Ex Ungue Leonem!

A Christmas Tale from Edinburgh 1891

The scene is Christmas Day 1891, at 32 Great King Street in the douce Georgian New Town of Edinburgh. If we were able to look through the window, we might see some servants and family rushing around in a state of high anxiety. Helen, the lady of the house, with her children Millicent, John, Arthur and Cuthbert, all home from school, all dreading the arrival of Papa coming home from his attic office in New Register House off Princes Street. Why were they so anxious and dreading the arrival of the head of the household?

The Christmas tree was up and decorated sumptuously with ornaments and candles, a roaring fire was crackling in the hearth, an enormous goose had been turning on the spit. What could possibly go wrong?  

“Here he comes,” cries Millicent, posted as a look-out at an upstairs window. Her father, tired after a busy day working on some contentious heraldic conundrum, spotted her and waved cheerily to his darling daughter.

“Right,” cried Mama, “all into the drawing room and close the door. I want to speak to your father alone!”

 Helen opened the door to her husband, Mr James Balfour Paul, Lord Lyon King-of-Arms, for it is he, and uttered the fatal words,

 “Darling, I have something to tell you before we go in to Christmas Dinner, and I want you to remain very calm.”

 Lyon’s face darkened.

What is it,” he asked testily. “Has cook burned the goose?”

“Much worse,” said Helen, pausing for dramatic effect: “we have no potatoes!”

Her husband let out a truly leonine roar.

 “What?!! I ordered them myself – a half-ton sack – from that wonderful farm in Crook of Devon! How could there be no potatoes for our Christmas Dinner?”

 “Cook went up to Waverley Station to find out and it seems the potatoes could not get through as the train-drivers are on strike,” said Helen pacifically.

 “On strike!” her husband bellowed, with such vehemence that it drew an answering carillon from the grandfather clock in the hall. “That useless North British Railway Company will be hearing from my solicitors!”

And so, the Balfour Paul family, James and Helen, little Millicent, John, Arthur, and young Cuthbert, munched their way through an unusually spartan Christmas Dinner, the clouds of their father’s rage adding an unseasonal sauce. Three months later, at Edinburgh Sheriff Small Debt Court, the roaring Lyon had the satisfaction of being awarded a decree of absolvitur against the North British Railway Company in the sum of 9 shillings by Sheriff Hamilton. Ex ungue leonem!

The later-knighted James Balfour Paul went on to make some pretty strong judgements himself, including that allowing Mrs. Fraser-Mackenzie to keep the supporters with her quartered arms formerly thought to be exclusive to the Clan Chief. The decision was upheld by the Court of Session and ultimately by the House of Lords in 1921, establishing an important precedent in Scottish heraldic law regarding the differentiation of arms and the non-exclusive use of supporters.

Even this victory did not give Sir James the satisfaction granted to him by the 9/- won for depriving his Christmas table of roast potatoes.  Truly, ex ungue leonem!