Edinburgh Under Sir Walter Scott

by W. T. Fyfe

It was in 1778 that Walter Scott began to attend the Grammar School, or High School of Edinburgh. The High School building stood at the foot of Infirmary Street, in what was called the High School Wynd. The name 'High School Yards' is still attached to a neighbouring lane. The 'Yards' would be the boys' playground. Like other Grammar Schools in Scotland the High School was managed by the Town Council,[1] by whose authority, at a date so early as 1519, the citizens were charged to send their boys to it and to no other school. In 1777 the Town Council erected a new schoolhouse, as the rapidly increasing numbers required more extensive accommodation. It seems that in the eighteenth century the reputation of the school stood very high, and, of course, it had then no rivals in the city. The number of pupils about this time is stated to have been six hundred. The teaching staff consisted of the Rector and four masters.

[1] The school was transferred in 1873 to the School Board of Edinburgh.

The classes were, of course, very large, and the method of teaching was necessarily very simple. Short tasks in Latin, set purely for repetition, were rhymed over by each boy in the same words and the same way. One Henry Cockburn, who joined the school in 1787, says it drove him stupid. 'Oh! the bodily and mental wearisomeness of sitting six hours a day, staring idly at a page, without motion and without thought.' He says the school was notorious for its severity and riotousness, and recalls his feelings of trembling and dizziness when he sat down amidst above a hundred new faces. His master he characterises as being as bad a schoolmaster as it is possible to fancy. Walter Scott was more fortunate. His class was taught by Mr. Luke Fraser, a good Latin scholar and a very worthy man. Walter seems to have enjoyed his school life. In Mr. Fraser's class he was not distinguished as one of the brilliant pupils. To the latter, especially the dux, James Buchan, he pays a warm tribute, and of himself he says: 'I glanced like a meteor from one end of the class to the other, and commonly disgusted my kind master as much by negligence and frivolity as I occasionally pleased him by flashes of intellect and talent. Among my companions, my good-nature and a flow of ready imagination rendered me very popular.... In the winter play-hours, when hard exercise was impossible, my tales used to assemble an admiring audience round Lucky Brown's fireside, and happy was he that could sit next to the inexhaustible narrator. I was also, though often negligent of my own task, always ready to assist my friends; and hence I had a little party of staunch adherents and partisans, stout of hand and heart, though somewhat dull of head—the very tools for raising a hero to eminence. So, on the whole, I made a brighter figure in the yards than in the class.' In speaking of his education, it must be remembered that he always underrates his attainments. There is no doubt that he had a gift for acquiring languages and was a remarkable pupil in every class. But because he was a little behind the others at the start, he seems to have fancied himself somewhat in that position all through. As to the manners and morals of the boys, Scott has left no criticism. Of their outside fun and adventures he has given a lively sketch in the episode of Green-Breeks in the third Appendix to the General Preface of his novels. We learn from Lord Cockburn that in his time and in his opinion, the tone of the school was vulgar and harsh. Among the boys (he states) coarseness of language and manners was the only fashion. An English boy was so rare, that his language was openly laughed at. No lady could be seen within the walls. Nothing evidently civilised was safe. Two of the masters, in particular, were so savage, that any master doing now what they did every hour, would certainly be transported.

The same writer mentions that the boys had to be at school during summer at seven in the morning. Here is his interesting description of his dress as a schoolboy: 'I often think I see myself in my usual High School apparel, which was the common dress of other boys. It consisted of a round black hat; a shirt fastened at the neck by a black ribbon, and except on dress days, unruffled; a cloth waistcoat, rather large, with two rows of buttons and of button-holes, so that it could be buttoned on either side, which, when one side got dirty, was convenient; a single-breasted jacket, which in due time got a tail and became a coat; brown corduroy breeks, tied at the knees by a showy knot of brown cotton tape; worsted stockings in winter, blue cotton stockings in summer, and white cotton for dress; clumsy shoes made to be used on either foot, and each requiring to be used on alternate feet daily; brass or copper buckles. The coat and waistcoat were always of glaring colours, such as bright blue, grass green, and scarlet. I remember well the pride with which I was once rigged out in a scarlet waistcoat and a bright green coat. No such machinery as what are now termed braces or suspenders had then been imagined.'

There was plenty of pride among the High School boys. The roughness of manners and coarseness of speech which they shared with the lower orders never impaired the strong feeling of caste which they imbibed at home. Among the baser spirits it was, of course, selfish and conceited, but it had a better and healthier effect on the finer natures of the few. Even as a boy, Walter Scott, as we have seen, lived much in an ideal world of his own creation. It was largely peopled with the romantic figures of the adventurous past, and the boy must have delighted greatly in the knowledge that many of his heroes of the past were ancestors of his own. Pride of birth was certainly one of his earliest ideals, and it continued to influence him, in a manly and noble spirit, all through life. It colours, as we know, every page of his romantic writings, both verse and prose. It is united always with the ideas of truth, honour, and courage, and strongly allied with a beautiful sentiment of chivalry and grace.

Though he never boasted of his own lineage—vulgarity being alien to his nature—he was always conscious of it, and always lived up to the ideal standard it created in his mind. His pedigree was one in which a romantic antiquary could not but rejoice. On the mother's side he was a lineal descendant of the Swintons of that ilk, a family which (as he records) produced many distinguished warriors in the Middle Ages, and which, for antiquity and honourable alliances, may rank with any in Britain. His father's family, the Scotts of Harden, were still more after his poetical heart. 'Wat of Harden, who came with speed,' was a typical Border chief, the sturdy hero of many a minstrel's lay. For among these rude Borderers not only had every dale its battle, but every river its song. And this attachment to music and song, together with the 'rude species of chivalry in constant use' among the Border clans, raises them to a level amply sufficient for romance. The grandson of Wat of Harden was another Walter Scott, who, not being his father's eldest son, was employed as Factor on the estate of Makerston. It is strange to think of Wat of Harden's grandson in a quasi-legal post and noted as a gentleman of literary leanings. Such he was, however, and a favourite friend of that great physician and elegant Latinist, Archibald Pitcairn. The two used to meet together in Edinburgh, and talked treasonable sentences in majestic Latin. This Walter, indeed, had proved his Jacobite loyalty in a manner worthy of his name. He had fought, 'with conquering Graham,' at Killiecrankie, and now testified his sorrow for the exile of the Stuarts by letting his beard grow, untouched by razor or scissors, as a symbol of mourning, and a visible protest.

This eccentricity gained for him the nickname of 'Beardie,' and it would have been well (says Sir Walter) that his zeal had stopped there. But he took arms, and intrigued in their cause, until he lost all he had in the world. His second son, Robert, was intended for the sea, but a shipwreck, which unfortunately occurred in his first voyage, gave him such a dislike for the salt water, that he refused to go back for a second trial. His father, displeased with his son's perversity, now left him to his own resources. It was the best thing that could have happened, for the youth had grit and character, as his grandson's amusing account of his proceedings sufficiently shows. 'He turned Whig upon the spot, and fairly abjured his father's politics and his learned poverty. His chief and relative, Mr. Scott of Harden, gave him a lease of the farm of Sandyknowe, comprehending the rocks in the centre of which Smailholm or Sandyknowe Tower is situated. He took for his shepherd an old man called Hogg, who willingly lent him, out of respect to his family, his whole savings, about thirty pounds, to stock the new farm. With this sum, which it seems was at that time sufficient for the purpose, the master and the servant set off to purchase a stock of sheep at Whitsun-Tryste, a fair held on a hill near Wooler in Northumberland. The old shepherd went carefully from drove to drove, till he found a hirsel likely to answer their purpose, and then returned to tell his master to come and conclude the bargain. But what was his surprise to see him galloping a mettled hunter about the racecourse, and to find he had expended the whole stock in this extraordinary purchase!—Moses' bargain of green spectacles did not strike more dismay into the Vicar of Wakefield's family, than my grandfather's rashness into the poor old shepherd. The thing, however, was irretrievable, and they returned without the sheep. In the course of a few days, however, my grandfather, who was one of the best horsemen of his time, attended John Scott of Harden's hounds on this same horse, and displayed him to such advantage that he sold him for double the original price. The farm was now stocked in earnest, and the rest of my grandfather's career was that of successful industry.'

The wife of this Robert Scott was Barbara Haliburton, daughter of a Berwickshire laird, whose brother was proprietor of part of the lands of Dryburgh, including the ruins of Dryburgh Abbey. Thus this rare old-world relic, unequalled in its beauty and its hallowed associations, was likely to fall into the hands of the father of Sir Walter Scott. It happened, however, that the old laird, Robert Haliburton, had a weakness for dabbling in trade, and so came to ruin himself. His Dryburgh possessions were sold, and passed for ever out of the hands of the novelist's relations. Scott seems to have felt considerable regret over this incident in his family history. There is a touching note of pathos in the remarks with which he sums it up in his Autobiography: 'And thus we have nothing left of Dryburgh, although my father's maternal inheritance, but the right of stretching our bones where mine may perhaps be laid ere any eye but my own glances over these pages.'

CHAPTER IV

Dr. Adam, Rector of High School—Walter Scott's first Lines—Influence of Adam—Persecution by Nicol—Death-scene of the Rector—Home Life in George Square—Walter Scott the 'Writer'—Anecdotes of his Character.