I 16 MEMORIALS OF EDINBURGH.
We shall only add, that until our civic rulers manifest, by some such act, 8 regard for the
monuments of antiquity committed to their care, they must take their unenviable share in
the minstrel’s curse :-
Dun Edin’s Cross, a pillar’d stone,
Rose on a turret octagon ;
But now is razed that monument,
Whence royal edict rang,
And voice of Scotland‘s law was sent
In glorious trumpet clang.
Oh I be his tomb as lead to lead,
Upon its dull destroyer’s head. !-
A minstrel’s malison is said?
Large portions of the city wall have been demolished from time to time, owing to the
extension of the town and the many alterations that have been made on the older portions
of it, so that only a few scattered fragments remain. These, however, are sufficient to show
the nature of the aucient fortifications. No part of the earliest wall, erected under the
charter of James II., in 1450, is now visible, if we except the fine old ruin of the Wellhouse
tower, at the base of the Castle rock, which formed 8 strong protection at that
point where the overhanging cliff might have otherwise enabled an enemy to approach under
its shelter. A fragment of this wall, about fifty feet long and twenty feet in height, was
found in 1832, about ten feet south from the Advocates’ Library: when digging for the
foundations of a new lock-up-house, in connection with the Parliament House ; and, in
1845, another considerable portion
was disclosed to the east
of this, on the site of the old
Parliament Stairs, in making
the more recent additions to
the same building. Both of
these fragments have been
closed over by the new buildings,
and may in all probability
continue to exist for
centuries. The next addition
to the fortifications of the
city is the well-known Flodden
wall, reared, as already described,
by the terrified citizens
in 1513.’ Of this there still
remains the large portion forming
the north side of Drummond Street; an interesting little fragment at the back of
the Society, at Bristo Port, cnripusly pierced for windows and other openings; and,
lastly, the old tower in the Vennel, already alluded to, which, thankpl to the zealous
efforts of Dr Neill, has been preserved from destruction, when the Town Council had
already prouounced its doom as a useless encumbrance. We furnish a view of its in-
Marmion, canto v. v. 25. Minor Antiquitiee, p. 73, ’ Ante, p. 35.
VIGNETTE-hteriOr of the Tower in the Vennel.
