to the Royal Society of Edinburgh. 
 
 My brother took up geology, not as a plaything, but 
 as a matter to be pursued with his usual quiet earnest- 
 ness of purpose. He went off from time to time on 
 trips to different parts of England, Scotland, and Ire- 
 land; his explorations, however, being confined in a 
 great measure to the sea-coast, the shores of lakes, and 
 banks of rivers, in order to trace the mutations that had 
 in the course of ages taken place on the earth's surface, 
 as regards the relative level of sea and land. 
 
 These excursions in quest of ' raised beaches,' resem- 
 bling artificial terraces on the face of hills and rising 
 grounds at some hundreds of feet above the present 
 surface of the ocean, were carried on with a steady 
 enthusiasm for a series of years. He, in particular, took 
 much interest in elucidating the character of the ' par- 
 allel roads of Glenroy,' which, by inveterate legend, had 
 been represented as pathways constructed for the Fin- 
 gallian heroes. Pennant thought it probable that the 
 country people were right in entertaining this legendary 
 notion. Playfair considered that the ' roads ' were the 
 remains of ancient aqueducts. Dr Macculloch, followed 
 by Sir Thomas Dick Lauder, endeavoured to explain 
 that they were produced by fresh- water lakes which from 
 time to time had burst out. By M. Agassiz, Dr Buck- 
 land, and Mr Lyell, the ' roads ' were imputed to glacial 
 action. Mr Danvin pronounced them to be a result 
 of upheaval of the land. This theory met with a 
 formidable challenge from Mr David Milne (now Mr 
 Milne-Home), who very satisfactorily shewed that the 
 ' roads ' were markings left by successive retrocessions 
 of the sea at an early period of the earth's history.
 
 T.TFE-ASSURANCE. 2S3 
 
 Such views coincided with those of my brother, who, 
 besides accompanying Mr Milne on some of his explora- 
 tions, went alone to Glenroy, and made minute investi- 
 gations all over the district, as will be seen by his work, 
 Anciefit Sca-Margijis (1848), in which the whole subject 
 is treated with his usual lucidity. 
 
 To carry out the explorations which ensued in the 
 above work, he was impelled to attempt a remedy for 
 that ill-executed surgical operation on his feet shortly 
 after his birth, and which had entailed years of suffer- 
 ing. A fresh operation performed by that eminent 
 surgeon. Professor James Syme, proved altogether suc- 
 cessful Robert was ever afterwards able to encounter 
 the fatigues incidental to pedestrian excursions, and to 
 go with more cheerfulness into general society. 
 
 He became an untiring advocate of the principles of 
 life-assurance, on which subject he wrote a tract, in the 
 form of a familiar dialogue, that, issued at a small price, 
 had a circulation of several hundred thousand copies. 
 The explanations offered did much to stimulate life- 
 assurance among certain classes in the community; and 
 of this we had numerous and gratifying proofs. Robert 
 did not confine himself to theory. As an insurer for the 
 benefit of his family, he connected himself with an emi- 
 nently well-managed and trustworthy institution, the 
 Scottish Equitable Life Assurance Society, in which 
 he became a director, and regularly attended the meet- 
 ings, unless when absent on his explorations. 
 
 On the occasion of an annual dinner of the directors 
 of the Assurance Society, he had the misfortune, while 
 on a geological excursion in Lanarkshire, to be detained 
 at a small inn at Harestanes. To while away the very 
 dreary evening, he wrote the following rhymed epistle,
 
 284 MEMOIR. 
 
 addressed to W. S. Wcilker of Bowland, with whom, as 
 a co-director, he should that day have dined : 
 
 EPISTLE BY A DISTRESSED DIRECTOR. 
 
 ' My chair and my plate will be empty to-night 
 (Thus sadly an errant Director complains), 
 For while they are feasting o'er platters so bright, 
 Fate binds me to tea and a chop at Harestanes ! 
 
 O Walker, be not at my absence offended, 
 
 'Tis I, and not you, who condolence may claim ; 
 
 Did you know but how sadly your colleague 's been stranded. 
 You would say that his stars, and not he, were to blame. 
 
 And did you but see him now scribbling forlorn, 
 
 With his one mutton candle that waves in the breeze. 
 
 In the worst inn's best room all so tattered and torn, 
 With its small fire within half an inch of his knees. 
 
 And did you but hear how the mail had deceived him. 
 How posting had failed like a dream in his clutch. 
 
 How for twice twenty hours disappointment had grieved him, 
 You would say he already is punished too much. 
 
 Nor yet is he sure that his troubles are ended. 
 
 From London he might in less time have come down ; 
 And should he not be by the night-coach befriended, 
 
 It may be half a week yet before he reach town. 
 
 So much for cross roads, and so much for long stages 
 (Thus musing our errant Director complains) ; 
 
 He could scarce wish Old Scratch, in his direst of rages, 
 A Tantalean evening thus spent at Harestanes ! ' 
 
 In his numerous excursions, whether connected with 
 geology or objects of historical and antiquarian interest, 
 Robert made many friends. One of these was the 
 late John M'Diarmid, editor of the Diunfries Courier., 
 Of this estimable literary man, my brother gleefully 
 related an anecdote, which is here subjoined from his 
 uncollected writings.
 
 JOHN M'DIARMTD. 2S5 
 
 * Mr M'Diarmid is one of those ingenious writers 
 who gather a fund of information by the means recom- 
 mended by Sir Walter Scott in the Waverley Novels. 
 Whenever he falls in with a stranger, he studies to 
 learn what is his trade or bent of his mind. It does 
 not matter who he is ; he may be a nabob from India, 
 or a saddler from Annan — that is all one. Within an 
 hour, he has got everything out of him worth knowing. 
 This practice is incessant and invariable on the part 
 of the ingenious editor. To prove that it is so, we 
 may mention an anecdote. Our lot was once so cast 
 as to travel a week with M'Diarmid through Galloway. 
 One evening, at the inn of Glenluce, we had occasion 
 to wait till midnight, that we might be taken up by 
 the mail, which was to carry us on to Stranraer. 
 Between ten and eleven, we felt so much fatigued that 
 we stretched our length upon a sofa, and took an hour's 
 sleep. While we were so occupied, our indefatigable 
 companion strolled into the kitchen, where a miscel- 
 laneous group of travellers and villagers was assembled 
 around a blazing fire ; in particular, there was one 
 person present, a poor wayworn being, who, in his 
 youth, had been a cork-cutter. To him M'Diarmid 
 forthwith attached himself in the way described, and 
 the result was, that, after we were seated in the mail, 
 on the way to Stranraer, he boasted of having, while 
 we were enjoying our inglorious sleep, made himself 
 master of " the whole statistics of cork-cutting! " ' 
 
 In the summer of 184S, Robert went eagerly off on 
 a visit to Rhineland and Switzerland, with a view to 
 satisfy himself on the subject of glacial action, the 
 theories regarding which, of Agassiz and Forbes, had 
 lately raised much interest among geologists. As
 
 2S6 MEMOIR. 
 
 Norway was known to offer some striking examples of 
 the effects produced by glaciers, he resolved to proceed 
 thither. Quitting Edinburgh in the latter part of June 
 1849, he arrived at Gottenburg, from which he made 
 a journey through Sweden and Norway — sometimes 
 going by steam-vessels, sometimes by carrioles, and at 
 other times by boats on the fiords that indent the 
 coast ; but always making explorations on foot wherever 
 it was expedient to do so. The result of the excur- 
 sion was given in a series of papers in Chambers's 
 Journal at the close of 1849 and beginning of 1850, 
 under the title of Tracings of the North of Europe. 
 Besides any scientific value attaching to these papers, 
 they offered amusing sketches of the social condition of 
 the country as far as Hammerfest, or nearly to the 
 seventy-first degree of north latitude. 
 
 Speaking of the climate at Trondhiem, which is placed 
 somewhere in the sixty-third parallel, and therefore 
 about the same latitude with the south of Iceland, he 
 says : ' An Englishman naturally expects to find it a 
 place of cold and harsh appearance, possibly occupied 
 by people wearing skin-dresses, with the wool inner- 
 most; whereas, everything looks pretty and in good 
 order, the ladies and gentlemen as well dressed as those 
 of any town of its size in England. As regards climate, 
 I can testify that, on the 17th July, it was barely pos- 
 sible to walk the streets during the day on account of 
 the intense heat' In proceeding from this place to 
 Hammerfest by steamer, he landed on the occasion of 
 a young gentleman, a native, reaching home, and here 
 he was struck with the kindly manners of the people. 
 * The simplicity, united with education and good 
 manners, recalled the pleasant pictures which Johnson
 
 A VISIT TO NORWAY. 287 
 
 and Bosvvell give of the life and state of the Hebridcan 
 gentry — the Macleans and Macleods of seventy years 
 ago ; pictures which, I may remark, are rapidly attaining 
 a historical value. Unaffected kindness beamed in the 
 foces of all towards the strangers, and when we came 
 away, they accompanied us to our boats.' 
 
 These accounts of the Norwegians form the most 
 agreeable part of the narrative. A few passages may 
 be presented descriptive of a scene when boating with 
 some fellow-travellers in the Altenfiord : 
 
 SCENE IN NORWAY. 
 
 ' In the afternoon, after rowing upwards of twenty miles, 
 we began to approach Komagfiord, where we designed to 
 spend the night. The washed, shattered coast here presents 
 remarkable disturbances of the slate strata, with curious 
 interjections, veinings, and contortions. Many blocks ap- 
 pear, lying on the slate, of totally different kinds of rock, 
 and therefore presumably brought from a distance. By- 
 and-by terraces begin to appear, with many of these travelled 
 blocks reposing on them. Such stones speak, and the talc 
 which they tell is as truthful, perhaps more truthful, than 
 most of those narrated in black and white. 
 
 ' At length, at an early hour of the evening, we turned 
 into a comparatively small, but sheltered and almost land- 
 locked recess, where we first see palings along the green 
 hill-sides, indicating pastoral farming, and then a neat house 
 seated a little way back from the shore, with a number of 
 smaller buildings scattered near it, including one which 
 advances as a wharf into the sea. That pretty red and 
 yellow mansion, so riant with its clean dimity window- 
 curtains, and a little garden in front, is the kiopman's house 
 of Komagfiord. It has a small porch in the centre, with 
 a wooden esplanade and a short flight of steps descending 
 on cither hand. A good-looking man, in the prime of life, 
 leans over the rail at the wharf to receive us as we land.
 
 288 MEMOIR. 
 
 We are met by him with a few courteous words in Enj^lish ; 
 we present our letter of recommendation for Mr Buch, 
 the kiopman, who presently appears, a bulkier and older 
 man, of remarkably open genial countenance, reminding 
 me much of Cowper's description, though not exactly true 
 so far as dress is concerned : 
 
 " An honest man, close-buttoned to the chin, 
 Broadcloth without, and a warm heart within." 
 
 He meets us with welcome, and we are speedily conducted, 
 with our baggage, to the house, a few steps from the shore, 
 where we are at once introduced into a clean parlour, 
 adorned with family portraitures and some of the favourite 
 prints of Sweden and Norway, particularly the never-absent 
 royal family. Mr Buch, however, does not speak any lan- 
 guage besides his own. He only looks the welcome he feels. 
 His wife presently appears, a pleasant-looking matron ; like- 
 wise his daughter and sole child, whom we by-and-by dis- 
 cover to be the wife of the younger man. Two or three 
 little children, too, the offspring of the young couple, make 
 their way into the room to see those extraordinary beings 
 the English strangers. The younger man, Mr Fantrom, 
 knowing a good deal of English, we speedily, through that 
 channel, become acquainted with the whole of this amiable 
 family, from whom I was eventually to receive a greater 
 amount of kindness than it almost ever was my lot to 
 experience from strangers. We desired, of course, to be 
 considered as travellers taking advantage in all courtesy of 
 the obligation under which the kiopman lies to receive such 
 persons into his house ; but it will be found that we could 
 not induce our kind hosts to regard us in that light. The 
 family seemed to be in very comfortable circumstances, and 
 the union in which the three generations lived together was 
 beautiful to contemplate. I shall not soon, I trust, forget 
 the kiopman's house of Kamagfiord. 
 
 ' After the refreshment of tea — for we had taken a good 
 luncheon at sea — we went out to examine the neighbouring
 
 A NORWEGIAN FAMILY. 289 
 
 grounds, and soon ascertained that a terrace of dctrital 
 matter and blocks goes entirely roinid the little valley, at 
 the height of about sixty-four feet above the sea. Walking 
 along it round the angle which divides the fiord from the 
 open sea in Varg Sund, we find it become a terrace of 
 erosion on the rough coast there, with huge blocks every- 
 where encumbering its surface — blocks of foreign rocL Mr 
 Fantrom obligingly went along with us over this ground, 
 and seemed glad when I could employ him in holding the 
 levelling staff for a few minutes. We soon found him a 
 very sensible well-informed man, though geology and 
 geodesy were new ideas to his mind. 
 
 'The latter part of the evening proved extremely beauti- 
 ful, and we were tempted to take seats on the esplanade in 
 front of the door, to enjoy the cool but still balmy air, a 
 delightful refreshment after the heat of the day. The little 
 fiord lay hke glass below our feet, with a merchant sloop 
 moored in the entrance ; the rugged mountains beyond the 
 Sound rose clear into the bright blue sky, where the light 
 was yet scarcely dulled. Mr Buch sat down with his long 
 pipe, emitting alternate puffs of smoke, and sentences 
 addressed to his son-in-law and grandchildren. The bustle 
 of Mrs Buch engaged in her household duties made the 
 smallest possible stir within. All besides was as calm as 
 nature before the birth of sound. Having nothing better to 
 do, I proposed at this juncture to bring out my flute, and play 
 a few airs, provided it should be agreeable to all present. 
 
 'This being cordially assented to, I proceeded to intro- 
 duce the music of my native country to these simple- 
 hearted Norwegians. The scenery and time seemed to 
 give magic to what might otherwise perhaps have proved of 
 very little interest; and finding my audience give unequiv- 
 ocal tokens of being pleased with my performance, I was 
 induced to go on from one tunc to another for fully an hour. 
 It was curious to think of my audience hearing for the first 
 time strains which are an inheritance of the heart to every 
 Scottishuian from his earliest sense— to myself, fur instance,
 
 290 MEMOIR. 
 
 since three years old— and to reflect on some of our national 
 favourites, as the Flowers of the Forest, Loch Erroch 
 Side, and the Shepherd's Wi'/e, now floating over the 
 unwonted ground of a Norwegian fiord. With each air, 
 in general, the idea of some home friend, with whom it is 
 a favourite, was associated. There was scarcely one which 
 did not take my mind back to some scene endeared by 
 domestic aftection, or the love which, in common with 
 every Scot, I cherish for the classic haunts of my native 
 land. It was deeply interesting now to summon up all these 
 associations in succession, in the presence of an alien family 
 who could know nothing of them, and to whom it would 
 have been in vain to explain them, but who, from that very 
 incapability of sympathy, made them in the existing circum- 
 stances fall only the more touchingly and penetratingly into 
 my own spirit.' 
 
 On returning from his northern excursion, my brother 
 set to work on a subject for which he had long been 
 accumulating materials — the Life and Works of Robert 
 Burns. As the brilliant and painful history of Burns 
 had been already written by seven of his countrymen, 
 it might seem unnecessary to resume its considera- 
 tion. Something, however, was wanting. There still 
 survived persons who were acquainted ^vith the poet, 
 but they were passing away, and now was the time for 
 gathering from them such facts and reminiscences 
 as might serve for a full and authentic biography. 
 Among others whose memory might be reckoned on, 
 was Burns's youngest sister, Mrs Begg; and she, on 
 being communicated with, entered cordially into the 
 project. George Thomson was also at hand, and glad 
 to be of any service. As regards the works of the 
 poet, a peculiar arrangement was contemplated. This 
 consisted in presenting the various compositions in
 
 LIFE AND WORKS OF BURNS. 291 
 
 strict chronological order, in connection with the narra- 
 tive, so that they might render up the whole light they 
 were qualified to throw upon the history of the life and 
 mental progress of Burns ; at the same time that a new 
 significance was given to them by their being read in 
 connection with the current of events and emotions 
 which led to their production. Acting on this plan, 
 and after minute personal investigations, the Life and 
 Works of Robert Burns was produced in 1851. It was 
 well received, and passed through several editions, to 
 suit different classes of purchasers. 
 
 Some years previously, in a great degree through 
 the energetic efforts of my brother, a small pension 
 on the roll of Her Majesty's Charities and Bounties 
 for Scotland had been granted to Mrs Begg and her 
 two daughters ; the government in this respect making 
 up, as it were, for neglect on the score of Bums. To 
 add to the pension, he set on foot the collection of 
 a fund, which was moderately successful. In writing 
 from Edinburgh, May 4, 1842,10 his wife at St Andrews, 
 he says : ' On Monday, the first-fruits of my applica- 
 tion for Bums's sister appeared in two tributes, one of 
 ten pounds from Mr Tegg, bookseller; the other, ten 
 guineas from Mr Procter, the poet Isn't that capital ? ' 
 To increase these resources, the profits of a cheap 
 edition of the Life and Works of Burns were set aside. 
 The sum realised was not great, but it helped. Writing 
 under date May 15, 1856, to a young American friend 
 who had lately been in Scotland, he says : ' I am glad 
 you saw old Mrs Bcgg, but it was a pity to miss the black 
 eyes and intelligent face of her daughter, Isabella, who 
 is a charming creature of her kind and sort, and more 
 a reminiscence of Burns than even her mother Just
 
 292 MEMOIR. 
 
 about a fortnight ago, W. & R. C. liad the pleasure 
 of handing two hundred pounds to the Misses Begg> 
 being the profits of the cheap edition of the Life and 
 Works of Burns edited by me, as promised by us at 
 the time of publication. This sum will lie at interest 
 accumulating till Mrs Begg and her annuity cease, 
 when, with one hundred and sixty pounds of the fund 
 formerly collected for Mrs B., it will be sunk in dis- 
 tinct annuities for the daughters. The result, with their 
 several pensions of ten pounds, will place them above 
 all risk of anything like want. They well deserve all 
 that has been done for them by their self-devotion to 
 their mother in less bright days. I have great pleasure 
 in thinking of that happy family on the banks of Doon, 
 and reflecting on the little services I have been able to 
 render them.' 
 
 Except in this private way, my brother, who 
 modestly shrunk from all parade, never spoke of 
 what he had helped to do for the poor and, in all 
 respects, deserving relations of Burns. His exertions 
 and liberal gift remained almost unnoted until unex- 
 pectedly referred to in the Household Words of Mr 
 Dickens ; the article on the occasion being a notice of 
 the Burns' Centenary Commemoration at Edinburgh, in 
 1859. The following paragraph from the article appeared 
 in The Times, on the loth February of that year : 
 
 Robert Burns and Robert Chambers. — The claim of 
 our Edinburgh friends to be called out for favourable dis- 
 tinction, arises, in our estimation, from the circumstance 
 that one man happened to be present who has done some- 
 thing for the memory of Burns besides talk about it. Among 
 the list of toasts and speeches we find just two lines 
 reporting that the company drank 'The Biographers of
 
 BURNS' SISTER, MRS BEGG. 293 
 
 Burns/ and that Mr Robert Chambers acknowledged the 
 toast. What Mr Robert Chambers said for Burns on this 
 occasion is not mentioned in the report \vo read. The 
 infinitely more important question of what he has done for 
 Burns, we are in a position to answer without referring to 
 reports. About seventeen years ago a grateful country had 
 left Burns' sister, Mrs Begg, and her daughters in most 
 impoverished circumstances, and Mr Robert Chambers set 
 on foot a subscription for them. The result of the appeal 
 thus made, and of a solemn Branch Burns' Commemoration, 
 got up in Ayrshire, was a subscription amounting to some- 
 thing less than ^400, of which the queen and court gave 
 £fi\. As much was done with this pittance as could be 
 done ; and it was sunk in an annuity for the three poor 
 souls to live upon. Mrs Begg and her daughters were 
 settled in a cottage in Ayrshire. Mr Robert Chambers 
 then went bravely to work with his own hands and brains to 
 help Burns' kindred for Burns' sake. After devoting 
 admirable industry and research to the task, he produced 
 The Life and Poems of Burns, in four volumes ; published 
 the work in 1851, and devoted the first proceeds of the sale, 
 £200, to the necessities of Mrs Begg and her daughters — 
 thus giving from his own individual exertion more than 
 half as much as the entire sum which all Scotland had 
 given. — Dickens' Household Words. 
 
 Immediately on the publication of the above, a note 
 was written to my brother by Leigh Hunt. It c;ame 
 into my hands only lately, and is too characteristic to 
 be omitted : it was as follows : 
 
 ' Hammersmith, Feb. i \th. 
 'Dear RorERT Chambers — You must take this, please, 
 as a postscript to my last; so that you need not put your- 
 self to the trouble of a reply ; but I could not help adding it, 
 to tell you how delighted I was at seeing last night in Tiie 
 Times the passage extracted from Household Words, 
 respecting your Life and Wor^s of B ions, and what you did
 
 294 MEMOIR. 
 
 with it for the poet's family. These are things which bring 
 tears of admiration into one's eyes. I never heard of the 
 circumstance before, or I should have spoken of it. It did 
 not surprise me, for I already believed you to be a man 
 capable of such things ; but it is affecting to see realised 
 what one believes in. I often wish that half-a-dozen people 
 whom I could choose, lived near one another, and could thus 
 make each life half-a-dozen times what it is. I venture to 
 say (for I suppose myself admitted to their society) that I 
 should never give them a moment's pain, except for some 
 grief common to all mortals, or for the approach of my own 
 death ; and I feel sure they would give no other to myself. 
 I shall see the whole article to-night in Household Words, 
 which always come to me by the last Friday post ; but I 
 could not wait. Your affectionate friend, 
 
 Leigh Hunt.' 
 
 In June 1855, he had an excellent opportunity of 
 visiting the Faroe Islands and Iceland, and this, for 
 geological reasons, he did not neglect. The Thar, a 
 Danish screw war-steamer, touched at Leith on its way 
 to Iceland, and at a certain charge six gentlemen were 
 accommodated as passengers. It was a pleasant trip. 
 Reikiavik, the capital of Iceland, was reached in safety ; 
 and in a day or two began a journey, in a rude fashion, 
 on the backs of ponies, to the famed Geysers, a distance 
 of seventy miles across a wild country, with no proper 
 places for rest or lodging. Yet, as he describes the 
 excursion, it was, though rough, a novel, hilarious affair 
 after all. At Thingvalla, the only accommodation for 
 the night was to bivouac in the church, and the only 
 means of lingual communication with the clergyman 
 who acted as host was in a corrupt Latin. Robert 
 made his couch in the pulpit. On the second day, the 
 party got to a farm-house in the vicinity of the Geysers ;
 
 VISIT TO ICELAND. 295 
 
 and next morning, some of these hot-water volcanoes 
 were in ebullition. The chief curiosity is the Great 
 Geyser, a kind of well, nine feet in diameter, and eighty- 
 seven feet deep, from which were seen thrown up violent 
 jets of water to a height of from seventy to a hundred 
 feet. The heat of the water is extraordinary. ' It has 
 been found that the water of the Great Geyser at the 
 bottom of the tube has a temperature higher than that 
 of ordinary boiling water, and this goes on increasing 
 till an eruption takes place, immediately before which it 
 has been found as high as 261° Fahrenheit,' or 49° above 
 ordinary boiling-point — a circumstance inferring enor- 
 mous compression under violent heat, until the water 
 bursts out into the atmosphere. 
 
 Returning by the way they had come, the excursion- 
 ists were again glad to take up their quarters in the 
 establishment of the parish minister, who, it appeared, on 
 a cross-examination in Latin by my brother, supported a 
 wife and eight children, performed his parochial duties, 
 and travelled once a month to a preaching station 
 eighteen miles distant — all for five-and-twenty pounds a 
 year. 'We could not but wonder how so large a family, 
 besides a horse, could be supported on means so small. 
 In wandering about the place, I lighted upon his little 
 stithy, which reminds me to tell that in Iceland a priest 
 is always able to shoe your horse if required.' The little 
 book in which these particulars were given, entided 
 Tracings in Iceland and the Faroe Islands, was published 
 in 1856. 
 
 A number of years had elapsed since he wrote a 
 llislory of Scotland for a series of books issued by 
 Richard Bentley. The subject was so familiar that 
 he now applied himself with zest to a work entitled
 
 29fi MEMOIR. 
 
 the Domestic Annals of Scotland. It was comprised in 
 three volumes. Two of these were issued in 1859, and 
 a third appeared in 1861. The period over which the 
 annals extended was from the Reformation to the 
 Rebellion of 1745, nearly two hundred of the most 
 interesting years in Scottish history. The work, how- 
 ever, was not a history in the usual sense of the word. 
 It consisted of a chronicle of occurrences of a familiar, 
 sometimes amusing, nature beneath the region of history, 
 but calculated to convey a correct notion of the man- 
 ners, customs, passions, superstitions, and ignorance of 
 the people — tlie pestilences, famines, and other extra- 
 ordinary events which disturbed their tranquillity — the 
 traits of false political economy by which their well-being 
 was checked — and generally those things which enable 
 us to see how our forefathers thought, felt, and suffered, 
 and how, on the whole, ordinary life looked in their 
 days. The materials for this assemblage of facts were 
 searched for in public records, acts of parliament, 
 criminal trials, private diaries, family papers, histories, 
 biographies, journals of transactions, &c. — the whole 
 amounting to nearly a hundred different authorities, 
 while the passages selected were so strung together 
 chronologically as to offer a progressive picture of the 
 times. On this work, so laborious, yet coincident with 
 his feelings, he occupied himself at times during five 
 years without in any respect remitting his WTitings for 
 Chambers' s /ouniai. 
 
 Between 1853 and 1858, Robert had occasion to be 
 frequently in London, partly from business and literary 
 considerations, and partly to enjoy the converse of 
 scientific friends. On the loth February 1857, in writing 
 to his daughter Anne, he alluded to a club dinner he had
 
 LONDON CLUB DINNER. 297 
 
 been at, and the letter is so characteristic, that we 
 present the following extract : 
 
 ' Yesterday, I went as the guest of Lord Ducie to the 
 Geographical Society Club dinner, in the Thatched House 
 Tavern, St James' Street. Sir Roderick I. Murchison 
 was in the chair, with Count Chreptovitsch, the Russian 
 ambassador, at his right hand ; next to him Lord Ducie, 
 then myself; Sir Henry Rawlinson at my other side. 
 This was very agreeable society. The ambassador is a 
 pleasant-looking man of sixty-five, with white hair rather 
 close clipped. His health was drunk very cordially, and 
 he returned thanks in one brief sentence. Afterwards, 
 Sir Roderick rose up and repeated as a communication 
 from His Excellency, that the Russian government is 
 quite with England in the Persian War. Sir George 
 Pollock was my vis-^-vis, who conducted the army back 
 from Afghanistan in 1843 — a quiet old man, the son of 
 a saddler from Berwick, and brother of the Chief Baron, 
 with whom I dined last week. 
 
 * Having a momentary opportunity of conversing with 
 the Russian ambassador, I told him of a large Russian 
 vessel being thrown on the east coast of Aberdeenshire, 
 in the time of the Regency of Mary of Guise (1542-60), 
 when all the crew were saved, along with some persons 
 of distinction, who were brought to the court at Edin- 
 burgh, and hospitably entertained there; after wliirh 
 they were conducted honourably to Berwick, and there 
 passed into the dominions of the English sovereign, 
 Mary. Seeing that he appeared to be interested in the 
 story, I told him I should have much pleasure in send- 
 ing him the particulars of the affair, remarking it was 
 one of a much more pleasant nature for both countries 
 than some that had taken place since; in which he
 
 298 MEMOIR. 
 
 cordially agreed, and gave me his card that I might 
 address the communication properly.' 
 
 My brother became a member of the Merchant 
 Company of Edinburgh, a guild or corporation of old 
 date, existing mainly for beneficiary purposes, and 
 which, by good management, has attained to wealth 
 and importance ; being deservedly esteemed for its acts 
 of public usefulness. As a member of this body, he in 
 time was elected to fill the office of Master, such being 
 the designation given to the president. While occupy- 
 ing this honorary position, he delivered a lecture at an 
 evening conversazione, 14th February 1859, on the 
 subject of ' Edinburgh Merchants and Merchandise in 
 Old Times,' which gratified a very numerous audience, 
 and was aftenvards printed for general circulation. 
 Into this lecture he threw a great variety of amusing 
 facts collected in the course of his studies. The matter 
 more particularly curious in the discourse consisted 
 of statements regarding families of distinction through- 
 out the country, which had sprung from persons who 
 had carried on business, many of them in a humble style, 
 in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. 
 
 The object of these illustrations was to shew how, by 
 a course of sobriety and diligence in his calling, a man 
 may rise to fortune, not only for his own advantage, but 
 that of his descendants ; and to remind many who 
 occupy a high social position what they owe to the 
 thrift and plodding industry of their ancestors. The 
 lecture was in my brother's best anecdotic style. He 
 spoke of a Hamilton of the house of Innen\ack who 
 was a trafficker in the West Bow, who acquired land, and 
 fell as a gallant gentleman at the battle of Pinkie, 
 leaving a son, who was ancestor of the Earls of
 
 LECTURE ON OLD FAMILIES. 299 
 
 Haddington, — Of Edward Hope, a shopkeeper in the 
 Luckenbooths, who lived in Tod's Close in the Castle- 
 hill, whose eldest son was the progenitor of all the 
 Hopes who have stood conspicuous in rank, in wealth, 
 and in public service in Scotland ; while from his 
 younger son are descended the famous mercantile firm 
 of the Hopes of Amsterdam, — Of Thomas Foulis, a 
 goldsmith in the Parliament Close, who lent money to 
 James VI., and had for requital a grant of the lead 
 mines of Lanarkshire, which he worked with good 
 result, and handed ultimately to his grand-daughter, 
 who married James Hope, the ancestor of the Earls of 
 Hopetoun, — Of John Trotter, who acquired by mer- 
 chandise the means of purchasing the estate of Morton 
 Hall, and thus laid the foundation of a family which 
 still exists in great note and opulence. Another instance 
 was that of James Riddell of that Ilk. This gendeman, 
 after pursuing a business career for some time in 
 Poland, where many Scotch youths then found occupa- 
 tion, returned to Edinburgh about the year 1603, set up 
 business there, married a lady of means styled Bessie 
 Allan, and died a wealthy man. His son, who became 
 a merchant in Leith, purchased the estate of Kinglass, 
 which he left to a line of descendants. We cannot but 
 view with interest the good sense of our gentry of two 
 and three hundred years ago, in setting their younger 
 sons to a career of useful and honourable industry, 
 instead of allowing them idly to loiter at home, or go 
 into the little better than idleness of a foreign military 
 service. After citing numerous instances, he mentioned 
 that a notable case was that of John Dalrymple, a cloth- 
 merchant, younger brother of Lord Hailes, and great- 
 grandson of the first Earl of Stair ; and then added :
 
 300 MEMOIR. 
 
 'That so many landed families amongst us have 
 descended from Edinburgh merchants, is no singular 
 fact, for trade efflorescing into nobility is an old phe- 
 nomenon in the south. There we have a Duke of Leeds 
 descended from the apprentice of Sir William Hewit, 
 the goldsmith ; the Wentworth Fitzwilliams, from a 
 worthy London merchant, knighted by Henry VI IL 
 From the nautical adventurer Phipps, of the time of 
 Charles II., come the Earls of Mulgrave. Cornwallis is 
 from a London merchant ; Coventry from a mercer ; 
 Radnor from a silk manufacturer ; Warwick from a 
 wool-stapler; Pomfret from a Calais merchant; Essex, 
 Dartmouth, Craven, Tankerville, Darnley, Cowper, and 
 Romney, have all had a similar origin. More recently 
 ennobled families — the Dacres, the Dormers, the 
 Dudley Wards, the Hills, the Caringtons — have all in 
 like manner taken their rise from successful trade. It 
 is an origin surely as honourable as dexterous courtier- 
 ship, gifts of church lands, or medieval robbery and 
 plunder.' 
 
 Contrasting old with new times, he concludes by 
 observing that ' our predecessors had not merely to 
 contend with the narrow resources of the country, and 
 with the want of a thousand conveniences as regards 
 transport of goods and conveyance of intelligence, but, 
 worst of all, they had to struggle with their own ignor- 
 ance, as well as with a host of erroneous principles of 
 legislation, of which we are now happily rid.' 
 
 Shortly after this, he edited and wTote an introduc- 
 tory notice to a volume purporting to be the Memoirs 
 of a Bankifig-Ziouse, by Sir William Forbes of Pitsligo, 
 Bart, author of the life of the poet Beattie. The bank- 
 ing-house so signalised was that which was set on foot
 
 S/Za WILLIAM FORBES. 301 
 
 in Edinburgh by John Coutts & Co., who occupied as 
 business premises an upper floor in the Parliament Close. 
 The Coutts family were from Montrose, and began as 
 corn-merchants and negotiators of bills of exchange. 
 One of them, John Coutts, was Lord Provost of Edin- 
 burgh in 1742. He had four sons — Patrick, John, 
 James, and Thomas. By these the business was con- 
 tinued, and received as apprentice the youthful Sir 
 William Forbes, in 1754. In the whole round of 
 biography, there is nothing finer by way of example to 
 the young than the life of Sir William Forbes. Born in 
 1739, heir to a baronetcy, and left fatherless at four 
 years of age, without patrimony, he was, commercially 
 speaking, a self-made man, though, like many youths in 
 similar circumstances, he owed much to the care of an 
 amiable and intelligent mother, who, dwelling in a small 
 house in one of the dingy lanes of Edinburgh, main- 
 tained on the most slender means the style and manners 
 of a lady. Her son. Sir William, a boy fourteen years 
 of age, instead of being bred to one of the ' learned pro- 
 fessions,' was put apj)rcntice to Messrs Coutts ; from an 
 apprentice, he became a junior clerk ; from a clerk, he 
 rose to be a partner; and finally, when several of the 
 partners died or quitted Edinburgh, the firm was trans- 
 formed into that of Sir William Forbes & Co., of which 
 he was the leading member. The firm, as is well known, 
 is now merged in the Union Bank of Scotland. 
 
 Sir William, as we learn from the memoir, was reared, 
 and acquired strict habits of business, chiefly under the 
 eye of John Coutts ; for Thomas, his brother, the 
 youngest son of the Lord Provost, removed to London. 
 There, founding the banking concern of Coutts & Co., 
 he died in 1S22, at about ninety years of age; his 
 
 T
 
 302 MEMOIR. 
 
 youngest daughter Sophia, married to Sir Francis 
 Burdctt, being mother of the much-esteemed Baroness >C 
 Burdett Coutts. The memoir, which contains many 
 curious particulars about banking in the olden time, was 
 written by Sir William Forbes with a view to impress his 
 son and successor with the paramount importance of 
 exercising, with diligence in his profession, the highest 
 principles of integrity, for only by such could he expect 
 to sustain the enviable reputation of the house. The 
 universal mourning on the death of Sir William Forbes, 
 in 1806, shortly after he had completed his Life of 
 Beattie, caused Sir Walter Scott to refer to him in one of 
 the cantos of Marmion, when addressing the amiable 
 banker's son-in-law, and the poet's friend, Mr Skene of 
 Rubislaw : 
 
 ' Scarce had the lamented Forbes paid 
 The tribute to his minstrel's shade, 
 The tale of friendship scarce was told, 
 Ere the narrator's heart was cold. 
 Far may we search before we find 
 A heart so manly and so kind.' 
 
 In editing the autobiography of this distinguished 
 banker, my brother enjoyed a pleasure instead of per- 
 forming a task. The same might be said of a series of 
 detached papers, written at spare intervals, or to deliver 
 as lectures. The subjects of these tracts, ultimately 
 issued in 186 1 under the title of Edinburgh Papers, 
 were various — old domestic architecture, merchants and 
 merchandise in old times, the posture of the scientific 
 world, some notions on geology, and the romantic 
 Scottish ballads. By this last-named paper, the accepted 
 opinions regarding several popular ballads, as given by 
 Percy and Scott, were considerably ruffled. In it he
 
 MRS SIDDONS. 303 
 
 ventured to shew that, so far from being ancient, these 
 ballads had been written, in an affectedly old style, not 
 earlier than the beginning of the eighteenth centurj' — 
 the surreptitious manufacture being executed by a 
 woman clever at versification, Lady Wardlaw of Pitreavie. 
 Professor Aytoun, amongst others, was, of course, not 
 well pleased at this unhappy overturn of certain literary 
 traditions, but could not disprove the accuracy of the 
 view that had been adopted. There was at the time 
 considerable discussion on the subject. 
 
 My brother and I had talked of visiting the United 
 States and Canada, We had pretty extensive business 
 relations in these countries ; but what chiefly interested 
 us was the social aspect of affairs beyond the Atlantic. 
 I was able to make this desired trip in 1853, the 
 account of which appeared as Things as They are in 
 America (1854). Robert's excursion was postponed for 
 a few years longer. 
 
 When the old Theatre Royal in Edinburgh was about 
 to be taken down in 1859, in order to make way for the 
 new General Post-office, he, at the request of some 
 amateurs of the drama, wrote a historical sketch of the 
 old building, with its successive managers, and the great 
 theatrical stars who had made their appearance on its 
 stage. The pamphlet was a trifle, but not devoid of 
 some amusing particulars ; for example, the account 
 given of the visit of Mrs Siddons, in May 1784, when 
 she performed twelve nights, extending over a period 
 of three weeks, and during which she played her prin- 
 cipal characters, including Mrs Beverley, Jane Shore, 
 Isabella, Lady Randolph, and Euphrasia in the Grecian 
 Dauiihter :
 
 304 MEMOIR. 
 
 MRS SIDDONS. 
 
 'The furor created in the town by the performances of 
 this illustrious lady was extraordinary. Prodigious crowds 
 attended hours before the performance for the chance of a 
 place. It came to be necessary to admit them at three, and 
 then people began to attend at twelve to get in at three. 
 The General Assembly of the church, in session at the time, 
 found it necessary to arrange their meetings with some 
 reference to the hours at the theatre, for the younger 
 members had discovered that attendance on Mrs Siddons's 
 performances was calculated to be of some advantage to 
 them, as a means of improving their elocution. People 
 came from distant places, even from Newcastle, to witness 
 what all spoke of with wonder. There were one day appli- 
 cations for 2557 places, while there were only 630 of that 
 kind in the house. Porters and servants had to bivouac for 
 a night in the streets, on mats and palliasses, in order that 
 they might get an early chance of admission to the box- 
 office next day. At the more thrilling parts of the perfor- 
 mance, the audience were agitated to a degree unprecedented 
 in this cool latitude. Many ladies fainted. This was par- 
 ticularly the case on the evening when Isabella^ or the Fatal 
 Marriage, v/as performed. The personator of Isabella has 
 to exhibit the distress of a wife, on finding, after a second 
 marriage, that her first and loved husband, Biron, is still 
 alive. Mrs Siddons herself was left at the close in such an 
 exhausted state, that some minutes elapsed before she could 
 be carried off the stage. A young heiress, Miss Gordon of 
 Gight, in Aberdeenshire, was carried out of her box in 
 hysterics, screaming loudly the words caught from the great 
 actress : " Oh, my Biron ! my Biron ! " A strange tale was 
 therewith connected. A gentleman, whom she had not at 
 this time seen or heard of, the Honourable John Biron, next 
 year met, paid his addresses, and married her. It was to 
 her a fatal marriage in several respects, although it gave to 
 the world the poet Lord Byron. Strange to say, a lady
 
 RESIDENCE IN LONDON. 305 
 
 lived till January 1858, the Dowager Lady G , who was 
 
 in the house that evening, and who never could forget the 
 ominous sounds of "Oh, my Biron!" The writer of this 
 little memoir has heard the story related by another lady 
 who was also in the house that night, and who died in 1855. 
 By her performances in Edinburgh on this occasion, Mrs 
 Siddons cleared nearly £1000, her benefit alone yielding 
 £350 ; all this being over and above the profits of a night 
 given to the Charity-Workhouse.' 
 
 Robert, accompanied by his \vife, effected his long- 
 desired visit to the United States in i860, everywhere 
 receiving much attention from men of literary and scien- 
 tific tastes. Unfortunately, his dear old friend and 
 correspondent, Willie Wilson, had died shortly before 
 his arrival in the country. Of his extensive excursion my 
 brother did not give any regular account, but contented 
 himself with writing two or three articles in Chambers's 
 Journal. 
 
 We now approach the end. On my brother's return 
 from America, there were consultations on the project 
 of a work, likely to be successful, but which could not 
 be executed in Edinburgh. It required the resources of 
 the British Museum. For this purpose it was resolved 
 that he should migrate, with his family, to London, if 
 his stay should be only for a few years. So to London 
 he and his family went, their residence being Verulam 
 House, one of the pleasant villas at St John's Wood. 
 The work which had suggested this wrench in accus- 
 tomed habits was the Book of Days, a miscellany of 
 popular antiquities in connection with the calendar, 
 including anecdotes, biographies, curiosities of literature, 
 and oddities of human life and character.
 
 3o6 MEMOIR. 
 
 From the time he began to reside in London, March 
 1 86 1, he was much occupied with this undertaking, 
 and became a frequent visitor of the British Museum, 
 as well as of the Athenasum, of which club he had the 
 good fortune to be elected a member. Although he 
 possessed an excellent private collection of books, it 
 was nothing in comparison to the very comprehensive 
 library of the Athenaeum, which accordingly formed a 
 great attraction, independently of the very choice 
 company to be met with. Verulam House was a resi- 
 dence excelling in amenities any which he and his 
 family had yet occupied. Regarding his life here for 
 the next two years, his daughter Anne, now Mrs Dowie 
 (who most closely resembles him of all his family), has 
 furnished me with the following particulars : 
 
 'My dear father wrote to me shortly after taking 
 possession of Verulam, which he described as com- 
 prehending "a large garden, lawn, hot-houses, and 
 in short the whole paraphernalia of a gentleman's 
 country-house, with a fine conservatory, adjoining the 
 drawing-room, and containing a fountain surrounded 
 with flowers." Besides plenty of space for the beloved 
 books, and spare rooms for guests, there was no end 
 of scope for the romping of grandchildren. On the 
 lawn, adjoining a rustic summer-house, there were some 
 fine trees, one of them a splendid spreading oak, beneath 
 which my mother often took breakfast, at which she 
 usually held a levee of cats. Her fondness for these 
 animals was extraordinary, and she always maintained 
 that they were a misunderstood and ill-used people. Her 
 more special favourites were two beautiful white cats, 
 known as Mr and Mrs Archie, and one of their kittens
 
 THE BOOK OF DA YS. 307 
 
 was generally perched on her shoulder, when seated 
 under the trees. 
 
 'During the ^vinter of 1861-2, my father spent a 
 large part of his time at the Athenreum, perusing the 
 proof sheets not only of the Book of Days, but of the 
 History of the Indian Mutiny, which the firm was pub- 
 lishing, and for this latter work he felt it to be strange 
 and interesting to have the advantage of consulting the 
 general who had held the chief command during that 
 terrible Indian convulsion — namely, Lord Clyde, with 
 whom he became acquainted at the club. In 1862, he 
 was somewhat surprised to find himself appointed a 
 judge in one of the sections of the International 
 Exhibition, a circumstance which brought him in con- 
 tact with the commissioners, and led to some pleasant 
 soire'es at the South Kensington Museum. About the 
 same period he, in company with his daughter Janet, 
 attended the meetings and lectures of the Royal Insti- 
 tution, and had much pleasant intercourse with such 
 friends as Dr Carpenter, Dr W. B. Hodgson, Mr Watts 
 of the British Museum, Professors Huxley, Tyndall, and 
 H. D. Rogers, also Sir Charles Nicholson, late of Sydney, 
 a person whose society always afforded him the highest 
 pleasure. With Sir Charles, he made a trip to France 
 and Belgium, chiefly with the view of visiting the quarry 
 near Amiens, noted for its deposit of flint axes. 
 
 *In January 1863, he wrote to me, that he had just 
 returned from Scotland, where he had enjoyed a lively 
 fortnight among a circle of old acquaintances. Scarcely 
 was he well settled at Verulam, when he was invited to 
 St Andrews to receive the degree of LL.D. from the 
 university, an honour which came upon him entirely 
 unsolicited. Returning again to London, he endeav-
 
 3o8 MEMOIR. 
 
 oured to make up for lost time by excessive labour at 
 the Book of Days, wliich, wherever lie was, kept him 
 pretty much on the rack. Accordingly, work, work, 
 work still went on to a degree which it is most painful 
 to recollect. Some assistance, on which he confidently 
 reckoned, having grievously failed, and the press 
 being urgent, there was no escape from the labour 
 which he had undertaken. For a breathing space, 
 he took refuge with me at Moffat in June 1863. 
 Here he enjoyed the bracing air and pastoral scenery, 
 yet not greatly advancing in health. We made little 
 excursions together up the valleys in the neighbourhood. 
 One day, we went as far as the cataract known as 
 the Gray Mare's Tail, pausing for an hour or two at 
 Jenny Broadfoot's, at Braehead, in whose tiny parlour, 
 containing a box-bed, he was much affected, when telling 
 me that he had spent a night here forty years ago, 
 when travelling on foot to collect materials for the 
 Picture of Scotland. " Here," said he, " in the midst 
 of these grand old hills, noted in our national annals, 
 and embalmed in immortal verse, I again take my coun- 
 trymen to my heart, and wonder if I shall be able to live 
 any more as an exile in the south." Necessity, however, 
 drew him back to St John's Wood, where, at length, nis 
 herculean literary task came to a conclusion.' 
 
 The mental strain which my brother underwent with 
 what his daughter properly calls a 'herculean literary 
 task,' was more than he was able to bear. The work 
 was finished, but the author was finished also. Not that 
 he died on the spot, but his system was shattered, and 
 he could not in future incur any continuous exertion. 
 To aggravate his disorder, he experienced some sad
 
 SE TTLING AT ST ANDRE WS. 309 
 
 domestic bereavements. In September 1863, he lost 
 his wife, and almost immediately thereafter Janet, an 
 amiable daughter of great intellect and beauty. Like 
 most other works he produced, the Book of Days proved 
 a success. But at what a cost ? He was heard to say : 
 * That book was my death-blow,' and such it really was. 
 With all its attractions, Verulam House could not 
 retain my brother in London. He longed to be in 
 the midst of scenes connected with old associations. 
 Returning to Scotland in an enfeebled state of health, 
 he took up his residence in St Andrews, a place to 
 which he had twenty years previously become much 
 attached, on account of its agreeable society, its bracing 
 atmosphere, and its extensive links, noted for the 
 game of golf, a healthful outdoor amusement, not 
 demanding too great an amount of physical exertion. 
 There we may leave him for a little space, in the 
 society of his youngest daughter — his windows over- 
 looking the Firth of Tay, and the celebrated Bell-rock 
 Light-house Hashing far in the east, like a lustrous gem 
 on the bosom of the German Ocean.
 
 CHAPTER XIII. 
 
 A SKELETON IN THE HOUSE, AND OTHER MATTERS. 
 
 'HPHERE is a skeleton in every house ! All' have 
 -*- something or other to trouble them, however 
 well off and at ease they may appear to be. For twenty- 
 one years after the commencement of Chambers^s 
 Journal, and while all seemed to be going on prosper- 
 ously, my brother and I were plagued with a skeleton, 
 of whom the world had no means of being cognisant 
 The nature of the skeleton was this. Operating from 
 Edinburgh as a centre, we had necessarily to entrust 
 a large commission business to a bookseller in London, 
 who had us pretty much at his mercy. Things might 
 be going right or wrong with him, for anything we could 
 satisfactorily discover. At first, there was no cause 
 for uneasiness ; but in the progress of events, when a 
 small grew into a great concern, we could not divest 
 ourselves of apprehensions of a catastrophe. 
 
 Such was our skeleton ! Perhaps we were no worse 
 off than our neighbours, but that is always a poor 
 consolation. We might possibly have rid ourselves of 
 the skeleton. That, however, would perhaps only have 
 amounted to a substitution of a new for an old source of 
 distrust So we were fain to temporise, and to make
 
 RE V. SYDNE Y SMITH. 31 1 
 
 the best of things as they stood. In a social point of 
 view, we were on excellent terms with the personality of 
 our skeleton, and there was not a little pleasant inter- 
 course among us. I was often for weeks in London ; 
 and by these visits an acquaintanceship was kept up 
 with various esteemed contributors, among whom we 
 had great pleasure in numbering Mrs S. C. Hall, who 
 wrote for us some admirable stories of Irish life, and 
 through whom we procured a juvenile story from the 
 venerable Maria Edgeworth. 
 
 On one of these occasions of visiting the metropolis, 
 a new and unexpected acquaintance was formed. It 
 was in 1844, when residing in Greek Street, Soho. 
 One day about noon, a carriage drives up to the door — 
 not a vehicle of the light modern sort, but an old family 
 coach, drawn by a pair of sleek horses. From it 
 descends an aged gentleman, who, from his shovel 
 hat and black gaiters, is seen to be an ecclesiastical 
 dignitary. I overhear, by the voices at the door, that 
 I am asked for. * Who, in all the world, can this be ? ' 
 A few minutes solve the question. Heavy footsteps 
 are heard deliberately ascending the antique balus- 
 traded stair. My unknown visitor is ushered in — his 
 name announced : ' The Rev. Sydney Smith.' I hasten 
 to receive so celebrated a personage as is befitting, and 
 express the pleasure I have in the unexpected visit — 
 wondering how he had discovered me. 
 
 * I heard at Rogers's you were in town,' said he, 
 ' and was resolved to call. Let us sit down, and have 
 a talk.' 
 
 We drew towards the fire, for the day was cold, and 
 he continued : ' You are surprised possibly at my visit 
 There is nothing at all stranjie about it. The originator
 
 312 MEMOIR. 
 
 of tlie Edinburgh Review has come to see the originator 
 of the Edinburgh Journal.^ 
 
 I felt honoured by the remark, and deHghted beyond 
 measure witla the good-natured and unceremonious 
 observations which my visitor made on a variety of 
 subjects. We talked of Edinburgh, and I asked him 
 where he had lived. He said it was in Buccleuch 
 Place, not far from Jeffrey, with an outlook behind to 
 the Meadows. ' Ah,' he remarked, ' what charming 
 walks I had about Arthur's Seat, with the clear mountain 
 air blowing in one's face ! I often think of that glorious 
 scene.' I alluded to the cluster of young men — Jeffrey, 
 Horner, Brougham, himself, and one or two others, who 
 had been concerned in commencing the Review in 1802. 
 Of these, he spoke with most affection of Horner, and 
 specified one who, from his vanity and eccentricities, 
 could not be trusted. Great secrecy, he said, had to be 
 employed in conducting the undertaking, and this agrees 
 with what Lord Jeffrey told my brother. My reverend 
 and facetious visitor made some little inquiry about my 
 own early efforts, and he laughed when I reminded him 
 of a saying of his own about studying on a little oat- 
 meal — for that would have applied literally to my 
 brother and to myself. 'Ah, labora, iabora,' he said 
 sententiously, ' how that word expresses the character 
 of your country !' 
 
 'Well, we do sometimes work pretty hard,' I observed; 
 * but for all that, we can relish a pleasantry as much as 
 our neighbours. You must have seen that the Scotch 
 have a considerable fund of humour.' 
 
 ' Oh, by all means,' replied my visitor, ' you are an 
 immensely funny people, but you need a little operating 
 upon to let the fun out. I know no instrument so
 
 Af/SS MITFORD. 313 
 
 effectual for the purpose as the cork-screw ! ' Mutual 
 laughter, of course. 
 
 There was some more chat of this kind, and we parted. 
 This interview led to a few days of agreeable intercourse 
 with Sydney Smith. By invitation, I went next morning 
 to his house in Green Street, Grosvenor Square, to 
 breakfast ; and the day following, went with him to 
 breakfast with a select party, at the mansion of Samuel 
 Rogers, St James's, when there ensued a stream of 
 witticisms and repartees for pretty nearly a couple of 
 hours. This was assuredly the most pleasant conversa- 
 tional treat I ever experienced. On quitting London, 
 I bade good-bye to Sydney Smith with extreme regret. 
 We never met again. He died in February the following 
 year. 
 
 Years pass on ; in each, excursions being made with 
 some Hterary object in view. While residing in London 
 in 1847, I was honoured \vith the acquaintance of Miss 
 Mitford, whom I visited by invitation at her neat little 
 cottage, Three-mile Cross, near Reading; the pleasantest 
 thing about the visit being a walk with the aged lady 
 among the green lanes in the neighbourhood — she 
 trotting along with a tall cane, and speaking of rural 
 scenes and circumstances. I see by the lately published 
 life of Boner, that in a letter to him, under date 
 December 16, 1847, she refers to this visit, stating that 
 she was at the time engaged along with Mr Lovejoy, a 
 l:)Ooksellcr in Reading, in a plan for establishing lending 
 libraries for the poor, in which, she says, I assisted her 
 with information and advice. What I really advised 
 was that, following out a scheme adopted in East 
 Lothian, parishes should join in establishing itinerating 
 libraries, each composed of different books, so that,
 
 314 MEMOIR. 
 
 being shifted from place to place, a degree of novelty 
 might be maintained for mutual advantage. 
 
 In 1848, I visited Germany, mainly to look into 
 educational and penal arrangements ; and at Berlin, 
 through the polite attention of Professor Zumpt, had the 
 satisfaction of becoming acquainted with the Prussian 
 compulsory system of education, which, in its later 
 developments, has had so startling an effect on the 
 affairs of continental Europe. 
 
 I had visited France several times : To see the extinct 
 volcanoes of Auvergne, and the Roman remains of 
 Provence — to see the prison discipline at Roquette 
 and Fontrevault, and the juvenile reformatory at ISIettray 
 — to see Voisin's method of rousing the dormant intellect 
 of imbecile children at the Bicetre, and so on. I 
 again visited the country in 1849 j o^ this occasion 
 remaining longer than usual in Paris, and seeing 
 more of the social life of the people. For this, let 
 me acknowledge myself indebted to the Dowager 
 Countess of Elgin (a Scottish lady of the Oswalds of 
 Dunnikier), who found me out in the Boulevard des 
 Italiens, and introduced me along with my wife to 
 an agreeable literary circle, including M. Lamartine, 
 M. Mohl, and Leon Faucher. Lamartine — tall, thin, 
 and unimpassioned — the centre of a group of admirers, 
 listened with cold complace-ncy when I told him that a 
 translation of his Voyage en Orient had been eminently 
 popular in England. Faucher was greatly more con- 
 versible. He was interested in hearing about our system 
 of poor-laws, municipal government, and other topics 
 connected with social economy, on which I did my best 
 to give him some information. 
 
 On one of these evenings, I was introduced to a
 
 SOCIE TY IN PA RIS. 3 1 5 
 
 young Frenchman, son of a noted revolutionist during 
 the Reign of Terror, who had aftenvards saved his life 
 by hiding himself, and changing his name, until he 
 could again appear publicly. He had recently died, and 
 his whole effects were about to be sold, in order that 
 the produce might be equally divided among his family. 
 The articles were said to be curious ; and such I found 
 to be the case, on going by invitation to see them in 
 an old dignified mansion, near the Temple — the most 
 curious thing of all being the identical proclamation 
 which Robespierre had begun to write at the Hotel de 
 Ville, when his assailants burst in upon him, and he 
 was shot through the jaw. He had got only the length 
 of scrawling the words, * Courage, mes compatriotes^ when, 
 being stnick, the pen fell from his hand, and big drops 
 of blood were scattered over the paper. Bearing these 
 marks of discoloration, how strange a memorial of the 
 horrors of 1794 ! 
 
 I was much delighted with the simplicity and inexpen- 
 siveness of the evening parties at the house of the 
 countess, which was situated in the neighbourhood 
 of the Rue de Bac, and had been a palace of some 
 pretension in the days of the old monarchy. People 
 came to see and converse with each other — not cere- 
 moniously to eat and drink, and go away in a state of 
 discomfort. The few weeks I spent in Paris on this 
 occasion were among the most delightful in my whole 
 existence. 
 
 While residing at Glenormiston, in Peeblesshire, in 
 the summer of 1850, I was favoured with a visit from 
 the aged Sir Adam Ferguson, the early friend of Sir 
 Walter Scott, and who is often referred to by LockharL 
 Sir Adam was a son of Professor Ferguson, author of
 
 31 6 MEMOIR. 
 
 the History of the Roman Republic, who had lived at 
 Hallyards, in the parish of Manor, Peeblesshire, at the 
 end of the last and beginning of the present century. 
 From his acquaintance with the Fergusons, Scott, when 
 travelling to Carlisle in 1797, paid a passing visit to 
 Hallyards, when he and young Adam had an interview 
 with David Ritchie, whose misshapen figure and misan- 
 thropic character suggested the fictitious Black Dwarf, 
 
 After these days of youth and hope, Adam Ferguson 
 had an active and hazardous career. He entered the 
 army, in which he rose to the rank of captain. In the 
 war in the Peninsula, he suffered a severe wound in the 
 knee, by a musket-bullet, and was taken prisoner. To 
 relieve the tedium of his captivity, he petitioned Fouche 
 to be permitted to visit Paris, and this unusual favour 
 was granted in consideration of his father's fame, but 
 still more for that of his uncle, the illustrious Black, 
 whose discoveries in chemistry were highly appreciated 
 in France. Wliile in Paris, Captain Ferguson had the 
 satisfaction of seeing Bonaparte. At the peace, he 
 returned to Scotland, and renewed his intimacy with 
 Scott. This friendship was warm and confidential, for 
 in his old acquaintance, the ' Great Unknown ' reposed 
 the secret of his authorship of Waverley ; and, indeed, 
 Captain Ferguson spent much of his time at Abbotsford, 
 and sat for hours with Sir Walter, while he was penning 
 his deathless fictions. A few years previous to his 
 visit to me in the country, he had received the honour 
 of knighthood. 
 
 Sir Adam was an intimate acquaintance of my brother, 
 at whose house I frequently met him. Notwithstanding 
 his extreme age, he possessed great buoyancy of spirit, 
 told amusing anecdotes, and was an entliusiastic admirer
 
 SIR ADAM FERGUSON. 317 
 
 of the Scottish melodies. On one occasion, when 
 sitting in a state of entrancement listening to some music 
 played by Mrs R. Chambers, one of her daughters (Mary) 
 made a clever sketch of him in crayons. He had long 
 entertained a wish to visit Peeblesshire for the last time, 
 and now, in his eighty-first year, the wish was realised. 
 Accompanied by my brother and a gentleman of the 
 neighbourhood, I drove him to Hallyards to see his 
 former haunts. Every step in the excursion awakened 
 old and slumbering recollections. He declared, however, 
 that he with difficulty recognised some of the ancient 
 landmarks. The sight of the old avenue at Hallyards 
 affected him considerably. He said he was afraid his 
 feelings would not allow him to enter the house; but the 
 spirit of the old soldier rallied, and with all his wonted 
 humour, he related various incidents illustrative of past 
 events. He essayed to mount to a room which he had 
 occupied when a youth, but the narrowness of the stair- 
 case, and the infirmity of the unfortunate knee, pre- 
 sented insuperable obstacles to the ascent. On leaving 
 the grounds, we drove to the Black Dwarfs cottage, the 
 scene of the interview with Scott. A shock awaited the 
 veteran. By an unfortunate exercise of bad taste, the 
 lowly thatched structure had been transformed into a 
 slated house — a circumstance for which we all heartily 
 expressed our regret. Next day 1 parted with Sir Adam. 
 Afterwards, I saw him several times in l^dinburgh. He 
 died at the close of 1854. 
 
 How my brother and I, as fancy directed, should have 
 had leisure to spend months in rambling up and down 
 the world, is worth a little explanation. In one of 
 Robert's essays, he moralises on the advantxige of 
 blending with professional pursuits that amount of 
 
 i;
 
 3i8 MEMOIR. 
 
 leisure which will enable us to cultivate the higher class 
 of feelings ; for, by neglect on this score, life in the 
 long-run will only be looked back upon as a disappoint- 
 ing dream. On principles of this kind, we endeavoured 
 to act, but could have obtained no success in the 
 attempt, by following the too common practice of hurry- 
 ing into one project after another, irrespective of conse- 
 quences. At the outset, we laid down three rules, 
 which were inflexibly maintained : Never to take credit, 
 but pay for all the great elements of trade in ready 
 money ; never to give a bill, and never discount one ; 
 and never to undertake any enterprise for which means 
 were not prepared. Obviously, by no other plan of 
 operations could we have been freed from anxiety, and 
 at liberty to make use of the leisure at our disposal. 
 
 No anxiety ? — yes, there was some. We had still the 
 skeleton, which had so grown and grown in dimensions 
 as to be at length truly formidable. About 1852, matters 
 became critical. It was as clear as could be, that we 
 were to incur a heavy loss. In nothing in his whole 
 life did my brother manifest more vigour of character 
 than in determining to get rid, at all hazards, of this 
 source of disquietude. He thought of Scott and the 
 Ballantynes, and how, by an extreme and misplaced 
 confidence, arising from kindness of heart, a man may 
 be irretrievably ruined. Without further periphrasis : 
 taking all risks, we withdrew our agency in 1853, and 
 established a branch business in London under charge 
 of our youngest brother, David, on whose fidelity we 
 thought we might rely. 
 
 Now comes a startling and melancholy fact, from 
 which it would not be difficult to draw a moral. The 
 concern that had for twenty-one years possessed our
 
 A COMMERCIAL STUDY. 319 
 
 agency, had reaped a profit from it of not less than 
 forty thousand pounds — a sum equal to about eight times 
 what Gibbon received for his Decline and Fall of the 
 Roman Empire, and eighty times what poor Robert 
 Burns ever received for all his world-famed writings ! 
 All was gone, and a vast deal more — vanished into 
 empty space. A fortune such as few arc born to had 
 been absolutely thrown away. 
 
 The whole of this affair, with some collateral circum- 
 stances, reviewed over a course of years, furnished an 
 interesting and not uninstructive commercial study. In 
 London, as any one may observe, there are tvvo pre- 
 vailing methods of ruination : Extravagance in living, 
 and trading beyond means — substituting sanguine 
 expectations, along with borrowed money, for capital. 
 Such, no doubt, are errors everywhere, but in the 
 metropolis they revel without restraint, almost without 
 rebuke. And from the glimpses obtained, I regret to 
 say, they are not unknown in certain sections of the 
 publishing profession. In whatever department of trade, 
 so frightful is the hurry, that means are not suffered to 
 accumulate in order to allow of ready-money payments. 
 The whole transactions subside into a system of bills 
 . — bills to wholesale stationers, bills to printers, bills to 
 artists, bills to writers, bills to everybody. In the same 
 wild way, bills that are received are hurried off for dis- 
 count. There is great seeming prosperity, but so is 
 there too frequently a great bill-book — dismal record of 
 difficulties and heart-aches. The chief difficulty is how 
 to effect discounts. Hours are perhaps spent daily in 
 the effort. Commercially, there is a struggle between 
 life and death every four-and-twenty hours. Who would 
 covet existence on such terms ?
 
 320 MEMOIR. 
 
 The banks, somehow, fail to monopohse the discount 
 trade. They are rivalled by private capitalists, who, in 
 ordinary slang, are known as ' parties.' There is always 
 a ' party ' — some mysterious being who lives at Bath, or 
 Boulogne, or somewhere — to whom, through a ' party ' 
 more immediately visible, succour is looked for in 
 emergencies. The 'party' dealt with is sometimes a 
 mighty pleasant and presentable person — ^joUy, good- 
 natured countenance ; punctilious in dress ; abounding 
 in anecdotes about the drama and the 'Derby;' well 
 read; and avowing a high opinion of Campbell as a 
 poet, can give with proper effect quotations from the 
 Pleasures of Hope. Meeting him at a ceremonious 
 family dinner, you would never, from his appearance and 
 high-souled chivalric ideas, take him for a ' party,' 
 but half the guests know that he possesses that imposing 
 character in relation to the unfortunate host, whom 
 he could any day crumple up at pleasure, and only bides 
 his time to do so. When Junius made the famous 
 remark, that ' party is the madness of many for the gain 
 of a few,' he spoke the truth in more ways than one. 
 
 Usually, in one way or other, the money-lending 
 * party ' becomes the final beneficiary. Should the 
 advances be made to some unhappy publishing concern, 
 copyrights are assigned in security, and seldom do they 
 return to their original owner. Valuable literary pro- 
 perty, the fruit of ingenious conception and enterprise, 
 is thus constantly undergoing a process of transfer and 
 confiscation. We may feel shocked with the tyranny of 
 capital, but the blame is due to the extravagant credit 
 system, along with an insane overhaste to be rich ; 
 along, also — for we must not forget that — with an 
 insane extravagance in living, which yields comfort to
 
 DEA Til OF JAMES KING. 321 
 
 neither body nor mind ; this, however, is a circumstance 
 so very commonplace as to engage little or no attention. 
 It will be remembered how James King, our early 
 friend and fellow-labourer in scientific experiments, had 
 emigrated to Australia, in order to follow out an indus- 
 trial career. From one thing to another, he became 
 proprietor of vineyards at Irawang, New South Wales, 
 and there devoted himself to the perfection of the 
 wine-manufacture in the colony. In this pursuit, he 
 was, by his chemical knowledge, perseverance, and 
 enterprise, eminently successful ; but what avails pro- 
 fessional eminence with loss of health? Returning to 
 England, he travelled over the continent, and estab- 
 lished a friendship with Baron Liebig, who furnished 
 suggestions for improving the quality of his wines. 
 Hints of this kind he did not live to profit by. I found 
 him in London, a wreck — sad contrast to what he had 
 been when departing, as a high-spirited youth, to push 
 his fortune abroad. A renewal of intercourse was 
 scarcely practicable, for he heard and spoke only with 
 difficulty. He died in London in 1857, leaving a 
 widow and son to conduct his affairs in the colony. 
 
 Amidst literary and other avocations, my brother and I 
 never forgot Peebles. We visited the place — notably so in 
 1 84 1 , to be complimented with the ' Freedom of the Burgh j' 
 and tried to keep up an acquaintance with old friends, 
 ever diminishing in number till scarcely one of them was 
 left. After residing several summers in the neighbourhood, 
 being forcibly reminded of the benefits which my brother 
 and I had derived from Elder's library — long since extinct 
 — I gifted to the town a suite of buildings consisting 
 of a library of ten thousand volumes, reading-room, 
 museum, gallery of art, and lecture-hall, with the view
 
 322 MEMOIR. 
 
 of promoting the mental improvement of the humbler 
 classes; but whether the institution so organised will 
 have any such effect, seems, after an experience of twelve 
 years, exceedingly doubtful. So slight has been the 
 success, that others may well pause before venturing on 
 a similar experiment. 
 
 An incident in strange contrast to some events re- 
 corded in the early part of these reminiscences, and 
 which occurred very unexpectedly without any wish on 
 my part, was my election to the office of Lord Provost 
 of Edinburgh in 1865. Through a second election in 
 1868, I occupied the office altogether for four years ; it 
 was voluntarily resigned by me in 1869. Regarding 
 this period of public service, which formed an inter- 
 esting episode in a usually quiet life, the circumstance 
 on which I have most reason to reflect with satisfaction, 
 is that of having projected and obtained an act of parlia- 
 ment for effecting a much wanted sanitary and general 
 improvement of the older part of the city. Another 
 incident, never for a moment anticipated, was the 
 offer by the University of Edinburgh of conferring on 
 me the honorary degree of LL.D., which was bestowed 
 in a way too complimentary to be declined, or readily 
 forgotten, in 1872, 
 
 While giving some attention to Chambers^ s Journal, 
 now in its forty-seventh year, it may be permitted me 
 to mention that I was able to add a few books to 
 the list already noted : The Youth's Companion and 
 Counsellor, i860; Something 0/ Italy, 1862; Ifistory of 
 Peeblesshire, i?>64t; IViiitering in Mentone, 1870; France: 
 its History and Revolutions, 1871; Chambers s Social 
 Science Tracts, designed to disseminate useful informa- 
 tion among the working-classes on subjects connected
 
 UNEXPECTED HONOURS. 323 
 
 with Social, Political, and Sanitary Economy; the 
 present Memoir, 1872, and Ailie Giiroy, a Scottish 
 story, which appeared shortly afterwards. Some books 
 printed for private circulation do not require to be 
 particularised. 
 
 It is not for me to say a single word regarding the 
 influence which Chambers's Journal and other publi- 
 cations, edited by my brother and myself, may have 
 exerted in the cause of popular enlightenment during 
 the past forty years. Of that the public must be the 
 judge. Neither — though such might not be uninterest- 
 ing in some points of view — do 1 purpose to offer any 
 details regarding the magnitude of the circulation of 
 the various works in which our names have been and 
 still remain mutually associated. What, however, I am 
 bound above all things to do, is to express the sense 
 of obligation felt by my brother during his declining 
 years, and not less vividly entertained by myself, for 
 those gratifying demonstrations of good feeling show- 
 ered from all quarters in acknowledgment of ' labours,' 
 which should more correctly be defined as ' pleasures,' 
 extending over the greater part of a lifetime. In laying 
 down the pen, what satisfaction can be greater than 
 that of having been a pioneer in that chea]) literature 
 movement, which, under a variety of conditions and 
 auspices, has proved one of the conspicuous engines of 
 social improvement in the nineteenth century.
 
 CHAPTER XIV. 
 
 ROBERTS CLOSING YEARS, DEATH, AND CHARACTER. 
 
 /^~^HANGE of air and scene is said to work wonders 
 ^^ on the overtasked brain. It did so to a certain 
 extent on Robert. The fresh air and tranquillity of St 
 Andrews, with some moderate exercise at golf, had a 
 beneficial effect on his health. He wished for peace, 
 and here it was, enlivened with converse in the society 
 of old friends. He had built for himself a house, with a 
 spacious saloon-library, entering from which was a small 
 apartment fitted up as a study. Environed by his 
 books — a very choice collection — he was now enjoying 
 a luxurious and 'learned leisure.' All task-work was 
 at an end. Sometimes he came for a few days to 
 Edinburgh ; and, extending his journey, he occasionally 
 visited one or other of his married daughters. At 
 the new-year, as long as he was able, he made an 
 agreeable excursion across the Tay to Fingask 
 Castle, in the Carse of Gowrie, to pass a day or 
 two according to old fashions with his friends, the 
 Thrieplands. 
 
 No house, to look at, could be more pleasant than 
 that which he had constructed according to his fancy at
 
 LIFE AT ST ANDREWS. 325 
 
 St Andrews. In it he constantly received company, 
 and was always the same kindly and entertaining host. 
 But apart from these receptions, his establishment was 
 cheerless, contrasted with former days, when his home 
 was enlivened by a troop of merry-hearted girls. Pos- 
 sibly it was from a sense of comparative solitude, that 
 he formed a second matrimonial alliance. He married 
 (January 1867) the widow of Robert Frith, a lady of 
 musical accomplishments, and of that liveliness of 
 disposition which was calculated to soothe his declining 
 years. 
 
 The university of St Andrews having conferred on 
 him the honorary degree of LL.D., he was subsequently 
 known as the ' Doctor.' After his second marriage, the 
 doctor's dinner and evening parties had something in 
 them of the smack of old times, though all could see 
 he was gradually declining in health ; he never failed, 
 however, in his accustomed cheerfulness, his love of 
 music, and his anecdotic, but slowly uttered remarks. 
 
 The pen was now taken up only as an amusement ; 
 but such was the pleasure he derived from writing, that 
 he felt as if the abandonment of literary exercise would 
 kill him outright. Little by little, he finished a book 
 that he had long been employed upon. It was the Life 
 of Smollett, interspersed with characteristic specimens 
 of his writings. This was a slight work, in one volume, 
 but which had the recommendation of adding some- 
 thing to the personal history of Smollett and his family, 
 and presenting a curious fragmentary memoir, written 
 by the novelist's grandfather, Sir James Smollett, a stern 
 old Whig Presbyterian, knighted by William HI. This 
 was the last of my brother's printed productions, and 
 with it his literary career closes.
 
 326 MEMOIR. 
 
 Those who were unacquainted with his private habits 
 of thought may be surprised to know that, in his latter 
 days, he wrote a number of prayers, and graces to be 
 said at meals, all breathing the purest religious spirit. 
 He began \ht Life and Freachings of Jesus Christ, from 
 the Evangelists. It was a work apparently designed for 
 the edification of youth, and was left unfinished. He 
 likewise began a catechism for the young, which he did 
 not live to complete. The reminiscences of his early 
 life, from which some extracts have been given, were 
 also among his latest compositions. The mass of papers 
 which he accumulated, and left as literary remains, is 
 indescribable in variety. A considerable number of 
 these fragments refer to Scottish Songs and Ballads, 
 for which, as already stated, he entertained a great 
 affection. 
 
 One of the more bulky papers which he left is a 
 species of inquiry into the so-called manifestations 
 of spiritualism. Without pronouncing an opinion dog- 
 matically, he considered the subject worthy of patient 
 investigation. 'The phenomena of spirituaHsm,' he 
 says, ' may be the confused elements of a new chapter 
 of human nature, which will only require some careful 
 investigation to form a respectable addition to our stock 
 of knowledge. Such, I must confess, is the light in 
 which it has presented itself to me, or rather the aspect 
 which it promises to assume.' Acknowledging so much, 
 perhaps he thought of a saying he had heard used by 
 Sir Walter Scott, that 'if there be a vulgar credulity, 
 there is also a vulgar incredulity.' In his anxiety for 
 fair-play, he perhaps leant too much to the side of 
 credulity. 
 
 Among the papers amassed by my brother, some old
 
 A CATECHIS.V. 327 
 
 and some new, we have the evidence of a mind that 
 for half a century had never been free from some 
 kind of hterary assiduity. His casual thoughts, things 
 he heard spoken of, anecdotes, stories, fragments of 
 family history — all sooner or later assumed shape in 
 sentences and paragraphs. He never forgot anything. 
 His memory, from a faculty of concentrativeness, was 
 altogether remarkable. He could tell you any date 
 in history; he remembered all the people of any note 
 he had conversed with, and how they looked, and 
 what they said, if it was at all worth remembering. 
 Every place he had visited was fresh in his recollec- 
 tion. 
 
 With a memory so stored, and of untiring industry, 
 he was always writing down odds and ends, as if assem- 
 bling materials for books, which years would have been 
 required to execute. From desultory thoughts on a 
 variety of secular subjects in prose and verse, my 
 brother seems to have turned to those literary exercises 
 of a religious nature already specified. The last of 
 these productions appears to have been the catechism 
 for the young, which, like some other compositions, 
 was left unfinished. Though fragmentary, this tract 
 affords a good insight into the writer's love of truth, 
 his acute sense of duty, and regard for the rights of 
 others. I can only quote a few sentences respecting 
 duties in affairs of state. They bear the true ring of my 
 brother's upright character. 
 
 ' In political procedure, truth, rectitude, forbearance, 
 and respect for rights are as much required as in 
 ordinary society. And as no man can neglect or violate 
 the simplest laws which bind him to his neighbour, 
 without creatine: some decree of suffering, which is liable
 
 328 l\rEMOTR. 
 
 to react against himself, so it is certain that those in 
 authority cannot use it recklessly or oppressively without 
 producing an unhappiness which will turn round to 
 their own annoyance, injury, or destruction. There is, 
 in short, but one rule of duty in the world, and that is 
 summed in " Love your Neighbour." .... The errors 
 and delusions of mankind are unfortunately endless ; 
 and they are to be deplored, not only as occupying 
 much time and thought uselessly, but as obscuring our 
 ideas as to what is of real importance for the fulfilment 
 of the Divine purposes of our being.' 
 
 The year 1S70 opened gloomily in that pleasant- 
 looking house at St Andrews. After a short illness, 
 and very unexpectedly, my brother's second wife 
 died on the iSth January. Now was he again in a 
 sense desolate. Yet, though afflicted with this fresh 
 calamity, and broken down in health, he did not repine. 
 His bereavements only tended the more to bring out 
 his true character. In him were now seen united the 
 piety of the Christian with the philosophy of an ancient 
 sage. * I know,' he said, ' that my days are numbered. 
 My time cannot be long. I feel the gradual but sure 
 indication of approaching dissolution. But don't let us 
 be dismal about it; that would be alike futile and sinful.' 
 And so he spoke as one reconciled to his appointed 
 destiny. Setting his affairs in order, he looked calmly 
 on the advances of the destroyer. He had done his 
 work, and we may be permitted to think that he had 
 done it nobly. 
 
 Pale and feeble, he crept about, took short drives, and 
 received visitors as usual ; for bodily weakness did not 
 in the least affect his spirits. With one of his married 
 daughters, Mrs Dowie, who had come to visit him, he
 
 LAST ILL.VESS. 329 
 
 walked to the Cathedral Burial-ground, and pointed out 
 the spot where he wished to be interred. It was the 
 interior of the old church of St Regulus. ' There,' said 
 he, ' I hope to have the honour of finding a resting- 
 place ; I should certainly be in excellent company, for 
 Mr Lyon, the historian of St Andrews, told me there 
 is a surprising number of bishops interred here.' The 
 desire to be buried in this place of historical note was 
 what might have been looked for. The church of St 
 Regulus is one of the most ancient ecclesiastical struc- 
 tures in Scotland. It dates from the twelfth century, and, 
 as seen by its tall square tower, is built in the Roman- 
 esque style. When the cathedral, a more modern and 
 ornamental structure, was laid in ruin by a mob at the 
 Reformation, this adjacent antique church was so far 
 spared, that till this day it remains all, except the roof, 
 in a state of good preservation. Carefully secured as 
 crown property, it cannot be called a part of the general 
 cemetery; and interment within it requires the sanction of 
 the chief commissioner of Her Majesty's Board of Works. 
 Being recommended change of scene, my brother 
 accomj)anied Mrs Dowie to her home at ^Vest Kirby, 
 near Birkenhead ; and thereafter, in April, went with 
 her, by way of Gloucester, to Torquay, where for a time 
 he took up his abode. Here he felt a slight improve- 
 ment of health, and was able not only to attend and 
 fully enjoy an interesting lecture by Mr Pengelly on the 
 discoveries in Kent's Cavern, but to visit the cave, and 
 make remarks on the objects ot natural history that had 
 recently been brought to light. Before returning home, 
 he once more visited a daughter in London, and also 
 his surviving sister, Mrs Wills, at Sherrards, in Hertford- 
 shire, where he greatly enjoyed the beauty of a quiet
 
 330 MEMOIR. 
 
 rural scene. Brightened up a little by these visits among 
 relatives, he returned to Scotland, in the company of his 
 youngest daughter, who describes the fervency of his 
 emotion in crossing the Border and finding himself again 
 in his native country. He got back to St Andrews in 
 June. 
 
 From this time, he did not leave home, where, to 
 keep him company, he was visited, one after the other, 
 by several of his daughters. I went to see him in 
 August, and found him in a frail condition, though able 
 to converse on literary and other topics. His most 
 conspicuous ailment was want of appetite, along with a 
 deadly paleness of countenance. So greatly was his 
 system disorganised, that, on sitting down to table, he 
 could not eat. Nothing that he was solicited to take 
 did him any good, farther than keeping up the spark of 
 life. Still, in a way, he joked and told stories, felt an 
 interest in the stirring news concerning France, and 
 continued to take delight in music. 
 
 Towards the conclusion of autumn, a change for the 
 worse took place, and his mind was visibly weakened. 
 Then came winter in more than ordinary severity, with 
 its deadly effects on the aged and invalid. Shortly after 
 the beginning of 1871, he could no longer sit up, and 
 for his accommodation, his study, adjoining the library, 
 had been for some time fitted up as a bedroom. Here 
 I found him in bed on the 27th January. He said he 
 preferred to be in this apartment, for it was on a level 
 with the sitting-rooms, whence he could hear something 
 of the lively conversation of his daughters, and where 
 they could conveniently see him. A piano was placed 
 in the library for his solacement. 
 
 Constantly attended by Dr Oswald Bell, and by great
 
 DEATH AND FUNERAL. 331 
 
 care in nursing, he got through the winter. His married 
 daughters now left him, it being arranged they should 
 come back in turn, when required. Day by day, he lost 
 strength, and one of them, Mrs Dowie, returned. On 
 her appearance, he said he was glad that she had come 
 back to see the last of him. On Sunday, 12th March, 
 he was able to listen to, and heartily appreciate his 
 favourite prayers and psalms in the Morning Service — 
 ejaculating from time to time : ' How true, how beautiful.' 
 
 In a note to me, Mrs Dowie gives a simple and 
 touching account of the closing scene : 
 
 'On Wednesday the 15th, he described himself as 
 "quite wordless," and just pressing our hands, returned 
 our embraces with fervour. He begged for some music, 
 and was much gratified on my playing to him Ma<:pher- 
 soris Farewell, an air he greatly admired, and which in 
 former years he used to play himself on the piano, with 
 my accompaniment Next day, he seemed very torpid, 
 and scarcely spoke to us, more than answering questions. 
 Early in the following morning, life was fleeting away. 
 His last faintly uttered words were : " Quite comfort- 
 able — quite happy — nothing more!" And so, with us 
 sitting in silent tears beside him, at about five o'clock 
 on Friday morning, the 17 th March, he gently breathed 
 his last' 
 
 At this mournful juncture, I had gone to T.ondon 
 on account of the illness of my youngest brother, 
 David, whose health had for some time been in a 
 critical condition, partly from distress at the death of 
 his wife, but principally the result of tastes and habits 
 which had wholly undermined his constitution. He was 
 now in so very delicate a state, that intelligence of the 
 death of Robert brought on a severe paroxysm, whicli
 
 332 MEMOIR. 
 
 terminated in his decease on the 21st March. David 
 possessed some estimable quahties, and was a general 
 favourite, but his business career was disappointing. 
 He was very much a repetition of my father — kind 
 and genial, with an exquisite taste for music, sang the 
 Scottish songs beautifully, and was ready on all occa- 
 sions to help in charitable undertakings. Unfortu- 
 nately for himself, he came upon the stage of existence 
 after tlie family struggle was over, and never experi- 
 enced any of those difficulties to which Robert and I 
 were in our early days exposed, and which, as has been 
 seen, helped to impart a knowledge of the world, and 
 more particularly a knowledge of the value of steadily 
 persevering industry and thrift. I will not dwell on 
 the distressful fact of losing two brothers within the 
 short space of four days, and of having thereby to 
 undertake responsibilities demitted by their decease. 
 Of the last distressing scene at the death of poor 
 David, I was not a witness, for I had been called to St 
 Andrews to assist at the funeral of my brother Robert. 
 
 This solemnity took place on the 2 2d ; and to meet 
 the wishes of many who expressed a wish to be present, 
 the arrangements were more of a public character than 
 had at first been intended. Service was performed over 
 the body in the Episcopal chapel, by the incumbent, 
 the Rev. L. Tuttiett ; after which the procession of 
 friends and relatives proceeded to the church of St 
 Regulus, in the Cathedral Burying-ground, for interment 
 in which permission had been obligingly granted. On 
 approaching the cemetery, the funeral procession was 
 met by the provost and magistrates of St Andrews, also 
 by members of the Senatus Academicus, with their 
 official insignia. Surrounded by a large and sympathis-
 
 FUNERAL SERMONS. 333 
 
 ing crowd, and with the last offices of tlie church, the 
 body of Robert Chambers was lowered into the grave, 
 where it reposes amidst the dust of ecclesiastics 
 whose names are now only known by the records of 
 history. 
 
 In his sermon on Sunday 26th, the Rev. Mr Tuttiett 
 made the following remarks on the deceased : 
 
 *A little more than a year ago, when first I came to 
 minister in this church, there sat; before me one to whom 
 I could not but turn with especial interest at that time. He 
 was, I knew, a man dear to many of his fellow-worshippers, 
 dear to the place in which he lived, dear to his country, and 
 to many far away. He was a man of high endowments, 
 great and varied knowledge, deep philosophy, sound judg- 
 ment, and refined taste. He was also — what is far better 
 than all this — a man of upright and unostentatiously religious 
 life — noble and kind in his nature, gentle and modest in his 
 manner, genial and warm in his sympathies, faithful in his 
 friendships, and generous in his dealings. He had come 
 from his recently bereaved home to seek comfort in the 
 common prayers of the Christian Brotherhood with whom 
 he delighted to worship. The text of the sermon he heard 
 on that occasion was taken from Saint Paul's address in the 
 synagogue of Antioch : " David, after he had served his 
 own generation, by the will of God, fell on sleep, and was 
 laid to his fathers." Those words seem to have struck his 
 mind most forcibly. I shall not forget with what earnest- 
 ness and solemnity he afterwards commented upon them. 
 They suggested, he thought, " a sublime ideal of human life, 
 and a comfortable view of decease." Certainly, he seems 
 to have kept such an ideal before him. He " sen-ed his 
 own generation " in the way God marked out for him faith- 
 fully and well. Let me only remind you how much he has 
 done, in conjunction with the brother who now survives 
 him, for the dissemination of that pure, wholesome literature, 
 which, though not coming under the special denomination
 
 334 MEMOIR. 
 
 of religious, has very greatly served the cause of religion, 
 by humanising and elevating the mind, and thus preparing 
 it for the direct teaching of divine truth. Those who, like 
 myself, have been much interested in the work of popular 
 education in England, must ever honour his name for this 
 service to the generation in which he lived. But my object 
 is not so much to speak his praises, as to gather out for 
 myself and for you the instruction of his life and example. 
 He was a great lover of nature, and a patient, nor by any 
 means an unsuccessful, student of her works. And he was 
 ever ready to encourage the investigations of every man 
 whose heart was loyal to truth, even though the investi- 
 gator might seem, in his better judgment, to be pro- 
 ceeding upon a wrong principle. But, certainly, in his 
 conversations with myself, he ever evinced the clearest 
 recognition of a Personal God moving amidst His own 
 
 creation, and ruling it constantly by His Word 
 
 He seems to have had so great a reverence for the deep 
 things of God, and so humbling a sense of his own inability 
 to grapple with them, that he was ever most unwilling to 
 converse about them. He was, I believe, a sincerely 
 attached member of the Episcopal Church of Scotland. He 
 venerated its old historic associations and traditions. He 
 loved its sound and sober standards of faith and devotion. 
 At the same time, he very highly esteemed the ministers of 
 the National Establishment ; he did full justice to the good 
 he knew in other communions ; and he never counted men 
 offenders for difference of opinion. ... He seemed to be a 
 man of vigorous, manly intellect, sparing no labour, no self- 
 devotion, in the acquirement of whatever knowledge he 
 thought it good, for himself and for his fellow-creatures, to 
 possess ; and, at the same time, a man of pure, gentle, kind, 
 and unselfish character, whom it was impossible to know 
 and not to love.' 
 
 Here terminates our Memoir. The principal subject 
 of it had passed away in his sixty-ninth year, a victim, as
 
 PRIVATE CHARACTER. 335 
 
 it appeared to himself and his family, of that species 
 of excessive literary labour which, by overtasking the 
 nervous system, often proves so fatal. Of the esteem 
 generally entertained for him in his private character, I 
 do not propose to dilate. His genial and kindly dis- 
 position, to say nothing of his acquirements, gave him 
 many friends. Never had children a more loving 
 father. In public affairs, he was not qualified to take a 
 prominent part. At one time, as has been seen, he 
 edited a newspaper in the old Conservative interest, but 
 his politics were of a mild type; and latterly he was 
 numbered among the friends of social progress within 
 sound constitutional limits. On few things was he more 
 resolute than in upholding the principles of free trade, 
 the opposition to which, particularly as regards the free 
 importation of com and other elements of food, he con- 
 sidered to be not only a prodigious economic blunder, 
 but a great national crime. His generosity in extending 
 aid to the needy and deserving was a marked trait in 
 his character ; and so was his frugality. Liberal in his 
 dealings, munificent in his donations, he spent little 
 on himself — did not indulge in costly amusements or 
 luxuries. While freely giving a cheque for a large 
 sum to advance some charitable object, he would 
 grudge small outlays on any matter purely personal, 
 except, perhaps, the purchase of books, on which he 
 expended considerable sums. 
 
 He never forgot old friends, no matter what was 
 their rank in life, and many who had been less fortunate 
 than himself he privately and delicately assisted. 
 Among these was * Leila,' who, in life's young dream, 
 he had glowingly celebrated in verse, and who, as has 
 been stated, was led to contract a marriage which, while
 
 336 MEMOIR. 
 
 frustrating my brother's hopes, proved particularly unfor- 
 tunate to herself. His early attachment to Lelia sobered 
 down in after years to a friendly interest in her hapless 
 fate. As a widow in reduced circumstances, she was 
 indebted to his considerately administered bounty. In 
 his latter days, when broken down in health, he paid her 
 what might be termed a farewell visit. Both were on the 
 verge of the grave, and the interview, as I have under- 
 stood, was correspondingly affecting. It brought up 
 a crowd of reminiscences almost too choking for utter- 
 ance. What, in losing him, through the well-meant but 
 indiscreet decision of her mother, had she not suffered 
 — reverse of fortune, and its manifold attendant ills, 
 from which she might otherwise have been exempt ! 
 Holding out his hand, which she clasped for the last 
 time, she dropped on it an involuntary tear ! It was a 
 j parting salutation. They never saw each other again. 
 i-^ ' The final chapter in a sorrowful romance was closed. 
 sJ Lelia was not forgotten in my brother's will. He left her 
 a provision sufficient for her moderate wants ; but this 
 she did not live to enjoy. She survived her early admirer 
 and benefactor only the short space of three months. 
 
 My brother's scientific and literary tastes led him to 
 be elected a Fellow of several learned Societies, in the 
 proceedings of which, more particularly the Royal 
 Society of Edinburgh, he occasionally took a prominent 
 part. He was also, as stated, a member of the Athe- 
 naeum Club, where he spent much of his time when in 
 London in converse with valued literary friends. 
 
 Diligent, accurate, and upright, he had clear views 
 on all ordinary concerns ; and no one could be more 
 unscrupulous in his denunciation of whatever was 
 narrow, mean, or dishonourable. If, in any of these
 
 EARLY LOVE OF BOOKS. 337 
 
 respects, he sometimes cherished resentments that, 
 founded on misconception and prejudice, had belter 
 have been forgotten, it is allowable to think that such 
 feelings might fairly be imputed to an overwrought 
 susceptibility of temperament not common in the 
 ordinary walks of life. 
 
 In the common language of the world, Robert's life 
 had been 'successful.' From humble beginnings, he had 
 risen to the enjoyment of a fair share of earthly posses- 
 sions. Let it, however, be understood that he never 
 sought to acquire wealth for its own sake. He had a 
 hatred of mere money-making. Life with him, as I may 
 say with myself, was viewed as a trust for much more 
 noble ends than that of miserly accumulation. At the 
 outset, as has been seen, we had both to encounter some 
 privations, but the struggle was by no means either dis- 
 couraging or cheerless. Sustained by an earnest reso- 
 lution to rise, if possible, above the position in which 
 we had been plunged by family disasters, there was an 
 ever present, an unextinguishable impulse upwards. 
 Excelsior ! — the very difficulties to be overcome being 
 in themselves a discipline and means of making us 
 usefully acquainted with a variety of amusing character 
 and incident. 
 
 Nor should I omit another sustaining influence. 
 Robert and I had from boyhood a keen love of, a 
 veneration for, books. We revelled in imaginative, as 
 well as in the more serious kinds of literature. Poetry 
 and old ballads and legends were our early as well 
 as our later solace. In looking back through a long 
 vista of years to the ' Dark Ages,' I cannot but think 
 that this species of enjoyment was not only actively, 
 but negatively advantageous. There was always for
 
 338 MEMOIR. 
 
 us something to think of, besides ordinary cares, some- 
 thing to modify and subdue the temptation to mean 
 indulgences. The spare nooks of the mind were kept 
 tenanted by elevating emotions. Poor we were, but 
 so far as the pleasures of reading were concerned, we 
 might be said to be almost on a level with the affluent. 
 Obscure as was our lot, we were enabled, as it were, 
 to come into the presence, and be impressed with the 
 ideas of the great writers of our country. This constant 
 converse with men of literary renown through their 
 printed productions, no doubt helped greatly to prepare 
 Robert, despite his imperfect education, for his future 
 career, and for gaining that general estimation to which 
 he happily attained. To the young and friendless, 
 therefore, his life ought to be alike instructive and 
 inspiriting. 
 
 Yet, in the story of this humble and ambitious student, 
 there is really nothing new. You will find the same 
 tale told in proverbs and apologues thousands of years 
 old ; the value of diligent application associated with 
 integrity and a cultivation of the nobler sentiments 
 of our nature. From first to last — in early life especially 
 — he offered in his own person an example of one who, 
 in all matters of importance, practised the maxim, 
 Trust to yourself. In this spirit, he wrote one of his 
 best moral essays, shewing that the only true way to 
 make a happy progress through the world, is to go on 
 in a dogged, persevering pursuit of one good object, 
 asking no favours, neither courting any special patronage, 
 nor relying on counsels which may be worthless. The 
 principles which he and I laid down could not, un- 
 fortunately, be always adhered to without inflicting a 
 degree of pain on ourselves and others. From the outset,
 
 LITER A R V CHAR A C TER. 339 
 
 we resolved never to allow our names to be employed 
 in connection with undertakings which did not meet 
 our approval, and over which we could exercise no 
 personal supervision. Unpleasant, if not harsh, as such 
 a rule may appear, it would be better for the com- 
 mercial world were it more generally acted upon. 
 
 Actuated by correct and generous impulses, Robert's 
 career afforded a lesson not only to the young, but to the 
 middle-aged. The talents which had been beneficently 
 given him were employed not alone for his own benefit; 
 they were exercised for the welfare and happiness of 
 others. On all occasions, he assiduously exercised the 
 moral and intellectual faculties, with such development 
 for practical ends as the circumstances of his position 
 admitted. There was furthermore a purity, a simplicity, 
 a geniality about his whole career, which we do not 
 often see so consistently or so amiably demonstrated. 
 In youth, in manhood, and in declining age, in all the 
 social phases through which he passed, he was ever the 
 same gentle and benign being — loved and esteemed by 
 all who knew him. 
 
 With regard to my brother's literary character and 
 works, I shall not, having said so much already, attempt 
 any elaborate estimate or analysis. His best services 
 were devoted to his native country, and, with the 
 exception of his illustrious contemporary, Sir Walter 
 Scott, no other author has done so much to illustrate 
 its social state, its scenery, romantic historical inci- 
 dents, and antiquities — the lives of its eminent men — 
 and the changes in Scottish society and the condition 
 of the people (especially those in the capital), during the 
 last two centuries. His first work, the Traditions of 
 Edinburgh, evinced this strong bias and ruling passion
 
 340 MEMOIR. 
 
 of his mind. He was, as has been stated, assisted by 
 Charles Kirkpatrick Sharpe and Sir Walter Scott, but 
 the great bulk of the traditions and all their setting were 
 his own. He knew every remarkable house, its pos- 
 sessors, and their genealogy ; every wynd and close 
 from the Castle-hill to Holyrood ; and in describing 
 these, he poured forth a vast amount of curious 
 reading and information, much of which would have 
 been lost but for the taste and diligence of so enthusi- 
 astic a collector. Perhaps this work will hereafter be 
 considered the most unique and valuable of all his 
 labours. His next production, however, has enjoyed a 
 still greater share of popularity. I allude to the History 
 of the Rehellio7i of 1745-6, a work which was very 
 carefully written; and the subject had a wide and deep 
 interest, for the enterprise of Charles Edward was one 
 of those bold and striking events in which history 
 assumes the colour and fascination of romance. As 
 latterly extended, by materials gathered from the Lyon 
 in Motcrningj^ the book has taken its place among our 
 standard historical works, as a faithful and animated 
 narrative of one of the most striking and memorable 
 periods in our national annals. 
 
 The other popular histories written between 1827 and 
 1830 are less original and less valuable than the narra- 
 tive of the '45. The Calendars of State Papers were not 
 then published, nor had antiquarian clubs and family 
 repositories enriched our stores of historical knowledge 
 
 * This curious and valuable collection of manuscripts has been 
 bequeathed to the Faculty of Advocates, Edinburgh, in grateful 
 acknowledgment of the many benefits derived from their extensive 
 library.
 
 LITERARY CHARACTER. 34" 
 
 with those minute and graphic details which add life, 
 and spirit, and individuality to the pages of Macaulay 
 and Froude. My brother's works are of the nature 
 of memoirs. His object was to present a view or 
 portraiture of the external circumstances of the period 
 embraced — a series of military narratives — rather than 
 to attempt ' histories of the legitimate description, which 
 should appeal only to the moral faculties of the select 
 few.' He anticipated Macaulay in desiring to make 
 history interesting to the many, embracing details of the 
 manners, customs, social habits, and daily life of the 
 nation ; and with all young readers, and generally with 
 the middle and lower ranks of the Scottish people, he 
 was eminently successful. Of a kindred character with 
 these works was the Popular Rhymes of Scotland, an 
 amusing embodiment of folk-lore and mementos of 
 childhood descending from one generation to another 
 in various countries of Europe. 
 
 By the establishment of Chambers's Journal, my 
 brother was happily led into a new walk of literature. 
 He came forward as a weekly essayist. During fifteen 
 years, as he has himself related, he laboured in this field, 
 * alternately gay, grave, sentimental, and philosophical,' 
 until not much fewer than four hundred separate papers 
 proceeded from his pen. In these were best seen his 
 imaginative faculties. His familiar and humorous 
 sketches of Scottish life and character are allowed to 
 be true to nature; they were certainly drawn from 
 the life, and may be compared to the descriptions 
 of Henry Mackenzie in the Mirror and Lounger as to 
 discrimination and fidelity of portraiture ; but those 
 of the earlier essayist are confined to the higher ranks 
 of Scottish society. Many of my brother's essays
 
 342 MEMOIR. 
 
 are also on literary and antiquarian topics, and will be 
 found not only honourable to his diligence as a self- 
 directed and self-upheld student, but replete with correct, 
 humane, and manly feeling. Essays or short disquisi- 
 tions on scientific subjects were occasionally inserted in 
 the Journal, for, as has been shewn, my brother, latterly, 
 devoted much time and study to geology and other 
 departments of physical science — the result of which 
 was the work on Ancient Sea-Margins, and a variety of 
 papers communicated to the Royal Society of Edinburgh. 
 
 The patient investigation, long journeys, and careful 
 accumulation of facts employed in establishing his geo- 
 logical theories, indicate the true scientific spirit and 
 enthusiasm, and there can be little doubt that, had the 
 circumstances of his early life been more favourable, 
 he would have taken a high place among the men 
 of science who have illustrated the nineteenth century. 
 Considering that his education, as he frankly avows, 
 never cost his parents so much as ten pounds, the 
 wonder is that he did so much. 
 
 Referring to my brother's services to geology, Mr 
 Prestwich, President of the Geological Society, in his 
 anniversary address to the Society, 1872, observes: 
 'In 1852, Mr Robert Chambers published a paper on 
 " Glacial Phenomena in Scotland and Parts of England," 
 in which he was, if not the first, one of the first, to 
 maintain that while our lake district had been the seat_ 
 of local glaciers, each of which moved do\\'n its respect- 
 ive valley, the glaciation of Scotland had been far more 
 general, more like that of Greenland at present. He 
 shewed the prevalence, over all the north of Scotland, 
 of striae having a general direction north-west and south- 
 east, passing over high hills and traversing the valleys,
 
 LITER A R V CHAR A CTER. 343 
 
 independently of the configuration of the country ; and 
 he considers that this points to a wide extension of the 
 circum-polar ice, with a southward movement of it over 
 the greater part of Scotland. To the abrasion caused 
 by this enormous mass of ice, he was disposed to 
 attribute, not only the rounded form of many of the 
 hills, but the excavation of many of the valleys ; while 
 he assigned to a later period, the more local radiating 
 valley system of glaciers. He instanced, in support of 
 these views, similar phenomena in Scandinavia, where 
 the glaciation has also been general, and passed over 
 tracts four thousand feet in height. In 1848, his well- 
 known work on Ancient Sea-Margins appeared. . . . 
 Much as we may differ from the author on the extent of 
 his generalisation and number of sea-levels, the work is 
 full of interesting facts and descriptions, collected with 
 great .care and labour, which cannot fail to be useful to 
 future observers. ... His later descriptive works, 
 Tracifigs of the North of Europe, Tracings of Iceland, 
 and others, are full of excellent observations relating to 
 various geological questions connected with the glacial 
 and other phenomena of the Quaternary period.' 
 
 As regards Robert's Cyclopedia of English Literature, 
 his Life and Writings of Burns, his Domestic Annals of 
 Scotland, his Book of Days, and the lesser works he pro- 
 duced, sufficient has perhaps been said in the course of 
 this Memoir. On none of his later works did he look 
 back with so much heartfelt pleasure and satisfaction, and 
 none deserves greater praise for its remarkable fidelity, 
 than that concerning Robert Burns. Here, for the first 
 time, the life of the poet, with all its lights and shades, 
 was correctly delineated. The story of Highland Mary, 
 and the dark days of Dumfries, were placed truly before
 
 344 MEMOIR. 
 
 the world, and allusions in the poems and letters were 
 fully explained. Of all future editions of the Scottish 
 poet, this explanatory and chronological one must form 
 the basis. 
 
 Altogether, as nearly as can be reckoned, my brother 
 produced upwards of seventy volumes, exclusive of de- 
 tached papers which it would be impossible to enumer- 
 ate. His whole writings had for their aim the good of 
 society — the advancement in some shape or other of 
 the true and beautiful. It will hardly be thought that 
 I exceed the proper bounds of panegyric in stating, 
 that in the long list of literary compositions of Robert 
 Chambers, we see the zealous and successful student, 
 the sagacious and benevolent citizen, and the devoted 
 lover of his country. 
 
 W. C. 
 yaiiiiary, 1873.
 
 SUPPLEMENTARY CHAPTER 
 
 1865— 18S3
 
 ( 347 ) 
 
 SUPPLEMENTARY CHAPTER. 
 
 LATER YEARS AND DEATH OF DR WILLIAM CHAMBERS. 
 1865— 1883. 
 
 T^HE story of William and Robert Chambers, as 
 -*- told in the foregoing lively and graceful record 
 from the pen of the elder brother, brings the romantic 
 narrative of their lives down to 187 1, the year in which 
 Robert died. In 1883, twelve years afterwards, and 
 when eleven editions of this work had gone through the 
 press, William, full of years and honours, passed like- 
 wise from the scene of his early struggles and later 
 triumphs, and it falls to another pen to complete the 
 story of his singular life. In so doing, it seems desir- 
 able that the history of this later period of William 
 Chambers's career should begin with the year 1S65, at 
 which time he was elected to the high and honourable 
 office of Lord Provost of the city of Edinburgh. The 
 brief and modest reference which he has made to 
 the circumstance in the preceding pages, far from 
 adequately sets forth the extent of his services in his 
 official capacity, and the value of these services to the 
 community. It is not only becoming, therefore, but a 
 simple act of justice to his memory, that in this volume 
 those public measures of his which served to round off
 
 34S MEMOIR. 
 
 and complete a long and varied career of usefulness, 
 should have due prominence given to them in this 
 supplementary record of his closing years. 
 
 In the beginning of 1882, the Jubilee year of the 
 Journal which he had originated in 1832, Dr William 
 Chambers took occasion to contribute to its pages some 
 notes of his career as associated therewith, which notes 
 he afterwards extended and published in a little volume 
 under the title of Story of a Long atid Busy Life. In 
 this volume he says : * In 1865, the citizens of Edinburgh 
 were in want of a Lord Provost, and, to my surprise, 
 fixed on me for the distinguished office. I had hitherto 
 shrunk from taking any prominent part in public affairs ; 
 and on the present occasion only acceded to the general 
 solicitations from a wish to promote, if possible, certain 
 measures of social improvement. From a consideration 
 of the state of large cities, I entertained the convic- 
 tion, that the insalubrity, the vice and misery, that 
 prevail among the more abject classes, are traceable in 
 a great measure to that inveterately wrong system of 
 house construction which consists in narrow courts and 
 alleys branching from the main thoroughfares. I felt 
 that if I could possibly obliterate, by legislation, the 
 hideous resorts in these quarters, a good deed would be 
 done.' 
 
 This was the beginning and motive of the Edinburgh 
 City Improvement Act of 1867, which has effected so 
 great a change for the better on the social and sanitary 
 condition of the Scottish capital, and the example of 
 which has since been followed with advantage in more 
 than one of the larger towns of England and Scotland. 
 The passing of the Edinburgh Act was not secured
 
 DR WILLIAM CHAMBERS. 349 
 
 without considerable opposition in certain quarters ; but 
 Dr Chambers had made his account with this. He was 
 aware, from his knowledge of the world, that no such 
 sweeping measure of reform as that proposed by him 
 could possibly be carried through without exciting the 
 hostility of those whose conservative habits of thought, 
 or local and proprietary interests, rendered them averse 
 from engaging in a scheme that would of necessity efface 
 so many of the time-honoured associations of the ancient 
 city. The line of the Pligh Street and Canongatc, 
 occupying the crest of the ridge that slopes down from 
 the Castle-rock to Holyrood, has been from time im- 
 memorial flanked on both sides by thick rows of houses, 
 only separated from each other by narrow wynds and 
 closes, which branch off at right angles from the main 
 thoroughfare like ribs from the backbone of a skeleton. 
 Many of the buildings, so huddled away down narrow 
 lanes, were at one time the dwelling-places of Scotland's 
 nobility and gentry. But the removal of the court and 
 parliament from Edinburgh, and the gradual change in 
 the character of the population due to the extension of 
 the city outward, had left these aristocratic residences 
 to be divided and subdivided to suit the wants of 
 tenants in a constantly descending social scale, till 
 at length, in many quarters, these densely-jiopulated 
 ' lands ' — as such rows of houses are called — were 
 almost wholly given over to the more vicious and prof- 
 ligate of the community, and had become the haunts of 
 crime and misery in every form. These houses, besides 
 harbouring idle and evil-disposed persons, were at the 
 same time the hotbed of fevers and other malignant 
 forms of disease, which no amount of police and sanitary 
 supervision was able adequately to cope with. The 
 w
 
 350 MEMOIR. 
 
 problem how to deal with the difficulty had been the 
 subject of much thought on the part of Dr Chambers, 
 and the conclusion to which he came was, that the only 
 way to improve these quarters of the city was to obtain 
 power to demolish them, or at anyrate a portion of 
 them, and to replace the closely-huddled and tumble- 
 down tenements by broad and open lines of street, 
 accessible to the free air and the sunshine. 
 
 This resolution was not unaccompanied by some 
 sentiments of regret, Dr Chambers shared largely in 
 his brother Robert's veneration for the historical 
 antiquities of Edinburgh ; and the removal of those 
 old houses, that bore about them, even in their decay, 
 so many memorials of a vanished past — sculptured coats 
 of arms, pious mottoes of ancient founders, dates 
 and names suggestive of many a stirring page in 
 Scottish story — was not to be thought of without 
 regretting the necessities of modern life which rendered 
 their demolition desirable. This feeling of respect for 
 the fading relics of a grand historic past was rational 
 and patriotic ; but the social and sanitary claims of 
 present existence were still more urgent, and the work 
 of reform could not with safety be postponed. 
 
 Dr Chambers no sooner, therefore, entered upon the 
 duties of his civic office than he set about those 
 preliminary investigations that were necessary to the 
 success of his scheme. The report of the medical 
 officer of the city sufficiently indicated the enormously 
 high death-rate that prevailed in the insalubrious and 
 densely-populated quarters of the Old Town ; and the 
 facts thus elicited strongly impressed Dr Chambers 
 with the necessity of at once obtaining statutory powers 
 to enable the Town Council to deal with the questioa
 
 LORD PROVOST OF EDINBURGH. 351 
 
 The powers thus required would be directed towards 
 the pulling down and removal of the large blocks of old 
 and crowded tenements, the widening of wynds and 
 alleys, and the formation of wide and convenient streets. 
 In the drafting and carrying out of this important 
 scheme, Dr Chambers fully acknowledged the efficient 
 help and assistance which he received in the work from 
 the city officials, chiefly Mr J. D. Marwick, then Town 
 Clerk, and Mr Robert Adam, the City Accountant. 
 The result was the passing of the Improvement Act of 
 1867, under the operation of which extensive changes 
 have been made in the distribution of population in the 
 city. Spacious streets have taken the place of many of 
 the old narrow, sunless, pestiferous lanes ; and the work- 
 ing inhabitants that before were huddled away in dens 
 inaccessible to light and air, have now at their disposal 
 a class of houses with which their former domiciles 
 cannot be brought into comparison, either as regards 
 the nature of their accommodation or the salubrity of 
 their surroundings. 
 
 The Improvement Act was in all respects a success. 
 Between 1867 and the time of Dr Chambers's death, 
 there had been expended, under the Improvement Trust, 
 in the purchase and removal of nearly three thousand 
 houses, the sum of ;p^S33,657; while there was derived 
 from the sale of new building sites disposed of on the 
 ground tluis cleared, and from a small annual rate and 
 other sources of income, the sum of ^443,460. The 
 excess of expenditure over receipts at the end of the 
 fifteenth year of the Trust's existence was thus ^90,197 ; 
 but as the Trust will continue till 1887, with various 
 ground annuals and building areas still at its disposal, 
 it is believed that at the end of the twenty years
 
 352 MEMOIR. 
 
 fixed by the Act, a financially successful issue will 
 have been achieved. This magnificent scheme of 
 urban reform had a strikingly beneficial effect upon 
 the health and general condition of the population; 
 a remarkable proof of which is to be found in the fact, 
 that the death-rate of Edinburgh, which in 1865 was 
 twenty-six per thousand per annum, had in 18S2 fallen 
 to eighteen per thousand. 
 
 From 1865 to 1868, Dr Chambers worked vigorously 
 at his Improvement Scheme ; and when his triennial 
 period of oflice came to an end in the latter year, 
 he allowed himself to be re-elected for a second period, 
 in order to secure certain portions of his scheme being 
 carried out upon the lines laid down by him. He was 
 successful in effecting his purpose, though not without a 
 stiff fight ; and this accomplished, he resigned his office 
 at the end of 1869, and retired into private life. 
 
 While the civic rule of Dr Chambers was mainly 
 distinguished by his reforms under the City Improve- 
 ment Scheme, it was also signalised by the visits of 
 various eminent personages to the city. In May 1866, 
 he had the honour of entertaining at luncheon His 
 Royal Highness Prince Alfred, now Duke of Edinburgh, 
 along with a number of noble and distinguished guests, 
 on the occasion of the opening of the National Museum 
 of Science and Art, in Chambers Street.* It also fell 
 to him as Lord Provost to preside at the presentation 
 of the freedom of the city to three distinguished men, 
 namely. Lord Napier of Magdala, ]\Ir John Bright, and 
 Mr Benjamin Disraeli (afterwards Lord Beaconsfield), 
 
 *This is one of the finest of the new streets made under the 
 Improvement Trust, and was so named in honour of Dr Chambers.
 
 PRESENTA TION AT COURT. 353 
 
 then Chancellor of the Exchequer. The presentation 
 to Mr Disraeli took place on the 30th October 1867 ; 
 and on the previous day, when being entertained at a 
 great public banquet, the Chancellor of the Exchequer, 
 in toasting ' the Magistrates of the City,' referred to the 
 application of literature to the world generally as a 
 distinguishing feature of the present age, and added : 
 ' I do not think that the name of Chambers will ever 
 be mentioned in the future without a sentiment of 
 gratitude.' This reference could not fail to be highly 
 pleasing to Dr Chambers, and was not more than his 
 own and his brother's services to literature amply 
 merited. 
 
 During the currency of his office as Lord Provost, 
 and in his official capacity, Dr Chambers was presented 
 at Court. This event took place at a levde held at the 
 palace of St James, on the 2d of May 1866, Her Majesty 
 on the occasion being represented by the Prince of 
 Wales. 'On going up the great staircase,' says Dr 
 Chambers, with a touch of natural feeling, ' I confess to 
 being affected by a strange sensation. A recollection 
 of my early stmggles rushed across my memory. Plow 
 strange the metamorphosis, from having been a penni- 
 less and unknown youth to being a full-blown dignitary 
 arrayed in rich apparel, and wearing the robes and 
 insignia of office. Without presumption, could I help 
 remembering the notable text in Scripture, which had 
 similarly occurred to the mind of Benjamin Franklin ? 
 "Seest thou a man diligent in business? he shall stand 
 before kings.'" 
 
 The Lord Provost of Edinburgh is cx-officio a member 
 of the Commission of Northern Lighthouses, a body 
 invested with the duty of managing all the lighthouses on
 
 354 MEMOIR. 
 
 the coast of Scotland and the Isle of Man. The Com- 
 missioners are in the habit of annually making a tour of 
 inspection, in a steamer called the Pharos, belonging to 
 the service, to certain of the lighthouses under their 
 charge; and Dr Chambers on two occasions took part in 
 this official duty. It will be remembered that in 1814 
 Sir Walter Scott had the honour of being invited to join 
 the Commissioners of the time in their annual tour, 
 and that English literature is indebted to that voyage 
 for the poem of The Lord of the Isles and the romance 
 of The Pirate. The fact that Scott had thus preceded 
 him in a tour among the picturesque bays and wild 
 islets of the Scottish coast, was to Dr Chambers a 
 matter of pleasing recollection, Scott being one of 
 those authors whom he especially, and for obvious 
 reasons, held in high esteem. Both had a strong love 
 for their native land ; its history was to each a matter 
 of every-day study; its old families were enshrined to 
 both in a halo of past associations ; its woods and 
 hills and rivers had become mapped in the mind of 
 each by long and loving observation ; and each in his 
 own way had used its ancient traditions and historical 
 episodes for the instruction and entertainment of later 
 generations. 
 
 Dr Chambers's first trip in the Pharos took place in 
 1866, on which occasion he visited the west coast of 
 Scotland, among the Outer Hebrides. He had also an 
 opportunity of ascending what he calls ' that wonderful 
 triumph of art,' the Skerryvore lighthouse, rising to 
 the height of one hundred and fifty feet above high 
 water. As the vessel approached Skerryvore, which was 
 seen looming dimly through the dull haze, solitary amidst 
 the world of waters, ' the feeling,' he says, ' of those who
 
 IN ORKNEY AND SHETLAND. 355 
 
 had not previously seen it was one of intense pleasure 
 and satisfaction. There are sights of such impressive 
 grandeur as cannot be forgotten, and the recollection 
 of which forms one of the charms of existence. Among 
 these I have reckoned the falls of Niagara, the ruins of 
 the Colosseum, the interior of St Peter's, and now am 
 able to add the Skerryvore lighthouse.' 
 
 The second trip in the Pharos, which was in the 
 following year, took Dr Chambers along the east coast 
 of Scotland, from the Firth of Forth and Bell Rock 
 lighthouses, to the far islands of Orkney and Shetland. 
 The external characteristics of these islands are familiar 
 to readers of The Pirate; and Dr Chambers was careful 
 to note, at Sumburgh Head and other jjlaces mentioned 
 in the romance, the extraordinary fidelity of Scott in his 
 descriptions of the scenery, and the charm which his 
 work had given to places and names which otherwise 
 had scarcely been known outside Shetland. Under 
 the title of ' My Holiday,' Dr Chambers wrote an 
 account of these two excursions, in a series of articles 
 which appeared in Chatnbers's Journal, and which were 
 afterwards printed in a small volume for private cir- 
 culation. These papers are marked by racy bits of 
 description, wise and practical observations on the 
 condition of the scattered populations whom he thus 
 visited, and useful suggestions for their future improve- 
 ment, especially as regards the development of the 
 fisheries on the western coast. 
 
 With his retirement from the Lord Provostship of 
 Edinburgh, towards the end of 1869, Dr Chambers's 
 brief jjeriod of public life may be said to have come 
 to an end. He once more fell back into tlie familiar
 
 3S6 MEMOIR. 
 
 groove of his early and middle years, dividing his time 
 between his literary pursuits, and the direction of the 
 large publishing establishment which he and his brother 
 had founded. The latter was now suffering from 
 declining health, and in 187 1, as already told in these 
 pages, the end came. Thereafter, Dr William Chambers 
 spent some time abroad, in the district of Mentone, 
 which was his favourite continental resort ; and though 
 his pen was not altogether idle, the advance of age 
 rendered him less disposed towards the laborious exer- 
 tions of his earlier years. Nevertheless, besides writing 
 the present Memoir of his brother, and contributing an 
 occasional article to the Journal whose welfare he had 
 ever keenly at heart, he managed in these years to pro- 
 duce a few other works. Two of these were suggested 
 by his sojourn abroad. Wintering at Mentone was the 
 result of his residence for two winters at that pleasant 
 resort in the Riviera; and Fra?ice: its History and 
 Revolutions, was due to his desire to place in the hands 
 of young persons a simple and succinct account of 
 some of the chief events in the history of France — which 
 history had become, by the Franco-German war of 
 1870-71, a subject of fresh and exciting interest to both 
 young and old. The latter book has passed through 
 four editions. While abroad, also, he WTOte Ailie 
 Gilroy, a story which he tells us was founded on facts, 
 and written with the view to put young ladies on their 
 guard against designing adventurers. 
 
 During the last six or seven years of his life he began 
 to take a less active part in the concerns of his business, 
 though his interest in its welfare and his knowledge of 
 all its operations were in no degree lessened. The 
 direction of its literary projects, however, including the
 
 RESTORA TION OF ST GILES'. 357 
 
 management of Chambers's Journa/, was gradually 
 passed into the hands of his nephew, Mr Robert 
 Chambers, the eldest son of his brother Robert ; and 
 the greater rest and leisure which he thus secured gave 
 him the opportunity of carrying out and completing a 
 work which he had long had in contemplation, and with 
 which his name was in his latest years very closely 
 associated, namely, the restoration of the Cathedral 
 Church of St Giles, Edinburgh. 
 
 This ancient edifice, dating from about the twelfth 
 century, is closely connected with the leading events 
 of Scottish history, and was the scene of many re- 
 markable episodes in Reformation times, as well as 
 during the later struggle in Scotland between Episco- 
 pacy and Presbyterianism. When the ecclesiastical 
 changes consequent upon the establishment of Pro- 
 testantism in the sixteenth century had put an end to 
 the old Roman Catholic ritual, and St Giles' had become 
 a place of plain Presbyterian worship, its long-drawn 
 aisles were not thought advantageous to the preachers 
 of the day, and the interior of the edifice was con- 
 sequently partitioned off into a number of separate 
 places of worship. The stone walls which thus cut the 
 fine old church into small and meaningless sections, 
 entirely destroyed the effect of its original architecture ; 
 while the erection of the high steep galleries which 
 filled the side aisles and blocked up every possible 
 recess, had been effected at the cost of much hacking 
 and hewing of the ancient stone-work. A so-called 
 process of rehabilitation of the edifice in 1830, when 
 the exterior of the building was newly incased in stone, 
 helped still further to obliterate its historic features ; the 
 stately old tower, surmounted by its finely-proportioned
 
 358 MEMOIR. 
 
 mural crown, being now perhaps the only characteristic 
 of its external aspect which can really be regarded as 
 ancient. The interior, also, at the same time underwent 
 certain other changes for the worse. In order that the 
 preacher might be seen by as many of the congregation 
 as possible, the massive octagonal pillars in the nave 
 were sliced down into narrow fluted shafts, altogether 
 out of keeping with the general character of the 
 architecture ; and in order that room might be made 
 for the galleries, arches and capitals were ruthlessly cut 
 into, and the whole place made as unlike its ancient 
 self as possible. What was done in the nave, was to 
 a great extent imitated in the transepts and choir; 
 while the side chapels were either demolished, or, as 
 was the case with the historic Albany Aisle, completely 
 blocked up with the unadorned wood-work of galleries 
 and pews. 
 
 The idea of restoring the Church of St Giles to some- 
 thing like its ancient condition — as far at least as 
 regarded the interior, for the exterior was hopelessly 
 changed— occurred to Dr Chambers during those years 
 when he was Lord Provost of Edinburgh. He had 
 frequently occasion to attend public worship officially 
 along with the other Magistrates and members of the 
 Town Council, the place of assemblage being the choir 
 of the old cathedral. This portion of St Giles' was 
 known as the High Church ; but there were other two 
 places of worship within the edifice, all three being 
 divided from each other by stone walls that formed 
 no part of the original building, and with separate 
 congregations meeting in each. It was while sitting in 
 the choir, or High Church, in the elevated gallery 
 reserved for the Magistrates and Town Council of the
 
 RESTORATION OF ST GILES\ 359 
 
 city, that Dr Chambers, as he tells us, * conceived the 
 idea of attempting a restoration of the building, and 
 producing a church in which the people of Edinburgh 
 might feel some pride.' 
 
 The objects he originally had in promoting the 
 restoration of the building, in the first place by public 
 subscription, and latterly at his own cost, have been 
 clearly defined by himself, and were never in any essen- 
 tial respect departed from. He did not forget that such 
 an edifice as St Giles' was not primarily designed for 
 the purposes of modem Presbyterian worship ; and his 
 desire was to restore its interior as nearly as possible to 
 its original condition, when, as he remarks in a paper 
 which he read on the subject in 1867, ' the whole interior 
 was an open space, with only such furnishings as per- 
 tained to a dignified ecclesiastical structure previous to 
 the Reformation.* ' With the removal of the partition- 
 walls,' he said, ' my aim goes the length of clearing out 
 the whole interior, so as to bring it back, as nearly as 
 possible, to what it was originally.' The choir, or High 
 Church, was the first portion of the building which he 
 proposed to renovate ; more could not be attempted 
 until the congregations which occupied the other two 
 divisions were removed elsewhere. But he was hopeful 
 that even these obstacles to the complete restoration of 
 the fabric would in course of time disappear ; in which 
 case, he said, ' the proposal I would offer is, to clear 
 away the dividing walls, take down all the galleries, 
 remove the pews, bring all to a uniform level, and leave 
 an open stretch of pavement tliroughout. l"',xcei)ting 
 the partially inclosed choir, tiie whole eilifice wouhi be 
 free to the perambulation of visitors.' He further 
 hoped that the restoration of the building and per-
 
 36o MEMOIR. 
 
 manent clearance of the nave would give an oppor- 
 tunity for the erection therein of monuments to distin- 
 guished Scotchmen of past and future times, and that 
 St Giles', in a sense, might come to be viewed as the 
 Westminster Abbey of Scotland. 
 
 When once the idea of the restoration had suggested 
 itself to him, he entered into the matter with his 
 accustomed decision and vigour. An influential and 
 enthusiastic public committee, of which he was chair- 
 man, was shortly formed, with the object of collecting 
 funds to defray the cost of the proposed work. The 
 part of the edifice to which the efforts of the Restora- 
 tion Committee were first directed, was, as had been 
 proposed, the choir; and the committee was fairly 
 successful in its efibrts. The renovation of the choir 
 was not at this time so thorough as might have been 
 desired ; but still the improvement eftected upon its 
 appearance was very marked, and it might once more 
 lay claim to the artistic beauty of which former genera- 
 tions had thoughtlessly deprived it. 
 
 The first renovation of the choir was finished in 
 1873; and five years afterwards, one of the other two 
 portions of the building fell into disuse as a place of 
 worship. Dr Chambers, whose zeal for the complete 
 restoration of the church had never abated, took advan- 
 tage of this opportunity, resolving to apply the same 
 process of renovation to it that had been so effective 
 in the choir. But this time he determined to relieve 
 the Restoration Committee of any further trouble and 
 responsibility, and to proceed entirely on his own judg- 
 ment, and at his own cost. Even the most enthusiastic 
 of committees rarely work without more or less of 
 friction, which means in the end irritation and delay ;
 
 RESTORATION OF ST GILES\ 361 
 
 and Dr Chambers's advanced age, and the extent of 
 the task which he had now set before himself to 
 accompUsh — namely, the complete restoration and open- 
 ing up of the whole interior of St Giles' — rendered it 
 necessary that the work should be done as smoothly 
 and expeditiously as possible, if he were to sec the 
 end of his labours. In 1878, therefore, and the 
 following year, he succeeded in restoring the southern 
 aisles of the church, including the Preston and Chepman 
 Aisles. The Preston Aisle, as renovated, exhibits a 
 beauty of groining which is said not to be surpassed, 
 if equalled, in Great Britain ; while under the Chepman 
 Aisle, which had been degraded into a coal-cellar, is 
 the vault wherein were deposited the mortal remains 
 of the great Montrose. 
 
 There now only remained to complete the restoration 
 of this fine old historic church, the nave and the north 
 transept, with the adjoining chapels. Before this work 
 could be begun, however, elaborate arrangements had 
 to be made, by Act of Parliament and otherwise, for the 
 removal of the congregation then worshipping in tlie 
 nave, the arrangements being burdened by the necessity 
 of collecting from the public a sum of j[^'i-0,%oo to pro- 
 vide that congregation with a church elsewhere. Con- 
 ditional upon this sum being raised, and the keys of the 
 building handed over to Dr Chambers by Whitsunday 
 1880, he, on his part, undertook to carry out and com- 
 plete the work of restoration. A committee was formed, 
 which charged itself with the collection of the sum in 
 question ; but the ai)peal made to the public was at first 
 only meagrely responded to, many being disposed to 
 regard the restoration as rather of a denominational 
 than a national character. But the intentions of Dr
 
 362 MEMOIR. 
 
 Chambers were clearly public and national, and not 
 sectarian in any sense. The renovation proposed by 
 him was undertaken with the view, not of benefiting 
 any particular Church or congregation, but of beautify- 
 ing a neglected national edifice, and rendering it in some 
 degree a place of national utility — in his own words, a 
 Westminster Abbey of Scotland, As these patriotic 
 and undenominational objects of Dr Chambers became 
 clearer to the public, principally through the advocacy of 
 the newspaper press, which all throughout had favoured 
 his project, money began to come in more freely, and 
 from all sections of society. It was not, however, till 
 the spring of 1881 that the money was fully secured, 
 and the congregation removed from the nave of St 
 Giles'. The workmen were thenceforth for two years 
 busily engaged upon this last stage of the restoration, 
 which included not only the nave and northern chapels, 
 but also a more complete renovation of the choir than 
 it had undergone in 1873, 
 
 Unfortunately, while this work of restoration was 
 being pressed forward, the health of the Restorer 
 himself was evidently failing. At this time he was 
 in his eighty-second year, and for a long while had 
 suffered periodically from severe neuralgic pains in the 
 head, followed by more or less of prostration of the 
 system. In the spring of 1881, these attacks recurred 
 more frequently and with greater vehemence, accom- 
 panied by fits of sickness of a depressing kind. In the 
 summer he went to Portobello, a watering-place in the 
 neighbourhood of Edinburgh, where he stayed for some 
 weeks, and was so much benefited by the change, that 
 he was able to spend the autumn, as had long been his 
 annual custom, at his estate of Glenormiston, in Peebles-
 
 FAILING HEALTH. 363 
 
 shire.* While not altogether free from occasional neur- 
 algic attacks, he was, during 1882, somewhat improved 
 in his general health, though becoming physically 
 weaker. But it was not till the beginning of 1883 that 
 his condition became such as to alarm his friends. 
 Throughout the early spring of that year, it could be 
 seen that he was perceptibly breaking down both in 
 mind and body. Till then, and even while suffering 
 the most acute pain, his intellect had remained un- 
 touched ; he thought, and spoke, and acted, in all 
 matters of business or advising that came before him, 
 with the clearness and promptitude of his most vigorous 
 years. But now it was obvious that his memory was 
 failing, and his mind exhibiting otherwise symptoms of 
 decay. ' The keeper of the house was beginning to 
 tremble, and the strong man to bow himself. ' Happily, 
 his illness was no longer accompanied by acute 
 suffering; it was simply a gradual exhaustion of the 
 vital energies, the machinery of life worn done by old 
 age and use. 
 
 During the last year of his life, the St Giles' restoration 
 formed the chief object of his thoughts, and reports were 
 regularly made to him of the progress of the work and 
 
 * The estate of Glenormiston was purcliascd by Dr Chambers 
 in 1849, for the sum of ;^25,ooo. It is finely situated on the 
 Tweed, in the parish of Innerleithen, in the eastern district of the 
 county of Peebles, and about five miles from his native town. 
 Immediately after obtaining possession of the estate, Ur Chambers 
 carried out extensive improvements upon it, adorning and beauti- 
 fying it in many respects. He formed a new ajiproach, with 
 entrance lodge, drained a large part of the land, reconstructed the 
 farm-steading, and adapted the mansion-house to his requirements ; 
 these and other improvements costing him the further sum of 
 
 ;^I0,000.
 
 3C^ MEMOIR. 
 
 all that pertained to it. In 1879, he had written a 
 Historical Sketch of St dies' Cathedral, embracing an 
 account of the restorations up to that year ; and perhaps 
 the last of his suggestions as an author and publisher 
 was when, about a month before his death, and 
 now no longer able to wield the pen himself, he 
 requested one of his literary assistants to prepare a 
 new edition of the Sketch, giving therein the final 
 details of the restoration work. He was naturally 
 desirous to live to see St Giles' in its renovated con- 
 dition ; and with this view the operations, many of 
 which involved much careful and artistic manipulation, 
 had been for two years pushed rapidly forward. From 
 1872 onward, the whole of the restoration work 
 had been done by the advice and under the per- 
 sonal superintendence of Mr William Hay, architect, 
 Edinburgh, whose knowledge of ancient ecclesias- 
 tical architecture is only equalled by the refined 
 taste and artistic skill which he brought to bear upon 
 the work. By the spring of 1883, the process of 
 renovation was all but completed, and with a suc- 
 cess even more striking than had been anticipated. 
 Portion after portion of the ancient edifice had been 
 cleared out, and each in succession renovated and 
 restored, with the result of bringing back to the interior, 
 so far as architectural effect is concerned, very much 
 the appearance which we may suppose it to have had 
 immediately before the Reformation. The magnificent 
 restoration which Dr Chambers thus accomplished, 
 was executed at a cost to himself of between t\venty 
 and thirty thousand pounds. The re-opening of the 
 church for public worship was fixed for Wednesday 
 the 23d of May 1883 ; but three days previously
 
 DEA TIL 365 
 
 Dr Chambers had passed away, and the imposing 
 ceremony of the 23d was rendered all the more solemn 
 and imj)ressive by the regretful feeling that he who 
 had conceived and executed the design of restoration 
 had died without witnessing the consummation of his 
 work. 
 
 His end, though not unexpected, came somewhat 
 sooner than had been anticipated. During the first two 
 weeks of May he had exhibited from time to time 
 alarming symptoms of physical exhaustion, from which, 
 however, he occasionally rallied, giving still some faint 
 hopes of partial recovery. But on Friday the iSth of 
 that month, he fell into a kind of lethargy, which con- 
 tinued throughout the whole of Saturday, and into the 
 morning of Sunday the 20th, when, a few minutes before 
 two o'clock, he calmly breathed his last. 
 
 His death was attended in the public mind by two 
 poignant sources of regret. One of these we have 
 already alluded to, namely, his death on the very eve of 
 the re-opening of the restored St Giles'. The other was 
 the flattering circumstance that, only two weeks before 
 his death, Her Majesty the Queen, through her Prime 
 Minister, Mr Gladstone, had offered Dr Chambers the 
 honour of a baronetcy. Two years previously, Mr 
 Gladstone had, in complimentary terms, made him an 
 offer of a knighthood ; but that offer he then respect- 
 fully declined. This later renewal of the honour, how- 
 ever, in the shape of a baronetcy, Dr Chambers accepted ; 
 but his end came before the title had been fomially 
 bestowed. The great number of letters following 
 immediately upon the announcement, and addressed 
 to him by readers of Chainbers's Journal in all parts 
 of the United Kingdom, congratulating him upon
 
 366 MEMOIR. 
 
 the honour Her Majesty had at length done him, 
 formed a strong indication of the interest which the 
 pubhc felt in the matter. His death, therefore, ere 
 the honour had been formally conferred upon him, 
 could not fail to stimulate and increase the general 
 regret when it was intimated that William Chambers 
 was no more. 
 
 The re-opening of St Giles' Cathedral for public wor- 
 ship had been already fixed for the 23d of May ; and 
 though at first it was naturally felt that the occurrence 
 in the meantime of Dr Chambers's death might lead to 
 a postponement of the ceremony, other considerations 
 showed how impossible it was to stay a great public 
 demonstration for which preparations had been making 
 for weeks previously. It had been the desire of those 
 charged with the arrangements, that the Queen should 
 perform the opening ceremony ; but, in the unavoidable 
 absence of Her Majesty, the duty was performed by 
 the Right Hon. the Earl of Aberdeen, Lord High 
 Commissioner to the General Assembly of the Church 
 of Scotland. The ceremony was in all respects a 
 magnificent one, and was attended, not only by great 
 numbers of the general public, but by representatives of 
 all the chief public corporations in Scotland, including 
 the Judges of the Court of Session, the Faculty of 
 Advocates, the Society of Writers to the Signet, the 
 Solicitors before the Supreme Courts, the Magistrates 
 and Town Councillors of Edinburgh, the Senatus of 
 the University, the Royal Colleges of Physicians and 
 Surgeons, the Royal Scottish Academy, the High 
 Constables of Holyrood, the Convener and Deacons 
 of the Trades, and many other public bodies, besides 
 almost the whole of the members of the General
 
 RE-OPENING OF ST GTLES\ 367 
 
 Assembly of the Church of Scotland. A choir of 
 two hundred voices, with the organ, led the service 
 of praise ; and a congregation of not fewer than three 
 thousand persons crowded the immense building in 
 every part. The judges, magistrates, clergy, and 
 almost all the other representatives of public bodies 
 present, were in their official robes ; and as deputation 
 after deputation entered the church, and slowly filed up 
 the nave to their respective places in the choir, the 
 sight, with its imposing solemnity and occasionally 
 picturesque effects, was suggestive of the pageants of an 
 older day, when Scottish kings and queens graced with 
 their presence the hallowed precincts of St Giles'. The 
 opening sermon was preached by the minister of the 
 Church, the Rev. J, Cameron Lees, D.D. ; and probably 
 no one had addressed so large and distinguished an 
 audience within the old historic edifice since the day 
 when John Knox preached in the same place the funeral 
 sermon of the Regent Moray. 
 
 From the spring of 1881, Dr Chambers had practically 
 been the custodian of the Church of St Giles, and the 
 formal part of the opening ceremony consisted in the 
 transference of the keys of the building from the posses- 
 sion of his representatives to that of the Queen's 
 Commissioner. With this object, Mr Robert Chambers, 
 as representing his deceased uncle, awaited Lord 
 Aberdeen at the west door of the Cathedral, and 
 there, through the medium of Lord Provost Harrison, 
 delivered the keys into his lordship's hand, who, after 
 the formal ceremony of opening the door of the church, 
 passed them into the custody of the minister, Dr Lees. 
 Dr Chambers, feeling in the later weeks of his life the 
 improbability of his being able to attend the opening
 
 368 MEMOIR. 
 
 ceremony, had, with his cliaracteristic forethought, 
 prepared an address which, in the event of his 
 absence, was to be read to Her Majesty's representa- 
 tive. This address, which was now read by Mr R. 
 Chambers, is remarkable for the singular grace and 
 simplicity of its language, and will be of permanent 
 interest as among the last literary compositions dictated 
 by the Restorer of St Giles' : 
 
 To His Grace the Lord High Commissioner. 
 
 May it Please Your Grace, 
 
 I esteem it a high honour that Her Majesty has commis- 
 sioned one so respected and esteemed, and whose name and 
 family are so dear to Scotland, to represent her on this 
 occasion. 
 
 It is with much thankfulness that I have completed the 
 restoration of this venerable Cathedral. 
 
 The interests of Edinburgh, where I have spent so many 
 years, are very dear to me ; and it is as a token of my affec- 
 tion that I have endeavoured to restore her historic church 
 to somewhat of its former beauty. 
 
 It is ample reward to me to know that my work has met 
 with the approval of my beloved Sovereign, and so many of 
 her Scottish subjects. 
 
 May I ask Your Grace to present my humble duty to Her 
 Most Gracious Majesty, and to express my deep gratitude 
 for her recognition of my labours. 
 
 I have now to present to Your Grace the keys of St Giles', 
 which have been intrusted to me for a time, and to ask 
 Your Grace to open the church in name of Her TNIajesty the 
 Oueen. 
 
 W. Chambers. 
 
 The opening ceremony outside was followed by 
 appropriate devotional services in the interior of the 
 church ; after Avhich an eloquent sermon was preached
 
 SERMON. 369 
 
 by Dr Lees from the words in Joshua iv. 21: ' What 
 mean these stones ? ' In the course of the sermon, and 
 in answer to the question of the text as apphed to 
 the old historic fabric in which the congregation were 
 assembled, the preacher said : 
 
 * To-day these stones mean — henceforth they will menn 
 — something more than before. They will be associated, 
 not alone in our day, but in days to come, with noble 
 munificence. They will be the monument of a great and 
 generous Scottish man. A feeling of sadness has mingled 
 with the ceremonial of to-day, a pathos which has given a 
 solemnity to our service greater than any outward acces- 
 sories could ever give it. There has been a presence 
 to-day within these walls mightier than any earthly presence, 
 the shadow that awes even the lightest-hearted into silence. 
 We are celebrating the completion of a great work. The 
 generous heart that prompted it, the thoughtful mind that 
 carried it out, is for ever at rest. Another day will pass, 
 and he will be borne here on the way to his burial, and his 
 obsequies will be celebrated amid the beauty he created, 
 but which he was never to see. There is something inex- 
 pressibly touching in life thus closing on the threshold of 
 achievement. It is ever so. The great leader dying with 
 the light of the promised land in his eyes ; the funeral of 
 the Persian poet passing out of one gate of the city, while 
 camels bearing the gold that was to reward him were 
 coming in at the other ; the last words of the laborious 
 writer, Buckle, " My poor book !" "When the keys," Dr 
 Chambers wrote, " are put into my hands, not an hour will 
 be lost in accomplishing this important undertaking, and 
 God grant me life and health to carry through the work to 
 a successful issue." His reverent prayer has been answered. 
 How successful the issue has been, you can all see. I know 
 it lay very close to the heart of my dear old friend. Weak 
 and feeble though he was, and confined long to his room, 
 he knew every detail of what was being done here. " If
 
 37° MEMOTR. 
 
 God," he once said to me feelingly, as he clasped my hand 
 one day in parting with him, " enables me to finish this 
 work, I will sing my Nunc Dimitlis." Often he told me of 
 the motives that weighed with him in undertaking this 
 work. He believed that this restored building might teach 
 great historic lessons, that it might inspire men with the 
 feeling of reverence, that it might be a source of good and 
 sweetening influence in this city. All this is in keeping 
 with the rest of his life. It is a life, like that of his distin- 
 guished brother, of which Scotsmen may be proud. In 
 its record of perseverance, endurance, foresight, perfect 
 integrity, it displays the best features of the national 
 character. The poor lad by honest industry rising to 
 eminence, becoming the chief citizen of Edinburgh, in- 
 augurating sanitary measures which lowered the terrible 
 death-rate of the inhabitants of its formerly overcrowded 
 tenements ; above all, becoming the founder of that popular 
 literature which is so marked a feature of our time. These 
 are things which will not be soon forgotten. There are few 
 who did not rejoice when our gracious Sovereign intimated 
 that she was to confer on him well-merited honour. There 
 are none who did not feel a pang of sorrow at hearing how 
 he passed away before that honour reached him. It is a 
 touching story from first to last — a touching, yet, in many 
 ways, an elevating and instructive one. So long, my 
 brethren, as these stones remain one upon another, will 
 men remember the deed that William Chambers hath done, 
 and tell of it to their children.' 
 
 Lord Aberdeen, at the conclusion of the service, 
 communicated to Her Majesty the successful com- 
 pletion of the ceremony of re-opening the Cathedral of 
 St Giles, and a telegram was received in reply from the 
 Queen's secretary. Sir Henry Ponsonby, with a message 
 from Her Majesty, stating that the Queen had heard 
 with sincere regret of the death of Dr Chambers
 
 FUNERAL. 371 
 
 before even his title had been gazetted, aftd express- 
 ing Her Majesty's satisfaction at the success of the 
 proceedings. 
 
 Friday, the 25th of May, was the day fixed for the 
 funeral. It had been Dr Chambers's wish that he 
 should be buried in his native town of Peebles, in 
 the old St Andrew's churchyard there, beside the 
 dust of his ancestors ; and preparations were made 
 accordingly. The Magistrates and Town Council 
 of Edinburgh resolved that the remains of the man 
 who had at one time filled the civic chair, and 
 whose public reforms and private munificence had 
 done so much to enhance the city's attractions, should 
 be honoured with a public funeral. The members of 
 the Magistracy and Town Council, with other digni- 
 taries of the city, in their official robes, met therefore, 
 on the morning of the 25th, at Dr Chambers's 
 house, No. 13 Chester Street, and accompanied his 
 remains to St Giles' Cathedral, where a funeral service 
 was to be held. As the procession moved off, a 
 mufiled peal of bells was rung from the tower of St 
 Mary's Cathedral ; and on the public buildings of the 
 city, flags were hoisted half-mast high. All along the 
 route, numerous spectators lined the streets, and in the 
 vicinity of St Giles' a large crowd had assembled. 
 Inside the cliurch was an immense congregation of 
 waiting worshippers, the silence only broken from time 
 to time by the muffled stroke of the great bell tolling 
 in the tower. On the arrival of the cortege at the 
 church, the cofhn, covered with wreaths of flowers, was 
 carried shoulder-high up the choir to the ancient 
 chancel, and placed in front of the communion-table, 
 with the foot to the east. As the solemn procession
 
 372 MEMOIR. 
 
 entered the holy fane which the patriotism of the 
 deceased had so beautified and adorned, the whole 
 assembled congregation rose to their feet, while the 
 low pealing of the organ filled the aisles. The Rev. 
 Dr Lees then proceeded with an appropriate service, 
 strikingly suggestive of the solemn rites which the old 
 cathedral walls had witnessed in earlier times, this 
 being doubtless the first public funeral ceremony 
 observed within; St Giles' since the date of the Revolu- 
 tion. Its occurrence on this occasion was singularly 
 befitting, as being the last honours paid to the remains 
 of one who had lovingly restored to the nation its 
 metropolitan church in all its original magnificence and 
 beauty. 
 
 The service over, the funeral procession was re-formed ; 
 and on its way to the Waverley Station, whence the 
 remains were to be conveyed by rail to Peebles, the 
 cortege passed through great crowds of spectators 
 assembled on the Mound and Princes Street, and in 
 the vicinity of the railway station. On arriving at 
 Peebles, the funeral party was joined by the Magistrates 
 and Council of that burgh, with many others in their 
 public or private capacity, and proceeded to the St 
 Andrew's churchyard, about a mile from the town. 
 The bell was tolled from the old church steeple; 
 the shops were shut, and the blinds of the houses 
 drawn ; and all along the route, men and women and 
 children had everywhere come out to witness the 
 funeral of a townsman of whom the community of 
 Peebles have reason long to be proud. As the pro- 
 cession passed within a few yards of the house in 
 which he and his brother Robert had been bom more 
 than eighty years before, it was impossible to avoid
 
 FUNERAL. 373 
 
 being struck by the contrasting circumstances of that 
 time and the present. It was exactly seventy years 
 since he had left his native place, with his parents, a 
 poor boy, departing thence in misfortune and distress ; 
 and now his remains were being brought thither amid 
 the regrets of a grateful nation, and honoured by the 
 personal sympathies of his country's sovereign. 
 
 The secluded churchyard of St Andrew surrounds the 
 ruins of what was once the parish church of Peebles, 
 founded by the enterprising Bishop Jocelyn of Glasgow 
 in 1 195, and, as its name implies, dedicated to the 
 national saint. The church, of which only a frag- 
 mentary wall remains, was built of the hard undressed 
 stone of the district, with a tower at its west end, 
 which had for long stood in tolerable preservation, 
 though roofless, ragged, and windowless. Towards the 
 close of Dr Chambers's life, he had made preparations 
 for strengthening and, so far as was needful for its 
 further preservation, restoring this ancient tower, and 
 the work had only been begun a few weeks before his 
 decease. The workmen had suspended their labours on 
 the day of the funeral; but as the company approached 
 the churchyard, and saw the old tower encaged in its 
 scaffolding of wood-work, with the other evidences of 
 building operations lying around, it seemed as if the 
 notable activities of the deceased had not quite died 
 with his death, but were still to be prolonged on the 
 very site of his grave. The place prepared for the 
 reception of his remains, and containing also the dust 
 of his father and mother, lies within the space which 
 must in ancient times have been included within the 
 precincts of the now dilajjidated church. When the 
 coffin had been borne to the grave, and placed ready
 
 374 MEMOIR. 
 
 for interment, the Rev. Dr Lees read a {^.w passages of 
 Scripture, and oftered up a touching and impressive 
 prayer, in the course of which he thanked God for the 
 long and useful life which had been granted to him 
 whom they had now brought to the place of burial, for 
 the honour which had been bestowed upon him, and, 
 above all, for the good which he had been able to do in 
 this world for the benefit of others. The sun shone 
 down brightly on the throng of mourners as they stood 
 uncovered beside the open grave, listening to the 
 solemn words that alone broke the noonday stillness. 
 In a few minutes the simple rites were over, dust 
 returned to dust, and ashes to ashes, and he to 
 whom were now paid the last obsequies of earth was 
 left to his long repose, overshadowed by the green hills 
 of his native valley, and almost within sound of the 
 silver Tweed. 
 
 On the following Sunday, further public reference 
 was made in St Giles' Cathedral to the death of Dr 
 Chambers. The Rev. Archibald Scott, D.D., minister 
 of St George's parish, Edinburgh, had been appointed 
 by the General Assembly of the Church of Scotland to 
 preach before the Lord High Commissioner and the 
 members of Assembly on the morning of that day. 
 The preacher chose for his text, Psalm xvii. 15 : * As for 
 me, I will behold thy face in righteousness ; I shall be 
 satisfied, when I awake, with thy likeness ; ' and at the 
 close of his discourse spoke as follows, in allusion to the 
 death of Dr Chambers : 
 
 * We surely make no descent from the solemn themes on 
 which we have been meditating, when, ere we close, we 
 desire to recall to your affectionate remembrance him to
 
 PULPIT REFERENCE. 375 
 
 whose munificence we owe this ancient building, which has 
 again been dedicated to the holiest of uses. He too, having 
 liberally served his day, was called away before his eyes 
 could see the completion of his last and perhaps most 
 cherished work. Indeed, were there no truth in such a text 
 as ours, there would be bitter satire, and not melting pathos, 
 in the fact that all the use he personally got of that on 
 which he spent his treasure, was the celebration in it of his 
 funeral obsequies. From such an incident might there 
 be drawn the mocking conclusion that life is vanity. But 
 life is never vanity, nor is the world worthless to any one 
 who really tries to do on earth some unselfish and worthy 
 work. The man whose memory we desire to cherish did 
 not despise the world ; but, as a true man should do, he 
 tried to use and make the most of it. He endeavoured to 
 improve it, and make it a scene of more elevated happiness 
 to himself and to all around him, and to all who should 
 come after him ; and no one shall say that he tried in vain. 
 His example of patient, earnest, and victorious struggle, in 
 which he rose from poverty to opulence, and from obscurity 
 to the highest service and honour which his city could 
 bestow ; his veneration for his country's story, the plea- 
 sure which he took in her very stones leading him to 
 rescue from out misuse, and to render worthy of its sacred 
 object, this great historic fane, would be themselves a 
 precious legacy ; while his activities as a public man, and 
 especially that stream of pure and healthy literature, of 
 useful information, which he helped to send into every land 
 and nearly every home in which the English tongue is 
 spoken, are surely results which make this life of o\\\% 
 worth living to achieve. Bravely he did the work which 
 his hand found to do ; fearlessly he took the good which 
 God provided ; and now, having had his happy turn, and 
 having fulfilled his hour — sooner, indeed, than we had 
 wished — he has cheerfully given place to others who follow. 
 Touched by the solemn lesson which his dying has im- 
 parted to the dedication of his offering, let us begin or carry
 
 376 MEMOIR. 
 
 on our work for our day and jijeneration in the unselfish 
 spirit of those who by Christ do believe in God, and who, 
 not having received the earthly promises, if God so ordain 
 are willing to die in faith— confessing that we are strangers 
 and pilgrims on the earth, and desiring a better country, 
 that is, a heavenly.' 
 
 The career of the two brothers, William and Robert 
 Chambers, has been set forth with such interesting and 
 minute detail in the foregoing chapters of this work, 
 that not much remains to be added by way of incident. 
 It may not, however, be out of place to give here 
 some particulars as to the personal habits and character 
 of the two men, more especially of those qualities of 
 mind and disposition which rendered their lifelong 
 partnership and co-operation of so much advantage to 
 themselves and to the public, A high degree of literary 
 ability is rarely found associated in the same person with 
 serviceable business habits ; and this, not necessarily 
 from any fundamental inequality of mind between the 
 man of business and the man of letters, but mainly 
 because of the very opposite lines of thought which 
 they respectively cultivate, and of which the tendency 
 in each is to become habitual. Both pursuits, as in 
 the case of Grote, may be followed by the same indi- 
 vidual within certain lines ; but the essential elements 
 requisite to high achievement in either department of 
 effort, would almost appear to be, as a rule, mutu- 
 ally exclusive. Burns was a brilliant poet, but an 
 indifferent farmer; the Ettrick Shepherd could charm 
 the soul away into Fairyland, but he could not keep 
 business embarrassments from his door ; Rogers was a
 
 PERSONAL CHARACTERISTICS. 377 
 
 prosperous banker, but only a mediocre writer of verses. 
 Among the higher names in literature, Scott to a 
 very considerable extent possessed the rare conjunction 
 in himself; but even he, while eminently successful as 
 an author, greatly miscalculated in his commercial 
 projects, and suffered accordingly. Whether William 
 and Robert Chambers would, apart from each other, 
 have risen to the height which, together, as authors and 
 fellow-publishers they attained to, is perhaps an idle 
 question; but there can be no reasonable doubt that 
 much of the material success and prosperity of both 
 was due to the extremely happy combination which 
 their respective types of mind and character enablqd 
 them to form. 
 
 In personal appearance the two brothers were not 
 much alike. William was about the middle size, thin, 
 muscular, and wiry; Robert slightly taller, and of a 
 fuller and more sanguine habit. Both were men of 
 marked appearance, more especially the younger, and 
 it was no uncommon thing for strangers to turn and 
 look after Robert Chambers in the street, certain 
 that he, though unkno\\Ti to them, was no ordinary 
 individual. In youth, William was dark in hair and 
 complexion ; Robert of a fairer type, with brown 
 hair; but at quite an early period of their lives their 
 hair was tinged with "white, and became wholly or 
 nearly so before they had reached the age of fifty. 
 This, however, in no way marked any premature decay 
 either of mental or bodily energy ; for Robert lived to 
 within a little of his seventieth year, and William 
 reached his eighty-fourth, both continuing their literary 
 labours almost to the last. 
 
 In the personal habits and mental characteristics of
 
 378 MEMOIR. 
 
 the two brothers, there were, with certain points of 
 resemblance, almost as many points of departure as 
 in their personal appearance. William, in early and 
 middle life, was a man of quiet and reserved habits, 
 not caring to mix largely with his fellows, devoting all 
 his energies of mind and body to his business and its 
 concerns. Robert, while not less industrious and 
 painstaking in his own sphere of labour, lived, upon the 
 whole, a freer and larger life, was courted by society 
 and mingled readily in its enjoyments, kept a hospitable 
 table and was frequently at the tables of others. 
 William was inclined to be somewhat unyielding in 
 his business relations, while his own sterling integrity 
 and unvarying self-control tended to make him 
 but little indulgent towards the faults or weaknesses 
 of others ; yet upon occasion he could show real 
 kindness, and in private was known to do many 
 generous actions of which the world knew nothing, 
 Robert was not less upright in all his relations of life, 
 but was more ready to evince consideration for the 
 mistakes or misfortunes of others, benevolence being 
 one of the most striking traits in his character. 
 William was a man of business first, a man of letters 
 afterwards. Indeed, his efforts in literature may be 
 regarded as originally somewhat of an accident of his 
 calling as printer and bookseller ; he found it con- 
 venient and profitable to provide in this manner work 
 for his own press, and he followed out the practice with 
 characteristic perseverance and aptitude, till in a few 
 years he achieved both facility and success in the use of 
 the pen. Had he, instead of having been apprenticed 
 to an Edinburgh bookseller, become indentured to the 
 grocer in Tolbooth Wynd, Leith, who sent him sadly
 
 WILLIAM CHAMBERS. 379 
 
 away as being too small and weak for the duties 
 assigned, it is just possible that, while he could hardly 
 have failed, from his splendid business qualities, to have 
 risen to the first rank of merchants in that ancient port, 
 he might never have sought to pen anything more endur- 
 ing than business advices and bills of lading. Robert, 
 no matter in what position of life he might have been 
 placed, would have drifted into literature. He was essen- 
 tially a literary man, loving learning and books for their 
 own sake, and endowed with an amazing versatility of 
 genius and an equally amazing capacity for work. It 
 was, therefore, the elements of power, the existing poten- 
 tialities, which these two remarkable brothers possessed 
 between them — each with his own individual faculties, and 
 these differing not so much in kind as in degree — that, 
 when welded together by a common interest, enabled 
 them to execute a series of labours, and to effect a suc- 
 cession of triumphs, which have rendered their names 
 conspicuous as publishers and producers of popular 
 literature. Each had precisely what the other required 
 to give the requisite force and stability to their under- 
 takings; and the combination of their resources was, as 
 we shall see, effected at the very time when their united 
 efforts were destined to be most serviceable to both. 
 
 A fuller consideration of the personal character- 
 istics of the two brothers will bring out the above 
 features more clearly. Both were men of unwearying 
 diligence, but the industry of each was variously 
 exemplified. William, as has been already indicated, 
 and as may be gathered from his own account 
 of his early privations and struggles, was a man 
 of formal and exact habits, somewhat reserved in 
 manner, who in business hours allowed nothing to stand
 
 38o MEMOIR. 
 
 in the way of the work upon which he might he 
 engaged, and who carried out all his operations with 
 systematic, almost mechanical precision. This, indeed, 
 was one of the valuable secrets of his success. 
 He never put off till to-morrow what he could do to- 
 day ; and whatever he undertook to do, he did to his 
 very best, and expected every one about him to do the 
 same. In the preparation of his articles for the press, 
 he did not put much stress upon mere literary form ; 
 his chief object was, to have something definite to say, 
 and to say it as clearly and tersely as possible. With 
 him, literary grace was a secondary matter; lucidity, 
 the primary. When engaged upon any bit of literary 
 work, he allowed his whole mind to become engrossed 
 in it. In preparing his manuscript for the press, or 
 revising his proofs, he would rally his thoughts to the 
 best mode of expression by muttering to himself, at 
 times rising from his chair and walking about the 
 room, still continuing his half-audible remarks, until 
 the expression or idea he might be in search of 
 occurred to him, when he would hastily return to 
 his desk, resume his seat, dash down the words 
 that were required, and proceed with his task as 
 before. If similarly engaged, as he often was, in 
 the evenings in his own house, however much en- 
 grossed he might be in the work before him, the 
 moment the clock struck the hour of nine, down 
 dropped his pen, in went the stopper into his ink-glass, 
 and the whole thing was set aside and apparently 
 forgotten for the night. The supper-tray was then 
 brought in, the meal being of the simplest kind — 
 generally only a few biscuits, with the ingredients of a 
 single glass of toddy. These he partook of, chatting
 
 SOCIAL HABITS. 381 
 
 pleasantly and happily the while to whoever might 
 be with him ; and by ten o'clock he was in bed, 
 appearing as regularly next morning at the breakfast 
 table at eight o'clock. Such was the simple tenor of 
 his daily habits from year to year. 
 
 But while not given to much festivity either in his own 
 house or abroad, he was exceedingly hap[)y to have at 
 his table from time to time such friends as Peter 
 Fraser, with his inimitable drolleries ; James Ballantine, 
 author of * Ilka blade o' grass,' and other fine lyrics ; 
 and Sheriff (Jordon, of versatile notoriety. On such 
 occasions, Dr Chambers exhibited a wealth of geniality 
 and bonhomie which those who knew him only in his 
 business hours would scarcely have expected. He was 
 an admirable racon/eur of Scotch stories, and could sing 
 with spirit and expression some of our old Scotch songs, 
 such as ' The Ewie wi' the crookit horn,' * Maggie 
 Lauder,' and the like. Or if an impromptu dance were 
 got up, he would foot it with the best. In later years 
 he was in terms of intimate friendship with Dean 
 Ramsay, and gave that genial divine not a {qw of the 
 telling anecdotes which have drawn tears of laughter 
 from many a reader of the Reminiscences. To visitors 
 his manner was homely and genial, and left upon them 
 the impression of a man who had a warm and generous 
 heart behind the transparent barrier of a slight out- 
 ward reserve. 
 
 A very pleasing feature in his character was his 
 love of domestic animals, especially of dogs. He and 
 his wife had in succession more than one canine pet, 
 and he was never tired of watching their peculiarities 
 and habits, encouraging their gambols, and narrating 
 their feats gf wisdom and trickery to his friends. Of 
 
 Y
 
 382 MEMOIR. 
 
 more than one of them he has left some record in 
 the pages of Chambers^ Journal ; and their death, in 
 one or two cases, caused him more real pain than he 
 would probably have cared to make known. A donkey, 
 which answered to the name of Donald, and which he 
 kept at Glenormiston, was also a subject of much 
 interest to him, and the idiosyncrasies of this long- 
 eared friend afforded him on one occasion matter 
 for a sprightly and amusing paper. 
 
 William Chambers's life was, in the main, one of 
 arduous and unremitting labour. The habits which he 
 had acquired in early years remained in part with him to 
 the last. For instance, he always ate his food hastily — 
 it might almost be said, bolted it; a relic, doubtless, 
 of the time when he worked sixteen hours a day, and 
 allowed himself only a quarter of an hour for his meals. 
 Again, when he took a holiday anywhere, he generally 
 combined work with it, in the sense that he almost 
 invariably made his experiences, whether at home or 
 on the continent, the subject of one or more papers, 
 and sometimes of an occasional volume. UtiHty was 
 the beginning and end of all his occupations, whether 
 of work or pleasure. Even in his reading of books, 
 his early habits of incessant industry were present. 
 He usually read with pencil and note-book in hand, and 
 seldom perused Avith care any volume which he did 
 not intend to make some special use of, either in the 
 form of a review for the Joiir7ial, or as a source of 
 information on some subject which he had otherwise 
 in hand. As an exception to this, the Waverley 
 Novels may be noted. These he was fond of reading 
 time and again, and he has been heard to remark, 
 what is worthy of mention, that he looked upon the
 
 BUSINESS HABITS. 383 
 
 writing of these novels as a lost art, in respect that 
 Scott was able, in a degree not since equalled, to com- 
 bine in the same book at once a romance and a history. 
 He took little interest in books of verse, and exhibited 
 at no time any great taste even for the higher 
 English poets. But any work relating to the history 
 of Scotland, especially to the history of its ancient 
 families, would at all times command his interest, and 
 he made good use of his reading in these departments 
 by contributions to the yipwr/za/ and otherwise. 
 
 By the outside world, he was in some respects never 
 quite understood. Many of those who came in contact 
 with him in his business capacity, did not fully appre- 
 ciate the extraordinary earnestness of purpose which he 
 displayed, the sharp and, as it might seem, peremptory 
 method in which he disposed of matters of detail 
 over which others might have been inclined to waste 
 hours of debate. With a kind of intuitive perception, 
 he saw quickly and clearly the line which he ought, 
 in any given set of circumstances, to follow ; and 
 the success which had attended his early eftbrts gave 
 him a degree of confidence in his own judgment, which 
 to others less clear-headed and decisive might seem 
 slightly overweening. But any appearance of ostenta- 
 tion or haughtiness which might characterise him at 
 such times was merely superficial, and was born of the 
 circumstance that he never could see any advantage 
 in wasting a great many words over matters which 
 admitted of immediate settlement, and that he was 
 strongly alive to the fact that a great deal of what 
 passes both in individuals and public bodies as busi- 
 ness activity, is mere idle fuss and palaver. On 
 the other hand, those connected with him in the
 
 384 MEMOIR. 
 
 operations, whether literary or otherwise, of his own 
 business estabhshment, found him at all times most 
 willing to listen to suggestions, even upon his own 
 plans, and if these suggestions were feasible and useful, 
 he would without hesitation adopt them. For instance, 
 in his later years each of his literary compositions was 
 submitted to his nephew, Mr Robert Chambers, on 
 whose judgment he had reliance, and to many of whose 
 suggestions he readily deferred. He was, moreover, 
 warmly appreciative of all work that was well done 
 by others, and, with the heartiness of one who knows 
 and understands how much literary or artistic effort 
 is stimulated by the approval of one qualified to judge, 
 was ever ready, in a few kindly words of praise, to 
 express his satisfaction with any well-executed task. 
 At the same time, he expected his ultimate instructions 
 to be attended to with the assiduity which marked all 
 his own operations — an assiduity, indeed, which he never 
 relaxed, until old age and increasing bodily infirmities 
 rendered such relaxation absolutely necessary. 
 
 His powers as a writer having developed late, and 
 the field of his purely literary and intellectual attain- 
 ments having been all along somewhat circumscribed, 
 it is difficult to see how William Chambers could have 
 accomplished, as a pioneer of popular literature, what 
 he actually lived to achieve, but for the fact, as 
 already mentioned, that he found in his brother 
 Robert precisely those mental and literary qualities 
 which his own individual acquirements desiderated. 
 The brothers both possessed, in a high degree, 
 that invaluable accomplishment in any sphere of 
 effort, the power of originating work ; and while 
 William, in founding Chambers's Journal, truly diag-
 
 CHAMBERS'S JOURNAL. 385 
 
 nosed, and skilfully provided for, the public wants in 
 the way of readable and instructive literature, it may 
 be safely averred that that Journal could scarcely have 
 continued to hold the ground which it immediately 
 gained, but for the fortunate circumstance that Robert 
 had from the beginning enlivened its pages by his 
 regular contributions, and that at the end of three 
 months he entered into partnership with his brother 
 for the joint-conduct of the magazine. No jjossible 
 combination of individual powers could have been 
 more happy, or, in the end, more successful. The 
 one brother was the complement of the other. For 
 all business requirements, William's industry, frugality, 
 prudence, and foresight were eminently suitable ; while 
 for the literary necessities of the project, Robert's 
 versatility and elegance as a writer, his diligence in 
 collecting and working-up stray materials, his percep- 
 tion of what was suited to the popular taste in history 
 and poetry, science and art, rendered him an admirable 
 coadjutor in the conduct of the Journal uj^on which 
 the whole fortune of the brothers was now staked. 
 
 It must not be forgotten that when, in 1832, Cham- 
 bers's Journal was originated, the two brothers were 
 neither weak in their pecuniary resources, nor meagre 
 in their literary equipment for the work. William, 
 it is true, had not up to that time written anything 
 of much note, although he had exhibited his literary 
 industry in his Book of Scotland and in the Gazdteer; 
 but he had for over a do/en years successfully con- 
 ducted his business of bookseller and printer, and had 
 already, as the result of economy and hard work, 
 gathered not a few golden eggs into his basket. On 
 the other hand, Robeit, while he had also carried on
 
 386 MEMOIR. 
 
 profitably for a similar period the business of book- 
 selling, had at the same time made for himself no 
 mean reputation as an author, and had received con- 
 siderable sums of money for the copyright of his several 
 works — for the Traditions of Edinburgh alone, between 
 three and four hundred pounds. His literary achieve- 
 ments between 1822 and 1832 have not indeed hitherto 
 had full justice done to them. ' Literary composi- 
 tion,' as William says elsewhere in this volume, ' came 
 upon Robert like an inspiration at nineteen years of age.' 
 This was in 1821, in which year the younger brother 
 began the periodical called The Kaleidoscope, the most 
 of which he personally wrote, William executing the 
 work of printer and publisher. The little venture was 
 not successful, and scarcely perhaps deserved to be; 
 for, while it contained many clever and spirited contri- 
 butions which clearly gave promise of future literary 
 power, its contents were on the whole jejime and 
 amateurish. In 1822, Robert Chambers issued his 
 first book, Illustrations of the Author of Waverley ; 
 a somewhat bold attempt on the part of a youth of 
 twenty to solve the enigma of the Great Unkno\\Ti. 
 The list of his published works during the next twelve 
 years is certainly startling, and brings into prominence 
 the extraordinary literary and intellectual precocity of 
 the author. In succession to the Illustrations, pub- 
 lished in 1822, he wrote the Traditions of Edinburgh, 
 2 vols., which appeared in 1823-24 ; The Fires in Edin- 
 burgh, in 1824; Walks in EdinburgJi, in 1825; 
 Popular Rhymes of Scotland, i vol., and the Picture of 
 Scotland, 2 vols., in 1826 ; History of the Rebellion of 
 1745, 2 vols., and the Rebellions of 1638-1660, 2 vols., 
 in 1829; Rebellions <?/ 1689-17 15, i vol., and Ballads
 
 SUCCESS OF JOURNAL. 387 
 
 and Songs, 3 vols., in 1829; the Life of James I. of 
 England, 2 vols., in 1830; Scottish Jests and Anecdotes, 
 in 1832; Reekiana, in 1S33 ; the Biographical Dic- 
 tionary of Eminent Scotsmen, 4 vols., 1832-34; and 
 Jacobite Memoirs, in 1834. That is, in all, twenty- 
 five volumes, many of them of great literary merit and 
 permanent historical value, written within the space 
 of twelve years, by a young man between the twentieth 
 and thirty-second year of his age, and during the 
 intervals when not occupied at the back of his counter 
 as bookseller. In authorship so youthful, so courageous, 
 and so prolific, the annals of English literature can 
 hardly parallel the achievement. 
 
 The starting of Chambers's Journal, involving at once 
 a great outlay and heavy pecuniary responsibilities, 
 was certainly a bold venture on the part of William 
 Chambers — so bold, indeed, that Robert, while he 
 promised his brother all the literary assistance in his 
 power, was disposed to dissuade him from it. Yet the 
 venture was by no means what it was long popularly 
 and vaguely supposed to be, merely a chance effort by 
 two penniless youths, which, by strange good luck, 
 took root and flourished, nobody could tell how. Luck, 
 in the popular acceptation, had something to do with 
 its success, just as luck, in the same sense, had to do 
 with the success of The Lay of the Last A/ instrel and the 
 romance of Waverlcy. But in both cases, success was 
 due to solid causes ; and just as these and other works 
 of Scott may be regarded as having grow^n, by a process 
 of evolution, out of his earlier study of Border ballads 
 and historical antiquities, so Chambers's Journal wzs the 
 natural product of a course of literary eftbrt which 
 amply qualified its projectors to meet the public taste
 
 388 MEMOIR. 
 
 for popular literature. They were not a couple of young 
 men trying to open the oyster of the world with no more 
 experience of its ways than is to be learned within the 
 walls of a school or college. They had lived in it for 
 thirty years, and learned to cope with its difficulties ; their 
 school had been in great part the trying but salutary 
 one of hard experience ; they had both travelled on foot 
 over nearly every county in Scotland — William for his 
 Gazetteer, and Robert for his Picture of Scotland — and 
 in this way must not only have gathered large collec- 
 tions of popular lore, but acquired valuable insight 
 into the popular tastes in the matter of literature. 
 These experiences could scarcely fail to be of advantage 
 to them when they projected and issued Chambers's 
 Journal. William's object was clearly stated in his 
 preface to the first number; it was to * take advantage 
 of the universal appetite for instruction which at present 
 exists,' and 'to supply that appetite with food of the 
 best kind.' The success which from the first attended 
 the magazine, is the best proof that the right kind of 
 literary fare had been provided. 
 
 At the end of the fourteenth number it was resolved 
 between the brothers that Robert should cease to 
 conduct a separate business, and that the energies of 
 both should be concentrated on the Journal, Robert 
 taking upon himself the chief duties of editor. William 
 has frankly stated that the permanent hold on the 
 public mind which the Journal fortunately obtained, 
 was undoubtedly owing, in a very great degree, to the 
 leading articles from the pen of his brother. His own 
 duties lay mainly in the commercial administration of 
 the business. This apportionment of labour, by which 
 the stronger faculties of each were duly exercised, was
 
 ROBERT CHAMBERS. 389 
 
 eminently qualified to give solidity to their joint 
 undertakings. Personally, Robert had, as he writes to 
 a friend, * hardly anything to do with business,' and 
 this quite suited his studious habits, enabling him 
 to devote his whole powers to literary labour. In 
 addition to his regular contributions to the Journal, 
 he, as mentioned in previous chapters, projected 
 various important works published by the firm, and 
 found time, besides, to write many volumes dealing 
 with social, historical, and scientific topics, a detailed 
 estimate of which does not come within the scope of 
 the present sketch. 
 
 From boyhood, Robert Chambers had shown himself 
 possessed of high mental powers, with a quick and 
 retentive memory.* He was in the habit of reading 
 
 * The following receipt for school-fees and books for William 
 and Robert Chambers, when they were aged respectively eleven 
 and nine years, and in which the teacher undercharges himself by 
 fourpence, is of interest. In the spelling of his name, their 
 father formed an exception to the rest of his family. When 
 a schoolboy, he had capriciously changed it to Chalmers. His 
 sons, on their part, returned to the correct and original spelling of 
 Chambers. 
 
 Mk Chalmers, Merchant, Peebles, 
 
 To James Si-oane. 
 
 For Education to his sons Messrs William and Robert, from Martin- 
 mas 1810 to Whitsunday 1811, deducting 2 months for each during 
 
 said time, for absence on account of bad health ^o 13 4 
 
 Ditto I quarter to Mr William at the evening school in Winter 050 
 
 For a copy of the Rudiments to Mr Robert on 4th October 1810. 013 
 
 For Ditto to Mr William on 31st January o i 3 
 
 For Grammatical Exercises to William on 30th April 013 
 
 ;Ci I 9 
 
 Mr Robert from Whitsunday to Martinmas 181 1 o 10 o 
 
 (,\ II 9 
 
 Pbebles, ^th October 1811, — Received payment. 
 
 JAMES SLOANE.
 
 390 MEMOTR. 
 
 every bit of print that came into his hands ; and instead 
 of joining in the more active games of boyhood, would 
 be content to sit for liours in some retired part of the 
 house, reading by himself At quite an early age, he 
 had read a considerable number of the classics of 
 English hterature. As he grew up, his love of books 
 and learning increased with his years, and at an age 
 when most professional men have hardly completed 
 their education, he was already the author of several 
 popular works. Beginning business for himself in a 
 humble way at the age of sixteen years, he carried into 
 it his general habits of industry. The books which he 
 kept contain a note of every day's sales, however 
 small ; each book being named, with the price he 
 received for it, and the profit which he had on each 
 particular transaction. In literary matters, likewise, he 
 was a diligent note-taker; and in the course of his 
 many rambles over Scotland, he lost no opportunity, 
 as his note-books show, of jotting down all available 
 memoranda of old traditions, superstitious usages, 
 popular rhymes and proverbs, and folk-lore generally. 
 He was in the habit also of sketching any picturesque 
 old ruin, place of historical interest, or remarkable 
 natural feature of the districts through which he passed ; 
 and in this way he gained original and curious materials 
 for many of his better-known books. In his younger 
 years, he wrote a good deal of verse, much of which 
 is of a semi-humorous kind, having reference to 
 some social or domestic incident ; the best of these 
 being his 'Annuitant's Answer,' written in reply to 
 George Outram's well-kno\vn song, 'The Annuity.' 
 He had likewise a distinct lyrical vein, which he 
 might have cultivated with sfood result. This is shown
 
 LITERARY IfADITS. 391 
 
 in the beautiful lines * To the Evening Star,' printed 
 in this volume (pp. 178-79), as also in his spirited and 
 patriotic poem * To Scotland,' beginning : 
 
 Scotland ! the land of all I love, 
 
 The land of all that love me ; 
 Land whose green sod my youth has trod, 
 
 Whose sod shall lie above me ! 
 Hail, country of the brave and good, 
 
 Hail, land of song and story ; 
 Land of the uncorrupted heart, 
 
 Of ancient faith and glory ! * 
 
 It is not astonishing to find that one so imbued with 
 love of country, looked back with a kind of poetical 
 regret upon the ill-fated Stuarts, and their struggles to 
 regain their lost sovereignty. Without approving of 
 the attempts of the Jacobites, he yet was warmly 
 attracted by their heroism and self-devotion, and 
 followed up with enthusiastic diligence all traces of the 
 last two rebellions in Scotland, the history of which he 
 has so graphically told. To this enthusiasm in the 
 lost cause, he was indebted for one of the warmest 
 friendships of his life, namely, his intimacy with the 
 family of Sir Peter Threipland of Fingask, where he 
 was a frequent visitor, and a great favourite. t 
 
 Robert Chambers's literary habits, as may be inferred 
 from the amount and quality of his work, were of 
 the most assiduous kind. He was so constituted 
 that remarkably little sleep sufficed for him when in 
 health, seldom more than five out of the twenty-four 
 hours being so spent. He read extensively in all 
 
 * Podical Remains of Kobat Chambers, LL.D. (Edin. 18S3). 
 + See The Thyeiplands of Fin^ask : A Tatnily Manoir, by 
 R. Chambers (Edin. 18S0).
 
 392 MEMOIR. 
 
 departments of literature, and was in the habit of 
 making copious notes or extracts, either for present 
 purposes, or as materials for future use, scarcely a day 
 passing without some addition hcing made to his stores of 
 manuscript. His method of work was, upon the whole, 
 regular and systematic. He breakfasted at eight in the 
 morning, and afterwards wrote in his own house till one 
 o'clock, at which hour he visited the office, saw his 
 brother, spent a few hours in the disposal of manu- 
 scripts from contributors, or other business that might 
 fall to be transacted by him, and then walked for an 
 hour or two if the weather were favourable. After 
 dinner, when not entertaining company or dining abroad, 
 he was generally in his study again by eight o'clock, 
 when he continued his work till about one o'clock next 
 morning. Notwithstanding his late hour of retiring, he 
 was generally awake early, when he would remain in bed 
 reading for an hour or so, always having some favourite 
 volume by him for this purpose — frequently Horace, 
 whose odes delighted him, and almost the whole of 
 which he had by heart. 
 
 But while there was system in this method of work, 
 there was none of the monotonous regularity with 
 which Southey, for instance, performed his literary 
 tasks. Robert Chambers's social instincts were strong, 
 hence his labours were delightfully blended with the 
 pleasures of friendship, and the light and love of his 
 own fireside. He was fond of music ; and his wife 
 being gifted with fine musical faculties, which were 
 inherited by her daughters, scarcely an evening passed 
 without its little family concert — wife and eldest daughter 
 at the harp and piano, and the father on the flute. 
 These musical evenings in Robert Chambers's house
 
 FRIENDS AND CORRESPONDENTS. 393 
 
 formed a feature of ?",<linburgh society for the time ; and 
 it was no uncommon thing to find gathered in his draw- 
 ing-room the chief representative men of literature and 
 law, science and art, in the northern metropolis, as 
 well as the humbler ' waifs and strays ' of artistic and 
 literary life. Visitors from all parts of the world were 
 at all times welcome at No. i Doune Terrace, and 
 with these might be seen commingled some of the 
 most notable men of their time — Lord Jeffrey, Lord 
 Cockburn, Christopher North, Lockharl, the Ettrick 
 Shepherd, De Quincey, Dr Moir ('Delta'), Professor 
 Aytoun, George and Andrew Combe, Lord Ivory, 
 Sir Adam Ferguson, Patrick Robertson, besides many 
 noted Edinburgh wits and conversationalists who 
 'had their day,' and, as is mostly the fate of such 
 ephemera, have 'ceased to be.' He also carried on 
 an immense correspondence with literary and scientific 
 men, and left behind him large collections of letters, 
 many of them of great interest. These collections 
 embrace almost every name of note in the world of 
 literature and science from 1825 to 187 1. They contain 
 long manuscript notes on the Traditions of Edinburgh, 
 with various letters, in the well-known hand of the 
 Author of Waverley ; letters from the Ettrick Shepherd,* 
 Southey, John Calt, Allan Cunningham, De Quincey, 
 
 * The following note from liic Sheplicnl is delightfully charac- 
 teristic : 
 
 Altrive, Scf'ttmber iS, 1835. 
 Dear Rohert — Voii know or shnulJ know that my literary pride is very 
 easily hurt, hut that is no reason wliy we should not be friends as usual. I 
 believe you have not .1 greater admirer in Scotland than myself, but I will not 
 succumb to you that any man is superior to mc as a poet. I introduce to you a 
 young countryman of our own— Mr Dickson^who s.iys he cannot leave 
 Scotland without first seeing your face. — Yours ever, 
 
 JAMES HOGG.
 
 394 MEMOTR. 
 
 Carlyle, Macaulay, Darwin, Sir Charles Lyell, Sir 
 Roderick Murchison, and many others whose names 
 are now set in the roll of fame. These letters evince 
 the catholicity of his opinions, the friendship and esteem 
 with which he was regarded by his contemporaries, and 
 the wide and general scope of his faculties, which enabled 
 him to pursue intelligently even studies that naturally 
 seemed far apart. If his health broke down at an 
 earlier period of life than was the case with his brother, 
 it must be remembered that the younger of the two 
 men was intrusted with that department of work which 
 is the most exacting and exhaustive, and that he 
 engaged in that work with an energy and persistence 
 which few men have equalled. 
 
 Such is a brief outline of the habits and character of 
 the two men who founded Chambers^s Journal, and 
 whose names have long been associated together in 
 almost every country where the English language is 
 spoken. The trials and struggles of their early years, the 
 success which at a later period rewarded their eftbrts, 
 the munificence with which the elder brother spent a 
 portion of his wealth in purposes of public utility, and 
 the valuable contributions to literature and science 
 which were made by the younger — all these are 
 matters of history, reflecting honour upon the men 
 themselves and upon the country which gave them 
 birth. It is not too much to say that even in the far 
 future the hearts of the lowly will be cheered, and 
 the hopes of the aspiring strengthened, by the story of 
 these two Scottish brothers— William and Robert 
 Chambers.
 
 INDEX. 
 
 Aberdeen, Earl of, re-opens St Gilei' 
 Cathedral, 366. 
 
 Adam, Robert, 351. 
 
 Ailie Giiroy, by VV. Chambers, 356. 
 
 Alexander, Jamie, street porter, 112. 
 
 Alison, Rev. Archibald, 79. 
 
 Ancient Sea-Margins, by R. 
 Chambers, 283. 
 
 Anecdotes — Laird Baird, the Coven- 
 anter, 8 ; Dr Dalgliesh, parish 
 minister of Peebles, 11; Willie 
 Paterson's boots, 12 ; Tammas and 
 the strolling-players, 13 ; Candle 
 Nell, 14, 15; daft Jock Grey, 18; 
 Laird Grieve, 19, 20; Drummer 
 Will, 22; Miss Ritchie's, 23; Tam 
 Grieve, the joiner, 24 ; Tam Fleck 
 and7oj'c///«j, 25 : William Chambers, 
 weaver, 26, 27 : Margaret Kerr and 
 the parish minister, 28, 29 ; Andrew 
 Gemmclls, the beggar, 33 ; Jamie 
 Hall, the stocking-maker, 38 ; Kirsty 
 Cranston and the big words, 40 ; 
 James Gray, the burgh teacher, 41 ; 
 school punishment, 43 ; the two 
 boarders at Sloane's school, 44 ; 
 Howey, the assistant at Sloane's 
 school, 46; Robbie Ballantyne and 
 the Shorter Catechism, 47 ; Jock 
 Forsyth punished, 50; the story of 
 a military substitute, 61 ; Peter 
 Cairns, auctioneer, 81 ; Tammie Tod 
 and the sermon, 89 ; a voluntary 
 prisoner in thcTolboolh, 102; Jamie 
 Alexander, 112; Claverhousc, Vis- 
 count Dundee, 128 ; Major Weir, 
 128; Deacon Brodie, 129; Pawkie 
 
 Macgouggy, 166; Colli-Gosperado, 
 167; Matthewson, the tj-pefounder, 
 169 ; Scott's remarks to Lockhart on 
 the Traditions 0/ Edinburgh, 206; 
 David Bridges, 208 ; James Hogg's 
 Festival, 255. 
 
 Arthur's Seat, 127. 
 
 Auvergne. extinct volcanoes of. 314. 
 
 Aytoun, Professor, 303. 
 
 Baker Turnbull, 14. 
 Barric's Collection, 50. 
 Beaconsfield, Earl of, 352, 353. 
 I'eattie, Life of, by Forbes, 302. 
 Begg, Mrs, youngest sister of Burns, 
 
 290, 291 ; assisted by Robert 
 
 Chambers, 292. 
 Bell, Sir Charles, 281. 
 Bell-rock Lighthouse, the, 309. 
 Bills, businesses conducted by means 
 
 of, 319. 
 Biographical Dictionary 0/ Eminent 
 
 Scotsmen, edited by R. Chambers, 
 
 213, 387- 
 Birkbeck Institution founded, 230. 
 Bo<'i: 0/ Days, by R. Chambers, 305, 
 
 307 ; effect on author's health, 308. 
 Book 0/ Scotland, by W. Chambers, 
 
 22s, 385. 
 Bore-stone, the, 127. 
 Borough Moor, the, 127. 
 Box-beds, the old Scottish, 7. 
 Braid Hills, the, 127. 
 Brewster, Sir David, optical toy 
 
 invented by, 171. 
 Bridges, David, draper, 207, ao8. 
 Bright, John, 35a.
 
 396 
 
 MEMOIR. 
 
 Hrodie, Deacon, story of, 139. 
 
 Burdett, Sir Francis, 302. 
 
 Burdett-Coutts, Baroness, 302. 
 
 Burns, Robert, letter written during 
 his last illness, 120 ; Life and 
 Works of, by R. Chambers, 290, 291, 
 343 ; profits of edition given to the 
 Beggs, 292. 
 
 Business rules, three good, 318. 
 
 Cairns, Peter, auctioneer, 80, Si. 
 
 Campbell, Alexander, editor oi Albyn's 
 Anthology, 186. 
 
 Campbell, Lady Charlotte, 203. 
 
 Candlemaker Row Festival, 255. 
 
 Carfrae's book auction, 80. 
 
 Carpenter, Dr, 307. 
 
 Carruthers, Dr R., 274. 
 
 Cauper Jock, 15. 
 
 Cave, Edward, 238. 
 
 Chambers, David, brother of William 
 and Robert, career of, 332. 
 
 Chambers, Ephraim, his Cyclopedia 
 or Universal Dictionary, 270. 
 
 Chambers, James, father of William 
 and Robert, begins business, 27 ; 
 marriage to Jean Gibson, 36 ; affects 
 the study of music and astronomy, 
 10, 37 ; failure of handloom weav- 
 ing, 59 ; begins business as a draper, 
 59 ; literary tastes of, 64 ; cheated 
 by French prisoners, 71 ; failure in 
 business, 72 ; settlement in Edin- 
 burgh, 75 ; want of knowledge of 
 the world, 77 ; accepts a situation 
 as manager of a salt manufactory, 
 87 ; too independent for a situation, 
 118; views as to the upbringing of 
 children, 119; unfortunate lawsuit, 
 222 ; death, 224, 389. 
 
 Chambers, James, brother of William 
 and Robert, 171 ; death of, 238. 
 
 Chambers, Robert, birth of, at 
 Peebles, 5 ; autobiographical notes 
 and descriptions, 6-10; strange con- 
 genital malformation, 39 ; account 
 of his early schooldays, 49-56; early 
 education and reading, 51-58 ; 
 removal to Edinburgh, 87; begins 
 
 to compose verses, 125 : studies 
 the old buildings in the Old Town, 
 126 ; knowledge of the history of 
 Old Edinburgh, 128 : letter relating 
 his early struggles in Edinburgh, 
 129 ; too poor to go to the university, 
 131 : acts as a clerk, 132; discharged 
 as incompetent, 133 ; begins business 
 as a bookseller, 135 ; his home in 
 Leith Walk, 138 ; literary composi- 
 tion, 170 ; edits the Kaleidoscope, 
 171 ; habits and occupation, 180-182 ; 
 introduction to Sir Walter Scott, 
 182-184 ; second interview with 
 Scott, 188 ; Scott's commission to 
 transcribe poems, 189; removal to 
 India Place, 189 ; his Illustrations 
 of the Author of Waverley, 190; 
 a love affair, 196; the Traditions of 
 Edinburgh, 197-201 ; Scott's visit 
 along with Lockhart, to, 206 ; popu- 
 lar account of Edinburgh fires, 210; 
 Walks in Edinburgh, 210; Popular 
 Rhymes of Scotland, 210; Picture 
 of Scotlatid, 211 ; his great literary 
 industry, 212 ; his History of the 
 Rebellion of 1745, and other works, 
 213, 214; poems for private circula- 
 tion, 216, 217 ; letters from Sir 
 Walter Scott, 218, 219; joins in 
 partnership with his brother, 237 ; 
 popularity of his leading articles and 
 essays in Chambers's yoiimnl, 239 ; 
 life of Scott, 242 ; earnest literary 
 labour, 252 ; the writing of a History 
 of the British Empire, and History 
 of the English Language and 
 Literature, 265 ; letter to Hugh 
 Miller, 267 ; his work on the Land 
 of Burns, 273 ; Cyclopaedia of Eng- 
 lish Literatrire projected, 273 ; 
 Romantic Scottish Ballads, 276 ; 
 his Select Writings, 276 ; residence 
 at St Andrews, 2S0 ; elected a mem- 
 ber of the Royal Society of Edin- 
 burgh, 2S1 ; geological studies, 282; 
 Ancient Sea-Margins, 283 ; tract 
 on life-assurance, 283 ; visits Swit- 
 zerland and Norway, 285, 286 ; Life
 
 INDEX. 
 
 397 
 
 and Works of Bums, ago, 291 ; 
 liberality to the sister of Burns, 292; 
 visit to the Karoe Islands and Ice- 
 land, 294 ; publishes Tracings in 
 Iceland and the Faroe Islands, 
 295 ; History 0/ Scotland, 295 ; 
 Domestic Annals of Scotland, 296 ; 
 visit to London, 296 ; becomes a 
 member of the Edinburgh Merchant 
 Company, 298 ; lecture on Edinburgh 
 Merchants and Merchandise of Old 
 Times, by, 298 ; edits Forbes' 
 Memoirs 0/ a Dankinf; House, 
 300; publication of Edinburgh 
 Papers, 302 ; sketch of the Old 
 Theatre Royal, 303 ; visits America, 
 30s ; removal to London, 305 ; the 
 Book 0/ Days commenced, 305 ; 
 elected a member of the Athena:um 
 Club, 306 ; pleasant intercourse with 
 London celebrities, 307 ; appointed 
 a judge in the International Exhibi- 
 tion, 307 ; visit to France and Del- 
 glum, 307 ; receives the degree of 
 LL.D., 307; taxing nature of the 
 work on the Book of Days, 308 ; 
 return to St Andrews, 309 ; death 
 of his wife and daughter Janet, 309; 
 quiet home life, 324; second mar- 
 riage, 325; Life of SmolUtt, 325; 
 close of literary career, 325 ; views 
 on Spiritualism, 326; death of second 
 wife, 328 ; visit to England, 329 ; fail- 
 ing health, 330; death, 331; funeral, 
 332 ; funeral sermon, 333 ; private 
 character, 335 ; liberality and gene- 
 rosity, 335 ; early love of books, 
 337 ; literary character, 339-343 ; 
 enormous literary industry, 344 ; 
 veneration for Edinburgh anticjuitics, 
 350 ; personal appearance, 377 ; the 
 two brothers compared, 378, 379; 
 Robert's share in starting Chambers's 
 Journal, 384, 385 ; his literary and 
 intellectual precocity, 386, 387; lit- 
 erary habits, 3S9-392 ; friends and 
 correspondents, 392-394. 
 Chambers, Robert, son of Dr Robert 
 Chambers, 357, 3C7-368, 384. 
 
 Chambers, William, birth of, at 
 Peebles, 5 ; education and school 
 experiences, 40-47 ; Sandy Elder's 
 library, 56 ; keeping a note-book, 
 58 ; recollections of the French war, 
 60 ; Sunday in Peebles, 63, 64 ; 
 attends the plays given by the 
 French prisoners, 71 ; failure of his 
 father, 72 ; removal to Edinburgh, 
 73 ; a struggle with poverty, 77 ; 
 thinks of trj-ing the book-trade, 80, 
 82 ; apprenticed to John Sutherland, 
 bookseller, 87 ; removal of his family 
 to Joppa Pans, 87 : trying experi- 
 ences, 91-95 ; attempts at self-educa- 
 tion, 107 ; scientific studies, 111-115; 
 close of his apprenticeship, 139; 
 starts in business, 148 ; early 
 struggles, 150-155; writes an account 
 of David Ritchie, the original of the 
 Black Dwarf, 157 ; purchase of a 
 printing-press, 157 ; produces a 
 pocket edition of the Songs of 
 burns, 160; opens circulating lib- 
 rary, 164 ; writes an account of the 
 Scottish Gipsies, 170; prints the 
 Kaleidoscope, 171; success in busi- 
 ness, and removal to Droughton 
 Street, 189; first visit to London, 
 200 ; writes the Book of Scotland, 
 225 ; assists in writing the Catetteer 
 of Scotland, 225 ; severe illness, 227; 
 Chamberis Edinburgh Journal 
 published, 232 ; great success of, 
 234 ; founding of the firm of W. & R. 
 Chambers, 237 ; interviews with 
 James Hogg, 254 ; issue of Infor- 
 mation for tlu i'eople, 264 ; Educa- 
 tional Course, 265 ; visit to America, 
 303 ; visit to the Netherlands, 265 ; 
 the writing of a I'our in Holland 
 and the Rhine Countries, 265 ; 
 issue of Chambers's Miscellany, 
 269 ; Chambers's Eiuycloptrdia pro- 
 jected, 269 ; Things as they are in 
 America, 303; Sydney Smith, 311 ; 
 Miss Mitford, 313; visit to Germany, 
 314; interviews with Sir Adam 
 Ferguson, 316, 317; three business
 
 598 
 
 MEMOIR. 
 
 niles, 318 ; losses tlirouRh the Lon- 
 don agtincy, 319; presented with the 
 freedom of the burgh of Peebles, 
 321 ; founding of the Chambers In- 
 stitution in Peebles, 321 ; remarks 
 on the works issued by W. & R. 
 Chambers, 323 ; the virtue of self- 
 reliance enforced, 338 ; elected Lord 
 Provost of Edinburgh, 322, 348 ; 
 scheme of City Improvement, 
 348-352 ; presented at Court, 353 ; 
 trips in the Pharos, 353-355 ; later 
 writings, 356 ; restoration and re- 
 opening of St Giles' Cathedral, 
 Edinburgh, 357-371 ; failing health, 
 362, 363 ; his death, 365 ; previous 
 offer of a baronetcy by the Queen, 
 365 ; funeral service in St Giles", 
 371, 372 ; burial at Peebles, 371-374; 
 pulpit references, 369-370, 374-376 ; 
 personal appearance, 377 ; literary 
 habits, 378-3S1 ; social do., 3S1, 382; 
 business do., 382-384; advantages 
 of partnership with his brother, 384- 
 387 ; causes of the early success of 
 Chavihers' s Journal, 387, 388. 
 
 Chambers' s Journal, first publication 
 of, 232 ; great success, 234 ; how 
 read by the Galloway shepherds, 
 245 ; religious persecution, 246 ; con- 
 tinued popularity 266 ; essays con- 
 tributed by R. Chambers, 341 ; 
 causes of its earl^' success, 384-388. 
 
 Clapperton, John, 168. 
 
 Clarinda, the, of Bums, 253. 
 
 Clarke, William, musician, 79. 
 
 Claverhouse, Viscount Dundee, 128. 
 
 Clutterbuck, Captain, erroneous con- 
 jecture regarding, 193. 
 
 Clyde, Lord, 307. 
 
 Combe, Dr Andrew, 281. 
 
 Combe, George, 281. 
 
 Constable, Archibald, publisher, 183 ; 
 letter of thanks from R. Chambers 
 to, 185 ; refuses to publish Illustra- 
 tions of the AutJior of Waverley, 
 192 ; Miscellany published by, 212. 
 
 Cooper Gibson, 14. 
 
 Cornucopia, an Edinburgh journal, 231. 
 
 Coutts & Co., bankers, 301. 
 Cunningham, Allan, letter to, from 
 
 R. Chambers, 243 ; reply by, 244. 
 Cyclopcrdia of English Literature, 
 
 projected by R. Chambers, 273 ; 
 
 assistance in the preparation of, by 
 
 Dr R. Carruthers, 274. 
 
 Dalgliesh, Rev. Dr, parish minister of 
 
 Peebles, 11 ; reproved by Margaret 
 
 Kerr, 28, 29. 
 Dalrymple, John, cloth-merchant, 299. 
 Darwin, Charles, on the parallel roads 
 
 of Glenroy, 2S2. 
 Denovan. John C, poet, 156. 
 Dick, Lady Anne, 203. 
 Disraeli, Benjamin, 352, 353. 
 Dotnestic Antials of Scotland, the, by 
 
 R. Chambers, 296. 
 Douglas, Gavin, his translation of 
 
 Virgil, 53. 
 Dowie, Mrs, daughter of R. Chambers, 
 
 306, 331. 
 Dredgy, the, 19. 
 Drummer Will, 22. 
 Ducie, Lord, 297. 
 
 Edge worth, Maria, 311. 
 
 Edinburgh Advertiser, the, 218. 
 
 Edinburgh, Duke of, 352. 
 
 Edinburgh, Old Tolbooth of, 98-107 ; 
 Traditions of, by R. Chambers, 
 197-209 ; Edinburgh Merchants and 
 IMerchandise in Old Times, a lecture 
 by R. Chambers, 298 ; papers on, 
 by R. Chambers, 302 ; City Im- 
 provement Act secured by W. 
 Chambers, 322, 350-352 ; old houses, 
 34S-350 ; death-rate reduced, 352. 
 
 Elgin, Dowager Countess of, 314. 
 
 Encyclopaedia, CJiambers's, projected, 
 269. 
 
 Epistle by a Distressed Director, 
 poem by R. Chambers, 284. 
 
 Faucher, Leon, 314. 
 
 Ferguson, Sir Adam, 315 ; sketch of 
 the career of, 316 ; visit of, to Hall- 
 yards with W. Chambers, 317.
 
 INDEX. 
 
 399 
 
 Fielding, value of, as a novelist, 56. 
 Findlater, Dr Andrew, acting editor of 
 
 Cluivibers's Encyclopiedia, 269. 
 Fingask Castle, 324. 
 Fires in Edinburgh, by R. Chambers, 
 
 210, 386. 
 Forbes, Rev. Bishop, 215. 
 Forbes, Sir William, banker, 301. 
 Foulis, Thomas, goldsmith, 299. 
 Fratice : Its History and Rii'oliitioiis, 
 
 by W. Chambers, 322, 356. 
 Franklin, Benjamin, 169. 
 French prisoners, behaviour of, in 
 
 Peebles, 6S-72. 
 Frith, Mrs Robert, marriage of, to 
 
 R. Chambers, 325. 
 Fyfe, Peter, amateur artist, 163 ; his 
 
 illustration of the Scottish gipsies, 
 
 170. 
 
 Galloway, George, poet, 155. 
 Gazetteer <i/ Scotland, 225-227, 385, 
 
 388. 
 Gemmells, Andrew, prototype of Edic 
 
 Ochiltree, 33. 
 George IV. in Edinburgh, 182. 
 Geysers, the, of Iceland, visited by 
 
 R. Chambers, 295. 
 Gibson, Jean, mother of William and 
 
 Robert Chambers, character and 
 
 appearance of, 10, 36. 
 Gibsons of Newby, 31. 
 Giltillan, Robert, poet, 155. 
 Gipsies, an account of the Scottish, by 
 
 W. Chambers, 170. 
 Glacial Phenomena, R. Chambers on, 
 
 342- 
 Gladstone, William, offers a baronetcy 
 
 to W. Chambers, 365. 
 Glenormiston, the estate of, 315, 
 
 362-363, 382. 
 Glenroy, the parallel ro.ids of, 282. 
 GoUi-Gospcrado, a savoury dish, 
 
 167. 
 Cjranimar-schools, value of, 51. 
 CJray, James, teacher, Peebles, 41. 
 Greyfriars Churchyard, Edinburgh, 
 
 127. 
 Grieve, David, of Jedderficid, 30. 
 
 Griffin, Richard, kiodncss of, to W. 
 Chambers, 144. 
 
 Hall, MrsS. C, 311. 
 
 Hallyards, house of, 316. 
 
 Hamilton, John, song-writer, 79. 
 
 Hamilton of Inncrwick, 298. 
 
 Hamilton, Thomas, first Earl of 
 Haddington, 160. 
 
 Handsel Monday in Peebles, 19. 
 
 Harrison, Lord Provost, 367. 
 
 Hay, William, architect, 364. 
 
 Haystoun, near Peebles, 31. 
 
 Historical Sketch 0/ St Giles' Cathe- 
 dral, by W. Chambers, 364. 
 
 History 0/ Peeblesshire, by W. 
 Chambers, 322. 
 
 History of the Indian Mutiny, 
 Chambers's, 307. 
 
 History 0/ the Rebellion of 1745, by 
 R. Chambers, 213. 
 
 Hodgson, Dr W. B., 307. 
 
 Hogg, James, the Ettrick Shepherd, 
 his opinion of R. Chambers, 209; 
 reminiscences of, 354 ; his Candle- 
 maker Row festival, 255 ; monument 
 to, in Vale of Yarrow, 263 ; letter to 
 R. Chambers, 393. 
 
 Hogmanay in Peebles, 18, 19. 
 
 Holyrood, Sanctuary of, 97, 349. 
 
 Hope, Edward, merchant, 29'> 
 
 Hunt, Leigh, start o( London Journal 
 by, 247; letter to, from R. Chambers, 
 248; letters from, to R. Chambers, 
 250, 293. 
 
 Huxley, Professor, 307. 
 
 Illustrations 0/ the Author of 
 Waverley, refused by Constable, 
 192 ; first edition printed and pub- 
 lished by W. Chambers, 193, 386. 
 
 Information for tlu People, Cham- 
 bers's, 264- 
 
 Jacobite Memoirs, by R. Cliambcr!>, 
 
 216, 387. 
 Johnson, Samuel, 152. 
 Johnstone, John, printer, 2(8. 
 Joppa Pans, near Portobellu, 87: the 
 
 !»alt-makcrs of, 117.
 
 400 
 
 MEMOIR. 
 
 Kaleidoscope, issue of, 171 ; conclud- 
 ing number of, 179, 386. 
 Kemble, John, in Edinburgh, no. 
 Kent's Cavern visited by R. Chambers, 
 
 329- 
 Kerr, Margaret, grandmother of Wil- 
 
 Uam and Robert Chambers, 27. 
 Kirk of Field, 127. 
 Kirkwood, Miss Anne, married to R. 
 
 Chambers, 217. 
 Kirsty Cranston's school, 40. 
 Knight, Charles, publisher, 234. 
 Knox, William, poet, 155. 
 
 Lackington, James, bookseller, 146. 
 Laird Baird, of Peebles, 8. 
 Lamartine, M., 314. 
 Lauder, Sir Thomas Dick, on the 
 
 parallel roads of Glenroy, 2S2. 
 Leeds, Duke of, ancestors of, 300. 
 Lees, Rev. J. Cameron, D.D., 367, 
 
 369-370, 372, 374. 
 Leila, R. Chambers's love affair vv'ith, 
 
 196 ; her unhappy marriage, 335 ; 
 
 provision made for, 336. 
 Leith Walk, 141, 152. 
 Lewis, Stewart, 172. 
 Life assurance, R. Chambers on, 
 
 283. 
 Life o/yames I., by R. Chambers, 213, 
 
 387. 
 London Jonrnal established by Leigh 
 
 Hunt, 247. 
 Lottery tickets, sale of, 95, 96. 
 Lumsden, James, artist, 52. 
 Lyon in Mottrning, a. Jacobite ^IS., 
 
 215. 34°- 
 
 Macculloch, Dr, on the parallel roads 
 
 of Glenroy, 2S2. 
 M'Diarmid, John, of the Dumfries 
 
 Courier, 284, 285. 
 Mackenzie, Henry, 198, 209. 
 Maclehose, Mrs, Burns's 'Clariuda,' 
 
 253- 
 Magdalene Bridge, 121. 
 Marwuck, J. D., 351. 
 Matthewson, an Edinburgh tj'pe^ 
 
 founder, 169. 
 
 Memoir of R. Cliambers, written by 
 W. Chambers, 323. 
 
 Alemoirs of a Banking House, by 
 Forbes, 300. 
 
 Mentone, wintering at, 322. 
 
 Merchant Company of Edinburgh, 298. 
 
 Mettray, juvenile reformatory at, 314. 
 
 Miller, Hugh, letter to, from Robert 
 Chambers, 135, 267 ; letters to R. 
 Chambers from, 267; his contribu- 
 tions to Chambers's Jourtial, 268. 
 
 Miller, Robert, bookseller, 145. 
 
 Milne-Home, Mr David, on the parallel 
 roads of Glenroy, 282. 
 
 Mirror, the, a cheap periodical, 229. 
 
 Miscellany of Useful and Entertain- 
 i>ig Tracts, Chambers's, 269. 
 
 Mitford, Miss, visit to, by W. Cham- 
 bers, 313. 
 
 Mudie, George, editor of the Cornu- 
 co/>ia, 231. 
 
 Murchison, Sir Roderick L, 297. 
 
 Murray, Mrs Alexander, 204. 
 
 Napier of Magdala, Lord, 352. 
 Nicholson, Sir Charles, 307. 
 Noble, Sandy, 61. 
 Norway, 286, 287. 
 
 Patriot, the, a weekly periodical, 136. 
 
 Peebles, birthplace of William and 
 Robert Chambers, 5 ; described by 
 Robert Chambers, 6-13 ; Cockbum 
 on, 6 ; new town of, 14 ; schools 
 characterised, 48 ; how Sunday 
 was spent there, 63, 64 ; militia 
 stationed at, 60 ; arrival of French 
 prisoners at, 67 ; theatre extem- 
 porised by French prisoners, 70 ; 
 founding of Chambers's Institution 
 at, 321 ; burial of W. Chambers at, 
 
 372-374. 339- 
 
 Penny Magazine, publication of, 234. 
 
 Pharos, trips in the, 354, 355. 
 
 Picture of Scotland, by R. Chambers, 
 211, 308, 386. 
 
 Pilrig Avenue, 142. 
 
 Poetical Retnaiifs of Robert Cliam- 
 bers, 391.
 
 INDEX. 
 
 401 
 
 Pollock, Sir George, 297. 
 
 Ponsonby, Sir Henry, 370. 
 
 Popular Rhymes 0/ Scotland, by R. 
 
 Chambers, 210, 386. 
 Porteous Mob, the, 98. 
 rriniing Machine, the, a periodical. 
 
 Prison rhyme, a, gg. 
 
 Provence, Roman remains of, 314. 
 
 Quarterly Rcvieiv on R. Chambers's 
 History 0/ tlu Rebellion, 214. 
 
 Queen, the, offers a baronetcy to W. 
 Chambers, 365 ; her message after 
 his death, 370. 
 
 Queensberry, the Duchess of, 204. 
 
 Ramsay, Dean, 217, 381. 
 Rawlinson, Sir Henry, 297. 
 Rebellions in Scotland, histories of, by 
 
 R. Chambers, 213, 386. 
 Rcikiana, by R. Chambers, 203, 209, 
 
 387. 
 Rcid, William, bookseller, Leith, 183. 
 Riddell, Henry Scott, poet, 156. 
 Riddell, James, merchant, 299. 
 Ritchie, David, the original of the 
 
 Black Divar/, 157; his cottage 
 
 visited by Sir Adam Ferguson and 
 
 W. Chambers, 317. 
 Rob Roy, a likeness of, 193. 
 Rogers, H. D., 307. 
 Royston, near Edinburgh, 127. 
 Ruthvcn, printer, Edinburgh, 160. 
 Rye House Plot, loi. 
 
 Salt, contraband trade in, 120. 
 
 School of Arts, Edinburgh, no, 230. 
 
 Scotland, History o/, by R. Chambers, 
 295- 
 
 Scott, a metrical history of the clan 
 oi". S3- 
 
 Scott, Rev. Archibald, D.D., 374-376. 
 
 Scott, Sir Walter, describes the ' bore- 
 slone' in Marmion, 127 ; affords R. 
 Chambers an interview, 1S4, ios ; a 
 second interview, iS3 ; contributions 
 to the Traditions and Rhymes 0/ 
 Scotland, 207 ; death and funcr.il of, 
 241 ; memoir of, by R. Chanibers, 
 
 242 ; visit of, to Hallyards, in 
 Peeblesshire, 316; references to, 
 354, 355- 
 
 Scott, Thomas, 186, 194. 
 
 Scottish Ballads and Songs, by R. 
 Chambers, 213, 386. 
 
 Scottish Jests aiul Anecdates, col- 
 lection of, by R. Chambers, 217, 387. 
 
 Select Writings of R. Chambers, 276 ; 
 ' Delta's ' opinion of, 277. 
 
 Sharpe, Charles Kirkpatrick, 201. 
 
 Shortrede, John, of Jedburgh, 276. 
 
 Sibbald, Captain, of the Old Tolbooth, 
 100, 
 
 Siddons, Mrs, at the old Edinburgh 
 Theatre Royal, 303, 304. 
 
 Sime, Alexander, shipbuilder, 182. 
 
 Skerryvore Lighthouse, 354-355. 
 
 Sloane's grammar-school, Peebles, 42, 
 
 389- 
 
 Smith, Rev. Sydney, interview of W. 
 Chambers with, 311. 
 
 Smollett, Life of, by R. Chambers, 325. 
 
 Smollett, Sir James, grandfather of 
 the novelist, 325. 
 
 Snowing-up of the Peebles roads, 21. 
 
 Social Science Tracts, by W. Cham- 
 bers, 322. 
 
 Society for the DifTusioa of Useful 
 Knowledge, founding of the, 230. 
 
 Soiree, the first in W. & R. Chambers's, 
 271. 
 
 Something of Haly, by W. Chambers, 
 322. 
 
 Spiritualism, views of R. Chambers 
 on, 326. 
 
 St Giles' Cathedral, Edinburgh, res- 
 toration of, 357-364 ; re-opening of, 
 366-371 ; funeral service for W. 
 Chambers in, 371-372. 
 
 Stall-keeping, the advantages of, 151. 
 
 Stationarii, the original, 151. 
 
 Sterne, value of, as a novelist, 56. 
 
 Steuart, Sir Henry, of Allanton, Ji6. 
 
 Stobic, excise officer, and ISurns, 120. 
 
 Story pf a Long and Busy Li/e, by 
 W. Chambers, 348. 
 
 Superstitions, some old, ai. 
 
 Susanna, Countess of E^lintnune, io\.
 
 402 
 
 MEMOIR. 
 
 Tarn Fleck of Peebles, 25. 
 
 Tegg, Mr Thomas, cheap editions of 
 
 standard works by, 144. 
 Telford, Thomas, engineer, rhymes 
 
 by, 228. 
 Theatre Royal, Edinburgh, Old, 303. 
 Things as tliey are in America, by 
 
 W. Chambers, 303. 
 Thomson, George, a contemporary of 
 
 Burns, 253, 271. 
 Threiplands of Fingask, 324 ; history 
 
 of, 391. 
 Tod-hunter Will of Peebles, 15. 
 Tolbooth, the Old, 97-106 ; Captain 
 
 Sibbald of, 100 ; Davie, a voluntary 
 
 prisoner in, 102. 
 Tour in Holland and the Rhine 
 
 Countries, by W. Chambers, 265. 
 Town Guard of Edinburgh, gg. 
 Tracings in Iceland and the Faroe 
 
 Islands, by R. Chambers, 295. 
 Tracings in the North 0/ Etcrope, by 
 
 R. Chambers, 2S6. 
 Traditions of Edinburgh, the writing 
 
 of, by R. Chambers, 197 ; great 
 
 success of, 198-201 ; Scott's contri- 
 butions to, 207, 386, 393. 
 Trondhiem, climate of, 286. 
 Trotter, John, of Mortonhall, 299. 
 
 Tuttictt, Rev. Mr, funeral sermon on 
 
 R. Chambers, 333. 
 Tyndall, Professor, 307. 
 
 Verulam House, the home of R 
 Chambers in London, 306. 
 
 Walker, W. S., of Bowland, 284. 
 Walks in Edinburgh, by R. Cham 
 
 bers, 210, 386. 
 Wardlaw, Lady, of Pitreavie, 303. 
 Watts, Mr, of the British Museum, 
 
 307- 
 Weavers, large wages earned by, 9. 
 Weir, Major, story of, 128. 
 Wilson, Professor, commends the 
 
 Traditions in the Nodes, 209. 
 Wilson, William, poet, 195 ; letter 
 
 from R. Chambers to, 198 ; letter 
 
 from, to R. Chambers, 265. 
 Window Willie, 15. 
 IVintering in Mentone, by W. 
 
 Chambers, 322, 356. 
 Witchcraft, a limited belief in, 20. 
 
 Youth's Companio7i and Counsellor, 
 by W. Chambers, 322. 
 
 I Zumpt, Professor, 314. 
 
 Edinburgh : 
 Printed by W. & R. Chambers. 
 
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