The father of Lord Eldon was William Scott, a merchant of good means and good repute at Newcastle, his principal business being connected with the coal trade. He lived to be seventy-nine years old, and his wife (a second marriage) to be ninety-one. By her he had thirteen children, of whom John (Lord Eldon) was the eighth. William (Lord Stowell) was born in 1745, the year of the Scottish invasion, in Heworth, where his mother had been sent for her accouchement, to avoid the perils, Newcastle then expecting a siege. After her return to Newcastle, she gave birth to John, June 4, 1751. The house was situated at the end of one of those narrow streets, which in the native dialect are called chares, the extremity being a "chare-foot." A bar story is told of a judge on circuit, who hearing a witness depose that he had seen three men come out of a "chare-foot," desired the jury to disregard his evidence altogether, as none but a madman could say that he saw three men come out of the "foot of a chair." Lord Eldon appears to have been so fond of the jest, that he once stated in the Court of Chancery, that "he had been born in a chair-foot." At the suitable age, John and his brothers were sent to the Foundation Grammar School of Newcastle, then under the headship of one Moises, fellow of Peterhouse. His predecessor had been Dawes, the well-known author of the "Miscellanea Critica"—an able scholar, but only an additional example of the frequent insufficiency of scholars to teach. Dawes was eccentric, and injured the reputation of the school. His predominant propensity while in Newcastle was bell-ringing. On his leaving that place he adopted a new taste, that of rowing. If Moises had any peculiar taste, it seems to have been flogging.
"I was once," said Lord Eldon, "the seventeenth boy whom Moises flogged, and richly did we merit it. There was an elderly lady who lived in Westgate Street, whom we surrounded, and would not allow her to go either backward or forward. She complained, and he flogged us all. When he came to me, he exclaimed, 'What, John Scott! were you there too?' And I was obliged to say, 'Yes, sir.' 'I will not stop,' said he, 'you shall all have it.' But I think I came off best, for his arm was rather tired with the sixteen who went before me."
A flogging may be all very well in its recollection fifty years after. But the impression of the moment was, we presume, not quite so favourable. The inevitable consequence of this habit was to spoil both master and scholars. It made the timid boy pusillanimous, while it made the fierce more indignant and resentful. What could be the feelings of the master who could inflict almost agony on seventeen mere children, let the offence be what it might? Yet the offence was trifling; troublesome behaviour to an old woman in the street. A slight reprimand, or trivial fine, would have properly finished the affair; but then comes the flagellation.
But our great public schools exhibit another offence; the system of fagging alike foolish and mischievous. It only teaches the elder boys to be tyrants, and the younger to be liars and slaves. In practice, it promises to correct itself, by destroying the great schools. The proprietary schools, and other institutions for the education of the people, have uniformly discountenanced this abominable nuisance; and we know none whose abolition would do more credit to the heads of the church, or, if they should remain indolent on the subject, to the heads of the legislature.
William Scott, in 1761, was sent to Oxford as a candidate for a Durham scholarship, which he obtained, but which was perilled by a blunder of the head of Corpus Christi college. This worthy person delivered his opinion in this style:—"I think, gentlemen, there can be no doubt that young Scott is by far the best scholar of them. But he has told us that his father is a fiddler, and I do not quite like to take the son of a fiddler into the college." The doctor was an ass for his dictum; and it is only to be regretted that he did not live to express this impudent opinion in our day. England is certainly growing more rational, whatever colleges may be. Language of that sort, used in a country which boasts that no artificial impediment can be suffered to exist in the career of genius and virtue, would quickly meet the reception merited by its arrogant absurdity. The "fiddler" was a blunder of the doctor for "fitter," the local name of the coal trade.
William, in his twentieth year, became a tutor; John was intended for a coal-merchant, but his brother desired that he should be sent to Oxford. "Send Jack up to me," were the words; "I can do better for him here." He was then under fifteen.
A striking anecdote marks his first starting in life. "When I left school to go to Oxford," said Lord Eldon, "I came up from Newcastle to London in a coach, then denominated, on account of its quick travelling, 'a Fly,' being three or four days and nights on the road. On the panels were the words, Sat cito, si sat bene, (Fast enough, if well enough,) which made a most lasting impression on my mind, and have had their influence on my conduct in all subsequent life." He then exhibits a specimen of that sly humour which characterized him to the last.
"A Quaker fellow-traveller stopped the coach at the inn at Tuxford to give the chambermaid a sixpence, telling her that he had forgotten it when he slept there two years before. I was a very saucy boy, and I said to him, 'Friend, have you seen the motto on the coach?' 'No.' 'Then look at it, for I think giving her only sixpence now is neither sat cito nor sat bene."
On his arrival in London, he was overturned, with his brother, in a sedan chair. "This," thought he, "is more than sat cito, and it certainly is not sat bene." He concludes more gravely by saying, "It was this impression which made me that deliberative judge, as some have said too deliberative. And reflection upon all that is past, will not authorize me to deny, that while I have been thinking, 'Sat cito, si sat bene,' I may not have sufficiently remembered whether 'Sat bene, si sat cito' has had its due influence."
The chief feature of this portion of the biography is its recollections of remarkable persons. We have heard this one of Johnson before: but the names and place are now first given from Lord Eldon's anecdote-book.