THE HIGH STREET AND NETHER BO W. 251
so near their ancient burgh. The port was accordingly shut up, and the sluices of the
North Loch closed, so as to flood a small mound that had afforded a footpath to the
port for the freetraders of this obnoxious village. The battle was stoutly maintained for
a time, but the magistrates finding the law somewhat rigid in its investigation of their
right over the city ports, and the election most probably being satisfactorily settled meanwhile,
they opened the port of their own accord, and allowed the sluices of the North
Loch again to run.
twenb years, a very handsome and substantial old stone land, with large and neatly moulded
windows, and abounding with curious irregular projections, adapting it to its straitened
site. Over the main entrance was a finely carved lintel, having the Williamson arms
boldly cut in high relief, with the initials I - W - accompanied by a singular device of the
moss of passion springing from the centre of a saltier, and the inscription and date in
large Roman letters, FEIR - GOD * IN * LUIF * 1595.
The ancient timber-fronted land which faces the street at the head of this close is
one possessing peculiar claims to our interest, as the
scene of Allan Ramsay’s earlier labours, where, “ at
the sign of the Mercury, opposite to Niddry’s Wynd,”
he prosecuted his latter business as author, editor,
and bookseller. From thence issued his poems
printed in single sheets, or half sheets, as they were
written, in which Fhape they ‘are reported to have
found a ready sale; the citizens being in the habit
of sending their children with a penny for ‘‘ Allan
Ramsay’s last piece.”’ Encouraged by the favourable
reception of his poetic labours, he at length
published proposals for a re-issue of his works in a
collected form, and, accordingly, in 1721, they
appeared .in one handsome quarto volume, with a
portrait of the author from the pencil of his friend
Smibert. Ramsay continued to carry on business
at the sign of the Mercury till the year 1725, so
that nearly all his original publications issued from
this ancient fabric. In that year he removed to the famous land in the Luckenbooths,
which has been already minutely described. The accompanying vignette represents
the former building as it existed previous to 1845, when a portion of the timber front
was removed, and the picturesque character of the old land somewhat marred by modern
alterations.
Immediately to the east of Ramsay’s old shop, a plain and narrow pend gives access
to Carrubber’s Close, the retreat of the faithful remnant of the Jacobites of 1688. Here,
about half way down the close, on the east side, St Paul’s Chapel still stands, a plain and
unpretending edifice, erected immediately after the Revolution. Thither the persecuted
In Kinloch’s Close, immediately adjoining this wpd, there stood, till within the last-
-
l Scottish Biographical Dictionary, Aficle Ramsay.
VIGNETT6Ah.U Ramaay’s shop, opposite Niddry’s Wynd.
