about two
o'clock
I do not allude to the nine days ' deadly sickness , that was the legacy of every one that ate his segar , but to the awful truth , that , at the next election of councillors , my poor uncle Jamie was completely blackballed -- a general spite having been taken to him in the town-hall , on account of having led the magistracy wrong , by doing what he ought to have let alone , thereby making himself and the rest a topic of amusement to the world at large , for many and many a month . Others , to be sure , it becomes me to make mention , have another version of the story , and impute the cause of his having been turned out to the implacable wrath of old Bailie Bogie , whose best black coat , square in the tails , that he had worn only on the Sundays for nine years , was totally spoiled , on their way home in the dark from his lordship 's , by a tremendous blash , that my unfortunate uncle happened , in the course of nature , to let flee in the frenzy of a deadly upthrowing . I have no distinct recollection of the thing myself , yet there is every reason to believe that I was born on the 15th of October 1765 , in that little house standing by itself , not many yards from the eastmost side of the Flesh-market Gate , Dalkeith . My eyes opened on the light about two o'clock in a dark and rainy morning . Long was it spoken about that something great and mysterious would happen on that dreary night ; as the cat , after washing her face , went mewing about , with her tail sweeing behind her like a ramrod ; and a corbie , from the Duke 's woods , tumbled down Jamie Elder 's lum , when he had set the little still-a-going -- giving them a terrible fright , as they all took it first for the devil , and then for an exciseman -- and fell with a great cloud of soot , and a loud skraigh , into the empty kail-pot . The first thing that I have any clear memory of , was my being carried out on my auntie 's shoulder , with a leather cap tied under my chin , to see the Fair Race . Oh !