Locking the Door during Dinner. The custom of keeping the door of a house or chateau locked during the time of dinner, probably arose from the family being anciently assembled in the hall at that meal, and liable to surprise. But it was in many instances continued as a point of high etiquette, of which the following is an example:
A considerable landed proprietor in Dumfries-shire, being a bachelor, without near relations, and determined to make his will, resolved previously to visit his two nearest kinsmen, and decide which should be his heir, according to the degree of kindness with which he should be received. Like a good clansman, he first visited his own chief, a baronet in rank, descendant and representative of one of the oldest families in Scotland. Unhappily the dinner-bell had rung, and the door of the castle had been locked before his arrival. The visitor in vain announced his name and requested admittance; but his chief adhered to the ancient etiquette, and would on no account suffer the doors to be unbarred. Irritated at this cold reception, the old Laird rode on to Sanquhar Castle, then the residence of the Duke of Queensberry, who no sooner heard his name, than, knowing well he had a will to make, the drawbridge dropped, and the gates flew open — the table was covered anew — his grace’s bachelor and intestate kinsman was received with the utmost attention and respect; and it is scarcely necessary to add, that upon his death some years after, the visitor’s considerable landed property went to augment the domains of the Ducal House of Queensberry. This happened about the end of the seventeenth century.
12 The Scots retain the use of the word town in its comprehensive Saxon meaning, as a place of habitation. A mansion or a farm house, though solitary, is called the town. A landward town is a dwelling situated in the country.
Chapter 9
I am a son of Mars who have been in many wars,
And show my cuts and scars wherever I come;
This here was for a wench, and that other in a trench,
When welcoming the French at the sound of the drum.
Burns.
“Don’t be too much cast down,” said Sergeant Bothwell to his prisoner as they journeyed on towards the head-quarters; “you are a smart pretty lad, and well connected; the worst that will happen will be strapping up for it, and that is many an honest fellow’s lot. I tell you fairly your life’s within the compass of the law, unless you make submission, and get off by a round fine upon your uncle’s estate; he can well afford it.”
“That vexes me more than the rest,” said Henry. “He parts with his money with regret; and, as he had no concern whatever with my having given this person shelter for a night, I wish to Heaven, if I escape a capital punishment, that the penalty may be of a kind I could bear in my own person.”
“Why, perhaps,” said Bothwell, “they will propose to you to go into one of the Scotch regiments that are serving abroad. It’s no bad line of service; if your friends are active, and there are any knocks going, you may soon get a commission.”
“I am by no means sure,” answered Morton, “that such a sentence is not the best thing that can happen to me.”
“Why, then, you are no real whig after all?” said the sergeant.
“I have hitherto meddled with no party in the state,” said Henry, “but have remained quietly at home; and sometimes I have had serious thoughts of joining one of our foreign regiments.”
“Have you?” replied Bothwell; “why, I honour you for it; I have served in the Scotch French guards myself many a long day; it’s the place for learning discipline, d — n me. They never mind what you do when you are off duty; but miss you the roll-call, and see how they’ll arrange you — D— n me, if old Captain Montgomery didn’t make me mount guard upon the arsenal in my steel-back and breast, plate-sleeves and head-piece, for six hours at once, under so burning a sun, that gad I was baked like a turtle at Port Royale. I swore never to miss answering to Francis Stewart again, though I should leave my hand of cards upon the drum-head — Ah! discipline is a capital thing.”
“In other respects you liked the service?” said Morton,
“Par excellence,” said Bothwell; “women, wine, and wassail, all to be had for little but the asking; and if you find it in your conscience to let a fat priest think he has some chance to convert you, gad he’ll help you to these comforts himself, just to gain a little ground in your good affection. Where will you find a crop-eared whig parson will be so civil?”
“Why, nowhere, I agree with you,” said Henry; “but what was your chief duty?”
“To guard the king’s person,” said Bothwell, “to look after the safety of Louis le Grand, my boy, and now and then to take a turn among the Huguenots (protestants, that is.) And there we had fine scope; it brought my hand pretty well in for the service in this country. But, come, as you are to be a bon camerado, as the Spaniards say, I must put you in cash with some of your old uncle’s broad-pieces. This is cutter’s law; we must not see a pretty fellow want, if we have cash ourselves.”
Thus speaking, he pulled out his purse, took out some of the contents, and offered them to Henry without counting them. Young Morton declined the favour; and, not judging it prudent to acquaint the sergeant, notwithstanding his apparent generosity, that he was actually in possession of some money, he assured him he should have no difficulty in getting a supply from his uncle.
“Well,” said Bothwell, “in that case these yellow rascals must serve to ballast my purse a little longer. I always make it a rule never to quit the tavern (unless ordered on duty) while my purse is so weighty that I can chuck it over the signpost. 13 When it is so light that the wind blows it back, then, boot and saddle,— we must fall on some way of replenishing.— But what tower is that before us, rising so high upon the steep bank, out of the woods that surround it on every side?”
“It is the tower of Tillietudlem,” said one of the soldiers. “Old Lady Margaret Bellenden lives there. She’s one of the best affected women in the country, and one that’s a soldier’s friend. When I was hurt by one of the d — d whig dogs that shot at me from behind a fauld-dike, I lay a month there, and would stand such another wound to be in as good quarters again.”
“If that be the case,” said Bothwell, “I will pay my respects to her as we pass, and request some refreshment for men and horses; I am as thirsty already as if I had drunk nothing at Milnwood. But it is a good thing in these times,” he continued, addressing himself to Henry, “that the King’s soldier cannot pass a house without getting a refreshment. In such houses as Tillie — what d’ye call it? you are served for love; in the houses of the avowed fanatics you help yourself by force; and among the moderate presbyterians and other suspicious persons, you are well treated from fear; so your thirst is always quenched on some terms or other.”
“And you purpose,” said Henry, anxiously, “to go upon that errand up to the tower younder?”
“To be sure I do,” answered Bothwell. “How should I be able to report favourably to my officers of the worthy lady’s sound principles, unless I know the taste of her sack, for sack she will produce — that I take for granted; it is the favourite consoler of your old dowager of quality, as small claret is the potation of your country laird.”
