High Street. NIDDRY?S WYND. 245
to protect the powdered head of loftily-dressed
hair, when walking or driving, and it could be
folded back flat like the hood of a carriage ; they
also wore the capuchin or short cloak tippet,
reaching to the elbows, usually of silk. trimmed
with velvet or lace. In walking, they camed the
skirt of the long gown over one arm, a necessary
precaution in the wynds and closes of 1750, as
well as to display the rich petticoat below ; but on
.entering a room, the full train swept majestically
behind them ; and their stays were SO long, as to
touch the chair before and behind when seated.
The vast hoops proved a serious inconvenience
in the turnpike stairs of the Old Town, when, as
ladies had to tilt them up, it wa5 absolutely necessary
to have a fine show petticoat beneath; and
we are told that such ?? care was taken of appear-
.ances, that even the gartxs were worn fine, being
either embroidered, or having gold or silver fringes
and tassels. , . . Plaids were worn by ladies to
cover their heads and muffle their faces when they
went into the street ; ? and we have already shown
how vain were the fulniinations of magistrates
.against the latter fzshion.
In 1733 the silk stockings worn by ladies and
gentlemen were so thick, and so heavily adorned
with gold and silver, that they could rarely be
washed perhaps more than once. The Scottish
ladies used enormous Dutch fans ; and all women
high and low ,wore prodigious busks.
Below the Old Assembly Close is one named
from the Covenant, that great national document
and solemn protest against interference with the
Teligion of a free people having been placed for
signature at a period after 1638 in an old mansion
long afterwards used as a tavern at the foot of
the alley.
Lower down we come to Bell?s Wynd, 146, High
Street, which contained another Assembly Room,
for the Edinburgh fashionables, removed thither, in
1758, to a more commodious hall, and there the
weekly reunions and other balls were held in the
season, until the erection of the new hall in George
Street.
Hair Street, and Hunter?s Square, which was built
in 1788, occasioned the removal of more than
one old alley that led down southward to the
Cowgate, among them were Marlin?s and Peebles?
Wynds, to which we shall refer when treating of
the North and South Bridges. The first tenement
of the former at the right corner, descending, marks
the site of Kennedy?s Close, on the first floor of
the first turnpike on the left hand, wherein George
Buchanan, the historian and poet, died in his 76th
year, on the morning of Friday the 28th of
September, 1582, and from whence he was borne
to his last home in the Greyfkiars? churchyard.
The last weeks of his life were spent, it is alleged,
in the final correction of the proofs of his history,
equally remarkable for its pure Latinity and for its
partisan spirit. He survived its appearance only a
month.
When on his death-bed, finding that all the
money he had about him was insufficient to defray
the expense of his funeral, he ordered his servant
to divide it among the poor, adding ?that if the
city did not choose to bury him they might let him
lie where he was.?
The site of his grave is now unknown, though a
?throchstone ? would seem to have marked it so
lately as 1710. A skull, believed to be that of
Buchanan, is preserved in the hluseum of the
University, and is so remarkably thin as to be
transparent; but the evidence in favour of the
tradition, though not conclusive, does not render
its truth improbable. From the Council Records
in 1701, it would seem that Buchanan?s gravestone
had sunk into the earth, and had gradually
been covered up.
In the En?inburph Magazine for 1788 we are told
that the areas of some of the demolished closes
westward of the Tron Church and facing Blair
Street, were exposed for sale in April, and that
?? the first lot immediately west of the new opening
sold for _f;z,ooo, and that to the southward for
A1,500, being the upset price of both.?
Niddry?s Street, which opens eastward of the
South Bridge, occupies the site of Niddry?s Wynd,
an ancient thoroughfare, which bore an important
part in the history of the city. ? It is well known,?
says Wilson, ? that King James VI. was very condescending
in his favours to his loyal citizens of
Edinburgh, making no scruple, when the larder
of Holyrood grew lean, and the privy purse was
exhausted, to give up housekeeping for a time,
and honour one or other of the substantial burghers
of his capital with a visit of himself and household
; or when the straitened mansions within the
closes of old Edinburgh proved insufficient singly
to accommodate the hungry train of courtiers, he
would very considerately distribute his favours
through the whole length of tlie close ! ?
Thus from Moyse?s (or Moyses?) Memoirs, page
I 82, we learn that when James was troubled by the
Earl of Bothwell in January, 1591, and ordered
Sir James Sandilands to apprehend him, he, with
the Queen and Chancellor (and theirsuiteof course),
?withdrew themselves within the town of Edinburgh,
and lodged themselves in Nicol Edward?s
house, in Niddry?s Wynd, and the Chancellor in
