The Edinburgh populace was noted, during many ages, for its readiness
to rise in tumultuary fashion, whether under the prompting of religious
zeal or from inferior motives. At an early time they became an
impromptu army, each citizen possessing weapons which he was ready
and willing to use. Thus they are understood to have risen in 1482 to
redeem James III. from restraint in the Castle; for which service,
besides certain privileges, ‘he granted them,’ says Maitland, ‘a banner
or standard, with a power to display the same in defence of their
king, country, and their own right.’ The historian adds: ‘This flag,
at present denominated the BLUE BLANKET, is kept by the Convener of
the Trades; at whose appearance therewith, ’tis said that not only
the artificers of Edinburgh are obliged to repair to it, but all the
artisans or craftsmen within Scotland are bound to follow it, and fight
under the Convener of Edinburgh, as aforesaid.’ The Blue Blanket, I may
mention, has become a sort of myth in Edinburgh, being magnified by the
popular imagination into a banner which the citizens carried with them
to the Holy Land in one of the Crusades—expeditions which took place
before Edinburgh had become a town fit to furnish any distinct corps of
armed men.[157]
When the Protestant faith came to stir up men’s minds, the lower order
of citizens became a formidable body indeed. James VI., who had more
than once experienced their violence, and consequently knew them well,
says very naïvely in his _Basilicon Doron_, or ‘Book of Instruction’ to
his son: ‘They think we should be content with their work, how bad and
dear soever it be; and if they be in anything controuled, up goeth the
_Blue Blanket_!’
The tumults at the introduction of the Service-book, in 1637, need
only be alluded to. So late as the Revolution there appears a military
spirit of great boldness in the Edinburgh populace, reminding us of
that of Paris in our own times: witness the bloody contests which took
place in accomplishing the destruction of the papistical arrangements
at the Abbey, December 1688. The Union mobs were of unexampled
violence; and Edinburgh was only kept in some degree of quiet, during
the greater part of that crisis, by a great assemblage of troops.
Finally, in the Porteous mob we have a singular example of popular
vengeance, wreaked out in the most cool but determined manner. Men seem
to have been habitually under an impression in those days that the
law was at once an imperfect and a partial power. They seem to have
felt themselves constantly liable to be called upon to supplement its
energy, or control or compensate for its errors. The mob had at that
time a part in the state.
[Illustration: ‘General’ Joe Smith laying down the Law to the
Magistrates.]
In this ‘fierce democracy’ there once arose a mighty Pyrrhus, who
contrived, by dint of popular qualifications, to subject the rabble to
his command, and to get himself elected, by acclamation, dictator of
all its motions and exploits. How he acquired his wonderful power is
not recorded; but it is to be supposed that his activity on occasions
of mobbing, his boldness and sagacity, his strong voice and uncommonly
powerful whistle, together with the mere whim or humour of the thing,
conspired to his promotion. His trade was that of a cobbler, and he
resided in some obscure den in the Cowgate. His person was low and
deformed, with the sole good property of great muscular strength in the
arms. Yet this wretch, miserable and contemptible as he appeared, might
be said to have had at one time the command of the Scottish metropolis.
The magistrates, it is true, assembled every Wednesday forenoon to
manage the affairs and deliberate upon the improvements of the city;
but their power was merely that of a viceroyalty. _Bowed Joseph_,
otherwise called General Joseph Smith, was the only true potentate;
and their resolutions could only be carried into effect when not
inconsistent with his views of policy.
In exercising the functions of his perilous office, it does not appear
that he ever drew down the vengeance of the more lawfully constituted
authorities of the land. On the contrary, he was in some degree
countenanced by the magistracy, who, however, patronised him rather
from fear than respect. They frequently sent for him in emergencies,
in order to consult with him regarding the best means of appeasing
and dispersing the mob. On such occasions nothing could equal the
consequential air which he assumed. With one hand stuck carelessly into
his side, and another slapped resolutely down upon the table—with a
majestic toss of the head, and as much fierceness in his little gray
eye as if he were himself a mob—he would stand before the anxious and
feeble council, pleading the cause of his compeers, and suggesting the
best means of assuaging their just fury. He was generally despatched
with a promise of amendment and a hogshead of good ale, with which
he could easily succeed in appeasing his men, whose dismissal, after
a speech from himself and a libation from the barrel, was usually
accomplished by the simple words: ‘_Now disperse, my lads!_’
Joseph was not only employed in directing and managing the mobs, but
frequently performed exploits without the co-operation of his greasy
friends, though always for their amusement and in their behalf. Thus,
for instance, when Wilkes by his celebrated Number 45 incensed the
Scottish nation so generally and so bitterly, Joseph got a cart, fitted
up with a high gallows, from which depended a straw-stuffed effigy of
North Britain’s arch-enemy, with the devil perched upon his shoulder;
and this he paraded through the streets, followed by the multitude,
till he came to the Gallow Lee in Leith Walk, where two criminals were
then hanging in chains, beside whom he exposed the figures of Wilkes
and his companion. Thus also, when the Douglas cause was decided
against the popular opinion in the Court of Session, Joseph went up to
the chair of the Lord President as he was going home to his house, and
called him to account for the injustice of his decision. After the said
decision was reversed by the House of Lords, Joseph, by way of triumph
over the Scottish court, dressed up fifteen figures in rags and wigs,
resembling the judicial attire, mounted them on asses, and led them
through the streets, telling the populace that they saw the fifteen
senators of the College of Justice!
When the craft of shoemakers used, in former times, to parade the High
Street, West Bow, and Grassmarket, with inverted tin kettles on their
heads and schoolboys’ rulers in their hands, Joseph—who, though a
leader and commander on every other public occasion, was not admitted
into this procession on account of his being only a cobbler—dressed
himself in his best clothes, with a royal crown painted and gilt and a
wooden truncheon, and marched pompously through the city till he came
to the Netherbow, where he planted himself in the middle of the street
to await the approach of the procession, which he, as a citizen of
Edinburgh, proposed to welcome into the town. When the royal shoemaker
came to the Netherbow Port, Joseph stood forth, removed the truncheon
from his haunch, flourished it in the air, and pointing it to the
ground, with much dignity of manner, addressed his paste-work majesty
in these words: ‘O great King Crispianus! what are we in thy sight but
a parcel of puir slaister-kytes—creeshy cobblers—sons of bitches?’
And I have been assured that this ceremony was performed in a style of
burlesque exhibiting no small artistic power.
Joseph had a wife, whom he would never permit to walk beside him, it
being his opinion that women are inferior to the male part of creation,
and not entitled to the same privileges. He compelled his spouse to
walk a few paces behind him; and when he turned, she was obliged to
make a circuit so as to maintain the precise distance from his person
which he assigned to her. When he wished to say anything to her, he
whistled as upon a dog, upon which she came up to him submissively and
heard what he had to say; after which she respectfully resumed her
station in the rear.
After he had figured for a few years as an active partisan of the
people, his name waxed of such account with them that it is said he
could in the course of an hour collect a crowd of not fewer than ten
thousand persons, all ready to obey his high behests, or to disperse
at his bidding. In collecting his troops he employed a drum, which,
though a general, he did not disdain to beat with his own hands; and
never, surely, had the fiery cross of the Highland chief such an effect
upon the warlike devotion of his clan as Bowed Joseph’s drum had upon
the spirit of the Edinburgh rabble. As he strode along, the street was
cleared of its loungers, every close pouring forth an addition to his
train, like the populous glens adjacent to a large Highland strath
giving forth their accessions to the general force collected by the
aforesaid cross. The Town Rats, who might peep forth like old cautious
snails on hearing his drum, would draw in their horns with a Gaelic
execration, and shut their door, as he approached; while the _Lazy
Corner_ was, at sight of him, a lazy corner no longer; and the West Bow
ceased to resound as he descended.
It would appear, after all, that there was a moral foundation for
Joseph’s power, as there must be for that of all governments of a more
regular nature that would wish to thrive or be lasting. The little man
was never known to act in a bad cause, or in any way to go against the
principles of natural justice. He employed his power in the redress
of such grievances as the law of the land does not or cannot easily
reach; and it was apparent that almost everything he did was for the
sake of what he himself designated _fair-play_. Fair-play, indeed, was
his constant object, whether in clearing room with his brawny arms for
a boxing-match, insulting the constituted authorities, sacking the
granary of a monopolist, or besieging the Town-council in their chamber.
An anecdote which proves this strong love of fair-play deserves to be
recorded. A poor man in the Pleasance having been a little deficient
in his rent, and in the country on business, his landlord seized and
rouped his household furniture, turning out the family to the street.
On the poor man’s return, finding the house desolate and his family in
misery, he went to a neighbouring stable and hanged himself.[158] Bowed
Joseph did not long remain ignorant of the case; and as soon as it
was generally known in the city, he shouldered on his drum, and after
beating it through the streets for half-an-hour, found himself followed
by several thousand persons, inflamed with resentment at the landlord’s
cruelty. With this army he marched to an open space of ground now
covered by Adam Street, Roxburgh Street, &c., named in former times
Thomson’s Park, where, mounted upon the shoulders of six of his
lieutenant-generals, he proceeded to harangue them, in Cambyses’s vein,
concerning the flagrant oppression which they were about to revenge.
He concluded by directing his men to sack the premises of the cruel
landlord, who by this time had wisely made his escape; and this order
was instantly obeyed. Every article which the house contained was
brought out to the street, where, being piled up in a heap, the general
set fire to them with his own hand, while the crowd rent the air with
their acclamations. Some money and bank-notes perished in the blaze,
besides an eight-day clock, which, sensible to the last, calmly struck
ten just as it was consigned to the flames.
On another occasion, during a scarcity, the mob, headed by Joseph, had
compelled all the meal-dealers to sell their meal at a certain price
per peck, under penalty of being obliged to shut up their shops. One of
them, whose place of business was in the Grassmarket, agreed to sell
his meal at the price fixed by the general, for the good of the poor,
as he said; and he did so under the superintendence of Joseph, who
stationed a party at the shop-door to preserve peace and good order
till the whole stock was disposed of, when, by their leader’s command,
the mob gave three hearty cheers, and quietly dispersed. Next day, the
unlucky victualler let his friends know that he had not suffered so
much by this compulsory trade as might be supposed; because, though the
price was below that of the market, he had taken care to use a measure
which gave only about three-fourths instead of the whole. It was not
long ere this intelligence came to the ears of our tribune, who,
immediately collecting a party of his troops, beset the meal-dealer
before he was aware, and compelled him to pay back a fourth of the
price of every peck of meal sold; then giving their victim a hearty
drubbing, they sacked his shop, and quietly dispersed as before.
Some foreign princes happening to visit Edinburgh during Joseph’s
administration, at a period of the year when the mob of Edinburgh
was wont to amuse itself with an annual burning of the pope, the
magistrates felt anxious that this ceremony should for once be
dispensed with, as it might hurt the feelings of their distinguished
visitors. The provost, in this emergency, resolved not to employ his
own authority, but that of Joseph, to whom, accordingly, he despatched
his compliments, with half a guinea, begging his kind offices in
dissuading the mob from the performance of their accustomed sport.
Joseph received the message with the respect due to the commission of
‘his friend the Lord Provost,’ and pocketed the half-guinea with a
complacent smile; but standing up to his full height, and resolutely
shaking his rough head, he gave for answer that ‘he was highly
gratified by his lordship’s message; but, everything considered, the
pope _must be burnt_!’ And so the pope, honest man, _was_ burnt with
all the honours accordingly.
Joseph was at last killed by a fall from the top of a Leith
stage-coach, in returning from the races, while in a state of
intoxication, about the year 1780. It is to be hoped, for the good of
society, that ‘we ne’er shall look upon his like again.’[159]