336 OLD AND NEW EDINBURGH. [Nicolson Stret.
brated chemist, Dr. Joseph Black, who, as we have
elsewhere stated, was found dead in his chair in
November, 1799, and whose high reputation contributed
so largely in his time to the growing fame
of our University.
The institution was first suggested by the celebrated
Dr. Thomas Blacklock, who lost his sight
before he was six months old, and by Mr. David
Miller, also a sufferer from blindness ; but it was
chiefly through the exertions of Dr. David Johnsales
of the above kinds of work have in some years
amounted to ;C;IO,OOO, and in 1880 to &18,724 8s.,
notwithstanding the general depression of trade ;
but this was owing to the Government contract for
brushes.' Hence the directors have been enabled
to make extensive alterations and improvements to
a large amount.
The asylum has received a new and elegant
fapde, surmounted by stone-faced dormer windows,
a handsome cornice, and balustrade, with a large
THE MAHOGANY LAND, POTTERROW, 1821. (Ajtecr a Paintinc ay W. McEwan, in the #osscsaim of Dr. ].A. Sidey.)
stone, the philanthropic minister of North Leith,
aided by a subscription of only A20 from the great
Wilberforce, that the asylum was founded in 1793,
ip one of the dingy old houses of Shakespeare
Square, into which nine blind persons were received;
but the public patronage having greatly increased,
in 1806 the present building, No. 58, was purchased,
acd in 1822 another house, No. 38, was
bought for the use of the female blind.
The latter are employed in sewing the covers
for mattresses and feather beds, knitting stockings,
Src. The males are employed in making mattresses,
mats, ,brushes, baskets of every kind, in weaving
sacking, matting, and " rag-carpets.'' No less than
eighteen looms are employed in this work. The
central doorway, in a niche above which is a bust
of Dr. David Johnstone, the founder, from the
studio of the late Handyside Ritchie.
The inmates seem to spend a very merry life,
for though the use of their eyes has been denied
them, they have no restriction placed upon their
tongues ; thus, whenever two or three of them are
together, they are constantly talking, or singing
their national songs.
A chapel is attached to the works, and therein,
besides regular morning worship, the blind hold
large meetings in connection with the various
benefit societies they have established among
themselves. The younger lads who come from the
Blind School at Craigmillar, and are employed here,
NioiLson Street.] JOHN MACLAREN. 337
spend a portion of each day in education, often
passing an hour or more daily in learning to read
by means of raised letters, under the direction of
the chaplain.
One of the most remarkable inmates here was
John Maclaren, who deserves to be recorded for
his wonderful memory. He was a native of Edinburgh,
and lost his sight by small-pox in infancy.
He was admitted into the first asylum ir. Shakespeare
Square in 1793, and was the last survivor
In West Richmond Street, which opens off the
east side of Nicolson Street, is the McCrie Free
Church, so named from being long the scene of
the labours of Dr. Thomas McCric, the zealous
biographer of Knox and Melville. Near it, a large
archway leads into a small and dingy-looking court,
named Simon Square, crowded by a humble, but
dense population ; yet it has associations intimately
connected with literature and the fine arts, for
there a poor young student from Rnnandale, named
SURGEONS? HALL.
of the original members. With little exception,
he had committed the whole of the Scriptures to
memory, and was most earnest in his pious efforts
to instruct the blind boys of the institution in portions
of the sacred volume. He could repeat an
entire passage of the Bible, naming chapter and
verse, wherever it might be opened for him. As
age came upon him the later events of his life eluded
his memory, while all that it had secured of the
earlier remained distinct to the last. Throughout
his long career he was distinguished by his zeal
in promoting the spiritual welfare and temporal
comfort of the little community of which he was
a member, and also for 3 life of increasing industry,
which closed on the 14th of November, 1840.
91
Thomas Carlyle, lodged when he first came to
Edinburgh, and in a narrow alley called Paul
Street David Wilkie took up his abode on his
arrival in Edinburgh in 1799.
He was then in his fourteenth year; and so little
was thought of his turn for art, that it required all
the powerful influence of the kind old Earl of
Leven to obtain him admission as a student at the
Academy of the Board of Trustees. The room he
occupied in Paul Street was a little back one, about
ten feet square, at the top of a common stair on
the south side of the alley, and near the Pleasance.
From this he removed to a better lodging in East
Richmond Street, and from thence to an attic in
Palmer?s Lane, West Nicolson Street, where hq
