One is disposed to pause a moment on Steil’s name, as it is honourably
connected with the history of music in Scotland. Being a zealous lover
of the divine science and a good singer of the native melodies, he had
rendered his house a favourite resort of all who possessed a similar
taste, and here actually was formed (1728) the first regular society of
amateur musicians known in our country. It numbered seventy persons,
and met once a week, the usual entertainments consisting in playing
on the harpsichord and violin the concertos and sonatas of Handel,
then newly published. Apparently, however, this fraternity did not
long continue to use Steil’s house, if I am right in supposing his
retirement from business as announced in an advertisement of February
1729, regarding ‘a sale by auction, of the haill pictures, prints,
music-books, and musical instruments, belonging to Mr John Steill’
(_Caledonian Mercury_).
Coming down to a later time—1760-1770—we find the tavern in highest
vogue to have been _Fortune’s_, in the house which the Earl of
Eglintoune had once occupied in the Stamp-office Close. The gay men
of rank, the scholarly and philosophical, the common citizens, all
flocked hither; and the royal commissioner for the General Assembly
held his levees here, and hence proceeded to church with his cortège,
then additionally splendid from having ladies walking in it in their
court-dresses as well as gentlemen.[143] Perhaps the most remarkable
set of men who met here was the POKER CLUB,[144] consisting of Hume,
Robertson, Blair, Fergusson, and many others of that brilliant galaxy,
but whose potations were comparatively of a moderate kind.
The _Star and Garter_, in Writers’ Court, kept by one Clerihugh (the
_Clerihugh’s_ alluded to in _Guy Mannering_), was another tavern
of good consideration, the favourite haunt of the magistrates and
Town-council, who in those days mixed much more of private enjoyments
with public duties than would now be considered fitting.[145] Here the
Rev. Dr Webster used to meet them at dinner, in order to give them the
benefit of his extensive knowledge and great powers of calculation when
they were scheming out the New Town.
A favourite house for many of the last years of the bygone century
was _Douglas’s_, in the Anchor Close, near the Cross, a good specimen
of those profound retreats which have been spoken of as valued in the
inverse ratio of the amount of daylight which visited them. You went
a few yards down the dark, narrow alley, passing on the left hand the
entry to a scale stair, decorated with ‘THE LORD IS ONLY MY SVPORT;’
then passed another door, bearing the still more antique legend: ‘O
LORD, IN THE IS AL MY TRAIST;’ immediately beyond, under an architrave
calling out ‘BE MERCIFVL TO ME,’ you entered the hospitable mansion
of Dawney Douglas, the scene of the daily and nightly orgies of the
Pleydells and Fairfords, the Hays, Erskines, and Crosbies, of the time
of our fathers. Alas! how fallen off is now that temple of Momus and
the Bacchanals! You find it divided into a multitude of small lodgings,
where, instead of the merry party, vociferous with toasts and catches,
you are most likely to be struck by the spectacle of some poor lone
female, pining under a parochial allowance, or a poverty-struck family
group, one-half of whom are disposed on sick-beds of straw mingled with
rags—the terrible exponents of our peculiar phasis of civilisation.
The frequenter of Douglas’s, after ascending a few steps, found himself
in a pretty large kitchen—a dark, fiery Pandemonium, through which
numerous ineffable ministers of flame were continually flying about,
while beside the door sat the landlady, a large, fat woman, in a
towering head-dress and large-flowered silk gown, who bowed to every
one passing. Most likely on emerging from this igneous region, the
party would fall into the hands of Dawney himself, and so be conducted
to an apartment. A perfect contrast was he to his wife: a thin, weak,
submissive man, who spoke in a whisper, never but in the way of answer,
and then, if possible, only in monosyllables. He had a habit of using
the word ‘quietly’ very frequently, without much regard to its being
appropriate to the sense; and it is told that he one day made the
remark that ‘the Castle had been firing to-day—_quietly_;’ which, it
may well be believed, was not soon forgotten by his customers. Another
trait of Dawney was that some one lent him a volume of Clarendon’s
history to read, and daily frequenting the room where it lay, used
regularly, for some time, to put back the reader’s mark to the same
place; whereupon, being by-and-by asked how he liked the book, Dawney
answered: ‘Oh, very weel; but dinna ye think it’s gay mickle the same
thing o’er again?’ The house was noted for suppers of tripe, rizzared
haddocks, mince collops, and _hashes_, which never cost more than
sixpence a head. On charges of this moderate kind the honest couple
grew extremely rich before they died.
The principal room in this house was a handsome one of good size,
having a separate access by the second of the entries which have been
described, and only used for large companies, or for guests of the
first importance. It was called _the Crown Room_, or _the Crown_—so
did the guests find it distinguished on the tops of their bills—and
this name it was said to have acquired in consequence of its having
once been used by Queen Mary as a council-room, on which occasions
the emblem of sovereignty was disposed in a niche in the wall, still
existing. How the queen should have had any occasion to hold councils
in this place tradition does not undertake to explain; but assuredly,
when we consider the nature of all public accommodations in that time,
we cannot say there is any decided improbability in the matter. The
house appears of sufficient age for the hypothesis. Perhaps we catch a
hint on the general possibility from a very ancient house farther down
the close, of whose original purpose or owners we know nothing, but
which is adumbrated by this legend:
ANGVSTA AD VSVM AVGVSTA[M]
W F B G
The Crown Room, however, is elegant enough to have graced even the
presence of Queen Mary, so that she only had not had to reach it by the
Anchor Close. It is handsomely panelled, with a decorated fireplace,
and two tall windows towards the alley. At present this supposed seat
of royal councils, and certain seat of the social enjoyments of many
men of noted talents, forms a back-shop to Mr Ford, grocer, High
Street, and, all dingy and out of countenance, serves only to store
hams, firkins of butter, packages of groceries, and bundles of dried
cod.[146]
The gentle Dawney had an old Gaelic song called Crochallan, which he
occasionally sang to his customers. This led to the establishment of
a club at his house, which, with a reference to the militia regiments
then raising, was called the Crochallan Corps, or Crochallan Fencibles,
and to which belonged, amongst other men of original character and
talent, the well-known William Smellie, author of the _Philosophy of
Natural History_. Each member bore a military title, and some were
endowed with ideal offices of a ludicrous character: for example, a
lately surviving associate had been _depute-hangman_ to the corps.
Individuals committing a fault were subjected to a mock trial, in which
such members as were barristers could display their forensic talents
to the infinite amusement of the brethren. Much mirth and not a little
horse-play prevailed. Smellie, while engaged professionally in printing
the Edinburgh edition of the poems of Burns, introduced that genius
to the Crochallans, when a scene of rough banter took place between
him and certain privileged old hands, and the bard declared at the
conclusion that he had ‘never been so abominably thrashed in his life.’
There was one predominant wit, Willie Dunbar by name, of whom the poet
has left a characteristic picture:
‘As I came by Crochallan,
I cannily keekit ben—
Rattling roaring Willie
Was sitting at yon board en’—
Sitting at yon board en’,
Amang gude companie;
Rattling roaring Willie,
Ye’re welcome hame to me!’
He has also described Smellie as coming to Crochallan with his old
cocked hat, gray surtout, and beard rising in its might:
‘Yet though his caustic wit was biting, rude,
His heart was warm, benevolent, and good.’
The printing-office of this strange genius being at the bottom of the
close, the transition from the correction of proofs to the roaring
scenes at Crochallan must have been sufficiently easy for Burns.
[Illustration: UPPER BAXTER’S CLOSE.
Where Burns first resided in Edinburgh.