"When we had a king, and a chancellor, and parliament men o' our ain, we could aye peeble them wi' stanes when they werena gude bairns. But naebody's nails can reach the length o' Lunnon."
Mrs Howden, in Sir Walter Scott's *The Heart of Midlothian*, 1818. The words are carved into the wall of the Scottish Parliament.
The book takes Scotland to be a country, states that once, deals only in facts that can be checked, and asks for one thing that isn't independence: a written rule by which Scotland may choose.
The receipts
The source list for this chapter, as the publisher maintains it. Archive links are given wherever a cited page could move or die.
- Epigraph. Sir Walter Scott, The Heart of Midlothian (1818), Chapter Third, spoken by Mrs Howden in the street after the reprieve of Captain Porteous. Text verified against Project Gutenberg ebook 6944, read in full. Scott died in 1832; the text is out of copyright and Rule 6 does not apply. The line is carved on the Canongate Wall of the Scottish Parliament in Easdale slate from Easdale Island, Argyll, attributed there as "Sir Walter Scott (1771-1832) Mrs Howden in 'Heart of Midlothian'"; verified by direct fetch of parliament.scot, 1 September 2026. The wall's own transcription reads "parliament-men" where the novel reads "parliament men"; the novel's wording is used. Full dossier:.
- Johnson and "Friendly Fire": poem by James Michie, published in The Spectator in 2004, during Boris Johnson's editorship (2001 to 2005); earliest dated report, The Herald, "Outrage at Spectator's poetic attack on Scots", 13 August 2004.
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