_Scottish Chapbook Literature_
_Scottish
Chapbook Literature_
By WILLIAM HARVEY
Author of
“Scottish Life and Character in Anecdote and Story,”
“Kennethcrook: Some Sketches of Village Life,”
“Robert Burns in Stirlingshire,”
&c., &c.
[Illustration]
PAISLEY: ALEXANDER GARDNER
Publisher by Appointment to the late Queen Victoria
1903
PRINTED BY
ALEXANDER GARDNER, PAISLEY
PREFACE.
The diffusion of knowledge by means of the Chapbook practically began
with the introduction of printing into Scotland. From the days when the
_Gude and Godlie Ballates_ of the Wedderburns were put in circulation,
down to the middle of last century, the chapman was a travelling
publisher of much importance. In crowded mart and on solitary moor he
plied his calling: there he sold his broadsides by the ream, here he
tempted the reading rustic to a judicious selection from his pack: in
both cases he did what he could to spread knowledge and line his pockets.
The object of this volume is to provide a brief account of the chapman
and his literary wares: to present a short survey of the literature
of the common people during a period of three centuries, to trace the
rise and influence of the Chapbook, and to mark its decay, or rather
its blending into the cheap publication of the present time. The most
important of the Chapbooks are discussed at length, and as many of them
are valuable for the light they throw upon the life and customs of the
people among whom they circulated, the extracts that have been made will
doubtless be read with interest and enjoyment.
Much biographical and bibliographical information concerning authors
and printers and publishers is given. The greater part of this is
presented in footnotes, which have been introduced freely with the view
of enhancing the usefulness and value of the work, and at the same time
preventing the text from becoming overloaded with details.
To facilitate reference, an alphabetical list of all Chapbooks referred
to in the volume is included. It will be found at page 145. A Glossary
and General Index have also been added.
In the matter of Illustrations the book is well supplied. A number of
the quaintest pictures are reproduced, many of which shew at once the
crudities of art and the pictorial limitations with which early printers
had to contend.
No pains have been spared to make the volume worthy the subject of
which it treats, and it is hoped that it will be of value both as a
contribution to the literature of the social life of Scotland, and as
supplying, in the absence of an exhaustive history, a hitherto unwritten
chapter of the literary annals of our country.
55 MILNBANK ROAD, DUNDEE, _July 1903_.
CONTENTS.
PAGE
INTRODUCTORY, 9
HUMOROUS, 35
INSTRUCTIVE, 72
HISTORICAL, 72
BIOGRAPHICAL, 84
RELIGIOUS AND MORAL, 89
MANUALS OF INSTRUCTION, 99
ALMANACS, 100
ROMANTIC, 103
SUPERSTITIOUS, 107
SONGS AND BALLADS, 116
CONCLUSION, 122
LIST OF CHAPBOOKS, 145
GLOSSARY, 149
GENERAL INDEX, 151
LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS.
PAGE
THE WEDDING OF JOCKEY AND MAGGY, 39
BRUCE AND DE BOUNE, 85
THE WRECK OF ROBINSON CRUSOE, 88
NOAH ENTERING THE ARK, 89
HAGAR AND ISHMAEL CAST OUT, 90
JOSEPH SOLD INTO EGYPT, 91
THE PLAGUE OF FROGS, 92
THE SUN AND MOON STAND STILL, 93
JONAH IS SWALLOWED BY A FISH, 94
DANIEL CAST INTO THE DEN OF LIONS, 95
SARAH PROMISED A SON, 96
THE OLD HOUND, 99
THE BURIAL OF JACOB, 100
SOLOMON’S TEMPLE, 102
JACK THE GIANT KILLER AND THE GIANT, 104
THE TRIAL OF SIR JOHN BARLEYCORN, KNT., 117
THE LAST DAY, 144
Scottish Chapbook Literature.
INTRODUCTORY.
Nothing has yet been done in the way of providing an exhaustive history
of Scottish chapbook literature, but the wish for such a work has
not remained unexpressed. So long ago as the late twenties of last
century, when the chapman was still a person of considerable importance,
and chapbooks—properly so called—were in wide circulation, it was
believed that Sir Walter Scott would undertake the task. When it became
evident that the author of _Waverley_ was not to do anything, a hope
was expressed that William Motherwell might become the historian of
the vulgar literature. That poet entertained the idea himself, but
subsequently abandoned it owing to paucity of materials and want of
leisure. Other writers may have thought to do something, but up to the
present time nothing of a general nature has been accomplished. Certain
departments of our chapbook literature, however, have not lacked their
editors and historians. The _Humorous Prose Chapbooks of Scotland_[1]
found an able editor in Professor Fraser, although the work done is but
a portion of his original scheme; and George Mac Gregor—notwithstanding
that his volumes are not much more than a paraphrase of Professor
Fraser’s books—accomplished a notable work in _The Collected Writings of
Dougal Graham_.[2] The volumes published by Robert Lindsay of Glasgow[3]
are valuable for the specimens of chapbooks which they contain; and
Robert Hays Cunningham has compiled a not unmeritorious work in his
_Amusing Prose Chapbooks Chiefly of Last [the Eighteenth] Century_.[4]
But these are only fragments. It is true that Dougal Graham was the chief
writer of secular Scottish chapbooks, and that the humorous production
found a wider circle of readers than the sermon or the serious poem,
but the Skellat Bellman of Glasgow and the comic effusion are not, on
that account, wholly representative of Scotland’s cheap literature of a
by-gone day. It is to be regretted that too often that section of our
chapbooks has been held up as typical of the whole, and that our fathers
have not received the credit which is due them for their appreciation
of history and theology. The more serious chapbooks—such as those which
recounted the deeds of Wallace and the achievements of Bruce, and those
which contained the fiery eloquence of the Covenanters, and, later, of
the Erskines—have been almost entirely overlooked. The song chapbooks,
too, of which there were myriads, have only been referred to incidentally
when they happened to be humorous. It is to be hoped—though every hour
that passes makes the task more difficult of accomplishment—that some day
a history of our national chapbooks will be written, so that a record may
be preserved of a most interesting chapter of our literary annals.
Many difficulties beset a writer on this subject, and probably the
greatest is to define exactly what a chapbook is. In _Chambers’s
Encyclopædia_ publications of the chapbook order are defined as
“a variety of old and scarce tracts of a homely kind, which
at one time formed the only popular literature. In the trade
of the bookseller they are distinguishable from the ordinary
products of the press by their inferior paper and typography,
and are reputed to have been sold by chapmen or pedlars.”
This may be _Encyclopædia_ information, but it is hardly accurate, and
was apparently written by one who knew nothing about the subject. The
chapbook is much more than, and is sometimes very different from what
is here defined. In a general sense it is anything from a broadside to
a decent-sized volume, and it received its name, “chapbook,” not on
account of its size or its contents, but in virtue of the fact that it
was chiefly circulated by the pedlars who sought to carry civilization
and soft goods into hamlets and farm-towns far from the madding crowd.
These men were known as chapmen. The derivation of the word shews that
a “chapman” was simply a “cheap-man”; and chap literature may therefore
be truthfully set down as “cheap literature.”[5] In these days of
“World’s Classics” and Sixpenny Reprints, “Penny Poets” and “Halfpenny
Novelettes,” chapbooks are unknown, while cheap literature is more in
evidence than ever it was. But though it is true that chapbook literature
derived its name from the fact that it was vended by chapmen, it in
reality existed before it was added to the pedlar’s pack of multifarious
goods, just as it flourished apart from the chapman altogether, and
continued to survive after he had ceased to vend it to any extent.
The chapman, although still with us, and hated no less fervently than
ever, is not in these days the indispensable travelling merchant of
by-gone years. At the time when the telegraph and the telephone were
undreamt of, and “iron horses” were things to be discussed with bated
breath and wondering eyes, the smaller towns and villages of Scotland
dwelt in complete isolation from each other. News—even bad news—travelled
slowly; the stage-coach—where there was one—lumbered along, a prey to
bad roads and drunken drivers; and the average Scot who desired to go
from home expressed a lofty contempt for a conveyance, and increased his
mileage by what was facetiously termed “shanks’ machine.” In such times
and circumstances, the pedlar was a necessity. His pack of needles and
laces, buttons and tapes, handkerchiefs and cravats, and other trifles,
formed the stock from which many a matron replenished the store, that
supplied her with the means of passing the long winter nights.
That the chapman’s life was not all lavender, is evident from the
literature and the successor he has left behind. Various references in
Dougal Graham’s booklets prove that his lot was not a happy one. By
many people he was tolerated as a necessary evil, and in _The Loss of
the Pack_—a chapbook which doubtless had a wide circulation—we learn
something of the esteem (or, rather, want of esteem) in which the
travelling merchant was held. The author of that poem says:—
“It fires, it boils my vera blude,
And sweets me at ilk pore,
To think how aft I’m putten wud,
When drawing near a door:
Out springs the mastiff, through the mud,
Wi’ fell Cerberian roar,
And growling, as he really would
Me instantly devour,
Alive that day.
“‘Ye’re come frae Glasgow, lad, I true;’
(The pert guidwife presumes;)
‘Ye’ll be a malefactor, too,
Ye’ll hae your horse and grooms;
What de’il brings siccan chaps like you
To lea’ your wabs and looms?
Wi’ beggars, packmen, and sic crew,
Our door it never tooms
The live-lang day.’”
But this angry outburst on the part of “the pert guidwife” at an end, she
lapses into kindlier speech and indicates the more humane side of the
pedlar’s life:
“‘Nae doubt ye’ll e’en right hungry be,
I see your belly’s clung:
I ha’e some parritch here to gi’e
As soon’s a sang ye’ve sung;
Come, lilt it up wi’ blithesome glee;
Ye’re supple, smart, and young,
And gin ye please our John and me,
Ye’se get the kirnan rung
To lick, this day.’”
It was the “lilting up wi’ blithesome glee” that constituted the pedlar’s
passport to every farm-town. The songs he sang and the stories he told
brought him bed and breakfast and sometimes helped to lighten his pack.
When newspapers were unknown the chapman was a moving “Intelligencer,”
who carried the doings of the outer world into remote parts, and extended
the horizon of many who otherwise might have been inclined to think that
the earth was their own and the fulness thereof.
The chapman did not change much in the course of years, The frontispiece
to Mr. John Ashton’s _Chapbooks of the Eighteenth Century_[6] is a
portrait of a pedlar reproduced from _The Cries and Habits of the City
of London_, published in 1709. The attire of the man in the picture is
that of the period to which he belongs, but beyond that there is nothing
to distinguish him from the street-vendor of to-day. There he stands,
with his tray of nick-nacks and cheap jewellery suspended in front of him
like the street-pedlar to be seen at any time in the busy thoroughfares
of Edinburgh, Glasgow, or Dundee. The city hawker, like his brother who
vended in rural parts, was not slow to recognise a valuable and saleable
commodity in broadsides and booklets. These he added to his goods, and
ere long gave them a name derived from himself.
Just when he did this is somewhat difficult to say. Broadsides and
booklets similar to those which at a subsequent period formed the
staple of chapbook literature were issued from the Scottish presses at
a very early date. Indeed, the earliest printed examples of our popular
poetry are comprised in a series of black-letter chapbooks published by
“Walter Chepman and Androw Myllar, Edinburgh, in the year M.D.VIII.” In
the previous year these two printers—burgesses of Edinburgh—received a
patent under the hand of James IV. which entitled them to establish a
printing-press. The instrument set forth that Chepman and Myllar had, at
the request of His Majesty,
“for our plesour, the honour, and profitt of our Realme and
leigis, takin on thame to furnis and bring hame ane prent, with
all stuff belangand thereto, and expert men to use the samyne,
for imprenting within our Realme of the bukis of our Lawis ...
and all utheris bukis that salbe sene necessar, and to sel the
sammyn for competent pricis,” etc.
The printers duly implemented their bargain, and started business in the
Cowgate,[7] from which place these black-letter chapbooks issued. A few
years later Scotland was in the throes of the fight for Protestantism.
The press was called into use both for and against the new order.
“During the heat of the Reformation,” says one writer, “there were
many ‘ballatis, sangis, blasphematious rhymes, alsweill of kirkmen as
temporal and utheris tragedies’ published.” Robert Lekprevick, another
early Scottish printer, issued many broadsides of a political and
ecclesiastical character in the interests of Protestantism. So partisan
were these productions that Sir Robert Maitland was constrained to say in
his verses “On the Malice of Poets”—
“Sum of the poyets, and makars, that are now,
Of grit despyte, and malice are sa fow
That all lesingis, that can be inventit,
They put in writ, and garris thame be prentit.”
The chief of the broadside authors of this period was Robert Sempill.
Along with him may be mentioned Sir William Kirkcaldy of Grange and
Sir John Maitland, Lord Thirlestane and the Earl of Glencairn, John
Davidson and Nicol Burne. Reference should also be made to the brothers
Wedderburn of Dundee, whose _Gude and Godlie Ballates_[8] were so
popular in their day, and are believed originally to have been issued
singly in broadside form. Writers of the Reformation period, too—notably
Buchanan and Knox—issued tractates not dissimilar in appearance from the
chapbooks of a later age. But these, in one sense at least, were not
chapbook literature. They may have done much, in an indirect way, to
fire the imagination of “the rascal multitude,” but they must have been
sealed books to many of the commonalty, with whom reading was an unknown
accomplishment.
The Scottish printers were not long at work ere their labours were viewed
with apprehension. The Scots Parliament, jealous, doubtless, of the power
of the press, early instituted a press-censorship. On 1st February,
1551-52, it ordained—
“That na Prentar presume, attempt or tak upone hand to prent
ony bukis _ballatis_, _sangis_, _blasphematiounis rymes_, or
tragedies, outhir in Latin or Englis toung in ony tymes to cum,
unto the tyme the samin be sene, vewit, and examit be sum wyse
and discreit persounis depute thairto ... and thaireftir ane
licence had and obtenit ... under the pain of confiscatioun of
all the Prentaris gudis, and banisshing him of the Realme for
ever.”
Notwithstanding these restrictions, the art of printing developed in many
directions.
As time went on, education became more general and broadsides more
numerous. The single sheet was the vehicle by which many authors sought
to reach the public. Ballads and songs, old and new, genuine and
fictitious, made their appearance in broadside form, and thus ceased to
be dependant on oral tradition for their existence. It is not too much
to suppose that these broadsides circulated among all classes. Their
cost could not have been great, and if they were vended at fairs and
markets, as is not unlikely, they may be accepted as the earliest form
of our chapbook literature. In many ways they resembled the productions
common in later times, and as Mr. T. F. Henderson says in his _Scottish
Vernacular Literature_,[9]
“they indicate the existence in Scotland, in the seventeenth
century or earlier, of a great variety of forgotten lyrics,
most of them coloured with the ingenuous indelicacy which, more
or less, tinges all our early literature, and some of them very
much akin to the ditties collected by Burns.”
This, the vulgar literature of an earlier age, would seem to have met at
the hands of our fathers a fate similar to that which we have awarded to
the chapbook literature of later times, and which our children may mete
out to the cheap ephemeral publications of these days.
During the seventeenth century and down to the time of Allan Ramsay,
broadsides were in general circulation, and by their means popular
interest in our national song was kept alive. Many of our most
widely-known lyrics appeared originally in song-sheets. The earliest
version of “Auld Lang Syne” was so published, and so also was “Maggie
Lauder,” “The Blythesome Bridal,” and numberless others. Habbie Simpson,
the famous piper of Kilbarchan, was immortalised by Robert Sempill of
Beltrees and the broadside press; and thousands all over Scotland learned
how—
“At fairs he played before the spear-men
All gaily graithed in their gear, man:
Steel bonnets, jacks, and swords so clear, then,
Like ony bead:”
and then, with the author, asked—
“Now, wha will play before such weir-men,
Sen Habbie’s dead?”
This, and other productions by Sempill and his contemporaries,
popularised the single sheet publication, and Allan Ramsay seems
instinctively to have turned to the broadside printer when he added
poetry to the prosaic duties of a wig-maker. He soon became the laureate
of the Edinburgh streets, and his biographer tells us that “the women
of Edinburgh were wont to send out their children with a penny to buy
‘Ramsay’s last piece.’”[10] These broadsides of the author of _The Gentle
Shepherd_ were published in the early years of the eighteenth century,
but before this date chapbooks of eight, sixteen, twenty-four, and
sometimes a greater number of pages, had become common.
Mr. John Ashton, in his Introduction to the volume of English _Chapbooks
of the Eighteenth Century_, says that in England the chapbook proper
did not exist before the year 1700.[11] There is ample evidence that
it was known in Scotland before that date. In 1644 we find the famous
Glasgow divine, Zachary Boyd, complaining to the General Assembly, in
the vigorous language of the period, that “their schools and country
were stained, yea pestered, with idle books, and their children fed on
fables, love-songs, baudry ballads, heathen husks, youth’s poison;” and a
complaint of this kind clearly indicates that chapbook literature, in the
form of “idle books” and “fables,” “love-songs,” and “baudry ballads,”
was in general, if not approved, circulation. The troubles which came
upon the country with the Restoration, and the long period of unrest
that preceded the Revolution of 1688, doubtless turned men’s thoughts
to more serious matters. The Covenanting divines who were ejected from
their pulpits by Claverhouse and his dragoons, sought to spread the truth
according to their light by means of the press, and numerous sermons
were issued in chapbook form. Admirers of the “Scots Worthies,” too,
prepared tracts relating to them, their sufferings, and their prophecies,
which, we may suppose, were read with avidity in quiet corners by their
followers, and treasured almost as carefully as the Bible, for their
peculiar interpretation of which they were ready to lay down their lives.
“The internal evidence of the chapbooks relating to Peden, Cargill,
and other worthies of the ‘Killing-time,’” writes George Mac Gregor,
“indicates that their first editions were published within a few years at
least of the events recorded in them.”[12]
The Revolution of 1688 may be said to mark the beginning of the period
which may be called the chapbook era. There were earlier indications, as
has been pointed out, but from that date the commonalty were supplied
with booklets and broadsides in gradually increasing numbers, and the
work of their distribution was taken up more generally and thoroughly
by the scores of pedlars who did their best to keep village joined to
village and hamlet in touch with hamlet.
“Books and pamphlets,” writes Mr. J. M. Barrie in the chapter,
“A Literary Club,” which appears in _Auld Licht Idylls_, “were
brought into the town by the flying stationers, as they were
called, who visited the square periodically, carrying their
wares on their backs, except at the Muckly [an occasional
fair], when they had their stall and even sold books by
auction. The flying stationer best known in Thrums was
Sandersy Riach, who was stricken from head to foot with palsy,
and could only speak with a quaver in consequence. Sandersy
brought to the members of the club all the great books he could
get second-hand, but his stock in trade was _Thrummy Cap_ and
_Akenstaff_, _The Fishwives of Buckhaven_, _The Devil upon Two
Sticks_, _Gilderoy_, _Sir James the Rose_, _The Brownie of
Badenoch_, _The Ghaist of Firenden_, and the like.”[13]
The chapbook period—if one may set limits where points are difficult to
adjust—may be said to have extended from 1688 to 1830. From the date of
the Revolution chapbooks gradually increased in number and importance,
down to 1746, when Dougal Graham published his metrical _History of the
Rebellion_. Graham was a new and distinct force in Scottish chapbook
literature. The popularity of this class of reading was greatly enhanced
by his many productions, and during the next thirty years the gradual
increase of the earlier period gave place to a circulation that went
up by leaps and bounds. By 1775 they doubtless had attained their
widest limits, and for the next fifty years their prestige remained
unchallenged. With the later twenties of the nineteenth century, however,
the literature shewed signs of decay. Probably the fact that little new
was being added accounted in some degree for this, but doubtless the
chief reason was the introduction of other literature of a cheap kind.
Gradually chapbooks lost the potent sway they had had. Societies and
publishers set themselves to issue series little calculated to offend
public taste in the way the broad publications of Graham had done, or,
rather, were beginning to do. One firm, that of Messrs. D. Webster &
Son of Edinburgh, considering it desirable to print the old chapbooks
“in a more correct and neat form,” began the issue of a series under
the high-sounding title, “Caledonian Classics of the Common People.”
But even “apt alliteration’s artful aid” failed to do much, and this
series, in common with others, did not meet with unbounded success.
Popular taste demanded something entirely different from what had been,
and the chapbooks, though still lingering for many years, were gradually
superseded by, or became merged in, the cheap literature with which we
are familiar to-day.
It has been said that the chapbook varied in size. Leaving out of
consideration what are known as broadsides, it was a publication of
any extent from eight pages to two hundred pages, and sold at prices
ranging from a penny to a shilling. Sometimes, in the larger and more
expensive productions, there was an attempt at artistic printing, but, as
a general rule, chapbook literature did little credit to the followers
of Caxton. The paper was invariably of the coarsest kind. The heavy
duty on that article of manufacture kept it dear, and accounts for the
rude appearance of many of these productions. A study of a number of
chapbooks from any one press reveals some of the difficulties with which
the printer had to contend. For one thing, his type not unfrequently
gave out. An edition of Allan Ramsay’s _Collection of Scotch Proverbs_
forms one of the chapbooks of G. Caldwell of Paisley. This book naturally
entailed a heavy drain on “capitals,” and it is amusing to notice
with what frequency the compositor had to fall back on “italics” or
“lower-case” letters when his Roman capitals failed him. Sometimes the
paper ran short. In these days, the proverbial editorial blue-pencil
is called into use to effect a judicious condensation. The chapbook
printer scorned such a method. His reader must have everything, and the
last page or so was occasionally set in a smaller size of type, so that
all the author’s work might appear. At other times, the story was too
short to fill the desired number of pages, and trifles of any kind were
introduced to fill up space. In this last-mentioned respect, the editor
of the present day still follows the chapbook publisher. In the matter
of illustrations, some amazing results were achieved. Anything in the
way of ornament was called into service, and one picture had frequently
to do duty in many chapbooks. So long as an illustration did not deal
with a specific subject, the matter was of little moment; but when it
came to the portrait of one man—and that man probably a creature of the
artist’s imagination—doing duty for several authors, the result was as
amusing as it was absurd. A few examples may be mentioned. A number of
religious chapbooks, issued in Glasgow and “printed for the booksellers,”
were adorned with an illustration on the title page. This was a clergyman
of the conventional type, clad in gown and bands, and wearing a
full-bottomed wig. There was apparently only one woodcut in the printer’s
stock, and it did duty in turn for John Welch and Donald Cargill, William
Secker and Ebenezer Erskine, Thomas Wilcocks and Isaac Watts. No less
amusing was the combination effected on another occasion. A _History of
Wallace, the renowned Scottish Champion_, was issued at Glasgow, without
date, “printed for the booksellers.” At the first glance the illustration
on the cover did not seem quite accurate. It was the portrait of a man
wearing a crown. Now, not even the Scottish Rights Association or the
“Britain _v._ England” patriots ever claimed a crown for Wallace, and
there was evidently an error somewhere. A scrutiny of certain other
chapbooks explained the matter. The portrait requisitioned to adorn the
_History of Wallace_ had done duty in another chapbook as an illustration
of Henry the Second of England! For the humour of the thing, one could
wish that it had been Edward Longshanks. Less glaringly absurd were
some other combinations. A portrait of a man in Highland costume—with
an unmistakable claymore and an abbreviated kilt—adorned a history of
Prince Charlie. Accompanied by other text, it served to represent Rob
Roy. A Highland piper, seated on a stool or “creepie,” and playing
lustily on his pipes, embellished the front page of _Odds and Ends_,
and a footnote, which referred to one of the anecdotes contained in the
publication, set forth that he was “the Piper who was carried away for
dead during the Plague in London, but revived before interment.” Without
the explanatory footnote, he adorned _The Scotch Haggis_; somewhat
appropriately he embellished the _History of James Allan, the Celebrated
Northumberland Piper_, and he also played in _The Long Pack, or the
Robbers Discovered_. So far as the artist was concerned, Dick Turpin and
O’Donnel, the Irish assassin, wore a garb and features common to each
other in the chapbook, and in real life alien to them both. These facts
are not without consolation to those of us who have had to submit to the
not very tender mercies of the newspaper artist. A comparison of a number
of song-chapbooks, with the same imprint, shows that the early printer
was alive to the possibilities of variation, and that he frequently “rung
the changes” on certain pieces. When a song was put into type, it was
seemingly kept “standing” for some time, and made to serve in several
chapbooks ere the type was distributed. This afforded the printer an easy
and cheap method of producing a number of publications, and meant that if
any one wanted a collection of songs, he had to buy a greater quantity of
books than would have been the case if the contents of each sheet had
been entirely different.
The chapbook printer did not greatly concern himself with questions of
literary ownership. He was, in this way, as great a thief and pirate as
the men whose exploits he sometimes recounted in penny pamphlets. Readers
of Allan Ramsay will remember that, in his _Address to the Town Council
of Edinburgh_, the poet bewails the action of “Lucky Reid.” He begins by
saying:—
“Your poet humbly means and shaws,
That, contrair to just rights and laws,
I’ve suffered muckle wrang,
By Lucky Reid and ballad-singers,
Wha thumb’d with their coarse, dirty fingers,
Sweet Adie’s funeral sang;
They spoil’d my sense, and staw my cash,
My muse’s pride murgully’d,
And printing it like their vile trash,
The honest lieges whilly’d.”
“Lucky” Reid was the relict of John Reid, who had a printing
establishment in Bell’s Wynd, Edinburgh, and who did an extensive
business in the production of popular literature. She, Ramsay explains
in a footnote to his poem, “with the hawkers,” reprinted his pastoral on
Addison, without his knowledge, “on ugly paper, full of errors.” Having
made his plaint to the civic fathers, he pleads that he may be allowed
“to guide his gear” himself, when—
“clean and fair the type shall be,
The paper like the snaw,
Nor shall our town think shame wi’ me,
When we gang far awa.”
Ramsay’s was only one of many complaints that might have been made on the
score of literary piracy. Byron may have heard of such things when he
coined his phrase about Barrabas.
While the vast majority of chapbooks were issued singly, and were what
may be called fugitive productions, there were one or two publications
which took the form of series. One of these, issued at Edinburgh and
undated, was known as the _Select Collection_, and ran to a good many
numbers. Each part consisted of eight pages. Another, also undated, was
named _The Edinbury (sic) Gleaner: being a Collection of Anecdotes, etc.,
for the Amusement of Youth_. The title-page stated that it was “To be
published in numbers, with a beautiful wood engraving, price 3 Pence, by
W. Smith, Bristo Port, Edina.” It consisted of sixteen pages, and, in the
preface setting forth the aims of the publication, the editor invited
contributions from readers. In these days of two guineas per column and
five pounds per page, it is interesting to hear the terms on which this
old-world editor was prepared to accept MSS.
“As the work is to be published in numbers,” he says, in
somewhat halting English, “the editor hereby intimates to any
person who has any entertaining piece by them (either in prose
or verse), that they will send such pieces to him (free of
postage); and if he approves of the same, and print it, they
shall receive a few copies without any expence whatever.”
Verily, publication was its own reward.[14]
The chapbook literature of Scotland, in addition to those
productions—sermons, poems, songs, and sketches—which were of native
origin, included many chapbooks of English authorship. They issued from
Scottish presses, were vended by Scottish chapmen at Scottish fairs
and markets and all over Scotland, but they were not Scottish books.
While it is impossible to say how many chapbooks found readers north of
Tweed, it is worth noting that Robert Hays Cunningham, in his _Amusing
Prose Chapbooks Chiefly of the Last [the Eighteenth] Century_, which is
a Scottish production and is doubtless intended to be representative,
only includes four that are distinctly Scottish in a collection of
twenty-five. These four are _The Comical Sayings of Paddy from Cork_
(Scottish in authorship, as it was written or compiled by Dougal Graham);
_The Penny Budget of Wit and Package of Drollery_ (a collection of mainly
Scottish anecdotes); _Mansie Wauch, Tailor in Dalkeith_ (a condensation
of Delta’s famous work); and _The Life and Astonishing Adventures of
Peter Williamson, who was carried off when a Child from Aberdeen and
sold for a Slave_. But none of the others in Cunningham’s collection
was unknown to our fathers, though they are all of English origin. _The
Comical History of the King and the Cobbler_, _Mother Bunch’s Closet
Newly Broke Open_, _The History of the Blind Beggar of Bethnal Green_,
are three among many that were familiar as household words; while
_Jack the Giant Killer_ and _Blue Beard_, _Simple Simon_ and _Dick
Whittington_, have descended in all their grotesque glory to our own time.
In any survey of Scottish chapbook literature, it is almost essential
that English productions should be excluded or only referred to
incidentally. English chapbooks supplemented our national supply, but
did not enrich it. “Scottish chapbooks,” writes Professor Fraser, with
perhaps just a touch of the perfervid Scot, were “superior in every
respect to kindred productions in England, Ireland, and France.” With a
pronouncement such as that from a man who knew the subject so intimately
as Fraser did, we may well consider the Scottish publications in
themselves and apart—as far as we may—from the booklets of the sister
kingdom.
Chapbook literature has been divided into many sections. Professor Fraser
proposed to deal with the subject under five headings; John Ashton (and
his arrangement is applicable to Scottish as well as English chapbooks)
divided it into ten sections; and Cunningham, finding both of these
proposals inadequate for his needs, set out the literature in no fewer
than thirteen divisions. Probably an arrangement something like that of
Fraser’s is as good as any. We shall therefore glance briefly at our
chapbook literature under the following five sections:—
I.—HUMOROUS.
II.—INSTRUCTIVE.
III.—ROMANTIC.
IV.—SUPERSTITIOUS.
V.—SONGS AND BALLADS.
I.
HUMOROUS.
The humorous booklet undoubtedly occupied foremost place in public
favour. It frequently depicted a phase of life which was familiar to
readers, and dealt with men whose acquaintance they had made in the
flesh. The stories that were recounted may have been broad—coarse,
sometimes, as the paper on which they were printed—but they were always
true to actual life as the commonalty saw it. “John Cheap, the Chapman,”
was to be found at every fair and in every hamlet, and “Leper the Tailor”
was a visitor at every farm-town. What is more reasonable, then, than
that books which dealt with these worthies should be bought rapidly
and read with delight? In addition to their enjoying first place in
popularity, the humorous chapbooks are unique in that we know something
of some of their authors. Much of our vulgar literature, like a great
deal of our ballad minstrelsy, is the work of innominate writers.
Certain songs have been traced to particular poets, sermons invariably
appeared with their authors’ names, but the great bulk of general
chapbook literature was published anonymously. And, with the exception
of the most characteristic of the humorous booklets, the authorship has
continued in obscurity.
Dougal Graham, the Skellat Bellman of Glasgow, is the chief of chapbook
writers, and he must always occupy a prominent place in any history of
our vulgar literature. He was born at Raploch (a hamlet that nestles at
the foot of the rock on which Stirling Castle stands), in or about the
year 1724, and we are told that he was
“The wittiest fellow in his time,
Either for prose or making rhyme.”
In view of his subsequent career, there was something appropriate in
the place of his birth. He was born within sight of the Jousting Flats,
where the ancient fraternity of chapmen of the counties of Stirling and
Clackmannan were wont for centuries to engage in sports: he was born
under the shadow of the Palace of the Stuart Kings, and this may have
given him that interest in the “Auld Hoose” which impelled him to follow
Prince Charlie through victory and defeat to Culloden, and to write his
_History of the Rebellion_; and he was almost a native of Stirling,
one of the towns which were subsequently to become centres of chapbook
enterprise. Little or nothing is known of Graham’s early life. It is
believed that he was for some time engaged in farm-service at Campsie,
and that at an early period he relinquished that employment, for which,
from his deformity, he must have been unsuited, and turned pedlar. He
was pursuing this calling when Prince Charlie raised his standard in the
West Highlands. Meeting the Pretender’s army in the neighbourhood of
Stirling, he joined it—in the capacity of sutler or camp-follower, it
is surmised—and was with it in all its subsequent marchings. He himself
tells us, in the preface to his _History of the Rebellion_, that he was
“an eye-witness to most of the movements of the armies, from the rebels
first crossing the Ford of Frew to their final defeat at Culloden.” Then
Dougal’s faith failed him. “Life,” he says, in his own rugged phraseology,
“was preciouser to him
Than all the Princes in Christendom;”
and, cutting himself apart from Jacobite and Royalist, he returned to his
native Stirlingshire. From this time onwards, for more than thirty years,
he was the moving spirit in the production and sale of Scottish chapbook
literature.[15]
One of the earliest and best of Graham’s books is _The Whole Proceedings
of Jockey and Maggy_, which is believed to have been published in
1755.[16] It is written with considerable dramatic power, and gives a
striking and faithful representation of rustic life and manners in the
eighteenth century. We are introduced to Jockey and Maggy at a fair
in a neighbouring town, and, accompanying them on the way home, learn
something of how a country wooing is effected. They agree to accept each
other for “better or worse,” and thereafter communicate the fact to their
mothers, who immediately set about preparing for the wedding. The main
feature in a marriage of that time was the feast, and the author gives us
a delightful glimpse of what comprised it.
“The wooing being over,” he writes, “and the day being set,
Jockey’s mither killed the black boul horn’d yeal Ewe, that
lost her lamb the last year, three hens an’ a gule-fitted cock
to prevent the ripples, five peck o’ maut maskit in the meikle
kirn, a pint o’ trykle to mak’ it thicker an’ sweeter an’
maumier for the mouth; 5 pints o’ whisky, wherein was garlic
and spice, for the raisin’ o’ the wind an’ the clearing o’
their water.”
[Illustration: _The Wedding of Jockey and Maggy—from “The Whole
Proceedings of Jockey and Maggy,” by Dougal Graham._]
Then follows a description of the bridal procession.
“The friends and good neighbours went a’ wi’ John to the
kirk, where Maggy chanced to meet him, and was married by the
minister. The twa companies joined the gither and cam hame
in a croud; at every change-house they chanced to pass by,
Providence stopt their proceedings with full stoups, bottles
and glasses, drinking their healths, ‘wishing them much joy,
ten girls and a boy.’ Jockey, seeing so many wishing well to
his health, coupt up what he got to augment his health, and
gar him live lang, which afterwards coupt him up and proved
detrimental to the same.
“So hame cam they to the dinner, where his mither presented
to them a piping-het haggis, made o’ the creish o’ the black
boul horn’d Ewe, boil’d in the meikle bag, mixt with bear-meal,
onions, spice and mint.”
The heavy dinner, with the drink he had consumed on the way home,
proved too much for the bridegroom, who had to be assisted to bed. Then
the respective qualities of the young spouses were discussed by their
parents; they disagreed, words came to blows, and the marriage feast
ended in a regular Donnybrook.
“His friends and her friends being in a mixt multitude, some
took his part, some took her’s; and there did a battle begin
in the clap of a hand, being a very fierce tumult, which ended
in blood; they struck so hard with stones, sticks, beetles,
and barrow-trams; pigs, pots, stoups and trunchers were flying
like bombs and granadoes. The crook bouls and tangs were all
employed as weapons of war, till doon cam the bed, with a great
mou of peats! So this disturbet their bedding.
“The hamsheughs were very great, until auld uncle Rabby came in
to redd them; and a sturdy auld fallow he was. He stood stively
with a stiff rumple, and by strength of his arms rave them
sindry, flinging the tane east and the tither west, until they
stood a’ round about like as many breathless forfoughten cocks,
and no ane durst steer anither for him; Jockey’s mither was
driven o’er a kist, and brogit a’ her hips on a round heckle;
up she gat, and rinning to fell Maggy’s mither wi’ the ladle,
swearing she was the mither o’ a’ the mischief that happened,
Uncle Rabby ran in between them, he having a lang nose, like a
trumpet, she recklessly came o’er his lobster neb a drive wi’
the ladle till the blood sprang oot, an’ ran down his auld grey
beard and hang like snuffy bubbles at it. O! then he gaed wood,
and looked as waefu’ like as he had been a tod-lowrie come frae
worrying the lambs, wi’ his bloody mouth. Wi’ that he gets an
auld flail, and rives awa’ the supple, then drives them a’ to
the back o’ the door, but yet nane wan oot; then wi’ chirten
an’ chappen down comes the clayhallen and the hen bawk, wi’
Rab Reid the fiddler, who had crept up aside the hens for the
preservation of his fiddle.”
As a description of the humours of rustic life, _Jockey and Maggy’s
Courtship_ is difficult to excel. Scenes such as those depicted were
not uncommon, and they belong to a time when the whole machinery of
ecclesiastical law was brought into motion to impart decency and order
to “blithesome bridals.” But even strait-laced Scotland would not be
Kirk-ridden, and the eighteenth century Scot enjoyed life to the full,
and sinned, sometimes to his heart’s content, in spite of scowling Holy
Willies and stools of repentance. The remainder of _Jockey and Maggy’s
Courtship_ deals with some of the sins of Jockey’s youth and their
consequences. He had loved one of his mother’s maids not wisely but too
well, and this coming to the ears of the Kirk-Session he is summoned to
answer for his misdeeds. But he proves intractable, and aided and abetted
by his mother, who delivers herself of a denunciatory harangue against
the repentance stool, he refuses to come under the censure of the Church.
We get an interesting glimpse of what Church discipline really was, and
of the material with which the elders of the Kirk had to deal. In his
mother, Jockey had a stout defender and voluble advocate, but death put
an end to her pleading, and he was left to fight his battle alone. Then
he yielded to the order of the Kirk, and submitted to public correction.
“Upon Sunday thereafter, John comes with Uncle Rabby’s auld
wide coat, a muckle grey-tailed wig, and a big bonnet that
covered his face, so that he seemed more like an old Pilgrim
than a young fornicator; mounts the creepy[17] wi’ a stiff,
stiff back, as he had been a man of sixty. Every one looked at
him, thinking he was some old stranger that knew not the stool
of repentance by another seat, so that he passed the first
day unknown but to very few; yet on the second it came to be
known, and the whole parish, with many more, came to see him,
which caused such a confusion that he was absolved and got his
children baptized the next day.”
Love, Courtship, and Marriage are the themes most frequently dealt with
in Graham’s chapbooks. They were subjects at which a great deal of fun
might be poked, and in which everybody was more or less interested. Books
treating of them were assured a ready sale.
_The Coalman’s Courtship to the Creelwife’s Daughter_ is one which
deserves to be mentioned alongside _Jockey and Maggy’s Courtship_. Sawny,
a young coalman, is, like his friend Jockey, desirous of securing a wife,
but, not being informed in the art of courtship, he applies to his mother
for counsel and advice. That worthy dame—contrary to the general belief
that mothers never wish their sons to marry—enters heartily into the
project, and lays all her advice and experience at Sawny’s disposal.
She advises him
“to go in wi’ braw good manners, and something manfu’; to put
on a Sunday’s face and sigh as he were a saint; to sit down
beside her as he were a Mess John; to keek aye till her, now
and then, with a stolen look, and haud his mouth as mim and
grave as a May paddock.”
She also enjoins him “to crack weel o’ their wealth and hide their
poverty.”
Sawny was a “blate wooer.” Having considered the matter, he thought it
would be judicious to approach his sweetheart by means of her mother.
After selling his coals one day, he attires himself in his best and
proceeds in quest of Katie’s mother. They meet, and, over a gill and a
“het pint,” old Be-go promises her daughter to Sawny. Having obtained
the mother’s consent, he, a few days later, sets out on a visit to his
intended bride, to ascertain whether she is agreeable to his proposal. An
amusing dialogue ensues.
_Sawny._—“Now, Katty, do you ken what am come about?”
_Kate._—“Oh yes, my mither telt me; but I’m no ready yet. I hae
twa gowns to spin and things to mak’.”
_Sawny._—“Tute, things to mak’! ye hae as mony things as ye’ll
need, woman; canna ye spin gowns in oor ain hoose wi’ me, as
weel as here wi’ an auld girning mither?”
_Kate._—“But, dear Saunders, ye maun gie a body time to think
on’t—’twad be ill-far’d to rush thegither just at the first.”
_Sawny._—“And do ye think I hae nothing a-do but come here
every ither day hoiting after you! it’ll no do; I maun be
either aff wi’ ye or on wi’ ye; either tell me or tak’ me, for
I ken o’ ither twa, an’ some o’ ye I will hae; for, as am a
sinner, my mither is gaun to be married, too, an’ she can get a
bit man o’ ony shape or trade.”
_Kate._—“’Deed then, Saunders, since ye’re in sic a haste, ye
maun e’en tak’ them that’s readiest, for am no ready yet.”
_Sawny._—“A, dear woman, when your mither and my mither’s
pleased, and am willing to venture on ye, what a sorrow ails
ye?”
_Kate._—“Na, na, I’ll think on’t twa or three days; it’s o’er
lang a term to see without a thought.”
_Sawny._—“Wode, I think ye’re a cumstrarie piece o’ stuff; it’s
true enough ye’re mither said of ye, that ye’re no for a poor
man.”
_Kate._—“And what mair said she o’ me?”
_Sawny._—“Wode, she said you could do naething but wash mugs
and scoure gentleman’s bonny things; but hissies that is bred
amang gentle houses minds me o’ my mither’s cat, but ye’re far
costlier to keep, for she wastes nayther saep nor water, but
spits in her lufe and washes ay at her face, and wheens o’ ye
can do naether thing;” and up he gets.
_Kate._—“O, Saunders, but ye be short; will ye no stay till my
mither come hame?”
_Sawny._—“I’ve staid lang aneugh for onything I’ll be the
better; and am nae sae short as your tottom o’ a taylor that I
could stap in my shoe.”
Chagrined at being repulsed where no repulse was dreamt of, and having
fired off this parting shot at his rival, the “tottom of a taylor,” Sawny
made his way home feeling, like many a slighted lover before and since,
that he might now take melancholy farewell of the earth, the moon, and
the stars.
“‘O death, death!’ he exclaimed, ‘I thought the jade wad a
jumped at me; no comfort or happiness mair for poor me. O,
mither, gae mak’ my kist and bake my burial bread, for I’ll die
this night or soon the morn.’”
But a broken heart is only fatal on rare occasions. With the dawn came
Katie’s mother, anxious to smooth matters, and effect the union so much
desired by Sawny, and perhaps not altogether unwished by the independent
sweetheart of yesterday.
“In comes auld Be-go, his good mither,” says the author, “who
had left her daughter in tears for the slighting of Sawny, and
hauls him and his mither away to get a dinner of dead fish,
where a’ was agreed upon, and the wedding to be upon Wednesday;
no bridal folks but the mithers and themselves twa.”