Transcribed from the 1845 William Blackwood and Sons edition by David
Price, email ccx074@pglaf.org
THE LIFE
OF
MANSIE WAUCH
TAILOR IN DALKEITH
WRITTEN BY HIMSELF
A NEW EDITION
WILLIAM BLACKWOOD AND SONS
EDINBURGH AND LONDON
M.DCCC.XLV
TO
JOHN GALT, ESQ.
AUTHOR OF "THE ANNALS OF THE PARISH," "THE PROVOST," "THE AYRSHIRE
LEGATEES," &c. &c. &c.
THE FOLLOWING SKETCHES,
PRINCIPALLY OF HUMBLE SCOTTISH CHARACTER,
ARE DEDICATED,
BY HIS SINCERE FRIEND AND ADMIRER,
THE EDITOR.
ADVERTISEMENT.
Between the first and last genuine Editions of the following biography,
it has been repeatedly reprinted both in America and France; and portions
of it, pirated in the shape of cheap pamphlets, have, for two or three
years bypast, formed a staple article of commerce with the Peripatetic
Bibliopoles in this country. Popularity to an author must be always
gratifying; but it were well that it came through the proper channels.
* * * * *
The present Edition has been carefully revised, and it embodies all the
additions made to the book since its first appearance. Sixteen years
have now passed over since Mr Wauch joined his name to those of Rousseau
and Franklin as an autobiographer; and it must be pleasing to him in his
venerable old age to learn, that he is still a favourite with the Public.
Nay, more, it is to be hoped that the accommodating moderation in the
rates of charges anent his present fashions and furnishings, may be the
means of yet further enlarging the circle of his literary acquaintances.
PRELIMINARIES.
Having, within myself, made observation of late years, that all notable
characters, whatsoever line of life they may have pursued, and to
whatever business they might belong, have made a trade of committing to
paper all the surprising occurrences and remarkable events that chanced
to happen to them in the course of Providence, during their journey
through life--that such as come after them might take warning and be
benefited--I have found it incumbent on me, following a right example, to
do the same thing; and have set down, in black and white, a good few
uncos, that I should reckon will not soon be forgotten, provided they
make as deep an impression on the world as they have done on me. To this
decision I have been urged by the elbowing on of not a few judicious
friends; among whom I would particularly remark James Batter, who has
been most earnest in his request, and than whom a truer judge on any
thing connected with book-lear, or a better neighbour, does not breathe
the breath of life: both of which positions will, I doubt not, appear as
clear as daylight to the reader, in the course of the work: to say
nothing of the approval the scheme met with from the pious Maister
Wiggie, who has now gone to his account, and divers other advisers, that
wished either the general good of the world, or studied their own
particular profit.
Had the course of my pilgrimage lain just on the beaten track, I would
not--at least I think so--have been o'ercome by ony perswasions to do
what I have done; but as will be seen, in the twinkling of half-an-eye,
by the judicious reader, I am a man that has witnessed much, and come
through a great deal, both in regard to the times wherein I have lived,
and the out-o'-the-way adventures in which it has been my fortune to be
engaged. Indeed, though I say it myself, who might as well be silent, I
that have never stirred, in a manner so to speak, from home, have
witnessed more of the world we live in, and the doings of men, than many
who have sailed the salt seas from the East Indies to the West; or, in
the course of nature, visited Greenland, Jamaica, or Van Diemen's Land.
The cream of the matter, and to which we would solicit the attention of
old and young, rich and poor, is just this, that, unless unco doure
indeed to learn, the inexperienced may gleam from my pages sundry grand
lessons, concerning what they have a chance to expect in the course of an
active life; and the unsteady may take a hint concerning what it is
possible for one of a clear head and a stout heart to go through with.
Notwithstanding, however, these plain and evident conclusions, even after
writing the whole out, I thought I felt a kind of a qualm of conscience
about submitting an account of my actions and transactions to the world
during my lifetime; and I had almost determined, for decency's sake, not
to let the papers be printed till after I had been gathered to my
fathers; but I took into consideration the duty that one man owes to
another; and that my keeping back, and withholding these curious
documents, would be in a great measure hindering the improvement of
society, so far as I was myself personally concerned. Now this is a
business, which James Batter agrees with me in thinking is carried on,
furthered, and brought about, by every one furnishing his share of
experience to the general stock. Let-a-be this plain truth, another
point of argument for my bringing out my bit book at the present time is,
that I am here to the fore bodily, with the use of my seven senses, to
give day and date to all such as venture to put on the misbelieving front
of Sadducees, with regard to any of the accidents, mischances, marvellous
escapes, and extraordinary businesses therein related; and to show them,
as plain as the bool of a pint stoup, that each and every thing set down
by me within its boards is just as true, as that a blind man needs not
spectacles, or that my name is Mansie Wauch.
Perhaps, as a person willing and anxious to give every man his due, it is
necessary for me explicitly to mention, that, in the course of this book,
I am indebted to my friend James Batter, for his able help in assisting
me to spell the kittle words, and in rummaging out scraps of poem-books
for headpieces to my different chapters.
CHAPTER I.--OUR OLD GRANFATHER.
The sun rises bright in France,
And fair sets he;
But he has tint the blithe blink he had
In my ain countree.
ALLAN CUNNINGHAM.
Some of the rich houses and great folk pretend to have histories of the
auncientness of their families, which they can count back on their
fingers almost to the days of Noah's ark, and King Fergus the First; but
whatever may spunk out after on this point, I am free to confess, with a
safe conscience, in the mean time, that it is not in my power to come up
within sight of them; having never seen or heard tell of any body in our
connexion, further back than auld granfaither, that I mind of when a
laddie; and who it behoves to have belonged by birthright to some parish
or other; but where-away, gude kens. James Batter mostly blinded both
his eyes, looking all last winter for one of our name in the Book of
Martyrs, to make us proud of; but his search, I am free to confess, worse
than failed--as the only man of the name he could find out was a Sergeant
Jacob Wauch, that lost his lug and his left arm, fighting like a Russian
Turk against the godly, at the bloody battle of the Pentland Hills.
Auld granfaither died when I was a growing callant, some seven or eight
years old; yet I mind him full well; it being a curious thing how early
such matters take hold of one's memory. He was a straught, tall, old
man, with a shining bellpow, and reverend white locks hanging down about
his haffets; a Roman nose, and two cheeks blooming through the winter of
his long age like roses, when, poor body, he was sand-blind with
infirmity. In his latter days he was hardly able to crawl about alone;
but used to sit resting himself on the truff seat before our door,
leaning forward his head on his staff, and finding a kind of pleasure in
feeling the beams of God's own sun beaking on him. A blackbird, that he
had tamed, hung above his head in a whand-cage of my father's making; and
he had taken a pride in learning it to whistle two three turns of his own
favourite sang, "Oure the water to Charlie."
I recollect, as well as yesterday, that, on the Sundays, he wore a braid
bannet with a red worsted cherry on the top of it; and had a
single-breasted coat, square in the tails, of light Gilmerton blue, with
plaited white buttons, bigger than crown-pieces. His waistcoat was low
in the neck, and had flap pouches, wherein he kept his mull for rappee,
and his tobacco-box. To look at him, with his rig-and-fur Shetland hose
pulled up over his knees, and his big glancing buckles in his shoon,
sitting at our door-cheek, clean and tidy as he was kept, was just as if
one of the ancient patriarchs had been left on earth, to let succeeding
survivors witness a picture of hoary and venerable eld. Poor body, many
a bit Gibraltar-rock and gingerbread did he give to me, as he would pat
me on the head, and prophesy I would be a great man yet; and sing me bits
of old songs about the bloody times of the Rebellion, and Prince Charlie.
There was nothing that I liked so well as to hear him set a going with
his auld-warld stories and lilts; though my mother used sometimes to say,
"Wheest, granfaither, ye ken it's no canny to let out a word of thae
things; let byganes be byganes, and forgotten." He never liked to give
trouble, so a rebuke of this kind would put a tether to his tongue for a
wee; but, when we were left by ourselves, I used aye to egg him on to
tell me what he had come through in his far-away travels beyond the broad
seas; and of the famous battles he had seen and shed his precious blood
in; for his pinkie was hacked off by a dragoon of Cornel Gardener's, down
by at Prestonpans, and he had catched a bullet with his ankle over in the
north at Culloden. So it was no wonder that he liked to crack about
these times, though they had brought him muckle and no little mischief,
having obliged him to skulk like another Cain among the Highland hills
and heather, for many a long month and day, homeless and hungry. Not
dauring to be seen in his own country, where his head would have been
chacked off like a sybo, he took leg-bail in a ship over the sea, among
the Dutch folk; where he followed out his lawful trade of a cooper,
making girrs for the herring barrels and so on; and sending, when he
could find time and opportunity, such savings from his wages as he could
afford, for the maintenance of his wife and small family of three
helpless weans, that he had been obligated to leave, dowie and destitute,
at their native home of pleasant Dalkeith.
At long and last, when the breeze had blown over, and the feverish pulse
of the country began to grow calm and cool, auld granfaither took a
longing to see his native land; and though not free of jeopardy from
king's cutters on the sea, and from spies on shore, he risked his neck
over in a sloop from Rotterdam to Aberlady, that came across with a
valuable cargo of smuggled gin. When granfaither had been obliged to
take the wings of flight for the preservation of his life and liberty, my
father was a wean at grannie's breast: so, by her fending--for she was a
canny industrious body, and kept a bit shop, in the which she sold
oatmeal and red herrings, needles and prins, potatoes and tape, and
cabbage, and what not--he had grown a strapping laddie of eleven or
twelve, helping his two sisters, one of whom perished of the measles in
the dear year, to go errands, chap sand, carry water, and keep the housie
clean. I have heard him say, when auld granfaither came to their door at
the dead of night, tirling, like a thief of darkness, at the window-brod
to get in, that he was so altered in his voice and lingo that no living
soul kenned him, not even the wife of his bosom; so he had to put grannie
in mind of things that had happened between them, before she would allow
my father to lift the sneck, or draw the bar. Many and many a year, for
gude kens how long after, I have heard tell, that his speech was so
Dutchified as to be scarcely kenspeckle to a Scotch European; but Nature
is powerful, and, in the course of time, he came in the upshot to gather
his words together like a Christian.
Of my auntie Bell, that, as I have just said, died of the measles in the
dear year, at the age of fourteen, I have no story to tell but one, and
that a short one, though not without a sprinkling of interest.
Among her other ways of doing, grannie kept a cow, and sold the milk
round about to the neighbours in a pitcher, whiles carried by my father,
and whiles by my aunties, at the ransom of a halfpenny the mutchkin.
Well, ye observe, that the cow ran yeild, and it was as plain as pease
that she was with calf:--Geordie Drouth, the horse-doctor, could have
made solemn affidavy on that head. So they waited on, and better waited
on for the prowie's calfing, keeping it upon draff and oat-strae in the
byre; till one morning every thing seemed in a fair way, and my auntie
Bell was set out to keep watch and ward.
Some of her companions, howsoever, chancing to come by, took her out to
the back of the house to have a game at the pallall; and, in the interim,
Donald Bogie, the tinkler from Yetholm, came and left his little jackass
in the byre, while he was selling about his crockery of cups and saucers,
and brown plates, on the old one, through the town, in two creels.
In the middle of auntie Bell's game, she heard an unco noise in the byre;
and, knowing that she had neglected her charge, she ran round the gable,
and opened the door in a great hurry; when, seeing the beastie, she
pulled it to again, and fleeing, half out of breath, into the kitchen,
cried--"Come away, come away, mother, as fast as ye can. Eh, lyst, the
cow's cauffed,--and it's a cuddie!"