? CLARINDA.? 327 Bristo Strht.]
pointed out by Sir Walter himself to the late Dr.
Robert Chambers. In 1792 Mr. Luckmore was
appointed one of the four English masters of the
High School on the city?s establishment, and continued
to hold that office till his death, in 181 I. Sir
Walter Scott, on leaving his school in Hamilton?s
Entry, was placed under the domestic tutelage of
Mr. James French, who prepared him to join Mr.
Luke Fraser?s second class at the High School,
in October, 1779.
Another interesting locality in Bristo Street, at its
junction with the Potterrow, was long known as the
General?s Entry, No. 58, thoughhow it exists but
in name. This was a desolate-looking court of
ancient buildings. The south and east sides of the
quadrangle were formed by somewhat ornate edifices.
The crowstepped gable at the south-east
angle bore an antique sun-dial, with the quaint
legendand
beyond this was a row of circular-headed
dormer windows, in the richly decorated style of
James VI, One of these bore a shield, charged
with a monkey and three mullets-in-chief, surrounded
by elaborate scroll-work of the same reign
and bearing the initials J.D.
Unvarying tradition has assigned this mansion to
General Monk as a residence while commanding
in Scotland, but there is not much probability to
support it. The house was furnished with numerous
out-shots and projections, dark, broad, and
bulky stacks of chimneys, reared in unusual places,
all blackened by age and encrusted by the smoke
of centuries. It is said to have been built by Six
James Dalrymple, afterwards first Viscount Stair,
one of the Breda Cammissioners, and who continued
his practice at the bar with great reputation afte1
the battles of Dunbar and Worcester.
That he was a particular favourite with General
Monk, and even with Cromwell, to whom the
former recommended him as the fittest person foi
the bench in 1657, is well known; and under such
circumstances, it may be supposed ?that Monk
would be his frequent visitor when he came from
his quarters at Dalkeith to the capital. Tradition
has assigned the house as the permanent residence
in those days of the Commander of the Forces in
Scotland. But there is sufficient proof that it was
the town abode of the Stair family, till, like the
rest of the Scottish nobility, they abandoned Edinburgh,
after the Treaty of Union. ? I t is not
unlikely,? says Wilson, ?? that the present name oj
the old court is derived from the more recen!
residence there of John, second Earl of Stair, wha
served during the protracted campaigns of the
? WE SHALL DIE ALL ; ?
Duke of Marlborough, and was promoted to the
rank of lieutenant-general after. the bloody victory
of Malplaquet. He shared in the fall of the great
duke, and retired from Court until the accession of
George I., during which interval it is probable that
the family mansion in the Potterrow formed the
frequent abode of the disgraced favourite.?
But Generalk Entry is perhaps now most
intimately associated with one of Burns?s heroines,
Mrs. McLehose, the romantic Clarinda of the notorious
correspondence, in which the poet figured
as Sylvander. He was introduced to her in the
house of a Miss Nimmo, on the first floor of an
old tenement on the north side of Alison Square.
A little parlour, a bed-room, and kitchen, accord.
ding to Chambers, constituted the accommodation
of Mrs. Agnes McLehose, ?now the residence of
two, if not three, families in the extreme of humble
life.?
In December, 1787, Burns met at a tea-party
this lady, then a married woman of great beauty,
about his own age, and who, with her two children,
had been deserted by a worthless husband. She
had wit, could use her pen, had read ? Werther?
and his sorrows, was sociable and fl.irty, and possessed
a voluptuous lovelines% if we may judge by
the silhouette of her in Scott Douglas?s edition of
thepoet?s works. She and Burns took afancy to each
other on the instant. She invited him to tea, but he
offered a visit instead. An accident confined him
for about a month to his room, and this led to the
famous Clarinda and Sylvander correspondence.
At about the fifth or sixth exchange of their letters
she wrote: ? I t is really curious, so much fun
passing hetween two persons who saw each other
only once.?
During the few months of his fascination for this
fair one in General?s Entry, Bums showed more of
his real self, perhaps, than can be traced in other
parts of his published correspondence. In his first
letter to her after his marriage, he says, in reply to
her sentimental reproaches, ?? When you call over
the scenes that have passed between us, you will
survey the conduct of an honest man struggling
successfully with temptations the most powerful
that ever beset humanity, and preserving untainted
honour in situations where the severest virtue
would have forgiven a fall.? But had Clarinda
been less accessible, she might habze discovered
eventually that much of the poet?s warmth *as
fanciful and melodramatic. From their correspondence
it would appear that she was in expectation
of Bums visiting her again in Alison
Square in 1788.
She was the cousin-german of Lord Craig, who,
