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Old and New Edinburgh Vol. III

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church was accordingly built for them, at the expense, says h o t , of Az,400 sterling. A portion of this consisted of zo,ooo merks, left, in 1649, by Thomas Moodie, a citizen, called by some Sir Thomas Moodie of Sauchtonhall, to rebuild the church partially erected on the Castle -Hill, and demolished by the English during the siege of 1650. Two ministers were appointed to the Canongate church. The well-known Dr. Hugh Blair and the THE CANONGATE CHURCH. splendid scabbard. This life is full of contrasts ; so when the magistrates, in ermine and gold, took their seats behind this sword of state in the front gallery, on the right of the minister, and in the gallery, too, were to be seen congregated the humble paupers from the Canongate poorhouse, now divested of its inmates and turned into a hospital. Our dear old Canongate, too, had its , Baron Bailie and Resident Bailies before the late Principal Lee have been among the incumbents. It is of a cruciform plan, and has the summit of its ogee gable ornamented with the crest of the burgh-the stag?s head and cross of King David?s legendary adventure-and the arms of Thomas Moodie form a prominent ornament in front of i t ? In our young days,? says a recent writer in a local paper, ?the Incorporated Trades, eight in number, occupied pews in the body of the church, these having the names of the occupiers painted on them; and in mid-summer, when the Town Council visited it, as is still their wont, the tradesmen placed large bouquets of flowers on their pews, and as our sittings were near this display, we used to glance with admiration from the flowers up to the great sword standing erect in the front gallery in its Reform Bill in 1832 ruthlessly swept them away. Halberdiers, or Lochaber-axe-men, who turned out on all public occasions to grace the officials, were the civic body-guard, together with a body in plain clothes, whose office is on the ground flat under the debtors? jail.? But there still exists the convenery of the Canongate, including weavers, dyers, and cloth-dressers, &c., as incorporated by royal charter in 1630, under Charles I. In the burying-ground adjacent to the church, and which was surrounded by trees in 1765, lie the remainsof Dugald Stewart, the great philosopher, of Adam Smith, who wrote the ?Wealth of Nations ; ? Dr. Adam Fergusson, the historian of the Roman Republic; Dr. Burney, author of the
Volume 3 Page 29
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