University,] A STUDENTS? RIOT. I1
placed in the city charter room; and this order
occurs often afterwards, or is referred to thus :-
?? In 1663 the magistrates came down with their
halberts to the college, took away all our charters
and papers, declared the Provost perpetual rector,
though he was chancellor before, and at the same
time discharged university meetings.?
During the summer of 1656 some new buildings
were in progress on the south side of the old
college, as the town council records state that
for the better carrying on thereof, ?there is a
necessitie to break down and demolishe the hous
neirest the Potterrow Port, which now the Court du
Guaird possesseth ; thairfoir ordaines the thesaurer
with John Milne to visite the place, and doe therin
what they find expedient, as weil for demolishing
the said hous as for provyding for the Court du
Guaird utenvayis.?
During the year 1665 some very unpleasant relations
ensued between the university and its civic
patrons, and these originated in a frivolous cause.
It had been the ancient practice of the regents of
all European seminaries to chastise with a birch
rod such of the students as were unruly or committed
a breach of the laws of the college within
its bound. Some punishment of this nature had
been administered to the son of the then Provost,
Sir Andrew Ramsay, Knight, and great offence was
taken thereat.
In imitation of his colleagues and predecessors,
the regent, on this occasion, had used his own
entire discretion as to the mode and amount of
punishment he should inflict ; but the Lord Provost
was highly exasperated, and determining to wreak
his vengeance on the whole university, assumed the
entire executive authority into his own hands.
?? Having proceeded to the college, and exhibited
some very unnecessary symbols of his power within
the city-the halberts, we presume-on the tenth
of November he repaired to the Council Chamber
and procured the following Act- to be passed :-
Th CoumiZ agrees fhut fhe Provosf of Edinburgh,
present and to come, 6e &ways Rector and Governor
uf fhe roZZege in a21 time coming.? The only important
effects which this disagreeable business
produced were, that it was the cause of corporal
punishment being banished from the university,
and that no rector has since been elected,? adds
Bower, writing in 1817. ?The Senatw Arademiclls
have repeatedly made efforts to revive the election
of the ofice of rector, and have as often failed
of success.?
A short time before his death Cromwell made a
grant to the college of &zoo per annum, a sum
which in those days would greatly have added to
the prosperity of the institution ; but he happened
to die in the September of the same year in which
the grant was dated, and as all his Acts were
rescinded at the? Restoration, his intentions towards
the university came to nothing. The expense of
passing the document at the Exchequer cost about
L476 16s. Scots; hence it is extremely doubtful if
the smallest benefit ever came of it in any way.
The year 1680 saw the students of the university
engaged in a serious riot, which created a profound
sensation at the time.
?i After the Restoration, the students,? says
Amot, ? appear to have been pretty much tainted
with the fanatic principles of the Covenanters,?
and they resolved, while the Duke of Albany and
York was at Holyrood, to manifest their zeal by a
solemn procession and burning of the pope in effigy
on Christmas Day, and to that end posted up the
following :-
??I?HESE are to give notice to all Noblemen, Gentlemen,
Citizens, and others, that We, the Students of the Royal College
of Edinburgh (to show our detestation and abhorrence of
the Romish religion, and our zeal and fervency for the Protestant),
do resolve to bum the effigies of Anfi-ch&f, the
Pqe of Rome at the Mercat Cross of Edinburgh, the 25th of
December instant, at Twelve in the forenoon (being the
festival of Our Saviour?s nativity). And as we hate tumnlts
as we do superstition, we do hereby (under pain of death) discharge
all robbers, thieves, and bawds to come within 40
paces of our company, and such as shall be found disobedient
to these our commands, Sibi Caveant.
? By our Special command, ROBERT BROWN, Secretary
to all our Theatricals and Extra L i t d Divertisements.?
?AN ADVERTISEMENT.
This announcement filled the magistrates with
alarm, as such an exhibition was seriously calculated
to affront the duke and duchess, and, moreover,
to excite a dangerous sedition. According to a
history of, this affair, published for Richard Janeway,
in Queen?s Head Alley, Paternoster Row, 1681,
the students bound themselves by a solemn oath
to support each other, under penalty of a fine, and
they employed a carver, ?who erected then a
wooden Holiness, with clothes, tiiple crown, keys,
and other necessary habiliments,? and by Christmas
Eve all was in readiness for the display, to prevent
which the Lord Provost used every means
at his command.
He sent for Andrew Cant, the principal, and
the regents, whom he enjoined to deter the
students ? with menaces that if they would not, he
would make it a bloody Christmas to them.? He
then went to Holyrood, and had an interview with
the duke and the Lord Chancellor, who threatened
to march the Scottish troops into the town. Meanwhile,
the principal strove to exact oaths and
promises from the students that they would re
I 2 OLD AND NEW EDINBURGH. [University.
posts, and make the Grassmarket their headquarters.
The City Militia held the High Street,
a guard was placed on the college, and the guards
at the palace were doubled.
Undismayed by all this, the students mustered
in the Old High School Yard, with their effigy in
pontifical robes, and proceeded without opposition
down the High School Wynd, and up Blackfriars
Wynd to the lower end of High Street, where,
finding there was no time to lose, though unopposed
by the militia, they set fire to the figure
amid shouts of ?? Pereat Papa f I? but had instantly
to fly. Arnot says the burning took place in the
Blackfriars Wynd.
Grim old Dalyell of Binns came galloping
through the Netherbow Port at the head of his
linquish their intention, and a few who were
English were seized in their beds, and carried by
the guard to the Tolbooth.
All the forces in Leith and the neighbourhood
mere marched into the Canongate, where they remained
all night under arms ; and in the morning
the Provost allowed the privileges of a fortified
city to be violated, it was alleged, by permitting
the Foot Guards and Mars Fusiliers (latterly
zIst Foot) to enter the gates, seize advantageous
of treatment not much more respectful than their
own. In the course of this operation the head
fell OK,? and was borne in triumph up the Castle
Hill by a Dumber of boys. But this trumpery
affair did not end here.
Seven students were apprehended, and examined
before the Privy Council by Sir George
Mackenzie of Rosehaugh, the King?s Advocate,
and after being a few days in custody, were liberated.
So little were they gratified by this leniency
that many street scuffles took place between them
and the troops, whom they alleged to be the aggressors.
Violent denunciations of revenge against the
magistrates were uttered in the streets ; and upon
the 11th of January, 1681, the house of Priestfield
grey Dragoons; then came the Fusiliers, under the
Earl of Mar; and Lord Linlithgowv, with one
battalion of the Scots Foot Guards, in such haste
that he fell off his horse. The troops were ordered
to extinguish the flames and rescue the image.
? This, however, understanding the combustible
state of its interior, they were in no haste to do ;
keeping at a cautious distance, they merely belaboured
his Holiness with the butt end of their
musquets, which the students allege was a mode
.
THE LIBRARY OF THE OLD UNIVERSITY, AS SEEN FROM THE SOUTH-WESTERN CORNER OF THE QUADRANGLE,
LOOKING EAST. (From an EngnauiqQ W. H. Lizursofa Drawing& Playfair).
