138 - OLD AND NEW EDINBURGH. [West Church.
mode of procedure, made no resistance; and so
.active were the workmen that before sunset the
road was sufliciently formed to allow the bettor to
drive his carriage triumphantly over it, which he
did amidst the acclamations ofa great multitude of
persons, who flocked from the town to witness the
-issue of this extraordinary undertaking. Among
-the instances of temporary distress occasioned to
-the inhabitants, the most laughable was that of a
-poor simple woman who had a cottage and small
cow-feeding establishment upon the spot. It ap-
.pears that this good creature had risen early, as
usiial, milked her cows, smoked her pipe, taken
her ordinary matutinal tea, and lastly, recollecting
that she had some friends invited to dine kith her
cupon sheep-head and kail about noon, placed the
pot upon the fire, in order that it might simmer
peaceably till she should return from town, where
she had to supply a numerous set of customers with
the produce of her dairy. Our readers may judge
the consternation of this poor woman when, upon
her return from the duties of the morning, she
found neither house, nor byre, nor cows, nor fire,
nor pipe, nor pot, nor anything that was here
upon the spot where she had left them but a few
hours before. All had vanished, like the palace of
Aladdin, leaving not a wrack behind.?
Such was the origin of that broad and handsome
street which now leads to where the Castle Barns
:stood of old.
The Kirkbraehead House was demolished in
1869, when the new Caledonian Railway Station
was formed, and with it passed away the southern
portion of the handsome modern thoroughfare
named Rutland Street, and several other structures
.in the vicinity of the West Church.
Of these the most important was St. George?s
Free Church, built in 1845, at the north-east corner
.of Cuthbert?s Lane, the line of which has since been
turned into Rutland Street, in obedience to the
inexorable requirements of the railway.
During its brief existence this edifice was alone
famous for the ministrations of the celebrated Rev.
Robert Candlish, D.D., one of the most popular of
Scottish preachers, and one of the great leaders of
the ? Non Intrusion ? party during those troubles
-which eventually led to the separation of the
.Scottish Church into two distinct sections, and the
establishment of that Free Kirk to which we shall
have often to refer. He was born about the commencement
of the century, in 1807, and highly
aegarded as a debater. He was author of an
.?Exposition of the Book of Genesis,? works on
4? The Atonement,? ?6 The Resurrection,? ? Life of
a Risen Saviour,? and other important theological
books. In 18Gr he was Moderator of the Free
Church Assembly.
The church near St. Cuthbert?s was designed by
the late David Cousin in the Norman style of
architecture, and the whole edifice, which was
highly ornate, after being carefully taken down, was
re-constructed in its own mass in Deanhaugh Street,
Stockbridge, as a free church for that locality.
While the present Free St. George?s in Maitland
Street was in course of erection, Dr. Candlish
officiated to his congregation in the Music Hall,
George Street. He died, deeply regretted by them
and by all classes, on the 19th of October, 1873.
The next edifice of any importance demolished
at the time was the Riding School, with the old
Scottish Naval and Military Academy, so long
superintended byan old officer of the Black Watch,
and well-known citizen, Captain, John Orr, who
carried one of the colours of his regiment at
Waterloo. It was a plain but rather elegant Grecian
edifice, under patronage of the Crown, for train-,
ing young men chiefly for the service of the royal
and East India Company?s services, and to all the
ordinary branches of education were added fortification,
military drawing, gundrill, and military
exercises; but just about the time its site was
required by the railway the introduction of a
certain amount of competitive examination at military
colleges elsewhere rendered the institution
unnecessary, though Scotland is certainly worthy
of a military school of her own. Prior to its extinction
the academy sufficed to send more than a
thousand young men as officers into the army,
many of whom have risen to distinction in every
quarter of the globe.
The new station of the Caledonian Railway,
which covered the sites of the buildings mentioned,
and with its adjuncts has a frontage to the Lothian
Road of 1,100 feet (to where it abuts upon the
United Presbyterian Church) by about 800 feet at
its greatest breadth, forms a spacious and handsome
terminus, erected at the cost of more than it;~o,ooo,
succeeding the more temporary station at first
projected on the west side of the Lothian Road,
about half a furlong to the south, andivhich was
cleared and purchased at an enormous cost. It is
a most commodious structure, with a main front
103 feet long and zz feet high, yet designed only
for temporary use, and is intended to give place to
a permanent edifice of colossal proportions and
more than usual magnificence, with a great palatial
hotel to acljoin it, according to the custom now so
common as regards great railway termini.
