Conspicuous among the folk-customs which, north of the Tweed, have
survived from the remotest antiquity, remains that of welcoming with
wassail and good wishes the birth of the New Year. To all appearance
a pagan custom, dating from the pre-Christian past, it probably owes
its permanence to instincts acquired amid the superstitions of the
Dark Ages. Of late years, it is true, under the influence of southern
fashion, the festival of Christmas has seemed to be superseding that
of New Year’s Eve. But, as with many other picturesque and interesting
customs of Scotland, the older observance remains yet deeply rooted in
the heart of the people, and, having already survived so many changes
of habit and creed, may be expected to outlive even this latest inroad.
There is much to be said, too, for the keeping of Hogmanay. Christmas,
indeed, is the commemoration of a great religious event, and even in
the North it appears interesting and appropriate enough as a Church
festival; while to those with whom its observance has been a national
and family custom it contains, of course, an ample significance. But
to people who have inherited the instinct with their blood, the end of
the year remains a more fitting time for recalling the deeds and the
days that are past; and the keeping of Hogmanay awakens, north of the
Border, a subtle train of early feelings and associations--the pensive
charm and sweetness of “auld lang syne.” Scarcely a dwelling is there,
cottage or hall, in the breadth of all broad Scotland, which has not,
time out of mind, on this night of the year witnessed some observance
of the ancient and pleasant festival. Alike under gilded ceilings and
roofs of thatch there is to be heard then the toasting of old memories
and the pledging of health and fortune to the house and its occupants
throughout the dawning year. About every village cross, too, as the
last moments of the year approach, the young men of the neighbourhood
have ever been wont to gather to greet the incoming day with shouts of
rejoicing and with the curious traditional custom of “first-footing.”
Even in the cities, where contact with the world tends greatly to
obliterate such folk-customs, it is curious to see the ancient festival
year after year assert itself, its observance the better assured,
probably, because it brings back to those who attend it the scenes and
memories of earlier, and, perhaps, happier days.
Ever with the same details the time-honoured proceeding may be
witnessed on the night of any 31st day of December at the Cross of the
ancient city of St Mungo.
Some time before midnight the roar of the day’s traffic has died out of
the streets. The great warehouses are closed, and their windows gaze,
like sightless eyes, into the deserted thoroughfares. To one imbued
with the spirit of the hour, it is as if the city herself were thinking
of the past; and the sudden sweep of wind that comes and dies away
seems a sigh of regret for her departed glories. Many memories cluster
about this ancient heart of Glasgow; and at such an hour, and upon
such a night, it would seem little more than natural if the historic
figures of the past should move again abroad. Strangely enough, too,
the creatures of imagination present a no less tangible presence to
the mind’s eye than the real persons of bygone days. Behind the tall,
limping figure of Sir Walter Scott, a curious visitor here, the equally
immortal Bailie picks his steps; and as the bold Rob Roy strides past
into the shadow, there is heard the tramp of Cromwell’s bodyguard
and the clatter of the Regent Moray’s cavalry. For it was out by the
Gallowgate here, and across the river by the Briggate, that the troops
of the Protestant lords marched in 1568 to the battle of Langside; and
at the head of Saltmarket the Protector Cromwell quartered himself
in 1650, issued his orders, and held levees. In the Gallowgate yet,
though sore transformed from its ancient glory, stands that once-famous
inn, the Saracen’s Head, at which the learned Dr Johnson put up while
passing through Glasgow on his Hebridean tour. Close by the Cross,
where the street lamps shine on the shuttered windows of a great
east-end warehouse, stood the town-house of the Earls of Lennox;
and past it, up the gentle hill, and still wearing something of its
old-world look, bends the High Street with its memories. Out of sight
up there the façade of the venerable College, _alma mater_ of Campbell
the poet, Smollett the novelist, Archbishop Tait, and a host of great
divines, was wont for over four hundred years to frown upon the
pavement. The Vandal, however, has at last prevailed against it. A
few paces farther and the gigantic form of Sir William Wallace still
seems to slaughter his enemies at the Bell o’ the Brae. And beyond all,
on the slope of the hollow where the classic Molendinar once flowed,
surrounded in the darkness by its city of the dead, stands the grey
cathedral of St Kentigern.
[Illustration]
The spot itself, however, has indeed changed with time, and but few
links are left it to recall bygone days. The loud tramp of Dundee’s
dragoons long since died away in Rottenrow. No longer do the rustling
gowns of bishop and dean sweep through the cathedral choir. Even the
house from which the ill-fated Lord Darnley, sick to death, was carried
to the lonely Kirk o’ Fields three hundred years ago, has disappeared.
Cavalier and Covenanter and Virginia merchant have given place to
the petty trader and the artizan. The house at the foot of Glassford
Street, where Prince Charlie put up in the ’45, has been pulled down;
and of the walls which witnessed the rejoicing bonfires of the Whig
burgesses after the news of Culloden, few are left but those of the dim
cathedral. Even the Saltmarket at hand has been so altered of late
years, that if worthy Bailie Nicol Jarvie were to step out again on
the causeway he would find no trace at all of the narrow, ill-paved,
unlighted lane of his day, with its high, rickety houses, and creaking
shop-signs.
Rather must the city pride herself now upon her glories of the present.
Far off, upon the great Clyde artery at Govan, where the nets of the
salmon-fishers once hung in the sun to dry, the noise of a myriad
hammers has just ceased for the holiday, and the iron skeletons of a
hundred ships stand silent in the darkness--spectres not of the past
but of the future. Overhead, between the high house-roofs, the heaven
is very dark, and above the lanterns of the clock the Tron steeple is
hidden from sight; but one side of the neighbouring tower--that of the
ancient Tolbooth in High Street--reflects the red glare, from a mile
away, of the iron furnaces at Hutchesontown--those undying vestal fires
of the nineteenth century; and the golden vane upon the spire shines,
strangely lit, alone in the dark heaven. Significant indications,
these, of the strong modern life that throbs in the veins of the
ancient city.
But the great gilt hand of the clock overhead is approaching midnight,
and along the streets, from the four points of the compass, comes the
sound of innumerable hastening feet. It is the crowd gathering to
observe this immemorial ceremony of “bringing in the year.”
Few of the revellers, probably, reflect upon the antiquity of the
custom they are observing; if they did, it might, perhaps, lend
the proceeding a deeper interest in their eyes. To survive so many
vicissitudes of history, the rite must once have possessed a solemn
religious meaning. On the bank of the river below, the rough Norse
rover has shouted “Wæs hael” to Thor; on the crest of the hill above,
the Roman warrior has poured libations to Jove. Bishops of a feudal
church within the storied cathedral walls have said the mass of Christ;
and the spires of many a Presbyterian kirk now rise round the ancient
Cross. But through all changes, through the ebb and flow of Faith and
Fear, has come down the relic of an older worship, and in the mistletoe
and the New-Year mysteries the Druid lives among us still. These people
are gathering now, as for ages their race has gathered, to bid farewell
to the old year and welcome to the new, and to pour their mystic
sacrifice to Time--not, indeed, as of old, upon the unconscious earth
nor within the stone circle of a rude astronomy, but at least under the
open sky, and with something of the ancient wish-rites of the runes.
Hundreds in number they come, and over all the open space--at corners
where in the daytime knots of loafers are for ever to be seen, as well
as on the Trongate pavement, where, all day long, recruiting sergeants,
splendid in red and gold, pace magnificently to and fro--in little
groups they wait the stroke of twelve. Each man has brought with him a
bottle, and in each man’s pocket there is hidden a glass, one that has
seen service and lost its stem being the popular variety.
Quickly enough the final seconds of the year run out. The hand of the
great clock reaches and touches the hour. At last it strikes, a single
bell--one, two, three--a bold sound in the silence; and immediately
it is answered by a bewildering clangour from all the city belfries.
Before the last stroke has died away, a wild cheer bursts from the
throat of the waiting crowd below. There is a great commotion among
the little groups; and, as cheer after cheer rings up into the sky,
from the belfry overhead the city chimes ring out upon the night their
welcome to the New Year.
Meanwhile everyone is drinking the health of everyone else, Celt and
Saxon, countryman and citizen; and as no one can pass an acquaintance
without hospitality offered and taken, and as, moreover, the dew of Ben
Nevis is somewhat potent, the shaking of hands and wishing of good luck
soon become fairly exuberant. Presently, however, everyone sets off to
first-foot his friends.
The origin of this ceremony it is difficult to suggest, unless it be
to represent some priestly visitation, a sacrament assuring to the
people throughout the coming year the blessings of food and drink.
A door-to-door proceeding, at anyrate, it is--accompanied by much
eating of cake and drinking of whisky, and it will last well into the
morning hours. Lucky, for this performance, are accounted those dark
of skin. If the first-footer be fair the tradition runs that it bodes
ill-fortune for the year to the house whose threshold he or she has
crossed; and often enough a door is shut in the face of such a friend,
simply because of his complexion. Moreover, the visitor must not come
empty-handed; and so the bottle and broken wine-glass which each
carries serve as a double introduction.
And now all who sat up till the city bells struck twelve, as well in
the crowded tenements here as in the far-off suburbs of the rich, have
wished each other a good New Year, and are retiring to rest. Among
them, doubtless, there are many thoughts of sadness. Many a widow was a
wife last year; many a ruined home was prosperous; many a soiled heart
still was pure. But the old year, with its sorrow, has passed away in
the night, and with the New Year’s dawn a glimmer of hope comes in at
the darkest casement.
_Printed by_ M’FARLANE & ERSKINE, _Edinburgh_.