Old and New Edinburgh Vol. VI

All Books Kay's Originals Vol. 1 Kay's Originals Vol. 2 Memorials of Edinburgh in the Olden Time Edinburgh Past and Present Old and New Edinburgh Vol. I Old and New Edinburgh Vol. II Old and New Edinburgh Vol. III Old and New Edinburgh Vol. IV Old and New Edinburgh Vol. V Old and New Edinburgh Vol. VI

Go to: « Kay's Originals Vol. 1 « Kay's Originals Vol. 2 « Memorials of Edinburgh in the Olden Time « Edinburgh Past and Present « Old and New Edinburgh Vol. I « Old and New Edinburgh Vol. II « Old and New Edinburgh Vol. III « Old and New Edinburgh Vol. IV « Old and New Edinburgh Vol. V Old and New Edinburgh Vol. VI Plates Ch 20: Leith - Historical Survey (continued) Ch 21: Leith - Historical Survey (continued) Ch 22: Leith - Historical Survey (concluded) Ch 23: Leith - The Kirkgate Ch 24: Leith - The Kirkgate (concluded) Ch 25: Leith - Tolbooth Wynd and Adjoining Streets Ch 26: Leith - Rotten Row, Broad Wynd, Bernard Street, Baltic Street, and Quality Street Ch 27: Leith - Constitution Street, The Shore, Coal Hill, and Sheriff Brae Ch 28: North Leith Ch 29: Leith - The Links Ch 30: Leith - The Sands Ch 31: Leith - The Harbour Ch 32: Memorabilia of the Shipping of Leith and its Maritime Affairs Ch 33: Leith - The Docks Ch 34: Inchkeith Ch 35: Newhaven Ch 36: Wardie, Trinity, and Granton Ch 37: The Environs of Edinburgh Ch 38: The Environs of Edinburgh (continued) Ch 39: The Environs of Edinburgh (continued) Ch 40: The Environs of Edinburgh (continued) Ch 41: The Environs of Edinburgh (continued) Ch 42: The Environs of Edinburgh (continued) Ch 43: The Environs of Edinburgh (concluded) General Index Contents List of Illustrations

256 OLD AND NEW EDINBURGH. [Leith. sion opposite to the church of St. Ninian, but is now rebuilt into a modern edifice in Cobourg Street. In Robertson?s map, depicting Leith with its fortifications, 1560 (partly based upon Greenville Collins?s, which we have reproduced on p. 176), the church of Nicholas is shown between the sixth and seventh bastions, as a cruciform edifice, with choir, nave, and transepts, measuring about 150 feet in length, by 80 feet across the latter, and distant only IOO feet from the Short Sand, or old sea margin. the patron of seamen,? says Robertson, ?we may infer that Leith at a very early period was a sea St. Nicholas, the confessor, was a native of Lycia, who died in the year 342, according to the Bollandists. He was assumedas the patron of Venice and many other seaports, and is usually represented with an anchor at his side and a ship in the background, and, in some instances, as the patron of commerce, In Mrs. Jameson?s ?Sacred and port town.? ST. NINIAN?S CHURCHYARD. The church, or chapel, with the hospital of St. Nicholas, is supposed to have been founded at some date later than the chapel of Abbot Balhntyne, as the reasons assigned by him for building it seemed to imply that the inhabitants were without any accessible place of worship ; but when or by whom it was founded, the destruction of neatly all ecclesiastical records, at the Reformation, renders it even vain to surmise. Nothing nom can be known of their origin, and the last vestiges of them were swept away when Monk built his citadel. They were, of course, ruined by Hertford in his first invasion, ?and from the circumstance of the church in the citadel being dedicated to St. Nicholas, Legendary Art,? she mentions two : ?? a seaport with ships in the distance ; St. Nicholas in his episcopal robes (as Archbishop of Myra), stands by as directing the whole;? and a storm at sea, in which ?St. Nicholas appears as a vision above ; in one hand he holds a lighted taper ; with the other he appears to direct the course of the vessel.?? To this apostle of ancient manners had the old edifice in North Leith been dedicated, when the site whereon it stood was an open and sandy eminence, overlooking a waste of links to the northward, and afterwards encroached on by the sea ; and its memory is still commemorated in a narrow and obscure alley, called St. Nicholas Wynd, according to Fullarton?s ?? Gazetteer,? in 1851.

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