Of this club Fergusson the poet was a member. Is it not commemorated in his verse? Fergusson was catholic in his tastes. Johnnie Dowie’s in Libberton’s Wynd has been already mentioned in these pages. Here was to be met Paton the antiquary, and here in later days came Robert Burns, but indeed who did not at some time or other frequent this famous tavern? noted for its Nor’ Loch trout and its ale—that justly lauded Edinburgh ale of Archibald Younger, whose brewery was in Croft-an-righ, hard by Holyrood. The Crochallan Fencibles which met in the house of Dawney Douglas in the Anchor Close is chiefly known for its memories of Burns. Here he had his famous wit contest with Smellie, his printer, whose printing office was in the same close, so that neither Burns nor he had far to go after the compounding or correcting of proofs. We picture Smellie to ourselves as a rough old Scot, unshaven and unshorn, with rough old clothes—his “caustic wit was biting rude,” and Burns confessed its power. The poet praises the warmth and benevolence of his heart, and we need not rake in the ashes to discover his long-forgotten failings. William Smellie was another William Nicol. There was a touch of romance about the name of the club. It meant in Gaelic Colin’s cattle; there was a mournful Gaelic air and song and tradition attached to it. Colin’s wife had died young, but returned from the spirit world, and was seen on summer evenings, a scarce mortal shape, tending his cattle. Perhaps some antiquarian Scot or learned German will some day delight the curious with a monograph on the word Crochallan, but as yet the legend awaits investigation. Some of the clubs were “going strong” in the early years of the nineteenth century. There was a Friday Club founded in June 1803 which met at various places in the New Town. Brougham made the punch, and it was fearfully and wonderfully made. Lord Cockburn is its historian. He has some caustic sentences, as when he talks of Abercrombie’s “contemptible stomach,” and says George Cranstoun, Lord Corehouse, “is one of the very few persons who have not been made stupid by being made a Judge.” This Friday Club was imitated in the Bonally Friday Club, which met twice a year at Bonally House, where Lord Cockburn lived. It was in its prime about 1842. Candidates for admission were locked up in a dark room well provided with stools and chairs—not to sit on, but to tumble over! The members dressed themselves up in skins of tigers and leopards and what not, and each had a penny trumpet. Among these the candidate was brought in blindfold, had first to listen to a solemn, pompous address, “then the bandage was removed and a spongeful of water dashed in his face. In a moment the wild beasts capered about, the masked actors danced around him, and the penny trumpets were lustily blown. The whole scene was calculated to strike awe and amazement into the mind of the new member.” It would require a good deal of witty talk to make up for such things.