, in a more effective state than was
afterwards judged necessary, when their most dangerous service was to skirmish
with the rabble on the king's birthday. They were, therefore, more the objects
of hatred, and less that of scorn, than they were afterwards accounted.
    To Captain John Porteous, the honour of his command and of his corps seems
to have been a matter of high interest and importance. He was exceedingly
incensed against Wilson for the affront which he construed him to have put upon
his soldiers, in the effort he made for the liberation of his companion, and
expressed himself most ardently on the subject. He was no less indignant at the
report, that there was an intention to rescue Wilson himself from the gallows,
and uttered many threats and imprecations upon that subject, which were
afterwards remembered to his disadvantage. In fact, if a good deal of
determination and promptitude rendered Porteous, in one respect, fit to command
guards designed to suppress popular commotion, he seems, on the other, to have
been disqualified for a charge so delicate, by a hot and surly temper, always
too ready to come to blows and violence; a character void of principle; and a
disposition to regard the rabble, who seldom failed to regale him and his
soldiers with some marks of their displeasure, as declared enemies, upon whom it
was natural and justifiable that he should seek opportunities of vengeance.
Being, however, the most active and trustworthy among the captains of the City
Guard, he was the person to whom the magistrates confided the command of the
soldiers appointed to keep the peace at the time of Wilson's execution. He was
ordered to guard the gallows and scaffold, with about eighty men, all the
disposable force that could be spared for that duty.
    But the magistrates took farther precautions, which affected Porteous's
pride very deeply. They requested the assistance of part of a regular infantry
regiment, not to attend upon the execution, but to remain drawn up on the
principal street of the city, during the time that it went forward, in order to
intimidate the multitude, in case they should be disposed to be unruly, with a
display of force which could not be resisted without desperation. It may sound
ridiculous in our ears, considering the fallen state of this ancient civic
corps, that its officer should have felt punctiliously jealous of its honour.
Yet so it was. Captain Porteous resented, as an indignity, the introducing the
Welsh Fusileers within the city, and drawing them up in the street where no
drums but his own were allowed to be sounded without