THE LA WNMARKET. I73
to accomplish the foresaid bigging,” &c. This royal mandate not seeming to have produced
the ready acquiescence that was doubtless anticipated, King James, in the following
August, assumes the imperative mode,--“ Whereas the said Robert Gourlay is quarelled
and troubled for diminishing of ye breid and largeness of ye passage thereof, by use and
wont j albeit ye said vennel be na common nor free passage, lyke as ye same hath not been
this long time bygane, being only ane stay hill besouth ye said new wark, and nevir calsayit
nor usit as ane oppen and comoun vennall, lyke as na manner of persones has now, nor
can justlie plead ony richt or entrie to ye said vennal, q’“ be all lawis inviolable observit
in tymes bygane has pertainit, and aucht to pertene to US; ” and to make sure of the
matter this time, his Majesty closes by authorising the buildingof a dyke across the close,
“ notwithstanding that ye said transe and vennall have been at ony time of before, repute
or halden ane comoun and free passage I ”
The result of this mandate of royalty would appear to have been the erection of the house
at the foot of the close,-the only other building that had an entrance by it,-apparently
as the dwelling for his son, John Gourlay. This ancient edifice possessed a national interest
as having been the place where the earliest banking institution in Scotland was establislied.
The Bank of Scotland, or, as it was more generally styled by our ancestors, the Old Bank,
continued to carry on all its. business there, within the narrow alley that bore its name,
until the completion of the extensive erection in Bank Street, whither it removed in 1805.
The house bore the date 1588, the same year as that of the royal mandates authorising its
erection, and on an upright stone panel, on its north front, a device was sculptured representing
several stalks of wheat growing out of bones, with the motto, SPES ALTERA
VITAL The same ingenious emblem of the resurrection may still be seen on the fine
old range of buildings opposite the Canongate Tolbooth.
The only notice of Robert Gourlay we have been able to discover occurs in Calderwood‘
s History, and is worth extracting, for the illustration it affords of the extensive
jurisdiction the kirk was disposed to assume to itself in his day :-“ About this time,
Robert Gourlay, an elder of the Kirk of Edinburgh, was ordeanned to mak his publict
repentance in the kirk upon Friday, the 28th May [1574],for transporting mheate out of
the countrie.” The Regent, however, interfered, and interposed his licence as sufficient
security against the threatened discipline of the church.l
’John Gourlay is styled in some of his titles “ customar,” that is, one who “ taks taxatiounis,
custumis, or dewteis; ’” and his father also, in all probability, occupied a
situation of some importance in the royal household; nor is it to be supposed it was
altogether ‘‘ out of mere love and gade will” that King James was so ready to secure
to him the absolute control over the close wherein he built his house. It was a building
of peculiar strength and massiveness, and singularly intricate in its arrangements, even
for that period. Distinct and substantial stone .stairs led from nearly the same point
to separate parts of the mansion; and on its demolition, a most ingeniously contrived
secret chamber was discovered, between the ceiling of the first and the floor of the second
story, in which were several chests full of old deeds and other papers.’ A carved stone,
at the side of the highest entrance in the close, bore a shield with a martlet on it,
’ Calderwood, voL iii p. 328. ’ Vide Jamieaon’s Scottish Dictionary.
J Now in the Chambers of the Improvements Commission. . .
