In the Canongate, nearly opposite to Queensberry House, is a narrow, old-fashioned mansion, of peculiar form, having a coat-armorial conspicuously placed at the top, and a plain slab over the doorway containing the following inscriptions:

It appears that this quatrain was the production of Dr Pitcairn, while the sentence below is an anagram upon the name of John Patersone. The stanza expresses that ‘when Paterson had been crowned victor in a game peculiar to Scotland, in which his ancestors had also been often victorious, he then built this mansion, which one conquest raised him above all his predecessors.’ We must resort to tradition for an explanation of this obscure hint.

Till a recent period, golfing had long been conducted upon the Links of Leith.[251] It had even been the sport of princes on that field. We are told by Mr William Tytler of Woodhouselee that Charles I. and the Duke of York (afterwards James II.) played at golf on Leith Links, in succession, during the brief periods of their residence in Holyrood. Though there is an improbability in this tale as far as Charles is concerned, seeing that he spent too short a time in Edinburgh to have been able to play at a game notorious for the time necessary in acquiring it, I may quote the anecdote related by Mr Tytler: ‘That while he was engaged in a party at golf on the green or Links of Leith, a letter was delivered into his hands, which gave him the first account of the insurrection and rebellion in Ireland; on reading which, he suddenly called for his coach, and leaning on one of his attendants, and in great agitation, drove to the palace of Holyrood House, from whence next day he set out for London.’ Mr Tytler says, regarding the Duke of York, that he ‘was frequently seen in a party at golf on the Links of Leith with some of the nobility and gentry. I remember in my youth to have often conversed with an old man named Andrew Dickson, a golf-club maker, who said that, when a boy, he used to carry the duke’s golf-clubs, and run before him, and announce where the balls fell.’[252]

Tradition reports that when the duke lived in Holyrood House he had on one occasion a discussion with two English noblemen as to the native country of golf; his Royal Highness asserting that it was peculiar to Scotland, while they as pertinaciously insisted that it was an English game as well. Assuredly, whatever may have been the case in those days, it is not now an English game in the proper sense of the words, seeing that it is only played to the south of the Tweed by a few fraternities of Scotsmen, who have acquired it in their own country in youth. However this may be, the two English nobles proposed, good-humouredly, to prove its English character by taking up the duke in a match to be played on Leith Links. James, glad of an opportunity to make popularity in Scotland, in however small a way, accepted the challenge, and sought for the best partner he could find. By an association not at this day surprising to those who practise the game, the heir-presumptive of the British throne played in concert with a poor shoemaker named John Paterson, the worthy descendant of a long line of illustrious golfers. If the two southrons were, as might be expected, inexperienced in the game, they had no chance against a pair, one member of which was a good player. So the duke got the best of the practical argument; and Paterson’s merits were rewarded by a gift of the sum played for. The story goes on to say that John was thus enabled to build a somewhat stylish house for himself in the Canongate, on the top of which, being a Scotsman, and having of course a pedigree, he clapped the Paterson arms—three pelicans vulned; on a chief three mullets; crest, a dexter hand grasping a golf-club; together with the motto—dear to all golfers—Far and Sure.

It must be admitted there is some uncertainty about this tale. The house, the inscriptions, and arms only indicate that Paterson built the house after being a victor at golf, and that Pitcairn had a hand in decorating it. One might even see, in the fact of the epigram, as if a gentleman wit were indulging in a jest at the expense of some simple plebeian, who held all notoriety honourable. It might have been expected that if Paterson had been enriched by a match in which he was connected with the Duke of York, a Jacobite like Pitcairn would have made distinct allusion to the circumstance. The tradition, nevertheless, seems too curious to be entirely overlooked, and the reader may therefore take it at its worth.