John Galt

“ Syne came the rest of the gang and their officers, scattered as it were with a tempest of mud and stones, pursued and battered by a troop of desperate women and weans, whose fathers and brothers were in jeopardy. And these were followed by the wailing wife of the pressed man, with her five bairns, clamouring in their agony to heaven against the king and government for the outrage. I couldna listen to the fearful justice of their outcry, but sat down in a corner of the council-chamber with my fingers in my ears. ”

“ For few men can abide to see honours conferred on their neighbours, though between ourselves, Mr Mucklewheel, every man in a public trust should, for his own sake, further and promote the bestowing of public rewards on his predecessors; because looking forward to the time when he must himself become a predecessor, he should think how he would feel were he, like me, after a magistracy of near to fifty years, to sink into the humility of a private station, as if he had never been any thing in the world. ”

“ Peggy, however, was more terrified than damaged; but the gentry that were in the chaise, being termagant English travellers, swore like dragoons that the streets should be indicted as a nuisance; and when they put up at the inns, two of them came to me, as provost, to remonstrate on the shameful condition of the pavement, and to lodge in my hands the sum of ten pounds for the behoof of Peggy; the which was greater riches than ever the poor creature thought to attain in this world. ”

“ But the laird, likewise being a deputy lord-lieutenant, he accepted the invitation, and came with his sister in all the state of pedigree in their power. Such a prodigy of old-fashioned grandeur as Miss Jenny was!—but neither shop nor mantuamaker of our day and generation had been the better o’t. She was just, as some of the young lasses said, like Clarissa Harlowe, in the cuts and copperplates of Mrs Rickerton’s set of the book, and an older and more curious set than Mrs Rickerton’s was not in the whole town ”

“ But oh! what a dejected man was the miserable Bailie Booble, and what a laugh rose from shop and chamber, when the tidings came out from Edinburgh that, “the alien enemy” was but a French cook coming over from Dublin, with the intent to take up the trade of a confectioner in Glasgow, and that the map of the Clyde was nothing but a plan for the outset of a fashionable table—the bailie’s island of Arran being the roast beef, and the craig of Ailsa the plum-pudding, and Plada a butter-boat. Nobody enjoyed the jocularity of the business more than myself ”

“ It may be, that standing now clear and free of the world, I had less incitement to be so grippy, and so was thought of me, I very well know; but in sobriety and truth I conscientiously affirm, and herein record, that I had lived to partake of the purer spirit which the great mutations of the age had conjured into public affairs, and I saw that there was a necessity to carry into all dealings with the concerns of the community, the same probity which helps a man to prosperity in the sequestered traffic of private life. ”

“ CHAPTER XXVI—OF THE PUBLIC LAMPS
Death is a great reformer of corporate bodies, and we found, now and then, the benefit of his helping hand in our royal burgh. From the time of my being chosen into the council; and, indeed, for some years before, Mr Hirple had been a member, but, from some secret and unexpressed understanding among us, he was never made a bailie; for he was not liked; having none of that furthy and jocose spirit so becoming in a magistrate of that degree, and to which the gifts of gravity and formality make but an unsubstantial substitute. ”

“ My wife had been at the window when the hobleshow began, and was just like to die of diversion at seeing me so set upon by the tinklers; and when I entered the dining-room she said, “Really, Mr Pawkie, ye’re a gallant man, to be so weel in the good graces of the ladies.” But although I have often since had many a good laugh at the sport, I was not overly pleased with Mrs Pawkie at the time—particularly as the matter between the deacon’s wife and Jeanie did not end with my interlocutor. ”

“ We had in the town a clever lad, with a geni of a mechanical turn, who made punch-bowls of leather, and legs for cripples of the same commodity, that were lighter and easier to wear than either legs of cork or timber. His name was Geordie Sooplejoint, a modest, douce, and well-behaved young man—caring for little else but the perfecting of his art. I had heard of his talent, and was curious to converse with him; so I spoke to Bailie Pirlet, who had taken him by the hand, to bring him and his leather punch-bowl, and some of his curious legs and arms, to let me see them ”

“ But the dean of guild knew nothing of our correspondence, nor was it required that he should. However, when he saw my lord’s franking, he said, “Are the boroughs, then, really and truly to be contested?”
“Come into the shop, Mr M’Lucre,” said I sedately; “come in, and hear what I have to say.”
And he came in, and I shut and barred the half-door, in order that we might not be suddenly interrupted.
“You are a man of experience, Mr M’Lucre,” said I, “and have a knowledge of the world, that a young man, like me, would be a fool to pretend to. ”

“ I have had occasion to observe in the course of my experience, that there is not a greater mollifier of the temper and nature of man than a constant flowing in of success and prosperity. From the time that I had been dean of guild, I was sensible of a considerable increase of my worldly means and substance; and although Bailie M’Lucre played me a soople trick at the election, by the inordinate sale and roup of his potatoe-rig, the which tried me, as I do confess, and nettled me with disappointment ”

“ I had been, from the beginning, a true government man, as all loyal subjects ought in duty to be; for I never indeed could well understand how it would advantage, either the king or his ministers, to injure and do detriment to the lieges; on the contrary, I always saw and thought that his majesty, and those of his cabinet, had as great an interest in the prosperity and well-doing of the people, as it was possible for a landlord to have in the thriving of his tenantry. ”

“ CHAPTER X—A RIOT
Nothing very material, after Jeanie Gaisling’s affair, happened in the town till the time of my first provostry, when an event arose with an aspect of exceeding danger to the lives and properties of the whole town. I cannot indeed think of it at this day, though age has cooled me down in all concerns to a spirit of composure, without feeling the blood boil in my veins; so greatly, in the matter alluded to, was the king’s dignity and the rightful government, by law and magistracy, insulted in my person. ”

“ However, we drank our second glass without any actual molestation; but when we gave the three cheers, as the custom was, after the same, instead of being answered joyfully, the mob set up a frightful yell, and, rolling like the waves of the sea, came on us with such a shock, that the table, and punch-bowl, and glasses, were couped and broken. Bailie Weezle, who was standing on the opposite side, got his shins so ruffled by the falling of the table, that he was for many a day after confined to the house with two sore legs; and it was feared he would have been a lameter for life. ”

“ I did not much like this bantering of Mr M’Queerie, for I saw it made Geordie’s face grow red, and it was not what he had deserved; so to repress it, and to encourage the poor lad, I said, “Come, come, neighbour, none of your wipes—what Geordie has done, is but arles of what he may do.”
“That’s no to be debated,” replied Mr M’Queerie, “for he has shown already that he can make very good legs and arms; and I’m sure I shouldna be surprised were he in time to make heads as good as a bailie’s.” ”

“ The spirit of opposition that kithed towards me in the affair of Robin Boss, the drummer, was but an instance and symptom of the new nature then growing up in public matters. I was not long done with my second provostry, when I had occasion to congratulate myself on having passed twice through the dignity with so much respect; for, at the Michaelmas term, we had chosen Mr Robert Plan into the vacancy caused by the death of that easy man, Mr Weezle, which happened a short time before. ”

“ Mr Peevie, I need not tell to a man of your experience, that folk in public stations cannot always venture to lay before the world the reasons of their conduct on particular occasions; and therefore, when men who have been long in the station that I have filled in this town, are seen to step aside from what has been in time past, it is to be hoped that grave and sensible persons like you, Mr Peevie, will no rashly condemn them unheard ”

“ The upshot of this journey to London was very comical; and when the bailie afterwards came back, and him and me were again on terms of visitation, many a jocose night we spent over the story of the same; for the bailie was a kittle hand at a bowl of toddy; and his adventure was so droll, especially in the way he was wont to rehearse the particulars, that it cannot fail to be an edification to posterity, to read and hear how it happened, and all about it. ”

“ Thus had I the great satisfaction of going to my repose as a private citizen with a very handsome silver cup, bearing an inscription in the Latin tongue, of the time I had been in the council, guildry, and magistracy; and although, in the outset of my public life, some of my dealings may have been leavened with the leaven of antiquity, yet, upon the whole, it will not be found, I think, that, one thing weighed with another, I have been an unprofitable servant to the community. Magistrates and rulers must rule according to the maxims and affections of the world ”

“ The spunky nature of Mr Hirple was certainly very disagreeable often to most of the council, especially when there was any difference of opinion; but then it was only a sort of flash, and at the vote he always, like a reasonable man, sided with the majority, and never after attempted to rip up a decision when it was once so settled. Mr Hickery was just the even down reverse of this. ”

“ Mr Remnant was, in his younger years, when the growth of luxury and prosperity had not come to such a head as it has done since, a tailor that went out to the houses of the adjacent lairds and country gentry, whereby he got an inkling of the policy of the world, that could not have been gathered in any other way by a man of his station and degree of life. ”

“ As soon as it was understood among the commonality that the French were determined to subdue and make a conquest of Britain, as they had done of all the rest of Europe, holding the noses of every continental king and potentate to the grindstone, there was a prodigious stir and motion in all the hearts and pulses of Scotland, and no where in a more vehement degree than in Gudetown. But, for some reason or an other which I could never dive into the bottom of, there was a slackness or backwardness on the part of government in sending instructions to the magistrates to step forward ”

“ For I must in verity confess, that I myself partook, in a degree, at my beginning, of the caterpillar nature; and it was not until the light of happier days called forth the wings of my endowment, that I became conscious of being raised into public life for a better purpose than to prey upon the leaves and flourishes of the commonwealth. ”

“ Mrs Girdwood and her daughters having returned home, in a most uneasy state of mind on the lassie’s account, the deacon himself came over to me, to consult what he ought to do as the head of a family. But I advised him to wait till Jeanie cast up, which was the next morning. Where she had been, and who she was with, could never be delved out of her; but the deacon brought her to the clerk’s chamber, before Bailie Kittlewit, who was that day acting magistrate, and he sentenced her to be dismissed from her servitude with no more than the wage she had actually earned. ”

“ Gabriel M’Lucre, the dean of guild’s fifth son, a fine spirited laddie, somehow got suddenly a cadetcy to go to India; and there were uncharitably-minded persons, who said, that this was the payment for the Niggerbrae job to my lord. The outcry, in consequence, both against the dean of guild, and especially against the magistrates and council for consenting thereto, was so extraordinary, and I was so openly upbraided for being so long lukewarm, that I was, in a manner, forced again forward to take a prominent part ”

“ The affair of the pressgang gave great concern to all of the council; for it was thought that the loyalty of the burgh would be called in question, and doubted by the king’s ministers, notwithstanding our many assurances to the contrary; the which sense and apprehension begat among us an inordinate anxiety to manifest our principles on all expedient occasions. In the doing of this, divers curious and comical things came to pass; but the most comical of all was what happened at the Michaelmas dinner following the riot. ”