The Provost

by John Galt

  CHAPTER XXVI--OF THE PUBLIC LAMPS

  Death is a great reformer of corporate bodies, and we found, now andthen, the benefit of his helping hand in our royal burgh. From the timeof my being chosen into the council; and, indeed, for some years before,Mr Hirple had been a member, but, from some secret and unexpressedunderstanding among us, he was never made a bailie; for he was not liked;having none of that furthy and jocose spirit so becoming in a magistrateof that degree, and to which the gifts of gravity and formality make butan unsubstantial substitute. He was, on the contrary, a queer andquistical man, of a small stature of body, with an outshot breast, thewhich, I am inclined to think, was one of the main causes of our neverpromoting him into the ostensible magistracy; besides, his temper wasexceedingly brittle; and in the debates anent the weightiest concerns ofthe public, he was apt to puff and fiz, and go off with a pluff of angerlike a pioye; so that, for the space of more than five-and-twenty years,we would have been glad of his resignation; and, in the heat of argument,there was no lack of hints to that effect from more than one of hisfriends, especially from Bailie Picken, who was himself a sharp-temperedindividual, and could as ill sit quiet under a contradiction as any man Iever was conjunct with. But just before the close of my secondprovostry, Providence was kind to Mr Hirple, and removed him gently awayfrom the cares, and troubles, and the vain policy of this contendingworld, into, as I hope and trust, a far better place.

  It may seem, hereafter, to the unlearned readers among posterity,particularly to such of them as may happen not to be versed in that stateof things which we were obligated to endure, very strange that I shouldmake this special mention of Mr Hirple at his latter end, seeing andobserving the small store and account I have thus set upon his talentsand personalities. But the verity of the reason is plainly this: wenever discovered his worth and value till we had lost him, or rather,till we found the defect and gap that his death caused, and theaffliction that came in through it upon us in the ill-advised selectionof Mr Hickery to fill his vacant place.

  The spunky nature of Mr Hirple was certainly very disagreeable often tomost of the council, especially when there was any difference of opinion;but then it was only a sort of flash, and at the vote he always, like areasonable man, sided with the majority, and never after attempted to ripup a decision when it was once so settled. Mr Hickery was just the evendown reverse of this. He never, to be sure, ran himself into a passion,but then he continued to speak and argue so long in reply, never heedingthe most rational things of his adversaries, that he was sure to putevery other person in a rage; in addition to all which, he was likewise asorrowful body in never being able to understand how a determination byvote ought to and did put an end to every questionable proceeding; sothat he was, for a constancy, ever harping about the last subjectdiscussed, as if it had not been decided, until a new difference ofopinion arose, and necessitated him to change the burden and o'ercome ofhis wearysome speeches.

  It may seem remarkable that we should have taken such a plague into thecouncil, and be thought that we were well served for our folly; but wewere unacquaint with the character of the man--for although a native ofthe town, he was in truth a stranger, having, at an early age, espousedhis fortune, and gone to Philadelphia in America; and no doubt his argol-bargolous disposition was an inheritance accumulated with his otherconquest of wealth from the mannerless Yankees. Coming home and settlingamong us, with a power of money, (some said eleven thousand pounds,) ashort time before Mr Hirple departed this life, we all thought, on thatevent happening, it would be a very proper compliment to take Mr Hickeryinto the council, and accordingly we were so misfortunate as to do so;but I trow we soon had reason to repent our indiscretion, and none morethan myself, who had first proposed him.

  Mr Hickery having been chosen to supply the void caused by the death ofMr Hirple, in the very first sederunt of the council after his election,he kithed in his true colours.

  Among other things that I had contemplated for the ornament andedification of the burgh, was the placing up of lamps to light thestreets, such as may be seen in all well regulated cities and towns ofany degree. Having spoken of this patriotic project to several of mycolleagues, who all highly approved of the same, I had no jealousy orsuspicion that a design so clearly and luminously useful would meet withany other opposition than, may be, some doubt as to the fiscal abilitiesof our income. To be sure Mr Dribbles, who at that time kept the headinns, and was in the council, said, with a wink, that it might be foundan inconvenience to sober folk that happened, on an occasion now andthen, to be an hour later than usual among their friends, either at hishouse or any other, to be shown by the lamps to the profane populace asthey were making the best of their way home; and Mr Dippings, thecandlemaker, with less public spirit than might have been expected fromone who made such a penny by the illuminations on news of victory, was ofopinion that lamps would only encourage the commonality to keep latehours; and that the gentry were in no need of any thing of the sort,having their own handsome glass lanterns, with two candles in them,garnished and adorned with clippit paper; an equipage which he prophesiedwould soon wear out of fashion when lamps were once introduced, and thewhich prediction I have lived to see verified; for certainly, now-a-days,except when some elderly widow lady, or maiden gentlewoman, wanting thehelp and protection of man, happens to be out at her tea and supper, atight and snod serving lassie, with a three-cornered glass lantern, isnever seen on the causey. But, to return from this digression; savingand excepting the remarks of Mr Dribbles and Mr Dippings, and neither ofthem could be considered as made in a sincere frame of mind, I had noforetaste of any opposition. I was, therefore, but ill prepared for theworrying argument with which Mr Hickery seized upon the scheme, assertingand maintaining, among other apparatus-like reasoning, that in such anorthern climate as that of Scotland, and where the twilight was of suchlong duration, it would be a profligate waste of the public money toemploy it on any thing so little required as lamps were in our streets.

  He had come home from America in the summer time, and I reminded him,that it certainly could never be the intention of the magistrates tolight the lamps all the year round; but that in the winter there was agreat need of them; for in our northern climate the days were then veryshort, as he would soon experience, and might probably recollect. Butnever, surely, was such an endless man created. For, upon this, heimmediately rejoined, that the streets would be much more effectuallylighted, than by all the lamps I proposed to put up, were the inhabitantsordered to sit with their window-shutters open. I really did not knowwhat answer to make to such a proposal, but I saw it would never do toargue with him; so I held my tongue quietly, and as soon as possible, ona pretence of private business, left the meeting, not a little mortifiedto find such a contrary spirit had got in among us.

  After that meeting of the council, I went cannily round to all the othermembers, and represented to them, one by one, how proper it was that thelamps should be set up, both for a credit to the town, and as aconformity to the fashion of the age in every other place. And I tookoccasion to descant, at some length, on the untractable nature of MrHickery, and how it would be proper before the next meeting to agree tosay nothing when the matter was again brought on the carpet, but just tocome to the vote at once. Accordingly this was done, but it made nodifference to Mr Hickery; on the contrary, he said, in a vehement manner,that he was sure there must be some corrupt understanding among us,otherwise a matter of such importance could not have been decided by asilent vote; and at every session of the council, till some new matter ofdifference cast up, he continued cuckooing about the lamp-job, as hecalled it, till he had sickened every body out of all patience.

  CHAPTER XXVII--THE PLAINSTONES

  The first question that changed the bark of Mr Hickery, was my proposalfor the side plainstones of the high street. In the new paving of thecrown of the causey, some years before, the rise in the middle had beenlevelled to an equality with the side loans, and in disposing of the lamp-po
sts, it was thought advantageous to place them halfway from the housesand the syvers, between the loans and the crown of the causey, which hadthe effect at night, of making the people who were wont, in their travelsand visitations, to keep the middle of the street, to diverge into thespace and path between the lamp-posts and the houses. This, especiallyin wet weather, was attended with some disadvantages; for the pavement,close to the houses, was not well laid, and there being then no ronns tothe houses, at every other place, particularly where the nepus-gableswere towards the streets, the rain came gushing in a spout, like as ifthe windows of heaven were opened. And, in consequence, it began to befreely conversed, that there would be a great comfort in having the sidesof the streets paved with flags, like the plainstones of Glasgow, andthat an obligation should be laid on the landlords, to put up ronns tokepp the rain, and to conduct the water down in pipes by the sides of thehouses;--all which furnished Mr Hickery with fresh topics for hisfasherie about the lamps, and was, as he said, proof and demonstration ofthat most impolitic, corrupt, and short-sighted job, the consequences ofwhich would reach, in the shape of some new tax, every ramification ofsociety;--with divers other American argumentatives to the same effect.However, in process of time, by a judicious handling and the help of anadvantageous free grassum, which we got for some of the town lands fromMr Shuttlethrift the manufacturer, who was desirous to build avilla-house, we got the flagstone part of the project accomplished, andthe landlords gradually, of their own free-will, put up the ronns, bywhich the town has been greatly improved and convenienced.

  But new occasions call for new laws; the side pavement, concentrating thepeople, required to be kept cleaner, and in better order, than when thewhole width of the street was in use; so that the magistrates wereconstrained to make regulations concerning the same, and to enact finesand penalties against those who neglected to scrape and wash theplainstones forenent their houses, and to denounce, in the strictestterms, the emptying of improper utensils on the same; and this, until thepeople had grown into the habitude of attending to the rules, gave riseto many pleas, and contentious appeals and bickerings, before themagistrates. Among others summoned before me for default, was one MrsFenton, commonly called the Tappit-hen, who kept a small change-house,not of the best repute, being frequented by young men, of a station oflife that gave her heart and countenance to be bardy, even to thebailies. It happened that, by some inattention, she had, one frostymorning, neglected to soop her flags, and old Miss Peggy Dainty beingearly afoot, in passing her door committed a false step, by treading on abit of a lemon's skin, and her heels flying up, down she fell on herback, at full length, with a great cloyt. Mrs Fenton, hearing theaccident, came running to the door, and seeing the exposure that perjinkMiss Peggy had made of herself, put her hands to her sides, and laughedfor some time as if she was by herself. Miss Peggy, being sorely hurt inthe hinder parts, summoned Mrs Fenton before me, where the whole affair,both as to what was seen and heard, was so described, with name andsurname, that I could not keep my composure. It was, however, mademanifest, that Mrs Fenton had offended the law, in so much, as her flagshad not been swept that morning; and therefore, to appease the offendeddelicacy of Miss Peggy, who was a most respectable lady in single life, Ifined the delinquent five shillings.

  "Mr Pawkie," said the latheron, "I'll no pay't. Whar do ye expeck awidow woman like me can get five shillings for ony sic nonsense?"

  "Ye must not speak in that manner, honest woman," was my reply; "but justpay the fine."

  "In deed and truth, Mr Pawkie," quo she, "it's ill getting a breek off ahighlandman. I'll pay no sic thing--five shillings--that's a story!"

  I thought I would have been constrained to send her to prison, the womangrew so bold and contumacious, when Mr Hickery came in, and hearing whatwas going forward, was evidently working himself up to take the randy'spart; but fortunately she had a suspicion that all the town-council andmagistrates were in league against her, on account of the repute of herhouse, so that when he enquired of her where she lived, with a view, as Isuspect, of interceding, she turned to him, and with a leer and a laugh,said, "Dear me, Mr Hickery, I'm sure ye hae nae need to speer that!"

  The insinuation set up his birses; but she bamboozled him with herbanter, and raised such a laugh against him, that he was fairly drivenfrom the council room, and I was myself obliged to let her go, withoutexacting the fine.

  Who would have thought that this affair was to prove to me the means ofan easy riddance of Mr Hickery? But so it turned out; for whether or notthere was any foundation for the traffickings with him which shepretended, he never could abide to hear the story alluded to, which, whenI discerned, I took care, whenever he showed any sort of inclination tomolest the council with his propugnacity, to joke him about his bonnysweetheart, "the Tappit-hen," and he instantly sang dumb, and quietlyslipped away; by which it may be seen how curiously events come to pass,since, out of the very first cause of his thwarting me in the lamps, Ifound, in process of time, a way of silencing him far better than anysort of truth or reason.

  CHAPTER XXVIII--THE SECOND CROP OF VOLUNTEERS

  I have already related, at full length, many of the particulars anent theelecting of the first set of volunteers; the which, by being germinatedpartly under the old system of public intromission, was done with moremanagement and slight of art than the second. This, however, I will evermaintain, was not owing to any greater spirit of corruption; but only andsolely to following the ancient dexterous ways, that had been, in amanner, engrained with the very nature of every thing pertaining to therepresentation of government as it existed, not merely in burgh towns,but wheresoever the crown and ministers found it expedient to have theirlion's paw.

  Matters were brought to a bearing differently, when, in the secondedition of the late war, it was thought necessary to call on the peopleto resist the rampageous ambition of Bonaparte, then champing andtrampling for the rich pastures of our national commonwealth.Accordingly, I kept myself aloof from all handling in the pecuniaries ofthe business; but I lent a friendly countenance to every feasible projectthat was likely to strengthen the confidence of the king in the loyaltyand bravery of his people. For by this time I had learnt, that there wasa wake-rife common sense abroad among the opinions of men; and that thesecret of the new way of ruling the world was to follow, not to control,the evident dictates of the popular voice; and I soon had reason tofelicitate myself on this prudent and seasonable discovery. For it wonme great reverence among the forward young men, who started up at thecall of their country; and their demeanour towards me was as tokens andarles, from the rising generation, of being continued in respect andauthority by them. Some of my colleagues, who are as well not named, bymaking themselves over busy, got but small thank for their pains. I waseven preferred to the provost, as the medium of communicating thesentiments of the volunteering lads to the lord-lieutenant; and theircause did not suffer in my hands, for his lordship had long been in thehabit of considering me as one of the discreetest men in the burgh; andalthough he returned very civil answers to all letters, he wrote to me inthe cordial erudition of an old friend--a thing which the volunteers soondiscerned, and respected me accordingly.

  But the soldiering zeal being spontaneous among all ranks, and breakingforth into ablaze without any pre-ordered method, some of the magistrateswere disconcerted, and wist not what to do. I'll no take it upon me tosay that they were altogether guided by a desire to have a finger in thepie, either in the shape of the honours of command or the profits ofcontract. This, however, is certain, that they either felt or feigned agreat alarm and consternation at seeing such a vast military power incivil hands, over which they had no natural control; and, as was said,independent of the crown and parliament. Another thing there could be nodoubt of: in the frame of this fear they remonstrated with thegovernment, and counselled the ministers to throw a wet blanket on theardour of the volunteering, which, it is well known, was very readilydone; for the ministers, on seeing such a pressing forw
ard to join thebanners of the kingdom, had a dread and regard to the old leaven ofJacobinism, and put a limitation on the number of the armed men that wereto be allowed to rise in every place--a most ill-advised prudence, as wasmade manifest by what happened among us, of which I will now rehearse theparticulars, and the part I had in it myself.