The Heart of Mid-Lothian - Penn State University

five minutes sooner, before Wilson was cut down, he
would have been versans in licito; engaged, that is, in a
lawful act, and only liable to be punished propter
excessum, or for lack of discretion, which might have
mitigated the punishment to poena ordinaria.
“Discretion!” echoed Mrs. Howden, on whom, it may
well be supposed, the fineness of this distinction was
entirely thrown away,— “whan had Jock Porteous either
grace, discretion, or gude manners?—I mind when
his father”
“But, Mrs. Howden,” said Saddletree—
“And I,” said Miss Damahoy, “mind when his mother”
“Miss Damahoy,” entreated the interrupted orator
“And I,” said Plumdamas, “mind when his wife”
“Mr. Plumdamas—Mrs. Howden—Miss Damahoy,”
again implored the orator,— “Mind the distinction, as
Counsellor Crossmyloof says— ‘I,’ says he, ‘take a distinction.’
Now, the body of the criminal being cut down,
and the execution ended, Porteous was no longer official;
the act which he came to protect and guard, being
done and ended, he was no better than cuivis ex populo.”
Sir Walter Scott
69
“Quivis—quivis, Mr. Saddletree, craving your pardon,”
said (with a prolonged emphasis on the first syllable)
Mr. Butler, the deputy-schoolmaster of a parish near
Edinburgh, who at that moment came up behind them
as the false Latin was uttered.
“What signifies interrupting me, Mr. Butler?—but I
am glad to see ye notwithstanding—I speak after Counsellor
Crossmyloof, and he said cuivis.”
“If Counsellor Crossmyloof used the dative for the
nominative, I would have crossed his loof with a tight
leathern strap, Mr. Saddletree; there is not a boy on the
booby form but should have been scourged for such a
solecism in grammar.”
“I speak Latin like a lawyer, Mr. Butler, and not like a
schoolmaster,” retorted Saddletree.
“Scarce like a schoolboy, I think,” rejoined Butler.
“It matters little,” said Bartoline; “all I mean to say
is, that Porteous has become liable to the poena extra
ordinem, or capital punishment—which is to say, in plain
Scotch, the gallows—simply because he did not fire when
he was in office, but waited till the body was cut down,