--At first the babe
Was sickly; and a smile was seen to pass
Across the midwife's cheek, when, holding up
The feeble wretch, she to the father said,
"A fine man-child!" What else could they expect?
The father being, as I said before,
A weaver.
HOGG'S _Poetic Mirror_.
I have no distinct recollection of the thing myself, yet there is every
reason to believe that I was born on the 15th of October 1765, in that
little house standing by itself, not many yards from the eastmost side of
the Flesh-Market Gate, Dalkeith. My eyes opened on the light about two
o'clock in a dark and rainy morning. Long was it spoken about that
something great and mysterious would happen on that dreary night; as the
cat, after washing her face, went mewing about, with her tail sweeing
behind her like a ramrod; and a corbie, from the Duke's woods, tumbled
down Jamie Elder's lum, when he had set the little still a-going--giving
them a terrible fright, as they all took it first for the devil, and then
for an exciseman--and fell with a great cloud of soot, and a loud
skraigh, into the empty kail-pot.
The first thing that I have any clear memory of, was my being carried out
on my auntie's shoulder, with a leather cap tied under my chin, to see
the Fair Race. Oh! but it was a grand sight! I have read since then the
story of Aladdin's Wonderful Lamp, but this beat it all to sticks. There
was a long row of tables covered with carpets of bonny patterns, heaped
from one end to the other with shoes of every kind and size, some with
polished soles, and some glittering with sparribles and cuddy-heels; and
little red worsted boots for bairns, with blue and white edgings, hanging
like strings of flowers up the posts at each end;--and then what a
collection of luggies! the whole meal in the market-sacks on a Thursday
did not seem able to fill them;--and horn-spoons, green and black
freckled, with shanks clear as amber,--and timber caups,--and ivory egg-
cups of every pattern. Have a care of us! all the eggs in Smeaton dairy
might have found resting-places for their doups in a row. As for the
gingerbread, I shall not attempt a description. Sixpenny and shilling
cakes, in paper, tied with skinie; and roundabouts, and snaps, brown and
white quality, and parliaments, on stands covered with calendered linen,
clean from the fold. To pass it was just impossible; it set my teeth a-
watering, and I skirled like mad, until I had a gilded lady thrust into
my little nieve; the which, after admiring for a minute, I applied my
teeth to, and of the head I made no bones; so that in less than no time
she had vanished, petticoats and all, no trace of her being to the fore,
save and except long treacly daubs, extending east and west from ear to
ear, and north and south from cape neb of the nose to the extremity of
beardy-land.
But what, of all things, attracted my attention on that memorable day,
was the show of cows, sheep, and horses, mooing, baaing, and neighering;
and the race--that was best! Od, what a sight!--we were jammed in the
crowd of old wives, with their toys and shining ribands; and carter lads,
with their blue bonnets; and young wenches, carrying home their fairings
in napkins, as muckle as would hold their teeth going for a month;--there
scarcely could be much for love, when there was so much for the
stomach;--and men, with wooden legs, and brass virls at the end of them,
playing on the fiddle,--and a bear that roared, and danced on its hind
feet, with a muzzled mouth,--and Punch and Polly,--and puppie-shows, and
more than I can tell,--when up came the horses to the starting-post. I
shall never forget the bonny dresses of the riders. One had a napkin
tied round his head, with the flaps fleeing at his neck; and his coat-
tails were curled up into a big hump behind; it was so tight buttoned ye
would not think he could have breathed. His corduroy trowsers (such like
as I have often since made to growing callants) were tied round his
ankles with a string; and he had a rusty spur on one shoe, which I saw a
man take off to lend him. Save us! how he pulled the beast's head by the
bridle, and flapped up and down on the saddle when he tried a canter! The
second one had on a black velvet hunting-cap, and his coat stripped. I
wonder he was not feared of cold, his shirt being like a riddle, and his
nether nankeens but thin for such weather; but he was a brave lad; and
sorry were the folks for him, when he fell off in taking over sharp a
turn, by which old Pullen, the bell-ringer, who was holding the post, was
made to coup the creels, and got a bloody nose.--And but the last was a
wearyful one! He was all life, and as gleg as an eel. Up and down he
went; and up and down philandered the beast on its hind-legs and its fore-
legs, funking like mad; yet though he was not above thirteen, or fourteen
at most, he did not cry out for help more than five or six times, but
grippit at the mane with one hand, and at the back of the saddle with the
other, till daft Robie, the hostler at the stables, claught hold of the
beast by the head, and off they set. The young birkie had neither hat
nor shoon, but he did not spare the stick; round and round they flew like
mad. Ye would have thought their eyes would have loupen out; and loudly
all the crowd were hurraing, when young hatless came up foremost,
standing in the stirrups, the long stick between his teeth, and his white
hair fleeing behind him in the wind like streamers on a frosty night.