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Language and Social Change
in China

Language and Social Change in China: Undoing Commonness through Cosmopolitan

Mandarin offers an innovative and authoritative account of the crucial role of
language in shaping the sociocultural landscape of contemporary China. Based
on a wide range of data collected since the 1990s and grounded in quantitative
and discourse analyses of sociolinguistic variation, Qing Zhang tracks the emer-
gence of what she terms “Cosmopolitan Mandarin” as a new stylistic resource
for a rising urban elite and a new middle-class, consumption-based lifestyle.
The book powerfully illuminates that Cosmopolitan Mandarin participates
in dismantling the pre-reform, socialist, conformist society by bringing about
new social distinctions. Rich in cultural and linguistic details, the book is the
first of its kind to highlight the implications of language change on the social
order and cultural life of contemporary China. Language and Social Change in
China is ideal for students and scholars interested in sociolinguistics and linguis-
tic anthropology, and Chinese language and society.

Qing Zhang is Associate Professor in the School of Anthropology at the

University of Arizona, USA.
This page intentionally left blank
Language and
Social Change
in China
Undoing Commonness through
Cosmopolitan Mandarin

Qing Zhang
First published 2018
by Routledge
711 Third Avenue, New York, NY 10017
and by Routledge
2 Park Square, Milton Park, Abingdon, Oxon, OX14 4RN
Routledge is an imprint of the Taylor & Francis Group, an informa business
© 2018 Taylor & Francis
The right of Qing Zhang to be identified as author of this work has
been asserted by her in accordance with sections 77 and 78 of the
Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reprinted or
reproduced or utilised in any form or by any electronic, mechanical,
or other means, now known or hereafter invented, including
photocopying and recording, or in any information storage or retrieval
system, without permission in writing from the publishers.
Trademark notice: Product or corporate names may be trademarks
or registered trademarks, and are used only for identification and
explanation without intent to infringe.
Every effort has been made to contact copyright holders. Please advise
the publisher of any errors or omissions, and these will be corrected in
subsequent editions.
Library of Congress Cataloging in Publication Data
A catalog record for this title has been requested

ISBN: 978-0-415-70807-4 (hbk)

ISBN: 978-0-415-70808-1 (pbk)
ISBN: 978-1-315-88625-1 (ebk)
Typeset in Bembo
by codeMantra
This book is dedicated to Dan and Jing-yi.
This page intentionally left blank
Contents

List of Illustrations viii

Preface ix
Notes on Chinese Names and Transcription Conventions xiii
List of Abbreviations xv

Introduction: Emerging Social Distinctions and the
Semiotic Inadequacy of the “Common Speech” 1

1 Sociolinguistic Change, Style, and Ideology 20

2 Beijing Yuppies: The New Business Elite 46

3 Cosmopolitan Mandarin in the Making of Beijing Yuppies 61

4 Cosmopolitan Mandarin in the Making of a New

Chinese Middle-Class Consumer 105

5 Warring Standards: Contesting the Enregisterment of

Cosmopolitan Mandarin 134

6 A Style-Based Approach to Sociolinguistic Change 177

Index 191
List of Illustrations

Figures
0.1 Enjoy the same class of private 3
0.2 Let the era of no individuality be gone forever! 6
3.1 Gender Variation in Each Professional Group 78
3.2 Topic Variation in Each Professional Group 79
3.3 Contrast in Styles 81

Tables
3.1 Summary of Linguistic Variables 76
3.2 Effects of Professional Group, Gender, and
Topic on Variation 77
3.3 Effects of Gender and Topic in Yuppie Group 77
3.4 Effects of Gender and Topic in State Professional Group 77
4.1 Vocabulary of New Urban Lifestyle 111
4.2 “Trendy” Expressions 113
4.3 English Expressions 115
4.4 Limited Use of Rhotacization 116
4.5 Locative Particles with Non-rhotacized Suffixes 118
4.6 Most Frequent Lexemes in S Information Station 125
5.1 Contrasting Indexical Values of Standard Putonghua and
Cosmopolitan Mandarin 137
5.2 State’s Construals of “Gang-Tai Qiang” vis-à-vis
Standard Putonghua 155
5.3 N-th and n+1st Order Indexicality of Standard Putonghua
and Cosmopolitan Mandarin 166
Preface

The seeds of my research in this book were sown at the end of my master’s
study in China, when I went on job interviews with foreign companies in
Beijing and Shanghai and at the same time was awaiting admission letters from
graduate schools overseas. With a bachelor’s degree in English and a master’s
in linguistics, and no background in business, I crafted myself in the inter-
views as a linguistic and cultural intermediary for foreign businesses in China.
Eventually, I received offers from three multinational corporations and admis-
sions with financial support from several universities in the United States and
the United Kingdom. My interest in pursuing graduate studies in linguistics
overpowered my desire to join a new breed of Chinese business professionals.
That decision shaped the trajectory of my professional and personal life: I have
become an academic specializing in language and social change in China rather
than one of the Chinese yuppies whom I studied for my dissertation research.
I started my graduate studies in linguistics at Stanford University, knowing
that I wanted to focus on the relation between language and social change, and
where else is a better place to examine the relation than China?
People of my age cohort—starting primary school in the late 1970s when
China initiated the opening-up policy and economic reform—have grown up
with and lived the drastic socioeconomic and ideological changes that have
profoundly transformed Chinese society. The power of language in such
transformations has always fascinated me. The Department of Linguistics at
Stanford University was where this passion of mine grew from a rudimentary
interest articulated in my application statement in terms of speech act theory
and cross-cultural communication to a deepened understanding of language
as social action and meaning-making resource. Specifically, I became inter-
ested in examining the inextricable link between language and social change
grounded in rigorous linguistic analysis and cultural theories.
x Preface

I began to find my own intellectual voice during the writing of my disser-

tation. I am grateful for three people who helped nurture the voice and shape
my intellectual trajectory at its early stage. I owe a tremendous intellectual debt
to Penny Eckert, my doctoral adviser at Stanford University. Taking me on as
her advisee from the very beginning of my graduate studies, she has encour-
aged and supported my interest in language and social change throughout my
academic career. I draw inspiration from her work on style and sociolinguistic
variation and from her encouragement to expand my intellectual horizon, inte-
grating scholarship from other related fields to make greater waves in advancing
sociolinguistic theory on language and social change. I am grateful for her
unwavering encouragement and enthusiasm in my work, and her comments
on Chapter 1 and earlier drafts of Chapter 2 and 3 of this book. I have also
benefited tremendously from Miyako Inoue’s advice and insights on seeing
the broader picture: How linguistic issues come to stand in for larger social
and political projects and processes, and how a deep understanding of the lo-
cal political economies can shed light on the intricacies of linguistic practices.
John Rickford, another mentor and member of my dissertation committee
at Stanford, whose earlier work on linguistic variation and change in a non-­
Western, non-industrialized community, inspired me to pursue my research
in China. Research on sociolinguistic variation and change has continued to
be dominated by studies in Western societies and on English. More research
in other societies and on other languages is needed to not only expand the
empirical breadth of the discipline but also to strengthen the methodological
and theoretical rigor in investigating sociolinguistic change in diverse contexts.
This book seeks to offer such a contribution.
The project on the emergence of Cosmopolitan Mandarin at its various
stages has benefited from the support of many people. I extend my greatest ap-
preciation to the yuppies and state professionals in Beijing. I am most grateful
to them for finding time from their busy schedules to participate in my study. I
thank them for sharing with me their professional experiences and their views
on the effects of social and economic changes on their lives and their city.
Particularly, I would like to thank “Mr. Wang,” my point of contact and friend,
for his enthusiasm in my project and for introducing me to the first six yuppie
participants, and I thank “Ms. Jiang” for getting me into contact with managers
in the state sector. I am deeply grateful to Liu Ling of Tianjin Television Sta-
tion, one of the hosts of the program S Information Station, for allowing me to
analyze her program and helping me obtain recordings of the show.
Friends, colleagues, and mentors at the University of Arizona whose friend-
ship, encouragement, and support have enriched my academic and personal life.
My deepest appreciation goes to Dianne Austin, Anita Bhappu, Wenhao Diao,
Tami Draves, Perry Gilmore, Jane Hill, John Olsen, Susan Philips, Barney
Pavao-Zuckerman, Jen Roth-Gordon, and Stacey Tecot. Senior colleagues and
peers, Asif Agha, Susan Gal, Barbara Johnstone, Bonnie McElhinny, Norma
 Preface xi

Mendoza-Denton, Rob Podesva, Michael Silverstein, Keith Walters, and

Kathryn Woolard have offered me insights and comments on various issues
and versions of the chapters in this book. I am deeply grateful for their inter-
est in my work. I am particularly thankful to Andrew Wong, my colleague,
friend, and sounding board, for spending time on reading and commenting on
Chapters 1, 5, and 6.
Earlier versions of chapters of this book were read and discussed at my
graduate seminar “Linguistic Analysis of Social Meaning” and at Norma
Mendoza-­Denton’s graduate seminar “Genealogies of Language and Power”
at the University of California, Los Angeles. I am thankful for the students’
questions and comments. I am thankful for Bill Cotter and Priscilla Shin for
their assistance at the final editing stage of the book. Earlier sections of the
book were presented at lectures and workshops at the following universi-
ties: National Taiwan Normal University (English); Tianjin Foreign Studies
University (English and Semiotics); Stanford University (Linguistics); Univer-
sity of Chicago (Anthropology); University of California, Los Angeles (Center
for Chinese Studies); University of California, San Diego (Anthropology); and
University of Virginia (Anthropology and East Asian Studies). I extend my ap-
preciation to the student and faculty audiences for offering me valuable insights
and suggestions.
I would also like to extend my special appreciation to Nikki Seifert for her
incredible editing work that helped shape the final product and made the book
more readable for a general audience. I am deeply grateful for the editor at
Routledge, Rebecca Novack, and editorial assistant, Kathrene Binag, for their
support and patience that helped me carry the project to its completion.
I gratefully acknowledge the financial support and research leave time at var-
ious stages of my research offered by Stanford University, University of Texas at
Austin, and University of Arizona. I am also thankful to Cambridge University
Press for allowing me to reuse portions of my 2005 article published in Language
in Society 34 (3):431-466, “A Chinese Yuppie in Beijing: Phonological Variation
and the Construction of a New Professional Identity” in Chapter 3 of this book.
Parts of my 2012 article, “‘Carry Shopping through to the End’: Linguistic
Innovation in a Chinese Television Program” in Style-Shifting in Public: New
Perspective on Stylistic Variation, edited by Juan Manuel Hernández-Campoy and
Juan Antonio Cutillas-Espinosa, 205-224 (Amsterdam: John Benjamins), were
significantly modified and incorporated in Chapter 4 of this book.
My deepest appreciation goes to my family—my parents, my sister, and
my brother-in-law on the other side of the Pacific; my husband, Dan; and our
six-year-old daughter Jing-yi. I owe the greatest debt to my parents, for their
unconditional love, for being my ardent supporters, and for their faith in my
ability to accomplish whatever I dedicate myself to. I am also forever grateful for
their love and support of my whole family: Taking care of Jing-yi and me when
we go back to China on my research trips, and traveling to the United States to
xii Preface

support all three of us when we need their help. I am also grateful for my sister
and brother-in-law for taking good care of our parents when I am thousands of
miles away from them. Finally, I am tremendously indebted to Dan and Jing-yi,
who lived the book project with me. The book would not have been possible
without Dan’s support and love. I am grateful for him sharing my academic life
and always being there for me. To our daughter, Jing-yi, I deeply appreciate
her understanding at such a young age that sometimes I have to prioritize the
book over spending time with her. Her sunny smile and laughter are the best
de-stressors after long hours of work, and her self-made congratulation card for
the completion of my book manuscript is the best reward I could ask for. This
book is for you, Dan and Jing-yi!
Notes on Chinese Names and
Transcription Conventions

In this book, Chinese names are presented with the family name (xing) fol-
lowed by the given name (ming). Original Chinese expressions and utterances
are represented in italics in pinyin, the official phonetic alphabet system of main-
land China, and English translation is enclosed in single quotation marks. All
English translations are mine unless otherwise noted. The pinyin transcription
does not include tone marks except for examples used to illustrate variation in
tones. In such examples, the four Beijing/Standard Mandarin tones are marked
by numbers: 1 for the high-level tone; 2 for the rising tone; 3 for the falling–­
rising tone; 4 for the falling tone; and 0 for the neutral tone, for example,
piao4liang0 versus piao4liang4 ‘pretty’. The International Phonetic Alphabet is
used to transcribe particular sounds, specifically in Chapter 3 in the description
of linguistic variables.

The following symbols are used in the transcription of speech:

Underline Words originally spoken in English are underlined

EMPHASIS Capitalization indicates emphasis, which may be signaled by increased
amplitude or careful articulation
h laughter, each token marks one pulse
[] overlapping speech
: Lengthening
- Self-interruption
. end of an intonation unit with a falling contour
? end of an intonation unit with a rising contour
, a pause shorter than 1 second
(n) A number enclosed in parentheses, e.g., (2), indicates a longer pause
(( )) transcriber’s comments
xiv Notes on Chinese Names and Transcription Conventions

Boldface highlights linguistic features and content that are significant and
receive special attention in analysis. Bold capitalized letters in square brackets
represent the following types of linguistic feature:

[+R]: -r, rhotacization; [-R]: de-rhotacization

[+lenition]: lenition of zh /tʂ/, ch /tʂh/, and sh /ʂ/ as r [ɻ ]; [-lenition]: zh /tʂ/,
ch /tʂh/, and sh /ʂ/ realized as [tʂ], [tʂh], and [ʂ] respectively
[+interdental]: interdental realization of z /ts/, c /tsh/, and s /s/ as [tθ], [tθh],
and [θ] [-interdental]: z /ts/, c /tsh/, and s /s/ realized as [ts], [tsh], and [s]
respectively
[T0], [T1], [T2], [T3], [T4]: represent the tone realization of the syllable:
[T0] = neutral tone; [T1], [T2], [T3], and [T4] each represents a full tone in
a conventionally neutral tone environment
[E]: use of English
[L]: innovative lexical item
List of Abbreviations

BM Beijing Mandarin
CCP Chinese Communist Party
CCTV China Central Television
CM Cosmopolitan Mandarin
IPA International Phonetic Alphabet
KMT Kuomintang, the nationalist party
MSP Mainland Standard Putonghua
PRC People’s Republic of China
PSC Putonghua Shuiping Ceshi ‘Putonghua Proficiency Test’
PSCSG Putonghua Shuiping Ceshi Shishi Gangyao ‘The Implementation
Guidelines for the Putonghua Proficiency Test’
PTH Putonghua, the name of the standard language in the People’s
Republic of China
RMB renminbi ‘Chinese yuan’
SARFT Guojia Guangbo Dianying Dianshi Zongju ‘State Administration of
Radio, Film, and Television’
XHC Xiandai Hanyu Cidian ‘Modern Chinese Dictionary’
XXCC Xinhua Xin Ciyu Cidian ‘Xinhua Dictionary of New Expressions’
This page intentionally left blank
Introduction
Emerging Social Distinctions and the Semiotic
Inadequacy of the “Common Speech”

It is our policy to let some people and some regions prosper before others,
so that they can bring along the backward regions. … The [economic] re-
form is designed, first and foremost, to break with egalitarianism, and to
break with the practice of having everyone “eat from the same big pot.”
(Deng 1994 [1986], 169)

我们的政策是让一部分人、一部分地区先富起来，以带动和帮助落后的
地区… 改革首先要打破平均主义，打破“大锅饭”
(Deng 1993 [1986], 155)1

0.1 The Power of Language in Social Change

The opening quote from Deng Xiaoping, often referred to as the chief architect
of China’s economic reform, offers perhaps the most convincing example of
the power of language in transforming Chinese society. In an Austinian sense,
Deng’s declaratives perform a powerful speech act that has fundamentally re-
shaped the country’s socioeconomic trajectory. However, the power of language
resides not just in such speech acts performed by powerful leaders. The focus
of this book is that changing ways of using language—even at the micro level
of innovative ways of using sounds and words—can bring about social change.
The central theme of this book is about the mutually constitutive relation be-
tween language and social change. Linguistic innovation and change are not
merely the reflexes and effects of social change but are among the very forces
and resources for reconfiguring sociopolitical landscapes. I argue that sociolin-
guistic investigation of language change needs to look beyond the linguistic
system to locate it within broader cultural political processes. This book thus
examines language change in China as a tool to dismantle a pre-­reform socialist
2 Introduction

egalitarian society that upheld political and cultural conformity and suppressed
expression of difference. It tracks the emergence of a new linguistic style, “Cos-
mopolitan Mandarin,” and how it is used to bring about new social distinctions.
In doing so, the book develops a style-based approach to sociolinguistic change
that treats linguistic change and innovation as emerging stylistic resources for
effecting social change.
Ultimately, the book seeks to illuminate how Cosmopolitan Mandarin par-
ticipates in the emergence of a postsocialist stylistic regime that valorizes differ-
entiation. The social-ideological upheaval of Chinese society over the past four
decades makes China one of the most fecund sites for examining the inextrica-
ble relation between language and social change. The investigation of linguistic
innovation in this book is not only timely but also contributes more broadly
to the development of sociolinguistic change that embeds language change in
the broader processes of sociopolitical transformation—and this book looks in
detail at the ways in which style has a particular role to play in effecting this
change (Coupland 2014).
The rest of this chapter provides the sociolinguistic context for the book.
Following a short description of an ideological shift from socialist egalitarianism
to valorization of difference, Section 0.3 discusses tidbits of innovative language
use as an example of the kind of linguistic analysis developed in the rest of the
book. Section 0.4 explains the various language-related terms used in this book.
Section 0.5 offers a historical overview of language standardization in the Peo-
ple’s Republic of China (PRC). The chapter ends with an overview of the book.

0.2 Abolishing Socialist Egalitarianism and

Valorizing Difference
“Let[ting] some people and some regions prosper before others” and abolishing
egalitarianism became a central guiding principle of economic reform initiated
in the late 1970s. The seismic socioeconomic change over the past four decades
has led to the advent of consumerism and increased socioeconomic stratifica-
tion, including the burgeoning Chinese middle classes (e.g., Bian 1994; Bian
et al. 2005; Croll 2006; Davis 2000; Griffiths 2013; Hanser 2008; Pun 2005;
Woronov 2016; Zhou 2004). Emergent social groups draw on linguistic and
other semiotic resources and engage in practices that forge new cultural iden-
tities and (life)styles (e.g., Dong 2016; Farquhar and Zhang 2012; Goodman
2008; Hoffman 2010; Hsu 2007; Ren 2013; Zhang 2010). The diversification
of the contemporary Chinese society would not have happened without the
fundamental ideological shift away from socialist egalitarianism, captured in
the opening quotation. As Dirlik observes (2001, 16):

The most important contrast between the capitalist present and the social-
ist past is the valorization of difference, which provides a radical departure
 Introduction 3

from the days of socialist frugality and control which dressed everyone
in sexless green and blue in the name of socialist equality. Socialism, at
least as it was understood then, required homogeneity of values as well
as of representations. Capitalism, and the consumer revolution, require
for their sustenance the production of heterogeneity, however superficial
and symbolic.

Valorization of difference legitimizes overt display and expression of difference,

which requires the use of semiotic resources to create meanings of distinction.
Language thus comes to serve as a vital tool in the making of new social dis-
tinctions. Examples of language being used to effect differentiation are ubiqui-
tous. The next section introduces the reader to a few tidbits of innovative ways
of using language to bring about distinction.

0.3 Tidbits of Language and Social Change in China

A large billboard real estate advertisement across the top of a five-story commer-
cial building reads 同一个圈层的私享, Tong yige quanceng de sixiang, ‘the same
circle-stratum’s private enjoyment’, or more idiomatically, ‘private enjoyment for
the same stratum’ (see Figure 0.1). The original English—or rather Chinglish—­
translation, “ENJOY THE SAME CLASS OF PRIVATE,” is printed in a much
smaller size, so small that it is barely visible from across the street.
The advertisement is for Hai Yi Chang Zhou, a luxury residential real es-
tate development in the city of Tianjin. The expression si-xiang 私享 ‘private-­
enjoyment’ is a nonce compound noun and a creative antonym to an established

Figure 0.1 Enjoy the same class of private

4 Introduction

compound gong-xiang共享 ‘shared-enjoyment’, meaning enjoying together or

sharing with others. Furthermore, ‘private-enjoyment’ is homophonous with
the noun sixiang 思想 ‘thought, thinking’. Hence, at least two layers of meaning
are created simultaneously in this advertisement: (1) The denotational mean-
ing expressed through the characters of the phrase “private enjoyment [shared
among members] of the same stratum,” and (2) a meaning created through
the sound of the characters “thought/thinking [shared among members] of
the same stratum.” Another potential meaning can be created by linking the
ownership and owner of a property in this development to belonging to “the
same stratum,” which is the intended message of the advertisement. In other
words, the real estate property is intended to serve as a social index, linking a
commodity to a social class of people and the privacy and exclusiveness offered
by the property. Language is used in this case to produce this message about
class privilege and distinction.
About a kilometer to the north, at the end of a busy thoroughfare, stands an-
other large billboard with an advertisement for the 八里台新文化广场: 三百万
新青年的 Shopping Mall ‘8 Miles New Culture Plaza: The Shopping Mall for
three million new youth’. In this advertisement, the English expression “shop-
ping mall” is perfectly mixed with Chinese, which violates the official mandate
that prohibits mixing of “scripts and words from foreign languages with Chinese
in the same sentence in an advertisement” (State Administration for Industry
and Commerce 1998). Rather than using the Chinese expression for shopping
mall, gouwu zhongxin, the English “shopping mall” adds a linguistic fashion ele-
ment to the advertisement and creates the meaning of yangqi ‘Western’, ‘stylish’,
and ‘newness’. This is in accordance with the intended consumers of 8 Miles
New Culture Plaza, who are fashion-conscious young urbanites.
Upon entering the shopping mall, one is greeted with a mural of sharp con-
trasting colors of red, black, and white (see Figure 0.2). In the middle frame is
an apparently old black-and-white photo of three rows of young women and
two men in the mid-front row wearing the same People’s Liberation Army-style
uniform. The uniform and unisex style of the people in the photo immediately
evokes a connection to the pre-reform era. A closer look at the faces reveals that
the images are actually reproductions of the same woman and man. The caption
at the bottom of the photo reads “Chinese clone technology in 1949,” written
in standard, i.e., simplified, characters. Below the picture, in a much larger font
size, a slogan reads Rang meiyou gexing de niandai yiqu bu fufan!, ‘Let the era of
no-individuality be gone forever!’ In contrast to the photo caption, the slogan is
written in traditional Chinese characters, a script officially prohibited in adver-
tisements in mainland China (State Administration for Industry and Commerce
1998), but in use in Hong Kong, Taiwan, and many diaspora Chinese commu-
nities.2 The middle frame is bordered on each side by the image of two cultural
icons, on the left, the image of Che Guevara reminiscent of the famous portrait
by Jim Fitzpatrick and on the right, that of Lei Feng in a similar style. Lei Feng
 Introduction 5

(1940–1962) was a soldier of the People’s Liberation Army. After his death on
duty, a national “Learn from Lei Feng” campaign was initiated, and March
5 is designated the “Day of Learning from Lei Feng.” As a model soldier and
Communist Party member, he is an emblem of altruism and collectivism; loy-
alty to the Party, the people, and the country; industriousness; and plain-living
( jian-ku-pu-su). Both Lei Feng and Che Guevara were communist soldiers, but
Lei was a loyal and dutiful servant of an established communist regime, whereas
Guevara was a communist rebel-revolutionary participating in overthrowing
an oppressive capitalist government. Particularly in Jim Fitzpatrick’s rendition,
he “has become the romantic embodiment of youthful idealism and passionate
rebellion” (Kemp 2012, 167). Lei Feng is the antithesis of individualism, in-
dividuality, rebellion, and consumerism. Thus, Lei represents the bygone era
of no-individuality. Juxtaposing the Chinese domestic communist icon of Lei
Feng with the global icon of Che Guevara in this shopping mall targeting youth
consumers, the message cannot be clearer: Guevara stands in defiance of all that
Lei represents, and the consumers are invited to align with the former and join
in a consumer revolution to dismantle the bygone world of “no individuality.”
This is the denotational meaning of the slogan.
In a parallel way, the contrast between the two types of scripts creates a cor-
responding message. The simplified script used in the caption is linked to the
pre-reform era portrayed in the photo, one of homogeneity and no individu-
ality. Not only is the traditional script the medium through which the defying
slogan is written but also the use of the script itself performs simultaneously
an act of breaking the norm—that is, the norm would be to use the standard,
simplified script—and an act of breaking away from a past of homogeneity. In
addition to the temporal contrast just described, the two sets of juxtaposition
(simplified vs. traditional script and Lei Feng vs. Che Guevara) index a spatial
contrast between a mainland China territorial orientation and a transterritorial,
global orientation and connection.
In this example, we see that multiple kinds of semiotic resources work to-
gether to create social meanings through contrast. We also see that contrast at one
level is projected onto other levels (Irvine and Gal 2000): On one level, homoge-
neity and collectivism contrast with individualism; this contrast is mapped onto
one on the temporal level between the past and the present and a spatial contrast
between a mainland China orientation and a supraregional orientation.
The three examples show that linguistic and other semiotic resources from
both regional sources (simplified Chinese script, black-and-white photo of
clones, and image of Lei Feng) and extraregional sources (traditional Chinese
script, English, and image of Che Guevara) are combined to create social
meanings. Furthermore, multiple layers of meaning are created through the
content of the message as well as variation in the form of the semiotic resources
employed, including the juxtaposition of contrasting linguistic forms. Inno-
vative language—at the morphological level (creative nonce compound noun
6 Introduction

Figure 0.2 Let the era of no individuality be gone forever!

‘private-enjoyment’), choice of scripts (traditional and simplified characters),

and choice of languages (Chinese and English)—expresses the social meaning
of newness and differentiation.
The use of “new” linguistic elements in the above examples indicates
that the creators of the advertisements seemed to find the standard language,
Putonghua ‘common speech’, lacking as a meaning-making resource in the pres-
ent socioeconomic context. To better understand the intimate relation between
linguistic innovation and social change presented in the upcoming chapters, it
is necessary to explicate a cultural and political understanding of what I refer to
as the semiotic inadequacy of the “common speech.”3 With an emphasis on the
cultural and the political, the following short historical overview of the standard-
ization of Modern Standard Chinese, and Putonghua in particular, highlights
the politics of language standardization whereby Standard Chinese, as standard
languages elsewhere, is vested as a sociopolitical tool in national and political
endeavors. But before the discussion on Standard Chinese, a clarification of
terms referring to language varieties that are relevant to this book is necessary.

0.4 Clarification of Terms4

Chinese, or Chinese language, Zhongwen, in its singular form, implies a mono-
lithic linguistic entity, whereas in reality, the so-called “Chinese language”
consists of numerous fangyan, or groups of regional varieties, some of which can
be as different as the Romance languages of Europe (e.g., Norman 1988). Thus,
 Introduction 7

a Chinese speaker from the northern part of the country, such as the capital city
of Beijing, is unlikely to understand a Chinese speaker from the south, such
as the city of Guangzhou. Linguists usually classify the Chinese varieties into
seven or eight regional groups, Beifanghua ‘Northern varieties’ also known as
Guanhua ‘Mandarin’, Wu, Gan, Xiang, Yue ‘Cantonese’, Kejia (Hakka), and Min,
which some scholars further divide into Northern Min and Southern Min (e.g.,
De Francis 1984; Ramsey 1987). Mandarin is the largest dialect group, with
more than eight million speakers (e.g., Shen 2015). The non-Mandarin varieties
are also commonly known as Southern dialects. Furthermore, many linguists
identify four major dialect groups within Mandarin: Northern Mandarin,
Northwestern Mandarin, Southwestern Mandarin, and Eastern or Jiang-Huai
Mandarin (e.g., Norman 1988; Ramsey 1987). One Northern Mandarin dia-
lect, Beijing Mandarin, is officially designated as the phonological basis for the
standard language of the PRC, i.e., Putonghua. Hence, according to a linguistic
view of Chinese languages and dialects, the term “Chinese” masks linguistic
diversity and complexity among and within regional language varieties. By
associating the term “Chinese” or the “Chinese language” with the people(s)
of China and those of Chinese origin, the singular label makes invisible, or
rather erases, the vast number of languages used by ethnic minority groups
living in Han Chinese dominant territories, namely, the PRC and Taiwan,5
and non-Chinese languages used in Chinese diaspora communities around the
world. However, the reader needs to be aware of a difference between the
above linguistic description of what constitutes Chinese and a widely shared
view among many native Chinese speakers that the various fangyan are subvari-
eties of a single language called “Chinese” (e.g., Chen 2007; De Francis 1984).
The fact that speakers of diverse, even mutually unintelligible fangyan, share
a standard Chinese writing system further strengthens this belief in a shared
Chinese language among speakers of regional varieties. The Chinese script, or
Hanzi ‘Chinese characters’ as it is called in Mandarin, is believed by many to be
a unifying emblem of Chinese culture that transcends linguistic, geographic,
and temporal divides. However, as De Francis (1984) points out, the appearance
of uniformity and universality of the written Chinese script across space and
time is also largely an illusion.
The term Zhongwen, literally ‘Chinese language’, is used to differentiate
Chinese from non-Sinitic languages. Hanyu, the ‘language of the Han people’,
the majority ethnic group in PRC and Taiwan, is often interchangeable with
Zhongwen. Both Zhongwen and Hanyu are often used to refer to Mandarin, and
specifically the standard language of China. For example, the official dictionary
that codifies the pronunciation of the standard language is titled Xiandai Hanyu
Cidian ‘Modern Han Language Dictionary’, commonly translated as the Modern
Chinese Dictionary, and the official standard alphabetical system is called Hanyu
Pinyin ‘Han Language Spelling-Pronunciation’, or Pinyin for short, commonly
translated as the Chinese Spelling System. Zhongwen and Hanyu are also used
8 Introduction

in contexts of language teaching. Zhongwen often refers to Chinese taught as a

foreign language outside of the PRC whereas Hanyu is the preferred appellation
by the Chinese government and institutions for Chinese taught as a second and
foreign language. For instance, the national standardized test for proficiency
in Chinese is called Hanyu Shuiping Kaoshi ‘Han Language Proficiency Test’,
commonly translated as Chinese Proficiency Test. Hanban ‘Hanyu Office’ is
the abbreviation of the China National Office for Teaching Chinese as a For-
eign Language. Putonghua ‘common speech’ is the term for the standard lan-
guage in the PRC. It is commonly translated as Standard Chinese or Standard
Mandarin. The former emphasizes its distinction from standard languages of
other countries. The latter English term specifies Mandarin as its dialectal basis
(see definition in the next section).
In this book, I use “Standard Chinese” or “Modern Standard Chinese” in
general discussions about the national standard language, as in the next section,
including its spoken and written forms. I use “Standard Mandarin,” “Mainland
Standard Putonghua,” “Mainland Standard Mandarin,” and “Beijing-­Mandarin-
based Putonghua” in discussions highlighting the phonological basis of the
spoken standard language in mainland China. Furthermore, Guoyu ‘national
language’ and Huayu ‘Chinese language’ are the terms for standard Chinese
used in Taiwan and Singapore, respectively. The two terms are also used among
Chinese diaspora, referring to Mandarin as a lingua franca among speakers of
Chinese origin who may not otherwise share a Chinese language. It should
be noted that the specific cultural meaning of any one of the above terms is
determined by who uses it, when, and where it is used. Their use in context
often reveals underlying beliefs about the “Chinese language,” the standard
language, and the attitude and stance of the user of a particular term vis-à-vis
broader sociopolitical considerations.

0.5 Modern Standard Chinese and the Semiotic

Inadequacy of the “Common Speech”
The standardization of Modern Chinese in mainland China from the late 19th
century, through the Republican era (1911–1949) and the People’s Republic
under the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) is a process of popularization, and
in effect, de-eliticization to form a modern standard language that is accessi-
ble to the masses. The outcome of the process is a standard language based on
Northern Mandarin—known as Putonghua ‘common speech’—that symbolizes
a modern Chinese nation as well as socialist egalitarianism. This section focuses
on the development of Putonghua (here in after PTH) in the PRC, showing
that language standardization is part of the social-ideological transformation
from an old society under “the rule of imperialism, feudalism and bureaucrat-­
capitalism” (China 1983, 3) to a new socialist state under “the dictatorship of
proletariat” (ibid., 4).
 Introduction 9

0.5.1 Modern Standard Chinese for a Modern Nation-State

Two regime changes in the history of modern China have shaped the course
of the development of Modern Standard Chinese: the imperial Qing Dynasty
(1644–1911) overthrown by the nationalists (Kuomintang) in 1911 and the de-
feat of the latter by the CCP in the mainland in 1949. Modern China began in
the mid-19th century with a series of humiliating military defeats of the Qing
Dynasty by foreign powers. These defeats engendered a keenly felt national crisis
and an urgent need to modernize the country. A strong negative perception of
the Chinese language as a major culprit for the backwardness of the country and
ill suited for a modern nation-state was shared among progressive, prominent
intellectuals and nationalist revolutionaries at the time (Chen 2007; Ramsey
1987). Advocates of language reform at the turn of the 20th century viewed the
Chinese language as impeding modernization and unification in three main
areas: (1) lack of a unified spoken standard language serving as a lingua franca
among mutually unintelligible regional varieties, (2) lack of a modern written
language closer to the daily vernacular, and (3) a traditional character-based
script too difficult to acquire. The last two were considered responsible for the
low literacy rate among the vast Chinese populations (Chen 1999). Hence, lan-
guage reform became part of the efforts to modernize the country.
After the nationalists overthrew the imperial Qing regime and founded the
Republic of China (1912–1949 in mainland China), Guoyu was established in
1926 as the national standard language. It was defined as “the speech of natives
of Peking who have received a middle-school education” (De Francis 1950, 76).
A phonetic alphabet system based on the pronunciation of Beijing Mandarin
was also created, which was called Guoyu Luomazi ‘National Language
Romanization’. It served as an auxiliary tool for learning the written script. To
reform the written language, the traditional wenyan ‘classical literary Chinese’,
which had been the most prestigious style of written Chinese up to the begin-
ning of the 20th century but did not resemble any of the contemporary spoken
vernaculars, was replaced by baihua ‘vernacular-based literary Chinese’.6 By
the 1930s, baihua was established as the basis for the standard written language
for all purposes and occasions (Chen 1999). Little progress was made in script
reform, however, in the Republic era (ibid.). Thus, language reform and stan-
dardization in the first half of the 20th century under the Kuomintang (KMT)
regime was intended to modernize the standard language so that it became
compatible with a modern, unified nation-state.

0.5.2 The Rise of Putonghua in the PRC

The defeat of the KMT regime by the CCP marked the bifurcation of the
development of standard Chinese in the mainland and in Taiwan. Language
standardization and reform remained a priority in building a new unified
10 Introduction

and socialist People’s Republic (Zhou and Sun 2004). Guided by the politi-
cal agenda to eradicate social inequality, language—particularly the standard
language—is treated as a tool to transform China from an old society marked
by socioeconomic inequality to a new socialist egalitarian People’s Republic
under the rule of the proletariat. The equalizing function of the standard lan-
guage was evident in the designation of PTH ‘common speech’ as the standard
language of the PRC in 1956 (Guojia Yuyan Wenzi 1996, 12):

The standard form of Modern Chinese with the Beijing Mandarin pho-
nological system as its norm of pronunciation, Northern Mandarin as
its base dialect, and the exemplary works of modern baihua [vernacular
literary language] literature as its grammatical norms.

In contrast to the 1926 definition of the standard pronunciation of Guoyu cited

earlier, the above definition of PTH left out any overt status-marking descriptor
of Beijing Mandarin. The change in the appellation of the standard language
from Guoyu ‘national language’ to PTH ‘common speech’ is also politically
significant. The new name not only specifies the instrumental function of the
standard language as a shared lingua franca among speakers of diverse varieties
but also, and more important, an ideological shift to privilege the language of the
common people rather than that of a minority educated elite (see also Dong 2010;
Li 2004). Thus, the connotation of the newly designated PTH stands in sharp
contrast to its early uses in the late 19th century, which associated putong, ‘com-
mon’ or ‘general’, with “being adulterated and substandard” (Chen 1999, 25).7
The political implication of the term PTH can be traced back to the writings
of Qu Qiubai in the 1930s. A prominent leader of the Communist Party and
an advocate of language reform at that time, Qu proposed PTH as “a new
modern vernacular of the urban proletariat” (1953 [1932], 889). Distinguishing
the new “common speech” from “the so-called national language [guoyu] of
the officials” (ibid.), Qu argued that PTH should be the new common language
used in the revolutionary popular literature so that it would be accessible to the
masses.8 Thus, at its inception, the standard language of the PRC takes on a
distinctly class-based connotation, that is, the proletariat, the new ruling class
who stood in opposition to the old guanliao zichanjieji ‘bureaucrat-­capitalists’
overthrown by the communist revolution.

0.5.3 Script Reform

In the area of script reform, the traditional characters were seen as not only
a great barrier to mass literacy but also a means to sustain the privilege and
power of the former ruling classes (Zhao and Baldauf 2008). Hence, to make
the written standard language more accessible to the masses, efforts were car-
ried out in the early 1950s to simplify the characters by reducing the number of
 Introduction 11

strokes. In 1964, the General List of Simplified Characters ( Jianhuazi Zongbiao)

was published, providing a comprehensive list of 2,236 simplified characters
(Chen 1999, 154). Reducing the average number of strokes of the most com-
monly used 2,000 characters from 11.2 to 9.8, the list became the standard for
all publications in mainland China (ibid., 157). Take the verb xuexi ‘study’ as an
example, the number of strokes of the two characters in the traditional script,
學習, is 15 and 11 respectively, whereas the two simplified characters 学习 have
11 strokes combined. A new phonetic alphabet called Hanyu Pinyin (Pinyin for
short) was officially published in 1964 to serve as a sound annotation tool that
provides the standard pronunciation for Chinese characters. Since the mid-
1960s, simplified script jianti zi or jianhua zi and pinyin have come to take on
a territorial and potentially political association with socialist mainland China
but traditional characters fanti zi and non-pinyin alphabet systems with Hong
Kong, Taiwan, and other overseas Chinese communities.9 Hence, the tradi-
tional script and non-pinyin spelling convention can be employed to signal an
extra-mainland association or orientation, as demonstrated in the example of
the mural in the 8 Miles New Culture Plaza.

0.5.4 De-eliticization and Conformity during the Great

Proletarian Cultural Revolution
The de-eliticization of the standard language took another drastic turn during
the Great Proletariat Cultural Revolution (1966–1976). Just like androgynous
clothing styles in green, blue, and grey were used to represent and express cul-
tural and political conformity at that time, drastic linguistic changes took place
as language served a similar political function erasing social differentiation and
producing conformity in the name of socialist egalitarianism. It is thus no sur-
prise that one of the most drastic changes in language use happened in the area
of address terms. All traditional honorific titles, terms that marked superior
status in pre-revolutionary time and those with gender marking became ob-
solete, for example, laoban ‘boss’, laoye ‘master’, the patriarch of a prestigious
family, taitai ‘madam or Mrs.’, xiaojie ‘miss’, a young woman or daughter of a
prestigious family, shaoye ‘junior master’, a young man or son of a prestigious
family, and xiansheng ‘mister’. In their place, the government promoted the use
of tongzhi ‘comrade’ as a general neutral term that “implies no social or eco-
nomic distinctions but which unites all as sharing the same political goals”
(Scotton and Zhu 1983, 479; emphasis added). In addition, the prestigious status
of the proletariat gave rise to the popularity of another term, shifu. Originally
used to address senior skilled tradesmen and craftsmen, during the Cultural
Revolution, its use was extended to address all workers to express deference
to the proletariat and solidarity among those identifying with the workers
(Scotton and Zhu 1984).10 Other explicit ways of signaling status differenti-
ation and social privilege were also masked through changes in language use.
12 Introduction

For example, in the description of his visit to China in 1972, Simon Leys, a Bel-
gian art historian and Sinologist, observes (1977, 117 cited in Evans 1978, 85):

In trains … first, second, and third classes have disappeared in name, but
you have now “sitting hard”(ying tso) [hard seat], “sleeping hard” (ying
wo) [hard sleeper], and “sleeping soft” (ruan wo) [soft sleeper], which are
exactly the same classes as before and with the fares, as before, ranging
from single to triple prices.

More totalitarian attempts to control language use in the public sphere were
made through what is called “linguistic engineering” during the Cultural
Revolution ( Ji 2004). Linguistic engineering refers to processes and attempts
to control and change language to affect beliefs and attitudes. The strict central
control and enforcement of revolutionary discourse, including “carefully crafted
words, phrases, slogans, and scripts expressing politically correct thought”
( Ji 2004, 2), reached its zenith in that period. The goal of such rigorous con-
trol on language was to produce political conformity and consent among the
Chinese people. Thus, the ability to produce “correct” revolutionary speech
demarcated revolutionaries from their enemies. Failure and “incorrect” use of
revolutionary speech would lead to draconian punishments. As vividly demon-
strated in Ji (2004), the Cultural Revolution exerted a tremendous impact on
the Chinese language not only in public life but also in private communication
“as people resorted to safe formulae because they were uncertain about whom
they could trust” ( Ji 2004, 155). Under such circumstances, Mao’s words, as
published in Mao Zhuxi Yulu ‘Quotations from Chairman Mao’, or the Little
Red Book, were taken to be the source for the safest and most revolutionary way
of speaking and writing (ibid.). According to Ji (ibid., 155):

The result was a profound, if temporary, impoverishment of the Chinese

language, which became repetitive, narrowly political, and cliché ridden.
Newspapers and journals that had once catered to intellectuals were now
written in the language of political talks Mao had given with the needs
of illiterate soldiers and peasants in mind.

0.5.5 The Semiotic Inadequacy of “Common Speech”

The preceding discussion shows that language in the Cultural Revolution era
served as a tool to erase or mask social inequality and produce cultural and po-
litical conformity. At the same time, it was deployed to articulate dichotomiz-
ing political differentiation, or huaqing jiexian ‘demarcate a clear line’, between
the proletariat revolutionaries and their enemies (Dittmer 1977; Ji 2004). As
Chuang observes, since the CCP came to power, “every political campaign
in China has been simultaneously a semantic campaign as well, introducing
Another random document with
no related content on Scribd:
reminds us of the doings of Justice, when she did act, in the reign of
James VI. Hunter and Strachan, a notary, were hanged on the 18th of
February, ‘as an example to the terror of others,’ says Fountainhall.
Three other persons, including a notary, were glad to save
themselves from a trial, by voluntary banishment. ‘Some moved that
they might be delivered to a captain of the recruits, to serve as
soldiers in Flanders; but the other method was judged more
legal.’[397]

The parish of Spott, in East Lothian, Dec. 30.

having no communion-cups of its own, was
accustomed to borrow those of the neighbouring parish of Stenton,
when required. The Stenton kirk-session latterly tired of this
benevolence, and resolved to charge half-a-crown each time their
cups were borrowed by Spott. Spott then felt a little ashamed of its
deficiency of communion-cups, and resolved to provide itself with a
pair. Towards the sum required, the minister was directed to take all
the foreign coin now in the box, as it was to be no longer current, and
such further sum as might be necessary.
The parish is soon after found sanctioning the account of Thomas
Kerr, an Edinburgh goldsmith, for ‘ane pair of communion-cups,
weighing 33 oz. 6 drops, at £3, 16s. per oz.,’ 1707.
being £126, 12s. in all, Scots money, besides
‘two shillings sterling of drink-money given to the goldsmith’s
men.’[398]

The Union produced some immediate 1708.

effects of a remarkable nature on the
industry and traffic of Scotland—not all of them good, it must be
owned, but this solely by reason of the erroneous laws in respect of
trade which existed in England, and to which Scotland was obliged to
conform.
Scotland had immediately to cease importing wines, brandy, and
all things produced by France; with no remeed but what was
supplied by the smuggler. This was one branch of her public or
ostensible commerce now entirely destroyed. She had also, in
conformity with England, to cease exporting her wool. This, however,
was an evil not wholly unalleviated, as will presently be seen.
Before this time, as admitted by Defoe, the Scotch people had
‘begun to come to some perfection in making broad cloths, druggets,
and [woollen] stuffs of all sorts.’ Now that there was no longer a
prohibition of English goods of the same kinds, these began to come
in in such great quantity, and at such prices, as at once extinguished
the superior woollen manufacture in Scotland. There remained the
manufacture of coarse cloths, as Stirling serges, Musselburgh stuffs,
and the like; and this now rather flourished, partly because the wool,
being forbidden to be sent abroad, could be had at a lower price, and
partly because these goods came into demand in England. Of course,
the people at large were injured by not getting the best price for their
wool, and benefited by getting the finer English woollen goods at a
cheaper rate than they had formerly paid for their own manufactures
of the same kinds; but no one saw such matters in such a light at that
time. The object everywhere held in view was to benefit trade—that
is, everybody’s peculium, as distinguished from the general good.
The general good was left to see after itself, after everybody’s
peculium had been served; and small enough were the crumbs
usually left to it.
On the other hand, duties being taken off Scottish linen introduced
into England, there was immediately a large increase to that branch
of the national industry. Englishmen came down and established
works for sail-cloth, for damasks, and other linen articles heretofore
hardly known in the north; and thus it was 1708.
remarked there was as much employment
for the poor as in the best days of the woollen manufacture.
The colonial trade being now, moreover, open to Scottish
enterprise, there was an immediate stimulus to the building of ships
for that market. Cargoes of Scottish goods went out in great quantity,
in exchange for colonial products brought in. According to Defoe,
‘several ships were laden for Virginia and Barbadoes the very first
year after the Union.’[399]
We get a striking idea of the small scale on which the earlier
commercial efforts were conducted, from a fact noted by Wodrow, as
to a loss made by the Glasgow merchants in the autumn of 1709. ‘In
the beginning of this month [November],’ says he, ‘Borrowstounness
and Glasgow have suffered very much by the fleet going to Holland,
its being taken by the French. It’s said that in all there is about eighty
thousand pounds sterling lost there, whereof Glasgow has lost ten
thousand pounds. I wish trading persons may see the language of
such a providence. I am sure the Lord is remarkably frowning upon
our trade, in more respects than one, since it was put in the room of
religion, in the late alteration of our constitution.’[400]
When one thinks of the present superb wealth and commercial
distinction of the Queen of the West, it is impossible to withhold a
smile at Wodrow’s remarks on its loss of ten thousand pounds. Yet
the fact is, that up to this time Glasgow had but a petty trade, chiefly
in sugar, herrings, and coarse woollen wares. Its tobacco-trade, the
origin of its grandeur, is understood to date only from 1707, and it
was not till 1718 that Glasgow sent any vessel belonging to itself
across the Atlantic. Sir John Dalrymple, writing shortly before 1788,
says: ‘I once asked the late Provost Cochrane of Glasgow, who was
eminently wise, and who has been a merchant there for seventy
years, to what causes he imputed the sudden rise of Glasgow. He said
it was all owing to four young men of talents and spirit, who started
at one time in business, and whose success gave example to the rest.
The four had not ten thousand pounds amongst them when they
began.’[401]
Defoe tells us that, within little more than 1708.
a year after the Union, Scotland felt the
benefit of the liberation of her commerce in one article to a most
remarkable extent. In that time, she sent 170,000 bolls of grain into
England, besides a large quantity which English merchants bought
up and shipped directly off for Portugal. The hardy little cattle of her
pastures, which before the Union had been sent in large droves into
England, being doubtless the principal article represented in the two
hundred thousand pounds which Scotland was ascertained to obtain
annually from her English customers, were now transmitted in still
larger numbers, insomuch that men of birth and figure went into the
trade. Even a Highland gentleman would think it not beneath him to
engage in so lucrative a traffic, however much in his soul he might
despise the Saxons whose gluttony he considered himself as
gratifying. It has often been told that the Honourable Patrick Ogilvie,
whom the reader has already seen engaged in a different career of
activity, took up the cattle-trade, and was soon after remonstrated
with by his brother, the Earl of Seafield, who, as Chancellor of
Scotland, had been deeply concerned in bringing about the Union.
The worthy scion of nobility drily remarked in answer: ‘Better sell
nowte than sell nations.’[402]
A sketch given of a cattle-fair at Crieff in 1723 by an intelligent
traveller, shews that the trade continued to prosper. ‘There were,’
says he, ‘at least thirty thousand cattle sold there, most of them to
English drovers, who paid down above thirty thousand guineas in
ready money to the Highlanders; a sum they had never before seen.
The Highland gentlemen were mighty civil, dressed in their slashed
waistcoats, a trousing (which is, breeches and stockings of one piece
of striped stuff), with a plaid for a cloak, and a blue bonnet. They
have a poniard knife and fork in one sheath, hanging at one side of
their belt, their pistol at the other, and their snuff-mill before; with a
great broadsword by their side. Their attendance was very numerous,
all in belted plaids, girt like women’s petticoats down to the knee;
their thighs and half of the leg all bare. They had also each their
broadsword and poniard, and spake all Irish, an unintelligible
language to the English. However, these poor creatures hired
themselves out for a shilling a day, to drive the cattle to England, and
to return home at their own charge.’[403]
Previous to the Union, the Customs and 1708. May 1.
Excise of Scotland were farmed respectively
at £30,000 and £35,000 per annum,[404] which, after every
allowance is made for smuggling, must be admitted as indicative of a
very restricted commercial system, and a simple and meagre style of
living on the part of the people. At the Union, the British government
took the Customs and Excise of Scotland into its own hands, placing
them severally under commissions, partly composed of Englishmen,
and also sending English officers of experience down to Scotland, to
assist in establishing proper arrangements for collection. We learn
from Defoe that all these new fiscal arrangements were unpopular.
The anti-union spirit delighted in proclaiming them as the outward
symptoms of that English tyranny to which poor Scotland had been
sold. Smuggling naturally flourished, for it became patriotic to cheat
the English revenue-officers. The people not only assisted and
screened the contrabandist, but if his goods chanced to be captured,
they rose in arms to rescue them. Owing to the close of the French
trade, the receiving of brandy became a favourite and flourishing
business. It was alleged that, when a Dutch fleet approached the
Scottish shores some months after the Union, several thousands of
small casks of that liquor were put ashore, with hardly any effort at
concealment.
Assuming the Excise as a tolerably fair index to the power of a
people to indulge in what they feel as comforts and luxuries, the
progress of this branch of the public revenue may be esteemed as a
history of wealth in Scotland during the remarkable period following
upon the Union. The summations it gives us are certainly of a kind
such as no Scotsman of the reign of Queen Anne, adverse or friendly
to the incorporation of the two countries, could have dreamed of.
The items in the account of the first year ending at May 1, 1708, are
limited to four—namely, for beer, ale, and vinegar, £43,653; spirits,
£901; mum,[405] £50; fines and forfeitures, £58; giving—when £6350
for salaries, and some other deductions, were allowed for—a net total
of £34,898, as a contribution to the revenue of the country.
The totals, during the next eleven years, go on thus: £41,096,
£37,998, £46,795, £51,609, £61,747, £46,979, £44,488, £45,285—
this refers to the year of the Rebellion— 1708.
£48,813, £46,649, £50,377. On this last
sum the charges of management amounted to £15,400. After this,
the total net produce of the Excise, exclusive of malt, never again
came up to fifty thousand pounds, till the year 1749. The malt tax,
which was first imposed in 1725, then amounted to £22,627, making
the entire Excise revenue of Scotland in the middle of the eighteenth
century no more than £75,987. It is to be feared that increase of
dexterity and activity in the smuggler had some concern in keeping
down these returns at so low an amount;[406] yet when large
allowance is made on that score, we are still left to conclude that the
means of purchasing luxuries remained amongst our people at a very
humble point.
I am informed by a gentleman long connected with the Excise
Board in Scotland, that the books exhibited many curious indications
of the simplicity, as well as restrictedness, of all monetary affairs as
relating to our country in the reigns of Anne and the first George.
According to a recital which he has been kind enough to
communicate in writing, ‘The remittances were for the most part
made in coin, and various entries in the Excise accounts shew that
what were called broad pieces frequently formed a part of the
moneys sent. The commissioners were in the habit of availing
themselves of the opportunity of persons of rank travelling to
London, to make them the bearers of the money; and it is a curious
historical fact, that the first remittance out of the Excise duties,
amounting to £20,000, was sent by the Earl of Leven, who delivered
£19,000 of the amount at the proper office in London, retaining the
other thousand pounds for his trouble and risk in the service. As the
Board in Scotland could only produce to their comptroller a voucher
for the sum actually delivered in London, he could not allow them
credit for more. The £1000 was therefore placed “insuper” upon the
accounts, and so remained for several years; until at last a warrant
was issued by the Treasury, authorising the sum to be passed to the
credit of the commissioners.’
After the middle of the century, the progress is such as to shew
that, whether by the removal of repressive influences, or the
imparting of some fresh spring of energy, the means of the people
were at length undergoing a rapid increase. In 1761, including part of
the first year of George III., the net total 1708.
Excise revenue had sprung up to £100,985.
It included taxes on glass (£1151), candles (£6107), leather (£8245),
soap and paper (£2992), and wheel-carriages (£2308). The total had,
however, receded fully fourteen thousand pounds by 1775. After that
time, war increased the rate of taxation, and we therefore need not
be surprised to find the Scottish Excise producing £200,432 in 1781.
In 1790, when Robert Burns honoured this branch of the revenue by
taking an office in it, it had reached but to the comparatively
insignificant sum of £331,117. In 1808, being the hundredth year of
its existence, it yielded £1,793,430, being rather more than fifty-one
times its produce during the first year.[407]

The Duke of Argyle resigning his place as June 1.

an extraordinary Lord of Session, in order
to follow his charge in the army, his younger brother, the Earl of Ilay,
succeeded him, though under twenty-five years of age; not
apparently that he might take part in the decisions of the bench, but
rather that he might be a learner there, it ‘being,’ says Fountainhall,
‘the best school for the nobility to learn that is in Europe.’

The election of a knight to represent June 26.

Ross-shire in the British parliament took
place at Fortrose, under the presidency of the sheriff, Hugh Rose, of
Kilravock. There was much dissension in the county, and the sheriff,
whose son was elected, had probably reasons of his own for
appointing the last day of the week for the ceremony. This, however,
having led to travelling on Sunday, was taken into consideration by
the synod some months later, as a breach of decorum on the part of
the sheriff, who consequently received a letter from one of their
number who had been appointed to administer their censure. It set
forth how, even if the meeting had been dissolved on the Saturday
evening, many could not have got home without breaking the fourth
commandment; but Kilravock had caused worse than this, for, by
making the meeting late in the day, he had ‘occasioned the affair to
be protracted till the Sabbath began more than to dawn [two
o’clock],’ and there had been ‘gross disorders,’ in consequence of late
drinking in taverns. ‘Some,’ says the document, ‘who were in your
own company, are said to have sung, shott, 1708.
and danced in their progress to the ferry,
without any check or restraint, as if they meant to spit in the face of
all sacred and civil laws,’ The synod had found it impossible to keep
silence and allow such miscarriages to remain unreproved.
It is to be feared that Kilravock was little benefited by their
censure, as he left the paper docketed in his repositories as ‘a comical
synodical rebuke.’[408]

That remarkable property of human Aug. 18.

nature—the anxiety everybody is under that
all other people should be virtuous—had worked itself out in sundry
famous acts of parliament, general assembly, and town-council,
throughout our history subsequent to the Reformation. There was an
act of Queen Mary against adultery, and several of Charles II. against
profaneness, drunkenness, and other impurities of life. There was
not one of William and Mary for the enforcement of the fifth
commandment; but the general principle operated in their reign very
conspicuously nevertheless, particularly in regard to profaneness and
profanation of the Lord’s Day. King William had also taken care in
1698 to issue a proclamation containing an abbreviate of all the acts
against immorality, and in which that of Charles II. against cursing
and beating of parents was certainly not overlooked, as neither were
those against adultery. So far had the anxiety for respectable conduct
in others gone in the present reign, that sheriffs and magistrates
were now enjoined by proclamation to hold courts, once a month at
least, for taking notice of vice and immorality, fining the guilty, and
rewarding informers; moreover, all naval and military officers were
ordered to exemplify the virtues for the sake of those under them,
and, above all, see that the latter duly submitted themselves to kirk
discipline.
An act of the town-council of Edinburgh ‘anent prophaneness,’ in
August 1693, threatened a rigorous execution of all the public
statutes regarding immoral conduct, such as swearing, sitting late in
taverns, and desecration of the Lord’s Day. It strictly prohibited all
persons within the city and suburbs ‘to brew, or to work any other
handiwork, on the Lord’s Day, or to be found on the streets, standing
or walking idly, or to go in company or vague to the Castlehill [the
only open space then within the city walls], 1708.
public yards, or fields.’ It discharged all
going to taverns on that day, unseasonably or unnecessarily, and
forbade ‘all persons to bring in water from the wells to houses in
greater quantities than single pints.’ By another act in 1699, tavern-
keepers were forbidden to have women for servants who had not
heretofore been of perfectly correct conduct. All these denunciations
were renewed in an act of February 1701, in which, moreover, there
was a severe threat against barbers who should shave or trim any one
on Sunday, and against all who should be found on that day carrying
periwigs, clothes, or other apparel through the streets.
Not long after this, the Edinburgh council took into their
consideration three great recent calamities—namely, the fire in the
Kirk-heugh in February 1700; another fire ‘which happened on the
north side of the Land market, about mid-day upon the 28th of
October 1701, wherein several men, and women, and children were
consumed in the flames, and lost by the fall of ruinous walls;’ and
finally, ‘that most tremendous and terrible blowing up of gunpowder
in Leith, upon the 3d of July last;’ and, reflecting on these things as
tokens of God’s wrath, came to the resolution, ‘to be more watchful
over our hearts and ways than formerly, and each of us in our several
capacities to reprove vice with zeal and prudence, and promote the
execution of the laws for punishing the vicious.’
All originality is taken from a notorious parliamentary enactment
of our time by a council act of April 1704, wherein, after reference to
the great decay of virtue and piety, and an acknowledgment that ‘all
manner of scandals and immoralities do daily abound,’ it is ordered
that taverners, under strong penalties, shall shut at ten o’clock at
night, all persons harbouring there at a later hour to be likewise
punished.
Inordinate playing at cards and dice in taverns is instanced in a
council act of about the same period, as one of the most flagrant vices
of the time.
It is to be understood that the discipline of the church over the
morals of congregations was at the same time in full vigour, although
not now fortified by a power of excommunication, inferring loss of
civil rights, as had been the case before the Revolution. Much was
done in this department by fines, proportioned to the quality of
offenders, and for the application of these to charitable uses there
was a lay-officer, styled the Kirk-treasurer, who naturally became a
very formidable person. The poems of 1708.
Ramsay and others during the earlier half of
the eighteenth century are full of waggish allusions to the terrible
powers of even the ‘man’ or servant of the Kirk-treasurer; and in a
parody of the younger Ramsay on the Integer Vitæ of Horace, this
personage is set forth as the analogue of the Sabine wolf:
‘For but last Monday, walking at noon-day,
Conning a ditty, to divert my Betty,
By me that sour Turk (I not frighted) our Kirk-
Treasurer’s man passed.

And sure more horrid monster in the Torrid

Zone cannot be found, sir, though for snakes renowned, sir;
Nor does Czar Peter’s empire boast such creatures,
Of bears the wet-nurse.’[409]
 Burt, who, as an English stranger, viewed the moral police of
Scotland with a curious surprise, broadly asserts that the Kirk-
treasurer employed spies to track out and report upon private
individuals; so that ‘people lie at the mercy of villains who would
perhaps forswear themselves for sixpence.’ Sometimes, a brother and
sister, or a man and his wife, walking quietly together, would find
themselves under the observation of emissaries of the Kirk-treasurer.
Burt says he had known the town-guard in Edinburgh under arms
for a night besetting a house into which two persons had been seen
to enter. He at the same time remarks the extreme anxiety about
Sabbath observance. It seemed as if the Scotch recognised no other
virtue. ‘People would startle more at the humming or whistling of a
tune on a Sunday, than if anybody should tell them you had ruined a
family.’[410]
It must have been a great rejoicement to the gay people, when a
Kirk-treasurer—as we are told by Burt[411]—‘having a round sum of
money in his keeping, the property of the kirk, marched off with the
cash, and took his neighbour’s wife along with him to bear him
company and partake of the spoil.’
The very imperfect success of acts and statutes for improving the
habits of the people, is strongly hinted at by their frequent repetition
or renewal. We find it acknowledged by the Town Council of
Edinburgh, in June 1709, that the Lord’s Day is still ‘profaned by
people standing on the streets, and vaguing to fields and gardens,
and to the Castlehill; also by standing idle gazing out at windows,
and children, apprentices, and other 1708.
[412]
servants playing on the streets.’

James Stirling of Keir, Archibald Seton of Nov. 22.

Touch, Archibald Stirling of Carden,
Charles Stirling of Kippendavie, and Patrick Edmondstone of
Newton, were tried for high treason in Edinburgh, on the ground of
their having risen in arms in March last, in connection with the
French plan of invasion, and marched about for several days,
encouraging others to rise in like manner, and openly drinking the
health of the Pretender. Considering the openness of this treason, the
charges against the five gentlemen were remarkably ill supported by
evidence, the only witnesses being David Fenton, a tavern-keeper at
Dunkeld; John Macleran, ‘change-keeper’ at Bridge of Turk; and
Daniel Morison and Peter Wilson, two servants of the Laird of Keir.
These persons were all free to testify that the gentlemen carried
swords and pistols, which few people travelled without in that age;
but as for treasonable talk, or drinking of treasonable healths, their
memories were entirely blank. Wilson knew of no reason for Keir
leaving his own house but dread of being taken up on suspicion by
the soldiers in Stirling Castle. A verdict of Not Proven unavoidably
followed.[413]
It has been constantly remembered since in Keir’s family, that as
he was riding home after the trial, with his servant behind him—
probably Wilson—he turned about, and asked from mere curiosity,
how it came to pass that his friend had forgotten so much of what
passed at their parade for the Chevalier in March last, when the man
responded: ‘I ken very weel what you mean, laird; but my mind was
clear to trust my saul to the mercy o’ Heaven, rather than your
honour’s body to the mercy o’ the Whigs.’

Sir James Hall of Dunglass was Nov.

proprietor of a barony called Old Cambus.
Within it was a ‘room’ or small piece of land belonging to Sir Patrick
Home of Renton, a member of a family of whose hotness of blood we
have already seen some evidences. To save a long roundabout, it had
been the custom for the tenants of the ‘room’ to drive peats from
Coldingham Muir through the Old Cambus grounds, but only on
sufferance, and when the corn was off the 1708.
fields, nor even then without a quart of ale
to make matters pleasant with Sir James’s tenants. Some dispute
having now arisen between the parties, the tenant of Headchester
forbade Sir Patrick Home’s people to pass through his farm any more
with their peats; and they, on the other hand, determined that they
should go by that short passage as usual. The winter stock of fuel
being now required, the time had come for making good their
assumed right. Mr John Home, eldest son of Sir Patrick,
accompanied the carts, with a few servants to assist in making way. A
collision took place, attended with much violence on both sides, but
with no exhibition of weapons that we hear of, excepting Mr John’s
sword, which, he alleged, he did not offer to draw till his horse had
been ‘beat in the face with a great rung [stick].’ The affair was
nevertheless productive of serious consequences, for a blacksmith
was trod to death, and several persons were hurt. Had it happened
eighty years earlier, there would have been both swords and pistols
used, and probably a dozen people would have been killed.
The justices of the peace for Berwickshire took up the matter, and
imposed a fine of fifty pounds upon Mr John Home, as the person
chiefly guilty of the riot. He appealed to the Court of Session, setting
forth several objections to the sentence. The Earl of Marchmont,
whose daughter had married Sir James Hall, and two other members
of the justice-court, ought to be held as disqualified by affinity to sit
in judgment in the case. To this it was answered, that Sir James was
not the complainer, and his lady was dead. Home then alleged a right
to the passage. It was shewn, on the other hand, that there never had
been a passage save by tolerance and on consideration of the quart of
ale; and though it had been otherwise, he ought to have applied to
the magistrates, and not taken the law into his own hands: ‘however
one enters into possession, though cast in with a sling-stone, yet he
must be turned out by order of law. The Lords would not hear of
reversing the award of the justices; but they reduced the fine to thirty
pounds.’[414]

The family of the antiquary, Sir James 1709. Mar.

Balfour, to whom we owe the preservation
of so many historical manuscripts, appears to have been a very
unfortunate one. We have seen that his youngest son and successor,
Sir Robert, was slaughtered in the reign of 1709.
[415]
Charles II. by M‘Gill of Rankeillour. The
head of a succeeding generation of the family, Sir Michael Balfour,
was a quiet country gentleman, with a wife and seven children,
residing at the semi-castellated old manor-house, which we now see
standing a melancholy ruin, in a pass through the Fife hills near
Newburgh. He appears to have had debts; but we do not anywhere
learn that they were of serious extent, and we hear of nothing else to
his disadvantage. One day in this month, Sir Michael rode forth at an
early hour ‘to visit some friends and for other business,’ attended by
a servant, whom, on his return home, he despatched on an errand to
Cupar, telling him he would be home before him. From that hour,
Denmill was never again seen. He was searched for in the
neighbourhood. Inquiries were made for him in the towns at a
distance. There were even advertisements inserted in London and
continental newspapers, offering rewards for any information that
might enable his friends to ascertain his fate. All in vain. ‘There were
many conjectures about him,’ says a contemporary judge of the Court
of Session, ‘for some have been known to retire and go abroad upon
melancholy and discontent; others have been said to be transported
and carried away by spirits; a third set have given out they were lost,
to cause their creditors compound, as the old Lord Belhaven was said
to be drowned in Solway Sands, and so of Kirkton, yet both of them
afterwards appeared. The most probable opinion was, that Denmill
and his horse had fallen under night into some deep coal-pit, though
these were also searched which lay in his way home.’ At the distance
of ten months from his disappearance, his wife applied to the Court
of Session, setting forth that her husband’s creditors were ‘falling
upon his estate, and beginning to use diligence,’ and she could not
but apprehend serious injury to the means of the family, though
these far exceeded the debts, unless a factor were appointed. We
learn that the court could better have interposed if the application
had come from the creditors; but, seeing ‘the case craved some pity
and compassion,’ they appointed a factor for a year, to manage the
estate for both creditors and relict, hoping that, before that time
elapsed, it would be ascertained whether Denmill were dead or alive.
[416]

The year passed, and many more years after it, without clearing up
the mystery. We find no trace of further legal proceedings regarding
the missing gentleman, his family, or property. The fact itself
remained green in the popular 1709.
remembrance, particularly in the district to
which Sir Michael belonged. In November 1724, the public curiosity
was tantalised by a story published on a broadside, entitled Murder
will Out, and professing to explain how the lost gentleman had met
his death. The narrative was said to proceed on the death-bed
confession of a woman who had, in her infancy, seen Sir Michael
murdered by her parents, his tenants, in order to evade a debt which
they owed him, and of which he had called to crave payment on the
day of his disappearance. Stabbing him with his own sword as he sat
at their fireside, they were said to have buried his body and that of
his horse, and effectually concealed their guilt while their own lives
lasted. Now, it was said, their daughter, who had involuntarily
witnessed a deed she could not prevent, had been wrought upon to
disclose all the particulars, and these had been verified by the finding
of the bones of Sir Michael, which were now transferred to the
sepulchre of his family. But this story was merely a fiction trafficking
on the public curiosity. On its being alluded to in the Edinburgh
Evening Courant as an actual occurrence, ‘the son and heir of the
defunct Sir Michael’ informed the editor of its falsity, which was also
acknowledged by the printer of the statement himself; and pardon
was craved of the honourable family and their tenants for putting it
into circulation. On making inquiry in the district, I have become
satisfied that the disappearance of this gentleman from the field of
visible life was never explained, as it now probably never will be. In
time, the property was bought by a neighbouring gentleman, who did
not require to use the mansion as his residence. Denmill Castle
accordingly fell out of order, and became a ruin. The fathers of
people still living thereabouts remembered seeing the papers of the
family—amongst which were probably some that had belonged to the
antiquarian Sir James—scattered in confusion about a garret
pervious to the elements, under which circumstances they were
allowed to perish.

There was at this time a dearth of victual May.

in Scotland, and it was considered to be
upon the increase. The magistrates and justices of Edinburgh
arranged means for selling meal in open market, though in quantities
not exceeding a firlot, at twelve shillings Scots per peck. They also
ordered all possessors of grain to have it thrashed out and brought to
market before the 20th of May, reserving none to themselves, and
forbade, on high penalties, any one to buy 1709.
[417]
up grain upon the road to market.
A well-disposed person offered in print an expedient for
preventing the dearth of victual. He discommended the fixing of a
price at market, for when this plan was tried in the last dearth,
farmers brought only some inferior kind of grain to market, ‘so that
the remedy was worse than the disease.’ Neither could he speak in
favour of the plan of the French king—namely, the confiscating of all
grain remaining after harvest—for it had not succeeded in France,
and would still less suit a country where the people were accustomed
to more liberty. He suggested the prohibition of exportation; the
recommending possessors of grain to sell it direct to the people,
instead of victual-mongers; and the use of strict means for fining all
who keep more than a certain quantity in reserve. This writer
thought that the corn was in reality not scarce; all that was needed
was, to induce possessors of the article to believe it to be best for
their interest to sell immediately.[418]

There is an ancient and well-known July 21.

privilege, still kept up, in connection with
the palace and park of Holyroodhouse, insuring that a debtor
otherwise than fraudulent, and who has not the crown for his
creditor, cannot have diligence executed against him there;
consequently, may live there in safety from his creditors. At this
time, the privilege was taken advantage of by Patrick Haliburton,
who was in debt to the extraordinary amount of nearly £3000
sterling, and who was believed to have secretly conveyed away his
goods.
It being also part of the law of Scotland that diligence cannot be
proceeded with on Sunday, the Abbey Lairds, as they were jocularly
called, were enabled to come forth on that day and mingle in their
wonted society.
It pleased Patrick Haliburton to come to town one Sunday, and call
upon one of his creditors named Stewart, in order to treat with him
regarding some proposed accommodation of the matters that stood
between them. Mr Stewart received Patrick with apparent kindness,
asked him to take supper, and so plied his hospitality as to detain
him till past twelve o’clock, when, as he was leaving the house, a
messenger appeared with a writ of caption, and conducted him to
prison. Patrick considered himself as 1709.
trepanned, and presented a complaint to
the Court of Session, endeavouring to shew that a caption, of which
all the preparatory steps had been executed on the Sunday, was the
same as if it had been executed on the Sunday itself; that he had been
treacherously dealt with; and that he was entitled to protection
under the queen’s late indemnity. The Lords repelled the latter plea,
but ‘allowed trial to be taken of the time of his being apprehended,
and the manner how he was detained, or if he offered to go back to
the Abbey, and was enticed to stay and hindered to go out.’[419] The
termination of the affair does not appear.
A case with somewhat similar features occurred in 1724. Mrs Dilks
being a booked inmate of the Abbey sanctuary, one of her creditors
formed a design of getting possession of her person. He sent a
messenger-at-law, who, planting himself in a tavern within the
privileged ground, but close upon its verge, sent for the lady to come
and speak with him. She, obeying, could not reach the house without
treading for a few paces beyond ‘the girth,’ and the messenger’s
concurrents took the opportunity to lay hold of her. This, however,
was too much to be borne by a fairplay-loving populace. The very
female residents of the Abbey rose at the news, and, attacking the
party, rescued Mrs Dilks, and bore her back in triumph within the
charmed circle.[420]

The Rev. James Greenshields, an Irish curate, but of Scottish birth

and ordination—having received this rite at the hands of the deposed
Bishop of Ross in 1694—set up a meeting-house in a court near the
Cross of Edinburgh, where he introduced the English liturgy, being
the first time a prayer-book had been publicly presented in Scotland
since the Jenny Geddes riot of July 1637. Greenshields was to be
distinguished from the nonjurant Scottish Episcopalian clergy, for he
had taken the oath of abjuration (disclaiming the ‘Pretender’), and he
prayed formally for the queen; but he was perhaps felt to be, on this
account, only the more dangerous to the Established Church. It was
necessary that something should be done to save serious people from
the outrage of having a modified idolatry practised so near them. The
first effort consisted of a process raised by the landlord of the house
against Mr Greenshields, in the Dean of 1709.
Guild’s court, on account of his having used
part of the house, which he took for a dwelling, as a chapel, and for
that purpose broken down certain partitions. The Dean readily
ordained that the house should be restored to its former condition.
Mr Greenshields having easily procured accommodation elsewhere,
it became necessary to try some other method for extinguishing the
nuisance. A petition to the presbytery of Edinburgh, craving their
interference, was got up and signed by two or three hundred persons
in a few hours. The presbytery, in obedience to their call, cited Mr
Greenshields to appear before them. He declined their jurisdiction,
and they discharged him from continuing to officiate, under high
pains and penalties.
Mr Greenshields having persisted, next Sep.
Sunday, in reading prayers to his
congregation, the magistrates, on the requirement of the presbytery,
called him before them, and formally demanded that he should
discontinue his functions in their city. Daniel Defoe, who could so
cleverly expose the intolerance of the Church of England to the
dissenters, viewed an Episcopalian martyrdom with different
feelings. He tells us that Greenshields conducted himself with
‘haughtiness’ before the civic dignitaries—what his own people of
course regarded as a heroic courage. He told them positively that he
would not obey them; and accordingly, next Sunday, he read the
service as usual in his obscure chapel. Even now, if we are to believe
Defoe, the magistrates would not have committed him, if he had
been modest in his recusancy; but, to their inconceivable disgust,
this insolent upstart actually appeared next day at the Cross, among
the gentlemen who were accustomed to assemble there as in an
Exchange, and thus seemed to brave their authority! For its
vindication, they were, says Defoe, ‘brought to an absolute necessity
to commit him;’ and they committed him accordingly to the
Tolbooth.
Here he lay till the beginning of November, when, the Court of
Session sitting down, he presented a petition, setting forth the
hardship of his case, seeing that there was no law forbidding any one
to read the English liturgy, and he had fully qualified to the civil
government by taking the necessary oaths. It was answered for the
magistrates, that ‘there needs no law condemning the English
service, for the introducing the Presbyterian worship explodes it as
inconsistent,’ and the statute had only promised that the oath-taking
should protect ministers who had been in possession of charges. ‘The
generality of the Lords,’ says Fountainhall, 1709.
[421]
‘regretted the man’s case;’ but they
refused to set him at liberty, unless he would engage to ‘forbear the
English service.’ Amongst his congregation there was a considerable
number of English people, who had come to Edinburgh as officers of
Customs and Excise. It must have bewildered them to find what was
so much venerated in their own part of the island, a subject of such
wrathful hatred and dread in this.
Greenshields, continuing a prisoner in the Tolbooth, determined,
with the aid of friends, to appeal to the House of Lords against the
decision of the Court of Session. Such appeals had become possible
only two years ago by the Union, and they were as yet a novelty in
Scotland. The local authorities had never calculated on such a step
being taken, and they were not a little annoyed by it. They persisted,
nevertheless, in keeping the clergyman in his loathsome prison, till,
after a full year, an order of the House of Lords came for his release.
Meanwhile, other troubles befell the church, for a Tory ministry
came into power, who, like the queen herself, did not relish seeing
the Episcopalian clergy and liturgy treated contumeliously in
Scotland. The General Assembly desired to have a fast on account of
‘the crying sins of the land, irreligion, popery, many errors and
delusions;’ and they chafed at having to send for authority to
Westminster, where it was very grudgingly bestowed. It seemed as if
they had no longer a barrier for the protection of that pure faith
which it was the happy privilege of Scotland, solely of all nations on
the face of the earth, to enjoy. Their enemies, too, well saw the
advantage that had been gained over them, and eagerly supported
Greenshields in his tedious and expensive process, which ended
(March 1711) in the reversal of the Session’s decision. ‘It is a tacit
rescinding,’ says Wodrow, ‘of all our laws for the security of our
worship, and that unhappy man [an Irish curate of fifteen pounds a
year, invited to Edinburgh on a promise of eighty] has been able to
do more for the setting up of the English service in Scotland than
King Charles the First was able to do.’

The Lords of Session decided this day on Nov. 9.

a critical question, involving the use of a
word notedly of uncertain meaning. John Purdie having committed
an act of immorality on which a parliamentary act of 1661 imposed a
penalty of a hundred pounds in the case of 1709.
‘a gentleman,’ the justices of peace fined
him accordingly, considering him a gentleman within the
construction of the act, as being the son of ‘a heritor,’ or land-
proprietor. ‘When charged for payment by Thomas Sandilands,
collector of these fines, he suspended, upon this ground that the fine
was exorbitant, in so far as he was but a small heritor, and, as all
heritors are not gentlemen, so he denied that he had the least
pretence to the title of a gentleman. The Lords sustained the reason
of suspension to restrict the fine to ten pounds Scots, because the
suspender had not the face or air of a gentleman: albeit it was
alleged by the charger [Sandilands] that the suspender’s
profligateness and debauchery, the place of the country where he
lives, and the company haunted by him, had influenced his mien.’[422]

An anonymous gentleman of Scotland, writing to the Earl of

Seafield, on the improvement of the salmon-fishing in Scotland,
informs us how the fish were then, as now, massacred in their
pregnant state, by country people. ‘I have known,’ he says, ‘a fellow
not worth a groat kill with a spear in one night’s time a hundred
black fish or kipper, for the most part full of rawns unspawned.’ He
adds: ‘Even a great many gentlemen, inhabitants by the rivers, are
guilty of the same crimes,’ little reflecting on ‘the prodigious treasure
thus miserably dilapidated.’
Notwithstanding these butcheries, he tells us that no mean profit
was then derived from the salmon-fishing in Scotland; he had known
from two to three thousand barrels, worth about six pounds sterling
each, exported in a single year. ‘Nay, I know Sir James Calder of
Muirton alone sold to one English merchant a thousand barrels in
one year’s fishing.’ He consequently deems himself justified in
estimating the possible product of the salmon-fishing, if rightly
protected and cultivated, at forty thousand barrels, yielding
£240,000 sterling, per annum.[423]

At Inchinnan, in Renfrewshire, there fell 1710. Feb.

out a ‘pretty peculiar accident.’ One Robert
Hall, an elder, and reputed as an estimable man, falling into debt
with his landlord, the Laird of Blackston, was deprived of all he had,
and left the place. Two months before this date, he returned secretly,
and being unable to live contentedly 1710.
without going to church, he disguised himself for that purpose in
women’s clothes. It was his custom to go to Eastwood church, but
curiosity one day led him to his own old parish-church of Inchinnan.
As he crossed a ferry, he was suspected by the boatman and a beadle
of being a man in women’s clothes, and traced on to the church. The
minister, apprised of the suspicion, desired them not to meddle with
him; but on a justice of peace coming up, he was brought forward for
examination. He readily owned the fact, and desired to be taken to
the minister, who, he said, would know him. The minister protected
him for the remainder of the day, that he might escape the rudeness
of the mob; and on the ensuing day, he was taken to Renfrew, and
liberated, at the intercession of his wife’s father.[424]

The General Assembly passed an act, May.

declaring the marriage of Robert Hunter, in
the bounds of the presbytery of Biggar, with one John [Joan]
Dickson to be incestuous, the woman having formerly been the
mother of a child, the father of which was grand-uncle to her present
husband. The act discharged the parties from remaining united
under pain of highest censure.
The church kept up long after this period a strict discipline
regarding unions which involved real or apparent relationship. In
May 1730, we find John Baxter, elder in Tealing parish, appealing
against a finding of the synod, that his marriage with his deceased
wife’s brother’s daughter’s daughter, was incestuous. Two years later,
the General Assembly had under its attention a case, which, while
capable of being stated in words, is calculated to rack the very brain
of whoever would try to realise it in his conceptions. A Carrick man,
named John M‘Taggart, had unluckily united himself to a woman
named Janet Kennedy, whose former husband, Anthony M‘Harg,
‘was a brother to John M‘Taggart’s grandmother, which
grandmother was said to be natural daughter of the said Anthony
M‘Harg’s father!’ The presbytery of Ayr took up the case, and
M‘Taggart was defended by a solicitor, in a paper full of derision and
mockery at the law held to have been offended; ‘a new instance,’ says
Wodrow,’ of the unbounded liberty that lawyers take.’[425] The
presbytery having condemned the marriage as incestuous, M‘Taggart
appealed in wonted form to the synod, which affirmed the former