Tennis Court Oath

‘…The hall of the Commons was fixed upon for the purposes of the Royal Sitting, as the largest of the three which were occupied by the three estates, and workmen were employed in making the necessary arrangements and alterations. These alterations were imprudently commenced [June 20] before holding any communication on the subject with the National Assembly; and it was simply notified to their president, Bailli, by the master of the royal ceremonies, that the King had suspended the meeting of the Assembly until the Royal Silting should have taken place. Bailli, the president, well known afterwards by his tragical fate, refused to attend to an order so intimated, and the members of Assembly, upon resorting to their ordinary place of meeting, found it full of workmen, and guarded by soldiers. This led to one of the most extraordinary scenes of the revolution.

The representatives of the nation, thus expelled by armed guards from their proper place of assemblage, found refuge in a common Tennis-court, while a thunder-storm, emblem of the moral tempest which raged upon the earth, poured down its terrors from the heavens. It was thus that, exposed to the inclemency of the weather, and with the wretched  accommodations which such a place afforded, the members of Assembly took, and attested by their respective signatures, a solemn oath, " to continue their sittings until the constitution of the kingdom, and the regeneration of the public order, should be established on a solid basis."* The scene was of a kind to make the deepest impression both on the actors and the spectators; although, looking back at the distance of so many years, we are tempted to ask, at what period the National Assembly would have been dissolved, had they adhered literally to their celebrated oath…’

The Tennis Court Oath was signed by 576 of the French Third Estate on June 20, 1789.  Coverage above comes from Sir Walter Scott’s “The Life of Napoleon”.

Anna Maria Porter

According to Chambers' Book of Days, the novelist Anna Maria Porter died on June 20, 1832.  Anna Maria was the sister of fellow author Jane Porter, and of brother Sir Robert Ker Porter.  Anna Maria's first novel, "Artless Tales", was published in 1792, when the author was twelve years old.

According to a brief bio by Robert Carruthers in "Chambers' Cyclopaedia of English Literature", Sir Walter Scott, when a student at college, was intimate with the family, and, we are told, "was very fond of either teasing the little female student [Anna Maria Porter] when very gravely engaged with her book, or more often fondling her on his knees, and telling her stories of witches and warlocks, till both forgot their former playful merriment in the marvellous interest of the tale."

Adam Ferguson

Today's subject may have done much to inspire a young Walter Scott to further his literary interests.  Dr. Adam Ferguson was Chair of Moral Philosophy at Edinburgh University, and a leading figure in the Scottish Enlightenment.  Ferguson's friends included David Hume and Adam Smith.  Dr. Ferguson was born on June 20, 1723.

Ferguson is best known as something of an early sociologist. One of his major works was "Essay on the History of Civil Society (1767)", which analyzed commercial society with regard to its impact on community virtues.

A generation older than Scott, a connection was made at Edinburgh University through Ferguson's son, also named Adam.  The elder Adam ran literary salons in Edinburgh, through which Walter Scott, at age 15 or so, met Robert Burns.  The story of this meeting has been told many times, which is that Burns noticed a print of the poem "The Justice of the Peace" while attending Ferguson's group, and asked who knew who had written it.  Scott had the correct answer, which is John Langhorne.