202 OLD AND NEW EDINBURGH. [Moray Pkn.
criticsas, ?beautifully monotonous, andmagnificently
dull;? and by others as the beau-ideal of a fashionable
west-end quarter ; but whatever may be their
intrinsic elegance, they have the serious and incurable
fault of turning their frontages inwards, and
shutting out completely, save from their irregular
rows of back windows, the magnificent prospect
over the valley of the Water of Leith and away to
the Forth
Moray Place, which reaches to within seventy
yards of the north-west quarter of Queen Street, is
a pentagon on a diameter of 325 yards, with an
ornate and central enclosed pleasure ground. It
displays a series of symmetrical, confronting fapdes,
adorned at regular intervals with massive, quartersunk
Doric columns, crowned by a bold entablature.
No 28, on the west side, divided afterwards,
was reserved as the residence of Francis tenth
Earl of Moray, who married Lucy, second daughter
of General John Scott, of Balcomie and Bellevue.
For years the Right Hon. Charles Hope, of
Granton, Lord President of the Court of Session,
and his son, John Hope, Solicitor-General for
Scotland in 182 2, ?and afterwards Lord Justice
Clerk in 1841, lived in Moray Place, No. 12.
The former, long a distinguished senator and
citizen, was born in 1763. His fathty, an eminent
Loiidon merchant, and cadet of the house of
Hopetoun, had been M.P. for West Lothian.
Charles Hope was educated at the High School,
where he attained distinction as dux of the highest
class, and from the University he passed to the
bar in 1784, and two years afterwards was Judge-
Advocate of Scotland. In 1791 he was Steward
of the Orkney and Shetland Isles, and in the first
year of the century was Lord Advocate, and as
such drew out and aided the magistrates in
obtaining a Poor?s Bill for the city, on which occasion
he was presented with a piece of plate valued
at a hundred guineas.
When the warlike Spirit of the country became
roused at that time by the menacing aspect of
France, none was more active among the
volunteer force than Charles Hope. He enrolled
as a private in the First Edinburgh Regident, and
was eventually appointed Lieut.-Colonel, and from
1801, with the exception of one year when the
the corps was disbanded at the Peace of Amiens,
he continued to command till its final dissolution
in 1814 Kay gives us an equestrian portrait
of him in 1812, clad in the now-apparently
grotesque uniform of the corps, a swallow-tailed
red coat, faced with blue and turned up with
white ; brass wings, and a beaver-covered helmethat
with a side hackle, jack boots, and white
breeches, with a leopard-skin saddle-cloth and
crooked sabre. The corps presented him with a
superb sword in 1807. He personally set an
example of unwearied exertion ; his speeches on
several occasions, and his correspondence with the
commander-in-chief, breathed a Scottish patriotism
not less pure than hearty in the common cause.
?We did not take up arms to please any Minister
or set of Ministers,? he declared on one occasion,
?but to defend our native land from foreign and
domestic enemies.?
After being M.P. for Dumfries, on the elevation
of Mr. Dundas to the peerage in 1802, he was
unanimously chosen a member for the city of
Edinburgh, and during the few years he continued
in Parliament, acted as few Lords Advocate have ever
done, and notwithstanding the pressure of imperial
matters and the threatening aspect of the times,
brought forward several measures of importance
to Scotland; but his parliamentary career was
rendered somewhat memorable by an accusation
of abuse of power as Lord Advocate, brought
against him by Mr. Whitbread, resulting in a vast
amount of correspondence and deiating in 1803-
The circumstances are curious, as stated by the
latter :-
?Mr. Momson, a farmer in Banffshire, had a
servant of the name of Garrow, wllo entered a
volunteer corps, and attended drills contrary to his
master?s pleasure; and on the 13th of October
last, upon the occasion of an inspection of the
company by the Marquis of Huntly, he absented
himself entirely from his master?s work, in conse
quence of which he discharged him The servant
transmitted a memorial to the Lord Advocate,
stating his case, and begging to know what
compensation he could by law claim from his late
master for the injury he had suffered His
lordship gave it as his opinion that the memorialist
had no claim for wages after the time he was
dismissed, thereby acknowledging that he had
done nothing contrary to law; but he had not
given a bare legal opinion, he had prefaced it by
representing Mr. Morrison?s act as unprincipled
and oppressive, and that without proof or inquiry.
Not satisfied with this, he next day addressed a
letter to the Sheriff-substitute of Banffshire, attributing
Mr. Morrison?s conduct to disafection and
disZoyaZby.?
The letter referred to described Momson?s
conduct as ? atrocious,? and such as could only
have arisen from a spirit of treason, adding, ?it is
my order to you as Sheriff-substitute of the county,
that on the first Frenchman landing in Scotland.
you do immediately apprehend and secure
