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222 OLD AND NEW EDINBURGH. [High Street
On becoming provost, he was easily led by his
religious persuasion to become a sort of voluntary
exchequer for the friends of the National Covenant,
and in 1641 he advanced to them IOO,OOO merks
to save them from the necessity of disbanding their
army; and when the Scottish Parliament in the
same year levied 10,000 men for the protection of
their colony in Ulster, they could not have embarked
had they not been provisioned at the expense
of Sir William Dick. Scott, in the ? Heart
of Midlothian,? alludes to the loans of the Scottish
Crcesus thus, when he makes Davie Deans say,
?My father saw them toom the sacks of dollars
out 0? Provost Dick?s window intil the carts that
carried them to the army at Dunse Law; and if
ye winna believe his testimony, there is the window
itself still standing in the Luckenbooths, five doors
aboon the Advocates? Close-I think it is a claithmerchant?s
the day.?
And singular to say, a cloth merchant?s ?booth ?
it continued long to be. ?
In 1642 the Customs were let to Sir William
Dick for zoz,ooo merks, and 5,000 merks of
gassum, or ? entrense siller;? but, as he had a
horror of Cromwell and the Independents, he advanced
~20,000 for the service of King Charlesa
step by which he kindled the wrath of the prevailing
party; and, after squandering his treasure
in a failing cause, he was so heavily.mulcted by
extortion of L65,ooo and other merciless penalties,
that his vast fortune passed speedily away, and he
died in 1655, a prisoner of Cromwell?s, in a gaol at
Westminster, under something painfully like a want
of the common necessaries of life.
He and Sir William Gray were the first men of
Edinburgh who really won the position of merchant
princes. The changeful fortunes of the former are
commemorated in a scarce folio pamphlet, entitled
?The Lamentable State of the Deceased Sir William
Dick,? and containing .several engravings.
One represents him on horseback, escorted by halberdiers,
as Lord Provost of Edinburgh, and superintending
the unloading of a great vessel at Leith ;
a second represents him in the hands of bailiffs;
and a third lying dead in prison. ?The tract is
highly esteemed by collectors of prints,? says Sir
Walter Scott, in a note to the ?Heart of Midlothian.?
?The only copy I ever saw upon sale
was rated at L30.?
Sir James Stewart of Goodtrees (a place now
called Moredun, in the parish of Liberton) who
was Lord Advocate of Scotland from 1692 until
his death in 1713, a few months only excepted,
gave a name to the next narrow and gloomy
alley, Advocates? Close, which bounded on the
east the venerable mansion of the Lords Holyroodhouse.
His father was provost of the city when Cromwell
paid his first peaceful visit thereto in 1648-9,
and again in 1658-9, at the close of the Protectorate,
The house in which he lived and died
was at the foot of the close, on the west side,
before descending a flight of steps that served te ;
lessen the abruptness of the descent. He had
returned from exile on the landing of the Prince of ,
Orange, and, as an active revolutionist, was detested
by the Jacobites, who ridiculed him as /amc
Wyhe in many a bitter pasquil. He died in 1713,
and Wodrow records that ? so great was the crowd
(at his funeral) that the magistrates were at the
grave in the Greyfriars? Churchyard before the
corpse was taken out of the house at the foot of
the Advocates? Close.?
In 1769 his grandson sold the house to David
Dalrymple, afterwards Lord Westhall, who resided
in it till nearly the time of his death in 1784.
This close was a very fashionable one in the days
of Queen Anne, and was ever a favourite locality
with members of the bar. Among many others,
there resided Andrew Crosbie, the famous original
of Scott?s ?Counsellor Pleydell,? an old lawyer
who was one of the few that was able to stand his.
ground in any argument or war of words with Dr.
Johnson during that visit when he made himself
so obnoxious in Edinburgh. From this dark and
steep alley, with its picturesque overhanging
gables and timber projections, Mr. Crosbie afterwards
removed to a handsome house erected by
him in St. Andrew?s Square, ornamented with lofty,
half-sunk Ionic columns and a most ornate attic
storey (on the north side of the present Royal
Bank), afterwards a fashionable hotel, long known
as Douglas?s and then as Slaney?s, where even
royalty has more than once found quarters. By
the failure of the Ayr Bank he was compelled to
leave his new habitation, and?died in 1784 in such
poverty that his widow owed her whole support to
a pension of A50 granted to her by the Faculty of
Advocates.
The house lowest down the close, and immediately
opposite that of Sir James Stewart of
Goodtrees, was the residence of an artist of some
note in his time, John Scougal, who painted the
well-known portrait of George Heriot, which hangs
in the council room of the hospital. He was a
cousin of that eminent divine Patrick Scougal,
parson of Saltoun in East Lothian and Bishop of
Aberdeen in 1664.
John Scougall added an upper storey to the old
land in the Advocates? Close, and fitted up one of ... OLD AND NEW EDINBURGH. [High Street On becoming provost, he was easily led by his religious persuasion to ...

Book 2  p. 222
(Score 0.21)

:a brave prince, demanded instant restitution, and,
at the head of an army, laid siege to the Normans
in the border stronghold.
At this time,the winter snow was covering all the
vast expanse of leafless forest, and the hills-then
growing only heath and gorse-around the Castle of
Edinburgh; and there the queen, with her sons
Edmond, Edgar, and David, and her daughters
Mary and Matilda (surnamed the Good, afterwards
queen of Henry I. of England), were anxiously
waiting tidings from the king and his son Edward,
who?had pressed the siege of Alnwick with such
severity that its garrison was hourly expected to
surrender. A sore sickness was now preying on
the wasted frame of the queen, who spent her days
in prayer for the success of the Scots and the
safety of the king. and prince.
All old historians vie with each other in praise of
the virtuous Margaret. ?? When health and beauty
were hers,? says one writer, ?she devoted her
strength to serve the poor and uncultivated people
whom God had committed to her care; she fed them
with her own hand, smoothed their pillow in sickness,
and softened the barbarous and iron rule of
their feudal lords. No wonder that they regarded
her as a guardian angel among them.?
She daily fed three hundred,? says another
authority, ?waiting upon them on her bended
knees, like a housemaid, washing their feet and
kissing them, For these and other expenses she
not only parted with her own royal dresses, but
more than once she drained the treasury.?
Malcolm, a Celt, is said to have been unable to
read the missals given him by his fair-haired Saxon,
but he was wont to kiss them and press them to
his heart in token of love and respect.
In the castle she built the little oratory on the
very summit of the rock. It stands within the
.citadel, and is in perfect preservation, measuring
about twenty-six feet long by ten, and is spanned
by a finely ornamented a p e arch that springs from
massive capitals, and is covered with zig-zag mouldings.
It was dedicated to her in after years, and
liberally endowed.
?There she is said to have prophetically announced
the surprise of the fortress in 1312, by
causing to be painted on the wall a representation
of a man scaling the Castle rock, with the inscription
underneath, ? Garak-vow Franfais,? a prediction
which was conveniently found to be verified
when the Castle was re-taken from the English by
William Frank (or Francis) and Earl Randolph ;
though why the Saxon saint should prophesy in
French we are left to conjecture.?
Comzcted with the residence of Edgar Atheling?s
sister in Edinburgh Castle there is another
legend, which states that while there she commissioned
her friend St. Catharine-but which
St. Catharine it fails to specify-to bring her some
oil from Mount Sinai; and that after long and
sore travel from the rocks of Mount Horeb, the
saint with the treasured oil came in sight of the
Castle of Edinburgh, on that ridge where stood
the Church of St Mary, built by Macbeth, baron
of Liberton. There she let fall the vessel containing
the sacred oil, which was spilt; but there
sprang up in its place a fountain of wonderful
medicinal efficacy, known now as the Balm Well
of St. Catharine, where the oil-which practical
folk say is bituminous and comes from the coal
seams-may still be seen floating on the limpid
water. It figuted long in monkish legends. For ?
vges a mound near it was alleged to be the tomb of
St Catharine; and close by it James IV. erected a
beautiful little chapel dedicated to St. Margaret,
but long since demolished.
During the king?s absence at Alnwick, the queen,
by the severity of her fastings and vigils, increased
a heavy illness under which she laboured. Two
days before her death, Prince Edgar, whom some
writers call her brother, and others her son, arrived
from the Scottish camp with tidings that Malcolm
had been slain, with her son Edward.
? Then,? according to Lord Hailes, who quotes
Turgot?s Life of SL Margaret, ?? lifting up her eyes
and hands towards heaven, she said, Praise and
blessing be to Thee, Almighty God, that Thou hast
been pleased to make me endure so bitter anguish
in the hour of my departure, thereby, as I trust, to
purify me in some measure from the corruption of
my sins; and Thou, Lord Jesus Christ, who
through the will of the Father, hast enlivened
the world by Thy death, oh, deliver me ! ? While
pronouncing ? deliver me? she expired.?
This, according to the Bishop of St. Andrews,
Turgot, previously Prior of Durham, was after she
had heard mass in the present little oratory, and
been borne to the tower on the west side of the
rock ; and she died holding in her hand a famous
relic known as ?the black rood of Scotland,? which
according to St. Elred, ?was a cross an ell long,
of pure gold and wonderful workmanship, having
thereon an ivory figure of our Saviour marvellously
adorned with gold.?
This was on 16th of November, 1093, when she
was in the forty-seventh year of her age. Unless
history be false, with the majesty of a queen and
the meekness of a saint Margaret possessed a
beauty that falls but seldom to the lot of women ;
and in her time she did much to soften the ... brave prince, demanded instant restitution, and, at the head of an army, laid siege to the Normans in the ...

Book 1  p. 18
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206 OLD AND NEW EDINBURGH. [Ainslie Place.
To the philosopher we have already referred in
our account of Lothian Hut, in the Horse Wynd.
In 1792 he published the first volume of the
?Philosophy of the Human Mind,? and in the
following year he read before the Royal Society of
Edinburgh his account of the life and writings of
Adam Smith.; and his other works are too wellknown
to need enumeration here. On the death
of his wife, in 1787, he married Helen D?Arcy
Cranstoun, daughter of the Hon. George Cranstoun,
who, it is said, was his equal in intellect, if
superior in blood. She was the sister of the
Countess Purgstall (the subject of Basil Hall?s
? Schloss Hainfeldt ?) and of Lord Corehouse, the
tiiend of Sir Walter Scott.
Though the least beautiful of a family iq which
beauty is hereditary, she had (according to the
Quarter& Review, No. 133) the best essence of
beauty, expression, a bright eye beaming with intelligence,
a manner the most distinguished, yet
soft, feminine, and singularly winning. On her illfavoured
Professor she doted with a love-match
devotion; to his studies and night lucubrations
she sacrificed her health and rest; she was his
amanuensis and corrector at a time when he was
singularly fortunate in his pupils, who never forgot
the charm of her presence, the instruction they
won, and the society they enjoyed, in the house of
Dugald Stewart Among these were the Lords
Dudley, Lansdowne, Palmerston, Kinnaird, and
Ashburton. In all his after-life he maintained a
good fellowship with them, and, in 1806, obtained
the sinecure office of Gazefie writer for Scotland,
with A600 per annum.
Her talent, wit, and beautymade the wife of the
Professor one of the most attractive women in the
city. ?( No wonder, therefore,? says the Quarfero,
?that her saloons were the resort of all that was
the best of Edinburgh, the house to which strangers
most eagerly sought introduction. In her Lord
Dudley found indeed a friend, she was to him in
the place of a mother. His respect for her was
unbounded, and continued to the close; often
have we seen him, when she was stricken in years,
seated near her for whole evenings, clasping her
hand in both of his. Into her faithful ear he
poured his hopes and his fears, and unbosomed his
inner soul ; and with her he maintained a constant
correspondence to the last.?
Her marriage with the Professor came about in a
singular manner. When Miss Cranstoun, she had
written a poem, which was accidentally shown by
her cousin, the Earl of Lothian, to Dugald Stewart,
then his private tutor, and unknown to fame ; and
?he was so enraptured with it, and so warm in his
commendations, that the authoress and her critic
fell in love by a species of second-sight, before their
first interview, and in due time were made one.
Dugald Stewart died at his house in Ainslie
Place, on Wednesday, the 11th June, 1828, after a
short but painful illness, when in the seventy-fifth
year of his age, having been born in the old College
of Edinburgh in 1753, when his father was professor
of mathematics. His long life had been
devoted to literature and science. He had acquired
a vast amount of information, profound as it was
exact, and possessed the faculty of memory in a
singular degree. As a public teacher he was
fluent, animated, and impressive, with great dignity
and grace in his manner.
He was buried in the Canongate churchyard.
The funeral procession proceeded as a private one
from Ainslie Place at, three in the afternoon ; but
on reaching the head of the North Bridge it was
joined by the Senatus Academicus in their gowns
(preceded by the mace bearer) two and two, the
junior members in front, the Rev. Principal Baird
in the rear, together with the Lord Provost, magistrates
and council, with their officers and regalia.
He left a widow and two children, a son and
daughter, the former of whom, Lieutenant-Colonel
Matthew Stewart, published an able pamphlet on
Indian affairs. His widow, who holds a high
place among writers of Scottish song, survived him
ten years, dying in July, 1838.
The Very Rev. Edward Bannerman Ramsay,
LL.D. and F.R.S.E., a genial writer on several
subjects, but chiefly known for his ? Reminiscences
of Scottish Life and Character,? was long the occupant
of No. 23. He was the fourth son of Sir
Alexander Ramsay, Bart., of Balmaine, in Kincardineshire,
and was a graduate of St. John?s College,
Cambridge. His degree of LL.D. was given him
by the University of Edinburgh, on the installation
of Mr. Gladstone as Lord Rector in 1859. He
held English orders, and for seven years had been
a curate in Somersetshire. His last and most
successful contribution to literature was derived
from his long knowledge of Scottish character. He
was for many years Dean of the Episcopal Church
in Scotland, and as a Churchman he always advocated
moderate opinions, both in ritual and doctrine.
He died on the 27th December, 1872, in
the seventy-ninth year of hi5 age.
In the summer of 1879 amemorial to his memory
was erected at the west end of Princes Street,
eastward of St. John?s Church, wherein he so long
officiated. It is a cross of Shap granite, twenty-six
feet in height, having a width of eight feet six
inches from end to end of the arms. At the height
. ... OLD AND NEW EDINBURGH. [Ainslie Place. To the philosopher we have already referred in our account of Lothian ...

Book 4  p. 206
(Score 0.21)

the blood of the Trojans. In Albanye (now called
Scotland) he edified the Castell of Alclude, which
is Dumbreyton j he made the Castell of Maydens,
now called Edinburgh; he also made the Castell
.of Banburgh, in the twenty-third year of his reign.?
All these events occurred, according to Stow, in
the year 989 beJore Christ ; and the information is
quite as veracious as much else that has been
written concerning the remote history of Scotland.
From sources that can scarcely be doabted, a
? fortress of some kind upon the rock would seem to
have been occupied by the Picts, from whom it
was captured in 452 by the Saxons of Northumbria
under Octa and Ebusa; and from that time
down to the reign of Malcolm 11. its history
exhibits but a constant struggle for its possession
between them and the Picts, each being victorious
in turn; and Edwin, one of these Northumbrian
invaders, is said to have rebuilt it in 626. Terri-
* tories seemed so easily overrun in those times, that
the latter, with the Scots, in the year 638, under
the reign of Valentinian I., penetrated as far as
London, but were repulsed by Theodosius, father
of the Emperor of the same name. This is the
Edwin whose pagan high-priest Coifi was converted
to Christianity by Paulinus, in 627, and who, according
to Bede, destroyed the heathen temples
and altars. A curious and very old tradition still
exists in Midlothian, that the stones used in the
construction of the castle were taken from a quarry
near Craigmillar, the Craig-moiZard of antiquity.
Camden says, ?The Britons called it CasfeZ
Mynedh Agnedh-the maidens? or virgins? castlebecause
certain young maidens of the royal blood
were kept there in old times.? The source of this
Oft-repeated story has probably been the assertion
of Conchubhranus, that an Irish saint, or recluse,
named Monena, late in the fifth century founded
seven churches in Scotland, on the heights of
Dun Edin, Dumbarton, and elsewhere. This may
have been the St. Monena of Sliabh-Cuillin, who
died in 5r8. The site of her edifice is supposed
to be that now occupied by the present chapel
of St. Margaret-the most ancient piece of masonry
in the Scottish capital; and it is a curious
circumstance, with special reference to the fable
of the Pictish princesses, that close by it (as recorded
in the CaZedonian Mercury of 26th September,
1853), when some excavations were made,
a number of human bones, apparently aZZ of
females, were found, together with the remains of
several coffins.
? Castmm PuelZarum,? says Chalmers, ?? was the
learned and diplomatic name of the place, as
appears from existing charters and documents
Edinburgh, its vulgar appellation f while Buchanan
asserts that its ancient names of the Dolorous
Valley and Maiden Castle were borrowed from .
ancient French romances, ? devised within the
space of three hundred years ? from his time.
The Castle was the nucleus, so to speak, around
which the city grew, a fact that explains the triple
towers in the arms of the latter-three great
towers connected by a curtain wall-being the
form it presented prior to the erection of the
Half-Moon Battery, in Queen Mary?s time.
Edwin, the most powerful of the petty kings of
Northumberland, largely extended the Saxon conquests
in the Scottish border counties; and his
possessions reached ultimately from the waters of
Abios to those of Bodoria-i.e., from Humber to
Forth ; but Egfrid, one of his successors, lost these
territories, together with his liie, in battle with the
Pictish King Bridei, or Brude, who totally defeated
him at Dun-nechtan, with temble slaughter. This
was a fatal blow to the Northumbrian monarchy,
which never regained its previous ascendency, and
was henceforth confined to the country south of
Tweed. Lodonia (a Teutonic name signifying
marshes or borders) became finally a part of the
Pichsh dominiops, Dunedin being its stronghold, and
both the Dalriadic Scots and Strathclyde Britons
were thus freed from the inroads of the Saxons.
This battle was fought in the year 685, the
epoch of the bishopric of Lindisfasne, and as the
Church of St. Giles was a chaplainry of that
ancient see, we may infer that some kind of townof
huts, doubtless-had begun to cluster round the
church, which was a wooden edifice of a primitive
kind, for as the world was expected to end in the
year 1000, sacred edifices of stone were generally
deemed unnecessary. From the time of the
Saxon expulsion to the days of Malcolm 11.-a
period of nearly four hundred years-everything
connected with the castle and town of Edinburgh
is steeped in obscurity or dim tradition.
According to a curious old tradition, preserved
in the statistical account of the parish of Tweedmuir,
the wife of Grime, the usurper, had her
residence in the Castle while he was absent
fighting against the invading Danes. He is said
to have granted, by charter, his hunting seat of
Polmood, in that parish, to one of his attendants
named Hunter, whose race were to possess it while
wood grew and water ran. But, as Hogg says
in his ?Winter Evening Tales,? ?There is one
remarkable circumstance connected with the place
that has rendered it unfamous of late years, and
seems to justify an ancient prediction that the
hunters of Polmood were mer foprospr..? ... blood of the Trojans. In Albanye (now called Scotland) he edified the Castell of Alclude, which is Dumbreyton ...

Book 1  p. 15
(Score 0.21)

1.86 OLD AND NEW EDINBURGH. [St. Gilea Street.
Russel never failed to meet the requirements of
the day ; and for three or four months scarcely a
day passed on which he did not write one or more
articles - seventy leading articles having been
written by him, we believe, day after day.? In
testimony of his literary ability and public services
a magnificent presentation of silver plate was made
to him in 1859, at the Waterloo Rooms.
The Sofsman, which has always opposed and
exposed Phansaism and inconsistency, yet the
while giving ample place to the ecclesiastical
element-a feature in Scottish everyday life quite
incomprehensible to strangers-was in the full
zenith and plenitude of its power when Alexander
Russel died, in about the thirtieth year of his
editorship and sixty-second of his age, leaving a
blank in his own circle that may never be supplied,
for he was the worthy successor of Maclaren in the
task of making the Sofsman what it is-the sole
representative of Scottish opinion in England and
abroad; ?and that it represents it so that that
opinion does not need to hang its head in the
area of cosmopolitan discussion, is largely due to
the independence of spirit, the tact, the discernment
of character, and the unflagging energy by
which Mr. Russel imparted a dignity to the work
of editing a newspaper which it can hardly be said
to have possessed in his own country before his
time.?
Among other institutions of New Edinburgh to
be found in picturesque Cockburn Street, under the
very shadow of the old city, such as the Ear and Eye
Dispensary, instituted in 1822, and the rooms of
the Choral Society, are the permanent Orderly
Rooms of the Edinburgh Volunteer Artillery, and
the Queen?s Edinburgh Rifle Volunteer Brigade,
respectively at No. 27 and No. 35.
Both these corps were embodied in the summer
of 1859, when the volunteer movement was exciting
that high enthusiasm which happily has never died,
but has continued till the auxiliary army then,
self-summoned into existence, though opposed by
Government in all its stages, has now become one
of the most important institutions in the kingdom.
The City Artillery Volunteer Corps, commanded
in 1878 by Sir William Baillie, Bart., of Polkemet,
consisting of nine batteries, showed in 1880 a
maximum establishment of 519 (57 of whom were
non-efficients), 14 officers, and 36 sergeants.*
Formed in two battalions (with a third corps 01
cadets), the Queen?s Edinburgh Rifle Brigade, oi
In addition to this corps, there are the Midlothian Coast Volunteei
Artillery, whose headquarters are at Edinburgh, and who showed in
1877 a maximum establishment of 640,442 of whom werc etlicients, with
11: oficers and 30 sergeants. (Volunteer Blue Book.)
which the Lord Provost is honorary colonel, consists
now of 25 companies, seven of which were
called Highland, with a total strength on the 31st
of October, 1880, of 2,252 efficients, 106 nonefficients,
with 82 officers, 116 sergeants, extraproficients.
Since its embodiment in 1859 there
have enrolled in this corps more than I 1,537 men,
of whom 9,584 have resigned, leaving the present
strength, as stated, at 2,252.
As a shooting corps, and for the excellence of
its drill, it has always borne a high character, and
its artisan battalion is ? second to none ? among
the auxiliary forces. At the International Regimental
Match shot for in May, 1877, the Queen?s
Edinburgh Brigade were twice victorious, and in
the preceding year no less than 78 officers and
I 2 I sergeants received certificates of proficiency.
Under the new system the brigade forms a portion
of the 62nd, or Edinburgh Brigade DepGt,
which includes the two battalions of the 1st RoyaL
Scots Regiment, the Edinburgh or Queen?s Regiment
of Light Infantry Militia, and the Administrative
Volunteer Rifle Battalions of Berwick,
Haddington, Linlithgow, and Midlothian.
In St. Giles Street, which opens on the north
side of the High Street (opposite to the square in
which the County Hall stands) and turning west
joins the head of the mound, at the foot of Bank
Street, are the offices of the Daio and Weekly
Rwim; The GZasgow NwaM and the Eirening
limes share a handsome edifice, built like the rest
of the street, in the picturesque old Scottish style,
with crowstepped gables and pedirnented dormer
windows, and having inscribed along its front in
large letters :
THE COURANT, ESTAB. 1705.
To this office, which was specially designed for
the purpose by the late David Bryce, R.S.A., the
headquarters of the paper were removed from 188,
High Street; and in noticing this venerable organ
of the Conservative party, it is impossible to omit
some reference to the rise of journalism in Edinburgh,
where it has survived its old contemporaries,
as the CaZedonian Memuy, a continued serial from
1720, is now incorporated with the Scofsman, and
the Edinburgh Advt-rfiser, which started in January,
1764, ceased about 1860; hence the oldest existing
paper in the city is the Xdinburgh Gazetfe,
which appeared in 1699, the successor to a shortlived
paper of the same name, started in 1680.
The newspaper press of Scotland began during
the civil wars of the 17th century. A party of
Cromwell?s troops which garrisoned the citadel of
Leith in 1652, brought with them a printer named
Christopher Higgins, to reprint the London paper ... OLD AND NEW EDINBURGH. [St. Gilea Street. Russel never failed to meet the requirements of the day ; and for ...

Book 2  p. 286
(Score 0.21)

I10 OLD -AND NEW EDINBURGH. [Calton Hill.
It was finished in 1832, and is a beautiful restoration,
with some variations, of the choragic monument
of Lysicrates, from a design by W. H. Playf5r.
The chaste Greek monument of Professor
Flayfair, at the south-east angle of the new
observatory serves also to enhance the classic
aspect of the hill, and was designed by his nephew.
This memorial to the great mathematician and
eminent natural philosopher is inscribed thus, in
large Roman characters :-
JOANNI PLAYFAIR
AMICORUM PIETAS
CESIDERIIS ICTA FIDELIBUS
QUO IPSE LOCO TEMPLUM X?RANAE SUAE
OLIM DICAVERIT
POSUIT.
NAT. VI. IDUS. MART. MDCCXLVIII.
OBIIT. XIV. KAL SEXTIL. MDCCCXIX.
Passing the eastern gate of the new prison, and
Jacob?s Ladder, a footway which, in two mutually
diverging lines, each by a series of steep traverses
and flights of steps, descends the sloping face of the
hill, to the north back of the Canongate, we find
Bums?s monument, perched over the line of the
tunnel, built in 1830, after a design by Thomas
Hamilton, in the style of a Greek peripteral temple,
its cupola being a literal copy from the monument
of Lysicrates at Athens. The original object of
this edifice was to serve as a shrine for Flaxman?s
beautiful statue of Bums, now removed to the
National Gallery, but replaced by an excellent
bust of the poet, by William Brodie, R.S.A., one
of the best of Scottish sculptors. This round
temple contains many interesting relics of Burns.
The entire length of the upper portion of the
hill is now enclosed by a stately terrace, more than
1,000 yards in length, with Grecian pillared doorwzrys,-
continuous iron balconies, and massive
cornices, commanding much of the magnificent
panorama seen from the higher elevations ; but,
by far the most important, interesting, and beautiful
edifice on this remarkable hill is the new High
School of Edinburgh, on its southern slope, adjoinimg
the Regent Terrace.
The new High School is unquestionably one
af the most chaste and classical edifices in Edinh
g h . It is a reproduction of the purest Greek,
and in every way quite worthy of its magnificent
site, which commands one of the richest of town
and country landscapes in the city and its
environs, and is in itself one of the most
striking features of the beautiful scenery with
which it is grouped.
When the necessity for having a new High
School in place of the old, within the city wall-the
old which had so many striking memories and
traditions (and to which we shall refer elsewhere)-
came to pass, several situations were suggested as a
site for it, such as the ground opposite to Princes
Street, and the then Excise Office (now the Royal
Bank), in St. Andrew Square; but eventually the
magistrates fixed on the green slope of the Calton
Hill, to the eastward of the Miller?s Knowe. In
digging the foundations copper ore in some quantities
was dug out, together with some fragments of
native copper.
The ceremony of laying the foundation stone
took place amid great pomp and display on the
28th of July, 1825. All the public bodies in the
city were present, with the then schola from the
Old School, the senators, academicians, clergy,
rector, and masters, and, at the request of Lord
Provost Henderson, the Rev. Dr. Brunton implored
the Divine blessing on the undertaking.
The stone was laid by Viscount Glenorchy,
Grand Master of Scotland, and the building was
proceeded with rapidly. It is of pure white stone,
designed by Thomas Hamilton, and has a front of
400 feet, including the temples, or wings, which
contain the writing and mathematical class-rooms.
The central portico is a hexastyle, and, having a
double range of twelve columns, projects considerably
in front of the general fa@e. The whole
edifice is of the purest Grecian Doric, and, even to its
most minute details, is a copy of the celebrated
Athenian Temple of Theseus. A spacious flight of
steps leading up to it from the closing wall in front,
and a fine playground behind, is overlooked by the
entrances to the various class-rooms. The interior
is distributed into a large hall, seventy-three feet by
forty-three feet ; a rector?s classroom, thirty-eight
feet by thirty-four feet ; four class-rooms for masters,
each thirty-eight feet by twenty-eight feet; a library ;
and two small rooms attached to each of the classrooms.
On the margin of the roadway, on a lower
site than the main building, are two handsome
lodges, each two storeys in height, oiie occupied by
the janitor, and the other containing class-rooms.
The area of the school and playground is two acres,
and is formed by cutting deep into the face of the
hill. The building cost when finished, according
to the City Chamberlain?s books, L34,rgg I IS. 6d.
There are a rector, and ten teachers of classics
and languages, in addition to seven lecturers on
science.
The school, the most important in Scotland,
and intimately connected with the literature and
progress of the kingdom, although at first only
a classical seminary, now furnishes systematic ... OLD -AND NEW EDINBURGH. [Calton Hill. It was finished in 1832, and is a beautiful restoration, with some ...

Book 3  p. 110
(Score 0.21)

26 OLD AND. NEW. EDINBURGH. [Cauongate.
date over a doorway in it, this street had been in
progress in 1768.
At the head of the street, with its front windows
overlooking the Canongate, is the house on the
first floor of which was the residence of Mrs. Telfer
of Scotstown, the sister of Tobias Smollett, who was
her guest in 1766, on his second and last visit to
his native country, and where, though in feeble
health, he mixed with the best society of the
capital,. the men and manners of which he so
graphically portrays in his last novel, ? Humphrey
Clinker,? a work in which fact and fiction are
curiously biended, and in which he mentions that
he owed an introduction into the literary circles to
Dr. Carlyle, the well-known incumbent of Inveresk.
Mrs. Telfer, though then a widow with moderate
means, moved in good society. She has been
described as a tall, sharp-visaged lady, with a hooked
nose and a great partiality for whist. Her brother
had then returned from that protracted Continental
tour, the experiences of which are given in his
(? Travels through France and Italy,? in twovolumes.
The novelist has been described as a tall and handsome
man, somewhat prone to satirical innuendo,
but with a genuine vein of humour, polished
manners, and great urbanity. On the latter Dr.
Carlyle particularly dwefls, and refers to an occasion
when Smollett supped in a tavern with
himself, Hepburn of Keith, Home the author of ?? Douglas,? Commissioner Cardonel, and others.
The beautiful ? Miss R-n,? with whom Jerry
Milford is described as dancing at the hunters?
ball, was the grand-daughter of Susannah Countess
of Eglinton, whose daughter Lady Susan became
the wife of Renton of Lamerton in the Merse.
The wife of the novelist, Anne Lascelles, the Narcissa
of ? Roderick Random,? was a pretty Creole lady, of
a somewhat dark complexion, whom he left at his
death nearly destitute in a foreign land, and for
whom a benefit was procured at the old Theatre
Royal in March, 1784, A sister of Miss Renton?s
was parried to Smollett?s eldest nephew, Telfer, who
inherited the family estate and assumed the name
of Smollett She afterwards. became the Wife of
Sharpe of Hoddam, and, ? strange to say, the lady
whose bright eyes had flamed upon poor Smollett?s
soul in the middle of the last century was living so
lately as 1836.?
The house in which Smollett resided with his
sister in 1766 was also the residence, prior to 1788,
of James Earl of Hopetoun, who in early life had
served in the Scots Guards and fought at Minden,
and of whom it was said that he ? maintained the
dignity 2nd noble bearing of a Scottish baron
with the humility of a Christian, esteeming the
7
religious character of his family to be its highest
distinction. He was an indulgent landlord, a
munificent benefactor to the poor, and a friend to
all.?
No. I St. John Street was the house of Sir-
Charles Preston, Bart., of Valleyfield, renowned for
his gallant defeqce of Fort St. John against the
American general Montgomery, when major of the
Cameronians. No. 3 was occupied by Lord
Blantyre ; No. 5 by George Earl of Dalhousie, who.
was Commissioner to the General Assembly from
1777 to 1782 ; No. 8 was the house of Andrew
Carmichael the last Earl of Hyndford.
In No. 10 resided James Ballantyne, the friend,
partner, and confidant of Sir Walter Scott-when
the Great Unknown-and it was the scene of those
assemblies of select and favoured guests to whom
? the hospitable printer read snatches of the forthcoming
novel, and whetted, while he seemed to
gratify, their curiosity by many a shrewd wink and
mysterious hint of confidential insight into the
literary riddle of the age.? No. 10 must have been
the scene of many a secret council connected with
the publication of the Waverley Novels. Scott
himself, Lockhart who so graphically describesthese
scenes, Erskine, Terry, Sir Tlrilliam Allan,.
George Hogarth, W.S. (Mrs. Ballantyne?s brother),
and others, were frequent guests here. In this.
house Mrs. Ballantyne died in 1829, and Ballantyne?sbrother
John died there on the 16thof June, 1821.
The house is now a Day Home for Destitute
Children.
In No. 13 dwelt Lord Monboddo and his beautiful
daughter, who died prematurely of consumption
at Braid on the 17th of June, 1790, and whom
Burns-her father?s frequent guest there-describes
so glowingly in his ?( Address to Edinburgh : ?-
?? Fair Burnet strikes the adoring eye,
Heaven?s beauties on my fancy shine ;
And own his work indeed divine ! ?
I see the sire of Love on high,
The fair girl?s early death he touchingly commemorates
in a special ode. She was the ornament
of the elegant society in which she moved; she
was her old father?s pride and the comfort of his
domestic life. Dr. Gregory, whom she is said to.
have refused, also lived in St. John Street, as did
Lady Suttie, Sinclair of Barrock, Sir David Rae, and
Lord Eskgrove, one of the judges who tried the
Reformers of 1793, a man of high ability and integrity.
He removed thither from the old Assembly
Close, and lived in St. John Street till his
death in 1804.
Among the residents there in 1784 were Sir
John Dalrymple and Sir John Stewart of Allanbank, ... OLD AND. NEW. EDINBURGH. [Cauongate. date over a doorway in it, this street had been in progress in 1768. At ...

Book 3  p. 26
(Score 0.21)

Canongate.] THE TENNIS COURT. ? 39
Scotland, and who for some years had been Commissioner
to the General Assembly. In this house
he died, 28th July, 1767, as recorded in the Scots
Magazine, and was succeeded by his son, Major-
General the Earl of Ancrum, Colonel of the 11th
Light Dragoons (now Hussars). His second son,
Lord Robert, had been killed at Culloden.
His marchioness, Margaret, the daughter of Sir
Thomas Nicholson, Bart., of Kempnay, who survived
him twenty years, resided in Lothian Hut
till her death. It was afterwards occupied by the
dowager of the ? fourth Marquis, Lady Caroline
D?Arcy, who was only daughter of Robert Earl
of Holderness, and great-grand-daughter of Charles
Louis, the Elector Palatine, a lady whose character
is remembered traditionally to have been both
grand and amiable. Latterly the Hut was the
residence of Professor Dugald Stewart, who, about
the end of the last century, entertained there many
English pupils of high rank. Among them, perhaps
the most eminent was Henry Temple, afterwards
Lord Palmerston, whose education, commenced
at Harrow, was continued at the University
of Edinburgh. When he re-visited the latter city in
1865, during his stay he was made aware that an
aged woman, named Peggie Forbes, who had been
a servant with Dugald Stewart at Lothian Hut,
was still alive, and residing at No. I, Rankeillor
Street. There the great statesman visited her, and
expressed the pleasure he felt at renewing the
acquaintance of the old domestic.
Lothian Hut, the scene of Dugald Stewart?s
most important literary labours, was pulled down
ih 1825, to make room for a brewery ; but a house
of the same period, at the south-west corner of the
Horse Wynd, bears still the name of Lothian
Vale.
A little to the eastward of the present White
Horse hostel, and immediately adjoining the Water
Gate, stood the Hospital of St. Thomas, founded
in 154r by George Crichton, Bishop of Dunkeld,
?dedicated to God, the Blessed Virgin Mary, and
all the saints.? It consisted of an almshouse and
chapel, the bedesmen of which were ?to celebrate
the founder?s anniversary obit. by solemnly singing
in the choir of Holyrood church yearly, on the
day of his death, ?the Placebo and Dinie for the
repose of his soul ? and the soul of the King of
Scotland. ? Special care,? says Amot, ? was taken
in allotting money for providing candles to be
lighted during the anniversary ma.ss of requiem,
and the number and size of the tapers were fixed
with a precision which shows the importance in
which these circumstances were held by the founder.
The number of masses, paternosters, aye-marias,
and credos, to be said by the chaplain and bedesmen
is distinctly ascertained.?
The patronage of the institution was vested by
the founder in himself and a certain series of representatives
named by him.
In 1617, with the consent of David Crichton of
Lugton, the patron, who had retained possession
of the endowments, the magistrates of the Canongate
purchased the chapel and almshouse from the
chaplains and bedesmen, and converted the institution
into a hospital for the poor of the burgh.
Over the entrance they placed the Canongate arms,
supported by a pair of ?cripples, an old man and
woman, with the inscription-
HELP HERE THE POORE, AS ZE WALD GOD DID ZOV.
JUNE 19, 1617.
The magistrates of the Canongate sold the patronage
of the institution in 1634 to the Kirk Session,
by whom its revenues ? were entirely embezzled f
by 1747 the buildings were turned into coachhouses,
and in 1787 were pulled down, and replaced
by modem houses of hideous aspect.
On the opposite side of the Water Gate was the
Royal Tennis Court, the buildings of which are
very distinctly shown in Gordon?s map of 1647.
Maitland says it was anciently called the Catchpel,
from Cache, a game now called Fives, a favourite
amusement in Scotland as early as the reign of
James IV. The house, a long, narrow building,
with a court, after being a weavers? workhouse,
was burned down in 1771, and rebuilt in the
tasteless fashion of that period ; but the locality is
full of interest, as being connected not only with
the game of tennis, as played there by the Duke
of Albany, Law the great financial schemer, and
others, but the early and obscure history of the
stage in Scotland.
In 1554 there was a ??litill farsche and play
maid be William Lauder,? and acted before the
Queen Regent, Mary of Guise, for which he was
rewarded by two silver cups. Where it was acted
is not stated. Neither are we told where was perlormed
another play, ? made by Robert Simple ?
at Edinburgh, before the grim Lord Regent and
others of the nobility in 1567, and for which the
mthor was paid ;E66 13s. 4d.
The next record of .a post-Reformation theatre is
in the time of James VI. when several companies
came from London for the amusement of the court,
including one of which Shakspere was a member,
though his appearance cannot be substantiated.
In 1599 the company of English comedians was
interdicted by the clergy and Kirk Session,
though their performances, says Spottiswoode in ... THE TENNIS COURT. ? 39 Scotland, and who for some years had been Commissioner to the General ...

Book 3  p. 39
(Score 0.21)

of all human shape at the foot of the cliff. James V,
was struck with remorse on hearing? bll this terrible
story, He released the friar ; but, singular to say,
William Lyon was merely banished the kingdom ;
while a man named Mackie, by whom the alleged
poison was said to be prepared, was shorn of his
ears.+
On thd last day of February, 1539, Thomas
Forret, Vicar of Dollar, John Keillor and John
Beveridge, two black-friars, Duncan Simpson a
priest, and a gentleman named Robert Forrester,
were all burned together on the Castle Hill on a
charge of heresy; and it is melancholy to know that
a king so good and so humane as James Vb was a
spectator of this inhuman persecution for religion,
and that he came all the way from Linlithgow
Palace to witness it, whither he returned on the
2nd of March. It is probable that he viewed it
from the Castle walls.
Again and again has the same place been the
scene of those revolting executions for sorcery
which disgraced the legal annals of Scotland.
There, in 1570, Bessie Dunlop ?? was worried ? at
the stake for simply practising as a ?wise woman?
in curing diseases and recovering stolen goods.
Several others perished in 1590-1 ; among others,
Euphemie M?Calzean, for consorting with the devil,
abjuring her baptism, making waxen pictures to be
enchanted, raismg zi storm to drown Anne of
Denmark on her way to Scotland, and so f0rth.f
In 1600 Isabel Young was ?woryt at a stake I?
for laying sickness on various persons, ?and
thereafter burnt to ashes on the Castle Hill.??#
Eight years after, James Reid, a noted sorcerer,
perished in the same place, charged with practising
healing by the black art, ?whilk craft,??
says one authority, ?? he learned frae the devil, his
master, in- Binnie Craigs and Corstorphine, where
he met with him and consulted with him diveE
tymes, whiles in the likeness of a man, whiles in
the likeness of a horse.? Moreover, he had tried
to destroy the crops of David Liberton by putting
a piece of enchanted flesh under his mill door,
and to destroy David bodily by making a picturc
of him in walc and mel$ng it before a fire, an
ancient sdperstition-common to the Westerr
Isles and in some parts of Rajpootana to thi:
day. So great was the horror these crimes excited,
that he was taken direct from the court to the
stake. During the ten years of the Commonwealtt
executions on this spot occurred with appalling
frequency.$ On the 15th October, 1656, seven
~
Tytler, ? Criminal Trials,? &c. &c. $ ? Diurnal of Occumnts.?
$ spot.iwod, ? Mmllany.? 0 Pitcairn
xlprits were executed at once, two of whom were
iurned ; and on the 9th March, 1659, ? there were,?
iays Nicoll, ?fyve wemen, witches, brint on the
:astell Hill, all of them confessand their covenantng
with Satan, sum of thame renunceand. thair
iaptisme, and all of them oft tymes dancing with
;he devell.?
During the reign of Charles? I., when the Earl of
Stirling obtained permission to colonise Nova
Scotia, and to sell baronetcies to some zoo supposed
colonists, with power of pit and gallows over
their lands, the difficulty of enfeoffing them in
possessions so distant was overcome by a royal
mandate, converting the soil of the Castle Hill for
the time being into that of Nova Scotia; and
>etween 1625 and 1649 sixty-four of these baronets
took seisin before the archway of the Spur.
When the latter was fairly removed the hill
became the favourite promenade of the citizens ;
md in June, 1709, we find it acknowledged by the
town council, that the Lord?s Day (? is profaned by
people standing in the streets, and vaguing (sic) to
ields, gardens, and the Castle Hill.? Denounce
ill these as they might, human nature never could
Je altogether kept off the Castle Hill ; and in old
imes even the most respectable people promenaded
:here in multitudes between morning and evening
jervice. In the old song entitled ?The Young
Laud and Edinburgh Katie,? to which Allan
Ramsay added some verses, the former addresses
i s mistress :7
? Wat ye wha I met yestreen,
Coming doon the street, my jo ?
FG bonny, braw, and sweet, my jo I ? My dear,? quo I, ? thanks to the night,
That never wished a lover ill,
Since ye?re out 0? your mother?s sight,
Let?s tak? a walk up to the HX.? ?
M y mistress in her tartan screen,
In IS58 there ensued a dispute between the
magistrates of Edinburgh and the Crown as to the
proprietary of the Castle Hill and Esplanade. The
former asserted their right to the whole ground
claimed by the board of ordnance, acknowledging
no other boundary to the possessions of the former
than the ramparts of the Castle. This extensive
claim they made in virtue of the rights conferred
upon them by the golden charter of James VI.
in 1603, wherein they were gifted with all and
whole, the loch called the North Loch, lands,
pools, and marisches thereof, the north and south
banks and braes situated on the west of the burgh,
near the Castle of Edinburgh, on both sides of the
Castle from the public highway, and that part of ... all human shape at the foot of the cliff. James V, was struck with remorse on hearing? bll this ...

Book 1  p. 86
(Score 0.21)

Lord Promsts.] THE DOUGLASES AND HAMILTONS. 279
?James of Creichtoun of Felde,? as a deputy provost
under him ; and the first entry in the Records
under that date is a statute that ? the commoun
pyperis of the towne ? shall be properly feed, for
the honour thereof, and that they get their food,
day about, from all honest persons of substance,
under a penalty of 9d. per day, ?? that is to ilk
pyper iijd at least.?
The fifth provost after this was Sir Thomas Tod,
zznd August, 1491, and again in 1498, with
Richard Lawson of the Highriggs, and Sir John
Murray in the interval during 1492.
From this date to 1513, with a little interval,
Richard Lawson was again provost ; the office was
held by Sir Alexander Lauder of Blythe, who -in
the last named year was also Justice Depute.
He fell in the battle.on the fatal 9th of September,
1513, and the apairs ofthe city, amid the consternation
and grief that ensued, were managed by George
of Tours, who with Robert Bruce, William Lockhart,
William Adamson, and William Clerk, all
bailies, had been, on the 19th of August, chosen
by the provost and community to rule the city
after his departure with the army for England.
The aged Archibald Douglas, Earl of Angus
(better known as Archibald Bell-thecat)-whose
two sons, George Master of Angus, and Sir William
Douglas of Glenbervie, with more then zoo
knights and gentlemen of his surname, found their
tomb on Flodden Hill-was elected provost on the
30th of September, twenty-one days after the battle ;
and at the same time his son, Gawain the Poet,
provost of St. Giles?s, was ?( made burgess, gratis, for
the Common benefit of the town.? It was he of
whom Scott makes th?e grim old Earl say, with
reference to the English knight?s act of forgery,
? Thanks to St. Bothan, son of mine,
Save Gawain, ne?er could pen a line.?
He was succeeded on the 24th July, 1514, by
Alexander Lord Home, Great Chamberlain 01
Scotland in 1507, and baron of Dunglasand Greenlaw,
under whom preparations for the defence of
the city, in expectation of a counter-invasion, went
on. An Act was passed for the furnishing ?01
artailyerie for the resisting of our auld innemies of
Ingland;? a tax was laid upon all-even the
widows of the fallen, so far as their substance permitted
them to pay-and all persons having heidyaird
dykes, ?were to build them up within fifteen
days, under pain of six pounds to the Kirk-werk.?
In August of the same year David Melville was
provost, and the pestilence caused the division ol
the city into four quarters, each under a bailie and
quartermaster to attend to the health of the people.
Except the interval, during which Sir Patrick
Hamilton of Kincavil and Archibald Douglas were
Provosts, Melville was in office till 15 17, when James
Earl of Arran, Regent of Scotland, took it upon
him, and was designated Lord Provost. In consequence
of the influence it conferred, the office was at
this time an object of ambition among the nobility.
His enemies, the Douglases, taking advantage of
his temporary absence from the city, procured the
election of Archibald Douglas of Kilspindie, the
uncle of the EarLof Angus, in his place ; and when
Arran returned from the castle of Dalkeith, where
the court was then held, he found the gates of Edinburgh
shut against him. His followers attempted
to force an entrance sword in hand, but were repulsed,
and a number were killed and wounded on.
both sides. Similar scenes of violence and bloodshed
were of almost daily occurrence, and between
the rival factions of Hamilton and Douglas the Lowlands
were in a complete state of demoralisation ;
and on the z 1st of February, 15 I 9, in consequence
of the bitter feud and bloody broils between the
houses of Douglas and Hamilton, he was ordered
by the Regent, then absent, to vacate his office, as
it was ordained that no person of either of those
names was eligible as provost, till the ?Lord
Governor?s home coming, and for a year.?
Thus, in 1510, Robert Logan of Coitfield was.
provost, and in October he was granted by the
Council 100 merks of the common good, beside his
ordinary fee, for the sustentation of four armed
men, to carry halberds before him, ?because the
warld is brukle and troublous.?
The fourth provost after this was Robert Lord
Maxwell, 18th August, 1524, who was made so by
the Queen-mother, when she (? tuik the hail1 government
of the realm and ruele of the king (James
V.) upoun her.? This was evidently an invasion of
the rights of the citizens ; yet on the same day the
Lord Justice Clerk. appeared before the Council,
and declared ? that it was the mind and will ? of the
king, then in his minority, that Mr. Francis Bothwell,
provost, ?? cedit and left his office of provostier
in the town?s hand,? and the said provost protested
that the leaving of his office thus should not be
derogatory to the city, nor injurious to its privileges
Lord Maxwell was afterwards Governor of Lochmaben,
Captain of the Royal Guard, Warden of the
West Marches, and Ambassador to France to
negotiate the king?s marriage with Mary of Lorraine ;
but long ere all that he had been succeeded as
provost by Allan Stuart.
In 15.26 Archibald Douglas of Kilspindie, Lord
High Treasurer, was provost again. In this year
it was ordained that through the resort to Edin ... Promsts.] THE DOUGLASES AND HAMILTONS. 279 ?James of Creichtoun of Felde,? as a deputy provost under him ; ...

Book 4  p. 279
(Score 0.21)

Here some stone coffins, or cists, were found by
the workmen, when preparing the ground for the - -
erection of Oxford Terrace, which f&es the north,
and has a most commanding site; and in October,
1866, at the foundations of Lennox Street, which runs
southward from the terrace at an angle, four solitary
ancient graves were discovered a little below the
surface. ?They lay north and south,? says a local
annalist, ?and were lined with slabs of undressed
stone. The length of these graves was abou!
four feet, and the breadth little beyond two feet,
so that the bodies must have been buried in a
sitting posture, or compressed in some .way. This
must have been the case in the short cists or coffins
made of slabs of stone, while in the great cists,
which were about six feet long, the body lay at full
length.?
On both sides of the Water of Leith lies Stockbridge,
some 280 yards east of the Dean Bridge.
Once a spacious suburb, it is now included in the
growing northern New Town, and displays a
curious mixture of grandeur and romance, with
something of classic beauty, and, in more than
one quarter, houses of rather a mean and humble
character. One of its finest features is the double
crescent called St. Bernard?s, suggested by Sir David
Wilkie, constructed by Sir Henry Raeburn, and
adorned with the grandest Grecian Doric pillars
that are to be found in any other edifice not a
public one.
Here the Water of Leith at times flows with
considerable force and speed, especially in seasons
of rain and flood. Nicoll refers to a visitation in
1659, when ?the town of Edinburgh obtained an
additional impost upon the ale sold in its boundsit
was now a full penny a pint, so that the liquor rose
to the unheard of price of thirty-two pence Scots,
for that quantity. Yet this imposition seemed not
to thrive,? he continues superstitiously, ? for at the
same instant, God frae the heavens declared His
anger by sending thunder and unheard-of tempests,
storms, and inundations of water, whilk destroyed
their common mills, dams, and warks, to the toun?s
great charges and expenses. Eleven mills belonging
to Edinburgh, and five belonging to Heriot?s Hospital,
all upon the Water of Leith, were destroyed on
this occasion, with their dams, water-gangs, timber
and stone-warks, the haill wheels of their mills,
timber-graith, and haill other warks.?
In 1794-5 there was a ?spate? in the river,
when the water rose so high that access to certain
houses in Haugh Street was entirely cut off, and a
mamage party-said to be that of the parents of
David Roberts, R.A.-was nearly swept away. In
1821 a coachman with his horse was carried down
the stream, and drowned near the gate of Inverleith ;
and in 1832 the stream flooded all the low-lying
land about Stockbridge, and did very considerable
damage.
This part of the town annot boast of great
antiquity, for we do not find it mentioned by
Nicoll in the instance of the Divine wrath being
excited by the impost on ale, or in the description
of Edinburgh preserved in the Advocates? Library,
and supposed to have been written between 1642
and 1651, and which refers to many houses and
hamlets on the banks of the Water of Leith,
The steep old Kirk Loan, that led, between
hedgerows, to St. Cuthbert?s, is now designated
Church Lane; where it passed the grounds of
Drumsheugh it was bordered by a deep ditch. A
village had begun to spring up here towards the
end of the seventeenth century, and by the year
1742, says a pamphlet by Mr. C. Hill, the total
population amounted to 574 persons. Before the
city extended over the arable lands now occupied
by the New Town, the village would be deemed as
somewhat remote from the old city, and the road
that led to it, down by where the Royal Circus
stands now, was steep, bordered by hawthorn
hedges, and known as ?Stockbrig Brae.?
It is extremely probable that the name originated
in the circumstance of the first bridge having been
built of wood, for which the old Saxon word was
sfoke; and a view that has been preserved of it,
drawn in 1760, represents it as a structure of beams
and pales, situated a little way above where the
present bridge stands.
In former days, the latter-like that at Canonmills-
was steep and narrow, but by raising up
the banks on both sides the steepness was removed,
and it was widened to double its original breadth.
The bridge farther up the stream, at Mackenzie
Place, was built for the accommodation of the
feuars of St. Bernard?s grounds ; and between these
two a wooden foot-bridge at one time existed, for
the convenience of the residents in Anne Street.
The piers of it are still remaining.
St. Bernard?s, originally a portion of the old
Dean estate, was acquired by Mr. Walter ROSS,
W.S., whose house, a large, irregular, three-storeyed
edifice, stood on the ground now occupied by the
east side of Carlton Street; and this was the
house afterwards obtained by Sir Henry Raeburn,
and in which he died. Mr. Ross was a man of
antiquarian taste, and this led him to collect many
of the sculptured stones from old houses then in
the process of demolition in the city, and some
of these he built into the house. In front of one
projection he built a fine Gothic window, and ... some stone coffins, or cists, were found by the workmen, when preparing the ground for the - - erection of ...

Book 5  p. 71
(Score 0.21)

2 OLD AND NEW EDINBURGH. [Kirk-of-Field.
land of umyle Hew Berrie?s tenement and chamber
adjacent yr to, lying in the Cowgaitt, on the south
side of the street, betwixt James Earl of Buchan?s
land on the east, and Thomas Tod?s on ye west.?
This lady was a daughter of John Lord Kennedy,
and was the widow of the aged Earl of Angus, who
died of a broken heart after the battle of Flodden.
In 1450-1 an obligation by the Corporation of
Skinners in favour of St. Christopher?s altar in St.
Giles?s was signed with much fornialityon the 12th
of January, infra ecdesiam Beate &Iarie He Canzpo,
in presence of Sir Alexander Hundby, John
Moffat, and John Hendirsone, chaplains thereof,
Thomas Brown, merchant, and other witnesses.
((? Burgh Rec.?)
James Laing, a burgess of Edinburgh, founded
an additional chaplaincy in this church during the
reign of James V., whose royal confirmation of it is
dated 19th June, 1530, and the grant is made ? to
a chaplain celebrating divine service at the high
altar within the collegiate church of Blessed
Marie-in-the-Fields.?
When made collegiate it was governed by a provost,
who with eight prebendaries and two choristers
composed the college ; but certain rights appear to
have been reserved then by the canons of Holyrood,
for in 1546 we find Robert, Commendator of
the abbey, presenting George Kerr to a. prebend
in it, ?according to the force and form of the
foundation.?
There is a charter by James V., arst May, 1531,
confirming a previous one of 16th May, I 53 I, by the
lady before mentioned, ?Janet Kennedy Domina
de Bothvill,? of tenements in Edinburgh, and an
annual rent of twenty shillings for a prebendary to
perform divine service ?in the college kirk of the
Blessed Virgin Mary-in-the-Fields, or without the
walls of Edinburgh, pro sat& #sius Domini Regis
(JamesV.), and for the souls OP his father (James
IV.), and the late Archibald, Earl of Angus?
Among the most distinguished provosts of the
Kirk-of-Field was its second one, Richard Bothwell,
rector of Ashkirk, who in A4ugust and
December, 1534, was a commissioner for opening
Parliament. He died in the provost?s house in
1547.
The prebendal buildings were of considerable
extent, exclusive of the provost?s house, or
lodging. David Vocat, one of the prebendaries,
and master of the Grammar School of Edinburgh,
clerk and orator of Holyrood,? was a liberal
? benefactor to the church ; but it and the buildings
attached to it seem to have suffered severely at the
hands of the English during the invasion of 1544
or 1547. In the ?? Inventory of the Townis purchase
from the Marquis of Hamilton in 1613,?? with
a view to the founding of a college, says Wilson,
we have found an abstract of ?a feu charter granted
by Mr. Alexander Forrest, provost of the collegiate
church of the Blessed Xlary-in-the-Fields, near
Edinr., and by the prebends of the said church,?
dated 1544, wherein it is stated:-?Considering that
ther houses, especially ther hospital annexed and
incorporated with ther college, were burnt down
and destroyed by their add enemies of EngZand, so
that nothing of their said hospital was left, but they
are altogether waste and entirely destroyed, wherethrough
the divine worship is not a little decreased
in the college, because they were unable to rebuild
the said hospital. . . , Therefore they gave and
granted, set in feu forme, and confirmed to a magnificent
and illustrious prince, James, Duke of
Chattelherault, Earl of Arran, Lord Hamilton, &c.,
all and hail their tenement or hospital, with the
yards and pertinints thereof, lying within the burgh
of Edinburgh, in the street or wynd called School
House Wynd, on the east part thereof.?
The duke appears, it is added, from frequent
allusions by contemporaries, to have built an abode
for his family on the site of this hospital, and that
edifice served in future years as the hall of the first
college of Edinburgh.
In 1556 we find Alexander Forrest, the provost
of the kirk, in the name of the Archbishop of St.
Andrews, presenting a protest, signed by Mary of
Guise, to the magistrates, praying them to suppress
?? certain odious ballettis and rymes baith sett
furth ? by certain evil-inclined persons, who had
also demolished certain images, but with what end
is unknown. (?Burgh Records.?)
But two years after Bishop Lesly records that
when the Earl of Argyle and his reformers entered
Edinburgh, after spoiling the Black and Grey
Friars, and having their ? haill growing treis
plucked up be the ruittis,? they destroyed and
burned all the images in the Kirk-of-Field.
In 1562 the magistrates made application to
Queen Mary, among other requests, for the Kirk-of-
Field and all its adjacent buildings and ground,
for the purpose of erecting a school thereon, and
for the revenues of the old foundation to endow the
same ; but they were not entirely made over to the
city for the purpose specified till 1566.
The quadrangle of the present university now
occupies the exact site of the church of St. Mary-inthe-
Fields, including that of the prebendal buildings,
and, says Wilson-who in this does not quite accord
with Bell-to a certain extent the house of the provost,
so fatally known in history; and the main access
and approach to the whole establishment was ... OLD AND NEW EDINBURGH. [Kirk-of-Field. land of umyle Hew Berrie?s tenement and chamber adjacent yr to, lying in ...

Book 5  p. 2
(Score 0.21)

310 OLD AND NEW EDINBURGH. [Granton.
Scots now takefl this to be a prophecy of the
thing which has happened. ? The next day,
4th May, the army landed two miles bewest the
town of Leith, at a place called Grantaine Cragge,
every man being so.prompt, that the whole army
was landed in four hours.? As there was no opposition,
a circumstance unlooked for, and having
guides, ?? We put ourselves in good order of war,??
continues the .narrator, ?marching towards Leith in
three battayles (columns), whereof my lord admiral
led the vanguard, the Earl of Shrewsbury the rearguard,
the Earl of Hertford the centre, with the
artillery drawn by men. In a valley on the right
of the said town the Scots were assembled to the
number of five or six thousand horse, besides foot,
to impeach our passage, and had planted their
artillery at two straits, through which we had to
pass. At first they seemed ready to attack the
vanguard.? But perceiving the English ready to
pass a ford that lay between them and the Scots,
the latter abandoned their cannon, eight pieces in
all, and fled towards Edinburgh j the first to quit
the field was ? the holy cardynall, lyke a vallyant
champion, with him the governor, Therles of
Huntly, Murray, and Bothwell?
The.fame of Granton for its excellent freestone
is not a matter of recent times, as in the City
Treasurer?s accounts, 1552-3, we read of half an
ell of velvet, given to the Laird of Carube
(Carrubber?) for ?licence to wyn stones on his
lands of Granton, to the schoir, for the hale space
of a year.?
In 1579 a ship called the Jinas of Leith
perished in a storm upon the rocks at Granton,
having been blown from her anchorage. Upon
this, certain burgesses of Edinburgh brought an
action against her owner, Vergell Kene of Leith,
for the value of goods lost in the said ship ; but he
urged that her wrecking was the ?providence of
God,? and the matter was remitted to the admiral
and his deputes (Privy Council Reg.)
In 1605 we first find a distinct mention legally,
of the old fortalice of Wardie, or Granton, thus in
the ?Retours.? ? Wardie-muir cum turre et fortalicio
de Wardie,? when George Tours is served heir to
his father, Sir John Tours of Inverleith, knight,
14th May.
In 1685, by an Act of Parliament passed by
James VII., the lands and barony of Royston
were ?ratified,? in favour of George Viscount
Tarbet, Lord Macleod, and Castlehaven, then
Lord Clerk Register, and his spouse, Lady Anna
Sinclair. They are described as comprehending
the lands of Easter Granton with the manor-house,
dovecot, coalheughs, and quarries, bounded by
?
.
Granton Bum; the lands of Muirhouse, and
Pilton on the south, and the lands of Wardie and
Wardie Bum, the sea links of Easter Granton, the
lands of Golden Riggs or Acres, all of which had
belonged to the deceased Patrick Nicoll of Royston.
The statesmen referred to was George Mackenzie,
Viscount Tarbet and first Earl of Cromarty,
eminent for his learning and abilities, descended
from a branch of the family of Seaforth, and born
in 1630. On the death of his father in 1654, with
General Middleton he maintained a guerrilla warfare
with the Parliamentary forces, in the interests
of Charles 11. ; but had to leave Scotland till the
Restoration, after which he became the great confidant
of Middleton, when the latter obtained the
chief administration of the kingdom.
In 1678 he was appointed Justice-General for
Scotland, in 1681, a Lord of Session and Clerk
Register, and four years afterwards James VII.
created him Viscount Tarbet, by which name he is
best known in Scotland.
Though an active and not over-scrupulous agent
under James VII., he had no objection to transfer
his allegiance to William of Orange, who, in 1692,
restored him to office, after which he repeatedly
falsified the records of Parliament, thus adding
much to the odium attaching to his name. In
1696 he retired upon a pension, and was created
Earl of Cromarty in 1703. He was a zealous
supporter of the Union, having sold his vote for
A300, for with all his eminence and talent as a
statesman, he was notoriously devoid of principle.
He was one of the original members of the Royal
Society, and was author of a series of valuable
articles, political and historical works, too
numerous to be noted here. He died at New
Tarbet in 1714, aged eighty-four, and left a son,
who became second Earl of Cromarty, and another,
Sir James Mackenzie, Bart., a senator with the
title of Lord Royston. His grandson, George,
third Earl of Cromarty, fought at Falkirk, leading
400 of his clan, but was afterwards taken prisoner,
sent to the Tower, and sentenced to death. The
latter portion was remitted, he retired into exile,
and his son and heir entered the Swedish service;
but when the American war broke out he raised the
regiment known as Macleod?s Highlanders (latterly
the 71st Regiment), consisting of two battalions,
and served at their head in the East Indies.
Lord Royston was raised to the bench on the
7th of June, I 7 10 ; and a suit of his and the Laird of
Fraserdale, conjointly against Haliburton of Pitcur,
is recorded in ? Bruce?s Decisions ? for 17 15.
He is said to have been ?one of the wittiest ... OLD AND NEW EDINBURGH. [Granton. Scots now takefl this to be a prophecy of the thing which has happened. ? ...

Book 6  p. 310
(Score 0.21)

Abbeyhill.] BARON NORTON. I27
CHAPTER XIII.
THE DISTRICT OF RESTALRIG.
Abhey Hill-Baron Norton-Alex. Campbell and ? Albyn?s Anthology ?--Comely Gardens-Easter Road-St. Margaret?s Well-Church and
Legend of St. Triduana-Made Collegiate by James 111.-The Mausoleum-Old Bardns of Restalrig-pe Logans, &c.-Conflict of
Black Saturday-Residents of Note-First Balloon in Britain-Rector Adams-The Nisbets of Craigantinnie and Dean-The Millers-
The Craieantinnie Tomb and Marbles-The Marionville Traeedv-The Hamlet of Jock?o Lodge-Mail-bag Robberies in seventeenth and - _
eighteenth centuries-Piershill House and Barracks.
AT the Abbey Hill, an old house-in that antiquated
but once fashionable suburb, which grew
up in the vicinity of the palace of Holyrood-with
groups of venerable trees around it, which are now,
like itself, all swept away to make room for the present
Abbeyhill station and railway to Leith, there
lived long the Hon. Fletcher Norton, appointed one
of the Barons of the Scottish Exchequer in 1776,
with a salary of &2,865 per annum, deemed a handsome
income in those days.
He was the second son of Fletcher Norton of
Grantley in Yorkshire, who was Attorney-General
of England in 1762, and was elevated to the British
peerage in 1782, as Lord Grantley.
He came to Scotland at a time when prejudices
then against England and Englishmen were strong
and deep, for the rancour excited by the affair of
1745, about thirty years before, was revived by the
periodical publication of the Nhth Briton, but
Baron Norton soon won the regard of all who knew
him. His conduct as a judge increased the respect
which his behaviour in private life obtained, His
perspicacity easily discovered the true merits of any
cause before him, while his dignified and conciliatory
manner, joined to the universal confidence
which prevailed in his rigid impartiality, reconciled
to him even those who suffered by such verdicts as
were given against them in consequence of his
charges to the juries.
He married in 1793 a Scottish lady, a Miss Balmain,
and in the Edinburgh society of his time stood
high in the estimation of all, ?as a husband, father,
friend, and master,? according to a print of 1820.
? His fund of information-of anecdotes admirably
told-his social disposition, and the gentlemanly
pleasantness of his manner, made his society to be
universally coveted. Resentment had no place in
his bosom. He seemed almost insensible to injury
so immediately did he pardon it. Amongst his
various pensioners were several who had shown
marked ingratitude ; but distress, with him, covered
every offence against himself.?
He was a warm patron of the amiable and enthusiastic,
but somewhat luckless Alexander Campbell,
author of ? The Grampians Desolate,? which
?fell dead ? from the press, and editor of ? Albyn?s
Anthology,? who writes thus in the preface to the
first volume of that book in 1816, and which, we
may mention, was a ? collection of melodies and
local poetry peculiar to Scotland and the isles ? :-
? So far back as the year 1780, while as yet the
editor of ?Albyn?s Anthology? was an organist to
one of the Episcopal chapels in Edinburgh, he projected
the present work. Finding but small encouragement
at that period, and his attention being
directed to pursuits of quite a different nature, the
plan was dropped, till by an accidental turn of conversation
at a gentleman?s table, the Hon. Fletcher
Norton gave a spur to the speculation now in its
career. He with that warmth of benevolence
peculiarly his own, offered his influence with the
Royal Highland Society of Scotland, of which he is
a member of long standing, and in conformity with
the zeal he has uniformly manifested for everything
connected with the distinction and prosperity of our
ancient realm, on the editor giving him a rough
outline of the present undertaking, the Hon. Baron
put it into the hands of Henry Mackenzie, Esq., of
the Exchequer, and Lord Bannatyne, whose influence
in the society is deservedly great. And
immediately on Mr. Mackenzie laying it before a
select committee for music, John H. Forbes, Esq.
(afterwards Lord Medwyn), as convener of the
committee, convened it, and the result was a recommendation
to the society at large, who embraced
the project cordially, voted a sum to enable the
editor to pursue his plan ; and forthwith he set out
on a tour through the Highlands and western
islands. Having performed a journey (in pursuit
of materials for the present work) of between eleven
and twelve hundred miles, in which he collected
191 specimens of melodies and Gaelic vocal poetry,
he returned to Edinburgh, and laid the fruits of
his gleanings before the society, who were pleased
to honour with their approbation his success in
attempting to collect and preserve the perishing remains
of what is so closely interwoven with the
history and literature of Scot!and.?
From thenceforth the ?? Anthology? was a success,
and a second volume appeared in 1818. Under
the influence of Baron Norton, Campbell got many
able contributors, among whom appear the names
of Scott, Hogg, Mrs. Grant of Laggan, RIaturin, and
Jamieson. ... BARON NORTON. I27 CHAPTER XIII. THE DISTRICT OF RESTALRIG. Abhey Hill-Baron Norton-Alex. Campbell ...

Book 5  p. 127
(Score 0.21)

I44 OLD AND NEW EDINBURGH. [George Street. --
already been made in the account of that institution,
of which he was the distinguished head.
Opposite is a new building occupied as shops and
chambers ; and the vast Elizabethan edifice near it
is the auction rooms of Dowel1 and Co., built
in 1880.
The Mercaitile Bank of India, London, and
China occupies No. 128, formerly the mansion of
Sir James Hall of Dunglass, Bart., a man in his
time eminent for his high attainments in geological
and chemical science, and author of popular but
peculiar works on Gothic architecture. By his
wife, Lady Helena Douglas, daughter of Ddnbar,
Earl of Selkirk, he had three sons and three
daughters-his second son being the well-known
Captain Basil Hall, R.N. While retaining his
house in George Street, Sir James, between 1808
and 1812, represented the Cornish borough of St.
Michael?s in Parliament. He died at Edinburgh,
after a long illness, on the z3rd of June, 1832.
Collaterally with him, another distiiiguished
baronet, Sir John Sinclair of Ulbster, was long the
occupant of No. 133, to the print of whom Kay
appends the simple title of ?The Scottish Patriot,?
and never was it more appropriately applied. To
attempt even an outline of his long, active, and
most useful life, would go far beyond our limits ;
suffice it to say, that his ? Code of Agriculture?
alone has been translated into nearlyevery European
language. He was born at Thurso in 1754, and so
active had been his mind, so vast the number of
his scientific pursuits and objects, that by 1797 he
began to suffer seriously from the effects of his
over-exertions, and being thus led to consider the
subject of health generally, he published, in 1803,
a quarto pamphlet, entitled ? Hints on Longevity?
-afterwards, in 1807, extended to four volumes
8vo. In 1810 he was made a Privy Councillor,
and in the following year, under the administration
of the unfortunate Mr. Perceval, was appointed
Cashier of Excise for Scotland. On retiring from
Parliament, he was succeeded as member for
Caithness by his son. He resided in Edinburgh
for the last twenty years of his life, and died at
his house in George Street in December, 1835, jn
his eighty-first year, and was interred in the Chapel
Royal at Holyrood.
By his first wife he
had two children j by tbe second, Diana, daughter
of Lord Macdonald, he had thirteen, one of whom,
Julia, became Countess of Glasgow. All these
attained a stature like his own, so great-being
nearly all above six feet-that he was wont playfully
to designate the pavement before No. 133 as
?? The Giants? Causeway.?
Sir. John was twice married.
St. Andrew?s church stands zoo feet westward
if St. Andrew?s Square; it is a plain building of
ival form, with a handsome portico, having four
;reat Corinthiafi pillars, and built, says Kincaid,
iom a design of Major Fraser, of the Engineers,
whose residence was close by it. It was erected
.n 178s.
It was at first proposed to have a spire of some
iesign, now unknown, between the portico and thc
body of the church, and for a model of this a
young man of the city, named M?Leish, received a
premium of sixty guineas from the magistrates, with
the freedom of the city j but on consideration, his
design ? was too great in proportion to the space left
for its base.? So the present spire, which is 168 feet
in height, and for its sky-line is one of the most
beautiful in the city, was designed by Major
Andrew Fraser, who declined to accept any
premium, suggesting that it should be awarded to
Mr. Robert Kay, whose designs for a square
church on the spot were most meritorious.
The last stone of the spire was placed thereon
on the 23rd of November, 1787. A chime of bells
was placed in it, 3rd June, 1789, ?to be rung in
the English manner.?
The dimensions of this church, as given by
Kincaid, are, within the walls from east to west
eighty-seven feet, and from north to south sixtyfour
feet. ?The front, consisting of a staircase
and portico, measures forty-one feet, and projects
twenty-six and a half feet.? The entrance is nine
feet in height by seven feet in breadth.
This parish was separated from St. Cuthbert?s in
1785, and since that date parts of it have been
assigned to other parishes of more recent erection
as the population increased.
The church cost A7,000, and is seated for about
1,053. The charge was collegiate, and is chiefly
remarkable for the General Assembly?s meeting in
1843, at which occurred the great Disruption, or
exodus of the Free Church-one of the most
important events in the modern history of Scotland
or of the United Kingdom.
It originated in a zealous movement of the
Presbyterian Church, mainly promoted by the great
Chalmers, to put an end to the connection between
Church and State. In 1834 the Church had passed
a law of its own, ordaining that thenceforth no
presentee to a parish should be admitted if opposed
by the majority of the male communicants-a law
which struck at the system of patronage restored
after the Union-a system involving importint1
civil rights.
When the Annual Assembly met in St. Andreds
Church, in May, 1843, it was generally understood ... OLD AND NEW EDINBURGH. [George Street. -- already been made in the account of that institution, of which he ...

Book 3  p. 144
(Score 0.21)

politically. These documents had been perfidiously
sent to Scotland by General Monk. The marquis
was condemned to die the death of a traitor.
From the Castle he begged in vain a ten days?
respite, that he might crave pity of the king. ??I
placed the crown upon his head,? said he, mourn-
- fully, ? and this is my reward ! ?
An escape was planned. He lay in bed for
some days feigning iuyess, and the Marchioness
came in a sedan to visit him. Being of the same
stature, he assumed her dress and coif; but when
about to step into the sedan his courage failed him,
and he abandoned the attempt. The night before
execution he was removed to the most ancient
prison in Edinburgh-an edifice in Mauchine?s
Close, long since removed, where the Marchioness
awaited him. ?The Lord will requite it,? she exclaimed,
as she wept bitterly on his breast. ? Forbear,
Margaret,? said. he, calmly, ?I pity my
enemies, and am as content in this ignominious
prison as in yonder Castle of Edinburgh.?
With his last breath he expressed abhorrence of
the death of Charles I, and on the 27th May his
head was struck from his body by the Maiden, at
the west end of the Tolbooth. By patent all his
ancient earldom and estates were restored to his
son, h r d Lorne, then a prisoner in the Castle,
where on one occasion he had a narrow escape,
when playing ? with hand bullets ? {bowls 3) one
of which, as Wodrow records, struck him senseless.
On the 30th May, 1667, the batteries of the
Castle returned the salute of the English fleet,
which came to anchor in the roads under the
pennant of Sir Jeremiah Smythe; who came thither
in quest of the Dutch fleet, which had been bombarding
Burntisland.
Janies Duke of Alhany and York succeeded the
odious Duke Q? Lauderdale in the administration
of Scottish affairs, and won the favour of all classes,
while he resided at Holyrood awaiting the issue of
the famous Bill of Exclusion, which would deprive
him of the throne of England on the demise of
his brother, and hence it became his earnest desire
to secure at least Scotland, the hereditary kingdom
of his race. OR his fixst Visit to &e Cask, on
30th October, 1680, Mons Meg br-rst when the
guns were saluting-a ring near the touchhole
giving way, which, saith Fountainhall, was deemed
by all men a bad omen. His lordship adds that
as the gun was charged by an English gunner,
required by the obnoxious Test Act as Commis.
Goner of the Scottish Treasury; and on the 12th
Scottish manners gradually gave way before the
affability of such entertainers as the Duchess
Mary d? Este of Modena, and the Princess Anne,
?and the novel luxuries of the English court
formed an attraction to the Scottish grandees.
Tea was introduced for the first time into Scotland
on this occasion, and given by the duchess as a
great treat to the Scottish ladies. Balls, plays, and
masquerades were also attempted; but the last
proved too great an innovation on the rigid manners
of that period to be tolerated.?
The accession of King James VII. is thus recorded
by Lord Fountainhall (&? Decisions,? vol. i.) :
--?Feb. 6th, 1685. The Privy Council is called
extraordinary, on the occasion of an express sent
them by his royal highness the Duke of Albany,
telling that, on Monday the 2nd February, the king
was seized with a violent and apoplectic fit, which
stupefied him for four hours ; but, by letting twelve
ounces of blood and applying cupping-glasses to
his head, he revived. This unexpected surprise
put our statesmen in a hurly-burly, and was
followed by the news of the death of his Majesty,
which happened on the 7th of February, and came
home to us on the roth, in the morning ; whereupon
a theatre was immediately erected at the cross of
Edinburgh, and the militia companies drawn out
in arms ; and, at ten o?clock, the Chancellor,
Treasurer, and all the other officers of State, with
the nobility, lotds of Privy Council and Session, the
magistrates and town council of Edinburgh, came
to the cross, with the lion king-at-arms, his heralds
and trumpeters ; the Chance!;or carried his own
purse, and, weeping, proclaimed Jimes Duke af
Albany the ~nZy and undoubtcrt king of this realm, by
fhe-tiile of Jirnes VfL, the clerk registrar reading
the words of the Act to him, and all of them swore
faith and allegiance to him. Then the other proclamation
was then read, whereby King James VII.
continued all oAices till he had more time to send
down new commissions. . - . . Then the
Castle shot a round of guns, and sermon began,
wherein Mr. John Robertson did regret our loss,
but desiredour tears might be dried up when we
looked upon so brave and excellent a successor.
The Privy Council called foa all the seals, and broke
them, appointing new ones with the name of James
VII. to be made.?
In r68c the Earl of Argyie was committed to
the Castle for the third time for declining the oath
. having no cannon in all England so big as she.?
During the duke?s residence at Holyrood a splendid
of December ,an assize brought in their verdict, by
the Marquis of Montrose, his hereditary foe, finding ... These documents had been perfidiously sent to Scotland by General Monk. The marquis was condemned to ...

Book 1  p. 58
(Score 0.21)

politically. These documents had been perfidiously
sent to Scotland by General Monk. The marquis
was condemned to die the death of a traitor.
From the Castle he begged in vain a ten days?
respite, that he might crave pity of the king. ??I
placed the crown upon his head,? said he, mourn-
- fully, ? and this is my reward ! ?
An escape was planned. He lay in bed for
some days feigning iuyess, and the Marchioness
came in a sedan to visit him. Being of the same
stature, he assumed her dress and coif; but when
about to step into the sedan his courage failed him,
and he abandoned the attempt. The night before
execution he was removed to the most ancient
prison in Edinburgh-an edifice in Mauchine?s
Close, long since removed, where the Marchioness
awaited him. ?The Lord will requite it,? she exclaimed,
as she wept bitterly on his breast. ? Forbear,
Margaret,? said. he, calmly, ?I pity my
enemies, and am as content in this ignominious
prison as in yonder Castle of Edinburgh.?
With his last breath he expressed abhorrence of
the death of Charles I, and on the 27th May his
head was struck from his body by the Maiden, at
the west end of the Tolbooth. By patent all his
ancient earldom and estates were restored to his
son, h r d Lorne, then a prisoner in the Castle,
where on one occasion he had a narrow escape,
when playing ? with hand bullets ? {bowls 3) one
of which, as Wodrow records, struck him senseless.
On the 30th May, 1667, the batteries of the
Castle returned the salute of the English fleet,
which came to anchor in the roads under the
pennant of Sir Jeremiah Smythe; who came thither
in quest of the Dutch fleet, which had been bombarding
Burntisland.
Janies Duke of Alhany and York succeeded the
odious Duke Q? Lauderdale in the administration
of Scottish affairs, and won the favour of all classes,
while he resided at Holyrood awaiting the issue of
the famous Bill of Exclusion, which would deprive
him of the throne of England on the demise of
his brother, and hence it became his earnest desire
to secure at least Scotland, the hereditary kingdom
of his race. OR his fixst Visit to &e Cask, on
30th October, 1680, Mons Meg br-rst when the
guns were saluting-a ring near the touchhole
giving way, which, saith Fountainhall, was deemed
by all men a bad omen. His lordship adds that
as the gun was charged by an English gunner,
required by the obnoxious Test Act as Commis.
Goner of the Scottish Treasury; and on the 12th
Scottish manners gradually gave way before the
affability of such entertainers as the Duchess
Mary d? Este of Modena, and the Princess Anne,
?and the novel luxuries of the English court
formed an attraction to the Scottish grandees.
Tea was introduced for the first time into Scotland
on this occasion, and given by the duchess as a
great treat to the Scottish ladies. Balls, plays, and
masquerades were also attempted; but the last
proved too great an innovation on the rigid manners
of that period to be tolerated.?
The accession of King James VII. is thus recorded
by Lord Fountainhall (&? Decisions,? vol. i.) :
--?Feb. 6th, 1685. The Privy Council is called
extraordinary, on the occasion of an express sent
them by his royal highness the Duke of Albany,
telling that, on Monday the 2nd February, the king
was seized with a violent and apoplectic fit, which
stupefied him for four hours ; but, by letting twelve
ounces of blood and applying cupping-glasses to
his head, he revived. This unexpected surprise
put our statesmen in a hurly-burly, and was
followed by the news of the death of his Majesty,
which happened on the 7th of February, and came
home to us on the roth, in the morning ; whereupon
a theatre was immediately erected at the cross of
Edinburgh, and the militia companies drawn out
in arms ; and, at ten o?clock, the Chancellor,
Treasurer, and all the other officers of State, with
the nobility, lotds of Privy Council and Session, the
magistrates and town council of Edinburgh, came
to the cross, with the lion king-at-arms, his heralds
and trumpeters ; the Chance!;or carried his own
purse, and, weeping, proclaimed Jimes Duke af
Albany the ~nZy and undoubtcrt king of this realm, by
fhe-tiile of Jirnes VfL, the clerk registrar reading
the words of the Act to him, and all of them swore
faith and allegiance to him. Then the other proclamation
was then read, whereby King James VII.
continued all oAices till he had more time to send
down new commissions. . - . . Then the
Castle shot a round of guns, and sermon began,
wherein Mr. John Robertson did regret our loss,
but desiredour tears might be dried up when we
looked upon so brave and excellent a successor.
The Privy Council called foa all the seals, and broke
them, appointing new ones with the name of James
VII. to be made.?
In r68c the Earl of Argyie was committed to
the Castle for the third time for declining the oath
. having no cannon in all England so big as she.?
During the duke?s residence at Holyrood a splendid
of December ,an assize brought in their verdict, by
the Marquis of Montrose, his hereditary foe, finding ... These documents had been perfidiously sent to Scotland by General Monk. The marquis was condemned to ...

Book 1  p. 59
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The Cowgate.] THE CUNZIE NOOK. 267
dexter hand palmed, and in its palm an eye. In
the dexter canton, a saltire argent, under the imperial
crown, surmounted by a thistle j and in base
a castle argent, masoned sable, within a border,
charged with instruments used by the society. To
the surgeons. were added the apothecaries.
James IV., one of the greatest patrons of art and
science in his time, dabbled a little in surgery and
chemistry, and had an assistant, John the Leeche,
whom he brought from the Continent. Pitscottie
tells us that James was ?ane singular guid chirurgione,?
and in his daily expense book, singular
entries occur in 1491, of payments made to people
to let him bleed them and pull their teeth :-
?Item, to ane fallow, because the King pullit
furtht his twtht, xviii shillings.
?Item, to Kynnard, ye barbour, for tua teith
drawin furtht of his hed be the King, xvci sh.?
The barbers were frequently refractory, and
brought the surgeons into the Court of Session t e
adjust rights, real or imagined. But after the union
of the latter with the apothecaries, they gave up
the barber craft, and were formed into one corporation
by an Act of Council, on the 25th February,
1657, as already mentioned in the account of
the old Royal College of Surgeons.
The first admitted after the change, was Christopher
Irving, recorded as ?? ane free chmgone,?
without the usual words ?and barber,? after his
name. He was physician to James VII., and from
him the Irvings of Castle Irving, in .Ireland, are
descended.
CHAPTER XXXIII.
THE SOCIETY.
The Candlemaker Row--The ? Cunzie Nook?-Tbe of Charles 1.-The Candlemakers? Hall--The Afhk of Dr. Symons-The Society, IS+
Brown Square-Proposed Statue to George III., x~-Di&nguished Inhabitants-Si IsIay Campbell-Lard Glenlec-Haigof Beimerside
--Si John Lerlie-Miss Jeannie Elliot-Argyle Square-Origin of it-Dr. Hugh Bkit-The Sutties of that Ilk-Trades Maiden Hospital-
-Mint0 House and the Elliots-New Medical School-Baptist Church-Chambers Strect-Idustrial Museum of Sdence and Art-Its
Great Hall and adjoining Halls-Aim of the Architect-Contents and Models briefly glanced at-New Watt Institution and School of
ArtsPhrenoloEical Museum-New Free Tron Church-New Tiainiing College of the Church of Scotland-The Dental Hospita-The
.
Theatre ofvari.&s.
THE Candlemaker Row is simply the first portion
of the old way that led from the Grassmarket and
Cowgate-head, where Sir John Inglis resided in
1784, to the lands of Bnsto, and thence on to
Powburn ; and it was down this way that a portion
of the routed Flemings, with Guy of Namur at their
head, fled towards the Castle rock, after their
defeat on the Burghmuir in 1335.
In Charles I.?s time a close line of street with a
great open space behind occupied the whole of the
east side, from the Greyfriars Port to the Cowgatehead.
The west side was the boundary wall of the
churchyard, save at the foot, where two or three
houses appear in 1647, one of which, as the Cunzie
Nook, is no doubt that referred to by Wilson as
a curious little timber-fronted tenement, surmounted
with antique crow-steps ; an open gallery
projects in front, and rude little; shot-windows admit
the light to the decayed and gloomy chambers
therein.? This, we presume, to be the Cunzie Nook,
a place where the Mint had no doubt been estab
Cshed at some early period, possibly during some
of the strange proceedings in the Regency of Mary
of Guise, when the Lords of the Congregation
?past to Holyroodhous, and tuik and intromettit
With the ernis of the Cunzehous.?
On the west side, near the present entrance to
the churchyard of the Greyfriars, stands the hall of
the ancient Corporation of the Candlemakers, which
gave its name to the Row, with the arms of the
craft boldly cut over the doorway, on a large oblong
panel, and, beneath, their appropriate motto,
. Omnia man;jesfa Zuce.
Internally, the hall is subdivided into many residences,
smaller accommodation sufficing for the
fraternity in this age of gas, so that it exists little
more than in name. In 1847 the number of its
members amounted to only fhw, who met periodically
for various purposes, connected with the corporation
and its funds.
Edgar?s plan shows, in the eighteenth century, the
close row of houses that existed along the whole of
the west side, from the Bristo Port to the foot, and
nearly till Forrest Road was opened up in a linewith
the central Meadow Walk.
Humble though this locality may seem now, Sir
James Dunbar, Bart., of Dum, rented No. ZI in
1810, latterly a carting office. In those days the
street was a place ?of considerable bustle; the
Hawick dilligence started twice weekly from
Paterson?s Inn, a well-known hostel in its time, ... Cowgate.] THE CUNZIE NOOK. 267 dexter hand palmed, and in its palm an eye. In the dexter canton, a saltire ...

Book 4  p. 267
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?54 OLD AND NEW EDINBURGH. [Leith Walk.
belonged to different vehicles. It is standing opposite
the Tron Kirk. The warning bell rings a
quarter of an hour before starting ! Shortly a pair
of illconditioned and ill-sized hacks make their
appearance, and are yoked to it ; the harness, partly
of old leathern straps and partly of ropes, bears
evidence of many a mend. A passenger comes
and takes a seat-probably from the Crames or
Luckenbooths-who has shut his shop and affixed
a notice to the door, ?Gone to Leith, and will be
back at 4 of the clock, p.m.? The quarter being
up, and the second bell rung, off starts the coach
at a very slow pace. Having taken three-quarters
of an b u r to get to the Halfway House, the ? ?bus ?
sticks fast in a rut ; the driver whips up his nags,
when 10 ! away go the horses, but fast remains the
stage. The ropes being re-tied, and assistance procured
from the ? Half-way,? the stage is extricated,
and proceeds. What a contrast,? adds the writer,
? between the above pictures and the present ? ?bus ?
with driver and conductor, starting every five
minutes.? But to-day the contrast is yet greater,
the tram having superseded the ?bus.
The forty oil-lamps referred to would seem not to
have been erected, as in the Advertiser for Sep
tember, 1802, a subscription was announced for
lighting the Walk during the ensuing winter season,
the lamps not to be lighted at all until a sufficient
sum had been subscribed at the Leith Bank and
certain other places to continue them to the end
of March, 1803 ; but we have no means of knowing
if ever this scheme were camed out.
? If my reader be an inhabitant of Edinburgh of
any standing,? writes Robert Chambers, ? he must
have many delightful associations of Leith Walk
in connection with his childhood. Of all the streets
in Edinburgh or Leith, the Walk, in former times,
was certainly the street for boys and girls. From
top to bottom it was a scene of wonders and enjoyments
peculiarly devoted to children. Besides the
panoramas and caravan shows, which were comparatively
transient spectacles, there were several
shows upon Leith Walk which might be considered
as regular fixtures, and part of the countv-cousin
sghts of Edinburgh. Who can forget the waxworks
of ?Mrs. Sands, widow of the late G. Sands,?
which occupied a laigh shop opposite to the present
Haddington Place, and at the door of which,
besides various parrots and sundry Birds of Paradise,
sat the wax figure of a little man in the dress
of a French courtier of the ancien r&iaime, reading
one eternal copy of the Edinburgh Advertiser?
The very outsides of these wonderful shops was an
immense treat ; all along the Walk it was one delicious
scene of squirrels hung out at doors and
monkeys dressed like soldiers and sailors, with
holes behind them where their tails came through.
Even the halfpenny-less boy might have got his
appetite for wonders to some extent gratified.?
The long spaces of blank garden or nursery
walls on both sides of the way were then literally
garrisoned with mendicants, organ-grinders, and
cripples on iron or wooden legs, in bowls and
wheelbarrows, by ballad singers and itinerant
fiddlers. Among the mendicants on the east side
of the Walk, below Elm Row (where the last of
the elms has long since disappeared) there was one
noted mendicant, an old seaman, whose figure was
familiar there for years, and whose sobriquet was
? Commodore O?Brien,? who sat daily in a little
masted boat which had been presented to him by
order of George IV. ?The commodore?s ship,?
says the Week0 JournaZ for 1831, ? is appropriately
called the Royal Ggt. It is scarcely 6 f t
long, by 24 breadth of beam, and when rigged for
use her mast is little stouter than a mopstick, her
cordage scarcely stronger than packthread, and
her tonnage is a light burden for two men. In this
mannikin cutter the intrepid navigator fearlessly
commits himself to the ocean and performs long
voyages.? Now the character of the Walk is entirely
changed, as it is a double row of houses from
end to end.
During the railway mania two schemes were projected
to supersede the omnibus traffic here. One
was an atmospheric railway, and the other a subterranean
one, to be laid under the Walk A road
for foot-passengers was to be formed alongside the
railway, and shops, from which much remuneration
was expected, were to be opened along the line ;
but both schemes collapsed, though plans for them
were laid before Parliament.
In April, 1803, there died, in a house in Leith
Walk, James Sibbald, an eminent bookseller and
antiquary, who was educated at the grarnmarschool
of Selkirk, and after being in the shop of
Elliott, a publisher in Edinburgh, in I 78 I acquired
by purchase the library which had once belonged to
Allan Ramsay, and was thereafter long one of the
leading booksellers in the Parliament Square.
One terrible peculiarity attended Leith Walk,
even till long after the middle of the last century
this was the presence of a permanent gibbet at the
Gallow Lee, a dreary object to the wayfarer by
night, when two or three malefactors swung there in
chains, with the gleds and crows perching over
them. It stood on rising ground, on the west side
of the Walk, and its site is enclosed in the precincts
of a villa once occupied by the witty and beautiful
Duchess of Gordon. As the knoll was composed ... OLD AND NEW EDINBURGH. [Leith Walk. belonged to different vehicles. It is standing opposite the Tron Kirk. ...

Book 5  p. 154
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262 OLD AND NEW EDINBURGH. [High Street
other services, Charles Philip Count d?artois,
brother of the ill-fated Louis XVI., and his son
the Duc d?Angoul&me, while, in the earlier years
of their exile, they resided at Holyrood, by
permission of the British Government, though the
people of Scotland liked to view it as in virtue of
the ancient Alliance; and a most humble place
of worship it must have seemed to the count,
who is described as having been ?the most
gay, gaudy, fluttering, accomplished, luxurious,
and expensive prince in Europe.? A doorway inscribed
in antique characters of the 16th century,
Miserwe mei Dew, gave access to this chapel. It
bore a shield in the centre with three mullets in
chief, a plain cross, and two swords saltire-waysthe
coat armorial of some long-forgotten race.
Another old building adjoined, above the door
of which was the pious legend ranged in two lines,
The feeir of the Lordis the Qegynning of al visdome,
but as to the generations of men that dwelt there
not even a tradition remains.
Lower down, at the south-west corner of the
Wynd, there formerly stood the English Episcopal
Chapel, founded, in 1722, by the Lord Chief Baron
Smith of the Exchequer Court, for a clergyman
qualified to take the oaths to Government. To
endow it he vested a sum in the public funds for
the purpose of yielding A40 per annum to the
incumbent, and left the management in seven
trustees nominated by himself. The Baron?s
chapel existed for exactly a century; it was demolished
in 1822, after serving as a place of worship
for all loyal and devout Episcopal High
Churchmen at a time when Episcopacy and
Jacobitism were nearly synonymous terms in Scotland.
It was the most fashionable church in the
city, and there it was that Dr. Johnson sat in 1773,
when on his visit to Boswell. When this edifice
was founded, according to Arnot, it was intended
that its congregation should unite with others of
the Episcopal persuasion in the new chapel ; but
the incumbent, differing from his hearers about the
mode of his settlement there, chose to withdraw
himself again to that in which he was already
established.
.? After the accession of George III., ?certain
officious people ? lodged information against some
of the Episcopal clergymen ; ?? but,? says Amot,
? the officers of state, imitating the liberality and
clemency of their gracious master, discountenanced
such idle and invidious endeavours at oppression.?
In the Blackfriars Wynd-though in what part
thereof is not precisely known now, unless on the
site of Baron Smith?s chapel-the semi-royal House
of Sinclair had a town. mansion. They were
Princes and Earls of Orkney, Lords of Roslin,
Dukes of Oldenburg, and had a list oE titles that
has been noted for its almost Spanish tediousness.
In his magnificence, Earl William-who built
Roslin Chapel, was High Chancellor in 1455, and
ambassador to England in the same year-far surpassed
what had often sufficed for the kings
of Scotland. His princess, Margaret Douglas,
daughter of Archibald Duke of Touraine, according
to Father Hay, in his ?Genealogie of the
Sainte Claires of Rosslyn,? was waited upon by
? seventy-five gentlewomen, whereof fifty-three
were daughters of noblemen, all cloathed in velvets
and silks, with their chains of gold and other pertinents
; together with two hundred riding gentlemen,
who accompanied her in all her journeys.
She had carried before her, when she went to
Edinburgh, if it were darke, eighty lighted torches.
Her lodging was at the foot of Blackfryer Wynde ;
so that in a word, none matched her in all the
country, save the Queen?s Majesty.?? Father
Hay tells us, too, that Earl William ?kept a great
court, and was royally served at his own table in
vessels of gold and silver : Lord Dirleton being his
master of the household, Lord Borthwick his cup
bearer, and Lord Fleming his carver, in whose
absence they had deputies, viz., Stewart, Laird of
Drumlanng ; Tweedie, Laird of Drumrnelzier; and
Sandilands, Laird of Calder. He had his halls
and other apartments richly adorned with embroidered
hangings.?
At the south-west end of the Wynd, and abutting
on the Cowgate, where its high octagon turret,
on six rows of corbels springing from a stone
shaft, was for ages a prominent feature, stood
the archiepiscopal palace, deemed in its time
one of the most palatial edifices of old Edinburgh.
It formed two sides of a quadrangle, with aporfe
rochlre that gave access to a court behind, and was
built by James Bethune, who was Archbishop of
Glasgow (1508-1524), Lord Chancellor of Scotland
in I 5 I 2, and one of the Lords Regent, under
the Duke of Albany, during the stormy minority of
James V. Pitscottie distinctlyrefers to it as the
xrchbishop?s house, ?? quhilk he biggit in the Freiris
Wynd,? and Keith records that over the door of it
were the arms of the family of Bethune, to be seen
in his time. But they had disappeared long before
the demolition of the house, the ancient risp of which
was sold among the collection of the late C. Kirkpatrick
Sharpe, in 1851. Another from the same
house is in the museum of the Scottish Antiquaries
The stone bearing the coat of arms was also in his
possession, and it is thus referred to by &bet in ... OLD AND NEW EDINBURGH. [High Street other services, Charles Philip Count d?artois, brother of the ill-fated ...

Book 2  p. 262
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282 OLD AND NEW EDINBURGH. [Lord PmYoss.
tion of five new professorships. A few years after
his death a bust of him by Nollekens was erected
in their public hall by the managers of the Royal
Infirmary.
In 1754 the Lord Provost, dean of guild, bailies,
and city treasurer, appeared in November, for the
first time, with gold chains and medals, in lieu of
the black velvet coats, which were laid aside by all
save the provost, and which had been first ordered
to be worn by an Act of the Council in I 7 I 8.
In 1753, on the 17th February, died Patrick
Lindsay, Esq., late Lord Provost of Edinburgh, and
Governor of the Isle of Man.
In 1768 the Lord Provost was James Stuart.
In the following year, during spring, the great Benjamin
Franklin and his son spent six weeks in Scotland,
and the University of St. Andrews conferred
upon him the honorary title of Doctor, by which he
has since been generally known. On his coming
to Edinburgh, Provost Stuart and the Corporation
bestowed upon him the freedom of the city, when
every house was thrown open to him, and the most
distinguished men of letters crowded round him.
Hume, Robertson, and Lord Kames, became his
intimate friends ; but Franklin was not unduly
elated, ?? On the whole,? he wrote, U I must say
the time I spent there (in Scotland) was six weeks
of the dearest happiness I have met with in any
part of my life.?
Stuart?s successor in ofice was John Dalrymple,
whose eldest son succeeded to the baronetcy of
Hailes (which is now extinct) on the death of Lord
Hailes, the distinguished judge and writer.
In the year 1774 there was considerable political
strife in the city, originating in the general parliamentary
election, when exertions were made to
wrest the representation from Sir Lawrence Dundas,
who unexpectedly found as opponents Loch of
Carnbie, and Captain James Francis Erskine of
Forrest. A charge of bribery being preferred against
Sir Lawrence, some delay occurred in the election,
and the then Lord Provost Stoddart came forward
as a candidate. The votes of the Council were-for
Sir Lawrence, twenty-three ; for Provost Stoddart,
six; and for Captain Erskine, three. One of the
Council, Gilbert Laurie (who had been provost in
1766) was absent. Messrs. Stoddart and Loch protested
that the election had been brought about by
undue influence.
The opposition to Sir Lawrence became still
greater, and a keen trial of strength took place when
the election of deacons and councillors came
in 1776, and many bitter letters appeared in the
public prints ; but the friends of the Dundas family
proved again triumphant, and united in the choice of
Alexander Kincaid, as Lord Provost, His Majesty?s
Printer for Scotland. He died in office in 1777,
in a house situated in the Cowgate, in a small court
westward of the Horse Wynd, and known as Kincaid?s
Land, and was succeeded by Provost Dalrymple.
Two years afterwards the city was assessed in
the sum of iC;1,500 to repay damage done by a mob
to the Roman Catholic place of worship, fo; the destruction
of furniture, ornaments, books, and altar
vessels. In this year, I 779, there were 188 hackney
sedan chairs in the city, but very few hackney
coaches; and the umbrella first appeared in the
streets. By 1783 there were 1,268 four-wheeled carriages
entered to pay duty, and 338 two-wheeled.
At Michaelmas, 1784, Sir James Hunter Blair,
Bart., was elected Lord Provost, in succession to
David Stuart, who resided in Queen Street, and
who was a younger son of Stuart of Dalguise. The
second son of Mr. John Hunter of Ayr, Sir James,
commenced life as an apprentice with Coutts and
Co., the Edinburgh bankers, in 1756, when Sir
William Forbes was then a clerk, and both became
ultimately the principal partners. He married the
eldest daughter of Blair of Dunskey, who left no
less than six sons at the time of this event, all of
whom died, and on her succession to the estates,
Sir James assumed the name and arms .of Blair.
As Lord Provost he was indefatigable in the
activity of his public spirit, and set afoot the great
operations for the improvement of Edinburgh, and
one object he had specially in view when founding
the South Bridge was the rebuilding of the
University.
Sir James lived only to see the commencement
of the great works he had projected in Edinburgh,
as he died of fever at Harrogate in July, 1787, and
was honoured with a public funeral in the Greyfriars?
churchyard. In private life he was affable
and cheerful, attached to his friends and anxious for
their success. In business and in his public exertions
he was upright, liberal, and, as a Scotsman,
patriotic; he possessed in no small degree those
talents which are requisite for rendering benevolence
effectual, uniting great knowledge of the
world with sagacity and sound understanding.
Sir James Stirling, Bart., elected Lord Provost,
after Elder of Forneth, had a stormy time when in
office. He was the son of a fishmonger at the
head of Marlin?s Wynd, where his sign was a
wooden Black BUZZ, now in the Antiquarian
Museum. Stirling, after being secretary to Sir
Charles Dalling, Governor of Jamaica, became a
partner in the bank of Mansfield, Ramsay, and Co.
in Cantore?s Close, Luckenbooths, and manied the ... OLD AND NEW EDINBURGH. [Lord PmYoss. tion of five new professorships. A few years after his death a bust of ...

Book 4  p. 282
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High Street I ST. CECILTA?S HALL. 25 I
years, and in June, 1749, died in a cottar?s humble
dwelling at Idragal, seventeen years after her abduction
on that evening of January from her house
in Niddry?s Wynd.
On the east side of Niddry?s Wynd, at the foot
thereof, and resting on the Cowgate, was St.
Cecilia?s Hall, an oval edifice, having a concave
ceiling, and built in 1762 by Robert Mylne, the
architect of Blackfriars Bridge (lineal descendant
of the royal master-masons) ?after the model
of the opera at Yarma,? says Kincaid. The orchestra
was placed over the north end, and therein
was placed a fine organ. It was seatqd for 500
persons.
The Musical Society of Edinburgh, whose weekly
concerts formed one of the most delightful entertainments
in the old city, dated back to the otherwise
gloomy era of 1728. Yet from ? Fountainhall?s
Decisions ? we learn that so far back as 1694
an enterprising citizen named Beck ?erected a
concert of music? somewhere in the city, which
involved him in a lawsuit with the Master of the
Revels. Even before I 7 28 several gentlemen, who
were performers on the harpsichord and violin, had
taken courage, and formed a weekly club at the
Cross Kys tavern, ?kept,? says knot, ?by one
Steil, a great lover of musick, and a good singer
of Scots songs.? Steil is mentioned in the Latin
lyrics of Dr. Pitcairn, who refers to a subject of
which he was fully master-the old Edinburgh
taverns of Queen Anne?s time. At Pate Steil?s the
common entertainment consisted in playing the
concertos and Sonatas of Corelli, then just published,
and the overtures of Handel. A governor, deputygovernor,
treasurer, and five directors, were annually
chosen to direct the affairs of this society, which
consisted of seventy members. They met in St.
Mary?s Chapel from 1728 till 1762, when this hall
was built for them.
Fc: some years the celebrated Tenducci, who is
mentioned in O?Keefe?s ? Recollections? in 1766 as
a famous singer of Scottish songs, was at the head of
the band ; and one great concert was given yearly
in honour of St. Cecilia, when Scottish songs were
among those chiefly sung. When the Prince of
Hesse came over, in 1745, with his 6,000 mercenaries,
to fight against the Jacobites, he was specially
entertained here by the then governor of the
Musical Society, Lord Drummore, Hugh Dalrymple.
The prince was not only a dilettante, but.a good
performer on an enormous violoncello. ?? Few
persons now living,? says Dr. Chambers in 1847,
? recollect the elegant concerts that were given
many years ago in what is now an obscure part of
our ancient city, known by the name- of St.
zecilia?s Hall,? and still fewer may remember them
On the death of Lord Drummore, in 1755, the
iociety performed a grand concert in honour of his
nemory, when the numerous company were all
lressed in the deepest mourning.
In I 7 63 the concerts began at six in the evening ;
n 1783 an hour later.
To the concertos of Corelli and Handel in the
iew hall, were added the overtures of Stamitz,
Bach, Abel, and latterly those of Haydn, Pleyel,
ind the magnificent symphonies of Mozart and
Beethoven. The vocal department of these old
:oncerts consisted of the songs of Handel, Arne,
;luck, and Guglielmi, with a great Infusion o f
jcottish songs, for as yet the fashionables of Ediniurgh
were too national to ignore their own stirring
nusic, and among the amateurs who took the lead
is choristers were the wealthy Gilbert Innes of
stow, Mr. Alexander Wight, advocate, Mt. John
Russell, W.S., and the Earl of Kellie, who on one
Iccasion acted as leader of the band when perbrming
one of six overtures of his own composition;
and though last, not least, Mr. George
rhomson, the well-known editor of the ? Melodies
>f Scotland.?
A snpper to the directors and their friends
it Fortune?s tavern always followed an oratorio,
where the names of the chief beauties who had
yaced the hall were toasted in bumpers from
;lasses of vast length, for exuberant loyalty to beauty
was a leading feature in the convivial meetings of
those days.
?Let me call to mind a few of those whose
lovely faces at the concerts gave us the sweetest
test for music,? wrote George Thomson, who died
in 1851, in his ninety-fourth year :-??Miss Cleghorn
of Edinburgh, still living in single blessedness ;
Miss Chalmers of Pittencrief, who married Sir
CVilliam Miller of Glenlee, Bart. ; Miss? Jessie
Chalmers of Edinburgh, who married Mr. Pringle
of Haining; Miss Hay of Hayston, who married
Sir William Forbes of Pitsligo, Bart. ; Miss
Murray of Lintrose, who was called the Flower of
Strathmore, and upon whom Burns wrote the song,
Brjhe, hlythe, and merry was she,
Blythe was she but and ben;
And blythe in Glenturit glen?
low.
Blythe by the bank? of Earn,
She married David Smith, Esq., of Methven,
one of the Lords of Session; Miss Jardine of
Edinburgh, who married Home Drunimond of
Blairdrummond, their daughter, if I mistake not,
is now Duchess of Athole; Miss Kinloch of Gilmerton,
who married Sir Foster Cunliffe of Acton ... Street I ST. CECILTA?S HALL. 25 I years, and in June, 1749, died in a cottar?s humble dwelling at Idragal, ...

Book 2  p. 251
(Score 0.21)

Holyrocd.] HOWIESON OF BRAEHEAD. 63
space of one year, with great triumph and mem
ness.? He diligently continued the works begur
by his gallant father, and erected the north-wes
towers, which have survived more than one con
flagration, and on the most northern of which coulc
be traced, till about 1820, his name, IACOBVS RE)
SCOTORVM, in large gilt Roman letters.
In 1528 blood was again shed in Holyrooc
during a great review of Douglases and Hamilton:
held there prior to a march against the Englis?
?borders. A groom of the Earl of Lennox perceiv
ing among those present Sir James Hamilton o
Finnart, who slew that noble at Linlithgow, intent or
vengeance, tracked him into the palace ?by a dad
staircase which led to a narrow gallery,? and then
attacked him, sword in hand. Sir James en
deavoured to defend himself by the aid of hi:
. velvet mantle, but fell, pierced by six wounds, nonc
of which, however, were mortal. The gates wen
closed, and while a general mClCe was on the poin
of ensuing between the Douglases and Hamil
tons, the would-be assassin was discovered With hi:
bloody weapon, put to the torture, and then hi:
right hand was cut 04 on which ?he observed
with a sarcastic smile, that it was punished les:
than it deserved for having failed to revenge tht
murder of his beloved master.??
James V. was still in the palace in 1530, as we find
in the treasurer?s accounts for that year : ?? Item, tc
the Egiptianis that dansit before the king in Holy
rud House, 40s.? He was a monarch whose pure
benevolence of intention often rendered his roman.
tic freaks venial, if not respectable, since from his
anxiety to learn the wants and wishes of his humbler
subjects he was wont, like Il Boadocan4 or Haroun
Alrdschid, to traverse the vicinity of his palaces
in the plainest of disguises ; and two comic songs,
composed by himself, entitled ?We?ll gang nae
mair a-roving,? and ?The Gaberlunzie Man,? are
said to have been founded on his adventures while
masked as a beggar; and one of these, which
nearly cost him his life at Cramond, some five
miles frum Holyrood, is given in Scott?s ?? Tales of
a Grandfather.?
While visiting a pretty peasant girl in Cramond
village he was beset by four or five persons, against
whom he made a stand with his sword upon the
high and narrow bridge that spans the Almond,
in a wooded hollow. Here, when well-nigh beaten,
and covered with blood, he was succoured and
rescued by a peasant armed with a flail, who conducted
him into a barn, where he bathed his wounds;
and in the course of conversation James discovered
that the summit of his deliverer?s earthly wishes
was to be proprietor of the little farm of Braehead,
on which he was then a labourer. Aware that it was
Crown property, James said, ?? Come to Holyrood,
and inquire for the gudeman of Ballengeich,? referring
to a part of Stirling Castle which he was
wont to adopt as a cognomen.
The peasant came as appointed, and was met
by the king in his disguise, who conducted him
through the palace, and asked him if he wished
to see the king. John Howison-for such was his
name-expressed the joy it would give him, provided
he gave no offence. But how shall I know
him?? he added.
? Easily,? replied James, ?All others will be
bareheaded, the king alone will wear his bonnet.?
Scared by his surroundings and the uncovered
crowd in the great hall, John Howison looked
around him, and then said, naively, ?The king
must be either you or me, for all but us are bareheaded.?
James and his courtiers laughed ; but
he bestowed upon Howison the lands of Braehead,
?? on condition that he and his successors should
be ready to present an ewer and basin for the king
to wash his hands when His Majesty should come
to Holyrood or pass the bridge of Cramond.
Accordingly, in the year 1822, when George IV.
came to Scotland, a descendant of John Howison,
whose hmily still possess the estate, appeared at a
solemn festival, and offered His Majesty water from
a silver ewer, that he might perform the service by
which he held his land.?
Such pranks as these were ended by the king?s marriage
in I 53 7 to the Princess Magdalene, the beautiful
daughter of Francis I., with unwonted splendour in
the cathedral of Notre Dame, in presence of the
Parliament of Paris, of Francis, the Queens of
France and Navarre, the Dauphin, Duke of Orleans,
md all the leading peers of Scotland and o(
France. On the 27th of May the royal pair
landed at Leith, amid every display of welcome,
md remained a few days at Holyrood, tin the
mthusiastic citizens prepared to receive them in
state with a procession of magnificence.
Magdalene, over whose rare beauty consump-
:ion seemed to spread a veil more tender and
rlluring, was affectionate and loving in nature. On
anding, in the excess of her love for James,
;he knelt down, and, kissing the soil, prayed God
:o bless the land of her adoption-scotland, and
ts people.
The ? Burgh Records ? bear witness how anxious
he Provost and citizens were to do honour to the
)ride of ?? the good King James. All beggars were
varned off the streets : ?lane honest man of ilk
:lose or two,? were to see this order enforced ; the
vbbish near John Makgill?s house and ?the litster ... HOWIESON OF BRAEHEAD. 63 space of one year, with great triumph and mem ness.? He diligently continued ...

Book 3  p. 63
(Score 0.21)

230 OLD AND NEW EDINBUXGH. [High Street.
?; two such animals in the whole island of Great
Britain.?
Between the back and front tenements occupied
of old by Andro Hart is a house, once a famous
tavern, which formed the meeting-place of the Cape
Club, one of the most noted of those wherein the
leading men of ? Auld Reekie? were wont to seek
relaxation-one celebrated in Fergusson?s poem on
the city, and where a system of ? high jinks ? was
kept up with an ardour that never abated.
In this tavern, then, the IsZe of Man Arms, kept
by James Mann, in Craig?s Close, the ? Cape
Club? was nightly inaugurated, each member receiving
on his election some grotesque name and
character, which he was expected to retain and
maintain for the future. From its minutes, which
are preserved in the Antiquarian Museum, the club
appears to have been formally constituted in 1764,
though it had existed long before. Its insignia
were a cape, or crown, worn by the Soverezgn of the
Cape on State occasions, when certain other members
wore badges, or jewels of office, and two
maces in the form of huge steel pokers, engraven
with mottoes, and still preserved in Edinburgh,
formed the sword and sceptre of the King in Cape
Hall, when the jovial fraternity met for high jinks,
and Tom Lancashire the comedian, Robert Fergusson
the poet, David Herd, Alexander Runciman,
Jacob More, Walter Ross the antiquary,
Gavin Wilson the poetical shoemaker, the Laird
of Cardrona a ban zivani of the last century, Sir
Henry Raeburn, and, strange to say, the notorious
Deacon Brodie, met round the ?flowing bowl.?
Tom Lancashire-on whom Fergusson wrote a
witty epitaph-was the first sovereign of the club
after 1764, as Sir Cape, while the title of Sir Poker
belonged to its oldest member, James Aitken.
David Herd, the ingenious collector of Scottish
ballad poetry, succeeded Lancashire (who was a
celebrated comedian in his day), under the sobriquet
of Sir Scrape, having as secretary Jacob More,
who attained fame as a landscape painter in Rome ;
and doubtless his pencil and that of Runciman, produced
many of the illustrations and caricatures
with which the old MS. books of the club abound.
When a knight of the Cape was inaugurated he
was led forward by his sponsors, and kneeling
before the sovereign, had to grasp the poker, and
take an oath of fidelity, the knights standing by
uncovered :-
.
? I devoutly swear by this light.
With all my might,
Both day and night,
To be a tme and faithful knight,
So help me Poker !?
The knights presented his Majesty with a contribution
of IOO guineas to assist in raising troops in
1778. The entrance-fee to this amusing club was
originally half-a-crown, and eventually it rose to a
guinea ; but so economical were the mevbers, that
among the last entries in their minutes was one to
the effect that the suppers should be at ?the old
price ? of 44d. a head. Lancashire the comedian,
leaving the stage, seems to have eked out a meagre
subsistence by opening in the Canongate a tavern,
where he was kindly patronised by the knights of
the Cape, and they subsequently paid him visits at
? Comedy Hut, New Edinburgh,? a place of entertainment
which he opened somewhere beyond the
bank of the North Loch ; and soon after this convivial
club-one of the many wherein grave citizens
and learned counsellors cast aside their powdered
wigs, and betook them to what may now seem madcap
revelry in very contrast to the rigid decorum
of everyday life-passed completely away j but a
foot-note to Wilson?s ? Memorials ? informs us that
? Provincial Cape Clubs, deriving their authority
and diplomas from the parent body, were successively
formed in Glasgow, Manchester, and London,
and in Charleston, South Carolina, each of
which was formally established in virtue of a royal
commission granted by the Sovereign of the Cape.
The American off-shoot of this old Edinburgh fra
ternity is said to be still flourishing in the Southern
States.?
In the ?Life of Lord Kames,? by Lord Woodhouselee,
we have an account of the Poker Club,
which held its meetings near this spot, at ?? our old
landlord of the Diversorium, Tom Nicholson?s, near
the cross. The dinner was on the table at two
o?clock ; we drank the best claret and sherry ; and
the reckoning was punctually called at six o?clock.
After the first fifteen, who were chosen by nomination,
the members were elected by ballot, and two
black balls excluded a candidate.?
A political question-on the expediency of establishing
a Scottish militia (while Charles Edward and
Cardinal York were living in Rome)-divided the
Scottish public mind greatly between 1760 and
1762, and gave rise to the club in the latter yean
and it subsisted in vigour and celebrity till 1784,
and continued its weekly meetings with great replarity,
long after the object of its institution had
ceased to engage attention; and it can scarcely be
doubted that its influence was considerable in fostering
talent and promoting elegant literature in
Edinburgh, though the few publications of a literary
nature that had been published under the auspices
of the club were, like most of that nature, ephemeral,
and are now utterly forgotten. ... OLD AND NEW EDINBUXGH. [High Street. ?; two such animals in the whole island of Great Britain.? Between the ...

Book 2  p. 230
(Score 0.21)

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