YEAR 1790
THE features of this Ann. Dom. partook of the character of its
predecessor. Several new houses were added to the clachan; Cayenneville
was spreading out with weavers’ shops, and growing up fast into a town.
In some respects it got the start of ours; for one day, when I was going
to dine with Mr. Cayenne at Wheatrig House, not a little to my amazement,
did I behold a bookseller’s shop opened there, with sticks of red and
black wax, pouncet-boxes, pens, pocket-books, and new publications, in
the window, such as the like of was only to be seen in cities and borough
towns. And it was lighted at night by a patent lamp, which shed a
wonderful beam, burning oil, and having no smoke. The man sold likewise
perfumery, powder-puffs, trinkets, and Dublin dolls, besides penknives,
Castile soap, and walking-sticks, together with a prodigy of other
luxuries too tedious to mention.
Upon conversing with the man, for I was enchanted to go into this
phenomenon, for as no less could I regard it, he told me that he had a
correspondence with London, and could get me down any book published
there within the same month in which it came out; and he showed me divers
of the newest come out, of which I did not read even in the _Scots
Magazine_ till more than three months after, although I had till then
always considered that work as most interesting for its early
intelligence. But what I was most surprised to hear, was, that he took
in a daily London newspaper for the spinners and weavers, who paid him a
penny a-week a-piece for the same; they being all greatly taken up with
what, at the time, was going on in France.
This bookseller in the end, however, proved a whawp in our nest, for he
was in league with some of the English reformers; and when the story took
wind three years after, concerning the plots and treasons of the
corresponding societies and democrats, he was fain to make a moonlight
flitting, leaving his wife for a time to manage his affairs. I could
not, however, think any ill of the man notwithstanding; for he had very
correct notions of right and justice, in a political sense, and when he
came into the parish he was as orderly and well-behaved as any other
body; and conduct is a test that I have always found as good for a man’s
principles as professions. Nor, at the time of which I am speaking, was
there any of that dread or fear of reforming the government that has
since been occasioned by the wild and wasteful hand which the French
employed in their revolution.
But, among other improvements, I should mention that a Doctor Marigold
came and settled in Cayenneville, a small, round, happy-tempered man,
whose funny stories were far better liked than his drugs. There was a
doubt among some of the weavers if he was a skilful Esculapian; and this
doubt led to their holding out an inducement to another medical man, Dr.
Tanzey, to settle there likewise, by which it grew into a saying, that at
Cayenneville there was a doctor for health as well as sickness; for Dr.
Marigold was one of the best hands in the country at a pleasant
punch-bowl, while Dr. Tanzey had all the requisite knowledge for the
faculty for the bedside.
It was in this year that the hour-plate and hand on the kirk steeple were
renewed, as indeed, may yet be seen by the date, though it be again
greatly in want of fresh gilding; for it was by my advice that the
figures of the Ann. Dom. were placed one in each corner. In this year,
likewise, the bridge over the Brawl burn was built—a great convenience,
in the winter time, to the parishioners that lived on the north side; for
when there happened to be a spait on the Sunday, it kept them from the
kirk; but I did not find that the bridge mended the matter, till after
the conclusion of the war against the democrats, and the beginning of
that which we are now waging with Boney, their child and champion. It
is, indeed, wonderful to think of the occultation of grace that was
taking place about this time, throughout the whole bound of Christendom;
for I could mark a visible darkness of infidelity spreading in the corner
of the vineyard committed to my keeping, and a falling away of the vines
from their wonted props and confidence in the truths of Revelation. But
I said nothing. I knew that the faith could not be lost, and that it
would be found purer and purer the more it was tried; and this I have
lived to see, many now being zealous members of the church, that were
abundantly lukewarm at the period of which I am now speaking.