86 OLD AND NEW EDINBURGH. me Mound.
distinguished trustees of whom it has been composed
since its formation ; considering also that the power
of appointing persons to be members of the Board
offers the means of conferring distinction on eminent
individuals belonging to Scotland, I entertain a
strong conviction that this Board should be kept
up to its present number, and that its vacancies
should be supplied as they occur. I am disposed
to think also that it would be desirable to give this
Board a corporate character by a charter or Act
of Incorporation.?
Under the fostering care of the Board of
Manufactures first sprang up the Scottish School
of Design, which had its origin in 1760. On the
27th of June in that year, in pursuance of previous
deliberations of the Board, as its records show, ?a
scheme or scroll of an advertisement anent the
drawing school was read, and it was referred to
Lord Kames to take evidence of the capacity and
genius for drawing of persons applying for instruction
before they were presented to the drawing
school, and to report when the salary of Mr.
De?lacour, painter, who had been appoihted to
teach the school, should commence.?
This was the first School of Design established
in the three kingdoms at the public expense. ? It
is,?? said the late Sir W. Stirling-Maxwell, in an
address to the institution. in 1870, $?a matter of
no small pride to us as Scotsmen to find a Scottish
judge in 1760 and two Scottish painters in 1837
takihg the lead in a movement which in each case
became national.?
The latter were Mr. William Dyce and Mr.
Charles Heath Wilson, who, in a letter to Lord
Meadowbank cn ?the best means of ameliorating
arts and manufactures in point of taste,? had all
the chief principles which they urged brought into
active operation by the present Science and
Art Department; and when the Royal Scottish
Academy was in a position to open its doors to art
pupils, the life school was transferred from the
Board to the Academy. Of the success of these
schools it is only necessary to say that almost
every Scotsman who has risen to distinction in
art has owed something of that distinction to
the training received here. There are annual examinations
and competitions for prizes. The latter
though small in actual and intrinsic value, possess a
very high value to minds of the better order. ? They
are,? said Sir W. Stirling-Maxwell, ? tokens of the
sympathy with which the State regards the exertions
of its students. They are rewards which those who
now sit or have sat in high places of a noble profession-
the Harveys, the Patons, the Faeds, the
Xobertses, and the Wilkies-have been proud to
win, and whose success in these early competitions
was the beginning of a long series of triumphs.?
In the same edifice is the gallery of sculpture, a
good collection of casts from the best ancient
works, such as the Elgin marbles and celebrated
statues of antiquity, of the well-known Ghiberti
gates of Florence, and a valuable series of antique
Greek and Roman busts known as the Albacini
collection, from which family they were purchased
for the Gallery.
In the western portion of the Royal Institution
are the apartments of the Royal Society of Edinburgh,
which was instituted in 1783, under the
presidency of Henry Duke of Buccleuch, K.G.
and K.T., with Professor John Robinson, LL.D., as
secretary, and twelve councillors whose names are
nearly all known to fame, and are as follows :-
Mr. Baron Gordon. Dr. Munro.
Lord Elliock. Dr. Hope.
Major-Gen. Fletcher CampbelL Dr. Black.
Adam Smith, Esq. Dr. Hutton.
Mr. John McLaurin.
Dr. Adam Feryson,
Prof. Dugald Stewart.
Mr. John Playfair.
The central portion of the Royal Institution is
occupied by the apartments and museum of the
Society of Antiquaries of Scotland, which was
founded in 1780 .by a body of noblemen and
gentlemen, who were anxious to secure a more
accurate and extended knowledge of the historic
and national antiquities of their native country
than single individual zeal or skill could hope to
achieve. ?For this purpose, a building and an
area formerly occupied as the post ofice, situated
in the Cowgate, then one of the chief thoroughfares
of Edinburgh, were purchased for LI,OOO.
Towards this, the Earl of Buchan, founder of the
Society, the Dukes of Montrose and Argyle, the
Earls of Fife, Bute, and Kintore, Sir Laurence
Dundas, Sir John Dalrymple, Sir Alexander Dick,
Macdonnel of Glengarry, Mr. Fergusson of Raith,
Mr. Ross of Cromarty, and other noblemen and
gentlemen, liberally contributed. Many valuable
objects of antiquity and original MSS. and books
were in like manner presented to the Society.?
After being long in a small room in 24, George
Street, latterly the studio of the well-known
Samuel Bough, R.S.A., the museum was removed
to the Institution, on the erection of the new
exhibition rooms for the Scottish Academy in the
q t galleries. Among the earliest contributions
towards the foundation of this interesting museum
were the extensive and valuable collection of
bronze weapons referred to in an early chapter
as being dredged from Duddingstone Loch, presented
by Sir Alexander Dick, Bart., of Preston
