Edinburgh Pubs

Family and two co-eds of the American contingent on a Pub crawl
(click to expand)

“If you are bored with Edinburgh, you are bored with life” -  R.L. Stevenson.

Well, you've been through the great Edinburgh Castle and the City's many exhibitions and museums, including the Scottish National Memorial to its war dead, the Stone of Scone (now retrieved from London), the Scottish Royal Crown, Jewels, Sword, and Scepter.  You’ve been through the tartan weaving mill and the whiskey tour - complete with riding in a whiskey barrel car, a veritable Scott’s Disney World ride in which you are immersed in the subtleties of the various forms of uisge beatha (water of life).

Over several days you’ve been through all six floors of the Scottish National Museum, where the natural and human history of Scotland over four and a half billion years is outlined and the various Scottish Diasporas are illuminated (a hundred million people in the world claim Scottish ancestry - just over five million live in Scotland).  

You’ve been through countless small streets and shops in every direction and down the Royal Mile and through the underground closes where the city has built over earlier editions of itself, forming something of a city basement, which in good Scottish form they have cleverly converted to a tourist trap so as not to waste it.  

You’ve had a wee bit o' Thai, Indian, Sudanese, various Mediterranean, and nouveau scot cuisine and filled yourself with fish and chips till you are picking up a brogue.

You’ve sat on Adam Smith’s lap and toured the surgery museum, conversed with Hume and his pigeon admirers, studied the stern faces of Wallace and The Bruce, and wondered who paid for all the many other statues of Edinburgh Scots past, fairly strewn about the city in numerous small parks and traffic islands. Among them, is the statue of a little Scotty dog who is claimed to have sat upon his master's grave for fourteen years, until his own death; doubtless guarding it from the likes of the notorious Burke and Hare who took to robbing graves for bodies to sell to the University surgeons for dissection, before advancing on to fresher subjects.  The latter practice met with the disapproval of less forward-thinking city residents, earning Burke the hangman's noose, whose skeleton can be viewed in the Anatomical Museum when it is open to the public.

As with most European cities, Edinburgh is compact enough that you are tempted to walk wherever you go and have covered so many miles that you have revisited a belt hole that has been a stranger for a while.  

It is raining again outside (in one day it snowed four times - one a five-minute blizzard - rained three times, with the sun shining in a blue sky between every event), and you are wondering what now, whereupon someone suggests that it is time for a visit to a “music pub”.

Shall it be the Green Mantle, just around the corner and down the street, or the Sandy Bell in the opposite direction, or the Royal Oak off between the two? Should we extend the walk and try the Malt Shovel, the Black Rose Tavern, Captain’s Bar, Finnegan’s Wake, the Scotsman, or ...one can go on to twice this number and more - every night of the week.

The Royal Oak is catty-corner from the first major iteration of Edinburgh University, now a grand administrative building befitting a University that some would say, along with its counterpart in Glasgow, was the orbital stage of the Enlightenment.

Located fittingly on Infirmary Street, The Royal Oak is a surprisingly small place. Its bar extends entirely across one end of the room, not much more than twenty feet, if that. It is not yet nine, but upon arrival, the little place remains sparsely populated and relatively subdued, such that the minute you open your mouth, everyone knows you are an alien.  

The sandy-haired barkeep is the only employee. Beaming a warm and friendly face and projecting an equally warm and gregarious personality, he is both host and hearth of the room and promptly asks - on behalf of all present - “wher-ye-frum?”.  When asked to repeat the name of an ale, he wryly apologizes for his English on account of his "being Irish", adding a chuckle to underline the playful sarcasm.

A bit gaunt perhaps but...looks familiar to
me.

After tasting a couple of ales, you order and inquire about the music.  As he slowly pumps your glass full, “We will have a guitarist in around nine who plays a bit’o blooes”, which comes with another smile, acknowledging the irony in the circumstances. “He’ll be joined later by a fiddler, who likes traditional folk.  Then they will be joined still later by a hand organ...”  You wonder where they are all going to sit.  

The usual questions follow, "What brings ya to Scootland, How long will ya be here, where have ya been...?"  Then, "du ya hve any scootish heritage?"  In reply, "Well, I tell you, my name is James Bruce McMath."  "Oh, I'd say there is a hint'o it there!" he says. (When my son Phillip Bruce first went through customs, the officer, upon reading the passport, said, "Welcome home, son".)

You look around the room, and you see an old man with a pint, snow-white hair, a nose, chin, forehead, cheeks, and a twinkle in the eye that all seem familiar, indeed familial—from Perth, he says.

The guitarist arrives, fetches one of his two allotted free pints, and unpacks a very well-used guitar.  Speaking, he reveals a plainly native accent, but when he sings the blues, it is as if it were piped in from Memphis.

An inspiration to attain old age! click and
and expand, worth a closer look.

After a tune or two and being so close as to be sitting with you, the bard queries, “wher-ye-frum”.  Everyone else in the pub already knows, of course, and the pub’s jester, who has already told a pointed joke or two, allows, across the tiny room, “perhaps yoo shood play'em a little rock”.  

The music rolls on, and other musicians arrive one at a time, each in turn sitting quietly for a time before joining in.  The attitude of the performers is that U'ra ther for them, no tha othu-way-rrown.  They sit and talk and sip a wee bit o' ale and play a wee bit o' music to suit themselves as if no one else was in the Pub or no one of any concern to them at least.  There is no obvious tip jar (though they put it out for me after inquiry), and little if any acknowledgement of any applause by the players, though it is freely given.

The old man from Perth sits absorbing every note, a romantic joy framed in the distant focus of his eyes.  In time, all the souls in the room are warmed by the combination of spirits and song; souls and thoughts melt and mingle across the tightly packed shared space.

What was to be one ale turns to several and then evolves to a wee bit’o the “water of life” - from Islay, then another wee bit from Skye, a wee bit from Speyside and then a wee bit more from the Highlands until there is a danger, to quote and old highlander, of “it devolving into just plain drinking”.  So, its time to go as moderation is always the Scottish roole.

Quiet souls warmed with music and whiskey.

Jimmy's Song (On the wall of the Royal Oak)

The Sandy Bell 

Jimmy leaves from Drummond Street every day
And passes round the Arches on his way
And just beyond the bookshop of James Thin
The Royal Oak’s a home from home for him.

There are so many whiskies, wines and beers,
To taste them all would take some hours, nay years
But Jimmy knows exactly what he wants ___
A pint of seventy and a nip will do fine, thanks.

Jimmy has a welcome smile for everyone

Drover Inn head of Lockloman

A laddish shake of the hands ___how are you, son?
From the girls he gets a cuddle and a kiss,
For a lady’s man is what our Jimmy is.

Now he’s taken up his position by the door;
He oils his singing voice before he lets it soar.
He takes us to the Fields of Athenry,
Through the Desert Song and to Tyree by and by.

And over at the old piano by the bar
Maestro; Johnny Dodds is the accompanying star.
The Oak’s a music lover’s paradise
When these two oldtimers harmonies.

When Dorothy or Sandra ring the bell at last
We realise how quick the time has passed.
And the Golden Boy watches from his lofty dome
As Jimmy set out for his journey home.

The Jolly Judge Pub - you should see the ceiling

But Jimmy leaves from Drummond Street every day
And passes round the Arches on his way.
And just beyond the bookshop of James Thin
The Oak will always b a home from home for him.

So here it is - once covered with currency and only recently
uncovered.