246 OLD AND NEW EDINBURGH. [High Street.
OF the house of Provost Nicol Edward (or Udward,
to which we have referred) a very elaborate
description is given in the work entitled ? Minor
Alexander Clark?s house, at the same wynd head.?
In after years the lintel of this house was built in to
Ross?s Tower, at the Dean. It bore this legend :-
?THE LORD IS MY PROTECTOR,
ALEXANDRUS CLARK.?
Nicol Edward was Provost of Edinburgh in 1591,
and his house was a large and substantial building
of quadrangular form and elegant proportions.
The Chancellor at this time was Sir John Maitland
of Lethington, Lord Thirlestane.
Moyses next tells us that on the 7th of February,
George Earl of Huntly (the same fiery peer who
fought the battle of Glenlivat), ? with his friends,
to the number of five or six score horse, passed
from his Majesty?s said house in Edinburgh, as intending
to pass to a horse-race in Leith ; but after
they came, they passed forward to the Queensferry,
where they caused to stop the passing of all
boats over the water,? and &ossing to Fife, attacked
the Castle of Donnibristle, and slew ?? the bonnie
Earl of Murray.?
From this passage it would seem that if Huntly?s
six score horse were not lodged in Nicol Edward?s
house, they were probably billeted over all the
adjacent wynd, which six years after was the scene
of a homicide, that affords a remarkable illustration
of the exclusive rule of master over man which
then prevailed.
On the first day of the sitting of Parliament, the
7th December, 1597, Archibald Jardine, niasterstabler
and servitor to the Earl of Angus, was slain,
through some negligence, by Andrew Stalker, a
,goldsmith at Niddry?s Wynd head, for which he was
put in prison.
Then the cry of ??Armour !? went through the
streets, and all the young men of Edinburgh rose in
arms, under James Williamson, their captain, ?? and
desirit grace,? as Birrel records, ?for the young
man who had done ane reckless deed. The
King?s majesty desirit them to go to my Lord
of Angus, the man?s master, and satisfy and
carved his arms, with an anagram upon his name
thus :- ?* VA @UN VOL h CHRIST ?-
pacify his wrath, and he should be contentit to
save his life.?
James Williamson thereupon went to the Earl of
Angus, and offered, in the name of the young men
of the city, ? their manreid,? or bond of man-rent,
to be ready to serve him in war and feud, upon
which he pardoned the said Andrew Stalker, who
was immediately released from prison.
In December, 1665, Nicoll mentions that a
doctor of physic named Joanna Baptista, acting
under a warrant from his Majesty Charles II.,
erected a stage between the head of Niddry?s Wynd
and Blackfriars? Wynd, whereon ?he vended his
drugs, powder, and medicaments, for the whilk he
received a great abundance of money.?
In May, 1692, we read that William Livingstone,
brother of the Viscount Kilsyth, a cavalier, and
husband of the widow of Viscount Dundee, had
been a prisoner in the Tolbooth from June, 1689,
to November, 1690-seventeen months ; thereafter,
that he had lived in a chamber in the city
under a guard for a year, and that he was permitted
to go forth for a walk daily, but still under the eye
of a guard. In consequence of his being thus
treated, and his rents being sequestrated by the
Revolutionary Government, his fortune was entirely
ruined. On his petition, the Privy Council now
permitted him ? to go abroad under a sentinel each
day.from morning to evening furth of the house of
Andrew Smith, periwig-maker, at the head of
Niddry?s Wynd,? he finding caution under A;1,500
sterling to remain a prisoner.
Under an escort of dragoons he was permitted
to leave the periwig-maker?s, and visit Kilsyth, after
which he was confined in two royal castles and the
Tolbooth till 1693, ?so that, as a writer remarks,
?in the course of the first five years of British
liberty, Mr. Livingstone must have acquired a
tolerably extensive acquaintance with the various
forms and modes of imprisonment, so far as these
existed in the northern section of the island.?
