made answer in a true technico-Caledonian strain
-?Oo, Doctor Morris, they are just a wheen
Kts, and (added he, with a most knowing compression
of his lips) let me tell you what, Doctor
Moms, there?s some no that ill bits among them.?
One proved to be an exquisitely finished sketch
by Sir William Allan, ?Two Tartar robbers dividing
their spoil.? This led to a proposal to visit
the artist?s atelier, and we. had no great distance to
walk, for Mr. Allan lives in the Parliament Close,
not a gun-shot from where we were.?
Mr. Bridges married Flora Macdonald of Scalpa
(sister of the heroic Sir John Macdonald, whose
powerful hand, with a few of the Scots Guards,
closed the gates of Hougomont), and died in
November, 1840.
One of the finest specimens of the woodenfronted
houses of 1540 was on the south side ol
the Lawnmarket, and was standing all unchanged,
after the lapse of more than 338 years, till its
demolition in 1878-9 (see the engraving aftex
Ewbank?s view of It, .p. rcq). ?As niay be ob
served, its north front, each storey of which advances
a little over that below, is not deficient in elegance,
there being Doric pilasters of timber interspersed
with the windows of one floor, and some decoration:
on the gable presented to the street. The wed
front is plaicer, in consequence apparently of re.
pairs ; but we there see the covered space in fronl
of the place for merchandise on the ground floor.?
A little east of the building, in the first or
smaller part of Riddell?s Close, which, like all others
on the south side, ran down towards the Cowgate,
a lofty tenement towers upward, with a turret
stair, dated 1726. This was the first residence of
David Hume, and there it was he mote the first
pages of his History. In 1751 he came hither
from his paternal place Ninewells, near Dunse, and
soon after he wrote to Adam Smith :-cc Direct
to me in Riddell?s Land, Lawnmarket. .? . .
I have now at last, being turned forty, to my
own honour, to that of learning, and to that of
the present age, arrived at the dignity of being a
householder! About seven months ago I got a
house of my own, and completed a regular family,
consisting of a head-myself-and two inferior
members, a maid and a cat. My sister has just
joined me, and keeps me company. With frugality,
I can reach, I find, cleanliness, warmth, light,
plenty, and contentment?
In the following year he succeeded Ruddiman
as Librarian to the Faculty of Advocates.
On the opposite side of this small dark court is
a more ancient house, having a curious wainscoted
room, the ceiling, walls, and every panel of which
are elaborately decorated in Norrie?s style of art;
and therein abode Sir John Smith of Grothall
(already mentioned), Provost of Edinburgh, and
whose name was long borne by the alley. He?
was one of the commissioners chosen, in 1650,
to convey the loyal assurances of the realm to
Charles 11. and Breda, and to have the Covenant
duly subscribed by him.
In the inner part of Riddell?s Close stands the
house of Bailie John Macmorran, whose tragic
death made a great stir at its time, threw the city
into painful excitement, and tarnished the reputation
of the famous old High School. The conduct
of the scholars there had been bad and turbulent
for some years, but it reached a climax on the
15th of September, 1595. On a week?s holiday
being refused, the boys were so exasperated, being
chiefly ? gentilmane?s bairnes,? that they formed
a compact for vengeance in the true spirit of the
age; and, armed with swords and pistols, took
possession at midnight of the ancient school in the
Blackfnars Gardens, and declining to admit the
masters or any one else, made preparation to stand
a siege, setting all authority at defiance.
The doors were not only shut but bamcaded and
strongly guarded within ; all attempts to storm the
boy-garrison proved impracticable, and all efforts
at reconciliation were unavailing. The Town
Council lost patience, and sent Bailie John
Macmorran, one of the wealthiest merchants in
the city (though he had begun life as a servant to
the Regent Morton), with a posse of city officers,
to enforce the peace. On their appearance in the
school-yard the boys became simply outrageous,
and mocked them as buttery carles,? daring any
one to approach at his peril. ?To the point likely
to be first attacked,? says Steven, in his history of
the school, they were observed to throng in a
highly excited state, and each seemed to vie with
his fellow in threatening instant death to the man
who should forcibly attempt to displace them.
William Sinclair, son of the Chancellor of Caithness,
had taken a conspicuous share in this bamng out,
and he now appeared foremost, encouraging his
confederates,? and stood at a window overlooking
one of the entrances which the Bailie ordered the
officers to force, by using a long beam as a battering
ram, and he had nearly accomplished his perilous
purpose, when a ball in the forehead from Sinclair?s
pistol slew him on the spot, and he fell on his
back.
Panic-stricken, the boys surrendered. Some
effected their escape, and others, including Sinclair
and the sons of Murray of Springiedale, and Pringle
of Whitebank, were thrown into prison. Macmor
ran?s family were too rich to be bribed, and
clamoured that they would have blood for blood.
On the other hand, ?friends threatened death to
a l l the people of Edinburgh if they did.the child
any harm, saying they were not wise who meddled
with scholars, especially gentlemen?s sons,? and Lord
Sinclair, as chief of the family to which the young
culprit belonged, moved boldly in his behalf, and
procured the intercession of King James with the
magistrates, and in the end all the accused got
free, including the slayer of the Bailie, who lived to
become Sir William Sinclair of hfey, in 1631, and
the husband of Catharine ROSS, of Balnagowan,
and from them the present Earls of Caithness are
descended.
When the brother of the Queen Consort, the
Duke of Holstein, visited Edinburgh in March,
t593, and as Moyse tells us, ?was received and
welcomed very gladly by Her Majesty, and used
every way like a prince,? after sundry entertainments
at Holyrood, Ravensheugh, and elsewhere,
a grand banquet was given him in the house of
the late Bailie Macmorran by the city of Edmburgh.
The King and Queen were present, ? with
great solemnity and merriness,? according to Birrel.
On the 3rd of June the Duke embarked at Leith,
under a salute of sixty pieces of cannon from the
bulwarks, and departed with his gifts, to Wit-1,ooo
five-pound pieces and 1,000 crowns, a hat and
string valued at IZ,OOO pounds (Scots?), and many
rich chains and jewels.
The Bailie?s initials, I. M., are on the pediments
that ornament his house, which after passing
through several generations of his surname, became
the residence of Sir John Clerk of Penicuik.
?By him,? says Wilson, ?it was sold to Sir
Roderick Mackenzie, of Preston Hall, appointed
tr senator of the College of Justice in 1702, who
resided in the upper part of the house at the same
time that Sir John Mackenzie Lord Royston, third
son of the celebrated Earl of Cromarty, one of the
wittiest and most gifted men of his time, occupied
the low flat. Here, in all probability, his witty
and eccentric daughter Anne was born and brought
up. This lady, who married Sir William Dick of
Prestonfield, carried her humorous pranks to an
excess scarcely conceivable in our decorous days j
sallying out occasionally in search of adventures,
like some of the maids of honour of Charles II.?s
Court, dressed in male attire, with. her maid for a
squire. She seems to have possessed more wit
than discretion.? Riddell?s Close was of old an
eminently aristocratic quarter.
Lower down the street Fisher?s Close adjoined
it, and therein stood, till 1835, the residence of the
ducal house of Buccleuch, which was demolished
in that year to make way for Victoria Terrace. On
the east side of an open court, beyond the Roman
Eagle Hall-a beautiful specimen of an ancient
saloon-stood the mansion of William Little of
Craigmillar (bearing the date 1570)~ whose brother
Clement was the founder of the university library,
for in 1580, when commissary of the city, he bequeathed
?to Edinburgh and the Kirk of God,?
all his books, 300 volumes in number. These
were chiefly theologicaL works, and were transferred
by the town council td the university. Clement
Little was not without having a share in the
troubles of those days, and on the 28th of April,
1572, with others, he was proclaimed at the market
cross, and deprived of his office, for rebellion against
Queen Mary ; but the proclamation failed to be put
in force. His son was Provost of the city in 1591.
Clement and William Little were buried in the
Greyfriars? churchyard, where a great-grandson of
the latter erected a tomb to their memory in 1683.~
Little?s Close appears as Lord Cullen?s in Edgar?s
map of 1742, so there had also resided that famous
lawyer and judge, Sir Francis Grant of Cullen, who
joined the Revolution party in 1688, who distinguished
himself in the Convention of 1689 by his
speech in favour of confemng the cram of Scotland
on William and Mary of Orange, and thus swayed
the destinies of the nation. He was raised to the
bench in 1709. His friend Wodrow has recorded
the closing scene of his active life in this old alley,
on the 16th of March, 1726. ?Brother,? said the
old revolutionist, to one who informed him that
his illness was mortal, ?you have brought me the
best news ever I heard ! ? ?? And,? adds old Robert
Wodrow, ?that day when he died was without a
czoud.?
_-
Menteth?s ??Iheatrc of Mortality.?? Eh, 1704.
