John Galt - The Ayrshire Legatees 1821

First edition -  June 1821

I must admit, I didn't enjoy this John Galt novel as much as I did The Annals of the Parish. The story is pretty straightforward. The Rev. Zachariah Pringle D.D., minister of Garnock (between Irvine and Kilwinning) receives a letter from India, informing him that his cousin, Colonel Armour, had died at Hyrabad, leaving him his residuary legatee. Off he sets for London, with his wife Janet, daughter Rachel (who now has a prospect before her) and son Andrew, who had just been called to the bar.

The majority of the book takes the form of letters posted back by all the four members of the family.  Dr. Pringle writes to Mr Micklewham, schoolmaster and Session clerk,  who is regularly told to give alms to the poor. Mrs Pringle, who has awful spelling (sometimes harder to work out than the Scottish words) writes to Miss Molly Glencairn, worrying always about actually receiving the nest-egg; the daughter writes to Miss Isabella Todd about the sights of the city, the shopping and her increasing attachment to one Captain Sabre of the Dragoon Hozars, who came up in the smak with us from Leith - she ends up marrying him and goes off to Paris with both her husband and brother; and Andrew sends letters to Rev. Charles Snodgrass, affecting to be quite 'a man about town' and commenting caustically on the Whigs.

They talk of their journey to Glasgow then Edinburgh; a rough sea voyage from Leith to Gravesend; 

there are adverse comments about the English episcopacy and their trip to Windsor for George III's funeral; they visit the Tower of London and Westminster Abbey, where they have a living-likeness of Lord Nelson, in the very identical regimentals that he was killed in. Opinions are sent on William Wilberforce, Sir Francis Burdet, the Marquis of Lansdowne and Lord Liverpool, Lord Erskine  and Lord Eldon - Eldon is the better lawyer...Erskine is the greater genius. London is assessed shrewdly: Living on the town, as it is slangishly called, the most friendless and isolated condition possible, is yet fraught with an amazing diversity of enjoyment.

Rev and Mrs Pringle return home and Mr Snodgrass is declared helper, and successor to the doctor, his marriage with Miss Isabella Todd will take place with all convenient expedition. The Pringles, meanwhile, are to move from the Manse to an elegant house. All well that ends well. A slight tale but quite well done.

Ian Campbell has, as usual, some useful comments on the novel: the central difference between this novel and the more famous Annals: where Micah Balwhidder's character is the sole filter of the event described there...here we have more than one character experiencing the change, and more than one character receiving and responding to their best estimate. The Ayrshire Legatees may look like a slim book but it is an extraordinarily rich one. It passes experience from level to level, and comments on it throughout...The metropolitan world is always at second-hand via letters, the Garnock world at first-hand via personal responses... Campbell also draws out the satire in the book and the tensions within the family (father and son) and between the various characters in Garnock.  By sharply setting up multiple layers of plot, and poking fun at everyone through his writing, Galt holds the reader's attention most skilfully while making his social points.