... OLD AND NEW EDINBURGH. [Roslin
minute decorations of the latest species of the
Tudor age. It is impossible to ...
Book 6 p. 350
(Score 0.48)
... OLD AND NEW EDINBURGH. [Pr?nees Street.
New Town, they are surprised at its being so badly
lighted and ...
Book 3 p. 120
(Score 0.48)
... OLD AND NEW EDINBURGH. [High Street.
likely to have arisen. It happened by accident
that the Earl of ...
Book 2 p. 210
(Score 0.48)
... 18 OLD AND NEW EDINBURGH. [cogs.
p. baronet of Nova Scotia by James VII., in
1687.
The close of the family is ...
Book 6 p. 318
(Score 0.48)
... OLD AND NEW EDINBURGH. [WaniStolL
The cost to the Government of fencing in the
-ground, planting, &c., up ...
Book 5 p. 98
(Score 0.48)
... OLD APU?D NEW EDINBURGH. [Corstorphine.
meaning, no doubt, the panelled box-beds so
common of old in ...
Book 5 p. 114
(Score 0.48)
... West Chum.: MR. ROBER?T PONT. 13x1
CHAPTER XVIII.
THE CHURCH OF ST. CUTHBERT.
Iiirtory and Antiquity-Old ...
Book 3 p. 131
(Score 0.48)
![THE PRECEPTORY OF ST. ANTHONY. 215 Leith]
not making any deliberate assault ; but a pistol
shot was heard, and in a few minutes the Sieur de
la Roche lay dead, with a sword thrust in his body,
while Isaac had a finger nearly hewn OK
The guard now came on the scene, and Mowat
was found under an outer stair, with a bent sword
in his hand, bloody from point to hilt, his hand
wounded, and the sleeves of his coat stained with
blood. On seeing the dead body, he viewed it
without emotion, and merely remarked that he
wondered who had slain him.
The Master, Mowat, and James Sinclair the writer,
were all tried for the murder of Elias Poiret before
the Court of Justiciary, but the jury brought in a
verdict of not proven. The whole affair might
have been easily explained, but for heat of temper,
intemperance, and the ready resort to arms so usual
in those days. The three Frenchmen concerned in
it were Protestant refugees who were serving as
privates in the Scottish Life Guards. The Mastet
of Tarbet became Earl of Cromarty in 1714 and
survived the death of Poiret forty years. Two of
his sons, who were officers in the Scots-Dutch
Brigade, perished at sea, and his eldest, the third
and last Earl of Cromarty, was nearly brought to
Tower Hill in 1746 for his loyalty to the House of
Stuart.
No. 141 Kirkgate was long the place of business
of Mr. Alexander Watson, who is chiefly remarkable
as being the nephew and close correspondent
of a very remarkable man, who frequently resided
with him-Robert Watson, who was made Principal
of the Scots College at Paris by the Emperor
Napoleon I., an office which he held for six years.
It was to his nephew at Leith, after his escape to
Rome (having been tried at the Old Bailey as
President of a Corresponding Society), he confided
his discovery of a large mass of correspondence
known as ? The Stuart Papers,? which he
purchased (as stated in the Courunt for 1819.)
In one of his letters, dated London, 6th April,
1818, he states that they consist ofhalf a million of
pieces, and are valued at ~300,000. ?? The Pope,
however, took military possession of them, under
the protest that they were of too much importance
to belong to a private individual. I protested
against the arbitrary proceedings of his Holiness.
The Prince Regent sent two ships of war to Civita
Vecchia to bring them to London, and they are
now in Carlton House.?
To his nephew in the Kirkgate he subsequently
wrote that a Royal Commissiolr under the Great
Seal (including Sir James Mackintosh) was a p
pointed to examine these valuable papers ; and in
1824 he wrote that amongst other things of some
value which have fallen into my possession, are the
carriage and tent-bed of Bonaparte, taken at the
battle of Waterloo. Further events will decide
to what purposes I may apply it (the carriage),
though it is probable I shall keep it for my own
use.?
This singular person committed suicide in 1838,
by strangling himself in a London tavern, in the
ninety-second year of his age--?a case of suicide,?
it was said, ?unparalleled in the annals of sorrow.?
On the east side of the Kirkgate, to take the
edifices in succession there, there was founded by
Robert Logan of Restalrig, in 1435, a preceptory
for the canons of St. Anthony, the only establkhment
of the kind in Scotland.
Arnot, in his history, unthinkingly mentions ?? the
monastery of Knights Templars of St. Anthony?
at Leith. These canons, says Chalmers, ? seem to
have been an order of religious knights, not
Templars. The only document in which they are
called Templars is a charter of James VI. in 1614,
giving away their establishment and revenues; and
this mistake of an ignorant clerk is wildly repeated
by Arnot.?
Their church, burying-ground, and gardens were
in St. Anthony?s Wynd, an alley off the Kirkgate ;
and the first community was brought from St
Anthony of Vienne, the seat of the order in France
They were formed in honour of St. Anthony, the
patriarch of monks, who was born at Coma, a
village of Heraclea on the borders of Arcadia, in
A.D.?z~I, and whose sister was placed in the first
convent that is recorded in history. A hermit by
habit, he dwelt long in the ruins of an old castle
that overlooked the Nile; and after his death (said
to have been in 356) his body was deposited in the
church of La Motte St. Didier, at Vienne, when,
according to old traditions, those labouring under
the pest known as St. ,4nthony?s Fire-a species of
erysipelas-were miraculously cured by praying at
his shrine.
Gaston, a noble of Vienne, and his son Gironde,
filled with awe, we are told, by these wonderful
cures, devoted their lives and estates to found a
hospital for those who laboured under this disease,
and seven others joined them in their attendance
on the sick; and on these Hospitaller Brethren
Boniface VIII. bestowed the Benedictine Priory
of Vienne, giving them the rules of St. Austin, and
declaring the Abbot General of this new orderthe
Canons Regular of St, Anthony. The superiors
of the subordinate preceptones were called commanders,
says Alban Butler, ? and their houses are
called commandenes, as when they were Hospitallers?
.](images/thumbs/old_new_edin_v6p034.gif "Old and New Edinburgh Vol. VI Page 215")
... PRECEPTORY OF ST. ANTHONY. 215 Leith]
not making any deliberate assault ; but a pistol
shot was heard, and in ...
Book 6 p. 215
(Score 0.48)
![Leith] SH EKIFF BRAE. 247
Leith by the rebels of Mary Queen of Scots, the
Earl of Lennox opened his council in the chambers
of the old tenement referred to, on the Coal Hill,
and it is, says Robertson, decorated with a rosethe
emblem of his connectian with Henry VIII. of
England-and the thistle for Scotland. Then
followed that war to which Morton?s ferocity imparted
a character so savage that ere long quarter
was neither given nor taken. And amidst it, in
connection with some private feud, some of the
followers of Sir William Kirkaldy, although they
had been ordered merely to use their batons, slew
Henry Setoun on the Shore of Leith, while his feet
were tripped up by an anchor. In escaping to
Edinburgh, one of them was taken and lodged in
the Tolbooth there ; but Kirkaldy came down from
the Castle with a party of his garrison, beat in the
doors, and rescued him, after which he seized ?? the
victualls brought into Leith from the merchants,
and (did} provide all necessarie furniture to endure
a long siege, till supplie was sent from forrane
nations.? (Calderwood.)
On the death of Lennox, John, Earl of Mar, was
made Regent, and fixed his head-quarters in the
same old tenement at the Coal Hill, Morton being
again chief lieutenant.
From the presence of these peers here, it is
probable that the adjacent gloomy, and now filthy,
court, so grotesquely called Parliament Square, obtained
its name, which seems to have been formerly
the Peat Neuk. The old Council House has been
doomed to perish by the new improvement scheme.
In December, 1797, it was ordered by the Lord
Provost, Magistrates, and Council of Edinburgh,
through the deputy shore-master at Leith, that every
vessel coming into the port with coals for public
sale, was to have a berth immediately on her arrival
off the Coal Hill, and that all other vessels were to
unmoor for that purpose, while no shore duties
were to be charged for coal vessels. (HeyaZd and
ChyonicZe, No. 1,215.)
The adjacent Peat Neuk, for years during the
last century and the beginning of the present,
afforded a shelter to those reckless and abandoned
characters who abound in every seaport ; while in
that portion of the town between the Coal Hill and
the foot of the Tolbooth Wynd were a number of
ancient and ruinous houses, the abode of wandering
outcasts, from whom no rent was ever derived
or expected. It was further alleged, in the early
part of the nineteenth century, to be the favourite
haunt of disembodied spirits, whose crimes or
sufferings in life compelled them to wander ; so,
every way, the Coal Hill seems to have been an
unpleasant, as it is still an unsavoury, locality.
From thence, another quarter known as the
Sheriff, or Shirra Brae, extends in a south-westerly
direction, still abounding in ancient houses. Here,
facing the Coal Hill, there stood, till 1840, a very
fine old edifice, described as having been the residence
of a Logan of Restalrig. The dormer
windows, which rose high above the eaves, were
elaborately sculptured with many dates and quaint
devices. Some of these have been preserved in
the north wall of the manse of St. Thomas?s Church.
One of them displays a shield charged with a heart,
surmounted by a fleur-de-lis, with the initials 1.L
and the date 1636 ; another has the initials I.L.,
M.C., with the date 24 Dec., 1636; a third has
the initials M.C., with a shield; while a fourth
gablet has the initials D.D., M.C., and the comparatively
recent date I 734
The supposed grandsoq of the luckless Logan
of the Gowrie conspiracy married Isabel Fowler,
daughter of Ludovic Fowler of Burncastle (says
Robertson), the famous ? Tibbie Fowler ? of
Scottish song, and here she is said to have resided ;
but her husband has been otherwise said to have
been a collateral of the ancient house of Restalrig,
as it is recorded, under date 12th June, 1572-
Majestro Joanne Logan de Shireff Braye,? who
poitpones the case of Christian Gudsonne, wife of
Andrew Burne in Leith, ?dilatit of the mutilation
of Willkm Burne, burgess of Edinburgh, of his
foremost finger be byting thereof.?
In the chartulary, says Robertson, we have also
John Logane of the Coatfield (Kirkgate), and George
Logane of Bonnington Mills is repeatedly alluded
to; ?? and we believe,? he adds, that these branches
?existed as early as the charter of King David.?
The old house at Bmnington still shows a curious
doorway, surmounted by a carefully sculptured
tablet bearing a shield, with a chevron and three
fleurs-de-lis; crest, a ship with sails furled. The
motto and date are obliterated.
. Another writer supposes that if the old house on
the Sheriff Brae was really the residence of George
Logan, it may have been acquired by marriage,
? seeing that the forfeiture of the family possessions
occurred so shortly before ; and this in itself affords
some colour to the tradition that he was the successhl
wooer of Tibbie Fowler.?
In support of this, the historian of Leith says :-
?f We think it not improbable that it was Tibbie?s
tocher that enabled Logan, who was ruined by the
attainder of 1609, to build the elegant mansion on
the Sheriff Brae. The marriage contract between
Logan and Isabella Fowler (supposed to be the
Tibbie of the song) is now in possession of a
gentleman in Leith.?](images/thumbs/old_new_edin_v6p066.gif "Old and New Edinburgh Vol. VI Page 247")
... SH EKIFF BRAE. 247
Leith by the rebels of Mary Queen of Scots, the
Earl of Lennox opened his council in ...
Book 6 p. 247
(Score 0.48)
![Koslin.] THE THREE BATTLES ON ONE DAY. 351
hillside, and not beneath, but is attached to its
eastern end, the means of communication between
the two being by a steep descent of steps. Its use
has sorely puzzled antiquaries, though it forms a
handsome little chapel, with ribbed arches and roof
of stone. Under its eastern window is an altar, and
there is a piscina and anibry for the sacramental
plate, together with a comfortable fireplace and a
rob+ of closets.
?? Its domestic appurtenances,? says a writer,
clearly- show. it. to have been the <house of: the
priestvrcustodier of the chapel, and the ecclesiastical?types
first named were for his private nieditation
; and thus the puzzle ceases.?
Near the,chapel is St, Mathew?s Well. The
parish of Roslin possesses many relics and traditions
of the famous three battles which were fought
there in one day-the 24th of February, 1302 :-
? Three triumphs in a day,
Three hosts subdued in one,
Beneath one common sun !?
Three armies scattered like the spray
On the 26th of January, 1302, the cruel and
treacherous Edward I. of England concluded a
treaty of truce-not peace-with Scotland, while,
on the other hand, he prepared to renew the war
against her. To this end he marched in an army
of 2o,ooo--Some say 30,ooo-men, chiefly cavalry,
under Sir John de Segrave, with orders?less to
fight than to waste and devastate the already wasted
country.
To obtain ptovisions with more ease, Segrave
marched his force in three columns, each a mile or
two apart, and the 24th of February saw them on
the north bank of the Esk, at three places, still
indicated by crossed swords on the county map ;
the first at Roslin ; the second . at Loanhead, on
high ground, still named, from the battle, ? Killrig,?
north of the village ; and the third at Park Bum,
near Gilmerton Grange.
Meanwhile, Sir John Comyn, Guardian of the
Kingdom, and Sir Simon Fraser of Oliver Castle
(the friend and comrade of Wallace), Heritable
Sheriff of Tweeddale, after mustering a force of
only 8,000 men-but men carefully selected and
well armed-marched from Biggar in the night,
and in the dull grey light of the February morning,
in the wooded glen near Roslin Castle, came
suddenly on the first column, under Segrave.
Animated by a just thirst for vengeance, the
Scots made a furious attack, and Segrave was
rapidly routed, wounded, and taken prisoner, together
with his brother, his son, sixteen knights,
and thirty esquires, called sergeants by the rhyming
English chronicler Langtoft.
.
The contest was barely over when the second
column, alarmed by the fugitives, advanced from its
camp at Loanhead, ?? and weary though the Scots
were with their forced night march, flushed with
their first success, and full of the most rancorous
hate of their invaders, they rushed to the charge,
and though the conflict was fiercer, were victorious.
A vast quantity of pillage fell into their hands,
together with Sir Ralph the Cofferer, a paymaster
of the English army.?
The second victory had barely been achieved,
when the third division, under Sir Robert Neville,
with all its arms and armour glittering in the
morning sun, came in sight, advancing from the
neighbourhood of Gilmerton, at a time when
many of the Scots had laid aside a portion of their
arms and helmets, and were preparing some to eat,
and others to sleep.
Frase; and Comyn at first thought of retiring,
but that was impracticable, as Neville was so close
upon, them. They flew from rank to rank, says
Tytler, ?and having equipped the camp followers
in the arms of their slain enemies, they made a
furious charge on the English, and routed them
with great slaughter.?
Before the second and third encounters took
place, old historians state that the Scots had recourse
to the cruel practice of slaying their prisoners,
which was likely enough in keeping with the spirit
with which the wanton English war was conducted
in those days. Sir Ralph the Cofferer begged Fraser
to spare his life, offering a large ransom for it.
? Your coat of mail is no priestly habit,? replied
Sir Simon. ? Where is thine alb-where thy hood ?
Often have you robbed us all and done us grievous
wrong, and now is our time to sum up the account,
and exact strict payment.??
With these words he hewed off the gauntleted
hands of the degraded priest, and then by one
stroke severed his head from his body.
Old English writers always attribute the glory of
the day to Wallace ; but he was not present. The
pursuit lasted sixteen miles, even as far as Biggar,
and 12,000 of the enemy perished, says Sir James
Balfour. English historians have attempted to
conceal the triple defeat of their countrymen on
this occasion. They state that Sir Robert Neville?s
division stayed behind to hear mass, and repelled the
third Scottish attack, adding that none who heard
mass that morning were slain. But, unfortunately
for this statement, Neville himself was among the
dead ; and Langtoft, in his very minute account of
the battle, admits that the English were utterly
routed.
Many places in the vicinity still bear names con-
.](images/thumbs/old_new_edin_v6p170.gif "Old and New Edinburgh Vol. VI Page 351")
... THE THREE BATTLES ON ONE DAY. 351
hillside, and not beneath, but is attached to its
eastern end, the ...
Book 6 p. 351
(Score 0.48)
... OLD AND NEW EDINBURGH.
So difficult was it to induce people to build in a
spot so sequestered and far apart ...
Book 3 p. 118
(Score 0.48)
... OLD AND NEW EDINBURGH. [Leith
The Old and New Ship are good examples of
what these old taverns were, as they ...
Book 6 p. 246
(Score 0.48)
... SKETCHES. 321
daughters and one son survived. One of his sons, the late Robert Jameson,
Esq., ...
Book 9 p. 427
(Score 0.48)
... OLD AND NEW EDINBURGH. [Leith Walk.
Tience, he was appointed captain of the East New
Town Company, and ...
Book 5 p. 162
(Score 0.48)
... OLD AND NEW EDINBURGH. . [High Street.
?capital already created under the last charter is
L;~OO,OOO stock, ...
Book 2 p. 280
(Score 0.48)
... OLD AND NEW EDINBURGH. [Restalrig.
latter married a lady whom Burke calls ?Miss
Alston, of America,? and died ...
Book 5 p. 138
(Score 0.48)
![The Water of Leith.] MAJOR-GENERAL MITCHELL. 79
1849. Horatio Macculloch, R.S.A., a most distinguished
landscape painter, lived for many years
in No. 7, Danube Street, where the best of his
works were executed. With Sir Daniel Macnee,
P.R.S.A., he first obtained employment from Lizars,
the engraver, as colourists of Selby?s ?? Ornithology.?
In 1829 he first exhibited; and from thence onwards,
to his death in 1867, he contributed to the
yearly exhibitions, and won himself much fame in
Scotland.
In No. 16, Carlton Street, adjoining, lived for
many years his chief friend, Kenneth Macleay,
R.S.A., who was born at Oban in 1802, and after
being educated at the Trustees? School, was one of
the thirteen founders of the Royal Scottish Academy,
and at his death was the last survivor of
them. He was chiefly famous for his beautiful
miniatures on ivory, and latterly was well known
for his occasional sketches and delineations of
Highland life, many of which were painted at the
express desire of Her Majesty. He died at No. 3,
Malta Terrace, in 1878, in his seventy-sixth year.
He was an enthusiastic Celt, and fond of wearing
the Highland dress on Academy receptions, and
on every possible occasion.
Among others connected with art who made
Stockbridge their residence was George Kemp, the
luckless architect of Sir Walter Scott?s monument,
who had a humble flat in No. 28, Bedford Street ;
James Stewart, the well-known engraver of Sir
Wlliam Allan?s finest works, who lived in No. 4
of that gloomy little street called Hermitage Place ;
and Comely Bank, close by, was not without its
famous people too, for there, for some years after
his marriage, dwelt Thomas Carlyle, and, in No. I I,
James Browne, LL.D., author of the ?History 01
the Highland Clans,? and editor of the CaZea?onian
Mermv and of The Edinburgh Week& JournaZ,
and Macvey Napier?s collaborateur in the ?? Encyclopzdia
Britannica.? Some differences having
arisen between him and Mr. Charles Maclaren,
the editor of the Scotsman, regarding a fine-art
criticism, the altercation ran so high that a hostile
meeting took place at seven o?clock in the morning
of the 12th of November, 1829, somewhere neaI
Ravelston, but, fortunately, without any calamitous
sequel. He took a great lead in Liberal politics,
and in No. 11 entertained Daniel O?Connell more
than once. He died at Woodbine Cottage, Trinity,
an the 8th of April, 1841, aged fifty years. John
Ewbank, R.S.A., the marine and landscape painter,
livedat No. 5, Comely Bank; while No. 13 was thc
residence of Mrs. Johnstone, who while there
wrote many of her best novels-among them, ? Clan
Albyn : a National Tale ?-and contributed man]
able articles to johnstone?s Magazine, a now forgotten
monthly.
From a passage in a memoir of himself prefixed
to ? The Mountain Bard,? we find that the Ettrick
Shepherd, about 1813, was living in Deanhaugh
Street while at work on the ?Queen?s Wake,?
which he produced in that year; and that, in his
lodgings there, he was wont to read passages of
his poems to Mr. Gray, of the High School, whose
criticisms would seem to have led to a quarrel
between them.
Sir James Young Simpson, Bart., in his boyhood
and as a student lived with his brother, David
Simpson, a respectable master baker, in the shop,
No. I, Raeburn Place, at the corner of Dean Street.
When he first began to practise as a physician, it
was in a first flat of No. 2, Deanhaugh Street ; and
as his fame began to spread, and he was elected
Professor of Midwifery in the University in 1840,
in succession to Dr. Hamilton, he was living in
No. I, Dean Terrace.
In St. Bernard?s Crescent, for many years while
in the employment of the Messrs. Chambers, lived
Leitch Ritchie, author of ?? Schinderhannes, the
Robber of the Rhine,?? a famous romance in its
day ; also of ?? Travelling Sketches on the Rhine,
in Belgium, and Holland,? and many other works.
He was born in 1801, and died on the 16th of
January, 1865.
His neighbour and friend here was Andrew
Crichton, LL.D., author of a ?? History of Scandinavia
I? and other works, and twenty-one years
editor of the Edinburgh Advertiser.
In the same quarter there spent many years of
his life Major-General John Mitchell, a gallant old
Peninsular officer, who was an able writer on military
matters and biography. In 1803 he began life
as an ensign in the 57th Foot, and served in
all the campaigns in Spain and Portugal, France
and Flanders. Under the nomdepZuume of ?Sabretache,?
he wrote some very smart things, his
earliest productions appearing in Fraser?s Magazine
and the United Serzlice JournaZ. He was the
author of a ? Life of Wallenstein? (London,
1837), which, like his ?Fall of Napoleon,? was
well received by the public ; and Sir Robert Peel
acknowledged the importance of the information
he derived from the latter work, after the appearance
of which, Augustus, King of Hanover, presented
the author with a diamond brooch. He
was the author of many other works, including
?Biographies of Eminent Soldiers.? He was a
handsome man, with great buoyancy of spirit and
conversational powers ; thus ? Old Sabretache,? as
he was often called, was welcome everywhere. A](images/thumbs/old_new_edin_v5p090.gif "Old and New Edinburgh Vol. V Page 79")
... Water of Leith.] MAJOR-GENERAL MITCHELL. 79
1849. Horatio Macculloch, R.S.A., a most distinguished
landscape ...
Book 5 p. 79
(Score 0.47)
... PGrt.1 THE LAWSONS. 22;
of Cromwell, expelled the General Assembly from
Edinburgh, literally drumming the ...
Book 4 p. 223
(Score 0.47)
... OLD AND NEW EDINBURGH. [Fountainbridge.
tional cemetery, a little to the south, beyond Ardmillan
Terrace, ...
Book 4 p. 218
(Score 0.47)
... OLD AND NEW EDINBURGH. : [Convivialia
In 1783, ? a chapter of the order? was adver
tised ?to be held at their ...
Book 5 p. 124
(Score 0.47)
![The High Street.] THE HIGH STREET.
six storeys each ; in short, down as far as the Cowgate
nothing was to be seen but frightful heaps of
calcined and blackened ruins, with gaping windows
and piles of smoking rubbish.
In the Par!iament Square four double tenements
of from seven to eleven storeys also perished, and
the incessant cmsh of falling walls made the old
vicinity re-echo. Among other places of interest
destroyed here was the shop of Kay, the cancaturist,
always a great attraction to idlers.
During the whole of Thursday the authorities
were occupied in the perplexing task of .examining
the ruined edifices in the Parliament Square. These
being of enormous height and dreadfully shattered,
threatened, by their fall, destruction to everything
in their vicinity. One eleven-storeyed edifice presented
such a very striking, terrible, and dangerous
appearance, that it was proposed to batter it down
with cannon. On the next day the ruins were inspected
by Admiral Sir David Milne, and Captain
(afterwardssir Francis) Head of theRoyal Engineers,
an officer distinguished alike in war and In literature,
who gave in a professional report on the subject,
and to him the task of demolition was assigned.
?
In the meantime offers of assistance from Captain
Hope of H.M.S. BnX, then in Leith Roads,
were accepted, and his seamen, forty in number,
threw a line over the lofty southern gable above
Heron?s Court, but brought down only a small
portion Next day Captain Hope returned to the
attack, with iron cables, chains, and ropes, while
some sappers daringly undermined the eastern wall.
These were sprung, and, as had been predicted by
Captain Head, the enormous mass fell almost
perpendicularly to the grognd.
At the Tron Church, on the last night of every
year, there gathers a vast crowd, who watch with
patience and good-humour the hands of the illuminated
clock till they indicate one minute past
twelve, and then the New Year is welcomed in
with ringing cheers, joy, and hilarity. A general
shaking of hands and congratdlations ensue, and
one and all wish each other ?? A happy New Year,
and mony 0? them.? A busy hum pervades the older
parts of the city; bands of music and bagpipes
strike up in many a street and wynd; and, furnished
with egg-flip, whiskey, &c., thousands hasten off in
all directions to ?first foot? friends and relations,
CHAPTER XXI.
THE HIGH STREET,
A Place for Brawling-First Paved and Lighted-The Meal and Flesh MarketsState of the Streets-Municipal Regulations 16th Century-
Tuleies-The Lairds of Ainh and Wemyss-The Tweedies of Drummelzier-A Mont- Quarrel-The Slaughter of Lord Tarthorwald-
-A Brawl in 1705-Attacking a Sedan Chair-Habits in Lhe Seventeenth Century-Abduction of Women and Girls-Sumptuary Law6
against Women.
BEFORE narrating the wondrous history of the many
quaint and ancient closes and wynds which diverged
of old, and some of which still diverge, from the
stately High Street, we shall treat of that venerable
thoroughfare itself-its gradual progress, changes,
and some of the stirring scenes that have been witnessed
from its windows.
Till so late as the era of building the Royal
Exchange Edinburgh had been without increase
or much alteration since King James VI. rode
forth for England in 1603. ?The extended wall
erected in the memorable year 1513 still formed
the boundary of the city, with the exception of the
enclosure of the Highriggs. The ancient gates remained
kept under the care of jealous warders,
and nightly closed at an early hour ; even as when
the dreaded iiiroads of the Southron summoned
the Burgher Watch to guard their walls. At the
foot of the High Street, the lofty tower and spire
of the Nether Bow Port terminated the vista, surmounting
the old Temple Bar of Edinburgh, interposed
between the city and the ancient burgh of
Canongate.?
On this upward-sloping thoroughfare first rose
the rude huts of the Caledonians, by the side of
the wooded way that led to the Dun upon the rock
-when Pagan rites were celebrated at sunrise on
the bare scalp of Arthur?s Seat-and destined
to become in future years ?the King?s High
Street,? as it was exclusively named in writs and
charters, in so far as it extended from the Nether
Bow to the edifice named Creech?s Land, at the
east end of the Luckenbooths. ?Here,? says a
writer, ? was the battle-ground of Scotland for
centuries, whereon private and party feuds, the
jealousies of nobles and burghers, and not a few of
the contests between the Crown and the people,
were settled at the sword.?
As a place for brawling it was proverbial ; and
thus it was that Colonel Munro, in ?His Expedition
with the Worthy Scots Regiment called
Mackeyes,? levied in 1626, for service in Denmark](images/thumbs/old_new_edin_v1p203.gif "Old and New Edinburgh Vol. I Page 191")
... High Street.] THE HIGH STREET.
six storeys each ; in short, down as far as the Cowgate
nothing was to be seen ...
Book 1 p. 191
(Score 0.47)
![York Place.] DR. ABERCROMBIE. 187
imagined, but can scarcely be described,? says the
CaZedonian Mercury of the 18th March. ?? From
eighty to a hundred persons, ladies as well as
gentlemen, were precipitated in one mass into an
apartment below, filled with china and articles of
vertu. The cries and shrieks, intermingled with
exclamations? and ejaculations of distress, were
heartrending ; but what added to the unutterable
agony of that awful moment, the density of the
cloud of dust, impervious to the rays of light, produced
total darkness, diffusing a choking atmosphere,
which nearly stifled the terrified multitude,
and in this state of suspense they remained several
minutes.? Among the mass of people who went
down with the floor were Lord Moncrieff, Sir
James Riddell of Ardnam~rchan, and Sir Archi-
. bald Campbell of Succoth. Many persons were
most severely injured, and Mr. Smith, banker, of
Moray Place, on whom the hearth-stone fell, was
killed.
. York Place, the continuation of this thoroughfare
to Queen Street, is nearly all unchanged since
it was built, and is broad and stately, with spacious
and lofty houses, which were inhabited by Sir
Henry Raeburn, Francis Homer, Dr. John Abercrombie,
Dr. John Coldstream, Alexander Geddes,
A.R.A., and other distinguished men.
No. 10 was the abode of Lord Craig, the successor
on the bench of Lord Hailes in 1792, and
whose well-known attainments, and especially his
connection with the Mirror and bunger, gave his
name an honourable place among local notorieties.
He was the cousin-german of the celebrated Mrs.
McLehose, the Clarinda of Robert Burns, and to
her he bequeathed an annuity, at his death, which
occurred in 1813. His house was afterwards occupied
by the gallant Admiral Sir David Milne, who,
when a lieutenant,. took possession of the P i p e
frigate, after her surrender to the Blanche, in the
West Indies ; captured L z Seine,, in I 798, and Lu
Vengeance, of 38 guns, in I 800, and who commanded
the hprepable, in the attack on Algiers, when he
was Rear-Admiral, and had 150 of his crew killed
and wounded, as Brenton records in his ?Naval
History.? He died a Knight Grand Cross of the
Bath, and left a son, Sir Alexander Milne, also
K.C.B., and Admiral, more than once commander
of fleets, and who first went to sea with his father
in the flag-ship hander, in 1817. Sir David died
on board of a Granton steamer, when returning
home, in 1845, and was buried at Inveresk.
Doctor John Abercrombie, Physician to Her
Majesty, lived in No. 19, and died there in 1844,
aged 64. He was a distinguished consulting
physician, and moral writer, born at Aberdeen, in
1781; F,RC.S. in 1823; and was author of
? Inquiries concerning the Intellectual Powers,?
which has gone through many editions, ?The Philosophy
of the Moral Feelings,? &c. His bust is
in the museum of the Royal College of Surgeons.
Concerning his death, the following curious story
has found its way into print. A Mrs. M., a native
of the West Indies, was at Blair Logie at the time
of the demise of Dr. Abercrombie, with whom she
had been very intimate. He died suddenly, without
any previous indisposition, just as he was about to
enter his carriage in York Place, at eleven o?clock
on a Thursday morning. On the night between
Thursday and Friday Mrs. M. dreamt that she saw
the whole family of Dr. Abercrombie dressed entirely
in white,dancing a solemn hneral dance, upon which
she awoke, wondering that she should have dreamt
anything so absurd, as it?was contrary to their
custom to dance on any occasion. Immediately
afterwards her maid came to tell her that she had
seen Dr. Abercrombie reclining against a wall
?with his jaw fallen, and a livid countenance,
mournfully shaking his head as he looked at her.?
She passed the day in great uneasiness, and wrote
to inquire for the Doctor, relating what had h i p
pened, and expressing her conviction that he was
dead, and her letter was seen by several persons
in Edinburgh on the day of its amval.
No. 22 was the house of Lord Newton, known
as the wearer of ? Covington?s gown,? in memory
of the patriotism and humanity displayed by the
latter in defending the ?Jacobite prisoners on their
trial at Carlisle in 1747. His judicial talents and
social eccentricities formed the subject of many
anecdotes. He participated largely in the bacchanalian
propensities so prevalent among the legal
men of his time, and was frequently known to put
?? three lang craigs ? (i.e. long-necked bottles of
claret) ? under his belt ? after dinner, and thereafter
dictate to his clerk a paper of more than skty pages.
The MS. would then be sent to press, and the
proofs be corrected next morning at the bar of the
Inner House.
He would often spend the whole night in con,
vivial indulgence at the Crochallan Club, perhaps
be driven home to York Place about seven in the
morning, sleep for two hours, and be seated on the
bench at the usual hour. The French traveller
Simond relates his surprise ?on stepping one
morning into the Parliament House to find in the
dignified capacity and exhibiting all the dignified
bearing of a judge, the very gentleman with whom
he had just spent a night of debauch and parted
from only one hour before, when both were excessively
intoxicated.?
.](images/thumbs/old_new_edin_v3p199.gif "Old and New Edinburgh Vol. III Page 187")
... Place.] DR. ABERCROMBIE. 187
imagined, but can scarcely be described,? says the
CaZedonian Mercury of the ...
Book 3 p. 187
(Score 0.47)
![High Street.] THE MAXWELLS OF MONREITH. 275
Theresa, and other royal and imperial personages,
which had been presented as friendly memorials to
the ambassador, have all been dispersed by the
salesman?s hammer, and Hyndford?s Close, on my
trying to get into it lately in 186P, was inaccessible
(literally) from filth.? Another writer, in 1856, says
in his report to the magistrates, ?that, with proper
drainage, causeway, and cleanliness, it might be
made quite respectable.?
Prior to the Carmichaels of Hyndford it had
been, for a time, the residence of the Earls of
Stirling, the first of whom ruined himself in tEx
colonisation of Nova Scotia, for which place he
set sail with fourteen ships filled with emigrants
and cattle in 1630. Here then, in this now
humble but once most picturesque locality-for
the house was singularly so, with its overhanging
timber gables, its small court and garden sloping
to the south-lived John third Earl of Hyndford,
the living representative of a long line of warlike
ancestors, including Sir John Carmichael of that
ilk, who broke a spear with the Duke of Clarence
at the battle of Bauge-en-Anjou, when the Scots
routed the English, the Duke was slain, and Carmichael
had added to his paternal arms a dexter
hand and arm, holding a broken spear,
In 1732 he was Lieutenant-Colonel of a company
in the Scots Foot Guards, and was twice
Commissioner to the General Assembly before
1740, and was Lord of Police in Scotland. In the
following year, when Frederick the Great invaded
Silesia, he was sent as plenipotentiary extraordinary
to adjust the differences that occasioned the
war, and at the conclusion of the Treaty of Breslau
had the Order of the Thistle conferred upon him
by George II., receiving at the same time a grant
from Frederick, dated at Berlin, 30th September,
1742, for adding the eagle of Silesia to his paternal
arms of Xyndford, with the motto Ex bene merifo.
He was six years an ambassador at the Russian
Court, and it wasbyhis able negociations that 30,000
Muscovite troops contributed to accelerate the
peace which was concluded at Aix-la-Chapelle.
These stimng events over, the year 1752 saw
him leave his old abode in that narrow close off
the High Street, to undertake a mission of the
greatest importance to the Court of Vienna. On
the death of Andrew Earl of Hyndford and Viscount
Inglisberry, in r817, the title became extinct,
but is claimed by a baronet of the name 01
Carmichael.
The entry and stair on the west side of Hyndford?s
Close was always a favourite residence, in
consequence of the ready access to it from the
High Street.
In the beginning of the reign of George 111. here
lived Lady Maxwell of Monreith, d e Magdalene
Blair of that ilk, and there she educated and
reared her three beautiful daughters-Catharine,
Jane, and Eglantine (or Eglintoun, so named after
the stately Countess Susanna who !ived in the Old
Stamp Office Close), the first of whom became the
wife of Fordyce of Aytoune, the second in 1767,
Duchess of Gordon, and the third, Lady Wallace
of Craigie.
Their house had a dark passage, and in going
to the dining-room the kitchen door was passed,
according to an architectural custom, common in
old Scottish and French houses; and such was
the thrift and so cramped the accommodation
in those times, that in this passage the laces
and fineries of the three young beauties were
hung to dry, while coarser garments were displayed
from a window pole, in the fashion
common to this day in the same localities for the
convenience of the poor. ? So easy and familiar
were the manners of the great, fabled to be so
stiff and decorous,? says the author of ?Traditions
of Edinburgh,? who must vouch for the story,
? that Mis,s Eglantine, afterwards Lady Wallace,
used to be sent across the street to the Fountain
Well for water to make tea. Lady Maxwell?s
daughters were the wildest romps imaginable. An
old gentleman who was their relation, told me that
the first time he saw these beautiful girls was in
the High Street, where Miss Jane, afterwards
Duchess of Gordon, was riding upon a sow, which
Miss Eglantine thumped lustily behind with a
stick. It must be understood that in the middle
of the eighteenth century vagrant swine went as
commonly about the streets of Edinburgh a?s dogs
do in our own day, and were more generally followed
as pets by the children of the last generation.
It may, however, be remarked, that the sows upon
which the Duchess of Gordon and her witty sister
rode when children, were not the common va,mnts
of the High Street, but belonged to Peter Ramsay,
of the inn in St. Mary?s Wynd, and were among
the last that were permitted to roam abroad. The
romps used to watch the animals as they were let
loose in the forenoon in the stable yard (where they
lived among the horse litter) and got upon their
backs the moment they issued from the close.?
Their eldest brother, Lieutenant-Colonel Maxwell,
of the 74th Highlanders, commanded the
grenadier companies of the army under Cornwallis
in the war against Tippoo, and died in India in
1800.
In the same stair with Lady Maxwell lived Anne
Dalrymple, Countess of James firth Earl of Bal](images/thumbs/old_new_edin_v2p095.gif "Old and New Edinburgh Vol. II Page 275")
... Street.] THE MAXWELLS OF MONREITH. 275
Theresa, and other royal and imperial personages,
which had been ...
Book 2 p. 275
(Score 0.47)
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