John Galt's home in Irvine

This is the house in Irvine where John Galt was born on 2 May 1779.  The house was situated on the High Street near the Seagate.  Galt's father, also John, was the captain of a ship trading with the West Indies.  His mother was Jean Thomson.  The couple married in Ayrshire in 1776.  

The site of the building is now home to a branch of the Bank of Scotland.  There is a plaque on the outside wall showing its connection to John Galt.

The plaque was made by Robert Bryden and is dated 1903.

Robert Bryden (1865-1939) was an artist and sculptor who was born in Coylton in Ayrshire.  Many of his works showed scenes of places in Ayrshire.  See more of his work here.

Delap-cheese or Dunlop cheese?

In both The Annals of the Parish (1821) and The Ayrshire Legatees (1820), John Galt mentions Delap-cheese.  While of course the works are fiction, there was a particular type of cheese that originated in Ayrshire and would have been popular when Galt was a boy in Irvine.  It is called Dunlop cheese. 

Dunlop cheese takes its name from the Dunlop, a village in Ayrshire where it was supposedly first made.  The story goes that a woman named Barbara Gilmour, a farmer’s wife, was the first to introduce the cheese in Ayrshire.  It is said that Barbara went to Ireland to avoid the troubles around the time of the Covenanters and it was there that she saw the process which she thought improved the taste and texture of cheese.  On returning home around 1688, she applied it in her own dairy, and the cheese became very popular and was produced throughout Ayrshire and other parts of Scotland.

In The Ayrshire Legatees, Mrs Pringle in a letter from London to her friend Miss Mally Glencairn describing her preparations for her journey to London writes –

“and in the same bocks with them I packit a small crock of our ain excellent poudered butter, with a Delap cheese, for I was told that such commodities are not to be had genuine in London.” 

John Galt has his own version of the origins of the cheese.  In Annals of the Parish The Rev Micah Balwhidder describes his future wife - 

“Soon after this, the time was drawing near for my second marriage.  I had placed my affections, with due consideration, on Miss Lizy Kibbock, the well brought-up daughter of Mr Joseph Kibbock of the Gorbyholm, who was the first that made a speculation in the farming way in Ayrshire, and whose cheese were of such an excellent quality, that they have, under the name of Delap-cheese, spread far and wide of the civilized world.”

Dunlop cheese was well known throughout Scotland and thought especially good for roasting and spread on oat cakes.

Galt, Gog and Magog

The History of Gog and Magog, the Champions of London by Robin Goodfellow.  A children’s book, it was written by John Galt and published in 1819 by J Souter of London.  Galt wrote under several pseudonyms, especially his text books and children's books.

Guildhall, London - source

While many people will associate the name Gog of the land of Magog with the Bible in Ezekiel, Chapter 38, there were many other ancient myths and legends about the characters.  Gog and Magog’s mythical association with London dates back to the writings of Geoffrey of Monmouth which seem to have inspired John Galt’s tale for children, as well as other works.  Gog and Magog were said to have been legendary giants, who lived in a castle on the site of London’s Guildhall.

Two large statues of Gog and Magog are displayed in the Guildhall in London and are paraded each year in the Lord Mayor’s Show.  The present statues date 1953, from but statues of these characters have been connected with London for many centuries.  The first wooden carvings were destroyed in the Great Fire of London in 1666 and were replaced.  Later representations were destroyed in the Blitz during WWII.  Read more about the Guildhall carvings here.

John Galt weaves the legendary characters into a tale about giants, princesses, battles to save the city, with a little bit of the history of London thrown in for good measure.  Galt’s tale ends –

“The renowned, the munificent, the courageous, Gog, and Magog, are gone.  But their spirit will never die, it will enter into the hearts of all good citizens.”  

There was probably a reason why Galt wrote this tale under the name of Robin Goodfellow.  That name has an interesting history in British folklore, being linked with a mischievous spirit.  Shakespeare used the name in A Midsummer Night’s Dream for Puck.  In 1628 a tract was published called The Mad Pranks and Merry Jests of Robin Goodfellow.

Galt's house in Guelph

The City of Guelph was founded by John Galt on St George’s Day (23 April) 1827.  One of the first houses built there was “The Priory” on the banks of the River Speed.  It was named after Charles Prior, who along with Dr William Dunlop were there with Galt at the ceremony to found the city.  Charles Prior was described as the Overseer of the Guelph Settlement by the Canada Company, on whose behalf the city was founded.

Galt, in his Autobiography (Volume II) describes The Priory -

“Having some sort a kind of taste in architecture, it seemed to me that the house could be made into a comfortable ecclesiastical abode, and accordingly, although it was only ten feet high in the ceiling, I employed my best skill in laying it out.  The reader will recollect, that it was but a cottage of one story and formed of trunks of trees; as I have said, however, before, it was of its kind very beautifully constructed by Mr Prior, externally.  I only added a rustic portico to it of trees with the bark, but illustrative of the origin of the Ionic order, it did not cost five pounds.”

Model of The Priory (Guelph Museums)

In 1828 Galt’s wife, Elizabeth and his three sons joined him in Canada.  They first stayed at Burlington Beach, but after his sons had gone to boarding school, the couple moved back to Guelph and lived at The Priory.  Galt described that time – 

“About a month ago, after sending the boys to school in the Lower Province, I brought Mrs Galt to this city, for now it begins to be worthy of the name, where, all things considered we are not uncomfortable.  Our house, it is true, is but a log one, the first that was erected in the town; but it is not without some pretension to elegance.  It has a rustic portico formed with the trunks of trees, in which the constituent parts of the Ionic order are really somewhat intelligibly displayed.  In the interior we have a handsome suit of public rooms, a library etc.”

In A Brief Sketch of the Early History of Guelph by Robert Thomson (A First Year’s Settler) the Priory is described – 

“The main building is about fifty by thirty feet, with a wing or lean-to at each end, which was all finished in first class style in 1828.  It was originally intended as a general headquarters for the company’s employees, and was also the residence of Mr Galt for some time previous to his being recalled."

John Galt was recalled to Britain by the Canada Company in 1829 and was never to return to Canada.  The Priory remained a landmark in Guelph.  A tavern was opened in one of the wings of the building. For a while it was also the local post office.  Later the building became the railway station.  After catching fire several times, it was dismantled in 1911.

The Priory as a railway station

Guelph Museums have an interesting article on The Priory - read it here. 

John Galt's schoolfriend William Spence

While in school in Greenock, John Galt formed a friendship with two other boys, a friendship which lasted for many years.  One of these boys was William Spence, son of a Greenock coppersmith, who from an early age showed a great interest in mathematics and science.  He was also a musician, as Galt writes in his Autobiography (Volume I), he encouraged Galt to learn to play the flute.  Galt writes of Spence - “Spence, besides being a most delicious performer was a considerable composer, and made beautiful sonatas, which had as much character as the compositions of Frederick the Great, King of Prussia.”

While young men in Greenock, Galt together James Park, William Spence formed a “monthly society” where the read various publications and wrote their own contributions.  Galt writes - “The essays of William Spence were very astronomical, we thought them profound; they were all about planets and comets, the cosmogony of the earth, the infinite divisibility of matter, and the boundless nature of premundane space; any thing of this world was too gross to enter into his speculative theories.”

While the three young men went their separate ways as far as their careers were concerned, Park and Spence visited John Galt shortly after he moved to London. 

William Spence died in 1815 at the age of 37.  In 1819 his mathematical essays were edited by John Frederick William Herschel (1792-1871).  Galt wrote a biography of Spence for this publication.  

In his Biography of Spence, Galt described him  – “His manners also were no less peculiar and his staidness was so remarkable, even before he became a mathematician, that about the age of fourteen he obtained from his companions the title of the Philosopher; and this title, although certainly not intended as a mark of respect, was undoubtedly bestowed from a sentiment of that kind mingled with something in ridicule of his constitutional gravity.”

He was so well regarded in his hometown of Greenock that a subscription was raised to mark his life with a memorial in the Wellpark Mid Kirk, Greenock.  This was widely encouraged by John Galt.

You can read more about William Spence here.

Ouranoulogos – John Galt’s “complete failure”!

It is not often that people own up to their failures!  In his Literary Life (Volume I) John Galt writes of his work Ouranoulogos - 

“But although the work was brought out at less than a fourth of the price at which it should have been published, and was greatly admired by everyone who saw it, it fell literally still-born from the press;  A more complete failure, indeed, I never heard of.”

The Ouranoulogos or The Celestial Volume, was a work written by John Galt in 1833 and published by Cadel in London and Blackwood in Edinburgh.  As the advertisement for the work shows, Ouranoulogos was meant to be the first of twelve instalments and Galt was fortunate to have the artist John Martin, provide an illustration for the first volume.

Ouranoulogos by John Martin

In a letter to William Blackwood written in March 1833 Galt writes – 

“I hear you are to be in town about the end of the month but in the mean time I write to say that I have seen Mr Cadell respecting a joint publication projected by me and Mr Martin (Balshazzar) and I propose to him to be my publisher with you; to which he readily acceded and I write this in consequence.”

John Martin, artist

Galt, continues -

“The work is to be in royal quatro and to consist of a picture by Martin and an illustrative tale by me with an extract from the original work that has suggested it.  It is to be executed in the very first style that the arts allow here and to come out in numbers.  We expect it will form an era in the arts as the drawing and engraving are to be executed simultaneously and the printing to be as elegant as can be produced.”

John Martin (1789-1854) was an English painter, engraver and illustrator known for his large, dramatic works, many of biblical scenes.  His works became very popular especially “Belshazzar’s Feast” of 1820 to which John Galt alludes in his letter to Blackwood.  John Martin illustrated scenes from many novels and was also an engineer and inventor.  The illustration for Ouranoulogos was later expanded by Martin into a work now owned by the Royal Collection Trust entitled The Eve of the Deluge. 

"Eve of the Deluge" by John Martin - source

Galt explains his lofty idea for Ouranoulogos in Literary Life -

“I really designed, and in part executed, a solemn abstract work of the Miltonic kind, a natural effect, as I believe it to be, of the comparative solitude to which I was consigned.  I allude to the Ouranoulogos, of which one number was published, illustrated with a picture, a rare and recently invented species of engraving, in which Mr Martin displayed all his singular power.”

Ouranoulogos is the story of the Biblical flood and Noah's Ark -

"Forty days and forty nights the rain fell as a curtain – the hills were drowned, the windows of Heaven were opened, and the angels contemplated the retiring Austerity of the Lord.  All around was the loneliness of death, and as the rimless vast of the premundane." (John Galt, Ouranoulogos)

Galt also quotes from the work by Arthur Golding (1536-1606) the translation of Ovid's Metamorphoses of 1603 - 

“Th’ outrageous swelling of the sea

The lesser hillocks drown;

Unwounted waves on highest tops

Of mountains did rebound.

 

The greatest part of men were drownde;

And such as scapt the flood,

Forlorne with fasting overlong,

Did die for want of food.”

In 1833 John Galt had become increasingly unwell and short of money.  At the time, he and his wife, Elizabeth were living at Barn Cottage, Old Brompton in London.  While admitting Ouranoulogos was a failure, he reasoned that -

 “A more complete failure, indeed, I never heard of; and it can only be accounted for by supposing, astrologically, that the disaster which withered my limbs, extended to my fortunes.  As yet, to be sure, I am not very sensible that it has affected my head, but it will do so, no doubt, by and by.”

Galt ends this rather sombre chain of thought with the words – 

“The hours that are rung on a doctor’s bottle, are not so salutary as those which are chimed by the village clock.”  (Literary Life Volume I.)

John Galt - Social Historian?

For many years the Greenock Philosophical Society held an annual John Galt Lecture.  This little book, John Galt, Social Historian was presented to William M Brownlie, Rector of Greenock High School, who delivered the lecture in March 1951.

The bookplate states - "Presented to William M Brownlie PhD by the members of the Greenock Philosophical Society as a memento of a very interesting occasion".  It was published by the Telegraph Printing Works in Greenock.

It is a very interesting account of Brownlie's lecture in which he looks at Annals of the Parish by John Galt and compares the accounts of the Parish of Dalmailing (the setting of the novel) with changes to the social and industrial lives of the people of Greenock and Irvine.  Changes in farming methods and introduction of large scale industry are particularly noted.

Greenock Philosophical Society (link leads to present Facebook page) was instituted in 1861 and still continues to this day.  Many interesting and learned speakers over the years.  The annual John Galt Lecture ran for a number of years along with an annual James Watt Lecture.

The Field of Battle

On this Remembrance Sunday thoughts turn to those who lost their lives in battle.  While the weapons may change, the carnage left behind on the battlefield remains.  

This extract from a poem The Field of Battle, published by John Galt in 1833 is a graphic description of the realities of war.

"At morn, the soldier from his comrade’s corpse

Startles the camp dog;

And the wounded oft,

To scare the foul birds hov’ring o’er them, lift

Their shatter’d limbs and roll their gashy heads.

And there the sun, remorseless on his throne,

Brings clouds of carnage-flies, that fill the air

With shadowy gloom – a living shower of sound."

John Galt at Makars' Court

The Royal Mile in Edinburgh is a very popular tourist destination.  Near the top of the Royal Mile, is Lady Stair’s Close.  Here can be found Edinburgh’s Makars' Court - makar is the Scots word for poet or author - and the Writers’ Museum.  One of the first things you will see on entering Lady Stair's Close is this paving slab commemorating author John Galt with the words birr and smeddum.

John Galt slab in Makars' Court, Edinburgh

Birr and smeddum are Scottish words often used by Galt in his writing.  Birr usually means energy or enthusiasm and smeddum can mean strength.

Galt uses the term “birr and smeddum” in Annals of the Parish when describing a book by the son of a parishioner -

“And his mother had the satisfaction, before she died, to see him a placed minister, and his name among the authors of his country; for he published at Edinburgh a volume of Moral Essays, of which he sent me a pretty bound copy, and they were greatly creditable to his pen, though lacking somewhat of that birr and smeddum that is the juice and flavour of books of that sort.”

Galt uses the words individually.  In his work The Annals of the Parish, when Mrs Craig states to Mr Snodgrass –

“For my part, it’s a very caldrife way of life to dine every day on coffee; broth and beef would put mair smeddum in the men.”  

The word caldrife can mean, cold, cheerless.  In The Provost, one of the characters is called “Mr Smeddum”.  Also in the Provost is an account of a council meeting when the Provost relates -

“Mr Keelevine made an endeavour to dissuade me; but I set him down with a stern voice, striking the table at the same time with all my birr, as I said “Sir, you have no voice here.”

The courtyard called Makars' Court contains many other slabs commemorating Scottish writers and poets.  The Writers' Museum faces the courtyard and has fabulous exhibits of the life and works of Robert Burns, Sir Walter Scott and Robert Louis Stevenson.  Unfortunately, there is nothing inside concerning John Galt – surely a great omission.

John Galt and the Gunpowder Plot

In 1821 John Galt published a massive work – Pictures Historical and Biographical drawn from English, Scottish and Irish History.  Volume I has 539 pages and Volume II has 564 pages.  They cover historical events from ancient Greece (taking the view of Geoffrey of Monmouth that after the fall of Troy, Brutus led his people to an island which they called Britain) the second volume ends with the reign of George III.  The book had many illustrations and was published in 1821. 

In his preface to the massive work Galt writes – 

“The object of this Work is to present a descriptive view of the most remarkable incidents in the annals of these kingdoms.  The selection consists of those transactions, which, either from their extraordinary nature, or the celebrity of the characters concerned in them, make the deepest impression on the memory.” 

One event that certainly left a lasting impression on Britain is covered in Volume II - the 1605 Gunpowder Plot when Guy Fawkes and his fellow Catholic conspirators attempted to blow up Parliament.  The plot was discovered on 5 November and to this day the phrase “remember, remember the 5th of November” is still used and bonfires are lit around Britain.   

John Galt tells of the plot in great detail and writes about the aftermath of the discovery of the barrels of gunpowder that had been hidden in the cellars of the Houses of Parliament – 

“After this discovery, Fawkes being searched, there was found upon him a dark lantern, a tinder-box, and three matches.  The villain, instead of being dismayed, boldly told them, that if he had been taken within the cellar he would have blown up himself and them together.  He confessed the design was to blow up the king and parliament.”

The two volumes show the breadth of Galt's interest in history and his commitment to large scale projects. 

John Galt and the Duke of York's mistress

In his Autobiography (Vol 1) John Galt spends a whole chapter describing how, in 1813, he received a visit from a “the famous Mrs Clarke” who had an interesting proposition for him.  Explaining that she had obtained his address from his publisher, Thomas Cadell, she told Galt that she wished him to visit her at her home which Galt says, was either “just off Baker Street or Gloucester Place” in London.  She also advised Galt that –

“she was surprised to see me so young a man, and so dressed, for she understood I was an old Scotch clergyman.”!

Mary Anne Clarke

On the following Sunday, Galt duly visited Mrs Clarke to discover just what she wanted from him.

Mrs Clarke was the famous Mary Anne Clarke, former mistress of Frederick, Duke of York, second son of George III.  

Frederick Duke of York

John Galt goes on to describe her -

“She had certainly no pretentions whatever to beauty, though there was a life and intellectuality in her eyes sparklingly agreeable.  She dressed with what I would call much taste, remarkably neat, plain, and clean; and generally with a bared head.  Her hair was almost black.  She possessed great powers of conversation, was often witty, and suddenly surprised you with flashed of shrewdness seldom seen in woman.  Her mind was decidedly masculine, and she read books of what may be called the male kind.  But if was not by knowledge that she made herself agreeable.  On the contrary, her general conversation had very few literary allusions; her great forte lay in the discernment of character.”

Mary Anne Clarke

On his visit John Galt soon found out why she had contacted him as she - “had been advised to consult me about a publication of her life.”  He decided that he would “use all my address to get possession of her secrets”.

Knowing that Clarke was in need of money, he admits that he “could give her no advice, unless she allowed me to see all her papers.  She consented; and laying an armful on the table, left me to peruse them.”

Mary Anne Clarke (1776-1852) had become the mistress of the Duke of York in 1803.  In 1809 she was accused of selling army commissions with the Duke's knowledge.  There was a parliamentary enquiry into the scandal and she was questioned before parliament.  The Duke (of course) was eventually cleared of any wrongdoing, but he resigned from his official post as Commander of the British Army (although he was later reinstated).  He paid off Mary Anne and she was forced to sell up and leave London.  In need of funds, she returned in 1813 with a view to publishing the Duke's letters to her.  That is why she had consulted John Galt.

After six hours perusing the material Mary Anne had made available to him, John Galt had decided that they were unfit for publication.  Galt explained to Mrs Clarke that -

“the publication she intended was disreputable, and that her best way, as she had too much in her power, was to try if she could get the money she wanted by hook or crook from the Duke of York, for the publication must not go on”. 

She and Galt then had an interesting conversation in which she told him some amusing anecdotes about some of the interesting people she had been connected with.

Later in 1813, Mary Anne Clarke was tried for libel against William Vesey-FitzGerald who had been instrumental in giving evidence against her with regard to selling army commissions.  She was found guilty of libel and imprisoned for nine months.  On her release she went to live abroad.

There is an excellent book about the fascinating life and adventures of Mary Anne Clarke entitled Mary Anne by Daphne du Maurier who was Mary Anne's great-great-grandaughter.

Mary Anne herself wrote several works, including a Memoir, The Authentic and Impartial Life of Mrs Mary Anne Clarke,  published in 1809 (available to read online).