topr8 - 6:12 pm on Oct 29, 2012 (gmt 0)

>>the other is that Scots are mean. This came from the music hall days with Sir Harry Lauder being notoriously mean. Somehow it was concluded from this that all Scots were mean.

not sure about that, i have a large collection of old Punch magazines and in a lot of the victorian and early 20th century issues there are jokes about 'careful' scotsmen - but they are nearly always aberdonians, so i don't think it was universally attributed to scotsmen in general.