The Life and Letters of John Gibson Lockhart
Chapter 2: 1808-13
John Gibson Lockhart to Jonathan Christie, [1810?]
“Balliol, Monday.
“My dearest Christie,—I
thought to have answered your letter by our friend Tom
Cornish, but a paucity of the ready detains him here, so I shall
send down songs (and what not?) by him, but must allow myself to describe our
St. Andrew’s Eve—I forget minutiæ. I believe we went there
individually without any great expectations as to the matter of fun. For (old
Leslie, Hamilton, Baillie,
yourself, and the Traills being gone—besides ![]()
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Annan, who was hurried to London that
very day, and Hannay, whom nobody
missed), we looked out in reality for an evening of port and dulness. But
di meliora. A man named
Taylor of Brazennose came there, and
M’Donald, and MacGowan of
University; and Jack Jenkyns, to
make a display of his boarding-school-governess sort of authority, issued his
mandate against dining in college; so we took to
Dickesons’,—where nine men had a famous dinner
for the small sum of £8, 8s. We went on with great harmony till about
eight o’clock. Taylor, who is a bachelor and a true
blue, proposed drinking in solemn silence this toast, ‘The illustrious
memory of the greatest champion of Scottish liberty, civil and
religious,—the Rev. John Knox,
minister of the gospel in the Tolbooth Kirk, Edinburgh.’
Jack looked blue, and harangued talis. ‘Sir’ (on
his legs)—‘I hope, sir, I have lived long enough, sir, in the
world to drink out of respect to you the devil—if you give it. But,
sir, I would rather drink all the devils in hell than John
Knox, who dung down the cathedral kirks and braw houses of
all the Bishops in Scotland. For, sir, I, though not a member of this
University, in so high a situation as the other members of this glorious
assembly—I am an antiquarian—a very lover of antiquities! Yet I will drink John Knox, if you on this
insist.’
“Taylor replied, and after
rejoinders, replies, and replications unnumbered, changed his toast to
‘The ![]()
| 46 | LIFE OF J. G. LOCKHART. | |
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Brigs of Ayr.’ My turn came, and I gave
‘The memory of the Prince,’” and I understand, spoke upon him and the
merits of his cause with unbounded applause—for I forgot all this in the
morning. And the whole party drunk this upon their knees, and
Jack reeled home, and so did we all, about half-past
eleven.
“Nicoll went
off at half-past seven crying—
‘Oh me when shall I sober me!’ |
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“Tom can expatiate on all these
things.
“I heard from Hamilton the other day, he is reading law at Edinburgh.”
Adam Annand (1789-1818)
The son of John Annand, Aberdeen merchant; he was a Snell Exhibitioner at Balliol
College, Oxford, afterwards rector of St. John's Episcopal Chapel, Golden Square, Aberdeen,
1815-18.
Hugh James Baillie (1786-1870)
Son of James Baillie of London; he was a contemporary of John Gibson Lockhart at Balliol
College, Oxford, afterwards a barrister at Lincoln's Inn.
Jonathan Henry Christie (1793-1876)
Educated at Marischal College, Baliol College, Oxford, and Lincoln's Inn; after slaying
John Scott in the famous duel at Chalk Farm he was acquitted of murder and afterwards
practiced law as a conveyancer in London. He was the lifelong friend of John Gibson
Lockhart and an acquaintance of John Keats.
Robert Hannay (1789 c.-1868)
Son of James Hannay of Kirkcudbright; he was a classmate of John Gibson Lockhart's at
Balliol College, Oxford, afterwards a Scottish barrister.
John Knox (1514 c.-1572)
The founder of Presbyterianism in Scotland.
Alexander Nicoll (1793-1828)
Educated at Marischal College, Aberdeen before becoming a Snell Exhibitioner at Balliol
College, Oxford, he catalogued oriental manuscripts at the Bodleian and was regius
professor of Hebrew (1822).
