THE GREAT WINCOW. ?59 Parliament Hoox.]
obelisks, with the motto Bominus cusfodif infroifurn
msfrunz. The destruction of all this was utterly
unwarrantable.
The tapestries with which the hall was hung
were all removed about the end of the last century,
and now its pictnres, statues, and decorations of
Scotland?s elder and latter days replace them.
Of the statues of the distinguished Scottish
statesmen and lawyers, the most noticeable are a
colossal one of Henry first Viscount Melville in
his robes as a peer, by Chantrey ; on his left is Lord
Cockburn, by Brodie ; Duncan Forbes of Culloden,
in his judicial costume as President of the Court,
by Roubiliac (a fine example) ; the Lord President
Boyle, and Lord Jeffrey, by Steel ; the Lord President
Blair (son of the author of ?The Grave?),
by Chantrey.. .
On the opposite or eastern side of the hall
(which stands north and south) is the statue
of Robert Dundas of Arniston, Lord Chief Baron
of the Scottish Exchequer, also by Chautrey;
portraits, many of them of considerable antiquity,
some by Jameson, a Scottish painter who studied
under Rubens at Antwerp. But the most remarkable
among the modern portraits are those of
Lord Broiigham, by Sir Daniel Macnee, P.R.S.A. ;
Lord Colonsay, formerly President of the Court,
and the Lord Justice-clerk Hope, both by the
same artist. Thete are also two very tine pQrtraits
of Lord Abercrombie and Professor Bell, by Sir
Henry Raeburn.
Light is given to this interestihg hall by fouI
windows on the side, and the great window on the
south. It is of stained glass, and trulymagnificent.
It was erected in 1868 at a cost of Az,ooo, and
was the work of two German artists, having been
designed by Wilhelm von Kaulbach, and executed
by the Chevalier Ainmiller of Munich. It repre.
sents the inauguration of the College of Justice, 01:
the Supreme Court of Scotland, by King Tames V.,
in 1532. The opening of the court is supposed by
the artist to have been the. occasion of a grand
state ceremonial, and the moment chosen for
representation is that in which the young king,
surrounded by his nobles and great officers
of state, is depicted in the ,act of presenting
the charter of institution and of confirniation by
Pope Clement VII. to Alexander Mylne, Abbot
of Cambuskenneth, the first Lord President, wha
kneels before him to receive it, surrounded by the
other judges in their robes, while the then Lord
Chancellor of Scotland, Gavin Dunbar, ArchbishoF
of Glasgow, and afterwards of St. Andrews, with
upraised hand invokes a.blessing on the act.
In 1870 the four side windows on the west of the
la11 were filled in with stained glass Qf a heraldic
:haracter, under the superintendence of the late
Sir George Harvey, president of the Royal Scottish
kcadeniy. Each window is twenty feet high
~y nine wide, divided by a central mullion, the
:racery between being occupied by the armorial
learings and crests of the various Lord Justice-
Zlerks, the great legal writers of the Faculty of
Advocates, those of the Deans of Faculty, and the
Lords Advocate.
This old hall has been the scene of many a
;reat event and many a strange debate, and most
Df the proceedings that took place here belong
to the history of the country j for with the exception
of the Castle and the ancient portion of Holyrood,
no edifice in the city is so rich in historic
memories.
Beneath the old roof consecrated to these, says
one of its latest chroniclers, ? the first ?great movements
of the Civil War took place, and the successive
steps in that eventful crisis were debated
with a zeal commensurate to the important results
involved in them. Here Montrose united with
Rothes, Lindsay, Loudon, and others of the
covenanting leaders, in maturing the bold measures
that formed the basis of our national liberties ; and
within the same hall, only a few years later, he sat
with the calmness of despair, to receive from the
lips of his old compatriot, Loudon, the barbarous
sentence, which was executed with such savage
rigour.?
After his victory at Dunbar, some of Cromwell?s
troopers in their falling bands, buff coats, and steel
morions, spent their time alternately in preaching to
the people in the Parliament Hall and guarding a
number of Scottish prisoners of war who were confined
in ? the laigh Parliament House ? below it
On the 17th of May, 1654, some of these contrived
to cut a hole in the floor of the great hall, and all
effected their escape save two; but when peace
was established between Croniwell and the Scots,
and the Courts of Law resumed their sittings,
the hall was restored to somewhat of its legitimate
uses, and there, in 1655, the leaders of the Commonwealth,
including General Monk, were feasted
with a lavish hospitality.
In 1660, under the auspices of the same republican
general, came to pass ? the - glorious
Restoration,? when the magistrates had a banquet
Ft the cross, and gave _~;I,OOO sterling to the king;
and his brother, the Duke of Albany and York, who
came as Koyal Commissioner, was feasted in the
same hall with his Princess Mary d?Este and his
daughter, the future Queen Anne, surrounded by all
the high-born and beautiful in Scotland. But dark
