No More Learning

He contributed largely to the North British Review. In 1855 he
published 'Horæ Subsecivæ,' which contained, among medical biog-
raphy and medico-literary papers, the immortal Scotch idyl, 'Rab
and his Friends. Up to this time the unique personality of the
doctor, with its delightful mixture of humor and sympathy, was


## p. 2438 (#644) ###########################################

2438
JOHN BROWN
known only to his own circle. The appearance of 'Rab and his
Friends' revealed it to the world. Brief as it is in form, and simple
in outline, Scotland has produced nothing so full of pure, pathetic
genius since Scott.
Another volume of 'Horæ Subsecivæ appeared two years after,
and some selections from it, and others from unpublished manuscript,
were printed separately in the volume entitled 'Spare Hours. ' They
met with instant and unprecedented success. In a short time ten
thousand copies of 'Minchmoor' and 'James the Doorkeeper' were
sold, fifteen thousand copies of 'Pet Marjorie,' and 'Rab' had reached
its fiftieth thousand. With all this success and praise, and constantly
besought by publishers for his work, he could not be persuaded that
his writings were of any permanent value, and was reluctant to
publish. In 1882 appeared a third volume of the 'Hora Subsecivæ,'
which included all his writings. A few weeks after its publication
he died.
The Doctor's medical essays, which are replete with humor, are
written in defense of his special theory, the distinction between the
active and the speculative mind. He thought there was too much
science and too little intuitive sagacity in the world, and looked back
longingly to the old-time common-sense, which he believed mod-
ern science had driven away. His own mind was anti-speculative,
although he paid just tributes to philosophy and science and ad-
mired their achievements. He stigmatized the speculations of the
day as the "lust of innovation. " But the reader cares little for the
opinions of Dr. Brown as arguments: his subject is of little conse-
quence if he will but talk. By the charm of his story-telling these
dead Scotch doctors are made to live again. The death-bed of Syme,
for instance, is as pathetic as the wonderful paper on Thackeray's
death; and to-day many a heart is sore for 'Pet Marjorie,' the ten-
year-old child who died in Scotland almost a hundred years ago.
As an essayist, Dr. Brown belongs to the followers of Addison
and Charles Lamb, and he blends humor, pathos, and quiet hopeful-
ness with
a grave and earnest dignity. He delighted, not like
Lamb "in the habitable parts of the earth," but in the lonely moor-
lands and pastoral hills, over which his silent, stalwart shepherds
walked with swinging stride. He had a keen appreciation for
anything he felt to be excellent: his usual question concerning
a stranger, either in literature or life, was "Has he wecht, sir? ”—
quoting Dr. Chalmers; and when he wanted to give the highest
praise, he said certain writing was "strong meat. " He had a warm
enthusiasm for the work of other literary men: an artist himself, he
was quick to appreciate and seize upon the witty thing or the excel-
lent thing wherever he found it, and he was eager to share his


## p. 2439 (#645) ###########################################

JOHN BROWN
2439
pleasure with the whole world. He reintroduced to the public
Henry Vaughn, the quaint seventeenth-century poet; he wrote a
sympathetic memoir of Arthur Hallam; he imported 'Modern Paint-
ers, and enlightened Edinburgh as to its merits. His art papers.
were what Walter Pater would call "appreciations," that is to say,
he dwelt upon the beauties of what he described rather than upon
the defects. What he did not admire he left alone.
As the author of 'Rab' loved the lonely glens on Minchmoor and
in the Enterkin, or where Queen Mary's "baby garden" shows its
box-row border among the Spanish chestnuts of Lake Monteith, so
he loved the Scottish character, "bitter to the taste and sweet to the
diaphragm": "Jeemes" the beadle, with his family worship when he
himself was all the family; the old Aberdeen Jacobite people; Miss
Stirling Graham of Duntrune, who in her day bewitched Edinburgh;
Rab, Ailie, and Bob Ainslie. His characters are oddities, but are
drawn without a touch of cynicism. What an amount of playful,
wayward nonsense lies between these pages, and what depths of
melancholy under the fun! Like Sir Walter, he had a great love
for dogs, and never went out unaccompanied by one or two of them.
They are the heroes of several of his sketches.
Throughout the English-speaking world, he was affectionately
known as Dr. John Brown of Edinburgh. He stood aloof from polit-
ical and ecclesiastical controversies, and was fond of telling a story
to illustrate how little reasoning went to forming partisans. A min-
ister catechizing a raw plowboy, after asking the first question, "Who
made you? " and getting the answer "God," asked him, "How do
you know that God made you? " After some pause and head-scratch-
ing, the reply came, "Weel, sir, it's the clash [common talk] o' the
kintry. " "Ay," Brown added, "I'm afraid that a deal of our belief
is founded on just the clash o' the kintry. › »
MARJORIE FLEMING
From 'Spare Hours'
ON
NE November afternoon in 1810-the year in which 'Wa-
verley' was resumed and laid aside again, to be finished
off, its last two volumes in three weeks, and made immor-
tal in 1814; and when its author, by the death of Lord Melville,
narrowly escaped getting a civil appointment in India - three
men, evidently lawyers, might have been seen escaping like
schoolboys from the Parliament House, and speeding arm-in-arm
down Bank Street and the Mound in the teeth of a surly blast
of sleet.


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2440
JOHN BROWN
The three friends sought the bield of the low wall old Edin-
burgh boys remember well, and sometimes miss now, as they
struggle with the stout west wind.
The third we all know. What has he not done for every one
of us? Who else ever, except Shakespeare, so diverted man-
kind, entertained and entertains a world so liberally, so whole-
somely? We are fain to say not even Shakespeare, for his is
something deeper than diversion, something higher than pleasure;
and yet who would care to split this hair?
Had any one watched him closely before and after the part-
ing, what a change he would see! The bright, broad laugh, the
shrewd, jovial word, the man of the Parliament House and of
the world; and next step, moody, the light of his eye withdrawn,
as if seeing things that were invisible; his shut mouth like a
child's, so impressionable, so innocent, so sad; he was now all
within, as before he was all without; hence his brooding look.
As the snow blattered in his face, he muttered, "How it raves
and drifts! On-ding o' snaw,-ay, that's the word,-on-ding"
He was
now at his own door, "Castle Street, No. 39. " He
opened the door and went straight to his den; that wondrous
workshop, where in one year, 1823, when he was fifty-two, he
wrote 'Peveril of the Peak,' 'Quentin Durward,' and 'St.
Ronan's Well,' besides much else. We once took the foremost
of our novelists—the greatest, we would say, since Scott — into
this room, and could not but mark the solemnizing effect of
sitting where the great magician sat so often and so long, and
looking out upon that little shabby bit of sky, and that back
green where faithful dog Camp lies.
He sat down in his large green morocco elbow-chair, drew
himself close to his table, and glowered and gloomed at his writ-
ing apparatus, "a very handsome old box, richly carved, lined
with crimson velvet, and containing ink-bottles, taper-stand, etc. ,
in silver, the whole in such order that it might have come from
the silversmith's window half an hour before. " He took out his
paper, then starting up angrily, said, "Go spin, you jade, go
spin. ' No, d-- it, it won't do,-
"My spinnin' wheel is auld and stiff,
The rock o't wunna stand, sir;
To keep the temper-pin in tiff
Employs ower aft my hand, sir. '


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JOHN BROWN
2441
I am off the fang. I can make nothing of 'Waverley' to-day;
I'll awa' to Marjorie. Come wi' me, Maida, you thief. " The
great creature rose slowly, and the pair were off, Scott taking a
maud (a plaid) with him. "White as a frosted plum-cake, by
jingo! " said he, when he got to the street. Maida gamboled and
whisked among the snow, and his master strode across to Young
Street, and through it to I North Charlotte Street, to the house
of his dear friend, Mrs. William Keith, of Corstorphine
Hill;
niece of Mrs. Keith of Ravelston, of whom he said at her death,
eight years after, "Much tradition, and that of the best, has died
with this excellent old lady, one of the few persons whose spirits,
and cleanliness and freshness of mind and body, made old age
lovely and desirable. "
now.
Sir Walter was in that house almost every day, and had a key,
so in he and the hound went, shaking themselves in the lobby.
«< Marjorie! Marjorie! " shouted her friend, "where are ye, my
bonnie wee croodlin' doo? " In a moment a bright, eager child
of seven was in his arms, and he was kissing her all over. Out
came Mrs. Keith. "Come your ways in, Wattie. " "No, not
I am going to take Marjorie wi' me, and you may come to
your tea in Duncan Roy's sedan, and bring the bairn home in
your lap. " "Tak' Marjorie, and it on-ding o' snaw! " said Mrs.
Keith. He said to himself, "On-ding,'- that's odd,- that is the
very word. Hoot, awa'! look here," and he displayed the cor-
ner of his plaid, made to hold lambs (the true shepherd's plaid,
consisting of two breadths sewed together, and uncut at one end,
making a poke or cul-de-sac). "Tak' your lamb," said she, laugh-
ing at the contrivance, and so the Pet was first well happit up,
and then put, laughing silently, into the plaid neuk, and the
shepherd strode off with his lamb,- Maida gamboling through the
snow, and running races in her mirth.
Didn't he face "the angry airt," and make her bield his
bosom, and into his own room with her, and lock the door, and
out with the warm rosy little wifie, who took it all with great
composure! There the two remained for three or more hours,
making the house ring with their laughter; you can fancy the
big man's and Maidie's laugh. Having made the fire cheery, he
set her down in his ample chair, and standing sheepishly before
her, began to say his lesson, which happened to be,- "Ziccotty,
diccotty, dock, the mouse ran up the clock; the clock struck
one, down the mouse ran, ziccotty, diccotty, dock. " This done


## p. 2442 (#648) ###########################################

2442
JOHN BROWN
repeatedly till she was pleased, she gave him his new lesson,
gravely and slowly, timing it upon her small fingers,—he saying
it after her,-
"Wonery, twoery, tickery, seven;
Alibi, crackaby, ten and eleven;
Pin, pan, musky dan;
Tweedle-um, twoddle-um, twenty-wan;
Eerie, orie, ourie,
You, are, out. "
He pretended to great difficulty, and she rebuked him with
most comical gravity, treating him as a child.
He used to say
that when he came to Alibi Crackaby he broke down, and Pin-
Pan, Musky-Dan, Tweedle-um Twoddle-um made him roar with
laughter. He said Musky-Dan especially was beyond endurance,
bringing up an Irishman and his hat fresh from the Spice
Islands and odoriferous Ind; she getting quite bitter in her dis-
pleasure at his ill behavior and stupidness.
Then he would read ballads to her in his own glorious way,
the two getting wild with excitement over 'Gil Morrice' or the
'Baron of Smailholm'; and he would take her on his knee, and
make her repeat Constance's speech in 'King John,' till he
swayed to and fro, sobbing his fill.
Scott used to say that he was amazed at her power over him,
saying to Mrs. Keith, "She's the most extraordinary creature I
ever met with, and her repeating of Shakespeare overpowers me
as nothing else does. "
Thanks to the unforgetting sister of this dear child, who has
much of the sensibility and fun of her who has been in her
small grave these fifty and more years, we have now before us
the letters and journals of Pet Marjorie,- before us lies and
gleams her rich brown hair, bright and sunny as if yesterday's,
with the words on the paper, "Cut out in her last illness," and
two pictures of her by her beloved Isabella, whom she wor-
shiped; there are the faded old scraps of paper, hoarded still,
over which her warm breath and her warm little heart had
poured themselves; there is the old water-mark, "Lingard, 1808. "
The two portraits are very like each other, but plainly done at
different times; it is a chubby, healthy face, deep-set, brooding
eyes, as eager to tell what is going on within as to gather in all
the glories from without; quick with the wonder and the pride
of life; they are eyes that would not be soon satisfied with


## p. 2443 (#649) ###########################################

JOHN BROWN
2443
seeing; eyes that would devour their object, and yet childlike
and fearless. And that is a mouth that will not be soon satisfied
with love; it has a curious likeness to Scott's own, which has
always appeared to us his sweetest, most mobile and speaking
feature.
There she is, looking straight at us as she did at him,-fear-
less and full of love, passionate, wild, willful, fancy's child.
There was an old servant, Jeanie Robertson, who was forty
years in her grandfather's family. Marjorie Fleming-or as
she is called in the letters and by Sir Walter, Maidie was the
last child she kept. Jeanie's wages never exceeded £3 a year,
and when she left service she had saved £40. She was devot-
edly attached to Maidie, rather despising and ill-using her sister
Isabella, a beautiful and gentle child. This partiality made
Maidie apt at times to domineer over Isabella. "I mention
this," writes her surviving sister, "for the purpose of telling you
an instance of Maidie's generous justice. When only five years
old, when walking in Raith grounds, the two children had run
on before, and old Jeanie remembered they might come too near
a dangerous mill-lade. She called to them to turn back. Maidie
heeded her not, rushed all the faster on, and fell, and would
have been lost, had her sister not pulled her back, saving her
life, but tearing her clothes. Jeanie flew on Isabella to 'give it
her' for spoiling her favorite's dress; Maidie rushed in between,
crying out, 'Pay (whip) Maidjie as much as you like, and I'll
not say one word; but touch Isy, and I'll roar like a bull! '
Years after Maidie was resting in her grave, my mother used to
take me to the place, and told the story always in the exact
same words. This Jeanie must have been a character. She
took great pride in exhibiting Maidie's brother William's Calvin-
istic acquirements when nineteen months old, to the officers of a
militia regiment then quartered in Kirkcaldy. This performance
was so amusing that it was often repeated, and the little theo-
logian was presented by them with a cap and feathers. Jeanie's
glory was "putting him through the carritch" (catechism) in
broad Scotch, beginning at the beginning with "Wha made ye,
ma bonnie man? " For the correctness of this and the three
next replies, Jeanie had no anxiety; but the tone changed to
menace, and the closed nieve (fist) was shaken in the child's face
as she demanded, "Of what are you made? " "DIRT," was the
>>
-


## p. 2444 (#650) ###########################################

2444
JOHN BROWN
answer uniformly given. "Wull ye never learn to say dust, ye
thrawn deevil? " with a cuff from the opened hand, was the as
inevitable rejoinder.
Here is Maidie's first letter, before she was six, the spelling
unaltered, and there are no "commoes. "
-
"MY DEAR ISA I now sit down to answer all your kind and
beloved letters which you was so good as to write to me. This
is the first time I ever wrote a letter in my Life. There are a
great many Girls in the Square and they cry just like a pig
when we are under the painfull necessity of putting it to Death.
Miss Potune a Lady of my acquaintance praises me dreadfully. I
repeated something out of Dean Swift and she said I was fit for
the stage and you may think I was primmed up with majestick
Pride but upon my word I felt myselfe turn a little birsay-
birsay is a word which is a word that William composed which
is as you may suppose a little enraged. This horrid fat simpli-
ton says that my Aunt is beautifull which is intirely impossible.
for that is not her nature. "
What a peppery little pen we wield! What could that have
been out of the sardonic Dean? what other child of that age
would have used "beloved" as she does? This power of affec-
tion, this faculty of beloving, and wild hunger to be beloved,
comes out more and more. She periled her all upon it, and
it may have been as well-we know, indeed, that it was far
better for her that this wealth of love was so soon withdrawn
to its one only infinite Giver and Receiver. This must have
been the law of her earthly life. Love was indeed "her Lord
and King"; and it was perhaps well for her that she found so
soon that her and our only Lord and King Himself is Love.
Here are bits from her Diary at Brachead: -
"The day of my existence here has been delightful and en-
chanting. On Saturday I expected no less than three well-made.
Bucks the names of whom is here advertised. Mr. Geo. Crakey
[Craigie], and Wm. Keith and Jn. Keith-the first is the funniest
of every one of them. Mr. Crakey and I walked to Crakyhall
[Craigiehall] hand in hand in Innocence and matitation [medita-
tion] sweet thinking on the kind love which flows in our tender
hearted mind which is overflowing with majestic pleasure no one
was ever so polite to me in the hole state of my existence. Mr.
Craky you must know is a great Buck and pretty good-looking. "


## p. 2445 (#651) ###########################################

JOHN BROWN
2445
"I am at Ravelston enjoying nature's fresh air. The birds
are singing sweetly- the calf doth frisk and nature shows her
glorious face. »
Here is a confession:
"I confess I have been very more like a little young divil
than creature for when Isabella went up stairs to teach me
religion and my multiplication and to be good and all my other
lessons I stamped with my foot and threw my new hat which
she had made on the ground and was sulky and was dreadfully
passionate, but she never whiped me but said Marjory go into
another room and think what a great crime you are commit-
ting letting your temper git the better of you. But I went so
sulkily that the Devil got the better of me but she never never
never whips me so that I think I would be the better of it and
the next time that I behave ill I think she should do it for she
never does it.
. Isabella has given me praise for checking
my temper for I was sulky even when she was kneeling an hole
hour teaching me to write. "
Our poor little wifie, she has no doubts of the personality of
the Devil! "Yesterday I behave extremely ill in God's most
holy church for I would never attend myself nor let Isabella
attend which was a great crime for she often, often tells me that
when to or three are geathered together God is in the midst of
them, and it was the very same Divil that tempted Job that
tempted me I am sure; but he resisted Satan though he had
boils and many many other misfortunes which I have escaped.
I am now going to tell you the horible and wretched
plaege that my multiplication gives me you can't conceive it the
most Devilish thing is 8 times 8 and 7 times 7 it is what nature
itself cant endure. "
·
« I
This is delicious; and what harm is there in her "Devilish"?
it is strong language merely; even old Rowland Hill used to say
"he grudged the Devil those rough and ready words. "
walked to that delightful place Crakyhall with a delightful young
man beloved by all his friends especially by me his loveress, but
I must not talk any more about him for Isa said it is not proper
for to speak of gentalmen but I will never forget him!
I am very very glad that satan has not given me boils and
many other misfortunes-In the holy bible these words are
written that the Devil goes like a roaring lyon in search of his
pray but the lord lets us escape from him but we" (pauvre


## p. 2446 (#652) ###########################################

2446
JOHN BROWN
petite! ) "do not strive with this awful Spirit.
To-day
I pronounced a word which should never come out of a lady's
lips it was that I called John a Impudent Bitch.
I will tell you
what I think made me in so bad a humor is I got one or two
of that bad sina [senna] tea to-day,". a better excuse for bad
humor and bad language than most.
-
She has been reading the Book of Esther: :- -"It was a dread-
ful thing that Haman was hanged on the very gallows which he
had prepared for Mordecai to hang him and his ten sons thereon
and it was very wrong and cruel to hang his sons for they did
not commit the crime; but then Jesus was not then come to teach
us to be merciful. " This is wise and beautiful,- has upon it the
very dew of youth and holiness. Out of the mouths of babes
and sucklings He perfects his praise.
"This is Saturday and I am very glad of it because I have
play half the Day and I get money too but alas I owe Isabella
4 pence for I am finned 2 pence whenever I bite my nails.
Isabella is teaching me to make simmecoling nots of interriga-
tions peorids commoes, etc.
As this is Sunday I will
meditate upon Senciable and Religious subjects. First I should
be very thankful I am not a beggar. "
This amount of meditation and thankfulness seems to have
been all she was able for.
"I am going to-morrow to a delightfull place, Braehead by
name, belonging to Mrs. Crraford, where there is ducks cocks
hens bubblyjocks 2 dogs 2 cats and swine which is delightful.
I think it is shocking to think that the dog and cat should bear
them" (this is a meditation physiological) "and they are drowned
after all. I would rather have a man-dog than a woman-dog,
because they do not bear like woman-dogs; it is a hard case
it is shocking. I came here to enjoy natures delightful breath
it is sweeter than a fial of rose oil. "
Braehead is the farm the historical Jock Howison asked and
got from our gay James the Fifth, "the gudeman o' Ballengiech,"
as a reward for the services of his flail when the King had the
worst of it at Cramond Brig with the gipsies. The farm is un-
changed in size from that time, and still in the unbroken line of
the ready and victorious thrasher. Braehead is held on the con-
dition of the possessor being ready to present the King with a
ewer and basin to wash his hands, Jock having done this for his
unknown king after the splore; and when George the Fourth


## p. 2447 (#653) ###########################################

JOHN BROWN
2447
to Edinburgh, this ceremony was performed in silver at
Holyrood.
-
It is a lovely neuk, this Braehead, preserved almost as it was
two hundred years ago. "Lot and his wife," mentioned by
Maidie, two quaintly cropped yew-trees, — still thrive; the burn
runs as it did in her time, and sings the same quiet tune, -as
much the same and as different as Now and Then. The house
is full of old family relics and pictures, the sun shining on them.
through the small deep windows with their plate-glass; and there,
blinking at the sun and chattering contentedly, is a parrot, that
might, for its looks of eld, have been in the ark, and domineered
over and deaved the dove. Everything about the place is old
and fresh.
This is beautiful: "I am very sorry to say that I forgot
God that is to say I forgot to pray to-day and Isabella
told me that I should be thankful that God did not forget me
if he did, O what would become of me if I was in danger and
God not friends with me- I must go to unquenchable fire and
if I was tempted to sin-how could I resist it O no I will never
do it again— no no if I can help it. " (Canny wee wifie! )
"My religion is greatly falling off because I dont pray with so
much attention when I am saying my prayers, and my charecter
is lost among the Braehead people. I hope I will be religious
again but as for regaining my charecter I despare for it. "
(Poor little "habit and repute "! )
Her temper, her passion, and her "badness" are almost daily
confessed and deplored:-"I will never again trust to my own
power, for I see that I cannot be good without God's assistance
I will not trust in my own selfe, and Isa's health will be quite
ruined by me-it will indeed.
" "Isa has giving me advice, which
is, that when I feel Satan beginning to tempt me, that I flea
him and he would flea me. " "Remorse is the worst thing to
bear, and I am afraid that I will fall a marter to it. "
Poor dear little sinner! - Here comes the world again:
"In
my travels I met with a handsome lad named Charles Balfour
Esq. , and from him I got ofers of marage-offers of marage,
did I say? Nay plenty heard me. " A fine scent for "breach of
promise"!
This is abrupt and strong: "The Divil is curced and all
works. 'Tis a fine work 'Newton on the profecies. ' I wonder if
there is another book of poems comes near the Bible. The Divil
―――――
-
―
--
-
:-
-


## p. 2448 (#654) ###########################################

2448
JOHN BROWN
always girns at the sight of the Bible. " "Miss Potune" (her
"simpliton" friend) "is very fat; she pretends to be very learned.
She says she saw a stone that dropt from the skies; but she is a
good Christian. "
Here come her views on church government:- "An Anni-
babtist is a thing I am not a member of -I am a Pisplekan
(Episcopalian) just now, and" (O you little Laodicean and Lati-
tudinarian! ) "a Prisbeteran at Kirkcaldy" - (Blandula! Vagula!
cælum et animum mutas quæ trans mare [i. e. , trans Bodotriam]
curris! )-"my native town. "
"Sentiment is not what I am acquainted with as yet, though
I wish it, and should like to practise it" (! ) "I wish I had a
great, great deal of gratitude in my heart, in all my body. "
"There is a new novel published, named 'Self-Control' (Mrs.
Brunton's) "a very good maxim forsooth! "
A
This is shocking:-"Yesterday a marrade man, named Mr.
John Balfour, Esq. , offered to kiss me, and offered to marry me,
though the man" (a fine directness this! ) "was espused, and his
wife was present and said he must ask her permission; but he
did not. I think he was ashamed and confounded before 3 gen-
telman Mr. Jobson and 2 Mr. Kings. " "Mr. Banesters" (Ban-
nister's) "Budjet is to-night; I hope it will be a good one.
great many authors have expressed themselves too sentimentally. "
You are right, Marjorie. "A Mr. Burns writes a beautiful song
on Mr. Cunhaming, whose wife desarted him-truly it is a most
beautiful one. " "I like to read the Fabulous historys, about the
histerys of Robin, Dickey, flapsay, and Peccay, and it is very
amusing, for some were good birds and others bad, but Peccay
was the most dutiful and obedient to her parients. " "Thom-
son is a beautiful author, and Pope, but nothing to Shakespear,
of which I have a little knolege. 'Macbeth' is a pretty com-
position, but awful one. ” "The 'Newgate Calender' is very in-
structive. " (! )
"A sailor called here to say farewell; it must be dreadful to
leave his native country when he might get a wife; or perhaps
me, for I love him very much. But O I forgot, Isabella forbid
me to speak about love. " This antiphlogistic regimen and lesson
is ill to learn by our Maidie, for here she sins again:- "Love is
a very papithatick thing" (it is almost a pity to correct this into
pathetic), "as well as troublesome and tiresome-but O Isabella
forbid me to speak of it. "
-
-


## p. 2449 (#655) ###########################################

JOHN BROWN
2449
Here are her reflections on a pineapple:-"I think the price
of a pineapple is very dear: it is a whole bright goulden guinea,
that might have sustained a poor family. " Here is a new vernal
simile: "The hedges are sprouting like chicks from the eggs
when they are newly hatched or, as the vulgar say, clacked. "
"Doctor Swift's works are very funny; I got some of them by
heart. " "Moreheads sermons are I hear much praised, but I
never read sermons of any kind; but I read novelettes and my
Bible, and I never forget it, or my prayers. " Brava, Marjorie!
She seems now, when still about six, to have broken out into
song:-
--
EPHIBOL [EPIGRAM OR EPITAPH-WHO KNOWS WHICH? ON MY DEAR
LOVE ISABELLA.
"Here lies sweet Isabel in bed,
With a night-cap on her head;
Her skin is soft, her face is fair,
And she has very pretty hair;
She and I in bed lies nice,
And undisturbed by rats or mice.
She is disgusted with Mr. Worgan,
Though he plays upon the organ.
Her nails are neat, her teeth are white,
Her eyes are very, very bright.
In a conspicuous town she lives,
And to the poor her money gives.
Here ends sweet Isabella's story,
And may it be much to her glory. "
Here are some bits at random:
"Of summer I am very fond,
And love to bathe into a pond:
The look of sunshine dies away,
And will not let me out to play;
I love the morning's sun to spy
Glittering through the casement's eye;
The rays of light are very sweet,
And puts away the taste of meat;
The balmy breeze comes down from heaven,
And makes us like for to be living. "
IV-154


## p. 2450 (#656) ###########################################

2450
JOHN BROWN
"The casawary is an curious bird, and so is the gigantic
crane, and the pelican of the wilderness, whose mouth holds a
bucket of fish and water. Fighting is what ladies is not qualy-
fied for, they would not make a good figure in battle or in a
duel. Alas! we females are of little use to our country. The
history of all the malcontents as ever was hanged is amusing. "
Still harping on the Newgate Calendar!
"Braehead is extremely pleasant to me by the companie of
swine, geese, cocks, etc. , and they are the delight of my soul. "
"I am going to tell you of a melancholy story.
A young
turkie of two or three months old, would you believe it, the
father broke its leg, and he killed another! I think he ought
to be transported or hanged. "
"Queen Street is a very gay one, and so is Princes Street,
for all the lads and lasses, besides bucks and beggars, parade
there. "
"I should like to see a play very much, for I never saw one
in all my life, and don't believe I ever shall; but I hope I can
be content without going to one. I can be quite happy without
my desire being granted. "
Some days ago Isabella had a terrible fit of the toothake,
and she walked with a long night-shift at dead of night like a
ghost, and I thought she was one. She prayed for nature's
sweet restorer - balmy sleep - but did not get it a ghostly
figure indeed she was, enough to make a saint tremble. It made
me quiver and shake from top to toe. Superstition is a very
mean thing, and should be despised and shunned. "
Here is her weakness and her strength again:-"In the love-
novels all the heroines are very desperate. Isabella will not
allow me to speak about lovers and heroins, and 'tis too refined
for my taste. " "Miss Egward's [Edgeworth's] tails are very
good, particularly some that are very much adapted for youth (! )
as Laz Laurance and Tarelton, False Keys, etc. , etc. "
-
"Tom Jones and Gray's Elegey in a country church-yard are
both excellent, and much spoke of by both sex, particularly
by the men. ” Are our Marjories now-a-days better or worse,
because they cannot read Tom Jones' unharmed? More better
than worse; but who among them can repeat Gray's 'Lines on a
Distant Prospect of Eton College' as could our Maidie ?
Here is some more of her prattle: "I went into Isabella's
bed to make her smile like the Genius Demedicus [the Venus
-


## p. 2451 (#657) ###########################################

JOHN BROWN
2451
de' Medicis] or the statute in an ancient Greece, but she fell
asleep in my very face, at which my anger broke forth, so that
I awoke her from a comfortable nap. All was now hushed up
again, but again my anger burst forth at her biding me get
up. ”
She begins thus loftily,-
"Death the righteous love to see,
But from it doth the wicked flee. "
Then suddenly breaks off (as if with laughter),—
"I am sure they fly as fast as their legs can carry them! "
"There is a thing I love to see,
That is our monkey catch a flee. "
"I love in Isa's bed to lie,
Oh, such a joy and luxury!
The bottom of the bed I sleep,
And with great care within I creep;
Oft I embrace her feet of lillys,
But she has goton all the pillys.
Her neck I never can embrace,
But I do hug her feet in place. "
How childish and yet how strong and free is her use of
words! "I lay at the foot of the bed because Isabella said I
disturbed her by continial fighting and kicking, but I was very
dull, and continially at work reading the Arabian Nights, which
I could not have done if I had slept at the top. I am reading
the Mysteries of Udolpho. I am much interested in the fate
of poor, poor Emily. "
Here is one of her swains:
"Very soft and white his cheeks,
His hair is red, and gray his breeks;
His tooth is like the daisy fair,
His only fault is in his hair. "
This is a higher flight:-


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2452
JOHN BROWN
DEDICATED TO MRS. H. CRAWFORD BY THE AUTHOR, M. F.
"Three turkeys fair their last have breathed,
And now this world forever leaved;
Their father, and their mother too,
They sigh and weep as well as you;
Indeed, the rats their bones have crunched,
Into eternity theire laanched.
A direful death indeed they had,
As wad put any parent mad;
But she was more than usual calm:
She did not give a single dam. "
This last word is saved from all sin by its tender age, not to
speak of the want of the n. We fear "she" is the abandoned
mother, in spite of her previous sighs and tears.
-
"Isabella says when we pray we should pray fervently, and
not rattel over a prayer · for that we are kneeling at the foot-
stool of our Lord and Creator, who saves us from eternal dam-
nation, and from unquestionable fire and brimston. "
She has a long poem on Mary Queen of Scots:-
"Queen Mary was much loved by all,
Both by the great and by the small,
But hark! her soul to heaven doth rise!
And I suppose she has gained a prize;
For I do think she would not go
Into the awful place below.
There is a thing that I must tell-
Elizabeth went to fire and hell!
He who would teach her to be civil,
It must be her great friend, the divil! »
She hits off Darnley well:
――――――
"A noble's son, a handsome lad,
By some queer way or other, had
Got quite the better of her heart;
With him she always talked apart:
Silly he was, but very fair;
A greater buck was not found there. "
-
"By some queer way or other": is not this the general case
and the mystery, young ladies and gentlemen? Goethe's doc-
trine of "elective affinities" discovered by our Pet Maidie!


## p. 2453 (#659) ###########################################

JOHN BROWN
2453
SONNET TO A MONKEY
"O lively, O most charming pug:
Thy graceful air and heavenly mug!
The beauties of his mind do shine,
And every bit is shaped and fine.
Your teeth are whiter than the snow;
Your a great buck, your a great beau;
Your eyes are of so nice a shape,
More like a Christian's than an ape;
Your cheek is like the rose's blume;
Your hair is like the raven's plume;
His nose's cast is of the Roman:
He is a very pretty woman.
I could not get a rhyme for Roman,
So was obliged to call him woman. "
This last joke is good. She repeats it when writing of James
the Second being killed at Roxburgh:-
―
"He was killed by a cannon splinter,
Quite in the middle of the winter;
Perhaps it was not at that time,
But I can get no other rhyme! "
Here is one of her last letters, dated Kirkcaldy, 12th October,
1811.
You can see how her nature is deepening and enrich-
ing: · -
"MY DEAR MOTHER-You will think that I entirely forget
you but I assure you that you are greatly mistaken. I think of
you always and often sigh to think of the distance between us
two loving creatures of nature. We have regular hours for all
our occupations first at 7 o'clock we go to the dancing and come
home at 8 we then read our Bible and get our repeating and
then play till ten then we get our music till I when we get
our writing and accounts we sew from 12 till I after which I
get my gramer and then work till five.
till 8 when we dont go to the dancing.
scription. I must take a hasty farewell to her whom I love,
reverence and doat on and who I hope thinks the same of
At 7 we come and knit
This is an exact de-
"MARJORY FLEMING.
"P. S. An old pack of cards (! ) would be very exceptible. "


## p. 2454 (#660) ###########################################

2454
JOHN BROWN
This other is a month earlier:
"MY DEAR LITTLE MAMA-I was truly happy to hear that
you were all well. We are surrounded with measles at present
on every side, for the Herons got it, and Isabella Heron was
near Death's Door, and one night her father lifted her out of
bed, and she fell down as they thought lifeless. Mr. Heron said,
'That lassie's deed noo'-'I'm no deed yet. ' She then threw
up a big worm nine inches and a half long. I have begun dan-
cing, but am not very fond of it, for the boys strikes and mocks
me. I have been another night at the dancing; I like it better.
I will write to you as often as I can; but I am afraid not every
week. I long for you with the longings of a child to embrace
you to fold you in my arms. I respect you with all the respect
due to a mother. You don't know how I love you. So I shall
remain, your loving child,
M. FLEMING. "
-
What rich involution of love in the words marked! Here are
some lines to her beloved Isabella, in July, 1811:-
-
"There is a thing that I do want
With you these beauteous walks to haunt;
We would be happy if you would
Try to come over if you could.
Then I would all quite happy be
Now and for all eternity.
My mother is so very sweet,
And checks my appetite to eat;
My father shows us what to do;
But I'm sure that I want you.
I have no more of poetry;
O Isa do remember me,
And try to love your Marjory. "
In a letter from "Isa" to
-
"Miss Muff Maidie Marjory Fleming,
favored by Rare Rear-Admiral Fleming,"
she says:
"I long much to see you, and talk over all our old
stories together, and to hear you read and repeat. I am pining
for my old friend Cesario, and poor Lear, and wicked Richard.
How is the dear Multiplication table going on? are you still as
much attached to 9 times 9 as you used to be? "
But this dainty, bright thing is about to flee, to come
"quick to confusion. " The measles she writes of seized her,
---


## p. 2455 (#661) ###########################################

JOHN BROWN
2455
and she died on the 19th of December, 1811. The day before.
her death, Sunday, she sat up in bed, worn and thin, her eye
gleaming as with the light of a coming world, and with a trem-
ulous, old voice repeated the lines by Burns, - heavy with the
shadow of death, and lit with the fantasy of the judgment-seat,
-the publican's prayer in paraphrase:-
"Why am I loth to leave this earthly scene? "
It is more affecting than we care to say to read her mother's
and Isabella Keith's letters, written immediately after her death.
Old and withered, tattered and pale, they are now: but when
you read them, how quick, how throbbing with life and love!
how rich in that language of affection which only women and
Shakespeare and Luther can use,-that power of detaining the
soul over the beloved object and its loss.
In her first letter to Miss Keith, Mrs. Fleming says of her
dead Maidie:-"Never did I behold so beautiful an object. It
resembled the finest wax-work. There was in the countenance
an expression of sweetness and serenity which seemed to indi-
cate that the pure spirit had anticipated the joys of heaven ere
it quitted the mortal frame. To tell you what your Maidie said
of you would fill volumes; for you were the constant theme of
her discourse, the subject of her thoughts, and ruler of her
actions. The last time she mentioned you was a few hours
before all sense save that of suffering was suspended, when she
said to Dr. Johnstone, 'If you will let me out at the New Year,
I will be quite contented. ' I asked what made her so anxious
to get out then. 'I want to purchase a New Year's gift for Isa
Keith with the sixpence you gave me for being patient in the
measles; and I would like to choose it myself. ' I do not re-
member her speaking afterwards, except to complain of her
head, till just before she expired, when she articulated, 'O
mother! mother! >»
Do we make too much of this little child, who has been in
her grave in Abbotshall Kirkyard these fifty and more years?
We may of her cleverness, not of her affectionateness, her
nature. What a picture the animosa infans gives us of herself,
her vivacity, her passionateness, her precocious love-making, her
passion for nature, for swine, for all living things, her reading,
her turn for expression, her satire, her frankness, her little sins.
and rages, her great repentances! We don't wonder Walter Scott
—


## p. 2456 (#662) ###########################################

2456
JOHN BROWN
carried her off in the neuk of his plaid, and played himself with
her for hours.
We are indebted for the following — and our readers will be
not unwilling to share our obligations to her sister:-"Her
birth was 15th January, 1803; her death 19th December, 1811.
I take this from her Bibles. I believe she was a child of robust
health, of much vigor of body, and beautifully formed arms, and
until her last illness, never was an hour in bed. She was niece
to Mrs. Keith, residing in No. 1 North Charlotte Street, who
was not Mrs. Murray Keith, although very intimately acquainted
with that old lady.
.
-
"As to my aunt and Scott, they were on a very intimate
footing. He asked my aunt to be godmother to his eldest
daughter Sophia Charlotte. I had a copy of Miss Edgeworth's
'Rosamond' and 'Harry and Lucy' for long, which was 'a gift
to Marjorie from Walter Scott,' probably the first edition of that
attractive series, for it wanted 'Frank,' which is always now
published as part of the series under the title of 'Early Lessons. '
I regret to say these little volumes have disappeared. "
Sir Walter was no relation of Marjorie's, but of the Keiths,
through the Swintons; and like Marjorie, he stayed much
at Ravelstone in his early days, with his grand-aunt Mrs.
Keith.