In times of civil war, personal rencontres of this kind, and even skirmishes between bands of armed men—usually called tulzies—were of no unfrequent occurrence upon the streets of Edinburgh. They abounded during the troublous time of the minority of James VI. On the 24th of November 1567, the Laird of Airth and the Laird of Wemyss met upon the High Street, and, together with their followers, fought a bloody battle, ‘many,’ as Birrel the chronicler reports, ‘being hurte on both sides by shote of pistoll.’ Three days afterwards there was a strict proclamation, forbidding ‘the wearing of guns or pistolls, or aney sick-like fyerwork ingyne, under ye paine of death, the king’s guards and shouldours only excepted.’ This circumstance seems to be referred to in The Abbot, where the Regent Murray, in allusion to Lord Seyton’s rencontre with the Leslies, in which Roland Græme had borne a distinguished part, says: ‘These broils and feuds would shame the capital of the Great Turk, let alone that of a Christian and reformed state. But if I live, this gear shall be amended; and men shall say,’ &c.
On the 30th of July 1588, according to the same authority, Sir William Stewart was slain in Blackfriars Wynd by the Earl of Bothwell [the fifth earl], who was the most famed disturber of the public peace in those times. The quarrel had arisen on a former occasion, on account of some despiteful language used by Sir William, when the fiery earl vowed the destruction of his enemy in words too shocking to be repeated; ‘sua therafter rancountering Sir William in ye Blackfriar Wynd by chance, told him he vold now ...; and vith yat drew his sword; Sir William standing to hes defence, and having hes back at ye vall, ye earle mad a thrust at him vith his raper, and strake him in at the back and out at the belley, and killed him.’
Ten years thereafter, one Robert Cathcart, who had been with the Earl of Bothwell on this occasion, though it does not appear that he took an active hand in the murder, was slain in revenge by William Stewart, son of the deceased, while standing inoffensively at the head of Peebles Wynd, near the Tron.
In June 1605, one William Thomson, a dagger-maker in the West Bow, which was even then remarkable for iron-working handicraftsmen, was slain by John Waterstone, a neighbour of his own, who was next day beheaded on the Castle-hill for his crime.
In 1640, the Lawnmarket was the scene of a personal combat between Major Somerville, commander of the forces then in the Castle, devoted to the Covenanting interest (a relation of Braid Hugh in the preceding extract), and one Captain Crawfuird, which is related in the following picturesque and interesting manner by the same writer: ‘But it would appear this gentleman conceived his affront being publict, noe satisfactione acted in a private way could save his honour; therefore to repair the same, he resolves to challange and fight Somervill upon the High Street of Edenburgh, and at such a tyme when ther should be most spectators. In order to this designe, he takes the occasione, as this gentleman was betwext ten and eleven hours in the foirnoon hastily comeing from the Castle (haveing been then sent for to the Committie of Estates and General Leslie anent some important busines), to assault him in this manner; Somervill being past the Weigh-house, Captaine Crawfuird observeing him, presentlie steps into a high chope upon the south side of the Landmercat, and there layes by his cloak, haveing a long broad sword and a large Highland durke by his side; he comes up to Somervill, and without farder ceremonie sayes: “If you be a pretty man, draw your sword;” and with that word pulles out his oune sword with the dagger. Somervill at first was somewhat stertled at the impudence and boldnesse of the man that durst soe openly and avowedly assault him, being in publict charge, and even then on his duty. But his honour and present preservatione gave him noe tyme to consult the conveniency or inconveniency he was now under, either as to his present charge or disadvantage of weapons, haveing only a great kaine staff[28] in his hand, which for ordinary he walked still with, and that same sword which Generall Rivane had lately gifted him, being a half-rapper sword backed, hinging in a shoulder-belt far back, as the fashion was then, he was forced to guaird two or three strokes with his kaine before he got out his sword, which being now drawne, he soon puts his adversary to the defencive part, by bearing up soe close to him, and putting home his thrusts, that the captaine, for all his courage and advantage of weapons, was forced to give back, having now much adoe to parie the redoubled thrusts that Somervill let in at him, being now agoeing.
‘The combat (for soe in effect it was, albeit accidental) begane about the midle of the Landmercat. Somervill drives doune the captaine, still fighting, neer to the goldsmiths’ chops, where, fearing to be nailled to the boords (these chops being then all of timber), he resolved by ane notable blow to revenge all his former affronts; makeing thairfor a fent, as if he had designed at Somervill’s right side, haveing parried his thrust with his dagger, he suddenly turnes his hand, and by a back-blow with his broadsword he thought to have hamshekelled[29] him in one, if not both of his legges, which Somervill only prevented by nimbly leaping backward at the tyme, interposeing the great kaine that was in his left hand, which was quyte cut through with the violence of the blow. And now Providence soe ordered it, that the captaine missing his mark, overstrake himself soe far, that in tyme he could not recover his sword to a fit posture of defence, untill Somervill, haveing beaten up the dagger that was in the captaine’s left hand with the remaineing part of his oune stick, he instantly closes with him, and with the pummil of his sword he instantly strikes him doune to the ground, where at first, because of his baseness, he was mynded to have nailled him to the ground, but that his heart relented, haveing him in his mercy. And att that same instant ther happened several of his oune soulders to come in, who wer soe incensed, that they wer ready to have cut the poor captaine all in pieces, if he had not rescued him out of theire hands, and saw him safely convoyed to prisone, where he was layd in the irones, and continued in prisone in a most miserable and wretched condition somewhat more than a year.’[30]
THE TINKLARIAN DOCTOR.
In the early part of the last century, the Bowhead was distinguished as the residence of an odd, half-crazy varlet of a tinsmith named William Mitchell, who occasionally held forth as a preacher, and every now and then astounded the quiet people of Edinburgh with some pamphlet full of satirical personalities. He seems to have been altogether a strange mixture of fanaticism, humour, and low cunning. In one of his publications—a single broadside, dated 1713—he has a squib upon the magistrates, in the form of a leit, or list, of a new set, whom he proposes to introduce in their stead. At the end he sets forward a claim on his own behalf, no less than that of representing the city in parliament. In another of his prose pieces he gives a curious account of a journey which he made into France, where, he affirms, ‘the king’s court is six times bigger than the king of Britain’s; his guards have all feathers in their hats, and their horse-tails are to their heels; and their king [Louis XV.] is one of the best-favoured boys that you can look upon—blithe-like, with black hair; and all his people are better natured in general than the Scots or English, except the priests. Their women seem to be modest, for they have no fardingales. The greatest wonder I saw in France, was to see the braw people fall down on their knees on the clarty ground when the priest comes by, carrying the cross, to give a sick person the sacrament.’
The Tinklarian Doctor, for such was his popular appellation, appears to have been fully acquainted with an ingenious expedient, long afterwards held in view by publishers of juvenile toy-books. As in certain sage little histories of Tommy and Harry, King Pepin, &c., we are sure to find that ‘the good boy who loved his lessons’ always bought his books from ‘kind, good, old Mr J. Newberry, at the corner of St Paul’s Churchyard, where the greatest assortment of nice books for good boys and girls is always to be had’—so in the works of Mr Mitchell we find some sly encomium upon the Tinklarian Doctor constantly peeping forth; and in the pamphlet from which the above extract is made, he is not forgetful to impress his professional excellence as a whitesmith. ‘I have,’ he says, ‘a good pennyworth of pewter spoons, fine, like silver—none such made in Edinburgh—and silken pocks for wigs, and French white pearl-beads; all to be sold for little or nothing.’ Vide ‘A part of the works of that Eminent Divine and Historian, Dr William Mitchell, Professor of Tinklarianism in the University of the Bowhead; being a Syze of Divinity, Humanity, History, Philosophy, Law, and Physick; Composed at Various Occasions for his own Satisfaction and the World’s Illumination.’ In his works—all of which were adorned with a cut of the Mitchell arms—he does not scruple to make the personages whom he introduces speak of himself as a much wiser man than the Archbishop of Canterbury, all the clergymen of his native country, and even the magistrates of Edinburgh! One of his last productions was a pamphlet on the murder of Captain Porteous, which he concludes by saying, in the true spirit of a Cameronian martyr: ‘If the king and clergy gar hang me for writing this, I’m content, because it is long since any man was hanged for religion.’ The learned Tinklarian was destined, however, to die in his bed—an event which came to pass in the year 1740.
The profession of which the Tinklarian Doctor subscribed himself a member has long been predominant in the West Bow. We see from a preceding extract that it reckoned dagger-makers among its worthy denizens in the reign of James VI. But this trade has long been happily extinct everywhere in Scotland; though their less formidable brethren the whitesmiths, coppersmiths, and pewterers have continued down to our own day to keep almost unrivalled possession of the Bow. Till within these few years, there was scarcely a shop in this street occupied by other tradesmen; and it might be supposed that the noise of so many hammermen, pent up in a narrow thoroughfare, would be extremely annoying to the neighbourhood. Yet however disagreeable their clattering might seem to strangers, it is generally admitted that the people who lived in the West Bow became habituated to the noise, and felt no inconvenience whatever from its ceaseless operation upon their ears. Nay, they rather experienced inconvenience from its cessation, and only felt annoyed when any period of rest arrived and stopped it. Sunday morning, instead of favouring repose, made them restless; and when they removed to another part of the town, beyond the reach of the sound, sleep was unattainable in the morning for some weeks, till they got accustomed to the quiescence of their new neighbourhood. An old gentleman once told me that, having occasion in his youth to lodge for a short time in the West Bow, he found the incessant clanking extremely disagreeable, and at last entered into a paction with some of the workmen in his immediate neighbourhood, who promised to let him have another hour of quiet sleep in the mornings for the consideration of some such matter as half-a-crown to drink on Saturday night. The next day happening (out of his knowledge) to be some species of Saint Monday, his annoyers did not work at all; but such was the force of a habit acquired even in a week or little more, that our friend awoke precisely at the moment when the hammers used to commence; and he was glad to get his bargain cancelled as soon as possible, for fear of another morning’s want of disturbance.