Restalrig.] ST. MARGARET?S WELL. 129
By the south side of what was once an old forest
path when the oaks of Drumsheugh were in all their
glory, there stood St. Margaret?s Well, the entire
edifice of which was removed to the Royal Park,
near Holyrood ; but the pure spring, deemed so
holy as to be the object of pilgrimages in the days
of old, still oozes into the fetid marsh close by.
It was no doubt the source of supply to the
ancient ecclesiastics of the village, and the path
alluded to had become in after times a means of
The structure-for elsewhere it still remains intact
-is octagonal, and entered by a pointed Gothic
doorway, and rises to the height of 4 ft. 6 in. It
is of plain ashlar work, with a stone ledge or seat
running round seven of the sides. From the centre
of the water, which fills the entire floor of the
building, rises a decorated pillar to the same height
as the walls, with grotesque gargoyles, from which
the liquid flows. Above this springs a richly
groined roof, ? presenting, with the ribs that rise
RESTALRIG.
communication between the church there and the
Abbey of Holyrood.
No authentic traces can be found of the history
of this consecrated fountain ; ? but from its name,?
says Billings, ?? it appears to have been dedicated
to the Scottish queen and saint, Margaret, wife of
Malcolm 111.?
In the legend which we have already referred
to in our account of Holyrood, which represents
David I. as being miraculously preserved from the
infuriated white hart, Bellenden records that it
?fled away with gret violence, and evanist in the
same place quhere now springs the Rude Well.?
From its vicinity to the abbey, St. Margaret?s has
been conjectured to be the well referred to.
113
from the corresponding corbels at each of the eight
angles of the building, a singularly rich effect when
illuminated by the reflected light from the water
below.?
When this most picturesque fountain stood in an
unchanged condition by the side of the old winding
path to Restalrig, an ancient elder-tree, With furrowed
and gnarled branches, covered all its grassgrown
top, and a tiny but aged thatched cottage
stood in front of it. Then, too, a mossy bank, rising
out of pleasant meadow land, protected the little
pillared cell; but the inexorable march of modem improvement
came, the old tree and the rustic cottage
were swept away, and the well itselfwas buried under
(See Vol. II., page 311.)
. a hideous station of the North British Railway.
130 OLD AND NEW EDINBURGH. [Restalrig.
By interdict the directors were compelled to give
access to the well, which they grudgingly did by a
species of drain, till the entire edifice was removed
to where it now stands.
Near the site of the well is the ancient church of
Restalrig, which, curiously enough, at first sight has
all the air of an entirely modern edifice ; but on a
minute inspection old mouldings and carvings of
great antiquity make their appearance in conjunction
with the modern stonework of its restoration.
It is a simple quadrangular building, without aisles
or transept.
The choir, which is the only part of the building
that has escaped the rough hands
of the iconoclasts of the sixteenth
century, is a comparatively small,
though handsome, specimen of
Decorated English Gothic ; and
it remained an open ruin until
a fev years since, when it was
restored in a manner as a chapel
of ease for the neighbouring district.
But a church existed here long
before the present one, and it
was celebrated all over Scotland
for the tomb of St. Triduana,
who died at Restalrig, and whose
shrine was famous as the resort
of pilgrims, particularly those
who were affected by diseased
eyesight. Thus, to this day, she
is frequently painted as carrying
her own eyes on a salver or the
point of a sword. A noble virgin
of Achaia, she is said to have
come to Scotland, in the fourth
century, with St. Rule. Her name
inferred that the well afterwards called St. Margaret?s
was the well of St. Triduana.
Curiously enough, Lestalric, the ancient name of
Restalrig, is that by which it is known in the present
day; and still one of the roads leading to it from
Leith is named the Lochsterrock Road
The existence of a church andparish here, long
prior to the death of King Alexander 111. is proved
by various charters ; and in 1291, Adam of St.
Edmunds, prior of Lestalric, obtained a writ, addressed
to the sheriff of Edinburgh, to put him
in possession of his lands and rights. The same
ecclesiastic, under pressure, like many others at
SEAL OF THE COLLEGIATE cnmcn
OF RESTALRIG.
is unknown in the Roman Breviary; but a recent
writer says, ?? S t Triduana, with two companions,
devoted themselves to a recluse life at Roscoby, but
a Pictish chief, named Nectan, having been attracted
by her beauty, she fled into Athole to
escape him. As his emissaries followed her there,
and she discovered that it was her eyes which had
entranced him, she plucked them out, and, fixing
them on a thorn, sent them to her admirer. In
consequence of this practical method of satisfying
a lover, St. Triduana, who came to Restalrig to
live, became famous, and her shrine was for many
generations the resort of pilgrims whose eyesight
was defective, miraculous cures being effected by
the waters of the well.?
Sir David Lindsay writes of their going to ? St.
Trid well to mend their ene;? thus it has been
the time, swore fealty to Edward
I. of England in 1296.
Henry de Leith, rector of Restalrig,
appeared as a witness
against the Scottish Knights of
the Temple, at the trial in Holyrood
in 1309. The vicar, John
Pettit, is mentioned in the charter
of confirmation by James III.,
under his great seal of donations
to the Blackfriars of Edinburgh
in 1473..
A collegiate establishment of
considerable note, having a dean,
with nine prebends and two singing
boys, was constituted at Restalrig
by James III., and completed
by James V. j but it seems
not to have interfered with the
parsonage, which remained entire
till the Reformation.
The portion of the choir now
remaining does not date, it is
supposed, earlier than from the
fourteenth century, and is much
plainer, says Wilson, than might be expected in
a church enriched by the contributions of three
pious monarchs in succession, and resorted to by
so many devout pilgrims as to excite the special
indignation of one of the earliest assemblies of the
Kirk, apparently on account of its abounding with
statues and images.
By the Assembly of 1560 it was ordered to be
? raysit and utterly casten doun,? as a monument
of idolatry; and this order was to some extent
obeyed, and the ?? aisler stanis ? were taken by
Alexander Clark to erect a house with, but were
used by the Reformers to build a new Nether Bow
Port. The parishioners of Restalrig were ordered
in future to adopt as their parish church that of
St. Mary?s, in Leith, which continues to the present
day to be South Leith church.
