THE MESSRS, NELSON. 355 The Meadows.]
G. H., cut in wood, remained in Several parts of the
l?ouse. The Rev. Dr. Steven, gpvernor of the
hospital, presented a coloured drawing of the house
to the Messrs. Nelson, as ?the country residence
of the founder of the hospital.? It perished in the
fire of 1878, but another is preserved.
The house was also, about 1800, the abode of an
aged lady, well known to those of Jacobite proclivities
in Edinburgh, Mrs. Hannah Robertson, an
alleged grand-daughter of Charles II., and whose
sister was ancestress of the Mercers of Gorthy.
She died in 1808.
The well-known firm of the Messrs. Nelson and
Sons was originally established by the late Mr.
Thomas Nelson, whose first business premises were
in a small corner shop at the head of the West Bow,
only lately removed, where he published cheap
editions of the ? Scots Worthies,? Baxter?s ?Saints?
Rest,? and similar works; but it was not until
his sons entered the business that the work of the
firm was placed upon a wider basis.
Mr. Nelson was born at a village called Throsk,
near Stirling, in 1780. When twenty years of age
he went to London, and after experiencing his own
share of difficulties, familiar to young men in
pushing their way in the world, he at last entered
the service of a publishing house in Paternoster
Row. This determined the course of his career.
One of his early associates in London was the late
Mr. Kejly, publisher, afterwards raised to the Lord
Mayor?s chair. Mr. Nelson had begun by this time
to show that love for the standard works of the old
theological school which characterised him in afteI
iife. He remained for some years in London, and
then came to Edinburgh, where he soon signalized
himself as a publisher.
Cheap issues are a common feature of the
publishing trade of the country now, but it was
otherwise in the beginning of the century, and he
was among the first to introduce the new order 01
things by the publication of works like those ol
Paley, Leighton, Romaine, Newton, and many
ithers.
For several years in the latter part of his life
le was more or less of an invalid. He died, at the
ige of eighty, on the 23rd of March, 1861. He
.ies buried in Edinburgh in the Grange cemetery,
iext to the grave of Hugh Miller.
The Messrs. Nelsons? range of offices at Hope
Park were on a scale surpassing any similar place
2f business in Edinburgh, as it consisted of three
:onjoined blocks of neat and plain design, forming
as many sides of a square. In the main building
were three floors, and machinery was used
wherever it was available, and by means of that
and an admirably organised system of the division
of labour, the amount of literary work turned out
was enormous. The process of stereotyping, which
was invented by Mr. William Ged, a goldsmith in
Edinburgh, and has been brought to the highest
perfection in the place of its birth, was here greatly
in practice. By 1870 the Messrs. Nelson employed
fully 600 workpeople, the half of whom were young
women, and on theii own premises they manufactured
all the inks used in printing, and the varnishes
for bookbinding.
The whole of their extensive premises were destroyed
by a calamitous fire, after which the Messrs.
Nelson erected new offices and workshops upon
several acres of land, known as Parkside, with a
fine frontage to the old Dalkeith Road, south of
?The Castle of Clouts,? and near what was called
of old the Gibbet TolL
Erected by the Messrs. Nelson in 1881, two
handsome pillars, surmounted respectively by
the Unicorn and Lion, now ornament the entrance
to the Melville Drive at the east end of the
Meadows. These pillars stand near the site of
their former premises, and were erected as a gift to
the city, in commemoration of the kindness and
sympathy shown to tkm by the magistrates at the
time of the great fire.
CHAPTER XLII.
LAURISTON.
The New University B u i l d h ~ l ? h c Estimates and Accommodation-George Watson?s Hospital-Founded-Opened and Sold--The New
Infirmary-Its Capabilities for Accommodation-Simpwn Memorial Hospital-Sick C h i l M s Hospital-Mberdust Maiden Haspitai-
Watson?s SchoobIauriston United Resbyterian Church-St. Catharine?s Convent.
IN the district of Lauriston we find quite a cluster
of charitable institutions ; but before treating of the
more ancient one-Heriot?s Hospital-we shall
describe those edifices which lie between the street
and the northern walk of the Meadows
In the city map of 1787, after Watson?s Hospital,
