The dancing assemblies of Edinburgh were for many years, about the
middle of the last century, under the direction and dictatorship of
the Honourable Miss Nicky Murray, one of the sisters of the Earl of
Mansfield. Much good sense, firmness, knowledge of the world and of
the histories of individuals, as well as a due share of patience and
benevolence, were required for this office of unrecognised though
real power; and it was generally admitted that Miss Murray possessed
the needful qualifications in a remarkable degree, though rather more
marked by good manners than good-nature. She and her sisters lived for
many years in a floor of a large building at the head of Bailie Fife’s
Close—a now unhallowed locality, where, I believe, Francis Jeffrey
attended his first school. In their narrow mansion, the Miss Murrays
received flights of young lady-cousins from the country, to be finished
in their manners and introduced into society. No light task must theirs
have been, all things considered. I find a highly significant note on
the subject inserted by an old gentleman in an interleaved copy of my
first edition: ‘It was from Miss Nicky Murray’s—a relation of the Gray
family—that my father ran off with my mother, then not sixteen years
old.’
The Assembly Room of that time was in the _close_ where the
Commercial Bank was afterwards established.[221] First there
was a lobby, where chairs were disburdened of their company,
and where a reduced gentleman, with pretensions to the title of
Lord Kirkcudbright—descendant of the once great Maclellans of
Galloway—might have been seen selling gloves; this being the person
alluded to in a letter written by Goldsmith while a student in
Edinburgh: ‘One day, happening to slip into Lord Kilcobry’s—don’t be
surprised, his lordship is only a glover!’ The dancing-room opened
directly from the lobby, and above stairs was a tea-room. The
former had a railed space in the centre, within which the dancers
were arranged, while the spectators sat round on the outside; and no
communication was allowed between the different sides of this sacred
pale. The lady-directress had a high chair or throne at one end. Before
Miss Nicky Murray, Lady Elliot of Minto and Mrs Brown of Coalstoun,
wives of judges, had exercised this lofty authority, which was thought
honourable on account of the charitable object of the assemblies.
The arrangements were of a rigid character, and certainly tending to
dullness. There being but one set allowed to dance at a time, it was
seldom that any person was twice on the floor in one night. The most of
the time was spent in acting the part of lookers-on, which threw great
duties in the way of conversation upon the gentlemen. These had to
settle with a partner for the year, and were upon no account permitted
to change, even for a single night. The appointment took place at the
beginning of the season, usually at some private party or ball given
by a person of distinction, where the fans of the ladies were all put
into a gentleman’s cocked hat; the gentlemen put in their hands and
took a fan, and to whomsoever the fan belonged, that was to be his
partner for the season. In the general rigours of this system, which
sometimes produced ludicrous combinations, there was, however, one
palliative—namely, the fans being all distinguishable from each other,
and the gentleman being in general as well acquainted with the fan as
the face of his mistress, and the hat being open, it was possible to
peep in, and exercise, to a certain extent, a principle of selection,
whereby he was perhaps successful in procuring an appointment to his
mind. All this is spiritedly given in a poem of Sir Alexander Boswell:
‘Then were the days of modesty of mien!
Stays for the fat, and quilting for the lean;
The ribboned stomacher, in many a plait,
Upheld the chest, and dignified the gait;
Some Venus, brightest planet of the train,
Moved in a lustering _halo_, propped with cane.
Then the _Assembly Close_ received the fair—
Order and elegance presided there—
Each gay Right Honourable had her place,
To walk a minuet with becoming grace.
No racing to the dance, with rival hurry—
Such was thy sway, O famed Miss Nicky Murray!
Each lady’s fan a chosen Damon bore,
With care selected many a day before;
For, unprovided with a favourite beau,
The nymph, chagrined, the ball must needs forego;
But, previous matters to her taste arranged,
_Certes_, the constant couple never changed;
Through a long night, to watch fair Delia’s will,
The same dull swain was at her elbow still.’
A little before Miss Nicky’s time, it was customary for gentlemen to
walk alongside the chairs of their partners, with their swords by their
sides, and so escort them home. They called next afternoon upon their
Dulcineas to inquire how they were and drink tea. The fashionable time
for seeing company in those days was the evening, when people were
all abroad upon the street, as in the forenoon now, making calls and
_shopping_. The people who attended the assemblies were very _select_.
Moreover, they were all known to each other; and the introduction of a
stranger required nice preliminaries. It is said that Miss Murray, on
hearing a young lady’s name pronounced for the first time, would say:
‘Miss ——, of what?’ If no territorial addition could be made, she
manifestly cooled. Upon one occasion, seeing a man at the assembly who
was born in a low situation and raised to wealth in some humble trade,
she went up to him, and, without the least deference to his fine-laced
coat, taxed him with presumption in coming there, and turned him out of
the room.
Major Topham praises the regularity and propriety observed at the
assemblies, though gently insinuating their heaviness. He says: ‘I was
never at an assembly where the authority of the manager was so observed
or respected. With the utmost politeness, affability, and good-humour,
Miss Murray attends to every one. All petitions are heard, and demands
granted, which appear reasonable. The company is so much the more
obliged to Miss Murray, as the task is by no means to be envied.
The crowd which immediately surrounds her on entering the room, the
impetuous applications of _chaperons_, maiden-aunts, and the earnest
entreaties of lovers to obtain a ticket in one of the first sets for
the dear object, render the fatigue of the office of lady-directress
almost intolerable.’[222]
Early hours were kept in those days, and the stinted time was never
exceeded. When the proper hour arrived for dissolving the party, and
the young people would crowd round the throne to petition for one other
set, up rose Miss Nicky in unrelenting rigidity of figure, and with one
wave of her hand silenced the musicians:
‘Quick from the summit of the grove they fell,
And left it inharmonious.’