Reminiscences of Scottish Life and Character by Edward Bannerman Ramsay

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REMINISCENCES OF SCOTTISH LIFE & CHARACTER

BY THE LATE E. B. RAMSAY, LL.D., F.R.S.E.

DEAN OF EDINBURGH

Twenty-Second Edition, Enlarged,
With the Author's Latest Corrections and Additions

And a Memoir of Dean Ramsay

By Cosmo Innes

1874

CONTENTS.

MEMOIR OF DEAN RAMSAY

PREFACE TO TWENTY-SECOND EDITION

CHAPTER I.

INTRODUCTORY

CHAPTER II.

SCOTTISH RELIGIOUS FEELINGS AND OBSERVANCES

CHAPTER III.

ON OLD SCOTTISH CONVIVIALITY

CHAPTER IV.

ON THE OLD SCOTTISH DOMESTIC SERVANT

CHAPTER V.

SCOTTISH JUDGES

CHAPTER VI.

ON HUMOUR PROCEEDING FROM SCOTTISH EXPRESSIONS,
INCLUDING SCOTTISH PROVERBS

CHAPTER VII.

ON SCOTTISH STORIES OF WIT AND HUMOUR

CONCLUSION

INDEX

MEMOIR OF DEAN RAMSAY.

I.

The friends of Dean Ramsay desiring a memorial of his life, his friendly
publishers, and his nearest relatives, have asked me to undertake the
work, and placed in my hands some materials giving authentic facts and
dates, and illustrating the Dean's own views on the leading events
of his life.

I feel myself excluded from dealing with one important part of such a
life, for I could not take upon me to speak with confidence or authority
upon church doctrines or church government. On the other hand, for the
_man_ I have that full sympathy which I suppose ought to exist between
the writer and the subject of the biography.

We were very old friends, natives of the same district, bred among a
people peculiar in manners and language, a people abounding in a racy
humour, differing from what prevails in most parts of Scotland--a
peculiarity which it was the joy of the Dean to bring before his
countrymen in his _Reminiscences_; and although he and I were not
kindred of blood, his relatives and friends were very much mine, and my
uncles and aunts were also his.

Edward Bannerman Burnett, known in after life as Edward Ramsay, and
Dean of Edinburgh, was born at Aberdeen on the last day of January 1793.
His father, Alexander, second son of Sir Thomas Burnett, Baronet, of
Leys, was an advocate, and sheriff of Kincardineshire, where the family
estates lay. The sheriff was of delicate constitution, and travelled in
the south of Europe for his health, until obliged to fly from the French
Revolution; and at Aberdeen, the first place where he and his wife
stopped, Edward was born. The Dean's mother was Elizabeth, the elder
daughter of Sir Alexander Bannerman of Elsick, and she and her sister
Mary, afterwards Mrs. Russell, were co-heirs of his estates in the
pretty valley of the Feugh, including the whole parish of Strachan, of
which the southern part, looking over into the _How_ of the Mearns, was
Mrs. Burnett's portion; the northern, with the beautiful bank of Dee
where Blackhall stands, falling to Mrs. Russell. Both sisters were
eminently handsome. I have a tradition of the young ladies, when they
first came from their York school to Edinburgh, being followed and gazed
at by passengers in the streets, for their beauty; and there are many
still living in Edinburgh who long after gazed with admiration on the
fine old lady, the Dean's mother, bending over her embroidery frame in
her window in Darnaway Street.

Alexander Burnett and his wife Elizabeth Bannerman had a large family.
Edward, the fourth son, when very young, was taken by his grand-uncle,
Sir Alexander Ramsay, and sent to school near his own house at Harlsey
in Yorkshire. Edward's first school, to which he was sent in 1801, made
a remarkable impression upon the Dean's memory. "I believe," he says,
"at that period (the very beginning of the century) it was about the
most retired village in England not of a mountainous district. No
turnpike road went through the parish. It lay in the line of no
thoroughfare. The only inhabitants of education were the clergyman, a
man of great simplicity of character, who had never been at the
University, and my great-uncle, of above fourscore, and a recluse. The
people were uneducated to an extent now unusual. Nearly all the letters
of the village were written by my uncle's gardener, a Scotchman, who,
having the degree of education usual with his countrymen of the
profession, and who being very good natured, had abundant occupation for
his evenings, and being, moreover, a prudent man, and _safe_, became the
depository of nine-tenths of the family secrets of the inhabitants.
Being thus ignorant generally, and few of them ever having been twenty
miles from the place, I may consider the parish fifty years behind the
rest of the world when I went there, so that it now furnishes
recollection of rural people, of manners and intelligence, dating back a
hundred years from the present time. It was indeed a very primitive
race; and it is curious to recall the many indications afforded in that
obscure village of unmitigated ignorance. With all this were found in
full exercise also the more violent and vindictive passions of our
nature. They might have the simplicity, but not the virtues, of
Arcadia.... There were some old English customs of an interesting
nature which lingered in the parish. For example, the old habit of
bowing to the altar was retained by the rustics on entering church, and
bowing respectfully to the clergyman in his place. A copy of the
Scriptures was in the vestry _chained_ to the desk on which it lay, and
where it had evidently been since that mode of introducing the Bible was
practised in the time of Edward VI. The passing bell was always sounded
on notice of the death of a parishioner, and sounded at any hour, night
or day, immediately on the event happening. One striking custom
prevailed at funerals. The coffin was borne through the village to the
churchyard by six or eight bearers of the same age and sex as the
deceased. Thus young maidens in white carried the remains of the girl
with whom they had lately sported. Boys took their playfellow and
companion to the churchyard. The young married woman was borne by
matrons; the men of middle age did the same office for their
contemporary.... The worship of the little church was, as may be
supposed, extremely simple, and yet even there innovation and refinement
had appeared in the musical department. The old men who used to execute
the psalmody, with the clerk at their head, had been superseded. A
teacher of singing had been engaged, and a choir, consisting of maidens,
boys and men, executed various sacred pieces with the assistance of a
bassoon and violin. I recollect in the church a practice which would
have shocked the strict rubricians of the present day. Whenever banns of
marriage were proclaimed, immediately after the words 'This is the
first, second, or third time of asking,' the old clerk shouted out, 'God
speed them weel.' In nothing was the primitive and simple character of
the people more remarkable than in the social position of the clergy
amongst them. The livings were all small, so that there was no
temptation for ecclesiastics of birth and high position in society to
come there. The clergy were in many cases clergy only on Sundays, and
for Sunday duty. The rest of the week they were like their people;
engaged in agriculture or horse-breeding, they lived with their
servants, and were scarcely raised above the position of farmers. To
show the primitive manners of many clergymen, I may mention the case of
an usher in my school, who was also curate. He enjoyed the euphonious
name of Caleb Longbottom. I recollect his dialect--pure Yorkshire; his
coat a black one only on Sunday, as I suppose he was on week days
wearing out his old blue coat which he had before going into orders.
Lord Macaulay has been charged that in describing the humble social
condition of the clergy in the reign of Charles II., he has greatly
exaggerated their want of refinement and knowledge of the world; but
really, from my recollection of my friend Mr. Longbottom and others at
the time I speak of, in the reign of George III., I cannot think he has
overdrawn the picture. Suppose this incident at a table in our own
time:--My uncle lived in what is called in Yorkshire the Hall; and being
principal proprietor in the parish, he was in fact the squire or great
man. The clergy always dined at the hall after evening service, and I
recollect the first day the new curate dined. The awkwardness and
shyness of the poor man were striking, even to the eyes of a thoughtless
schoolboy. He summoned courage to call for beer, and, according to the
old custom, deemed it necessary to drink the health of all present
before he put the glass to his lips. He addressed first the old
gentleman, then the vicar, then myself, and finally, with equal
solemnity, drank to the servants in attendance--the old butler and
coachman, who were waiting upon the company[1]."

I value these reminiscences of his Yorkshire school, written long after,
because I think them very curious; and they show how early Edward Ramsay
had his eyes open to characteristic features of the people.

Ramsay's grand-uncle, the old Sir Alexander Ramsay, died in 1806,
neglecting to make the provision which he had intended for his
grand-nephew, but leaving his estates to his nephew, Edward's father,
who then gave up his sheriffship (in which he was succeeded by Adam
Gillies), and being a Whig and of Whig family, accepted a baronetcy from
Mr. Fox, and made Fasque his home for the short remainder of his life.

The future Dean was not fortunate in schools. On his father's succeeding
to the family estates he quitted Harlsey indeed, but only to move to
Durham, which left no more pleasant memories in his mind than the other,
although there he learned to blow the flute, and indulge his strong
musical taste. He writes of Durham school that it had fallen off
terribly, from the increasing infirmities of the head master, and Ramsay
was anxious to leave it, when that move came naturally by the death of
his father[2]. Writing in his journal some time afterwards, he says,
"What was I to do? I was determined to go into the Church, and must go
to college. How was the intermediate period to be spent?" His first
private tutor was the Rev. J.H. Browne, at Kegworth in Leicestershire,
afterwards Archdeacon of Ely. "Here," says Edward, "I did learn
something both of books and of the world. Browne was a scholar, and my
fellow-students were gentlemen and knew something of life." He next
lived for a time with Mr. Joynes, a clergyman, at Sandwich in Kent, and
went from thence, in October 1811, to Cambridge.

He entered as a pensioner at St. John's, and although professing to be a
reading man, he was not eminently satisfied with the effects of the
society into which he fell upon his habits and accomplishments. "Not,"
he says, "that I had not really good associates, but somehow it seems
not to have been the best and such as I might have had." Another defect
was his not having a skilful and effective private tutor at a time when
he felt that he stood specially in need of one. "I could not form my
reading habits alone, and I had not sufficient help. I did enough,
however, to show I was not an ass. I got a scholarship. I was twice in
goodish places in the first class. I had a name for flute-playing;" and
then, ending this retrospect, which he wrote with some disgust, he tells
how he left Cambridge in his third year, going out B.A. with no contest
for honours. His college vacations were spent either in London with
college friends, or with a reading party under Wilkinson, the tutor, at
Redcar. In gathering up his recollections, he says he saw a good deal of
society: one summer was very musical; of another which he spent at home
he enumerates his occupations--"botany," "music," "Deeside." Through
all, his study was theology, but in "small doses" he says. His brother
Marmaduke joined him on the Christmas holiday of 1816, when they worked
together at the cryptogamics, and then went up to Cambridge
together--Edward to renew his theological studies with the help of the
formal lectures at the University. He spent the remainder of that season
at Bath with friends and relatives. He speaks of the Bath society, its
gaiety, theatricals, music--some rich clergymen giving good dinners, and
brother Marmaduke coming for his long vacation to a farm-house two miles
from Bath, "where we had some good botanical fun. Can it be that the
finding a new plant put us in a state of ecstasy? How we treasured up
specimens! How we gloried in our collections! But it has all passed
away; no chord is touched." To some, who think of the Dean as the
reverend, pious, grave, even melancholy man, these youthful
reminiscences may appear unnatural, even unworthy. I must own that there
breaks out now and then in his journal something which shows that he
himself was not satisfied with many of these juvenile memoranda, as if
they showed unfitting occupation and education of a young clergyman. But
that was not their real nature. Those small studies and accomplishments
took the place in his early training which the cricket-match or the
boat-race now take in the school time of Young England. The Dean speaks
somewhat contemptuously--"Here I got a smattering of astronomy," and
again of his studies of cryptogamics and botany; but he nevertheless
felt the full benefit of such accomplishments. His music, his passion
for rural and especially Highland scenery, the enjoyments of society,
the love of seeing others happy, the joining of happiness with goodness,
made the Dean what he was in after life, and enabled him to take that
position amongst his countrymen which a purely theological upbringing
would not have done.

But now our young cleric was to put away childish things, and to take
upon him the duty of his high calling. He was ordained at Wells, and
officiated for the first time as curate of Rodden, near Frome, Somerset,
on Christmas day 1816.

Rodden is a very small village, of one or two farms and some labourers'
cottages, nestling round the little church, with a few, very few,
outlying houses or farms. It lies among meadows on each side of the
rivulet which runs through the village. One of the outlying houses is
"Styles Hill," inhabited by one family of the Sheppards, all of whom
soon became dear friends of the Dean. Another was the "Pear-tree"
Cottage, an uninteresting red brick house, where Mr. Rogers provided a
residence for the young curate. The incumbent of the parish, when Ramsay
went there, was the Rev. John Methwen Rogers of Berkley, who was
non-resident. The duties of Rodden were too small to employ his whole
time, and in the following year (1817) Ramsay became curate also of
Buckland Dinham, the rector of which was non-resident and lived at a
distance, so that the curate had the sole charge of the parish. In his
work at Buckland, Ramsay took great delight, and soon won the hearts of
his people, although many of them were Wesleyan Methodists of the old
type[3]. But it was not only amongst the peasantry that Ramsay was
beloved. All the upper and middle classes in his own little parishes,
and through the whole valley, regarded him with strong esteem and
affection, and amongst them were persons whose character, and even whose
little peculiarities of language, he caught and remembered. One of
these, a retired Captain Balne, although he failed in prevailing on the
young clergyman to take a glass of grog, his own favourite cure for all
ailments, was pleased when the curate came to take a dish of tea with
him and his gentle wife. Once, when Ramsay was ill, the grief in the
parish was universal; but he used to say that the greatest proof of
attachment was given by Captain Balne, who happened to be enjoying his
dinner when the news of his friend's illness reached him, upon which he
laid down his knife and fork, and declared he could not take another
mouthful. Captain Balne had a peculiar phraseology. One phrase, in
particular, was, "If I may be allowed the language," which came readily
on all occasions. If he was asked "How is Mrs. Balne to-day?" the
Captain would reply, "She is quite well, I thank you, Mr. Ramsay, if I
may be allowed the language;" or ask him, "Have you a good crop of
apples this year?" "Pretty middling, sir, if I may be allowed the
language." The constant recurrence of the phrase struck Mr. Ramsay, who
quoted it long after in his letters to his Frome friends--"I am glad to
say my congregation at St John's continues good--if I may be allowed the
language."

Buckland is a larger village than Rodden, containing nearly 500
inhabitants. The two places are five miles apart. Buckland is on the
brow and slope of a steep hill, the church being on the summit, and the
irregular street descending from it on the Frome side, with many
cottages scattered about among orchards and meadows. So the curate of
Buckland, living at the Pear-tree Cottage in Rodden, required a pony for
locomotion, which he showed with some pride to his neighbours on first
buying it. It was an iron-gray, and a sedate clerical pony enough, to
which he gave the name of Rumplestiltskin, after one of Grimm's popular
stories; and whenever he spoke of him or to him, he gave him his name at
full length. The country and some of the places round Buckland are very
interesting. On the west is one of the entrances to Vallis, a grassy
valley bordered by limestone rocks, and trees and copse, with a
trout-stream winding through it. There, when the labours of the day were
done, the Sheppards and he would spend a summer afternoon sketching and
botanising, whilst tea was prepared at a neighbouring farm.

Vallis opened into several other vales, and on the heights above were
the picturesque villages of Elm and Skells, and the ruined nunnery and
massive old castle, the old seat of Delameres, renowned for a defence in
the Cromwellian wars. Mr. Ramsay proposed in jest to fit up the castle
as a dwelling, and bring all his friends to live there. Another time he
was for fitting it up as a museum. It would make, he said, a splendid
place for a _hortus siccus_--a "great ornament to our ponds and
ditches[4]." The writer of these trifles excuses herself for collecting
them, because she knew the value which is attached to the least of the
sayings and doings of a departed friend; but we are assured, that even
in those Arcadian regions life was not always holiday. There was some
serious work. The curate took great pains on the future interests as
well as the characters of his little flock.

In one family he acted the part of the truest of friends--gently
reproving the little ones when they deserved it, and ready to amuse
when it was the time for amusement--sometimes taking them to Bath for
the day, and making them very happy, bestowing at the same time great
pains on their instruction--sometimes practising music with them, and
accompanying their sonatas on his incomparable flute--recommending to
the governess a higher style of music, leading them on gradually to the
works of Beethoven and Mozart. By and by he gave them instructions in
architecture; taught them, as he said, all that he had learned from
Rickman. His teaching was minutely technical. He would assemble his
class in a little morning room, with books before them, and a case of
mathematical instruments, pens and pencils. His pupils wrote what he saw
fit to dictate, and he taught them how to use the compasses. Next came
botany, which was not a new study to his pupils. There his brothers
assisted him. They made a joint _hortus siccus_ under his instruction.
Edwin contributed many specimens from Scotland, and Marmaduke made a
little collection of mosses. But they had to thank the curate for yet
higher and better instruction. His younger pupils were not excluded from
the most earnest conversations between him and Mr. Algar, Mr. John
Sheppard, and some friends of the neighbouring gentlemen and clergy. In
these conversations books were read and criticised, theological and
other subjects, including some politics, were discussed. Ramsay was
quizzed for Whiggish tendencies. The mistress of the house usually
joined and set them right in politics, for she had been brought up in
Plymouth during the French war, and had learned the old-fashioned Tory
doctrine, and to think any other politics sinful. But all those high
subjects of politics and religion were discussed with fitting respect;
for that society--young and old--had a deep sense of religion, and the
parents encouraged the younger members to visit and instruct the workmen
and their families who were employed in the large cloth manufactories of
the Sheppards; so that it came to pass that every man, woman, and child
was taught or helped to teach others, for in those days very few of the
working-people, at least in that part of England, could read at all. A
lending library was attached to the mills. A large Sunday school was
formed, chiefly for the children of the workpeople, and additional
services were undertaken by the curate--a second sermon on Sundays
besides one on Thursday evenings, where the families of the
neighbourhood attended, and as many of the servants as could be spared.
There, be sure, was no big talk on the primary obligation of orthodoxy,
no attempts to proselytise. But all classes of that primitive people
valued his preaching, and farmers and their labourers, the workmen of
the factories, as well as their masters, took advantage of it. His
brothers often visited him, and joined heartily in his pursuits whether
gay or serious. It was delightful to see the three brothers so happy in
each other's society, and helping on a worthy common object. Marmaduke,
the Cambridge man, would talk astronomy, and William, the sailor,
afterwards Admiral Ramsay, brought down a fine telescope, and himself
gave them their first lesson in practical astronomy, handing over the
instrument when he left to his brother the curate, that he might
continue the instruction.

During all these years of useful, cheerful, happy employment at Frome,
Edward Ramsay never forgot the land of his forefathers and of his own
youth. He sometimes visited Bath and London to hear Edward Irving
preach, to see Kean act, to stare at old books and prints in the shop
windows, to revel in the beauties of Kew Gardens; but every summer he
found time for a visit to Scotland, and spent his holiday with boyish
delight amongst the scenes and friends of his childhood.

It was on one of those visits to Scotland, in the autumn of 1822, whilst
Mr. Ramsay was spending his holidays among his friends on Deeside, that
the managers of St. Paul's Chapel, Aberdeen, offered him the place of
second minister to that congregation, along with Mr. Cordiner. He was
much gratified, and would gladly have accepted the appointment. He liked
the place--his native town; thought highly of the respectability of the
congregation; but there was one objection, which to him was insuperable.
The congregation had for some time been Episcopal only in name, and it
went against Mr. Ramsay's conscience to minister in a church calling
itself Episcopal, but without the communion or discipline of a bishop.
He explained to the managers his objection, and thought for a time it
might be overcome by a union with the Scotch Episcopal churches in the
diocese. He had yet to learn the strength, of the Scotch prejudice
against bishops; perhaps to learn that the more shadowy the grounds of
dispute, so much the more keenly are ecclesiastical squabbles fought.
Worthy Bishop Skinner would have been glad to have Ramsay a
fellow-labourer in his city upon whatever conditions. Yet he could not
contradict his younger friend's honest and temperate adherence to his
principles and to Episcopacy. The correspondence all round, which I have
before me, is quite decorous; but after Ramsay had stated his objection,
and that it was insuperable, the managers wrote to him, 1st October
1822, that "a unanimous election would follow if he accepted the
situation under the present establishment." It would have been easy to
divide the congregation, but this did not suit Ramsay's feelings or
nature, and he courteously bowed to the decision of the managers, and
returned to Frome, where his income from both curacies was L100 a
year,--a poverty the more irksome to a man of culture and
refined tastes.

Not long after (still, I think in 1823), the Journal records--"Mrs.
Forbes, my aunt, had just come into her accession of fortune, and
presented me with L5000. A man may live many days in this world, and not
meet the like gift in a like kindly spirit[5]."

Of the year 1823 the Journal remarks very severe winter. "Marmaduke and
Edwin with me at the Pear-tree[6]; a delightful tour in South Wales with
the Sheppards and other friends most agreeable and
good-humoured,--botany, sketching, talk, and fun. Life has few things to
offer more enjoyable than such tours. I have found in them the happiest
hours in my life." And then follows the wail for so "many of them
departed; so many dear good friends; all different, but all excellent!"

Marmaduke having gone as tutor to Lord Lansdowne's eldest son, Edward
was more free to consider an offer from Edinburgh, and ultimately
accepted the curacy of St. George's in York Place, under Mr. Shannon. He
preached his two last sermons at Rodden and Buckland on Christmas
day 1823.

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