It was at the Michaelmas 1813 that I was chosen provost for the third
time, and at the special request of my lord the earl, who, being in ill
health, had been advised by the faculty of doctors in London to try the
medicinal virtues of the air and climate of Sicily, in the Mediterranean
sea; and there was an understanding on the occasion, that I should hold
the post of honour for two years, chiefly in order to bring to a
conclusion different works that the town had then in hand.
At the two former times when I was raised to the dignity, and indeed at
all times when I received any advancement, I had enjoyed an elation of
heart, and was, as I may say, crouse and vogie; but experience had worked
a change upon my nature, and when I was saluted on my election with the
customary greetings and gratulations of those present, I felt a solemnity
enter into the frame of my thoughts, and I became as it were a new man on
the spot. When I returned home to my own house, I retired into my
private chamber for a time, to consult with myself in what manner my
deportment should be regulated; for I was conscious that heretofore I had
been overly governed with a disposition to do things my own way, and
although not in an avaricious temper, yet something, I must confess, with
a sort of sinister respect for my own interests. 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.
This serious and religious communing wrought within me to a benign and
pleasant issue, and when I went back in the afternoon to dine with the
corporation in the council-room, and looked around me on the bailies, the
councillors, and the deacons, I felt as if I was indeed elevated above
them all, and that I had a task to perform, in which I could hope for but
little sympathy from many; and the first thing I did was to measure, with
a discreet hand, the festivity of the occasion.
At all former and precedent banquets, it had been the custom to give vent
to muckle wanton and luxurious indulgence, and to galravitch, both at
hack and manger, in a very expensive manner to the funds of the town. I
therefore resolved to set my face against this for the future; and
accordingly, when we had enjoyed a jocose temperance of loyalty and
hilarity, with a decent measure of wine, I filled a glass, and requesting
all present to do the same, without any preliminary reflections on the
gavaulling of past times, I drank good afternoon to each severally, and
then rose from the table, in a way that put an end to all the
expectations of more drink.
But this conduct did not give satisfaction to some of the old hands, who
had been for years in the habit and practice of looking forward to the
provost's dinner as to a feast of fat things. Mr Peevie, one of the very
sickerest of all the former sederunts, came to me next morning, in a
remonstrating disposition, to enquire what had come over me, and to tell
me that every body was much surprised, and many thought it not right of
me to break in upon ancient and wonted customs in such a sudden and
unconcerted manner.
This Mr Peevie was, in his person, a stumpy man, well advanced in years.
He had been, in his origin, a bonnet-maker; but falling heir to a friend
that left him a property, he retired from business about the fiftieth
year of his age, doing nothing but walking about with an ivory-headed
staff, in a suit of dark bluecloth with yellow buttons, wearing a large
cocked hat, and a white three-tiered wig, which was well powdered every
morning by Duncan Curl, the barber. The method of his discourse and
conversation was very precise, and his words were all set forth in a
style of consequence, that took with many for a season as the pith and
marrow of solidity and sense. The body, however, was but a pompous
trifle, and I had for many a day held his observes and admonishments in
no very reverential estimation. So that, when I heard him address me in
such a memorializing manner, I was inclined and tempted to set him off
with a flea in his lug. However, I was enabled to bridle and rein in
this prejudicial humour, and answer him in his own way.
"Mr Peevie," quo' I, "you know that few in the town hae the repute that
ye hae for a gift of sagacity by common, and therefore I'll open my mind
to you in this matter, with a frankness that would not be a judicious
polity with folk of a lighter understanding."
This was before the counter in my shop. I then walked in behind it, and
drew the chair that stands in the corner nearer to the fire, for Mr
Peevie. When he was seated thereon, and, as was his wont in
conversation, had placed both his hands on the top of his staff, and
leant his chin on the same, I subjoined.
"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; nevertheless, my good friend, I am very happy that ye have
spoken to me anent the stinted allowance of wine and punch at the dinner,
because the like thing from any other would have made me jealouse that
the complaint was altogether owing to a disappointed appetite, which is a
corrupt thing, that I am sure would never affect a man of such a public
spirit as you are well known to be."
Mr Peevie, at this, lifted his chin from off his hands, and dropping his
arms down upon his knees, held his staff by the middle, as he replied,
looking upward to me,
"What ye say, Provost Pawkie, has in it a solid commodity of judgment and
sensibility; and ye may be sure that I was not without a cogitation of
reflection, that there had been a discreet argument of economy at the
bottom of the revolution which was brought to a criticism yesterday's
afternoon. Weel aware am I, that men in authority cannot appease and
quell the inordinate concupiscence of the multitude, and that in a'
stations of life there are persons who would mumpileese the retinue of
the king and government for their own behoof and eeteration, without any
regard to the cause or effect of such manifest predilections. But ye do
me no more than a judicature, in supposing that, in this matter, I am
habituated wi' the best intentions. For I can assure you, Mr Pawkie,
that no man in this community has a more literal respect for your
character than I have, or is more disposed for a judicious example of
continence in the way of public enterteenment than I have ever been; for,
as you know, I am of a constipent principle towards every extravagant and
costive outlay. Therefore, on my own account, I had a satisfaction at
seeing the abridgement which you made of our former inebrieties; but
there are other persons of a conjugal nature, who look upon such
castrations as a deficiency of their rights, and the like of them will
find fault with the best procedures."
"Very true, Mr Peevie," said I, "that's very true; but if his Majesty's
government, in this war for all that is dear to us as men and Britons,
wish us, who are in authority under them, to pare and save, in order that
the means of bringing the war to a happy end may not be wasted, an
example must be set, and that example, as a loyal subject and a
magistrate, it's my intent so to give, in the hope and confidence of
being backed by every person of a right way of thinking."
"It's no to be deputed, Provost Pawkie," replied my friend, somewhat
puzzled by what I had said; "it's no to be deputed, that we live in a
gigantic vortex, and that every man is bound to make an energetic
dispensation for the good of his country; but I could not have thought
that our means had come to sic an alteration and extremity, as that the
reverent homage of the Michaelmas dinners could have been enacted, and
declared absolute and abolished, by any interpolation less than the
omnipotence of parliament."
"Not abolished, Mr Peevie," cried I, interrupting him; "that would indeed
be a stretch of power. No, no; I hope we're both ordained to partake of
many a Michaelmas dinner thegether yet; but with a meted measure of
sobriety. For we neither live in the auld time nor the golden age, and
it would not do now for the like of you and me, Mr Peevie, to be seen in
the dusk of the evening, toddling home from the town-hall wi' goggling
een and havering tongues, and one of the town-officers following at a
distance in case of accidents; sic things ye ken, hae been, but nobody
would plead for their continuance."
Mr Peevie did not relish this, for in truth it came near his own doors,
it having been his annual practice for some years at the Michaelmas
dinner to give a sixpence to James Hound, the officer, to see him safe
home, and the very time before he had sat so long, that honest James was
obligated to cleek and oxter him the whole way; and in the way home, the
old man, cagie with what he had gotten, stood in the causey opposite to
Mr M'Vest's door, then deacon of the taylors, and trying to snap his
fingers, sang like a daft man,
'The sheets they were thin and the blankets were sma',
And the taylor fell through the bed, thimble and a'."
So that he was disconcerted by my innuendo, and shortly after left the
shop, I trow, with small inclination to propagate any sedition against
me, for the abbreviation I had made of the Michaelmas galravitching.