by Donald Smith
When my father died, his worldly all went to the rapacious hellhounds that growl in the kennel of misnamed justice. But we made shift to scrape a little money with which to keep us together. My brother and I took the neighbouring farm of Mossgiel on hopeful terms. Gilbert lacks my harebrained imagination as well as my social disease; in good sense and every sober qualification he is my better by far.
I entered in on this farm on a flood-tide of resolution. I read agricultural books, I calculated crops, attended markets and in short put the Devil, the World and the Flesh behind me. I believe I would have matured soon into a wise husbandman. But the first year from buying bad seed, and the second from a late harvest, we lost half of our crops. This overset all my application, and I retuned ‘like the dog to his vomit, and the sow that was washed by wallowing in her mire’.
I had all but given up poetry excepting some religious pieces. But suddenly encountering Fergusson’s Scotch poems, I strung anew my rustic lyre with emulous vigour. I now began to be known in the neighbourhood as a maker of rhymes. At this time polemical divinity had set the country half-mad. And the first of my poetic offspring to be handed round for admiration was a burlesque lamentation on the quarrel between two Reverend Calvinists – dramatis personae in my ‘Holy Fair’.
It met with a roar of applause on a certain side of both clergy and laity, but also raised a hue and cry of heresy against me which has not ceased to this hour.
‘Holy Willie’s Prayer’ next made its appearance. This is one of my best known pieces yet never printed nor ever to be printed while breath remains in this corporeal frame.
It alarmed the Kirk Session so much that they held three special meetings to look over their righteous artillery and decide if any of it could be discharged against profane rhymers.
Unluckily for me the aftermath of my failed betrothal left me on another flank point blank within range of their heaviest metal. [Sentence scored out.] It was a shocking affair which I cannot yet bear to recollect in all its particulars. I was close to losing my bearings so shaken was I in the very hold of reason. Threatened at law, I gave up my share of the farm to Gilbert and made what little preparation I could to sail to Jamaica.
[Paragraph blotted out.]
Before leaving my native land for ever, I determined to publish my poems. I weighed my productions as impartially I thought they had merit. What though their true measure should never reach the ears of a poor slave driver or some hapless victim of that inhospitable clime? I would still leave to the world a critical reckoning.
It has always been my opinion that the great unhappy mistakes and blunders, both in a rational and a religious view, of which we see thousands guilty, are owing to mistaken notions of our selves. To know myself had all along been my constant study. I weighed myself alone; I balanced self with others; I gauged every inch of ground I occupied both as man and poet. I studied assiduously where Nature’s design seemed to have intended the lights and shades in my character. I was pretty sure that my efforts would meet with some applause, but at the worst the Atlantic roar would deaden any voice of censure. The novelty of the West Indies would dull any sense of unjust neglect.
I threw off six hundred copies of my poems in Kilmarnock. I had subscriptions for three hundred and fifty of them, and my vanity was highly gratified by the reception I met with from the public. Besides I pocketed nearly twenty pounds with all expenses deducted.
This arrived just in good time as I had been about to indent myself to bonded labour for want of money to pay my passage. As soon as I became master of nine guineas I reserved a passage on the first ship to sail for the Indies. I took a last farewell of my few friends; my chest was on the road to Greenock; I had composed the last song I would ever measure in Caledonia. When a letter from Dr Blacklock, your near neighbour at Potterrow, overthrew all my schemes: he raised poetic ambition beyond my wildest imaginings.
The Doctor said that I would meet with every encouragement for a second edition in Edinburgh. Fired by this encouragement, I posted for the capital without a single acquaintance in the town, or a single letter of introduction in my pocket. You may imagine the cold shock of my arrival in this teeming anthill of self-absorbed busyness.
But the baneful star so long in its zenith now revolved to a nadir. The providential care of a good God placed me under the patronage of the Earl of Glencairn. I entered a new world, mingling among all classes of men and women. The interest of my benefactors, not least that very Mackenzie who had authored my Man of Feeling, secured the new edition – to what effect you can judge for yourself.
For some months since I have been rambling over the country, partly to settle some business of the new edition and partly to make the poet’s face more familiar. But above all to garner inspiration from the scenes and melodies of Caledonia – ‘that I for poor auld Scotia’s sake, some useful plan or book could make, or sing a song at least’.
Now I have returned to Edinburgh to await the pleasure of my printer Mr Creech, and consider my future in life. But, my dear Clarinda, you are right: a friendly correspondence goes for nothing unless we disclose our undisguised feelings. I hope that I have shown you something of myself. Yet my heart is wounded by the loss of one who was nearest to myself in soul and body. I cannot tell you more by letter.
Your sentiments please me for their intrinsic merit, as well as because they are yours, which I assure you is high commendation to me. Your religious emotion I revere, and if you have on some suspicious evidence, from some lying oracle, learnt that I despise or ridicule so sacred a matter as real religion, then you have much misconstrued your friend.
My own definition of worth is short: truth and humanity respecting our fellow creatures, reverence and humility in the presence of that Being – my Creator and Redeemer – who I have every reason to believe will one day be my Judge.
I can easily enter into the sublime satisfaction that your strong imagination and keen sensibility must derive from religion, particularly when a little overshadowed by misfortune. But I admit myself unable, without a marked grudge, to watch Heaven totally engross so amiable, so charming a woman as my friend Clarinda. I should be well pleased if circumstance put it in the power of somebody, Happy Somebody, to divide her attention with all the delicacy and tenderness of an earthly attachment.
Yours etc, SYLVANDER
EDINBURGH
January 1788
An Account of the Life of Nancy MacLehose
by
Clarinda
SYLVANDER’S ACCOUNT OF himself has moved and enlightened me. There is pride and passion in that tale yet also the struggle for a tolerable modus vivendi, whatever cruel blows life inflicts on us. I recognise that honest endeavour and the courage it requires, since your struggle is companion to mine.
It is generous of you to wish that I see you ‘just as you are’. I believe I have a true sense of your nature. No wonder for as I said before, had I been a man, I would have been you. Do you recoil at the thought?
I wish to repay your confidence by laying out the story of my life. Not as to a stranger, but to a friend bound by sympathy, respect and a full measure of affectionate understanding.
I was born and brought up in Glasgow in the same two storeys of a tall tenement in the Saltmarket. My father was a doctor and I had one older sister, Margaret, who was my constant playmate and companion. All my earliest memories are coloured by the presence of my beloved mother. She was a loving and devoted soul; each one of her small family occupied a large room in her heart, yet there was always space for relations, neighbours, friends, and for the poor or sick who came often knocking at my father’s door.
My mother had been brought up in a manse. Reverend John MacLaurin, her father and my grandfather, was minister at Luss and then at St David’s, Ramshorn, where he ministered often in Gaelic to Glasgow’s Highlanders. His father in turn was minister at Kilmodan so they were all Gaelic speakers, and once I believe the MacLaurin Chiefs of Tiree.
From the outset my m
other was imbued with a profound sense of religion, and though never stern she founded her life on a bedrock of principle. I rarely saw her angry but her disapproval, spoken or unspoken, was compelling. My father was liberal in outlook, yet he always respected her principles as part of the deep and true bond which united them. I would run to his knee for a story, or to hers for comfort, but every morning and evening she joined our hands in prayer.
We ourselves were often in need of a doctor. I was a feeble infant and my hold on life was uncertain. I believe that I had a difficult birth, and my mother endured a long convalescence with frequent illness. It seems that Margaret and I were always aware of a shadow lingering beneath our happiness. Gradually as we grew, our mother became weaker. Night after night our father held her in his arms, till eventually she slipped away to a better place.
I was much younger than you when your father lost his hold on an unkind world. Yet I understand your feelings and share them completely. Would that I had kept more closely to her teaching and guidance through my giddy youth. But I am running ahead of myself. What I do clearly remember from these days are snatches of prayers and hymns, including that lovely verse of Addison’s which is also your earliest memory.
Glasgow was a bustling place in which to grow up. Our lofty lodgings were just south of where Trongate, High Street and Saltmarket meet in a cacophony of traffic, traders and loiterers. The Toun College – or University as they prefer – was further up towards the Cathedral, that sublime relic of more solemn and grander days. The Tolbooth Court and Jail stood at the junction of all these busy routes. Beggars mingled with professors and lawyers with common hawkers. The streets of Glasgow level all to an equal degree.
When we were little, our mother denied us the street and insisted on us playing inside. Only common ragamuffins were given the run of the stair and the filthy causeways. However, after she passed away we broke out from under our father’s more negligent hand. We had the run of the town, through narrow alleys into the Gallowgate or down onto the Green, where the great river crawled slowly by and massed ranks of washing lay out to dry. Every day we underwent the penance of private lessons, but chafed at the leash till we could break free.
I was by all accounts a sturdy youngster once I had outgrown my infant ills. Often at the head of games, I ordered my playmates about and spoke out even in adult company. In the street we chanted ‘Here we go by the jingo ring’ and ‘Round the merry-ma-tanzie’. But when my father came wearily along, carrying his surgical bag, we quickly retreated to play the part of polite little misses receiving company at home. I am told that my complexion was always pale but that with any excitement or exertion my pallid tones flushed warmly red.
Naturally we soon became more self-conscious and restrained. This was not though the chiding of our elders – our aunts and uncles or our dear, indulgent parent – but our own inner prompting. We consulted the mirror, compared appearances and began to consider how the world might regard us. We were not vain, nor did I, at least, have any cause since my nose turned up and my chin curved inwards. Yet we were soon intensely aware of appearance.
Suddenly the romance of street urchins had faded. We were young ladies in waiting, and dressed in shawls with matching bonnets we sallied out to call on friends. Up the stairs we went to try our hand at polite conversation, supping tea and mutely studying the ornaments and furnishings of every house. In truth, our main interest was the appearance of our peers, male or female, and the performance often dissolved in giggles or irreverent mirth.
By this time my father had been appointed town surgeon of Glasgow. Every day he laboured to relieve fever, abscess, flux and mental perturbation. Disease and distress were evident on every side, yet could have been invisible for all the impression made on us. Our elders strove to bind the wounds while we went gaily by with all the light-headed arrogance of youth. Even at Sunday service in my uncles’ kirk, we struggled to suppress our giggling.
All this levity was truly innocent, but of course we were growing into young women. My first experience of the tender emotion came on a visit to our MacLaurin cousins in Edinburgh. They were much older than us except for William the youngest who was nearer to me in age. He volunteered to show me the sights and I fancied he had taken a special fondness for me, young as I was.
We walked out to the Castlehill, to the romantic ruin of Holyrood, onto Arthur’s Seat, and down to the woodland paths by the Water of Leith. As day followed day in this brief idyll, I saw everything through the balm of his gentle companionship. I think it was William who first took my hand in his. A delicious yet chaste sensation invaded me; I seemed to walk on air in a cloud of diffused, radiant light. What a gentleman he was – delicate, protective and content to bask in my admiration. Within the year, he was dead of a fever.
I have not thought of William for many years, but the account, Sylvander, of your first gleaning and the lass of that early harvest, brought him back to mind as if it were yesterday. What tricks memory can play. Nothing can ever replace that first sublime softening.
You seem to have known this feature of my character intimately, and consequently entrusted me with all your faults and follies. The description of your first love scene delighted me. Our early love emotions are surely the most exquisite. In later years, my dear Sylvander, we may acquire more knowledge and more discrimination of sentiment, but none of these qualities can yield such rapture as the first delusions of the heart.
No more of these idle recollections. It was not my emotions but Margaret’s that occupied our full attention. She was approaching the age when young Scottish women of good family are expected to wed. But with whom? I began a habit – continued for some time thereafter – of listing Glasgow’s eligible young batchelors, with appendices for Dumbarton, Greenock and all points beyond. Note the ‘young’. Both Meg and I were resolved not to be purchased by the wealthy like prime stock at a country fair. There are traces in this precious Scotland, Sylvander, of more barbarous times, for Woman at least.
There had been no definite conclusion to my researches till one afternoon we were visitors at our Craig cousins in St Andrew’s Square and a Captain James Kennedy of Kailzie and Auchterfardle came calling. He was a slender Highlander with fair colouring, a courteous manner and keen hazel eyes beneath his smooth brow. Mentally I added him to my catalogue without hesitation. But it was too late. As we waited for the tea to arrive Margaret whispered to me that here was the man she wanted to marry.
How to proceed? With our mother departed and our father distracted, it would not be proper for a young man to visit alone, but since there were two of us… He arrived promptly and Bella our maid, cook and woman of all work, ushered him in to the drawing room. We rose to our feet, beribboned and becurled. He bowed; we bobbed. Holding his sword gracefully at an angle, the Captain sat down, while we perched ourselves on the settle edge. The weather was certainly much clearer since the rain had passed over, perhaps even seasonable.
Stilted talk progressed to more convivial lines. He laughed and joked about his time as a student, his lodgings near the Cathedral, night time japes by the Necropolis, and the Gallowgate taverns. Margaret hung on every word, teasing now and then to draw him out further.
‘Will ye hae the tea noo?’ Bella’s interruption came as a surprise to everyone. Margaret handed round the cups and I followed in train with sugared biscuits.
Within weeks we were speculating feverishly on a wedding date. Father was informed, complaining mildly at being the last to know. On 1st May 1771, Margaret and James were married. My principal mission in life had been accomplished. Yet I still had my list. I was now thirteen years of age.
Should I regret these carefree times? Had my mother lived things would surely have been different. Yet there was an innocence in my high spirits. My invitations increased till every family of merit claimed acquaintance with ‘pretty Miss Nancy’. There is a familiarity in Glasgow society not practiced in Edinburgh. Did that redound to my discredit? Not at all. I was a bright
spark amidst the stour of business and the bleak squalor of poverty. A butterfly fluttering through a rapacious jungle.
Of course I was teased, but I gave as good as I received. Friends said I was a walking encyclopaedia of unattached young gentlemen. One such was James McLehose, a lawyer’s agent, whom I first sighted at a soirée standing in a corner, slender, tall and dark, leaning over the daughter of our hostess. He caught my eye, but no more. If only it had rested there. As things transpired, I had come under his keen notice.
Conceive our delight when Margaret announced that she was expecting a baby. After all our losses, here was a great gain. Is there not always joy at the first signs of a new life? Though if the amours of country life run without restraint, then perhaps such first showing is not always welcome?
Our pleasure was unalloyed. We talked continually about the baby’s clothes and toilette. A blushing and bashful Captain James was constantly engaged in discussion on the choice of name, the likelihood of boy or girl, and so forth. Even my poor father looked up with a fresh interest in life.
A few short months later, Margaret died giving birth to a stillborn child. I had lost a sister who was also my best friend and closest companion in life. On a drear day of grey rain, Margaret was laid to rest by her heartbroken husband and father.
I sank into the slough of sadness and can hardly account for my next twelve months. Has it ever been so with you, Sylvander? Is such the effect of melancholy? I suppose that I continued to eat, sleep, breathe and make social calls, but drained of spirit, I was the empty shell of my former person.
Did my father notice my condition in the depths of his own depression? Or was he eventually shocked into action by my wan appearance, my efforts to put on an empty show of bravado? Whatever the cause he decreed that his nearly fifteen-year-old daughter should be delivered to a recently established school in Edinburgh where young ladies were finished by spinster ladies who were anything but young.