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Kay's Originals Vol. 2

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Volume 9 Page 536
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BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCHES. 401 and having taken lodgings at Rosslyn, for change of air, she died there in 1792. A stone in the churchyard, where her remains were interred, records her name and the date of her death. No. CCCVII. A POLITICAL SET-TO; ‘( FREEDOM OF ELECTION ” ILLUSTRATED. KINGHORNth, e scene of the affray represented in the Print, is the ferry-town opposite Edinburgh, on the north side of the Forth. Though small it is a royal burgh, and can boast an antiquity nearly as remote as any in the extensive peninsula ycleped the Kingdom of Fife- “ The most unhallowed mid the Scotian plains !”- at least so wrote poor Fergusson, some sixty or seventy years ago ; although few, we daresay, who visit the ‘( Fifan coast ” in our own day will acquiesce in the inhospitable character ascribed to it by the poet. Along with Dysart, Kirkaldy, and Burntisland, Kinghorn continues to send .a representative to Parliament; and, if common fame report truly, in no other Scottish burgh could a more curious or entertaining chronicle of electioneering manceuvres be gleaned. From the union of the kingdoms down to the passing of the Reform Bill, a series of political contentions agitated the otherwise peaceful community:; and, amid the alternate scenes of strife and jollity which prevailed, there were no lack of spirits-daring enough ; nor yet of joyous fellows-fond of merriment and good cheer-who “ Wisely thought it better far, To fall in banquet than in war.” I , The annual return of councillors-always an interesting evenkserved to keep alive the political excitement, and to whet the appetite for the more engrossing occasion of a Parliamentary election. Some idea may be formed of the consequence attached to the office of Chief Magistrate of the burgh, when it is known that the civic chair has been frequently filled by an Earl of Rothes, or an Earl of Leven, and that the Right Hon. Charles Hope, Lord President of the Court of Session, was at one period the Provost of Kinghorn for nearly twenty years. Not the least attractive circumstance attendant on the yearly VOL 11. 3 F
Volume 9 Page 537
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