The dancing assemblies of Edinburgh were for many years, about the middle of the last century, under the direction and dictatorship of the Honourable Miss Nicky Murray, one of the sisters of the Earl of Mansfield. Much good sense, firmness, knowledge of the world and of the histories of individuals, as well as a due share of patience and benevolence, were required for this office of unrecognised though real power; and it was generally admitted that Miss Murray possessed the needful qualifications in a remarkable degree, though rather more marked by good manners than good-nature. She and her sisters lived for many years in a floor of a large building at the head of Bailie Fife’s Close—a now unhallowed locality, where, I believe, Francis Jeffrey attended his first school. In their narrow mansion, the Miss Murrays received flights of young lady-cousins from the country, to be finished in their manners and introduced into society. No light task must theirs have been, all things considered. I find a highly significant note on the subject inserted by an old gentleman in an interleaved copy of my first edition: ‘It was from Miss Nicky Murray’s—a relation of the Gray family—that my father ran off with my mother, then not sixteen years old.’

The Assembly Room of that time was in the close where the Commercial Bank was afterwards established.[221] First there was a lobby, where chairs were disburdened of their company, and where a reduced gentleman, with pretensions to the title of Lord Kirkcudbright—descendant of the once great Maclellans of Galloway—might have been seen selling gloves; this being the person alluded to in a letter written by Goldsmith while a student in Edinburgh: ‘One day, happening to slip into Lord Kilcobry’s—don’t be surprised, his lordship is only a glover!’ The dancing-room opened directly from the lobby, and above stairs was a tea-room. The former had a railed space in the centre, within which the dancers were arranged, while the spectators sat round on the outside; and no communication was allowed between the different sides of this sacred pale. The lady-directress had a high chair or throne at one end. Before Miss Nicky Murray, Lady Elliot of Minto and Mrs Brown of Coalstoun, wives of judges, had exercised this lofty authority, which was thought honourable on account of the charitable object of the assemblies. The arrangements were of a rigid character, and certainly tending to dullness. There being but one set allowed to dance at a time, it was seldom that any person was twice on the floor in one night. The most of the time was spent in acting the part of lookers-on, which threw great duties in the way of conversation upon the gentlemen. These had to settle with a partner for the year, and were upon no account permitted to change, even for a single night. The appointment took place at the beginning of the season, usually at some private party or ball given by a person of distinction, where the fans of the ladies were all put into a gentleman’s cocked hat; the gentlemen put in their hands and took a fan, and to whomsoever the fan belonged, that was to be his partner for the season. In the general rigours of this system, which sometimes produced ludicrous combinations, there was, however, one palliative—namely, the fans being all distinguishable from each other, and the gentleman being in general as well acquainted with the fan as the face of his mistress, and the hat being open, it was possible to peep in, and exercise, to a certain extent, a principle of selection, whereby he was perhaps successful in procuring an appointment to his mind. All this is spiritedly given in a poem of Sir Alexander Boswell:

A little before Miss Nicky’s time, it was customary for gentlemen to walk alongside the chairs of their partners, with their swords by their sides, and so escort them home. They called next afternoon upon their Dulcineas to inquire how they were and drink tea. The fashionable time for seeing company in those days was the evening, when people were all abroad upon the street, as in the forenoon now, making calls and shopping. The people who attended the assemblies were very select. Moreover, they were all known to each other; and the introduction of a stranger required nice preliminaries. It is said that Miss Murray, on hearing a young lady’s name pronounced for the first time, would say: ‘Miss ——, of what?’ If no territorial addition could be made, she manifestly cooled. Upon one occasion, seeing a man at the assembly who was born in a low situation and raised to wealth in some humble trade, she went up to him, and, without the least deference to his fine-laced coat, taxed him with presumption in coming there, and turned him out of the room.

Major Topham praises the regularity and propriety observed at the assemblies, though gently insinuating their heaviness. He says: ‘I was never at an assembly where the authority of the manager was so observed or respected. With the utmost politeness, affability, and good-humour, Miss Murray attends to every one. All petitions are heard, and demands granted, which appear reasonable. The company is so much the more obliged to Miss Murray, as the task is by no means to be envied. The crowd which immediately surrounds her on entering the room, the impetuous applications of chaperons, maiden-aunts, and the earnest entreaties of lovers to obtain a ticket in one of the first sets for the dear object, render the fatigue of the office of lady-directress almost intolerable.’[222]

Early hours were kept in those days, and the stinted time was never exceeded. When the proper hour arrived for dissolving the party, and the young people would crowd round the throne to petition for one other set, up rose Miss Nicky in unrelenting rigidity of figure, and with one wave of her hand silenced the musicians: