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-} - -.figright { - float: right; - clear: right; - margin-left: 1em; - margin-bottom: - 1em; - margin-top: 1em; - margin-right: 0; - padding: 0; - text-align: center; -} - - .screenonly { display: none; } - .handonly { display: block; } -} - - - h1.pgx { text-align: center; - clear: both; - font-weight: bold; - font-size: 190%; - margin-top: 0em; - margin-bottom: 1em; - word-spacing: 0em; - letter-spacing: 0em; - line-height: 1; } - h2.pgx { text-align: center; - clear: both; - font-weight: bold; - font-size: 135%; - margin-top: 2em; - margin-bottom: 1em; - word-spacing: 0em; - letter-spacing: 0em; - line-height: 1; } - h3.pgx { text-align: center; - clear: both; - font-weight: bold; - font-size: 110%; - margin-top: 2em; - margin-bottom: 1em; - word-spacing: 0em; - letter-spacing: 0em; - line-height: 1; } - h4.pgx { text-align: center; - clear: both; - font-weight: bold; - font-size: 100%; - margin-top: 2em; - margin-bottom: 1em; - word-spacing: 0em; - letter-spacing: 0em; - line-height: 1; } - hr.pgx { width: 100%; - margin-top: 3em; - margin-bottom: 0em; - margin-left: auto; - margin-right: auto; - height: 4px; - border-width: 4px 0 0 0; /* remove all borders except the top one */ - border-style: solid; - border-color: #000000; - clear: both; } - </style> -</head> -<body> -<h1 class="pgx" title="header title">The Project Gutenberg eBook, Traditions of Edinburgh, by Robert Chambers, -Illustrated by James Riddel</h1> -<p>This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere in the United States -and most other parts of the world at no cost and with almost no -restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it -under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included with this -eBook or online at <a -href="http://www.gutenberg.org">www.gutenberg.org</a>. If you are not -located in the United States, you'll have to check the laws of the -country where you are located before using this ebook.</p> -<p>Title: Traditions of Edinburgh</p> -<p>Author: Robert Chambers</p> -<p>Release Date: February 4, 2020 [eBook #61314]</p> -<p>Language: English</p> -<p>Character set encoding: UTF-8</p> -<p>***START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK TRADITIONS OF EDINBURGH***</p> -<p> </p> -<h4 class="pgx" title="credit">E-text prepared by Susan Skinner<br /> - and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team<br /> - (<a href="http://www.pgdp.net">http://www.pgdp.net</a>)<br /> - from page images generously made available by<br /> - Internet Archive<br /> - (<a href="https://archive.org">https://archive.org</a>)</h4> -<p> </p> -<table border="0" style="background-color: #ccccff;margin: 0 auto;" cellpadding="10"> - <tr> - <td valign="top"> - Note: - </td> - <td> - Images of the original pages are available through - Internet Archive. See - <a href="https://archive.org/details/traditionsofedin00chamuoft"> - https://archive.org/details/traditionsofedin00chamuoft</a> - </td> - </tr> -</table> -<p> </p> -<hr class="pgx" /> -<p> </p> -<p> </p> -<p> </p> - -<h1>TRADITIONS OF EDINBURGH</h1> - -<hr class="chap" /> - -<div class="figcenter w500"><a id="frontispiece"></a> -<img src="images/frontis.jpg" width="500" height="687" alt="" /> -<div class="caption"><p class="center">AN ELEGANT MODERN CITY.</p> -<p class="right"> -<span class="smcap"><a href="#Page_8">Page 8.</a></span></p></div> -</div> - -<hr class="chap" /> - - -<p class="center p2"> -<span class="smcap xxlargetext">Traditions of Edinburgh</span><br /> -<br /> -<span class="xlargetext">By <span class="smcap">Robert Chambers, ll.d.</span></span><br /> -<br /> -ILLUSTRATED BY<br /> -<br /> -<span class="xlargetext">JAMES RIDDEL, R.S.W.</span></p> - -<div class="figcenter w350"> -<img src="images/illus_p_001.jpg" width="350" height="430" alt="" /> -</div> - -<p class="center"><span class="smalltext">LONDON: 38 Soho Square, W.</span><br /> -W. & R. CHAMBERS, LIMITED<br /> -<span class="smalltext">EDINBURGH: 339 High Street</span><br /> -J. B. LIPPINCOTT COMPANY, PHILADELPHIA<br /> -1912 -</p> - - -<hr class="chap" /> - -<p class="center"> -Edinburgh:<br /> -Printed by W. & R. Chambers, Limited.</p> -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_v" id="Page_v">{v}</a></span></p> - - - -<hr class="chap" /><div class="chapter"> - - -<h2><a name="INTRODUCTORY_NOTICE" id="INTRODUCTORY_NOTICE">INTRODUCTORY NOTICE.</a> -<br /> -1868.</h2> - - -<p>I am about to do what very few could do without emotion—revise -a book which I wrote forty-five years ago. This little -work came out in the Augustan days of Edinburgh, when Jeffrey -and Scott, Wilson and the Ettrick Shepherd, Dugald Stewart and -Alison, were daily giving the productions of their minds to the -public, and while yet Archibald Constable acted as the unquestioned -emperor of the publishing world. I was then an insignificant -person of the age of twenty; yet, destitute as I was both of means -and friends, I formed the hope of writing something which would -attract attention. The subject I proposed was one lying readily -at hand, the romantic things connected with Old Edinburgh. If, -I calculated, a first <em>part</em> or <em>number</em> could be issued, materials for -others might be expected to come in, for scores of old inhabitants, -even up perhaps to the very ‘oldest,’ would then contribute their -reminiscences.</p> - -<p>The plan met with success. Materials almost unbounded came -to me, chiefly from aged professional and mercantile gentlemen, -who usually, at my first introduction to them, started at my -youthful appearance, having formed the notion that none but an -old person would have thought of writing such a book. A friend -gave me a letter to Mr Charles Kirkpatrick Sharpe, who, I was -told, knew the scandal of the time of Charles II. as well as he did -the merest gossip of the day, and had much to say regarding the -good society of a hundred years ago.</p> - -<p>Looking back from the year 1868, I feel that C. K. S. has -himself become, as it were, a tradition of Edinburgh. His thin -effeminate figure, his voice pitched <i lang="it" xml:lang="it">in alt</i>—his attire, as he took -his daily walks on Princes Street, a long blue frock-coat, black -trousers, rather wide below, and sweeping over white stockings -and neat shoes—something like a web of white cambric round his<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_vi" id="Page_vi">{vi}</a></span> -neck, and a brown wig coming down to his eyebrows—had long -established him as what is called a character. He had recently -edited a book containing many stories of diablerie, and another in -which the original narrative of ultra-presbyterian church history -had to bear a series of cavalier notes of the most mocking character. -He had a quaint biting wit, which people bore as they would a -scratch from a provoked cat. Essentially, he was good-natured, -and fond of merriment. He had considerable gifts of drawing, -and one caricature portrait by him, of Queen Elizabeth dancing, -‘high and disposedly,’ before the Scotch ambassadors, is the delight -of everybody who has seen it. In jest upon his own peculiarity of -voice, he formed an address-card for himself consisting simply of -the following anagram:</p> - -<div class="figcenter w400"> -<img src="images/illus_p_vi.jpg" width="400" height="223" alt="" /> -</div> - -<p><i lang="la" xml:lang="la">quasi dicitur</i> C sharp. He was intensely aristocratic, and cared -nothing for the interests of the great multitude. He complained -that one never heard of any gentlefolks committing crimes nowadays, -as if that were a disadvantage to them or the public. Any -case of a Lady Jane stabbing a perjured lover would have delighted -him. While the child of whim, Mr Sharpe was generally believed -to possess respectable talents by which, with a need for exerting -them, he might have achieved distinction. His ballad of the -‘Murder of Caerlaverock,’ in the <cite>Minstrelsy</cite>, is a masterly production; -and the concluding verses haunt one like a beautiful strain -of music:</p> - -<div class="poetry-container"><div class="poetry"><div class="stanza"> -<div class="verse">‘To sweet Lincluden’s haly cells</div> -<div class="verse indent2">Fu’ dowie I’ll repair;</div> -<div class="verse">There Peace wi’ gentle Patience dwells,</div> -<div class="verse indent2">Nae deadly feuds are there.</div><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_vii" id="Page_vii">{vii}</a></span> -<div class="verse">In tears I’ll wither ilka charm,</div> -<div class="verse indent2">Like draps o’ balefu’ yew;</div> -<div class="verse">And wail the beauty that cou’d harm</div> -<div class="verse indent2">A knight sae brave and true.’</div> -</div></div></div> - -<p>After what I had heard and read of Charles Sharpe, I called -upon him at his mother’s house, No. 93 Princes Street, in a somewhat -excited frame of mind. His servant conducted me to the -first floor, and showed me into what is generally called amongst us -the back drawing-room, which I found carpeted with green cloth, -and full of old family portraits, some on the walls, but many more -on the floor. A small room leading off this one behind, was the -place where Mr Sharpe gave audience. Its diminutive space was -stuffed full of old curiosities, cases with family bijouterie, &c. -One petty object was strongly indicative of the man—a calling-card -of Lady Charlotte Campbell, the once adored beauty, stuck -into the frame of a picture. He must have kept it at that time -about thirty years. On appearing, Mr Sharpe received me very -cordially, telling me he had seen and been pleased with my first -two numbers. Indeed, he and Sir Walter Scott had talked together -of writing a book of the same kind in company, and calling -it <cite>Reekiana</cite>, which plan, however, being anticipated by me, the -only thing that remained for him was to cast any little matters of -the kind he possessed into my care. I expressed myself duly -grateful, and took my leave. The consequence was the appearance -of notices regarding the eccentric Lady Anne Dick, the beautiful -Susanna, Countess of Eglintoune, the Lord Justice-clerk Alva, and -the Duchess of Queensberry (the ‘Kitty’ of Prior), before the close -of my first volume. Mr Sharpe’s contributions were all of them -given in brief notes, and had to be written out on an enlarged -scale, with what I thought a regard to literary effect as far as the -telling was concerned.</p> - -<p>By an introduction from Dr Chalmers, I visited a living lady -who might be considered as belonging to the generation at the -beginning of the reign of George III. Her husband, Alexander -Murray, had, I believe, been Lord North’s Solicitor-general for -Scotland. She herself, born before the Porteous Riot, and well -remembering the Forty-five, was now within a very brief space<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_viii" id="Page_viii">{viii}</a></span> -of the age of a hundred. Although she had not married in her -earlier years, her children, Mr Murray of Henderland and others, -were all elderly people. I found the venerable lady seated at a -window in her drawing-room in George Street, with her daughter, -Miss Murray, taking the care of her which her extreme age -required, and with some help from this lady, we had a conversation -of about an hour. She spoke with due reverence of her -mother’s brother, the Lord Chief-justice Mansfield, and when I -adverted to the long pamphlet against him written by Mr Andrew -Stuart at the conclusion of the Douglas Cause, she said that, to -her knowledge, he had never read it, such being his practice in -respect of all attacks made upon him, lest they should disturb his -equanimity in judgment. As the old lady was on intimate terms -with Boswell, and had seen Johnson on his visit to Edinburgh—as -she was the sister-in-law of Allan Ramsay the painter, and had -lived in the most cultivated society of Scotland all her long life—there -were ample materials for conversation with her; but her -small strength made this shorter and slower than I could have -wished. When we came upon the <em>poet</em> Ramsay, she seemed to -have caught new vigour from the subject: she spoke with animation -of the child-parties she had attended in his house on the -Castle-hill during a course of ten years before his death—an event -which happened in 1757. He was ‘charming,’ she said; he -entered so heartily into the plays of children. He, in particular, -gained their hearts by making houses for their dolls. How -pleasant it was to learn that our great pastoral poet was a man -who, in his private capacity, loved to sweeten the daily life of his -fellow-creatures, and particularly of the young! At a warning -from Miss Murray, I had to tear myself away from this delightful -and never-to-be-forgotten interview.</p> - -<p>I had, one or two years before, when not out of my teens, -attracted some attention from Sir Walter Scott by writing for -him and presenting (through Mr Constable) a transcript of the -songs of the <cite>Lady of the Lake</cite>, in a style of peculiar calligraphy, -which I practised for want of any better way of attracting -the notice of people superior to myself. When George IV. -some months afterwards came to Edinburgh, good Sir Walter<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_ix" id="Page_ix">{ix}</a></span> -remembered me, and procured for me the business of writing -the address of the Royal Society of Edinburgh to His Majesty, -for which I was handsomely paid. Several other learned bodies -followed the example, for Sir Walter Scott was the arbiter of -everything during that frantic time, and thus I was substantially -benefited by his means.</p> - -<p>According to what Mr Constable told me, the great man liked -me, in part because he understood I was from Tweedside. On -seeing the earlier numbers of the <cite>Traditions</cite>, he expressed -astonishment as to ‘where the boy got all the information.’ -But I did not see or hear from him till the first volume had -been completed. He then called upon me one day, along with -Mr Lockhart. I was overwhelmed with the honour, for Sir -Walter Scott was almost an object of worship to me. I literally -could not utter a word. While I stood silent, I heard him -tell his companion that Charles Sharpe was a writer in the -<cite>Traditions</cite>, and taking up the volume, he read aloud what he -called one of his <em>quaint bits</em>. ‘The ninth Earl of Eglintoune -was one of those patriarchal peers who live to an advanced -age—indefatigable in the frequency of their marriages and the -number of their children—who linger on and on, with an unfailing -succession of young countesses, and die at last leaving a -progeny interspersed throughout the whole of Douglas’s <cite>Peerage</cite>, -two volumes, folio, re-edited by Wood.’ And then both gentlemen -went on laughing for perhaps two minutes, with interjections: -‘How like Charlie!’—‘What a strange being he is!’—‘<em>Two -volumes, folio, re-edited by Wood</em>—ha, ha, ha! There you -have him past all doubt;’ and so on. I was too much abashed -to tell Sir Walter that it was only an impudent little bit of writing -of my own, part of the solution into which I had diffused the -actual notes of Sharpe. But, having occasion to write next -day to Mr Lockhart, I mentioned Sir Walter’s mistake, and he -was soon after good enough to inform me that he had set his -friend right as to the authorship, and they had had a <em>second</em> -hearty laugh on the subject.</p> - -<p>A very few days after this visit, Sir Walter sent me, along -with a kind letter, a packet of manuscript, consisting of sixteen<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_x" id="Page_x">{x}</a></span> -folio pages, in his usual close handwriting, and containing all -the reminiscences he could at the time summon up of old -persons and things in Edinburgh. Such a treasure to me! -And such a gift from the greatest literary man of the age to the -humblest! Is there a literary man of the present age who -would scribble as much for any humble aspirant? Nor was this -the only act of liberality of Scott to me. When I was preparing -a subsequent work, <cite>The Popular Rhymes of Scotland</cite>, he sent me -whole sheets of his recollections, with appropriate explanations. -For years thereafter he allowed me to join him in his walks -home from the Parliament House, in the course of which he -freely poured into my greedy ears anything he knew regarding -the subjects of my studies. His kindness and good-humour on -these occasions were untiring. I have since found, from his -journal, that I had met him on certain days when his heart was -overladen with woe. Yet his welcome to me was the same. -After 1826, however, I saw him much less frequently than before, -for I knew he grudged every moment not spent in thinking and -working on the fatal tasks he had assigned to himself for the -redemption of his debts.</p> - -<p>All through the preparation of this book, I was indebted a good -deal to a gentleman who was neither a literary man nor an artist -himself, but hovered round the outskirts of both professions, and -might be considered as a useful adjunct to both. Every votary -of pen or pencil amongst us knew David Bridges at his drapery -establishment in the Lawnmarket, and many had been indebted -to his obliging disposition. A quick, dark-eyed little -man, with lips full of sensibility and a tongue unloving of rest, -such a man in a degree as one can suppose Garrick to have -been, he held a sort of court every day, where wits and painters -jostled with people wanting coats, jerkins, and spotted handkerchiefs. -The place was small, and had no saloon behind; -so, whenever David had got some ‘bit’ to show you, he dragged -you down a dark stair to a packing-place, lighted only by a -grate from the street, and there, amidst plaster-casts numberless, -would fix you with his glittering eye, till he had convinced you of -the fine handling, the ‘buttery touches’ (a great phrase with him),<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_xi" id="Page_xi">{xi}</a></span> -the admirable ‘scummling’ (another), and so forth. It was in -the days prior to the Royal Scottish Academy and its exhibitions; -and it was left in a great measure to David Bridges to bring -forward aspirants in art. Did such a person long for notice, -he had only to give David one of his best ‘bits,’ and in a short -time he would find himself chattered into fame in that profound, -the grate of which I never can pass without recalling something -of the buttery touches of those old days. The Blackwood wits, -who laughed at everything, fixed upon our friend the title of -‘Director-general of the Fine Arts,’ which was, however, too -much of a truth to be a jest. To this extraordinary being I -had been introduced somehow, and, entering heartily into my -views, he brought me information, brought me friends, read and -criticised my proofs, and would, I dare say, have written the -book itself if I had so desired. It is impossible to think of -him without a smile, but at the same time a certain melancholy, -for his life was one which, I fear, proved a poor one for himself.</p> - -<p>Before the <cite>Traditions</cite> were finished, I had become favourably -acquainted with many gentlemen of letters and others, who were -pleased to think that Old Edinburgh had been chronicled. -Wilson gave me a laudatory sentence in the <cite>Noctes Ambrosianæ</cite>. -The Bard of Ettrick, viewing my boyish years, always spoke of -and to me as an unaccountable sort of person, but never could -be induced to believe otherwise than that I had written all my -traditions from my own head. I had also the pleasure of -enjoying some intercourse with the venerable Henry Mackenzie, -who had been born in 1745, but always seemed to feel as if the -<cite>Man of Feeling</cite> had been written only one instead of sixty years -ago, and as if there was nothing particular in antique occurrences. -The whole affair was pretty much of a triumph at the -time. Now, when I am giving it a final revision, I reflect with -touched feelings, that all the brilliant men of the time when it -was written are, without an exception, passed away, while, for -myself, I am forced to claim the benefit of Horace’s humanity:</p> - -<div class="poetry-container"><div class="poetry"><div class="stanza"> -<div class="verse">‘Solve senescentem mature sanus equum, ne</div> -<div class="verse">Peccet ad extremum ridendus, et ilia ducat.’</div> -</div></div></div> -<hr class="chap" /></div><div class="chapter"> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_xiii" id="Page_xiii">{xiii}</a></span></p> - - - -<h2><a name="INTRODUCTION_TO_PRESENT_ISSUE" id="INTRODUCTION_TO_PRESENT_ISSUE">INTRODUCTION TO PRESENT ISSUE.</a></h2> - - -<p>It has been very shrewdly remarked by a famous essayist and -critic that a book is none the worse for having survived a -generation or two. Robert Chambers’s <cite>Traditions of Edinburgh</cite> -has survived many generations since its first appearance in 1825, -and I have before me a copy of this edition in the original six -parts, published at two shillings each, the first of which aroused in -Sir Walter Scott so much interest. The work when completed -appears to have passed through many reprints, but retained its -original form until it was remodelled and almost rewritten in -1846, much new matter being then added, and certain passages -altogether omitted. Shortly before his death the author again -revised the work, adding a new introduction, in which he -reviewed the changes of the preceding forty years. This was in -1868, and since that time old Edinburgh has almost ceased -to exist. Many an ancient wynd and close has disappeared, -or remains simply as a right of way, on all sides surrounded -by modern buildings. The City Improvements Act, obtained -by Dr William Chambers when Lord Provost of Edinburgh -in 1865 and again in 1868, swept away hundreds of old buildings; -and to it is due the disappearance of Leith Wynd, St -Mary’s Wynd, Blackfriars Wynd, the Ancient Scottish Mint in -the Cowgate, and other landmarks more or less familiar to our -grandfathers. These changes are confined not alone to the old -town of Edinburgh, but extend to other districts which at the -beginning of the nineteenth century were comparatively modern -and fashionable. Brown Square and the buildings adjoining it -known as ‘the Society’ have passed away, being intersected by the -modern Chambers Street. Adam Square, adjoining the College, -has been absorbed in South Bridge Street; Park Street and Park -Place, where was once a fashionable boarding-school for young<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_xiv" id="Page_xiv">{xiv}</a></span> -ladies, have disappeared to make room for the M’Ewan Hall and -other University buildings.</p> - -<p>If it is true that the old town of Edinburgh has been modernised -out of existence, the remark applies equally to its immediate -suburbs. Indeed the all-round changes of the last forty years can -fitly be compared to like changes which within the same period -have taken place in the city of Rome. Until within very recent -times Edinburgh bore some slight resemblance to the Rome of the -Popes, with its stately villas and great extent of walled-in garden -ground. Much of this aristocratic old-world aspect has passed -away, and one can but lament the disappearance of many an -eighteenth-century house and grounds, interesting in not a few -cases as the former residence of a citizen whose memory extended -back to the Edinburgh of Sir Walter Scott and the famous men -who were his contemporaries and friends.</p> - -<p>Falcon Hall on the south side of the town, with its great -gardens and walled-in parks, has disappeared. So also has the -interesting villa of Abbey Hill, occupied until very recent times -by the Dowager Lady Menzies. The Clock Mill House adjoining -Holyrood Palace and the Duke’s Walk, and surrounded by ancient -trees, has gone, as have likewise the many fine old residences with -pleasant gardens which adjoined the two main roads between -Edinburgh and Leith. All have passed away, giving place to rows -of semi-detached villas and endless lines of streets erected for the -housing of an ever-increasing population.</p> - -<p>One of the few surviving examples of the old Scotch baronial -mansion is Coates House, standing within the grounds of St Mary’s -Episcopal Cathedral at the west end of the city. This house was -occupied by Robert Chambers for several years prior to his removal -to St Andrews in 1840. It has since been modernised, and is now -used for various purposes in connection with the Cathedral.</p> - -<p>Although Robert Chambers died so long ago as 1871, no -adequate story of his life has since been attempted. This is a -matter for regret in view of some comparatively recent discoveries, -particularly those relating to the history of the authorship of -that famous work, <cite>Vestiges of the Natural History of Creation</cite>, -made public for the first time in 1884. Of that work,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_xv" id="Page_xv">{xv}</a></span> -written between the years 1841-44, in the solitude of Abbey -Park, St Andrews, a recent writer has said: ‘This book was -almost as great a source of wonder in its time as the <cite>Letters of -Junius</cite>, or <cite>Waverley</cite> itself. The learning and common-sense of -the book, its rare temperateness and common-sense, commanded -immediate attention. It was the wonder of the world at that -period, nor was the authorship ever acknowledged, I believe.’ -The mystery is now solved; but be it said that in the opinion of -many Robert Chambers is more interesting as an antiquary than -a scientist. It is in the former capacity that his name will be -handed down to posterity as author of the standard work on the -tradition and antiquities of the Scottish capital. The outstanding -feature of the present issue of the <cite>Traditions</cite> is the series of -original drawings which have been provided by Mr James -Riddel, R.S.W., and it is hoped they will enable the reader more -readily to realise the city’s old world charm, so sympathetically -described by Robert Chambers. While a few notes have been -added to this edition, it has not been deemed advisable to alter -the text, and therefore that fact must be borne in mind where -dates and lapses of time are mentioned.</p> - -<p class="right"> -C. E. S. CHAMBERS. -</p> - - -<hr class="chap" /></div><div class="chapter"> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_xvii" id="Page_xvii">{xvii}</a></span></p> - - - - -<h2><a name="CONTENTS" id="CONTENTS">CONTENTS.</a></h2> - -<div class="center"> -<table border="0" cellpadding="4" cellspacing="0" summary=""> -<tr><td align="left"></td><td align="right">PAGE</td></tr> -<tr><td align="left"><span class="smcap">The Changes of the Last Hundred Years</span></td><td align="right"><a href="#Page_1">1</a></td></tr> -<tr><td align="left"><span class="smcap">The Castle-Hill</span></td><td align="right"><a href="#Page_11">11</a></td></tr> -<tr><td align="left"><p class="blockquot">Hugo Arnot—Allan Ramsay—House of the Gordon Family—Sir -David Baird—Dr Webster—House of Mary de Guise.</p></td></tr> -<tr><td align="left"><span class="smcap">The West Bow</span></td><td align="right"><a href="#Page_26">26</a></td></tr> -<tr><td align="left"><p class="blockquot">The Bowhead—Weigh-house—Anderson’s Pills—Oratories—Colonel -Gardiner—‘Bowhead Saints’—‘The Seizers’—Story of a Jacobite -Canary—Major Weir—Tulzies—The Tinklarian Doctor—Old Assembly -Room—Paul Romieu—‘He that Tholes Overcomes’—Provost -Stewart—Donaldsons the Booksellers—Bowfoot—The -Templars’ Lands—The Gallows Stone.</p></td></tr> -<tr><td align="left"><span class="smcap">James’s Court</span></td><td align="right"><a href="#Page_55">55</a></td></tr> -<tr><td align="left"><p class="blockquot">David Hume—James Boswell—Lord Fountainhall.</p></td></tr> -<tr><td align="left"><span class="smcap">Story of the Countess of Stair</span></td><td align="right"><a href="#Page_63">63</a></td></tr> -<tr><td align="left"><span class="smcap">The Old Bank Close</span></td><td align="right"><a href="#Page_70">70</a></td></tr> -<tr><td align="left"><p class="blockquot">The Regent Morton—The Old Bank—Sir Thomas Hope—Chiesly of -Dalry—Rich Merchants of the Sixteenth Century—Sir William -Dick—The Birth of Lord Brougham.</p></td></tr> -<tr><td align="left"><span class="smcap">The Old Tolbooth</span></td><td align="right"><a href="#Page_82">82</a></td></tr> -<tr><td align="left"><span class="smcap">Some Memories of the Luckenbooths</span></td><td align="right"><a href="#Page_95">95</a></td></tr> -<tr><td align="left"><p class="blockquot">Lord Coalstoun and his Wig—Commendator Bothwell’s House—Lady -Anne Bothwell—Mahogany Lands and Fore-stairs—The Krames—Creech’s Shop.</p></td></tr> -<tr><td align="left"><span class="smcap">Some Memoranda of the Old Kirk of St Giles</span></td><td align="right"><a href="#Page_105">105</a></td></tr> -<tr><td align="left"><span class="smcap">The Parliament Close</span></td><td align="right"><a href="#Page_109">109</a></td></tr> -<tr><td align="left"><p class="blockquot">Ancient Churchyard—Booths attached to the High Church—Goldsmiths—George -Heriot—The Deid-Chack.</p></td></tr> -<tr><td align="left"><span class="smcap">Memorials of the Nor’ Loch</span></td><td align="right"><a href="#Page_117">117</a></td></tr> -<tr><td align="left"><span class="smcap">The Parliament House</span></td><td align="right"><a href="#Page_119">119</a></td></tr> -<tr><td align="left"><p class="blockquot">Old Arrangements of the House—Justice in Bygone Times—<cite>Court -of Session Garland</cite>—Parliament House Worthies.</p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_xviii" id="Page_xviii">{xviii}</a></span></td></tr> -<tr><td align="left"><span class="smcap">Convivialia</span></td><td align="right"><a href="#Page_138">138</a></td></tr> -<tr><td align="left"><span class="smcap">Taverns of Old Times</span></td><td align="right"><a href="#Page_158">158</a></td></tr> -<tr><td align="left"><span class="smcap">The Cross—Caddies</span></td><td align="right"><a href="#Page_174">174</a></td></tr> -<tr><td align="left"><span class="smcap">The Town-Guard</span></td><td align="right"><a href="#Page_179">179</a></td></tr> -<tr><td align="left"><span class="smcap">Edinburgh Mobs</span></td><td align="right"><a href="#Page_183">183</a></td></tr> -<tr><td align="left"><p class="blockquot">The Blue Blanket—Mobs of the Seventeenth Century—Bowed Joseph.</p></td></tr> -<tr><td align="left"><span class="smcap">Bickers</span></td><td align="right"><a href="#Page_189">189</a></td></tr> -<tr><td align="left"><span class="smcap">Susanna, Countess of Eglintoune</span></td><td align="right"><a href="#Page_192">192</a></td></tr> -<tr><td align="left"><span class="smcap">Female Dresses of Last Century</span></td><td align="right"><a href="#Page_199">199</a></td></tr> -<tr><td align="left"><span class="smcap">The Lord Justice-Clerk Alva</span></td><td align="right"><a href="#Page_204">204</a></td></tr> -<tr><td align="left"><p class="blockquot">Ladies Sutherland and Glenorchy—The Pin or Risp.</p></td></tr> -<tr><td align="left"><span class="smcap">Marlin’s and Niddry’s Wynds</span></td><td align="right"><a href="#Page_209">209</a></td></tr> -<tr><td align="left"><p class="blockquot">Tradition of Marlin the Pavier—House of Provost Edward—Story of -Lady Grange.</p></td></tr> -<tr><td align="left"><span class="smcap">Abbot of Melrose’s Lodging</span></td><td align="right"><a href="#Page_223">223</a></td></tr> -<tr><td align="left"><p class="blockquot">Sir George Mackenzie—Lady Anne Dick.</p></td></tr> -<tr><td align="left"><span class="smcap">Blackfriars Wynd</span></td><td align="right"><a href="#Page_228">228</a></td></tr> -<tr><td align="left"><p class="blockquot">Palace of Archbishop Bethune—Boarding-Schools of the Last Century—The -Last of the Lorimers—Lady Lovat.</p></td></tr> -<tr><td align="left"><span class="smcap">The Cowgate</span></td><td align="right"><a href="#Page_240">240</a></td></tr> -<tr><td align="left"><p class="blockquot">House of Gavin Douglas the Poet—Skirmish of Cleanse-the-Causeway—College -Wynd—Birthplace of Sir Walter Scott—The Horse Wynd—Tam o’ the Cowgate—Magdalen Chapel.</p></td></tr> -<tr><td align="left"><span class="smcap">St Cecilia’s Hall</span></td><td align="right"><a href="#Page_249">249</a></td></tr> -<tr><td align="left"><span class="smcap">The Murder of Darnley</span></td><td align="right"><a href="#Page_256">256</a></td></tr> -<tr><td align="left"><span class="smcap">Mint Close</span></td><td align="right"><a href="#Page_260">260</a></td></tr> -<tr><td align="left"><p class="blockquot">The Mint—Robert Cullen—Lord Chancellor Loughborough.</p></td></tr> -<tr><td align="left"><span class="smcap">Miss Nicky Murray</span></td><td align="right"><a href="#Page_265">265</a></td></tr> -<tr><td align="left"><span class="smcap">The Bishop’s Land</span></td><td align="right"><a href="#Page_269">269</a></td></tr> -<tr><td align="left"><span class="smcap">John Knox’s Manse</span></td><td align="right"><a href="#Page_271">271</a></td></tr> -<tr><td align="left"><span class="smcap">Hyndford’s Close</span></td><td align="right"><a href="#Page_275">275</a></td></tr> -<tr><td align="left"><span class="smcap">House of the Marquises of Tweeddale—The Begbie Tragedy</span></td><td align="right"><a href="#Page_279">279</a></td></tr> -<tr><td align="left"><span class="smcap">The Ladies of Traquair</span></td><td align="right"><a href="#Page_286">286</a><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_xix" id="Page_xix">{xix}</a></span></td></tr> -<tr><td align="left"><span class="smcap">Greyfriars Churchyard</span></td><td align="right"><a href="#Page_288">288</a></td></tr> -<tr><td align="left"><p class="blockquot">Signing of the Covenant—Henderson’s Monument—Bothwell Bridge -Prisoners—A Romance.</p></td></tr> -<tr><td align="left"><span class="smcap">Story of Mrs Macfarlane</span></td><td align="right"><a href="#Page_291">291</a></td></tr> -<tr><td align="left"><span class="smcap">The Canongate</span></td><td align="right"><a href="#Page_295">295</a></td></tr> -<tr><td align="left"><p class="blockquot">Distinguished Inhabitants in Former Times—Story of a Burning—Morocco’s -Land—New Street.</p></td></tr> -<tr><td align="left"><span class="smcap">St John Street</span></td><td align="right"><a href="#Page_302">302</a></td></tr> -<tr><td align="left"><p class="blockquot">Lord Monboddo’s Suppers—The Sister of Smollett—Anecdote of -Henry Dundas.</p></td></tr> -<tr><td align="left"><span class="smcap">Moray House</span></td><td align="right"><a href="#Page_306">306</a></td></tr> -<tr><td align="left"><span class="smcap">The Speaking House</span></td><td align="right"><a href="#Page_312">312</a></td></tr> -<tr><td align="left"><span class="smcap">Panmure House—Adam Smith</span></td><td align="right"><a href="#Page_318">318</a></td></tr> -<tr><td align="left"><span class="smcap">John Paterson the Golfer</span></td><td align="right"><a href="#Page_320">320</a></td></tr> -<tr><td align="left"><span class="smcap">Lothian Hut</span></td><td align="right"><a href="#Page_323">323</a></td></tr> -<tr><td align="left"><span class="smcap">Henry Prentice and Potatoes</span></td><td align="right"><a href="#Page_325">325</a></td></tr> -<tr><td align="left"><span class="smcap">The Duchess of Buccleuch and Monmouth</span></td><td align="right"><a href="#Page_327">327</a></td></tr> -<tr><td align="left"><span class="smcap">Claudero</span></td><td align="right"><a href="#Page_330">330</a></td></tr> -<tr><td align="left"><span class="smcap">Queensberry House</span></td><td align="right"><a href="#Page_336">336</a></td></tr> -<tr><td align="left"><span class="smcap">Tennis Court</span></td><td align="right"><a href="#Page_344">344</a></td></tr> -<tr><td align="left"><p class="blockquot">Early Theatricals—The Canongate Theatre—Digges and Mrs Bellamy—A -Theatrical Riot.</p></td></tr> -<tr><td align="left"><span class="smcap">Marionville—Story of Captain Macrae</span></td><td align="right"><a href="#Page_351">351</a></td></tr> -<tr><td align="left"><span class="smcap">Alison Square</span></td><td align="right"><a href="#Page_358">358</a></td></tr> -<tr><td align="left"><span class="smcap">Leith Walk</span></td><td align="right"><a href="#Page_360">360</a></td></tr> -<tr><td align="left"><span class="smcap">Gabriel’s Road</span></td><td align="right"><a href="#Page_366">366</a></td></tr> -<tr><td align="left">INDEX</td><td align="right"><a href="#Page_369">369</a></td></tr> -</table></div> -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_xxi" id="Page_xxi">{xxi}</a></span></p> - - -<hr class="chap" /> - -<h2><a name="LIST_OF_ILLUSTRATIONS" id="LIST_OF_ILLUSTRATIONS">LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS.</a></h2> - - -<div class="center"> -<table border="0" cellpadding="4" cellspacing="0" summary=""> -<tr><td align="left"></td><td align="right" colspan="3">PAGE</td></tr> -<tr><td align="left">An Elegant Modern City</td><td align="right" colspan="3"><em><a href="#frontispiece">Frontispiece</a></em></td></tr> -<tr><td align="left">Map of Edinburgh, Old and New</td><td align="right" colspan="3"><a href="#Page_xxvi">xxvi</a></td></tr> -<tr><td align="left">A series of towers rising from a palace on the plain to a castle in the air</td><td align="left" colspan="2"><em>Colour Drawing</em></td><td align="right"><a href="#illus_c_001">1</a></td></tr> -<tr><td align="left">White Hart Inn, Grassmarket</td><td class="center">”</td><td class="center">”</td><td align="right"><a href="#illus_c_002">2</a></td></tr> -<tr><td align="left">Newhaven Fishwife</td><td class="center">”</td><td class="center">”</td><td align="right"><a href="#illus_c_003">4</a></td></tr> -<tr><td align="left">Rouping-Wife</td><td class="center">”</td><td class="center">”</td><td align="right"><a href="#illus_c_004">9</a></td></tr> -<tr><td align="left">The Castle-Hill</td><td class="center">”</td><td class="center">”</td><td align="right"><a href="#illus_c_005">11</a></td></tr> -<tr><td align="left">Duke of Gordon’s House</td><td class="center">”</td><td class="center">”</td><td align="right"><a href="#illus_c_006">18</a></td></tr> -<tr><td align="left">The Bowhead</td><td class="center">”</td><td class="center">”</td><td align="right"><a href="#illus_c_007">27</a></td></tr> -<tr><td align="left">Grassmarket, from west end of Cowgate</td><td class="center">”</td><td class="center">”</td><td align="right"><a href="#illus_c_008">50</a></td></tr> -<tr><td align="left">Edinburgh, from the Calton Hill</td><td class="center">”</td><td class="center">”</td><td align="right"><a href="#illus_c_009">83</a></td></tr> -<tr><td align="left">St Giles, West Window</td><td class="center">”</td><td class="center">”</td><td align="right"><a href="#illus_c_010">105</a></td></tr> -<tr><td align="left">Heriot’s Hospital, from Greyfriars Churchyard</td><td class="center">”</td><td class="center">”</td><td align="right"><a href="#illus_c_011">113</a></td></tr> -<tr><td align="left">A Suggestion of the North Loch and St Cuthbert’s, from Allan Ramsay’s Garden</td><td class="center">”</td><td class="center">”</td><td align="right"><a href="#illus_c_012">117</a></td></tr> -<tr><td align="left">The Parliament House</td><td class="center">”</td><td class="center">”</td><td align="right"><a href="#illus_c_013">128</a></td></tr> -<tr><td align="left">‘Auld Reekie,’ from Largo</td><td class="center">”</td><td class="center">”</td><td align="right"><a href="#illus_c_014">152</a></td></tr> -<tr><td align="left">Upper Baxter’s Close, where Burns first resided in Edinburgh</td><td class="center">”</td><td class="center">”</td><td align="right"><a href="#illus_c_015">164</a></td></tr> -<tr><td align="left">White Horse Inn</td><td class="center">”</td><td class="center">”</td><td align="right"><a href="#illus_c_016">170</a></td></tr> -<tr><td align="left">Forenoon at the Cross</td><td class="center">”</td><td class="center">”</td><td align="right"><a href="#illus_c_017">174</a></td></tr> -<tr><td align="left">The Town-Guard</td><td class="center">”</td><td class="center">”</td><td align="right"><a href="#illus_c_018">179</a></td></tr> -<tr><td align="left">The Castle, from Princes Street</td><td class="center">”</td><td class="center">”</td><td align="right"><a href="#illus_c_019">214</a></td></tr> -<tr><td align="left">Blackfriars Wynd</td><td class="center">”</td><td class="center">”</td><td align="right"><a href="#illus_c_020">228</a></td></tr> -<tr><td align="left">The Cowgate</td><td class="center">”</td><td class="center">”</td><td align="right"><a href="#illus_c_021">240</a></td></tr> -<tr><td align="left">Old Houses, College Wynd (near here Sir Walter Scott was born)</td><td class="center">”</td><td class="center">”</td><td align="right"><a href="#illus_c_022">242</a></td></tr> -<tr><td align="left">John Knox’s Manse</td><td class="center">”</td><td class="center">”</td><td align="right"><a href="#illus_c_023">274</a></td></tr> -<tr><td align="left">Greyfriars Churchyard</td><td class="center">”</td><td class="center">”</td><td align="right"><a href="#illus_c_024">288</a></td></tr> -<tr><td align="left">St John’s Close, Entrance to Canongate Kilwinning Mason Lodge</td><td class="center">”</td><td class="center">”</td><td align="right"><a href="#illus_c_025">305</a></td></tr> -</table></div> - -<hr class="chap" /></div><div class="chap"> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_xxiii" id="Page_xxiii">{xxiii}</a></span></p> - - -<p class="p2 center">The objects of interest between the Castle and Holyrood are grouped topographically -in the following list, with references to the Map.</p> - -<p class="center p2">CASTLE.</p> - - - -<div class="center"> -<table border="0" cellpadding="4" cellspacing="0" summary="Objects of interest between the Castle and Holyrood"> -<tr><td align="left">Blair’s or Baird’s Close</td><td align="right" class="br">1</td><td align="left" colspan="2"> Castlehill Walk or Esplanade</td><td align="right" class="br">A</td><td align="left"> Allan Ramsay’s House</td><td align="right">a</td></tr> -<tr><td align="left">Brown’s Close</td><td align="right" class="br">3</td><td align="left" colspan="3" class="br"> </td><td align="left"> Blyth’s Close</td><td align="right">2</td></tr> -<tr><td align="left">Webster’s Close</td><td align="right" class="br">5</td><td align="left" colspan="2"> CASTLEHILL</td><td align="right" class="br">B</td><td align="left"> Nairn’s Close</td><td align="right">4</td></tr> -<tr><td align="left">Site of the Duke of Gordon’s House</td><td align="right" class="br">b</td><td align="left" colspan="2"> Weigh-House</td><td align="right" class="br">d</td><td align="left"> Tod’s Close</td><td align="right">6</td></tr> -<tr><td align="left" colspan="2" class="br"> </td><td align="left" colspan="3" class="br"></td><td align="left"> Site of Mary of Guise’s House</td><td align="right">c</td></tr> -<tr><td align="left" colspan="6"> </td></tr> -<tr><td align="left">West Bow</td><td align="right" class="br">CC</td><td align="left" colspan="2"> LAWNMARKET</td><td align="right" class="br">D</td><td align="left"> Mylne’s Court</td><td align="right">8</td></tr> -<tr><td align="left">Angle of Bow</td><td align="right" class="br">Z</td><td align="left" colspan="2"> Tolbooth</td><td align="right" class="br">e</td><td align="left"> James’s Court</td><td align="right">10</td></tr> -<tr><td align="left">Riddel’s Close</td><td align="right" class="br">7</td><td align="left" colspan="2"> Luckenbooths</td><td align="right" class="br">f</td><td align="left"> Lady Stair’s Close</td><td align="right">12</td></tr> -<tr><td align="left">Brodie’s Close</td><td align="right" class="br">9</td><td align="left" rowspan="4"> St Giles’ <span class="xxlargebracket">{</span></td><td align="left">Haddo’s Hole Church</td><td align="right" class="br">g</td><td align="left"> Upper Baxter’s Close</td><td align="right">14</td></tr> -<tr><td align="left">Old Bank Close</td><td align="right" class="br">11</td><td align="left">Tolbooth Church</td><td align="right" class="br">h</td><td align="left"> Wardrop’s Court</td><td align="right">16</td></tr> -<tr><td align="left">Liberton’s Wynd</td><td align="right" class="br">13</td><td align="left" colspan="2" class="br">Old Church</td><td align="left"> Paterson’s Court</td><td align="right">18</td></tr> -<tr><td align="left" colspan="2" class="br"></td><td align="left" colspan="2" class="br">New Church</td></tr> -<tr><td align="left" colspan="6"> </td></tr> -<tr><td align="left">Hope’s Close</td><td align="right" class="br">15</td><td align="left" colspan="2"> HIGH STREET</td><td align="right" class="br">EE</td><td align="left"> Dunbar’s Close</td><td align="right">20</td></tr> -<tr><td align="left">Beith’s or Bess Wynd</td><td align="right" class="br">17</td><td align="left" colspan="2"> Cross</td><td align="right" class="br">x</td><td align="left"> Byres’s Close</td><td align="right">22</td></tr> -<tr><td align="left">Parliament Close</td><td align="right" class="br">19</td><td align="left" colspan="2"> Guard House</td><td align="right" class="br">i</td><td align="left"> Writers’ Court</td><td align="right">24</td></tr> -<tr><td align="left">Parliament House</td><td align="right" class="br">k</td><td align="left" colspan="2"> Tron Church</td><td align="right" class="br">j</td><td align="left"> Royal Exchange</td><td align="right">26</td></tr> -<tr><td align="left">Back Stairs</td><td align="right" class="br">21</td><td align="left" colspan="3" class="br"></td><td align="left"> Mary King’s Close</td><td align="right">28</td></tr> -<tr><td align="left">Fishmarket Close</td><td align="right" class="br">23</td><td align="left" colspan="3" class="br"></td><td align="left"> Post-Office Close</td><td align="right">30</td></tr> -<tr><td align="left">Assembly Close</td><td align="right" class="br">25</td><td align="left" colspan="3" class="br"></td><td align="left"> Anchor Close</td><td align="right">32</td></tr> -<tr><td align="left">Bell’s Wynd</td><td align="right" class="br">27</td><td align="left" colspan="3" class="br"></td><td align="left"> Lyon Close</td><td align="right">34</td></tr> -<tr><td align="left">Peebles Wynd</td><td align="right" class="br">29</td><td align="left" colspan="3" class="br"></td><td align="left"> Jackson’s Close</td><td align="right">36</td></tr> -<tr><td align="left">Marlin’s Wynd</td><td align="right" class="br">31</td><td align="left" colspan="3" class="br"></td><td align="left"> Fleshmarket Close</td><td align="right">38</td></tr> -<tr><td align="left">Niddry’s Wynd</td><td align="right" class="br">33</td><td align="left" colspan="3" class="br"></td><td align="left"> Fleshmarket</td><td align="right">m</td></tr> -<tr><td align="left">Site of St Cecilia’s Hall</td><td align="right" class="br">l</td><td align="left" colspan="3" class="br"></td><td align="left"> Greenmarket</td><td align="right">n</td></tr> -<tr><td align="left">Dickson’s Close</td><td align="right" class="br">35</td><td align="left" colspan="3" class="br"></td><td align="left"> Halkerston’s Wynd</td><td align="right">40</td></tr> -<tr><td align="left">Cant’s Close</td><td align="right" class="br">37</td><td align="left" colspan="3" class="br"></td><td align="left"> Carrubber’s Close</td><td align="right">42</td></tr> -<tr><td align="left">Strichen’s Close</td><td align="right" class="br">39</td><td align="left" colspan="3" class="br"></td><td align="left"> Bailie Fife’s Close</td><td align="right">44</td></tr> -<tr><td align="left">Blackfriars Wynd</td><td align="right" class="br">41</td><td align="left" colspan="3" class="br"></td><td align="left"> Chalmers’ Close</td><td align="right">46</td></tr> -<tr><td align="left">Todrick’s Wynd</td><td align="right" class="br">43</td><td align="left" colspan="3" class="br"></td><td align="left"> John Knox’s Manse</td><td align="right">p</td></tr> -<tr><td align="left">Mint Close</td><td align="right" class="br">45</td><td align="left" colspan="3" class="br"></td></tr> -<tr><td align="left">The Old Mint</td><td align="right" class="br">o</td><td align="left" colspan="3" class="br"></td></tr> -<tr><td align="left">Hyndford’s Close</td><td align="right" class="br">47</td><td align="left" colspan="3" class="br"></td></tr> -<tr><td align="left">Tweeddale Court</td><td align="right" class="br">49</td><td align="left" colspan="2"> Nether Bow Port.</td><td align="right" class="br">F</td></tr> -<tr><td align="left" colspan="6"> </td></tr> -<tr><td align="left">St Mary’s Wynd</td><td align="right" class="br">51</td><td align="left" colspan="3" class="br"></td><td align="left"> Leith Wynd</td><td align="right">48</td></tr> -<tr><td align="left">Chessels’s Court</td><td align="right" class="br">53</td><td align="left" colspan="3" class="br"></td><td align="left"> Morocco’s Land</td><td align="right">50</td></tr> -<tr><td align="left">Weir’s Close</td><td align="right" class="br">55</td><td align="left" colspan="3" class="br"></td><td align="left"> New Street</td><td align="right">52</td></tr> -<tr><td align="left">Old Playhouse Close</td><td align="right" class="br">57</td><td align="left" colspan="3" class="br"></td><td align="left"> Jack’s Land</td><td align="right">54</td></tr> -<tr><td align="left">St John’s Close</td><td align="right" class="br">59</td><td align="left" colspan="3" class="br"></td><td align="left"> Tolbooth Wynd</td><td align="right">56</td></tr> -<tr><td align="left">St John’s Street</td><td align="right" class="br">61</td><td align="center" colspan="3" class="br"> CANONGATE.</td><td align="left"> Canongate Church</td><td align="right">58</td></tr> -<tr><td align="left">Moray House</td><td align="right" class="br">63</td><td align="left" colspan="3" class="br"></td><td align="left"> Canongate Churchyard</td><td align="right">q</td></tr> -<tr><td align="left">Speaking House</td><td align="right" class="br">65</td><td align="left" colspan="3" class="br"></td><td align="left"> Panmure House</td><td align="right">60</td></tr> -<tr><td align="left">Acheson House</td><td align="right" class="br">67</td><td align="left" colspan="3" class="br"></td><td align="left"> Golfers’ Land</td><td align="right">62</td></tr> -<tr><td align="left">Queensberry House</td><td align="right" class="br">69</td><td align="left" colspan="3" class="br"></td><td align="left"> White Horse Inn</td><td align="right">64</td></tr> -<tr><td align="left" colspan="2" class="br"></td><td align="left" colspan="3" class="br"></td><td align="left"> Water Gate</td><td align="right">r</td></tr> -</table></div> - -<hr class="chap" /></div><div class="chap"> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_xxvi" id="Page_xxvi">{xxvi}</a></span></p> - -<h2>EDINBURGH OLD AND NEW.</h2> - -<p>In the map the streets and buildings printed in black represent the historic Old Town; those in red indicate not -merely the ‘New Town’ to the north, specifically so called, but some part of the alterations, additions, and -extensions round the ancient nucleus that have gone to constitute the Edinburgh of the present day.</p> - -<div class="figcenter w600"> -<img src="images/map_thumb.jpg" width="600" height="291" alt="Map" /> -</div> - -<p class="screenonly center"><a href="images/map.jpg">Click here to view a larger version of the map.</a></p> -<p class="handonly center">[Transcriber’s note: A larger version of the map is available -in the HTML version of this text at Project Gutenberg.]</p> - - -<p class="ph3">KEY TO THE STREETS AND BUILDINGS NOT NAMED ON MAP.</p> - - -<div class="center"> -<table border="0" cellpadding="4" cellspacing="0" summary=""> -<tr><td align="left">Acheson House</td><td align="right">67</td></tr> -<tr><td align="left">Allan Ramsay’s House</td><td align="right"><em>a</em></td></tr> -<tr><td align="left">Anchor Close</td><td align="right">32</td></tr> -<tr><td align="left">Angle of Bow</td><td align="right"><em>Z</em></td></tr> -<tr><td align="left">Assembly Close</td><td align="right">25</td></tr> -<tr><td align="left">Back Stairs</td><td align="right">21</td></tr> -<tr><td align="left">Bailie Fife’s Close</td><td align="right">44</td></tr> -<tr><td align="left">Bank of Scotland</td><td align="right">red <em>F</em></td></tr> -<tr><td align="left">Beith’s or Bess Wynd</td><td align="right">17</td></tr> -<tr><td align="left">Bell’s Wynd</td><td align="right">27</td></tr> -<tr><td align="left">Blackfriars Wynd</td><td align="right">41</td></tr> -<tr><td align="left">Blair’s or Baird’s Close</td><td align="right">1</td></tr> -<tr><td align="left">Blyth’s Close</td><td align="right">2</td></tr> -<tr><td align="left">Bristo</td><td align="right"><em>N</em></td></tr> -<tr><td align="left">Bristo Port</td><td align="right"><em>O</em></td></tr> -<tr><td align="left">Brodie’s Close</td><td align="right">9</td></tr> -<tr><td align="left">Brown’s Close</td><td align="right">3</td></tr> -<tr><td align="left">Byres’s Close</td><td align="right">22</td></tr> -<tr><td align="left">Calton Burying-Ground</td><td align="right"><em>t</em></td></tr> -<tr><td align="left">Candlemaker Row</td><td align="right"><em>T</em></td></tr> -<tr><td align="left">Canongate Church</td><td align="right">58</td></tr> -<tr><td align="left">Canongate Churchyard</td><td align="right"><em>q</em></td></tr> -<tr><td align="left">Cant’s Close</td><td align="right">37</td></tr> -<tr><td align="left">Carrubber’s Close</td><td align="right">42</td></tr> -<tr><td align="left">Castlehill</td><td align="right"><em>B</em></td></tr> -<tr><td align="left">Castlehill Walk or Esplanade</td><td align="right"><em>A</em></td></tr> -<tr><td align="left">Castle Wynd</td><td align="right">74</td></tr> -<tr><td align="left">Chalmers’ Close</td><td align="right">46</td></tr> -<tr><td align="left">Chessels’s Court</td><td align="right">53</td></tr> -<tr><td align="left">College Wynd</td><td align="right">71</td></tr> -<tr><td align="left">Council Chambers</td><td align="right">red <em>G</em></td></tr> -<tr><td align="left">County Buildings</td><td align="right">red <em>I</em></td></tr> -<tr><td align="left">Court of Session</td><td align="right">red <em>K</em></td></tr> -<tr><td align="left">Cowgate</td><td align="right"><em>J J</em></td></tr> -<tr><td align="left">Cowgate Port</td><td align="right"><em>L</em></td></tr> -<tr><td align="left">Cross</td><td align="right"><em>x</em></td></tr> -<tr><td align="left">Dickson’s Close</td><td align="right">35</td></tr> -<tr><td align="left">Dunbar’s Close</td><td align="right">20</td></tr> -<tr><td align="left">Established Church Assembly Hall</td><td align="right">red <em>h</em></td></tr> -<tr><td align="left">Fishmarket Close</td><td align="right">23</td></tr> -<tr><td align="left">Fleshmarket</td><td align="right"><em>m</em></td></tr> -<tr><td align="left">Fleshmarket Close</td><td align="right">88</td></tr> -<tr><td align="left">Free Library</td><td align="right">red <em>L</em></td></tr> -<tr><td align="left">General Post-Office</td><td align="right">red <em>E</em></td></tr> -<tr><td align="left">Golfers’ Land</td><td align="right">62</td></tr> -<tr><td align="left">Gordon’s (Duke of) House</td><td align="right"><em>b</em></td></tr> -<tr><td align="left">Greenmarket</td><td align="right"><em>n</em></td></tr> -<tr><td align="left">Guard House</td><td align="right"><em>i</em></td></tr> -<tr><td align="left">Halkerston’s Wynd</td><td align="right">40</td></tr> -<tr><td align="left">Heriot’s Hospital</td><td align="right"><em>V</em></td></tr> -<tr><td align="left">Heriot-Watt College</td><td align="right">red <em>n n</em></td></tr> -<tr><td align="left">High School Wynd</td><td align="right">72</td></tr> -<tr><td align="left">High Street</td><td align="right"><em>E E</em></td></tr> -<tr><td align="left">Holyrood</td><td align="right"><em>G</em></td></tr> -<tr><td align="left">Hope’s Close</td><td align="right">15</td></tr> -<tr><td align="left">Horse Wynd</td><td align="right">70</td></tr> -<tr><td align="left">Hyndford’s Close</td><td align="right">47</td></tr> -<tr><td align="left">Jack’s Land</td><td align="right">54</td></tr> -<tr><td align="left">Jackson’s Close</td><td align="right">36</td></tr> -<tr><td align="left">James’s Court</td><td align="right">10</td></tr> -<tr><td align="left">John Knox’s Manse</td><td align="right"><em>p</em></td></tr> -<tr><td align="left">Lady Stair’s Close</td><td align="right">12</td></tr> -<tr><td align="left">Lauriston</td><td align="right"><em>M M</em></td></tr> -<tr><td align="left">Lawnmarket</td><td align="right"><em>D</em></td></tr> -<tr><td align="left">Leith Wynd</td><td align="right">48</td></tr> -<tr><td align="left">Liberton’s Wynd</td><td align="right">13</td></tr> -<tr><td align="left">Luckenbooths</td><td align="right"><em>f</em></td></tr> -<tr><td align="left">Lyon Close</td><td align="right">34</td></tr> -<tr><td align="left">Magdalen Chapel</td><td align="right">66</td></tr> -<tr><td align="left">Marlin’s Wynd</td><td align="right">31</td></tr> -<tr><td align="left">Mary King’s Close</td><td align="right">28</td></tr> -<tr><td align="left">Mary of Guise’s House, Site of</td><td align="right"><em>c</em></td></tr> -<tr><td align="left">Mint Close</td><td align="right">45</td></tr> -<tr><td align="left">Mint, The Old</td><td align="right"><em>o</em></td></tr> -<tr><td align="left">Moray House</td><td align="right">63</td></tr> -<tr><td align="left">Morocco’s Land</td><td align="right">50</td></tr> -<tr><td align="left">Mutrie’s Hill</td><td align="right"><em>u</em></td></tr> -<tr><td align="left">Mylne’s Court</td><td align="right">8</td></tr> -<tr><td align="left">Nairn’s Close</td><td align="right">4</td></tr> -<tr><td align="left">Nether Bow Port</td><td align="right"><em>F</em></td></tr> -<tr><td align="left">New Street</td><td align="right">52</td></tr> -<tr><td align="left">Niddry’s Wynd</td><td align="right">33</td></tr> -<tr><td align="left">Old Bank Close</td><td align="right">11</td></tr> -<tr><td align="left">Old Playhouse Close</td><td align="right">57</td></tr> -<tr><td align="left">Panmure House</td><td align="right">60</td></tr> -<tr><td align="left">Parliament Close</td><td align="right">19</td></tr> -<tr><td align="left">Parliament House</td><td align="right"><em>k</em></td></tr> -<tr><td align="left">Paterson’s Court</td><td align="right">18</td></tr> -<tr><td align="left">Peebles Wynd</td><td align="right">29</td></tr> -<tr><td align="left">Pleasance</td><td align="right"><em>R</em></td></tr> -<tr><td align="left">Portsburgh</td><td align="right"><em>H</em></td></tr> -<tr><td align="left">Post-Office Close</td><td align="right">80</td></tr> -<tr><td align="left">Potterrow</td><td align="right"><em>P</em></td></tr> -<tr><td align="left">Potterrow Port</td><td align="right"><em>Q</em></td></tr> -<tr><td align="left">Queensberry House</td><td align="right">69</td></tr> -<tr><td align="left">Register House</td><td align="right">red <em>A</em></td></tr> -<tr><td align="left">Riddel’s Close</td><td align="right">7</td></tr> -<tr><td align="left">Royal Exchange</td><td align="right">26</td></tr> -<tr><td align="left">Royal Infirmary</td><td align="right"><em>K</em></td></tr> -<tr><td align="left">Royal Scottish Academy Galleries</td><td align="right">red <em>B</em></td></tr> -<tr><td align="left">St Cecilia’s Hall, Site of</td><td align="right"><em>l</em></td></tr> -<tr><td align="left">St Giles’—<br /></td></tr> -<tr><td align="left"><span class="ml2">Haddo’s Hole Church</span></td><td align="right"><em>g</em></td></tr> -<tr><td align="left"><span class="ml2">Tolbooth Church</span></td><td align="right"><em>h</em></td></tr> -<tr><td align="left">St John’s Close</td><td align="right">59</td></tr> -<tr><td align="left">St John’s Street</td><td align="right">61</td></tr> -<tr><td align="left">St Mary’s Wynd</td><td align="right">51</td></tr> -<tr><td align="left">Scottish National Gallery</td><td align="right">red <em>C</em></td></tr> -<tr><td align="left">Scott’s (Sir Walter) Monument</td><td align="right">red <em>D</em></td></tr> -<tr><td align="left">Sheriff Court House</td><td align="right">red <em>M</em></td></tr> -<tr><td align="left">Speaking House</td><td align="right">65</td></tr> -<tr><td align="left">S.S.C. Library</td><td align="right">red <em>J</em></td></tr> -<tr><td align="left">Strichen’s Close</td><td align="right">39</td></tr> -<tr><td align="left">Surgeons’ Hall</td><td align="right">red <em>o</em></td></tr> -<tr><td align="left">Tailors’ Hall</td><td align="right">68</td></tr> -<tr><td align="left">Todrick’s Wynd</td><td align="right">43</td></tr> -<tr><td align="left">Tod’s Close</td><td align="right">6</td></tr> -<tr><td align="left">Tolbooth</td><td align="right"><em>e</em></td></tr> -<tr><td align="left">Tolbooth Wynd</td><td align="right">56</td></tr> -<tr><td align="left">Trinity College Church</td><td align="right"><em>S</em></td></tr> -<tr><td align="left">Tron Church</td><td align="right"><em>j</em></td></tr> -<tr><td align="left">Tweeddale Court</td><td align="right">49</td></tr> -<tr><td align="left">Upper Baxter’s Close</td><td align="right">14</td></tr> -<tr><td align="left">Wardrop’s Court</td><td align="right">16</td></tr> -<tr><td align="left">Water Gate</td><td align="right"><em>r</em></td></tr> -<tr><td align="left">Webster’s Close</td><td align="right">5</td></tr> -<tr><td align="left">Weigh-House</td><td align="right"><em>d</em></td></tr> -<tr><td align="left">Weir’s Close</td><td align="right">55</td></tr> -<tr><td align="left">West Bow</td><td align="right"><em>C C</em></td></tr> -<tr><td align="left">West Port</td><td align="right"><em>I</em></td></tr> -<tr><td align="left">White Hart Inn</td><td align="right">73</td></tr> -<tr><td align="left">White Horse Inn</td><td align="right">64</td></tr> -<tr><td align="left">Writers’ Court</td><td align="right">24</td></tr> -</table></div> - -<hr class="chap" /></div><div class="chapter"> - -<div class="figcenter w600"> -<a id="illus_c_001"></a> -<img src="images/illus_c_001.jpg" width="600" height="515" alt="" /> -<div class="caption"><p class="center">A series of towers rising from a palace on the plain to a castle in the air.</p> - -<p class="right"> -<span class="smcap"><a href="#Page_1">Page 1.</a></span></p></div> -</div> - -<hr class="chap" /></div><div class="chapter"> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_1" id="Page_1">{1}</a></span></p> - - - - -<h2><a name="TRADITIONS_OF_EDINBURGH" id="TRADITIONS_OF_EDINBURGH">TRADITIONS OF EDINBURGH.</a></h2> - - - -<hr class="chap" /></div><div class="chapter"> -<h2><a name="THE_CHANGES_OF_THE_LAST_HUNDRED_YEARS" id="THE_CHANGES_OF_THE_LAST_HUNDRED_YEARS">THE CHANGES OF THE LAST HUNDRED YEARS.</a><br /> -[1745-1845.]</h2> - - -<div class="figcenter w350"> -<img src="images/illus_p_001.jpg" width="350" height="430" alt="" /> -<div class="caption"><p class="center">Fortified Gate, -Nether Bow Port, from Canongate.</p></div> -</div> - -<p>Edinburgh was, at the beginning of George III.’s reign, a -picturesque, odorous, inconvenient, old-fashioned town, of -about seventy thousand inhabitants. It had no court, no factories, -no commerce; but there was a nest of lawyers in it, attending -upon the Court of Session; and a considerable -number of the Scotch gentry—one of -whom then passed as rich with a thousand -a year—gave it the benefit of -their presence during the winter. -Thus the town had lived for some -ages, during which political -discontent and division had -kept the country poor. A -stranger approaching the city, -seeing it piled ‘close and -massy, deep and high’—a -series of towers, rising from -a palace on the plain to a -castle in the air—would have -thought it a truly romantic -place; and the impression -would not have subsided much -on a near inspection, when he -would have found himself -admitted by a fortified gate -through an ancient wall, still -kept in repair. Even on entering the one old street of which -the city chiefly consisted, he would have seen much to admire—houses<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_2" id="Page_2">{2}</a></span> -of substantial architecture and lofty proportions, mingled -with more lowly, but also more arresting wooden fabrics; a huge -and irregular, but venerable Gothic church, surmounted by an -aërial crown of masonry; finally, an esplanade towards the Castle, -from which he could have looked abroad upon half a score of -counties, upon firth and fell, yea, even to the blue Grampians. -Everywhere he would have seen symptoms of denseness of -population; the open street a universal market; a pell-mell of -people everywhere. The eye would have been, upon the whole, -gratified, whatever might be the effect of the <i lang="la" xml:lang="la">clangor strepitusque</i> -upon the ear, or whatever might have been the private -meditations of the nose. It would have only been on coming -to close quarters, or to quarters at all, that our stranger would -have begun to think of serious drawbacks from the first impression. -For an inn, he would have had the White Horse, in -a close in the Canongate; or the White Hart, a house which -now appears like a carrier’s inn, in the Grassmarket. Or, had -he betaken himself to a private lodging, which he would have -probably done under the conduct of a ragged varlet, speaking -more of his native Gaelic than English, he would have had to -ascend four or five stories of a common stair, into the narrow -chambers of -some Mrs -Balgray or -Luckie Fergusson, -where -a closet-bed -in the sitting-room -would -have been -displayed as -the most comfortable -place -in the world; -and he would -have had, for -amusement, a -choice between -an extensive -view of house-tops from the window and the study of a -series of prints of the four seasons, a sampler, and a portrait of -the Marquis of Granby, upon the wall.</p> - -<div class="figcenter w500"> -<img src="images/illus_p_002.jpg" width="500" height="317" alt="" /> -<div class="caption"><p class="center">House-tops.</p></div> -</div> - -<div class="figcenter w500"> -<a id="illus_c_002"></a> -<img src="images/illus_c_002.jpg" width="500" height="666" alt="" /> -<div class="caption"><p class="center">WHITE HART INN, GRASSMARKET.</p> - -<p class="right"> -<span class="smcap"><a href="#Page_2">Page 2.</a></span> -</p> -</div> -</div> -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_3" id="Page_3">{3}</a></span></p> - -<p>On being introduced into society, our stranger might have discovered -cause for content with his lodging on finding how poorly -off were the first people with respect to domestic accommodations. -I can imagine him going to tea at Mr Bruce of Kennet’s, in -Forrester’s Wynd—a country gentleman and a lawyer (not long -after raised to the bench), yet happy to live with his wife and -children in a house of fifteen pounds of rent, in a region of profound -darkness and mystery, now no more. Had he got into -familiar terms with the worthy lady of the mansion, he might -have ascertained that they had just three rooms and a kitchen; -one room, ‘my lady’s’—that is, the kind of parlour he was -sitting in; another, a consulting-room for the gentleman; the -third, a bedroom. The children, with their maid, had beds -laid down for them at night in their father’s room; the housemaid -slept under the kitchen dresser; and the one man-servant -was turned at night out of the house. Had our friend chanced -to get amongst tradespeople, he might have found Mr Kerr, -the eminent goldsmith in the Parliament Square, stowing his -<i lang="fr" xml:lang="fr">ménage</i> into a couple of small rooms above his booth-like shop, -plastered against the wall of St Giles’s Church; the nursery -and kitchen, however, being placed in a cellar under the level -of the street, where the children are said to have rotted off -like sheep.</p> - -<p>But indeed everything was on a homely and narrow scale. The -College—where Munro, Cullen, and Black were already making -themselves great names—was to be approached through a mean -alley, the College Wynd. The churches were chiefly clustered -under one roof; the jail was a narrow building, half-filling up -the breadth of the street; the public offices, for the most part, -obscure places in lanes and dark entries. The men of learning -and wit, united with a proportion of men of rank, met as the -<em>Poker Club</em> in a tavern, the best of its day, but only a dark house -in a close, to which our stranger could scarcely have made his -way without a guide. In a similar situation across the way, he -would have found, at the proper season, the <em>Assembly</em>; that is, -a congregation of ladies met for dancing, and whom the gentlemen -usually joined rather late, and rather merry. The only theatre -was also a poor and obscure place in some indescribable part of the -Canongate.</p> - -<p>The town was, nevertheless, a funny, familiar, compact, and not -unlikable place. Gentle and semple living within the compass of -a single close, or even a single stair, knew and took an interest in<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_4" id="Page_4">{4}</a></span> -each other.<a name="FNanchor_1" id="FNanchor_1"></a><a href="#Footnote_1" class="fnanchor">[1]</a> Acquaintances might not only be formed, Pyramus-and-Thisbe -fashion, through party-walls, but from window to -window across alleys, narrow enough in many cases to allow of -hand coming to hand, and even lip to lip. There was little -elegance, but a vast amount of cheap sociality. Provokingly -comical clubs, founded each upon one joke, were abundant. The -ladies had tea-drinkings at the primitive hour of six, from which -they cruised home under the care of a lantern-bearing, patten-shod -lass; or perhaps, if a bad night, in Saunders Macalpine’s sedan-chair. -Every forenoon, for several hours, the only clear space -which the town presented—that around the Cross—was crowded -with loungers of all ranks, whom it had been an amusement to -the poet Gay to survey from the neighbouring windows of Allan -Ramsay’s shop. The jostle and huddlement was extreme everywhere. -Gentlemen and ladies paraded along in the stately attire -of the period; tradesmen chatted in groups, often bareheaded, -at their shop-doors; caddies whisked about, bearing messages, -or attending to the affairs of strangers; children filled the kennel -with their noisy sports. Add to all this, corduroyed men from -Gilmerton, bawling coals or yellow sand, and spending as much -breath in a minute as could have served poor asthmatic Hugo -Arnot for a month; fishwomen crying their caller haddies from -Newhaven; whimsicals and idiots going along, each with his or -her crowd of listeners or tormentors; sootymen with their bags; -town-guardsmen with their antique Lochaber axes; water-carriers -with their dripping barrels; barbers with their hair-dressing -materials; and so forth—and our stranger would have been -disposed to acknowledge that, though a coarse and confused, it -was a perfectly unique scene, and one which, once contemplated, -was not easily to be forgotten.</p> - -<p>A change at length began. Our northern country had settled -to sober courses in the reign of George II., and the usual results -of industry were soon apparent. Edinburgh by-and-by felt much -like a lady who, after long being content with a small and inconvenient -house, is taught, by the money in her husband’s pockets, -that such a place is no longer to be put up with. There was a<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_5" id="Page_5">{5}</a></span> -wish to expatiate over some of the neighbouring grounds, so as -to get more space and freer air; only it was difficult to do, considering -the physical circumstances of the town, and the character -of the existing outlets. Space, space!—air, air! was, however, -a strong and a general cry, and the old romantic city did at -length burst from its bounds, though not in a very regular way, -or for a time to much good purpose.</p> - -<div class="figcenter w550"> -<a id="illus_c_003"></a> -<img src="images/illus_c_003.jpg" width="550" height="680" alt="" /> -<div class="caption"><p class="center">NEWHAVEN FISHWIFE.</p> - -<p class="right"> -<span class="smcap"><a href="#Page_4">Page 4.</a></span> -</p> -</div> -</div> - -<p>A project for a new street on the site of Halkerston’s Wynd, -leading by a bridge to the grounds of Mutrie’s Hill, where a -suburb might be erected, was formed before the end of the -seventeenth century.<a name="FNanchor_2" id="FNanchor_2"></a><a href="#Footnote_2" class="fnanchor">[2]</a> It was a subject of speculation to John, -Earl of Mar, during his years of exile, as were many other schemes -of national improvement which have since been realised—for -example, the Forth and Clyde Canal. The grounds to the north -lay so invitingly open that the early formation of such a project -is not wonderful. Want of spirit and of means alone could delay -its execution. After the Rebellion of 1745, when a general spirit -of improvement began to be shown in Scotland, the scheme was -taken up by a public-spirited provost, Mr George Drummond, -but it had to struggle for years with local difficulties. Meanwhile, -a sagacious builder, by name James Brown, resolved to take -advantage of the growing taste; he purchased a field near the -town for £1200, and <em>feued</em> it out for a square. The speculation -is said to have ended in something like giving him his own money -as an annual return. This place (George Square) became the -residence of several of the judges and gentry. I was amused a -few years ago hearing an old gentleman in the country begin -a story thus: ‘When I was in Edinburgh, in the year ’67, I went -to George Square, to call for Mrs Scott of Sinton,’ &c. To this -day some relics of gentry cling to its grass-green causeways, -charmed, perhaps, by its propinquity to the Meadows and Bruntsfield -Links. Another place sprang into being, a smaller quadrangle -of neat houses, called Brown’s Square.<a name="FNanchor_3" id="FNanchor_3"></a><a href="#Footnote_3" class="fnanchor">[3]</a> So much was -thought of it at first that a correspondent of the <cite>Edinburgh -Advertiser</cite>, in 1764, seriously counsels his fellow-citizens to erect -in it an equestrian statue of the then popular young king, George -III.! This place, too, had some distinguished inhabitants; till -1846, one of the houses continued to be nominally the town -mansion of a venerable judge, Lord Glenlee. We pass willingly -from these traits of grandeur to dwell on the fact of its having<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_6" id="Page_6">{6}</a></span> -been the residence of Miss Jeanie Elliot of Minto, the authoress -of the original song, <cite>The Flowers of the Forest</cite>; and even to -bethink ourselves that here Scott placed the ideal abode of -Saunders Fairford and the adventure of Green Mantle. Sir -Walter has informed us, from his own recollections, that the -inhabitants of these southern districts formed for a long time a -distinct class of themselves, having even places of polite amusement -for their own recreation, independent of the rest of Edinburgh. -He tells us that the society was of the first description, including, -for one thing, most of the gentlemen who wrote in the <cite>Mirror</cite> -and the <cite>Lounger</cite>. There was one venerable inhabitant who did -not die till half the New Town was finished, yet he had never -once seen it!</p> - -<p>The exertions of Drummond at length procured an act (1767) -for extending the royalty of the city over the northern fields; -and a bridge was then erected to connect these with the elder -city. The scheme was at first far from popular. The exposure -to the north and east winds was felt as a grievous disadvantage, -especially while houses were few. So unpleasant even was the -North Bridge considered that a lover told a New-Town mistress—to -be sure only in an epigram—that when he visited her, he -felt as performing an adventure not much short of that of Leander. -The aristocratic style of the place alarmed a number of pockets, -and legal men trembled lest their clients and other employers -should forget them if they removed so far from the centre of -things as Princes Street and St Andrew Square. Still, the move -was unavoidable, and behoved to be made.</p> - -<p>It is curious to cast the eye over the beautiful city which now -extends over this district, the residence of as refined a mass of -people as could be found in any similar space of ground upon -earth, and reflect on what the place was a hundred years ago. -The bulk of it was a farm, usually called Wood’s Farm, from its -tenant (the father of a clever surgeon, well known in Edinburgh -in the last age under the familiar appellation of <em>Lang Sandy -Wood</em>). Henry Mackenzie, author of the <cite>Man of Feeling</cite>, who -died in 1831, remembered shooting snipes, hares, and partridges -about that very spot to which he alludes at the beginning of the -paper on Nancy Collins in the <cite>Mirror</cite> (July 1779): ‘As I walked -one evening, about a fortnight ago, <em>through St Andrew Square</em>, I -observed a girl meanly dressed,’ &c. Nearly along the line now -occupied by Princes Street was a rough enclosed road, called the -<em>Lang Gait</em> or <em>Lang Dykes</em>, the way along which Claverhouse<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_7" id="Page_7">{7}</a></span> -went with his troopers in 1689, when he retired in disgust from -the Convention, with the resolution of raising a rebellion in the -Highlands. On the site of the present Register House was a -hamlet or small group of houses called <em>Mutrie’s Hill</em>; and where -the Royal Bank now stands was a cottage wherein ambulative -citizens regaled themselves with fruit and curds and cream. -Broughton, which latterly has been surprised and swamped by -the spreading city, was then a village, considered as so far afield -that people went to live in it for the summer months, under the -pleasing idea that they had got into the country. It is related -that Whitefield used to preach to vast multitudes on the spot -which by-and-by became appropriated for the <em>Theatre Royal</em>. -Coming back one year, and finding a playhouse on the site of his -tub, he was extremely incensed. Could it be, as Burns suggests,</p> - -<div class="poetry-container"><div class="poetry"><div class="stanza"> -<div class="verse">‘There was rivalry just in the job!’</div> -</div></div></div> - -<p>James Craig, a nephew of the poet Thomson, was entrusted with -the duty of planning the new city. In the engraved plan, he -appropriately quotes from his uncle:</p> - -<div class="poetry-container"><div class="poetry"><div class="stanza"> -<div class="verse">‘August, around, what PUBLIC WORKS I see!</div> -<div class="verse">Lo, stately streets! lo, squares that court the breeze!</div> -<div class="verse">See long canals and deepened rivers join</div> -<div class="verse">Each part with each, and with the circling main,</div> -<div class="verse">The whole entwined isle.’</div> -</div></div></div> - -<p>The names of the streets and squares were taken from the royal -family and the tutelary saints of the island. The honest citizens -had originally intended to put their own local saint in the foreground; -but when the plan was shown to the king for his -approval, he cried: ‘Hey, hey—what, what—<em>St Giles Street!</em>—never -do, never do!’ And so, to escape from an unpleasant -association of ideas, this street was called <em>Princes Street</em>, in honour -of the king’s two sons, afterwards George IV. and the Duke of -York. So difficult was it at the very first to induce men to -build that a premium of twenty pounds was offered by the -magistrates to him who should raise the first house; it was -awarded to Mr John Young, on account of a mansion erected by -him in Rose Court, George Street. An exemption from burghal -taxes was granted to the first house in the line of Princes Street, -built by Mr John Neale, haberdasher (afterwards occupied by -Archibald Constable, and then as the Crown Hotel), in consequence -of a bargain made by Mr Graham, plumber, who sold<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_8" id="Page_8">{8}</a></span> -this and the adjoining ground to the town.<a name="FNanchor_4" id="FNanchor_4"></a><a href="#Footnote_4" class="fnanchor">[4]</a> Mr Shadrach Moyes, -when having a house built for himself in Princes Street, in 1769, -took the builder bound to rear another farther along besides his, -to shield him from the west wind! Other quaint particulars are -remembered; as, for instance: Mr Wight, an eminent lawyer, -who had planted himself in St Andrew Square, finding he was in -danger of having his view of St Giles’s clock shut up by the -advancing line of Princes Street, built the intervening house -himself, that he might have it in his power to keep the roof low -for the sake of the view in question; important to him, he said, -as enabling him to regulate his movements in the morning, when -it was necessary that he should be punctual in his attendance at -the Parliament House.</p> - -<div class="figcenter w600"> -<a id="illus_c_004"></a> -<img src="images/illus_c_004.jpg" width="600" height="590" alt="" /> -<div class="caption"><p class="center">ROUPING-WIFE.</p> - -<p class="right"> -<span class="smcap"><a href="#Page_9">Page 9.</a></span> -</p></div> -</div> - -<p>The foundation was at length laid of that revolution which has -ended in making Edinburgh a kind of double city—<em>first</em>, an -ancient and picturesque hill-built one, occupied chiefly by the -humbler classes; and <em>second</em>, an elegant modern one, of much -regularity of aspect, and possessed almost as exclusively by the -more refined portion of society. The New Town, keeping pace -with the growing prosperity of the country, had, in 1790, been -extended to Castle Street; in 1800 the necessity for a second -plan of the same extent still farther to the north had been felt, -and this was after acted upon. Forty years saw the Old Town -thoroughly changed as respects population. One after another, -its nobles and gentry, its men of the robe, its ‘writers,’ and even -its substantial burghers, had during that time deserted their -mansions in the High Street and Canongate, till few were left. -Even those modern districts connected with it, as St John Street, -New Street, George Square, &c., were beginning to be forsaken -for the sake of more elegantly circumstanced habitations beyond -the North Loch. Into the remote social consequences of this -change it is not my purpose to enter, beyond the bare remark -that it was only too accordant with that tendency of our present -form of civilisation to separate the high from the low, the intelligent -from the ignorant—that dissociation, in short, which would -in itself run nigh to be a condemnation of all progress, if we -were not allowed to suppose that better forms of civilisation are -realisable. Enough that I mention the tangible consequences of -the revolution—a flooding in of the humbler trading classes where -gentles once had been; the houses of these classes, again, filled<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_9" id="Page_9">{9}</a></span> -with the vile and miserable. Now were to be seen hundreds of -instances of such changes as Provost Creech indicates in 1783: -‘The Lord Justice-Clerk Tinwald’s house possessed by a French -teacher—Lord President Craigie’s house by a rouping-wife or -salewoman of old furniture—and Lord Drummore’s house left by -a chairman for want of accommodation.’ ‘The house of the Duke -of Douglas at the Union, now possessed by a wheelwright!’ To -one who, like myself, was young in the early part of the present -century, it was scarcely possible, as he permeated the streets and -closes of ancient Edinburgh, to realise the idea of a time when -the great were housed therein. But many a gentleman in middle -life, then living perhaps in Queen Street or Charlotte Square, -could recollect the close or the common stair where he had been -born and spent his earliest years, now altogether given up to a -different portion of society. And when the younger perambulator -inquired more narrowly, he could discover traces of this former -population. Here and there a carved coat-armorial, with supporters, -perhaps even a coronet, arrested attention -amidst the obscurities of some -<em>wynd</em> or court. Did he ascend a stair -and enter a floor, now subdivided -perhaps into four or five distinct -dwellings, he might readily perceive, -in the massive wainscot -of the lobby, a proof that -the refinements of life had -once been there. Still more -would this idea be impressed -upon him when, passing into -one of the best rooms of the -old house, he would find not -only a continuation of such -wainscoting, but perhaps a -tolerable landscape by Norie -on a panel above the fireplace, -or a ceiling decorated -by De la Cour, a French -artist, who flourished in -Edinburgh about 1740. Even yet he would discover a very few -relics of gentry maintaining their ground in the Old Town, as if -faintly to show what it had once been. These were generally old -people, who did not think it worth while to make any change<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_10" id="Page_10">{10}</a></span> -till the great one. There is a melancholy pleasure in recalling -what I myself found about 1820, when my researches for this -work were commenced. In that year I was in the house of -Governor Fergusson, an ancient gentleman of the Pitfour family, -in a floor, one stair up, in the Luckenbooths. About the same -time I attended the book-sale of Dr Arrot, a physician of good -figure, newly deceased, in the Mint Close. For several years later, -any one ascending a now miserable-looking stair in Blackfriars -Wynd would have seen a door-plate inscribed with the name -<span class="smcap">Miss Oliphant</span>, a member of the Gask family. Nay, so late as -1832, I had the pleasure of breakfasting with Sir William Macleod -Bannatyne in Whiteford House, Canongate (afterwards a type-foundry), -on which occasion the venerable old gentleman talked -as familiarly of the levees of the <i lang="fr" xml:lang="fr">sous-ministre</i> for Lord Bute in the -old villa at the Abbey Hill as I could have talked of the affairs -of the Canning administration; and even recalled, as a fresh -picture of his memory, his father drawing on his boots to go -to make interest in London in behalf of some of the men in -trouble for the Forty-five, particularly his own brother-in-law, -the Clanranald of that day. Such were the connections recently -existing between the past system of things and the present. Now, -alas! the sun of Old-Town glory has set for ever. Nothing is -left but the decaying and rapidly diminishing masses of ancient -masonry, and a handful of traditionary recollections, which be -it my humble but not unworthy task to transmit to future -generations.<a name="FNanchor_5" id="FNanchor_5"></a><a href="#Footnote_5" class="fnanchor">[5]</a></p> - -<div class="figcenter w350"> -<img src="images/illus_p_009.jpg" width="350" height="378" alt="" /> -<div class="caption"><p class="center">Carved Armorial, with Supporters.</p></div> -</div> - -<hr class="chap" /> - -<div class="figcenter w500"> -<a id="illus_c_005"></a> -<img src="images/illus_c_005.jpg" width="500" height="668" alt="" /> -<div class="caption"><p class="center">THE CASTLE-HILL.</p> - -<p class="right"> -<span class="smcap"><a href="#Page_11">Page 11.</a></span></p></div> -</div> - -<hr class="chap" /></div><div class="chapter"> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_11" id="Page_11">{11}</a></span></p> - - - - -<h2><a name="THE_CASTLE-HILL" id="THE_CASTLE-HILL">THE CASTLE-HILL.</a></h2> - -<p class="chapter_summary"><strong>Hugo Arnot—Allan Ramsay—House of the Gordon Family—Sir -David Baird—Dr Webster—House of Mary de Guise.</strong></p> - - -<p>The saunter which I contemplate through the streets and -stories, the lanes and legends, of Old Edinburgh may -properly commence at the Castle-hill, as it is a marked extremity -of the city as well as its highest ground.</p> - -<p>The Castle-hill is partly an esplanade, serving as a parade-ground -for the garrison of the Castle, and partly a street, the -upper portion of that vertebral line which, under the various -names of Lawnmarket, High Street, and Canongate, extends to -Holyrood Palace. The open ground—a scene of warfare during -the sieges of the fortress, often a place of execution in rude -times—the place, too, where, by a curious legal fiction, the Nova -Scotia baronets were enfeoffed in their ideal estates on the other -side of the Atlantic—was all that Edinburgh possessed as a -readily accessible promenade before the extension of the city. -We find the severe acts for a strict observance of the Sabbath, -which appeared from time to time in the latter part of the -seventeenth and early part of the eighteenth century, denouncing -the King’s Park, the Pier of Leith, and the <em>Castle-hill</em> as the -places chiefly resorted to for the profane sport of walking on -‘the Lord’s Day.’ Denounce as they might, human nature could -never, I believe, be altogether kept off the Castle-hill; even the -most respectable people walked there in multitudes during the -intervals between morning and evening service. We have an -allusion to the promenade character of the Castle-hill in Ramsay’s -city pastoral, as it may be called, of <cite>The Young Laird and -Edinburgh Katy</cite>—</p> - -<div class="poetry-container"><div class="poetry"><div class="stanza"> -<div class="verse">‘Wat ye wha I met yestreen,</div> -<div class="verse indent2">Coming down the street, my jo?</div> -<div class="verse">My mistress in her tartan screen,</div> -<div class="verse indent2">Fu’ bonny, braw, and sweet, my jo.</div> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<div class="verse">“My dear,” quoth I, “thanks to the night,</div> -<div class="verse indent2">That never wished a lover ill,</div> -<div class="verse">Since ye’re out o’ your mother’s sight,</div> -<div class="verse indent2">Let’s tak’ a walk up to <em>the hill</em>.”’</div> -</div></div></div> -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_12" id="Page_12">{12}</a></span></p> -<p>A memory of these Sunday promenadings here calls me to -introduce what I have to say regarding a man of whom there -used to be a strong popular remembrance in Edinburgh.</p> - - -<h3>HUGO ARNOT.</h3> - -<p>The cleverly executed <cite>History of Edinburgh</cite>, published by -Arnot in 1779, and which to this day has not been superseded, -gives some respectability to a name which tradition would have -otherwise handed down to us as only that of an eccentric gentleman, -of remarkably scarecrow figure, and the subject of a few -<i lang="fr" xml:lang="fr">bon-mots</i>.</p> - -<p>He was the son of a Leith shipmaster, named Pollock, and -took the name of Arnot from a small inheritance in Fife. Many -who have read his laborious work will be little prepared to hear -that it was written when the author was between twenty and -thirty; and that, antiquated as his meagre figure looks in Kay’s -Portraits, he was at his death, in 1786, only thirty-seven. His -body had been, in reality, made prematurely old -by a confirmed asthma, accompanied by a cough, -which he himself said would carry him off like a -rocket some day, when a friend remarked, with -reference to his known latitudinarianism: ‘Possibly, -Hugo, in the contrary direction.’</p> - -<div class="figcenter w150"> -<img src="images/illus_p_012.jpg" width="150" height="427" alt="" /> -<div class="caption"><p class="center">Hugo Arnot, looking -so like his meat.</p></div> -</div> - -<p>Most of the jokes about poor Hugo’s person -have been frequently printed—as Harry Erskine -meeting him on the street when he was gnawing -at a spelding or dried haddock, and congratulating -him on <em>looking so like his meat</em>; and his -offending the piety of an old woman who was -cheapening a Bible in Creech’s shop, by some -thoughtless remark, when she first burst out -with: ‘Oh, you monster!’ and then turning -round and seeing him, added: ‘And he’s an -anatomy too!’ An epigram by Erskine is less -known:</p> - -<div class="poetry-container"><div class="poetry"><div class="stanza"> -<div class="verse">‘The Scriptures assure us that much is forgiven</div> -<div class="verse"><em>To flesh and to blood</em> by the mercy of Heaven;</div> -<div class="verse">But I’ve searched the whole Bible, and texts can find none</div> -<div class="verse">That extend the assurance <em>to skin and to bone</em>.’</div> -</div></div></div> - -<p>Arnot was afflicted by a constitutional irritability to an extent<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_13" id="Page_13">{13}</a></span> -which can hardly be conceived. A printer’s boy, handing papers -to him over his shoulder, happened to touch his ear with one -of them, when he started up in a rage, and demanded of the -trembling youth what he meant by insulting him in that manner! -Probably from some quarrel arising out of this nervous weakness—for -such it really was—the Edinburgh booksellers, to a man, -refused to have anything to do with the prospectuses of his -<cite>Criminal Trials</cite>, and Arnot had to advertise that they were to -be seen in the coffee-houses, instead of the booksellers’ shops.</p> - -<p>About the time when he entered at the bar (1772), he had a -fancy for a young lady named Hay (afterwards Mrs Macdougall), -sister of a gentleman who succeeded as Marquis of Tweeddale, -and then a reigning toast. One Sunday, when he contemplated -making up to his divinity on the Castle-hill, after forenoon -service, he entertained two young friends at breakfast in his -lodgings at the head of the Canongate. By-and-by the affairs -of the toilet came to be considered. It was then found that -Hugo’s washerwoman had played false, leaving him in a total -destitution of clean linen, or at least of clean linen that was also -<em>whole</em>. A dreadful storm took place, but at length, on its -calming a little, love found out a way, by taking the hand-ruffles -of one cast garment, in connection with the front of another, -and adding both to the body of a third. In this eclectic form -of shirt the meagre young philosopher marched forth with his -friends, and was rewarded for his perseverance by being allowed -a very pleasant chat with the young lady on ‘the hill.’ His -friends standing by had their own enjoyment in reflecting what -the beauteous Miss Hay would think if she knew the struggles -which her admirer had had that morning in preparing to make -his appearance before her.</p> - -<p>Arnot latterly dwelt in a small house at the end of the Meuse -Lane in St Andrew Street, with an old and very particular lady -for a neighbour in the upper-floor. Disturbed by the enthusiastic -way in which he sometimes rang his bell, the lady ventured to -send a remonstrance, which, however, produced no effect. This -led to a bad state of matters between them. At length a very -pressing and petulant message being handed in one day, insisting -that he should endeavour to call his servants <em>in a different -manner</em>, what was the lady’s astonishment next morning to hear -a pistol discharged in Arnot’s house! He was simply complying -with the letter of his neighbour’s request, by firing, instead of -ringing, as a signal for shaving-water.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_14" id="Page_14">{14}</a></span></p> - - -<h3>ALLAN RAMSAY.</h3> - -<p>On the north side of the esplanade—enjoying a splendid view -of the Firth of Forth, Fife and Stirling shires—is the neat little -villa of Allan Ramsay, surrounded by its miniature pleasure-grounds. -The sober, industrious life of this exception to the -race of poets having resulted in a small competency, -he built this odd-shaped house in -his latter days, designing to enjoy in it -the Horatian quiet which he had so -often eulogised in his verse. The -story goes that, showing it soon -after to the clever Patrick, Lord -Elibank, with much fussy interest -in all its externals and -accommodations, he remarked -that the wags were already at -work on the subject—they -likened it to a goose-pie<a name="FNanchor_6" id="FNanchor_6"></a><a href="#Footnote_6" class="fnanchor">[6]</a> -(owing to the roundness of the -shape). ‘Indeed, Allan,’ said -his lordship, ‘now I see you in -it, I think the wags are not far -wrong.’</p> - -<div class="figcenter w300"> -<img src="images/illus_p_014.jpg" width="300" height="384" alt="" /> -<div class="caption"><p class="center">Allan Ramsay’s Villa.</p></div> -</div> - -<p>The splendid reputation of -Burns has eclipsed that of Ramsay -so effectually that this pleasing -poet, and, upon the whole, -amiable and worthy man, is now little regarded. Yet Ramsay -can never be deprived of the credit of having written the best -pastoral poem in the range of British literature—if even that be -not too narrow a word—and many of his songs are of great -merit.</p> - -<p>Ramsay was secretly a Jacobite, openly a dissenter from the -severe manners and feelings of his day, although a very decent -and regular attender of the Old Church in St Giles’s. He -delighted in music and theatricals, and, as we shall see, -encouraged the Assembly. It was also no doubt his own taste<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_15" id="Page_15">{15}</a></span> -which led him, in 1725, to set up a circulating library, whence -he diffused plays and other works of fiction among the people -of Edinburgh. It appears, from the private notes of the historian -Wodrow, that, in 1728, the magistrates, moved by some -meddling spirits, took alarm at the effect of this kind of reading -on the minds of youth, and made an attempt to put it down, -but without effect. One cannot but be amused to find amongst -these self-constituted guardians of morality Lord Grange, who -kept his wife in unauthorised restraint for several years, and -whose own life was a scandal to his professions. Ramsay, as is -well known, also attempted to establish a theatre in Edinburgh, -but failed. The following advertisement on this subject appears -in the <cite>Caledonian Mercury</cite>, September 1736: ‘The New -Theatre in Carrubber’s Close being in great forwardness, will be -opened the 1st of November. These are to advertise the -gentlemen and ladies who incline to purchase annual tickets, to -enter their names before the 20th of October next, on which day -they shall receive their tickets from Allan Ramsay, on paying -30s.—no more than forty to be subscribed for; after which none -will be disposed of under two guineas.’</p> - -<p>The late Mrs Murray of Henderland knew Ramsay for the -last ten years of his life, her sister having married his son, the -celebrated painter. She spoke of him to me in 1825, with kindly -enthusiasm, as one of the most amiable men she had ever -known. His constant cheerfulness and lively conversational -powers had made him a favourite amongst persons of rank, -whose guest he frequently was. Being very fond of children, he -encouraged his daughters in bringing troops of young ladies -about the house, in whose sports he would mix with a patience -and vivacity wonderful in an old man. He used to give these -young friends a kind of ball once a year. From pure kindness -for the young, he would help to make dolls for them, and cradles -wherein to place these little effigies, with his own hands.<a name="FNanchor_7" id="FNanchor_7"></a><a href="#Footnote_7" class="fnanchor">[7]</a> But -here a fashion of the age must be held in view; for, however -odd it may appear, it is undoubtedly true that to make and -dispose of dolls, such as children now alone are interested in, -was a practice in vogue amongst grown-up ladies who had little -to do about a hundred years ago.</p> -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_16" id="Page_16">{16}</a></span></p> -<p>Ramsay died in 1757. An elderly female told a friend of -mine that she remembered, when a girl, living as an apprentice -with a milliner in the Grassmarket, being sent to Ramsay -Garden to assist in making <em>dead-clothes</em> for the poet. She could -recall, however, no particulars of the scene but the roses -blooming in at the window of the death-chamber.</p> - -<p>The poet’s house passed to his son, of the same name, eminent -as a painter—portrait-painter to King George III. and his queen—and -a man of high mental culture; consequently much a -favourite in the circles of Johnson and Boswell. The younger -Allan enlarged the house, and built three additional houses to -the eastward, bearing the title of Ramsay Garden. At his death, -in 1784, the property went to his son, General John Ramsay, -who, dying in 1845, left this mansion and a large fortune to Mr -Murray of Henderland. So ended the line of the poet. His -daughter Christian, an amiable, kind-hearted woman, said to possess -a gift of verse, lived for many years in New Street. At -seventy-four she had the misfortune to be thrown down by a -hackney-coach, and had her leg broken; yet she recovered, and -lived to the age of eighty-eight. Leading a solitary life, she -took a great fancy for cats. Besides supporting -many in her own house, curiously -disposed in bandboxes, with doors to go in -and out at, she caused -food to be laid out for -others on her stair and -around her house. Not a word of obloquy -would she listen to against the species, alleging, -when any wickedness of a cat was spoken -of, that the animal must have acted under provocation, for by -nature, she asserted, cats are harmless. Often did her maid go -with morning messages to her friends, inquiring, with her compliments, -after their pet cats. Good Miss Ramsay was also a -friend to horses, and indeed to all creatures. When -she observed a carter ill-treating his horse, she would -march up to him, tax him with cruelty, and, by -the very earnestness of her remonstrances, arrest -the barbarian’s hand. So also, when she saw one -labouring on the street, with the appearance of -defective diet, she would send -rolls to its master, entreating -him to feed the animal. These<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_17" id="Page_17">{17}</a></span> -peculiarities, although a little eccentric, are not unpleasing; and -I cannot be sorry to record them of the daughter of one whose -heart and head were an honour to his country.</p> - -<div class="figcenter w200"> -<img src="images/illus_p_016a.jpg" width="200" height="80" alt="" /> -<div class="caption"><p class="center">Happy.</p></div> -</div> - -<div class="figcenter w200"> -<img src="images/illus_p_016b.jpg" width="200" height="86" alt="" /> -<div class="caption"><p class="center">Contented.</p></div> -</div> - -<div class="figcenter w200"> -<img src="images/illus_p_016c.jpg" width="200" height="98" alt="" /> -<div class="caption"><p class="center">Repose.</p></div> -</div> - -<div class="figcenter w350"> -<img src="images/illus_p_016d.jpg" width="350" height="133" alt="" /> -<div class="caption"><p class="center">Convivial.</p></div> -</div> - -<p>[1868.—It seems to have been unknown to the biographers of -Allan Ramsay the painter that he made a romantic marriage. In -his early days, while teaching the art of drawing in the family of -Sir Alexander Lindsay of Evelick, one of the young ladies fell in -love with him, captivated probably by the tongue which afterwards -gave him the intimacy of princes, and was undoubtedly a -great source of his success in life. The father of the enamoured -girl was an old proud baronet; her mother, a sister of the Chief-Justice, -Earl of Mansfield. A -marriage with consent of parents -was consequently impossible. The -young people, nevertheless, contrived -to get themselves united in -wedlock.</p> - -<div class="figcenter w500"> -<img src="images/illus_p_017.jpg" width="500" height="602" alt="" /> -<div class="caption"><p class="center">Allan Ramsay’s Monument, Princes Street Gardens.</p></div> -</div> - -<p>The speedily developed talent -of Ramsay, the illustrious patronage -they secured to him, and the -very considerable wealth which -he acquired must have in time -made him an acceptable relation -to those proud people. A -time came when their descendants -held the connection -even as an honour. The -wealth of the painter -ultimately, on the death -of his son -in 1845, -became the -property of -Mr Murray -of Henderland, -a -grandson of -Sir Alexander -Lindsay -and nephew -of Mrs Allan -Ramsay;<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_18" id="Page_18">{18}</a></span> -thence it not long after passed to Mr Murray’s brother, Sir John -Archibald Murray, better known by his judicial name of Lord -Murray. This gentleman admired the poet, and resolved to -raise a statue to him beside his goose-pie house on the Castlehill; -but the situation proved unsuitable, and since his own -lamented death, in 1858, the marble full-length of worthy -Allan, from the studio of John Steell, has found a noble -place in the Princes Street Gardens, resting on a pedestal, -containing on its principal side a medallion portrait of Lord -Murray, on the reverse one of General Ramsay, on the -west side one of the General’s lady, and on the east similar -representations of the General’s two daughters, Lady Campbell -and Mrs Malcolm. Thus we find—owing to the esteem -which genius ever commands—the poet of the <cite>Gentle Shepherd</cite> -in the immortality of marble, surrounded by the figures -of relatives and descendants who so acknowledged their aristocratic -rank to be inferior to his, derived from mind alone.]</p> - -<div class="figcenter w350"> -<img src="images/illus_p_018.jpg" width="350" height="467" alt="" /> -<div class="caption"><p class="center">Doorway of Duke of Gordon’s House. -Now built into School in Boswell’s Court.</p></div> -</div> - - -<h3>HOUSE OF THE GORDON -FAMILY.</h3> - -<p>Tradition points out, as the -residence of the Gordon family, a -house, or rather range of buildings, -situated between Blair’s and -Brown’s Closes, being almost the -first mass of building in the -Castle-hill Street on the right-hand -side. The southern portion -is a structure of lofty and massive -form, battlemented at top, and -looking out upon a garden which -formerly stretched down to the old -town-wall near the Grassmarket, -but is now crossed by the access -from the King’s Bridge.<a name="FNanchor_8" id="FNanchor_8"></a><a href="#Footnote_8" class="fnanchor">[8]</a> From -the style of building, I should be -disposed to assign it a date a little -subsequent to the Restoration. -There are, however, no authentic<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_19" id="Page_19">{19}</a></span> -memorials respecting the alleged connection of the Gordon family -with this house,<a name="FNanchor_9" id="FNanchor_9"></a><a href="#Footnote_9" class="fnanchor">[9]</a> unless we are to consider as of that character a -coronet resembling that of a marquis, flanked by two deer-hounds, -the well-known supporters of this noble family, which figures over -a finely moulded door in Blair’s Close.<a name="FNanchor_10" id="FNanchor_10"></a><a href="#Footnote_10" class="fnanchor">[10]</a> The coronet will readily -be supposed to point to the time when the <em>Marquis of Huntly</em> -was the principal honour of the family—that is, previous to 1684, -when the title of Duke of Gordon was conferred.<a name="FNanchor_11" id="FNanchor_11"></a><a href="#Footnote_11" class="fnanchor">[11]</a></p> - -<div class="figcenter w550"> -<a id="illus_c_006"></a> -<img src="images/illus_c_006.jpg" width="550" height="693" alt="" /> -<div class="caption"><p class="center">DUKE OF GORDON’S HOUSE.</p> - -<p class="right"> -<span class="smcap"><a href="#Page_18">Page 18.</a></span> -</p> -</div> -</div> - -<p>In more recent times, this substantial mansion was the abode of<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_20" id="Page_20">{20}</a></span> -Mr Baird of Newbyth; and here it was that the late gallant Sir -David Baird, the hero of Seringapatam, was born and brought up. -Returning in advanced life from long foreign service, this distinguished -soldier came to see the home of his youth on the Castle-hill. -The respectable individual whom I found occupying the -house in 1824 received his visitor with due respect, and after -showing him through the house, conducted him out to the garden. -Here the boys of the existing tenant were found actively engaged -in throwing cabbage-stalks at the tops of the chimneys of the -houses of the Grassmarket, situated a little below the level of the -garden. On making one plump down the vent, the youngsters -set up a great shout of triumph. Sir David fell a-laughing at -sight of this example of practical waggery, and entreated the -father of the lads ‘not to be too angry; he and his brother, when -living here at the same age, had indulged in precisely the same -amiable amusement, the chimneys then, as now, being so provokingly -open to such attacks that there was no resisting the -temptation.’</p> - -<p>The whole matter might have been put into an axiomatic form—Given -a garden with cabbage-stalks, and a set of chimneys -situated at an angle of forty-five degrees below the spot, any boys -turned loose into the said garden will be sure to endeavour to -bring the cabbage-stalks and the chimneys into acquaintance.</p> - - -<h3>DR WEBSTER.</h3> - -<p>An isolated house which formerly stood in Webster’s Close,<a name="FNanchor_12" id="FNanchor_12"></a><a href="#Footnote_12" class="fnanchor">[12]</a> a -little way down the Castle-hill, was the residence of the Rev. Dr -Webster, a man eminent in his day on many accounts—a leading -evangelical clergyman in Edinburgh, a statist and calculator of -extraordinary talent, and a distinguished figure in festive scenes. -The first population returns of Scotland were obtained by him in -1755; and he was the author of that fund for the widows of the -clergy of the Established Church which has proved so great a -blessing to many, and still exists in a flourishing state.<a name="FNanchor_13" id="FNanchor_13"></a><a href="#Footnote_13" class="fnanchor">[13]</a> He was<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_21" id="Page_21">{21}</a></span> -also deep in the consultations of the magistrates regarding the -New Town.</p> - -<p>It is not easy to reconcile the two leading characteristics of this -divine—his being the pastor of a flock of noted sternness, called, -from the church in which they assembled, the <em>Tolbooth Whigs</em>; -and his at the same time entering heartily and freely into the -convivialities of the more mirthful portion of society. Perhaps -he illustrated the maxim that one man may steal horses with -impunity, &c.; for it is related that, going home early one -morning with strong symptoms of over-indulgence upon him, and -being asked by a friend who met him ‘what the Tolbooth Whigs -would say if they were to see him at this moment,’ he instantly -replied: ‘They would not believe their own eyes.’ Sometimes he -did fall on such occasions under plebeian observation, but the -usual remark was: ‘Ah, there’s Dr Webster, honest man, going -hame, nae doubt, frae some puir afflicted soul he has been visiting. -Never does he tire o’ well-doing!’ And so forth.</p> - -<p>The history of Dr Webster’s marriage is romantic. When a -young and unknown man, he was employed by a friend to act as -go-between, or, as it is termed in Scotland, black-fit, or black-foot, -in a correspondence which he was carrying on with a young lady -of great beauty and accomplishment. Webster had not acted -long in that character, till the young lady, who had never entertained -any affection for his constituent, fell deeply in love with -himself. Her birth and expectations were better than his; and -however much he might have been disposed to address her on his -own behalf, he never could have thought of such a thing so long -as there was such a difference between their circumstances. The -lady saw his difficulty, and resolved to overcome it, and that in -the frankest manner. At one of these interviews, when he was -exerting all his eloquence in favour of his friend, she plainly told -him that he would probably come better speed if he were to speak -for himself. He took the hint, and, in a word, was soon after -married to her. He wrote upon the occasion an amorous lyric, -which exhibits in warm colours the gratitude of a humble lover -for the favour of a mistress of superior station, and which is -perhaps as excellent altogether in its way as the finest compositions<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_22" id="Page_22">{22}</a></span> -of the kind produced in either ancient or modern times. There is -one particularly impassioned verse, in which, after describing a -process of the imagination by which, in gazing upon her, he comes -to think her a creature of more than mortal nature, he says that -at length, unable to contain, he clasps her to his bosom, and—</p> - -<div class="poetry-container"><div class="poetry"><div class="stanza"> -<div class="verse">‘Kissing her lips, she turns woman again!’</div> -</div></div></div> - - -<h3>HOUSE OF MARY DE GUISE.</h3> - -<p>The restrictions imposed upon a city requiring defence appear -as one of the forms of misery leading to strange associations. -We become, in a special degree, sensible of this truth when we see -the house of a royal personage sunk amidst -the impurities of a narrow close in -the Old Town of Edinburgh. -Such was literally the -case of an aged pile of -buildings on the north -side of the Castle-hill, -behind the front line -of the street, and -accessible by Blyth’s, -Nairn’s, and Tod’s -Closes, which was declared -by tradition to -have been the residence -of Mary de Guise, the -widow of James V., and -from 1554 to 1560 -regent of this realm.</p> - -<div class="figcenter w450"> -<img src="images/illus_p_022.jpg" width="450" height="472" alt="" /> -<div class="caption"><p class="center">Ancient Pile of Buildings, North Side of Castle-Hill.</p></div> -</div> - -<p>Descending the first -of these alleys about -thirty yards, we came -to a dusky, half-ruinous -building on the left-hand -side, presenting one or two lofty windows and a doorway, -surrounded by handsome mouldings; the whole bearing that -appearance which says: ‘There is here something that has been -of consequence, all haggard and disgraced though it now be.’ -Glancing to the opposite side of the close, where stood another -portion of the same building, the impression was confirmed by -further appearances of a goodly style of architecture. These<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_23" id="Page_23">{23}</a></span> -were, in reality, the principal portions of the palace of the -Regent Mary; the former being popularly described as her -<em>house</em>, the latter as her <em>oratory</em> or chapel. The close terminated -under a portion of the building; and when the visitor -made his way so far, he found an exterior presented northwards, -with many windows, whence of old a view must have been -commanded, first of the gardens descending to the North Loch, -and second, of the Firth of Forth and Fife. One could easily -understand that, when the gardens existed, the north side of the -house might have had many pleasant apartments, and been, upon -the whole, tolerable as a place of residence, albeit the access by a -narrow alley could never have been agreeable. Latterly the site -of the upper part of the garden was occupied by a brushmaker’s -workshops and yard, while the lower was covered by the Earthen -Mound. In the wall on the east side there was included, as a -mere portion of the masonry, a stray stone, which had once been -an architrave or lintel; it contained, besides an armorial device -flanked by the initials A. A., the legend <span class="smcap">Nosce Teipsum</span>, and the -date 1557.</p> - -<p>Reverting to the door of the queen’s house, which was simply -the access of a common stair, we there found an ornamented -architrave, bearing the legend,</p> - -<p class="center"> -LAUS ET HONOR DEO, -</p> - -<p>terminated by two pieces of complicated lettering, one much -obliterated, the other a monogram of the name of the Virgin -Mary, formed of the letters M. R.<a name="FNanchor_14" id="FNanchor_14"></a><a href="#Footnote_14" class="fnanchor">[14]</a> Finally, at the extremities -of this stone, were two Roman letters of larger size—I. R.—doubtless -the initials of James Rex, for James V., the style of -cutting being precisely the same as in the initials seen on the -palace built by that king in Stirling Castle; an indirect proof, it -may be remarked, of this having been the residence of the Regent -Mary.</p> - -<p>Passing up a spiral flight of steps, we came to a darksome lobby, -leading to a series of mean apartments, occupied by persons of the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_24" id="Page_24">{24}</a></span> -humblest grade. Immediately within the door was a small recess -in the wall, composed of Gothic stonework, and supposed by the -people to have been designed for containing holy-water, though -this may well be matter of doubt. Overhead, in the ceiling, was -a round entablature, presenting a faded coronet over the defaced -outline of a shield. A similar object adorned the ceiling of the -lobby in the second floor, but in better preservation, as the shield -bore three <i lang="fr" xml:lang="fr">fleurs de lis</i>, with the coronet above, and the letters -H. R. below. There was a third of these entablatures, containing -the arms of the city of Edinburgh, in the centre of the top -of the staircase. The only other curious object in this part -of the mansion was the door of one of the wretched apartments—a -specimen of carving, bearing all the appearance of -having been contemporary with the building, and containing, -besides other devices, bust portraits of a gentleman and lady. -This is now in the possession of the Society of the Antiquaries of -Scotland.</p> - -<p>A portion of the same building, accessible by a stair nearer -the head of the close, contained a hall-like apartment, with other -apartments, all remarkable for their unusually lofty ceilings. In -the large room were the remains of a spacious decorated chimney, -to which, in the recollection of persons still living, there had been -attached a chain, serving to confine the tongs to their proper -domain. This was the memorial of an old custom, of which it is -not easy to see the utility, unless some light be held as thrown -upon it by a Scottish proverb, used when a child takes a thing -and says he found it: ‘You found it, I suppose, where the Highlandman -found the tongs.’ In the centre of almost all the -ceilings of this part of the mansion I found, in 1824, circular -entablatures, with coats of arms and other devices, in stucco, -evidently of good workmanship, but obscured by successive coats -of whitening.</p> - -<p>The place pointed out by tradition as the queen-regent’s oratory -was in the first-floor of the building opposite—a spacious and lofty -hall, with large windows designed to make up for the obscurity of -the close. Here, besides a finely carved piscina, was a pretty -large recess, of Gothic structure, in the back-wall, evidently designed -for keeping things of importance. Many years ago, out of -the wall behind this recess, there had been taken a small iron box, -such as might have been employed to keep jewellery, but empty. -I was the means of its being gifted to Sir Walter Scott, who had -previously told me that<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_25" id="Page_25">{25}</a></span> ‘a passion for such little boxes was one of -those that most did beset him;’ and it is now in the collection at -Abbotsford.</p> - -<p>The other portions of the mansion, accessible from different -alleys, were generally similar to these, but somewhat finer. One -chamber was recognised as the <em>Deid-room</em>; that is, the room where -individuals of the queen’s establishment were kept between their -death and burial.</p> - -<p>It was interesting to wander through the dusky mazes of this -ancient building, and reflect that they had been occupied three -centuries ago by a sovereign princess, and one of the most illustrious -lineage. Here was the substantial monument of a connection -between France and Scotland, a totally past state of things. She -whose ancestors owned Lorraine as a sovereignty, who had spent -her youth in the proud halls of the Guises in Picardy, and been -the spouse of a Longueville, was here content to live—in a <em>close</em> -in Edinburgh! In these obscurities, too, was a government -conducted, which had to struggle with Knox, Glencairn, James -Stewart, Morton, and many other powerful men, backed by a -popular sentiment which never fails to triumph. It was the -misfortune of Mary to be placed in a position to resist the -Reformation. Her own character deserved that she should have -stood in a more agreeable relation to what Scotland now venerates, -for she was mild and just, and sincerely anxious for the good of -her adopted country. It is also proper to remember on the present -occasion that ‘in her court she maintained a decent gravity, nor -would she tolerate any licentious practices therein. Her maids of -honour were always busied in commendable exercises, she herself -being an example to them in virtue, piety, and modesty.’<a name="FNanchor_15" id="FNanchor_15"></a><a href="#Footnote_15" class="fnanchor">[15]</a> When -all is considered, and we further know that the building was strong -enough to have lasted many more ages, one cannot but regret that -the palace of Mary de Guise, reduced as it was to vileness, should -not now be in existence. The site having been purchased by -individuals connected with the Free Church, the buildings were -removed in 1846 to make room for the erection of an academical -institution or college for the use of that body.<a name="FNanchor_16" id="FNanchor_16"></a><a href="#Footnote_16" class="fnanchor">[16]</a></p> - -<hr class="chap" /></div><div class="chapter"> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_26" id="Page_26">{26}</a></span></p> - - -<h2><a name="THE_WEST_BOW" id="THE_WEST_BOW">THE WEST BOW.</a></h2> - -<p class="chapter_summary"><strong>The Bowhead—Weigh-house—Anderson’s Pills—Oratories—Colonel -Gardiner—‘Bowhead Saints’—‘The Seizers’—Story of a Jacobite -Canary—Major Weir—Tulzies—The Tinklarian Doctor—Old Assembly -Room—Paul Romieu—‘He that Tholes Overcomes’—Provost -Stewart—Donaldsons the Booksellers—Bowfoot—The -Templars’ Lands—The Gallows Stone.</strong></p> - -<p class="center">[The West Bow has long since disappeared as a street; -see <a href="#Footnote_39">note</a> on <a href="#Page_54">p. 54</a>.]</p> - - -<p>In a central part of Old Edinburgh—the very Little Britain of -our city—is a curious, angular, whimsical-looking street, of great -steepness and narrowness, called the West Bow. Serving as a -connection between the Grassmarket and Lawnmarket, between -the Low and the High Town, it is of considerable fame in our -city annals as a passage for the entry of sovereigns, and the scene -of the quaint ceremonials used on those occasions. In more -modern times, it has been chiefly notable in the recollections of -country-people as a nest of the peculiarly noisy tradesmen, the -white-iron smiths, which causes Robert Fergusson to mark, as one -of the features of Edinburgh deserted for a holiday:</p> - -<div class="poetry-container"><div class="poetry"><div class="stanza"> -<div class="verse">‘The tinkler billies<a name="FNanchor_17" id="FNanchor_17"></a><a href="#Footnote_17" class="fnanchor">[17]</a> o’ the Bow</div> -<div class="verse indent2">Are now less eident<a name="FNanchor_18" id="FNanchor_18"></a><a href="#Footnote_18" class="fnanchor">[18]</a> clinkin.’</div> -</div></div></div> - -<p>Another remarkable circumstance connected with the street in -the popular mind is its having been the residence of the famed -wizard, Major Weir. All of these particulars serve to make it a -noteworthy sort of place, and the impression is much favoured by -its actual appearance. A perfect Z in figure, composed of tall -antique houses, with numerous dovecot-like gables projecting over -the footway, full of old inscriptions and sculpturings, presenting -at every few steps some darksome lateral profundity, into which -the imagination wanders without hindrance or exhaustion, it -seems eminently a place of old grandmothers’ tales, and sure at all -times to maintain a ghost or two in its community. When I -descend into particulars, it will be seen what grounds there truly -are for such a surmise.</p> - -<p>To begin with</p> - -<div class="figcenter w550"> -<a id="illus_c_007"></a> -<img src="images/illus_c_007.jpg" width="550" height="680" alt="" /> -<div class="caption"><p class="center">THE BOWHEAD.</p> - -<p class="right"> -<span class="smcap"><a href="#Page_27">Page 27.</a></span> -</p> -</div> -</div><p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_27" id="Page_27">{27}</a></span></p> - - -<h3>THE BOWHEAD.</h3> - -<p>This is a comparatively open space, though partially straightened -again by the insertion in it of a clumsy, detached old building -called the <em>Weigh-house</em>, where enormous masses of butter and -cheese are continually getting disposed of. Prince Charles had -his guard at the Weigh-house when blockading the Castle; using, -however, for this purpose, not the house itself, but a floor of the -adjacent tall tenement in the Lawnmarket, which appears to have -been selected on a very intelligible principle, in as far as it was -the deserted mansion of one of the city clergy, the same Rev. -George Logan who carried on a controversy with Thomas Ruddiman, -in which he took unfavourable views of the title of the -Stuart family to the throne, not only then, but at any time. It -was, no doubt, as an additional answer to a bad pamphlet that -the Highlanders took up their quarters at Mr Logan’s.</p> - - -<h3>ANDERSON’S PILLS.</h3> - -<p>In this tall <em>land</em>, dated 1690, there is a house on the second-floor -where that venerable drug, Dr Anderson’s pills, is sold, and has -been so for above a century. As is well known, the country-people -in Scotland have to this day [1824] a peculiar reverence for these -pills, which are, I believe, really a good form of aloetic medicine. -They took their origin from a physician of the time of Charles I., -who gave them his name. From his daughter, Lillias Anderson, -the patent came to a person designed Thomas Weir, who left -it to his daughter. The widow of this last person’s nephew, -Mrs Irving, is now the patentee; a lady of advanced age, who -facetiously points to the very brief series of proprietors intervening -between Dr Anderson and herself, as no inexpressive indication of -the virtue of the medicine. [Mrs Irving died in 1837, at the age -of ninety-nine.] Portraits of Anderson and his daughter are -preserved in this house: the physician in a Vandyke dress, with a -book in his hand; the lady, a precise-looking dame, with a pill in -her hand about the size of a walnut, saying a good deal for the -stomachs of our ancestors. The people also show a glove which -belonged to the learned physician.</p> - -<p>[1868.—In 1829 Mrs Irving lived in a neat, self-contained -mansion in Chessels’s Court, in the Canongate, along with her son, -General Irving, and some members of his family. The old lady,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_28" id="Page_28">{28}</a></span> -then ninety-one, was good enough to invite me to dinner, when I -likewise found two younger sisters of hers, respectively eighty-nine -and ninety. She sat firm and collected at the head of the table, -and carved a leg of mutton with perfect propriety. She then told -me, at her son’s request, that in the year 1745, when Prince -Charles’s army was in possession of the town, she, a child of -four years, walked with her nurse to Holyrood Palace, and -seeing a Highland gentleman -standing in the -doorway, she went up to -him to examine his peculiar -attire. She even -took the liberty of lifting -up his kilt a little way; -whereupon her nurse, -fearing some danger, -started forward for her -protection. But the -gentleman only patted -her head, and said something -kind to her. I -felt it as very curious to -sit as guest with a person -who had mingled in -the Forty-five. But my -excitement was brought -to a higher pitch when, -on ascending to the -drawing-room, I found -the general’s daughter, a -pretty young woman recently married, sitting there, dressed in -a suit of clothes belonging to one of the nonagenarian aunts—a -very fine one of flowered satin, with elegant cap and lappets, -and silk shoes three inches deep in the heel—the same having -been worn by the venerable owner just seventy years before -at a Hunters’ Ball at Holyrood Palace. The contrast between -the former and the present wearer—the old lady shrunk and -taciturn, and her young representative full of life and resplendent -in joyous beauty—had an effect upon me which it would be -impossible to describe. To this day, I look upon the Chessels’s -Court dinner as one of the most extraordinary events in my -life.]</p> - -<div class="figcenter w450"> -<img src="images/illus_p_028.jpg" width="450" height="496" alt="" /> -<div class="caption"><p class="center">Chessels’s Court, Canongate.</p></div> -</div> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_29" id="Page_29">{29}</a></span></p> - - -<h3>ORATORIES—COLONEL GARDINER.</h3> - -<p>This house presents a feature which forms a curious memorial -of the manners of a past age. In common with all the houses -built from about 1690 to 1740—a substantial class, still abundant -in the High Street—there is at the end of each row of windows -corresponding to a separate mansion, a narrow slit-like window, -such as might suffice for a closet. In reality, each of these narrow -apertures gives light to a small cell—much too small to require -such a window—usually entering from the dining-room or some -other principal apartment. The use of these cells was to serve as -a retreat for the master of the house, wherein he might perform -his devotions. The father of a family was in those days a sacred -kind of person, not to be approached by wife or children too -familiarly, and expected to be a priest in his own household. -Besides his family devotions, he retired to a closet for perhaps an -hour each day to utter his own prayers;<a name="FNanchor_19" id="FNanchor_19"></a><a href="#Footnote_19" class="fnanchor">[19]</a> and so regular was the -custom that it gave rise, as we see, to this peculiarity in house-building. -Nothing could enable us more clearly to appreciate -that strong outward demonstration of religious feeling which pervaded -the nation for half a century after the agonies of ‘the -Persecution.’ I cannot help here mentioning the interest with -which I have visited Bankton House,<a name="FNanchor_20" id="FNanchor_20"></a><a href="#Footnote_20" class="fnanchor">[20]</a> in East Lothian, where, as is -well known, Colonel Gardiner spent several years of his life. The -oratory of the pious soldier is pointed out by tradition, and it -forms even a more expressive memorial of the time than the closets -in the Edinburgh houses. Connected with a small front room, -which might have been a library or <em>study</em>, is a little recess, such -as dust-pans and brooms are kept in, consisting of the angular -space formed by a stair which passes overhead to the upper floor. -This place is wholly without light, yet it is said to have been the -place sacred to poor Gardiner’s private devotions. What leaves -hardly any doubt on the matter is that there has been a wooden -bolt within, capable only of being shot from the inside, and therefore -unquestionably used by a person desiring to shut himself<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_30" id="Page_30">{30}</a></span> -in. Here, therefore, in this darksome, stifling little cell, had this -extraordinary man spent hours in those devotional exercises by -which he was so much distinguished from his class.<a name="FNanchor_21" id="FNanchor_21"></a><a href="#Footnote_21" class="fnanchor">[21]</a></p> - - -<h3>BOWHEAD SAINTS—SEIZERS—A JACOBITE BLACKBIRD.</h3> - -<p>In the latter part of the seventeenth century, the inhabitants of -the West Bow enjoyed a peculiar fame for their piety and zeal in -the Covenanting cause. The wits of the opposite faction are full -of allusions to them as ‘the Bowhead Saints,’ ‘the godly plants of -the Bowhead,’ and so forth. [This is the basis of an allusion by a -later Cavalier wit, when describing the exit of Lord Dundee from -Edinburgh, on the occasion of the settlement of the crown upon -William and Mary:</p> - -<div class="poetry-container"><div class="poetry"><div class="stanza"> -<div class="verse">‘As he rode down the sanctified bends of the Bow,</div> -<div class="verse">Ilka carline was flyting, and shaking her pow;</div> -<div class="verse">But some young plants of grace, that looked couthie and slie,</div> -<div class="verse">Said: “Luck to thy bonnet, thou bonnie Dundee!”’</div> -</div></div></div> - -<p>It is to be feared that Sir Walter has here shown a relenting -towards the ‘young plants,’ for which they would not have thanked -him.] All the writings of the wits of their own time speak of the -system to which they were opposed as one of unmitigated sternness. -It was in those days a custom to patrol the streets during -the time of divine service, and take into captivity all persons found -walking abroad; and indeed make seizure of whatever could be -regarded as guilty of Sabbath-breaking. It is said that, led by a -sneaking sense, the patrol one day lighted upon a joint of meat -in the course of being roasted, and made prize of it, leaving the -graceless owner to chew the spit. On another occasion, about the -year 1735, a capture of a different kind was made. ‘The people -about that time,’ says Arnot, ‘were in use to teach their birds to -chant the songs of their party. It happened that the blackbird -of an honest Jacobitical barber, which from his cage on the outside -of the window gave offence to the zealous Whigs by his songs, -was neglected, on a Saturday evening, to be brought within the -house. Next morning he tuned his pipe to the usual air, <em>The -king shall enjoy his own again</em>. One of the <em>seizers</em>, in his holy -zeal, was enraged at this manifestation of impiety and treason in -one of the feathered tribe. He went up to the house, seized the -bird and the cage, and with much solemnity lodged them in the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_31" id="Page_31">{31}</a></span> -City-Guard.’<a name="FNanchor_22" id="FNanchor_22"></a><a href="#Footnote_22" class="fnanchor">[22]</a> Pennycook, a burgess bard of the time, represents -the officer as addressing the bird:</p> - -<div class="poetry-container"><div class="poetry"><div class="stanza"> -<div class="verse">‘Had ye been taught by me, a <em>Bowhead saint</em>,</div> -<div class="verse">You’d sung the Solemn League and Covenant,</div> -<div class="verse">Bessy of Lanark, or the Last Good-night;</div> -<div class="verse">But you’re a bird prelatic—that’s not right....</div> -<div class="verse">Oh could my baton reach the laverocks too,</div> -<div class="verse">They’re chirping <em>Jamie, Jamie</em>, just like you:</div> -<div class="verse">I hate vain birds that lead malignant lives,</div> -<div class="verse">But love the chanters to the Bowhead wives.’</div> -</div></div></div> - - -<h3>MAJOR WEIR.<a name="FNanchor_23" id="FNanchor_23"></a><a href="#Footnote_23" class="fnanchor">[23]</a></h3> - -<div class="figcenter w275"> -<img src="images/illus_p_031.jpg" width="275" height="366" alt="" /> -<div class="caption"><p class="center">Major Weir’s House.</p></div> -</div> - -<p>It must have been a sad scandal to this peculiar community -when Major Weir, one of their number, was found to have been -so wretched an example of human infirmity. The house -occupied by this man still exists, though in an altered shape, -in a little court accessible by a narrow passage near the first -angle of the street. His history -is obscurely reported; but it -appears that he was of a good -family in Lanarkshire, and had -been one of the ten thousand -men sent by the Scottish Covenanting -Estates in 1641 to -assist in suppressing the Irish -Papists. He became distinguished -for a life of peculiar -sanctity, even in an age when -that was the prevailing tone of -the public mind. According to -a contemporary account:<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_32" id="Page_32">{32}</a></span> ‘His -garb was still a cloak, and somewhat -dark, and he never went -without his staff. He was a tall -black man, and ordinarily looked -down to the ground; <em>a grim -countenance, and a big nose</em>. At -length he became so notoriously -regarded among the Presbyterian strict sect, that if four met -together, be sure Major Weir was one. At private meetings he -prayed to admiration, which made many of that stamp court his -converse. He never married, but lived in a private lodging with -his sister, Grizel Weir. Many resorted to his house, to join him -and hear him pray; but it was observed that he could not officiate -in any holy duty without the black staff, or rod, in his hand, and -leaning upon it, which made those who heard him pray admire his -flood in prayer, his ready extemporary expression, his heavenly -gesture; so that he was thought more angel than man, and was -termed by some of the holy sisters ordinarily <em>Angelical Thomas</em>.’ -Plebeian imaginations have since fructified regarding the staff, and -crones will still seriously tell how it could run a message to a shop -for any article which its proprietor wanted; how it could answer -the door when any one called upon its master; and that it used to -be often seen running before him, in the capacity of a link-boy, as -he walked down the Lawnmarket.</p> - -<p>After a life characterised externally by all the graces of devotion, -but polluted in secret by crimes of the most revolting nature, -and which little needed the addition of wizardry to excite the horror -of living men, Major Weir fell into a severe sickness, which affected -his mind so much that he made open and voluntary confession of -all his wickedness. The tale was at first so incredible that the -provost, Sir Andrew Ramsay,<a name="FNanchor_24" id="FNanchor_24"></a><a href="#Footnote_24" class="fnanchor">[24]</a> refused for some time to take him -into custody. At length himself, his sister (partner of one of his -crimes), and his staff were secured by the magistrates, together -with certain sums of money, which were found wrapped up in rags -in different parts of the house. One of these pieces of rag being -thrown into the fire by a bailie, who had taken the whole in -charge, flew up the chimney, and made an explosion like a cannon. -While the wretched man lay in prison, he made no scruple to -disclose the particulars of his guilt, but refused to address himself -to the Almighty for pardon. To every request that he would -pray, he answered in screams: ‘Torment me no more—I am -tormented enough already!’ Even the offer of a Presbyterian -clergyman, instead of an established Episcopal minister of the city, -had no effect upon him. He was tried April 9, 1670, and being -found guilty, was sentenced to be strangled and burnt between<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_33" id="Page_33">{33}</a></span> -Edinburgh and Leith. His sister, who was tried at the same time, -was sentenced to be hanged in the Grassmarket. The execution -of the profligate major took place, April 14, at the place indicated -by the judge. When the rope was about his neck, to prepare -him for the fire, he was bid to say: ‘Lord, be merciful to me!’ -but he answered as before: ‘Let me alone—I will not—I have -lived as a beast, and I must die as a beast!’ After he had dropped -lifeless in the flames, his stick was also cast into the fire; and, -‘whatever incantation was in it,’ says the contemporary writer -already quoted,<a name="FNanchor_25" id="FNanchor_25"></a><a href="#Footnote_25" class="fnanchor">[25]</a> ‘the persons present own that it gave rare -turnings, and was long a-burning, as also himself.’</p> - -<p>The conclusion to which the humanity of the present age would -come regarding Weir—that he was mad—is favoured by some -circumstances; for instance, his answering one who asked if he -had ever seen the devil, that ‘the only feeling he ever had of him -was in the dark.’ What chiefly countenances the idea is the unequivocal -lunacy of the sister. This miserable woman confessed -to witchcraft, and related, in a serious manner, many things which -could not be true. Many years before, a fiery coach, she said, -had come to her brother’s door in broad day, and a stranger -invited them to enter, and they proceeded to Dalkeith. On the -way, another person came and whispered in her brother’s ear -something which affected him; it proved to be supernatural -intelligence of the defeat of the Scotch army at Worcester, which -took place that day. Her brother’s power, she said, lay in his -staff. She also had a gift for spinning above other women, but -the yarn broke to pieces in the loom. Her mother, she declared, -had been also a witch. ‘The secretest thing that I, or any of the -family could do, when once a mark appeared upon her brow, she -could tell it them, though done at a great distance.’ This mark -could also appear on her own forehead when she pleased. At the -request of the company present, ‘she put back her head-dress, and -seeming to frown, there was an exact horse-shoe shaped for nails -in her wrinkles, terrible enough, I assure you, to the stoutest -beholder.’<a name="FNanchor_26" id="FNanchor_26"></a><a href="#Footnote_26" class="fnanchor">[26]</a> At the place of execution she acted in a furious -manner, and with difficulty could be prevented from throwing off -her clothes, in order to die, as she said, ‘with all the shame she -could.’</p> - -<p>The treatise just quoted makes it plain that the case of Weir<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_34" id="Page_34">{34}</a></span> -and his sister had immediately become a fruitful theme for the -imaginations of the vulgar. We there receive the following -story: ‘Some few days before he discovered himself, a gentlewoman -coming from the Castle-hill, where her husband’s niece -was lying-in of a child, about midnight perceived about the -Bowhead three women in windows shouting, laughing, and -clapping their hands. The gentlewoman went forward, till, at -Major Weir’s door, there arose, as from the street, a woman -about the length of two ordinary females, and stepped forward. -The gentlewoman, not as yet excessively feared, bid her maid -step on, if by the lantern they could see what she was; but -haste what they could, this long-legged spectre was still before -them, moving her body with a vehement cachinnation and great -unmeasurable laughter. At this rate the two strove for place, -till the giantess came to a narrow lane in the Bow, commonly -called the Stinking Close, into which she turning, and the gentlewoman -looking after her, perceived the close full of flaming -torches (she could give them no other name), and as if it had -been a great number of people stentoriously laughing, and gaping -with tahees of laughter. This sight, at so dead a time of night, -no people being in the windows belonging to the close, made -her and her servant haste home, declaring all that they saw to -the rest of the family.’</p> - -<p>For upwards of a century after Major Weir’s death, he continued -to be the bugbear of the Bow, and his house remained -uninhabited. His apparition was frequently seen at night, flitting, -like a black and silent shadow, about the street. His house, -though known to be deserted by everything human, was sometimes -observed at midnight to be full of lights, and heard to -emit strange sounds, as of dancing, howling, and, what is -strangest of all, spinning. Some people occasionally saw the -major issue from the low close at midnight, mounted on a black -horse without a head, and gallop off in a whirlwind of flame. -Nay, sometimes the whole of the inhabitants of the Bow would -be roused from their sleep at an early hour in the morning by -the sound as of a coach and six, first rattling up the Lawnmarket, -and then thundering down the Bow, stopping at the -head of the terrible close for a few minutes, and then rattling -and thundering back again—being neither more nor less than -Satan come in one of his best equipages to take home the major -and his sister, after they had spent a night’s leave of absence in -their terrestrial dwelling.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_35" id="Page_35">{35}</a></span></p> - -<p>About fifty years ago, when the shades of superstition began -universally to give way in Scotland, Major Weir’s house came to -be regarded with less terror by the neighbours, and an attempt -was made by the proprietor to find a person who should be bold -enough to inhabit it. Such a person was procured in William -Patullo, a poor man of dissipated habits, who, having been at -one time a soldier and a traveller, had come to disregard in a -great measure the superstitions of his native country, and was -now glad to possess a house upon the low terms offered by the -landlord, at whatever risk. Upon its being known that Major -Weir’s house was about to be reinhabited, a great deal of curiosity -was felt by people of all ranks as to the result of the experiment; -for there was scarcely a native of the city who had not felt, since -his boyhood, an intense interest in all that concerned that awful -fabric, and yet remembered the numerous terrible stories which -he had heard respecting it. Even before entering upon his -hazardous undertaking, William Patullo was looked upon with -a flattering sort of interest, similar to that which we feel respecting -a regiment on the march to active conflict. It was the hope of -many that he would be the means of retrieving a valuable -possession from the dominion of darkness. But Satan soon let -them know that he does not tamely relinquish any of the outposts -of his kingdom.</p> - -<p>On the very first night after Patullo and his spouse had taken -up their abode in the house, as the worthy couple were lying -awake in their bed, not unconscious of a certain degree of fear—a -dim, uncertain light proceeding from the gathered embers of -their fire, and all being silent around them—they suddenly saw -a form like that of a calf, which came forward to the bed, and, -setting its forefeet upon the stock, looked steadfastly at the -unfortunate pair. When it had contemplated them thus for a -few minutes, to their great relief it at length took itself away, -and, slowly retiring, gradually vanished from their sight. As -might be expected, they deserted the house next morning; and -for another half-century no other attempt was made to embank -this part of the world of light from the aggressions of the world -of darkness.</p> - -<p>It may here be mentioned that, at no very remote time, there -were several houses in the Old Town which had the credit of -being haunted. It is said there is one at this day in the Lawnmarket -(a flat), which has been shut up from time immemorial. -The story goes that one night, as preparations were making for<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_36" id="Page_36">{36}</a></span> -a supper-party, something occurred which obliged the family, as -well as all the assembled guests, to retire with precipitation, and -lock up the house. From that night it has never once been -opened, nor was any of the furniture withdrawn: the very goose -which was undergoing the process of being roasted at the time -of the occurrence is still at the fire! No one knows to whom -the house belongs; no one ever inquires after it; no one living -ever saw the inside of it; it is a condemned house! There is -something peculiarly dreadful about a house under these circumstances. -What sights of horror might present themselves if it -were entered! Satan is the <i lang="la" xml:lang="la">ultimus hæres</i> of all such unclaimed -property!</p> - -<p>Besides the many old houses that are haunted, there are several -endowed with the simple credit of having been the scenes of -murders and suicides. Some contain rooms which had particular -names commemorative of such events, and these names, handed -down as they had been from one generation to another, usually -suggested the remembrance of some dignified Scottish families, -probably the former tenants of the houses. There is a common-stair -in the Lawnmarket which was supposed to be haunted by -the ghost of a gentleman who had been mysteriously killed, -about a century ago, in open daylight, as he was ascending to -his own house: the affair was called to mind by old people on -the similar occasion of the murder of Begbie. A deserted house -in Mary King’s Close (behind the Royal Exchange) is believed -by some to have met with that fate for a very fearful reason. -The inhabitants of a remote period were, it is said, compelled -to abandon it by the supernatural appearances which took place -in it on the very first night after they had made it their residence. -At midnight, as the goodman was sitting with his wife by the -fire reading his Bible, and intending immediately to go to bed, -a strange dimness which suddenly fell upon his light caused him -to raise his eyes from the book. He looked at the candle, and -saw it burning blue. Terror took possession of his frame. -Turning away his eyes, there was, directly before him, and -apparently not two yards off, the head as of a dead person, -looking him straight in the face. There was nothing but a head, -though that seemed to occupy the precise situation in regard to -the floor which it might have done had it been supported by -a body of the ordinary stature. The man and his wife fainted -with terror. On awaking, darkness pervaded the room. Presently -the door opened, and in came a hand holding a candle. This<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_37" id="Page_37">{37}</a></span> -came and stood—that is, the body supposed to be attached to -the hand stood—beside the table, whilst the terrified pair saw -two or three couples of feet skip along the floor, as if dancing. -The scene lasted a short time, but vanished quite away upon -the man gathering strength to invoke the protection of Heaven. -The house was of course abandoned, and remained ever afterwards -shut up. Such were grandams’ tales at no remote period -in our northern capital:</p> - -<div class="poetry-container"><div class="poetry"><div class="stanza"> -<div class="verse">‘Where Learning, with his eagle eyes,</div> -<div class="verse">Seeks Science in her coy abode.’</div> -</div></div></div> - - -<h3>TULZIES.</h3> - -<p>At the Bowhead there happened, in the year 1596, a combat -between James Johnston of Westerhall and a gentleman of the -house of Somerville, which is thus related in that curious book, -the <cite>Memorie of the Somervilles</cite>.</p> - -<p>‘The other actione wherein Westerhall was concerned happened -three years thereftir in Edinburgh, and was only personal on the -same account, betwext Westerhall and Bread (Broad) Hugh -Somervill of the Writes. This gentleman had often formerly -foughten with Westerhall upon equal termes, and being now in -Edinburgh about his privat affaires, standing at the head of the -West Bow, Westerhall by accident comeing up the same, some -officious and unhappy fellow says to Westerhall: “There is -Bread Hugh Somervill of the Writes.” Whereupon Westerhall, -fancying he stood there either to waitt him, or out of contempt, -he immediately marches up with his sword drawen, and with the -opening of his mouth, crying: “Turne, villane;” he cuttes -Writes in the hint head a deep and sore wound, the foullest -stroak that ever Westerhall was knoune to give, acknowledged -soe, and much regrated eftirwards by himself. Writes finding -himself strucken and wounded, seeing Westerhall (who had not -offered to double his stroak), drawes, and within a short tyme -puttes Westerhall to the defensive part; for being the taller man, -and one of the strongest of his time, with the advantage of the -hill, he presses him sore. Westerhall reteires by little, traverseing -the breadth of the Bow, to gain the advantage of the ascent, -to supply the defect of nature, being of low stature, which Writes -observeing, keepes closse to him, and beares him in front, that -he might not quyte what good-fortune and nature had given him. -Thus they continued neer a quarter of ane hour, clearing the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_38" id="Page_38">{38}</a></span> -callsay,<a name="FNanchor_27" id="FNanchor_27"></a><a href="#Footnote_27" class="fnanchor">[27]</a> so that in all the strait Bow there was not one to be -seen without their shop doores, neither durst any man attempt -to red them, every stroak of their swords threatening present -death both to themselves and others that should come neer -them. Haveing now come from the head of the Bow neer to -the foot thereof, Westerhall being in a pair of black buites, -which for ordinary he wore closse drawen up, was quyte tyred. -Therefore he stepes back within a shop doore, and stood upon -his defence. The very last stroak that Writes gave went neer -to have brocken his broad sword in peaces, haveing hitt the -lintell of the door, the marke whereof remained there a long -tyme. Thereftir, the toune being by this tyme all in ane uproar, -the halbertiers comeing to seaze upon them, they wer separated -and privatly convoyed to ther chambers. Ther wounds but -slight, except that which Writes had upon his head proved very -dangerous; for ther was many bones taken out of it; however, -at lenth, he was perfectly cured, and the parties themselves, -eftir Hugh Lord Somerville’s death, reconcealled, and all injuries -forgotten.’</p> - -<p>In times of civil war, personal rencontres of this kind, and -even skirmishes between bands of armed men—usually called -tulzies—were of no unfrequent occurrence upon the streets of -Edinburgh. They abounded during the troublous time of the -minority of James VI. On the 24th of November 1567, the -Laird of Airth and the Laird of Wemyss met upon the High -Street, and, together with their followers, fought a bloody battle, -‘many,’ as Birrel the chronicler reports, ‘being hurte on both -sides by shote of pistoll.’ Three days afterwards there was a -strict proclamation, forbidding ‘the wearing of guns or pistolls, -or aney sick-like fyerwork ingyne, under ye paine of death, the -king’s guards and shouldours only excepted.’ This circumstance -seems to be referred to in <cite>The Abbot</cite>, where the Regent Murray, -in allusion to Lord Seyton’s rencontre with the Leslies, in which -Roland Græme had borne a distinguished part, says: ‘These -broils and feuds would shame the capital of the Great Turk, let -alone that of a Christian and reformed state. But if I live, this -gear shall be amended; and men shall say,’ &c.</p> - -<p>On the 30th of July 1588, according to the same authority, -Sir William Stewart was slain in Blackfriars Wynd by the Earl<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_39" id="Page_39">{39}</a></span> -of Bothwell [the fifth earl], who was the most famed disturber of -the public peace in those times. The quarrel had arisen on a -former occasion, on account of some despiteful language used by -Sir William, when the fiery earl vowed the destruction of his enemy -in words too shocking to be repeated; ‘sua therafter rancountering -Sir William in ye Blackfriar Wynd by chance, told him he -vold now ...; and vith yat drew his sword; Sir William standing -to hes defence, and having hes back at ye vall, ye earle mad -a thrust at him vith his raper, and strake him in at the back and -out at the belley, and killed him.’</p> - -<p>Ten years thereafter, one Robert Cathcart, who had been -with the Earl of Bothwell on this occasion, though it does -not appear that he took an active hand in the murder, was -slain in revenge by William Stewart, son of the deceased, while -standing inoffensively at the head of Peebles Wynd, near the -Tron.</p> - -<p>In June 1605, one William Thomson, a dagger-maker in the -West Bow, which was even then remarkable for iron-working -handicraftsmen, was slain by John Waterstone, a neighbour of -his own, who was next day beheaded on the Castle-hill for his -crime.</p> - -<p>In 1640, the Lawnmarket was the scene of a personal combat -between Major Somerville, commander of the forces then in the -Castle, devoted to the Covenanting interest (a relation of Braid -Hugh in the preceding extract), and one Captain Crawfuird, -which is related in the following picturesque and interesting -manner by the same writer: ‘But it would appear this gentleman -conceived his affront being publict, noe satisfactione acted in a -private way could save his honour; therefore to repair the same, -he resolves to challange and fight Somervill upon the High -Street of Edenburgh, and at such a tyme when ther should be -most spectators. In order to this designe, he takes the occasione, -as this gentleman was betwext ten and eleven hours in the -foirnoon hastily comeing from the Castle (haveing been then -sent for to the Committie of Estates and General Leslie anent -some important busines), to assault him in this manner; Somervill -being past the Weigh-house, Captaine Crawfuird observeing -him, presentlie steps into a high chope upon the south side of -the Landmercat, and there layes by his cloak, haveing a long -broad sword and a large Highland durke by his side; he comes -up to Somervill, and without farder ceremonie sayes: “If you -be a pretty man, draw your sword;” and with that word pulles<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_40" id="Page_40">{40}</a></span> -out his oune sword with the dagger. Somervill at first was -somewhat stertled at the impudence and boldnesse of the man -that durst soe openly and avowedly assault him, being in publict -charge, and even then on his duty. But his honour and present -preservatione gave him noe tyme to consult the conveniency or -inconveniency he was now under, either as to his present charge -or disadvantage of weapons, haveing only a great kaine staff<a name="FNanchor_28" id="FNanchor_28"></a><a href="#Footnote_28" class="fnanchor">[28]</a> in -his hand, which for ordinary he walked still with, and that same -sword which Generall Rivane had lately gifted him, being a half-rapper -sword backed, hinging in a shoulder-belt far back, as the -fashion was then, he was forced to guaird two or three strokes -with his kaine before he got out his sword, which being now -drawne, he soon puts his adversary to the defencive part, by -bearing up soe close to him, and putting home his thrusts, -that the captaine, for all his courage and advantage of weapons, -was forced to give back, having now much adoe to parie the -redoubled thrusts that Somervill let in at him, being now -agoeing.</p> - -<p>‘The combat (for soe in effect it was, albeit accidental) begane -about the midle of the Landmercat. Somervill drives doune the -captaine, still fighting, neer to the goldsmiths’ chops, where, -fearing to be nailled to the boords (these chops being then all -of timber), he resolved by ane notable blow to revenge all his -former affronts; makeing thairfor a fent, as if he had designed -at Somervill’s right side, haveing parried his thrust with his -dagger, he suddenly turnes his hand, and by a back-blow with -his broadsword he thought to have hamshekelled<a name="FNanchor_29" id="FNanchor_29"></a><a href="#Footnote_29" class="fnanchor">[29]</a> him in one, -if not both of his legges, which Somervill only prevented by -nimbly leaping backward at the tyme, interposeing the great -kaine that was in his left hand, which was quyte cut through -with the violence of the blow. And now Providence soe -ordered it, that the captaine missing his mark, overstrake himself -soe far, that in tyme he could not recover his sword to a fit -posture of defence, untill Somervill, haveing beaten up the dagger -that was in the captaine’s left hand with the remaineing part of -his oune stick, he instantly closes with him, and with the pummil -of his sword he instantly strikes him doune to the ground, where -at first, because of his baseness, he was mynded to have nailled -him to the ground, but that his heart relented, haveing him in -his mercy. And att that same instant ther happened several of -his oune soulders to come in, who wer soe incensed, that they<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_41" id="Page_41">{41}</a></span> -wer ready to have cut the poor captaine all in pieces, if he had -not rescued him out of theire hands, and saw him safely convoyed -to prisone, where he was layd in the irones, and continued -in prisone in a most miserable and wretched condition somewhat -more than a year.’<a name="FNanchor_30" id="FNanchor_30"></a><a href="#Footnote_30" class="fnanchor">[30]</a></p> - - -<h3>THE TINKLARIAN DOCTOR.</h3> - -<p>In the early part of the last century, the Bowhead was distinguished -as the residence of an odd, half-crazy varlet of a tinsmith -named William Mitchell, who occasionally held forth as a preacher, -and every now and then astounded the quiet people of Edinburgh -with some pamphlet full of satirical personalities. He seems to -have been altogether a strange mixture of fanaticism, humour, and -low cunning. In one of his publications—a single broadside, -dated 1713—he has a squib upon the magistrates, in the form of -a <em>leit</em>, or list, of a new set, whom he proposes to introduce in their -stead. At the end he sets forward a claim on his own behalf, no -less than that of representing the city in parliament. In another -of his prose pieces he gives a curious account of a journey which he -made into France, where, he affirms, ‘the king’s court is six times -bigger than the king of Britain’s; his guards have all feathers in -their hats, and their horse-tails are to their heels; and their king -[Louis XV.] is one of the best-favoured boys that you can look -upon—blithe-like, with black hair; and all his people are better -natured in general than the Scots or English, except the priests. -Their women seem to be modest, for they have no fardingales. -The greatest wonder I saw in France, was to see the braw people -fall down on their knees on the clarty ground when the priest -comes by, carrying the cross, to give a sick person the sacrament.’</p> - -<p>The Tinklarian Doctor, for such was his popular appellation, -appears to have been fully acquainted with an ingenious expedient, -long afterwards held in view by publishers of juvenile toy-books. -As in certain sage little histories of Tommy and Harry, King -Pepin, &c., we are sure to find that ‘the good boy who loved his -lessons’ always bought his books from ‘kind, good, old Mr J. -Newberry, at the corner of St Paul’s Churchyard, where the -greatest assortment of nice books for good boys and girls is always -to be had’—so in the works of Mr Mitchell we find some sly -encomium upon the Tinklarian Doctor constantly peeping forth; -and in the pamphlet from which the above extract is made, he is<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_42" id="Page_42">{42}</a></span> -not forgetful to impress his professional excellence as a whitesmith. -‘I have,’ he says, ‘a good pennyworth of pewter spoons, fine, like -silver—none such made in Edinburgh—and silken pocks for wigs, -and French white pearl-beads; all to be sold for little or nothing.’ -<i lang="la" xml:lang="la">Vide</i> ‘A part of the works of that Eminent Divine and Historian, -Dr William Mitchell, Professor of Tinklarianism in the University -of the <span class="smcap">Bowhead</span>; being a Syze of Divinity, Humanity, History, -Philosophy, Law, and Physick; Composed at Various Occasions -for his own Satisfaction and the World’s Illumination.’ In his -works—all of which were adorned with a cut of the Mitchell arms—he -does not scruple to make the personages whom he introduces -speak of himself as a much wiser man than the Archbishop of -Canterbury, all the clergymen of his native country, and even the -magistrates of Edinburgh! One of his last productions was a -pamphlet on the murder of Captain Porteous, which he concludes -by saying, in the true spirit of a Cameronian martyr: ‘If the -king and clergy gar hang me for writing this, I’m content, because -it is long since any man was hanged for religion.’ The learned -Tinklarian was destined, however, to die in his bed—an event -which came to pass in the year 1740.</p> - -<p>The profession of which the Tinklarian Doctor subscribed -himself a member has long been predominant in the West Bow. -We see from a preceding extract that it reckoned dagger-makers -among its worthy denizens in the reign of James VI. But this -trade has long been happily extinct everywhere in Scotland; -though their less formidable brethren the whitesmiths, coppersmiths, -and pewterers have continued down to our own day to -keep almost unrivalled possession of the Bow. Till within these -few years, there was scarcely a shop in this street occupied by -other tradesmen; and it might be supposed that the noise of so -many hammermen, pent up in a narrow thoroughfare, would be -extremely annoying to the neighbourhood. Yet however disagreeable -their clattering might seem to strangers, it is generally -admitted that the people who lived in the West Bow became -habituated to the noise, and felt no inconvenience whatever from -its ceaseless operation upon their ears. Nay, they rather experienced -inconvenience from its cessation, and only felt annoyed when -any period of rest arrived and stopped it. Sunday morning, -instead of favouring repose, made them restless; and when they -removed to another part of the town, beyond the reach of the -sound, sleep was unattainable in the morning for some weeks, till -they got accustomed to the quiescence of their new neighbourhood.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_43" id="Page_43">{43}</a></span> -An old gentleman once told me that, having occasion in his youth -to lodge for a short time in the West Bow, he found the incessant -clanking extremely disagreeable, and at last entered into a paction -with some of the workmen in his immediate neighbourhood, who -promised to let him have another hour of quiet sleep in the -mornings for the consideration of some such matter as half-a-crown -to drink on Saturday night. The next day happening -(out of his knowledge) to be some species of Saint Monday, his -annoyers did not work at all; but such was the force of a habit -acquired even in a week or little more, that our friend awoke -precisely at the moment when the hammers used to commence; -and he was glad to get his bargain cancelled as soon as possible, -for fear of another morning’s want of disturbance.</p> - - -<h3>OLD ASSEMBLY-ROOM.</h3> - -<p>At the first angle of the Bow, on the west side of the street, is -a tall picturesque-looking house, which tradition points to as -having been the first place where the fashionables of Edinburgh -held their dancing assemblies. Over the door is a well-cut -sculpture of the arms of the Somerville family, together with the -initials P. J. and J. W., and the date 1602. These are memorials -of the original owner of the mansion, a certain Peter Somerville, -a wealthy citizen, at one time filling a dignified situation in the -magistracy, and father of Bartholomew Somerville, who was a -noted benefactor to the then infant university of Edinburgh. The -architrave also bears a legend (the title of the eleventh psalm):</p> - -<p class="center"> -IN DOMINO CONFIDO. -</p> - -<p>Ascending by the narrow spiral stair, we come to the second -floor, now occupied by a dealer in wool, but presenting such -appearances as leave no doubt that it once consisted of a single -lofty wainscoted room, with a carved oak ceiling. Here, then, -did the fair ladies whom Allan Ramsay and William Hamilton -celebrate meet for the recreation of dancing with their toupeed -and deep-skirted beaux. There in that little side-room, formed -by an <em>outshot</em> from the building, did the merry sons of Euterpe -retire to <em>rosin their bows</em> during the intervals of the performance. -Alas! dark are the walls which once glowed with festive light; -burdened is that floor, not with twinkling feet, but with the most -sluggish of inanimate substances. And as for the fiddlers-room—enough:</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_44" id="Page_44">{44}</a></span></p> - -<div class="poetry-container"><div class="poetry"><div class="stanza"> -<div class="verse">‘A merry place it was in days of yore,</div> -<div class="verse">But something ails it now—the place is cursed.’<a name="FNanchor_31" id="FNanchor_31"></a><a href="#Footnote_31" class="fnanchor">[31]</a></div> -</div></div></div> - -<div class="figcenter w400"> -<img src="images/illus_p_044.jpg" width="400" height="490" alt="" /> -<div class="caption"><p class="center">Old Assembly-Room.</p></div> -</div> - -<p>Dancing, although said to be a favourite -amusement and exercise of the Scottish people, -has always been discountenanced, more or less, -in the superior circles -of society, or only -indulged after a very -abstemious and rigid -fashion, until a comparatively -late age. -Everything that -could be called public -or promiscuous -amusement was held -in abhorrence by the -Presbyterians, and -only struggled -through a desultory -and degraded existence -by the favour -of the Jacobites, who -have always been a -less strait-laced part -of the community. -Thus there was nothing -like a conventional -system of -dancing in Edinburgh -till the year -1710, when at length a private association was commenced -under the name of ‘the Assembly;’ and probably its first quarters -were in this humble domicile. The persecution which it experienced -from rigid thinkers and the uninstructed populace of -that age would appear to have been very great. On one occasion, -we are told, the company were assaulted by an infuriated rabble, -and the door of their hall perforated with red-hot spits.<a name="FNanchor_32" id="FNanchor_32"></a><a href="#Footnote_32" class="fnanchor">[32]</a> Allan -Ramsay, who was the friend of all amusements, which he conceived -to tend only to cheer this sublunary scene of care, thus -alludes to the Assembly:</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_45" id="Page_45">{45}</a></span></p> - -<div class="poetry-container"><div class="poetry"><div class="stanza"> -<div class="verse">‘Sic as against the Assembly speak,</div> -<div class="verse indent2">The rudest sauls betray,</div> -<div class="verse">When matrons noble, wise, and meek,</div> -<div class="verse indent2">Conduct the healthfu’ play;</div> -<div class="verse">Where they appear nae vice daur keek,</div> -<div class="verse indent2">But to what’s guid gies way,</div> -<div class="verse">Like night, sune as the morning creek</div> -<div class="verse indent2">Has ushered in the day.</div> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<div class="verse">Dear E’nburgh, shaw thy gratitude,</div> -<div class="verse indent2">And o’ sic friends mak sure,</div> -<div class="verse">Wha strive to mak our minds less rude,</div> -<div class="verse indent2">And help our wants to cure;</div> -<div class="verse">Acting a generous part and guid,</div> -<div class="verse indent2">In bounty to the poor:</div> -<div class="verse">Sic virtues, if right understood,</div> -<div class="verse indent2">Should every heart allure.’</div> -</div></div></div> - -<p>We can easily see from this, and other symptoms, that the -Assembly had to make many sacrifices to the spirit which sought -to abolish it. In reality, the dancing was conducted under such -severe rules as to render the whole affair more like a night at -La Trappe than anything else. So lately as 1753, when the -Assembly had fallen under the control of a set of directors, and -was much more of a public affair than formerly, we find Goldsmith -giving the following graphic account of its meetings in a -letter to a friend in his own country. The author of the <cite>Deserted -Village</cite> was now studying the medical profession, it must be -recollected, at the university of Edinburgh:</p> - -<p>‘Let me say something of their balls, which are very frequent -here. When a stranger enters the dancing-hall, he sees one end -of the room taken up with the ladies, who sit dismally in a group -by themselves; on the other end stand their pensive partners that -are to be; but no more intercourse between the sexes than between -two countries at war. The ladies, indeed, may ogle, and the -gentlemen sigh, but an embargo is laid upon any closer commerce. -At length, to interrupt hostilities, the lady-directress, intendant, -or what you will, pitches on a gentleman and a lady to walk a -minuet, which they perform with a formality approaching to -despondence. After five or six couple have thus walked the -gauntlet, all stand up to country-dances, each gentleman furnished -with a partner from the aforesaid lady-directress. So they dance -much, and say nothing, and thus concludes our Assembly. I told -a Scotch gentleman that such a profound silence resembled the -ancient procession of the Roman matrons in honour of Ceres; and<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_46" id="Page_46">{46}</a></span> -the Scotch gentleman told me (and, faith, I believe he was right) -that I was a very great pedant for my pains.’</p> - -<p>In the same letter, however, Goldsmith allows the beauty of -the women and the good-breeding of the men.</p> - -<p>It may add to the curiosity of the whole affair, that when the -Assembly was reconstituted in February 1746, after several years -of cessation, the first of a set of regulations hung up in the hall<a name="FNanchor_33" id="FNanchor_33"></a><a href="#Footnote_33" class="fnanchor">[33]</a> -was: ‘<em>No lady to be admitted in a night-gown, and no gentleman -in boots</em>.’ The eighth rule was: ‘No misses in skirts and jackets, -robe-coats, nor stay-bodied gowns, to be allowed to dance in -country-dances, but in a sett by themselves.’</p> - -<p>In all probability it was in this very dingy house that Goldsmith -beheld the scene he has so well described. At least it -appears that the improved Assembly Room in Bell’s Wynd (which -has latterly served as a part of the accommodations of the Commercial -Bank) was not built till 1766.<a name="FNanchor_34" id="FNanchor_34"></a><a href="#Footnote_34" class="fnanchor">[34]</a> Arnot, in his <cite>History of -Edinburgh</cite>, describes the Assembly Room in Bell’s Wynd as very -inconvenient, which was the occasion of the present one being -built in George Street in 1784.</p> - - -<h3>PAUL ROMIEU.</h3> - -<p>At this angle of the Bow the original city-wall crossed the -line of the street, and there was, accordingly, a gate at this spot,<a name="FNanchor_35" id="FNanchor_35"></a><a href="#Footnote_35" class="fnanchor">[35]</a> -of which the only existing memorial is one of the hooks for the -suspension of the hinges, fixed in the front wall of a house, at -the height of about five feet from the ground. It is from the -arch forming this gateway that the street takes its name, <em>bow</em> -being an old word for an arch. The house immediately <em>without</em> -this ancient port, on the east side of the street, was occupied, -about the beginning of the last century, and perhaps at an earlier -period, by Paul Romieu, an eminent watchmaker, supposed to -have been one of the French refugees driven over to this country -in consequence of the revocation of the Edict of Nantes. This<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_47" id="Page_47">{47}</a></span> -is the more likely, as he seems, from the workmanship of his -watches, to have been a contemporary of Tompion, the famous -London horologist of the reign of Charles II. In the front of -the house, upon the third story, there is still to be seen the -remains of a curious piece of mechanism—namely, a gilt ball -representing the moon, which was made to revolve by means of -a clock.<a name="FNanchor_36" id="FNanchor_36"></a><a href="#Footnote_36" class="fnanchor">[36]</a></p> - - -<h3>‘HE THAT THOLES OVERCOMES.’</h3> - -<p>Pursuing our way down the steep and devious street, we pass -an antique wooden-faced house, bearing the odd name of the -<em>Mahogany Land</em>, and just before turning the -second corner, pause before a stone one of -equally antiquated structure,<a name="FNanchor_37" id="FNanchor_37"></a><a href="#Footnote_37" class="fnanchor">[37]</a> having a -wooden-screened outer stair. Over the door -at the head of this stair is a legend in -very old lettering—certainly not later than -1530—and hardly to be deciphered. With -difficulty we make it out to be:</p> - -<p class="center"> -HE YT THOLIS OVERCVMMIS. -</p> - -<p><em>He that tholes</em> (that is, bears) <em>overcomes</em>; -equivalent to what Virgil says:</p> - -<div class="poetry-container"><div class="poetry"><div class="stanza"> -<div class="verse">‘Quidquid erit, superanda omnis fortuna ferendo est.’</div> -</div> - -<p class="right"> -<cite>Æneid</cite>, v. -</p></div></div> - -<p>We may safely speculate on this inscription -being antecedent in date to the Reformation, -as after that period merely moral -apothegms were held in little regard, and -none but biblical inscriptions were actually -put upon the fronts of houses.</p> - -<div class="figcenter w250"> -<img src="images/illus_p_047.jpg" width="250" height="421" alt="" /> -<div class="caption"><p class="center">Mahogany Land, West Bow.</p></div> -</div> - -<p>On the other side of the street is a small shop (marked No. 69), -now occupied by a dealer in small miscellaneous wares,<a name="FNanchor_38" id="FNanchor_38"></a><a href="#Footnote_38" class="fnanchor">[38]</a> and which -was, a hundred years ago, open for a nearly similar kind of -business, under the charge of a Mrs Jeffrey. When, on the night -of the 7th September 1736, the rioters hurried their victim -Porteous down the West Bow, with the design of executing him -in the Grassmarket, they called at this shop to provide themselves<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_48" id="Page_48">{48}</a></span> -with a rope. The woman asked if it was to hang Porteous, and -when they answered in the affirmative, she told them they were -welcome to all she had of that article. They coolly took off what -they required, and laid a guinea on the counter as payment; -ostentatious to mark that they ‘did all in honour.’</p> - - -<h3>PROVOST STEWART’S HOUSE—DONALDSONS -THE BOOKSELLERS.</h3> - -<p>The upper floors of the house which looks down into the -Grassmarket formed the mansion of Mr Archibald Stewart, Lord -Provost of Edinburgh in 1745. This is an abode of singular -structure and arrangements, having its principal access by a close -out of another street, and only a postern one into the Bow, and -being full of curious little wainscoted rooms, concealed closets, -and secret stairs. In one apartment there is a cabinet, or what -appears a cabinet, about three feet high: this, when cross-examined, -turns out to be the mask of a trap-stair. Only a -smuggler, one would think, or a gentleman conducting treasonable -negotiations, could have bethought him of building such a house. -Whether Provost Stewart, who was a thorough Jacobite, was the -designer of these contrivances, I cannot tell; but fireside gossip -used to have a strange story as to his putting his trap-stair to use -on one important occasion. It was said that, during the occupation -of Edinburgh by the Highland army in ’45, his lordship was -honoured one evening with a secret visit from the Prince and some -of his principal officers. The situation was critical, for close by -was the line between the Highland guards and the beleaguered -environs of the Castle. Intelligence of the Prince’s movements -being obtained by the governor of the fortress, a party was sent -to seize him in the provost’s house. They made their approach -by the usual access from the Castle-hill Street; but an alarm -preceded them, and before they obtained admission, the provost’s -visitors had vanished through the mysterious cabinet, and made -their exit by the back-door. What real foundation there may -have been for this somewhat wild-looking story I do not pretend -to say.</p> - -<p>The house was at a subsequent time the residence of Alexander -Donaldson the bookseller, whose practice of reprinting modern -English books in Edinburgh, and his consequent litigation with -the London booksellers, attracted much attention sixty years since. -Printing and publishing were in a low state in Edinburgh before<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_49" id="Page_49">{49}</a></span> -the time of Donaldson. In the frank language of Hugo Arnot: -‘The printing of newspapers and of school-books, of the fanatick -effusions of Presbyterian clergymen, and the law papers of the -Court of Session, joined to the patent Bible printing, gave a -scanty employment to four printing-offices.’ About the middle -of the century, the English law of copyright not extending to -Scotland, some of the booksellers began to reprint the productions -of the English authors of the day; for example, the <cite>Rambler</cite> -was regularly reproduced in this manner in Edinburgh, with no -change but the addition of English translations of the Latin -mottoes, which were supplied by Mr James Elphinstone. From -this and minor causes, it came to pass that, in 1779, there were -twenty-seven printing-offices in Edinburgh. The most active man -in this trade was Alexander Donaldson, who likewise reprinted -in Edinburgh, and sold in London, English books of which the -author’s fourteen years’ copyright had expired, and which were -then only protected by a usage of the London trade, rendering -it dishonourable as between man and man, among themselves, to -reprint a book which had hitherto been the assigned property of -one of their number. Disregarding the rule of his fraternity, -Donaldson set up a shop in the Strand for the sale of his cheap -Edinburgh editions of the books of expired copyright. They met -an immense sale, and proved of obvious service to the public, -especially to those of limited means; though, as Johnson remarked, -this made Donaldson ‘no better than Robin Hood, who robbed -the rich in order to give to the poor.’ In reality, the London -booksellers had no right beyond one of class sentiment, and this -was fully found when they wrestled with Mr Donaldson at law. -Waiving all question on this point, Donaldson may be considered -as a sort of morning-star of that reformation which has resulted in -the universal cheapening of literary publications. Major Topham, -in 1775, speaks of a complete set of the English classics which -he was bringing out, ‘in a very handsome binding,’ at the rate of -one and sixpence a volume!</p> - -<p>[Donaldson, in 1763, started a twice-a-week newspaper under -the name of the <cite>Edinburgh Advertiser</cite>, which was for a long -course of years the prominent journal on the Conservative side, -and eminently lucrative, chiefly through its multitude of advertisements. -All his speculations being of a prosperous nature, he -acquired considerable wealth, which he left to his son, the late -Mr James Donaldson, by whom the newspaper was conducted for -many years. James added largely to his wealth by successful<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_50" id="Page_50">{50}</a></span> -speculations in the funds, where he held so large a sum that the -rise of a per cent. made him a thousand pounds richer than he -had been the day before. Prompted by the example of Heriot -and Watson, and partly, perhaps, by that modification of egotism -which makes us love to be kept in the remembrance of future -generations, James Donaldson, at his death in 1830, devoted the -mass of his fortune—about £240,000—for the foundation of a -<em>hospital</em> for the maintenance and education of poor children of -both sexes; and a structure for the purpose was erected, on a -magnificent plan furnished by Mr Playfair, at an expense, it is -said, of about £120,000.</p> - -<p>The old house in the West Bow—which was possessed by both -of these remarkable men in succession, and the scene of their -entertainments to the literary men of the last age, with some of -whom Alexander Donaldson lived on terms of intimacy—stood -unoccupied for several years before 1824, when it was burnt down. -New buildings now occupy its site.]</p> - - -<h3>TEMPLARS’ LANDS.</h3> - -<p>We have now arrived at the <em>Bow-foot</em>, about which there is -nothing remarkable to be told, except that here, and along one -side of the Grassmarket, are several houses marked by a cross -on some conspicuous part—either an actual iron cross, or one -represented in sculpture. This seems a strange circumstance in -a country where it was even held doubtful, twenty years ago, -whether one could be placed as an ornament on the top of a -church tower. The explanation is that these houses were built -upon lands originally the property of the Knights Templars, and -the cross has ever since been kept up upon them, not from any -veneration for that ancient society, neither upon any kind of -religious ground; the sole object has been to fix in remembrance -certain legal titles and privileges which have been transmitted -into secular hands from that source, and which are to this day -productive of solid benefits. A hundred years ago, the houses -thus marked were held as part of the barony of Drem in -Haddingtonshire, the baron of which used to hold courts in them -occasionally; and here were harboured many persons not free of -the city corporations, to the great annoyance of the adherents -of local monopoly. At length, the abolition of heritable jurisdictions -in 1747 extinguished this little barony, but not certain -other legal rights connected with the <em>Templar Lands</em>, which, however,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_51" id="Page_51">{51}</a></span> -it might be more troublesome to explain than advantageous -to know.</p> - -<div class="figcenter w450"> -<a id="illus_c_008"></a> -<img src="images/illus_c_008.jpg" width="450" height="653" alt="" /> -<div class="caption"><p class="center">GRASSMARKET<br /> -from west end of Cowgate.</p> - -<p class="right"> -<span class="smcap"><a href="#Page_50">Page 50.</a></span> -</p> -</div> -</div> - - -<h3>THE GALLOWS STONE.</h3> - -<p>In a central situation at the east end of the Grassmarket, -there remained till very lately a massive block of sandstone, -having a quadrangular hole in the middle, being the stone which -served as a socket for the gallows, when this was the common -place of execution. Instead of the stone, there is now only a -St Andrew’s cross, indicated by an arrangement of the paving-stones.</p> - -<p>This became the regular scene of executions after the Restoration, -and so continued till the year 1784. Hence arises the sense -of the Duke of Rothes’s remark when a Covenanting prisoner -proved obdurate: ‘Then e’en let him glorify God in the Grassmarket!’—the -deaths of that class of victims being always -signalised by psalm-singing on the scaffold. Most of the hundred -persons who suffered for that cause in Edinburgh during the reigns -of Charles II. and James II. breathed their last pious aspirations -at this spot; but several of the most notable, including the Marquis -and Earl of Argyll, were executed at the Cross.</p> - -<p>As a matter of course, this was the scene of the Porteous riot -in 1736, and of the subsequent murder of Porteous by the mob. -The rioters, wishing to despatch him as near to the place of his -alleged crime as possible, selected for the purpose a dyer’s pole -which stood on the south side of the street, exactly opposite to -the gallows stone.</p> - -<p>Some of the Edinburgh executioners have been so far notable -men as to be the subject of traditionary fame. In the reign of -Charles II., Alexander Cockburn, the hangman of Edinburgh, and -who must have officiated at the exits of many of the ‘martyrs’ in -the Grassmarket, was found guilty of the murder of a bluegown, -or privileged beggar, and accordingly suffered that fate which he -had so often meted out to other men. One Mackenzie, the hangman -of Stirling, whom Cockburn had traduced and endeavoured -to thrust out of office, was the triumphant executioner of the -sentence.</p> - -<p>Another Edinburgh hangman of this period was a reduced -gentleman, the last of a respectable family who had possessed -an estate in the neighbourhood of Melrose. He had been a -profligate in early life, squandered the whole of his patrimony, -and at length, for the sake of subsistence, was compelled to accept<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_52" id="Page_52">{52}</a></span> -this wretched office, which in those days must have been unusually -obnoxious to popular odium, on account of the frequent executions -of innocent and religious men. Notwithstanding his extreme -degradation, this unhappy reprobate could not altogether forget -his original station and his former tastes and habits. He would -occasionally resume the garb of a gentleman, and mingle in the -parties of citizens who played at golf in the evenings on Bruntsfield -Links. Being at length recognised, he was chased from the ground -with shouts of execration and loathing, which affected him so -much that he retired to the solitude of the King’s Park, and was -next day found dead at the bottom of a precipice, over which he -was supposed to have thrown himself in despair. This rock was -afterwards called the <em>Hangman’s Craig</em>.</p> - -<p>In the year 1700, when the Scottish people were in a state of -great excitement on account of the interference of the English -government against their expedition to Darien, some persons were -apprehended for a riot in the city of Edinburgh, and sentenced to -be whipped and put upon the pillory. As these persons had acted -under the influence of the general feeling, they excited the sympathy -of the people in an extraordinary degree, and even the -hangman was found to have scruples about the propriety of -punishing them. Upon the pillory they were presented with -flowers and wine; and when arrayed for flagellation, the executioner -made a mere mockery of his duty, never once permitting -his whip to touch their backs. The magistrates were very indignant -at the conduct of their servant, and sentenced him to be -scourged in his turn. However, when the Haddington executioner -was brought to officiate upon his metropolitan brother, he was so -much frightened by the threatening aspect of the mob that he -thought it prudent to make his escape through a neighbouring -alley. The laugh was thus turned against the magistrates, who, -it was said, would require to get a third executioner to punish the -Haddington man. They prudently dropped the whole matter.</p> - -<p>At a somewhat later period, the Edinburgh official was a man -named John Dalgleish. He it was who acted at the execution -of Wilson the smuggler in 1736, and who is alluded to so -frequently in the tale of the <cite>Heart of Mid-Lothian</cite>. Dalgleish, -I have heard, was esteemed, before his taking up this office, as a -person in creditable circumstances. He is memorable for one -pithy saying. Some one asking him how he contrived in whipping -a criminal to adjust the weight of his arm, on which, it is obvious, -much must depend: ‘Oh,’ said he,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_53" id="Page_53">{53}</a></span> ‘I lay on the lash according to -my conscience.’ Either Jock, or some later official, was remarked -to be a regular <em>hearer</em> at the Tolbooth Church. As no other -person would sit in the same seat, he always had a pew to himself. -He regularly communicated; but here the exclusiveness of his -fellow-creatures also marked itself, and the clergyman was obliged -to serve a separate table for the hangman, after the rest of the -congregation had retired from the church.</p> - -<p>The last Edinburgh executioner of whom any particular notice -has been taken by the public was John High, commonly called -Jock Heich, who acceded to the office in the year 1784, and died -so lately as 1817. High had been originally induced to undertake -this degrading duty in order to escape the punishment due -to a petty offence—that of stealing poultry. I remember him -living in his official mansion in a lane adjoining to the Cowgate—a -small wretched-looking house, assigned by the magistrates -for the residence of this race of officers, and which has only been -removed within the last few years, to make way for the extension -of the buildings of the Parliament Square. He had then a second -wife, whom he used to beat unmercifully. Since Jock’s days, no -executioner has been so conspicuous as to be known by name. -The fame of the occupation seems somehow to have departed.</p> - - -<p class="p2">I have now finished my account of the West Bow; a most -antiquated place, yet not without its virtues even as to matters -of the present day. Humble as the street appears, many of -its shopkeepers and other inhabitants are of a very respectable -character. Bankruptcies are said to be very rare in the Bow. -Most of the traders are of old standing, and well-to-do in the -world; few but what are the proprietors of their own shops and -dwellings, which, in such a community, indicates something like -wealth. The smarter and more dashing men of Princes Street -and the Bridges may smile at their homely externals and darksome -little places of business, or may not even pay them the -compliment of thinking of them at all; yet, while they boast not -of their ‘warerooms,’ or their troops of ‘young men,’ or their -plate-glass windows, they at least feel no apprehension from the -approach of rent-day, and rarely experience tremulations on the -subject of bills. Perhaps, if strict investigation were made, the -‘bodies’ of the Bow could show more comfortable balances at -the New Year than at least a half of the sublime men who pay -an income by way of rental in George Street. Not one of them -but is respectfully known by a good sum on the creditor side at<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_54" id="Page_54">{54}</a></span> -Sir William Forbes’s; not one but can stand at his shop-door, -with his hands in his pockets and his hat on, not unwilling, it -may be, to receive custom, yet not liable to be greatly distressed -if the customer go by. Such, perhaps, were shopkeepers in the -golden age!<a name="FNanchor_39" id="FNanchor_39"></a><a href="#Footnote_39" class="fnanchor">[39]</a></p> - -<hr class="chap" /></div><div class="chapter"> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_55" id="Page_55">{55}</a></span></p> - - - -<h2><a name="JAMESS_COURT" id="JAMESS_COURT">JAMES’S COURT.</a></h2> - - -<p class="chapter_summary"><strong>David Hume—James Boswell—Lord Fountainhall.</strong></p> - - -<p>James’s Court, a well-known pile of building of great altitude -at the head of the Earthen Mound, was erected about -1725-27 by James Brownhill,<a name="FNanchor_40" id="FNanchor_40"></a><a href="#Footnote_40" class="fnanchor">[40]</a> a joiner, as a speculation, and was -for some years regarded as the <i lang="fr" xml:lang="fr">quartier</i> of greatest dignity and -importance in Edinburgh. The inhabitants, who were all persons -of consequence in society, although each had but a single -floor of four or five rooms and a kitchen, kept a clerk to -record their names and proceedings, -had a scavenger of their own, -clubbed in many public measures, -and had balls and parties among -themselves exclusively. In those -days it must have been quite a -step in life when a man was able -to fix his family in one of the -<em>flats</em> of James’s Court.</p> - -<p>Amongst the many notables -who have harboured here, only -two or three can be said to have -preserved their notability till our -day, the chief being David Hume -and James Boswell.</p> - -<div class="figcenter w350"> -<img src="images/illus_p_055.jpg" width="350" height="516" alt="" /> -<div class="caption"><p class="center">Riddel’s Land, Lawnmarket.</p></div> -</div> - - -<h3>DAVID HUME.</h3> - -<p>The first fixed residence of -David Hume in Edinburgh appears -to have been in <em>Riddel’s -Land</em>, Lawnmarket, near the head -of the West Bow. He commenced -housekeeping there in 1751, when, -according to his own account, he ‘removed from the country to -the town, the true scene for a man of letters.’ It was while in<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_56" id="Page_56">{56}</a></span> -Riddel’s Land that he published his <cite>Political Discourses</cite>, and -obtained the situation of librarian to the Faculty of Advocates. -In this place also he commenced the writing of his <cite>History of -England</cite>. He dates from Riddel’s Land in January 1753, but in -June we find him removed to -<em>Jack’s Land</em>,<a name="FNanchor_41" id="FNanchor_41"></a><a href="#Footnote_41" class="fnanchor">[41]</a> a somewhat airier -situation in the Canongate, -where he remained for nine -years. Excepting only the small -portion composed in the Lawnmarket -mansion, the whole of -the <cite>History of England</cite> was -written in Jack’s Land; a fact -which will probably raise some -interest respecting that locality. -It is, in reality, a plain, middle-aged -fabric, of no particular appearance, -and without a single -circumstance of a curious -nature connected with it, -besides the somewhat odd -one that the continuator of -the <cite>History</cite>, Smollett, lived, -some time after, in his -sister’s house precisely opposite.</p> - -<div class="figcenter w350"> -<img src="images/illus_p_056.jpg" width="350" height="522" alt="" /> -<div class="caption"><p class="center">Jack’s Land, Canongate.</p></div> -</div> - -<p>Hume removed at Whitsunday -1762 to a house -which he purchased in -James’s Court—the eastern -portion of the third floor -in the west stair (counting from the level of the court). This was -such a step as a man would take in those days as a consequence of -improvement in his circumstances. The philosopher had lived -in James’s Court but a short time, when he was taken to France -as secretary to the embassy. In his absence, which lasted several -years, his house was occupied by Dr Blair, who here had a son of -the Duke of Northumberland as a pupil. It is interesting to find -Hume, some time after, writing to his friend Dr Ferguson from<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_57" id="Page_57">{57}</a></span> -the midst of the gaieties of Paris: ‘I am sensible that I am -misplaced, and I wish twice or thrice a day for <em>my easy-chair and -my retreat in James’s Court</em>.’ Then he adds a beautiful sentiment: -‘Never think, dear Ferguson, that as long as you are master of -your own fireside and your own time, you can be unhappy, or that -any other circumstance can add to your enjoyment.’<a name="FNanchor_42" id="FNanchor_42"></a><a href="#Footnote_42" class="fnanchor">[42]</a> In one of -his letters to Blair he speaks minutely of his house: ‘Never put -a fire in the south room with the red paper. It was so warm of -itself that all last winter, which was a very severe one, I lay with -a single blanket; and frequently, upon coming in at midnight -starving with cold, have sat down and read for an hour, as if I had -had a stove in the room.’ From 1763 till 1766 he lived in high -diplomatic situations at Paris; and thinking to settle there for life, -for the sake of the agreeable society, gave orders to sell his house -in Edinburgh. He informs us, in a letter to the Countess de -Boufflers (<cite>General Correspondence</cite>, 4to, 1820, p. 231), that he was -prevented by a singular accident from carrying his intention into -effect. After writing a letter to Edinburgh for the purpose of -disposing of his house, and leaving it with his Parisian landlord, -he set out to pass his Christmas with the Countess de Boufflers -at L’Isle Adam; but being driven back by a snowstorm, which -blocked up the roads, he found on his return that the letter had -not been sent to the post-house. More deliberate thoughts then -determined him to keep up his Edinburgh mansion, thinking that, -if any affairs should call him to his native country, ‘it would be -very inconvenient not to have a house to retire to.’ On his -return, therefore, in 1766, he re-entered into possession of his <em>flat</em> -in James’s Court, but was soon again called from it by an invitation -from Mr Conway to be an under-secretary of state. At length, in -1769, he returned permanently to his native city, in possession of -what he thought opulence—a thousand a year. We find him -immediately writing from his retreat in James’s Court to his friend -Adam Smith, then commencing his great work <cite>On the Wealth of -Nations</cite> in the quiet of his mother’s house at Kirkcaldy: ‘I am -glad to have come within sight of you, and to have a view of -Kirkcaldy from my windows; but I wish also to be within speaking-terms -of you,’ &c. To another person he writes: ‘I live still, and -must for a twelvemonth, in my old house in James’s Court, which -is very cheerful, and even elegant, but too small to display my -great talent for cookery, the science to which I intend to addict -the remaining years of my life!’</p> -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_58" id="Page_58">{58}</a></span></p> -<p>Hume now built a superior house for himself in the New Town, -which was then little beyond its commencement, selecting a site -adjoining to St Andrew Square. The superintendence of this -work was an amusement to him. A story is related in more than -one way regarding the manner in which a denomination was -conferred upon the street in which this house is situated. Perhaps, -if it be premised that a corresponding street at the other angle of -St Andrew Square is called <em>St Andrew Street</em>—a natural enough -circumstance with reference to the square, whose title was determined -on in the plan—it will appear likely that the choosing of -‘St David Street’ for that in which Hume’s house stood was not -originally designed as a jest at his expense, though a second -thought, and the whim of his friends, might quickly give it that -application. The story, as told by Mr Burton, is as follows: -‘When the house was built and inhabited by Hume, but while yet -the street of which it was the commencement had no name, a witty -young lady, daughter of Baron Ord, chalked on the wall the words, -<span class="smcap">St David Street</span>. The allusion was very obvious. Hume’s “lass,” -judging that it was not meant in honour or reverence, ran into the -house much excited, to tell her master how he was made game of. -“Never mind, lassie,” he said, “many a better man has been made -a saint of before.”’</p> - -<p>That Hume was a native of Edinburgh is well known. One -could wish to know the spot of his birth; but it is not now -perhaps possible to ascertain it. The nearest approach made to -the fact is from intelligence conveyed by a memorandum in his -father’s handwriting among the family papers, where he speaks of -‘my son David, born in the <em>Tron Church parish</em>’—a district -comprehending a large square clump of town between the High -Street and Cowgate, east of the site of the church itself.</p> - -<p>One of Hume’s most intimate friends amongst the other sex was -Mrs Cockburn, author of one of the beautiful songs called <cite>The -Flowers of the Forest</cite>. While he was in France in 1764, she -writes to him from <em>Baird’s Close,<a name="FNanchor_43" id="FNanchor_43"></a><a href="#Footnote_43" class="fnanchor">[43]</a> Castle-hill</em>: ‘The cloven foot for -which thou art worshipped I despise; yet I remember <em>thee</em> with -affection. I remember that, in spite of vain philosophy, of dark -doubts, of toilsome learning, God has stamped his image of -benignity so strong upon thy <em>heart</em>, that not all the labours of thy -head could efface it.’ After Hume’s return to Edinburgh, he kept<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_59" id="Page_59">{59}</a></span> -up his acquaintance with this spirited and amiable woman. The -late Mr Alexander Young, W.S., had some reminiscences of parties -which he attended when a boy at her house, and at which the -philosopher was present. Hume came in one evening behind time -for her <i lang="fr" xml:lang="fr">petit souper</i>, when, seeing her bustling to get something for -him to eat, he called out: ‘Now, no trouble, if you please, about -quality; for you know I’m only a glutton, not an epicure.’ Mr -Young attended at a dinner where, besides Hume, there were -present Lord Monboddo and some other learned personages. Mrs -Cockburn was then living in the neat first floor of a house at the -end of Crighton Street, with windows looking along the Potterrow. -She had a son of eccentric habits, in middle life, or rather elderly, -who came in during the dinner tipsy, and going into a bedroom, -locked himself in, went to bed, and fell asleep. The company in -time made a move for departure, when it was discovered that their -hats, cloaks, and greatcoats were all locked up in Mr Cockburn’s -room. The door was knocked at and shaken, but no answer. -What was to be done? At length Mrs Cockburn had no alternative -from sending out to her neighbours to borrow a supply of -similar integuments, which was soon procured. There was then -such fun in fitting the various <i lang="fr" xml:lang="fr">savants</i> with suitable substitutes for -their own proper gear! Hume, for instance, with a dreadnought -riding-coat; Monboddo with a shabby old hat, as unlike his own -neat chapeau as possible! In the highest exaltation of spirits did -these two men of genius at length proceed homeward along the -Potterrow, Horse Wynd, Assembly Close, &c., making the old -echoes merry with their peals of laughter at the strange appearance -which they respectively made.<a name="FNanchor_44" id="FNanchor_44"></a><a href="#Footnote_44" class="fnanchor">[44]</a></p> - -<p>I lately inspected Hume’s <em>cheerful and elegant</em> mansion in James’s -Court, and found it divided amongst three or four tenants in -humble life, each possessing little more than a single room. It -was amusing to observe that what had been the dining-room -and drawing-room towards the north were <em>each</em> provided with one -of those little side oratories which have been described elsewhere<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_60" id="Page_60">{60}</a></span> -as peculiar to a period in Edinburgh house-building, being designed -for private devotion. Hume living in a house with two private -chapels!</p> - - -<h3>JAMES BOSWELL.</h3> - -<p>It appears that one of the immediately succeeding leaseholders -of Hume’s house in James’s Court was James Boswell. Mr Burton -has made this tolerably clear (<cite>Life of Hume</cite>, ii. 137), and he -proceeds to speculate on the fact of Boswell having there entertained -his friend Johnson. ‘Would Boswell communicate the fact, -or tell what manner of man was the landlord of the habitation -into which he had, under the guise of hospitality, entrapped the -arch-intolerant? Who shall appreciate the mental conflict which -Boswell may have experienced on this occasion?’ It appears, -however, that by the time when Johnson visited Boswell in James’s -Court, the latter had removed into a better and larger mansion -right below and on the level of the court—namely, that now -(1846) occupied by Messrs Pillans as a printing-office. This was -an extraordinary house in its day; for it consisted of two floors -connected by an internal stair. Here it was that the Ursa Major -of literature stayed for a few days, in August 1773, while preparing -to set out to the Hebrides, and also for some time after his return. -Here did he receive the homage of the trembling literati of -Edinburgh; here, after handling them in his rough manner, did -he relax in play with little Miss Veronica, whom Boswell promised -to consider peculiarly in his will for showing a liking to so -estimable a man. What makes all this evident is a passage in a -letter of Samuel himself to Mrs Thrale (Edinburgh, August 17), -where he says: ‘Boswell has very handsome and spacious rooms, -level with the ground on one side of the house, and on the other -four stories high.’ Boswell was only tenant of the mansion. It -affords a curious idea of the importance which formerly attached -to some of these Old Town residences, when we learn that this was -part of the entailed estate of the Macdowalls of Logan, one of -whom sold it, by permission of an act of parliament, to redeem -the land-tax upon his country property.</p> - -<p>Boswell ceased to be a citizen of Edinburgh in 1785, when -he was pleased to venture before the English bar. He is little -remembered amongst the elder inhabitants of our city; but the -late Mr William Macfarlane, the well-known small-debt judge, told -me that there was <em>this</em> peculiarity about him—it was impossible -to look in his face without being moved by the comicality which<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_61" id="Page_61">{61}</a></span> -always reigned upon it. He was one of those men whose very look -is provocative of mirth. Mr Robert Sym, W.S., who died in 1844, -at an advanced age, remembered being at parties in this house in -Boswell’s time.</p> - - -<h3>LORD FOUNTAINHALL.</h3> - -<p>Before James’s Court was built, its site was occupied by certain -closes, in one of which dwelt Lord Fountainhall, so distinguished -as an able, liberal, and upright judge, and still more so by his -industrious habits as a collector of historical memorabilia, and of -the decisions of the Court of Session. Though it is considerably -upwards of a century since Lord Fountainhall died,<a name="FNanchor_45" id="FNanchor_45"></a><a href="#Footnote_45" class="fnanchor">[45]</a> a traditionary -anecdote of his residence in this place has been handed down till -the present time by a surprisingly small number of persons. The -mother of the late Mr Gilbert Innes of Stow was a daughter of his -lordship’s son, Sir Andrew Lauder, and she used to describe to her -children the visits she used to pay to her venerable grandfather’s -house, situated, as she said, where James’s Court now stands. She -and her sister, a little girl like herself, always went with their maid -on the Saturday afternoons, and were shown into the room where -the aged judge was sitting—a room covered with gilt leather,<a name="FNanchor_46" id="FNanchor_46"></a><a href="#Footnote_46" class="fnanchor">[46]</a> -and containing many huge presses and cabinets, one of which was -ornamented with a death’s-head at the top. After amusing themselves -for an hour or two with his lordship, they used to get each -a shilling from him, and retire to the anteroom, where, as Mrs -Innes well recollected, the waiting-maid invariably pounced upon -their money, and appropriated it to her own use. It is curious to -think that the mother of a gentlewoman living in 1839 (for only -then did Miss Innes of Stow leave this earthly scene) should have -been familiar with a lawyer who entered at the bar soon after the -Restoration (1668), and acted as counsel for the unfortunate Earl -of Argyll in 1681; a being of an age as different in every respect -from the present as the wilds of North America are different from -the long-practised lands of Lothian or Devonshire.</p> - -<p>The judicial designation of Lord Fountainhall was adopted from -a place belonging to him in East Lothian, now the property of his -representative, Sir Thomas Dick Lauder. The original name of -the place was Woodhead. When the able lawyer came to the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_62" id="Page_62">{62}</a></span> -bench, and, as usual, thought of a new appellative of a territorial -kind—‘Woodhead—Lord Woodhead,’ thought he; ‘that will -never do for a judge!’ So the name of the place was changed -to Fountainhall, and he became Lord Fountainhall accordingly.</p> - -<p>[1868.—The western half of James’s Court having been destroyed -by accidental fire, the reader will now find a new building on the -spot. The houses rendered interesting by the names of Blair, -Boswell, Johnson, and Hume are consequently no more.]</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_63" id="Page_63">{63}</a></span></p> - -<div class="figcenter w450"> -<img src="images/illus_p_063.jpg" width="450" height="434" alt="" /> -<div class="caption"><p class="center">Lady Stair’s House as Restored.</p></div> -</div> - - - -<hr class="chap" /></div><div class="chapter"> -<h2><a name="STORY_OF_THE_COUNTESS_OF_STAIR" id="STORY_OF_THE_COUNTESS_OF_STAIR">STORY OF THE COUNTESS OF STAIR.</a></h2> - - -<p>In a short alley leading between the Lawnmarket and the Earthen -Mound, and called <em>Lady Stair’s Close</em>,<a name="FNanchor_47" id="FNanchor_47"></a><a href="#Footnote_47" class="fnanchor">[47]</a> there is a substantial<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_64" id="Page_64">{64}</a></span> -old mansion, presenting, in a sculptured stone over the doorway, a -small coat-armorial, with the initials W. G. and G. S., the date -1622, and the legend:</p> - -<p class="center"> -FEAR THE LORD, AND DEPART<br /> -FROM EVILL.<br /> -</p> - -<p>The letters refer to Sir William Gray -of Pittendrum, the original proprietor -of the house, and his wife. -Within there are marks of good -style, particularly in the lofty ceiling -and an inner stair apart from the common one; but all has long -been turned to common purposes; while it must be left to the -imagination to realise the terraced garden which formerly descended -towards the North Loch.</p> - -<div class="figcenter w275"> -<img src="images/illus_p_064.jpg" width="275" height="164" alt="" /> -</div> - -<p>This was the last residence of a lady conspicuous in Scottish -society in the early part of the last century—the widow of the -celebrated commander and diplomatist, John, Earl of Stair. Lady -Eleanor Campbell was, by paternal descent, nearly related to one -of the greatest historical figures of the preceding century, being the -granddaughter of the Chancellor, Earl of Loudon, whose talents -and influence on the Covenanting side were at one time believed to -have nearly procured him the honour of a secret death at the -command of Charles I. Her ladyship’s first adventure in matrimony -led to a series of circumstances of a marvellous nature, which I -shall set down exactly as they used to be related by friends of the -lady in the last century. It was her lot, at an early age, to be -united to James, Viscount Primrose, a man of the worst temper -and most dissolute manners. Her ladyship, who had no small -share of the old chancellor in her constitution, could have managed -most men with ease, by dint of superior intellect and force of -character; but the cruelty of Lord Primrose was too much for her. -He treated her so barbarously that she had even reason to fear -that he would some day put an end to her life. One morning she -was dressing herself in her chamber, near an open window, when -his lordship entered the room behind her with a drawn sword in -his hand. He had opened the door softly, and although his face -indicated a resolution of the most horrible nature, he still had the -presence of mind to approach her with caution. Had she not -caught a glimpse of his face and figure in the glass, he would in all -probability have come near enough to execute his bloody purpose -before she was aware or could have taken any measures to save<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_65" id="Page_65">{65}</a></span> -herself. Fortunately, she perceived him in time to leap out of -the open window into the street. Half-dressed as she was, she -immediately, by a very laudable exertion of her natural good sense, -went to the house of Lord Primrose’s mother, where she told her -story, and demanded protection. That protection was at once -extended; and it being now thought vain to attempt a reconciliation, -they never afterwards lived together.</p> - -<p>Lord Primrose soon afterwards went abroad. During his -absence, a foreign conjurer, or fortune-teller, came to Edinburgh, -professing, among many other wonderful accomplishments, to be -able to inform any person of the present condition or situation of -any other person, at whatever distance, in whom the applicant -might be interested. Lady Primrose was incited by curiosity to -go with a female friend to the lodgings of the wise man in the -Canongate, for the purpose of inquiring regarding the motions of -her husband, of whom she had not heard for a considerable time. -It was at night; and the two ladies went, with the tartan <em>screens</em> -or <em>plaids</em> of their servants drawn over their faces by way of disguise. -Lady Primrose having described the individual in whose fate she -was interested, and having expressed a desire to know what he was -at present doing, the conjurer led her to a large mirror, in which -she distinctly perceived the appearance of the inside of a church, -with a marriage-party arranged near the altar. To her astonishment, -she recognised in the shadowy bridegroom no other than her -husband. The magical scene was not exactly like a picture; or if -so, it was rather like the live pictures of the stage than the dead -and immovable delineations of the pencil. It admitted of additions -to the persons represented, and of a progress of action. As the -lady gazed on it, the ceremonial of the marriage seemed to proceed. -The necessary arrangements had at last been made, the priest -seemed to have pronounced the preliminary service; he was just -on the point of bidding the bride and bridegroom join hands, -when suddenly a gentleman, for whom the rest seemed to have -waited a considerable time, and in whom Lady Primrose thought -she recognised a brother of her own, then abroad, entered the -church, and advanced hurriedly towards the party. The aspect -of this person was at first only that of a friend who had been -invited to attend the ceremony, and who had come too late; -but as he advanced, the expression of his countenance and -figure was altered. He stopped short; his face assumed a -wrathful expression; he drew his sword, and rushed up to the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_66" id="Page_66">{66}</a></span> -bridegroom, who prepared to defend himself. The whole scene -then became tumultuous and indistinct, and soon after vanished -entirely away.<a name="FNanchor_48" id="FNanchor_48"></a><a href="#Footnote_48" class="fnanchor">[48]</a></p> - -<p>When Lady Primrose reached home she wrote a minute narrative -of the whole transaction, to which she appended the day of the -month on which she had seen the mysterious vision. This narrative -she sealed up in the presence of a witness, and then deposited it in -one of her drawers. Soon afterwards her brother returned from -his travels, and came to visit her. She asked if, in the course of -his wanderings, he had happened to see or hear anything of Lord -Primrose. The young man only answered by saying that he wished -he might never again hear the name of that detested personage -mentioned. Lady Primrose, however, questioned him so closely -that he at last confessed having met his lordship, and that under -very strange circumstances. Having spent some time at one of the -Dutch cities—it was either Amsterdam or Rotterdam—he had -become acquainted with a rich merchant, who had a very beautiful -daughter, his only child, and the heiress of his large fortune. One -day his friend the merchant informed him that his daughter was -about to be married to a Scottish gentleman, who had lately come -to reside there. The nuptials were to take place in the course of -a few days; and as he was a countryman of the bridegroom, he -was invited to the wedding. He went accordingly, was a little too -late for the commencement of the ceremony, but fortunately came -in time to prevent the sacrifice of an amiable young lady to the -greatest monster alive in human shape—his own brother-in-law, -Lord Primrose!</p> - -<p>The story proceeds to say that although Lady Primrose had -proved her willingness to believe in the magical delineations of the -mirror by writing down an account of them, yet she was so much -surprised by discovering them to be the representation of actual -fact that she almost fainted. Something, however, yet remained<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_67" id="Page_67">{67}</a></span> -to be ascertained. Did Lord Primrose’s attempted marriage take -place exactly at the same time with her visit to the conjurer? She -asked her brother on what day the circumstance which he related -took place. Having been informed, she took out her key, and -requested him to go to her chamber, to open a drawer which she -described, and to bring her a sealed packet which he would find in -that drawer. On the packet being opened, it was discovered that -Lady Primrose had seen the shadowy representation of her husband’s -abortive nuptials on the very evening when they were transacted -in reality.<a name="FNanchor_49" id="FNanchor_49"></a><a href="#Footnote_49" class="fnanchor">[49]</a></p> - -<p>Lord Primrose died in 1706, leaving a widow who could scarcely -be expected to mourn for him. She was still a young and beautiful -woman, and might have procured her choice among twenty better -matches. Such, however, was the idea she had formed of the -marriage state from her first husband that she made a resolution -never again to become a wife. She kept her resolution for many -years, and probably would have done so till the last but for a -singular circumstance. The celebrated Earl of Stair, who resided -in Edinburgh during the greater part of twenty years, which he -spent in retirement from all official employments, became deeply -smitten with her ladyship, and earnestly sued for her hand. If -she could have relented in favour of any man, it would have -been for one who had acquired so much public honour, and whose -private character was also, in general respects, so estimable. But -to him also she declared her resolution of remaining unmarried. -In his desperation, he resolved upon an expedient which strongly -marks the character of the age in respect of delicacy. By dint of -bribes to her domestics, he got himself insinuated overnight into a -small room in her ladyship’s house, where she used to say her -prayers every morning, and the window of which looked out upon -the principal street of the city. At this window, when the morning -was a little advanced, he showed himself, <i lang="fr" xml:lang="fr">en déshabillé</i>, to the people -passing along the street; an exhibition which threatened to have -such an effect upon her ladyship’s reputation that she saw fit to -accept of him for a husband.<a name="FNanchor_50" id="FNanchor_50"></a><a href="#Footnote_50" class="fnanchor">[50]</a></p> -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_68" id="Page_68">{68}</a></span></p> -<p>She was more happy as Countess of Stair than she had been as -Lady Primrose. Yet her new husband had one failing, which -occasioned her no small uneasiness. Like most other gentlemen -at that period, he sometimes indulged too much in the bottle. -When elevated with liquor, his temper, contrary to the general -case, was by no means improved. Thus, on reaching home after a -debauch, he generally had a quarrel with his wife, and sometimes -even treated her with violence. On one occasion, when quite -transported beyond the bounds of reason, he gave her so severe a -blow upon the upper part of the face as to occasion the effusion of -blood. He immediately after fell asleep, unconscious of what he -had done. Lady Stair was so overwhelmed by a tumult of bitter -and poignant feeling that she made no attempt to bind up her -wound. She sat down on a sofa near her torpid husband, and -wept and bled till morning. When his lordship awoke, and perceived -her dishevelled and bloody figure, he was surprised to the -last degree, and eagerly inquired how she came to be in such an -unusual condition. She answered by detailing to him the whole -history of his conduct on the preceding evening; which stung -him so deeply with regret—for he naturally possessed the most -generous feelings—that he instantly vowed to his wife never afterwards -to take any species of drink except what was first passed -through her hands. This vow he kept most scrupulously till the -day of his death. He never afterwards sat in any convivial -company where his lady could not attend to sanction his potations. -Whenever he gave any entertainment, she always sat next him and -filled his wine, till it was necessary for her to retire; after which, -he drank only from a certain quantity which she had first laid -aside.</p> - -<p>With much that was respectable in her character, we must -not be too much surprised that Lady Stair was capable of using -terms of speech which a subsequent age has learned to look on<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_69" id="Page_69">{69}</a></span> -as objectionable, even in the humblest class of society. The -Earl of Dundonald, it appears, had stated to the Duke of -Douglas that Lady Stair had expressed incredulity regarding the -genuineness of the birth of his nephews, the children of Lady -Jane Douglas, and did not consider Lady Jane as entitled to -any allowance from the duke on their account. In support of -what he reported, Dundonald, in a letter to the Lord Justice-Clerk, -gave the world leave to think him ‘a damned villain’ if -he did not speak the truth. This seems to have involved Lady -Stair unpleasantly with her friends of the house of Douglas, and -she lost little time in making her way to Holyroodhouse, where, -before the duke and duchess and their attendants, she declared -that she had lived to a good old age, and never till now had got -entangled in any <em>clatters</em>—that is, scandal. The old dame then -thrice stamped the floor with her staff, each time calling the -Earl of Dundonald ‘a damned villain;’ after which she retired -in great wrath. Perhaps this scene was characteristic, for we -learn from letters of Lady M. W. Montagu that Lady Stair -was subject to hysterical ailments, and would be screaming and -fainting in one room, while her daughter, Miss Primrose, and -Lady Mary were dancing in another.</p> - -<p>This venerable lady, after being long at the head of society -in Edinburgh, died in November 1759, having survived her -second husband twelve years. It was remembered of her that -she had been the first person in Edinburgh, of her time, to keep -a black domestic servant.<a name="FNanchor_51" id="FNanchor_51"></a><a href="#Footnote_51" class="fnanchor">[51]</a></p> -<hr class="chap" /></div><div class="chapter"> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_70" id="Page_70">{70}</a></span></p> - - - -<h2><a name="THE_OLD_BANK_CLOSE" id="THE_OLD_BANK_CLOSE">THE OLD BANK CLOSE.</a></h2> - -<p class="chapter_summary"><strong>The Regent Morton—The Old Bank—Sir Thomas Hope—Chiesly of -Dairy—Rich Merchants of the Sixteenth Century—Sir William -Dick—The Birth of Lord Brougham.</strong></p> - - -<h3>OLD BANK CLOSE.</h3> - -<p>Amongst the buildings removed to make way for George IV. -Bridge were those of a short blind alley in the Lawnmarket, -called the Old Bank Close. Composed wholly of solid goodly -structures, this close had an air of -dignity that might have almost -reconciled a modern gentleman to -live in it. One of these, crossing -and closing the bottom, had been -the Bank of Scotland—the <em>Auld -Bank</em>, as it used to be half-affectionately -called in Edinburgh—previously -to the erection of the -present handsome edifice in Bank -Street. From this establishment -the close had taken its name; -but it had previously been -called <em>Hope’s Close</em>, from -its being the residence -of a son of the celebrated -Sir Thomas -Hope, King’s Advocate -in the reign of -Charles I.</p> - -<div class="figcenter w425"> -<img src="images/illus_p_070.jpg" width="425" height="445" alt="" /> -<div class="caption"><p class="center">House of Robert Gourlay.</p></div> -</div> - -<p>The house of oldest -date in the close was -one on the west side, -of substantial and even handsome appearance, long and lofty, -and presenting some peculiarities of structure nearly unique -in our city. There was first a door for the ground-floor, about -which there was nothing remarkable. Then there was a door -leading by the stair to the <em>first floor</em>, and bearing this legend and -date upon the architrave:</p> - -<p class="center"> -IN THE IS AL MY TRAIST: 1569. -</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_71" id="Page_71">{71}</a></span></p> - -<p>Close beside this door was another, leading by a longer, but -distinct though adjacent stair to the second floor, and presenting -on the architrave the initials R. G. From this floor -there was an internal stair contained in a projecting turret, -which connected it with the higher floor. Thus, it will be -observed, there were three houses in this building, each having -a distinct access; a nicety of arrangement which, together with -the excellence of the masonry, was calculated to create a more -respectful impression regarding the domestic ideas of our ancestors -in Queen Mary’s time than most persons are prepared for. -Finally, in the triangular space surmounting an attic window -were the initials of a married couple, D. G., M. S.</p> - -<p>Our surprise is naturally somewhat increased when we learn -that the builder and first possessor of this house does not -appear to have been a man of rank, or one likely to own -unusual wealth. His name was Robert Gourlay, and his -profession a humble one connected with the law—namely, that -of a messenger-at-arms. In the second book of Charters in the -Canongate council-house, Adam Bothwell, Bishop of Orkney, -and commendator of Holyrood, gave the office of messenger or -officer-at-arms to the Abbey to Robert Gourlay, messenger, ‘our -lovit familiar servitor,’ with a salary of forty pounds, and other -perquisites. This was the Robert Gourlay who built the noble -tenement in the Old Bank Close; and through his official -functions it came into connection with an interesting historical -event. In May 1581, when the ex-Regent Morton was brought -to Edinburgh to suffer death, he was—as we learn from the -memoirs of Moyses, a contemporary—‘lodged in Robert Gourlay’s -house, and there keeped by the waged men.’ Gourlay had been -able to accommodate in his house those whom it was his professional -duty to take in charge as prisoners. Here, then, must -have taken place those remarkable conferences between Morton -and certain clergymen, in which, with the prospect of death -before him, he protested his innocence of Darnley’s death, while -confessing to a foreknowledge of it. Morton must have resided -in the house from May 29, when he arrived in Edinburgh, till -June 2, when he fell under the stroke of the ‘Maiden.’ In the -ensuing year, as we learn from the authority just quoted, De la -Motte, the French ambassador, was lodged in ‘Gourlay’s House.’</p> - -<p>David Gourlay—probably the individual whose initials appeared -on the attic—described as son of John Gourlay, customer, and -doubtless grandson of the first man Robert—disposed of the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_72" id="Page_72">{72}</a></span> -house in 1637 to Sir Thomas Hope of Craighall in liferent, and -to his second son, Sir Thomas Hope of Kerse.<a name="FNanchor_52" id="FNanchor_52"></a><a href="#Footnote_52" class="fnanchor">[52]</a> We may suppose -‘the Advocate’ to have thus provided a mansion for one of his -children. A grandson in 1696 disposed of the upper floor to -Hugh Blair, merchant in Edinburgh—the grandfather, I presume, -of the celebrated Dr Hugh Blair.</p> - -<p>This portion of the house was occupied early in the last -century by Lord Aberuchil, one of King William’s judges, -remarkable for the large fortune he accumulated. About 1780 -his descendant, Sir James Campbell of Aberuchil, resided in it -while educating his family. It was afterwards occupied by -Robert Stewart, writer, extensively known in Perthshire by the -name of <em>Rob Uncle</em>, on account of the immense number of his -nephews and nieces, amongst the former of whom was the late -worthy General Stewart of Garth, author of the work on the -Highland regiments.</p> - -<p>The building used by the bank was also a substantial one. -Over the architrave was the legend:</p> - -<p class="center"> -SPES ALTERÆ VITÆ, -</p> - -<p>with a device emblematising the resurrection—namely, a couple -of cross-bones with wheat-stalks springing from them, and the -date 1588. Latterly it was occupied as the University Printing-office, -and when I visited it in 1824 it contained an old wooden -press, which was believed to be the identical one which Prince -Charles carried with him from Glasgow to Bannockburn to print -his gazettes, but then used as a <em>proof-press</em>, like a good hunter -reduced to the sand-cart. This house was removed in 1834, -having been previously sold by the Commissioners of Improvements -for £150. The purchaser got a larger sum for a leaden -roof unexpectedly found upon it. When the house was demolished, -it was discovered that every window-shutter had a communication -by wires with an intricate piece of machinery in the -garret, designed to operate upon a bell hung at a corner on the -outside, so that not a window could have been forced without -giving an alarm.</p> - -<p>In the Cowgate, little more than fifty yards from the site of -this building, there is a bulky old mansion, believed to have -been the residence of the celebrated King’s Advocate Hope, -himself, the ancestor of all the considerable men of this name -now in Scotland. One can easily see, amidst all the disgrace<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_73" id="Page_73">{73}</a></span> -into which it has fallen, something remarkable in this house, -with two entrances from the street, and two <i lang="fr" xml:lang="fr">porte-cochères</i> leading -to other accesses in the rear. Over one door is the legend:</p> - -<p class="center"> -TECUM HABITA: 1616;<a name="FNanchor_53" id="FNanchor_53"></a><a href="#Footnote_53" class="fnanchor">[53]</a> -</p> - -<p>over the other a half-obliterated line, known to have been</p> - -<p class="center"> -AT HOSPES HUMO. -</p> - -<div class="figcenter w350"> -<img src="images/illus_p_073.jpg" width="350" height="475" alt="" /> -<div class="caption"><p class="center">Courtyard, Hope House.</p></div> -</div> - -<p>One often finds significant voices proceeding from the builders -of these old houses, generally to express humility. Sir Thomas -here quotes a well-known -passage in Persius, as if to -tell the beholder to confine -himself to a criticism of -his own house; and then, -with more certain humility, -uses a passage of the -Psalms (cxix. 19): ‘I am -a stranger upon earth,’ the -latter being an anagram of -his own name, thus spelt: -<span class="smcap">Thomas Houpe</span>. It is impossible -without a passing -sensation of melancholy to -behold this house, and to -think how truly the obscurity -of its history, and -the wretchedness into which -it has fallen, realise the -philosophy of the anagram. -Verily, the great statesman -who once lived here in dignity -and the respect of men -was but as a stranger who -tarried in the place for a -night, and was gone.</p> - -<p>The <cite>Diary of Sir Thomas Hope</cite>, printed for the Bannatyne -Club (1843), is a curious record of the public duties of a great -law-officer in the age to which it refers, as well as of the mixture<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_74" id="Page_74">{74}</a></span> -of worldly and spiritual things in which the venerable dignitary -was engaged. He is indefatigable in his religious duties and -his endeavours to advance the interests of his family; at the -same time full of kindly feeling about his sons’ wives and their -little family matters, never failing, for one thing, to tell how -much the midwife got for her attendance on these ladies. There -are many passages respecting his prayers, and the ‘answers’ he -obtained to them, especially during the agonies of the opening -civil war. He prays, for instance, that the Lord would pity his -people, and then hears the words: ‘I will preserve and saiff my -people’—‘but quhither be me or some other, I dar not say.’ -On another occasion, at the time when the Covenanting army -was mustering for Dunse Law to oppose King Charles, Sir -Thomas tells that, praying: ‘Lord, pitie thy pure [i.e. poor] -kirk, for their is no help in man!’ he heard a voice saying: ‘I -will pitie it;’ ‘for quhilk I blissit the Lord;’ immediately after -which he goes on: ‘Lent to John my <em>long carabin of rowet wark</em> -all indentit;’ &c.<a name="FNanchor_54" id="FNanchor_54"></a><a href="#Footnote_54" class="fnanchor">[54]</a></p> - -<p>The Countess of Mar, daughter of Esme, Duke of Lennox, -died of a <em>deadly brash</em> in Sir Thomas’s house in the Cowgate, -May 11, 1644.</p> - -<p>It is worthy of notice that the Hopes are one of several -Scottish families, possessing high rank and great wealth, which -trace their descent to merchants in Edinburgh. ‘The Hopes -are of French extraction, from Picardy. It is said they were -originally Houblon, and had their name from the plant [hop], -and not from esperance [the virtue in the mind]. The first that -came over was a domestic of Magdalene of France, queen of -James V.; and of him are descended all the eminent families of -Hopes. This John Hope set up as a merchant of Edinburgh, -and his son, by Bessie or Elizabeth Cumming, is marked as -a member of our first Protestant General Assembly, anno -1560.’<a name="FNanchor_55" id="FNanchor_55"></a><a href="#Footnote_55" class="fnanchor">[55]</a></p> -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_75" id="Page_75">{75}</a></span></p> - -<h3>CHIESLY OF DALRY.</h3> - -<p>The head of the Old Bank Close was the scene of the assassination -of President Lockhart by Chiesly of Dalry,<a name="FNanchor_56" id="FNanchor_56"></a><a href="#Footnote_56" class="fnanchor">[56]</a> March 1689. -The murderer had no provocation besides a simple judicial act -of the president, assigning an aliment or income of £93 out of -his estate to his wife and children, from whom it may be presumed -he had been separated. He evidently was a man abandoned -to the most violent passions—perhaps not quite sane. In -London, half a year before the deed, he told Mr Stuart, an -advocate, that he was resolved to go to Scotland before Candlemas -and kill the president; when, on Stuart remarking that the -very imagination of such a thing was a sin before God, he -replied: ‘Let God and me alone; we have many things to reckon -betwixt us, and we will reckon this too.’ The judge was informed -of the menaces of Chiesly, but despised them.</p> - -<p>On a Sunday afternoon, the last day of March—the town -being then under the excitement of the siege of the Castle by the -friends of the new government—Lockhart was walking home -from church to his house in this alley, when Chiesly came behind, -just as he entered the close, and shot him in the back with a -pistol. A Dr Hay, coming to visit the president’s lady, saw his -lordship stagger and fall. The ball had gone through the body, -and out at the right breast. He was taken into his house, laid -down upon two chairs, and almost immediately was a dead man. -Some gentlemen passing seized the murderer, who readily owned -he had done the deed, which he said was ‘to learn the president -to do justice.’ When immediately after informed that his victim -had expired, he said ‘he was not used to do things by halves.’ -He boasted of the deed as if it had been some grand exploit.</p> - -<p>After torture had been inflicted, to discover if he had any -accomplices, the wretched man was tried by the magistrates of -Edinburgh, and sentenced to be carried on a hurdle to the Cross,<a name="FNanchor_57" id="FNanchor_57"></a><a href="#Footnote_57" class="fnanchor">[57]</a> -and there hanged, with the fatal pistol hung from his neck, after -which his body was to be suspended in chains at the Gallow -Lee, and his right hand affixed to the West Port. The body -was stolen from the gallows, as was supposed, by his friends,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_76" id="Page_76">{76}</a></span> -and it was never known what had become of it till more than a -century after, when, in removing the hearthstone of a cottage -in Dalry Park, near Edinburgh, a human skeleton was found, -with the remains of a pistol near the situation of the neck. No -doubt was entertained that these were the remains of Chiesly, -huddled into this place for concealment, probably in the course -of the night in which they had been abstracted from the gallows.</p> - - -<h3>RICH MERCHANTS OF THE SIXTEENTH CENTURY—SIR -WILLIAM DICK.</h3> - -<p>Several houses in the neighbourhood of the Old Bank Close -served to give a respectful notion of the wealth and domestic -state of certain merchants of an early age. Immediately to the -westward, in Brodie’s Close, was the mansion of William Little -of Liberton, bearing date 1570. This was an eminent merchant, -and the founder of a family now represented by Mr Little Gilmour -of the Inch, in whose possession this mansion continued under -entail, till purchased and taken down by the Commissioners of -Improvements in 1836. About 1780 it was the residence of the -notorious Deacon Brodie, of whom something may be said elsewhere. -Sir William Gray of Pittendrum, mentioned a few pages -back as the original owner of the old house in Lady Stair’s Close, -was another affluent trafficker of that age.</p> - -<p>In Riddel’s Close, Lawnmarket, there is an enclosed court, -evidently intended to be capable of defence. It is the place where -John Macmoran, a rich merchant of the time of James VI., lived -and carried on his business. In those days even schoolboys -trusted to violence for attaining their ends. The youths of the -High School,<a name="FNanchor_58" id="FNanchor_58"></a><a href="#Footnote_58" class="fnanchor">[58]</a> being malcontent about their holidays, barred themselves -up in the school with some provisions, and threatened not -to surrender till the magistrates should comply with their demands. -John Macmoran, who held the office of one of the bailies, came -with a <i lang="la" xml:lang="la">posse</i> to deal with the boys, but, finding them obdurate, -ordered the door to be prised open with a joist. One within then<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_77" id="Page_77">{77}</a></span> -fired a pistol at the bailie, who fell shot through the brain, to -the horror of all beholders, including the schoolboys themselves, -who with difficulty escaped -the vengeance of -the crowd assembled on -the spot.</p> - -<p>It was ascertained that -the immediate author of -the bailie’s death was -William Sinclair, son of -the chancellor of Caithness. -There was a great -clamour to have justice -done upon him; but this -was a point not easily -attained, where a person -of gentle blood was concerned, -in the reign of -James VI. The boy lived -to be Sir William Sinclair -of Mey, and, as such, was -the ancestor of those who -have, since 1789, borne -the title of Earls of -Caithness.</p> - -<div class="figcenter w400"> -<img src="images/illus_p_077.jpg" width="400" height="589" alt="" /> -<div class="caption"><p class="center">Bailie Macmoran’s House, Riddel’s Court.</p></div> -</div> - -<p>A visit to the fine old -mansion of Bailie Macmoran -may be recommended. -Its masonry is -not without elegance. -The lower floor of the -building is now used as -‘The Mechanics’ Library.’<a name="FNanchor_59" id="FNanchor_59"></a><a href="#Footnote_59" class="fnanchor">[59]</a> Macmoran’s house is in the floor -above, reached by a stone stair, near the corner of the court. -This dwelling offers a fine specimen of the better class of -houses at the end of the sixteenth century. The marble jambs -of the fireplaces and the carved stucco ceilings are quite entire. -The larger room (occupied as a warehouse for articles of saddlery) -is that in which took place two memorable royal banquets in -1598—the first on the 24th of April to James VI. with his<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_78" id="Page_78">{78}</a></span> -queen, Anne of Denmark, and her brother the Duke of Holstein; -and the second on the 2nd of May, more specially to the Duke -of Holstein, but at which their Majesties were present. These -banquets, held, as Birrel says, with ‘grate solemnitie and mirrines,’ -were at the expense of the city. It need hardly be said that -James VI. was fond of this species of entertainment, and the house -of Macmoran was probably selected for the purpose not only -because he was treasurer to the corporation and a man of some -mark, but because his dwelling offered suitable accommodation. -The general aspect of the enclosed court which affords access to -Macmoran’s house has undergone little or no alteration since -these memorable banquets; and in visiting the place, with its -quietude and seclusion, one almost feels as if stepping back into -the sixteenth century. Considering the destruction all around -from city improvements, it is fortunate that this remarkable -specimen of an old mansion should have been left so singularly -entire. One of the higher windows continues to exemplify an -economical arrangement which prevailed about the time of the -Restoration—namely, to have the lower half composed of wooden -shutters.<a name="FNanchor_60" id="FNanchor_60"></a><a href="#Footnote_60" class="fnanchor">[60]</a></p> - -<p>The grandest of all these old Edinburgh merchants was William -Dick, ancestor of the Dicks, baronets of Prestonfield. In his -youth, and during the lifetime of his father, he had been able to -lend £6000 to King James, to defray the expense of his journey -to Scotland. The affairs in which he was engaged would even -now be considered important. For example, he farmed the customs -on wine at £6222, and the crown rents of Orkney at £3000. -Afterwards he farmed the excise. His fleets extended from the -Baltic to the Mediterranean. The immense wealth he acquired -enabled him to purchase large estates. He himself reckoned his -property as at one time equal to two hundred thousand pounds -sterling.</p> - -<p>Strange to say, this great merchant came to poverty, and died -in a prison. The reader of the Waverley novels may remember -David Deans telling how his father ‘saw them toom the sacks of -dollars out o’ Provost Dick’s window intill the carts that carried -them to the army at Dunse Law’—‘if ye winna believe his testimony, -there is the window itsell still standing in the Luckenbooths—I<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_79" id="Page_79">{79}</a></span> -think it’s a claith-merchant’s buith the day.’ This refers -to large advances which Dick made to the Covenanters to enable -them to carry on the war against the king. The house alluded -to is actually now a claith-merchant’s booth, having long been -in the possession of Messrs John Clapperton & Company. Two -years after Dunse Law, Dick gave the Covenanters 100,000 merks -in one sum. Subsequently, being after all of royalist tendencies, -he made still larger advances in favour of the Scottish government -during the time when Charles II. was connected with it; and thus -provoking the wrath of the English Commonwealth, his ruin was -completed by the fines to which he was subjected by that party -when triumphant, amounting in all to £65,000.</p> - -<p>Poor Sir William Dick—for he had been made a baronet by -Charles I.—went to London to endeavour to recover some part -of his lost means. When he represented the indigence to which -he had been reduced, he was told that he was always able to -procure pie-crust when other men could not get bread. There -was, in fact, a prevalent idea that he possessed some supernatural -means—such as the philosopher’s stone—of acquiring money. -(Pie-crust came to be called <em>Sir William Dick’s Necessity</em>.) The -contrary was shown when the unfortunate man died soon after in -a prison in Westminster. There is a picture in Prestonfield -House, near Edinburgh, the seat of his descendant, representing -him in this last retreat in a mean dress, surrounded by his -numerous hapless family. A rare pamphlet, descriptive of his -case, presents engravings of three such pictures; one exhibiting -him on horseback, attended by guards as Lord Provost of Edinburgh, -superintending the unloading of one of his rich ships at -Leith; another as a prisoner in the hands of the bailiffs; the -third as dead in prison. A more memorable example of the -instability of fortune does not occur in our history. It seems -completely to realise the picture in Job (chap. xxvii.): ‘The rich -man shall lie down, but he shall not be gathered: he openeth -his eyes, and he is not. Terrors take hold on him as waters, a -tempest stealeth him away in the night. The east wind carrieth -him away, and he departeth: and as a storm, hurleth him out of -his place. For God shall cast upon him, and not spare: he -would fain flee out of his hand. Men shall clap their hands at -him, and shall hiss him out of his place.’</p> - -<p>The fortunes of the family were restored by Sir William’s -grandson, Sir James, a remarkably shrewd man, who was likewise -a merchant in Edinburgh. There is a traditionary story that<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_80" id="Page_80">{80}</a></span> -this gentleman, observing the utility of manure, and that the -streets of Edinburgh were loaded with it, to the detriment of the -comfort of the inhabitants, offered to relieve the town of this -nuisance on condition that he should be allowed, for a certain -term of years, to carry it away gratis. Consent was given, and -the Prestonfield estate became, in consequence, like a garden. -The Duke of York had a great affection for Sir James Dick, and -used to walk through the Park to visit him at his house very -frequently. Hence, according to the report of the family, the -way his Royal Highness took came to be called <em>The Duke’s -Walk</em>; afterwards a famous resort for the fighting of duels. Sir -James became Catholic, and, while provost in 1681, had his house -burned over his head by the collegianers; but it was rebuilt -at the public expense. His grandson, Sir Alexander Dick, is -referred to in kindly terms in Boswell’s <cite>Tour to the Hebrides</cite> -as a venerable man of studious habits and a friend of men of -letters. The reader will probably learn with some surprise that -though Sir William’s descendants never recovered any of the -money lent by him to the State, a lady of his family, living -in 1844, was in the enjoyment of a pension with express reference -to that ancient claim.</p> - - -<h3>THE BIRTH OF LORD BROUGHAM.</h3> - -<p>[1868.—It has been remarked elsewhere that, for a great -number of years after the general desertion of the Old Town by -persons of condition, there were many denizens of the New who -had occasion to look back to the Canongate and Cowgate as the -place of their birth. The nativity of one person who achieved -extraordinary greatness and distinction, and whose death was an -occurrence of yesterday, Henry, Lord Brougham, undoubtedly -was connected with the lowly place last mentioned.</p> - -<p>The Edinburgh tradition on the subject was that Henry -Brougham, younger, of Brougham Hall, in the county of Cumberland, -in consequence of a disappointment in love, came to Edinburgh -for the diversion of his mind. Principal Robertson, to whom he -bore a letter of introduction, recommended the young man to -the care of his sister—Mrs Syme, widow of the minister of Alloa—who -occupied what was then considered as a good and spacious -house at the head of the Cowgate—strictly the third floor of the -house now marked No. 8—a house desirable from its having an -extraordinary space in front. Here, it would appear, Mr Brougham<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_81" id="Page_81">{81}</a></span> -speedily consoled himself for his former disappointment by falling -in love with Eleonora, the daughter of Mrs Syme; and a marriage, -probably a hurried one, soon united the young pair. They set -up for themselves (Whitsunday 1778) in an upper floor of a house -in the then newly built St Andrew Square, where, in the ensuing -September, their eldest son, charged with so illustrious a destiny, -first saw the light.<a name="FNanchor_61" id="FNanchor_61"></a><a href="#Footnote_61" class="fnanchor">[61]</a></p> - -<p>Mr Brougham conclusively settled in Edinburgh; he subsequently -occupied a handsome house in George Street. He was -never supposed to be a man of more than ordinary faculties; but -any deficiency in this respect was amply made up for by his wife, -who is represented by all who remember her as a person of uncommon -mental gifts. The contrast of the pair drew the attention -of society, and was the subject of a gently satiric sketch in Henry -Mackenzie’s <cite>Lounger</cite>, No. 45, published on the 10th December -1785, which, however, would vainly be looked for in the reprinted -copies, as it was immediately suppressed.]</p> - -<hr class="chap" /></div><div class="chapter"> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_82" id="Page_82">{82}</a></span></p> - -<div class="figcenter w500"> -<img src="images/illus_p_082.jpg" width="500" height="484" alt="" /> -</div> - - - - -<h2><a name="THE_OLD_TOLBOOTH" id="THE_OLD_TOLBOOTH">THE OLD TOLBOOTH.</a></h2> - - -<p>The genius of Scott has shed a peculiar interest upon this -ancient structure, whose cant name of the <cite>Heart of Mid-Lothian</cite> -has given a title to one of his happiest novels. It stood -in a singular situation, occupying half the width of the High -Street, elbow to elbow, as it were, with St Giles’s Church. Antique -in form, gloomy and haggard in aspect, its black stanchioned -windows opening through its dingy walls like the apertures of a -hearse, it was calculated to impress all beholders with a due and -deep sense of what was meant in Scottish law by the <i lang="la" xml:lang="la">squalor<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_83" id="Page_83">{83}</a></span> -carceris</i>. At the west end was a projecting ground-floor, formed -of shops, but presenting a platform on which executions took -place. The building itself was composed of two parts, one more -solid and antique than the other, and much resembling, with its -turret staircase, one of those tall, narrow fortalices which are so -numerous in the Border counties. Indeed, the probability is that -this had been a kind of peel or house of defence, required for -public purposes by the citizens of Edinburgh when liable to predatory -invasions. Doubtless the house or some part of it was of -great antiquity, for it was an old and ruinous building in the -reign of Mary, and only narrowly saved at that time from -destruction. Most likely it was the very <i lang="la" xml:lang="la">pretorium burgi de -Edinburgi</i> in which a parliament assembled in 1438 to deliberate -on the measures rendered necessary by the assassination of the -poet-king, James I. In those simple days great and humble -things came close together: the house which contained parliaments -upstairs, presented shops in the lower story, and thus drew in a -little revenue to the magistrates. Here met the Court of Session -in its earliest years. Here Mary assembled her parliaments; and -here—on the Tolbooth door—did citizens affix libels by night, -charging the Earl of Bothwell with the murder of Darnley. -Long, long since all greatness had been taken away from the old -building, and it was condemned to be a jail alone, though still -with shops underneath. At length, in 1817, the fabric was wholly -swept away, in consequence of the erection of a better jail on -the Calton Hill. The gateway, with the door and padlock, was -transferred to Abbotsford, and, with strange taste on the part of -the proprietor, built into a conspicuous part of that mansion.</p> - -<div class="figcenter w600"> -<a id="illus_c_009"></a> -<img src="images/illus_c_009.jpg" width="600" height="622" alt="" /> -<div class="caption"><p class="center">EDINBURGH<br /> -from the Calton Hill.</p> - -<p class="right"> -<span class="smcap"><a href="#Page_83">Page 83.</a></span> -</p></div> -</div> - -<p>The principal entrance to the Tolbooth, and the only one used -in later days, was at the bottom of the turret next the church. -The gateway was of tolerably good carved stone-work, and occupied -by a door of ponderous massiness and strength, having, besides -the lock, a flap-padlock, which, however, was generally kept -unlocked during the day. In front of the door there always -paraded, or rather loitered, a private of the town-guard, with his -rusty red clothes and Lochaber axe or musket. The door adjacent -to the principal gateway was, in the final days of the Tolbooth, -‘<span class="smcap">Michael Ketten’s Shoe-shop</span>,’ but had formerly been a <em>thief’s -hole</em>. The next door to that, stepping westward, was the residence -of the turnkey; a dismal, unlighted den, where the gray old man -was always to be found, when not engaged in unlocking or closing -the door. The next door westward was a lock-up house, which<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_84" id="Page_84">{84}</a></span> -in later times was never used. On the north side, towards the -street, there had once been shops, which were let by the magistrates; -but these were converted, about the year 1787, into a -guard-house for the city-guard, on their ancient capitol in the -High Street being destroyed for the levelling of the streets. The -ground-floor, thus occupied for purposes in general remote from -the character of the building, was divided lengthwise by a strong -partition wall; and communication between the rooms above and -these apartments below was effectually interdicted by the strong -arches upon which the superstructure was reared.</p> - -<p>On passing the outer door—where the rioters of 1736 thundered -with their sledge-hammers, and finally burnt down all that interposed -between them and their prey—the keeper instantly involved -the entrant in darkness by reclosing the gloomy portal. A flight -of about twenty steps then led to an inner door, which, being duly -knocked at, was opened by a bottle-nosed personage, denominated -Peter, who, like his sainted namesake, always carried two or three -large keys. You then entered <em>the Hall</em>, which, being free to all -the prisoners except those of the <em>East End</em>, was usually filled with -a crowd of shabby-looking but very merry loungers. A small rail -here served as an additional security, no prisoner being permitted -to come within its pale. Here also a sentinel of the city-guard -was always walking, having a bayonet or ramrod in his hand. The -<em>Hall</em>, being also the chapel of the jail, contained an old pulpit of -singular fashion—such a pulpit as one could imagine John Knox -to have preached from; which, indeed, he was traditionally said to -have actually done. At the right-hand side of the pulpit was a -door leading up the large turnpike to the apartments occupied -by the criminals, one of which was of plate-iron. The door was -always shut, except when food was taken up to the prisoners. On -the west end of the hall hung a board, on which were inscribed -the following emphatic lines:</p> - -<div class="poetry-container"><div class="poetry"><div class="stanza"> -<div class="verse">‘A prison is a house of care,</div> -<div class="verse indent2">A place where none can thrive,</div> -<div class="verse">A touchstone true to try a friend,</div> -<div class="verse indent2">A grave for men alive—</div> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<div class="verse">Sometimes a place of right,</div> -<div class="verse indent2">Sometimes a place of wrong,</div> -<div class="verse">Sometimes a place for jades and thieves,</div> -<div class="verse indent2">And honest men among.’<a name="FNanchor_62" id="FNanchor_62"></a><a href="#Footnote_62" class="fnanchor">[62]</a></div> -</div></div></div> -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_85" id="Page_85">{85}</a></span></p> -<p>A part of the hall on the north side was partitioned off into -two small rooms, one of which was the captain’s pantry, the other -his counting-room. In the latter hung an old musket or two, a -pair of obsolete bandoleers, and a sheath of a bayonet, intended, -as one might suppose, for his defence against a mutiny of the -prisoners. Including the space thus occupied, the hall was -altogether twenty-seven feet long by about twenty broad. The -height of the room was twelve feet. Close to the door, and within -the rail, was a large window, thickly stanchioned; and at the other -end of the hall, within the captain’s two rooms, was a double -window of a somewhat extraordinary character. Tradition, supported -by the appearance of the place, pointed out this as having -formerly been a door by which royalty entered the hall in the -days when it was the Parliament House. It is said that a kind -of bridge was thrown between this aperture and a house on the -other side of the street, and that the sovereign, having prepared -himself in that house to enter the hall in his state robes, proceeded -at the proper time along the arch—an arrangement by no means -improbable in those days of straitened accommodation.</p> - -<p>The window on the south side of the hall overlooked the outer -gateway. It was therefore employed by the inner turnkey as a -channel of communication with his exterior brother when any -visitor was going out. He used to cry over this window, in the -tone of a military order upon parade: ‘<em>Turn your hand</em>,’ whereupon -the gray-haired man on the pavement below opened the door -and permitted the visitor, who by this time had descended the -stair, to walk out.</p> - -<p>The floor immediately above the hall was occupied by one room -for felons, having a bar along part of the floor, to which condemned -criminals were chained, and a square box of plate-iron in the -centre, called <span class="smcap lowercase">THE CAGE</span>, which was said to have been constructed -for the purpose of confining some extraordinary culprit who had -broken half the jails in the kingdom. Above this room was -another of the same size, also appropriated to felons.</p> - -<p>The larger and western part of the edifice, of coarser and -apparently more modern construction, contained four floors, all of -which were appropriated to the use of debtors, except a part of -the lowest one, where a middle-aged woman kept a tavern for the -sale of malt liquors. A turnpike stair gave access to the different<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_86" id="Page_86">{86}</a></span> -floors. As it was narrow, steep, and dark, the visitor was assisted -in his ascent by a greasy rope, which, some one was sure to inform -him afterwards, had been employed in hanging a criminal. In -one of the apartments on the second floor was a door leading out -to the platform whereon criminals were executed, and in another, -on the floor above, was an ill-plastered part of the wall covering -the aperture through which the gallows was projected. The -fourth flat was a kind of barrack, for the use of the poorest -debtors.</p> - -<p>There was something about the Old Tolbooth which would have -enabled a blindfolded person led into it to say that it was a jail. -It was not merely odorous from the ordinary causes of imperfect -drainage, but it had poverty’s own smell—the odour of human -misery. And yet it did not seem at first a downcast scene. The -promenaders in the hall were sometimes rather merry, cutting -jokes perhaps upon Peter’s nose, or chatting with friends on the -benches regarding the news of the day. Then Mrs Laing drove a -good trade in her little tavern; and if any messenger were sent -out for a bottle of whisky—why, Peter never searched pockets. -New men were hailed with:</p> - -<div class="poetry-container"><div class="poetry"><div class="stanza"> -<div class="verse">‘Welcome, welcome, brother debtor,</div> -<div class="verse indent2">To this poor but merry place;</div> -<div class="verse">Here nor bailiff, dun, nor fetter,</div> -<div class="verse indent2">Dare to show his gloomy face.’</div> -</div></div></div> - -<p>They would be abashed at first, and the first visit of wife or -daughter, coming shawled and veiled, and with timorous glances, -into the room where the loved object was trying to become at -ease with his companions, was always a touching affair. But it -was surprising how soon, in general, all became familiar, easy, and -even to appearance happy. Each had his story to tell, and sympathy -was certain and liberal. The whole management was of a -good-natured kind, as far as a regard to regulations would allow. -It did not seem at all an impossible thing that a debtor should -accommodate some even more desolate friend with a share of his -lodging for the night, or for many nights, as is said to have been -done in some noted instances, to which we shall presently come.</p> - -<p>It was natural for a jail of such old standing to have passed -through a great number of odd adventures, and have many strange -tales connected with it. One of the most remarkable traits of its -character was a sad liability to the failure of its ordinary powers -of retention when men of figure were in question. The old house -had something like that faculty attributed by Falstaff to the lion<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_87" id="Page_87">{87}</a></span> -and himself—of knowing men who ought not to be too roughly -handled. The consequence was that almost every criminal of -rank confined in it made his escape. Lord Burleigh, an insane -peer, who, about the time of the Union, assassinated a schoolmaster -who had married a girl to whom he had paid improper addresses, -escaped, while under sentence of death, by changing clothes with -his sister. Several of the rebel gentlemen confined there in 1716 -were equally fortunate; a fact on which there was lately thrown -a flood of light, when I found, in a manuscript list of subscriptions -for the relief of the other rebel gentlemen at Carlisle, the name of -the Guidman of the Tolbooth—so the chief-keeper was called—down -for a good sum. I am uncertain to which of all these -personages the following anecdote, related to me by Sir Walter -Scott, refers.</p> - -<p>It was contrived that the prisoner should be conveyed out of -the Tolbooth in a trunk, and carried by a porter to Leith, where -some sailors were to be ready with a boat to take him aboard a -vessel about to leave Scotland. The plot succeeded so far as the -escape from jail was concerned, but was knocked on the head by -an unlucky and most ridiculous accident. It so happened that -the porter, in arranging the trunk upon his back, placed the end -which corresponded with the feet of the prisoner <em>uppermost</em>. The -head of the unfortunate man was therefore pressed against the -lower end of the box, and had to sustain the weight of the whole -body. The posture was the most uneasy imaginable. Yet life -was preferable to ease. He permitted himself to be taken away. -The porter trudged along with the trunk, quite unconscious of its -contents, and soon reached the High Street. On gaining the -Netherbow he met an acquaintance, who asked him where he was -going with that large burden. To Leith, was the answer. The -other inquired if the job was good enough to afford a potation -before proceeding farther upon so long a journey. This being -replied to in the affirmative, and the carrier of the box feeling in -his throat the philosophy of his friend’s inquiry, it was agreed -that they should adjourn to a neighbouring tavern. Meanwhile, -the third party, whose inclinations had not been consulted in this -arrangement, was wishing that it were at once well over with him -in the Grassmarket. But his agonies were not destined to be of -long duration. The porter in depositing him upon the causeway -happened to make the end of the trunk come down with such -precipitation that, unable to bear it any longer, the prisoner -screamed out, and immediately after fainted. The consternation<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_88" id="Page_88">{88}</a></span> -of the porter on hearing a noise from his burden was of course -excessive; but he soon recovered presence of mind enough to conceive -the occasion. He proceeded to unloose and to burst open -the trunk, when the hapless nobleman was discovered in a state of -insensibility. As a crowd collected immediately, and the city-guard -were not long in coming forward, there was of course no -further chance of escape. The prisoner did not recover from his -swoon till he had been safely deposited in his old quarters; but, -if I recollect rightly, he eventually escaped in another way.</p> - -<p>In two very extraordinary instances an escape from justice has, -strange as it may appear, been effected by <em>means</em> of the Old Tolbooth. -At the discovery of the Rye-House Plot, in the reign of -Charles II., the notorious Robert Fergusson, usually styled ‘The -Plotter,’ was searched for in Edinburgh, with a view to his being -subjected, if possible, to the extreme vengeance of the law. It -being known almost certainly that he was in town, the authorities -shut the gates, and calculated securely upon having him safe -within their toils. The Plotter, however, by an expedient worthy -of his ingenious character, escaped by taking refuge in the Old -Tolbooth. A friend of his happened to be confined there at -the time, and was able to afford protection and concealment to -Fergusson, who, at his leisure, came abroad, and betook himself to -a place of safer shelter on the Continent. The same device was -practised in 1746 by a gentleman who had been concerned in the -Rebellion, and for whom a hot search had been carried on in the -Highlands.</p> - -<p>The case of Katherine Nairne, in 1766, excited in no small -degree the attention of the Scottish public. This lady was allied, -both by blood and marriage, to some respectable families. Her -crime was the double one of poisoning her husband and having -an intrigue with his brother, who was her associate in the murder. -On her arrival at Leith in an open boat, her whole bearing betrayed -so much levity, or was so different from what had been expected, -that the mob raised a cry of indignation, and were on the point of -pelting her, when she was with some difficulty rescued from their -hands by the public authorities. In this case the Old Tolbooth -found itself, as usual, incapable of retaining a culprit of condition. -Sentence had been delayed by the judges on account of the lady’s -pregnancy. The midwife employed at her accouchement (who continued -to practise in Edinburgh so lately as the year 1805) had -the address to achieve a jail-delivery also. For three or four days -previous to that concerted for the escape, she pretended to be<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_89" id="Page_89">{89}</a></span> -afflicted with a prodigious toothache, went out and in with her -head enveloped in shawls and flannels, and groaned as if she had -been about to give up the ghost. At length, when the Peter of -that day had become so habituated to her appearance as not very -much to heed her exits and her entrances, Katherine Nairne one -evening came down in her stead, with her head wrapped all round -with the shawls, uttering the usual groans, and holding down her -face upon her hands, as with agony, in the precise way customary -with the midwife. The inner doorkeeper, not quite unconscious, -it is supposed, of the trick, gave her a hearty thump upon the -back as she passed out, calling her at the same time a howling old -Jezebel, and wishing she would never come back to trouble him -any more. There are two reports of the proceedings of Katherine -Nairne after leaving the prison. One bears that she immediately -left the town in a coach, to which she was handed by a friend -stationed on purpose. The coachman, it is said, had orders from -her relations, in the event of a pursuit, to drive into the sea, that -she might drown herself—a fate which was considered preferable -to the ignominy of a public execution. The other story runs -that she went up the Lawnmarket to the Castle-hill, where lived -Mr ——, a respectable advocate, from whom, as he was her cousin, -she expected to receive protection. Being ignorant of the town, -she mistook the proper house, and applied at that of the crown -agent,<a name="FNanchor_63" id="FNanchor_63"></a><a href="#Footnote_63" class="fnanchor">[63]</a> who was assuredly the last man in the world that could -have done her any service. As good luck would have it, she was -not recognised by the servant, who civilly directed her to her -cousin’s house, where, it is said, she remained concealed many weeks.<a name="FNanchor_64" id="FNanchor_64"></a><a href="#Footnote_64" class="fnanchor">[64]</a> -Her future life, it has been reported, was virtuous and fortunate. -She was married to a French gentleman, became the mother of a -large family, and died at a good old age. Meanwhile, Patrick -Ogilvie, her associate in the dark crime which threw a shade over -her younger years, suffered in the Grassmarket. He had been a -lieutenant in the —— regiment, and was so much beloved by his -fellow-soldiers, who happened to be stationed at that time in -Edinburgh Castle, that the public authorities judged it necessary<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_90" id="Page_90">{90}</a></span> -to shut them up in a fortress till the execution was over lest they -might have attempted a rescue.</p> - -<p>The Old Tolbooth was the scene of the suicide of Mungo -Campbell while under sentence of death (1770) for shooting the -Earl of Eglintoune. In the district where this memorable event -took place, it is somewhat remarkable that the fate of the murderer -was more generally lamented than that of the murdered person. -Campbell, though what was called ‘a graceless man,’ was rather -popular in his profession of exciseman, on account of his rough, -honourable spirit, and his lenity in the matter of smuggling. -Lord Eglintoune, on the contrary, was not liked, on account of -his improving mania, which had proved a serious grievance to the -old-fashioned farmers of Kyle and Cunningham. There was one -article, called rye-grass, which he brought in amongst them, and -forced them to cultivate; and black prelacy itself had hardly, a -century before, been a greater evil. Then, merely to stir them up -a little, he would cause them to exchange farms with each other; -thus giving their ancient plenishings, what was doubtless much -wanted, an airing, but also creating a strong sense that Lord -Eglintoune was ‘far ower fashious.’ His lordship had excited -some scandal by his private habits, which helped in no small -degree to render unpopular one who was in reality an amiable and -upright gentleman. He was likewise somewhat tenacious about -matters respecting game—the besetting weakness of British gentlemen -in all ages. On the other hand, Campbell, though an austere -and unsocial man, acted according to popular ideas both in respect -of the game and excise laws. The people felt that he was on their -side; they esteemed him for his integrity in the common affairs of -life, and even in some degree for his birth and connections, which -were far from mean. It was also universally believed, though -erroneously, that he had only discharged his gun by accident, on -falling backward, while retreating before his lordship, who had -determined to take it from him. In reality, Mungo, after his fall, -rose on his elbow and wilfully shot the poor earl, who had given -him additional provocation by bursting into a laugh at his awkward -fall. The Old Tolbooth was supposed by many, at the time, to -have had her usual failing in Mungo’s case. The interest of the -Argyll family was said to have been employed in his favour; and -the body which was found suspended over the door, instead of -being his, was thought to be that of a dead soldier from the Castle -substituted in his place. His relations, however, who were very -respectable people in Ayrshire, all acknowledged that he died by<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_91" id="Page_91">{91}</a></span> -his own hand; and this was the general idea of the mob of Edinburgh, -who, getting the body into their hands, dragged it down -the street to the King’s Park, and, inspired by different sentiments -from those of the Ayrshire people, were not satisfied till they got -it up to the top of Salisbury Crags, from which they precipitated -it down the <em>Cat Nick</em>.</p> - -<div class="figcenter w175"> -<img src="images/illus_p_091.jpg" width="175" height="320" alt="" /> -<div class="caption"><p class="center">Deacon Brodie’s -Keys and -Dark-Lantern.</p></div> -</div> - -<p>One of the most remarkable criminals ever confined in the -Old Tolbooth was the noted William Brodie. This was a man -of respectable connections, and who had moved in good society -all his life, unsuspected of any criminal pursuits. It is said that -a habit of frequenting cock-pits was the first symptom he -exhibited of a decline from rectitude. His ingenuity as a -mechanic gave him a fatal facility in the burglarious pursuits to -which he afterwards addicted himself. It was then customary for -the shopkeepers of Edinburgh to hang their keys upon a nail at -the back of their doors, or at least to take no pains in concealing -them during the day. Brodie used to take impressions of them -in putty or clay, a piece of which he would carry in the palm of -his hand. He kept a blacksmith in his pay, who forged exact -copies of the keys he wanted, and with these it was his custom to -open the shops of his fellow-tradesmen during the night. He -thus found opportunities of securely stealing whatever he wished -to possess. He carried on his malpractices for many years, and -never was suspected till, having committed a daring -robbery upon the Excise Office in Chessels’s Court, -Canongate, some circumstances transpired which induced -him to disappear from Edinburgh. Suspicion -then becoming strong, he was pursued to Holland, -and taken at Amsterdam, standing upright in a press -or cupboard. At his trial, Henry Erskine, his -counsel, spoke very eloquently in his behalf, representing, -in particular, to the jury how strange and improbable a -circumstance it was that a man whom they had themselves -known from infancy as a person of good repute -should have been guilty of such practices as those with -which he was charged. He was, however, found guilty, -and sentenced to death, along with his accomplice -Smith. At the trial he had appeared in a full-dress -suit of black clothes, the greater part of which was -of silk, and his deportment throughout the affair was -composed and gentlemanlike. He continued during -the period which intervened between his sentence<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_92" id="Page_92">{92}</a></span> -and execution to dress well and keep up his spirits. A -gentleman of his acquaintance, calling upon him in the -condemned room, was surprised to find him singing the song -from the <cite>Beggars’ Opera</cite>, ‘’Tis woman seduces all mankind.’ -Having contrived to cut out the figure of a draughtboard on the -stone floor of his dungeon, he amused himself by playing with -any one who would join him, and, in default of such, with his -right hand against his left. This diagram remained in the room -where it was so strangely out of place till the destruction of the -jail. His dress and deportment at the gallows (October 1, 1788) -displayed a mind at ease, and gave some countenance to the -popular notion that he had made certain mechanical arrangements -for saving his life. Brodie was the first who proved the -excellence of an improvement he -had formerly made on the apparatus -of the gibbet. This was -the substitution of what is called -the <em>drop</em> for the ancient practice of -the double ladder. He inspected -the thing with a professional air, -and seemed to view the result of his -ingenuity with a smile of satisfaction. -When placed on that insecure -pedestal, and while the rope -was adjusted round his neck by the -executioner, his courage did not -forsake him. On the contrary, even -there he exhibited a sort of levity; -he shuffled about, looked gaily -around, and finally went out of the -world with his hand stuck carelessly -into the open front of his vest.</p> - -<div class="figcenter w300"> -<img src="images/illus_p_092.jpg" width="300" height="503" alt="" /> -<div class="caption"><p class="center">Brodie’s Close.</p></div> -</div> - -<p>As its infirmities increased with -old age, the Tolbooth showed itself -incapable of retaining prisoners of -even ordinary rank. Within the -recollection of people living not -long ago, a youth named Hay, the son of a stabler in the -Grassmarket, and who was under sentence of death for burglary, -effected his escape in a way highly characteristic of the Heart -of Mid-Lothian, and of the simple and unprecise system upon -which all public affairs were managed before the present age.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_93" id="Page_93">{93}</a></span></p> - -<p>A few days before that appointed for the execution, the father -went up to the condemned room, apparently to condole with his -unhappy son. The irons had been previously got quit of by -files. At nightfall, when most visitors had left the jail, old Hay -invited the inner turnkey, or man who kept the hall-door, to -come into the room and partake of some liquor which he had -brought with him. The man took a few glasses, and became -mellow just about the time when the bottle was exhausted and -when the time of locking up the jail (ten o’clock at that period) -was approaching. Hay expressed unwillingness to part at the -moment when they were just beginning to enjoy their liquor; -a sentiment in which the turnkey heartily sympathised. Hay -took a crown from his pocket, and proposed that his friend -should go out and purchase a bottle of good rum at a neighbouring -shop. The man consented, and staggering away downstairs, -neglected to lock the inner door behind him. Young -Hay followed close, as had been concerted, and after the man -had gone out, and the outer turnkey had closed the outer door, -stood in the stair just within that dread portal, ready to spring -into the street. Old Hay then put his head to the great window -of the hall, and cried: ‘Turn your hand!’—the usual drawling -cry which brought the outer turnkey to open the door. The -turnkey came mechanically at the cry, and unclosed the outer -door, when the young criminal sprang out, and ran as fast as he -could down Beth’s Wynd, a lane opposite the jail. According -to the plan which had been previously concerted, he repaired -to a particular part of the wall of the Greyfriars Churchyard, -near the lower gate, where it was possible for an agile person to -climb up and spring over; and so well had every stage of the -business been planned that a large stone had been thrown down -at this place to facilitate the leap.</p> - -<p>The youth had been provided with a key which could open -Sir George Mackenzie’s mausoleum—a place of peculiar horror, -as it was supposed to be haunted by the spirit of the bloody -persecutor; but what will not be submitted to for dear life? -Having been brought up in Heriot’s Hospital, in the immediate -neighbourhood of the churchyard, Hay had many boyish acquaintances -still residing in that establishment. Some of these he -contrived to inform of his situation, enjoining them to be secret, -and beseeching them to assist him in his distress. The Herioters -of those days had a very clannish spirit—insomuch that to have -neglected the interests or safety of any individual of the community,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_94" id="Page_94">{94}</a></span> -however unworthy he might be of their friendship, would -have been looked upon by them as a sin of the deepest dye. Hay’s -confidants, therefore, considered -themselves bound -to assist him by all means -in their power. They -kept his secret faithfully, -spared from their own -meals as much food as -supported him, and ran -the risk of severe punishment, -as well as of seeing -eldritch sights, by visiting -him every night in -his dismal abode. About -six weeks after his escape -from jail, when the hue -and cry had in a great -measure subsided, he ventured -to leave the tomb, -and it was afterwards -known that he escaped -abroad.</p> - -<div class="figcenter w400"> -<img src="images/illus_p_094.jpg" width="400" height="576" alt="" /> -<div class="caption"><p class="center">Sir George Mackenzie’s Mausoleum.</p></div> -</div> - -<p>So ends our gossip -respecting a -building which has -witnessed and contained -the meetings -of the Scottish -parliament in the -romantic days of -the Jameses—which -held the -first fixed court of -law established in the country—which was looked to by the -citizens in a rude age as a fortified place for defence against -external danger to their lives and goods—which has immured -in its gloomy walls persons of all kinds liable to law, from the -gallant Montrose and the faithful Guthrie and Argyll down to -the humblest malefactor in the modern style of crime—and -which, finally, has been embalmed in the imperishable pages of -the greatest writer of fiction our country has produced.</p> - -<hr class="chap" /></div><div class="chapter"> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_95" id="Page_95">{95}</a></span></p> - - - - -<h2><a name="SOME_MEMORIES_OF_THE_LUCKENBOOTHS" id="SOME_MEMORIES_OF_THE_LUCKENBOOTHS">SOME MEMORIES OF THE LUCKENBOOTHS.</a></h2> - -<p class="chapter_summary"><strong>Lord Coalstoun and his Wig—Commendator Bothwell’s House—Lady -Anne Bothwell—Mahogany Lands and Fore-stairs—The Krames—Creech’s -Shop.</strong></p> - - -<p>A portion of the High Street facing St Giles’s Church was -called the <em>Luckenbooths</em>, and the appellation was shared -with a middle row of buildings which once burdened the street -at that spot. The name is -supposed to have been conferred -on the shops in that situation -as being -<em>close shops</em>, to -distinguish -them from the -open booths -which then -lined our great -street on both -sides; <em>lucken</em> -signifying -closed. This -would seem to -imply a certain -superiority in -the ancient -merchants of the Luckenbooths; and it is somewhat remarkable -that amidst all the changes of the Old Town there is still in this -limited locality an unusual proportion of mercers and clothiers of -old standing and reputed substantiality.</p> - -<div class="figcenter w350"> -<img src="images/illus_p_095.jpg" width="350" height="268" alt="" /> -<div class="caption"><p class="center">Tolbooth and Luckenbooths—looking East.</p></div> -</div> - -<p>Previous to 1811, there remained unchanged in this place -two tall massive houses, about two centuries old, one of which -contained the town mansion of Sir John Byres of Coates, a -gentleman of figure in Edinburgh in the reign of James VI., -and whose faded tombstone may yet be deciphered in the west -wall of the Greyfriars Churchyard. The Byreses of the Coates -died out towards the end of the last century, and their estate -has since become a site for streets, as our city spread westwards.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_96" id="Page_96">{96}</a></span> -The name alone survives in connection with an alley beneath -their town mansion—<em>Byres’s Close</em>.</p> - - -<h3>LORD COALSTOUN AND HIS WIG.</h3> - -<p>The <em>fourth floor</em>, constituting the Byres mansion, after being -occupied by such persons as Lord Coupar, Lord Lindores, and -Sir James Johnston of Westerhall, fell into the possession of -Mr Brown of Coalstoun, a judge under the designation of Lord -Coalstoun, and the father of the late Countess of Dalhousie. -His lordship lived here in 1757, but then removed to a more -spacious mansion on the Castle-hill.</p> - -<p>A strange accident one morning befell Lord Coalstoun while -residing in this house. It was at that time the custom for -advocates, and no less for judges, to dress themselves in gown, -wig, and cravat at their own houses, and to walk in a sort of -state, thus rigged out, with their cocked hats in their hands, to -the Parliament House.<a name="FNanchor_65" id="FNanchor_65"></a><a href="#Footnote_65" class="fnanchor">[65]</a> They usually breakfasted early, and -when dressed would occasionally lean over their parlour windows, -for a few minutes before St Giles’s bell sounded the starting peal -of a quarter to nine, enjoying the morning air, such as it was, -and perhaps discussing the news of the day, or the convivialities -of the preceding evening, with a neighbouring advocate on the -opposite side of the alley. It so happened that one morning, -while Lord Coalstoun was preparing to enjoy his matutinal treat, -two girls, who lived in the second floor above, were amusing themselves -with a kitten, which, in thoughtless sport, they had swung -over the window by a cord tied round its middle, and hoisted -for some time up and down, till the creature was getting rather -desperate with its exertions. In this crisis his lordship popped -his head out of the window directly below that from which the -kitten swung, little suspecting, good easy man, what a danger -impended, like the sword of Damocles, over his head, hung, too, -by a single—not <em>hair</em>, ’tis true, but scarcely more responsible -material—<em>garter</em>, when down came the exasperated animal at -full career directly upon his senatorial wig. No sooner did the -girls perceive what sort of a landing-place their kitten had found -than, in terror and surprise, they began to draw it up; but this<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_97" id="Page_97">{97}</a></span> -measure was now too late, for along with the animal up also came -the judge’s wig, fixed full in its determined talons. His lordship’s -surprise on finding his wig lifted off his head was much increased -when, on looking up, he perceived it dangling its way upwards, -without any means visible to him by which its motions might -be accounted for. The astonishment, the dread, the almost <em>awe</em> -of the senator below—the half mirth, half terror of the girls -above—together with the fierce and relentless energy of retention -on the part of Puss between—altogether formed a scene -to which language could not easily do justice. It was a joke -soon explained and pardoned; but assuredly the perpetrators -of it did afterwards get many lengthened injunctions from their -parents never again to fish over the window, with such a bait, for -honest men’s wigs.</p> - - -<h3>COMMENDATOR BOTHWELL’S HOUSE.</h3> - -<p>The eastern of the tenements, which has only been renovated -by a new front, formerly was the lodging of Adam Bothwell, -Commendator of Holyrood, who is remarkable for having performed -the Protestant marriage ceremony for Mary and the Earl -of Bothwell. This ecclesiastic, who belonged to an old Edinburgh -family of note, and was the uncle of the inventor of -logarithms,<a name="FNanchor_66" id="FNanchor_66"></a><a href="#Footnote_66" class="fnanchor">[66]</a> is celebrated in his epitaph in Holyrood Chapel as -a judge, and the son and father of judges. His son was raised -to the peerage in 1607, under the title of Lord Holyroodhouse, -the lands of that abbacy, with some others, being erected into -a temporal lordship in his favour. The title, however, sunk in -the second generation. The circumstance which now gives -most interest to the family is one which they themselves would -probably have regarded as its greatest disgrace. Among the old -Scottish songs is one which breaks upon the ear with the wail -of wronged womanhood, mingled with the breathings of its indestructible -affections:</p> - -<div class="poetry-container"><div class="poetry"><div class="stanza"> -<div class="verse">‘Baloo, my boy, lie still and sleep,</div> -<div class="verse">It grieves me sair to see thee weep.</div> -<div class="verse">If thou’lt be silent, I’ll be glad;</div> -<div class="verse">Thy mourning makes my heart full sad....</div> -<div class="verse">Baloo, my boy, weep not for me,</div> -<div class="verse">Whose greatest grief’s for wranging thee,</div> -<div class="verse">Nor pity her deserved smart,</div> -<div class="verse">Who can blame none but her fond heart.</div><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_98" id="Page_98">{98}</a></span> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<div class="verse">Baloo, my boy, thy father’s fled,</div> -<div class="verse">When he the thriftless son hath played;</div> -<div class="verse">Of vows and oaths forgetful, he</div> -<div class="verse">Preferred the wars to thee and me:</div> -<div class="verse">But now perhaps thy curse and mine</div> -<div class="verse">Makes him eat acorns with the swine.</div> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<div class="verse">Nay, curse not him; perhaps now he,</div> -<div class="verse">Stung with remorse, is blessing thee;</div> -<div class="verse">Perhaps at death, for who can tell</div> -<div class="verse">But the great Judge of heaven and hell</div> -<div class="verse">By some proud foe has struck the blow,</div> -<div class="verse">And laid the dear deceiver low,’ &c.</div> -</div></div></div> - -<p>Great doubt has long rested on the history of this piteous ditty; -but it is now ascertained to have been a contemporary effusion -on the sad love-tale of Anne Bothwell, a sister of the first Lord -Holyroodhouse. The only error in the setting down of the -song was in calling it <em>Lady</em> Anne Bothwell’s Lament, as the -heroine had no pretension to a term implying noble rank. Her -lover was a youth of uncommon elegance of person, the Honourable -Alexander Erskine, brother of the Earl of Mar, of the first -Earl of Buchan, and of Lord Cardross. A portrait of him, -which belonged to his mother (the countess mentioned a few pages -back), and which is now in the possession of James Erskine, Esq. -of Cambo, Lady Mar’s descendant, represents him as strikingly -handsome, with much vivacity of countenance, dark-blue eyes, a -peaked beard, and moustaches. The lovers were cousins. The song -is an evidence of the public interest excited by the affair: a fragment -of it found its way into an English play of the day, Broom’s -comedy of <cite>The Northern Lass</cite> (1632). This is somewhat different -from any of the stanzas in the common versions of the ballad:</p> - -<div class="poetry-container"><div class="poetry"><div class="stanza"> -<div class="wideverse">‘Peace, wayward bairn. Oh cease thy moan!</div> -<div class="wideverse">Thy far more wayward daddy’s gone,</div> -<div class="wideverse">And never will recallèd be,</div> -<div class="wideverse">By cries of either thee or me;</div> -<div class="wideverse indent4">For should we cry,</div> -<div class="wideverse indent4">Until we die,</div> -<div class="wideverse">We could not scant his cruelty.</div> -<div class="wideverse indent4">Baloo, baloo, &c.</div> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<div class="wideverse">He needs might in himself foresee</div> -<div class="wideverse">What thou successively mightst be;</div> -<div class="wideverse">And could he then (though me forego)</div> -<div class="wideverse">His infant leave, ere he did know</div> -<div class="wideverse indent4">How like the dad</div> -<div class="wideverse indent4">Would prove the lad,</div> -<div class="wideverse">In time to make fond maidens glad.</div> -<div class="wideverse indent4">Baloo, baloo,’ &c.</div> -</div></div></div> -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_99" id="Page_99">{99}</a></span></p> -<p>The fate of the deceiver proved -a remarkable echo of some of the -verses of the ballad. Having -carried his military experience and -the influence of his rank into the -party of the Covenanters, he was -stationed (1640) with his brother-in-law, -the Earl of Haddington, at Dunglass -Castle, on the way to Berwick, -actively engaged in bringing up levies -for the army, then newly advanced -across the Tweed; when, by the revenge -of an offended page, who applied -a hot poker to the powder -magazine, the place was blown up. -Erskine, with his brother-in-law and -many other persons, perished. A -branch of the Mar family retained, -till no remote time, the awe-mingled -feeling which had been produced by -this event, which they had been led -to regard as a punishment inflicted -for the wrongs of Anne Bothwell.</p> - -<div class="figcenter w200"> -<img src="images/illus_p_099.jpg" width="200" height="401" alt="" /> -<div class="caption"><p class="center">Byres’s Close, Back of -Commendator Bothwell’s House.</p></div> -</div> - -<p>At the back of the Commendator’s -house there is a projection,<a name="FNanchor_67" id="FNanchor_67"></a><a href="#Footnote_67" class="fnanchor">[67]</a> on the -top of which is a bartisan or flat -roof, faced with three lettered stones. -There is a tradition that Oliver -Cromwell lived in this house,<a name="FNanchor_68" id="FNanchor_68"></a><a href="#Footnote_68" class="fnanchor">[68]</a> and -used to come out and sit here to view -his navy on the Forth, of which, -together with the whole coast, it<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_100" id="Page_100">{100}</a></span> -commands a view. As this commander is said to have had his -guard-house in the neighbouring alley called Dunbar’s Close, -there is some reason to give credit to the story, though it is -in no shape authenticated by historical record. The same house -was, for certain, the residence of Sir William Dick, the hapless -son of Crœsus spoken of in a preceding article.</p> - -<p>These houses preserved, until their recent renovation, all the -characteristics of that ancient mode of architecture which has -procured for the edifices constructed upon it the dignified appellative -of <em>Mahogany Lands</em>. Below were the booths or piazzas, -once prevalent throughout the whole town, in which the merchants -of the laigh shops, or cellars, were permitted to exhibit their goods -to the passengers. The merchant himself took his seat at the -head of the stair to attend to the wants of passing customers. -By the ancient laws of the burgh, it was required that each should -be provided with ‘lang wappinis, sick as a spear or a Jeddart -staff,’ with which he was to sally forth and assist the magistrates -in time of need; for example, when a <em>tulzie</em> took place between -the retainers of rival noblemen meeting in the street.</p> - -<div class="figcenter w300"> -<img src="images/illus_p_100.jpg" width="300" height="194" alt="Picture of two pigs at bottom of staircase." /> -</div> - -<p>This house could also boast of that distinguished feature in all -ancient wooden structures, a <em>fore-stair</em>, an antiquated convenience, -or inconvenience, now almost extinct, consisting of a flight of -steps, ascending from the -pavement to the first floor -of the mansion, and protruding -a considerable way -into the street. Nuisances -as they still are, they were -once infinitely worse. What -will my readers think when -they are informed that -under these projections our -ancestors kept their swine? -Yes; <em>outside stairs</em> was formerly -but a term of outward -respect for what were -as frequently denominated -<em>swine’s cruives</em>; and the rude inhabitants of these narrow mansions -were permitted, through the day, to stroll about the ‘High Gait,’ -seeking what they might devour among the heaps of filth which -then encumbered the street,<a name="FNanchor_69" id="FNanchor_69"></a><a href="#Footnote_69" class="fnanchor">[69]</a> as barn-door fowls are at the present<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_101" id="Page_101">{101}</a></span> -day suffered to go abroad in country towns; and, like them (or -like the town-geese of Musselburgh, which to this day are privileged -to feed upon the race-ground), the sullen porkers were regularly -called home in the evening by their respective proprietors.</p> - -<p>These circumstances will be held as sufficient evidence, notwithstanding -all the enactments for the ‘policy of bigginis’ and -‘decoring the tounes,’ that the stranger’s constant reproach of -the Scots for want of cleanliness was not unmerited. Yet, to -show that our countrymen did not lack a taste for decent appearances, -let it be recollected that on every occasion of a public -procession, entry of a sovereign, or other ceremonial, these fore-stairs -were hung with carpets, tapestry, or arras, and were the -principal places for the display of rank and fashion; while the -windows, like the galleries of a theatre compared with the boxes, -were chiefly occupied by spectators of a lower degree.<a name="FNanchor_70" id="FNanchor_70"></a><a href="#Footnote_70" class="fnanchor">[70]</a> The -strictest proclamations were always issued, before any such occasion, -ordaining the ‘middinis’ and the ‘swine’ to be removed, and the -stairs to be decorated in the manner mentioned.</p> - -<p>Beneath the stair of the house now under review there abode -in later times an old man named Bryce, in whose life and circumstances -there was something characteristic of a pent-up city like<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_102" id="Page_102">{102}</a></span> -Edinburgh, where every foot of space was valuable. A stock of -small hardwares and trinkets was piled up around him, leaving -scarcely sufficient room for the accommodation of his own person, -which completely filled the vacant space, as a hermit-crab fills its -shell. There was not room for the admission of a customer; but -he had a <em>half-door</em>, over which he sold any article that was -demanded; and there he sat from morning till night, with his -face turned to this door, looking up the eternal Lawnmarket. -The place was so confined that he could not stand upright in it; -nor could he stretch out his legs. Even while he sat, there was -an uneasy obliquity of the stair, which compelled him to shrink -a little aside; and by accustoming himself to this posture for a -long series of years, he had insensibly acquired a twist in his -shoulders, nearly approaching to a humpback, and his head -swung a little to one side. This was <i lang="fr" xml:lang="fr">l’air boutiquier</i> in a most -distressing sense.</p> - -<p>In the description of this old tenement given in the title-deeds, -it is called ‘All and haill that Lodging or Timber Land lying in -the burgh of Edinburgh, on the north side of the High Street -thereof, forgainst the place of the Tolbooth, commonly called -the Poor Folks’ Purses.’ The latter place was a part of the -northern wall of the prison, deriving its name from a curious -circumstance. It was formerly the custom for the privileged -beggars, called <em>Blue-gowns</em>, to assemble in the palace yard, where -a small donation from the king, consisting of as many pennies as -he was years old, was conferred on each of them; after which they -moved in procession up the High Street, till they came to this -spot, where the magistrates gave each a <em>leathern purse</em> and a small -sum of money; the ceremony concluding by their proceeding to -the High Church to hear a sermon from one of the king’s -chaplains.<a name="FNanchor_71" id="FNanchor_71"></a><a href="#Footnote_71" class="fnanchor">[71]</a></p> - - -<h3>THE KRAMES.</h3> - -<p>The central row of buildings—the <em>Luckenbooths proper</em>—was -not wholly taken away till 1817. The narrow passage left -between it and the church will ever be memorable to all who -knew Edinburgh in those days, on account of the strange scene<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_103" id="Page_103">{103}</a></span> -of traffic which it presented—each recess, angle, and coign of -vantage in the wall of the church being occupied by little shops, -of the nature of Bryce’s, devoted to the sale of gloves, toys, -lollipops, &c. These were the <em>Krames</em>, so famous at Edinburgh -firesides. Singular places of business they assuredly were; often -not presenting more space than a good church-pew, yet supporting -by their commerce respectable citizenly families, from which would -occasionally come men of some consequence in society. At the -same spot the constable (Earl of Errol) was wont to sit upon a -chair at the ridings of the parliament, when ceremonially receiving -the members as they alighted.</p> - -<p>I am told that one such place, not more than seven feet by -three, had been occupied by a glover named Kennedy, who with -his gentle dame stood there retailing their wares for a time -sufficient to witness the rise and fall of dynasties, never enjoying -all that time the comfort of a fire, even in the coldest weather! -This was a specimen of the life led by these patient creatures; -many of whom, upon the demolition of their lath and plaster -tenements, retired from business with little competencies. Their -rents were from £3 to £6 per annum; and it appears that, -huddled as the town then was around them, they had no inconsiderable -custom. At the end of the row, under the angle of the -church, was a brief stair, called <em>The Lady’s Steps</em>, thought to be -a corruption of <em>Our Lady’s Steps</em>, with reference to a statue of -the Virgin, the niche for which was seen in the east wall of -the church till the renovation of the building in 1830. Sir -George Mackenzie, however, in his <cite>Observations on the Statutes</cite>, -states that the Lady’s Steps were so called from the infamous -Lady March (wife of the Earl of Arran, James VI.’s profligate -chancellor), from whom also the nine o’clock evening-bell, being -ordered by her to an hour later, came to be called <em>The Lady’s Bell</em>. -When men made bargains at the Cross, it was customary for them -to go up to the Lady’s Steps, and there consummate the negotiation -by wetting thumbs or paying <em>arles</em>.</p> - - -<h3>CREECH’S SHOP.</h3> - -<p>The building at the east end of the Luckenbooths proper had -a front facing down the High Street, and commanding not only -a view of the busy scene there presented, but a prospect of -Aberlady Bay, Gosford House, and other objects in Haddingtonshire. -The shop in the east front was that of Mr Creech, a<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_104" id="Page_104">{104}</a></span> -bookseller of facete memory, who had published many books by -the principal literary men of his day, to all of whom he was -known as a friend and equal. From this place had issued works -by Kames, Smith, Hume, Mackenzie, and finally the poems of -Burns. It might have been called the Lounger’s Observatory, -for seldom was the doorway free of some group of idlers, engaged -in surveying and commenting on the crowd in front; Creech -himself, with his black silk breeches and powdered head, being -ever a conspicuous member of the corps. The flat above had -been the shop of Allan Ramsay, and the place where, in 1725, -he set up the first example of a circulating library known in -Scotland.</p> - -<div class="figcenter w500"> -<a id="illus_c_010"></a> -<img src="images/illus_c_010.jpg" width="500" height="699" alt="" /> -<div class="caption"><p class="center">ST GILES, WEST WINDOW.</p> - -<p class="right"> -<span class="smcap"><a href="#Page_105">Page 105.</a></span> -</p> -</div> -</div> -<hr class="chap" /></div><div class="chapter"> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_105" id="Page_105">{105}</a></span></p> - - - - -<h2><a name="SOME_MEMORANDA_OF_THE_OLD" id="SOME_MEMORANDA_OF_THE_OLD">SOME MEMORANDA OF THE OLD -KIRK OF ST GILES.</a></h2> - - -<p>The central portion or transept of St Giles’s Church, opening -from the south, formed a distinct place of worship, under -the name of the Old Church, and this seems -to have been the first arranged for Protestant -worship after the Reformation. It was the -scene of the prelections of John Knox (who, -it will be remembered, was the first minister -of the city under the reformed religion), -until a month before his death, when it appears -that another portion of the building—styled -the Tolbooth Kirk—was fitted up for -his use.</p> - -<div class="figcenter w200"> -<img src="images/illus_p_105a.jpg" width="200" height="228" alt="" /> -<div class="caption"><p class="center">John Knox’s Pulpit.</p></div> -</div> - -<p>It also happened to be in the Old Kirk that -the celebrated riot of the 23rd of July 1637 -took place, when, on the opening of the new -Episcopal service-book, Jenny Geddes, of -worthy memory, threw her cutty-stool at the -dean who read it—the first weapon, and a formidable one it was, -employed in the great civil war.<a name="FNanchor_72" id="FNanchor_72"></a><a href="#Footnote_72" class="fnanchor">[72]</a></p> - -<div class="figcenter w200"> -<img src="images/illus_p_105b.jpg" width="200" height="131" alt="" /> -<div class="caption"><p class="center">Jenny Geddes’s Stool.</p></div> -</div> - -<p>Jenny Geddes was an herbwoman—<em>Scottice</em>, <em>a greenwife</em>—at -the Tron Church, where, in former as well as in recent times, -that class of merchants kept their stalls. It -seems that, in the midst of the hubbub, -Jenny, hearing the bishop call upon the dean -to read the <em>collect</em> of the day, cried out, with -unintentional wit: ‘Deil colic the wame o’ -ye!’<a name="FNanchor_73" id="FNanchor_73"></a><a href="#Footnote_73" class="fnanchor">[73]</a> and threw at the dean’s head the -small stool on which she sat; ‘a ticket of -remembrance,’ as a Presbyterian annalist -merrily terms it, so well aimed that the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_106" id="Page_106">{106}</a></span> -clergyman only escaped it by jouking;<a name="FNanchor_74" id="FNanchor_74"></a><a href="#Footnote_74" class="fnanchor">[74]</a> that is, by [ducking or] -suddenly bending his person.</p> - -<p>Jenny, like the originators of many other insurrections, appears -to have afterwards repented of her exertions on this occasion. -We learn from the simple diarist, Andrew Nichol, that when -Charles II. was known, in June 1650, to have arrived in the -north of Scotland, amidst other rejoicings, ‘the pure [<i lang="la" xml:lang="la"><abbr title="quasi dicitur">q.d.</abbr></i> poor] -kaill-wyves at the Trone [Jenny Geddes, no doubt, among the -number] war sae overjoyed, that they sacrificed their standis and -creellis, yea, the verie <em>stoollis</em> they sat on, in ane fyre.’ What -will give, however, a still more unequivocal proof of the repentance -of honest Jenny (after whom, by the way, Burns named a -favourite mare), is the conduct expressly attributed to herself on -the occasion of the king’s coronation in 1661 by the <cite>Mercurius -Caledonius</cite>:</p> - -<p>‘But among all our bontados and caprices,’ says that curious -register of events,<a name="FNanchor_75" id="FNanchor_75"></a><a href="#Footnote_75" class="fnanchor">[75]</a> ‘that of the immortal Jenet Geddis, Princesse -of the Trone adventurers, was most pleasant; for she was not -only content to assemble all her Creels, Basquets, <em>Creepies</em>,<a name="FNanchor_76" id="FNanchor_76"></a><a href="#Footnote_76" class="fnanchor">[76]</a> -Furmes, and other ingredients that composed the Shope of her -Sallets, Radishes, Turnips, Carrots, Spinage, Cabbage, with all -other sorts of Pot Merchandise that belongs to the garden, but -even her Leather Chair of State, where she used to dispense -Justice to the rest of her Langkale Vassals, were all very orderly -burned; she herself countenancing the action with a high-flown -flourish and vermilion majesty.’</p> - -<p>The Scottish Society of Antiquaries nevertheless exhibit in their -museum a clasp-stool, for which there is good evidence that it -was the actual stool thrown by Mrs Geddes at the dean.</p> - -<p>In the southern aisle of this church, the Regent Murray, three -weeks after his assassination at Linlithgow, February 14, 1569-70, -was interred:<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_107" id="Page_107">{107}</a></span> ‘his head placed south, contrair the ordour usit; -the sepulchre laid with hewin wark maist curiously, and on the -head ane plate of brass.’ John Knox preached a funeral-sermon -over the remains of his friend, and drew tears from the eyes of -all present. In the Tolbooth Church, immediately adjoining to -the west, sat the convention which chose the Earl of Lennox -as his successor in the regency. Murray’s monument was not -inelegant for the time; and its inscription, written by Buchanan, -is remarkable for emphatic brevity.</p> - -<div class="figcenter w350"> -<img src="images/illus_p_107.jpg" width="350" height="447" alt="" /> -<div class="caption"><p class="center">Modern Monument to the Marquis of Montrose -(see <a href="#Page_108">p. 108</a>).</p></div> -</div> - -<p>This part of the church appears to have formerly been an -open lounge. French Paris, Queen Mary’s servant, in his confession -respecting -the murder of Darnley, -mentions that, -during the communings -which took -place before that -deed was determined -on, he one day -‘took his mantle -and sword, and went -to walk (<i lang="fr" xml:lang="fr">promener</i>) -in the High Church.’ -Probably, in consequence -of the veneration -entertained -for the memory of -‘the Good Regent,’ -or else, perhaps, -from some simple -motive of conveniency, -the Earl of -Murray’s tomb was -a place frequently -assigned in bills for -the payment of the -money. It also appears -to have been -the subject of a -similar jest to that -respecting the tomb -of Duke Humphrey. -Robert Sempill, in his <cite>Banishment of Poverty</cite>, a poem referring to -the year 1680 or 1681, thus expresses himself:</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_108" id="Page_108">{108}</a></span></p> - -<div class="poetry-container"><div class="poetry"><div class="stanza"> -<div class="verse">‘Then I knew no way how to fen’;</div> -<div class="verse indent2">My guts rumbled like a <em>hurle-barrow</em>;</div> -<div class="verse">I dined with saints and noblemen,</div> -<div class="verse indent2">Even sweet Saint Giles and Earl of Murray.’</div> -</div></div></div> - -<p>In the immediate neighbourhood of the Earl of Murray’s tomb, -to the east, is the sepulchre of the Marquis of Montrose, executed -in 1650, and here interred most sumptuously, June 1661, after the -various parts of his body had been dispersed for eleven years in -different directions, according to his sentence.<a name="FNanchor_77" id="FNanchor_77"></a><a href="#Footnote_77" class="fnanchor">[77]</a></p> -<hr class="chap" /></div><div class="chapter"> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_109" id="Page_109">{109}</a></span></p> - - - -<h2><a name="THE_PARLIAMENT_CLOSE" id="THE_PARLIAMENT_CLOSE">THE PARLIAMENT CLOSE.</a></h2> - -<p class="chapter_summary"><strong>Ancient Churchyard—Booths attached to the High Church—Goldsmiths—George -Heriot—The Deid-Chack.</strong></p> - - -<p>Previous to the seventeenth century, the ground now occupied -by the Parliament House, and the buildings adjacent to the -south and west, was the churchyard of St Giles’s, from the south -side of which edifice it extended down a steep declivity to the -Cowgate. This might formerly be considered the metropolitan -cemetery of Scotland; as, together with the internal space of the -church, it contained the ashes of many noble and remarkable -personages, John Knox amongst the number. After the Reformation, -when Queen Mary conferred the gardens of the Greyfriars -upon the town, the churchyard of St Giles’s ceased to be much -used as a burying-ground; and that extensive and more appropriate -place of sepulture succeeded to this in being made <em>the Westminster -Abbey of Scotland</em>.</p> - -<p>The west side of the cemetery of St Giles’s was bounded by the -house of the provost of the church, who, in 1469, granted part of -the same to the citizens for the augmentation of the burying-ground. -From the charter accompanying the grant, it appears -that the provost’s house then also contained the public school of -Edinburgh.</p> - -<p>In the lower part of the churchyard<a name="FNanchor_78" id="FNanchor_78"></a><a href="#Footnote_78" class="fnanchor">[78]</a> there was a small place of -worship denominated the <em>Chapel of Holyrood</em>. Walter Chapman, -the first printer in Edinburgh, in 1528 endowed an altar in this -chapel with his tenement in the Cowgate; and, by the tenor of -the charter, I am enabled to point out very nearly the residence -of this interesting person, who, besides being a printer, was a -respectable merchant in Edinburgh, and, it would appear, a very -pious man. The tenement is thus described: ‘All and haill this -tenement of land, back and foir, with houses, biggings, yards, and -well<a name="FNanchor_79" id="FNanchor_79"></a><a href="#Footnote_79" class="fnanchor">[79]</a> thereof, lying in the Cowgate of Edinburgh, on the south<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_110" id="Page_110">{110}</a></span> -side thereof, near the said chapel, betwixt the lands of James Lamb -on the east, and the lands of John Aber on the west, the arable -lands called Wairam’s Croft on the south, and the said street on -the north part.’</p> - - -<h3>BOOTHS.</h3> - -<p>The precincts of St Giles’s being now secularised, the church -itself was, in 1628, degraded by numerous wooden booths being -stuck up around it. Yet, to show that -some reverence was still paid to the -sanctity of the place, the Town-council -decreed that no tradesmen should be -admitted to these shops except bookbinders, -mortmakers (watchmakers), -jewellers, and goldsmiths. <em>Bookbinders</em> -must here be meant to signify booksellers, -the latter term not being then -known in Scotland. Of -mortmakers there could -not be many, for watches -were imported from Germany -till about the conclusion -of the seventeenth -century. The goldsmiths -were a much more numerous -tribe than either of -their companions; for at -that time there prevailed -in Scotland, amongst the -aristocracy, a sort of rude -magnificence and taste for -show extremely favourable -to these tradesmen.</p> - -<div class="figcenter w300"> -<img src="images/illus_p_110.jpg" width="300" height="349" alt="" /> -<div class="caption"><p class="center">Old St Giles’s.</p></div> -</div> - -<p>In 1632, the present great hall of the Parliament House was -founded upon the site of the houses formerly occupied by the -ministers of St Giles’s. It was finished in 1639, at an expense of -£11,630 sterling, and devoted to the use of parliament.</p> - -<p>It does not appear to have been till after the Restoration -that the Parliament Close was formed, by the erection of a line -of private buildings, forming a square with the church. These -houses, standing on a declivity, were higher on one side than the -other; one is said to have been fifteen stories altogether in height.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_111" id="Page_111">{111}</a></span> -All, however, were burned down in a great fire which happened -in 1700, after which buildings of twelve stories in height were -substituted.<a name="FNanchor_80" id="FNanchor_80"></a><a href="#Footnote_80" class="fnanchor">[80]</a></p> - -<p>Among the noble inhabitants of the Parliament Close at an -early period, the noble family of Wemyss were not the least -considerable. At the time of Porteous’s affair, when Francis, the -fifth earl, was a boy, his sisters persuaded him to act the part of -Captain Porteous in a sort of drama which they got up in imitation -of that strange scene. The foolish romps actually went the length -of tucking up their brother, the heir of the family, by the neck, -over a door; and their sports had well-nigh ended in a real tragedy, -for the helpless representative of Porteous was black in the face -before they saw the necessity of cutting him down.<a name="FNanchor_81" id="FNanchor_81"></a><a href="#Footnote_81" class="fnanchor">[81]</a></p> - -<p>The small booths around St Giles’s continued, till 1817, to -deform the outward appearance of the church. Long before their -destruction, the booksellers at least had found the space of six or -seven feet too small for the accommodation of their fast-increasing -wares, and removed to larger shops in the elegant tenements of the -square. One of the largest of the booths, adjacent to the south -side of the New or High Church, and having a second story, was -occupied, during a great part of the last century, by Messrs Kerr -and Dempster, goldsmiths. The first of these gentlemen had been -member of parliament for the city, and was the last citizen who -ever held that office [in the Scottish parliament]. Such was the -humility of people’s wishes in those days respecting their houses, -that this respectable person actually lived, and had a great number -of children, in the small space of the flat over the shop and the -cellar under it, which was lighted by a grating in the pavement of -the square. The subterraneous part of his house was chiefly devoted -to the purposes of a nursery, and proved so insalubrious that all -his children died successively at a particular age, with the exception -of his son Robert, who, being born much more weakly than -the rest, had the good luck to be sent to the country to be nursed, -and afterwards grew up to be the author of a work entitled <cite>The -Life of Robert Bruce</cite>, and the editor of a large collection of voyages -and travels.</p> - - -<h3>GOLDSMITHS.</h3> - -<p>The goldsmiths of those days were considered a superior class of -tradesmen; they appeared in public with scarlet cloak, cocked hat,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_112" id="Page_112">{112}</a></span> -and cane, as men of some consideration. Yet in their shops every -one of them would have been found working with his own hands -at some light labour, in a little recess near the window, generally -in a very plain dress, but ready to come forth at a moment’s notice -to serve a customer. Perhaps, down to 1780, there was not a -goldsmith in Edinburgh who did not condescend to manual labour.</p> - -<p>As the whole trade was collected in the Parliament Close, this -was of course the place to which country couples resorted, during -the last century, in order to make the purchase of silver tea-spoons, -which always preceded their nuptials. It was then as customary -a thing in the country for the intending bridegroom to take a -journey, a few weeks before his marriage, to the Parliament Close, -in order to buy the <em>silver spoons</em>, as it was for the bride to have -all her clothes and stock of bed-furniture inspected by a committee -of matrons upon the wedding eve. And this important transaction -occasioned two journeys: one, in order to select the spoons, and -prescribe the initials which were to be marked upon them; the -other, to receive and pay for them. It must be understood that -the goldsmiths of Edinburgh then kept scarcely any goods on hand -in their shops, and that the smallest article had to be bespoken -from them some time before it was wanted. A goldsmith, who -entered as an apprentice about the beginning of the reign of -George III., informed me that they were beginning only at that -time to keep a few trifling articles on hand. Previously another -old custom had been abolished. It had been usual, upon both the -occasions above mentioned, for the goldsmith to adjourn with his -customer to John’s Coffee-house,<a name="FNanchor_82" id="FNanchor_82"></a><a href="#Footnote_82" class="fnanchor">[82]</a> or to the Baijen-hole,<a name="FNanchor_83" id="FNanchor_83"></a><a href="#Footnote_83" class="fnanchor">[83]</a> and to -receive the order or the payment, in a comfortable manner, over a -dram and a <em>caup</em> of small ale; which were upon the first occasion -paid for by the customer, and upon the second by the trader; -and the goldsmith then was perhaps let into the whole secret -counsels of the rustic, including a history of his courtship—in -return for which he would take pains to amuse his customer with -a sketch of the city news. In time, as the views and capitals of -the Parliament Close goldsmiths became extended, all these pleasant -customs were abandoned.<a name="FNanchor_84" id="FNanchor_84"></a><a href="#Footnote_84" class="fnanchor">[84]</a></p> - -<div class="figcenter w500"> -<a id="illus_c_011"></a> -<img src="images/illus_c_011.jpg" width="500" height="678" alt="" /> -<div class="caption"><p class="center">HERIOT’S HOSPITAL<br /> -from Greyfriars’ Churchyard.</p> - -<p class="right"> -<span class="smcap"><a href="#Page_113">Page 113.</a></span><br /> -</p></div> -</div><p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_113" id="Page_113">{113}</a></span></p> - - -<h3>GEORGE HERIOT.</h3> - -<p>The shop and workshop of George Heriot existed in this -neighbourhood till 1809, when the extension of the Advocates’ -Library occasioned the destruction of some interesting old <em>closes</em> to -the west of St Giles’s Kirk, and altered all the features of this part -of the town. There was a line of three small shops, with wooden -superstructures above them, extending between the door of the -Old Tolbooth and that of the <em>Laigh Council-house</em>, which occupied -the site of the present lobby of the Signet Library. A narrow -passage led between these shops and the west end of St Giles’s; -and George Heriot’s shop, being in the centre of the three, was -situated exactly opposite to the south window of the Little Kirk. -The back windows looked into an alley behind, called Beith’s or -Bess Wynd. In confirmation of this tradition, George Heriot’s -name was discovered upon the architrave of the door, being carved -in the stone, and apparently having served as his <em>sign</em>. Besides -this curious memorial, the booth was also found to contain his -forge and bellows, with a hollow stone, fitted with a stone cover or -lid, which had been used as a receptacle for and a means of extinguishing -the living embers of the furnace, upon closing the -shop at night. All these curiosities were bought by the late Mr -E. Robertson of the Commercial Bank, who had been educated in -Heriot’s Hospital, and by him presented to the governors, who -ordered them to be carefully deposited and preserved in the house, -where they now remain. George Heriot’s shop was only about -seven feet square! Yet his master, King James, is said to have -sometimes visited him and been treated by him here. There is a -story that one day, when the goldsmith visited His Majesty at -Holyrood, he found him sitting beside a fire, which, being composed -of perfumed wood, cast an agreeable smell through the room. -Upon George Heriot remarking its pleasantness, the king told him -that it was quite as costly as it was fine. Heriot said that if His -Majesty would come and pay him a visit at his shop, he would -show him a still more costly fire.</p> - -<p>‘Indeed!’ said the king; ‘and I will.’ He accordingly paid -the goldsmith a visit, but was surprised to find only an ordinary -fire. ‘Is this, then, your fine fire?’ said he.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_114" id="Page_114">{114}</a></span></p> - -<p>‘Wait a little,’ said George, ‘till I get my fuel.’ So saying, he -took from his bureau a bond for two thousand pounds which -he had lent to the king, and laying it in the fire, added: ‘Now, -whether is your Majesty’s fire or mine most expensive?’</p> - -<p>‘Yours most certainly, Master Heriot,’ said the king.</p> - -<p>Adjacent to George Heriot’s shop, and contiguous to the -Laigh Council-house, there was a tavern, in which a great deal of -small legal business used to be transacted in bygone times. Peter -Williamson, an original and singular person, who had long been -in North America, and therefore designated himself ‘from the -other world,’ kept this house for many years.<a name="FNanchor_85" id="FNanchor_85"></a><a href="#Footnote_85" class="fnanchor">[85]</a> It served also as -a sort of vestry to the Tolbooth Church, and was the place where -the magistrates took what was called the <em>Deid-chack</em>—that is, a -refreshment or dinner, of which those dignitaries always partook -after having attended an execution. The <em>Deid-chack</em> is now -abjured, like many other of those fashions which formerly rendered -the office of a magistrate so much more comfortable than it now is.<a name="FNanchor_86" id="FNanchor_86"></a><a href="#Footnote_86" class="fnanchor">[86]</a></p> - -<p>The various kirks which compose St Giles’s had all different -characters in former times. The High Kirk had a sort of dignified -aristocratic character, approaching somewhat to prelacy, and was -frequented only by sound church-and-state men, who did not care -so much for the sermon as for the gratification of sitting in the -same place with His Majesty’s Lords of Council and Session and -the magistrates of Edinburgh, and who desired to be thought men -of sufficient liberality and taste to appreciate the prelections of -Blair. The Old Kirk, in the centre of the whole, was frequented<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_115" id="Page_115">{115}</a></span> -by people who wished to have a sermon of good divinity, about -three-quarters of an hour long, and who did not care for the -darkness and dreariness of their temple. The Tolbooth Kirk was -the peculiar resort of a set of rigid Calvinists from the Lawnmarket -and the head of the Bow, termed the <em>Towbuith-Whigs</em>, -who loved nothing but <i lang="la" xml:lang="la">extempore</i> evangelical sermons, and would -have considered it sufficient to bring the house down about their -ears if the precentor had ceased, for one verse, the old hillside -fashion of reciting the lines of the psalm before singing them. Dr -Webster, of convivial memory, was long one of the clergymen of -this church, and deservedly admired as a pulpit orator; though -his social habits often ran nigh to scandalise his devout and self-denying -congregation.</p> - -<p>The inhabitants and shopkeepers of the Parliament Square were -in former times very sociable and friendly as neighbours, and -formed themselves into a sort of society, which was long known by -the name of <em>The Parliament-Close Council</em>. Of this association -there were from fifty to a hundred members, who met once or -twice a year at a dinner, when they usually spent the evening, as -the newspaper phrase goes, ‘in the utmost harmony.’ The whim -of this club consisted in each person assuming a titular dignity at -the dinner, and being so called all the year after by his fellow-members. -One was Lord Provost of Edinburgh, another was -Dean of Guild, some were bailies, others deacons, and a great -proportion state-officers. Sir William Forbes, who, with the -kindness of heart which characterised him, condescended to hold a -place in this assemblage of mummers, was for a long time <em>Member -for the City</em>.</p> - -<p>Previous to the institution of the police-court, a bailie of -Edinburgh used to sit, every Monday, at that part of the Outer -Parliament House where the statue of Lord Melville now stands, -to hear and decide upon small causes—such as prosecutions for -scandals and defamation, or cases of quarrels among the vulgar and -the infamous. This judicature, commonly called the <em>Dirt Court</em>, -was chiefly resorted to by washerwomen from Canonmills and the -drunken ale-wives of the Canongate. A list of Dirt-Court -processes used always to be hung up on a board every Monday -morning at one of the pillars in the piazza at the outside of the -Parliament Square; and that part of the piazza, being the lounge -of two or three low pettifoggers who managed such pleas, was -popularly called the <em>Scoundrels’ Walk</em>. Early on Monday, it was -usual to see one or two threadbare personages, with prodigiously<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_116" id="Page_116">{116}</a></span> -clean linen, bustling about with an air of importance, and -occasionally accosted by viragoes with long-eared caps flying behind -their heads. These were the agents of the Dirt Court, undergoing -conference with their clients.</p> - -<p>There was something lofty and august about the Parliament -Close, which we shall scarcely ever see revived in any modern part -of the town; so dark and majestic were the buildings all round, -and so finely did the whole harmonise with the ancient cathedral -which formed one of its sides! Even the echoes of the Parliament -Square had something grand in them. Such, perhaps, were the -feelings of William Julius Mickle when he wrote a poem on -passing through the Parliament Close of Edinburgh at midnight,<a name="FNanchor_87" id="FNanchor_87"></a><a href="#Footnote_87" class="fnanchor">[87]</a> -of which the following is one of the best passages:</p> - -<div class="poetry-container"><div class="poetry"><div class="stanza"> -<div class="wideverse indent4">‘In the pale air sublime,</div> -<div class="wideverse">St Giles’s column rears its ancient head,</div> -<div class="wideverse">Whose builders many a century ago</div> -<div class="wideverse">Were mouldered into dust. Now, O my soul,</div> -<div class="wideverse">Be filled with sacred awe—I tread</div> -<div class="wideverse">Above our brave forgotten ancestors. Here lie</div> -<div class="wideverse">Those who in ancient days the kingdom ruled,</div> -<div class="wideverse">The counsellors and favourites of kings,</div> -<div class="wideverse">High lords and courtly dames, and valiant chiefs,</div> -<div class="wideverse">Mingling their dust with those of lowest rank</div> -<div class="wideverse">And basest deeds, and now unknown as they.’</div> -</div></div></div> - -<div class="figcenter w500"> -<a id="illus_c_012"></a> -<img src="images/illus_c_012.jpg" width="500" height="691" alt="" /> -<div class="caption"><p class="center">A SUGGESTION OF THE NORTH LOCH AND ST CUTHBERT’S<br /> -from Allan Ramsay’s Garden.</p> - -<p class="right"> -<span class="smcap"><a href="#Page_117">Page 117.</a></span> -</p></div> -</div><hr class="chap" /></div><div class="chapter"> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_117" id="Page_117">{117}</a></span></p> - - - - -<h2><a name="MEMORIALS_OF_THE_NOR_LOCH" id="MEMORIALS_OF_THE_NOR_LOCH">MEMORIALS OF THE NOR’ LOCH.</a></h2> - - -<p>He who now sees the wide hollow space between the Old and -New Towns, occupied by beautiful gardens, having their -continuity only somewhat curiously broken up by a transverse -earthen mound and a line of railway, must be at a loss to realise -the idea of the same space presenting in former times a lake, -which was regarded as a portion of the physical defences of the -city. Yet many, in common with myself, must remember the by -no means distant time when the remains of this sheet of water, -consisting of a few pools, served as excellent sliding and skating -ground in winter, while their neglected grass-green precincts too -frequently formed an arena whereon the high and mighty quarrels -of Old and New Town <em>cowlies</em><a name="FNanchor_88" id="FNanchor_88"></a><a href="#Footnote_88" class="fnanchor">[88]</a> [etymology of the word unknown] -were brought to a lapidarian arbitration.</p> - -<p>The lake, it after all appears, was artificial, being fed by springs -under the Castle Rock, and retained by a dam at the foot of -Halkerston’s Wynd;<a name="FNanchor_89" id="FNanchor_89"></a><a href="#Footnote_89" class="fnanchor">[89]</a> which dam was a passable way from the city -to the fields on the north. Bower, the continuator of Fordun, -speaks of a tournament held on the ground, <i lang="la" xml:lang="la">ubi nunc est lacus</i>, in -1396, by order of the queen [of Robert III.], at which her eldest -son, Prince David, then in his twentieth year, presided. At the -beginning of the sixteenth century a ford upon the North Loch -is mentioned. Archbishop Beatoun escaped across that ford in -1517, when flying from the unlucky street-skirmish called <em>Cleanse -the Causeway</em>. In those early times the town corporation kept -ducks and swans upon the loch for ornament’s sake, and various -acts occur in their register for preserving those birds. An act, -passed in council between the years 1589 and 1594, ordained ‘a -boll of oats to be bought for feeding the swans in the North -Loch;’ and a person was unlawed at the same time for shooting -a swan in the said loch, and obliged to find another in its place. -The lake seems to have been a favourite scene for boating. Various -houses in the neighbourhood had servitudes of the use of a boat -upon it; and these, in later times, used to be employed to no little -purpose in smuggling whisky into the town.</p> -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_118" id="Page_118">{118}</a></span></p> -<p>The North Loch was the place in which our pious ancestors -used to dip and drown offenders against morality, especially of -the female sex. The Reformers, therefore, conceived that they -had not only done a very proper, but also a very witty thing, -when they threw into this lake, in 1558, the statue of St Giles, -which formerly adorned their High Church, and which they had -contrived to abstract.</p> - -<p>It was also the frequent scene of suicide, and on this point one -or two droll anecdotes are related. A man was deliberately proceeding -to drown himself in the North Loch, when a crowd of the -townspeople rushed down to the water-side, venting cries of horror -and alarm at the spectacle, yet without actually venturing into -the water to prevent him from accomplishing the rash act. Hearing -the tumult, the father of the late Lord Henderland threw up -his window in James’s Court, and leaning out, cried down the brae -to the people: ‘What’s all the noise about? Can’t ye e’en let -the honest man gang to the de’il his ain gate?’ Whereupon the -honest man quietly walked out of the loch, to the no small amusement -of his lately appalled neighbours. It is also said that a -poor woman, having resolved to put an end to her existence, -waded a considerable way into the water, designing to take the -fatal plunge when she should reach a place where the lake was -sufficiently deep. Before she could satisfy herself on that point, -her hoop caught the water, and lifted her off her feet. At the -same time the wind caught her figure, and blew her, whether she -would or not, into the centre of the pool, as if she had been -sailing upon an inverted tub. She now became <em>alarmed</em>, screamed -for help, and waved her arms distractedly; all of which signs -brought a crowd to the shore she had just left, who were unable, -however, to render her any assistance, before she had landed on -the other side—fairly cured, it appeared, of all desire of quitting -the uneasy coil of mortal life.</p> - -<hr class="chap" /></div><div class="chapter"> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_119" id="Page_119">{119}</a></span></p> - - - - -<h2><a name="THE_PARLIAMENT_HOUSE" id="THE_PARLIAMENT_HOUSE">THE PARLIAMENT HOUSE.</a></h2> - -<p class="chapter_summary"><strong>Old Arrangements of the House—Justice in Bygone Times—Court -of Session Garland—Parliament House Worthies.</strong></p> - - -<p>The Parliament House, a spacious hall with an oaken arched -roof, finished in 1639 for the meetings of the Estates or -native parliament, and used for that purpose till the Union, -has since then, as is well known, served exclusively as a material -portion of the suite of buildings required for the supreme civil -judicatory—the Court of Session. This hall, usually styled the -<em>Outer House</em>, is now a nearly empty space, but it was in a very -different state within the recollection of aged practitioners. So -lately as 1779, it retained the divisions, furnishings, and other -features which it had borne in the days when we had a national -legislature—excepting only that the portraits of sovereigns which -then adorned the walls had been removed by the Earl of Mar, to -whom Queen Anne had given them as a present when the Union -was accomplished.</p> - -<p>The divisions and furniture, it may be remarked, were understood -to be precisely those which had been used for the Court -of Session from an early time; but it appears that such changes -were made when the parliament was to sit as left the room one -free vacant space. The southern portion, separated from the rest -by a screen, accommodated the Court of Session. The northern -portion, comprising a sub-section used for the Sheriff-court, was -chiefly a kind of lobby of irregular form, surrounded by little -booths, which were occupied as taverns, booksellers’ shops, and -toy-shops, all of very flimsy materials.<a name="FNanchor_90" id="FNanchor_90"></a><a href="#Footnote_90" class="fnanchor">[90]</a> These <em>krames</em>, or boxes, -seem to have been established at an early period, the idea being -no doubt taken from the former condition of Westminster Hall. -John Spottiswoode of Spottiswoode, who, in 1718, published the -<cite>Forms of Process before the Court of Session</cite>, mentions that there -were ‘two keepers of the session-house, who had small salaries to -do all the menial offices in the house, and that no small part of -their annual perquisites came from the <em>kramers</em> in the outer hall.’</p> -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_120" id="Page_120">{120}</a></span></p> - -<h3>JUSTICE IN BYGONE TIMES.</h3> - -<p>The memories which have been preserved of the administration -of justice by the Court of Session in its earlier days are not such -as to increase our love for past times.<a name="FNanchor_91" id="FNanchor_91"></a><a href="#Footnote_91" class="fnanchor">[91]</a> This court is described -by Buchanan as extremely arbitrary, and by a nearly contemporary -historian (Johnston) as infamous for its dishonesty. An advocate -or barrister is spoken of by the latter writer as taking money from -his clients, and dividing it among the judges for their votes. At -this time we find the chancellor (Lord Fyvie) superintending the -lawsuits of a friend, and writing to him the way and manner in -which he proposed they should be conducted. But the strongest -evidence of the corruption of ‘the lords’ is afforded by an act of -1579, prohibiting them ‘be thame selffis or be their wiffis or -servandes, to tak in ony time cuming, <em>buddis</em>, <em>bribes</em>, <em>gudes</em>, <em>or -geir</em>, fra quhatever persone or persons presentlie havand, or that -heirefter sall happyne to have, <em>any actionis or caussis pursewit -befoir thame</em>, aither fra the persewer or defender,’ under pain of -confiscation. Had not bribery been common amongst the judges, -such an act as this could never have been passed.</p> - -<p>In the curious history of the family of Somerville there is a -very remarkable anecdote illustrative of the course of justice at -that period. Lord Somerville and his kinsman, Somerville of -Cambusnethan, had long carried on a litigation. The former was -at length advised to use certain means for the advancement of his -cause with the Regent Morton, it being then customary for the -sovereign to preside in the court. Accordingly, having one evening -caused his agents to prepare all the required papers, he went -next morning to the palace, and being admitted to the regent, -informed him of the cause, and entreated him to order it to be -called that forenoon. He then took out his purse, as if to give -a few pieces to the pages or servants, and slipping it down upon -the table, hurriedly left the presence-chamber. The earl cried -several times after him: ‘My lord, you have left your purse;’ -but he had no wish to stop. At length, when he was at the -outer porch, a servant overtook him with a request that he would -go back to breakfast with the regent. He did so, was kindly -treated, and soon after was taken by Morton in his coach to the -court-room in the city. ‘Cambusnethan, by accident, as the coach<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_121" id="Page_121">{121}</a></span> -passed, was standing at Niddry’s Wynd head, and having inquired -who was in it with the regent, he was answered: “None but Lord -Somerville and Lord Boyd;” upon which he struck his breast, and -said: “This day my cause is lost!” and indeed it proved so.’ By -twelve o’clock that day, Lord Somerville had gained a cause which -had been hanging in suspense for years.</p> - -<p>In those days both civil and criminal procedure was conducted -in much the same spirit as a suit at war. When a great noble -was to be tried for some monstrous murder or treason, he appeared -at the bar with as many of his retainers, and as many of his -friends and their retainers, as he could muster, and justice only -had its course if the government chanced to be the strongest, -which often was not the case. It was considered dishonourable -not to countenance a friend in troubles of this kind, however black -might be his moral guilt. The trial of Bothwell for the assassination -of Darnley is a noted example of a criminal outbraving his -judges and jury. Relationship, friendly connection, solicitation -of friends, and direct bribes were admitted and recognised influences -to which the civil judge was expected to give way. If a -difficulty were found in inducing a judge to vote against his -conscience, he might at least perhaps be induced by some of those -considerations to absent himself, so as to allow the case to go in -the desired way. The story of the abduction of Gibson of Durie -by Christie’s Will, and his immurement in a Border tower for -some weeks, that his voice might be absent in the decision of a -case—as given in the <cite>Border Minstrelsy</cite> by Scott—is only incorrect -in some particulars. (As the real case is reported in Pitcairn’s -<cite>Criminal Trials</cite>, it appears that, in September 1601, Gibson was -carried off from the neighbourhood of St Andrews by George -Meldrum, younger of Dumbreck, and hastily transported to the -castle of Harbottle in Northumberland, and kept there for eight -days.) But, after all, Scotland was not singular among European -nations in these respects. In Molière’s <cite>Misanthrope</cite>, produced in -1666, we find the good-natured Philinte coolly remonstrating with -Alceste on his unreasonable resolution to let his lawsuit depend -only on right and equity.</p> - -<p>‘Qui voulez-vous donc, qui pour vous sollicite?’ says Philinte. -‘Aucun juge par vous ne sera visité?’</p> - -<p>‘Je ne remuerai point,’ returns the misanthrope.</p> - -<p><em>Philinte.</em> Votre partie est forte, et peut par sa cabale entrainer....</p> - -<p><em>Alceste.</em> Il n’importe....</p> - -<p><em>Philinte.</em> Quel homme!... On se riroit de vous, Alceste, si on<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_122" id="Page_122">{122}</a></span> -vous entendoit parler de la façon. (<em>People would laugh at you if -they heard you talk in this manner.</em>)</p> - -<p>It is a general tradition in Scotland that the English judges -whom Cromwell sent down to administer the law in Scotland, -for the first time made the people acquainted with impartiality -of judgment. It is added that, after the Restoration, when -native lords were again put upon the bench, some one, in presence -of the President Gilmour, lauding the late English judges for the -equity of their proceedings, his lordship angrily remarked: ‘De’il -thank them; a wheen kinless loons!’ That is, no thanks to -them; a set of fellows without relations in the country, and who, -consequently, had no one to please by their decisions.</p> - -<p>After the Restoration there was no longer direct bribing, but -other abuses still flourished. The judges were tampered with by -private solicitation. Decisions went in favour of the man of most -personal or family influence. The following anecdote of the reign -of Charles II. rests on excellent authority: ‘A Scotch gentleman -having entreated the Earl of Rochester to speak to the Duke of -Lauderdale upon the account of a business that seemed to be -supported by a clear and undoubted right, his lordship very -obligingly promised to do his utmost endeavours to engage the -duke to stand his friend in a concern so just and reasonable as -his was; and accordingly, having conferred with his grace about -the matter, the duke made him this very odd return, that though -he questioned not the right of the gentleman he recommended to -him, yet he could not promise him a helping hand, and far less -success in business, if he knew not first the man, whom perhaps -his lordship had some reason to conceal; “because,” said he to -the earl, “if your lordship were as well acquainted with the -customs of Scotland as I am, you had undoubtedly known this -among others—<em>Show me the man, and I’ll show you the law</em>;” giving -him to understand that the law in Scotland could protect no man -if either his purse were empty or his adversaries great men, or -supported by great ones.’<a name="FNanchor_92" id="FNanchor_92"></a><a href="#Footnote_92" class="fnanchor">[92]</a></p> - -<p>One peculiar means of favouring a particular party was then -in the power of the presiding judge: he could call a cause when -he pleased. Thus he would watch till one or more judges who -took the opposite view to his own were out of the way—either -in attendance on other duties or from illness—and then calling -the cause, would decide it according to his predilection. Even<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_123" id="Page_123">{123}</a></span> -the first President Dalrymple, afterwards Viscount Stair, one of -the most eminent men whom the Scottish law-courts have ever -produced, condescended to favour a party in this way. An act -enjoining the calling of causes according to their place in a -regular roll was passed in the reign of Charles II.; but the -practice was not enforced till the days of President Forbes, sixty -years later. We have a remarkable illustration of the partiality -of the bench in a circumstance which took place about the time -of the Revolution. During the pleadings in a case between -Mr Pitilloch, an advocate, and Mr Aytoun of Inchdairnie, the -former applied the term <em>briber</em> to Lord Harcarse, a judge seated -at the moment on the bench, and who was father-in-law to the -opposite party. The man was imprisoned for contempt; but this -is not the point. Not long after, in this same cause, Lord -Harcarse went down to the bar in his gown, and pleaded for his -son-in-law Aytoun!</p> - -<p>About that period a curious indirect means of influencing the -judges began to be notorious. Each lord had a dependant or -favourite, generally some young relative, practising in the court, -through whom it was understood that he could be prepossessed -with a favourable view of any cause. This functionary was called -a <em>Peat</em> or <em>Pate</em>, from a circumstance thus related in Wilkes’s <cite>North -Briton</cite>: ‘One of the former judges of the Court of Session, of -the first character, knowledge, and application to business, had a -son at the bar whose name was Patrick; and when the suitors -came about, soliciting his favour, his question was: “Have you -consulted <em>Pat</em>?” If the answer was affirmative, the usual reply -of his lordship was: “I’ll inquire of <em>Pat</em> about it; I’ll take care -of your cause; go home and mind your business.” The judge in -that case was even as good as his word, for while his brother-judges -were robing, he would tell them what pains his son had -taken, and what trouble he had put himself to, by his directions, -in order to find out the real circumstances of the dispute; -and as no one on the bench would be so unmannerly as to question -the veracity of the son or the judgment of the father, the decree -always went according to the information of <em>Pat</em>. At the present -era, in case a judge has no son at the bar, his nearest relation -(and he is sure to have one there) officiates in that station. -But, as it frequently happens, if there are <em>Pats</em> employed on each -side, the judges differ, and the greatest interest—that is, the -longest purse—is sure to carry it.’</p> - -<p>I bring the subject to a conclusion by a quotation from the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_124" id="Page_124">{124}</a></span> -<cite>Court of Session Garland</cite>: ‘Even so far down as 1737 traces of -the ancient evil may be found. Thus, in some very curious letters -which passed between William Foulis, Esq. of Woodhall, and his -agent, Thomas Gibson of Durie, there is evidence that private -influence could even then be resorted to. The agent writes to his -client, in reference to a pending lawsuit (23rd November 1735): -“I have spoken to Strachan and several of the lords, who are all -surprised Sir F[rancis Kinloch] should stand that plea. By Lord -St Clair’s advice, Mrs Kinloch is to wait on Lady Cairnie to-morrow, -to cause her ask the favour of Lady St Clair to solicit Lady Betty -Elphingston and Lady Dun. My lord promises to back his lady, -and to ply both their lords, also Leven and his cousin Murkle.<a name="FNanchor_93" id="FNanchor_93"></a><a href="#Footnote_93" class="fnanchor">[93]</a> -He is your good friend, and wishes success; he is jealous Mrs -Mackie will side with her cousin Beatie. St Clair says <em>Leven<a name="FNanchor_94" id="FNanchor_94"></a><a href="#Footnote_94" class="fnanchor">[94]</a> has -only once gone wrong upon his hand since he was a Lord of Session</em>. -Mrs Kinloch has been with Miss Pringle, Newhall. Young Dr -Pringle is <em>a good agent there</em>, and discourses Lord Newhall<a name="FNanchor_95" id="FNanchor_95"></a><a href="#Footnote_95" class="fnanchor">[95]</a> -<em>strongly on the law of nature</em>,” &c.</p> - -<p>‘Again, upon the 23rd of January 1737, he writes: “I can -assure you that when Lord Primrose left this town, he stayed all -that day with Lord J[ustice] C[lerk],<a name="FNanchor_96" id="FNanchor_96"></a><a href="#Footnote_96" class="fnanchor">[96]</a> and went to Andrew -Broomfield at night, and went off post next morning; and what -made him despair of getting anything done was, that it has been -so long delayed, after promising so frankly, when he knew the one -could cause the other trot to him like a penny-dog when he -pleased. But there’s another hindrance: I suspect much Penty<a name="FNanchor_97" id="FNanchor_97"></a><a href="#Footnote_97" class="fnanchor">[97]</a> -has not been in town as yet, and I fancy it’s by him the other -must be managed. The Ld. J[ustice] C[lerk] is frank enough, but -the other two are —— clippies. I met with Bavelaw and Mr -William on Tuesday last. I could not persuade the last to go to -a wine-house, so away we went to an aquavity-house, where I told -Mr Wm. what had passed, as I had done before that to Bavelaw. -They seemed to agree nothing could be done just now, but to know<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_125" id="Page_125">{125}</a></span> -why Lord Drummore<a name="FNanchor_98" id="FNanchor_98"></a><a href="#Footnote_98" class="fnanchor">[98]</a> dissuaded bringing in the plea last winter. -<em>I have desired Lord Haining to speak</em>, but only expect his answer -against Tuesday or Wednesday.”</p> - -<p>‘It is not our intention to pursue these remarks further, although -we believe that judicial corruption continued long after the Union. -We might adduce Lord President Forbes as a witness on this point, -who, one of the most upright lawyers himself, did not take any -pains to conceal his contempt for many of his brethren. A -favourite toast of his is said to have been: “Here’s to such of the -judges as don’t deserve the gallows.” Latterly, the complaint -against the judges was not so much for corrupt dealing, with the -view of enriching themselves or their “pet” lawyer, but for weak -prejudices and feelings, which but ill accorded with the high office -they filled.</p> - -<p>‘These abuses, the recapitulation of which may amuse and -instruct, are now only matter of history—the spots that once -sullied the garments of justice are effaced, and the old compend, -“Show me the man, and I’ll show you the law,” is out of date.’</p> - - -<h3>COURT OF SESSION GARLAND.</h3> - -<p>A curious characteristic view of the Scottish bench about the -year 1771 is presented in a doggerel ballad, supposed to have been -a joint composition of James Boswell and John Maclaurin,<a name="FNanchor_99" id="FNanchor_99"></a><a href="#Footnote_99" class="fnanchor">[99]</a> -advocates, and professedly the history of a process regarding a bill -containing a clause of penalty in case of failure. This <cite>Court of -Session Garland</cite>, as it is called, is here subjoined, with such notes -on persons and things as the reader may be supposed to require or -care for.</p> - - -<h4>PART FIRST.</h4> - -<div class="poetry-container"><div class="poetry"><div class="stanza"> -<div class="verse">The bill charged on was payable at sight,</div> -<div class="verse">And decree was craved by Alexander Wight;<a name="FNanchor_100" id="FNanchor_100"></a><a href="#Footnote_100" class="fnanchor">[100]</a></div> -<div class="verse">But because it bore a penalty in case of failzie,</div> -<div class="verse">It therefore was null, contended Willie Baillie.<a name="FNanchor_101" id="FNanchor_101"></a><a href="#Footnote_101" class="fnanchor">[101]</a></div> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<div class="verse">The Ordinary, not choosing to judge it at random,</div> -<div class="verse">Did with the minutes make <i lang="la" xml:lang="la">avisandum</i>;</div> -<div class="verse">And as the pleadings were vague and windy,</div> -<div class="verse">His lordship ordered memorials <i lang="la" xml:lang="la">hinc inde</i>.</div><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_126" id="Page_126">{126}</a></span> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<div class="verse">We, setting a stout heart to a stay brae,</div> -<div class="verse">Took into the cause Mr David Rae.<a name="FNanchor_102" id="FNanchor_102"></a><a href="#Footnote_102" class="fnanchor">[102]</a></div> -<div class="verse">Lord Auchinleck,<a name="FNanchor_103" id="FNanchor_103"></a><a href="#Footnote_103" class="fnanchor">[103]</a> however, repelled our defence,</div> -<div class="verse">And, over and above, decerned for expense.</div> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<div class="verse">However, of our cause not being ashamed,</div> -<div class="verse">Unto the whole lords we straightway reclaimed;</div> -<div class="verse">And our Petition was appointed to be seen,</div> -<div class="verse">Because it was drawn by Robbie Macqueen.<a name="FNanchor_104" id="FNanchor_104"></a><a href="#Footnote_104" class="fnanchor">[104]</a></div> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<div class="verse">The Answer by Lockhart<a name="FNanchor_105" id="FNanchor_105"></a><a href="#Footnote_105" class="fnanchor">[105]</a> himself it was wrote,</div> -<div class="verse">And in it no argument nor fact was forgot.</div> -<div class="verse">He is the lawyer that from no cause will flinch,</div> -<div class="verse">And on this occasion divided the bench.</div> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<div class="verse">Alemore<a name="FNanchor_106" id="FNanchor_106"></a><a href="#Footnote_106" class="fnanchor">[106]</a> the judgment as illegal blames;</div> -<div class="verse">‘’Tis equity, you bitch,’ replies my Lord Kames.<a name="FNanchor_107" id="FNanchor_107"></a><a href="#Footnote_107" class="fnanchor">[107]</a></div> -<div class="verse">‘This cause,’ cries Hailes,<a name="FNanchor_108" id="FNanchor_108"></a><a href="#Footnote_108" class="fnanchor">[108]</a> ‘to judge I can’t pretend,</div> -<div class="verse">For <em>justice</em>, I perceive, wants an <em>e</em> at the end.’</div> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<div class="verse">Lord Coalstoun<a name="FNanchor_109" id="FNanchor_109"></a><a href="#Footnote_109" class="fnanchor">[109]</a> expressed his doubts and his fears;</div> -<div class="verse">And Strichen<a name="FNanchor_110" id="FNanchor_110"></a><a href="#Footnote_110" class="fnanchor">[110]</a> threw in his <em>weel-weels</em> and <em>oh dears</em>.</div> -<div class="verse">‘This cause much resembles the case of Mac-Harg,</div> -<div class="verse">And should go the same way,’ says Lordie Barjarg.<a name="FNanchor_111" id="FNanchor_111"></a><a href="#Footnote_111" class="fnanchor">[111]</a></div> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<div class="verse">‘Let me tell you, my lords, this cause is no joke!’</div><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_127" id="Page_127">{127}</a></span> -<div class="verse">Says, with a horse-laugh, my Lord Elliock.<a name="FNanchor_112" id="FNanchor_112"></a><a href="#Footnote_112" class="fnanchor">[112]</a></div> -<div class="verse">‘To have read all the papers I pretend not to brag!’</div> -<div class="verse">Says my Lord Gardenstone<a name="FNanchor_113" id="FNanchor_113"></a><a href="#Footnote_113" class="fnanchor">[113]</a> with a snuff and a wag.</div> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<div class="verse">Up rose the President,<a name="FNanchor_114" id="FNanchor_114"></a><a href="#Footnote_114" class="fnanchor">[114]</a> and an angry man was he—</div> -<div class="verse">‘To alter the judgment I can never agree!’</div> -<div class="verse">The east wing cried ‘<span class="smcap">Yes</span>,’ and the west wing cried ‘<span class="smcap">Not</span>;’</div> -<div class="verse">And it was carried ‘<span class="smcap">Adhere</span>’<a name="FNanchor_115" id="FNanchor_115"></a><a href="#Footnote_115" class="fnanchor">[115]</a> by my lord’s casting vote.</div> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<div class="verse">The cause being somewhat knotty and perplext,</div> -<div class="verse">Their lordships did not know how they’d determine next;</div> -<div class="verse">And as the session was to rise so soon,</div> -<div class="verse">They superseded extract till the 12th of June.<a name="FNanchor_116" id="FNanchor_116"></a><a href="#Footnote_116" class="fnanchor">[116]</a></div> -</div></div></div> - - -<h4>PART SECOND.</h4> - -<div class="poetry-container"><div class="poetry"><div class="stanza"> -<div class="verse">Having lost it so nigh, we prepare for the summer,</div> -<div class="verse">And on the 12th of June presented a reclaimer;</div> -<div class="verse">But dreading a refuse, we gave Dundas<a name="FNanchor_117" id="FNanchor_117"></a><a href="#Footnote_117" class="fnanchor">[117]</a> a fee,</div> -<div class="verse">And though it run nigh, it was carried ‘<span class="smcap">To See</span>.’<a name="FNanchor_118" id="FNanchor_118"></a><a href="#Footnote_118" class="fnanchor">[118]</a></div> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<div class="verse">In order to bring aid from usage bygone,</div> -<div class="verse">The Answers were drawn by <i lang="la" xml:lang="la">quondam</i> Mess John.<a name="FNanchor_119" id="FNanchor_119"></a><a href="#Footnote_119" class="fnanchor">[119]</a></div> -<div class="verse">He united with such art our law with the civil,</div> -<div class="verse">That the counsel on both sides wished him to the devil.</div> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<div class="verse">The cause being called, my Lord Justice-clerk,<a name="FNanchor_120" id="FNanchor_120"></a><a href="#Footnote_120" class="fnanchor">[120]</a></div> -<div class="verse">With all due respect, began a loud bark:</div><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_128" id="Page_128">{128}</a></span> -<div class="verse">He appealed to his conscience, his heart, and from thence</div> -<div class="verse">Concluded—‘<span class="smcap">To Alter</span>,’ but to give no expense.</div> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<div class="verse">Lord Stonefield,<a name="FNanchor_121" id="FNanchor_121"></a><a href="#Footnote_121" class="fnanchor">[121]</a> unwilling his judgment to pother,</div> -<div class="verse">Or to be <em>anticipate</em>, agreed with his brother:</div> -<div class="verse">But Monboddo<a name="FNanchor_122" id="FNanchor_122"></a><a href="#Footnote_122" class="fnanchor">[122]</a> was clear the bill to enforce</div> -<div class="verse">Because, he observed, it was the price of a horse.</div> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<div class="verse">Says Pitfour,<a name="FNanchor_123" id="FNanchor_123"></a><a href="#Footnote_123" class="fnanchor">[123]</a> with a wink, and his hat all a-jee,</div> -<div class="verse">‘I remember a case in the year twenty-three—</div> -<div class="verse">The Magistrates of Banff <i lang="la" xml:lang="la">contra</i> Robert Carr;</div> -<div class="verse">I remember weel—I was then at the bar.</div> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<div class="verse">Likewise, my lords, in the case of Peter Caw,</div> -<div class="verse"><i lang="la" xml:lang="la">Superflua non nocent</i> was found to be law.’</div> -<div class="verse">Lord Kennet<a name="FNanchor_124" id="FNanchor_124"></a><a href="#Footnote_124" class="fnanchor">[124]</a> also quoted the case of one Lithgow,</div> -<div class="verse">Where a penalty in a bill was held <i lang="la" xml:lang="la">pro non scripto</i>.</div> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<div class="verse">The Lord President brought his chair to the plumb,</div> -<div class="verse">Laid hold of the bench, and brought forward his bum;</div> -<div class="verse">‘In these Answers, my lords, some freedoms are used,</div> -<div class="verse">Which I could point out, provided I choosed.</div> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<div class="verse">I was for the interlocutor, my lords, I admit,</div> -<div class="verse">But am open to conviction as long’s I here do sit.</div> -<div class="verse">To oppose your precedents, I quote a few cases;’</div> -<div class="verse">And Tait<a name="FNanchor_125" id="FNanchor_125"></a><a href="#Footnote_125" class="fnanchor">[125]</a> <i lang="la" xml:lang="la">à priori</i>, hurried up the causes.</div> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<div class="verse">He proved it as clear as the sun in the sky,</div> -<div class="verse">That their maxims of law could not here apply;</div> -<div class="verse">That the writing in question was neither bill nor band,</div> -<div class="verse">But something unknown in the law of the land.</div> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<div class="verse">The question—‘Adhere,’ or ‘Alter,’ being put,</div> -<div class="verse">It was carried—‘To Alter,’ by a casting vote;</div> -<div class="verse">Baillie then moved—‘In the bill there’s a raze;’</div> -<div class="verse">But by this time their lordships had called a new cause.</div> -</div></div></div> - -<p>A few additions to the notes, in a more liberal space, will -complete what I have to set down regarding the lawyers of the -last age.</p> - -<div class="figcenter w500"> -<a id="illus_c_013"></a> -<img src="images/illus_c_013.jpg" width="500" height="686" alt="" /> -<div class="caption"><p class="center">THE PARLIAMENT HOUSE.</p> - -<p class="right"> -<span class="smcap"><a href="#Page_128">Page 128.</a></span> - -</p></div> -</div><p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_129" id="Page_129">{129}</a></span></p> - - -<h3>LOCKHART OF COVINGTON.<a name="FNanchor_126" id="FNanchor_126"></a><a href="#Footnote_126" class="fnanchor">[126]</a></h3> - -<p>Lockhart used to be spoken of by all old men about the Court -of Session as a paragon. He had been at the bar from 1722, and -had attained the highest eminence long before going upon the -bench, which he did at an unusually late period of life; yet so -different were those times from the present that, according to the -report of Sir William Macleod Bannatyne to myself in 1833, -Lockhart realised only about a thousand a year by his exertions, -then thought a magnificent income. The first man at the Scottish -bar in our day is believed to gain at least six times this sum -annually. Lockhart had an isolated house behind the Parliament -Close, which was afterwards used as the Post-office.<a name="FNanchor_127" id="FNanchor_127"></a><a href="#Footnote_127" class="fnanchor">[127]</a> It was -removed some years ago to make way for the extension of the -buildings connected with the court; leaving only its coach-house -surviving, now occupied as a broker’s shop in the Cowgate.</p> - -<p>Mr Lockhart and Mr Fergusson (afterwards Lord Pitfour) were -rival barristers—agreeing, however, in their politics, which were of -a Jacobite complexion. While the trials of the poor <em>forty-five</em> -men were going on at Carlisle, these Scottish lawyers heard with -indignation of the unscrupulous measures adopted to procure convictions. -They immediately set off for Carlisle, arranging with -each other that Lockhart should examine evidence, while Fergusson -pleaded and addressed the jury; and offering their services, they -were gladly accepted as counsel by the unfortunates whose trials -were yet to take place. Each exerted his abilities, in his respective -duties, with the greatest solicitude, but with very little effect. -The jurors of Carlisle had been so frightened by the Highland -army that they thought everything in the shape or hue of tartan -a damning proof of guilt; and, in truth, there seemed to be no -discrimination whatever exerted in inquiring into the merits of any<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_130" id="Page_130">{130}</a></span> -particular criminal; and it might have been just as fair, and much -more convenient, to try them by wholesale or in companies. At -length one of our barristers fell upon an ingenious expedient, which -had a better effect than all the eloquence he had expended. He -directed his man-servant to dress himself in some tartan habiliments, -to skulk about for a short time in the neighbourhood of the town, -and then permit himself to be taken. The man did so, and was -soon brought into court, and accused of the crime of high treason, -and would have been condemned to death had not his master -stood up, claimed him as his servant, and proved beyond dispute -that the supposed criminal had been in immediate attendance upon -his person during the whole time of the Rebellion. This staggered -the jury, and, with the aid of a little amplification from the mouth -of the young advocate, served to make them more cautious afterwards -in the delivery of their important fiat.</p> - -<p>To show the estimation in which Lockhart of Covington was -held as an advocate, the late Lord Newton, when at the bar, wore -his gown till it was in tatters, and at last had a new one made, -with a fragment of the neck of the original sewed into it, whereby -he could still make it his boast that he wore ‘Covington’s gown.’</p> - - -<h3>LORD KAMES.</h3> - -<p>This able judge and philosopher in advance of his time—for -such he was—is described by his biographer, Lord Woodhouselee, -as indulging in a certain humorous playfulness, which, to those -who knew him intimately, detracted nothing from the feeling of -respect due to his eminent talents and virtues. To strangers, his -lordship admits, it might convey ‘the idea of lightness.’ The -simple fact here shadowed forth is that Lord Kames had a roughly -playful manner, and used phrases of an ultra-eccentric character. -Among these was a word only legitimately applicable to the female -of the canine species. The writer of the <cite>Garland</cite> introduces this -characteristic phrase. When his lordship found his end approaching -very near, he took a public farewell of his brethren. I was informed -by an ear-and-eye witness, who is certain that he could not -be mistaken, that, after addressing them in a solemn speech and -shaking their hands all round, in going out at the door of the court-room -he turned about, and casting them a last look, cried in his -usual familiar tone: ‘Fare ye a’ weel, ye bitches!’ He died eight -days after.</p> - -<p>It was remarked that a person called <em>Sinkum the Cawdy</em>, who<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_131" id="Page_131">{131}</a></span> -had a short and a long leg and was excessively addicted to swearing, -used to lie in wait for Lord Kames almost every morning, and walk -alongside of him up the street to the Parliament House. The -mystery of Sterne’s little, flattering Frenchman, who begged so -successfully from the ladies, was scarcely more wonderful than this -intimacy, which arose entirely from Lord Kames’s love of the -gossip which Sinkum made it his business to cater for him.</p> - -<p>These are not follies of the wise. They are only the tribute -which great genius pays to simple nature. The serenity which -marked the close of the existence of Kames was most creditable to -him, though it appeared, perhaps, in somewhat whimsical forms to -his immediate friends. For three or four days before his death, he -was in a state of great debility. Some one coming in, and finding -him, notwithstanding his weakness, engaged in dictating to an -amanuensis, expressed surprise. ‘How, man,’ said the declining -philosopher, ‘would you ha’e me stay wi’ my tongue in my cheek -till death comes to fetch me?’</p> - - -<h3>LORD HAILES.</h3> - -<p>When Lord Hailes died, it was a long time before any will could -be found. The heir-male was about to take possession of his -estates, to the exclusion of his eldest daughter. Some months -after his lordship’s death, when it was thought that all further -search was vain, Miss Dalrymple prepared to retire from New -Hailes, and also from the mansion-house in New Street, having lost -all hope of a will being discovered in her favour. Some of her -domestics, however, were sent to lock up the house in New Street, -and in closing the window-shutters, Lord Hailes’s will dropped out -upon the floor from behind a panel, and was found to secure her in -the possession of his estates, which she enjoyed for upwards of -forty years.</p> - -<p>The literary habits of Lord Hailes were hardly those which -would have been expected from his extreme nicety of phrase. The -late Miss Dalrymple once did me the honour to show me the place -where he wrote the most of his works—not the fine room which -contained, and still contains, his books—no secluded boudoir, or -den, where he could shut out the world, but the parlour fireside, -where sat his wife and children.</p> - -<p>[1868.—Now that the grave has for thirty years closed over Miss -Dalrymple, it may be allowable to tell that she was of dwarfish and -deformed figure, while amiable and judicious above the average of<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_132" id="Page_132">{132}</a></span> -her sex. Taking into view her beautiful place of residence and her -large wealth, she remarked to a friend one day: ‘I can say, for the -honour of man, that I never got an offer in my life.’]</p> - - -<h3>LORD GARDENSTONE.</h3> - -<p>This judge had a predilection for pigs. One, in its juvenile -years, took a particular fancy for his lordship, and followed him -wherever he went, like a dog, reposing in the same bed. When it -attained the mature years and size of swinehood, this of course was -inconvenient. However, his lordship, unwilling to part with his -friend, continued to let it sleep at least in the same room, and, -when he undressed, laid his clothes upon the floor as a bed to it. -He said that he liked it, for it kept his clothes warm till the -morning. In his mode of living he was full of strange, eccentric -fancies, which he seemed to adopt chiefly with a view to his health, -which was always that of a valetudinarian.<a name="FNanchor_128" id="FNanchor_128"></a><a href="#Footnote_128" class="fnanchor">[128]</a></p> - - -<h3>LORD PRESIDENT DUNDAS.</h3> - -<p>This distinguished judge was, in his latter years, extremely subject -to gout, and used to fall backwards and forwards in his chair—whence -the ungracious expression in the <cite>Garland</cite>. He used to -characterise his six clerks thus: ‘Two of them cannot <em>read</em>, two -of them cannot <em>write</em>, and the other two can neither <em>read</em> nor -<em>write</em>!’ The eccentric Sir James Colquhoun was one of those who -could not <em>read</em>. In former times it was the practice of the Lord -President to have a sand-glass before him on the bench, with which -he used to measure out the utmost time that could be allowed to -a judge for the delivery of his opinion. Lord President Dundas -would never allow a single moment after the expiration of the sand, -and he has often been seen to shake his old-fashioned chronometer -ominously in the faces of his brethren when their ‘ideas upon the -subject’ began, in the words of the <cite>Garland</cite>, to get vague and -windy.</p> - - -<h3>LORD MONBODDO.</h3> - -<p>Lord Monboddo’s motion for the enforcement of the bill, on -account of its representing the value of a horse, is partly an allusion -to his Gulliverlike admiration of that animal, but more particularly<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_133" id="Page_133">{133}</a></span> -to his having once embroiled himself in an action respecting a -horse which belonged to himself. His lordship had committed the -animal, when sick, to the charge of a farrier, with directions for the -administration of a certain medicine. The farrier gave the medicine, -but went beyond his commission, in as far as he mixed it in a -liberal <i lang="la" xml:lang="la">menstruum</i> of treacle in order to make it palatable. The -horse dying next morning, Lord Monboddo raised a prosecution -for its value, and actually pleaded his own cause at the bar. He -lost the case, however; and is said to have been so enraged in consequence -at his brethren that he never afterwards sat with them -upon the bench, but underneath amongst the clerks. The report -of this action is exceedingly amusing, on account of the great -quantity of Roman law quoted by the judges, and the strange -circumstances under which the case appeared before them.</p> - -<p>Lord Monboddo, with all his oddities, and though generally -hated or despised by his brethren, was by far the most learned and -not the least upright judge of his time. His attainments in -classical learning and in the study of the ancient philosophers -were singular in his time in Scotland, and might have qualified him -to shine anywhere. He was the earliest patron of one of the best -scholars of his age, the late Professor John Hunter of St Andrews, -who was for many years his secretary, and who chiefly wrote the -first and best volume of his lordship’s <cite>Treatise on the Origin of -Languages</cite>.</p> - -<p>The manners of Lord Monboddo were not more odd than his -personal appearance. He looked rather like an old stuffed monkey -dressed in a judge’s robes than anything else. His face, however, -‘sicklied o’er’ with the pale cast of thought, bore traces of high -intellect. So convinced is he said to have been of the truth of his -fantastic theory of human tails, that whenever a child happened to -be born in his house, he would watch at the chamber-door in -order to see it in its first state, having a notion that the midwives -pinched off the infant tails.</p> - -<p>There is a tradition that Lord Monboddo attended and witnessed -the catastrophe of Captain Porteous in 1736. He had just that -day returned from completing his law education at Leyden, and -taken lodgings near the foot of the West Bow, where at that time -many of the greatest lawyers resided. When the rioters came -down the Bow with their hapless victim, Mr Burnet was roused -from bed by the noise, came down in his night-gown with a candle -in his hand, and stood in a sort of stupor, looking on, till the -tragedy was concluded.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_134" id="Page_134">{134}</a></span></p> - - -<h3>PARLIAMENT HOUSE WORTHIES.</h3> - -<p>Scott has sketched in <cite>Peter Peebles</cite> the type of a class of crazy -and half-crazy litigants who at all times haunt the Parliament -House. Usually they are rustic men possessing small properties, -such as a house and garden, which they are constantly talking -of as their ‘subject.’ Sometimes a faded shawl and bonnet is -associated with the case—objects to be dreaded by every good-natured -member of the bar. But most frequently it is simple -countrymen who become pests of this kind. That is to say, simple -men of difficult and captious tempers, cursed with an overstrong -sense of right or an overstrong sense of wrong, under which they -would, by many degrees, prefer utter ruin to making the slightest -concession to a neighbour. Ruined these men often are; and yet -it seems ruin well bought, since they have all along had the pleasure -of seeing themselves and their little affairs the subject of consideration -amongst men so much above themselves in rank.</p> - -<p>Peebles was, as we are assured by the novelist himself, a real -person, who frequented the Edinburgh courts of justice about -the year 1792, and ‘whose voluminous course of litigation served -as a sort of essay piece to most young men who were called to -the bar.’<a name="FNanchor_129" id="FNanchor_129"></a><a href="#Footnote_129" class="fnanchor">[129]</a> Many persons recollect him as a tall, thin, slouching -man, of homely outworn attire, understood to be a native of -Linlithgow. Having got into law about a small house, he became -deranged by the cause going against him, and then peace was no -more for him on earth. He used to tell his friends that he had -at present thirteen causes in hand, but was only going to ‘move -in’ seven of them this session. When anxious for a consultation -on any of his affairs, he would set out from his native burgh at -the time when other people were going to bed, and reaching -Edinburgh at four in the morning, would go about the town -ringing the bells of the principal advocates, in the vain hope of -getting one to rise and listen to him, to the infinite annoyance -of many a poor serving-girl, and no less of the Town-guard, into -whose hands he generally fell.</p> - -<p>Another specimen of the class was Campbell of Laguine, who -had perhaps been longer at law than any man of modern times. -He was a store-farmer in Caithness, and had immense tracts of -land under lease. When he sold his wool, he put the price in -his pocket (no petty sum), and came down to waste it in the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_135" id="Page_135">{135}</a></span> -Court of Session. His custom—an amusing example of method -in madness—was to pay every meal which he made at the inns -on the road <em>double</em>, that he might have a <i lang="la" xml:lang="la">gratis</i> meal on his -return, knowing he would not bring a cross away in his pocket -from the courts of justice. Laguine’s figure was very extraordinary. -His legs were like two circumflexes, both curving -outward in the same direction; so that, relative to his body, they -took the direction of the blade of a reaping-hook, supposing the -trunk of his person to be the handle. These extraordinary legs -were always attired in Highland trews, as his body was generally -in a gray or tartan jacket, with a bonnet on his head; and duly -appeared he at the door of the Parliament House, bearing a -tin case, fully as big as himself, containing a plan of his farms. -He paid his lawyers highly, but took up a great deal of their -time. One gentleman, afterwards high in official situation, -observed him coming up to ring his bell, and not wishing that -he himself should throw away his time or Laguine his fee, -directed that he should be denied. Laguine, however, made his -way to the lady of the learned counsel, and sitting down in the -drawing-room, went at great length into the merits of his cause, -and exhibited his plans; and when he had expatiated for a couple -of hours, he departed, but not without leaving a handsome fee, -observing that he had as much satisfaction as if he had seen the -learned counsel himself. He once told a legal friend of the writer -that his laird and he were nearly agreed now—there was only -about <em>ten miles of country</em> contested betwixt them! When finally -this great cause was adjusted, his agent said: ‘Well, Laguine, -what will ye do now?’ rashly judging that one who had, in a -manner, lived upon law for a series of years would be at a loss -how to dispose of himself now. ‘No difficulty there,’ answered -Laguine; ‘I’ll dispute your account, and go to law with <em>you</em>!’ -Possessed as he was by a demon of litigation, Campbell is said to -have been, apart from his disputes, a shrewd and sensible, and, -moreover, an honourable and worthy man. He was one of the -first who introduced sheep-farming into Ross-shire and Caithness, -where he had farms as large as some whole Lowland or English -counties; and but for litigation, he had the opportunity of -making much money.</p> - -<p>A person usually called, from his trade, the Heckler was -another Parliament House worthy. He used to work the whole -night at his trade; then put on a black suit, curled his hair -behind and powdered it, so as to resemble a clergyman, and<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_136" id="Page_136">{136}</a></span> -came forth to attend to the great business of the day at the -Parliament House. He imagined that he was deputed by Divine -Providence as a sort of controller of the Court of Session; but -as if that had not been sufficient, he thought the charge of the -General Assembly was also committed to him; and he used to -complain that that venerable body was ‘much worse to keep in -good order’ than the lawyers. He was a little, smart, well-brushed, -neat-looking man, and used to talk to himself, smile, and nod with -much vivacity. Part of his lunacy was to believe himself a clergyman; -and it was chiefly the Teind Court which he haunted, his -object there being to obtain an augmentation of his stipend. The -appearance and conversation of the man were so plausible that he -once succeeded in imposing himself upon Dr Blair as a preacher, -and obtained permission to hold forth in the High Church on the -ensuing Sunday. He was fortunately recognised when about to -mount the pulpit. Some idle boys about the Parliament House, -where he was a constant attendant, persuaded him that, as he held -two such dignified offices as his imagination shaped out, there -must be some salary attached to them, payable, like others upon -the Establishment, in the Exchequer. This very nearly brought -about a serious catastrophe; for the poor madman, finding his -applications slighted at the Exchequer, came there one day with a -pistol heavily loaded to shoot Mr Baird, a very worthy man, an -officer of that court. This occasioned the Heckler being confined -in durance vile for a long time; though, I think, he was at length -emancipated.</p> - -<p>Other insane fishers in the troubled waters of the law were the -following:</p> - -<p>Macduff of Ballenloan, who had two cases before the court -at once. His success in the one depended upon his showing -that he had capacity to manage his own affairs; and in the -other, upon his proving himself incapable of doing so. He -used to complain, with some apparent reason, that he lost them -both!</p> - -<p>Andrew Nicol, who was at law thirty years about a <em>midden-stead</em>—<i lang="la" xml:lang="la">Anglicé</i>, -the situation of a dunghill. This person was a -native of Kinross, a sensible-looking countryman, with a large, -flat, blue bonnet, in which guise Kay has a very good portrait of -him, displaying, with chuckling pride, a plan of his precious -midden-stead. He used to frequent the Register House as well -as the courts of law, and was encouraged in his foolish pursuits -by the roguish clerks of that establishment, by whom he was<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_137" id="Page_137">{137}</a></span> -denominated <em>Muck Andrew</em>, in allusion to the object of his -litigation. This wretched being, after losing property and credit -and his own senses in following a valueless phantom, died at last -(1817) in Cupar jail, where he was placed by one of his legal -creditors.</p> - - - - -<hr class="chap" /></div><div class="chapter"> -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_138" id="Page_138">{138}</a></span></p> -<div class="figcenter w200"> -<img src="images/illus_p_138a.jpg" width="200" height="242" alt="" /> -</div> - - -<h2><a name="CONVIVIALIA" id="CONVIVIALIA">CONVIVIALIA.</a></h2> - -<div class="poetry-container"><div class="poetry"><div class="stanza"> -<div class="wideverse indent6">‘Auld Reekie! wale o’ ilka toon</div> -<div class="wideverse">That Scotland kens beneath the moon;</div> -<div class="wideverse">Where coothy chields at e’enin’ meet,</div> -<div class="wideverse">Their bizzin’ craigs and mous to weet,</div> -<div class="wideverse">And blithely gar auld care gae by,</div> -<div class="wideverse">Wi’ blinkin’ and wi’ bleerin’ eye.’</div> -</div> - -<p class="right"> -<span class="smcap">Robert Fergusson.</span> -</p></div></div> - - -<p>Tavern dissipation, now so rare amongst the respectable classes -of the community, formerly prevailed in Edinburgh to an -incredible extent, and engrossed the leisure hours of all professional -men, scarcely excepting even the most stern and dignified. No -rank, class, or profession, indeed, formed an exception to this -rule. Nothing was so common in the morning as to meet men -of high rank and official dignity reeling home from a close in the -High Street, where they had spent the night in drinking. Nor -was it unusual to find two or three of His Majesty’s most honourable -Lords of Council and Session mounting the bench in the -forenoon in a crapulous state. A gentleman one night stepping -into Johnnie Dowie’s, opened a side-door, and looking -into the room, saw a sort of <em>agger</em> or heap of -snoring lads upon the floor, illumined by the gleams -of an expiring candle. ‘Wha may thae be, Mr -Dowie?’ inquired the visitor. ‘Oh,’ quoth John in -his usual quiet way, ‘just twa-three o’ Sir Willie’s -drucken clerks!’—meaning the young gentlemen -employed in Sir William Forbes’s banking-house, -whom of all earthly mortals one would have expected -to be observers of the decencies.</p> - -<div class="figcenter w125"> -<img src="images/illus_p_138b.jpg" width="125" height="296" alt="" /> -<div class="caption"><p class="center">Johnnie Dowie.</p></div> -</div> - -<p>To this testimony may be added that of all -published works descriptive of Edinburgh during -the last century. Even in the preceding century, -if we are to believe Taylor the Water-poet, there -was no superabundance of sobriety in the town. -‘The worst thing,’ says that sly humorist in his -<cite>Journey</cite> (1623),<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_139" id="Page_139">{139}</a></span> ‘was, that wine and ale were so -scarce, and the people such misers of it, that every night, before -I went to bed, if any man had asked me a civil question, all the -wit in my head could not have made him a sober answer.’</p> - -<p>The <i lang="la" xml:lang="la">diurnal</i> of a Scottish judge<a name="FNanchor_130" id="FNanchor_130"></a><a href="#Footnote_130" class="fnanchor">[130]</a> of the beginning of the last -century, which I have perused, presents a striking picture of the -habits of men of business in that age. Hardly a night passes -without some expense being incurred at taverns, not always of -very good fame, where his lordship’s associates on the bench were -his boon-companions in the debauch. One is at a loss to understand -how men who drugged their understandings so habitually -could possess any share of vital faculty for the consideration -or transaction of business, or how they contrived to make a decent -appearance in the hours of duty. But, however difficult to be -accounted for, there seems no room to doubt that deep drinking -was compatible in many instances with good business talents, and -even application. Many living men connected with the Court of -Session can yet look back to a juvenile period of their lives when -some of the ablest advocates and most esteemed judges were -noted for their convivial habits. For example, a famous counsel -named Hay, who became a judge under the designation of Lord -Newton, was equally remarkable as a bacchanal and as a lawyer.<a name="FNanchor_131" id="FNanchor_131"></a><a href="#Footnote_131" class="fnanchor">[131]</a> -He considered himself as only the better fitted for business that -he had previously imbibed six bottles of claret; and one of his -clerks afterwards declared that the best paper he ever knew his -lordship dictate was done after a debauch where that amount of -liquor had fallen to his share. It was of him that the famous -story is told of a client calling for him one day at four o’clock, -and being surprised to find him at dinner; when, on the client -saying to the servant that he had understood five to be Mr Hay’s -dinner-hour—‘Oh, but, sir,’ said the man, ‘it is his <em>yesterday’s -dinner</em>!’ M. Simond, who, in 1811, published a <cite>Tour in Scotland</cite>, -mentions his surprise, on stepping one morning into the Parliament -House, to find in the dignified capacity of a judge, and displaying -all the gravity suitable to the character, the very gentleman with -whom he had spent most of the preceding night in a fierce -debauch. This judge was Lord Newton.</p> - -<p>Contemporary with this learned lord was another of marvellous -powers of drollery, of whom it is told, as a fact too notorious at -the time to be concealed, that he was one Sunday morning, not -long before church-time, found asleep among the paraphernalia<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_140" id="Page_140">{140}</a></span> -of the sweeps, in a shed appropriated to the keeping of these -articles at the end of the Town Guard-house in the High Street. -His lordship, in staggering homeward alone from a tavern during -the night, had tumbled into this place, where consciousness did -not revisit him till next day. Of another group of clever but -over-convivial lawyers of that age, it is related that, having set -to wine and cards on a Saturday evening, they were so cheated -out of all sense of time that the night passed before they thought -of separating. Unless they are greatly belied, the people passing -along Picardy Place next forenoon, on their way to church, were -perplexed by seeing a door open, and three gentlemen issue forth, -in all the disorder to be expected after a night of drunken vigils, -while a fourth, in his dressing-gown, held the door in one hand -and a lighted candle in the other, by way of showing them out!<a name="FNanchor_132" id="FNanchor_132"></a><a href="#Footnote_132" class="fnanchor">[132]</a></p> - -<p>The <em>High Jinks</em> of Counsellor Pleydell, in <cite>Guy Mannering</cite>, -must have prepared many for these curious traits of a bypast -age; and Scott has further illustrated the subject by telling, in -his notes to that novel, an anecdote, which he appears to have -had upon excellent authority, respecting the elder President -Dundas of Arniston, father of Lord Melville. ‘It had been -thought very desirable, while that distinguished lawyer was king’s -counsel, that his assistance should be obtained in drawing up an -appeal case, which, as occasion for such writings then rarely -occurred, was held to be a matter of great nicety. The solicitor -employed for the appellant, attended by my informant, acting -as his clerk, went to the Lord Advocate’s chambers in the Fishmarket -Close, as I think. It was Saturday at noon, the court was -just dismissed, the Lord Advocate had changed his dress and -booted himself, and his servant and horses were at the foot of the -close to carry him to Arniston. It was scarcely possible to get -him to listen to a word respecting business. The wily agent, -however, on pretence of asking one or two questions, which would -not detain him half-an-hour, drew his lordship, who was no less -an eminent <i lang="fr" xml:lang="fr">bon-vivant</i> than a lawyer of unequalled talent, to take -a whet at a celebrated tavern, when the learned counsel became -gradually involved in a spirited discussion of the law points of the -case. At length it occurred to him that he might as well ride to -Arniston in the cool of the evening. The horses were directed -to be put into the stable, but not to be unsaddled. Dinner was -ordered, the law was laid aside for a time, and the bottle circulated<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_141" id="Page_141">{141}</a></span> -very freely. At nine o’clock at night, after he had been honouring -Bacchus for so many hours, the Lord Advocate ordered his horses -to be unsaddled—paper, pen, and ink were brought—he began -to dictate the appeal case, and continued at his task till four -o’clock the next morning. By next day’s post the solicitor sent -the case to London—a <i lang="fr" xml:lang="fr">chef-d’œuvre</i> of its kind; and in which, my -informant assured me, it was not necessary, on revisal, to correct -five words.’</p> - -<p>It was not always that business and pleasure were so successfully -united. It is related that an eminent lawyer, who was -confined to his room by indisposition, having occasion for the -attendance of his clerk at a late hour, in order to draw up a -paper required on an emergency next morning, sent for and -found him at his usual tavern. The man, though remarkable -for the preservation of his faculties under severe application to -the bottle, was on this night further gone than usual. He was -able, however, to proceed to his master’s bedroom, and there -take his seat at the desk with the appearance of a sufficiently -collected mind, so that the learned counsel, imagining nothing -more wrong than usual, began to dictate from his couch. This -went on for two or three hours, till, the business being finished, -the barrister drew his curtain—to behold <em>Jamie</em> lost in a profound -sleep upon the table, with the paper still in virgin whiteness -before him!</p> - -<p>One of the most notable jolly fellows of the last age was -James Balfour, an accountant, usually called <em>Singing Jamie -Balfour</em>, on account of his fascinating qualities as a vocalist. -There used to be a portrait of him in the Leith Golf-house, -representing him in the act of commencing the favourite song -of <em>When I ha’e a saxpence under my thoom</em>, with the suitable -attitude and a merriness of countenance justifying the traditionary -account of the man. Of Jacobite leanings, he is said to have -sung <cite>The wee German lairdie</cite>, <cite>Awa, Whigs, awa</cite>, and <cite>The sow’s -tail to Geordie</cite> with a degree of zest which there was no resisting.</p> - -<p>Report speaks of this person as an amiable, upright, and able -man; so clever in business matters that he could do as much -in one hour as another man in three; always eager to quench -and arrest litigation rather than to promote it; and consequently -so much esteemed professionally that he could get business -whenever he chose to undertake it, which, however, he only did -when he felt himself in need of money. Nature had given him -a robust constitution, which enabled him to see out three sets of<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_142" id="Page_142">{142}</a></span> -boon-companions, but, after all, gave way before he reached -sixty. His custom, when anxious to repair the effects of intemperance, -was to wash his head and hands in cold water; this, it -is said, made him quite cool and collected almost immediately. -Pleasure being so predominant an object in his life, it was thought -surprising that at his death he was found in possession of some -little money.</p> - -<p>The powers of Balfour as a singer of the Scotch songs of all -kinds, tender and humorous, are declared to have been marvellous; -and he had a happy gift of suiting them to occasions. Being a -great peacemaker, he would often accomplish his purpose by -introducing some ditty pat to the purpose, and thus dissolving -all rancour in a hearty laugh. Like too many of our countrymen, -he had a contempt for foreign music. One evening, in a company -where an Italian vocalist of eminence was present, he professed to -give a song in the manner of that country. Forth came a ridiculous -cantata to the tune of <cite>Aiken Drum</cite>, beginning: ‘There was -a wife in Peebles,’ which the wag executed with all the proper -graces, shakes, and appoggiaturas, making his friends almost expire -with suppressed laughter at the contrast between the style of -singing and the ideas conveyed in the song. At the conclusion, -their mirth was doubled by the foreigner saying very simply: -‘De music be very fine, but I no understand de words.’ A lady, -who lived in the Parliament Close, told a friend of mine that she -was wakened from her sleep one summer morning by a noise as -of singing, when, going to the window to learn what was the -matter, guess her surprise at seeing Jamie Balfour and some of -his boon-companions (evidently fresh from their wonted orgies), -singing <cite>The king shall enjoy his own again</cite>, on their knees, -around King Charles’s statue! One of Balfour’s favourite haunts -was a humble kind of tavern called <em>Jenny Ha’s</em>, opposite to -Queensberry House, where, it is said, Gay had boosed during his -short stay in Edinburgh, and to which it was customary for -gentlemen to adjourn from dinner-parties, in order to indulge in -claret from the butt, free from the usual domestic restraints. -Jamie’s potations here were principally of what was called <em>cappie -ale</em>—that is, ale in little wooden bowls—with wee thochts of -brandy in it. But, indeed, no one could be less exclusive than -he as to liquors. When he heard a bottle drawn in any house -he happened to be in, and observed the cork to give an unusually -smart report, he would call out: ‘Lassie, gi’e me a glass o’ <em>that</em>;’ -as knowing that, whatever it was, it must be good of its kind.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_143" id="Page_143">{143}</a></span></p> - -<p>Sir Walter Scott says, in one of his droll little missives to his -printer Ballantyne: ‘When the press does not follow me, I get -on slowly and ill, and put myself in mind of Jamie Balfour, who -could run, when he could not stand still.’ He here alludes to a -matter of fact, which the following anecdote will illustrate: Jamie, -in going home late from a debauch, happened to tumble into the -pit formed for the foundation of a -house in James’s Square. A gentleman -passing heard his complaint, and -going up to the spot, was entreated -by our hero to help him out. -‘What would be the use of helping -you out,’ said the passer-by, ‘when -you could not stand though you -<em>were</em> out?’ ‘Very true, perhaps; -yet if you help me up, I’ll <em>run</em> you -to the Tron Kirk for a bottle of -claret.’ Pleased with his humour, -the gentleman placed him upon his -feet, when instantly he set off for -the Tron Church at a pace distancing -all ordinary competition; and -accordingly he won the race, though, -at the conclusion, he had to sit down -on the steps of the church, being -quite unable to stand. After taking -a minute or two to recover his -breath—‘Well, another race to -Fortune’s for another bottle of -claret!’ Off he went to the tavern -in question, in the Stamp-office -Close, and this bet he gained also. -The claret, probably with continuations, -was discussed in Fortune’s; and the end of the story is, -Balfour sent his new friend home in a chair, utterly done up, at -an early hour in the morning.</p> - -<div class="figcenter w200"> -<img src="images/illus_p_143.jpg" width="200" height="404" alt="" /> -<div class="caption"><p class="center">Stamp-office Close.</p></div> -</div> - -<p>It is hardly surprising that habits carried to such an extravagance -amongst gentlemen should have in some small degree -affected the fairer and purer part of creation also. It is an old -story in Edinburgh that three ladies had one night a merry-meeting -in a tavern near the Cross, where they sat till a very -late hour. Ascending at length to the street, they scarcely<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_144" id="Page_144">{144}</a></span> -remembered where they were; but as it was good moonlight, -they found little difficulty in walking along till they came to the -Tron Church. Here, however, an obstacle occurred. The moon, -shining high in the south, threw the shadow of the steeple directly -across the street from the one side to the other; and the ladies, -being no more clear-sighted than they were clear-headed, mistook -this for a broad and rapid river, which they would require to cross -before making further way. In this delusion, they sat down upon -the brink of the imaginary stream, deliberately took off their shoes -and stockings, <em>kilted</em> their lower garments, and proceeded to wade -through to the opposite side; after which, resuming their shoes -and stockings, they went on their way rejoicing, as before! -Another anecdote (from an aged nobleman) exhibits the bacchanalian -powers of our ancestresses in a different light. During the -rising of 1715, the officers of the crown in Edinburgh, having -procured some important intelligence respecting the motions and -intentions of the Jacobites, resolved upon despatching the same -to London by a faithful courier. Of this the party whose interests -would have been so materially affected got notice; and that -evening, as the messenger (a man of rank) was going down the -High Street, with the intention of mounting his horse in the -Canongate and immediately setting off, he met two tall, handsome -ladies, in full dress, and wearing black velvet masks, who accosted -him with a very easy demeanour and a winning sweetness of -voice. Without hesitating as to the quality of these damsels, he -instantly proposed to treat them with a pint of claret at a -neighbouring tavern; but they said that, instead of accepting his -kindness, they were quite willing to treat <em>him</em> to his heart’s -content. They then adjourned to the tavern, and sitting down, -the whole three drank plenteously, merrily, and long, so that the -courier seemed at last to forget entirely the mission upon which -he was sent, and the danger of the papers which he had about -his person. After a pertinacious debauch of several hours, the -luckless messenger was at length fairly drunk under the table; -and it is needless to add that the fair nymphs then proceeded -to strip him of his papers, decamped, and were no more heard -of; though it is but justice to the Scottish ladies of that period -to say that the robbers were generally believed at the time to -be young men disguised in women’s clothes.<a name="FNanchor_133" id="FNanchor_133"></a><a href="#Footnote_133" class="fnanchor">[133]</a></p> -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_145" id="Page_145">{145}</a></span></p> -<p>The custom which prevailed among ladies, as well as gentlemen, -of resorting to what were called <em>oyster-cellars</em>, is in itself a striking -indication of the state of manners during the last century. In -winter, when the evening had set in, a party of the most fashionable -people in town, collected by appointment, would adjourn in -carriages to one of those abysses of darkness and comfort, called -in Edinburgh <em>laigh shops</em>, where they proceeded to regale themselves -with raw oysters and porter, arranged in huge dishes upon -a coarse table, in a dingy room, lighted by tallow candles. The -rudeness of the feast, and the vulgarity of the circumstances under -which it took place, seem to have given a zest to its enjoyment, -with which more refined banquets could not have been accompanied. -One of the chief features of an oyster-cellar entertainment was -that full scope was given to the conversational powers of the -company. Both ladies and gentlemen indulged, without restraint, -in sallies the merriest and the wittiest; and a thousand remarks -and jokes, which elsewhere would have been suppressed as improper, -were here sanctified by the oddity of the scene, and appreciated -by the most dignified and refined. After the table was cleared of -the oysters and porter, it was customary to introduce brandy or -rum-punch—according to the pleasure of the ladies—after which -dancing took place; and when the female part of the assemblage -thought proper to retire, the gentlemen again sat down, or -adjourned to another tavern to crown the pleasures of the evening -with unlimited debauch. It is not (1824) more than thirty years -since the late Lord Melville, the Duchess of Gordon, and some -other persons of distinction, who happened to meet in town after -many years of absence, made up an oyster-cellar party, by way -of a frolic, and devoted one winter evening to the revival of this -almost forgotten entertainment of their youth.<a name="FNanchor_134" id="FNanchor_134"></a><a href="#Footnote_134" class="fnanchor">[134]</a></p> -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_146" id="Page_146">{146}</a></span></p> -<p>It seems difficult to reconcile all these things with the staid -and somewhat square-toed character which our country has obtained -amongst her neighbours. The fact seems to be that a kind of -Laodicean principle is observable in Scotland, and we oscillate -between a rigour of manners on the one hand, and a laxity on -the other, which alternately acquire an apparent paramouncy. In -the early part of the last century, rigour was in the ascendant; -but not to the prevention of a respectable minority of the free-and-easy, -who kept alive the flame of conviviality with no small -degree of success. In the latter half of the century—a dissolute -era all over civilised Europe—the minority became the majority, -and the characteristic sobriety of the nation’s manners was only -traceable in certain portions of society. Now we are in a sober, -perhaps tending to a rigorous stage once more. In Edinburgh, -seventy years ago (1847), intemperance was the rule to such an -degree that exception could hardly be said to exist. Men appeared -little in the drawing-room in those days; when they did, not -infrequently their company had better have been dispensed with. -When a gentleman gave an entertainment, it was thought necessary -that he should press the bottle as far as it could be made to go. -A particularly good fellow would lock his outer door to prevent -any guest of dyspeptic tendencies or sober inclinations from -escaping. Some were so considerate as to provide shake-down -beds for a general bivouac in a neighbouring apartment. When -gentlemen were obliged to appear at assemblies where decency -was enforced, they of course wore their best attire. This it was -customary to change for something less liable to receive damage, -ere going, as they usually did, to conclude the evening by a -scene of conviviality. Drinking entered into everything. As Sir -Alexander Boswell has observed:</p> - -<div class="poetry-container"><div class="poetry"><div class="stanza"> -<div class="verse">‘O’er draughts of wine the beau would moan his love,</div> -<div class="verse">O’er draughts of wine the cit his bargain drove,</div> -<div class="verse">O’er draughts of wine the writer penned the will,</div> -<div class="verse">And legal wisdom counselled o’er a gill.’</div> -</div></div></div> - -<p>Then was the time when men, despising and neglecting the company<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_147" id="Page_147">{147}</a></span> -of women, always so civilising in its influence, would yet -half-kill themselves with bumpers in order, as the phrase went, to -<em>save them</em>. Drinking to save the ladies is said to have originated -with a catch-club, which issued tickets for gratuitous concerts. -Many tickets with the names of ladies being prepared, one was -taken up and the name announced. Any member present was -at liberty to toast the health of this lady in a bumper, and this -ensured her ticket being reserved for her use. If no one came -forward to honour her name in this manner, the lady was said to -be damned, and her ticket was thrown under the table. Whether -from this origin or not, the practice is said to have ultimately had -the following form. One gentleman would give out the name of -some lady as the most beautiful object in creation, and, by way -of attesting what he said, drink one bumper. Another champion -would then enter the field, and offer to prove that a certain other -lady, whom he named, was a great deal more beautiful than she -just mentioned—supporting his assertion by drinking two bumpers. -Then the other would rise up, declare this to be false, and in -proof of his original statement, as well as by way of turning the -scale upon his opponent, drink four bumpers. Not deterred or -repressed by this, the second man would reiterate, and conclude -by drinking as much as the challenger, who would again start up -and drink eight bumpers; and so on, in geometrical progression, -till one or other of the heroes fell under the table; when of course -the fair Delia of the survivor was declared the queen supreme -of beauty by all present. I have seen a sonnet addressed -on the morning after such a scene of contention to the lady -concerned by the unsuccessful hero, whose brains appear to have -been woefully muddled by the claret he had drunk in her behalf.</p> - -<p>It was not merely in the evenings that taverns were then -resorted to. There was a petty treat, called a ‘meridian,’ which -no man of that day thought himself able to dispense with; and -this was generally indulged in at a tavern. ‘A cauld cock and -a feather’ was the metaphorical mode of calling for a glass of -brandy and a bunch of raisins, which was the favourite regale of -many. Others took a glass of whisky, some few a lunch. Scott -very amusingly describes, from his own observation, the manner -in which the affair of the meridian was gone about by the writers -and clerks belonging to the Parliament House. ‘If their proceedings -were watched, they might be seen to turn fidgety about -the hour of noon, and exchange looks with each other from their -separate desks, till at length some one of formal and dignified<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_148" id="Page_148">{148}</a></span> -presence assumed the honour of leading the band; when away -they went, threading the crowd like a string of wild-fowl, crossed -the square or close, and following each other into the [John’s] -coffee-house, drank the meridian, which was placed ready at the -bar. This they did day by day; and though they did not speak -to each other, they seemed to attach a certain degree of sociability -to performing the ceremony in company.’</p> - -<p>It was in the evening, of course, that the tavern debaucheries -assumed their proper character of unpalliated fierceness and -destructive duration. In the words of Robert Fergusson:</p> - -<div class="poetry-container"><div class="poetry"><div class="stanza"> -<div class="wideverse">‘Now night, that’s cunzied chief for fun,</div> -<div class="wideverse">Is with her usual rites begun.</div> -<div class="wideverse indent8"> * * * *</div> -<div class="wideverse indent8">Some to porter, some to punch,</div> -<div class="wideverse">Retire; while noisy ten-hours’ drum</div> -<div class="wideverse">Gars a’ the trades gang danderin’ hame.</div> -<div class="wideverse">Now, mony a club, jocose and free,</div> -<div class="wideverse">Gi’e a’ to merriment and glee;</div> -<div class="wideverse">Wi’ sang and glass they fley the power</div> -<div class="wideverse">O’ care, that wad harass the hour.</div> -<div class="wideverse indent8"> * * * *</div> -<div class="wideverse indent8">Chief, <span class="smcap">O Cape</span>! we crave thy aid,</div> -<div class="wideverse">To get our cares and poortith laid.</div> -<div class="wideverse">Sincerity and genius true,</div> -<div class="wideverse">O’ knights have ever been the due.</div> -<div class="wideverse">Mirth, music, porter deepest-dyed,</div> -<div class="wideverse">Are never here to worth denied.’</div> -</div></div></div> - -<p>All the shops in the town were then shut at eight o’clock; and -from that hour till ten—when the drum of the Town-guard -announced at once a sort of license for the deluging of the streets -with nuisances,<a name="FNanchor_135" id="FNanchor_135"></a><a href="#Footnote_135" class="fnanchor">[135]</a> and a warning of the inhabitants home to their -beds—unrestrained scope was given to the delights of the table. -No tradesman thought of going home to his family till after he -had spent an hour or two at his club. This was universal and -unfailing. So lately as 1824, I knew something of an old-fashioned -tradesman who nightly shut his shop at eight o’clock, and then -adjourned with two old friends, who called upon him at that hour, -to a quiet old public-house on the opposite side of the way, -where they each drank precisely one bottle of Edinburgh ale, ate -precisely one halfpenny roll, and got upon their legs precisely -at the first stroke of ten o’clock.</p> -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_149" id="Page_149">{149}</a></span></p> -<p>The <span class="smcap">Cape Club</span> alluded to by Fergusson aspired to a refined -and classical character, comprising amongst its numerous members -many men of talents, as well as of private worth. Fergusson -himself was a member; as were Mr Thomas Sommers, his friend -and biographer; Mr Woods, a player of eminence on the humble -boards of Edinburgh, and an intimate companion of the poet; -and Mr Runciman the painter. The name of the club had its -foundation in one of those weak jokes such as ‘gentle dullness -ever loves.’ A person who lived in the Calton was in the custom -of spending an hour or two every evening with one or two city -friends, and being sometimes detained till after the regular period -when the Netherbow Port was shut, it occasionally happened that -he had either to remain in the city all night, or was under the -necessity of bribing the porter who attended the gate. This -difficult <em>pass</em>—partly on account of the rectangular corner which -he turned immediately on getting out of the Port, as he went -homewards down Leith Wynd—the Calton burgher facetiously -called <em>doubling the Cape</em>; and as it was customary with his friends -every evening when they assembled to inquire ‘how he turned -the Cape last night,’ and indeed to make that circumstance and -that phrase, night after night, the subject of their conversation -and amusement, ‘the Cape’ in time became so assimilated with -their very existence that they adopted it as a title; and it was -retained as such by the organised club into which shortly after -they thought proper to form themselves. The Cape Club owned -a regular institution from 1763. It will scarcely be credited in -the present day that a jest of the above nature could keep an -assemblage of rational citizens, and, we may add, professed wits, -merry after a thousand repetitions. Yet it really is true that -the patron-jests of many a numerous and enlightened association -were no better than this, and the greater part of them worse. -As instance the following:</p> - -<p>There was the <span class="smcap">Antemanum Club</span>, of which the members used to -boast of the state of their hands, <em>before-hand</em>, in playing at ‘Brag.’ -The members were all men of respectability, some of them gentlemen -of fortune. They met every Saturday and dined. It was at -first a purely convivial club; but latterly, the Whig party gaining -a sort of preponderance, it degenerated into a political association.</p> - -<p>The <span class="smcap">Pious Club</span> was composed of decent, orderly citizens, who -met every night, Sundays not excepted, in a <em>pie-house</em>, and whose -joke was the <i lang="fr" xml:lang="fr">équivoque</i> of these expressions—similar in sound, but -different in signification. The agreeable uncertainty as to whether<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_150" id="Page_150">{150}</a></span> -their name arose from their <em>piety</em>, or the circumstance of their -eating <em>pies</em>, kept the club hearty for many years. At their Sunday -meetings the conversation usually took a serious turn—perhaps -upon the sermons which they had -respectively heard during the day: -this they considered as rendering -their title of <em>Pious</em> not altogether -undeserved. Moreover, they were -all, as the saying was, <em>ten o’clock -men</em>, and of good character. Fifteen -persons were considered as -constituting a full night. The -whole allowable debauch was a gill -of toddy to each person, which was -drunk, like wine, out of a common -decanter. One of the members of -the Pious Club was a Mr Lind, a -man of at least twenty-five stone -weight, immoderately fond of good -eating and drinking. It was generally -believed of him that were all -the oxen he had devoured ranged in -a line, they would reach from the Watergate to the Castle-hill, and -that the wine he had drunk would swim a seventy-four. His most -favourite viand was a very strange one—salmon skins. When -dining anywhere, with salmon on the table, he made no scruple of -raking all the skins off the plates of the rest of the guests. He -had only one toast, from which he never varied: ‘Merry days to -honest fellows.’ A Mr Drummond was esteemed poet-laureate to -this club. He was a facetious, clever man. Of his poetical talents, -take a specimen in the following lines on Lind:</p> - -<div class="poetry-container"><div class="poetry"><div class="stanza"> -<div class="verse">‘In going to dinner, he ne’er lost his way,</div> -<div class="verse">Though often, when done, he was carted away.’</div> -</div></div></div> - -<p>He made the following impromptu on an associate of small figure -and equally small understanding, who had been successful in the -world:</p> - -<div class="poetry-container"><div class="poetry"><div class="stanza"> -<div class="verse">‘O thou of genius slow,</div> -<div class="verse indent2">Weak by nature;</div> -<div class="verse">A rich fellow,</div> -<div class="verse indent2">But a poor creature.’</div> -</div></div></div> - -<div class="figcenter w200"> -<img src="images/illus_p_150.jpg" width="200" height="249" alt="" /> -<div class="caption"><p class="center">The Watergate.</p></div> -</div> - -<p>The <span class="smcap">Spendthrift Club</span> took its name from the extravagance of -the members in spending no less a sum than fourpence halfpenny<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_151" id="Page_151">{151}</a></span> -each night! It consisted of respectable citizens of the middle -class, and continued in 1824 to exist in a modified state. Its -meetings, originally nightly, were then reduced to four a week. -The men used to play at whist for a halfpenny—one, two, three—no -rubbers; but latterly they had, with their characteristic -extravagance, doubled the stake! Supper originally cost no less -than twopence; and half a bottle of strong ale, with a dram, stood -every member twopence halfpenny; to all which sumptuous profusion -might be added still another halfpenny, which was given to -the maid-servant—in all, fivepence! Latterly the dram had been -disused; but such had been the general increase, either in the -cost or the quantity of the indulgences, that the usual nightly -expense was ultimately from a shilling to one and fourpence. The -winnings at whist were always thrown into the reckoning. A large -two-quart bottle or tappit-hen was introduced by the landlady, -with a small measure, out of which the company helped themselves; -and the members made up their own bill with chalk upon the table. -In 1824, in the recollection of the senior members, some of whom -were of fifty years’ standing, the house was kept by the widow of -a Lieutenant Hamilton of the army, who recollected having -attended the theatre in the Tennis Court at Holyroodhouse, when -the play was the <cite>Spanish Friar</cite>, and when many of the members -of the <em>Union Parliament</em> were present in the house.</p> - -<div class="figcenter w250"> -<img src="images/illus_p_151.jpg" width="250" height="391" alt="" /> -<div class="caption"><p class="center">Tappit-hen.</p></div> -</div> - -<p>The <span class="smcap">Boar Club</span> was an association of a different sort, consisting -chiefly of wild, fashionable young men; and the place of meeting -was not in any of the snug profundities of the Old Town, -but in a modern tavern in Shakspeare Square, kept by -one Daniel Hogg. The <em>joke</em> of this club consisted in -the supposition that all the members were <em>boars</em>, that -their room was a <em>sty</em>, that their talk was <em>grunting</em>, -and in the <i lang="fr" xml:lang="fr">double-entendre</i> of the small piece of stone-ware -which served as a repository of all the fines being -a <em>pig</em>. Upon this they lived twenty years. I have, at -some expense of eyesight and with no small exertion of -patience, perused the soiled and blotted records of the -club, which in 1824 were preserved by an old vintner, -whose house was their last place of meeting; and -the result has been the following memorabilia. -The Boar Club commenced its meetings in 1787, -and the original members were J. G. C. Schetky, -a German musician; David Shaw; Archibald -Crawfuird; Patrick Robertson; Robert Aldridge,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_152" id="Page_152">{152}</a></span> -a famed pantomimist and dancing-master; James Neilson; -and Luke Cross. Some of these were remarkable men, in particular -Mr Schetky. He had come to Edinburgh about the beginning of -the reign of George III. He used to tell that on alighting at -Ramsay’s inn, opposite the Cowgate Port, his first impression of -the city was so unfavourable that he was on the point of leaving -it again without further acquaintance, and was only prevented -from doing so by the solicitations of his fellow-traveller, who was -not so much alarmed at the dingy and squalid appearance of this -part of Auld Reekie.<a name="FNanchor_136" id="FNanchor_136"></a><a href="#Footnote_136" class="fnanchor">[136]</a> He was first employed at St Cecilia’s Hall, -where the concerts were attended by all the ‘rank, beauty, and -fashion’ of which Edinburgh could then boast, and where, besides -the professional performers, many amateurs of great musical skill -and enthusiasm, such as Mr Tytler of Woodhouselee,<a name="FNanchor_137" id="FNanchor_137"></a><a href="#Footnote_137" class="fnanchor">[137]</a> were pleased -to exhibit themselves for the entertainment of their friends, who -alone were admitted by tickets. Mr Schetky composed the march -of a body of volunteers called the Edinburgh Defensive Band,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_153" id="Page_153">{153}</a></span> -which was raised out of the citizens of Edinburgh at the time of -the American war, and was commanded by the eminent advocate -Crosbie. One of the verses to which the march was set may be -given as an admirable specimen of <em>militia poetry</em>:</p> - -<div class="poetry-container"><div class="poetry"><div class="stanza"> -<div class="verse">‘Colonel Crosbie takes the field;</div> -<div class="verse">To France and Spain he will not yield;</div> -<div class="verse">But still maintains his high command</div> -<div class="verse">At the head of the noble Defensive Band.’<a name="FNanchor_138" id="FNanchor_138"></a><a href="#Footnote_138" class="fnanchor">[138]</a></div> -</div></div></div> - -<div class="figcenter w500"> -<a id="illus_c_014"></a> -<img src="images/illus_c_014.jpg" width="500" height="658" alt="" /> -<div class="caption"><p class="center">‘AULD REEKIE’<br /> -from Largo.</p> - -<p class="right"> -<span class="smcap"><a href="#Page_152">Page 152.</a></span> - -</p></div> -</div> - -<p>Mr Schetky was primarily concerned in the founding of the Boar -Club. He was in the habit of meeting every night with Mr -Aldridge and one or two other professional men, or gentlemen -who affected the society of such persons, in Hogg’s tavern; and it -was the host’s name that suggested the idea of calling their society -the ‘<em>Boar</em> Club.’ Their laws were first written down in proper -form in 1790. They were to meet every evening at seven o’clock; -each <em>boar</em>, on his entry, to contribute a halfpenny to the <em>pig</em>. Mr -Aldridge was to be perpetual <em>Grand-boar</em>, with Mr Schetky for his -deputy; and there were other officers, entitled Secretary, Treasurer, -and Procurator-fiscal. A fine of one halfpenny was imposed upon -every person who called one of his brother-boars by his proper out-of-club -name—the term ‘sir’ being only allowed. The entry-moneys, -fines, and other pecuniary acquisitions were hoarded for a -grand annual dinner. The laws were revised in 1799, when some -new officials were constituted, such as Poet-laureate, Champion, -Archbishop, and Chief-grunter. The fines were then rendered -exceedingly severe, and in their exaction no one met with any -mercy, as it was the interest of all the rest that the <em>pig</em> should -bring forth as plenteous a <em>farrow</em> as possible at the grand dinner-day. -This practice at length occasioning a violent insurrection in -the <em>sty</em>, the whole fraternity was broken up, and never again -returned to ‘wallow in the mire.’</p> - -<p>The <span class="smcap">Hell-fire Club</span>, a terrible and infamous association of wild -young men about the beginning of the last century, met in various -profound places throughout Edinburgh, where they practised -orgies not more fit for seeing the light than the Eleusinian<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_154" id="Page_154">{154}</a></span> -Mysteries. I have conversed with old people who had seen the -last worn-out members of the Hell-fire Club, which in the country -is to this day believed to have been an association in compact with -the Prince of Darkness.</p> - -<p>Many years afterwards, a set of persons associated for the purpose -of purchasing goods condemned by the Court of Exchequer. -For what reason I cannot tell, they called themselves the Hell-fire -Club, and their president was named the Devil. My old friend, -Henry Mackenzie, whose profession was that of an attorney before -the Court of Exchequer, wrote me a note on this subject, in which -he says very naïvely: ‘In my youngest days, I knew the Devil.’</p> - -<p>The <span class="smcap">Sweating Club</span> flourished about the middle of the last -century. They resembled the Mohocks mentioned in the <cite>Spectator</cite>. -After intoxicating themselves, it was their custom to sally forth at -midnight, and attack whomsoever they met upon the streets. Any -luckless wight who happened to fall into their hands was chased, -jostled, pinched, and pulled about, till he not only perspired, but -was ready to drop down and die with exhaustion. Even so late as -the early years of this century, it was unsafe to walk the streets of -Edinburgh at night on account of the numerous drunken parties -of young men who then reeled about, bent on mischief, at all hours, -and from whom the Town-guard were unable to protect the sober -citizen.</p> - -<p>A club called the <span class="smcap">Industrious Company</span> may serve to show how -far the system of drinking was carried by our fathers. It was a -sort of joint-stock company, formed by a numerous set of porter-drinkers, -who thought fit to club towards the formation of a stock -of that liquor, which they might partly profit by retailing, and -partly by the opportunity thus afforded them of drinking their -own particular tipple at the wholesale price. Their cellars were -in the Royal Bank Close, where they met every night at eight -o’clock. Each member paid at his entry £5, and took his turn -monthly of the duty of superintending the general business of the -company. But the curse of joint-stock companies—negligence on -the part of the managers—ultimately occasioned the ruin of the -Industrious Company.</p> - -<p>About 1790, a club of first-rate citizens used to meet each -Saturday afternoon for a <em>country dinner</em>, in a tavern which still -exists in the village of Canonmills, a place now involved within -the limits of the New Town. To quote a brief memoir on the -subject, handed to me many years ago by a veteran friend, who -was a good deal of the <i lang="la" xml:lang="la">laudator temporis acti</i>:<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_155" id="Page_155">{155}</a></span> ‘The club was -pointedly attended; it was too good a thing to miss being present -at. They kept their own claret, and managed all matters as to -living perfectly well.’ Originally the fraternity were contented -with a very humble room; but in time they got an addition built -to the house for their accommodation, comprehending one good-sized -room with two windows, in one of which is a pane containing -an olive-dove; in the other, one containing a wheat-sheaf, both -engraved with a diamond. ‘This,’ continues Mr Johnston, ‘was -the doing of William Ramsay [banker], then residing at Warriston—the -tongue of the trump to the club. Here he took great -delight to drink claret on the Saturdays, though he had such a -paradise near at hand to retire to; but then there were Jamie -Torry, Jamie Dickson, Gilbert Laurie, and other good old council -friends with whom to crack [that is, chat]; and the said cracks -were of more value in this dark, unseemly place than the enjoyments -of home. I never pass these two engraved panes of glass -but I venerate them, and wonder that, in the course of fifty years, -they have not been destroyed, either from drunkenness within or -from misrule without.’<a name="FNanchor_139" id="FNanchor_139"></a><a href="#Footnote_139" class="fnanchor">[139]</a></p> - -<p>Edinburgh boasted of many other associations of the like nature, -which it were perhaps best merely to enumerate in a tabular form, -with the appropriate joke opposite each, as</p> - -<div class="center"> -<table border="0" cellpadding="2" cellspacing="0" summary=""> -<tr><td align="left"><span class="smcap">The Dirty Club</span></td><td align="left" colspan="2">No gentleman to appear in clean linen.</td></tr> -<tr><td align="left"><span class="smcap">The Black Wigs</span></td><td align="left" colspan="2">Members wore black wigs.</td></tr> -<tr><td align="left"><span class="smcap">The Odd Fellows</span></td><td align="left" colspan="2">Members wrote their names upside down.</td></tr> -<tr><td align="left"><span class="smcap">The Bonnet Lairds</span></td><td align="left" colspan="2">Members wore blue bonnets.</td></tr> -<tr><td align="left"><span class="smcap">The Doctors of Faculty Club</span></td><td align="left"><span class="xxlargebracket">{</span></td><td align="left">Members regarded as Physicians, and so -styled; wearing, moreover, gowns and wigs.</td></tr> -</table></div> - -<p>And so forth. There were the <span class="smcap">Caledonian Club</span> and the <span class="smcap">Union -Club</span>, of whose foundation history speaketh not. There was the -<span class="smcap">Wig Club</span>, the president of which wore a wig of extraordinary -materials, which had belonged to the Moray family for three -generations, and each new <em>entrant</em> of which drank to the fraternity -in a quart of claret without pulling bit. The Wigs usually drank -twopenny ale, on which it was possible to get satisfactorily drunk -for a groat; and with this they ate souters’ clods,<a name="FNanchor_140" id="FNanchor_140"></a><a href="#Footnote_140" class="fnanchor">[140]</a> a coarse,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_156" id="Page_156">{156}</a></span> -lumpish kind of loaf.<a name="FNanchor_141" id="FNanchor_141"></a><a href="#Footnote_141" class="fnanchor">[141]</a> There was also the <span class="smcap">Brownonian System -Club</span>, which, oddly enough, bore no reference to the license which -that system had given for a phlogistic regimen—for it was a douce -citizenly fraternity, venerating ten o’clock as a sacred principle—but -in honour of the founder of that system, who had been a -constituent member.</p> - -<p>The <span class="smcap">Lawnmarket Club</span> was composed chiefly of the woollen-traders -of that street, a set of whom met every morning about -seven o’clock, and walked down to the Post-office, where they -made themselves acquainted with the news of the morning. After -a plentiful discussion of the news, they adjourned to a public-house -and got a dram of brandy. As a sort of ironical and self-inflicted -satire upon the strength of their potations, they sometimes -called themselves the <em>Whey Club</em>. They were always the first -persons in the town to have a thorough knowledge of the foreign -news; and on Wednesday mornings, when there was no post from -London, it was their wont to meet as usual, and, in the absence -of real news, amuse themselves by the invention of what was -imaginary; and this they made it their business to circulate -among their uninitiated acquaintances in the course of the forenoon. -Any such unfounded articles of intelligence, on being -suspected or discovered, were usually called <em>Lawnmarket Gazettes</em>, -in allusion to their roguish originators.</p> - -<p>In the year 1705, when the Duke of Argyll was commissioner -in the Scottish parliament, a singular kind of fashionable club, or -coterie of ladies and gentlemen, was instituted, chiefly by the -exertions of the Earl of Selkirk, who was the distinguished beau -of that age. This was called the <span class="smcap">Horn Order</span>, a name which, as -usual, had its origin in the whim of a moment. A horn-spoon -having been used at some merry-meeting, it occurred to the club, -which was then in embryo, that this homely implement would be -a good badge for the projected society; and this being proposed, -it was instantly agreed by all the party that the ‘Order of the -Horn’ would be a good caricature of the more ancient and better-sanctioned<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_157" id="Page_157">{157}</a></span> -honorary dignities. The phrase was adopted; and the -members of the <em>Horn Order</em> met and caroused for many a day -under this strange designation, which, however, the common -people believed to mean more than met the ear. Indeed, if all -accounts of it be true, it must have been a species of masquerade, -in which the sexes were mixed and all ranks confounded.<a name="FNanchor_142" id="FNanchor_142"></a><a href="#Footnote_142" class="fnanchor">[142]</a></p> -<hr class="chap" /></div><div class="chapter"> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_158" id="Page_158">{158}</a></span></p> - - - -<h2><a name="TAVERNS_OF_OLD_TIMES" id="TAVERNS_OF_OLD_TIMES">TAVERNS OF OLD TIMES.</a></h2> - - -<p>When the worship of Bacchus held such sway in our city, his -peculiar temples—the taverns—must, one would suppose, -have been places of some importance. And so they were, comparatively -speaking; and yet, absolutely, an Edinburgh tavern of -the last century was no very fine or inviting place. Usually these -receptacles were situated in obscure places—in courts or closes, -away from the public thoroughfares; and often they presented -such narrow and stifling accommodations as might have been -expected to repel rather than attract visitors. The truth was, -however, that a coarse and darksome snugness was courted by -the worshippers. Large, well-lighted rooms, with a look-out to a -street, would not have suited them. But allow them to dive -through some Erebean alley, into a cavern-like house, and there -settle themselves in a cell unvisited of Phœbus, with some dingy -flamen of either sex to act as minister, and their views as to -circumstances and properties were fulfilled.</p> - -<p>The city traditions do not go far back into the eighteenth -century with respect to taverns; but we obtain some notion of the -principal houses in Queen Anne’s time from the Latin lyrics of -Dr Pitcairn, which Ruddiman published, in order to prove that -the Italian muse had not become extinct in our land since the -days of Buchanan. In an address <cite>To Strangers</cite>, the wit tells -those who would acquire some notion of our national manners to -avoid the triple church of St Giles’s:</p> - -<div class="poetry-container"><div class="poetry"><div class="stanza"> -<div class="verse">‘Tres ubi Cyclopes fanda nefanda boant’—</div> -</div></div></div> - -<p>where three horrible monsters bellow forth sacred and profane discourse—and -seek the requisite knowledge in the sanctuaries of the -rosy god, whose worship is conducted by night and by day. ‘At -one time,’ says he, ‘you may be delighted with the bowls of Steil -of the <em>Cross Keys</em>; then other heroes, at the <em>Ship</em>, will show you -the huge cups which belonged to mighty bibbers of yore. Or you -may seek out the sweet-spoken Katy at <em>Buchanan’s</em>, or <em>Tennant’s</em> -commodious house, where scalloped oysters will be brought in with -your wine. But <em>Hay</em> calls us, than whom no woman of milder -disposition or better-stored cellar can be named in the whole town. -Now it will gratify you to make your way into the Avernian<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_159" id="Page_159">{159}</a></span> -grottoes and caves never seen of the sun; but remember to make -friends with the dog which guards the threshold. Straightway -Mistress Anne will bring the native liquor. Seek the innermost -rooms and the snug seats: these know the sun, at least, when -Anne enters. What souls joying in the Lethæan flood you may -there see! what frolics, God willing, you may partake of! Mindless -of all that goes on in the outer world, joys not to be -told to mortal do they there imbibe. But perhaps you may -wish by-and-by to get back into the world—which is indeed no -easy matter. I recommend you, when about to descend, to take -with you a trusty Achates [a caddy]: say to Anne, “Be sure you -give him no drink.” By such means it was that Castor and Pollux -were able to issue forth from Pluto’s domain into the heavenly -spaces. Here you may be both merry and wise; but beware how -you toast kings and their French retreats,’ &c. The sites of -these merry places of yore are not handed down to us; but -respecting another, which Pitcairn shadows forth under the -mysterious appellation of <em>Greppa</em>, it chances that we possess some -knowledge. It was a suite of dark underground apartments in -the Parliament Close, opening by a descending stair opposite the -oriel of St Giles’s, in a mass of building called the Pillars. By the -wits who frequented it, it was called the <em>Greping-office</em>, because -one could only make way through its dark passages by groping. -It is curious to see how Pitcairn works this homely Scottish idea -into his Sapphics, talking, for example, by way of a good case of -bane and antidote, of</p> - -<div class="poetry-container"><div class="poetry"><div class="stanza"> -<div class="verse">‘Fraudes Egidii, venena Greppæ.’</div> -</div></div></div> - -<p>A venerable person has given me an anecdote of this singular -mixture of learning, wit, and professional skill in connection with -the Greping-office. Here, it seems, according to a custom which -lasted even in London till a later day, the clever physician used -to receive visits from his patients. On one occasion a woman -from the country called to consult him respecting the health of -her daughter, when he gave a shrewd hygienic advice in a pithy -metaphor not be mentioned to ears polite. When, in consequence -of following the prescription, the young woman had recovered her -health, the mother came back to the Greping-office to thank Dr -Pitcairn and give him a small present. Seeing him in precisely -the same place and circumstances, and surrounded by the same -companions as on the former occasion, she lingered with an -expression of surprise. On interrogation, she said she had only<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_160" id="Page_160">{160}</a></span> -one thing to speer at him (ask after), and she hoped he would not -be angry.</p> - -<p>‘Oh no, my good woman.’</p> - -<p>‘Well, sir, have you been sitting here ever since I saw you -last?’</p> - -<p>According to the same authority, small claret was then sold at -twentypence the Scottish pint, equivalent to tenpence a bottle. -Pitcairn once or twice sent his servant for a regale of this liquor -on the Sunday forenoon, and suffered the disappointment of having -it intercepted by the <em>seizers</em>, whose duty it was to make capture -of all persons found abroad in time of service, and appropriate -whatever they were engaged in carrying that smelled of the -common enjoyments of life. To secure his claret for the future -from this interference, the wit caused the wine on one occasion to -be drugged in such a manner as to produce consequences more -ludicrous than dangerous to those drinking it. The triumph he -thus attained over a power which there was no reaching by any -appeal to common-sense or justice must have been deeply relished -in the Greping-office.</p> - -<p>Pitcairn was professedly an Episcopalian, but he allowed himself -a latitude in wit which his contemporaries found some difficulty -in reconciling with any form of religion. Among the popular -charges against him was that he did not believe in the existence -of such a place as hell; a point of heterodoxy likely to be sadly -disrelished in Scotland. Being at a book-sale, where a copy of -Philostratus sold at a good price and a copy of the Bible was not -bidden for, Pitcairn said to some one who remarked the circumstance: -‘Not at all wonderful; for is it not written, “<i lang="la" xml:lang="la">Verbum Dei -manet in eternum</i>”?’ For this, one of the <em>Cyclopes</em>, a famous Mr -Webster, called him publicly an atheist. The story goes on to -state that Pitcairn prosecuted Webster for defamation in consequence, -but failed in the action from the following circumstance: -The defender, much puzzled what to do in the case, consulted a -shrewd-witted friend of his, a Mr Pettigrew, minister of Govan, -near Glasgow. Pettigrew came to Edinburgh to endeavour to -get him out of the scrape. ‘Strange,’ he said, ‘since he has -caught so much at your mouth, if we can catch nothing at his.’ -Having laid his plan, he came bustling up to the physician at -the Cross, and tapping him on the shoulder, said: ‘Are you Dr -Pitcairn the atheist?’</p> - -<p>The doctor, in his haste, overlooking the latter part of the -query, answered:<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_161" id="Page_161">{161}</a></span> ‘Yes.’</p> - -<p>‘Very good,’ said Pettigrew; ‘I take you all to witness that he -has confessed it himself.’</p> - -<p>Pitcairn, seeing how he had been outwitted, said bitterly to the -minister of Govan, whom he well knew: ‘Oh, Pettigrew, that -skull of yours is as deep as hell.’</p> - -<p>‘Oh, man,’ replied Pettigrew, ‘I’m glad to find you have come -to believe there is a hell.’ The prosecutor’s counsel, who stood -by at the time, recommended a compromise, which accordingly -took place.</p> - -<p>A son of Pitcairn was minister of Dysart; a very good kind -of man, who was sometimes consulted in a medical way by his -parishioners. He seems to have had a little of the paternal -humour, if we may judge from the following circumstance: A lady -came to ask what her maid-servant should do for sore or tender -eyes. The minister, seeing that no active treatment could be -recommended, said: ‘She must do naething wi’ them, but just -rub them wi’ her elbucks [elbows].’</p> - -<p>Allan Ramsay mentions, of Edinburgh taverns in his day,</p> - -<div class="poetry-container"><div class="poetry"><div class="stanza"> -<div class="verse">‘Cumin’s, Don’s, and Steil’s,’</div> -</div></div></div> - -<p>as places where one may be as well served as at <em>The Devil</em> in -London.</p> - -<div class="poetry-container"><div class="poetry"><div class="stanza"> -<div class="verse">‘’Tis strange, though true, he who would shun all evil,</div> -<div class="verse">Cannot do better than go to the Devil.’</div> -</div> - -<p class="right"> -<span class="smcap">John Maclaurin.</span> -</p></div></div> - -<p>One is disposed to pause a moment on Steil’s name, as it is -honourably connected with the history of music in Scotland. -Being a zealous lover of the divine science and a good singer of -the native melodies, he had rendered his house a favourite resort -of all who possessed a similar taste, and here actually was formed -(1728) the first regular society of amateur musicians known in -our country. It numbered seventy persons, and met once a -week, the usual entertainments consisting in playing on the -harpsichord and violin the concertos and sonatas of Handel, -then newly published. Apparently, however, this fraternity did -not long continue to use Steil’s house, if I am right in supposing -his retirement from business as announced in an advertisement -of February 1729, regarding ‘a sale by auction, of the haill -pictures, prints, music-books, and musical instruments, belonging -to Mr John Steill’ (<cite>Caledonian Mercury</cite>).</p> - -<p>Coming down to a later time—1760-1770—we find the tavern -in highest vogue to have been <em>Fortune’s</em>, in the house which the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_162" id="Page_162">{162}</a></span> -Earl of Eglintoune had once occupied in the Stamp-office Close. -The gay men of rank, the scholarly and philosophical, the common -citizens, all flocked hither; and the royal commissioner for the -General Assembly held his levees here, and hence proceeded to -church with his cortège, then additionally splendid from having -ladies walking in it in their court-dresses as well as gentlemen.<a name="FNanchor_143" id="FNanchor_143"></a><a href="#Footnote_143" class="fnanchor">[143]</a> -Perhaps the most remarkable set of men who met here was the -<span class="smcap">Poker Club</span>,<a name="FNanchor_144" id="FNanchor_144"></a><a href="#Footnote_144" class="fnanchor">[144]</a> consisting of Hume, Robertson, Blair, Fergusson, and -many others of that brilliant galaxy, but whose potations were -comparatively of a moderate kind.</p> - -<p>The <em>Star and Garter</em>, in Writers’ Court, kept by one Clerihugh -(the <em>Clerihugh’s</em> alluded to in <cite>Guy Mannering</cite>), was another -tavern of good consideration, the favourite haunt of the magistrates -and Town-council, who in those days mixed much more -of private enjoyments with public duties than would now be -considered fitting.<a name="FNanchor_145" id="FNanchor_145"></a><a href="#Footnote_145" class="fnanchor">[145]</a> Here the Rev. Dr Webster used to meet them -at dinner, in order to give them the benefit of his extensive knowledge -and great powers of calculation when they were scheming -out the New Town.</p> - -<p>A favourite house for many of the last years of the bygone -century was <em>Douglas’s</em>, in the Anchor Close, near the Cross, a -good specimen of those profound retreats which have been spoken -of as valued in the inverse ratio of the amount of daylight which -visited them. You went a few yards down the dark, narrow alley, -passing on the left hand the entry to a scale stair, decorated with -‘<span class="smcap lowercase">THE LORD IS ONLY MY SVPORT</span>;’ then passed another door, -bearing the still more antique legend: ‘<span class="smcap lowercase">O LORD, IN THE IS AL MY -TRAIST</span>;’ immediately beyond, under an architrave calling out -‘<span class="smcap lowercase">BE MERCIFVL TO ME</span>,’ you entered the hospitable mansion of -Dawney Douglas, the scene of the daily and nightly orgies of the -Pleydells and Fairfords, the Hays, Erskines, and Crosbies, of the -time of our fathers. Alas! how fallen off is now that temple<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_163" id="Page_163">{163}</a></span> -of Momus and the Bacchanals! You find it divided into a -multitude of small lodgings, where, instead of the merry party, -vociferous with toasts and catches, you are most likely to be struck -by the spectacle of some poor lone female, pining under a parochial -allowance, or a poverty-struck family group, one-half of whom are -disposed on sick-beds of straw mingled with rags—the terrible -exponents of our peculiar phasis of civilisation.</p> - -<p>The frequenter of Douglas’s, after ascending a few steps, found -himself in a pretty large kitchen—a dark, fiery Pandemonium, -through which numerous ineffable ministers of flame were continually -flying about, while beside the door sat the landlady, a large, -fat woman, in a towering head-dress and large-flowered silk gown, -who bowed to every one passing. Most likely on emerging from -this igneous region, the party would fall into the hands of Dawney -himself, and so be conducted to an apartment. A perfect contrast -was he to his wife: a thin, weak, submissive man, who spoke in a -whisper, never but in the way of answer, and then, if possible, -only in monosyllables. He had a habit of using the word -‘quietly’ very frequently, without much regard to its being -appropriate to the sense; and it is told that he one day made the -remark that ‘the Castle had been firing to-day—<em>quietly</em>;’ which, -it may well be believed, was not soon forgotten by his customers. -Another trait of Dawney was that some one lent him a volume of -Clarendon’s history to read, and daily frequenting the room -where it lay, used regularly, for some time, to put back the reader’s -mark to the same place; whereupon, being by-and-by asked how -he liked the book, Dawney answered: ‘Oh, very weel; but dinna -ye think it’s gay mickle the same thing o’er again?’ The house -was noted for suppers of tripe, rizzared haddocks, mince collops, -and <em>hashes</em>, which never cost more than sixpence a head. On -charges of this moderate kind the honest couple grew extremely -rich before they died.</p> - -<p>The principal room in this house was a handsome one of good -size, having a separate access by the second of the entries which -have been described, and only used for large companies, or for -guests of the first importance. It was called <em>the Crown Room</em>, or -<em>the Crown</em>—so did the guests find it distinguished on the tops of -their bills—and this name it was said to have acquired in consequence -of its having once been used by Queen Mary as a council-room, -on which occasions the emblem of sovereignty was disposed -in a niche in the wall, still existing. How the queen should have -had any occasion to hold councils in this place tradition does not<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_164" id="Page_164">{164}</a></span> -undertake to explain; but assuredly, when we consider the nature -of all public accommodations in that time, we cannot say there is -any decided improbability in the matter. The house appears of -sufficient age for the hypothesis. Perhaps we catch a hint on the -general possibility from a very ancient house farther down the -close, of whose original purpose or owners we know nothing, but -which is adumbrated by this legend:</p> - -<p class="center">ANGVSTA AD VSVM AVGVSTA[M]</p> -<p class="center">W F<span class="w12"> </span>B G</p> - -<p>The Crown Room, however, is elegant enough to have graced -even the presence of Queen Mary, so that she only had not had -to reach it by the Anchor Close. It is handsomely panelled, -with a decorated fireplace, and two tall windows towards the alley. -At present this supposed seat of royal councils, and certain seat -of the social enjoyments of many men of noted talents, forms a -back-shop to Mr Ford, grocer, High Street, and, all dingy and out -of countenance, serves only to store hams, firkins of butter, packages -of groceries, and bundles of dried cod.<a name="FNanchor_146" id="FNanchor_146"></a><a href="#Footnote_146" class="fnanchor">[146]</a></p> - -<p>The gentle Dawney had an old Gaelic song called Crochallan, -which he occasionally sang to his customers. This led to the -establishment of a club at his house, which, with a reference to -the militia regiments then raising, was called the Crochallan -Corps, or Crochallan Fencibles, and to which belonged, amongst -other men of original character and talent, the well-known -William Smellie, author of the <cite>Philosophy of Natural History</cite>. -Each member bore a military title, and some were endowed with -ideal offices of a ludicrous character: for example, a lately -surviving associate had been <em>depute-hangman</em> to the corps. -Individuals committing a fault were subjected to a mock trial, -in which such members as were barristers could display their -forensic talents to the infinite amusement of the brethren. Much -mirth and not a little horse-play prevailed. Smellie, while -engaged professionally in printing the Edinburgh edition of the -poems of Burns, introduced that genius to the Crochallans, -when a scene of rough banter took place between him and -certain privileged old hands, and the bard declared at the -conclusion that he had ‘never been so abominably thrashed in -his life.’ There was one predominant wit, Willie Dunbar by -name, of whom the poet has left a characteristic picture:</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_165" id="Page_165">{165}</a></span></p> - -<div class="poetry-container"><div class="poetry"><div class="stanza"> -<div class="verse">‘As I came by Crochallan,</div> -<div class="verse indent2">I cannily keekit ben—</div> -<div class="verse">Rattling roaring Willie</div> -<div class="verse indent2">Was sitting at yon board en’—</div> -<div class="verse">Sitting at yon board en’,</div> -<div class="verse indent2">Amang gude companie;</div> -<div class="verse">Rattling roaring Willie,</div> -<div class="verse indent2">Ye’re welcome hame to me!’</div> -</div></div></div> - -<p>He has also described Smellie as coming to Crochallan with -his old cocked hat, gray surtout, and beard rising in its -might:</p> - -<div class="poetry-container"><div class="poetry"><div class="stanza"> -<div class="verse">‘Yet though his caustic wit was biting, rude,</div> -<div class="verse">His heart was warm, benevolent, and good.’</div> -</div></div></div> - -<p>The printing-office of this strange genius being at the bottom of -the close, the transition from the correction of proofs to the -roaring scenes at Crochallan must have been sufficiently easy for -Burns.</p> - -<div class="figcenter w325"> -<a id="illus_c_015"></a> -<img src="images/illus_c_015.jpg" width="325" height="667" alt="" /> -<div class="caption"><p class="center">UPPER BAXTER’S CLOSE.<br /> -Where Burns first resided in Edinburgh.</p> - -<p class="right"> -<span class="smcap"><a href="#Page_164">Page 164.</a></span> -</p></div> -</div> - -<p>I am indebted to a privately printed memoir on the Anchor -Close for the following anecdote of Crochallan: ‘A comical -gentleman, one of the members of the corps [old Williamson of -Cardrona, in Peeblesshire], got rather tipsy one evening after a -severe <em>field-day</em>. When he came to the head of the Anchor -Close, it occurred to him that it was necessary that he should -take possession of the Castle. He accordingly set off for this -purpose. When he got to the outer gate, he demanded immediate -possession of the garrison, to which he said he was entitled. -The sentinel, for a considerable time, laughed at him; he, -however, became so extremely clamorous that the man found it -necessary to apprise the commanding officer, who immediately -came down to inquire into the meaning of such impertinent -conduct. He at once recognised his friend Cardrona, whom he -had left at the festive board of the Crochallan Corps only a few -hours before. Accordingly, humouring him in the conceit, he -said: ‘Certainly you have every right to the command of this -garrison; if you please, I will conduct you to your proper -apartment.’ He accordingly conveyed him to a bedroom in -his house. Cardrona took formal possession of the place, and -immediately afterwards went to bed. His feelings were indescribable -when he looked out of his bedroom window next -morning, and found himself surrounded with soldiers and great -guns. Some time afterwards this story came to the ears of the -Crochallans; and Cardrona said he never afterwards had the life<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_166" id="Page_166">{166}</a></span> -of a dog, so much did they tease and harass him about his strange -adventure.’</p> - -<p>There is a story connected with the air and song of Crochallan -which will tell strangely after these anecdotes. The title is -properly <cite>Cro Chalien</cite>—that is, ‘Colin’s Cattle.’ According to -Highland tradition, Colin’s wife, dying at an early age, <em>came -back</em>, some months after she had been buried, and was seen -occasionally in the evenings milking her cow as formerly, and -singing this plaintive air. It is curious thus to find Highland -superstition associated with a snug tavern in the Anchor Close -and the convivialities of such men as Burns and Smellie.</p> - -<div class="figcenter w275"> -<img src="images/illus_p_166.jpg" width="275" height="395" alt="" /> -<div class="caption"><p class="center">Dowie’s Tavern.</p></div> -</div> - -<p><em>John Dowie’s</em>, in Liberton’s Wynd, a still more -perfect specimen of those taverns which -Pitcairn eulogises—</p> - -<div class="poetry-container"><div class="poetry"><div class="stanza"> -<div class="verse">‘Antraque Cocyto penè propinqua’—</div> -</div></div></div> - -<p>enjoyed the highest celebrity -during the latter years -of the past and early years -of the present century. A -great portion of this house -was literally without light, -consisting of a series of -windowless chambers, decreasing -in size till the -last was a mere box, of -irregular oblong figure, jocularly, -but not inappropriately, -designated <em>the Coffin</em>. -Besides these, there were -but two rooms possessing -light, and as that came -from a deep, narrow alley, -it was light little more -than in name. Hither, -nevertheless, did many of -the Parliament House men -come daily for their meridian. -Here nightly assembled -companies of cits, as -well as of men of wit and -of fashion, to spend hours in what may, by comparison, be described<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_167" id="Page_167">{167}</a></span> -as gentle conviviality. The place is said to have been -a howff of Fergusson and Burns in succession. Christopher -North somewhere alludes to meetings of his own with Tom -Campbell in that couthy mansion. David Herd, the editor of -the Scottish songs, Mr Cumming of the Lyon Office, and George -Paton the antiquary were regular customers, each seldom allowing -a night to pass without a symposium at Johnie Dowie’s. -Now, these men are all gone; their very habits are becoming -matters of history; while, as for their evening haunt, the place -which knew it once knows it no more, the new access to the -Lawnmarket, by George IV. Bridge, passing over the area where -it stood.</p> - -<p><em>Johnie Dowie’s</em> was chiefly celebrated for ale—<em>Younger’s -Edinburgh ale</em>—a potent fluid which almost glued the lips of -the drinker together, and of which few, therefore, could despatch -more than a bottle. John, a sleek, quiet-looking man, in a last-century -style of attire, always brought in the liquor himself, -decanted it carefully, drank a glass to the health of the company, -and then retired. His neat, careful management of the -bottle must have entirely met the views of old William Coke, -the Leith bookseller, of whom it is told that if he saw a greenhorn -of a waiter acting in a different manner, he would rush -indignantly up to him, take the ale out of his hands, caress it -tenderly, as if to soothe and put it to rights again, and then -proceed to the business of decanting it himself, saying: ‘You -rascal, is that the way you attend to your business? Sirrah, you -ought to handle a bottle of ale as you would do a new-born -babe!’</p> - -<p><em>Dowie’s</em> was also famed for its <i lang="fr" xml:lang="fr">petits soupers</i>, as one of its -customers has recorded:</p> - -<div class="poetry-container"><div class="poetry"><div class="stanza"> -<div class="wideverse indent6">‘’Deed, gif ye please,</div> -<div class="wideverse">Ye may get a bit toasted cheese,</div> -<div class="wideverse">A crumb o’ tripe, ham, dish o’ peas,</div> -<div class="wideverse indent6">The season fitting;</div> -<div class="wideverse">An egg, or, cauler frae the seas,</div> -<div class="wideverse indent6">A fleuk or whiting.’</div> -</div></div></div> - -<p>When the reckoning came to be paid, John’s duty usually consisted -simply in counting the empty bottles which stood on a -little shelf where he had placed them above the heads of his -customers, and multiplying these by the price of the liquor—usually -threepence. Studious of decency, he was rigorous as to<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_168" id="Page_168">{168}</a></span> -hours, and, when pressed for additional supplies of liquor at a -particular time, would say: ‘No, no, gentlemen; it’s past twelve -o’clock, and time to go home.’</p> - -<p>Of John’s conscientiousness as to money matters there is -some illustration in the following otherwise trivial anecdote: -David Herd, being one night prevented by slight indisposition -from joining in the malt potations of his friends, called for first -one and then another glass of spirits, which he dissolved, <i lang="la" xml:lang="la">more -Scotico</i>, in warm water and sugar. When the reckoning came -to be paid, the antiquary was surprised to find the second glass -charged a fraction higher than the first—as if John had been -resolved to impose a tax upon excess. On inquiring the reason, -however, honest John explained it thus: ‘Whe, sir, ye see, the -first glass was out o’ the auld barrel, and the second was out o’ -the new; and as the whisky in the new barrel cost me mair than -the other, whe, sir, I’ve just charged a wee mair for ’t.’ An -ordinary host would have doubtless equalised the price by -raising that of the first glass to a level with the second. It is -gratifying, but, after this anecdote, not surprising, that John -eventually retired with a fortune said to have amounted to six -thousand pounds. He had a son in the army, who attained the -rank of major, and was a respectable officer.</p> - -<p>We get an idea of a class of taverns, humbler in their appointments, -but equally comfortable perhaps in their entertainments, -from the description which has been preserved of <em>Mrs Flockhart’s</em>—otherwise -<em>Lucky Fykie’s</em>—in the Potterrow. This was a -remarkably small, as well as obscure mansion, bearing externally -the appearance of a huckstry shop. The lady was a neat, little, -thin, elderly woman, usually habited in a plain striped blue -gown, and apron of the same stuff, with a black ribbon round -her head and lappets tied under her chin. She was far from -being poor in circumstances, as her husband, the umquhile -John Flucker, or Flockhart, had left her some ready money, -together with his whole stock-in-trade, consisting of a multifarious -variety of articles—as ropes, tea, sugar, whip-shafts, -porter, ale, beer, yellow sand, <em>calm-stane</em>, herrings, nails, cotton-wicks, -stationery, thread, needles, tapes, potatoes, lollipops, -onions, matches, &c., constituting her a very respectable <em>merchant</em>, -as the phrase was understood in Scotland. On Sundays, too, -Mrs Flockhart’s little visage might have been seen in a front-gallery -seat in Mr Pattieson’s chapel in the Potterrow. Her -abode, situated opposite to Chalmers’s Entry in that suburban<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_169" id="Page_169">{169}</a></span> -thoroughfare, was a square of about fifteen feet each way, divided -agreeably to the following diagram:</p> - -<div class="figcenter w450"> -<img src="images/illus_p_169.jpg" width="450" height="363" alt="Plan" /> -</div> - -<p>Each forenoon was this place, or at least all in front of the -screen, put into the neatest order; at the same time three -bottles, severally containing brandy, rum, and whisky, were -placed on a bunker-seat in the window of the ‘hotel,’ flanked -by a few glasses and a salver of gingerbread biscuits. About -noon any one watching the place from an opposite window -would have observed an elderly gentleman entering the humble -shop, where he saluted the lady with a ‘Hoo d’ye do, mem?’ -and then passed into the side space to indulge himself with a -glass from one or other of the bottles. After him came another, -who went through the same ceremonial; after him another -again; and so on. Strange to say, these were men of importance -in society—some of them lawyers in good employment, some -bankers, and so forth, and all of them inhabitants of good houses -in George Square. It was in passing to or from forenoon -business in town that they thus regaled themselves. On special -occasions Lucky could furnish forth a <em>soss</em>—that is, stew—which -the votary might partake of upon a clean napkin in the closet, -a place which only admitted of one chair being placed in it. -Such were amongst the habits of the fathers of some of our -present (1824) most distinguished citizens!</p> - -<p>This may be the proper place for introducing the few notices -which I have collected respecting Edinburgh inns of a past date.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_170" id="Page_170">{170}</a></span></p> - -<p>The oldest house known to have been used in the character -of an inn is one situated in what is called Davidson’s or the -White Horse Close, at the bottom of the Canongate. A sort of -<i lang="fr" xml:lang="fr">porte-cochère</i> gives access to a court having mean buildings on -either hand, but facing us a goodly structure of antique fashion, -having two outside stairs curiously arranged, and the whole -reminding us much of certain houses still numerous in the -Netherlands. A date, deficient in the decimal figure (16-3), -gives us assurance of the seventeenth century, and, judging from -the style of the building, I would say the house belongs to an -early portion of that age. The whole of the ground-floor, accessible -from the street called North Back of Canongate, has been -used as stables, thus reminding us of the absence of nicety in a -former age, when human beings were content to sit with only a -wooden floor between themselves and their horses.</p> - -<p>This house, supposed to have been styled <em>The White Horse -Inn</em> or <em>White Horse Stables</em> (for the latter was the more common -word), would be conveniently situated for persons travelling to -or arriving from London, as it is close to the ancient exit of the -town in that direction. The adjacent Water-gate took its name -from a horse-pond, which probably was an appendage of this -mansion. The manner of procedure for a gentleman going to -London in the days of the <em>White Horse</em> was to come booted to -this house with saddle-bags, and here engage and mount a -suitable roadster, which was to serve all the way. In 1639, -when Charles I. had made his first pacification with the -Covenanters, and had come temporarily to Berwick, he sent -messages to the chief lords of that party, desiring some conversation -with them. They were unsuspectingly mounting their -horses at this inn, in order to ride to Berwick, when a mob, -taught by the clergy to suspect that the king wished only to wile -over the nobles to his side, came and forcibly prevented them -from commencing their designed journey. Montrose alone -broke through this restraint; and assuredly the result in his -instance was such as to give some countenance to the suspicion, -as thenceforward he was a royalist in his heart.</p> - -<div class="figcenter w550"> -<a id="illus_c_016"></a> -<img src="images/illus_c_016.jpg" width="550" height="442" alt="" /> -<div class="caption"><p class="center">WHITE HORSE INN.</p> - -<p class="right"> -<span class="smcap"><a href="#Page_170">Page 170.</a></span> -</p></div> -</div> - -<p>The <em>White Horse</em> has ceased to be an inn from a time which -no ‘oldest inhabitant’ of my era could pretend to have any -recollection of. The only remaining fact of interest connected -with it is one concerning Dr Alexander Rose, the last Bishop -of Edinburgh, and the last survivor of the established Episcopacy -of Scotland. Bishop Keith, who had been one of his<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_171" id="Page_171">{171}</a></span> -presbyters, and describes him as a sweet-natured man, of a -venerable aspect, states that he died March 20, 1720, ‘in his -own sister’s house in the Canongate, in which street he also -lived.’ Tradition points to the floor immediately above the -<i lang="fr" xml:lang="fr">porte-cochère</i> by which the stable-yard is entered from the street -as the humble mansion in which the bishop breathed his last. -I know at least one person who never goes past the place -without an emotion of respect, remembering the self-abandoning -devotion of the Scottish prelates to their engagements at the -Revolution:<a name="FNanchor_147" id="FNanchor_147"></a><a href="#Footnote_147" class="fnanchor">[147]</a></p> - -<div class="poetry-container"><div class="poetry"><div class="stanza"> -<div class="verse">‘Amongst the faithless, faithful only found.’</div> -</div></div></div> - -<p>To the elegant accommodations of the best New Town establishments -of the present day, the inns of the last century present a -contrast which it is difficult by the greatest stretch of imagination -to realise. For the west road, there was the <em>White Hart</em> in the -Grassmarket; for the east, the <em>White Horse Inn</em> in Boyd’s Close, -Canongate; for the south, and partly also the east, Peter Ramsay’s, -at the bottom of St Mary’s Wynd. Arnot, writing in 1779, -describes them as ‘mean buildings; their apartments dirty and -dismal; and if the waiters happen to be out of the way, a stranger -will perhaps be shocked with the novelty of being shown into a -room by a dirty, sunburnt wench, without shoes or stockings.’ -The fact is, however, these houses were mainly used as places for -keeping horses. Guests, unless of a very temporary character, were -usually relegated to lodging-houses, of which there were several -on a considerable scale—as Mrs Thomson’s at the Cross, who -advertises, in 1754, that persons not bringing ‘their silver plate, -tea china, table china, and tea linen, can be served in them all;’ -also in wines and spirits; likewise that persons boarding with -her ‘may expect everything in a very genteel manner.’ But -hear the unflattering Arnot on these houses.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_172" id="Page_172">{172}</a></span> ‘He [the stranger] -is probably conducted to the third or fourth floor, up dark -and dirty stairs, and there shown into apartments meanly -fitted up and poorly furnished.... In Edinburgh, letting of -lodgings is a business by itself, and thereby the prices are very -extravagant; and every article of furniture, far from wearing the -appearance of having been purchased for a happy owner, seems -to be scraped together with a penurious hand, to pass muster -before a stranger who will never wish to return!’</p> - -<p><em>Ramsay’s</em> was almost solely a place of stables. General -Paoli,<a name="FNanchor_148" id="FNanchor_148"></a><a href="#Footnote_148" class="fnanchor">[148]</a> on visiting Edinburgh in 1771, came to this house, but -was immediately taken home by his friend Boswell to James’s -Court, where he lived during his stay in our city; his companion, -the Polish ambassador, being accommodated with a bed by Dr -John Gregory, in a neighbouring floor. An old gentleman of my -acquaintance used to talk of having seen the Duke of Hamilton -one day lounging in front of Ramsay’s inn, occasionally chatting -with any gay or noble friend who passed. To one knowing -the Edinburgh of the present day, nothing could seem more -extravagant than the idea of such company at such places. I -nevertheless find Ramsay, in 1776, advertising that, exclusive -of some part of his premises recently offered for sale, he is -‘possessed of a good house of entertainment, good stables for -above one hundred horses, and sheds for above twenty carriages.’ -He retired from business about 1790 with £10,000.<a name="FNanchor_149" id="FNanchor_149"></a><a href="#Footnote_149" class="fnanchor">[149]</a></p> - -<p>The modern <em>White Horse</em> was a place of larger and somewhat -better accommodations, though still far from an equality -with even the second-rate houses of the present day. Here -also the rooms were directly over the stables.</p> - -<p>It was almost a matter of course that Dr Johnson, on arriving -in Edinburgh, August 17, 1773, should have come to the <em>White -Horse</em>, which was then kept by a person of the name of Boyd. -His note to Boswell informing him of this fact was as follows:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> -<p class="right"> -‘<em>Saturday night.</em> -</p> - -<p>‘Mr Johnson sends his compliments to Mr Boswell, being just arrived at -Boyd’s.’</p></div> - -<p>When Boswell came, he found his illustrious friend in a violent -passion at the waiter for having sweetened his lemonade without -the ceremony of a pair of sugar-tongs. Mr William Scott, -afterwards Lord Stowell, accompanied Johnson on this occasion; -and he informs us, in a note to Croker’s edition of Boswell, -that when he heard the mistress of the house styled, in Scotch -fashion, <em>Lucky</em>, which he did not then understand, he thought -she should rather have been styled <em>Unlucky</em>, for the doctor -seemed as if he would destroy the house.<a name="FNanchor_150" id="FNanchor_150"></a><a href="#Footnote_150" class="fnanchor">[150]</a></p> -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_173" id="Page_173">{173}</a></span></p> -<p>James Boyd, the keeper of this inn, was addicted to horse-racing, -and his victories on the turf, or rather on Leith sands, -are frequently chronicled in the journals of that day. It is said -that he was at one time on the brink of ruin, when he was -saved by a lucky run with a white horse, which, in gratitude, he -kept idle all the rest of its days, besides setting up its portrait -as his sign. He eventually retired from this ‘dirty and dismal’ -inn with a fortune of several thousand pounds; and, as a -curious note upon the impression which its slovenliness conveyed -to Dr Johnson, it may be stated as a fact, well authenticated, -that at the time of his giving up the house he possessed -<em>napery</em> to the value of five hundred pounds!</p> - -<p>A large room in the <em>White Horse</em> was the frequent scene of -the marriages of runaway English couples, at a time when these -irregularities were permitted in Edinburgh. On one of the -windows were scratched the words:</p> - -<p class="center"> -‘JEREMIAH and SARAH BENTHAM, 1768.’ -</p> - -<p>Could this be the distinguished jurist and codificator, on a -journey to Scotland in company with a female relation?<a name="FNanchor_151" id="FNanchor_151"></a><a href="#Footnote_151" class="fnanchor">[151]</a></p> -<hr class="chap" /></div><div class="chapter"> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_174" id="Page_174">{174}</a></span></p> - - - -<h2><a name="THE_CROSS_CADDIES" id="THE_CROSS_CADDIES">THE CROSS—CADDIES.</a></h2> - - -<p>The Cross, a handsome octagonal building in the High Street, -surmounted by a pillar bearing the Scottish unicorn, was the -great centre of gossip in former days. The principal coffee-houses -and booksellers’ shops were close to this spot. The -chief merchants, the leading official persons, the men of learning -and talents, the laird, the noble, the clergyman, were constantly -clustering hereabouts during certain hours of the day. It was -the very centre and cynosure of the old city.</p> - -<p>During the reigns of the first and second Georges, it was -customary for the magistrates of Edinburgh to drink the king’s -health on his birthday on a stage erected at the Cross—loyalty -being a virtue which always becomes peculiarly ostentatious -when it is under any suspicion of weakness. On one of these -occasions the ceremony was interrupted by a shower of rain, so -heavy that the company, with one consent, suddenly dispersed, -leaving their entertainment half-finished. When they returned, -the glasses were found full of water, which gave a Jacobite lady -occasion for the following epigram, reported to me by a venerable -bishop of the Scottish Episcopal Church:</p> - -<div class="poetry-container"><div class="poetry"><div class="stanza"> -<div class="verse">‘In Cana once Heaven’s king was pleased</div> -<div class="verse indent2">With some gay bridal folks to dine,</div> -<div class="verse">And then, in honour of the feast,</div> -<div class="verse indent2">He changed the water into wine.</div> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<div class="verse">But when, to honour Brunswick’s birth,</div> -<div class="verse indent2">Our tribunes mounted the Theâtre,</div> -<div class="verse">He would not countenance their mirth,</div> -<div class="verse indent2">But turned their claret into water!’</div> -</div></div></div> - -<div class="figcenter w550"> -<a id="illus_c_017"></a> -<img src="images/illus_c_017.jpg" width="550" height="693" alt="" /> -<div class="caption"><p class="center">FORENOON AT THE CROSS.</p> - -<p class="right"> -<span class="smcap"><a href="#Page_174">Page 174.</a></span> -</p></div> -</div> - -<p>As the place where state proclamations were always made, -where the execution of noted state criminals took place, and -where many important public ceremonials were enacted, the -Cross of Edinburgh is invested with numberless associations of -a most interesting kind, extending over several centuries. Here -took place the mysterious midnight proclamation, summoning -the Flodden lords to the domains of Pluto, as described so -strikingly in <cite>Marmion</cite>; the witness being ‘Mr Richard Lawson,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_175" id="Page_175">{175}</a></span> -ill-disposed, ganging in his gallery fore-stair.’ Here did King -James VI. bring together his barbarous nobles, and make them -shake hands over a feast partaken of before the eyes of the -people. Here did the Covenanting lords read their protests -against Charles’s feeble proclamations. Here fell Montrose, -Huntly, the Argylls, Warriston, and many others of note, victims -of political dissension. Here were fountains set a-flowing with -the blood-red wine, to celebrate the passing of kings along the -causeway. And here, as a last notable fact, were Prince Charles -and his father proclaimed by their devoted Highlanders, amidst -screams of pipe and blare of trumpet, while the beautiful Mrs -Murray of Broughton sat beside the party on horseback, adorned -with white ribbons, and with a drawn sword in her hand! How -strange it seems that a time should at length have come when a -set of magistrates thought this structure an encumbrance to the -street, and had it removed. This event took place in 1756—the -ornamental stones dispersed, the pillar taken to the park -at Drum.<a name="FNanchor_152" id="FNanchor_152"></a><a href="#Footnote_152" class="fnanchor">[152]</a></p> - -<p>The Cross was the peculiar citadel and rallying-point of a -species of lazzaroni called <em>Caddies</em> or <em>Cawdies</em>, which formerly -existed in Edinburgh, employing themselves chiefly as street-messengers -and <i lang="fr" xml:lang="fr">valets de place</i>. A ragged, half-blackguard-looking -set they were, but allowed to be amazingly acute and -intelligent, and also faithful to any duty entrusted to them. A -stranger coming to reside temporarily in Edinburgh got a caddy -attached to his service to conduct him from one part of the town -to another, to run errands for him; in short, to be wholly at his -bidding.</p> - -<div class="poetry-container"><div class="poetry"><div class="stanza"> -<div class="wideverse indent2">‘Omnia novit,</div> -<div class="wideverse">Græculus esuriens, in cœlum, jusseris, ibit.’</div> -</div></div></div> - -<p>A caddy <em>did</em> literally know everything—of Edinburgh; even to -that kind of knowledge which we now only expect in a street -directory. And it was equally true that he could hardly be asked -to go anywhere, or upon any mission, that he would not go. On -the other hand, the stranger would probably be astonished to find -that, in a few hours, his caddy was acquainted with every particular<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_176" id="Page_176">{176}</a></span> -regarding himself, where he was from, what was his purpose -in Edinburgh, his family connections, and his own tastes and -dispositions. Of course for every particle of scandal floating about -Edinburgh, the caddy was a ready book of reference. We sometimes -wonder how our ancestors did without newspapers. We -do not reflect on the living vehicles of news which then existed: -the privileged beggar for the country people; for townsfolk, the -caddies.</p> - -<p>The caddy is alluded to as a useful kind of blackguard in Burt’s -<cite>Letters from the North of Scotland</cite>, written about 1740. He says -that although they are mere wretches in rags, lying upon stairs -and in the streets at night, they are often considerably trusted, -and seldom or never prove unfaithful. The story told by tradition -is that they formed a society under a chief called their -constable, with a common fund or box; that when they committed -any misdemeanour, such as incivility or lying, they were punished -by this officer by fines, or sometimes corporeally; and if by any -chance money entrusted to them should not be forthcoming, it -was made up out of the common treasury. Mr Burt says: -‘Whether it be true or not I cannot say, but I have been told -by several that one of the judges formerly abandoned two of -his sons for a time to this way of life, as believing it would -create in them a sharpness which might be of use to them in -the future course of their lives.’ Major Topham, describing -Edinburgh in 1774, says of the caddies: ‘In short, they are the -tutelary guardians of the city; and it is entirely owing to them -that there are fewer robberies and less housebreaking in Edinburgh -than anywhere else.’</p> - -<p>Another conspicuous set of public servants characteristic of Edinburgh -in past times were the <em>Chairmen</em>, or carriers of sedans, who -also formed a society among themselves, but were of superior respectability, -in as far as none but steady, considerate persons of so -humble an order could become possessed of the means to buy the -vehicle by which they made their bread. In former times, when -Edinburgh was so much more limited than now, and rather an -assemblage of alleys than of streets, sedans were in comparatively -great request. They were especially in requisition amongst the -ladies—indeed, almost exclusively so. From time immemorial the -sons of the Gael have monopolised this branch of service; and as -far as the business of a sedan-carrier can yet be said to exist -amongst us, it is in the possession of Highlanders.</p> - -<p>The reader must not be in too great haste to smile when I<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_177" id="Page_177">{177}</a></span> -claim his regard for an historical person among the chairmen of -Edinburgh. This was Edward Burke, the immediate attendant -of Prince Charles Edward during the earlier portion of his wanderings -in the Highlands. Honest Ned had been a chairman in our -city, but attaching himself as a servant to Mr Alexander Macleod -of Muiravonside, aide-de-camp to the Prince, it was his fortune to -be present at the battle of Culloden, and to fly from the field in -his Royal Highness’s company. He attended the Prince for -several weeks, sharing cheerfully in all his hardships, and doing -his best to promote his escape. Thus has his name been inseparably -associated with this remarkable chapter of history. After -parting with Charles, this poor man underwent some dreadful -hardships while under hiding, his fears of being taken having -reference chiefly to the Prince, as he was apprehensive that the -enemy might torture him to gain intelligence of his late master’s -movements. At length the Act of Indemnity placed him at his -ease; and the humble creature who, by a word of his mouth, -might have gained thirty thousand pounds, quietly returned to -his duty as a chairman on the streets of Edinburgh! Which -of the venal train of Walpole, which even of the admirers of -Pulteney, is more entitled to admiration than Ned Burke? A -man, too, who could neither read nor write—for such was actually -his case.<a name="FNanchor_153" id="FNanchor_153"></a><a href="#Footnote_153" class="fnanchor">[153]</a></p> - -<p>One cannot but feel it to be in some small degree a consolatory -circumstance, and not without a certain air of the romance of an -earlier day, that a bacchanal company came with a bowl of -punch, the night before the demolition, and in that mood of mind -when men shed ‘smiles that might as well be tears,’ drank the -Dredgie of the Cross upon its doomed battlements.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_178" id="Page_178">{178}</a></span></p> - -<div class="poetry-container"><div class="poetry"><div class="stanza"> -<div class="verse">‘Oh! be his tomb as lead to lead,</div> -<div class="verse">Upon its dull destroyer’s head!</div> -<div class="verse">A minstrel’s malison is said.’<a name="FNanchor_154" id="FNanchor_154"></a><a href="#Footnote_154" class="fnanchor">[154]</a></div> -</div></div></div> - -<hr class="chap" /></div><div class="chapter"> - - - -<div class="figcenter w425"> -<a id="illus_c_018"></a> -<img src="images/illus_c_018.jpg" width="425" height="683" alt="" /> -<div class="caption"><p class="center">THE TOWN-GUARD.</p> - -<p class="right"> -<span class="smcap"><a href="#Page_179">Page 179.</a></span><br /> -</p></div> -</div> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_179" id="Page_179">{179}</a></span></p> - - -<h2><a name="THE_TOWN-GUARD" id="THE_TOWN-GUARD">THE TOWN-GUARD.</a></h2> - - -<p>One of the characteristic features of Edinburgh in old times -was its Town-guard, a body of military in the service of the -magistrates for the purposes of a police, but dressed and armed -in all respects as soldiers. Composed for the most part of old -Highlanders, of uncouth aspect and speech, dressed in a dingy -red uniform with cocked hats, and often exchanging the musket -for an antique native weapon called the Lochaber axe, these men -were (at least in latter times) an unfailing subject of mirth to the -citizens, particularly the younger ones. In my recollection they -had a sort of Patmos in the ground-floor of the Old Tolbooth, -where a few of them might constantly be seen on duty, endeavouring -to look as formidable as possible to the little boys who might -be passing by. On such occasions as executions, or races at Leith, -or the meeting of the General Assembly, they rose into a certain -degree of consequence; but in general they could hardly be -considered as of any practical utility. Their numbers were at that -time much reduced—only twenty-five privates, two sergeants, two -corporals, and a couple of drummers. Every night did their -drum beat through the Old Town at eight o’clock, as a kind of -curfew. No other drum, it seems, was allowed to sound on the -High Street between the Luckenbooths and Netherbow. They -also had an old practice of giving a <i lang="la" xml:lang="la">charivari</i> on the drum on -the night of a marriage before the lodgings of the bridegroom; -of course not without the expectation of something wherewithal to -drink the health of the young couple. A strange remnant of old -times altogether were the <em>Town Rats</em>, as the poor old fellows -were disrespectfully called by the boys, in allusion to the hue of -their uniform.</p> - -<p>Previous to 1805, when an unarmed police was established for -the protection of the streets, the Town-guard had consisted of -three equally large companies, each with a lieutenant (complimentarily -called captain) at its head. Then it was a somewhat more -respectable body, not only as being larger, but invested with a -really useful purpose. The unruly and the vicious stood in some -awe of a troop of men bearing lethal weapons, and generally -somewhat frank in the use of them. If sometimes roughly<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_180" id="Page_180">{180}</a></span> -handled on kings’ birthdays and other exciting occasions, they -in their turn did not fail to treat cavalierly enough any unfortunate -roisterer whom they might find breaking the peace. They -had, previous to 1785, a guard-house in the middle of the High -Street, the ‘black hole’ of which had rather a bad character -among the bucks and the frail ladies. One of their sergeants -in those days, by name John Dhu, is commemorated by Scott as -the fiercest-looking fellow he ever saw. If we might judge from -poor Robert Fergusson, they were truly formidable in his time. -He says:</p> - -<div class="poetry-container"><div class="poetry"><div class="stanza"> -<div class="wideverse">‘And thou, great god o’ aquavitæ,</div> -<div class="wideverse">Wha sway’st the empire o’ this city; ...</div> -<div class="wideverse indent4">Be thou prepared</div> -<div class="wideverse">To hedge us frae that <em>black banditti</em>,</div> -<div class="wideverse indent4">The City-guard.’</div> -</div></div></div> - -<p>He adds, apostrophising the irascible veterans:</p> - -<div class="poetry-container"><div class="poetry"><div class="stanza"> -<div class="wideverse">‘Oh, soldiers, for your ain dear sakes,</div> -<div class="wideverse">For Scotland’s love—the land o’ cakes—</div> -<div class="wideverse">Gi’e not her bairns sae deadly paiks,</div> -<div class="wideverse indent4">Nor be sae rude,</div> -<div class="wideverse">Wi’ firelock and Lochaber axe,</div> -<div class="wideverse indent4">As spill their blude!’</div> -</div></div></div> - -<p>The affair at the execution of Wilson the smuggler in 1736, -when, under command of Porteous, they fired upon and killed -many of the mob, may be regarded as a peculiarly impressive -example of the stern relation in which they stood to the populace -of a former age.</p> - -<p>The great bulk of the corps was drawn either from the Highlands -directly or from the Highland regiments. A humble -Highlander considered it as getting a <em>berth</em> when he was enlisted -into the Edinburgh Guard. Of this feeling we have a remarkable -illustration in an anecdote which I was told by the late Mr Alexander -Campbell regarding the Highland bard, Duncan Macintyre, -usually called <em>Donacha Bhan</em>. This man, really an exquisite poet -to those understanding his language, became the object of a kind -interest to many educated persons in Perthshire, his native county. -The Earl of Breadalbane sent to let him know that he wished to -befriend him, and was anxious to procure him some situation that -might put him comparatively at his ease. Poor Duncan returned -his thanks, and asked his lordship’s interest—to get him into the -Edinburgh Town-guard—pay, sixpence a day! What sort of -material these men would have proved in the hands of the magistrates<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_181" id="Page_181">{181}</a></span> -if Provost Stewart had attempted by their means and the -other forces at his command to hold out the city against Prince -Charlie seems hardly to be matter of doubt. I was told the -following anecdote of a member of the corps, on good authority. -Robert Stewart, a descendant of the Stewarts of Bonskeid in -Athole, was then a private in the City-guard. When General -Hawley left Edinburgh to meet the Highland army in the west -country, Stewart had just been relieved from duty for the customary -period of two days. Instantly forming his plan of action, -he set off with his gun, passed through the English troops on -their march, and joined those of the Prince. Stewart fought next -day like a hero in the battle of Falkirk, where the Prince had the -best of it; and next morning our Town-guardsman was back to -Edinburgh in time to go upon duty at the proper hour. The -captain of his company suspected what business Robert and his -gun had been engaged in, but preserved a friendly silence.</p> - -<p>The <em>Gutter-blood</em> people of Edinburgh had an extravagant idea -of the antiquity of the Guard, led probably by a fallacy arising -from the antiquity of the individual men. They used to have a -strange story—too ridiculous, one would have thought, for a -moment’s credence anywhere—that the Town-guard existed before -the Christian era. When the Romans invaded Britain, some of -the Town-guard joined them; and three were actually present in -Pilate’s guard at the Crucifixion! In reality, the corps took its -rise in the difficulties brought on by bad government in 1682, -when, at the instigation of the Duke of York, it was found -necessary to raise a body of 108 armed men, under a trusty -commander, simply to keep the people in check.<a name="FNanchor_155" id="FNanchor_155"></a><a href="#Footnote_155" class="fnanchor">[155]</a></p> - -<p>Fifty years ago (1824) the so-called captaincies of the Guard -were snug appointments, in great request among respectable old -citizens who had not succeeded in business. Kay has given us -some illustrations of these extraordinary specimens of soldier-craft, -one of whom was nineteen stone. Captain Gordon of -Gordonstown, representative of one of the oldest families in -Scotland, found himself obliged by fortune to accept of one of -these situations.</p> - -<p>Scott, writing his <cite>Heart of Mid-Lothian</cite> in 1817, says: ‘Of -late, the gradual diminution of these civic soldiers reminds one -of the abatement of King Lear’s hundred knights. The edicts of -each set of succeeding magistrates have, like those of Goneril -and Regan, diminished this venerable band with similar question—“What<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_182" id="Page_182">{182}</a></span> -need have we of five-and-twenty?—ten?—five?” and -now it is nearly come to: “What need we one?” A spectre may -indeed here and there still be seen of an old gray-headed and -gray-bearded Highlander, with war-worn features, but bent double -by age; dressed in an old-fashioned cocked-hat, bound with white -tape instead of silver lace, and in coat, waistcoat, and breeches -of a muddy-coloured red; bearing in his withered hand an ancient -weapon, called a Lochaber axe—a long pole, namely, with an axe -at the extremity, and a hook at the back of the hatchet. Such a -phantom of former days still creeps, I have been informed, round -the statue of Charles II. in the Parliament Square, as if the image -of a Stuart were the last refuge for any memorial of our ancient -manners,’ &c. At the close of this very year, the ‘What need -we one?’ was asked, and answered in the negative; and the corps -was accordingly dissolved. ‘Their last march to do duty at -Hallow Fair had something in it affecting. Their drums and -fifes had been wont, in better days, to play on this joyous occasion -the lively tune of</p> - -<div class="poetry-container"><div class="poetry"><div class="stanza"> -<div class="verse">“Jockey to the fair;”</div> -</div></div></div> - -<p>but on this final occasion the afflicted veterans moved slowly to -the dirge of</p> - -<div class="poetry-container"><div class="poetry"><div class="stanza"> -<div class="verse">“The last time I came owre the muir.”’<a name="FNanchor_156" id="FNanchor_156"></a><a href="#Footnote_156" class="fnanchor">[156]</a></div> -</div></div></div> - -<p>The half-serious pathos of Scott regarding this corps becomes -wholly so when we learn that a couple of members survived to -make an actual last public appearance in the procession which -consecrated his richly deserved monument, August 15, 1846.</p> - -<hr class="chap" /></div><div class="chapter"> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_183" id="Page_183">{183}</a></span></p> - - - - -<h2><a name="EDINBURGH_MOBS" id="EDINBURGH_MOBS">EDINBURGH MOBS.</a></h2> - - - -<p class="chapter_summary"><strong>The Blue Blanket—Mobs of the Seventeenth Century—Bowed -Joseph.</strong></p> - - -<p>The Edinburgh populace was noted, during many ages, for its -readiness to rise in tumultuary fashion, whether under the -prompting of religious zeal or from inferior motives. At an early -time they became an impromptu army, each citizen possessing -weapons which he was ready and willing to use. Thus they are -understood to have risen in 1482 to redeem James III. from -restraint in the Castle; for which service, besides certain privileges, -‘he granted them,’ says Maitland, ‘a banner or standard, with a -power to display the same in defence of their king, country, and -their own right.’ The historian adds: ‘This flag, at present -denominated the <span class="smcap">Blue Blanket</span>, is kept by the Convener of the -Trades; at whose appearance therewith, ’tis said that not only -the artificers of Edinburgh are obliged to repair to it, but all the -artisans or craftsmen within Scotland are bound to follow it, and -fight under the Convener of Edinburgh, as aforesaid.’ The Blue -Blanket, I may mention, has become a sort of myth in Edinburgh, -being magnified by the popular imagination into a banner which -the citizens carried with them to the Holy Land in one of the -Crusades—expeditions which took place before Edinburgh had -become a town fit to furnish any distinct corps of armed men.<a name="FNanchor_157" id="FNanchor_157"></a><a href="#Footnote_157" class="fnanchor">[157]</a></p> - -<p>When the Protestant faith came to stir up men’s minds, -the lower order of citizens became a formidable body indeed. -James VI., who had more than once experienced their violence, -and consequently knew them well, says very naïvely in his <cite>Basilicon -Doron</cite>, or ‘Book of Instruction’ to his son: ‘They think we -should be content with their work, how bad and dear soever it be; -and if they be in anything controuled, up goeth the <em>Blue Blanket</em>!’</p> - -<p>The tumults at the introduction of the Service-book, in 1637, -need only be alluded to. So late as the Revolution there appears -a military spirit of great boldness in the Edinburgh populace, -reminding us of that of Paris in our own times: witness the bloody -contests which took place in accomplishing the destruction of the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_184" id="Page_184">{184}</a></span> -papistical arrangements at the Abbey, December 1688. The -Union mobs were of unexampled violence; and Edinburgh was -only kept in some degree of quiet, during the greater part of that -crisis, by a great assemblage of troops. Finally, in the Porteous -mob we have a singular example of popular vengeance, wreaked -out in the most cool but determined manner. Men seem to have -been habitually under an impression in those days that the law -was at once an imperfect and a partial power. They seem to have -felt themselves constantly liable to be called upon to supplement -its energy, or control or compensate for its errors. The mob had -at that time a part in the state.</p> - -<div class="figcenter w150"> -<img src="images/illus_p_184.jpg" width="150" height="281" alt="" /> -<div class="caption"><p class="center">‘General’ Joe Smith -laying down the Law -to the Magistrates.</p></div> -</div> - -<p>In this ‘fierce democracy’ there once arose a mighty Pyrrhus, -who contrived, by dint of popular qualifications, to subject the -rabble to his command, and to get himself elected, by acclamation, -dictator of all its motions and exploits. How he acquired his -wonderful power is not recorded; but it is to be supposed that -his activity on occasions of mobbing, his boldness and sagacity, his -strong voice and uncommonly powerful whistle, together with the -mere whim or humour of the thing, conspired to his promotion. -His trade was that of a cobbler, and he -resided in some obscure den in the Cowgate. -His person was low and deformed, with the -sole good property of great muscular strength -in the arms. Yet this wretch, miserable and -contemptible as he appeared, might be said -to have had at one time the command of the -Scottish metropolis. The magistrates, it is -true, assembled every Wednesday forenoon -to manage the affairs and deliberate upon -the improvements of the city; but their -power was merely that of a viceroyalty. -<em>Bowed Joseph</em>, otherwise called General Joseph -Smith, was the only true potentate; and -their resolutions could only be carried into -effect when not inconsistent with his views of -policy.</p> - -<p>In exercising the functions of his perilous -office, it does not appear that he ever drew -down the vengeance of the more lawfully constituted -authorities of the land. On the -contrary, he was in some degree countenanced by the magistracy, -who, however, patronised him rather from fear than respect. They<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_185" id="Page_185">{185}</a></span> -frequently sent for him in emergencies, in order to consult with him -regarding the best means of appeasing and dispersing the mob. -On such occasions nothing could equal the consequential air which -he assumed. With one hand stuck carelessly into his side, and -another slapped resolutely down upon the table—with a majestic -toss of the head, and as much fierceness in his little gray eye as if -he were himself a mob—he would stand before the anxious and -feeble council, pleading the cause of his compeers, and suggesting -the best means of assuaging their just fury. He was generally -despatched with a promise of amendment and a hogshead of good -ale, with which he could easily succeed in appeasing his men, whose -dismissal, after a speech from himself and a libation from the -barrel, was usually accomplished by the simple words: ‘<em>Now -disperse, my lads!</em>’</p> - -<p>Joseph was not only employed in directing and managing the -mobs, but frequently performed exploits without the co-operation -of his greasy friends, though always for their amusement and in -their behalf. Thus, for instance, when Wilkes by his celebrated -Number 45 incensed the Scottish nation so generally and so -bitterly, Joseph got a cart, fitted up with a high gallows, from -which depended a straw-stuffed effigy of North Britain’s arch-enemy, -with the devil perched upon his shoulder; and this he -paraded through the streets, followed by the multitude, till he -came to the Gallow Lee in Leith Walk, where two criminals -were then hanging in chains, beside whom he exposed the figures -of Wilkes and his companion. Thus also, when the Douglas cause -was decided against the popular opinion in the Court of Session, -Joseph went up to the chair of the Lord President as he was -going home to his house, and called him to account for the -injustice of his decision. After the said decision was reversed by -the House of Lords, Joseph, by way of triumph over the Scottish -court, dressed up fifteen figures in rags and wigs, resembling the -judicial attire, mounted them on asses, and led them through the -streets, telling the populace that they saw the fifteen senators of -the College of Justice!</p> - -<p>When the craft of shoemakers used, in former times, to parade -the High Street, West Bow, and Grassmarket, with inverted tin -kettles on their heads and schoolboys’ rulers in their hands, -Joseph—who, though a leader and commander on every other -public occasion, was not admitted into this procession on account -of his being only a cobbler—dressed himself in his best clothes, -with a royal crown painted and gilt and a wooden truncheon, and<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_186" id="Page_186">{186}</a></span> -marched pompously through the city till he came to the Netherbow, -where he planted himself in the middle of the street to -await the approach of the procession, which he, as a citizen of -Edinburgh, proposed to welcome into the town. When the royal -shoemaker came to the Netherbow Port, Joseph stood forth, -removed the truncheon from his haunch, flourished it in the air, -and pointing it to the ground, with much dignity of manner, -addressed his paste-work majesty in these words: ‘O great King -Crispianus! what are we in thy sight but a parcel of puir slaister-kytes—creeshy -cobblers—sons of bitches?’ And I have been -assured that this ceremony was performed in a style of burlesque -exhibiting no small artistic power.</p> - -<p>Joseph had a wife, whom he would never permit to walk beside -him, it being his opinion that women are inferior to the male part -of creation, and not entitled to the same privileges. He compelled -his spouse to walk a few paces behind him; and when he turned, -she was obliged to make a circuit so as to maintain the precise -distance from his person which he assigned to her. When he -wished to say anything to her, he whistled as upon a dog, upon -which she came up to him submissively and heard what he had to -say; after which she respectfully resumed her station in the rear.</p> - -<p>After he had figured for a few years as an active partisan of the -people, his name waxed of such account with them that it is said -he could in the course of an hour collect a crowd of not fewer -than ten thousand persons, all ready to obey his high behests, or -to disperse at his bidding. In collecting his troops he employed -a drum, which, though a general, he did not disdain to beat with -his own hands; and never, surely, had the fiery cross of the -Highland chief such an effect upon the warlike devotion of his -clan as Bowed Joseph’s drum had upon the spirit of the Edinburgh -rabble. As he strode along, the street was cleared of its loungers, -every close pouring forth an addition to his train, like the -populous glens adjacent to a large Highland strath giving forth -their accessions to the general force collected by the aforesaid -cross. The Town Rats, who might peep forth like old cautious -snails on hearing his drum, would draw in their horns with a -Gaelic execration, and shut their door, as he approached; while -the <em>Lazy Corner</em> was, at sight of him, a lazy corner no longer; -and the West Bow ceased to resound as he descended.</p> - -<p>It would appear, after all, that there was a moral foundation -for Joseph’s power, as there must be for that of all governments -of a more regular nature that would wish to thrive or be lasting.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_187" id="Page_187">{187}</a></span> -The little man was never known to act in a bad cause, or in any -way to go against the principles of natural justice. He employed -his power in the redress of such grievances as the law of the land -does not or cannot easily reach; and it was apparent that almost -everything he did was for the sake of what he himself designated -<em>fair-play</em>. Fair-play, indeed, was his constant object, whether in -clearing room with his brawny arms for a boxing-match, insulting -the constituted authorities, sacking the granary of a monopolist, -or besieging the Town-council in their chamber.</p> - -<p>An anecdote which proves this strong love of fair-play deserves -to be recorded. A poor man in the Pleasance having been a -little deficient in his rent, and in the country on business, his -landlord seized and rouped his household furniture, turning out -the family to the street. On the poor man’s return, finding the -house desolate and his family in misery, he went to a neighbouring -stable and hanged himself.<a name="FNanchor_158" id="FNanchor_158"></a><a href="#Footnote_158" class="fnanchor">[158]</a> Bowed Joseph did not long remain -ignorant of the case; and as soon as it was generally known in the -city, he shouldered on his drum, and after beating it through the -streets for half-an-hour, found himself followed by several thousand -persons, inflamed with resentment at the landlord’s cruelty. With -this army he marched to an open space of ground now covered -by Adam Street, Roxburgh Street, &c., named in former times -Thomson’s Park, where, mounted upon the shoulders of six of his -lieutenant-generals, he proceeded to harangue them, in Cambyses’s -vein, concerning the flagrant oppression which they were about to -revenge. He concluded by directing his men to sack the premises -of the cruel landlord, who by this time had wisely made his -escape; and this order was instantly obeyed. Every article which -the house contained was brought out to the street, where, being -piled up in a heap, the general set fire to them with his own hand, -while the crowd rent the air with their acclamations. Some -money and bank-notes perished in the blaze, besides an eight-day -clock, which, sensible to the last, calmly struck ten just as it was -consigned to the flames.</p> - -<p>On another occasion, during a scarcity, the mob, headed by -Joseph, had compelled all the meal-dealers to sell their meal at a -certain price per peck, under penalty of being obliged to shut up -their shops. One of them, whose place of business was in the -Grassmarket, agreed to sell his meal at the price fixed by the -general, for the good of the poor, as he said; and he did so under -the superintendence of Joseph, who stationed a party at the shop-door<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_188" id="Page_188">{188}</a></span> -to preserve peace and good order till the whole stock was -disposed of, when, by their leader’s command, the mob gave three -hearty cheers, and quietly dispersed. Next day, the unlucky victualler -let his friends know that he had not suffered so much by -this compulsory trade as might be supposed; because, though the -price was below that of the market, he had taken care to use a -measure which gave only about three-fourths instead of the whole. -It was not long ere this intelligence came to the ears of our tribune, -who, immediately collecting a party of his troops, beset the meal-dealer -before he was aware, and compelled him to pay back a -fourth of the price of every peck of meal sold; then giving their -victim a hearty drubbing, they sacked his shop, and quietly -dispersed as before.</p> - -<p>Some foreign princes happening to visit Edinburgh during -Joseph’s administration, at a period of the year when the mob of -Edinburgh was wont to amuse itself with an annual burning of -the pope, the magistrates felt anxious that this ceremony should -for once be dispensed with, as it might hurt the feelings of their -distinguished visitors. The provost, in this emergency, resolved -not to employ his own authority, but that of Joseph, to whom, -accordingly, he despatched his compliments, with half a guinea, -begging his kind offices in dissuading the mob from the performance -of their accustomed sport. Joseph received the message with -the respect due to the commission of ‘his friend the Lord Provost,’ -and pocketed the half-guinea with a complacent smile; but -standing up to his full height, and resolutely shaking his rough -head, he gave for answer that ‘he was highly gratified by his -lordship’s message; but, everything considered, the pope <em>must be -burnt</em>!’ And so the pope, honest man, <em>was</em> burnt with all the -honours accordingly.</p> - -<p>Joseph was at last killed by a fall from the top of a Leith -stage-coach, in returning from the races, while in a state of -intoxication, about the year 1780. It is to be hoped, for the -good of society, that ‘we ne’er shall look upon his like again.’<a name="FNanchor_159" id="FNanchor_159"></a><a href="#Footnote_159" class="fnanchor">[159]</a></p> -<hr class="chap" /></div><div class="chapter"> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_189" id="Page_189">{189}</a></span></p> - - - -<h2><a name="BICKERS" id="BICKERS">BICKERS.</a></h2> - - -<p>Amongst the social features of a bygone age in Edinburgh -were the <em>bickers</em> in which the boys were wont to indulge—that -is, street conflicts, conducted chiefly with stones, though -occasionally with sticks also, and even more formidable weapons. -One cannot but wonder that, so lately as the period when elderly -men now living were boys, the powers for preserving peace in the -city should have been so weak as to allow of such battles taking -place once or twice almost every week. The practice was, however, -only of a piece with the general rudeness of those old days; -and, after all, there was more appearance than reality of danger -attending it. It was truly, as one who had borne a part in it has -remarked, ‘only a rough kind of play.’<a name="FNanchor_160" id="FNanchor_160"></a><a href="#Footnote_160" class="fnanchor">[160]</a></p> - -<p>The most likely time for a bicker was Saturday afternoon, when -the schools and hospitals held no restraint over their tenants. -Then it was almost certain that either the Old Town and New -Town boys, the George Square and Potterrow boys, the Herioters -and the Watsoners, or some other parties accustomed to regard -themselves as natural enemies, would meet on some common -ground, and fall a-pelting each other. There were hardly anywhere -two adjoining streets but the boys respectively belonging -to them would occasionally hold encounters of this kind; and the -animosity assumed a darker tinge if there was any discrepancy of -rank or condition between the parties, as was apt to be the case -when, for instance, the Old Town lads met the children of the -aristocratic streets to the north. Older people looked on with -anxiety, and wondered what the Town-guard was about, and -occasionally reports were heard that such a boy had got a wound -in the head, while another had lost a couple of his front teeth; it -was even said that fatal cases had occurred in the memory of aged -citizens. Yet, to the best of my recollection—for I do remember -something of bickers—there was little likelihood of severe damage. -The parties somehow always kept at a good distance from each -other, and there was a perpetual running in one direction or -another; certainly nothing like hand-to-hand fighting. Occasionally -attempts were made to put down the riot, but seldom with<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_190" id="Page_190">{190}</a></span> -much success; for it was one of the most ludicrous features of -these contests that whenever the Town-guard made its appearance -on the ground, the belligerent powers instantly coalesced against -the common foe. Besides, they could quickly make their way to -other ground, and there continue the war.</p> - -<p>Bickers must have had a foundation in human nature: from no -temporary effervescence of the boy-mind did they spring; pleasant, -though wrong, had they been from all time. Witness the following -act of the Town-council so long ago as 1529: ‘<em>Bikkyrringis -betwix Barnis</em>.—It is statut and ordainit be the prouest ballies -and counsall Forsamekle as ther has bene gret bikkyrringis betwix -barnis and followis in tymes past and diuerse thar throw hurt in -perell of ther lyffis and gif sik thingis be usit thar man diuerse -barnis and innocentis be slane and diuisione ryse amangis -nychtbouris theirfor we charge straitlie and commandis in our -Souerane Lord the Kingis name the prouest and ballies of this -burgh that na sic bykkyrringis be usit in tymes to cum. Certifing -that and ony persone be fund bykkyrrand that faderis and moderis -sall ansuer and be accusit for thar deidis and gif thai be vagabondis -thai to be scurgit and bannist the toune.’</p> - -<p>An anecdote which Scott has told of his share in the bickers -which took place in his youth between the George Square youth -and the plebeian fry of the neighbouring streets is so pat to this -occasion that its reproduction may be excusable. ‘It followed,’ -he says, ‘from our frequent opposition to each other, that, though -not knowing the names of our enemies, we were yet well acquainted -with their appearance, and had nicknames for the most remarkable -of them. One very active and spirited boy might be considered -as the principal leader in the cohort of the suburbs. He was, I -suppose, thirteen or fourteen years old, finely made, tall, blue-eyed, -with long fair hair, the very picture of a youthful Goth. -This lad was always first in the charge and last in the retreat—the -Achilles, at once, and Ajax, of the Crosscauseway. He was -too formidable to us not to have a cognomen, and, like that of -a knight of old, it was taken from the most remarkable part of his -dress, being a pair of old green livery breeches, which was the -principal part of his clothing; for, like Pentapolin, according to -Don Quixote’s account, Green Breeks, as we called him, always -entered the battle with bare arms, legs, and feet.</p> - -<p>‘It fell that, once upon a time, when the combat was at the -thickest, this plebeian champion headed a sudden charge, so rapid -and furious that all fled before him. He was several paces before<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_191" id="Page_191">{191}</a></span> -his comrades, and had actually laid his hands on the patrician -standard, when one of our party, whom some misjudging friend -had entrusted with a <i lang="fr" xml:lang="fr">couteau de chasse</i>, or hanger, inspired with a -zeal for the honour of the corps worthy of Major Sturgeon himself, -struck poor Green Breeks over the head with strength sufficient -to cut him down. When this was seen, the casualty was so far -beyond what had ever taken place before that both parties fled -different ways, leaving poor Green Breeks, with his bright hair -plentifully dabbled in blood, to the care of the watchman, who -(honest man) took care not to know who had done the mischief. -The bloody hanger was flung into one of the Meadow ditches, -and solemn secrecy was sworn on all hands; but the remorse and -terror of the actor were beyond all bounds, and his apprehensions -of the most dreadful character. The wounded hero was for a few -days in the Infirmary, the case being only a trifling one. But -though inquiry was strongly pressed on him, no argument could -make him indicate the person from whom he had received the -wound, though he must have been perfectly well known to him. -When he recovered, and was dismissed, the author and his brother -opened a communication with him, through the medium of a -popular gingerbread baker, of whom both parties were customers, -in order to tender a subsidy in name of smart-money. The sum -would excite ridicule were I to name it; but sure I am that the -pockets of the noted Green Breeks never held as much money of -his own. He declined the remittance, saying that he would not -sell his blood; but at the same time reprobated the idea of being -an informer, which he said was <em>clam</em>—that is, base or mean. -With much urgency he accepted a pound of snuff for the use of -some old woman—aunt, grandmother, or the like—with whom he -lived. We did not become friends, for the bickers were more -agreeable to both parties than any more pacific amusement; but -we conducted them ever after under mutual assurances of the -highest consideration for each other.’<a name="FNanchor_161" id="FNanchor_161"></a><a href="#Footnote_161" class="fnanchor">[161]</a></p> -<hr class="chap" /></div><div class="chapter"> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_192" id="Page_192">{192}</a></span></p> - - - -<h2><a name="SUSANNA_COUNTESS_OF_EGLINTOUNE" id="SUSANNA_COUNTESS_OF_EGLINTOUNE">SUSANNA, COUNTESS OF EGLINTOUNE.</a></h2> - - -<p>The house on the west side of the Old Stamp-office Close, -High Street, formerly Fortune’s Tavern, was, in the early -part of the last century, the family mansion of Alexander, Earl -of Eglintoune. It is a building of considerable height and extent, -accessible by a broad scale stair. The alley in which it is situated -bears great marks of former respectability, and contained, till -the year 1821, the Stamp-office, then removed to the Waterloo -Buildings.<a name="FNanchor_162" id="FNanchor_162"></a><a href="#Footnote_162" class="fnanchor">[162]</a></p> - -<p>The ninth Earl of Eglintoune<a name="FNanchor_163" id="FNanchor_163"></a><a href="#Footnote_163" class="fnanchor">[163]</a> was one of those patriarchal -peers who live to an advanced age—indefatigable in the frequency -of their marriages and the number of their children—who linger -on and on, with an unfailing succession of young countesses, and -die at last leaving a progeny interspersed throughout the whole -of Douglas’s <cite>Peerage</cite>, two volumes, folio, re-edited by Wood. -His lordship, in early life, married a sister of Lady Dundee, who -brought him a large family, and died just about that happy period -when she could not have greatly increased it. His next wife was -a daughter of Chancellor Aberdeen, who only added one daughter -to his stock, and then paused, in a fit of ill-health, to the great -vexation of his lordship, who, on account of his two sons by the -first countess having died young, was anxious for an heir. This -was a consummation to his nuptial happiness which Countess Anne -did not seem at all likely to bring about, and the chagrin of his -lordship must have been increased by the longevity which her very -ill-health seemed to confer upon her; for her ladyship was one of -those valetudinarians who are too well acquainted with death, -being always just at his door, ever to come to closer quarters with -him. At this juncture the blooming Miss Kennedy was brought -to Edinburgh by her father, Sir Archibald, the rough old cavalier,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_193" id="Page_193">{193}</a></span> -who made himself so conspicuous in <em>the Persecution</em> and in -Dundee’s wars.</p> - -<p>Susanna Kennedy, though the daughter of a lady considerably -under the middle size—one of the three co-heiresses of the -Covenanting general, David Leslie (Lord Newark), whom Cromwell -overthrew at Dunbar—was six feet high, extremely handsome, -elegant in her carriage, and had a face and complexion of most -bewitching loveliness. Her relations and nurses always anticipated -that she was to marry the Earl of Eglintoune, in spite of their -disparity of age;<a name="FNanchor_164" id="FNanchor_164"></a><a href="#Footnote_164" class="fnanchor">[164]</a> for, while walking one day in her father’s garden -at Culzean, there alighted upon her shoulder a hawk, with his -lordship’s name upon its bells, which was considered an infallible -omen of her fate. Her appearance in Edinburgh, which took -place about the time of the Union, gained her a vast accession of -lovers among the nobility and gentry, and set all the rhyming -fancies of the period agog. Among her swains was Sir John Clerk -of Penicuik, a man of learning and talent in days when such -qualities were not common. As Miss Kennedy was understood to -be fond of music, he sent her a flute as a love-gift; from which it -may be surmised that this instrument was played by females in -that age, while as yet the pianoforte was not. When the young -lady attempted to blow the instrument, something was found to -interrupt the sound, which turned out to be a copy of verses in her -praise:</p> - -<div class="poetry-container"><div class="poetry"><div class="stanza"> -<div class="verse">‘Harmonious pipe, I languish for thy bliss,</div> -<div class="verse">When pressed to Silvia’s lips with gentle kiss!</div> -<div class="verse">And when her tender fingers round thee move</div> -<div class="verse">In soft embrace, I listen and approve</div> -<div class="verse">Those melting notes which soothe my soul in love.</div> -<div class="verse">Embalmed with odours from her breath that flow,</div> -<div class="verse">You yield your music when she’s pleased to blow;</div> -<div class="verse">And thus at once the charming lovely fair</div> -<div class="verse">Delights with sounds, with sweets perfumes the air.</div> -<div class="verse">Go, happy pipe, and ever mindful be</div> -<div class="verse">To court bewitching Silvia for me;</div> -<div class="verse">Tell all I feel—you cannot tell too much—</div> -<div class="verse">Repeat my love at each soft melting touch—</div> -<div class="verse">Since I to her my liberty resign,</div> -<div class="verse">Take thou the care to tune her heart to mine.’</div> -</div></div></div> - -<p>Unhappily for this accomplished and poetical lover, Lord -Eglintoune’s sickly wife happened just about this time to die, and -set his lordship again at large among the spinsters of Scotland. -Admirers of a youthful, impassioned, and sonnet-making cast -might have trembled at his approach to the shrine of their<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_194" id="Page_194">{194}</a></span> -divinity; for his lordship was one of those titled suitors who, -however old and horrible, are never rejected, except in novels and -romances. It appears that poor Clerk had actually made a -declaration of his passion for Miss Kennedy, which her father was -taking into consideration, a short while before the death of Lady -Eglintoune. As an old friend and neighbour, Sir Archibald -thought he would consult the earl upon the subject, and he -accordingly proceeded to do so. Short but decisive was the -conference. ‘Bide a wee, Sir Archy,’ said his lordship; ‘my -wife’s very sickly.’ With Sir Archibald, as with Mrs Slipslop, -the least hint sufficed: the case was at once settled against the -elegant baronet of Penicuik. The lovely Susanna accordingly -became in due time the Countess of Eglintoune.</p> - -<p>Even after this attainment of one of the greatest blessings -that life has to bestow,<a name="FNanchor_165" id="FNanchor_165"></a><a href="#Footnote_165" class="fnanchor">[165]</a> the old peer’s happiness was like to -have been destroyed by another untoward circumstance. It was -true that he had the handsomest wife in the kingdom, and she -brought him as many children as he could desire. One after -another came no fewer than seven daughters. But then his -lordship wanted a male heir; and every one knows how poor a -consolation a train of daughters, however long, proves in such a -case. He was so grieved at the want of a son that he threatened -to divorce his lady. The countess replied that he need not do -that, for she would readily agree to a separation, provided he -would give back what he had with her. His lordship, supposing -she alluded only to pecuniary matters, assured her she should have -her fortune to the last penny. ‘Na, na, my lord,’ said she, ‘that -winna do: return me my youth, beauty, and virginity, and dismiss -me when you please.’ His lordship, not being able to comply -with this demand, willingly let the matter drop; and before the -year was out her ladyship brought him a son, who established -the affection of his parents on an enduring basis. Two other -male children succeeded. The countess was remarkable for a -manner quite peculiar to herself, and which was remembered as -the <em>Eglintoune air</em>, or the <em>Eglintoune manner</em>, long after her -death. A Scottish gentleman, writing from London in 1730, -says: ‘Lady Eglintoune has set out for Scotland, much satisfied -with the honour and civilities shown her ladyship by the queen -and all the royal family: she has done her country more honour -than any lady I have seen here, both by a genteel and a prudent<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_195" id="Page_195">{195}</a></span> -behaviour.’<a name="FNanchor_166" id="FNanchor_166"></a><a href="#Footnote_166" class="fnanchor">[166]</a> Her daughters were also handsome women. It was -a goodly sight, a century ago, to see the long procession of sedans, -containing Lady Eglintoune and her daughters, devolve from the -close and proceed to the Assembly Rooms, where there was sure -to be a crowd of plebeian admirers congregated to behold their -lofty and graceful figures step from the chairs on the pavement. -It could not fail to be a remarkable sight—eight beautiful women, -conspicuous for their stature and carriage, all dressed in the -splendid though formal fashions of that period, and inspired at -once with dignity of birth and consciousness of beauty! Alas! -such <em>visions</em> no longer illuminate the dark tortuosities of Auld -Reekie!</p> - -<p>Many of the young ladies found good matches, and were the -mothers of men more or less distinguished for intellectual attainments. -Sir James Macdonald, the Marcellus of the Hebrides, -and his two more fortunate brothers, were the progeny of Lady -Margaret; and in various other branches of the family talent -seems to be hereditary.</p> - -<p>The countess was herself a blue-stocking—at that time a sort -of prodigy—and gave encouragement to the humble literati of -her time. The unfortunate Boyse dedicated a volume of poems -to her; and I need scarcely remind the Scottish reader that the -<cite>Gentle Shepherd</cite> was laid at her ladyship’s feet. The dedication -prefixed to that pastoral drama contains what appears the usual -amount of extravagant praise; yet it was perhaps little beyond -the truth. For the ‘penetration, superior wit, and profound -judgment’ which Allan attributes to her ladyship, she was perhaps -indebted in some degree to the lucky accident of her having -exercised it in the bard’s favour; but he assuredly overstrained -his conscience very little when he said she was ‘possessed of every -outward charm in the most perfect degree.’ Neither was it too -much to speak of ‘the unfading beauties of wisdom and piety’ -which adorned her ladyship’s mind.’<a name="FNanchor_167" id="FNanchor_167"></a><a href="#Footnote_167" class="fnanchor">[167]</a> Hamilton of Bangour<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_196" id="Page_196">{196}</a></span>’s -prefatory verses, which are equally laudatory and well bestowed, -contain the following beautiful character of the lady, with a just -compliment to her daughters:</p> - -<div class="poetry-container"><div class="poetry"><div class="stanza"> -<div class="verse">‘In virtues rich, in goodness unconfined,</div> -<div class="verse">Thou shin’st a fair example to thy kind;</div> -<div class="verse">Sincere, and equal to thy neighbours’ fame,</div> -<div class="verse">How swift to praise, how obstinate to blame!</div> -<div class="verse">Bold in thy presence bashfulness appears,</div> -<div class="verse">And backward merit loses all its fears.</div> -<div class="verse">Supremely blest by Heaven, Heaven’s richest grace</div> -<div class="verse">Confest is thine—an early blooming race;</div> -<div class="verse">Whose pleasing smiles shall guardian wisdom arm—</div> -<div class="verse">Divine instruction!—taught of thee to charm,</div> -<div class="verse">What transports shall they to thy soul impart</div> -<div class="verse">(The conscious transports of a parent’s heart),</div> -<div class="verse">When thou behold’st them of each grace possessed,</div> -<div class="verse">And sighing youths imploring to be blest</div> -<div class="verse">After thy image formed, with charms like thine,</div> -<div class="verse">Or in the visit or the dance<a name="FNanchor_168" id="FNanchor_168"></a><a href="#Footnote_168" class="fnanchor">[168]</a> to shine:</div> -<div class="verse">Thrice happy who succeed their mother’s praise,</div> -<div class="verse">The lovely Eglintounes of other days!’</div> -</div></div></div> - -<p>It may be remarked that her ladyship’s thorough-paced Jacobitism, -which she had inherited from her father, tended much to make -her the friend of Ramsay, Hamilton, and other Cavalier bards. -She was, it is believed, little given to patronising Whig poets.</p> - -<p>The patriarchal peer who made Susanna so happy a mother -died in 1729, leaving her a dowager of forty, with a good jointure. -Retiring to the country, she employed her widowhood in the -education of her children, and was considered a perfect example to -all mothers in this useful employment. In our days of freer -manners, her conduct might appear too reserved. The young -were taught to address her by the phrase ‘Your ladyship;’ and she -spoke to them in the same ceremonious style. Though her eldest -son was a mere boy when he succeeded to the title, she constantly -called him Lord Eglintoune; and she enjoined all the rest of the -children to address him in the same manner. When the earl grew<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_197" id="Page_197">{197}</a></span> -up, they were upon no less formal terms; and every day in the -world he took his mother by the hand at the dinner-hour, and led -her downstairs to her chair at the head of his table, where she sat -in state, a perfect specimen of the stately and ostentatious politeness -of the last age.</p> - -<p>All this ceremony was accompanied with so much affection -that the countess was never known to refuse her son a request but -one—to walk as a peeress at the coronation of King George III. -Lord Eglintoune, then a gentleman of the bedchamber, was proud -of his mother, and wished to display her noble figure on that -occasion. But she jestingly excused herself by saying that it was -not worth while for so old a woman to buy new robes.</p> - -<p>The unhappy fate of her eldest and favourite son—shot by a -man of violent passions, whom he was rashly treating as a poacher -(1769)—gave her ladyship a dreadful shock in her old age. The -earl, after receiving the fatal wound, was brought to Eglintoune -Castle, when his mother was immediately sent for from Auchans. -What her feelings must have been when she saw one so dear to -her thus suddenly struck down in the prime of his days may be -imagined. The tenderness he displayed towards her and others -in his last hours is said to have been to the last degree noble and -affecting.</p> - -<p>When Johnson and Boswell returned from their tour to the -Hebrides, they visited Lady Eglintoune at Auchans. She was so -well pleased with the doctor, his politics, and his conversation that -she embraced and kissed him at parting, an honour of which the -gifted tourist was ever afterwards extremely proud. Boswell’s -account of the interview is interesting. ‘Lady Eglintoune,’ says -he, ‘though she was now in her eighty-fifth year, and had lived in -the country almost half a century, was still a very agreeable woman. -Her figure was majestic, her manners high-bred, her reading extensive, -and her conversation elegant. She had been the admiration -of the gay circles, and the patroness of poets. Dr Johnson was -delighted with his reception here. Her principles in church and -state were congenial with his. In the course of conversation, -it came out that Lady Eglintoune was married the year before Dr -Johnson was born; upon which she graciously said to him that she -might have been his mother, and she now adopted him.’</p> - -<div class="figcenter w300"> -<div class="figleft w150"> -<img src="images/illus_p_198a.jpg" width="150" height="93" alt="" /> -</div> - -<div class="figright w100"> -<img src="images/illus_p_198b.jpg" width="100" height="94" alt="" /> -</div></div> - -<p class="clear">This venerable woman amused herself latterly in taming and -patronising rats. She kept a vast number of these animals in her -pay at Auchans, and they succeeded in her affections to the poets -and artists whom she had loved in early life. It does not reflect<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_198" id="Page_198">{198}</a></span> -much credit upon the latter that her ladyship used to complain of -never having met with true gratitude except from four-footed -animals. She had a panel in the oak wainscot of her -dining-room, which she tapped upon and opened at -meal-times, when ten or twelve jolly rats -came tripping forth and joined her at table. -At the word of command, or a signal from -her ladyship, they retired again obediently to their -native obscurity—a trait of good sense in the character -and habits of the animals which, it is hardly necessary to -remark, patrons do not always find in two-legged -protégés.</p> - -<div class="figcenter w450"> -<div class="figleft w190"> -<img src="images/illus_p_198c.jpg" width="190" height="106" alt="" /> -</div> - -<div class="figright w220"> -<img src="images/illus_p_198d.jpg" width="220" height="92" alt="" /> -</div></div> - -<p class="clear">Her ladyship died in 1780, at the age of ninety-one, -having preserved her stately mien and beautiful -complexion to the last. The -latter was a mystery of fineness to many -ladies not the third of her age. As her secret -may be of service to modern beauties, I shall, -in kindness to the sex, divulge it. <em>She never -used paint, but washed her face periodically with <span class="smcap lowercase">SOW’S MILK</span>!</em> I -have seen a portrait, taken in her eighty-first year, in which it is -observable that her skin is of exquisite delicacy and tint. Altogether, -the countess was a woman of ten thousand!</p> - -<p>The jointure-house of this fine old country-gentlewoman—Auchans -Castle, a capital specimen of the Scottish manor-house of -the seventeenth century, situated near Irvine—is now uninhabited, -and the handsome wainscoted rooms in which she entertained -Johnson and Boswell are fast hastening to decay. One last trait -may now be recorded; in her ladyship’s bedroom at this place was -hung a portrait of her sovereign <i lang="la" xml:lang="la">de jure</i>, the ill-starred Charles -Edward, so situated as to be <em>the first object which met her sight on -awaking in the morning</em>.</p> - -<hr class="chap" /></div><div class="chapter"> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_199" id="Page_199">{199}</a></span></p> - - - - -<h2><a name="FEMALE_DRESSES_OF_LAST_CENTURY" id="FEMALE_DRESSES_OF_LAST_CENTURY">FEMALE DRESSES OF LAST CENTURY.</a></h2> - - -<p>Ladies in the last century wore dresses and decorations many -of which were of an inconvenient nature; yet no one can deny -them the merit of a certain dignity and grace. How fine it must -have been to see, as an old gentleman told me he had seen, two -hooped ladies moving along the Lawnmarket in a summer evening, -and filling up the whole footway with their stately and voluminous -persons!</p> - -<p>Amongst female articles of attire in those days were calashes, -bongraces, capuchins, negligées, stomachers, stays, hoops, lappets, -pinners, plaids, fans, busks, rumple-knots, &c., all of them now -forgotten.</p> - -<p>The calash was a species of hood, constructed of silk upon a -framework of cane, and was used as a protection to a cap or head-dress -in walking out or riding in a carriage. It could be folded -back like the hood of a carriage, so as to lie gathered together -behind the neck.</p> - -<p>The bongrace was a bonnet of silk and cane, in shape somewhat -like a modern bonnet.</p> - -<p>The capuchin was a short cloak, reaching not below the elbows. -It was of silk, edged with lace, or of velvet. Gentlemen also wore -capuchins. The first Sir William Forbes frequently appeared at -the Cross in one. A lady’s <em>mode tippet</em> was nearly the same piece -of dress.</p> - -<p>The negligée was a gown, projecting in loose and ample folds -from the back. It could only be worn with stays. It was entirely -open in front, so as to show the stomacher, across which it was -laced with flat silk cords, while below it opened more widely and -showed the petticoat. This latter, though shorter, was sometimes -more splendid than the gown, and had a deep flounce. Ladies in -walking generally carried the skirt of the gown over the arm, and -exhibited the petticoat; but when they entered a room, they -always came sailing in, with the train sweeping full and majestically -behind them.</p> - -<p>The stomacher was a triangular piece of rich silk, one corner -pointing downwards and joining the fine black lace-bordered apron, -while the other two angles pointed to the shoulders. Great pains -were usually discovered in the adornment of this beautiful and<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_200" id="Page_200">{200}</a></span> -most attractive piece of dress. Many wore jewels upon it; and a -lady would have thought herself poor indeed if she could not -bedizen it with strings of bugles or tinsel.</p> - -<p>Stays were made so long as to touch the chair, both in front and -rear, when a lady sat. They were calculated to fit so tightly that -the wearers had to hold by the bedpost while the maid was lacing -them. There is a story told of a lady of high rank in Scotland, -about 1720, which gives us a strange idea of the rigours and -inconvenience of this fashion. She stinted her daughters as to diet, -with a view to the improvement of their shapes; but the young -ladies, having the cook in their interest, used to unlace their stays -at night, after her ladyship went to bed, and make a hearty meal. -They were at last discovered, by the smell of a roast goose, carried -upstairs to their bedchamber; as unluckily their lady-mother did -not take snuff,<a name="FNanchor_169" id="FNanchor_169"></a><a href="#Footnote_169" class="fnanchor">[169]</a> and was not asleep.</p> - -<p>The hoop was contemporary with, and a necessary appendage -of, the stays. There were different species of hoops, being of -various shapes and uses. The pocket-hoop, worn in the morning, -was like a pair of small panniers, such as one sees on an ass. The -bell-hoop was a sort of petticoat, shaped like a bell and made with -cane or rope for framework. This was not quite full-dress. There -was also a straw petticoat, a species of hoop such as is so common -in French prints. The full-sized evening hoop was so monstrous -that people saw one-half of it enter the room before the wearer. -This was very inconvenient in the Old Town, where doorways and -closes were narrow. In going down a close or a turnpike stair, -ladies tilted them up and carried them under their arms. In case -of this happening, there was a <em>show petticoat</em> below; and such care -was taken of appearances that even the <em>garters</em> were worn fine, -being either embroidered or having gold and silver fringes and -tassels.</p> - -<p>The French silks worn during the last century were beautiful, -the patterns were so well drawn and the stuff of such excellent -quality. The dearest common brocade was about a guinea a yard; -if with gold or silver, considerably more.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_201" id="Page_201">{201}</a></span></p> - -<p>The lappet was a piece of Brussels or point lace, hanging in -two pieces from the crown of the head and streaming gracefully -behind.</p> - -<p>Pinners, such as the celebrated Egyptian Sphinx wears, were -pinned down the stomacher.</p> - -<p>Plaids were worn by ladies to cover their heads and muffle their -faces when they went into the street. The council records of -Edinburgh abound in edicts against the use of this piece of dress, -which, they said, confounded decent women with those who were -the contrary.</p> - -<p>Fans were large, the sticks curiously carved, and if of leather, -generally very well painted—being imported from Italy or Holland. -In later times these have been sometimes framed like pictures and -hung on the walls.</p> - -<p>All women, high and low, wore enormous busks, generally with -a heart carved at the upper end. In low life this was a common -present to sweethearts; if from carpenters, they were artificially -veneered.</p> - -<p>The rumple-knot was a large bunch of ribbons worn at the peak -of the waist behind. Knots of ribbons were then numerous over -the whole body. There were the breast-knots, two hainch-knots -(at which there were also buttons for looping up the gown behind), -a knot at the tying of the beads behind the neck, one in front and -another at the back of the head-gear, and knots upon the shoes. -It took about twelve yards or upwards to make a full suit of -ribbons.<a name="FNanchor_170" id="FNanchor_170"></a><a href="#Footnote_170" class="fnanchor">[170]</a></p> - -<p>Other minor articles of dress and adornment were the <em>befong</em> -handkerchief (spelt at random), of a stuff similar to what is now -called <em>net</em>, crossed upon the breast; paste ear-rings and necklace; -broad black bracelets at the wrists; a <em>pong pong</em>—a jewel fixed to -a wire with a long pin at the end, worn in front of the cap, and -which shook as the wearer moved. It was generally stuck in the -cushion over which the hair was turned in front. Several were -frequently worn at once. A song in the <cite>Charmer</cite>, 1751, alludes -to this bijou:</p> - -<div class="poetry-container"><div class="poetry"><div class="stanza"> -<div class="verse">‘Come all ye young ladies whose business and care</div> -<div class="verse">Is contriving new dresses, and curling your hair;</div> -<div class="verse">Who flirt and coquet with each coxcomb who comes</div> -<div class="verse">To toy at your toilets, and strut in your rooms;</div> -<div class="verse">While you’re placing a patch, <em>or adjusting pong pong</em>,</div> -<div class="verse">Ye may listen and learn by the truth of my song.’</div> -</div></div></div> -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_202" id="Page_202">{202}</a></span></p> -<p>Fly-caps, encircling the head, worn by young matrons, and mob-caps, -falling down over the ears, used only by old ones; pockets -of silk or satin, of which young girls wore one above their other -attire; silk or linen stockings—never of cotton, which is a modern -stuff—slashed with pieces of a colour in strong contrast with the -rest, or gold or silver clocks, wove in. The silk stockings were -very thick, and could not be washed on account of the gold or -silver. They were frequently of scarlet silk, and (1733) worn both -by ladies and gentlemen. High-heeled shoes, set off with fine lace -or sewed work, and sharply pointed in front.</p> - -<p>To give the reader a more picturesque idea of the former dresses -of the ladies of Edinburgh, I cite a couple of songs, the first wholly -old, the second a revivification:</p> - -<div class="poetry-container"><div class="poetry"><div class="stanza"> -<div class="verse">‘I’ll gar our guidman trow that I’ll sell the ladle,</div> -<div class="verse">If he winna buy to me a new side-saddle—</div> -<div class="verse">To ride to the kirk, and frae the kirk, and round about the toun—</div> -<div class="verse">Stand about, ye fisher jades, and gi’e my goun room!</div> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<div class="verse">I’ll gar our guidman trow that I’ll tak the fling-strings,</div> -<div class="verse">If he winna buy to me twelve bonnie goud rings,</div> -<div class="verse">Ane for ilka finger, and twa for ilka thumb—</div> -<div class="verse">Stand about, ye fisher jades, and gi’e my goun room!</div> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<div class="verse">I’ll gar our guidman trow that I’m gaun to dee,</div> -<div class="verse">If he winna fee to me twa valets or three,</div> -<div class="verse">To beir my tail up frae the dirt and ush me through the toun—</div> -<div class="verse">Stand about, ye fisher jades, and gi’e my goun room!’</div> -</div> - -<hr class="tb" /> - -<div class="stanza"> -<div class="verse">‘As Mally Lee cam’ down the street, her <em>capuchin</em> did flee;</div> -<div class="verse">She coost a look behind her, to see her <em>negligee</em>.</div> -<div class="verse indent1">And we’re a’ gaun east and wast, we’re a’ gaun agee,</div> -<div class="verse indent1">We’re a’ gaun east and wast, courtin’ Mally Lee.<a name="FNanchor_171" id="FNanchor_171"></a><a href="#Footnote_171" class="fnanchor">[171]</a></div> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<div class="verse">She had twa <em>lappets</em> at her head, that flaunted gallantlie,</div> -<div class="verse">And <em>ribbon knots</em> at back and breast of bonnie Mally Lee.</div> -<div class="verse indent1">And we’re a’ gaun, &c.</div> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<div class="verse">A’ down alang the Canongate were beaux o’ ilk degree;</div> -<div class="verse">And mony are turned round to look at bonnie Mally Lee.</div> -<div class="verse indent1">And we’re a’ gaun, &c.</div> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<div class="verse">And ilka bab her <em>pong pong</em> gi’ed, ilk lad thought that’s to me;</div> -<div class="verse">But feint a ane was in the thought of bonnie Mally Lee.</div> -<div class="verse indent1">And we’re a’ gaun, &c.</div><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_203" id="Page_203">{203}</a></span> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<div class="verse">Frae Seton’s Land a countess fair looked owre a window hie,</div> -<div class="verse">And pined to see the genty shape of bonnie Mally Lee.</div> -<div class="verse indent1">And we’re a’ gaun, &c.</div> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<div class="verse">And when she reached the palace porch, there lounged erls three;</div> -<div class="verse">And ilk ane thought his Kate or Meg a drab to Mally Lee.</div> -<div class="verse indent1">And we’re a’ gaun, &c.</div> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<div class="verse">The dance gaed through the palace ha’, a comely sight to see;</div> -<div class="verse">But nane was there sae bright or braw as bonnie Mally Lee.</div> -<div class="verse indent1">And we’re a’ gaun, &c.</div> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<div class="verse">Though some had jewels in their hair, like stars ’mang cluds did shine,</div> -<div class="verse">Yet Mally did surpass them a’ wi’ but her glancin’ eyne.</div> -<div class="verse indent1">And we’re a’ gaun, &c.</div> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<div class="verse">A prince cam’ out frae ’mang them a’, wi’ garter at his knee,</div> -<div class="verse">And danced a stately minuet wi’ bonnie Mally Lee.</div> -<div class="verse indent1">And we’re a’ gaun, &c.’</div> -</div></div></div> -<hr class="chap" /></div><div class="chapter"> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_204" id="Page_204">{204}</a></span></p> - - - -<h2><a name="THE_LORD_JUSTICE-CLERK_ALVA172" id="THE_LORD_JUSTICE-CLERK_ALVA172">THE LORD JUSTICE-CLERK ALVA.</a><a name="FNanchor_172" id="FNanchor_172"></a><a href="#Footnote_172" class="fnanchor">[172]</a></h2> - - - -<p class="chapter_summary"><strong>Ladies Sutherland and Glenorchy—The Pin or Risp.</strong></p> - - -<div class="figcenter w300"> -<img src="images/illus_p_204.jpg" width="300" height="338" alt="" /> -<div class="caption"><p class="center">Mylne’s Court, -where some of the Mylne family resided.</p></div> -</div> - -<p>This eminent person—a cadet of -the ancient house of Mar -(born 1680, died 1763)—had -his town mansion in an -obscure recess of the -High Street called -Mylne Square,<a name="FNanchor_173" id="FNanchor_173"></a><a href="#Footnote_173" class="fnanchor">[173]</a> the -first place bearing such -a designation in our -northern capital: it -was, I may remark, -built by one of a -family of Mylnes, who -are said to have been -master-masons to the -Scottish monarchs for -eight generations, and -some of whom are at this -day architects by profession.<a name="FNanchor_174" id="FNanchor_174"></a><a href="#Footnote_174" class="fnanchor">[174]</a> -Lord Alva’s residence was in the -second and third floors of the large -building on the west side of the -square. Of the same structure, an Earl -of Northesk occupied another <em>flat</em>. And, -to mark the character of Lord Alva’s abode, -part of it was afterwards, in the hands of a Mrs Reynolds, -used as a lodging-house of the highest grade. The Earl of<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_205" id="Page_205">{205}</a></span> -Hopetoun, while acting as Commissioner to the General -Assembly, there held viceregal state. But to return to Lord -Alva: it gives a curious idea of the habits of such a dignitary -before the rise of the New Town that we should find him -content with this dwelling while in immediate attendance upon -the court, and happy during the summer vacation to withdraw to -the shades of his little villa at Drumsheugh, standing on a spot -now surrounded by <em>town</em>. Lord Lovat, who, on account of his -numerous law-pleas, was a great intimate of Lord Alva’s, frequently -visited him here; and Mrs Campbell of Monzie, Lord Alva’s -daughter, used to tell that when she met Lord Lovat on the stair -he always took her up in his arms and kissed her, to her great -annoyance and horror—<em>he was so ugly</em>. During one of his law-pleas, -he went to a dancing-school ball, which Misses Jean and -Susanna, Lord Alva’s daughters, attended. He had his pocket -full of <em>sweeties</em>, as Mrs Campbell expressed it; and so far did he -carry his exquisitely refined system of cunning, that—in order no -doubt to find favour with their father—he devoted the greater -share of his attentions and the whole of his comfits to them alone. -Those who knew this singular man used to say that, with all his -duplicity, faithlessness, and cruelty, his character exhibited no -redeeming trait whatever: nobody ever knew any good of him.</p> - -<p>In his Mylne Square mansion Lord Alva’s two step-daughters -were married; one to become Countess of Sutherland, the other -Lady Glenorchy. There was something very striking in the fate -of Lady Sutherland and of the earl, her husband—a couple -distinguished as much by personal elegance and amiable character -as by lofty rank. Lady Sutherland was blessed with a temper of -extraordinary sweetness, which shone in a face of so much beauty -as to have occasioned admiration where many were beautiful—the -coronation of George III. and his queen. The happiness of the -young pair had been increased by the birth of a daughter. One -unlucky day his lordship, coming after dinner into the drawing-room -at Dunrobin a little flushed with wine, lifted up the infant -above his head by way of frolic, when, sad to tell, he dropped her -by accident on the floor, and she received injuries from which she -never recovered. This incident had such an effect upon his lordship’s -spirits that his health became seriously affected, so as finally -to require a journey to Bath, where he was seized with an infectious -fever. For twenty-one successive days and nights he was attended -by his wife, then pregnant, till she herself caught the fatal distemper. -The countess’s death was concealed from his lordship;<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_206" id="Page_206">{206}</a></span> -nevertheless, when his delirium left him, the day before he died, -he frequently said: ‘I am going to join my dear wife;’ appearing -to know that she had ‘already reached the goal with mended pace!’ -Can it be that we are sometimes able to penetrate the veil which -hangs, in thick and gloomy folds, between this world and the next; -or does the ‘mortal coil’ in which the light of mind is enveloped -become thinner and more transparent by the wearing of deadly -sickness? The bodies of the earl and countess were brought to -Holyrood House, where they had usually resided when in town, and -lay in state for some time previous to their interment in one grave in -the Abbey Chapel. The death of a pair so young, so good, and -who had stood in so distinguished a position in society—leaving one -female infant to a disputed title—made a deep impression on the -public, and was sincerely lamented in their own immediate circle. -Of much poetry written on the occasion, a specimen may be seen -in Evans’s <cite>Old Ballads</cite>. Another appears in Brydges’s <cite>Censura -Literaria</cite>, being the composition of Sir Gilbert Elliot of Minto:</p> - -<div class="poetry-container"><div class="poetry"><div class="stanza"> -<div class="wideverse indent4">‘In pity, Heaven bestowed</div> -<div class="wideverse">An early doom: lo, on the self-same bier,</div> -<div class="wideverse">A fairer form, cold by her husband’s side,</div> -<div class="wideverse">And faded every charm. She died for thee,</div> -<div class="wideverse">For thee, her only love. In beauty’s prime,</div> -<div class="wideverse">In youth’s triumphant hour, she died for thee.</div> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<div class="wideverse">Bring water from the brook, and roses spread</div> -<div class="wideverse">O’er their pale limbs; for ne’er did wedded love</div> -<div class="wideverse">To one sad grave consign a lovelier pair,</div> -<div class="wideverse">Of manners gentler, or of purer heart!’</div> -</div></div></div> - -<p>Lady Glenorchy, the younger sister of Lady Sutherland, was -remarkable for her pious disposition. Exceedingly unfortunate in -her marriage, she was early taught to seek consolation from things -‘not of this world.’ I have been told that nothing could have -been more striking than to hear this young and beautiful creature -pouring forth her melodious notes and hymns, while most of her -sex and age at that time exercised their voices only upon the -wretched lyrics imported from Vauxhall and Ranelagh, or the -questionable verses of Ramsay and his contemporaries. She met -with her rich reward, even in this world; for she enjoyed the -applause of the wealthy and the blessings of the poor, with that -supreme of all pleasures—the conviction that the eternal welfare -of those in whose fate she was chiefly interested was forwarded, if -not perfected, by her precepts and example.<a name="FNanchor_175" id="FNanchor_175"></a><a href="#Footnote_175" class="fnanchor">[175]</a></p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_207" id="Page_207">{207}</a></span></p> - -<div class="figcenter w150"> -<img src="images/illus_p_207.jpg" width="150" height="314" alt="" /> -<div class="caption"><p class="center">Old Risps.</p></div> -</div> - -<p>It is not unworthy of notice, in this record of all that is old -and quaint in our city, that the Lord Justice-clerk’s house was -provided with a <em>pin</em> or <em>risp</em>, instead of the more modern convenience—a -knocker. The Scottish ballads, in numberless passages, -make reference to this article: no hero in those compositions ever -comes to his mistress’s door but he <em>tirles at the pin</em>. What, then, -was a pin? It was a small slip or bar of iron, starting out from -the door vertically, serrated on the side towards the door, and -provided with a small ring, which, being drawn roughly along -the serrations or nicks, produced a harsh and grating sound, to -summon the servant to open. Another term for the article was -a <em>crow</em>. In the fourth eclogue of Edward Fairfax, a production -of the reign of James VI. and I., quoted in the <cite>Muses’ Library</cite>, -is this passage:</p> - -<div class="poetry-container"><div class="poetry"><div class="stanza"> -<div class="verse">‘Now, farewell Eglon! for the sun stoops low,</div> -<div class="verse">And calling guests before my sheep-cot’s door;</div> -<div class="verse">Now <em>clad in white, I see my porter-crow</em>;</div> -<div class="verse">Great kings oft want these blessings of the poor;’</div> -</div></div></div> - -<p>with the following note: ‘The ring of the door, called a <em>crow</em>, -and when covered with white linen, denoted the mistress of the -house was in travel.’ It is quite appropriate -to this explanation that a small Latin vocabulary, -published by Andrew Simpson in 1702, -places among the parts of a house, ‘<em>Corvex—a -clapper or ringle</em>.’ Hardly one specimen of -the pin, crow, or ringle now survives in the -Old Town. They were almost all disused -many years ago, when knockers were generally -substituted as more stylish. Knockers at that -time did not long remain in repute, though -they have never been altogether superseded, -even by bells, in the Old Town. The comparative -merit of knockers and pins was for a -long time a controversial point, and many -knockers got their heads twisted off in the -course of the dispute. Pins were, upon the -whole, considered very inoffensive, decent, old-fashioned -things, being made of a modest metal, and making little<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_208" id="Page_208">{208}</a></span> -show upon a door; knockers were thought upstart, prominent, -brazen-faced articles, and received the full share of odium always -conferred by Scotsmen of the old school upon tasteful improvements. -Every drunken fellow, in reeling home at night, thought -it good sport to carry off all the knockers that came in his way; -and as drunken gentlemen were very numerous, many acts of -violence were committed, and sometimes a whole stair was found -stripped of its knockers in the morning; when the voice of -lamentation raised by the servants of the sufferers might have -reminded one of the wailings of the Lennox dairy-women after a -<em>creagh</em> in the days of old. Knockers were frequently used as -missile weapons by the bucks of that day against the Town-guard; -and the morning sun sometimes saw the High Street strewed with -them. The aforesaid Mrs Campbell remembered residing in an -Old Town house, which was one night disturbed in the most -intolerable manner by a drunken party at the knocker. In the -morning the greater part of it was found to be gone; and it was -besides discovered, to the horror of the inmates, that part of a -finger was left sticking in the fragments, with the appearance of -having been forcibly wrenched from the hand.</p> - -<hr class="chap" /></div><div class="chapter"> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_209" id="Page_209">{209}</a></span></p> - - - - -<h2><a name="MARLINS_AND_NIDDRYS_WYNDS" id="MARLINS_AND_NIDDRYS_WYNDS">MARLIN’S AND NIDDRY’S WYNDS.</a></h2> - - - -<p class="chapter_summary"><strong>Tradition of Marlin the Pavier—House of Provost Edward—Story -of Lady Grange.</strong></p> - - -<p>Where South Bridge Street now stands, there formerly -existed two wynds, or alleys, of the better class, named -Marlin’s and Niddry’s Wynds. Many persons of importance lived -in these obscurities. Marlin’s Wynd, which extended from behind -the Tron Church, and contained several bookshops and stalls, the -favourite lounge of the lovers of old literature, was connected with -a curious tradition, which existed at the time when Maitland -wrote his <cite>History of Edinburgh</cite> (1753). It was said that the -High Street was first paved or <em>causewayed</em> by one Marlin, a -Frenchman, who, thinking that specimen of his ingenuity the best -monument he could have, desired to be buried under it, and was -accordingly interred at the head of this wynd, which derived its -name from him. The tradition is so far countenanced by there -having formerly been a space in the pavement at this spot, marked -by six flat stones, in the shape of a grave. According, however, -to more authentic information, the High Street was first paved in -1532<a name="FNanchor_176" id="FNanchor_176"></a><a href="#Footnote_176" class="fnanchor">[176]</a> by John and Bartoulme Foliot, who appear to have had -nothing in common with this legendary Marlin, except country. -The grave of at least Bartoulme Foliot is distinctly marked by a -flat monument in the Chapel-Royal at Holyrood House. It is -possible, nevertheless, that Marlin may have been the more -immediate executor or superintendent of the work.</p> - -<p>Niddry’s Wynd abounded in curious antique houses, many of -which had been the residences of remarkable persons. The most -interesting <em>bit</em> was a paved court, about half-way down, on the -west side, called Lockhart’s Court, from its having latterly been -the residence of the family of Lockhart of Carnwath.<a name="FNanchor_177" id="FNanchor_177"></a><a href="#Footnote_177" class="fnanchor">[177]</a> This was,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_210" id="Page_210">{210}</a></span> -in reality, a quadrangular palace, the whole being of elegant -old architecture in one design, and accessible by a deep arched -gateway. It was built by Nicol Edward, or Udward, who was -provost of Edinburgh in 1591; a wealthy citizen, and styled in -his <em>writts</em>, ‘of old descent in the burgh.’ On a mantelpiece -within the house his arms were carved, along with an anagram -upon his name:</p> - -<p class="center"> -VA D’UN VOL À CHRIST— -</p> - -<p><em>Go with one flight to Christ</em>; which, the reader will find, can only -be made out by Latinising his name into <span class="smcap">Nicholaus Eduartus</span>. -We learn from Moyses’s <cite>Memoirs</cite> that, in January 1591, this house -was the temporary residence of James VI. and his queen, then -recently arrived from Denmark; and that, on the 7th of February, -the Earl of Huntly passed hence, out of the immediate royal -presence, when he went to murder the Bonny Earl of Moray at -Donibrissle; which caused a suspicion that His Majesty was concerned -in that horrid outburst of feudal hate. Lockhart’s Court -was latterly divided into several distinct habitations, one of which, -on the north side of the quadrangle, was occupied by the family -of Bruce of Kinnaird, the celebrated traveller. In the part on -the south side, occupied by the Carnwath family, there was a -mantelpiece in the drawing-room of magnificent workmanship, -and reaching to the ceiling. The whole mansion, even in its -reduced state, bore an appearance of security and strength which -spoke of other times; and there was, moreover, a profound -dungeon underground, which was only accessible by a secret trap-door, -opening through the floor of a small closet, the most remote -of a suite of rooms extending along the south and west sides of -the court. Perhaps, at a time when to be rich was neither so<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_211" id="Page_211">{211}</a></span> -common nor so safe as now, Provost Edward might conceal his -hoards in this <em>massy more</em>.</p> - -<p>Alexander Black of Balbirney, who was provost of Edinburgh -from 1579 to 1583, had a house at the head of the wynd. King -James lodged in this house on the 18th of August 1584, and -walked from it in state next day to hold a parliament in the -Tolbooth. Here also lodged the Chancellor Thirlstain, in -January 1591, while the king and queen were the guests of -Nicol Edward.<a name="FNanchor_178" id="FNanchor_178"></a><a href="#Footnote_178" class="fnanchor">[178]</a> It must be understood that these visits of -royalty were less considered in the light of an honour than of a -tax. The king in those times went to live at the board of a -wealthy subject when his own table happened to be scantily -furnished; which was too often the case with poor King James.</p> - -<p>On the east side of the wynd, nearly opposite to Lockhart’s -Court, was a good house,<a name="FNanchor_179" id="FNanchor_179"></a><a href="#Footnote_179" class="fnanchor">[179]</a> which, early in the last century, was -possessed by James Erskine of Grange, best known by his judicial -title of Lord Grange, and the brother of John, Earl of Mar. -This gentleman has acquired an unhappy notoriety in consequence -of his treatment of his wife. He was externally a professor of -ultra-evangelical views of religion, and a patron of the clergy on -that side, yet in his private life is understood to have been far -from exemplary. The story of Lady Grange, as Mrs Erskine was -called, had a character of romance about it which has prevented it -from being forgotten. It also reflects a curious light upon the -state of manners in Scotland in the early part of the eighteenth -century. The lady was a daughter of that Chiesly of Dalry whom -we have already seen led by an insane violence of temper to commit -one of the most atrocious of murders.</p> - - -<h3>STORY OF LADY GRANGE.<a name="FNanchor_180" id="FNanchor_180"></a><a href="#Footnote_180" class="fnanchor">[180]</a></h3> - -<p>Lord and Lady Grange had been married upwards of twenty -years, and had had several children, when, in 1730, a separation<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_212" id="Page_212">{212}</a></span> -was determined on between them. It is usually difficult in such -cases to say in what degree the parties are respectively blamable; -how far there have been positive faults on one side, and want of -forbearance on the other, and so forth. If we were to believe the -lady in this instance, there had been love and peace for twenty -years, when at length Lord Grange took a sudden dislike to his -wife, and would no longer live with her. He, on the other hand, -speaks of having suffered long from her ‘unsubduable rage and -madness,’ and of having failed in all his efforts to bring her -to a reasonable conduct. There is too much reason to believe -that the latter statement is in the main true; although, were it -more so, it would still leave Lord Grange unjustifiable in the -measures which he took with respect to his wife. It is traditionally -stated that in their unhappy quarrels the lady did not scruple -to remind her husband whose daughter she was—thus hinting at -what she was capable of doing if she thought herself deeply -aggrieved. However all this might be, in the year 1730 a -separation was agreed to (with great reluctance on the part of -the lady), his lordship consenting to give her a hundred a year -for her maintenance so long as she should continue to live apart -from him.</p> - -<p>After spending some months in the country, Lady Grange -returned to Edinburgh, and took a lodging near her husband’s -house, for the purpose, as she tells us, of endeavouring to induce -him to take her back, and that she might occasionally see her -children. According to Lord Grange, she began to torment him -by following him and the children on the street ‘in a scandalous -and shameful manner,’ and coming to his house, and calling reproaches -to him through the windows,<a name="FNanchor_181" id="FNanchor_181"></a><a href="#Footnote_181" class="fnanchor">[181]</a> especially when there was -company with him. He thus writes: ‘In his house, at the bottom -of Niddry’s Wynd, where there is a court through which one -enters the house, one time among others, when it was full of chairs, -chairmen, and footmen, who attended the company that were with -himself, or his sister Lady Jane Paterson, then keeping house -together, she came into this court, and among that mob shamelessly<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_213" id="Page_213">{213}</a></span> -cried up to the windows injurious reproaches, and would not -go away, though entreated, till, hearing the late Lord Lovat’s -voice, who was visiting Mr E——, and seeing two of his servants -among the other footmen, “Oh,” said she, “is your master here?” -and instantly ran off.’ He speaks of her having attacked him one -day in church; at another time she forced him to take refuge -with his son in a tavern for two hours. She even threatened to -assault him on the bench, ‘which he every day expected; for she -professed that she had no shame.’</p> - -<p>The traditionary account of Lady Grange represents her fate as -having been at last decided by her threatening to expose her -husband to the government for certain treasonable practices. It -would now appear that this was partially true. In his statement, -Lord Grange tells us that he had some time before gone to -London to arrange the private affairs of the Countess of Mar, -then become unable to conduct them herself, and he had sent an -account of his procedure to his wife, including some reflections on -a certain great minister (doubtless Walpole), who had thwarted -him much, and been of serious detriment to the interests of his -family in this matter. This document she retained, and she now -threatened to take it to London and use it for her husband’s -disadvantage, being supported in the design by several persons -with whom she associated. While denying that he had been -concerned in anything treasonable, Lord Grange says, ‘he had -already too great a load of that great minister’s wrath on his back -to stand still and see more of it fall upon him by the treachery -and madness of such a wife and such worthy confederates.’ The -lady had taken a seat in a stage-coach for London.<a name="FNanchor_182" id="FNanchor_182"></a><a href="#Footnote_182" class="fnanchor">[182]</a> Lord -Grange caused a friend to go and make interest to get her money -returned, and the seat let to another person; in which odd -proceeding he was successful. Thus was the journey stayed for -the meantime; but the lady declared her resolution to go as soon -as possible. ‘What,’ says Lord Grange, ‘could a man do with -such a wife? There was great reason to think she would daily go -on to do mischief to her family, and to affront and bring a blot -on her children, especially her daughters. There were things that -could not be redressed in a court of justice, and we had not then -a madhouse to lock such unhappy people up in.’</p> -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_214" id="Page_214">{214}</a></span></p> -<p>The result of his lordship’s deliberations was a plan for what he -calls ‘sequestrating’ his wife. It appears to have been concerted -between himself and a number of Highland chiefs, including, -above all, the notorious Lord Lovat.<a name="FNanchor_183" id="FNanchor_183"></a><a href="#Footnote_183" class="fnanchor">[183]</a> We now turn to the lady’s -narrative, which proceeds to tell that, on the evening of the 22nd -of January 1732, a party of Highlandmen, wearing the livery of -Lord Lovat, made their way into her lodgings, and forcibly seized -her, throwing her down and gagging her, then tying a cloth over -her head, and carrying her off as if she had been a corpse. At -the bottom of the stair was a chair containing a man, who took -the hapless lady upon his knees, and held her fast in his arms till -they had got to a place in the outskirts of the town. Then they -took her from the chair, removed the cloth from her head, and -mounted her upon a horse behind a man, to whom she was tied; -after which the party rode off ‘by the lee light of the moon,’ to -quote the language of the old ballads, whose incidents the present -resembles in character.</p> - -<p>The treatment of the lady by the way was, if we can believe her -own account, by no means gentle. The leader, although a gentleman -(Mr Forster of Corsebonny), disregarded her entreaties to be -allowed to stop on account of cramp in her side, and only answered -by ordering a servant to renew the bandages over her mouth. -She observed that they rode along the Long Way (where Princes -Street now stands), past the Castle, and so to the Linlithgow road. -After a ride of nearly twenty miles, they stopped at Muiravonside, -the house of Mr John Macleod, advocate, where servants appeared -waiting to receive the lady—and thus showed that the master of -the house had been engaged to aid in her abduction. She was -taken upstairs to a comfortable bedroom; but a man being posted -in the room as a guard, she could not go to bed nor take any -repose. Thus she spent the ensuing day, and when it was night, -she was taken out and remounted in the same fashion as before; -and the party then rode along through the Torwood, and so to -the place called Wester Polmaise, belonging to a gentleman of the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_215" id="Page_215">{215}</a></span> -name of Stewart, whose steward or factor was one of the cavalcade. -Here was an old tower, having one little room on each floor, as is -usually the case in such buildings; and into one of these rooms, -the window of which was boarded over, the lady was conducted. -She continued here for thirteen or fourteen weeks, supplied with a -sufficiency of the comforts of life, but never allowed to go into the -open air; till at length her health gave way, and the factor began -to fear being concerned in her death. By his intercession with -Mr Forster, she was then permitted to go into the court, under a -guard; but such was the rigour of her keepers that the garden -was still denied to her.</p> - -<div class="figcenter w500"> -<a id="illus_c_019"></a> -<img src="images/illus_c_019.jpg" width="500" height="678" alt="" /> -<div class="caption"><p class="center">THE CASTLE<br /> -from Princes Street.</p> - -<p class="right"> -<span class="smcap"><a href="#Page_214">Page 214.</a></span> -</p></div> -</div> - -<p>Thus time passed drearily on until the month of August, during -all which time the prisoner had no communication with the -external world. At length, by an arrangement made between Lord -Lovat and Mr Forster, at the house of the latter, near Stirling, -Lady Grange was one night forcibly brought out, and mounted -again as formerly, and carried off amidst a guard of horsemen. -She recognised several of Lovat’s people in this troop, and found -Forster once more in command. They passed by Stirling Bridge, -and thence onward to the Highlands; but she no longer knew the -way they were going. Before daylight they stopped at a house, -where she was lodged during the day, and at night the march -was resumed. Thus they journeyed for several days into the -Highlands, never allowing the unfortunate lady to speak, and -taking the most rigid care to prevent any one from becoming -aware of her situation. During this time she never had off her -clothes: one day she slept in a barn, another in an open enclosure. -Regard to delicacy in such a case was impossible. After a -fortnight spent at a house on Lord Lovat’s ground (probably in -Stratherrick, Inverness-shire), the journey was renewed in the -same style as before; only Mr Forster had retired from the party, -and the lady found herself entirely in the hands of Frasers.</p> - -<p>They now crossed a loch into Glengarry’s land, where they -lodged several nights in cow-houses or in the open air, making -progress all the time to the westward, where the country becomes -extremely wild. At Lochourn, an arm of the sea on the west -coast, the unfortunate lady was transferred to a small vessel which -was in waiting for her. Bitterly did she weep, and pitifully -implore compassion; but the Highlanders understood not her -language; and though they had done so, a departure from the -orders which had been given them was not to be expected from -men of their character. In the vessel, she found that she was in<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_216" id="Page_216">{216}</a></span> -the custody of one Alexander Macdonald, a tenant of one of -the Western Islands named Heskir, belonging to Sir Alexander -Macdonald of Sleat; and here we have a curious indication of the -spirit in which the Highlanders conducted such transactions. ‘I -told him,’ says the lady, ‘that I was stolen at Edinburgh, and -brought there by force, and that it was contrary to the laws what -they were doing. He answered that he would not keep me, or -any other, against their will, <em>except Sir Alexander Macdonald were -in the affair</em>.’ While they lay in Lochourn, waiting for a wind, -the brother and son of Macdonald of Scothouse came to see but -not to relieve her. Other persons visited the sloop, and among -these one William Tolmy, a tenant of the chief of Macleod, and -who had once been a merchant at Inverness. This was the first -person she had seen who expressed any sympathy with her. He -undertook to bear information of her retreat to her friend and -‘man of business,’ Mr Hope of Rankeillor, in Edinburgh; but it -does not appear that he fulfilled his promise.</p> - -<p>Lady Grange remained in Macdonald’s charge at Heskir nearly -two years—during the first year without once seeing bread, and -with no supply of clothing; obliged, in fact, to live in the same -miserable way as the rest of the family; afterwards some little -indulgence was shown to her. This island was of desolate aspect, -and had no inhabitant besides Macdonald and his wife. The -wretchedness of such a situation for a lady who had been all her -life accustomed to the refined society of a capital may of course -be imagined. Macdonald would never allow her to write to any -one; but he went to his landlord, Sir Alexander, to plead for the -indulgences she required. On one of these occasions, Sir Alexander -expressed his regret at having been concerned in such an affair, -and wished he were quit of it. The wonder is how Erskine should -have induced all these men to interest themselves in the ‘sequestration’ -of his wife. One thing is here remarkable: they were all of -them friends of the Stuart family, as was Macleod of Macleod, -into whose hands the lady subsequently fell. It therefore becomes -probable that Erskine had at least convinced them that her -seclusion from the world was necessary in some way for the -preservation of political secrets important to them.</p> - -<p>In June 1734 a sloop came to Heskir to take away the lady; -it was commanded by a Macleod, and in it she was conveyed to -the remotest spot of ground connected with the British Islands—namely, -the isle of St Kilda, the property of the chief of Macleod, -and remarkable for the simple character of the poor peasantry<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_217" id="Page_217">{217}</a></span> -who occupy it. There cannot, of course, be a doubt that those -who had an interest in the seclusion of Lady Grange regarded -this as a more eligible place than Heskir, in as far as it was more -out of the way, and promised better for her complete and permanent -confinement. In some respects it was an advantageous -change for the lady: the place was not uninhabited, as Heskir -very nearly was; and her domestic accommodation was better. -In St Kilda, she was placed in a house or cottage of two small -apartments, tolerably well furnished, with a girl to wait upon -her, and provided with a sufficiency of good food and clothing. -Of educated persons the island contained not one, except for a -short time a Highland Presbyterian clergyman, named Roderick -Maclennan. There was hardly even a person capable of speaking -or understanding the English language within reach. No books, -no intelligence from the world in which she had once lived. Only -once a year did a steward come to collect the rent paid in kind by -the poor people; and by him was the lady regularly furnished -with a store of such articles, foreign to the place, as she needed—usually -a stone of sugar, a pound of tea, six pecks of wheat, and an -anker of spirits.<a name="FNanchor_184" id="FNanchor_184"></a><a href="#Footnote_184" class="fnanchor">[184]</a> Thus she had no lack of the common necessaries -of life; she only wanted society and freedom. In this way she -spent seven dreary years in St Kilda. How she contrived to pass -her time is not known. We learn, however, some particulars of -her history during this period from the testimony of those who -had a charge over her. If this is to be believed, she made -incessant efforts, though without effect, to bribe the islanders to -assist in liberating her. Once a stray vessel sent a boat ashore -for water; she no sooner heard of it than she despatched the -minister’s wife to apprise the sailors of her situation, and entreat -them to rescue her; but Mrs Maclennan did not reach the spot -till after they had departed. She was kind to the peasantry, -giving them from her own stores, and sometimes had the women -to come and dance before her; but her temper and habits were -not such as to gain their esteem. Often she drank too much; and -whenever any one near her committed the slightest mistake, she -would fly into a furious passion, and even resort to violence. -Once she was detected in an attempt, during the night, to obtain -a pistol from above the steward’s bed, in the room next to her -own. On his awaking and seeing her, she ran off to her own bed. -One is disposed, of course, to make all possible allowances for a -person in her wretched circumstances; yet there can be little<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_218" id="Page_218">{218}</a></span> -doubt, from the evidence before us, that it was a natural and -habitual violence of temper which displayed itself during her -residence in St Kilda.</p> - -<p>Meanwhile it was known in Edinburgh that Lady Grange had -been forcibly carried away and placed in seclusion by orders of her -husband; but her whereabouts was a mystery to all besides a few -who were concerned to keep it secret. During the years which -had elapsed since her abduction, Mr Erskine had given up his seat -on the bench, and entered into political life as a friend of the -Prince of Wales and opponent of Sir Robert Walpole. The -world had wondered at the events of his domestic life, and several -persons denounced the singular means he had adopted for obtaining -domestic peace. But, in the main, he stood as well with society -as he had ever done. At length, in the winter of 1740-41, a -communication from Lady Grange for the first time reached her -friends. It was brought by the minister Maclennan and his wife, -who had left the island in discontent, after quarrelling with -Macleod’s steward. The idea of a lady by birth and education -being immured for a series of years in an outlandish place where -only the most illiterate peasantry resided, and this by the -command of a husband who could only complain of her irritable -temper, struck forcibly upon public feeling, and particularly upon -the mind of Lady Grange’s legal agent, Mr Hope of Rankeillor, -who had all along felt a keen interest in her fate. Of Mr Hope it -may be remarked that he was also a zealous Jacobite; yet, though -all the persons engaged in the lady’s abduction were of that party, -he hesitated not to take active measures on the contrary side. -He immediately applied to the Lord Justice-clerk (supreme -criminal judge) for a warrant to search for and liberate Lady -Grange. This application was opposed by the friends of Mr -Erskine, and eventually it was defeated; yet he was not on that -account deterred from hiring a vessel, and sending it with armed -men to secure the freedom of the lady—a step which, as it was -illegal and dangerous, obviously implied no small risk on his own -part. This ship proceeded no farther than the harbour called the -Horse-shoe, in Lorn (opposite to the modern town of Oban), where -the master quarrelled with and set on shore Mrs Maclennan, his -guide. Apparently the voyage was not prosecuted in consequence -of intelligence being received that the lady had been removed to -another place, where she was kept in more humane circumstances. -If so, its object might be considered as in part at least, though -indirectly, accomplished.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_219" id="Page_219">{219}</a></span></p> - -<p>I have seen a warrant, signed in the holograph of Normand -Macleod—the same insular chief who, a few years after, lost -public respect in consequence of his desertion of the Jacobite -cause, and showing an active hostility to Prince Charles when in -hiding. The document is dated at Dunvegan, February 17, -1741, and proceeds upon a rumour which has reached the writer -that a certain gentlewoman, called Lady Grange, was carried to -his isle of St Kilda in 1734, and has ever since been confined -there under cruel circumstances. Regarding this as a scandal -which he is bound to inquire into (as if it could have hitherto -been a secret to him), he orders his baron-bailie of Harris, -Donald Macleod of Bernera (this was a gallant fellow who went -out in the ’Forty-five), to proceed to that island and make the -necessary investigations. I have also seen the original precognition -taken by honest Donald six days thereafter, when the -various persons who had been about Lady Grange gave evidence -respecting her. The general bearing of this testimony, besides -establishing the fact of her confinement as a prisoner, is to the -effect that she was treated well in all other respects, having a -house forty feet long, with an inner room and a chimney to it, -a curtained bed, arm-chair, table, and other articles; ample store -of good provisions, including spirits; and plenty of good -clothes; but that she was addicted to liquor, and liable to -dreadful outbreaks of anger. Evidence was at the same time -taken regarding the character of the Maclennans, upon whose -reports Mr Hope had proceeded. It was Mr Erskine’s interest -to establish that they were worthless persons, and to this effect -strong testimony was given by several of the islanders, though -it would be difficult to say with what degree of verity. The -whole purpose of these precognitions was to meet the clamours -raised by Mr Hope as to the barbarities to which Lady Grange -had been subjected. They had the effect of stopping for a -time the legal proceedings threatened by that gentleman; but -he afterwards raised an action in the Court of Session for payment -of the arrears of aliment or allowance due to the lady, -amounting to £1150, and obtained decreet or judgment in the -year 1743 against the defender in absence, though he did not -choose to put it in force.</p> - -<p>The unfortunate cause of all these proceedings ceased to be a -trouble to any one in May 1745. Erskine, writing from Westminster, -June 1, in answer to an intimation of her death, says: -‘I most heartily thank you, my dear friend, for the timely notice<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_220" id="Page_220">{220}</a></span> -you gave me of the death of <em>that person</em>. It would be a -ridiculous untruth to pretend grief for it; but as it brings to my -mind a train of various things for many years back, it gives me -concern. Her retaining wit and facetiousness to the last surprises -me. These qualities none found in her, no more than -common-sense or good-nature, before she went to these parts; -and of the reverse of all which, if she had not been irrecoverably -possest, in an extraordinary and insufferable degree, after many -years’ fruitless endeavours to reclaim her, she had never seen -these parts. I long for the particulars of her death, which, you -are pleased to tell me, I am to have by next post.’</p> - -<p>Mr Hope’s wife and daughters being left as heirs of Lady -Grange, an action was raised in their name for the £1150 -formerly awarded, and for three years additional of her annuity; -and for this compound sum decreet was obtained, which was -followed by steps for forcing payment. The Hopes were aware, -however, of the dubious character of this claim, seeing that Mr -Erskine, from whatever causes, had substituted an actual subsistence -since 1732. They accordingly intimated that they aimed -at no personal benefit from Lady Grange’s bequest; and the -affair terminated in Mr Erskine reimbursing Mr Hope for all -the expenses he had incurred on behalf of the lady, including -that for the sloop which he had hired to proceed to St Kilda for -her rescue.</p> - -<p>It is humbly thought that this story casts a curious and faithful -light upon the age of our grandfathers, showing things in a kind -of transition from the sanguinary violence of an earlier age to the -humanity of the present times. Erskine, not to speak of his -office of a judge in Scotland, moved in English society of the -highest character. He must have been the friend of Lyttelton, -Pope, Thomson, and other ornaments of Frederick’s court; and -as the brother-in-law of the Countess of Mar, who was sister of -Lady Mary Wortley Montagu, he would figure in the brilliant circle -which surrounded that star of the age of the second George. Yet -he does not appear to have ever felt a moment’s compunction at -leaving the mother of his children to pine and fret herself to -death in a half-savage wilderness—</p> - -<div class="poetry-container"><div class="poetry"><div class="stanza"> -<div class="verse">‘Placed far amidst the melancholy main;’</div> -</div></div></div> - -<p>for in a paper which expresses his feelings on the subject pretty -freely, he justifies the ‘sequestration’ as a step required by -prudence and decency; and in showing that the gross necessaries<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_221" id="Page_221">{221}</a></span> -of life were afforded to his wife, seems to have considered -that his whole duty towards her was discharged. Such an insensibility -could not be peculiar to one man: it indicates the -temper of a class and of an age. While congratulating ourselves -on the improved humanity of our own times, we may glance with -satisfaction to the means which it places in our power for the -proper treatment of patients like Mrs Erskine. Such a woman -would now be regarded as the unfortunate victim of disease, -and instead of being forcibly carried off under cloud of night by -a band of Highlanders, and committed to confinement on the -outskirts of the world, she would, with proper precautions, be -remitted to an asylum, where, by gentle and rational management, -it might be hoped that she would be restored to mental -health, or, at the worst, enabled to spend the remainder of her -days in the utmost comfort which her state admitted of.</p> - -<hr class="tb" /> - -<p>[1868.—About the middle of Cant’s Close,<a name="FNanchor_185" id="FNanchor_185"></a><a href="#Footnote_185" class="fnanchor">[185]</a> on the west side, -there exists a remarkable edifice, different from all others in the -neighbourhood. It is two -stories in height, the second -story being reached by an -outside stone stair within -a small courtyard, which -had originally been shut in -by a gate. The stone pillars -of the gateway are decorated -with balls at the top, as -was the fashion of entrances -to the grounds of a country -mansion. The building is -picturesque in character, in -the style of the sixteenth -century in Scotland. As -it resembles a neat, old-fashioned -country-house, one -wonders to find it jammed -up amidst tall edifices in this confined alley. Ascending the stair, -we find that the interior consists of three or four apartments,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_222" id="Page_222">{222}</a></span> -with handsome panelled walls and elaborately carved stucco -ceilings. The principal room has a double window on the west -to Dickson’s Close.<a name="FNanchor_186" id="FNanchor_186"></a><a href="#Footnote_186" class="fnanchor">[186]</a></p> - -<div class="figcenter w300"> -<img src="images/illus_p_221.jpg" width="300" height="281" alt="" /> -<div class="caption"><p class="center">Old Mansion, Cant’s Close.</p></div> -</div> - -<p>Daniel Wilson, in his <cite>Memorials of Edinburgh</cite>, speaks of this -building in reference to Dickson’s Close. He says: ‘A little -lower down the close on the same side, an old and curious stone -tenement bears on its lower crow-step the Haliburton arms, -impaled with another coat, on one shield. It is a singularly -antique and time-worn edifice, evidently of considerable antiquity. -A curious double window projects on a corbelled base into the -close, while the whole stone-work is so much decayed as greatly -to add to its picturesque character. In the earliest deed which -exists, bearing date 1582, its first proprietor, Master James -Halyburton—a title then of some meaning—is spoken of in -indefinite terms as <i lang="la" xml:lang="la">umq<sup>le</sup></i>, or deceased; so that it is a building -probably of the early part of the sixteenth century.’ It is known -that the adjoining properties on the north once pertained to -the collegiate church of Crichton; while those on the east, in -Strichen’s Close, comprehended the town residence of the Abbot -of Melrose, 1526.</p> - -<p>The adjoining woodcut [<a href="#Page_222">p. 221</a>] will give some idea of this -strange old mansion in Cant’s Close, with its gateway and flight of -steps. In looking over the titles, we find that the tenement was -conveyed in 1735 from Robert Geddes of Scotstoun, Peeblesshire, -to George Wight, a burgess of Edinburgh, since which period it -has gradually deteriorated; every apartment, from the ground to -the garret, is now a dwelling for a separate family; and the -whole surroundings are most wretched. The edifice formed one -of the properties removed under the Improvement Act of 1867.]</p> - -<hr class="chap" /></div><div class="chapter"> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_223" id="Page_223">{223}</a></span></p> - - - - -<h2><a name="ABBOT_OF_MELROSES_LODGING" id="ABBOT_OF_MELROSES_LODGING">ABBOT OF MELROSE’S LODGING.</a></h2> - - -<p class="chapter_summary"><strong>Sir George Mackenzie—Lady Anne Dick.</strong></p> - - -<p>In Catholic times several of the great dignitaries of the Church -had houses in Edinburgh, as the Archbishop of St Andrews -at the foot of Blackfriars -Wynd, the Bishop of Dunkeld -in the Cowgate, and -the Abbot of Cambuskenneth -in the Lawnmarket.<a name="FNanchor_187" id="FNanchor_187"></a><a href="#Footnote_187" class="fnanchor">[187]</a> -The Abbot of Melrose’s -‘lodging’ appears from -public documents to have -been in what is now called -Strichen’s Close, in the High -Street, immediately to the -west of Blackfriars Wynd. -It had a garden extending -down to the Cowgate and -up part of the opposite -slope.</p> - -<div class="figcenter w275"> -<img src="images/illus_p_223.jpg" width="275" height="405" alt="" /> -<div class="caption"><p class="center">Strichen’s Close.</p></div> -</div> - -<p>A successor of the abbot -in this possession was Sir -George Mackenzie of Rosehaugh, -king’s advocate in -the reigns of Charles II. -and James II., and author -of several able works in -Scottish law, as well as a -successful cultivator of miscellaneous -literature. He -got a charter of the property -from the magistrates in 1677. The house occupied by Sir -George still exists,<a name="FNanchor_188" id="FNanchor_188"></a><a href="#Footnote_188" class="fnanchor">[188]</a> and appears to have been a goodly enough -mansion for its time. It is now, however, possessed by a brass-founder<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_224" id="Page_224">{224}</a></span> -as a place of business. From Sir George the alley was -called Rosehaugh’s Close, till, this house falling by marriage connection -into the possession -of Lord Strichen, -it got the name of -Strichen’s Close, which -it still bears. Lord -Strichen was a judge of -the Court of Session for -forty-five years subsequent -to 1730. He was -the direct ancestor of the -present Lord Lovat of -the British peerage.</p> - -<div class="figcenter w300"> -<img src="images/illus_p_224.jpg" width="300" height="281" alt="" /> -<div class="caption"><p class="center">Back of Mackenzie’s House, looking into -Cant’s House.</p></div> -</div> - -<p>Mackenzie has still a -place in the popular -imagination in Edinburgh -as the <em>Bluidy -Mackingie</em>, his office having -been to prosecute the -unruly Covenanters. It -therefore happens that -the founder of our -greatest national library,<a name="FNanchor_189" id="FNanchor_189"></a><a href="#Footnote_189" class="fnanchor">[189]</a> one whom Dryden regarded as a -friend, and who was the very first writer of classic English -prose in Scotland, is a sort of Raw-head and Bloody-bones -by the firesides of his native capital. He lies in a beautiful -mausoleum, which forms a conspicuous object in the Greyfriars -Churchyard, and which describes him as an ornament to his age, -and a man who was kind to all, ‘except a rebellious crew, from -whose violence, with tongue and pen, he defended his country and -king, whose virulence he stayed by the sword of justice, and whose -ferocity he, by the force of reason, blunted, and only did not -subdue.’ This monument was an object of horror to the good -people of Edinburgh, as it was almost universally believed that -the spirit of the persecutor could get no rest in its superb but -gloomy tenement. It used to be ‘a feat’ for a set of boys, in a -still summer evening, to march up to the ponderous doors, bedropt -with white tears upon a black ground, and cry in at the keyhole:—</p> - -<div class="poetry-container"><div class="poetry"><div class="stanza"> -<div class="verse">‘Bluidy Mackingie, come out if ye daur,</div> -<div class="verse">Lift the sneck, and draw the bar!’</div> -</div></div></div> -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_225" id="Page_225">{225}</a></span></p> -<p>after which they would run away as if some hobgoblin were in -chase of them, probably not looking round till they were out of -the churchyard.</p> - -<p>Sir George Mackenzie had a country-house called Shank, about -ten miles to the south of Edinburgh,<a name="FNanchor_190" id="FNanchor_190"></a><a href="#Footnote_190" class="fnanchor">[190]</a> now a ruin. One day the -Marquis of Tweeddale, having occasion to consult him about some -law business, rode across the country, and arrived at so early an -hour in the morning that the lawyer was not yet out of bed. -Soliciting an immediate audience, he was admitted to the bedroom, -where he sat down and detailed the case to Sir George, who -gave him all necessary counsel from behind the curtains. When -the marquis advanced to present a fee, he was startled at the -apparition of a female hand through the curtains, in an attitude -expressive of a readiness to receive, while no hand appeared on the -part of Sir George. The explanation was that Sir George’s lady, -as has been the case with many a weaker man, took entire charge -of his purse.<a name="FNanchor_191" id="FNanchor_191"></a><a href="#Footnote_191" class="fnanchor">[191]</a></p> - -<p>Several of the descendants of this great lawyer have been -remarkable for their talents. None, perhaps, possessed more -of the <i lang="la" xml:lang="la">vivida vis animi</i> than his granddaughter, Lady Anne -Dick of Corstorphine (also granddaughter, by the father’s side, -to the clever but unscrupulous ‘Tarbat Register,’ the first Earl of -Cromarty).<a name="FNanchor_192" id="FNanchor_192"></a><a href="#Footnote_192" class="fnanchor">[192]</a> This lady excited much attention in Edinburgh -society by her eccentric manners and her droll pasquinade -verses: one of those beings she was who astonish, perplex, and -fidget their fellow-creatures, till at last the world feels a sort of -relief when they are removed from the stage. She made many -enemies by her lampoons; and her personal conduct only afforded -them too good room for revenge. Sometimes she would dress -herself in men’s clothes, and go about the town in search of -adventures. One of her frolics ended rather disgracefully, for -she and her maid, being apprehended in their disguise, were -lodged all night in the Town Guard-house. It may be readily -imagined that by those whom her wit had exasperated such<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_226" id="Page_226">{226}</a></span> -follies would be deeply relished and made the most of. We must -not, therefore, be surprised at Scandal telling that Lady Anne had -at one period lain a whole year in bed, in a vain endeavour—to -baffle <em>himself</em>.</p> - -<p>Through private channels have oozed out at this late day a -few specimens of Lady Anne’s poetical abilities; less brilliant than -might be expected from the above character of her, yet having a -certain air of dash and <i lang="fr" xml:lang="fr">espièglerie</i> which looks appropriate. They -are partly devoted to bewailing the coldness of a certain Sir Peter -Murray of Balmanno, towards whom she chose to act as a sort of -she-Petrarch, but apparently in the mere pursuit of whim. One -runs in the following tender strain:</p> - -<div class="poetry-container"><div class="poetry"><div class="stanza"> -<div class="verse">‘Oh, when he dances at a ball,</div> -<div class="verse indent2">He’s rarely worth the seeing;</div> -<div class="verse">So light he trips, you would him take</div> -<div class="verse indent2">For some aërial being!</div> -<div class="verse">While pinky-winky go his een,</div> -<div class="verse indent2">How blest is each bystander!</div> -<div class="verse">How gracefully he leads the fair,</div> -<div class="verse indent2">When to her seat he hands her!</div> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<div class="verse">But when in accents saft and sweet,</div> -<div class="verse indent2">He chants forth <em>Lizzie Baillie</em>,</div> -<div class="verse">His dying looks and attitude</div> -<div class="verse indent2">Enchant, they cannot fail ye.</div> -<div class="verse">The loveliest widow in the land,</div> -<div class="verse indent2">When she could scarce disarm him,</div> -<div class="verse">Alas! the belles in Roxburghshire</div> -<div class="verse indent2">Must never hope to charm him!</div> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<div class="verse">O happy, happy, happy she,</div> -<div class="verse indent2">Could make him change his plan, sir,</div> -<div class="verse">And of this rigid bachelor,</div> -<div class="verse indent2">Convert the married man, sir:</div> -<div class="verse">O happy, and thrice happy she,</div> -<div class="verse indent2">Could make him change his plan, sir,</div> -<div class="verse">And to the gentle Benedick</div> -<div class="verse indent2">Convert the single man, sir,’ &c.</div> -</div></div></div> - -<p>In another, tired, apparently, of the apathy of this sweet youth, -she breaks out as follows:</p> - -<div class="poetry-container"><div class="poetry"><div class="stanza"> -<div class="verse">‘Oh, wherefore did I cross the Forth,</div> -<div class="verse indent2">And leave my love behind me?</div> -<div class="verse">Why did I venture to the north,</div> -<div class="verse indent2">With one that did not mind me?</div> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<div class="verse">Had I but visited Carin!</div> -<div class="verse indent2">It would have been much better,</div> -<div class="verse">Than pique the prudes, and make a din</div> -<div class="verse indent2">For careless, cold Sir Peter!</div><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_227" id="Page_227">{227}</a></span> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<div class="verse">I’m sure I’ve seen a better limb,</div> -<div class="verse indent2">And twenty better faces;</div> -<div class="verse">But still my mind it ran on him,</div> -<div class="verse indent2">When I was at the races.</div> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<div class="verse">At night, when we went to the ball,</div> -<div class="verse indent2">Were many there discreeter;</div> -<div class="verse">The well-bred duke, and lively Maule,</div> -<div class="verse indent2">Panmure behaved much better.</div> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<div class="verse">They kindly showed their courtesy,</div> -<div class="verse indent2">And looked on me much sweeter;</div> -<div class="verse">Yet easy could I never be,</div> -<div class="verse indent2">For thinking on Sir Peter.</div> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<div class="verse">I fain would wear an easy air,</div> -<div class="verse indent2">But, oh, it looked affected,</div> -<div class="verse">And e’en the fine ambassador</div> -<div class="verse indent2">Could see he was neglected.</div> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<div class="verse">Though Powrie left for me the spleen,</div> -<div class="verse indent2">My temper grew no sweeter;</div> -<div class="verse">I think I’m mad—what do I mean,</div> -<div class="verse indent2">To follow cold Sir Peter!’</div> -</div></div></div> - -<p>Her ladyship died, without issue, in 1741.</p> - -<hr class="chap" /></div><div class="chapter"> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_228" id="Page_228">{228}</a></span></p> - - - - -<h2><a name="BLACKFRIARS_WYND" id="BLACKFRIARS_WYND">BLACKFRIARS WYND.</a></h2> - -<p class="chapter_summary"><strong>Palace of Archbishop Bethune—Boarding-schools of the Last -Century—The Last of the Lorimers—Lady Lovat.</strong></p> - - -<p>Those who now look into Blackfriars Wynd—passing through -it is out of the question—will be surprised to learn that, all -dismal and wretched as it is in all respects, it was once a place of -some respectability and even dignity. On several of its tall old -<em>lands</em> may be seen inscriptions implying piety on the part of the -founder—one, for example:</p> - -<p class="center"> -PAX INTRANTIBUS,<br /> -SALUS EXEUNTIBUS;<br /> -</p> - -<p>another:</p> - -<p class="center"> -MISERERE MEI, DEUS;<br /> -</p> - -<p>this last containing in its <em>upper floor</em> all that the adherents of -Rome had forty years ago as a place of worship in Edinburgh—the -chapel to which, therefore, as a matter of course, the late -Charles X. resorted with his suite, when residing as Comte d’Artois -in Holyrood House. The alley gets its name from having been -the access to the Blackfriars’ Monastery on the opposite slope, and -being built on their land.</p> - - -<h3>PALACE OF ARCHBISHOP BETHUNE [OR BEATON].</h3> - -<p>At the foot of the wynd, on the east side, is a large mansion -of antique appearance, forming two sides of a quadrangle, with a -<i lang="fr" xml:lang="fr">porte-cochère</i> giving access to a court behind, and a picturesque -overhanging turret at the exterior angle.<a name="FNanchor_193" id="FNanchor_193"></a><a href="#Footnote_193" class="fnanchor">[193]</a> This house was built -by James Bethune, Archbishop of Glasgow (1508-1524), chancellor -of the kingdom, and one of the Lords Regent under the Duke -of Albany during the minority of James V. Lyndsay, in his -<cite>Chronicles</cite>, speaks of it as ‘his owen ludging quhilk he biggit in -the Freiris Wynd.’ Keith, at a later period, says: ‘Over the -entry of which the arms of the family of Bethune are to be -seen to this day.’ Common report represents it as the house -of Cardinal Bethune, who was the nephew of the Archbishop of<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_229" id="Page_229">{229}</a></span> -Glasgow; and it is not improbable that the one prelate bequeathed -it to the other, and that it thus became what Maitland calls it, -‘the archiepiscopal palace belonging to the see of St Andrews.’</p> - -<div class="figcenter w450"> -<a id="illus_c_020"></a> -<img src="images/illus_c_020.jpg" width="450" height="667" alt="" /> -<div class="caption"><p class="center">BLACKFRIARS’ WYND.</p> - -<p class="right"> -<span class="smcap"><a href="#Page_228">Page 228.</a></span> -</p> -</div> -</div> - -<div class="figcenter w350"> -<img src="images/illus_p_229.jpg" width="350" height="427" alt="" /> -<div class="caption"><p class="center">Cardinal Bethune’s House.</p></div> -</div> - -<p>The ground-floor of this extensive -building is arched over -with strong stone-work, after -the fashion of those houses of -defence of the same period -which are still scattered over -the country. Some years ago, -when one of the arches was -removed to make way for a -common ceiling, a thick layer -of sand, firmly beaten down, -was found between the surface -of the vault and the floor -above. Ground-floors thus -formed were applied in former -times to inferior domestic uses, -and to the storing of articles -of value. The chief apartments -for living in were on -the floor above—that is, the -so-called <em>first floor</em>. And such -is the case in all the best -houses of an old fashion in the city of St Andrews at this day.</p> - -<p>I shall afterwards have something to say of an event of the year -1517, with which Archbishop Bethune’s house was connected. It -appears to have been occupied by James V. in 1528, while he was -deliberating on the propriety of calling a parliament.<a name="FNanchor_194" id="FNanchor_194"></a><a href="#Footnote_194" class="fnanchor">[194]</a></p> - -<p>The Bethune palace is now, like its confrères, abandoned to the -humblest class of tenants. Eighty years ago, however, it must -still have been a tolerably good house, as it was then the residence -of Bishop Abernethy Drummond, of the Scottish Episcopal communion, -the husband of the heiress of Hawthornden. This worthy<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_230" id="Page_230">{230}</a></span> -divine occupied some space in the public eye in his day, and was -particularly active in obtaining the repeal of the penal statutes -against his church. Some wag, figuring the surprise in high places -at a stir arising from a quarter so obscure, penned this epigram:</p> - -<div class="poetry-container"><div class="poetry"><div class="stanza"> -<div class="verse">‘Lord Sydney, to the privy-council summoned,</div> -<div class="verse indent2">By testy majesty was questioned quick:</div> -<div class="verse">“Eh, eh! who, who’s this Abernethy Drummond,</div> -<div class="verse indent2">And where, in Heaven’s name, is his bishopric?”’</div> -</div></div></div> - - -<h3>BOARDING-SCHOOLS OF THE LAST CENTURY.</h3> - -<p>When the reader hears such things of the Freir Wynd, he must -not be surprised overmuch on perusing the following advertisement -from the <cite>Edinburgh Gazette</cite> of April 19, 1703: ‘There is a -Boarding-school to be set up in Blackfriars Wynd, in Robinson’s -Land, upon the west side of the wynd, near the middle thereof, in -the first door of the stair leading to the said land, against the -latter end of May, or first of June next, where young Ladies and -Gentlewomen may have all sorts of breeding that is to be had in -any part of Britain, and great care taken of their conversation.’</p> - -<p>I know not whether this was the same seminary which, towards -the middle of the century, was kept by a distinguished lady named -Mrs Euphame or Effie Sinclair, who was descended from the ancient -family of Longformacus, in Berwickshire, being the granddaughter -of Sir Robert Sinclair, first baronet of Longformacus, upon whom -that dignity was conferred by King Charles II., in consideration -of his services and losses during the civil war. Mrs Effie was -allied to many of the best families in Scotland, who made it a -duty to place their children under her charge; and her school was -thus one of the most respectable in Edinburgh. By her were -educated the beautiful Miss Duff, afterwards Countess of Dumfries -and Stair, and, by a second marriage, lady of the Honourable -Alexander Gordon (Lord Rockville); the late amiable and excellently -well informed Mrs Keith, sister of Sir Robert Keith, -commonly called, from his diplomatic services, <em>Ambassador Keith</em>;<a name="FNanchor_195" id="FNanchor_195"></a><a href="#Footnote_195" class="fnanchor">[195]</a><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_231" id="Page_231">{231}</a></span> -the two Misses Hume of Linthill; and Miss Rutherford, the -mother of Sir Walter Scott. All these ladies were Scottish cousins -to Mrs Effie. To judge by the proficiency of her scholars, although -much of what is called accomplishment might be then left untaught, -she must have been possessed of uncommon talents for education; -for all the ladies before mentioned had well-cultivated minds, were -fond of reading, wrote and spelled admirably, were well acquainted -with history and with <i lang="fr" xml:lang="fr">belles-lettres</i>, without neglecting the more -homely duties of the needle and the account-book; and, while two -of them were women of extraordinary talents, all of them were -perfectly well-bred in society.</p> - -<div class="figcenter w275"> -<img src="images/illus_p_231.jpg" width="275" height="176" alt="Two cows." /> -</div> - -<p>It may be added that many of these young ladies were sent to -reside with and be <em>finished off</em> by the Honourable Mrs Ogilvie, -lady of the Honourable Patrick Ogilvie of Longmay and Inchmartin, -who was supposed to be the <em>best-bred</em> woman of her time -in Scotland (ob. 1753). Her system was very rigorous, according -to the spirit of the times. The young ladies were taught to sit -quite upright; and the mother of my informant (Sir Walter Scott), -even when advanced to nearly her eightieth year, never permitted -her back to touch the chair in sitting. There is a remarkably -good and characteristic anecdote told of the husband of this -rigorous preceptress, a younger brother of the Earl of Findlater, -whose exertions, while Lord -High-chancellor of Scotland, in -favour of the Union were so conspicuous. -The younger brother, it -appears, had condescended to trade -a little in cattle, which was not -considered derogatory to the dignity -of a Scottish gentleman at that -time, and was by no means an -uncommon practice among them. -However, the earl was offended at the measure, and upbraided -his brother for it. ‘Haud your tongue, man!’ said the cattle-dealer;<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_232" id="Page_232">{232}</a></span> -‘better sell nowte than sell nations,’ pronouncing the last -word with peculiar and emphatic breadth.</p> - -<p>I am tempted, by the curious and valuable document -appended, to suspect that the female accomplishments of the -last century were little behind those of the present in point of -useless elaboration.</p> - -<p>‘<em>Thursday, December 9, 1703.</em>—Near Dundee, at Dudhope, -there is to be taught, by a gentlewoman from London, the following -works, viz.—1. Wax-work of all sorts, as any one’s picture to the -life, figures in shadow glasses, fruits upon trees or in dishes, all -manner of confections, fish, flesh, fowl, or anything that can be -made of wax.—2. Philligrim-work of any sort, whether hollow or -flat.—3. Japan-work upon timber or glass.—4. Painting upon -glass.—5. Sashes for windows, upon sarsnet or transparent paper.—6. -Straw-work of any sort, as houses, birds, or beasts.—7. Shell-work, -in sconces, rocks, or flowers.—8. Quill-work.—9. Gum-work.—10. -Transparent-work.—11. Puff-work.—12. Paper-work.—13. -Plate-work on timber, brass, or glass.—14. Tortoise-shell-work.—15. -Mould-work, boxes and baskets.—16. Silver -landskips.—17. Gimp-work.—18. Bugle-work.—19. A sort of -work in imitation of japan, very cheap.—20. Embroidering, -stitching, and quilting.—21. True point or tape lace.—22. -Cutting glass.—23. Washing gauzes, or Flanders lace and -point.—24. Pastry of all sorts, with the finest cuts and -shapes that’s now used in London.—25. Boning fowls, -without cutting the back.—26. Butter-work.—27. Preserving, -conserving, and candying.—28. Pickling and -colouring.—29. All sorts of English wines.—30. Writing -and arithmetic.—31. Music, and the great end of dancing, -which is a good carriage; and several other things too -tedious here to be mentioned. Any who are desirous to -learn the above works may board with herself at a reasonable -rate, or may board themselves in Dundee, and may -come to her quarterly.’—Advertisement in <cite>Edinburgh Gazette</cite>, 1703.</p> - -<div class="figcenter w100"> -<img src="images/illus_p_232.jpg" width="100" height="188" alt="" /> -<div class="caption"><p class="center">‘The great -end of -dancing.’</p></div> -</div> - -<p>Another distinguished Edinburgh boarding-school of the last -century was kept by two ladies, of Jacobite predilections, named -the Misses Ged, in Paterson’s Court, Lawnmarket. They were -remarkable at least for their family connections, for it was a -brother of theirs who, under the name of Don Patricio Ged, -rendered such kindly and effective service to Commodore Byron, -as gratefully recorded in the well-known <cite>Narrative</cite>, and gracefully -touched on by Campbell in the <cite>Pleasures of Hope</cite>:</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_233" id="Page_233">{233}</a></span></p> - -<div class="poetry-container"><div class="poetry"><div class="stanza"> -<div class="verse">‘He found a warmer world, a milder clime,</div> -<div class="verse">A home to rest, a shelter to defend,</div> -<div class="verse">Peace and repose, <em>a Briton and a friend</em>.’</div> -</div></div></div> - -<p>Another member of the family, William Ged, originally a goldsmith -in Edinburgh, was the inventor of stereotype printing. -The Misses Ged were described by their friends as of the Geds of -Baldridge, near Dunfermline; thorough Fife Jacobites every one of -them. The old ladies kept a portrait of the Chevalier in their -parlour, and looked chiefly to partisans of the Stuarts for support. -They had another relative of less dignity, who, accepting a situation -in the Town-guard, became liable to satiric reference from -Robert Fergusson:</p> - -<div class="poetry-container"><div class="poetry"><div class="stanza"> -<div class="verse">‘Nunc est bibendum, et bendere bickerum magnum,</div> -<div class="verse">Cavete Town-guardum, <em>Dougal Geddum</em>, atque Campbellum.’</div> -</div></div></div> - -<p>Dougal had been a silversmith, but in his own conceit his red -coat as a Town-guard officer made him completely military. -Seeing a lady without a beau at the door of the Assembly Room, -he offered his services, ‘if the arm of an old soldier could be of -any use.’ ‘Hoot awa, Dougal,’ said the lady, accepting his -assistance, however; ‘an auld tinkler, you mean.’</p> - - -<h3>THE LAST OF THE LORIMERS.</h3> - -<p>To return for a moment to the archiepiscopal palace. It -contained, about eighty years ago, a person calling himself a -<span class="smcap">Lorimer</span>—an appellative once familiar in Edinburgh, being applied -to those who deal in the ironwork used in saddlery.<a name="FNanchor_196" id="FNanchor_196"></a><a href="#Footnote_196" class="fnanchor">[196]</a></p> -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_234" id="Page_234">{234}</a></span></p> - -<h3>LADY LOVAT.</h3> - -<p>The widow of the rebel Lord Lovat spent a great portion of a -long widowhood and died (1796) in a house at the head of -Blackfriars Wynd.</p> - -<p>Her ladyship was a niece of the first Duke of Argyll, and born, -as she herself expressed it, in the year <em>Ten</em>—that is, 1710. The -politic <em>Mac Shemus</em><a name="FNanchor_197" id="FNanchor_197"></a><a href="#Footnote_197" class="fnanchor">[197]</a> marked her out as a suitable second wife, -in consideration of the value of the Argyll connection. As he -was above thirty years her senior, and not famed for the tenderest -treatment of his former spouse, or for any other amiable trait of -disposition, she endeavoured, by all gentle means, to avoid the -match; but it was at length effected through the intervention -of her relations, and she was carried north to take her place in -the semi-barbarous state which her husband held at Castle Downie.</p> - -<p>Nothing but misery could have been expected from such an -alliance. The poor young lady, while treated with external -decorum, was in private subjected to such usage as might have -tried the spirit of a Griselda. She was occasionally kept confined -in a room by herself, from which she was not allowed to -come forth even at meals, only a scanty supply of coarse food -being sent to her from his lordship’s table. When pregnant, her -husband coolly told her that if she brought forth a girl he -would put it on the back of the fire. His eldest son by the -former marriage was a sickly child. Lovat therefore deemed it -necessary to raise a strong motive in the step-mother for the -child being taken due care of during his absence in the Lowlands. -On going from home, he would calmly inform her that any harm<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_235" id="Page_235">{235}</a></span> -befalling <em>the boys</em> in his absence would be attended with the -penalty of her own death, for in that event he would undoubtedly -shoot her through the head. It is added that she did, from this -in addition to other motives, take an unusual degree of care of her -step-son, who ever after felt towards her the tenderest love and -gratitude. One is disposed to believe that there must be some -exaggeration in these stories; and yet when we consider that -it is an historical fact that Lovat applied to Prince Charles for a -warrant to take President Forbes <em>dead or alive</em> (Forbes being his -friend and daily intimate), it seems no extravagance that he -should have acted in this manner to his wife. Sir Walter Scott -tells an additional story, which helps out the picture. ‘A lady, -the intimate friend of her youth, was instructed to visit Lady -Lovat, as if by accident, to ascertain the truth of those rumours -concerning her husband’s conduct which had reached the ears of -her family. She was received by Lord Lovat with an extravagant -affectation of welcome, and with many assurances of the happiness -his lady would receive from seeing her. The chief then went to -the lonely tower in which Lady Lovat was secluded, without -decent clothes, and even without sufficient nourishment. He laid -a dress before her becoming her rank, commanded her to put it -on, to appear, and to receive her friend as if she were the mistress -of the house; in which she was, in fact, a naked and half-starved -prisoner. And such was the strict watch which he maintained, -and the terror which his character inspired, that the visitor durst -not ask, nor Lady Lovat communicate, anything respecting her -real situation.’<a name="FNanchor_198" id="FNanchor_198"></a><a href="#Footnote_198" class="fnanchor">[198]</a> Afterwards, by a letter rolled up in a clew of -yarn and dropped over a window to a confidential person, she -was enabled to let her friends know how matters actually stood; -and steps were then taken to obtain her separation from her -husband. When, some years later, his political perfidy had -brought him to the Tower—forgetting all past injuries, and -thinking only of her duty as a wife, Lady Lovat offered to come -to London to attend him. He returned an answer, declining -the proposal, and containing the only expressions of kindness and -regard which she had ever received from him since her marriage.</p> - -<p>The singular character of Lord Lovat makes almost every -particular regarding him worth collecting.</p> - -<div class="figcenter w200"> -<img src="images/illus_p_235.jpg" width="200" height="93" alt="" /> -</div> - -<p>Previous to 1745, when the late Mr -Alexander Baillie of Dochfour was a student -at the grammar-school of Inverness,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_236" id="Page_236">{236}</a></span> -cock-fights were very common among the boys. This detestable -sport, by the way, was encouraged by the schoolmasters of those -days, who derived a profit from the beaten cocks, or, as they -were called, <em>fugies</em>, which became, at the end of every game, -their appropriated perquisite. In pursuit of cocks, Mr Baillie -went to visit his friends in the Aird, and in the course of his -researches was introduced to Lord Lovat, whose policy it was, -on all occasions, to show great attentions to his neighbours and -their children. The situation in which his lordship was found -by the schoolboy was, if not quite unprecedented, nevertheless -rather surprising. He was stretched out in bed between two -Highland lasses, who, on being seen, affected out of modesty to -hide their faces under the bedclothes. The old lord accounted -for this strange scene by saying that his blood had become cold, -and he was obliged to supply the want of heat by the application -of animal warmth.</p> - -<p>It is said that he lay in bed for the most part of the two years -preceding the Rebellion; till, hearing of Prince Charles’s arrival -in Arisaig, he roused himself with sudden vehemence, crying to an -attendant: ‘Lassie, bring me my brogues—I’ll rise <em>noo</em>!’</p> - -<p>One of his odd fancies was to send a retainer every day to -Loch Ness, a distance of eight miles, for the water he drank.</p> - -<p>His intimacy with his neighbour President Forbes is an -amusing affair, for the men must have secretly known full well -what each other was, and yet policy made them keep on decent -terms for a long course of years. Lovat’s son by the subject of -this notice—the Honourable Archibald Campbell Fraser—was a -boy at Petty school in 1745. The President sometimes invited -him to dinner. One day, pulling a handful of foreign gold pieces -out of his pocket, he carelessly asked the boy if he had ever seen -such coins before. Here was a stroke worthy of Lovat himself, -for undoubtedly he meant thus to be informed whether the lord -of Castle Downie was accustomed to get remittances for the -Chevalier’s cause from abroad.</p> - -<p>After the death of Lord Lovat, there arose some demur about -his lady’s jointure, which was only £190 per annum. It was not -paid to her for several years, during which, being destitute of -other resources, she lived with one of her sisters. Some of her -numerous friends—among the rest, Lord Strichen—offered her the -loan of money to purchase a house and suffice for present maintenance. -But she did not choose to encumber herself with debts -which she had no certain prospect of repaying. At length the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_237" id="Page_237">{237}</a></span> -dispute about her jointure was settled in a favourable manner, -and her ladyship received in a lump the amount of past dues, -out of which she expended £500 in purchasing a house at the -head of Blackfriars Wynd,<a name="FNanchor_199" id="FNanchor_199"></a><a href="#Footnote_199" class="fnanchor">[199]</a> and a further sum upon a suite of -plain substantial furniture.</p> - -<p>It would surprise a modern dowager to know how much good -Lady Lovat contrived to do amongst her fellow-creatures with -this small allowance. It is said that the succeeding Lady of -Lovat, with a jointure of £4000, was less distinguished for her -benefactions. In Lady Lovat’s dusky mansion, with a waiting-maid, -cook, and footboy, she not only maintained herself in the -style of a gentlewoman, but could welcome every kind of Highland -cousin to a plain but hospitable board, and even afford permanent -shelter to several unfortunate friends. A certain Lady Dorothy -Primrose, who was her niece, lived with her for several years, -using the best portion of her house, namely, the rooms fronting -the High Street, while she herself was contented with the duller -apartments towards the <em>wynd</em>. There was another desolate old -person, styled Mistress of Elphinstone, whom Lady Lovat supported -as a friend and equal for many years. Not by habit a -card-player herself, she would make up a whist-party every week -for the benefit of <em>the Mistress</em>. At length the poor Mistress came -to a sad fate. A wicked, perhaps half-crazy boy, grandson to -her ladyship, having taken an antipathy to his venerable relative, -put poison into the oatmeal porridge which she was accustomed -to take at supper. Feeling unwell that night, she did not eat -any, and the Mistress took the porridge instead, of which she -died. The boy was sent away, and died in obscurity.</p> - -<p>An unostentatious but sincere piety marked the character of -Lady Lovat. Perhaps her notions of Providence were carried -to the verge of a kind of fatalism; for not merely did she receive -all crosses and troubles as trials arranged for her benefit by a -Higher Hand, but when a neighbouring house on one occasion took -fire, she sat unmoved in her own mansion, notwithstanding the -entreaties of the magistrates, who ordered a sedan to be brought -for her removal. She said if her hour was come, it would be -vain to try to elude her fate; and if it was not come, she would -be safe where she was. She had a conscientiousness almost ludicrously -nice. If detained from church on any occasion, she always -doubled her usual oblation at the <em>plate</em> next time. When her<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_238" id="Page_238">{238}</a></span> -chimney took fire, she sent her fine to the Town-guard before they -knew the circumstance. Even the tax-collector experienced her -ultra-rectitude. When he came to examine her windows, she -took him to a closet lighted by a single pane, looking into a -narrow passage between two houses. He hesitated about charging -for such a small modicum of light, but her ladyship insisted on -his taking note of it.<a name="FNanchor_200" id="FNanchor_200"></a><a href="#Footnote_200" class="fnanchor">[200]</a></p> - -<p>Lady Lovat was of small stature, had been thought a beauty, -and retained in advanced old age much of her youthful delicacy -of features and complexion. Her countenance bore a remarkably -sweet and pleasing expression. When at home, her dress was -a red silk gown, with ruffled cuffs, and sleeves puckered like a -man’s shirt; a fly-cap, encircling the head, with a mob-cap laid -across it, falling down over the cheeks, and tied under the chin; -her hair dressed and powdered; a double muslin handkerchief -round the neck and bosom; <em>lammer-beads</em>; a white lawn apron, -edged with lace; black stockings with red gushets; high-heeled -shoes.<a name="FNanchor_201" id="FNanchor_201"></a><a href="#Footnote_201" class="fnanchor">[201]</a> She usually went abroad in a chair, as I have been -informed by the daughter of a lady who was one of the first -inhabitants of the New Town, and whom Lady Lovat regularly -visited there once every three months. As her chair emerged from -the head of Blackfriars Wynd, any one who saw her sitting in it, -so neat and fresh and clean, would have taken her for a queen -in waxwork, pasted up in a glass-case.</p> - -<p>Lady Lovat was intimate with Lady Jane Douglas; and one -of the strongest evidences in favour of Lord Douglas being the -son of that lady<a name="FNanchor_202" id="FNanchor_202"></a><a href="#Footnote_202" class="fnanchor">[202]</a> was the following remarkable circumstance: -Lady Lovat, passing by a house in the High Street, saw a child -at a window, and remarked to a friend who was with her: ‘If I -thought Lady Jane Douglas could be in Edinburgh, I would say -that was her child—he is so like her!’ Upon returning home, -she found a note from Lady Jane, informing her that she had -just arrived in Edinburgh, and had taken lodgings in —— Land, -which proved to be the house in which Lady Lovat had observed -the child, and that child was young Archibald Douglas. Lady -Lovat was a person of such strict integrity that no consideration -could have tempted her to say what she did not think; and at<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_239" id="Page_239">{239}</a></span> -the time she saw the child, she had no reason to suppose that -Lady Jane was in Scotland.</p> - -<p>Such was the generosity of her disposition that when her -grandson Simon was studying law, she at various times presented -him with £50, and when he was to pass as an advocate she sent -him £100. It was wonderful how she could spare such sums -from her small jointure. Whole tribes of grand-nephews and -grand-nieces experienced the goodness of her heart, and loved -her with almost filial affection. She frequently spoke to them of -her misfortunes, and was accustomed to say: ‘I dare say, bairns, -the events of my life would make a good <em>novelle</em>; but they have -been of so strange a nature that nobody would believe them’—meaning -that they wanted the <i lang="fr" xml:lang="fr">vraisemblance</i> necessary in fiction. -She contemplated the approach of death with fortitude, and in -anticipation of her obsequies, had her grave-clothes ready and -the stair whitewashed. Yet the disposal of her poor remains -little troubled her. When asked by her son if she wished to be -placed in the burial-vault at Beaufort, she said: ‘’Deed, Archie, -ye needna put yoursel’ to ony fash about me, for I dinna care -though ye lay me aneath that hearthstane!’ After all, it chanced, -from some misarrangements, that her funeral was not very promptly -executed; whereupon a Miss Hepburn of Humbie, living in a -floor above, remarked, ’she wondered what they were keeping her -sae lang for—stinkin’ a’ the stair.’ This gives some idea of circumstances -connected with Old Town life.</p> - -<p>The conduct of her ladyship’s son in life was distinguished by -a degree of eccentricity which, in connection with that of his son -already stated, tends to raise a question as to the character of -Lord Lovat, and make us suspect that wickedness so great as his -could only result from a certain unsoundness of mind. It is -admitted, however, that the eldest son, Simon, who rose to be a -major-general in the army, was a man of respectable character. -He retained nothing of his father but a genius for making fine -speeches.<a name="FNanchor_203" id="FNanchor_203"></a><a href="#Footnote_203" class="fnanchor">[203]</a> The late Mrs Murray of Henderland told me she was -present at a supper-party given by some gentleman in the Horse -Wynd, where General Fraser, eating his egg, said to the hostess: -‘Mrs ——, other people’s eggs overflow with <em>milk</em>; but yours -run over with <em>cream</em>!’</p> -<hr class="chap" /></div><div class="chapter"> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_240" id="Page_240">{240}</a></span></p> - - - -<h2><a name="THE_COWGATE" id="THE_COWGATE">THE COWGATE.</a></h2> - -<p class="chapter_summary"><strong>House of Gavin Douglas the Poet—Skirmish of Cleanse-the-Causeway—College -Wynd—Birthplace of Sir Walter Scott—The Horse -Wynd—Tam o’ the Cowgate—Magdalen Chapel.</strong></p> - - -<p>Looking at the present state of this ancient street, it is -impossible to hear without a smile the description of it given -by Alexander Alesse about the year 1530—<i lang="la" xml:lang="la">Ubi nihil est humile aut -rusticum, sed omnia magnifica!</i> (‘Where nothing is humble or -homely, but everything magnificent!’) The street was, he tells -us, that in which the nobles and judges resided, and where the -palaces of princes were situated. The idea usually entertained -of its early history is that it rose as an elegant suburb after the -year 1460, when the existing city, consisting of the High Street -alone, was enclosed in a wall. It would appear, however, that -some part of it was built before that time, and that it was in an -advanced, if not complete, state as a street not long after. It -was to enclose this esteemed suburb that the city wall was extended -after the battle of Flodden.</p> - - -<h3>HOUSE OF GAVIN DOUGLAS THE POET—SKIRMISH OF -CLEANSE-THE-CAUSEWAY.</h3> - -<p>So early as 1449, Thomas Lauder, canon of Aberdeen, granted -an endowment of 40s. annually to a chaplain in St Giles’s -Church, ‘out of his own house lying in the Cowgaite, betwixt -the land of the Abbot of Melrose on the east, and of George -Cochrane on the west.’ This appears to have been the same -Thomas Lauder who was preceptor to James II., and who -ultimately became Bishop of Dunkeld. We are told that, besides -many other munificent acts, he purchased a lodging in Edinburgh -<em>for himself and his successors</em>.<a name="FNanchor_204" id="FNanchor_204"></a><a href="#Footnote_204" class="fnanchor">[204]</a> That its situation was the same -as that above described appears from a charter of Thomas -Cameron, in 1498, referring to a house on the south side of the -Cowgate, ‘betwixt <em>the Bishop of Dunkeld’s land on the east</em>, -and William Rappilowe’s on the west, the common street on -the north, and the gait that leads to the Kirk-of-Field on the -south.’</p> - -<div class="figcenter w550"> -<a id="illus_c_021"></a> -<img src="images/illus_c_021.jpg" width="550" height="634" alt="" /> -<div class="caption"><p class="center">THE COWGATE.<br /> -‘Nothing is humble or homely, but everything magnificent!’</p> - -<p class="right"> -<span class="smcap"><a href="#Page_240">Page 240.</a></span> -</p></div> -</div> -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_241" id="Page_241">{241}</a></span></p> - -<p>From these descriptions we attain a tolerably distinct idea of -the site of the house of the bishops of Dunkeld in Edinburgh, -including, of course, one who is endeared to us from a peculiar -cause—Gavin Douglas, who succeeded to the see in 1516. This -house must have stood nearly opposite to the bottom of Niddry -Street, but somewhat to the eastward. It would have gardens -behind, extending up to the line of the present Infirmary Street.</p> - -<p>We thus not only have the pleasure of ascertaining the -Edinburgh whereabouts of one of our most distinguished national -poets, but we can now read, with a somewhat clearer intelligence, -a remarkable chapter in the national history.</p> - -<p>It was in April 1520 that the Hamiltons (the party of the -Earl of Arran), with Bethune, Archbishop of Glasgow, called an -assembly of the nobility in Edinburgh, in order to secure the -government for the earl. The rival magnate, the Earl of Angus, -soon saw danger to himself in the great crowds of the Hamilton -party which flocked into town. Indeed warlike courses seem to -have been determined on by that side. Angus sent his uncle, -the Bishop of Dunkeld, to caution them against any violence, -and to offer that he should submit to the laws if any offence -were laid to his charge. The reverend prelate, proceeding to -the place of assembly, which was in the archbishop’s house, -at the foot of Blackfriars Wynd, found the Hamilton party -obstinate. Thinking an archbishop could not or ought not to -allow strife to take place if he could help it, he appealed to -Bethune, who, however, had actually prepared for battle by -putting on armour under his rochet. ‘Upon my conscience, -my lord,’ said Bethune, ‘I know nothing of the matter,’ at the -same time striking his hand upon his breast, which caused the -armour to return a rattling sound. Douglas’s remark was simply, -‘Your conscience clatters;’ a happy pun for the occasion, clatter -being a Scotch word signifying to tell tales. Gavin then returned -to his lodging, and told his nephew that he must do his best to -defend himself with arms. ‘For me,’ he said, ‘I will go to my -chamber and pray for you.’ With our new light as to the locality -of the Bishop of Dunkeld’s lodging, we now know that Angus and -his uncle held their consultations on this occasion within fifty -yards of the house in which the Hamiltons were assembled. The -houses, in fact, nearly faced each other in the same narrow street.</p> - -<p>Angus now put himself at the head of his followers, who, -though not numerous, stood in a compact body in the High -Street. They were, moreover, the favourites of the Edinburgh<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_242" id="Page_242">{242}</a></span> -citizens, who handed spears from their windows to such as were -not armed with that useful weapon. Presently the Hamiltons -came thronging up from the Cowgate, through narrow lanes, -and entering the High Street in separate streams, armed with -swords only, were at a great disadvantage. In a short time the -Douglases had cleared the streets of them, killing many, and -obliging Arran himself and his son to make their escape through -the North Loch, mounted on a coal-horse. Archbishop Bethune, -with others, took refuge in the Blackfriars’ Monastery, where he -was seized behind the altar and in danger of his life, when Gavin -Douglas, learning his perilous situation, flew to save him, and with -difficulty succeeded in his object. Here, too, local knowledge is -important. The Blackfriars’ Monastery stood where the High -School latterly was, a spot not more than a hundred yards from -the houses of both Bethune and Gavin Douglas. It would not -necessarily require more than five minutes to apprise Douglas of -Bethune’s situation, and bring him to the rescue.</p> - -<p>The popular name given to this street battle is characteristic—<em>Cleanse-the-Causeway</em>.</p> - - -<h3>COLLEGE WYND—BIRTHPLACE OF SIR WALTER SCOTT.</h3> - -<p>The old buildings of the College of Edinburgh, themselves -mean, had for their main access, in former times, only that -narrow dismal alley called the College Wynd,<a name="FNanchor_205" id="FNanchor_205"></a><a href="#Footnote_205" class="fnanchor">[205]</a> leading up from -the Cowgate. Facing down this humble lane was the gateway, -displaying a richly ornamented architrave. The wynd itself, -strange as the averment may now appear, was the abode of -many of the professors. The illustrious Joseph Black lived at -one time in a house adjacent to the College gate, on the east -side, afterwards removed to make way for North College Street.<a name="FNanchor_206" id="FNanchor_206"></a><a href="#Footnote_206" class="fnanchor">[206]</a> -Another floor of the same building was occupied by Mr Keith, -father of the late Sir Alexander Keith of Ravelston, Bart.; and -there did the late Lord Keith reside in his student days. There -was a tradition, but of a vague nature, that Goldsmith, when -studying at the Edinburgh University, lived in the College Wynd.</p> - -<div class="figcenter w500"> -<a id="illus_c_022"></a> -<img src="images/illus_c_022.jpg" width="500" height="660" alt="" /> -<div class="caption"><p class="center">OLD HOUSES, COLLEGE WYND.<br /> -Near here Sir Walter Scott was born.</p> - -<p class="right"> -<span class="smcap"><a href="#Page_242">Page 242.</a></span> -</p></div> -</div> - -<p>The one peculiar glory of this humble place remains to be -mentioned—its being the birthplace of Sir Walter Scott. In -the third floor of the house just described, accessible by an entry<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_243" id="Page_243">{243}</a></span> -leading to a common stair behind, -did this distinguished person -first see the light, August -15, 1771. It was a house of -plain aspect, like many of its -old neighbours yet surviving; -its truest disadvantage, however, -being in the unhealthiness -of the situation, to which Sir -Walter himself used to attribute -the early deaths of several -brothers and sisters born before -him. When the house was required -to give way for the -public conveniency, the elder -Scott received a fair price for -his portion of it; he had previously -removed to an airier -mansion, No. 25 George Square, -where Sir Walter spent his boyhood -and youth.</p> - -<div class="figcenter w250"> -<img src="images/illus_p_243.jpg" width="250" height="316" alt="" /> -<div class="caption"><p class="center">25 George Square.</p></div> -</div> - -<p>In the course of a walk through -this part of the town in 1825, Sir Walter did me the honour to -point out the site of the house in which he had been born. On -his mentioning that his father had got a good price for his share -of it, in order that it might be taken down for the public convenience, -I took the liberty of jocularly expressing my belief that -more money might have been made of it, and the public certainly -<em>much more</em> gratified, if it had remained to be shown as the birthplace -of a man who had written so many popular books. ‘Ay, -ay,’ said Sir Walter, ‘that is very well; but I am afraid I should -have required to be dead first, and that would not have been so -comfortable, you know.’</p> - -<p>In the transition state of the College, from old to new -buildings, the gate at the head of the wynd was shut up by -Principal Robertson, who, however, living within the walls, -found this passage convenient as an access to the town, and -used it accordingly. It became the joke of a day, that from -being the principal gate it had become only a gate for the -Principal.<a name="FNanchor_207" id="FNanchor_207"></a><a href="#Footnote_207" class="fnanchor">[207]</a></p> -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_244" id="Page_244">{244}</a></span></p> - -<h3>THE HORSE WYND.</h3> - -<p>This alley, connecting the Cowgate with the grounds on the -south side of the town within the walls, and broad enough for a -carriage, is understood to have derived its name from an inn -which long ago existed at its head, where the Gaelic Church -long after stood. Although the name is at least as old as the -middle of the seventeenth century, none of the buildings appear -older than the middle of the eighteenth. They had all been -renewed by people desirous of the benefit of such air as was to -be had in an alley double the usual breadth. Very respectable -members of the bar were glad to have a flat in some of the tall -<em>lands</em> on the east side of the wynd.<a name="FNanchor_208" id="FNanchor_208"></a><a href="#Footnote_208" class="fnanchor">[208]</a></p> - -<p>On the west side of the wynd, about the middle, the Earl of -Galloway had built a distinct mansion, ornamented with vases -at top. They kept a coach and six, and it was alleged that -when the countess made calls, the leaders were sometimes at -the door she was going to, when she was stepping into the -carriage at her own door. This may be called a <i lang="fr" xml:lang="fr">tour de force</i> -illustration of the nearness of friends to each other in Old -Edinburgh.</p> - - -<h3>TAM O’ THE COWGATE.</h3> - -<p>A court of old buildings, in a massive style of architecture, -existed, previous to 1829, on a spot in the Cowgate now occupied -by the southern piers of George IV. Bridge. In the middle of -the last century it was used as the Excise-office; but even this -was a kind of declension from its original character. It is certain -that the celebrated Thomas Hamilton, first Earl of Haddington, -President of the Court of Session, and Secretary of State for -Scotland, lived here at the end of the sixteenth century, renting -the house from Macgill of Rankeillour.<a name="FNanchor_209" id="FNanchor_209"></a><a href="#Footnote_209" class="fnanchor">[209]</a> This distinguished -person, from the circumstance of his living here, was endowed -by his master, King James, with the nickname of <span class="smcap">Tam o’ the -Cowgate</span>, under which title he is now better remembered than -by any other.</p> - -<p>The earl, who had risen through high legal offices to the -peerage, and who was equally noted for his penetration as a<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_245" id="Page_245">{245}</a></span> -judge, his industry as a collector of decisions, and his talent for -amassing wealth, was one evening, after a day’s hard labour in -the public service, solacing himself with a friend over a flask of -wine in his house in the Cowgate<a name="FNanchor_210" id="FNanchor_210"></a><a href="#Footnote_210" class="fnanchor">[210]</a>—attired, for his better ease, -in a nightgown, cap, and slippers—when he was suddenly -disturbed by a great hubbub which arose under his window in -the street. This soon turned out to be a <em>bicker</em> between the -High School youths and those of the College; and it also -appeared that the latter, fully victorious, were, notwithstanding -a valiant defence, in the act of driving their antagonists before -them. The Earl of Haddington’s sympathies were awakened -in favour of the retiring party, for he had been brought up at -the High School, and going thence to complete his education at -Paris, had no similar reason to affect the College. He therefore -sprang up, dashed into the street, sided with and rallied the -fugitives, and took a most animated share in the combat that -ensued, so that finally the High School youths, acquiring fresh -strength and valour at seeing themselves befriended by the prime -judge and privy-councillor of their country (though not in his -most formidable habiliments), succeeded in turning the scale of -victory upon the College youths, in spite of their superior individual -ages and strength. The earl, who assumed the command -of the party, and excited their spirits by word as well as action, -was not content till he had pursued the Collegianers -through the Grassmarket, and out at the West Port, -the gate of which he locked against their return, thus -compelling them to spend the night in the suburbs -and the fields. He then returned home in triumph to -his castle of comfort in -the Cowgate, and resumed -the enjoyment of his friend -and flask. We can easily -imagine what a rare jest -this must have been for -King Jamie.</p> - -<div class="figcenter w350"> -<img src="images/illus_p_245.jpg" width="350" height="374" alt="" /> -<div class="caption"><p class="center">A Court of Old Buildings.</p></div> -</div> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_246" id="Page_246">{246}</a></span></p> - -<p>When this monarch visited Scotland in 1617, he found the -old statesman very rich, and was informed that the people -believed him to be in possession of the Philosopher’s Stone; -there being no other feasible mode of accounting for his -immense wealth, which rather seemed the effect of supernatural -agency than of worldly prudence or talent. King James, quite -tickled with the idea of the Philosopher’s Stone, and of so -enviable a talisman having fallen into the hands of a Scottish -judge, was not long in letting his friend and gossip know of the -story which he had heard respecting him. The Lord President -immediately invited the king, and the rest of the company -present, to come to his house next day, when he would both do -his best to give them a good dinner and lay open to them the -mystery of the Philosopher’s Stone. This agreeable invitation -was of course accepted; and the next day saw his Cowgate -<i lang="it" xml:lang="it">palazzo</i> thronged with king and courtiers, all of whom the -President feasted to their hearts’ content. After dinner the -king reminded him of his Philosopher’s Stone, and expressed -his anxiety to be speedily made acquainted with so rare a -treasure, when the pawky lord addressed His Majesty and the -company in a short speech, concluding with this information, -that his whole secret lay in two simple and familiar maxims—‘Never -put off till to-morrow what can be done to-day; nor -ever trust to another’s hand what your own can execute.’ He -might have added, from the works of an illustrious contemporary:</p> - -<p class="center">‘This is the only witchcraft I have used;’</p> - -<p>and none could have been more effectual.</p> - -<p>A ludicrous idea is obtained from the following anecdote of -the estimation in which the wisdom of the Earl of Haddington -was held by the king, and at the same time, perhaps, of that -singular monarch’s usual mode of speech. It must be understood, -by way of prefatory illustration, that King James, who -was the author of the earl’s popular appellation, ‘<em>Tam o’ the -Cowgate</em>,’ had a custom of bestowing such ridiculous <i lang="fr" xml:lang="fr">sobriquets</i> -on his principal councillors and courtiers. Thus he conferred -upon that grave and sagacious statesman, John, Earl of Mar, -the nickname <em>Jock o’ Sklates</em>—probably in allusion to some -circumstance which occurred in their young days when they -were the fellow-pupils of Buchanan. On hearing of a meditated -alliance between the Haddington and Mar families, His Majesty -exclaimed, betwixt jest and earnest: ‘The Lord hand a grup <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_247" id="Page_247">{247}</a></span>o’ -me! If Tam o’ the Cowgate’s son marry Jock o’ Sklates’s -daughter, what’s to come o’ <em>me</em>?’ The good-natured monarch -probably apprehended that so close a union betwixt two of his -most subtle statesmen might make them too much for their -master—as hounds are most dangerous when they hunt in couples.</p> - -<p>The Earl of Haddington died in 1637, full of years and -honours. At Tyningham, the seat of his family, there are two -portraits of his lordship, one a half-length, the other a head; as -also his state-dress; and it is a circumstance too characteristic -to be overlooked that in the crimson-velvet breeches there are -no fewer than <em>nine pockets</em>! Among many of the earl’s papers -which remain in Tyningham House, one contains a memorandum -conveying a curious idea of the way in which public -and political affairs were then managed in Scotland. The -paper details the heads of a petition in his own handwriting to -the Privy Council, and at the end is a note ‘to <em>gar</em> [that is, -make] the chancellor’ do something else in his behalf.</p> - -<p>A younger son of Tam o’ the Cowgate was a person of much -ingenuity, and was popularly known, for what reason I cannot -tell, by the nickname of ‘Dear Sandie Hamilton.’ He had -a foundry in the Potterrow, where he fabricated the cannon -employed in the first Covenanting war in 1639. This artillery, -be it remarked, was not formed exclusively of metal. The -greater part of the composition was leather; and yet, we are -informed, they did some considerable execution at the battle of -Newburnford, above Newcastle (August 28, 1640), where the -Scots drove a large advanced party of Charles I.’s troops before -them, thereby causing the king to enter into a new treaty. The -cannon, which were commonly called ‘Dear Sandie’s Stoups,’ -were carried in swivel fashion between two horses.</p> - -<p>The Excise-office had been removed, about 1730, from the -Parliament Square to the house occupied many years before -by Tam o’ the Cowgate. It afforded excellent accommodations -for this important public office. The principal room on the -second floor, towards the Cowgate, was a very superb one, -having a stucco ceiling divided into square compartments, each -of which contained some elegant device. To the rear of the -house was a bowling-green, which the Commissioners of Excise -let on lease to a person of the name of Thomson. In those -days bowling was a much more prevalent amusement than now, -being chiefly a favourite with the graver order of the citizens. -There were then no fewer than three bowling-greens in the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_248" id="Page_248">{248}</a></span> -grounds around Heriot’s Hospital; one in the Canongate, near -the Tolbooth; another on the opposite side of the street; another -immediately behind the palace of Holyrood House, where the Duke -of York used to play when in Scotland; and perhaps several others -scattered about the outskirts of the town. The arena behind the -Excise-office was called Thomson’s Green, from the name of the -man who kept it; and it may be worth while to remind the reader -that it is alluded to in that pleasant-spirited poem by Allan -Ramsay, in imitation of the <i lang="la" xml:lang="la">Vides ut alta</i> of Horace:</p> - -<div class="poetry-container"><div class="poetry"><div class="stanza"> -<div class="verse">‘Driving their ba’s frae whins or tee,</div> -<div class="verse indent2">There’s no ae gouffer to be seen,</div> -<div class="verse">Nor doucer folk wysing a-jee</div> -<div class="verse indent2">The byas bowls on Tamson’s green.’</div> -</div></div></div> - -<p>The green was latterly occupied by the relict of this Thomson; -and among the bad debts on the Excise books, all of which are -yearly brought forward and enumerated, there still stands a sum -of something more than six pounds against Widow Thomson, -being the last half-year’s rent of <em>the green</em>, which the poor woman -had been unable to pay. The north side of Brown’s Square was -built upon part of this space of ground; the rest remained a -vacant area for the recreation of the people dwelling in Merchant -Street, until the erection of the bridge, which has overrun that, as -well as every other part of the scene of this article.<a name="FNanchor_211" id="FNanchor_211"></a><a href="#Footnote_211" class="fnanchor">[211]</a></p> -<hr class="chap" /></div><div class="chapter"> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_249" id="Page_249">{249}</a></span></p> - - - -<h2><a name="ST_CECILIAS_HALL" id="ST_CECILIAS_HALL">ST CECILIA’S HALL.</a></h2> - - -<p>Few persons now living (1847) recollect the elegant concerts -that were given many years ago in what is now an obscure -part of our ancient city, known by the name of St Cecilia’s Hall. -They did such honour to Edinburgh, nearly for half a century, -that I feel myself called on to make a brief record of them, and -am glad to be enabled to do so by a living authority, one of the -most fervent worshippers in the temple of the goddess. Hear, -then, his last <i lang="it" xml:lang="it">aria parlante</i> on this interesting theme.</p> - -<div class="figcenter w275"> -<img src="images/illus_p_249.jpg" width="275" height="314" alt="" /> -<div class="caption"><p class="center">St Cecilia’s Hall.</p></div> -</div> - -<p>‘The concerts of St Cecilia’s Hall formed one of the most -liberal and attractive amusements that any city in Europe could -boast of. The hall was built on -purpose at the foot of Niddry’s -Wynd, by a number of public-spirited -noblemen and gentlemen; -and the expense of the -concerts was defrayed by about -two hundred subscribers paying -two or three guineas each annually; -and so respectable was -the institution considered, that -upon the death of a member -there were generally several -applications for the vacancy, as -is now the case with the Caledonian -Hunt. The concerts -were managed by a governor -and a set of six or more -directors, who engaged the performers—the -principal ones from Italy, one or two from Germany, -and the rest of the orchestra was made up of English and native -artists. The concerts were given weekly during most of the time -that I attended; the instrumental music consisting chiefly of the -concertos of Corelli and Handel, and the overtures of Bach, Abel, -Stamitz, Vanhall, and latterly of Haydn and Pleyel; for at that -time, and till a good many years after, the magnificent symphonies -of Haydn, Mozart, and Beethoven, which now form the most<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_250" id="Page_250">{250}</a></span> -attractive portions of all public concerts, had not reached this -country. Those truly grand symphonies do not seem likely to be -superseded by any similar compositions for a century to come, -transcending so immensely, as they do, all the orchestral compositions -that ever before appeared; yet I must not venture to -prophesy, when I bear in mind what a powerful influence fashion -and folly exercise upon music, as well as upon other objects of -taste. When the overtures and quartettes of Haydn first found -their way into this country, I well remember with what coldness -the former were received by most of the grave Handelians, while -at the theatres they gave delight. The old concert gentlemen -said that his compositions wanted the solidity and full harmony -of Handel and Corelli; and when the celebrated leader—the elder -Cramer—visited St Cecilia’s Hall, and played a spirited charming -overture of Haydn’s, an old amateur next to whom I was seated -asked me: “Whase music is that, now?” “Haydn’s, sir,” said I. -“Poor new-fangled stuff,” he replied; “I hope I shall never hear -it again!” Many years have since rolled away, and mark what -some among us now say: A friend, calling lately on an old lady -much in the fashionable circle of society, heard her give directions -to the pianist who was teaching her nieces to bring them some -new and fashionable pieces of music, but no more of the <em>unfashionable</em> -compositions of Haydn! Alas for those ladies whose taste in -music is regulated by fashion, and who do not know that the -music of Haydn is the admiration and delight of all the real -lovers and judges of the art in Europe!</p> - -<p>‘The vocal department of our concerts consisted chiefly of the -songs of Handel, Arne, Gluck, Sarti, Jornelli, Guglielmi, Paisiello, -Scottish songs, &c.; and every year, generally, we had an oratorio -of Handel performed, with the assistance of a principal bass -and a tenor singer, and a few chorus-singers from the English -cathedrals; together with some Edinburgh amateurs,<a name="FNanchor_212" id="FNanchor_212"></a><a href="#Footnote_212" class="fnanchor">[212]</a> who cultivated -that sacred and sublime music; Signor and Signora -Domenico Corri, the latter our <i lang="it" xml:lang="it">prima donna</i>, singing most of the -principal songs, or most interesting portions of the music. On -such occasions the hall was always crowded to excess by a splendid<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_251" id="Page_251">{251}</a></span> -assemblage, including all the beauty and fashion of our city. A -supper to the directors and their friends at Fortune’s Tavern -generally followed the oratorio, where the names of the chief -beauties who had graced the hall were honoured by their healths -being drunk: the champion of the lady whom he proposed as his -toast being sometimes challenged to maintain the pre-eminence of -her personal charms by the admirer of another lady filling a glass -of double depth to her health, and thus forcing the champion of -the first lady to <em>say more</em> by drinking a still deeper bumper in -honour of her beauty; and if this produced a rejoinder from the -other, by his seizing and quaffing the cup of <em>largest</em> calibre, there -the contest generally ended, and the deepest drinker <em>saved</em> his -lady, as it was phrased, although he might have had some difficulty -in saving himself from a flooring while endeavouring to regain his -seat.<a name="FNanchor_213" id="FNanchor_213"></a><a href="#Footnote_213" class="fnanchor">[213]</a> Miss Burnet of Monboddo and Miss Betsy Home, reigning -beauties of the time, were said more than once to have been the -innocent cause of the fall of man in this way. The former was -gifted with a countenance of heavenly sweetness and expression, -which Guido, had he beheld it, would have sought to perpetuate -upon canvas as that of an angel; while the other lady, quite -piquant and brilliant, might have sat to Titian for a Hebe or one -of the Graces. Miss Burnet died in the bloom of youth, universally -regretted both for her personal charms and the rare endowments -of her mind. Miss Home was happily married to Captain Brown, -her ardent admirer, who had made her his <em>toast</em> for years, and -vowed he would continue to do so till he toasted her <em>Brown</em>. -This sort of exuberant loyalty to beauty was by no means uncommon -at the convivial meetings of those days, when “time had -not thinned our flowing hair, nor bent us with his iron hand.”</p> - -<p>‘Let me call to mind a few of those whose lovely faces at the -concerts gave us the sweetest zest for the music. Miss Cleghorn -of Edinburgh, still living in single-blessedness; Miss Chalmers of -Pittencrief, who married Sir William Miller of Glenlee, Bart.; Miss -Jessie Chalmers of Edinburgh, who was married to Mr Pringle of -Haining; Miss Hay of Hayston, who married Sir William Forbes -of Pitsligo, Bart.; Miss Murray of Lintrose, who was called the -<em>Flower of Strathmore</em>, and upon whom Burns wrote the song:</p> - -<div class="poetry-container"><div class="poetry"><div class="stanza"> -<div class="verse">“Blithe, blithe, and merry was she,</div> -<div class="verse">Blithe was she but and ben;</div> -<div class="verse">Blithe by the banks of the Earn,</div> -<div class="verse">And blithe in Glenturit Glen.”</div> -</div></div></div> -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_252" id="Page_252">{252}</a></span></p> -<p>She married David Smith, Esq. of Methven, one of the Lords of -Session; Miss Jardine of Edinburgh, who married Mr Home -Drummond of Blairdrummond—their daughter, if I mistake not, -is now the Duchess of Athole; Miss Kinloch of Gilmerton, who -married Sir Foster Cunliffe of Acton, Bart.; Miss Lucy Johnston -of East Lothian, who married Mr Oswald of Auchincruive; Miss -Halket of Pitferran, who became the wife of the celebrated Count -Lally-Tollendal; and Jane, Duchess of Gordon, celebrated for her -wit and spirit, as well as for her beauty. These, with Miss Burnet -and Miss Home, and many others whose names I do not distinctly -recollect, were indisputably worthy of all the honours conferred -upon them. But beauty has tempted me to digress too long from -my details relative to the hall and its concerts, to which I return.</p> - -<p>‘The hall [built in 1762 from a design of Mr Robert Mylne, -after the model of the great opera theatre of Parma] was an -exact oval, having a concave elliptical ceiling, and was remarkable -for the clear and perfect conveyance of sounds, without -responding echoes, as well as for the judicious manner in which -the seating was arranged. In this last respect, I have seen no -concert-room equal to it either in London or Paris. The orchestra -was erected at the upper end of the hall, opposite to the door of -entrance; a portion of the area, in the centre or widest part, was -without any seats, and served as a small promenade, where friends -could chat together during the intervals of performance. The -seats were all <em>fixed</em> down on both sides of the hall, and each side -was raised by a gradual elevation from the level area, backward, -the rows of seats behind each other, till they reached a passage a -few feet broad, that was carried quite round the hall behind the -last of the elevated seats; so that when the audience was seated, -each half of it fronted the other—an arrangement much preferable -to that commonly adopted, of placing all the seats upon a <em>level</em> -behind each other, for thus the whole company must look one way, -and see each other’s <em>backs</em>. A private staircase at the upper end -of the hall, not seen by the company, admitted the musicians into -the orchestra; in the front of which stood a harpsichord, with -the singers, and the principal violoncellist; and behind these, on -a platform a little elevated, were the violins, and other stringed -and wind instruments, just behind which stood a noble organ. -The hall, when filled, contained an audience of about four hundred. -No money was taken for admission, tickets being given gratis to -the lovers of music, and to strangers. What a pity that such a -liberal and gratifying institution should have ceased to exist!<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_253" id="Page_253">{253}</a></span> -But after the New Town arose, the Old was deserted by the upper -classes: the hall was too small for the increased population, and -concerts were got up at the Assembly Rooms and Corri’s Rooms -by the professional musicians, and by Corri himself. Now a -capacious Music Hall is erected behind the Assembly Rooms, -where a pretty good subscription concert is carried on; and from -the increased facility of intercourse between Paris, London, and -Edinburgh, it seems probable that concerts by artists of the -highest talents will ere long be set on foot in Edinburgh in this -fine hall, diversified sometimes by oratorios or Italian operas.</p> - -<p>‘Before concluding this brief memoir of St Cecilia’s Hall -Concerts, I shall mention the chief performers who gave attractions -to them. These were Signor and Signora Domenico Corri, from -Rome; he with a falsetto voice, which he managed with much -skill and taste; the signora with a fine, full-toned, flexible soprano -voice. Tenducci, though not one of the band, nor resident among -us, made his appearance occasionally when he came to visit the -Hopetoun family, his liberal and steady patrons; and while he -remained he generally gave some concerts at the hall, which made -quite a sensation among the musicals. I considered it a jubilee -year whenever Tenducci arrived, as no singer I ever heard sang -with more expressive simplicity, or was more efficient, whether he -sang the classical songs of Metastasio, or those of Arne’s <cite>Artaxerxes</cite>, -or the simple melodies of Scotland. To the latter he gave such -intensity of interest by his impassioned manner, and by his clear -enunciation of the words, as equally surprised and delighted us. -I never can forget the pathos and touching effect of his <cite>Gilderoy</cite>, -<cite>Lochaber no more</cite>, <cite>The Braes of Ballenden</cite>, <cite>I’ll never leave thee</cite>, -<cite>Roslin Castle</cite>, &c. These, with the <i lang="it" xml:lang="it">Verdi prati</i> of Handel, <cite>Fair -Aurora</cite> from Arne’s <cite>Artaxerxes</cite>, and Gluck’s <i lang="it" xml:lang="it">Che faro</i>, were above -all praise. Miss Poole, Mr Smeaton, Mr Gilson, and Mr Urbani -were also for a time singers at the hall—chiefly of English and -Scottish songs.</p> - -<p>‘In the instrumental department we had Signor Puppo, from -Rome or Naples, as leader and violin concerto player, a most -capital artist; Mr Schetky, from Germany, the principal violoncellist, -and a fine solo concerto player; Joseph Reinagle, a very -clever violoncello and viola player; Mr Barnard, a very elegant -violinist; Stephen Clarke, an excellent organist and harpsichord -player; and twelve or fifteen violins, basses, flutes, violas, horns, -and clarionets, with extra performers often from London. Upon -the resignation of Puppo, who charmed all hearers, Stabilini<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_254" id="Page_254">{254}</a></span> -succeeded him, and held the situation till the institution was at -an end: he had a good round tone, though, to my apprehension, -he did not exceed mediocrity as a performer.</p> - -<p>‘But I should be unpardonable if I omitted to mention the -most accomplished violin-player I ever heard, Paganini only -excepted—I mean Giornovicki, who possessed in a most extraordinary -degree the various requisites of his beautiful art: -execution peculiarly brilliant, and finely articulated as possible; -a tone of the richest and most exquisite quality; expression of -the utmost delicacy, grace, and tenderness; and an animation -that commanded your most intense and eager attention. Paganini -did not appear in Edinburgh till [thirty years] after the hall was -closed. There, as well as at private parties, I heard Giornovicki -often, and always with no less delight than I listened to Paganini.<a name="FNanchor_214" id="FNanchor_214"></a><a href="#Footnote_214" class="fnanchor">[214]</a> -Both, if I may use the expression, threw their whole hearts and -souls into their Cremonas, bows, and fingers.</p> - -<div class="poetry-container"><div class="poetry"><div class="stanza"> -<div class="verse">“Hall of sweet sounds, adieu, with all thy fascinations of langsyne,</div> -<div class="verse">My dearest reminiscences of music all are thine.”’</div> -</div> - -<p class="right"> -<cite>G. T. Octogenarius Edinburgensis</cite>, Feb. 1847.<a name="FNanchor_215" id="FNanchor_215"></a><a href="#Footnote_215" class="fnanchor">[215]</a><br /> -</p></div></div> - -<p>Stabilini, to whom our dear G. T. refers, and who died in 1815, -much broken down by dissipation, was obliged, against his will, to -give frequent attendance at the private concerts of one of these -gentlemen performers, where Corelli’s trios were in great vogue. -There was always a capital supper afterwards, at which Stab (so -he was familiarly called) ate and drank for any two. A waggish<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_255" id="Page_255">{255}</a></span> -friend, who knew his opinion of Edinburgh amateurs, meeting him -next day, would ask: ‘Well, Mr Stabilini, what sort of music had -you the other night at —— ——’s?’</p> - -<p>‘Vera good soaper, sir; vera good soaper!’</p> - -<p>‘But tell us the verse you made about one of these parties.’</p> - -<p>Stabilini, twitching up his shirt-collar, a common trick of his, -would say:</p> - -<div class="poetry-container"><div class="poetry"><div class="stanza"> -<div class="verse">‘A piece ov toarkey for a hungree bellee</div> -<div class="verse">Is moatch sup<em>eer</em>ior to Corelli!’</div> -</div></div></div> - -<p>The accent, the manner, the look with which this was delivered, is -said to have been beyond expression rich.</p> - -<p>It is quite remarkable, when we consider the high character of -the popular melodies, how late and slow has been the introduction -of a taste for the higher class of musical compositions into Scotland. -The Earl of Kelly, a man of yesterday, was the first Scotsman who -ever composed music for an orchestra.<a name="FNanchor_216" id="FNanchor_216"></a><a href="#Footnote_216" class="fnanchor">[216]</a> This fact seems sufficient. -It is to be feared that the beauty of the melodies is itself partly to -be blamed for the indifference to higher music. There is too great -a disposition to rest with the distinction thus conferred upon the -nation; too many are content to go no further for the enjoyments -which music has to give. It would be well if, while not forgetting -those beautiful simple airs, we were more generally to open our -minds to the still richer charms of the German and the Italian -muses.</p> -<hr class="chap" /></div><div class="chapter"> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_256" id="Page_256">{256}</a></span></p> - - - -<h2><a name="THE_MURDER_OF_DARNLEY" id="THE_MURDER_OF_DARNLEY">THE MURDER OF DARNLEY.</a></h2> - - -<p>While this event is connected with one of the most problematical -points in our own history, or that of any other -nation, it chances that the whole topography of the affair is very -distinctly recorded. We know not only the exact spot where the -deed was perpetrated, but almost every foot of the ground over -which the perpetrators walked on their way to execute it. It is -chiefly by reason of the depositions and confessions brought out -by the legal proceedings against the inferior instruments that this -minute knowledge is attained.</p> - -<p>The house in which the unfortunate victim resided at the time -was one called the Prebendaries’ Chamber, being part of the suite -of domestic buildings connected with the collegiate church of -St-Mary-in-the-Fields (usually called the <em>Kirk o’ Field</em>). Darnley -was brought to lodge here on the 30th of January 1566-7. He -had contracted the smallpox at Glasgow, and it was thought -necessary, or pretended to be thought necessary, to lodge him in -this place for air, as also to guard against infecting the infant -prince, his son, who was lodged in Holyrood House. The house, -which then belonged, by gift, to a creature of the Earl of Bothwell, -has been described as so very mean as to excite general surprise. -Yet, speaking by comparison, it does not appear to have been a -bad temporary lodging for a person in Darnley’s circumstances. -It consisted of two stories, with a <em>turnpike</em> or spiral staircase -behind. The gable adjoined to the town-wall, which there ran in -a line east and west, and the cellar had a postern opening through -that wall. In the upper floor were a chamber and closet, with a -little gallery having a window also through the town-wall.<a name="FNanchor_217" id="FNanchor_217"></a><a href="#Footnote_217" class="fnanchor">[217]</a> Here<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_257" id="Page_257">{257}</a></span> -Darnley was deposited in an old purple travelling-bed. Underneath -his room was an apartment in which the queen slept for one -or two nights before the murder took place. On the night of -Sunday, February 9, she was attending upon her husband in his -sick-room, when the servants of the Earl of Bothwell deposited the -powder in her room, immediately under the king’s bed. The -queen afterwards took her leave, in order to attend the wedding of -two of her servants at the palace.</p> - -<p>It appears, from the confessions of the wretches executed for -this foul deed, that as they returned from depositing the powder -they saw ‘the Queenes grace gangand before thame with licht -torches up the Black Frier Wynd.’ On their returning to Bothwell’s -lodging at the palace, that nobleman prepared himself for -the deed by changing his gay suit of ‘hose, stockit with black -velvet, passemented with silver, and doublett of black satin of the -same maner,’ for ‘ane uther pair of black hose,<a name="FNanchor_218" id="FNanchor_218"></a><a href="#Footnote_218" class="fnanchor">[218]</a> and ane canvas -doublet white, and tuke his syde [long] riding-cloak about him, of -sad English claith, callit the new colour.’ He then went, attended -by Paris, the queen’s servant, Powry, his own porter, Pate Wilson, -and George Dalgleish, ‘downe the turnepike altogedder, and along -the bak of the Queene’s garden, till you come to the bak of the -cunyie-house [mint], and the bak of the stabbillis, till you come to -the Canongate fornent the Abbey zett.’ After passing up the -Canongate, and gaining entry with some difficulty by the Netherbow -Port, ‘thai gaid up abone Bassentyne’s hous on the south side -of the gait,<a name="FNanchor_219" id="FNanchor_219"></a><a href="#Footnote_219" class="fnanchor">[219]</a> and knockit at ane door beneath the sword slippers, -and callit for the laird of Ormistounes, and one within answerit he -was not thair; and thai passit down a cloiss beneath the Frier -Wynd [<em>apparently Toddrick’s Wynd</em>], and enterit in at the zett of -the Black Friers, till thay came to the back wall and dyke of the -town-wall, whair my lord and Paris past in over the wall.’ The -explosion took place soon after, about two in the morning. The -earl then came back to his attendants at this spot, and ‘thai past -all away togidder out at the Frier zett, and sinderit in the Cowgait.’ -It is here evident that the alley now called the High School -Wynd was the avenue by which the conspirators approached<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_258" id="Page_258">{258}</a></span> -the scene of their atrocity. Bothwell himself, with part of his -attendants, went up the same wynd ‘be east the Frier Wynd,’ and -crossing the High Street, endeavoured to get out of the city by -leaping a broken part of the town-wall in Leith Wynd, but finding -it too high, was obliged to rouse once more the porter at the -Netherbow. They then passed—for every motion of the villains -has a strange interest—down St Mary’s Wynd, and along the south -back of the Canongate to the earl’s lodgings in the palace.</p> - -<div class="figcenter w400"> -<img src="images/illus_p_258.jpg" width="400" height="538" alt="" /> -<div class="caption"><p class="center">High School Wynd.</p></div> -</div> - -<p>The house itself, by this explosion, was destroyed, ‘<em>even</em>,’ as the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_259" id="Page_259">{259}</a></span> -queen tells in a letter to her ambassador in France, ‘<em>to the very -grund-stane</em>.’ The bodies of the king and his servant were found -next morning in a garden or field on the outside of the town-wall. -The buildings connected with the Kirk o’ Field were afterwards -converted into the College of King James, now our Edinburgh -University. The hall of the Senatus in the new buildings occupies -nearly the exact site of the Prebendaries’ Chamber, the ruins of -which are laid down in De Witt’s map of 1648.</p> - -<hr class="chap" /></div><div class="chapter"> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_260" id="Page_260">{260}</a></span></p> - - - - -<h2><a name="MINT_CLOSE" id="MINT_CLOSE">MINT CLOSE.</a></h2> - -<p class="chapter_summary"><strong>The Mint—Robert Cullen—Lord Chancellor Loughborough.</strong></p> - - -<p>The <em>Cunyie House</em>, as the Scottish Mint used to be called, was -near Holyrood Palace in the days of Queen Mary. In the -regency of Morton a large house was erected for it in the Cowgate, -where it may still be seen,<a name="FNanchor_220" id="FNanchor_220"></a><a href="#Footnote_220" class="fnanchor">[220]</a> with the following inscription over the -door:</p> - -<p class="center"> -BE. MERCYFULL. TO. ME. O. GOD. 1574.<br /> -</p> - -<p>In the reign of Charles II. other buildings were added behind, -forming a neat quadrangle; and here was the Scottish coin -produced till the Union, when a separate coinage was given up -and this establishment abandoned; though, to gratify prejudice, -the offices were still kept up as sinecures. This court with its -buildings was a sanctuary for persons prosecuted for debt, as was -the King’s Stables, a mean place at the west end of the Grassmarket. -There was, however, a small den near the top of the -oldest building, lighted by a small window looking up the Cowgate, -which was used as a jail for debtors or other delinquents condemned -by the Mint’s own officers.</p> - -<p>In the western portion of the old building, accessible by a stair -from the court, is a handsome room with an alcove ceiling, and -lighted by two handsomely proportioned windows, which is known -to have been the council-room of the Mint, being a portion of the -private mansion of the master. Here, in May 1590, on a Sunday -evening, the town of Edinburgh entertained the Danish lords who -accompanied James VI. and his queen from her native court—namely, -Peter Monk, the admiral of Denmark; Stephen Brahe, -captain of Eslinburg [perhaps a relative of Tycho?]; Braid Ransome -Maugaret; Nicholaus Theophilus, Doctor of Laws; Henry -Goolister, captain of Bocastle; William Vanderwent; and some -others. For this banquet, ‘maid in Thomas Aitchinsoune, master -of the cunyie-house lugeing,’ it was ordered<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_261" id="Page_261">{261}</a></span> ‘that the thesaurer -caus by and lay in foure punsheouns wyne; John Borthuik baxter -to get four bunnis of beir, with foure gang of aill, and to furneis -breid; Henry Charteris and Roger Macnacht to caus hing the -hous with tapestrie, set the burdis, furmis, chandleris [<em>candlesticks</em>], -and get flowris; George Carketill and Rychert Doby to provyde -the cupbuirds and men to keep thame; and my Lord Provest was -content to provyde naprie and twa dozen greit veschell, and to -avance ane hunder pund or mair, as thai sall haif a do.’</p> - -<p>In the latter days of the Mint as an active establishment, the -coining-house was in the ground-floor of the building, on the north -side of the court; in the adjoining house, on the east side, was the -finishing-house, where the money was polished and fitted for circulation. -The chief instruments used in coining were a hammer -and steel dies, upon which the device was engraved. The metal, -being previously prepared of the proper fineness and thickness, was -cut into longitudinal slips, and a square piece being cut from the -slip, it was afterwards rounded and adjusted to the weight of the -money to be made. The blank pieces of metal were then placed -between two dies, and the upper one was struck with a hammer. -After the Restoration another method was introduced—that of -the mill and screw, which, modified by many improvements, is -still in use. At the Union, the ceremony of destroying the dies of -the Scottish coinage took place in the Mint. After being heated -red-hot in a furnace, they were defaced by three impressions of a -broad-faced <em>punch</em>, which were of course visible on the dies as long -as they existed; but it must be recorded that all these implements, -which would now have been great curiosities, are lost, and none of -the machinery remains but the press, which, weighing about half a -ton, was rather too large to be readily appropriated, or perhaps it -would have followed the rest.</p> - -<p>The floors over the coining-house—bearing the letters, <span class="smcap lowercase">C. R. II.</span>, -surmounting a crown, and the legend, <span class="smcap lowercase">GOD SAVE THE KING, 1674</span>, -originally the mansion of the master—were latterly occupied by the -eminent Dr Cullen, whose family were all born here, and who died -here himself in 1792.</p> - - -<h3>ROBERT CULLEN.</h3> - -<p>Robert Cullen, the son of the physician, made a great impression -on Edinburgh society by his many delightful social qualities, and -particularly his powers as a mimic of the Mathews genus. He -manifested this gift in his earliest years, to the no small discomposure -of his grave old father. One evening, when Dr Cullen was -going to the theatre, Robert entreated to be taken along with him,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_262" id="Page_262">{262}</a></span> -but for some reason was condemned to remain at home. Some -time after the departure of the doctor, Mrs Cullen heard him come -along the passage, as if from his own room, and say at her door: -‘Well, after all, you may let Robert go.’ Robert was accordingly -allowed to depart for the theatre, where his appearance gave no -small surprise to his father. On the old gentleman coming home -and remonstrating with his lady for allowing the boy to go, it was -discovered that the voice which seemed to give the permission had -proceeded from the young wag himself.</p> - -<p>In maturer years, Cullen could not only mimic any voice or -mode of speech, but enter so thoroughly into the nature of any -man that he could supply exactly the ideas which he was likely -to use. His imitations were therefore something much above -mimicries—they were artistic representations of human character. -He has been known in a social company, where another individual -was expected, to stand up, in the character of that person, and -return thanks for the proposal of his health; and this was done -so happily that when the individual did arrive and got upon his -legs to speak for himself, the company was convulsed with an -almost exact repetition of what Cullen had previously uttered, the -manner also and every inflection of the voice being precisely alike. -In relating anecdotes, of which he possessed a vast store, he usually -prefaced them with a sketch of the character of the person referred -to, which greatly increased the effect, as the story then told characteristically. -These sketches were remarked to be extremely -graphic and most elegantly expressed.</p> - -<p>When a young man, residing with his father, he was very -intimate with Dr Robertson, the Principal of the university. To -show that Robertson was not likely to be easily imitated, it may -be mentioned, from the report of a gentleman who has often heard -him making public orations, that when the students observed him -pause for a word, and would themselves mentally supply it, they -invariably found that the word which he did use was different from -that which they had hit upon. Cullen, however, could imitate -him to the life, either in his more formal speeches or in his -ordinary discourse. He would often, in entering a house which -the Principal was in the habit of visiting, assume his voice in the -lobby and stair, and when arrived at the drawing-room door, astonish -the family by turning out to be—Bob Cullen. Lord Greville, a -pupil of the Principal’s, having been one night detained at a -protracted debauch, where Cullen was also present, the latter -gentleman next morning got admission to the bedroom of the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_263" id="Page_263">{263}</a></span> -young nobleman, where, personating Dr Robertson, he sat down -by the bedside, and with all the manner of the reverend Principal, -gave him a sound lecture for having been out so late last night. -Greville, who had fully expected this visit, lay in remorseful -silence, and allowed his supposed monitor to depart without saying -a word. In the course of a quarter of an hour, however, when the -real Dr Robertson entered, and commenced a harangue exactly -duplicating that just concluded, he could not help exclaiming that -it was <em>too bad</em> to give it him twice over. ‘Oh, I see how it is,’ -said Robertson, rising to depart; ‘that rogue Bob Cullen must -have been with you.’ The Principal became at length accustomed -to Bob’s tricks, which he would seem, from the following anecdote, -to have regarded in a friendly spirit. Being attended during an -illness by Dr Cullen, it was found necessary to administer a liberal -dose of laudanum. The physician, however, asked him, in the first -place, in what manner laudanum affected him. Having received -his answer, Cullen remarked, with surprise, that he had never -known any one affected in the same way by laudanum besides -his son Bob. ‘Ah,’ said Robertson, ‘<em>does the rascal take me off -there too?</em>’</p> - -<p>Mr Cullen entered at the Scottish bar in 1764, and, distinguishing -himself highly as a lawyer, was raised to the bench -in 1796, when he took the designation of Lord Cullen. He -cultivated elegant literature, and contributed some papers of -acknowledged merit to the <cite>Mirror</cite> and <cite>Lounger</cite>; but it was in -conversation that he chiefly shone.</p> - -<p>The close adjoining to the Mint contains several old-fashioned -houses of a dignified appearance. In a floor of one bearing the -date 1679, and having a little court in front, Alexander Wedderburn, -Earl of Rosslyn and Lord Chancellor of England, resided -while at the Scottish bar. This, as is well known, was a very -brief interval; for a veteran barrister having one day used the -term ‘presumptuous boy’ with reference to him, and his own -caustic reply having drawn upon him a rebuke from the bench, he -took off his gown, and making a bow, said he would never more -plead where he was subjected to insult, but would seek a wider -field for his exertions. His subsequent rapid rise at the English -bar is matter of history. It is told that, returning to Edinburgh -at the end of his life, after an absence of many years, he wished -to see the house where he had lived while a Scotch advocate. -Too infirm to walk, he was borne in a chair to the foot of the -Mint Close to see this building. One thing he was particularly<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_264" id="Page_264">{264}</a></span> -anxious about. While residing here, he had had five holes made -in the little court to play at some bowling game of which he was -fond. He wished, above all things, to see these holes once more, -and when he found they were still there, he expressed much satisfaction. -Churchill himself might have melted at such an anecdote -of the old days of him who was</p> - -<div class="poetry-container"><div class="poetry"><div class="stanza"> -<div class="verse">‘Pert at the bar, and in the senate loud.’</div> -</div></div></div> - -<p>About midway up the close is a turreted mansion, accessible -from Hyndford’s Close, and having a tolerably good garden connected -with it. This was, in 1742, the residence of the Earl of -Selkirk; subsequently it was occupied by Dr Daniel Rutherford, -professor of botany. Sir Walter Scott, who, being a nephew of -that gentleman, was often in the house in his young days, communicated -to me a curious circumstance connected with it. It -appears that the house immediately adjacent was not furnished -with a stair wide enough to allow of a coffin being carried down -in decent fashion. It had, therefore, what the Scottish law calls -a <em>servitude</em> upon Dr Rutherford’s house, conferring the perpetual -liberty of bringing the deceased inmates through a passage into -that house and down <em>its</em> stair into the lane.</p> - -<hr class="chap" /></div><div class="chapter"> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_265" id="Page_265">{265}</a></span></p> - - - - -<h2><a name="MISS_NICKY_MURRAY" id="MISS_NICKY_MURRAY">MISS NICKY MURRAY.</a></h2> - - -<p>The dancing assemblies of Edinburgh were for many years, -about the middle of the last century, under the direction and -dictatorship of the Honourable Miss Nicky Murray, one of the -sisters of the Earl of Mansfield. Much good sense, firmness, -knowledge of the world and of the histories of individuals, as well -as a due share of patience and benevolence, were required for this -office of unrecognised though real power; and it was generally -admitted that Miss Murray possessed the needful qualifications in -a remarkable degree, though rather more marked by good manners -than good-nature. She and her sisters lived for many years in a -floor of a large building at the head of Bailie Fife’s Close—a now -unhallowed locality, where, I believe, Francis Jeffrey attended his -first school. In their narrow mansion, the Miss Murrays received -flights of young lady-cousins from the country, to be finished -in their manners and introduced into society. No light task -must theirs have been, all things considered. I find a highly -significant note on the subject inserted by an old gentleman in an -interleaved copy of my first edition: ‘It was from Miss Nicky -Murray’s—a relation of the Gray family—that my father ran off -with my mother, then not sixteen years old.’</p> - -<p>The Assembly Room of that time was in the <em>close</em> where the -Commercial Bank was afterwards established.<a name="FNanchor_221" id="FNanchor_221"></a><a href="#Footnote_221" class="fnanchor">[221]</a> First there was a -lobby, where chairs were disburdened of their company, and where -a reduced gentleman, with pretensions to the title of Lord Kirkcudbright—descendant -of the once great Maclellans of Galloway—might -have been seen selling gloves; this being the person alluded -to in a letter written by Goldsmith while a student in Edinburgh: -‘One day, happening to slip into Lord Kilcobry’s—don’t be surprised, -his lordship is only a glover!’ The dancing-room opened -directly from the lobby, and above stairs was a tea-room. The<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_266" id="Page_266">{266}</a></span> -former had a railed space in the centre, within which the dancers -were arranged, while the spectators sat round on the outside; and -no communication was allowed between the different sides of this -sacred pale. The lady-directress had a high chair or throne at -one end. Before Miss Nicky Murray, Lady Elliot of Minto and -Mrs Brown of Coalstoun, wives of judges, had exercised this lofty -authority, which was thought honourable on account of the -charitable object of the assemblies. The arrangements were of a -rigid character, and certainly tending to dullness. There being -but one set allowed to dance at a time, it was seldom that any -person was twice on the floor in one night. The most of the time -was spent in acting the part of lookers-on, which threw great -duties in the way of conversation upon the gentlemen. These -had to settle with a partner for the year, and were upon no -account permitted to change, even for a single night. The appointment -took place at the beginning of the season, usually at -some private party or ball given by a person of distinction, where -the fans of the ladies were all put into a gentleman’s cocked hat; -the gentlemen put in their hands and took a fan, and to whomsoever -the fan belonged, that was to be his partner for the season. -In the general rigours of this system, which sometimes produced -ludicrous combinations, there was, however, one palliative—namely, -the fans being all distinguishable from each other, and the gentleman -being in general as well acquainted with the fan as the face -of his mistress, and the hat being open, it was possible to peep -in, and exercise, to a certain extent, a principle of selection, -whereby he was perhaps successful in procuring an appointment to -his mind. All this is spiritedly given in a poem of Sir Alexander -Boswell:</p> - -<div class="poetry-container"><div class="poetry"><div class="stanza"> -<div class="verse">‘Then were the days of modesty of mien!</div> -<div class="verse">Stays for the fat, and quilting for the lean;</div> -<div class="verse">The ribboned stomacher, in many a plait,</div> -<div class="verse">Upheld the chest, and dignified the gait;</div> -<div class="verse">Some Venus, brightest planet of the train,</div> -<div class="verse">Moved in a lustering <em>halo</em>, propped with cane.</div> -<div class="verse">Then the <em>Assembly Close</em> received the fair—</div> -<div class="verse">Order and elegance presided there—</div> -<div class="verse">Each gay Right Honourable had her place,</div> -<div class="verse">To walk a minuet with becoming grace.</div> -<div class="verse">No racing to the dance, with rival hurry—</div> -<div class="verse">Such was thy sway, O famed Miss Nicky Murray!</div> -<div class="verse">Each lady’s fan a chosen Damon bore,</div> -<div class="verse">With care selected many a day before;</div> -<div class="verse">For, unprovided with a favourite beau,</div> -<div class="verse">The nymph, chagrined, the ball must needs forego;</div><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_267" id="Page_267">{267}</a></span> -<div class="verse">But, previous matters to her taste arranged,</div> -<div class="verse"><em>Certes</em>, the constant couple never changed;</div> -<div class="verse">Through a long night, to watch fair Delia’s will,</div> -<div class="verse">The same dull swain was at her elbow still.’</div> -</div></div></div> - -<p>A little before Miss Nicky’s time, it was customary for gentlemen -to walk alongside the chairs of their partners, with their -swords by their sides, and so escort them home. They called -next afternoon upon their Dulcineas to inquire how they were -and drink tea. The fashionable time for seeing company in those -days was the evening, when people were all abroad upon the street, -as in the forenoon now, making calls and <em>shopping</em>. The people -who attended the assemblies were very <em>select</em>. Moreover, they -were all known to each other; and the introduction of a stranger -required nice preliminaries. It is said that Miss Murray, on -hearing a young lady’s name pronounced for the first time, would -say: ‘Miss ——, of what?’ If no territorial addition could be -made, she manifestly cooled. Upon one occasion, seeing a man at -the assembly who was born in a low situation and raised to wealth -in some humble trade, she went up to him, and, without the least -deference to his fine-laced coat, taxed him with presumption in -coming there, and turned him out of the room.</p> - -<p>Major Topham praises the regularity and propriety observed at -the assemblies, though gently insinuating their heaviness. He says: -‘I was never at an assembly where the authority of the manager -was so observed or respected. With the utmost politeness, affability, -and good-humour, Miss Murray attends to every one. All -petitions are heard, and demands granted, which appear reasonable. -The company is so much the more obliged to Miss Murray, as the -task is by no means to be envied. The crowd which immediately -surrounds her on entering the room, the impetuous applications -of <i lang="fr" xml:lang="fr">chaperons</i>, maiden-aunts, and the earnest entreaties of lovers to -obtain a ticket in one of the first sets for the dear object, render -the fatigue of the office of lady-directress almost intolerable.’<a name="FNanchor_222" id="FNanchor_222"></a><a href="#Footnote_222" class="fnanchor">[222]</a></p> -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_268" id="Page_268">{268}</a></span></p> -<p>Early hours were kept in those days, and the stinted time was -never exceeded. When the proper hour arrived for dissolving the -party, and the young people would crowd round the throne to -petition for one other set, up rose Miss Nicky in unrelenting -rigidity of figure, and with one wave of her hand silenced the -musicians:</p> - -<div class="poetry-container"><div class="poetry"><div class="stanza"> -<div class="verse">‘Quick from the summit of the grove they fell,</div> -<div class="verse">And left it inharmonious.’</div> -</div></div></div> -<hr class="chap" /></div><div class="chapter"> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_269" id="Page_269">{269}</a></span></p> - - - -<h2><a name="THE_BISHOPS_LAND" id="THE_BISHOPS_LAND">[THE BISHOP’S LAND.</a></h2> - - -<p>On the north side of the High Street, a hundred yards or so -below the North Bridge, there existed previous to 1813 an -unusually large and handsome old <em>land</em> or building named the -<em>Bishop’s Land</em>. It rested upon an arcade or <i lang="it" xml:lang="it">piazza</i>, as it is called, -and the entry in the first floor bore the ordinary legend:</p> - -<p class="center"> -BLISSIT BE ZE LORD FOR ALL HIS GIFTIS, -</p> - -<p>together with the date 1578, and a shield impaled with two coats -of arms. Along the front of this floor was a balcony composed of -brass, a thing unique in the ancient city. The house had been -the Edinburgh residence of Archbishop John Spottiswood. Most -unfortunately the whole line of building towards the street was -burned down in the year 1813.</p> - -<p>In the latter part of the last century the Bishop’s Land was -regarded as a very handsome residence, and it was occupied accordingly -by persons of consideration. The dictum of an old citizen -to me many years ago was: ‘Nobody without livery-servants lived -in the Bishop’s Land.’ Sir Stuart Threipland of Fingask occupied -the first floor. His estate, forfeited by his father in 1716, was -purchased back by him, with money obtained through his wife, in -1784; and the title, which was always given to him by courtesy, -was restored as a reality to his descendants by George IV. He -had himself been engaged in the affair of 1745-6, and had accompanied -‘the Prince’ in some part of his wanderings. In the hands -of this ‘fine old <em>Scottish</em> gentleman,’ for such he was, his house -in the Bishop’s Land was elegantly furnished, there being in -particular some well-painted portraits of royal personages—<em>not -of the reigning house</em>. These had all been sent to his father and -himself by the persons represented in them, who thus showed their -gratitude for efforts made and sufferings incurred in their behalf. -There were five windows to the street, three of them lighting the -drawing-room; the remaining two lighted the eldest son’s room. -A dining-room, Sir Stuart’s bedroom, his sister Janet’s (who kept -house for him) room, and other apartments were in the rear, some -lighted from the adjacent close—and these still exist, having been -spared by the fire. The kitchen and servants’ rooms were below.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_270" id="Page_270">{270}</a></span></p> - -<p>In the next floor above lived the Hamiltons of Pencaitland; in -the next again, the Aytouns of Inchdairnie. Mrs Aytoun, who -was a daughter of Lord Rollo, would sometimes come down the -stair in a winter evening, lighting herself with a little wax-taper, -to drink tea with <em>Mrs</em> Janet Threipland, for so she called herself, -though unmarried. In the uppermost floor of all lived a reputable -tailor and his family. All the various tenants, including the -tailor, were on good neighbourly terms with each other; a pleasant -thing to tell of this bit of the old world, which has left nothing -of the same kind behind it in these later days, when we all live at -a greater distance, physical and moral, from each other.]</p> - -<hr class="chap" /></div><div class="chapter"> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_271" id="Page_271">{271}</a></span></p> - - - - -<h2><a name="JOHN_KNOXS_MANSE" id="JOHN_KNOXS_MANSE">JOHN KNOX’S MANSE.</a></h2> - - -<p>The lower portion of the High Street, including <em>the Netherbow</em>, -was, till a recent time, remarkable for the antiquity of the -greater number of the buildings, insomuch that no equal portion -of the city was more distinctly a memorial of the general appearance -of the whole as it was in the sixteenth and seventeenth -centuries. On the north side of the High Street, immediately -adjacent to the Netherbow, there was a nest of tall wooden-fronted -houses of one character, and the age of which generally -might be guessed from the date existing upon one—1562. This -formed a perfect example of the <em>High Gait</em> as it appeared to -Queen Mary, excepting that the open booths below had been -converted into close shops. The <em>fore-stairs</em>—that is, outside -stairs ascending to the <em>first floor</em> (technically so called), from -which the women of Edinburgh reviled the hapless queen as she -rode along the street after her surrender at Carberry—were -unchanged in this little district.</p> - -<p>The popular story regarding houses of this kind is that they -took their origin in an inconvenience which was felt in having -the Boroughmoor covered with wood, as it proved from that -circumstance a harbour for robbers. To banish the robbers, it -was necessary to extirpate the wood. To get this done, the -magistrates granted leave to the citizens to project their house-fronts -seven feet into the street, provided they should execute -the work with timber cut from the Boroughmoor. Robert -Fergusson follows up this story in a burlesque poem by relating -how, consequently,</p> - -<div class="poetry-container"><div class="poetry"><div class="stanza"> -<div class="verse">‘Edina’s mansions with lignarian art</div> -<div class="verse">Were piled and fronted. Like an ark she seemed</div> -<div class="verse">To lie on mountain’s top, with shapes replete,</div> -<div class="verse">Clean and unclean——</div> -<div class="verse">To Jove the Dryads prayed, nor prayed in vain,</div> -<div class="verse">For vengeance on her sons. At midnight drear</div> -<div class="verse">Black showers descend, and teeming myriads rise</div> -<div class="verse">Of bugs abhorrent’——</div> -</div></div></div> - -<p>The only authentic information to be obtained on the point is -presented by Maitland, when he tells us that the clearing of the -Boroughmoor of timber took place in consequence of a charter<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_272" id="Page_272">{272}</a></span> -from James IV. in 1508. He says nothing of robbers, but attributes -the permission granted by the magistrates for the making -of wooden projections merely to their desire of getting sale for -their timber. After all, I am inclined to trace this fashion -to taste. The wooden fronts appear to have originated in open -galleries—an arrangement often spoken of in early writings. -These, being closed up or formed into a range of windows, would -produce the wooden-fronted house. It is remarkable that the -wooden fronts do not in many instances bear the appearance of -afterthoughts, as the stone structure within often shows such -an arrangement of the fore wall as seems designed to connect -the projecting part with the chambers within, or to give these -chambers as much as possible of the borrowed light. At the same -time, it is somewhat puzzling to find, in the closes below the -buildings, gateways with hooks for hinges seven feet or so from -the present street-front—an arrangement which does not appear -necessary on the supposition that the houses were built designedly -with a stone interior and a wooden projection.</p> - -<p>In the Netherbow the street receives a contraction from the -advance of the houses on the north side, thus closing a species -of parallelogram, of which the Luckenbooths formed the upper -extremity—the market-place of our ancient city. The uppermost -of the prominent houses—having of course two fronts -meeting in a right angle, one fronting to the line of street, the -other looking up the High Street—is pointed to by tradition as -the residence or manse of John Knox during his incumbency -as minister of Edinburgh, from 1560 till (with few interruptions) -his death in 1572. It is a picturesque building of three above-ground -floors, constructed of substantial ashlar masonry, but on -a somewhat small scale, and terminating in curious gables and -masses of chimneys. A narrow door, right in the angle, gives -access to a small room, lighted by one long window presented -to the westward, and apparently the <em>hall</em> of the mansion in -former times. Over the window and door is this legend, in an -unusually old kind of lettering:</p> - -<p class="center"> -LVFE·GOD·ABVFE·AL·AND·YI·NYCHTBOVR·[AS·]YI·SELF· -</p> - -<p>The word ‘as’ is obliterated. The words are, in modern -English, simply the well-known scriptural command: ‘Love -God above all, and thy neighbour as thyself.’ Perched upon -the corner above the door is a small effigy of the Reformer, -preaching in a pulpit, and pointing with his right hand to a<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_273" id="Page_273">{273}</a></span> -stone above his head in that direction, which presents in rude -sculpture the sun bursting from clouds, with the name of the -Deity inscribed on his disc in three languages:</p> - -<p class="center"> -ΘΕΟΣ<br /> -DEUS<br /> -GOD<br /> -</p> - -<p>Dr M’Crie, in his <cite>Life of John Knox</cite>, states that the Reformer, -on commencing duty in Edinburgh at the conclusion of the -struggles with the queen-regent, ‘lodged in the house of David -Forrest, a burgess of Edinburgh, from which he removed to the -lodging which had belonged to Durie, Abbot of Dunfermline.’ -The magistrates acted liberally towards their minister, giving -him a salary of two hundred pounds Scottish money, and paying -his house-rent for him, at the rate of fifteen merks yearly. In -October 1561 they ordained the Dean of Guild, ‘with al diligence, -to mak ane warm studye of dailles to the minister, Johne Knox, -within his hous, aboue the hall of the same, with lyht and -wyndokis thereunto, and all uther necessaris.’ This study is -generally supposed to have been a very small wooden projection, -of the kind described a few pages back, still seen on the front -of the <em>first floor</em>. Close to it is a window in the angle of the -building, from which Knox is said by tradition to have occasionally -held forth to multitudes below.</p> - -<p>The second floor, which is accessible by two narrow spiral -stairs, one to the south, another to the west, contains a tolerably -spacious room, with a ceiling ornamented by stucco mouldings, -and a window presented to the westward. A partition has at -one time divided this room from a narrow one towards the -north, the ceiling of which is composed of the beams and -flooring of the attic flat, all curiously painted with flower-work -in an ancient taste. Two inferior rooms extend still farther to -the northward. It is to be remarked that the wooden projection -already spoken of extends up to this floor, so that there is here -likewise a small room in front; it contains a fireplace, and a -recess which might have been a cupboard or a library, besides -two small windows. That this fireplace, this recess, and also -the door by which the wooden chamber is entered from the -decorated room should all be formed in the front wall of the -house, and with a necessary relation to the wooden projection, -strikes one as difficult to reconcile with the idea of that projection -being an afterthought; the appearances rather indicate -the whole having been formed at once, as parts of one design.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_274" id="Page_274">{274}</a></span> -The attic floor exhibits strong oaken beams, but the flooring is -in bad order.</p> - -<p>In the lower part of the house there is a small room, said by -tradition to have been used in times of difficulty for the purpose -of baptising children; there is also a well to supply the house -with water, besides a secret stair, represented as communicating -subterraneously with a neighbouring alley.</p> - -<p>From the size of this house, and the variety of accesses to it, -it becomes tolerably certain that Knox could have occupied only -a portion of it. The question arises, which part did he occupy? -Probability seems decidedly in favour of the <em>first floor</em>—that -containing the window from which he is traditionally said to -have preached, and where his effigy appears. An authentic fact -in the Reformer’s life favours this supposition. When under -danger from the hostility of the queen’s party in the castle—in -the spring of 1571—‘one evening a musket-ball was fired in at -his window, and lodged in the roof of the apartment in which -he was sitting. It happened that he sat at the time in a -different part of the room from that which he had been accustomed -to occupy, otherwise the ball, from the direction it took, -must have struck him’ (M’Crie). The second floor is too high -to have admitted of a musket being fired in at one of the -windows. A ball fired in at the ground-floor would not have -struck the ceiling. The only feasible supposition in the case is -that the Reformer dwelt in the <em>first floor</em>, which was not beyond -an assassin’s aim, and yet at such a height that a ball fired from -the street would hit the ceiling.<a name="FNanchor_223" id="FNanchor_223"></a><a href="#Footnote_223" class="fnanchor">[223]</a></p> - -<div class="figcenter w500"> -<a id="illus_c_023"></a> -<img src="images/illus_c_023.jpg" width="500" height="545" alt="" /> -<div class="caption"><p class="center">JOHN KNOX’S MANSE.</p> - -<p class="right"> -<span class="smcap"><a href="#Page_274">Page 274.</a></span> -</p></div> -</div> -<hr class="chap" /></div><div class="chapter"> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_275" id="Page_275">{275}</a></span></p> - - - - -<h2><a name="HYNDFORDS_CLOSE" id="HYNDFORDS_CLOSE">HYNDFORD’S CLOSE.</a></h2> - - -<p>At the bottom of the High Street, on the south side, there is -an uncommonly huge and dense mass of stone buildings or -<em>lands</em>, penetrated only by a few narrow closes. One of these is -Hyndford’s Close, a name indicating the -noble family which once had lodgment in -it. This was a Scotch peerage not without -its glories—witness particularly the -third earl, who acted as ambassador in -succession to Prussia, to Russia, and to -Vienna. It is now extinct: its <i lang="fr" xml:lang="fr">bijouterie</i>, -its pictures, including portraits of Maria -Theresa, and other royal and imperial -personages, which had been presented as -friendly memorials to the ambassador, -have all been dispersed by the salesman’s -hammer, and Hyndford’s Close, on my -trying to get into it lately (1868), was -inaccessible (literally) from filth.</p> - -<div class="figcenter w200"> -<img src="images/illus_p_275.jpg" width="200" height="500" alt="" /> -<div class="caption"><p class="center">Hyndford’s Close.</p></div> -</div> - -<p>The entry and stair at the head of the -close on the west side was a favourite -residence, on account of the ready access -to it from the street. In the second -floor of this house lived, about the beginning -of the reign of George III., Lady -Maxwell of Monreith, and there brought -up her beautiful daughters, one of whom -became Duchess of Gordon. The house -had a dark passage, and the kitchen door -was passed in going to the dining-room, -according to an agreeable old practice in -Scotch houses, which lets the guests know -on entering what they have to expect. -The fineries of Lady Maxwell’s daughters -were usually hung up, after washing, on a screen in this passage -to dry; while the coarser articles of dress, such as shifts and petticoats, -were slung decently out of sight at the window, upon a projecting<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_276" id="Page_276">{276}</a></span> -contrivance similar to a dyer’s pole, of which numerous -specimens still exist at windows in the Old Town for the convenience -of the poorer inhabitants.</p> - -<p>So easy and familiar were the manners of the great in those -times, fabled to be so stiff and decorous, that Miss Eglintoune, -afterwards Lady Wallace, used to be sent with the tea-kettle -across the street to the Fountain Well for water to make tea. -Lady Maxwell’s daughters were the wildest romps imaginable. -An old gentleman, who was their relation, told me that the first -time he saw these beautiful girls was in the High Street, where -Miss Jane, afterwards Duchess of Gordon, was riding upon a -sow, which Miss Eglintoune thumped lustily behind with a stick. -It must be understood that in the middle of the eighteenth -century vagrant swine went as commonly about the streets of -Edinburgh as dogs do in our own day, and were more generally -fondled as pets by the children of the last generation.<a name="FNanchor_224" id="FNanchor_224"></a><a href="#Footnote_224" class="fnanchor">[224]</a> It may, -however, be remarked that the sows upon which the Duchess -of Gordon and her witty sister rode, when children, were not -the common vagrants of the High Street, but belonged to Peter -Ramsay, of the inn in St Mary’s Wynd, and were among the -last that were permitted to roam abroad. The two romps used -to watch the animals as they were let loose in the forenoon -from the stable-yard (where they lived among the horse-litter), -and get upon their backs the moment they issued from the close.</p> - -<p>The extraordinary cleverness, the genuine wit, and the delightful -<em>abandon</em> of Lady Wallace made an extraordinary impression -on Scottish society in her day. It almost seemed as if some -faculty divine had inspired her. A milliner bringing home a -cap to her when she was just about to set off to the Leith races -was so unlucky as to tear it against the buckle of a porter’s knee -in the street. ‘No matter,’ said her ladyship; and instantly -putting it on, restored all to grace by a single pin. The cap -thus misarranged was found so perfectly exquisite that ladies -tore their caps on nails, and pinned them on in the hope of -imitating it. It was, however, a grace beyond the reach of art.</p> - -<p>Of the many <i lang="fr" xml:lang="fr">bon mots</i> attributed to her, one alone seems<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_277" id="Page_277">{277}</a></span> -worthy, from its being unhackneyed, of appearing here. The -son of Mr Kincaid, king’s printer—a great Macaroni, as the -phrase went; that is, dandy—was nicknamed, from his father’s -lucrative patent, <em>Young Bibles</em>. This beau entering a ballroom -one evening, some of the company asked who was that extraordinary-looking -young man. ‘Only Young Bibles,’ quoth Lady -Wallace, ‘bound in calf, and gilt, but not lettered!’</p> - -<p>[In the same stair in Hyndford’s Close lived another lady of -rank, and one who, for several reasons, filled in her time a broad -space in society. This was Anne, Countess of Balcarres, the -progenitrix of perhaps as many persons as ever any woman was -in the same space of time. Her eldest daughter, Anne, authoress -of the ballad of <cite>Auld Robin Gray</cite>, was, of all her eleven children, -the one whose name is most likely to continue in remembrance—yea, -though another of them put down the Maroon war in -the West Indies. When in Hyndford’s Close, Lady Balcarres -had for a neighbour in the same alley Dr Rutherford, the uncle -of Sir Walter Scott; and young Walter, often at his uncle’s, -occasionally accompanied his aunt ‘Jeanie’ to Lady Balcarres’s. -Forty years after, having occasion to correspond with Lady -Anne Barnard, <i lang="fr" xml:lang="fr">née</i> Lindsay, he told her: ‘I remember all the -<i lang="fr" xml:lang="fr">locale</i> of Hyndford’s Close perfectly, even to the Indian screen -with Harlequin and Columbine, and the harpsichord, though I -never had the pleasure of hearing Lady Anne play upon it. I -suppose the close, once too clean to soil the hem of your -ladyship’s garment, is now a resort for the lowest mechanics—and -so wears the world away.... It is, to be sure, more -picturesque to lament the desolation of towers on hills and -haughs, than the degradation of an Edinburgh close; but I -cannot help thinking on the simple and cosie retreats where -worth and talent, and elegance to boot, were often nestled, and -which now are the resort of misery, filth, poverty, and vice.’<a name="FNanchor_225" id="FNanchor_225"></a><a href="#Footnote_225" class="fnanchor">[225]</a></p> - -<p>The late Mrs Meetham, a younger sister of Miss Spence -Yeaman, of Murie, in the Carse of Gowrie, had often heard -her grand-aunt, Miss Molly Yeaman, describe, from her own -recollection, the tea-drinkings of the Countess of Balcarres in -Hyndford’s Close. The family was not rich, and it still retained -something of its ancient Jacobitism. The tea-drinkings, as was -not uncommon, took place in my lady’s bedroom. At the foot -of a four-posted bed, exhibiting a finely worked coverlet, stood -John, an elderly man-servant, and a <em>character</em>, in full Balcarres<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_278" id="Page_278">{278}</a></span> -livery, an immense quantity of worsted lace on his coat. -Resting with his arm round a bedpost, he was ready to hand -the kettle when required. As the ladies went chattering on, -there would sometimes occur a difficulty about a date or a -point in genealogy, and then John was appealed to to settle the -question. For example, it came to be debated how many of the -Scotch baronetcies were real; for, as is still the case, many of -them were known to be fictitious, or assumed without legal -grounds. Here John was known to be not only learned, but -eloquent. He began: ‘Sir James Kinloch, Sir Stuart Threipland, -Sir John Wedderburn, Sir —— Ogilvy, Sir James Steuart -of Coltness’ [all of them forfeited baronets, be it observed]: -‘these, leddies, are the only <em>real</em> baronets. For the rest, I do -believe, the Deil’——then a figurative declaration not fit for -modern print, but which made the Balcarres party only laugh, -and declare to John that they thought him not far wrong.]</p> - -<hr class="chap" /></div><div class="chapter"> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_279" id="Page_279">{279}</a></span></p> - - - - -<h2><a name="HOUSE_OF_THE_MARQUISES_OF_TWEEDDALE_THE" id="HOUSE_OF_THE_MARQUISES_OF_TWEEDDALE_THE">HOUSE OF THE MARQUISES OF TWEEDDALE—THE -BEGBIE TRAGEDY.</a></h2> - - -<div class="figcenter w300"> -<img src="images/illus_p_279.jpg" width="300" height="521" alt="" /> -<div class="caption"><p class="center">Tweeddale Court.</p></div> -</div> - -<p>The town mansion of the Marquises -of Tweeddale was one of -large extent and dimensions, in a -court which still bears the title of -that family, nearly opposite to the -mansion of John -Knox.<a name="FNanchor_226" id="FNanchor_226"></a><a href="#Footnote_226" class="fnanchor">[226]</a> When -John, the fourth -marquis, was Secretary -of State for -Scotland, in the -reign of George -II., this must have -been a dwelling of -considerable importance -in the eyes of -his countrymen. It -had a good garden -in the rear, with a<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_280" id="Page_280">{280}</a></span> -yard and coach entry from the Cowgate. Now all the buildings -and ‘pertinents’ are in the occupation of Messrs Oliver & Boyd, -the well-known publishers.</p> - -<div class="figcenter w250"> -<img src="images/illus_p_280.jpg" width="250" height="355" alt="" /> -<div class="caption"><p class="center">Scene of the Begbie Murder.</p></div> -</div> - -<p>The passage from the street into Tweeddale Court is narrow -and dark, and about fifteen yards in length. Here, in 1806, when -the mansion was possessed as a banking-house by the British Linen -Company, there took place an extraordinary tragedy. About five -o’clock of the evening -of the 13th of November, -when the short -midwinter day had -just closed, a child, -who lived in a house -accessible from the -close, was sent by her -mother with a kettle -to obtain a supply of -water for tea from -the neighbouring well. -The little girl, stepping -with the kettle -in her hand out of the -public stair into the -close, stumbled in the -dark over something -which lay there, and -which proved to be the -body of a man just -expiring. On an alarm -being given, it was -discovered that this -was William Begbie, a -porter connected with -the bank, in whose -heart a knife was stuck up to the haft, so that he bled to death -before uttering a word which might tend to explain the dismal -transaction. He was at the same time found to have been robbed -of a package of notes to the value of above four thousand pounds, -which he had been entrusted, in the course of his ordinary duty, -to carry from the branch of the bank at Leith to the head-office.<a name="FNanchor_227" id="FNanchor_227"></a><a href="#Footnote_227" class="fnanchor">[227]</a><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_281" id="Page_281">{281}</a></span> -The blow had been given with an accuracy and a calculation of -consequences showing the most appalling deliberation in the -assassin; for not only was the knife directed straight into the -most vital part, but its handle had been muffled in a bunch of -soft paper, so as to prevent, as was thought, any sprinkling of -blood from reaching the person of the murderer, by which he -might have been by some chance detected. The knife was -one of those with broad thin blades and wooden handles which -are used for cutting bread, and its rounded front had been ground -to a point, apparently for the execution of this horrible deed. -The unfortunate man left a wife and four children to bewail his -loss.</p> - -<p>The singular nature and circumstances of Begbie’s murder -occasioned much excitement in the public mind, and every effort -was of course made to discover the guilty party. No house of a -suspicious character in the city was left unsearched, and parties -were despatched to watch and patrol all the various roads leading -out into the country. The bank offered a reward of five hundred -pounds for such information as might lead to the conviction of -the offender or offenders; and the government further promised -the king’s pardon to any except the actual murderer who, having -been concerned in the deed, might discover their accomplices. -The sheriff of Edinburgh, Mr Clerk Rattray, displayed the -greatest zeal in his endeavours to ascertain the circumstances of -the murder, and to detect and seize the murderer, but with surprisingly -little success. All that could be ascertained was that -Begbie, in proceeding up Leith Walk on his fatal mission, had -been accompanied by ‘a man;’ and that about the supposed -time of the murder ‘a man’ had been seen by some children to -run out of the close into the street and down Leith Wynd, a -lane leading off from the Netherbow at a point nearly opposite -to the close. There was also reason to believe that the knife had -been bought in a shop about two o’clock on the day of the -murder, and that it had been afterwards ground upon a grinding-stone -and smoothed on a hone. A number of suspicious characters -were apprehended and examined; but all, with one exception, produced -satisfactory proofs of their innocence. The exception was -a carrier between Perth and Edinburgh, a man of dissolute and -irregular habits, of great bodily strength, and known to be a<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_282" id="Page_282">{282}</a></span> -dangerous and desperate character. He was kept in custody for -a considerable time on suspicion, having been seen in the Canongate, -near the scene of the murder, a very short time after it was -committed. It has since been ascertained that he was then going -about a different business, the disclosure of which would have -subjected him to a capital punishment. It was in consequence -of the mystery he felt himself impelled to preserve on this subject -that he was kept so long in custody; but at length facts and -circumstances came out to warrant his discharge, and he was -discharged accordingly.</p> - -<p>Months rolled on without eliciting any evidence respecting the -murder, and, like other wonders, it had ceased in a great measure -to engage public attention, when, on the 10th of August 1807, -a journeyman mason, in company with two other men, passing -through the Bellevue grounds in the neighbourhood of the city, -found, in a hole in a stone enclosure by the side of a hedge, a -parcel containing a large quantity of bank-notes, bearing the -appearance of having been a good while exposed to the weather. -After consulting a little, the men carried the package to the -sheriff’s office, where it was found to contain about £3000 in large -notes, being those which had been taken from Begbie. The -British Linen Company rewarded the men with two hundred -pounds for their honesty; but the circumstance passed without -throwing any light on the murder itself.</p> - -<p>Up to the present day the murderer of Begbie has not been -discovered; nor is it probable, after the space of time which has -elapsed, that he will ever be so. It is most likely that the grave -has long closed upon him. The only person on whom public -suspicion alighted with any force during the sixteen years ensuing -upon the transaction was a medical practitioner in Leith, a dissolute -man and a gambler, who put an end to his own existence -not long after the murder. But I am not acquainted with any -particular circumstances on which this suspicion was grounded -beyond the suicide, which might spring from other causes. It was -not till 1822 that any further light was thrown on this mysterious -case. In a work then published under the title of <cite>The Life and -Trial of James Mackoull</cite>, there was included a paper by Mr -Denovan, the Bow Street officer, the object of which was to prove -that Mackoull was the murderer, and which contained at least one -very curious statement.</p> - -<p>Mr Denovan had discovered in Leith a man, then acting as -a teacher, but who in 1806 was a sailor-boy, and who had<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_283" id="Page_283">{283}</a></span> -witnessed some circumstances immediately connected with the -murder. The man’s statement was as follows: ‘I was at that -time (November 1806) a boy of fourteen years of age. The -vessel to which I belonged had made a voyage to Lisbon, and -was then lying in Leith harbour. I had brought a small present -from Portugal for my mother and sister, who resided in the -Netherbow, Edinburgh, immediately opposite to Tweeddale’s Close, -leading to the British Linen Company’s Bank. I left the vessel -late in the afternoon, and as the articles I had brought were -contraband, I put them under my jacket, and was proceeding -up Leith Walk, when I perceived a tall man carrying a yellow-coloured -parcel under his arm, and a genteel man, dressed in a -black coat, dogging him. I was a little afraid: I conceived the -man who carried the parcel to be a smuggler, and the gentleman -who followed him to be a custom-house or excise officer. In -dogging the man, the supposed officer went from one side of -the Walk to the other [the Walk is a broad street], as if afraid -of being noticed, but still kept about the same distance behind -him. I was afraid of losing what I carried, and shortened sail -a little, keeping my eyes fixed on the person I supposed to be -an officer, until I came to the head of Leith Street, when I saw -the smuggler take the North Bridge, and the custom-house officer -go in front of the Register Office; here he looked round him, -and imagining he was looking for me, I hove to, and watched -him. He then looked up the North Bridge, and, as I conceive, -followed the smuggler, for he went the same way. I stood a -minute or two where I was, and then went forward, walking -slowly up the North Bridge. I did not, however, see either of -the men before me; and when I came to the south end or head -of the Bridge, supposing that they might have gone up the High -Street or along the South Bridge, I turned to the left, and reached -the Netherbow, without again seeing either the smuggler or the -officer. Just, however, as I came opposite to Tweeddale’s Close, -<em>I saw the custom-house officer come running out of it with something -under his coat</em>: I think he ran down the street. Being much -alarmed, and supposing that the officer had also seen me and -knew what I carried, I deposited my little present in my mother’s -with all possible speed, and made the best of my way to Leith, -without hearing anything of the murder of Begbie until next day. -On coming on board the vessel, I told the mate what a narrow -escape I conceived I had made: he seemed somewhat alarmed -(having probably, like myself, smuggled some trifling article from<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_284" id="Page_284">{284}</a></span> -Portugal), and told me in a peremptory tone that I should not go -ashore again without first acquainting him. I certainly heard of -the murder before I left Leith, and concluded that the man I saw -was the murderer; but the idea of waiting on a magistrate and -communicating what I had seen never struck me. We sailed in -a few days thereafter from Leith; and the vessel to which I -belonged having been captured by a privateer, I was carried to -a French prison, and only regained my liberty at the last peace. -I can now recollect distinctly the figure of the man I saw; he was -well dressed, had a genteel appearance, and wore a black coat. -I never saw his face properly, for he was before me the whole way -up the Walk; I think, however, he was a stout big man, but not -so tall as the man I then conceived to be a smuggler.’</p> - -<p>This description of the supposed custom-house officer coincides -exactly with that of the appearance of Mackoull; and other circumstances -are given which almost make it certain that he was the -murderer. This Mackoull was a London rogue of unparalleled -effrontery and dexterity, who for years haunted Scotland, and effected -some daring robberies. He resided in Edinburgh from September -1805 till the close of 1806, and during that time frequented a -coffee-house in the <em>Ship Tavern</em> at Leith. He professed to be a -merchant expelled by the threats of the French from Hamburg, -and to live by a new mode of dyeing skins, but in reality he -practised the arts of a gambler and a pickpocket. He had a -mean lodging at the bottom of New Street in the Canongate, near -the scene of the murder of Begbie, to which it is remarkable -that <em>Leith Wynd</em> was the readiest as well as most private access -from that spot. No suspicion, however, fell upon Mackoull -at this period, and he left the country for a number of years, at -the end of which time he visited Glasgow, and there effected a -robbery of one of the banks. For this crime he did not escape -the law. He was brought to trial at Edinburgh in 1820, was -condemned to be executed, but died in jail while under reprieve -from his sentence.</p> - -<p>The most striking part of the evidence which Mr Denovan -adduces against Mackoull is the report of a conversation which -he had with that person in the condemned cell of the Edinburgh -jail in July 1820, when Mackoull was very doubtful of being -reprieved. To pursue his own narrative, which is in the third -person: ‘He told Captain Sibbald [the superior of the prison] -that he intended to ask Mackoull a single question relative to -the murder of Begbie, but would first humour him by a few jokes,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_285" id="Page_285">{285}</a></span> -so as to throw him off his guard, and prevent him from thinking -he had called for any particular purpose [it is to be observed that -Mr Denovan had a professional acquaintance with the condemned -man]; but desired Captain Sibbald to watch the features of the -prisoner when he (Denovan) put his hand to his chin, for he -would then put the question he meant. After talking some time -on different topics, Mr Denovan put this very simple question to -the prisoner: “By the way, Mackoull, if I am correct, you resided -at the foot of New Street, Canongate, in November 1806—did -you not?” He stared—he rolled his eyes, and, as if falling -into a convulsion, threw himself back upon his bed. In this condition -he continued for a few moments, when, as if recollecting -himself, he started up, exclaiming wildly: “No, —— ——! I -was then in the East Indies—in the West Indies. What do you -mean?” “I mean no harm, Mackoull,” he replied; “I merely -asked the question for my own curiosity; for I think when you -left these lodgings you went to Dublin. Is it not so?” “Yes, -yes, I went to Dublin,” he replied; “and I wish I had remained -there still. I won £10,000 there at the tables, and never knew -what it was to want cash, although you wished the folks here to -believe that they locked me up in Old Start (Newgate), and -brought down your friend Adkins to swear he saw me there: this -was more than your duty.” He now seemed to rave, and lose all -temper, and his visitor bade him good-night, and left him.’</p> - -<p>It appears extremely probable, from the strong circumstantial -evidence which has been offered by Mr Denovan, that Mackoull -was the murderer of Begbie.</p> - -<p>One remaining fact regarding the Netherbow will be listened to -with some interest. It was the home—perhaps the native spot—of -William Falconer, the author of <cite>The Shipwreck</cite>, whose father -was a wigmaker in this street.<a name="FNanchor_228" id="FNanchor_228"></a><a href="#Footnote_228" class="fnanchor">[228]</a></p> -<hr class="chap" /></div><div class="chapter"> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_286" id="Page_286">{286}</a></span></p> - - - -<h2><a name="THE_LADIES_OF_TRAQUAIR" id="THE_LADIES_OF_TRAQUAIR">[THE LADIES OF TRAQUAIR.</a></h2> - - -<p>Lady Lovat was at the head of a genus of old ladies of -quality, who, during the last century, resided in third and -fourth <em>flats</em> of Old Town houses, wore pattens when they went -abroad, had miniatures of the Pretender next their hearts, and -gave tea and card parties regularly every fortnight. Almost every -generation of a Scottish family of rank, besides throwing off its -swarm of male cadets, who went abroad in quest of fortune, used -to produce a corresponding number of daughters, who stayed at -home, and for the most part became old maids. These gentlewomen, -after the death of their parents, when, of course, a brother -or nephew succeeded to the family seat and estate, were compelled -to leave home, and make room for the new laird to bring up a -new generation, destined in time to experience the same fate. -Many of these ladies, who in Catholic countries would have found -protection in nunneries, resorted to Edinburgh, where, with the -moderate family provision assigned them, they passed inoffensive -and sometimes useful lives, the peace of which was seldom broken -otherwise than by irruptions of their grand-nephews, who came -with the hunger of High School boys, or by the more stately calls -of their landed cousins and brothers, who rendered their visits the -more auspicious by a pound of hyson for the caddy, or a replenishment -of rappee for the snuff-box. The <em>leddies</em>, as they were -called, were at once the terror and the admiration of their neighbours -in the stair, who looked up to them as the patronesses of -the <em>land</em>, and as shedding a light of gentility over the flats below.</p> - -<p>In the best days of the Old Town, people of all ranks lived very -closely and cordially together, and the whole world were in a -manner next-door neighbours. The population being dense, and -the town small, the distance between the houses of friends was -seldom considerable. When a hundred friends lived within the -space of so many yards, the company was easily collected, and -consequently meetings took place more frequently, and upon more -trivial occasions, than in these latter days of stately dinners and -fantastic balls. Tea—simple tea—was then almost the only meal -to which invitations were given. Tea-parties, assembling at four -o’clock, were resorted to by all who wished for elegant social -intercourse. There was much careful ceremonial in the dispensation<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_287" id="Page_287">{287}</a></span> -of those pretty, small china cups, individualised by the -numbers marked on each of the miniature spoons which circulated -with them, and of which four or five returns were not uncommon. -The spoon in the saucer indicated a wish for more—in the cup -the reverse. A few tunes on the spinnet, a Scotch song from -some young lady (solo), and the unfailing whist-table furnished -the entertainment. At eight o’clock to a minute would arrive the -sedan, or the lass with the lantern and pattens, and the whole -company would be at home before the eight o’clock drum of the -Town-guard had ceased to beat.</p> - -<p>In a house at the head of the Canongate, but having its entrance -from St Mary’s Wynd, and several stairs up, lived two old maiden -ladies of the house of Traquair—the Ladies Barbara and Margaret -Stuart. They were twins, the children of Charles, the fourth earl, -and their birth on the 3rd of September, the anniversary of the -death of Cromwell, brought a Latin epigram from Dr Pitcairn—of -course previous to 1713, which was the year of his own death. -The learned doctor anticipated for them ‘timid wooers,’ but they -nevertheless came to old age unmarried. They drew out their -innocent, retired lives in this place, where, latterly, one of their -favourite amusements was to make dolls, and little beds for them -to lie on—a practice not quite uncommon in days long gone by, -being to some degree followed by Queen Mary.<a name="FNanchor_229" id="FNanchor_229"></a><a href="#Footnote_229" class="fnanchor">[229]</a></p> - -<p>I may give, in the words of a long-deceased correspondent, an -anecdote of the ladies of Traquair, referring to the days when -potatoes had as yet an equivocal reputation, and illustrative of -the frugal scale by which our ‘leddies’ were in use to measure the -luxuries of their table. ‘Upon the return one day of their -weekly ambassador to the market, and the anxious investigation -by the old ladies of the contents of Jenny’s basket, the little -morsel of mutton, with a portion of accompanying off-falls, was -duly approved of. “But, Jenny, what’s this in the bottom of -the basket?” “Oo, mem, just a dozen o’ ’taties that Lucky, -the green-wife, wad ha’e me to tak’—they wad eat sae fine wi’ the -mutton.” “Na, na, Jenny; tak’ back the ’taties—we need nae -provocatives in this house.”’</p> - -<p>The latest survivor of these Traquair ladies died in 1794.]</p> - -<hr class="chap" /></div><div class="chapter"> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_288" id="Page_288">{288}</a></span></p> - - - - -<h2><a name="GREYFRIARS_CHURCHYARD" id="GREYFRIARS_CHURCHYARD">GREYFRIARS CHURCHYARD.</a></h2> - -<p class="chapter_summary"><strong>Signing of the Covenant—Henderson’s Monument—Bothwell -Bridge Prisoners—A Romance.</strong></p> - - -<div class="figcenter w75"> -<img src="images/illus_p_288a.jpg" width="75" height="174" alt="" /> -</div> - -<div class="figcenter w275"> -<img src="images/illus_p_288b.jpg" width="275" height="433" alt="" /> -<div class="caption"><p class="center">Henderson’s Monument, -Greyfriars.</p></div> -</div> - -<p>This old cemetery—the burial-place of Buchanan,<a name="FNanchor_230" id="FNanchor_230"></a><a href="#Footnote_230" class="fnanchor">[230]</a> George -Jameson the painter, Principal Robertson, Dr Blair, Allan -Ramsay, Henry Mackenzie, and many other men of note—whose -walls are a circle of aristocratic sepulchres, will ever be memorable -as the scene of the Signing of the Covenant; the document -having first been produced in the church, after a sermon by -Alexander Henderson, and signed by all the congregation, -from the Earl of Sutherland downward, after which it was -handed out to the multitudes assembled in the kirkyard, and -signed on the flat monuments, amidst tears, -prayers, and aspirations which could find no -words; some writing with their blood! Near -by, resting well from all these struggles, -lies the preacher under a square obelisk-like -monument; near also rests, in equal peace, -the Covenant’s enemy, Sir George Mackenzie. -The inscriptions on Henderson’s -stone were ordered by Parliament to be -erased at the Restoration; and small depressions -are pointed out in it as having<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_289" id="Page_289">{289}</a></span> -been inflicted by bullets from the soldiery when executing this -order. With the ’88 came a new order of things, and the -inscriptions were then quietly reinstated.</p> - -<div class="figcenter w450"> -<a id="illus_c_024"></a> -<img src="images/illus_c_024.jpg" width="450" height="691" alt="" /> -<div class="caption"><p class="center">GREYFRIARS’ CHURCHYARD.</p> - -<p class="right"> -<span class="smcap"><a href="#Page_288">Page 288.</a></span> -</p></div> -</div> - - -<h3>BOTHWELL BRIDGE PRISONERS.</h3> - -<p>As if there had been some destiny in the matter, the Greyfriars -Churchyard became connected with another remarkable event in -the religious troubles of the seventeenth century. At the south-west -angle, accessible by an old gateway bearing emblems of -mortality, and which is fitted with an iron-rail gate of very old -workmanship, is a kind of supplement to the burying-ground—an -oblong space, now having a line of sepulchral enclosures on each -side, but formerly empty. On these enclosures the visitor may -remark, as he passes, certain names venerable in the history of -science and of letters; as, for instance, Joseph Black and Alexander -Tytler. On one he sees the name of Gilbert Innes of Stow, who -left a million, to take six feet of earth here. These, however, do -not form the matter in point. Every lesser particular becomes -trivial beside the extraordinary use to which the place was put by -the Government in the year 1679. Several hundred of the prisoners -taken at Bothwell Bridge were confined here in the open air, under -circumstances of privation now scarcely credible. They had hardly -anything either to lie upon or to cover them; their allowance of -provision was four ounces of bread per day, with water derived -from one of the city pipes, which passed near the place. They -were guarded by day by eight and through the night by twenty-four -men; and the soldiers were told that if any prisoner escaped, -they should answer it life for life by cast of dice. If any prisoner -rose from the ground by night, he was shot at. Women alone -were permitted to commune with them, and bring them food or -clothes; but these had often to stand at the entrance from morning -till night without getting access, and were frequently insulted and -maltreated by the soldiers, without the prisoners being able to -protect them, although in many cases related by the most endearing -ties. In the course of several weeks a considerable number of the -prisoners had been liberated upon signing a bond, in which they -promised never again to take up arms against the king or without -his authority; but it appears that about four hundred, refusing -mercy on such terms, were kept in this frightful bivouac for five -months, being only allowed at the approach of winter to have -shingle huts erected over them, which was boasted of as a great<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_290" id="Page_290">{290}</a></span> -mercy. Finally, on the 15th of November, a remnant, numbering -two hundred and fifty-seven, were put on board a ship to be sent -to Barbadoes. The vessel was wrecked on one of the Orkney -Islands, when only about forty came ashore alive.</p> - -<p>From the gloom of this sad history there is shed one ray of -romance. Amongst the charitable women of Edinburgh who came -to minister to the prisoners, there was one attended by a daughter—a -young and, at least by right of romance, a fair girl. Every -few days they approached this iron gate with food and clothes, -either from their own stores or collected among neighbours. -Between the young lady and one of the juvenile prisoners an -attachment sprang up. Doubtless she loved him for the dangers -he had passed in so good a cause, and he loved her because she -pitied them. In happier days, long after, when their constancy -had been well tried by an exile which he suffered in the plantations, -this pair were married, and settled in Edinburgh, where -they had sons and daughters. A respectable elderly citizen tells -me he is descended from them.<a name="FNanchor_231" id="FNanchor_231"></a><a href="#Footnote_231" class="fnanchor">[231]</a></p> -<hr class="chap" /></div><div class="chapter"> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_291" id="Page_291">{291}</a></span></p> - - - -<h2><a name="STORY_OF_MRS_MACFARLANE" id="STORY_OF_MRS_MACFARLANE">STORY OF MRS MACFARLANE.</a></h2> - -<p class="chapter_summary"><strong>‘Let them say I am romantic; so is every one said to be that either admires -a fine thing or does one. On my conscience, as the world goes, ’tis hardly worth -anybody’s while to do one for the honour of it. Glory, the only pay of generous -actions, is now as ill paid as other just debts; and neither Mrs Macfarlane for -immolating her lover, nor you for constancy to your lord, must ever hope to be -compared to Lucretia or Portia.’—<em>Pope to Lady Mary W. Montagu.</em></strong></p> - - -<p>Pope here alludes to a tragical incident which took place in -Edinburgh on the 2nd of October 1716. The victim was a -young Englishman, who had been sent down to Scotland as a -Commissioner of Customs. It appears that Squire Cayley, or -Captain Cayley, as he was alternatively called, had become the -slave of a shameful passion towards Mrs Macfarlane, a woman of -uncommon beauty, the wife of Mr John Macfarlane, Writer to the -Signet in Edinburgh. One Saturday forenoon Mrs Macfarlane -was exposed, by the treachery of Captain Cayley’s landlady, with -whom she was acquainted, to an insult of the most atrocious kind -on his part, in the house where he lodged, which seems to have -been situated in a close in the Cowgate, opposite to what were -called the Back Stairs.<a name="FNanchor_232" id="FNanchor_232"></a><a href="#Footnote_232" class="fnanchor">[232]</a> Next Tuesday Mr Cayley waited upon -Mrs Macfarlane at her own house, and was shown into the drawing-room. -According to an account given out by his friends, he was -anxious to apologise for his former rudeness. From another -account, it would appear that he had circulated reports derogatory -to the lady’s honour, which she was resolved to punish. A third -story represents him as having repeated the insult which he had -formerly offered; whereupon she went into another room, and -presently came back with a pair of pistols in her hand. On her -bidding him leave the house instantly, he said: ‘What, madam, -d’ye design to act a comedy?’ To which she answered that ‘<em>he -would find it a tragedy if he did not retire</em>.’ The infatuated man<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_292" id="Page_292">{292}</a></span> -not obeying her command, she fired one of the pistols, which, -however, only wounded him slightly in the left wrist, the bullet -slanting down into the floor. The mere instinct, probably, of self-preservation -caused him to draw his sword; but before he could -use it she fired the other pistol, the shot of which penetrated his -heart. ‘This dispute,’ says a letter of the day, ‘was so close that -Mr Cayley’s shirt was burnt at the sleeves with the fire of one of -the pistols, and his cravat and the breast of his shirt with the fire -of the other.’<a name="FNanchor_233" id="FNanchor_233"></a><a href="#Footnote_233" class="fnanchor">[233]</a> Mrs Macfarlane immediately left the room, locking -the door upon the dead body, and sent a servant for her husband, -who was found at a neighbouring tavern. On his coming home -about an hour after, she took him by the sleeve, and leading him -into the room where the corpse lay, explained the circumstances -which had led to the bloody act. Mr Macfarlane said: ‘Oh, -woman! what have you done?’ But soon seeing the necessity for -prompt measures, he went out again to consult with some of his -friends. ‘They all advised,’ says the letter just quoted, ‘that he -should convey his wife away privately, to prevent her lying in jail, -till a precognition should be taken of the affair, and it should -appear in its true light. Accordingly [about six o’clock], she -walked down the High Street, followed by her husband at a little -distance, and now absconds.</p> - -<p>‘The thing continued a profound secret to all except those -concerned in the house till past ten at night, when Mr Macfarlane, -having provided a safe retreat for his wife, returned and gave -orders for discovering it to the magistrates, who went and viewed -the body of the deceased, and secured the house and maid, and all -else who may become evidence of the fact.’</p> - -<p>Another contemporary says: ‘I saw his [Cayley’s] corpse after -he was cereclothed, and saw his blood where he lay on the floor for -twenty-four hours after he died, just as he fell; so it was a difficulty -to straight him.’</p> - -<p>A careful investigation was made into every circumstance connected -with this fatal affair, but without demonstrating anything -except the passionate rashness or magnanimity of the fair homicide. -Mr Macfarlane was discharged upon his own affirmation that he -knew nothing of the deed till after it had taken place. A pamphlet -was published by Mrs Murray, Mr Cayley’s landlady, who seems -to have kept a grocery shop in the Cowgate, vindicating herself -from the imputation which Mrs Macfarlane’s tale had thrown upon<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_293" id="Page_293">{293}</a></span> -her character; but to this there appeared an answer, from some -friend of the other party, in which the imputation was fixed almost -beyond the possibility of doubt. Mrs Murray denied that Mrs -Macfarlane had been in her house on the Saturday before the -murder; but evidence was given that she was seen issuing from the -close in which Mrs Murray resided, and, after ascending the Back -Stairs, was observed passing through the Parliament Square towards -her own house.</p> - -<p>It will surprise every one to learn that this Scottish Lucrece was -a woman of only nineteen or twenty years of age, and some months -<i lang="fr" xml:lang="fr">enceinte</i>, at the time when she so boldly vindicated her honour. -She was a person of respectable connections, being a daughter of -Colonel Charles Straiton, ‘a gentleman of great honour,’ says one -of the letters already quoted, and who further appears to have -been entrusted with high negotiations by the Jacobites during the -reign of Queen Anne. By her mother, she was granddaughter to -Sir Andrew Forrester.</p> - -<p>Of the future history of Mrs Macfarlane we have but one glimpse, -but it is of a romantic nature. Margaret Swinton, who was the -aunt of Sir Walter Scott’s mother, and round whom he and his -boy-brothers used to close to listen to her tales, remembered being -one Sunday left by her parents at home in their house of Swinton -in Berwickshire, while the rest of the family attended church. -Tiring of the solitude of her little nursery, she stole quietly downstairs -to the parlour, which she entered somewhat abruptly. There, -to her surprise, she beheld the most beautiful woman she had ever -seen, sitting at the breakfast-table making tea. She believed it -could be no other than one of those enchanted queens whom she -had heard of in fairy tales. The lady, after a pause of surprise, -came up to her with a sweet smile, and conversed with her, concluding -with a request that she would speak only to her mamma -of the stranger whom she had seen. Presently after, little Margaret -having turned her back for a few moments, the beautiful vision had -vanished. The whole appeared like a dream. By-and-by the -family returned, and Margaret took her mother aside that she -might talk of this wonderful apparition. Mrs Swinton applauded -her for thus observing the injunction which had been laid upon -her. ‘Had you not,’ she added, ‘it might have cost that lady her -life.’ Subsequent explanations made Margaret aware that she had -seen the unfortunate Mrs Macfarlane, who, having some claim of -kindred upon the Swinton family, had been received by them, and -kept in a secret room till such time as she could venture to make<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_294" id="Page_294">{294}</a></span> -her way out of the country. On Margaret looking away for a -moment, the lady had glided by a sliding panel into her Patmos -behind the wainscot, and thus unwittingly increased the child’s -apprehension of the whole being an event out of the course of -nature.</p> - -<hr class="chap" /></div><div class="chapter"> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_295" id="Page_295">{295}</a></span></p> - - - - -<h2><a name="THE_CANONGATE" id="THE_CANONGATE">THE CANONGATE.</a></h2> - -<p class="chapter_summary"><strong>Distinguished Inhabitants in Former Times—Story of a Burning—Morocco’s -Land—New Street.</strong></p> - - -<p>The Canongate, which takes its name from the Augustine canons -of Holyrood (who were permitted to build it by the charter -of David I. in 1128, and afterwards ruled it as a burgh of regality), -was formerly the court end of the town. As the main avenue -from the palace into the city, it has borne upon its pavement the -burden of all that was beautiful, all that was gallant, all that has -become historically interesting in Scotland for the last six or seven -hundred years. It still presents an antique appearance, although -many of the houses are modernised. There is one with a date from -Queen Mary’s reign,<a name="FNanchor_234" id="FNanchor_234"></a><a href="#Footnote_234" class="fnanchor">[234]</a> and many may be guessed, from their appearance, -to be of even an earlier era. Previously to the Union, when -the palace ceased to be occasionally inhabited, as it had formerly -been, by at least the vicar of majesty in the person of the Commissioner -to the Parliament, the place was densely inhabited by -persons of distinction. Allan Ramsay, in lamenting the death of -Lucky Wood, says:</p> - -<div class="poetry-container"><div class="poetry"><div class="stanza"> -<div class="wideverse">‘Oh, Canigate, puir elrich hole,</div> -<div class="wideverse">What loss, what crosses does thou thole!</div> -<div class="wideverse">London and death gars thee look droll,</div> -<div class="wideverse indent4">And hing thy head;</div> -<div class="wideverse">Wow but thou has e’en a cauld coal</div> -<div class="wideverse indent4">To blaw indeed;’</div> -</div></div></div> - -<p>and mentions in a note that this place was ‘the greatest sufferer -by the loss of our members of parliament, which London now -enjoys, many of them having had their houses there;’ a fact which -Maitland confirms. Innumerable traces are to be found, in old -songs and ballads, of the elegant population of the Canongate in a -former day. In the piteous tale of Marie Hamilton—one of the -Queen’s Maries—occurs this simple but picturesque stanza:</p> - -<div class="poetry-container"><div class="poetry"><div class="stanza"> -<div class="verse">‘As she cam’ doun the Cannogait,</div> -<div class="verse indent2">The Cannogait sae free,</div> -<div class="verse">Mony a lady looked owre her window,</div> -<div class="verse indent2">Weeping for this ladye.’</div> -</div></div></div> -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_296" id="Page_296">{296}</a></span></p> -<p>An old popular rhyme expresses the hauteur of these Canongate -dames towards their city neighbours of the male sex:</p> - -<div class="poetry-container"><div class="poetry"><div class="stanza"> -<div class="verse">‘The lasses o’ the Canongate,</div> -<div class="verse indent2">Oh they are wondrous nice;</div> -<div class="verse">They winna gi’e a single kiss</div> -<div class="verse indent2">But for a double price.</div> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<div class="verse">Gar hang them, gar hang them,</div> -<div class="verse indent2">Hich upon a tree;</div> -<div class="verse">For we’ll get better up the gate</div> -<div class="verse indent2">For a bawbee!’</div> -</div></div></div> - -<div class="figcenter w350"> -<img src="images/illus_p_297.jpg" width="350" height="466" alt="" /> -<div class="caption"><p class="center">Weir’s Close, Canongate—wretchedly squalid.</p></div> -</div> - -<p>Even in times comparatively modern, this faubourg was inhabited -by persons of very great consideration.<a name="FNanchor_235" id="FNanchor_235"></a><a href="#Footnote_235" class="fnanchor">[235]</a> Within the memory of -a lady living in 1830, it used to be a common thing to hear, among -other matters of gossip, ‘<em>that there was to be a braw flitting<a name="FNanchor_236" id="FNanchor_236"></a><a href="#Footnote_236" class="fnanchor">[236]</a> in the -Canongate to-morrow</em>;’ and parties of young people were made up -to go and see the fine furniture brought out, sitting perhaps for -hours in the windows of some friend on the opposite side of the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_297" id="Page_297">{297}</a></span> -street, while cart after cart was laden with magnificence.<a name="FNanchor_237" id="FNanchor_237"></a><a href="#Footnote_237" class="fnanchor">[237]</a> Many -of the houses to this day are fit for the residence of a first-rate -family in every respect -but <em>vicinage</em> -and <em>access</em>. The -last grand blow was -given to the place -by the opening of -the road along the -Calton Hill in -1817, which rendered -it no longer -the avenue of approach -to the city -from the east. Instead -of profiting by -the comparative retirement -which it -acquired on that -occasion, it seemed -to become the more -wretchedly squalid -from its being the -less under notice—as -a gentleman -dresses the least -carefully when not -expecting visitors. -It is now a secluded and, in general, meanly inhabited suburb, -only accessible by ways which, however lightly our fathers and<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_298" id="Page_298">{298}</a></span> -grandfathers might regard them, are hardly now pervious to a lady -or gentleman without shocking more of the senses than one, besides -the difficulty of steering one’s way through the herds of the idle -and the wretched who encumber the street.</p> - -<p>One of the houses near the head of the Canongate, on the north -side of the street, was indicated to me by an old lady a few years -ago as that which tradition in her young days pointed to in connection -with a wild story related in the notes to <cite>Rokeby</cite>. She had -often heard the tale told, nearly in the same manner as it has been -given by Scott, and the site of the house concerned in the tragedy -was pointed out to her by her seniors. Perhaps the reader will -again excuse a quotation from the writings of our late gifted fellow-townsman: -if to be related at all—and surely in a work devoted -to Edinburgh popular legends it could not rightly be overlooked—it -may as well be given in the language of the prince of modern -<i lang="fr" xml:lang="fr">conteurs</i>:</p> - -<p>‘About the beginning of the eighteenth century, when the large -castles of the Scottish nobles, and even the secluded hotels, like -those of the French <i lang="fr" xml:lang="fr">noblesse</i>, which they possessed in Edinburgh, -were sometimes the scenes of strange and mysterious transactions, -a divine of singular sanctity was called up at midnight to pray -with a person at the point of death. This was no unusual summons; -but what followed was alarming. He was put into a sedan-chair, -and after he had been transported to a remote part of the town, -the bearers insisted upon his being blindfolded. The request was -enforced by a cocked pistol, and submitted to; but in the course -of the discussion, he conjectured, from the phrases employed by the -chairmen, and from some part of their dress, not completely concealed -by their cloaks, that they were greatly above the menial -station they assumed. After many turns and windings, the chair -was carried upstairs into a lodging, where his eyes were uncovered, -and he was introduced into a bedroom, where he found a lady, -newly delivered of an infant. He was commanded by his attendants -to say such prayers by her bedside as were fitting for a person -not expected to survive a mortal disorder. He ventured to remonstrate, -and observe that her safe delivery warranted better hopes. -But he was sternly commanded to obey the orders first given, and -with difficulty recollected himself sufficiently to acquit himself of -the task imposed on him. He was then again hurried into the -chair; but as they conducted him downstairs he heard the report -of a pistol. He was safely conducted home; a purse of gold was -forced upon him; but he was warned, at the same time, that the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_299" id="Page_299">{299}</a></span> -least allusion to this dark transaction would cost him his life. He -betook himself to rest, and after long and broken musing, fell into -a deep sleep. From this he was awakened by his servant, with the -dismal news that a fire of uncommon fury had broken out in the -house of ——, near the head of the Canongate, and that it was -totally consumed; with the shocking addition that the daughter -of the proprietor, a young lady eminent for beauty and accomplishments, -had perished in the flames. The clergyman had his -suspicions, but to have made them public would have availed -nothing. He was timid; the family was of the first distinction; -above all, the deed was done, and could not be amended. Time -wore away, however, and with it his terrors. He became unhappy -at being the solitary depositary of this fearful mystery, and mentioned -it to some of his brethren, through whom the anecdote -acquired a sort of publicity. The divine, however, had been long -dead, and the story in some degree forgotten, when a fire broke out -again on the very same spot where the house of —— had formerly -stood, and which was now occupied by buildings of an inferior -description. When the flames were at their height, the tumult -which usually attends such a scene was suddenly suspended by -an unexpected apparition. A beautiful female, in a nightdress -extremely rich, but at least half a century old, appeared in the -very midst of the fire, and uttered these tremendous words in her -vernacular idiom: “<em>Anes</em> burned, <em>twice</em> burned; the <em>third</em> time I’ll -scare you all!” The belief in this story was formerly so strong -that on a fire breaking out, and seeming to approach the fatal -spot, there was a good deal of anxiety testified, lest the apparition -should make good her denunciation.’</p> - -<p>A little way farther down the Canongate, on the same side, is -an old-fashioned house called <em>Morocco’s Land</em>, having an alley -passing under it, over which is this inscription<a name="FNanchor_238" id="FNanchor_238"></a><a href="#Footnote_238" class="fnanchor">[238]</a>—a strange cry of -the spirit of man to be heard in a street:</p> - -<p class="center"> -MISERERE MEI, DOMINE: A PECCATO, PROBRO,<br /> -DEBITO, ET MORTE SUBITA, LIBERA ME. -</p> - -<p>From whom this exclamation proceeded I have never learned; but -the house, which is of more modern date than the legend, has a -story connected with it. It is said that a young woman belonging -to Edinburgh, having been taken upon a voyage by an African -rover, was sold to the harem of the Emperor of Morocco, with -whom she became a favourite. Mindful, like her countrymen in<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_300" id="Page_300">{300}</a></span> -general, of her native land and her relations, she held such a -correspondence with home as led to a brother of hers entering into -merchandise, and conducting commercial transactions -with Morocco. He was successful, and realised a -little fortune, out of which he built this stately -mansion. From gratitude, or out of a feeling -of vanity regarding his imperial brother-in-law, -he erected a statue of that personage -in front of his house—a black, -naked figure, with a turban and a -necklace of beads; such being the -notion which a Scottish artist -of those days entertained -of the personal -aspect of the chief of -one of the Mohammedan -states of -Africa. And this -figure, perched in a -little stone pulpit, -still exists. As to -the name bestowed -upon the house, it -would most probably -arise from the man -being in the first place called -<em>Morocco</em> by way of sobriquet, -as is common when any one -becomes possessed by a particular -subject, and often -speaks of it.</p> - -<div class="figcenter w75"> -<img src="images/illus_p_300b.jpg" width="75" height="204" alt="" /> -</div> - -<div class="figcenter w275"> -<img src="images/illus_p_300a.jpg" width="275" height="517" alt="" /> -<div class="caption"><p class="center">Morocco’s Land.</p></div> -</div> - -<p>A little farther along is -the opening of New Street, -a modern offshoot of the -ancient city, dating from a -time immediately before the -rise of the New Town. Many -persons of consequence lived -here: Lord Kames, in a neat house at the top, on the east side—an -edifice once thought so fine that people used to bring their -country cousins to see it; Lord Hailes, in a house more than half-way -down, afterwards occupied by Mr Ruthven, mechanist; Sir<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_301" id="Page_301">{301}</a></span> -Philip Ainslie, in another house in the same row. The passers-by -were often arrested by the sight of Sir Philip’s preparations for a -dinner-party through the open windows, the show of plate being -particularly great. Now all these mansions are left to become -workshops. <i lang="la" xml:lang="la">Sic transit.</i><a name="FNanchor_239" id="FNanchor_239"></a><a href="#Footnote_239" class="fnanchor">[239]</a> Opposite to Kames’s house is a small -circular arrangement of causeway, indicating where St John’s Cross -formerly stood. Charles I., at his ceremonial entry into Edinburgh -in 1633, knighted the provost at St John’s Cross.<a name="FNanchor_240" id="FNanchor_240"></a><a href="#Footnote_240" class="fnanchor">[240]</a></p> - -<hr class="chap" /></div><div class="chapter"> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_302" id="Page_302">{302}</a></span></p> - -<div class="figcenter w400"> -<img src="images/illus_p_302.jpg" width="400" height="525" alt="ST JOHN STREET." /> -</div> - - - - -<h2><a name="ST_JOHN_STREET" id="ST_JOHN_STREET">ST JOHN STREET.</a></h2> - -<p class="chapter_summary"><strong>Lord Monboddo’s Suppers—The Sister of Smollett—Anecdote -of Henry Dundas.</strong></p> - - -<p>St John Street, so named with reference to St John’s Cross -above mentioned, was one of the heralds of the New Town. In -the latter half of the last century it was occupied solely by persons -of distinction—nobles, judges, and country gentleman; now it is<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_303" id="Page_303">{303}</a></span> -possessed as exclusively by persons of the middle rank. In No. 13 -lived that eccentric genius, Lord Monboddo, whose supper-parties, -conducted in classic taste, frequented by the <i lang="la" xml:lang="la">literati</i>, and for a -time presided over by an angel in the form of a daughter of his -lordship, were of immense attraction in their day. In a stair at -the head of this street lived the sister of the author of <cite>Roderick -Random</cite>.</p> - -<p>Smollett’s life as a literary adventurer in London, and the full -participation he had in the woes of authors by profession, have -perhaps conveyed an erroneous idea of his birth and connections. -The Smolletts of Dumbartonshire were in reality what was called -in Scotland a good old family. The novelist’s own grandfather -had been one of the commissioners for the Union between England -and Scotland. And it is an undoubted fact that Tobias himself, -if he had lived two or three years longer, would have become the -owner of the family estate, worth about a thousand a year. All -this, to any one conversant with the condition of the Scottish -gentry in the early part of the last century, will appear quite -consistent with his having been brought up as a druggist’s -apprentice in Glasgow—‘the bubbly-nosed callant, wi’ the stane -in his pouch,’ as his master affectionately described him, with -reference to his notorious qualities as a Pickle.</p> - -<p>The sister of Smollett—she who, failing him, did succeed to the -family property—was a Mrs Telfer, domiciled as a gentle widow -in a common stair at the head of St John Street (west side), first -door up. She is described as a somewhat stern-looking specimen -of her sex, with a high cast of features, but in reality a good-enough-natured -woman, and extremely shrewd and intelligent. -One passion of her genus possessed her—whist. A relative tells -me that one of the city magistrates, who was a tallow-chandler, -calling upon her one evening, she said: ‘Come awa, bailie, and -take a trick at the cartes.’</p> - -<p>‘Troth, ma’am,’ said he, ‘I hav’na a bawbee in my pouch.’</p> - -<p>‘Tut, man, ne’er mind that,’ replied the lady; ‘let’s e’en play -for a pund o’ candles!’</p> - -<p>During his last visit to Edinburgh (1766)—the visit which -occasioned <cite>Humphry Clinker</cite>—Smollett lived in his sister’s house. -A person who recollects seeing him there describes him as dressed -in black clothes, tall, and extremely handsome, but quite unlike -the portraits at the front of his works, all of which are disclaimed -by his relations. The unfortunate truth appears to be that the -world is in possession of no genuine likeness of Smollett! He was<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_304" id="Page_304">{304}</a></span> -very peevish, on account of the ill-health to which he had been so -long a martyr, and used to complain much of a severe ulcerous -disorder in his arm.</p> - -<p>His wife, according to the same authority, was a Creole, with a -dark complexion, though, upon the whole, rather pretty—a fine -lady, but a silly woman. Yet she had been the Narcissa of -<cite>Roderick Random</cite>.<a name="FNanchor_241" id="FNanchor_241"></a><a href="#Footnote_241" class="fnanchor">[241]</a></p> - -<p>In <cite>Humphry Clinker</cite>, Smollett works up many observations of -things and persons which he had made in his recent visit to -Scotland. His relative Commissary Smollett, and the family seat -near Loch Lomond, receive ample notice. The story in the family -is that while Matthew Bramble was undoubtedly himself, he -meant in the gay and sprightly Jerry Melford to describe his -sister’s son, Major Telfer, and in Liddy to depict his own daughter, -who was destined to be the wife of the major, but, to the inexpressible -and ineffaceable grief of her father, died before the -scheme could be accomplished. Jerry, it will be recollected, ‘got -some damage from the bright eyes of the charming Miss R——n, -whom he had the honour to dance with at the ball.’ Liddy -contracted an intimate friendship with the same person. This -young beauty was Eleonora Renton, charming by the true right -divine, for she was daughter of Mr Renton of Lamerton, by Lady -Susan Montgomery, one of the fair offshoots of the house of -Eglintoune, described in a preceding article. A sister of hers -was married to Smollett’s eldest nephew, Telfer, who became -inheritor of the family estate, and on account of it took the -surname of Smollett: a large modern village in Dumbartonshire -takes its name from this lady. It seems to have been this -connection which brought the charming Eleonora under the -novelist’s attention. She afterwards married Charles Sharpe of -Hoddam, and became the mother of Charles Kirkpatrick Sharpe, -the well-known antiquary. Strange to say, the lady whose bright -eyes had flamed upon poor Smollett’s soul in the middle of the -last century, was living so lately as 1836.</p> - -<div class="figcenter w450"> -<a id="illus_c_025"></a> -<img src="images/illus_c_025.jpg" width="450" height="671" alt="" /> -<div class="caption"><p class="center">ST JOHN’S CLOSE.<br /> -Entrance to Canongate Kilwinning Mason Lodge.</p> - -<p class="right"> -<span class="smcap"><a href="#Page_305">Page 305.</a></span> -</p></div> -</div> - -<p>When Smollett was confined in the King’s Bench Prison for the -libel upon Admiral Knowles, he formed an intimacy with the -celebrated Tenducci. This melodious singing-bird had recently<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_305" id="Page_305">{305}</a></span> -got his wings clipped by his creditors, and was mewed up in the -same cage with the novelist. Smollett’s friendship proceeded to -such a height that he paid the vocalist’s debts from his own purse, -and procured him his liberty. Tenducci afterwards visited -Scotland, and was one night singing in a private circle, when -somebody told him that a lady present was a near relation of his -benefactor; upon which the grateful Italian prostrated himself -before her, kissed her hands, and acted so many fantastic extravagances, -after the foreign fashion, that she was put extremely out -of countenance.</p> - -<p>On the west side of the street, immediately to the south of the -Canongate Kilwinning Mason Lodge, there is a neat self-contained -house of old fashion, with a flower-plot in front. This was the -residence of —— Anderson, merchant in Leith, the father of seven -sons, all of whom attained respectable situations in life: one was -the late Mr Samuel Anderson of St Germains, banker. They had -been at school with Mr Henry Dundas (afterwards Lord Melville); -and when he had risen to high office, he called one day on Mr -Anderson, and expressed his earnest wish to have the pleasure of -dining with his seven school companions, all of whom happened at -that time to be at home. The meeting took place at Mr Dundas’s, -and it was a happy one, particularly to the host, who, when the -hour of parting arrived, filled a bumper in high elation to their -healths, and mentioned that they were the only men who had ever -dined with him since he became a public servant who had not -asked some favour either for themselves or their friends.</p> - -<p>The house adjoining to the one last mentioned—having its -gable to the street, and a garden to the south—was, about 1780, -the residence of the Earl of Wemyss. A Lady Betty Charteris, -of this family, occupied the one farthest to the south on that side -of the street. She was a person of romantic history, for, being -thwarted in an affair of the heart, she lay in bed for twenty-six -years, till dismissed to the world where such troubles are unknown.</p> - -<hr class="chap" /></div><div class="chapter"> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_306" id="Page_306">{306}</a></span></p> - -<div class="figcenter w400"> -<img src="images/illus_p_306.jpg" width="400" height="261" alt="" /> -</div> - - - -<h2><a name="MORAY_HOUSE" id="MORAY_HOUSE">MORAY HOUSE.</a></h2> - - -<p>In the Canongate there is a house which has had the fortune to -be connected with more than one of the most interesting points -in our history. It is usually styled Moray House, being the -entailed property of the noble family of Moray. The large -proportions and elegant appearance of this mansion distinguish it -from all the surrounding buildings, and in the rear (1847) there is -a fine garden, descending in the old fashion by a series of terraces. -Though long deserted by the Earls of Moray, it has been till a -recent time kept in the best order, being occupied by families of -respectable character.<a name="FNanchor_242" id="FNanchor_242"></a><a href="#Footnote_242" class="fnanchor">[242]</a></p> - -<p>This house was built in the early part of the reign of Charles -I. (about 1628) by Mary, Countess of Home, then a widow. Her -ladyship’s initials, M. H., appear, in cipher fashion, underneath -her coronet upon various parts of the exterior; and over one of -the principal windows towards the street there is a lozenge shield, -containing the two lions rampant which form the coat armorial of -the Home family. Lady Home was an English lady, being the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_307" id="Page_307">{307}</a></span> -daughter of Edward Sutton, Lord Dudley. She seems to have -been unusually wealthy for the dowager of a Scottish earl, for in -1644 the English Parliament repaid seventy thousand pounds -which she had lent to the Scottish Covenanting Government; and -she is found in the same year lending seven thousand to aid in -paying the detachment of troops which that Government had sent -to Ireland. She was also a sufferer, however, by the civil war, in -as far as Dunglass House, which was blown up in 1640, by -accident, when in the hands of the Covenanters, belonged to her -in liferent. To her affluent circumstances, and the taste which -she probably brought with her from her native country, may be -ascribed the superior style of this mansion, which not only displays -in the outside many traces of the elegant architecture which -prevailed in England in the reign of James I., but contains two -state apartments, decorated in the most elaborate manner, both -in the walls and ceilings, with the favourite stucco-work of that -reign. On the death of Lady Home the house passed (her ladyship -having no surviving male issue) to her daughters and co-heiresses, -Margaret, Countess of Moray, and Anne, Countess (afterwards -Duchess) of Lauderdale, between whom the entire property of their -father, the first Earl of Home, appears to have been divided, his -title going into another line. By an arrangement between the -two sisters, the house became, in 1645, the property of the -Countess of Moray and her son James, Lord Doune.</p> - -<p>It stood in this condition as to ownership, though still popularly -called ‘Lady Home’s Lodging,’ when, in the summer of 1648, -Oliver Cromwell paid his first visit to Edinburgh. Cromwell had -then just completed the overthrow of the army of the <em>Engagement</em>—a -gallant body of troops which had been sent into England by -the more Cavalier party of the Scottish Covenanters, in the hope -of rescuing the king from the hands of the sectaries. The -victorious general, with his companion Lambert, took up his -quarters in this house, and here received the visits of some of the -leaders of the less loyal party of the Covenanters—the Marquis of -Argyll, the Chancellor Loudoun, the Earl of Lothian, the Lords -Arbuthnot, Elcho, and Burleigh, and the Reverend Messrs David -Dickson, Robert Blair, and James Guthrie. ‘What passed among -them,’ says Bishop Henry Guthrie in his <cite>Memoirs</cite>, ‘came not to -be known infallibly; but it was talked very loud that he did -communicate to them his design in reference to the king, and had -their assent thereto.’ It is scarcely necessary to remark that this -was probably no more than a piece of Cavalier scandal, for there<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_308" id="Page_308">{308}</a></span> -is no reason to believe that Cromwell, if he yet contemplated the -death of the king, would have disclosed his views to men still so -far tinctured with loyalty as those enumerated. Cromwell’s object -in visiting Edinburgh on this occasion and in holding these -conferences, was probably limited to the reinstatement of the ultra-Presbyterian -party in the government, from which the Duke of -Hamilton and other loyalists had lately displaced it.</p> - -<p>When, in 1650, the Lord Lorn, eldest son of the Marquis of -Argyll, was married to Lady Mary Stuart, eldest daughter of the -Earl of Moray, the wedding feast ‘stood,’ as contemporary writers -express it, at the Earl of Moray’s house in the Canongate. The -event so auspicious to these great families was signalised by a -circumstance of a very remarkable kind. A whole week had been -passed in festivity by the wedded pair and their relations, when, -on Saturday the 18th of May, the Marquis of Montrose was -brought to Edinburgh, an excommunicated and already condemned -captive, having been taken in the north in an unsuccessful attempt -to raise a Cavalier party for his young and exiled prince. When -the former relative circumstances of Argyll and Montrose are -called to mind—when it is recollected that they had some years -before struggled for an ascendancy in the civil affairs of Scotland, -that Montrose had afterwards chased Argyll round and round the -Highlands, burned and plundered his country undisturbed, and on -one occasion overthrown his forces in a sanguinary action, while -Argyll looked on from a safe distance at sea—the present relative -circumstances of the two chiefs become a striking illustration of -the vicissitudes in personal fortune that characterise a time of civil -commotion. Montrose, after riding from Leith on a sorry horse, -was led into the Canongate by the Watergate, and there placed -upon a low cart, driven by the common executioner. In this -ignominious fashion he was conducted up the street towards the -prison, in which he was to have only two days to live, and in -passing along was necessarily brought under the walls and windows -of Moray House. On his approach to that mansion, the Marquis -of Argyll, his lady, and children, together with the whole of the -marriage-party, left their banqueting, and stepping out to a -balcony which overhangs the street, there planted themselves to -gaze on the prostrated enemy of their house and cause. Here, -indeed, they had the pleasure of seeing Montrose in all external -circumstances reduced beneath their feet; but they had not -calculated on the strength of nature which enabled that extraordinary -man to overcome so much of the bitterness of humiliation<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_309" id="Page_309">{309}</a></span> -and of death. He is said to have gazed upon them with so much -serenity that they shrank back with some degree of discomposure, -though not till the marchioness had expressed her spite at the -fallen hero by spitting at him—an act which in the present age -will scarcely be credible, though any one well acquainted with the -history of the seventeenth century will have too little reason to -doubt it.</p> - -<p>In a Latin manuscript of this period, the gardens connected -with the house of the Earl of Moray are spoken of as ‘of such -elegance, and cultivated with so much care, as to vie with those -of warmer countries, and perhaps even of England itself. And -here,’ pursues the writer, ‘you may see how much the art and -industry of man may avail in supplying the defects of nature. -Scarcely any one would believe it possible to give so much beauty -to a garden in this frigid clime.’ One reason for the excellence of -the garden may have been its southern exposure. On the uppermost -of its terraces there is a large and beautiful thorn, with pensile -leaves; on the second there are some fruit-trees, the branches of -which have been caused to spread out in a particular way, so as to -form a kind of cup, possibly for the reception of a pleasure-party, -for such fantastic twistings of nature were not uncommon among -our ancestors. In the lowest level of the garden there is a little -receptacle for water, beside which is the statue of a fishing-boy, -having a basket of fish at his feet, and a <em>clam-shell</em> inverted upon -his head.<a name="FNanchor_243" id="FNanchor_243"></a><a href="#Footnote_243" class="fnanchor">[243]</a> Here is also a small building, surmounted by two lions -holding female shields, and which may therefore be supposed -contemporaneous with the house: this was formerly a summer-house, -but has latterly been expanded into the character of a -conservatory. Tradition vaguely reports it as the place where the -Union between England and Scotland was signed; though there is -also a popular story of that fact having been accomplished in a -<em>laigh shop</em> of the High Street (marked No. 117), at one time a -tavern, and known as the <em>Union Cellar</em>.<a name="FNanchor_244" id="FNanchor_244"></a><a href="#Footnote_244" class="fnanchor">[244]</a> Probably the rumour, -in at least the first instance, refers only to private arrangements -connected with the passing of the celebrated statute in question. -The Chancellor Earl of Seafield inhabited Moray House at that<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_310" id="Page_310">{310}</a></span> -time on lease, and nothing could be more likely than that he -should there have after-dinner consultations on the pending -measure, which might in the evening be adjourned to this garden -retreat.</p> - -<p>It would appear that about this period the garden attached -to the house was a sort of a public promenade or lounging-place; -as was also the garden connected with Heriot’s Hospital. In -this character it forms a scene in the licentious play called <cite>The -Assembly</cite>, written in 1692 by Dr Pitcairn. <em>Will</em>, ‘a discreet -smart gentleman,’ as he is termed in the prefixed list of <i lang="la" xml:lang="la">dramatis -personæ</i>, but in reality a perfect debauchee, first makes an -appointment with Violetta, his mistress, to meet her in this place; -and as she is under the charge of a sourly devout aunt, he has -to propound the matter in metaphorical language. Pretending -to expound a particular passage in the Song of Solomon for -the benefit of the dame, he thus gives the hint to her young -protégée:</p> - -<p>‘<em>Will.</em> “Come, my beloved, let us walk in the fields, let us -lodge in the villages.” The same metaphor still. The kirk -not having the liberty of bringing her servant to her mother’s -house, resolveth to meet him in the villages, such as the Canongate, -in respect of Edinburgh; and the vineyard, such as <em>my -Lady Murray’s Yards</em>, to use a homely comparison.</p> - -<p>‘<em>Old Lady.</em> A wondrous young man this!</p> - -<p class="center">* * * *</p> - -<p>‘<em>Will.</em> The eighth chapter towards the close: “Thou that -dwellest in the gardens, cause me to hear thy voice.”</p> - -<p>‘<em>Violetta.</em> That’s still alluding to the metaphor of a gallant, -who, by some signs, warns his mistress to make haste—a whistle -or so. The same with early in the former chapter; that is to -say, to-morrow by six o’clock. Make haste to accomplish our -loves.</p> - -<p>‘<em>Old L.</em> Thou art a hopeful girl; I hope God has blest my -pains on thee.’</p> - -<p>In terms of this curious assignation, the third act opens in a -walk in Lady Murray’s Yards, where Will meets his beloved -Violetta. After a great deal of badinage, in the style of Dryden’s -comedies, which were probably Dr Pitcairn’s favourite models, the -dialogue proceeds in the following style:</p> - -<p>‘<em>Will.</em> I’ll marry you at the rights, if you can find in your -heart to give yourself to an honest fellow of no great fortune.</p> - -<p>‘<em>Vio.</em> In truth, sir, methinks it were fully as much for my<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_311" id="Page_311">{311}</a></span> -future comfort to bestow myself, and any little fortune I have, -upon you, as some reverend spark in a band and short cloak, -with the patrimony of a good gift of prayer, and as little sense -as his father, who was hanged in the Grassmarket for murdering -the king’s officers, had of honesty.</p> - -<p>‘<em>Will.</em> Then I must acknowledge, my dear madam, I am most -damnably in love with you, and must have you by foul or fair -means; choose you whether.</p> - -<p>‘<em>Vio.</em> I’ll give you fair-play in an honest way.</p> - -<p>‘<em>Will.</em> Then, madam, I can command a parson when I please; -and if you be half so kind as I could wish, we’ll take a hackney, -and trot up to some honest curate’s house: besides, a guinea or -so will be a charity to him perhaps.</p> - -<p>‘<em>Vio.</em> Hold a little; I am hardly ready for that yet,’ &c.</p> - -<p>After the departure of this hopeful couple, Lord Huffy and -Lord Whigriddin, who are understood to have been intended for -Lord Leven (son of the Earl of Melville) and the Earl of Crawford, -enter the gardens, and hold some discourse of a different kind.</p> - - - -<hr class="chap" /></div><div class="chapter"> -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_312" id="Page_312">{312}</a></span></p> - -<div class="figcenter w350"> -<img src="images/illus_p_312.jpg" width="350" height="273" alt="" /> -</div> - - - -<h2><a name="THE_SPEAKING_HOUSE" id="THE_SPEAKING_HOUSE">THE SPEAKING HOUSE.</a></h2> - - -<p>The mansion on which I venture to confer this title is an old -one of imposing appearance, a little below Moray House. -It is conspicuous by three gables presented to the street, and by -the unusual space of linear ground which it occupies. Originally, -it has had no door to the street. A <i lang="fr" xml:lang="fr">porte-cochère</i> gives admittance -to a close behind, from which every part of the house had been -admissible, and when this gateway was closed the inhabitants -would be in a tolerably defensible position. In this feature the -house gives a striking idea of the insecurity which marked the -domestic life of three hundred years ago.</p> - -<div class="figcenter w500"> -<a id="illus_c_026"></a> -<img src="images/illus_c_026.jpg" width="500" height="557" alt="" /> -<div class="caption"><p class="center">BAKEHOUSE CLOSE.<br /> -Back of ‘Speaking House.’</p> - -<p class="right"> -<span class="smcap"><a href="#Page_313">Page 313.</a></span> -</p></div> -</div> - -<p>It was built in the year of the assassination of the Regent Moray, -and one is somewhat surprised to think that, at so dark a crisis -of our national history, a mansion of so costly a character should -have taken its rise. The owner, whatever grade he held, seems to -have felt an apprehension of the popular talk on the subject of -his raising so elegant a mansion; and he took a curious mode -of deprecating its expression. On a tablet over the ground-floor -he inscribes: <span class="smcap lowercase">HODIE MIHI: CRAS TIBI. CUR IGITUR CURAS?</span> along -with the year of the erection, 1570. This is as much as to say: -‘I am the happy man to-day; your turn may come to-morrow.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_313" id="Page_313">{313}</a></span> -Why, then, should you repine?’ One can imagine from a -second tablet, a little way farther along the front, that as -the building proceeded, the storm of public remark and outcry -had come to be more and more bitter, so that the soul of the -owner got stirred up into a firm and defying anger. He exclaims -(for, though a lettered inscription, one feels it as an exclamation): -<span class="smcap">Ut Tu Linguæ tuæ, sic Ego Mear. aurium, Dominus sum</span> (‘As -thou of thy tongue, so I of my ears, am lord’); thus quoting, -in his rage on this petty occasion, an expression said to have been -used in the Roman senate by Titus Tacitus when repelling the -charges of Lucius Metellus.<a name="FNanchor_245" id="FNanchor_245"></a><a href="#Footnote_245" class="fnanchor">[245]</a> Afterwards he seems to have cooled -into a religious view of the predicament, and in a third legend -along the front he tells the world: <span class="smcap">Constanti pectori res -mortalium umbra</span>; ending a little farther on with an emblem of -the Christian hope of the Resurrection, ears of wheat springing -from a handful of bones. It is a great pity that we should not -know who was the builder and owner of this house, since he has -amused us so much with the history of his feelings during the -process of its erection. A friend at my elbow suggests—a -schoolmaster! But who ever heard of a schoolmaster so handsomely -remunerated by his profession as to be able to build a -house?</p> - -<p>Nothing else is known of the early history of this house beyond -the fact of the Canongate magistrates granting a charter for it -to the Hammermen of that burgh, September 10, 1647.<a name="FNanchor_246" id="FNanchor_246"></a><a href="#Footnote_246" class="fnanchor">[246]</a> It was, -however, in 1753 occupied by a person of no less distinction than -the Dowager Duchess of Gordon.<a name="FNanchor_247" id="FNanchor_247"></a><a href="#Footnote_247" class="fnanchor">[247]</a></p> - -<p>In the alley passing under this mansion there is a goodly -building of more modern structure, forming two sides of a quadrangle, -with a small court in front divided from the lane by a -wall in which there is a large gateway. Amidst filthiness indescribable,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_314" id="Page_314">{314}</a></span> -one discerns traces of former elegance: a crest over the -doorway—namely, a cock mounted on a trumpet, with the motto -‘<span class="smcap">Vigilantibus</span>,’ and the date 1633; over two upper windows, -the letters ‘S. A. A.’ and ‘D. M. H.’ These memorials, with -certain references in the charter before mentioned, leave no -room for doubt that this was the house of Sir Archibald -Acheson of Abercairny, -Secretary -of State for Scotland -in the reign -of Charles I., and -ancestor to the -Earl of Gosford -in Ireland, who -to this day bears -the same crest -and motto. The -letters are the -initials of Sir Archibald -and his wife, Dame -Margaret Hamilton. -Here of course was the -<em>court</em> of Scotland for -a certain time, the Secretary -of State being the -grand dispenser of patronage -in our country -at that period—<em>here</em>, -where nothing but the -extremest wretchedness -is now to be seen! That boastful bird, too, still seeming to -assert the family dignity, two hundred years after it ceased to -have any connection with the spot! Verily there are some moral -preachments in these dark old closes if modern refinement could -go to hear the sermon!</p> - -<div class="figcenter w350"> -<img src="images/illus_p_314.jpg" width="350" height="369" alt="" /> -<div class="caption"><p class="center">Acheson House.</p></div> -</div> - -<p>Sir Archibald Acheson acquired extensive lands in Ireland,<a name="FNanchor_248" id="FNanchor_248"></a><a href="#Footnote_248" class="fnanchor">[248]</a> -which have ever since been in the possession of his family. It -was a descendant of his, and of the same name, who had the -gratification of becoming the landlord of Swift at Market-hill,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_315" id="Page_315">{315}</a></span> -and whom the dean was consequently led to celebrate in many -of his poems. Swift seems to have been -on the most familiar terms with this -worthy knight and his lady; the latter -he was accustomed to call <em>Skinnibonia</em>, -<em>Lean</em>, or <em>Snipe</em>, as the humour inclined -him. The inimitable comic painting of -her ladyship’s maid Hannah, in the -debate whether Hamilton’s Bawn should -be turned into a malt-house or a barrack, -can never perish from our literature. -In like humour, the dean asserts the -superiority of himself and his brother-tenant -Colonel Leslie, who had served -much in Spain, over the knight:</p> - -<div class="poetry-container"><div class="poetry"><div class="stanza"> -<div class="verse">‘Proud baronet of Nova Scotia,</div> -<div class="verse">The dean and Spaniard much reproach ye.</div> -<div class="verse">Of their two fames the world enough rings;</div> -<div class="verse">Where are thy services and sufferings?</div> -<div class="verse">What if for nothing once you kissed,</div> -<div class="verse">Against the grain, a monarch’s fist?</div> -<div class="verse">What if among the courtly tribe,</div> -<div class="verse">You lost a place and saved a bribe?</div> -<div class="verse">And then in surly mood came here</div> -<div class="verse">To fifteen hundred pounds a year,</div> -<div class="verse">And fierce against the Whigs harangued?</div> -<div class="verse">You never ventured to be hanged.</div> -<div class="verse">How dare you treat your betters thus?</div> -<div class="verse">Are you to be compared to us?’</div> -</div></div></div> - -<p>Speaking also of a celebrated thorn at Market-hill, which had -long been a resort of merry-making parties, he reverts to the -Scottish Secretary of former days:</p> - -<div class="poetry-container"><div class="poetry"><div class="stanza"> -<div class="verse">‘Sir Archibald, that valorous knight,</div> -<div class="verse indent2">The lord of all the fruitful plain,</div> -<div class="verse">Would come and listen with delight,</div> -<div class="verse indent2">For he was fond of rural strain:</div> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<div class="verse">Sir Archibald, whose favourite name</div> -<div class="verse indent2">Shall stand for ages on record,</div> -<div class="verse">By Scottish bards of highest fame,</div> -<div class="verse indent2">Wise Hawthornden and Stirling’s lord.’</div> -</div></div></div> - -<div class="figcenter w275"> -<img src="images/illus_p_315.jpg" width="275" height="256" alt="" /> -</div> - -<p>The following letter to Sir Archibald from his friend Sir James<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_316" id="Page_316">{316}</a></span> -Balfour, Lord Lyon, occurs amongst the manuscript stores of the -latter gentleman in the Advocates’ Library:</p> - -<div class="blockquot"> -<p> -‘To Sir <span class="smcap">Archibald Achesone</span>,<br /> -<span class="ml2">one of the Secretaries of Staite.</span> -</p> - -<p>‘<span class="smcap">Worthy Sir</span>—Your letters, full of Spartanical brevity to the first view, -bot, againe overlooked, Demosthenicall longe; stuffed full of exaggerations -and complaints; the yeast of your enteirest affections, sent to quicken a -slumbring friend as you imagine, quho nevertheless remains vigilant of you -and of the smallest matters, which may aney wayes adde the least rill of -content to the ocean of your happiness; quherfor you may show your comerad, -and intreat him from me, as from one that trewly loves and honors his best -pairts, that now he vold refraine, both his tonge and pen, from these quhirkis -and obloquies, quherwith he so often uses to stain the name of grate personages, -for hardly can he live so reteiredly, in so voluble ane age, without becoming -at one tyme or uther obnoxious to the blow of some courtier. So begging -God to bless you, I am your—</p> - -<p class="right"> -<span class="smcap">Ja. Balfour</span>.</p> -<p> -‘<span class="smcap">London</span>, <em>9 Apryll 1631.</em>’<br /> -</p></div> - -<p>Twenty years before the Duchess of Gordon lived in the venerable -house at the head of the close, a preceding dowager resided -in another part of the town. This was the distinguished Lady -Elizabeth Howard (daughter of the Duke of Norfolk, by Lady -Anne Somerset, daughter of the Marquis of Worcester), who -occasioned so much disturbance in the end of Queen Anne’s reign -by the Jacobite medal which she sent to the Faculty of Advocates. -Her grace lived in a house at the Abbeyhill, where, as we are -informed by Wodrow, in a tone of pious horror,<a name="FNanchor_249" id="FNanchor_249"></a><a href="#Footnote_249" class="fnanchor">[249]</a> she openly kept -a kind of college for instructing young people in Jesuitism and -Jacobitism together. In this labour she seems to have been -assisted by the Duchess of Perth, a kindred soul, whose enthusiasm -afterwards caused the ruin of her family, by sending her son into -the insurrection of 1745.<a name="FNanchor_250" id="FNanchor_250"></a><a href="#Footnote_250" class="fnanchor">[250]</a> The Duchess of Gordon died here in -1732. I should suppose the house to have been that respectable -old villa, at the extremity of the suburb of Abbeyhill, in which -the late Baron Norton, of the Court of Exchequer, lived for many -years. It was formerly possessed by Baron Mure, who, during the -administration of the Earl of Bute, exercised the duties and dispensed -the patronage of the <i lang="fr" xml:lang="fr">sous-ministre</i> for Scotland, under the -Hon. Stuart Mackenzie, younger brother of the Premier. This<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_317" id="Page_317">{317}</a></span> -was of course in its turn the <em>court</em> of Scotland; and from the -description of a gentleman old enough to remember attending the -levees (Sir W. M. Bannatyne), I should suppose that it was as -much haunted by suitors of all kinds as ever were the more elegant -halls of Holyrood House. Baron Mure, who was the personal -friend of Earl Bute, died in 1774.</p> - -<hr class="chap" /></div><div class="chapter"> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_318" id="Page_318">{318}</a></span></p> - - -<h2><a name="PANMURE_HOUSE_ADAM_SMITH" id="PANMURE_HOUSE_ADAM_SMITH">PANMURE HOUSE—ADAM SMITH.</a></h2> - - -<p>At the bottom of a close a little way below the Canongate -Church, there is a house which a few years ago bore the -appearance of one of those small semi-quadrangular manor-houses -which were prevalent in the country about the middle of the -seventeenth century. -It is now -altered, and -brought into juxtaposition -with -the coarse details -of an ironfoundry, -yet still is not -without some -traits of its -original style. The -name of Panmure -House takes the -mind back to the -Earls of Panmure, -the fourth of -whom lost title -and estates for his -concern in the -affair of 1715; -but I am not certain -of any earlier -proprietor of this -family than -William Maule, -nephew of the -attainted earl, -created Earl of Panmure as an Irish title in 1743. <em>He</em> possessed -the house in the middle of the last century.</p> - -<div class="figcenter w350"> -<img src="images/illus_p_318.jpg" width="350" height="406" alt="" /> -<div class="caption"><p class="center">Back of Canongate Tolbooth—Tolbooth Wynd.</p></div> -</div> - -<p>All reference to rank in connection with this house appears -trivial in comparison with the fact that it was the residence of -Adam Smith from 1778, when he came to live in Edinburgh as<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_319" id="Page_319">{319}</a></span> -a commissioner of the customs, till his death in 1790, when he -was interred in a somewhat obscure situation at the back of the -Canongate Tolbooth. In his time the house must have seen -the most intellectual company to be had in Scotland; but it had -not the honour of being the birthplace of any of Smith’s great -works. His last and greatest—the book which has undoubtedly -done more for the good of the community than any other ever -produced in Scotland—was the work of ten quiet, studious years -previous to 1778, during which the philosopher lived in his -mother’s house in Kirkcaldy.</p> - -<p>The gentle, virtuous character of Smith has left little for the -anecdotist. The utmost simplicity marked the externals of the -man. He said very truly (being in possession of a handsome -library) that ‘he was only a beau in his books.’ Leading an -abstracted, scholarly life, he was ill-fitted for common worldly -affairs. Some one remarked to a friend of mine while Smith still -lived: ‘How strange to think of one who has written so well on -the principles of exchange and barter—he is obliged to get a -friend to buy his horse-corn for him!’ The author of the <cite>Wealth -of Nations</cite> never thought of marrying. His household affairs -were managed to his perfect contentment by a female cousin, a -Miss Jeanie Douglas, who almost necessarily acquired a great -control over him. It is said that the amiable philosopher, being -fond of a bit sugar, and chid by her for taking it, would sometimes, -in sauntering backwards and forwards along the parlour, watch -till Miss Jeanie’s back was turned in order to supply himself with -his favourite morsel. Such things are not derogatory to greatness -like Smith’s: they link it to human nature, and secure for it the -love, as it had previously possessed the admiration, of common -men.</p> - -<p>The one personal circumstance regarding Smith which has made -the greatest impression on his fellow-citizens is the rather too -well-known anecdote of the two fishwomen. He was walking -along the streets one day, deeply abstracted, and speaking in a -low tone to himself, when he caught the attention of two of these -many-petticoated ladies, engaged in selling their fish. They -exchanged significant looks, bearing strong reference to the -restraints of a well-managed lunatic asylum, and then sighed one -to the other: ‘Aih, sirs; and he’s weel put on too!’—that is, -well dressed; his gentleman-like condition making the case appear -so much the more piteous.</p> - -<hr class="chap" /></div><div class="chapter"> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_320" id="Page_320">{320}</a></span></p> - - - - -<h2><a name="JOHN_PATERSON_THE_GOLFER" id="JOHN_PATERSON_THE_GOLFER">JOHN PATERSON THE GOLFER.</a></h2> - - -<p>In the Canongate, nearly opposite to Queensberry House, is a -narrow, old-fashioned mansion, of peculiar form, having a coat-armorial -conspicuously placed at the top, and a plain slab over -the doorway containing the following inscriptions:</p> - -<div class="poetry-container"><div class="poetry"><div class="stanza"> -<div class="verse">‘Cum victor ludo, Scotis qui proprius, esset,</div> -<div class="verse indent2">Ter tres victores post redimitus avos,</div> -<div class="verse">Patersonus, humo tunc educebat in altum</div> -<div class="verse indent2">Hanc, quæ victores tot tulit una, domum.’</div> -</div></div></div> -<div class="poetry-container"><div class="poetry"><div class="stanza"> -<div class="verse">‘I hate no person.’</div> -</div></div></div> - -<p>It appears that this quatrain was the production of Dr -Pitcairn, while the -sentence below is an -anagram upon the -name of <span class="smcap">John -Patersone</span>. The -stanza expresses that -‘when Paterson had -been crowned victor -in a game peculiar -to Scotland, in which -his ancestors had -also been often victorious, -he then -built this mansion, -which one conquest -raised him -above all his predecessors.’ -We must -resort to tradition -for an explanation -of this obscure -hint.</p> - -<div class="figcenter w275"> -<img src="images/illus_p_320.jpg" width="275" height="310" alt="" /> -<div class="caption"><p class="center">Golfers’ Land.</p></div> -</div> - -<p>Till a recent -period, golfing had -long been conducted -upon the Links of Leith.<a name="FNanchor_251" id="FNanchor_251"></a><a href="#Footnote_251" class="fnanchor">[251]</a> It had even been the sport of princes on<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_321" id="Page_321">{321}</a></span> -that field. We are told by Mr William Tytler of Woodhouselee -that Charles I. and the Duke of York (afterwards James II.) -played at golf on Leith Links, in succession, during the brief -periods of their residence in Holyrood. Though there is an -improbability in this tale as far as Charles is concerned, seeing -that he spent too short a time in Edinburgh to have been able -to play at a game notorious for the time necessary in acquiring -it, I may quote the anecdote related by Mr Tytler: ‘That while -he was engaged in a party at golf on the green or Links of -Leith, a letter was delivered into his hands, which gave him the -first account of the insurrection and rebellion in Ireland; on -reading which, he suddenly called for his coach, and leaning on -one of his attendants, and in great agitation, drove to the palace -of Holyrood House, from whence next day he set out for London.’ -Mr Tytler says, regarding the Duke of York, that he ‘was -frequently seen in a party at golf on the Links of Leith with -some of the nobility and gentry. I remember in my youth to -have often conversed with an old man named Andrew Dickson, -a golf-club maker, who said that, when a boy, he used to carry -the duke’s golf-clubs, and run before him, and announce where -the balls fell.’<a name="FNanchor_252" id="FNanchor_252"></a><a href="#Footnote_252" class="fnanchor">[252]</a></p> - -<div class="figcenter w500"> -<a id="illus_c_027"></a> -<img src="images/illus_c_027.jpg" width="500" height="699" alt="" /> -<div class="caption"><p class="center">GOLFERS ON LEITH LINKS.</p> - -<p class="right"> -<span class="smcap"><a href="#Page_320">Page 320.</a></span> -</p></div> -</div> - -<p>Tradition reports that when the duke lived in Holyrood House -he had on one occasion a discussion with two English noblemen -as to the native country of golf; his Royal Highness asserting -that it was peculiar to Scotland, while they as pertinaciously -insisted that it was an English game as well. Assuredly, whatever -may have been the case in those days, it is not now an -English game in the proper sense of the words, seeing that it is -only played to the south of the Tweed by a few fraternities of -Scotsmen, who have acquired it in their own country in youth. -However this may be, the two English nobles proposed, good-humouredly, -to prove its English character by taking up the -duke in a match to be played on Leith Links. James, glad of -an opportunity to make popularity in Scotland, in however small -a way, accepted the challenge, and sought for the best partner -he could find. By an association not at this day surprising to -those who practise the game, the heir-presumptive of the British -throne played in concert with a poor shoemaker named John -Paterson, the worthy descendant of a long line of illustrious -golfers. If the two southrons were, as might be expected, -inexperienced in the game, they had no chance against a pair,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_322" id="Page_322">{322}</a></span> -one member of which was a good player. So the duke got the -best of the practical argument; and Paterson’s merits were -rewarded by a gift of the sum played for. The story goes on to -say that John was thus enabled to build a somewhat stylish -house for himself in the Canongate, on the top of which, being -a Scotsman, and having of course a pedigree, he clapped the -Paterson arms—three pelicans vulned; on a chief three mullets; -crest, a dexter hand grasping a golf-club; together with the -motto—dear to all golfers—<span class="smcap">Far and Sure</span>.</p> - -<p>It must be admitted there is some uncertainty about this tale. -The house, the inscriptions, and arms only indicate that Paterson -built the house after being a victor at golf, and that Pitcairn had -a hand in decorating it. One might even see, in the fact of the -epigram, as if a gentleman wit were indulging in a jest at the -expense of some simple plebeian, who held all notoriety honourable. -It might have been expected that if Paterson had been enriched -by a match in which he was connected with the Duke of York, a -Jacobite like Pitcairn would have made distinct allusion to the -circumstance. The tradition, nevertheless, seems too curious to -be entirely overlooked, and the reader may therefore take it at -its worth.</p> - -<hr class="chap" /></div><div class="chapter"> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_323" id="Page_323">{323}</a></span></p> - - - - -<h2><a name="LOTHIAN_HUT" id="LOTHIAN_HUT">[LOTHIAN HUT.</a></h2> - - -<p>The noble family of Lothian had a mansion in Edinburgh, -though of but a moderate dignity. It was a small house -situated in a spare piece of ground at the bottom of the Canongate, -on the south side. Latterly it was leased to Professor Dugald -Stewart, who, about the end of the last century, here entertained -several English pupils of noble rank—among others, the Hon. -the Henry Temple, afterwards Lord Palmerston.<a name="FNanchor_253" id="FNanchor_253"></a><a href="#Footnote_253" class="fnanchor">[253]</a> About 1825 -building was taken down to make room for a brewery.</p> - -<p>About the middle of the last century, Lothian Hut was -occupied by the wife of the fourth marquis, a lady of great -lineage, being the only daughter of Robert, Earl of Holderness, -and great-granddaughter of Charles Louis, Elector Palatine. -Her ladyship was a person of grand character, while yet -admittedly very amiable. As a piece of very old gossip, the -Lady Marchioness, on first coming to live in the Hut, found -herself in want of a few trifling articles from a milliner, and -sent for one who was reputed to be the first of the class then -in Edinburgh—namely, Miss Ramsay. But there were two -Miss Ramsays. They had a shop on the east side of the Old -Lyon Close, on the south side of the High Street, and there -made ultimately a little fortune, which enabled them to build -the villa of Marionville, near Restalrig (called <em>Lappet Hall</em> by -the vulgar). The Misses Ramsay, receiving a message from so -grand a lady, instead of obeying the order implicitly, came -together, dressed out in a very splendid style, and told the -marchioness that every article they wore was ‘at the very top -of the fashion.’ The marchioness, disgusted with their forwardness<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_324" id="Page_324">{324}</a></span> -and affectation, said she would take their specimens into -consideration, and wished them a good-morning. According to -our gossiping authority, she then sent for Mrs Sellar, who carried -on the millinery business in a less pretentious style at a place -in the Lawnmarket where Bank Street now stands. (I like the -localities, for they bring the Old Town of a past age so clearly -before us.) Mrs Sellar made her appearance at Lothian Hut in -a plain, decorous manner. Her head-dress consisted of a mob-cap -of the finest lawn, tied under her chin; over which there -was a hood of the same stuff. She wore a cloak of plain black -silk without any lace, and had no bonnet, the use of which was -supplied by the hood. Mrs Sellar’s manners were elegant and -pleasing. When she entered, the marchioness rose to receive -her. On being asked for her patterns, she stepped to the door -and brought in two large boxes, which had been carried behind -her by two women. The articles, being produced, gave great -satisfaction, and her ladyship never afterwards employed any -other milliner. So the story ends, in the manner of the good-boy -books, in establishing that milliners ought not to be too -prone to exhibit their patterns upon their own persons.]</p> - -<hr class="chap" /></div><div class="chapter"> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_325" id="Page_325">{325}</a></span></p> - - - - -<h2><a name="HENRY_PRENTICE_AND_POTATOES" id="HENRY_PRENTICE_AND_POTATOES">HENRY PRENTICE AND POTATOES.</a></h2> - - -<p>No doubt is entertained on any hand that the field-culture of -the potato was first practised in Scotland by a man of -humble condition, originally a pedlar, by name Henry Prentice. -He was an eccentric person, as many have been who stepped out -of the common walk to do things afterwards discovered to be great. -A story is told that while the potatoes were growing in certain -little fields which he leased near our city, Lord Minto came -from time to time to inquire about the crop. Prentice at length -told his lordship that the experiment was entirely successful, and -all he wanted was a horse and cart to drive his potatoes to -Edinburgh that they might be sold. ‘I’ll give you a horse and -cart,’ said his lordship. Prentice then took his crop to market, -cart by cart, till it was all sold, after which he disposed of <em>the -horse and cart</em>, which he affected to believe Lord Minto had -given him as a present.</p> - -<p>Having towards the close of his days realised a small sum -of money, he sunk £140 in the hands of the Canongate magistrates, -as managers of the poorhouse of that parish, receiving in -return seven shillings a week, upon which he lived for several -years. Occasionally he made little donations to the charity. -During his last years he was an object of no small curiosity in -Edinburgh, partly on account of his connection with potato -culture and partly by reason of his oddities. It was said of -him that he would never shake hands with any human being -above two years of age. In his bargain with the Canongate -dignitaries, it was agreed that he should have a <em>good grave</em> in -their churchyard, and one was selected according to his own -choice. Over this, thinking it as well, perhaps, that he should -enjoy a little quasi-posthumous notoriety during his life, he -caused a monument to be erected, bearing this inscription:</p> - -<div class="poetry-container"><div class="poetry"><div class="stanza"> -<div class="verse">‘Be not anxious to know how I lived,</div> -<div class="verse">But rather how you yourself should die.’</div> -</div></div></div> - -<p>He also had a coffin prepared at the price of two guineas, taking -the undertaker bound to screw it down gratis with his own -hands. In addition to all this, his friends the magistrates were -under covenant to bury him with a hearse and four coaches.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_326" id="Page_326">{326}</a></span> -But even the designs of mortals respecting the grave itself are -liable to disappointment. Owing to the mischief done by the -boys to the premature monument, Prentice saw fit to have it -removed to a quieter cemetery, that of Restalrig, where, at his -death in 1788, he was accordingly interred.</p> - -<p>Such was the originator of that extensive culture of the potato -which has since borne so conspicuous a place in the economics -of our country, for good and for evil.</p> - -<p>It is curious that this plant, although the sole support of -millions of our population, should now again (1846) have fallen -under suspicion. At its first introduction, and for several ages -thereafter, it was regarded as a vegetable of by no means good -character, though for a totally different reason from any which -affect its reputation in our day. Its supposed tendency to inflame -some of the sensual feelings of human nature is frequently -adverted to by Shakespeare and his contemporaries; and this long -remained a popular impression in the north.<a name="FNanchor_254" id="FNanchor_254"></a><a href="#Footnote_254" class="fnanchor">[254]</a></p> -<hr class="chap" /></div><div class="chapter"> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_327" id="Page_327">{327}</a></span></p> - - - -<h2><a name="THE_DUCHESS_OF_BUCCLEUCH_AND_MONMOUTH" id="THE_DUCHESS_OF_BUCCLEUCH_AND_MONMOUTH">THE DUCHESS OF BUCCLEUCH AND MONMOUTH.</a></h2> - - -<p>It is rather curious that one of my informants in this article -should have dined with a lady who had dined with a peeress -married in the year 1662.</p> - -<p>This peeress was Anne, Duchess of Buccleuch and Monmouth, -the wife of the unfortunate son of Charles II. As is well known, -she was early deserted by her husband, who represented, not -without justice, that a marriage into which he had been tempted -for reasons of policy by his relations, when he was only thirteen -years of age, could hardly be binding.</p> - -<p>The young duchess, naturally plain in features, was so unfortunate -in early womanhood as to become lame in consequence -of some feats in dancing. For her want of personal graces there -is negative evidence in a dedication of Dryden, where he speaks -abundantly of her wit, but not a word of beauty, which shows -that the case must have been desperate. [This, by the way, -was the remark made to me on the subject by Sir Walter Scott, -who, in the <cite>Lay of the Last Minstrel</cite>, has done what Dryden could -not do—flattered the duchess:</p> - -<div class="poetry-container"><div class="poetry"><div class="stanza"> -<div class="wideverse indent6">‘She had known adversity,</div> -<div class="wideverse">Though born in such a high degree;</div> -<div class="wideverse">In pride of power and <em>beauty’s bloom</em>,</div> -<div class="wideverse">Had wept o’er Monmouth’s bloody tomb.’]</div> -</div></div></div> - -<p>Were any further proof wanting, it might be found in the regard -in which she was held by James II., who, as is well known, had -such a tendency to plain women as induced a suspicion in his -witty brother that they were prescribed to him by his confessor -by way of penance. This friendship, in which there was nothing -improper, was the means of saving her grace’s estates at the -tragical close of her husband’s life.</p> - -<p>It is curious to learn that the duchess, notwithstanding the -terms on which she had been with her husband, and the sad -stamp put upon his pretensions to legitimacy, acted throughout -the remainder of her somewhat protracted life as if she had been -the widow of a true prince of the blood-royal. In her state-rooms -she had a canopy erected, beneath which was the only seat -in the apartment, everybody standing besides herself. When<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_328" id="Page_328">{328}</a></span> -Lady Margaret Montgomery, one of the beautiful Countess of -Eglintoune’s daughters, was at a boarding-school near London—previous -to the year <em>Thirty</em>—she was frequently invited by the -duchess to her house; and because her great-grandmother, Lady -Mary Leslie, was sister to her grace’s mother, <em>she</em> was allowed -a chair; but this was an extraordinary mark of grace. The -duchess was the last person of quality in Scotland who kept -<em>pages</em>, in the proper acceptation of the term—that is, young -gentlemen of good birth, who acquired manners and knowledge -of the world in attending upon persons of exalted rank. The -last of her grace’s pages rose to be a general. When a letter -was brought for the duchess, the domestic gave it to the page, -the page to the waiting-gentlewoman (always a person of birth -also), and she at length to her grace. The duchess kept a -tight hand over her clan and tenants, but was upon the whole -beloved.</p> - -<p>She was buried (1732) on the same day with the too-much-celebrated -Colonel Charteris. At the funeral of Henry, Duke -of Buccleuch, in the year 1812, in the aisle of the church at -Dalkeith, my informant (Sir Walter Scott) was shown an old -man who had been at the funeral of both her grace and Colonel -Charteris. He said that the day was dreadfully stormy, which -all the world agreed was owing to the devil carrying off Charteris. -The mob broke in upon the mourners who followed this personage -to the grave, and threw cats, dogs, and a pack of cards upon the -coffin; whereupon the gentlemen drew their swords, and cut away -among the rioters. In the confusion one little old man was -pushed into the grave; and the sextons, somewhat prompt in the -discharge of their duty, began to shovel in the earth upon the -quick and the dead. The grandfather of my informant (Dr -Rutherford), who was one of the mourners, was much hurt in -the affray; and my informant has heard his mother describe the -terror of the family on his coming home with his clothes bloody -and his sword broken.</p> - -<p>As to pages—a custom existed among old ladies till a later -day of keeping such attendants, rather superior to the little -polybuttoned personages who are now so universal. It was not, -however, to be expected that a pranksome youth would behave -with consistent respect to an aged female of the stiff manners -then prevalent. Accordingly, ridiculous circumstances took place. -An old lady of the name of Plenderleith, of very stately aspect -and grave carriage, used to walk to Leith by the Easter Road<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_329" id="Page_329">{329}</a></span> -with her little foot-page behind her. For the whole way, the -young rogue would be seen projecting burs at her dress, laughing -immoderately, but silently, when one stuck. An old lady and -her sequel of a page was very much like a tragedy followed by a -farce. The keeping of the rascals in order at home used also to -be a sad problem to a quiet old lady. The only expedient which -Miss —— could hit upon to preserve her page from the corruption -of the streets was, in her own phrase, to <em>lock up his breeks</em>, -which she did almost every evening. The youth, being then only -presentable at a window, had to content himself with such chat -as he could indulge in with his companions and such mischief as -he could execute from that loophole of retreat. So much for the -parade of keeping pages.</p> - -<hr class="chap" /></div><div class="chapter"> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_330" id="Page_330">{330}</a></span></p> - - - - -<h2><a name="CLAUDERO" id="CLAUDERO">CLAUDERO.</a></h2> - - -<p>Edinburgh, which now smiles complacently upon the gravities -of her reviews and the flippancies of her magazines, formerly -laughed outright at the coarse lampoons of her favourite poet -and pamphleteer, Claudero. The distinct publications of this -witty and eccentric personage (whose real name was James Wilson) -are well known to collectors; and his occasional pieces must be -fresh in the remembrance of those who, forty or fifty years ago -(1824), were in the habit of perusing the <cite>Scots Magazine</cite>, amidst -the general gravity of which they appeared, like the bright and -giddy eyes of a satyr, staring through the sere leaves of a sober -forest scene.</p> - -<p>Claudero was a native of Cumbernauld, in Dumbartonshire, -and at an early period of his life showed such marks of a mischief-loving -disposition as procured him general odium. The occasion -of his lameness was a pebble thrown from a tree at the minister, -who, having been previously exasperated by his tricks, chased him -to the end of a closed lane, and with his cane inflicted such -personal chastisement as rendered him a cripple, and a hater of -the clergy, for the rest of his life.</p> - -<p>In Edinburgh, where he lived for upwards of thirty years -previous to his death in 1789, his livelihood was at first ostensibly -gained by keeping a little school, latterly by celebrating -what were called <em>half-mark marriages</em>—a business resembling that -of the Gretna blacksmith. It is said that he, who made himself -the terror of so many by his wit, was in his turn held in fear by -his wife, who was as complete a shrew as ever fell to the lot of -poet or philosopher.</p> - -<p>He was a satirist by profession; and when any person wished -to have a squib played off upon his neighbours, he had nothing -to do but call upon Claudero, who, for half a crown, would -produce the desired effusion, composed, and copied off in a fair -hand, in a given time. He liked this species of employment -better than writing upon speculation, the profit being more -certain and immediate. When in want of money, it was his -custom to write a sly satire on some opulent public personage, -upon whom he called with it, desiring to have his opinion of the -work, and his countenance in favour of a subscription for its<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_331" id="Page_331">{331}</a></span> -publication. The object of his ridicule, conscious-struck by his -own portrait, would wince and be civil, advise him to give up -thoughts of publishing so hasty a production, and conclude by -offering a guinea or two to keep the poet alive till better times -should come round. At that time there lived in Edinburgh a -number of rich old men who had made fortunes in questionable -ways abroad, and whose characters, labouring under strange -suspicions, were wonderfully susceptible of Claudero’s satire. -These the wag used to bleed profusely and frequently by working -upon their fears of public notice.</p> - -<p>In 1766 appeared <cite>Miscellanies in Prose and Verse, by Claudero, -Son of Nimrod the Mighty Hunter, &c., &c.</cite>, opening with this -preface: ‘Christian Reader—The following miscellany is published -at the desire of many gentlemen, who have all been my -very good friends; if there be anything in it amusing or entertaining, -I shall be very glad I have contributed to your diversion, -and will laugh as heartily at your money as you do at my works. -Several of my pieces may need explanation; but I am too -cunning for that: what is not understood, like Presbyterian -preaching, will at least be admired. I am regardless of critics; -perhaps some of my lines want a foot; but then, if the critic -look sharp out, he will find that loss sufficiently supplied in other -places, where they have a foot too much: and besides, men’s -works generally resemble themselves; if the poems are lame, so -is the author—<span class="smcap">Claudero</span>.’</p> - -<p>The most remarkable poems in this volume are: ‘The Echo -of the Royal Porch of the Palace of Holyrood House, which -fell under Military Execution, anno 1753;’ ‘The Last Speech -and Dying Words of the Cross, which was Hanged, Drawn, and -Quartered on Monday the 15th of March 1756, for the horrid -crime of being an Incumbrance to the Street;’ ‘Scotland in -Tears for the horrid Treatment of the Kings’ Sepulchres;’ ‘An -Elegy on the much-lamented Death of Quaker Erskine;’<a name="FNanchor_255" id="FNanchor_255"></a><a href="#Footnote_255" class="fnanchor">[255]</a> ‘A -Sermon on the Condemnation of the Netherbow;’ ‘Humphry -Colquhoun’s Last Farewell,’ &c. Claudero seems to have been -the only man of his time who remonstrated against the destruction -of the venerable edifices then removed from the streets which they<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_332" id="Page_332">{332}</a></span> -ornamented, to the disappointment and indignation of all future -antiquaries. There is much wit in his sermon upon the destruction -of the Netherbow. ‘What was too hard,’ he says, ‘for the great -ones of the earth, yea, even queens, to effect, is now accomplished. -No patriot duke opposeth the scheme, as did the great Argyll in -the grand senate of our nation; therefore the project shall go into -execution, and down shall Edina’s lofty porches be hurled with a -vengeance. Streets shall be extended to the east, regular and -beautiful, as far as the Frigate Whins; and Portobello<a name="FNanchor_256" id="FNanchor_256"></a><a href="#Footnote_256" class="fnanchor">[256]</a> shall -be a lodge for the captors of tea and brandy. The city shall be -joined to Leith on the north, and a procession of wise masons -shall there lay the foundations of a spacious harbour. Pequin or -Nanquin shall not be able to compare with Edinburgh for magnificence. -Our city shall be the greatest wonder of the world, and -the fame of its glory shall reach the distant ends of the earth.<a name="FNanchor_257" id="FNanchor_257"></a><a href="#Footnote_257" class="fnanchor">[257]</a> -But lament, O thou descendant of the royal Dane, and chief of -the tribe of Wilson; for thy shop, contiguous to the porch, shall -be dashed to pieces, and its place will know thee no more! No -more shall the melodious voice of the loyalist Grant<a name="FNanchor_258" id="FNanchor_258"></a><a href="#Footnote_258" class="fnanchor">[258]</a> be heard -in the morning, nor shall he any more shake the bending wand -towards the triumphal arch. Let all who angle in deep waters -lament, for Tom had not his equal. The Netherbow Coffee-house -of the loyal Smeiton can now no longer enjoy its ancient name<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_333" id="Page_333">{333}</a></span> -with propriety; and from henceforth <em>The Revolution Coffee-house</em> -shall its name be called. Our gates must be extended wide for -accommodating the gilded chariots, which, from the luxury of -the age, are become numerous. With an impetuous career, they -jostle against one another in our streets, and the unwary foot-passenger -is in danger of being crushed to pieces. The loaded -cart itself cannot withstand their fury, and the hideous yells of -<em>Coal Johnie</em> resound through the vaulted sky. The sour-milk -barrels are -overturned, -and deluges of -Corstorphin -cream run -down our -strands, while -the poor unhappy -milkmaid -wrings -her hands -with sorrow.’ -To the sermon -are appended -the ‘Last -Speech and -Dying Words -of the Netherbow,’ -in which -the following -laughable declaration -occurs: -‘May -my clock be -struck dumb -in the other -world, if I lie in this! and may <span class="smcap">Mack</span>, the reformer of Edina’s -lofty spires, never bestride my weathercock on high, if I deviate -from truth in these my last words! Though my fabric shall be -levelled with the dust of the earth, yet I fall in hope that my -weathercock shall be exalted on some more modern dome, where it -shall shine like the burnished gold, reflecting the rays of the sun -to the eye of ages unborn. The daring Mack shall yet look down -from my cock, high in the airy region, to the brandy-shops below,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_334" id="Page_334">{334}</a></span> -where large graybeards shall appear to him no bigger than -mutchkin-bottles, and mutchkin-bottles shall be in his sight like -the spark of a diamond.’ One of Claudero’s versified compositions, -‘Humphry Colquhoun’s Farewell,’ is remarkable as a kind of -coarse prototype of the beautiful lyric entitled ‘Mary,’ sung in -<cite>The Pirate</cite> by Claud Halcro. One wonders to find the genius of -Scott refining upon such materials:</p> - -<div class="poetry-container"><div class="poetry"><div class="stanza"> -<div class="verse">‘Farewell to Auld Reekie,</div> -<div class="verse indent2">Farewell to lewd Kate,</div> -<div class="verse">Farewell to each ——,</div> -<div class="verse indent2">And farewell to cursed debt;</div> -<div class="verse">With light heart and thin breeches,</div> -<div class="verse indent2">Humph crosses the main;</div> -<div class="verse">All worn out to stitches,</div> -<div class="verse indent2">He’ll ne’er come again.</div> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<div class="verse">Farewell to old Dido,</div> -<div class="verse indent2">Who sold him good ale;</div> -<div class="verse">Her charms, like her drink,</div> -<div class="verse indent2">For poor Humph were too stale;</div> -<div class="verse">Though closely she urged him</div> -<div class="verse indent2">To marry and stay,</div> -<div class="verse">Her Trojan, quite cloyed,</div> -<div class="verse indent2">From her sailed away.</div> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<div class="verse">Farewell to James Campbell,</div> -<div class="verse indent2">Who played many tricks;</div> -<div class="verse">Humph’s ghost and Lochmoidart’s<a name="FNanchor_259" id="FNanchor_259"></a><a href="#Footnote_259" class="fnanchor">[259]</a></div> -<div class="verse indent2">Will chase him to Styx;</div> -<div class="verse">Where in Charon’s wherry</div> -<div class="verse indent2">He’ll be ferried o’er</div> -<div class="verse">To Pluto’s dominions,</div> -<div class="verse indent2">’Mongst rascals great store.</div> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<div class="verse">Farewell, pot-companions,</div> -<div class="verse indent2">Farewell, all good fellows;</div> -<div class="verse">Farewell to my anvil,</div> -<div class="verse indent2">Files, pliers, and bellows;</div> -<div class="verse">Sails, fly to Jamaica,</div> -<div class="verse indent2">Where I mean long to dwell,</div> -<div class="verse">Change manners with climate—</div> -<div class="verse indent2">Dear Drummond, farewell.’</div> -</div></div></div> - -<div class="figcenter w450"> -<img src="images/illus_p_333.jpg" width="450" height="509" alt="" /> -<div class="caption"><p class="center">Netherbow.</p></div> -</div> - -<p>It is not unworthy of notice that the publication of Dr Blair’s -<cite>Lectures on Rhetoric and the Belles-lettres</cite> was hastened by Claudero, -who, having procured notes taken by some of the students, -avowed an intention of giving these to the world. The reverend -author states in his preface that he was induced to publish the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_335" id="Page_335">{335}</a></span> -lectures in consequence of some surreptitious and incorrect copies -finding their way to the public; but it has not hitherto been told -that this doggerel-monger was the person chiefly concerned in -bringing about that result.</p> - -<p>Claudero occasionally dealt in whitewash as well as blackball, -and sometimes wrote regular panegyrics. An address of this -kind to a <em>writer</em> named Walter Fergusson, who built St James’s -Square, concludes with a strange association of ideas:</p> - -<div class="poetry-container"><div class="poetry"><div class="stanza"> -<div class="verse">‘May Pentland Hills pour forth their springs,</div> -<div class="verse indent2">To water all thy square!</div> -<div class="verse">May Fergussons still bless the place,</div> -<div class="verse indent2">Both gay and debonnair!’</div> -</div></div></div> - -<p>When the said square was in progress, however, the water seemed -in no hurry to obey the bard’s invocation; and an attempt was -made to procure this useful element by sinking wells for it, -despite the elevation of the ground. Mr Walter Scott, W.S., -happened one day to pass when Captain Fergusson of the Royal -Navy—a good officer, but a sort of Commodore Trunnion in his -manners—was sinking a well of vast depth. Upon Mr Scott -expressing a doubt if water could be got there, ‘I will get it,’ -quoth the captain, ‘though I sink to hell for it!’ ‘A bad place -for water,’ was the dry remark of the doubter.</p> - -<hr class="chap" /></div><div class="chapter"> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_336" id="Page_336">{336}</a></span></p> - - - - -<h2><a name="QUEENSBERRY_HOUSE" id="QUEENSBERRY_HOUSE">QUEENSBERRY HOUSE.</a></h2> - - -<p>In the Canongate, on the south side, is a large, gloomy building, -enclosed in a court, and now used as a refuge for destitute -persons. This was formerly the town mansion of the Dukes of -Queensberry, and a scene, of course, of stately life and high -political affairs. It was built by the first duke, the willing -minister of the last two Stuarts—he who also built Drumlanrig -Castle in Dumfriesshire, which he never slept in but one night, -and with regard to which it is told that he left the accounts for -the building tied up with this inscription: ‘The deil pyke out -his een that looks herein!’ Duke William was a noted money-maker -and land-acquirer. No little laird of his neighbourhood -had any chance with him for the retention of his family property. -He was something still worse in the eyes of the common people—a -<em>persecutor</em>; that is, one siding against the Presbyterian -cause. There is a story in one of their favourite books of his -having died of the <i lang="la" xml:lang="la">morbus pediculosus</i>, by way of a judgment -upon him for his wickedness. In reality, he died of some ordinary -fever. It is also stated, from the same authority, that about the -time when his grace died, a Scotch skipper, being in Sicily, saw -one day a coach-and-six driving to Mount Etna, while a diabolic -voice exclaimed: ‘Open to the Duke of Drumlanrig!’—‘which -proves, by the way,’ says Mr Sharpe, ‘that the devil’s porter is -no herald. In fact,’ adds this acute critic, ‘the legend is borrowed -from the story of Antonio the Rich, in George Sandys’s <cite>Travels</cite>.’<a name="FNanchor_260" id="FNanchor_260"></a><a href="#Footnote_260" class="fnanchor">[260]</a></p> - -<p>It appears, from family letters, that the first duchess often -resided in the Canongate mansion, while her husband occupied -Sanquhar Castle. The lady was unfortunately given to drink, -and there is a letter of hers in which she pathetically describes -her situation to a country friend, left alone in Queensberry House -with only a few bottles of wine, one of which, having been drawn, -had turned out sour. Sour wine being prejudicial to her health, -it was fearful to think of what might prove the quality of the -remaining bottles.</p> - -<p>The son of this couple, James, second duke, must ever be -memorable as the main instrument in carrying through the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_337" id="Page_337">{337}</a></span> -Union. His character has been variously depicted. By Defoe, -in his <cite>History of the Union</cite>, it is liberally panegyrised. ‘I think -I have,’ says he, ‘given demonstrations to the world that I will -flatter no man.’ Yet he could not refrain from extolling the -‘prudence, calmness, and temper’ which the duke showed during -that difficult crisis. Unfortunately the author of <cite>Robinson -Crusoe</cite>, though not a flatterer, could not insure himself against -the usual prepossessions of a partisan. Boldness the duke must -certainly have possessed, for during the ferments attending the -parliamentary proceedings on that occasion, he continued daily -to drive between his lodgings in Holyrood and the Parliament -House, notwithstanding several intimations that his life was -threatened. His grace’s eldest son, James, was an idiot of the -most unhappy sort—rabid and gluttonous, and early grew to an -immense height, which is testified by his coffin in the family -vault at Durisdeer, still to be seen, of great length and unornamented -with the heraldic follies which bedizen the violated remains -of his relatives. A tale of mystery and horror is preserved by -tradition respecting this monstrous being. While the family -resided in Edinburgh, he was always kept confined in a ground -apartment, in the western wing of the house, upon the windows -of which, till within these few years, the boards still remained -by which the dreadful receptacle was darkened to prevent the -idiot from looking out or being seen. On the day the Union -was passed, all Edinburgh crowded to the Parliament Close to -await the issue of the debate, and to mob the chief promoters -of the detested measure on their leaving the House. The whole -household of the commissioner went <i lang="fr" xml:lang="fr">en masse</i>, with perhaps a -somewhat different object, and among the rest was the man whose -duty it was to watch and attend Lord Drumlanrig. Two members -of the family alone were left behind—the madman himself, and a -little kitchen-boy who turned the spit. The insane being, hearing -everything unusually still around, the house being deserted, and -the Canongate like a city of the dead, and observing his keeper -to be absent, broke loose from his confinement, and roamed wildly -through the house. It is supposed that the savoury odour of the -preparations for dinner led him to the kitchen, where he found -the little turnspit quietly seated by the fire. He seized the boy, -killed him, took the meat from the fire, and spitted the body of -his victim, which he half-roasted, and was found devouring when -the duke, with his domestics, returned from his triumph. The -idiot survived his father many years, though he did not succeed<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_338" id="Page_338">{338}</a></span> -him upon his death in 1711, when the titles devolved upon -Charles, the younger brother. He is known to have died in -England. This horrid act of his child was, according to the -common sort of people, the judgment of God upon him for his -wicked concern in the Union—the greatest blessing, as it has -happened, that ever was conferred upon Scotland by any statesman.</p> - -<div class="figcenter w275"> -<img src="images/illus_p_338.jpg" width="275" height="324" alt="" /> -<div class="caption"><p class="center">Allan Ramsay’s Shop, High Street.</p></div> -</div> - -<p>Charles, third Duke of Queensberry, who was born in Queensberry -House, resided occasionally in it when he visited Scotland; -but as he was much engaged in attending the court during the -earlier part of his life, his stay here was seldom of long continuance. -After his grace and the duchess embroiled themselves -with the court (1729), on account of the support which they gave -to the poet Gay, they came to Scotland, and resided for some time -here. The author of the <cite>Beggar’s Opera</cite> accompanied them, and -remained about a month, part of which was given to Dumfriesshire. -Tradition in Edinburgh -used to point out -an attic in an old house -opposite to Queensberry -House, where, as an appropriate -abode for a poet, his -patrons are said to have -stowed him. It was said he -wrote the <cite>Beggar’s Opera</cite> -there—an entirely gratuitous -assumption. In the progress -of the history of his writings, -nothing of consequence occurs -at this time. He had -finished the second part of -the opera a short while -before. After his return to -the south, he is found engaged -in ‘new writing a -damned play, which he wrote -several years before, called -<cite>The Wife of Bath</cite>; a task -which he accomplished while -living with the Duke of -Queensberry in Oxfordshire, during the ensuing months of August, -September, and October.’<a name="FNanchor_261" id="FNanchor_261"></a><a href="#Footnote_261" class="fnanchor">[261]</a> It is known, however, that while in<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_339" id="Page_339">{339}</a></span> -Edinburgh, he haunted the shop of Allan Ramsay, in the Luckenbooths—the -flat above that well-remembered and classical shop so -long kept by Mr Creech, -from which issued the -<cite>Mirror</cite>, <cite>Lounger</cite>, and -other works of name, and -where for a long course -of years all the <i lang="la" xml:lang="la">literati</i> of -Edinburgh used to assemble -every day, like -merchants at an Exchange. -Here Ramsay -amused Gay by pointing -out to him the chief -public characters of the -city as they met in the -forenoon at the Cross. -Here, too, Gay read the -<cite>Gentle Shepherd</cite>, and -studied the Scottish language, -so that upon his -return to England he was -enabled to make Pope -appreciate the beauties of that delightful pastoral. He is said -also to have spent some of his time with the sons of mirth and -humour in an alehouse opposite to Queensberry House, kept by -one Janet Hall. <em>Jenny Ha’s</em>, as the place was called, was a noted -house for drinking claret from the butt within the recollection of -old gentlemen living in my time.</p> - -<div class="figcenter w375"> -<img src="images/illus_p_339.jpg" width="375" height="369" alt="" /> -<div class="caption"><p class="center">Jenny Ha’s Ale-House.</p></div> -</div> - -<p>While Gay was at Drumlanrig, he employed himself in picking -out a great number of the best books from the library, which were -sent to England, whether for his own use or the duke’s is not -known.</p> - -<p>Duchess Catherine was a most extraordinary lady, eccentric to -a degree undoubtedly bordering on madness. Her beauty has -been celebrated by Pope not in very elegant terms:</p> - -<div class="poetry-container"><div class="poetry"><div class="stanza"> -<div class="verse">‘Since Queensberry to strip there’s no compelling,</div> -<div class="verse">’Tis from a handmaid we must take a Helen.’</div> -</div></div></div> - -<p>Prior had, at an early period of her life, depainted her irrepressible -temper:</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_340" id="Page_340">{340}</a></span></p> - -<div class="poetry-container"><div class="poetry"><div class="stanza"> -<div class="verse">‘Thus Kitty, beautiful and young,</div> -<div class="verse indent2">And wild as colt untamed,</div> -<div class="verse">Bespoke the fair from whom she sprang,</div> -<div class="verse indent2">By little rage inflamed;</div> -<div class="verse">Inflamed with rage at sad restraint,</div> -<div class="verse indent2">Which wise mamma ordained;</div> -<div class="verse">And sorely vexed to play the saint,</div> -<div class="verse indent2">Whilst wit and beauty reigned.</div> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<div class="verse">“Shall I thumb holy books, confined</div> -<div class="verse indent2">With Abigails forsaken?</div> -<div class="verse">Kitty’s for other things designed,</div> -<div class="verse indent2">Or I am much mistaken.</div> -<div class="verse">Must Lady Jenny frisk about,</div> -<div class="verse indent2">And visit with her cousins?</div> -<div class="verse">At balls must she make all the rout,</div> -<div class="verse indent2">And bring home hearts by dozens?</div> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<div class="verse">What has she better, pray, than I?</div> -<div class="verse indent2">What hidden charms to boast,</div> -<div class="verse">That all mankind for her should die,</div> -<div class="verse indent2">Whilst I am scarce a toast?</div> -<div class="verse">Dearest mamma, for once let me,</div> -<div class="verse indent2">Unchained, my fortune try;</div> -<div class="verse">I’ll have my earl as well as she,</div> -<div class="verse indent2">Or know the reason why.</div> -</div><div class="stanza"> -<div class="verse">I’ll soon with Jenny’s pride quit score,</div> -<div class="verse indent2">Make all her lovers fall;</div> -<div class="verse">They’ll grieve I was not loosed before,</div> -<div class="verse indent2">She, I was loosed at all.”</div> -<div class="verse">Fondness prevailed, mamma gave way;</div> -<div class="verse indent2">Kitty, at heart’s desire,</div> -<div class="verse">Obtained the chariot for a day,</div> -<div class="verse indent2">And set the world on fire!’</div> -</div></div></div> - -<p>It is an undoubted fact that, before her marriage, she had been -confined in a <em>strait-jacket</em> on account of mental derangement; and -her conduct in married life was frequently such as to entitle her -to a repetition of the same treatment. She was, in reality, at -all times to a certain extent insane, though the politeness of -fashionable society and the flattery of her poetical friends seem -to have succeeded in passing off her extravagances as owing to an -agreeable freedom of carriage and vivacity of mind. Her brother -was as clever and as mad as herself, and used to amuse himself by -hiding a book in his library, and hunting for it after he had forgot -where it was deposited.</p> - -<p>Her grace was no admirer of Scottish manners. One of their -habits she particularly detested—the custom of eating off the end -of a knife. When people dined with her at Drumlanrig, and<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_341" id="Page_341">{341}</a></span> -began to lift their food in this manner, she used to scream out -and beseech them not to cut their throats; and then she would -confound the offending persons by sending them a silver spoon or -fork upon a salver.<a name="FNanchor_262" id="FNanchor_262"></a><a href="#Footnote_262" class="fnanchor">[262]</a></p> - -<p>When in Scotland her grace always dressed herself in the garb -of a peasant-girl. Her object seems to have been to ridicule and -put out of countenance the stately dresses and demeanour of the -Scottish gentlewomen who visited her. One evening some country -ladies paid her a visit, dressed in their best brocades, as for some -state occasion. Her grace proposed a walk, and they were of -course under the necessity of trooping off, to the utter discomfiture -of their starched-up frills and flounces. Her grace at last pretended -to be tired, sat down upon the dirtiest dunghill she could -find, at the end of a farmhouse, and saying, ‘Pray, ladies, be -seated,’ invited her poor draggled companions to plant themselves -round about her. They stood so much in awe of her that they -durst not refuse; and of course her grace had the satisfaction of -afterwards laughing at the destruction of their silks.</p> - -<p>When she went out to an evening entertainment, and found a -tea-equipage paraded which she thought too fine for the rank of -the owner, she would contrive to overset the table and break the -china. The forced politeness of her hosts on such occasions, and -the assurances which they made her grace that no harm was done, -&c., delighted her exceedingly.</p> - -<p>Her custom of dressing like a <i lang="fr" xml:lang="fr">paysanne</i> once occasioned her -grace a disagreeable adventure at a review. On her attempting -to approach the duke, the guard, not knowing her rank or relation -to him, pushed her rudely back. This threw her into such a -passion that she could not be appeased till his grace assured her -that the men had all been soundly flogged for their insolence.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_342" id="Page_342">{342}</a></span></p> - -<p>An anecdote scarcely less laughable is told of her grace as -occurring at court, where she carried to the same extreme her -attachment to plain-dealing and plain-dressing. An edict had -been issued forbidding the ladies to appear at the drawing-room -in aprons. This was disregarded by the duchess, whose rustic -costume would not have been complete without that piece of dress. -On approaching the door she was stopped by the lord in waiting, -who told her that he could not possibly give her grace admission -in that guise, when she, without a moment’s hesitation, stripped -off her apron, threw it in his lordship’s face, and walked on, in her -brown gown and petticoat, into the brilliant circle!</p> - -<p>Her caprices were endless. At one time when a ball had been -announced at Drumlanrig, after the company were all assembled -her grace took a headache, declared that she could bear no noise, -and sat in a chair in the dancing-room, uttering a thousand peevish -complaints. Lord Drumlanrig, who understood her humour, said: -‘Madam, I know how to cure you;’ and taking hold of her -immense elbow-chair, which moved on castors, rolled her several -times backwards and forwards across the saloon, till she began -to laugh heartily—after which the festivities were allowed to -commence.</p> - -<p>The duchess certainly, both in her conversation and letters, -displayed a great degree of wit and quickness of mind. Yet -nobody perhaps, saving Gay, ever loved her. She seems to have -been one of those beings who are too much feared, admired, or -envied, to be loved.</p> - -<p>The duke, on the contrary, who was a man of ordinary mind, -had the affection and esteem of all. His temper and dispositions -were sweet and amiable in the extreme. His benevolence, extending -beyond his fellow-creatures, was exercised even upon his old -horses, none of which he would ever permit to be killed or sold. -He allowed the veterans of his stud free range in some parks near -Drumlanrig, where, retired from active life, they got leave to die -decent and natural deaths. Upon his grace’s decease, however, -in 1778, these luckless pensioners were all put up to sale by his -heartless successor; and it was a painful sight to see the feeble -and pampered animals forced by their new masters to drag carts, -&c., till they broke down and died on the roads and in the ditches.</p> - -<p>Duke Charles’s eldest son, Lord Drumlanrig, was altogether -mad. He had contracted himself to one lady when he married -another. The lady who became his wife was a daughter of the -Earl of Hopetoun, and a most amiable woman. He loved her<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_343" id="Page_343">{343}</a></span> -tenderly, as she deserved; but owing to the unfortunate contract -which he had engaged in, they were never happy. They were -often observed in the beautiful pleasure-grounds at Drumlanrig -weeping bitterly together. These hapless circumstances had such -a fatal effect upon him that during a journey to London in 1754 -he rode on before the coach in which the duchess travelled, and -shot himself with one of his own pistols. It was given out that -the pistol had gone off by chance.</p> - -<p>There is just one other tradition of Drumlanrig to be noticed. -The castle, being a very large and roomy mansion, had of course -a ghost, said to be the spirit of a Lady Anne Douglas. This -unhappy phantom used to walk about the house, terrifying everybody, -with her head in one hand and her fan in the other—are -we to suppose, fanning her face?</p> - -<p>On the death of the Good Duke, as he was called, in 1778, the -title and estates devolved on his cousin, the Earl of March, so -well remembered as a sporting character and debauchee of the old -school by the name of <em>Old Q.</em> In his time Queensberry House -was occupied by other persons, for he had little inclination to -spend his time in Scotland. And this brings to mind an anecdote -highly illustrative of the wretchedness of such a life as his. When -professing, towards the close of his days, to be eaten up with -ennui, and incapable of any longer taking an interest in anything, -it was suggested that he might go down to his Scotch estates and -live among his tenantry. ‘I’ve tried that,’ said the <i lang="fr" xml:lang="fr">blasé</i> aristocrat; -‘it is not amusing.’ In 1801 he caused Queensberry House -to be stripped of its ornaments and sold. With fifty-eight fire-rooms, -and a gallery seventy feet long, besides a garden, it was -offered at the surprisingly low upset price of £900. The Government -purchased it for a barrack. Thus has passed away the [home -of the] Douglas of Queensberry from its old place in Edinburgh, -where doubtless the money-making duke thought it would stand -for ever.</p> - -<hr class="chap" /></div><div class="chapter"> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_344" id="Page_344">{344}</a></span></p> - - - - -<h2><a name="TENNIS_COURT" id="TENNIS_COURT">TENNIS COURT.</a></h2> - -<p class="chapter_summary"><strong>Early Theatricals—The Canongate Theatre—Digges and Mrs -Bellamy—A Theatrical Riot.</strong></p> - - -<p>‘Just without the Water-gate,’ says Maitland, ‘on the eastern -side of the street, was the Royal Tennis Court, anciently -called the Catchpel [from Cache, a game since called <em>Fives</em>, and a -favourite amusement in Scotland so early as the reign of James -IV.].’ The house—a long, narrow building with a court—was -burned down in modern times, and rebuilt for workshops. Yet -the place continues to possess some interest as connected with the -early and obscure history of the stage in Scotland, not to speak -of the tennis itself, which was a fashionable amusement in Scotland -in the seventeenth century, and here played by the Duke of York, -Law the financial schemer, and other remarkable persons.</p> - -<p>The first known appearance of the post-reformation theatre in -Edinburgh was in the reign of King James VI., when several -companies came from London, chiefly for the amusement of the -Court, including one to which Shakespeare is known to have -belonged, though his personal attendance cannot be substantiated. -There was no such thing, probably, as a play acted in Edinburgh -from the departure of James in 1603 till the arrival of his grandson, -the Duke of York, in 1680.</p> - -<p>Threatened by the Whig party in the House of Commons with -an exclusion from the throne of England on account of his adherence -to popery, this prince made use of his exile in Scotland -to conciliate the nobles, and attach them to his person. His -beautiful young wife, Mary of Modena, and his second daughter, -the <em>Lady Anne</em>, assisted by giving parties at the palace—where, -by the bye, tea was now first introduced into Scotland. Easy and -obliging in their manners, these ladies revived the entertainment -of the masque, and took parts themselves in the performance. At -length, for his own amusement and that of his friends, James had -some of his own company of players brought down to Holyrood -and established in a little theatre, which was fitted up in the -Tennis Court. On this occasion the remainder of the company -playing at Oxford apologised for the diminution of their strength -in the following lines written by Dryden:</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_345" id="Page_345">{345}</a></span></p> - -<div class="poetry-container"><div class="poetry"><div class="stanza"> -<div class="verse">‘Discord and plots, which have undone our age,</div> -<div class="verse">With the same ruin have o’erwhelmed the stage.</div> -<div class="verse">Our house has suffered in the common woe;</div> -<div class="verse">We have been troubled with Scots rebels too.</div> -<div class="verse">Our brethren have from Thames to Tweed departed,</div> -<div class="verse">And of our sisters, all the kinder-hearted</div> -<div class="verse">To Edinburgh gone, or coached or carted.</div> -<div class="verse">With bonny <em>Blew cap</em> there they act all night,</div> -<div class="verse">For Scotch half-crowns—in English threepence hight.</div> -<div class="verse">One nymph to whom fat Sir John Falstaff’s lean,</div> -<div class="verse">There, with her single person, fills the scene.</div> -<div class="verse">Another, with long use and age decayed,</div> -<div class="verse">Died here old woman, and there rose a maid.</div> -<div class="verse">Our trusty door-keeper, of former time,</div> -<div class="verse">There struts and swaggers in heroic rhyme.</div> -<div class="verse">Tack but a copper lace to drugget suit,</div> -<div class="verse">And there’s a hero made without dispute;</div> -<div class="verse">And that which was a capon’s tail before,</div> -<div class="verse">Becomes a plume for Indian emperor.</div> -<div class="verse">But all his subjects, to express the care</div> -<div class="verse">Of imitation, go like Indians bare.</div> -<div class="verse">Laced linen there would be a dangerous thing,</div> -<div class="verse">It might perhaps a new rebellion bring;</div> -<div class="verse">The Scot who wore it would be chosen king.’</div> -</div></div></div> - -<p>We learn from Fountainhall’s <cite>Diary</cite> that on the celebration of -the king’s birthday, 1681, the duke honoured the magistrates of -the city with his presence in the theatre—namely, this theatre in -the Tennis Court.</p> - -<p>No further glimpse of our city’s theatrical history is obtained till -1705, when we find a Mr Abel announcing a concert in the Tennis -Court, under the patronage of the Duke of Argyll, then acting as -the queen’s commissioner to the Parliament. It is probable that -the concert was only a cloak to some theatrical representation. -This is the more likely from a tradition already mentioned of -some old members of the Spendthrift Club who once frequented -the tavern of a Mrs Hamilton, whose husband recollected having -attended the theatre in the Tennis Court at Holyrood House, -when the play was <cite>The Spanish Friar</cite>, and many members of the -Union Parliament were present in the house.</p> - -<p>Theatrical amusements appear to have been continued at the -Tennis Court in the year 1710, if we are to place any reliance -upon the following anecdote: When Mrs Siddons came to Edinburgh -in 1784, the late Mr Alexander Campbell, author of the -<cite>History of Scottish Poetry</cite>, asked Miss Pitcairn, daughter of Dr -Pitcairn, to accompany him to one of the representations. The -old lady refused, saying with coquettish vivacity: ‘Laddie, wad -ye ha’e an auld lass like me to be running after the play-actors—me<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_346" id="Page_346">{346}</a></span> -that hasna been at a theatre since I gaed wi’ papa to the -Canongate in the year <em>ten</em>?’ The theatre was in those days -encouraged chiefly by such Jacobites as Dr Pitcairn. It was -denounced by the clergy as a hotbed of vice and profanity.</p> - -<p>After this we hear no more of the theatre in the Tennis Court. -The next place where the drama set up its head was in a house in -Carrubber’s Close, under the management of an Italian lady styled -Signora Violante, who paid two visits to Edinburgh. After her -came, in 1726, one Tony Alston, who set up his scenes in the same -house, and whose first prologue was written by Ramsay: it may -be found in the works of that poet. In 1727 the Society of High -Constables, of which Ramsay was then a member, endeavoured to -‘suppress the abominable stage-plays lately set up by Anthony -Alston.’<a name="FNanchor_263" id="FNanchor_263"></a><a href="#Footnote_263" class="fnanchor">[263]</a> Mr Alston played for a season or two, under the -fulminations of the clergy and a prosecution on their part in the -Court of Session.</p> - - -<h3>CANONGATE THEATRE.</h3> - -<p>From a period subsequent to 1727 till after the year 1753, -the Tailors’ Hall in the Cowgate<a name="FNanchor_264" id="FNanchor_264"></a><a href="#Footnote_264" class="fnanchor">[264]</a> was used as a theatre by -itinerating companies, who met with some success notwithstanding -the incessant hostility of the clergy.<a name="FNanchor_265" id="FNanchor_265"></a><a href="#Footnote_265" class="fnanchor">[265]</a> It was a house which in<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_347" id="Page_347">{347}</a></span> -theatrical phrase, could hold from £40 to £45. A split in the -company here concerned led to the erection, in 1746-7, of a -theatre at the bottom of a close in the Canongate, nearly opposite -to the head of New Street. This house, capable of holding about -£70—the boxes being half-a-crown and pit one and sixpence—was -for several years the scene of good acting under Lee, Digges, -Mrs Bellamy, and Mrs Ward. We learn from Henry Mackenzie -that the tragedy of -<cite>Douglas</cite>, which first -appeared here in -1756, was most respectably -acted—the -two ladies above -mentioned playing -respectively Young -Norval and Lady -Randolph.<a name="FNanchor_266" id="FNanchor_266"></a><a href="#Footnote_266" class="fnanchor">[266]</a> The -personal elegance of -Digges—understood -to be the natural -son of a man of rank—and -the beauty of -Mrs Bellamy were -a theme of interest -amongst old people -fifty years ago; but -their scandalous life<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_348" id="Page_348">{348}</a></span> -was of course regarded with horror by the mass of respectable -society. They lived in a small country-house at Bonnington, -between Edinburgh and Leith. It is remembered that Mrs Bellamy -was extremely fond of singing-birds, and kept many about her. -When emigrating to Glasgow, she had her feathered favourites -carried by a porter all the way that they might not suffer from -the jolting of a carriage. Scotch people wondered to hear of ten -guineas being expended on this occasion. Persons under the social -ban for their irregular lives often win the love of individuals by -their benevolence and sweetness of disposition—qualities, it is -remarked, not unlikely to have been partly concerned in their first -trespasses. This was the case with Mrs Bellamy. Her waiting-maid, -Annie Waterstone, who is mentioned in her <cite>Memoirs</cite>, lived -many years after in Edinburgh, and continued to the last to adore -the memory of her mistress. Nay, she was, from this cause, a -zealous friend of all kinds of players, and never would allow a -slighting remark upon them to pass unreproved. It was curious -to find in a poor old Scotchwoman of the humbler class such a -sympathy with the follies and eccentricities of the children of -Thespis.</p> - -<div class="figcenter w375"> -<img src="images/illus_p_347.jpg" width="375" height="587" alt="" /> -<div class="caption"><p class="center">Tailors’ Hall, Cowgate.</p></div> -</div> - -<p>While under the temporary management of two Edinburgh -citizens extremely ill-qualified for the charge—one of them, by the -bye, a Mr David Beatt, who had read the rebel proclamations from -the Cross in 1745—a sad accident befell the Canongate playhouse. -Dissensions of a dire kind had broken out in the company. The -public, as usual, was divided between them. Two classes of persons—the -gentlemen of the bar and the students of the university<a name="FNanchor_267" id="FNanchor_267"></a><a href="#Footnote_267" class="fnanchor">[267]</a>—were -especially zealous as partisans. Things were at that pass -when a trivial incident will precipitate them to the most fearful -conclusion. One night, when <cite>Hamlet</cite> was the play, a riot took -place of so desperate a description that at length the house was -set on fire. It being now necessary for the authorities to interfere, -the Town-guard was called forth, and marched to the scene of -disturbance; but though many of that veteran corps had faced the -worst at Blenheim and Dettingen, they felt it as a totally different -thing to be brought to action in a place which they regarded as a -peculiar domain of the Father of Evil. When ordered, therefore, -by their commander to advance into the house and across the stage,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_349" id="Page_349">{349}</a></span> -the poor fellows fairly stopped short amidst the scenes, the glaring -colours of which at once surprised and terrified them. Indignant -at their pusillanimity, the bold captain seized a musket, and -placing himself in an attitude equal to anything that had -ever appeared on those boards, exclaimed: ‘Now, my lads, -follow <em>me</em>!’ But just at the moment that he was going to -rush on and charge the rioters, a trap-door on which he -trod gave way, and in an instant the -heroic leader had sunk out of sight, as -if by magic. This was too much for -the excited nerves of the guard; they -immediately vacated the house, leaving -the devil to make his own of it; and -accordingly it was completely destroyed. -It is added that when the captain by-and-by -reappeared, they received him -in the quality of a gentleman from the -other world; nor could they all at -once be undeceived, even when he -cursed them in vigorous Gaelic for a -pack of cowardly scoundrels.</p> - -<div class="figcenter w175"> -<img src="images/illus_p_349.jpg" width="175" height="450" alt="" /> -<div class="caption"><p class="center">Old Playhouse Close.</p></div> -</div> - -<p>The Canongate theatre revived for -a short time, and had the honour to -be the first house in our city in which -the drama was acted with a license. -It was opened with this privilege by -Mr Ross on the 9th December 1767, -when the play was <cite>The Earl of Essex</cite>, -and a general prologue was spoken, -the composition of James Boswell. -Soon after, being deserted for the -present building in the New Town,<a name="FNanchor_268" id="FNanchor_268"></a><a href="#Footnote_268" class="fnanchor">[268]</a> it -fell into ruin; in which state it formed -the subject of a mock elegy to the -muse of Robert Fergusson. The -reader will perhaps be amused with the following extract from that -poem:</p> - -<div class="poetry-container"><div class="poetry"><div class="stanza"> -<div class="verse">‘Can I contemplate on those dreary scenes</div> -<div class="verse">Of mouldering desolation, and forbid</div> -<div class="verse">The voice elegiac, and the falling tear!</div> -<div class="verse">No more from box to box the basket, piled</div><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_350" id="Page_350">{350}</a></span> -<div class="verse">With oranges as radiant as the spheres,</div> -<div class="verse">Shall with their luscious virtues charm the sense</div> -<div class="verse">Of taste or smell. No more the gaudy beau,</div> -<div class="verse">With handkerchief in lavender well drenched,</div> -<div class="verse">Or bergamot, or [in] rose-waters pure,</div> -<div class="verse">With flavoriferous sweets shall chase away</div> -<div class="verse">The pestilential fumes of vulgar cits,</div> -<div class="verse">Who, in impatience for the curtain’s rise,</div> -<div class="verse">Amused the lingering moments, and applied</div> -<div class="verse">Thirst-quenching porter to their parched lips.</div> -<div class="verse">Alas! how sadly altered is the scene!</div> -<div class="verse">For lo! those sacred walls, that late were brushed</div> -<div class="verse">By rustling silks and waving capuchines,</div> -<div class="verse">Are now become the sport of wrinkled Time!</div> -<div class="verse">Those walls that late have echoed to the voice</div> -<div class="verse">Of stern King Richard, to the seat transformed</div> -<div class="verse">Of crawling spiders and detested moths,</div> -<div class="verse">Who in the lonely crevices reside,</div> -<div class="verse">Or gender in the beams, that have upheld</div> -<div class="verse">Gods, demigods, and all the joyous crew</div> -<div class="verse">Of thunderers in the galleries above.’</div> -</div></div></div> -<hr class="chap" /></div><div class="chapter"> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_351" id="Page_351">{351}</a></span></p> - - - -<h2><a name="MARIONVILLE_STORY_OF_CAPTAIN_MACRAE" id="MARIONVILLE_STORY_OF_CAPTAIN_MACRAE">MARIONVILLE—STORY OF CAPTAIN MACRAE.</a></h2> - - -<div class="figcenter w375"> -<img src="images/illus_p_351.jpg" width="375" height="239" alt="" /> -<div class="caption"><p class="center">Marionville.</p></div> -</div> - -<p>Between the eastern suburbs of Edinburgh and the village -of Restalrig stands a solitary house named Marionville, -enclosed in a shrubbery of no great extent, surrounded by high -walls. Whether it be that the place has become dismal in consequence -of the rise of a noxious fen in its neighbourhood, -or that the tale connected with it acts upon the -imagination, I cannot pretend -to decide, but unquestionably -there is about the house an -air of depression and melancholy -such as could scarcely -fail to strike the most unobservant -passenger. Yet, in -1790, this mansion was the -abode of a gay and fashionable -family, who, amongst -other amusements, indulged in -that of private theatricals, and -in this line were so highly successful that admission to the Marionville -theatre became a privilege for which the highest in the land -would contend. Mr Macrae, the head of this family, was a man -of good fortune, being the proprietor of an estate in Dumfriesshire, -and also of good connections—the Earl of Glencairn, whom Burns -has so much celebrated, being his cousin, while by his mother he -was nearly related to Viscount Fermoy and the celebrated Sir -Boyle Roche. He had been for some years retired from the Irish -Carabiniers, and being still in the prime of life, he was thinking of -again entering the army, when the incident which I am about to -relate took place. He was a man of gentlemanlike accomplishments -and manners, of a generous and friendly disposition, but marked -by a keen and imperious sense of the deference due to a gentleman, -and a heat of temper which was apt to make him commit actions -of which he afterwards bitterly repented. After the unfortunate -affair which ended his career in Scotland, the public, who never -make nice distinctions as to the character of individuals, adopted -the idea that he was as inhumane as rash, and he was reported to<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_352" id="Page_352">{352}</a></span> -be an experienced duellist. But here he was greatly misrepresented. -Mr Macrae would have shrunk from a deliberate act of cruelty; -and the only connection he had ever had with single combat was -in the way of endeavouring to reconcile friends who had quarrelled—an -object in which he was successful on several memorable -occasions. But the same man—whom all that really knew him -allowed to be a delightful companion and kind-hearted man—was -liable to be transported beyond the bounds of reason by casual and -trivial occurrences. A messenger of the law having arrested the -Rev. Mr Cunningham, brother of the Earl of Glencairn, for debt, -as he was passing with a party from the drawing-room to the -dining-room at Drumsheugh House, Mr Macrae threw the man -over the stair. He was prompted to this act by indignation at the -affront which he conceived his cousin, as a gentleman, had received -from a common man. But soon after, when it was represented to -him that every other means of inducing Mr Cunningham to settle -his debt had failed, and when he learned that the messenger had -suffered severe injury, he went to him, made him a hearty apology, -and agreed to pay three hundred guineas by way of compensation. -He had himself allowed a debt due to a tailor to remain too long -unpaid, and the consequence was that he received a summons for -it before the sheriff-court. With this document in his hand, he -called, in a state of great excitement, upon his law-agent, to whom -he began to read: ‘Archibald Cockburn of Cockpen, sheriff-depute,’ -&c., till he came to a passage which declared that ‘he, the said -James Macrae, had been oft and diverse times desired and required,’ -&c. ‘The greatest lie ever uttered!’ he exclaimed. ‘He had -never heard a word of it before; he would instantly go to the -sheriff and horsewhip him.’ The agent had at the time letters of -<em>horning</em> against a very worthy baronet lying upon his table—that -is to say, a document in which the baronet was denounced as a -rebel to the king, according to a form of the law of Scotland, for -failing to pay his debt. The agent took up this, and coolly began -to read: ‘George III. by the grace of God,’ &c. Macrae at once -saw the application, and fell a-laughing at his own folly, saying he -would go directly and give the sheriff tickets for the play at -Marionville, which he and his family requested. It will be seen -that the fault of this unfortunate gentleman was heat of temper, -not a savage disposition; but what fault can be more fatal than -heat of temper?</p> - -<p>Mr Macrae was married to an accomplished lady, Maria Cecilia -le Maitre, daughter of the Baroness Nolken, wife of the Swedish<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_353" id="Page_353">{353}</a></span> -ambassador. They occasionally resided in Paris, with Mrs Macrae’s -relations, particularly with her cousin, Madame de la Briche, whose -private theatricals in her elegant house at the Marais were the -models of those afterwards instituted at Marionville. It may not -be unworthy of notice that amongst their fellow-performers at -Madame de la Briche’s was the celebrated Abbé Sieyès. When -Mr Macrae and his lady set up their theatre at Marionville, they -both took characters, he appearing to advantage in such parts as -that of Dionysius in the <cite>Grecian Daughter</cite>, and she in the first line -of female parts in genteel comedy. Sir David Kinloch and a Mr -Justice were their best male associates; and the chief female -performer, after Mrs Macrae herself, was Mrs Carruthers of Dormont, -a daughter of the celebrated artist Paul Sandby. When all due -deduction is made for the effects of complaisance, there seems to -remain undoubted testimony that these performances involved no -small amount of talent.</p> - -<p>In Mr and Mrs Macrae’s circle of visiting acquaintance, and -frequent spectators of the Marionville theatricals, were Sir George -Ramsay of Bamff and his lady. Sir George had recently returned, -with an addition to his fortune, from India, and was now settling -himself down for the remainder of life in his native country. I -have seen original letters between the two families, showing that -they lived on the most friendly terms and entertained the highest -esteem for each other. One written by Lady Ramsay to Mrs -Macrae, from Sir George’s country-seat in Perthshire, commences -thus: ‘My dear friend, I have just time to write you a few lines -to say how much I long to hear from you, and to assure you how -sincerely I love you.’ Her ladyship adds: ‘I am now enjoying -rural retirement with Sir George, who is really so good and -indulgent, that I am as happy as the gayest scenes could make me. -He joins me in kind compliments to you and Mr Macrae,’ &c. -How deplorable that social affections, which contribute so much -to make life pass agreeably, should be liable to a wild upbreak -from perhaps some trivial cause, not in itself worthy of a moment’s -regard, and only rendered of consequence by the sensitiveness of -pride and a deference to false and worldly maxims!</p> - -<p>The source of the quarrel between Mr Macrae and Sir George -was of a kind almost too mean and ridiculous to be spoken of. -On the evening of the 7th April 1790, the former gentleman -handed a lady out of the Edinburgh theatre, and endeavoured to -get a chair for her, in which she might be conveyed home. Seeing -two men approaching through the crowd with one, he called to ask<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_354" id="Page_354">{354}</a></span> -if it was disengaged, to which the men replied with a distinct -affirmative. As Mr Macrae handed the lady forward to put her -into it, a footman, in a violent manner, seized hold of one of the -poles, and insisted that it was engaged for his mistress. The man -seemed disordered by liquor, and it was afterwards distinctly made -manifest that he was acting without the guidance of reason. His -lady had gone home some time before, while he was out of the way. -He was not aware of this, and, under a confused sense of duty, he -was now eager to obtain a chair for her, but in reality had not -bespoken that upon which he laid hold. Mr Macrae, annoyed at -the man’s pertinacity at such a moment, rapped him over the -knuckles with a short cane to make him give way; on which the -servant called him a scoundrel, and gave him a push on the breast. -Incensed overmuch by this conduct, Mr Macrae struck him smartly -over the head with his cane, on which the man cried out worse than -before, and moved off. Mr Macrae, following him, repeated his -blows two or three times, but only with that degree of force which -he thought needful for a chastisement. In the meantime the lady -whom Mr Macrae had handed out got into a different chair, and -was carried off. Some of the bystanders, seeing a gentleman beating -a servant, cried shame, and showed a disposition to take part with -the latter; but there were individuals present who had observed -all the circumstances, and who felt differently. One gentleman -afterwards gave evidence that he had been insulted by the servant, -at an earlier period of the evening, in precisely the same manner -as Mr Macrae, and that the man’s conduct had throughout been -rude and insolent, a consequence apparently of drunkenness.</p> - -<p>Learning that the servant was in the employment of Lady -Ramsay, Mr Macrae came into town next day, full of anxiety -to obviate any unpleasant impression which the incident might -have made upon her mind. Meeting Sir George in the street, he -expressed to him his concern on the subject, when Sir George said -lightly that the man being his lady’s footman, he did not feel any -concern in the matter. Mr Macrae then went to apologise to Lady -Ramsay, whom he found sitting for her portrait in the lodgings of -the young artist Raeburn, afterwards so highly distinguished. It -has been said that he fell on his knees before the lady to entreat -her pardon for what he had done to her servant. Certainly he left -her with the impression that he had no reason to expect a quarrel -between himself and Sir George on account of what had taken -place.</p> - -<p>James Merry—this was the servant’s name—had been wounded<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_355" id="Page_355">{355}</a></span> -in the head, but not severely. The injuries which he had sustained—though -nothing can justify the violence which inflicted -them—were only of such a nature as a few days of confinement -would have healed. Such, indeed, was the express testimony -given by his medical attendant, Mr Benjamin Bell. There was, -however, a strong feeling amongst his class against Macrae, who -was informed, in an anonymous letter, that a hundred and seven -men-servants had agreed to have some revenge upon him. Merry -himself had determined to institute legal proceedings against Mr -Macrae for the recovery of damages. A process was commenced -by the issue of a summons, which Mr Macrae received on the 12th. -Wounded to the quick by this procedure, and smarting under the -insolence of the anonymous letter, Mr Macrae wrote next day a -note to Sir George Ramsay, in which, addressing him without any -term of friendly regard, he demanded that either Merry should -drop the prosecution or that his master should turn him off. Sir -George temperately replied ‘that he had only now heard of the -prosecution for the first time; that the man met with no encouragement -from him; and that he hoped that Mr Macrae, on further -consideration, would not think it incumbent on him to interfere, -especially as the man was at present far from being well.’</p> - -<p>On the same evening Mr Amory, a military friend of Mr -Macrae, called upon Sir George with a second note from that -gentleman, once more insisting on the man being turned off, and -stating that in the event of his refusal Mr Amory was empowered -to communicate his opinion of his conduct. Sir George did -refuse, on the plea that he had yet seen no good reason for his -discharging the servant; and Mr Amory then said it was his duty -to convey Mr Macrae’s opinion, which was ‘that Sir George’s -conduct had not been that of a gentleman.’ Sir George then -said that further conversation was unnecessary; all that remained -was to agree upon a place of meeting. They met again that -evening at a tavern, where Mr Amory informed Sir George that -it was Mr Macrae’s wish that they should meet, properly attended, -next day at twelve o’clock at Ward’s Inn, on the borders of -Musselburgh Links.</p> - -<p>The parties met there accordingly, Mr Macrae being attended -by Captain Amory, and Sir George Ramsay by Sir William -Maxwell; Mr Benjamin Bell, the surgeon, being also of the party. -Mr Macrae had brought an additional friend, a Captain Haig, to -favour them with his advice, but not to act formally as a second. -The two parties being in different rooms, Sir William Maxwell<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_356" id="Page_356">{356}</a></span> -came into that occupied by Mr Macrae, and proposed that if Mr -Macrae would apologise for the intemperate style of his letters -demanding the discharge of the servant, Sir George would grant -his request, and the affair would end. Mr Macrae answered that -he would be most happy to comply with this proposal if his -friends thought it proper; but he must abide by their decision. -The question being put to Captain Haig, he answered, in a -deliberate manner: ‘It is altogether impossible; Sir George must, -in the first place, turn off his servant, and Mr Macrae will then -apologise.’ Hearing this speech, equally marked by wrong -judgment and wrong feeling, Macrae, according to the testimony -of Mr Bell, shed tears of anguish. The parties then walked to -the beach, and took their places in the usual manner. On the -word being given, Sir George took deliberate aim at Macrae, the -neck of whose coat was grazed by his bullet. Macrae had, if his -own solemn asseveration is to be believed, intended to fire in the -air; but when he found Sir George aiming thus at his life, he -altered his resolution, and brought his antagonist to the ground -with a mortal wound in the body.</p> - -<p>There was the usual consternation and unspeakable distress. -Mr Macrae went up to Sir George and ‘told him that he was -sincerely afflicted at seeing him in that situation.’<a name="FNanchor_269" id="FNanchor_269"></a><a href="#Footnote_269" class="fnanchor">[269]</a> It was with -difficulty, and only at the urgent request of Sir William Maxwell, -that he could be induced to quit the field. Sir George lingered -for two days. The event occasioned a great sensation in the -public mind, and a very unfavourable view was generally taken of -Mr Macrae’s conduct. It was given out that during a considerable -interval, while in expectation of the duel taking place, he -had practised pistol-shooting in his garden at a barber’s block; -and he was also said to have been provided with a pair of pistols -of a singularly apt and deadly character; the truth being that -the interval was a brief one, his hand totally unskilled in shooting, -and the pistols a bad brass-mounted pair, hastily furnished by -Amory. We have Amory’s testimony that as they were pursuing -their journey to another country, he was constantly bewailing the -fate of Sir George Ramsay, remarking how unfortunate it was -that he took so obstinate a view about the servant’s case. The -demand, he said, was one which he would have thought it -necessary to comply with. He had asked Sir George nothing but -what he would have done had it been his own case. This is so -consonant with what appears otherwise respecting his character<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_357" id="Page_357">{357}</a></span> -that we cannot doubt it. It is only to be lamented that he should -not have made the demand in terms more calculated to lead to -compliance.</p> - -<p>The death of an amiable man under such deplorable circumstances -roused the most zealous vigilance on the part of the law -authorities; but Mr Macrae and his second succeeded in reaching -France. A summons was issued for his trial, but he was advised -not to appear, and accordingly sentence of outlawry was passed -against him. The servant’s prosecution meanwhile went on, and -was ultimately decided against Mr Macrae, although, on a cool -perusal of the evidence on both sides, there appears to me the -clearest proof of Merry having been the first aggressor. Mr -Macrae lived in France till the progress of the Revolution forced -him to go to Altona. When time seemed to have a little softened -matters against him, he took steps to ascertain if he could safely -return to his native country. It was decided by counsel that he -could not. They held that his case entirely wanted the extenuating -circumstance which was necessary—his having to contemplate -degradation if he did not challenge. He was under no such -danger; so that, from his letters to Sir George Ramsay, he -appeared to have forced on the duel purely for revenge. He came -to see the case in this light himself, and was obliged to make up -his mind to perpetual self-banishment. He survived thirty years. -A gentleman of my acquaintance, who had known him in early life in -Scotland, was surprised to meet him one day in a Parisian coffee-house -after the peace of 1814—the wreck or ghost of the handsome, -sprightly man he had once been. The comfort of his home, -his country, and friends, the use of his talents to all these, had -been lost, and himself obliged to lead the life of a condemned -Cain, all through the one fault of a fiery temper.</p> - -<hr class="chap" /></div><div class="chapter"> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_358" id="Page_358">{358}</a></span></p> - - - - -<h2><a name="ALISON_SQUARE" id="ALISON_SQUARE">ALISON SQUARE.</a></h2> - - -<p>This is a large mass of building between Nicolson Square and -the Potterrow, in the south side of the town. It was built -about the middle of the eighteenth century, upon venture, by one -Colin Alison, a joiner, who in after-life was much reduced in his -circumstances, not improbably in consequence of this large speculation. -In his last days he spent some of his few remaining -shillings in the erection of two boards, at different parts of his -buildings, whereon was represented a globe in the act of falling, -with this inscription:</p> - -<div class="poetry-container"><div class="poetry"><div class="stanza"> -<div class="verse">‘If Fortune smile, be not puffed up,</div> -<div class="verse">And if it frown, be not dismayed;</div> -<div class="verse">For Providence governeth all,</div> -<div class="verse">Although the world’s turned upside down.’</div> -</div></div></div> - -<p>Alison Square<a name="FNanchor_270" id="FNanchor_270"></a><a href="#Footnote_270" class="fnanchor">[270]</a> has enjoyed some little connection with the -Scottish muses. It was in the house of a Miss Nimmo in this -place that Burns met Clarinda. It would amuse the reader of -the ardent letters which passed between these two kindred souls -to visit the plain, small, dusky house in which the lady lived at -that time, and where she received several visits of the poet. It is -situated in the adjacent humble street called the Potterrow, the -first floor over the passage into General’s Entry, accessible by a -narrow spiral stair from the court. A little parlour, a bedroom, -and a kitchen constituted the accommodations of Mrs M’Lehose; -now the residence of two, if not three, families in the extreme of -humble life. Here she lived with a couple of infant children, a -young and beautiful woman, blighted in her prospects in consequence -of an unhappy marriage (her husband having deserted her, -after using her barbarously), yet cheerful and buoyant, through -constitutional good spirits and a rational piety. To understand -her friendship with Burns and the meaning of their correspondence, -it was almost necessary to have known the woman. Seeing -her and hearing her converse, even in advanced life, one could -penetrate the whole mystery very readily, in appreciating a spirit<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_359" id="Page_359">{359}</a></span> -unusually gay, frank, and emotional. The perfect innocence of the -woman’s nature was evident at once; and by her friends it was -never doubted.</p> - -<div class="figcenter w500"> -<a id="illus_c_028"></a> -<img src="images/illus_c_028.jpg" width="500" height="645" alt="" /> -<div class="caption"><p class="center">ALISON SQUARE.</p> - -<p class="right"> -<span class="smcap"><a href="#Page_358">Page 358.</a></span> -</p></div> -</div> - -<p>In Alison Square Thomas Campbell lived while composing his -<cite>Pleasures of Hope</cite>. The place where any deathless composition -took its shape from the author’s brain is worthy of a place in the -chart. A lady, the early friend of Campbell and his family, -indicates their residence at that time as being the second door in -the stair, entered from the east side, on the north side of the arch, -the windows looking partly into Nicolson Square and partly to the -Potterrow. The same authority states that much of the poem was -written in the middle of the night, and from a sad cause. The -poet’s mother, it seems, was of a temper so extremely irritable -that her family had no rest till she retired for the night. It was -only at that season that the young poet could command repose of -mind for his task.</p> - - -<hr class="chap" /></div><div class="chapter"> -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_360" id="Page_360">{360}</a></span></p> - -<div class="figcenter w450"> -<img src="images/illus_p_360.jpg" width="450" height="213" alt="" /> -</div> - - -<h2><a name="LEITH_WALK" id="LEITH_WALK">LEITH WALK.</a></h2> - - -<p>Up to the period of the building of the North Bridge, which -connects the Old with the New Town of Edinburgh, the -Easter Road was the principal passage to Leith. The origin of -Leith Walk was accidental. At the approach of Cromwell to -Edinburgh, immediately before the battle of Dunbar, Leslie, the -Covenanting general, arranged the Scottish troops in a line, the -right wing of which rested upon the Calton Hill, and the left -upon Leith, being designed for the defence of these towns. A -battery was erected at each extremity, and the line was itself -defended by a trench and a mound, the latter composed of the -earth dug from the former. Leslie himself took up his head-quarters -at Broughton, whence some of his despatches are dated. -When the war was shifted to another quarter, this mound became -a footway between the two towns. It is thus described in a book -published in 1748: ‘A very handsome gravel walk, twenty feet -broad, which is kept in good repair at the public charge, and no -horses suffered to come upon it.’ When Provost Drummond built -the North Bridge in 1769, he contemplated that it should become -an access to Leith as well as to the projected New Town. -Indeed, he seems to have been obliged to make it pass altogether -under that semblance in order to conciliate the people; for upon -the plate sunk under the foundations of the bridge it is solely -described as the opening of a road to Leith. At that time the -idea of a New Town seemed so chimerical that he scarcely dared<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_361" id="Page_361">{361}</a></span> -to avow his patriotic intentions. After the opening of the bridge, -the <em>Walk</em> seems to have become used by carriages, but without -any regard being paid to its condition or any system established -for keeping it in repair. It consequently fell into a state of -disorder, from which it was not rescued till after the commencement -of the present century, when a splendid causeway was formed -at a great expense by the city of Edinburgh, and a toll erected for -its payment.</p> - -<p>One terrible peculiarity attended Leith Walk in its former -condition. It was overhung by a gibbet, from which were suspended -all culprits whose bodies at condemnation were sentenced -to be hung in chains. The place where this gibbet stood, called -the Gallow Lee, is now a good deal altered in appearance. It was -a slight rising ground immediately above the site of the toll<a name="FNanchor_271" id="FNanchor_271"></a><a href="#Footnote_271" class="fnanchor">[271]</a> and -on the west side of the road, being now partly enclosed by the -precincts of a villa, where the beautiful Duchess of Gordon once -lived. The greater part of the Gallow Lee now exists in the -shape of mortar in the walls of the houses of the New Town. At -the time when that elegant city was built, the proprietor of this -redoubtable piece of ground, finding it composed of excellent sand, -sold it all away to the builders, to be converted into mortar, so -that it soon, from a rising ground, became a deep hollow. An -amusing anecdote is told in connection with this fact. The -honest man, it seems, was himself fully as much of a sand-bed -as his property. He was a big, voluminous man, one of those -persons upon whom drink never seems to have any effect. It is -related that every day, while the carts were taking away his sand, -he stood regularly at the place receiving the money in return, and -every little sum he got was immediately converted into liquor and -applied to the comfort of his inner man. A public-house was at -length erected at the spot for his particular behoof; and, assuredly, -as long as the Gallow Lee lasted this house did not want custom. -Perhaps, familiar as the reader may be with stories of sots who -have drunk away their last acre, he never before heard of the thing -being done in so literal a manner.</p> - -<p>If my reader be an inhabitant of Edinburgh of any standing, -he must have many delightful associations of Leith Walk in -connection with his childhood. Of all the streets in Edinburgh -or Leith, the <em>Walk</em> in former times was certainly the street for -boys and girls. From top to bottom, it was a scene of wonders<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_362" id="Page_362">{362}</a></span> -and enjoyments peculiarly devoted to children. Besides the -panoramas and caravan-shows, which were comparatively transient -spectacles, there were several shows upon Leith Walk, which -might be considered as regular fixtures and part of the <em>country-cousin -sights</em> of Edinburgh. Who can forget the waxworks of -‘Mrs Sands, widow of the late G. Sands,’ which occupied a <em>laigh</em> -shop opposite to the present Haddington Place, and at the door -of which, besides various parrots and sundry birds of Paradise, sat -the wax figure of a little man in the dress of a French courtier of -the <i lang="fr" xml:lang="fr">ancien régime</i>, reading one eternal copy of the <cite>Edinburgh -Advertiser</cite>? The very outsides of these wonder-shops was an -immense treat; all along the Walk it was one delicious scene of -squirrels hung out at doors, and monkeys dressed like soldiers and -sailors, with holes behind where their tails came through. Even -the half-penniless boy might here get his appetite for wonders to -some extent gratified.</p> - -<p>Besides being of old the chosen place for shows, Leith Walk -was the Rialto of <em>objects</em>. This word requires explanation. It is -applied by the people of Scotland to persons who have been born -with or overtaken by some miserable personal evil. From one -end to the other, Leith Walk was garrisoned by poor creatures -under these circumstances, who, from handbarrows, wheelbarrows, -or iron legs, if peradventure they possessed such adjuncts, entreated -the passengers for charity—some by voices of song, some by -speech, some by driddling, as Burns calls it, on fiddles or grinding -on hand-organs—indeed, a complete continuous ambuscade against -the pocket. Shows and <em>objects</em> have now alike vanished from -Leith Walk. It is now a plain street, composed of little shops of -the usual suburban appearance, and characterised by nothing -peculiar, except perhaps a certain air of pretension, which is -in some cases abundantly ludicrous. A great number, be it -observed, are mere tiled cottages, which contrive, by means of -lofty fictitious fronts, plastered and painted in a showy manner, to -make up a good appearance towards the street. If there be a -school in one of those receptacles, it is entitled an <em>academy</em>; if -an artisan’s workshop, however humble, it is a <em>manufactory</em>. -Everything about it is still showy and unsubstantial; it is still, in -some measure, the type of what it formerly was.</p> - -<p>Near the bottom of Leith Walk is a row of somewhat old-fashioned -houses bearing the name of Springfield. A large one, -the second from the top, was, ninety years ago, the residence of -Mr M’Culloch of Ardwell, a commissioner of customs, and noted<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_363" id="Page_363">{363}</a></span> -as a man of pleasantry and wit. Here, in some of the last years -of his life, did Samuel Foote occasionally appear as Mr M’Culloch’s -guest—<i lang="la" xml:lang="la">Arcades ambo et respondere parati</i>. But the history of -their intimacy is worthy of being particularly told; so I transcribe -it from the recollection of a gentleman whose advanced age and -family connections could alone have made us faithfully acquainted -with circumstances so remote from our time.</p> - -<p>In the winter of 1775-6 [more probably that of 1774-5], Mr -M’Culloch visited his country mansion in the stewartry of Kirkcudbright, -in company of a friend named Mouat, in order to be -present at an election. Mr M’Culloch was a man of joyous -temperament and a good deal of wit, and used to amuse his -friends by spouting half-random verses. He and his friend spent -a week or two very pleasantly in the country, and then set out -on their return to Leith; Mr M’Culloch carrying with him his -infant son David, familiarly called <em>Wee Davie</em>, for the purpose -of commencing his education in Edinburgh. To pursue the -narrative of my correspondent: ‘The two travellers got on pretty -well as far as Dumfries; but it was with difficulty, occasioned by -a snowstorm, that they reached Moffat, where they tarried for -the night.</p> - -<p>‘Early on a January morning, the snow having fallen heavily -during the preceding night, they set off in a post-chaise and four -horses to proceed on their perilous journey. Two gentlemen in -their own carriage left the <em>King’s Arms Inn</em> (then kept by James -Little) at the same time. With difficulty the first pair of travellers -reached the top of Erickstane, but farther they could not go. -The parties came out of their carriages, and, aided by their -postillions, they held a consultation as to the prudence of attempting -to proceed down the vale of Tweed. This was considered as -a vain and dangerous attempt, and it was therefore determined -on to return to Moffat. The turning of the carriages having -become a dangerous undertaking, Wee Davie had to be taken out -of the chaise and laid on the snow, wrapped in a blanket, until -the business was accomplished. The parties then went back to -Moffat, arriving there between nine and ten in the morning. Mr -M’Culloch and his friend then learned that, of the two strangers -who had left the inn at the same time, and had since returned, -one was the celebrated Foote, and the other either Ross or Souter, -but which of the two favourite sons of Thalia I cannot remember -at this distant period of time. Let it be kept in mind that -Foote had lost a leg, and walked with difficulty.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_364" id="Page_364">{364}</a></span></p> - -<p>‘Immediately on returning Foote had entered the inn, not in -good-humour, to order breakfast. His carriage stood opposite -the inn door, in order to get the luggage taken off. While this -was going on a paper was placarded on one of the panels. The -wit came out to see how all matters were going on, when, observing -the paper, he in wrath exclaimed: “What rascal has been -placarding his ribaldry on my carriage?” He had patience, -however, to pause and read the following lines:</p> - -<div class="poetry-container"><div class="poetry"><div class="stanza"> -<div class="verse">“While Boreas his flaky storm did guide,</div> -<div class="verse">Deep covering every hill, o’er Tweed and Clyde,</div> -<div class="verse">The north-wind god spied travellers seeking way;</div> -<div class="verse">Sternly he cried: ‘Retrace your steps, I say;</div> -<div class="verse">Let not <em>one foot</em>, ’tis my behest, profane</div> -<div class="verse">The sacred snows which lie on Erickstane.’”</div> -</div></div></div> - -<p>The countenance of our wit now brightened, as he called out, -with an exclamation of surprise: “I should like to know the -fellow who wrote that; for, be he who he may, he’s no mean -hand at an epigram.” Mrs Little, the good but eccentric landlady, -now stepped forward and spoke thus: “Trouth, Maister -Fut, it’s mair than likely that it was our <em>frien’</em> Maister M’Culloch -of Ardwell that did it; it’s weel kent that he’s a poyet; he’s a -guid eneugh sort o’ man, but he never comes here without poyet-teasing -mysel’ or the guidman, or some are or other about the -house. It wud be weel dune if ye wud speak to him.” Ardwell -now came forward, muttering some sort of apology, which Foote -instantly stopped by saying: “My dear sir, an apology is not -necessary; I am fair game for every one, for I take any one for -game when it suits me. You and I must become acquainted, -for I find that we are brother-poets, and that we were this -morning companions in misfortune on ‘the sacred snows of Erickstane.’” -Thus began an intimacy which the sequel will show -turned out to be a lasting one. The two parties now joined at -the breakfast-table, as they did at every other meal for the next -twenty days.</p> - -<div class="figcenter w550"> -<a id="illus_c_029"></a> -<img src="images/illus_c_029.jpg" width="550" height="679" alt="" /> -<div class="caption"><p class="center">DYERS’ CLOSE. -<br />Old houses being demolished to make room for extension of -Heriot Watt College.</p> - -<p class="right"> -<span class="smcap"><a href="#Page_364">Page 364.</a></span> -</p></div> -</div> - -<p>‘Foote remained quiet for a few hours after breakfast, until he -had beat about for game, as he termed it, and he first fixed on -worthy Mrs Little, his hostess. By some occult means he had -managed to get hold of some of the old lady’s habiliments, -particularly a favourite night-cap—provincially, a <em>mutch</em>. After -attiring himself <i lang="fr" xml:lang="fr">à la</i> Mrs Little, he went into the kitchen and -through the house, mimicking the garrulous landlady so very -exactly in giving orders, scolding, &c. that no servant doubted<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_365" id="Page_365">{365}</a></span> -as to its being the mistress <i lang="la" xml:lang="la">in propriâ personâ</i>. This kind of -amusement went on for several days for the benefit of the people -in Moffat. By-and-by the snow allowed the united parties to -advance as far as the Crook, upon Tweed, and here they were -again storm-stayed for ten days. Nevertheless, Foote and his -companion, who was well qualified to support him, never for a -moment flagged in creating merriment or affording the party -amusement of some sort. The snow-cleared away at last, so as -to enable the travellers to reach Edinburgh, and there to end -their journey. The intimacy of Foote and Ardwell did not end -here, but continued until the death of Foote.</p> - -<p>‘After this period Foote several times visited Scotland: he -always in his writings showed himself partial to Scotland and to -the Scotch. On every visit which he afterwards made to the -northern metropolis, he set apart a night or two for a social -meeting with his friend Ardwell, whose family lived in the second -house from the head of that pretty row of houses more than half-way -down Leith Walk, still called Springfield. In the parlour, -on the right-hand side in entering that house, the largest of the -row, Foote, the celebrated wit of the day, has frequently been -associated with many of the Edinburgh and Leith worthies, when -and where he was wont to keep the table in a roar.</p> - -<p>‘The biography of Foote is well known. However, I may -add that Mr Mouat and Mr M’Culloch died much lamented in -the year 1793. David M’Culloch (Wee Davie) died in the year -1824, at Cheltenham, much regretted. For many years he had -resided in India. In consequence of family connection, he became -a familiar visitor at Abbotsford, and a favourite acquaintance of -Sir Walter Scott.<a name="FNanchor_272" id="FNanchor_272"></a><a href="#Footnote_272" class="fnanchor">[272]</a> Mr Lockhart tells us that, next to Tom -Moore, Sir Walter thought him the finest warbler he had ever -heard. He was certainly an exquisitely fine singer of Scotch -songs. Sir Walter Scott never heard him sing until he was far -advanced in life, or until his voice had given way to a long -residence in India. Mr Lockhart also tells us that David -M’Culloch in his youth was an intimate and favourite companion -of Burns, and that the poet hardly ventured to publish many of -his songs until he heard them sung by his friend. I will only -add that the writer of this has more than once heard Burns say -that he never fully knew the beauty of his songs until he heard -them sung by David M’Culloch.’</p> -<hr class="chap" /></div><div class="chapter"> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_366" id="Page_366">{366}</a></span></p> - - - -<h2><a name="GABRIELS_ROAD" id="GABRIELS_ROAD">[GABRIEL’S ROAD.</a></h2> - - -<p>Previous to 1767 the eye of a person perched in a favourable -situation in the Old Town surveyed the whole ground on -which the New Town was afterwards built. Immediately beyond -the North Loch was a range of grass fields called Bearford’s Parks, -from the name of the proprietor, Hepburn of Bearford in East -Lothian. Bounding these on the north, in the line of the subsequent -Princes Street, was a road enclosed by two dry-stone walls, -thence called the Lang Dykes; it was the line by which the -Viscount Dundee rode with his small troop of adherents when -he had ascertained that the Convention was determined to settle -the crown upon the Prince of Orange, and he saw that the only -duty that remained for him was to raise the Highland clans for -King James.<a name="FNanchor_273" id="FNanchor_273"></a><a href="#Footnote_273" class="fnanchor">[273]</a> The main mass of ground, originally rough with -whins and broom, but latterly forming what was called Wood’s -Farm, was crossed obliquely by a road extending between Silvermills, -a rural hamlet on the mill-course of the Leith, and the -passage into the Old Town obtained by the dam of the North -Loch at the bottom of Halkerston’s Wynd. There are still some -traces of this road. You see it leave Silvermills behind West -Cumberland Street. Behind Duke Street, on the west side, the -boundary-wall of the Queen Street Garden is oblique in consequence -of its having passed that way. Finally it terminates in a -short, oblique passage behind the Register House, wherein stood -till lately a tall building containing a famous house of resort, -Ambrose’s Tavern. This short passage bore the name of Gabriel’s -Road, and it was supposed to do so in connection with a remarkable -murder, of which it was the scene.</p> - -<p>The murderer in the case was in truth a man named Robert -Irvine. He was tutor to two boys, sons of Mr Gordon of Ellon. -In consequence of the children having reported some liberties -they saw him take with their mother’s maid, he conceived the -horrible design of murdering them, and did so one day as he -was leading them for a walk along the rough ground where the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_367" id="Page_367">{367}</a></span> -New Town is now situated. The frightful transaction was beheld -from the Castle-hill; he was pursued, taken, and next day but one -hanged by the baron of Broughton, after having his hands hacked -off by the knife with which he had committed the deed. The date -of this off-hand execution was 30th April 1717. Both the date -and the murderer’s name have several times been misstated.<a name="FNanchor_274" id="FNanchor_274"></a><a href="#Footnote_274" class="fnanchor">[274]</a></p> - -<p>Adjacent to this road, about the spot now occupied by the -Royal Bank, stood a small group of houses called Mutrie’s Hill, -some of which professed to furnish curds and cream and fruits in -their seasons, and were on these accounts resorted to by citizens -and their families on summer evenings. One in particular bore -the name of ‘Peace and Plenty.’</p> - -<p>The village of Silvermills, for the sake of which, as an access -to the city, Gabriel’s Road existed, still maintains its place amidst -the streets and crescents of the New Town. It contains a few -houses of a superior cast; but it is a place sadly in want of the -<i lang="la" xml:lang="la">sacer vates</i>. No notice has ever been taken of it in any of the -books regarding Edinburgh, nor has any attempt ever been made -to account for its somewhat piquant name. I shall endeavour -to do so.</p> - -<p>In 1607 silver was found in considerable abundance at Hilderstone, -in Linlithgowshire, on the property of the gentleman who -figures in another part of this volume as Tam o’ the Cowgate. -Thirty-eight barrels of ore were sent to the Mint in the Tower -of London to be tried, and were found to give about twenty-four -ounces of silver for every hundredweight. Expert persons were -placed upon the mine, and mills were erected on the Water of -Leith for the melting and fining of the ore. The sagacious owner -gave the mine the name of <em>God’s Blessing</em>. By-and-by the king -heard of it, and thinking it improper that any such fountain of -wealth should belong to a private person, purchased God’s Blessing -for £5000, that it might be worked upon a larger scale for the -benefit of the public. But somehow, from the time it left the -hands of the original owner, God’s Blessing ceased to be anything -like so fertile as it had been, and in time the king withdrew from -the enterprise a great loser. The Silvermills I conceive to have -been a part of the abandoned plant.<a name="FNanchor_275" id="FNanchor_275"></a><a href="#Footnote_275" class="fnanchor">[275]</a>]</p> -<hr class="chap" /></div><div class="chapter"> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_368" id="Page_368"></a><a name="Page_369" id="Page_369">{369}</a></span></p> - - - -<h2><a name="INDEX" id="INDEX">INDEX.</a></h2> - - -<ul class="index"><li class="ifrst">Abbey Chapel, <a href="#Page_206">206</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Abbey Hill, <a href="#Page_10">10</a>, <a href="#Page_316">316</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Abbey Zett (Yett, Gate), <a href="#Page_257">257</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Abbotsford, <a href="#Page_25">25</a>, <a href="#Page_83">83</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Aberuchil, Lord, <a href="#Page_72">72</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Acheson House, <a href="#Page_313">313</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Acheson, Sir Archibald, of Abercairny, <a href="#Page_314">314</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Actors, Canongate Theatre, <a href="#Page_346">346</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Adam Street, <a href="#Page_187">187</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx"><cite>Advertiser, Edinburgh</cite>, <a href="#Page_5">5</a>, <a href="#Page_49">49</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Advocates’ Library, <a href="#Page_113">113</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Ainslie, Sir Philip, <a href="#Page_300">300</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Airth, Laird of, <a href="#Page_38">38</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Aitchinsoune, Thomas (Cunyie House), <a href="#Page_260">260</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Aldridge, Robert, dancing-master, <a href="#Page_151">151</a>, <a href="#Page_153">153</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Alesse, Alexander, <a href="#Page_240">240</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Alison Square, <a href="#Page_358">358</a>, <a href="#Page_359">359</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Aloetic medicine, an, <a href="#Page_27">27</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Alston, Tony, <a href="#Page_346">346</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Alva, Lord Justice-clerk, <a href="#Page_204">204-208</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Ambrose’s Tavern, <a href="#Page_366">366</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Amory, Captain, <a href="#Page_355">355</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Anchor Close, <a href="#Page_162">162</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Anderson, Samuel, anecdote of, <a href="#Page_305">305</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Anderson’s pills, <a href="#Page_27">27</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Angus, Earl of, <a href="#Page_241">241</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Antemanum Club, <a href="#Page_149">149</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Arbuthnot, Lord, <a href="#Page_307">307</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Ardwell, residence of M’Culloch of, <a href="#Page_362">362</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Argyll, <a href="#Page_15">15</a>, <a href="#Page_51">51</a>, <a href="#Page_156">156</a>, <a href="#Page_175">175</a>, <a href="#Page_234">234</a>, <a href="#Page_307">307</a>, <a href="#Page_308">308</a>, <a href="#Page_345">345</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Arnot, Hugo, <a href="#Page_4">4</a>, <a href="#Page_12">12</a>, <a href="#Page_36">36</a>, <a href="#Page_46">46</a>, <a href="#Page_49">49</a>, <a href="#Page_171">171</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Arran, Earl of, <a href="#Page_241">241</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Arrot, Dr, <a href="#Page_10">10</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Assemblies, <a href="#Page_3">3</a>, <a href="#Page_14">14</a>, <a href="#Page_44">44</a>, <a href="#Page_265">265</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Assembly Close, <a href="#Page_59">59</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Assembly Rooms, <a href="#Page_43">43</a>, <a href="#Page_46">46</a>, <a href="#Page_195">195</a>, <a href="#Page_233">233</a>, <a href="#Page_253">253</a>, <a href="#Page_265">265</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx"><cite>Assembly, The</cite>, a play by Dr Pitcairn, <a href="#Page_310">310</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Auchans House, Dr Johnson at, <a href="#Page_197">197</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Auld Reekie, <a href="#Page_138">138</a>, <a href="#Page_152">152</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx"><cite>Auld Robin Gray</cite>, author of, <a href="#Page_277">277</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Aytoun of Inchdairnie, <a href="#Page_123">123</a>, <a href="#Page_270">270</a>.</li> - - -<li class="ifrst">Back Stairs, the, <a href="#Page_291">291</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Baijen-hole, <a href="#Page_112">112</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Baillie, Alexander, of Dochfour, <a href="#Page_235">235</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Baird, Mr, of Newbyth, <a href="#Page_20">20</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Baird’s Close, Castlehill, <a href="#Page_58">58</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Baird, Sir David, <a href="#Page_20">20</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Balcarres, Countess of, <a href="#Page_277">277</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Balfour, James, accountant (‘Singing Jamie’), <a href="#Page_141">141-143</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Balfour, Sir James (Lord Lyon), <a href="#Page_315">315</a>, <a href="#Page_316">316</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Ballantyne, printer, <a href="#Page_143">143</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Bank Close, Old, <a href="#Page_70">70</a>, <a href="#Page_94">94</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Bank of Scotland, <a href="#Page_70">70</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Bankton House, oratory at, <a href="#Page_29">29</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Bannatyne Club, <a href="#Page_73">73</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Bannatyne, Sir William Macleod, <a href="#Page_10">10</a>, <a href="#Page_129">129</a>, <a href="#Page_317">317</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Banquet at Mint House to Danish lords, <a href="#Page_260">260</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Barnard, Mr, violinist, <a href="#Page_253">253</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Bassentyne’s house, <a href="#Page_257">257</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Bearford’s Parks, <a href="#Page_366">366</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Beatoun, Archbishop, <a href="#Page_117">117</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Begbie’s murder, <a href="#Page_36">36</a>, <a href="#Page_280">280</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Beith’s or Bess Wynd, <a href="#Page_93">93</a>, <a href="#Page_113">113</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Bellamy, Mrs, <a href="#Page_347">347-350</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Bell, Benjamin, surgeon, <a href="#Page_355">355</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Bell’s Wynd, <a href="#Page_46">46</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Bethune, Archbishop, <a href="#Page_228">228</a>, <a href="#Page_241">241</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Bethune, Cardinal, <a href="#Page_228">228</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Bickers (street fights of boys), <a href="#Page_189">189</a>, <a href="#Page_245">245</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Birrel, the chronicler, <a href="#Page_38">38</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Bishop’s Land, <a href="#Page_269">269</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Black, Alexander, of Balbirney, <a href="#Page_211">211</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Blackbird, a Jacobite, <a href="#Page_30">30</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Blackfriars’ Monastery, <a href="#Page_242">242</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Blackfriars Wynd, <a href="#Page_10">10</a>, <a href="#Page_38">38</a>, <a href="#Page_223">223</a>, <a href="#Page_228">228</a>, <a href="#Page_234">234</a>, <a href="#Page_237">237</a>, <a href="#Page_238">238</a>, <a href="#Page_241">241</a>, <a href="#Page_257">257</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Black, Joseph, Professor, <a href="#Page_242">242</a>, <a href="#Page_289">289</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Black Wigs Club, <a href="#Page_155">155</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Blair, Dr, <a href="#Page_56">56</a>, <a href="#Page_136">136</a>, <a href="#Page_288">288</a>, <a href="#Page_334">334</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Blair, Hugh, merchant, <a href="#Page_72">72</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Blair, Rev. Robert, <a href="#Page_307">307</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Blair’s Close, <a href="#Page_18">18</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Blue Blanket, <a href="#Page_183">183</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Blue-gowns—their annual assembly, <a href="#Page_102">102</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Bluidy Mackenzie, <a href="#Page_224">224</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Blyth’s Close, <a href="#Page_22">22</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Boar Club, <a href="#Page_151">151</a>, <a href="#Page_153">153</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Boarding-schools of last century, <a href="#Page_230">230</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Bonnet Lairds’ Club, <a href="#Page_155">155</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Bonnington, <a href="#Page_348">348</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Booths, <a href="#Page_3">3</a>, <a href="#Page_110">110</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Boroughmoor, <a href="#Page_271">271</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Boswell, James, <a href="#Page_16">16</a>, <a href="#Page_55">55</a>, <a href="#Page_60">60</a>, <a href="#Page_172">172</a>, <a href="#Page_197">197</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Boswell, James, advocate, <a href="#Page_125">125</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Boswell, Sir Alexander, <a href="#Page_126">126</a>, <em><a href="#Footnote_103">n.</a></em>, <a href="#Page_146">146</a>, <a href="#Page_266">266</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Bothwell, Adam, Bishop of Orkney, Commendator of Holyrood, <a href="#Page_71">71</a>, <a href="#Page_97">97</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Bothwell, Anne, her <cite>Lines</cite>, <a href="#Page_97">97</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Bothwell Bridge, <a href="#Page_289">289</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Bothwell, Earl of, <a href="#Page_38">38</a>, <a href="#Page_83">83</a>, <a href="#Page_121">121</a>, <a href="#Page_256">256</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Bow, angle of, <a href="#Page_46">46</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">‘Bowed Joseph,’ a general of mobs, <a href="#Page_184">184-188</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Bowfoot, <a href="#Page_50">50</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Bowhead, <a href="#Page_27">27</a>, <a href="#Page_41">41</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Bowhead Saints, <a href="#Page_30">30</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Bowling-greens, <a href="#Page_247">247</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Bow, the West, <a href="#Page_26">26</a>, <a href="#Page_53">53</a>, <a href="#Page_133">133</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Boyd, James, White Horse Inn, <a href="#Page_172">172</a>.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_370" id="Page_370">{370}</a></span></li> - -<li class="indx">Boyd, Lord, <a href="#Page_121">121</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Breadalbane, Earl of, <a href="#Page_180">180</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Bridge, North, <a href="#Page_269">269</a>, <a href="#Page_283">283</a>, <a href="#Page_360">360</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Bridges, the, <a href="#Page_53">53</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">British Linen Company’s Bank, <a href="#Page_280">280</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Brodie, Deacon, <a href="#Page_76">76</a>, <a href="#Page_91">91</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Brodie’s Close, <a href="#Page_76">76</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Broomfield, Andrew, <a href="#Page_124">124</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Brougham, Lord, <a href="#Page_80">80</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Broughton, <a href="#Page_360">360</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Broughton, Baron of, <a href="#Page_367">367</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Brownhill, James, joiner, <a href="#Page_55">55</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Brown, James, builder, <a href="#Page_5">5</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Brown, Mrs, of Coalstoun, <a href="#Page_266">266</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Brownonian System Club, <a href="#Page_156">156</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Brown’s Close, <a href="#Page_18">18</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Brown Square, <a href="#Page_5">5</a>, <a href="#Page_248">248</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Bruce, Dame Magdalen, of Kinross, <a href="#Page_19">19</a> <em><a href="#Footnote_11">n.</a></em></li> - -<li class="indx">Bruce of Kennet, <a href="#Page_3">3</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Bruce of Kinnaird, <a href="#Page_210">210</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Bruntsfield Links, <a href="#Page_5">5</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Bryce, his small shop, <a href="#Page_101">101</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Buccleuch, Duchess of, <a href="#Page_327">327</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Buccleuch, Duke of, <a href="#Page_328">328</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Buchanan, George, <a href="#Page_288">288</a> <em><a href="#Footnote_230">n.</a></em></li> - -<li class="indx">Buchan, Earl of, <a href="#Page_98">98</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Burke, Edward (Ned—a chairman engaged in the escape of Prince Charles), <a href="#Page_177">177</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Burleigh, Lord, <a href="#Page_307">307</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Burnett, Miss, of Monboddo, <a href="#Page_251">251</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Burning, strange tale of a, <a href="#Page_298">298</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Burns, Robert, <a href="#Page_7">7</a>, <a href="#Page_14">14</a>, <a href="#Page_106">106</a>, <a href="#Page_164">164</a>, <a href="#Page_251">251</a>, <a href="#Page_351">351</a>, <a href="#Page_358">358</a>, <a href="#Page_362">362</a>, <a href="#Page_365">365</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Burton, Mrs, <a href="#Page_58">58</a>, <a href="#Page_60">60</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Burt’s Letters, <a href="#Page_176">176</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Busks, enormous size of, <a href="#Page_201">201</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Bute, Lord, <a href="#Page_10">10</a>, <a href="#Page_316">316</a>, <a href="#Page_317">317</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Byres of Coates, <a href="#Page_95">95</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Byres’s Close, <a href="#Page_96">96</a>.</li> - - -<li class="ifrst">Caddies (street messengers), <a href="#Page_175">175</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Cairnie, Lady, <a href="#Page_124">124</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Caithness, Earls of, <a href="#Page_77">77</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Caledonian Club, <a href="#Page_155">155</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx"><cite>Caledonian Mercury</cite>, <a href="#Page_15">15</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Calton, <a href="#Page_149">149</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Calton Hill, <a href="#Page_83">83</a>, <a href="#Page_297">297</a>, <a href="#Page_360">360</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Cambuskenneth, Abbot of, <a href="#Page_223">223</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Campbell, Alexander, <a href="#Page_180">180</a>, <a href="#Page_345">345</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Campbell, Lady Eleanor, <a href="#Page_64">64</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Campbell, Mrs, of Monzie, <a href="#Page_205">205</a>, <a href="#Page_208">208</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Campbell, Mungo, <a href="#Page_90">90</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Campbell of Laguine, <a href="#Page_134">134</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Campbell, Sir James, of Aberuchil, <a href="#Page_72">72</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Campbell, Thomas, poet, <a href="#Page_167">167</a>, <a href="#Page_359">359</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Canal, Forth and Clyde, <a href="#Page_5">5</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Canongate, <a href="#Page_3">3</a>, <a href="#Page_8">8</a>, <a href="#Page_11">11</a>, <a href="#Page_65">65</a>, <a href="#Page_295">295-301</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Canongate Council House, <a href="#Page_71">71</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Canongate Theatre, <a href="#Page_346">346</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Canongate Tolbooth, <a href="#Page_248">248</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Canonmills, <a href="#Page_154">154</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Cant’s Close, <a href="#Page_221">221</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Cape Club, <a href="#Page_149">149</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Cardross, Lord, <a href="#Page_98">98</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Carrubber’s Close, <a href="#Page_15">15</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Carters of Gilmerton, the, <a href="#Page_4">4</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Castle-hill, <a href="#Page_11">11</a>, <a href="#Page_18">18</a>, <a href="#Page_20">20</a>, <a href="#Page_22">22</a>, <a href="#Page_39">39</a>, <a href="#Page_150">150</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Castle Street, <a href="#Page_8">8</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Cathcart, Robert, <a href="#Page_39">39</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Cat Nick on Salisbury Crags, <a href="#Page_91">91</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Cats, a lover of, <a href="#Page_16">16</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Cayley, Squire, or Captain, <a href="#Page_291">291</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Chairmen, <a href="#Page_176">176</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Chalmers, Miss (Mrs Pringle), <a href="#Page_251">251</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Chalmers, Miss, of Pittencrief, <a href="#Page_251">251</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Chalmers’s Entry, <a href="#Page_168">168</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Changes of the last hundred years, <a href="#Page_1">1</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Chapman, Walter, printer, <a href="#Page_109">109</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Charles I., <a href="#Page_64">64</a>, <a href="#Page_170">170</a>, <a href="#Page_301">301</a>, <a href="#Page_306">306</a>, <a href="#Page_321">321</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Charles II., <a href="#Page_260">260</a>, <a href="#Page_327">327</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Charles X., <a href="#Page_228">228</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Charles, Prince, <a href="#Page_27">27</a>, <a href="#Page_28">28</a>, <a href="#Page_48">48</a>, <a href="#Page_72">72</a>, <a href="#Page_175">175</a>, <a href="#Page_177">177</a>, <a href="#Page_181">181</a>, <a href="#Page_219">219</a>, <a href="#Page_235">235</a>, <a href="#Page_236">236</a>, <a href="#Page_269">269</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Charlotte Square, <a href="#Page_9">9</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Charteris, Colonel, <a href="#Page_328">328</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Chessels’s Court, <a href="#Page_27">27</a>, <a href="#Page_91">91</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Chiesly of Dairy, <a href="#Page_75">75</a>, <a href="#Page_211">211</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Circulating Library, <a href="#Page_15">15</a>, <a href="#Page_104">104</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Citadel of Leith, inhabitants in 1745, <a href="#Page_19">19</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">City Guard, <a href="#Page_4">4</a>, <a href="#Page_31">31</a>, <a href="#Page_84">84</a>, <a href="#Page_148">148</a>, <a href="#Page_179">179</a>, <a href="#Page_233">233</a>, <a href="#Page_238">238</a>, <a href="#Page_348">348</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Clarinda, <a href="#Page_358">358</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Clarke, Stephen, musician, <a href="#Page_253">253</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Clattering of tinsmiths in West Bow, <a href="#Page_42">42</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Claudero, pamphleteer, <a href="#Page_330">330</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Claverhouse, <a href="#Page_6">6</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Cleanse the Causeway, <a href="#Page_117">117</a>, <a href="#Page_241">241</a>, <a href="#Page_242">242</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Cleghorn, Miss, <a href="#Page_251">251</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Clerihugh’s Tavern, <a href="#Page_162">162</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Clerks, drucken, of Sir William Forbes, <a href="#Page_138">138</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Clerk, Sir John, of Penicuik, <a href="#Page_193">193</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Clubs, convivial, <a href="#Page_149">149-157</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Coalstoun, Lord, and his wig, <a href="#Page_96">96</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Coates, Sir John Byres of, <a href="#Page_95">95</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Cockburn, Mrs, author of <cite>Flowers of the Forest</cite>, <a href="#Page_58">58</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Cock-fights, <a href="#Page_236">236</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Coffee-house, John’s, <a href="#Page_112">112</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Coffee-house, Netherbow, <a href="#Page_332">332</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Coffin, the, <a href="#Page_166">166</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Coinage, <a href="#Page_260">260</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Coke, William, bookseller, <a href="#Page_167">167</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">College of King James, <a href="#Page_259">259</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">College Street, North, <a href="#Page_242">242</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">College, the, <a href="#Page_3">3</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">College Wynd, <a href="#Page_3">3</a>, <a href="#Page_242">242</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Colquhoun, Sir James, <a href="#Page_132">132</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Commendator Bothwell’s house, <a href="#Page_97">97</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Commercial Bank, <a href="#Page_265">265</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Concerts, <a href="#Page_249">249</a>, <a href="#Page_251">251</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Constable, Archibald, <a href="#Page_7">7</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Convivial clubs, <a href="#Page_149">149-157</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Convivialia, <a href="#Page_138">138-157</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Corelli, musician, <a href="#Page_254">254</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Corri, Signor and Signora Domenico, <a href="#Page_250">250</a>, <a href="#Page_253">253</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx"><cite>Court of Session Garland</cite>, a burlesque poem, <a href="#Page_124">124</a>, <a href="#Page_125">125</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Court, the Dirt, <a href="#Page_115">115</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Covington, Lockhart of, <a href="#Page_129">129</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Covington, Lord, fate of his gown, <a href="#Page_130">130</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Cowgate, <a href="#Page_72">72</a>, <a href="#Page_223">223</a>, <a href="#Page_240">240</a>, <a href="#Page_244">244</a>, <a href="#Page_257">257</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Cowgate Port, <a href="#Page_152">152</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Craigie, Lord President, <a href="#Page_9">9</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Craig, James, <a href="#Page_7">7</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Crawford, Earl of, <a href="#Page_311">311</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Crawfuird, <a href="#Page_39">39</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Creech, Provost, bookseller, <a href="#Page_9">9</a>, <a href="#Page_103">103</a>, <a href="#Page_339">339</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Crighton Street, Potterrow, <a href="#Page_59">59</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx"><cite>Criminal Trials</cite>, by Hugo Arnot, <a href="#Page_13">13</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Crochallan, a convivial society, <a href="#Page_164">164</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Cromarty, Earl of, <a href="#Page_225">225</a>.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_371" id="Page_371">{371}</a></span></li> - -<li class="indx">Cromwell, Oliver, <a href="#Page_99">99</a>, <a href="#Page_122">122</a>, <a href="#Page_193">193</a>, <a href="#Page_307">307</a>, <a href="#Page_360">360</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Crosbie, advocate, <a href="#Page_153">153</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Cross, the, <a href="#Page_4">4</a>, <a href="#Page_174">174</a>, <a href="#Page_175">175</a>;</li> -<li class="isub1">taken down, <a href="#Page_178">178</a> <em><a href="#Footnote_154">n.</a></em></li> - -<li class="indx">Cullen, Dr, <a href="#Page_261">261</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Cullen, Lord, <a href="#Page_263">263</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Cullen, Robert, mimic, <a href="#Page_261">261</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Culloden, <a href="#Page_177">177</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Cumming of Lyon Office, <a href="#Page_167">167</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Cunliffe, Sir Foster, of Acton, <a href="#Page_252">252</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Cunningham, Rev. Mr, <a href="#Page_352">352</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Cunyie House (Mint), <a href="#Page_257">257</a>, <a href="#Page_260">260</a>.</li> - - -<li class="ifrst">Dalrymple, Miss, New Hailes, <a href="#Page_131">131</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Dalrymple, President, <a href="#Page_123">123</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Dalrymple, Sir David (Lord Hailes), <a href="#Page_126">126</a> <em><a href="#Footnote_108">n.</a></em>, <a href="#Page_131">131</a>, <a href="#Page_300">300</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Dancing in Edinburgh, <a href="#Page_44">44</a>;</li> -<li class="isub1">Allan Ramsay on, <a href="#Page_44">44</a>;</li> -<li class="isub1">Goldsmith on, <a href="#Page_45">45</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Danish lords entertained, <a href="#Page_260">260</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Darien Expedition, the, <a href="#Page_52">52</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Darnley, <a href="#Page_71">71</a>, <a href="#Page_83">83</a>, <a href="#Page_107">107</a>, <a href="#Page_121">121</a>, <a href="#Page_256">256</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">David I., <a href="#Page_295">295</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Davidson’s Close, <a href="#Page_170">170</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Defensive Band, <a href="#Page_152">152</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Defoe, <a href="#Page_337">337</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">‘Deid-chack,’ the, <a href="#Page_114">114</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">De la Cour, artist, <a href="#Page_9">9</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">De Witt’s map, <a href="#Page_259">259</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Dhu, Sergeant John, <a href="#Page_180">180</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Dick, Lady Anne, of Corstorphine, her eccentricities and verses, <a href="#Page_225">225</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Dick, Sir William, &c., <a href="#Page_78">78</a>, <a href="#Page_100">100</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Dicks of Prestonfield, <a href="#Page_78">78</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Dickson, Andrew, golf-club maker, <a href="#Page_321">321</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Dickson, Rev. David, <a href="#Page_307">307</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Dickson’s Close, <a href="#Page_222">222</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Dirt Court, the, <a href="#Page_115">115</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Dirty Club, <a href="#Page_155">155</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx"><cite>Diurnal</cite>, the, of a Scottish judge, <a href="#Page_139">139</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Doctors of Faculty Club, the, <a href="#Page_155">155</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Doctor, the Tinklarian, <a href="#Page_41">41</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Donacha Bhan, a Highland poet, <a href="#Page_180">180</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Donaldson, Alexander, bookseller, <a href="#Page_48">48</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Donaldson, James, bookseller, <a href="#Page_49">49</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Douglas, Archibald, <a href="#Page_238">238</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Douglas, Duke of, <a href="#Page_9">9</a>, <a href="#Page_69">69</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Douglas, Gavin, poet, <a href="#Page_240">240</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Douglas, Jeanie, Adam Smith’s cousin, <a href="#Page_319">319</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Douglas, Lady Anne, ghost of, <a href="#Page_343">343</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Douglas, Lady Jane, <a href="#Page_69">69</a>, <a href="#Page_238">238</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Douglas’s Tavern, <a href="#Page_162">162</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx"><cite>Douglas</cite>, tragedy of, <a href="#Page_347">347</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Doune, Lord, <a href="#Page_307">307</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Dowie, Johnnie, <a href="#Page_138">138</a>, <a href="#Page_166">166</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Dowie’s Tavern, <a href="#Page_138">138</a>, <a href="#Page_166">166</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Drem, Barony of, <a href="#Page_50">50</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Dresses, ladies’, of last century, <a href="#Page_199">199</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Drinking customs, <a href="#Page_138">138</a>, <a href="#Page_143">143</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Drumlanrig, <a href="#Page_336">336</a>, <a href="#Page_339">339</a>, <a href="#Page_340">340</a>, <a href="#Page_343">343</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Drummond, Bishop Abernethy, <a href="#Page_229">229</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Drummond, Pious Club poet, <a href="#Page_150">150</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Drummond, Provost, <a href="#Page_5">5</a>, <a href="#Page_6">6</a>, <a href="#Page_360">360</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Drummore, Lord, <a href="#Page_9">9</a>, <a href="#Page_125">125</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Drumsheugh, <a href="#Page_205">205</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Dryden, <a href="#Page_327">327</a>, <a href="#Page_344">344</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Duff, Miss (Countess of Dumfries and Stair), <a href="#Page_230">230</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Dunbar’s Close, <a href="#Page_100">100</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Dunbar, Willie, <a href="#Page_164">164</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Dundas, Robert, of Arniston, Lord President, <a href="#Page_127">127</a>, <a href="#Page_132">132</a>, <a href="#Page_140">140</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Dundee, Lord, <a href="#Page_30">30</a>, <a href="#Page_366">366</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Dundonald, Earl of, <a href="#Page_69">69</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Dunglass Castle, <a href="#Page_99">99</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Dunkeld, Bishop of, <a href="#Page_223">223</a>, <a href="#Page_240">240</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Dun, Lady, <a href="#Page_124">124</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Durie, Abbot of Dunfermline, <a href="#Page_273">273</a>.</li> - - -<li class="ifrst">Easter Road, <a href="#Page_328">328</a>, <a href="#Page_360">360</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Edward or Udward, Nicol, Provost, <a href="#Page_210">210</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Eglintoune, Countess of, <a href="#Page_192">192-198</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Eglintoune, Earl of, <a href="#Page_90">90</a>, <a href="#Page_162">162</a>, <a href="#Page_192">192</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Eglintoune, Miss (Lady Wallace), <a href="#Page_276">276</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Elcho, Lord, <a href="#Page_307">307</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Elibank, Lord, <a href="#Page_14">14</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Elliot, Jeanie, of Minto, <a href="#Page_6">6</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Elliot, Lady, of Minto, <a href="#Page_266">266</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Elliot, Sir Gilbert, of Minto, <a href="#Page_206">206</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Elphingston, Lady Betty, <a href="#Page_124">124</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Elphinstone, James, <a href="#Page_49">49</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Errol, Earl of (Constable), <a href="#Page_103">103</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Erskine, Alexander, the Hon., <a href="#Page_98">98</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Erskine, Harry, epigram by, on Hugo Arnot, <a href="#Page_12">12</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Erskine, James, of Cambo, <a href="#Page_98">98</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Erskine, James, of Grange, <a href="#Page_211">211</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Euphame, Mrs (Effie Sinclair), <a href="#Page_230">230</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Excise Office, <a href="#Page_91">91</a>, <a href="#Page_244">244</a>, <a href="#Page_247">247</a>, <a href="#Page_248">248</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Executioners of Edinburgh, <a href="#Page_51">51</a>.</li> - - -<li class="ifrst">Faculty of Doctors’ Club, <a href="#Page_155">155</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Falconer, William, author of <cite>The Shipwreck</cite>, <a href="#Page_285">285</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Female dresses of last century, <a href="#Page_199">199-203</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Ferguson, Dr, <a href="#Page_56">56</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Fergusson, Governor, his house in the Luckenbooths, <a href="#Page_10">10</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Fergusson, Robert, <a href="#Page_26">26</a>, <a href="#Page_114">114</a> <em><a href="#Footnote_85">n.</a></em>, <a href="#Page_148">148</a>, <a href="#Page_149">149</a>, <a href="#Page_162">162</a>, <a href="#Page_180">180</a>, <a href="#Page_233">233</a>, <a href="#Page_271">271</a>, <a href="#Page_349">349</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Fergusson, Robert, the Plotter, took refuge in Old Tolbooth, <a href="#Page_88">88</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Fergusson, Walter, writer, digs for water in James’s Square, <a href="#Page_335">335</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Fife’s Close, Bailie, <a href="#Page_265">265</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Findlater, Earl of, <a href="#Page_231">231</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Fishmarket Close, <a href="#Page_140">140</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Fives, the game of, <a href="#Page_344">344</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Flockhart’s, Lucky, Tavern in Potterrow, <a href="#Page_168">168</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx"><cite>Flowers of the Forest</cite>, the author of, <a href="#Page_58">58</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Foliot, John and Bartoulme, <a href="#Page_209">209</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Foote, Samuel, anecdotes of, <a href="#Page_363">363-365</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Forbes, Lord President, <a href="#Page_123">123</a>, <a href="#Page_125">125</a>, <a href="#Page_235">235</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Forbes, Rev. Robert, Bishop of Orkney, <a href="#Page_19">19</a> <em><a href="#Footnote_11">n.</a></em></li> - -<li class="indx">Forbes, Sir William, <a href="#Page_115">115</a>, <a href="#Page_138">138</a>, <a href="#Page_199">199</a>, <a href="#Page_251">251</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Fore-stairs, <a href="#Page_100">100</a>, <a href="#Page_271">271</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Forrest, David, <a href="#Page_273">273</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Forrester, Sir Andrew, <a href="#Page_293">293</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Forrester’s Wynd, <a href="#Page_3">3</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Forster of Corsebonny, <a href="#Page_214">214</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Forth and Clyde Canal, <a href="#Page_5">5</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Fortune’s Tavern, <a href="#Page_143">143</a>, <a href="#Page_161">161</a>, <a href="#Page_192">192</a>, <a href="#Page_251">251</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Foulis, William, of Woodhall, <a href="#Page_124">124</a>.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_372" id="Page_372">{372}</a></span></li> - -<li class="indx">Fountainhall, Lord, anecdote of, <a href="#Page_61">61</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Fyvie, Lord, <a href="#Page_120">120</a>.</li> - - -<li class="ifrst">Gabriel’s Road, <a href="#Page_366">366</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Galloway, Earl of, <a href="#Page_244">244</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Gallow Lee, the, <a href="#Page_75">75</a>, <a href="#Page_185">185</a>, <a href="#Page_361">361</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Gallows Stone in Grassmarket, <a href="#Page_51">51</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Gardenstone, Lord, <a href="#Page_132">132</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Gardiner, Colonel, his oratory, <a href="#Page_29">29</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Gask family, <a href="#Page_10">10</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Gay, John, poet, <a href="#Page_4">4</a>, <a href="#Page_338">338</a>, <a href="#Page_339">339</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Geddes, Jenny, and her stool, <a href="#Page_105">105</a>, <a href="#Page_106">106</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Ged, Dougal, of Town-guard, <a href="#Page_233">233</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Ged, Misses, their boarding-school, <a href="#Page_232">232</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">General’s Entry, the residence of Burns’s ‘Clarinda,’ <a href="#Page_358">358</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">George II., <a href="#Page_279">279</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">George III., <a href="#Page_16">16</a>, <a href="#Page_197">197</a>, <a href="#Page_275">275</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">George IV., <a href="#Page_269">269</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">George IV. Bridge, <a href="#Page_70">70</a>, <a href="#Page_167">167</a>, <a href="#Page_244">244</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">George Square, <a href="#Page_5">5</a>, <a href="#Page_8">8</a>, <a href="#Page_169">169</a>, <a href="#Page_243">243</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">George Street, <a href="#Page_46">46</a>, <a href="#Page_53">53</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Gibson of Durie, <a href="#Page_121">121</a>, <a href="#Page_124">124</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Gilmerton, carters of, <a href="#Page_4">4</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Gilmour, Lord President, <a href="#Page_122">122</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Gilmour, Mr Little, of the Inch, <a href="#Page_76">76</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Gilson, Mr, singer, <a href="#Page_253">253</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Giornovicki, violinist, <a href="#Page_254">254</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Glencairn, <a href="#Page_25">25</a>, <a href="#Page_352">352</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Glenlee, Lord, <a href="#Page_5">5</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Glenorchy, Lady, <a href="#Page_226">226</a>, <a href="#Page_205">205</a>, <a href="#Page_206">206</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Goldsmith, <a href="#Page_242">242</a>, <a href="#Page_265">265</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Goldsmith, account of a dancing assembly in Edinburgh, <a href="#Page_45">45</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Goldsmiths in Parliament Square, <a href="#Page_111">111</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Golfers’ Land, <a href="#Page_320">320</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Golf, the game of, <a href="#Page_52">52</a>;</li> -<li class="isub1">Charles I. plays on Leith Links, <a href="#Page_321">321</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Goolister, Henry, Captain, <a href="#Page_260">260</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Gordon, Captain, <a href="#Page_181">181</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Gordon, Duchess of, <a href="#Page_145">145</a>, <a href="#Page_252">252</a>, <a href="#Page_275">275</a>, <a href="#Page_276">276</a>, <a href="#Page_313">313</a>, <a href="#Page_316">316</a>, <a href="#Page_361">361</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Gordon family, <a href="#Page_18">18</a>, <a href="#Page_316">316</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Gordon, Mr, of Ellon, <a href="#Page_366">366</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Gourlay, Robert, house of, <a href="#Page_70">70</a>, <a href="#Page_71">71</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Grace, Countess, of Aboyne and Murray, <a href="#Page_66">66</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Grange, Lady, story of, <a href="#Page_211">211-221</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Grange, Lord, <a href="#Page_15">15</a>, <a href="#Page_211">211</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Grassmarket, <a href="#Page_18">18</a>, <a href="#Page_26">26</a>, <a href="#Page_50">50</a>, <a href="#Page_51">51</a>, <a href="#Page_171">171</a>, <a href="#Page_260">260</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Gray, Sir William, of Pittendrum, <a href="#Page_64">64</a>, <a href="#Page_76">76</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Green Breeks, a noted fighter, <a href="#Page_190">190</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Gregory, Dr John, <a href="#Page_172">172</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Greping-office Tavern, <a href="#Page_159">159</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Greville, Lord, <a href="#Page_262">262</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Greyfriars, <a href="#Page_93">93</a>, <a href="#Page_95">95</a>, <a href="#Page_109">109</a>, <a href="#Page_224">224</a>, <a href="#Page_288">288</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Guard, City or Town, <a href="#Page_84">84</a>, <a href="#Page_148">148</a>, <a href="#Page_179">179</a>, <a href="#Page_233">233</a>, <a href="#Page_238">238</a>, <a href="#Page_348">348</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Guard-house, <a href="#Page_84">84</a>, <a href="#Page_140">140</a>, <a href="#Page_180">180</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Guise, Mary of, <a href="#Page_22">22</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Guthrie, Bishop Henry, <a href="#Page_307">307</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Guthrie, Rev. James, <a href="#Page_307">307</a>.</li> - - -<li class="ifrst">Haddington, Earl of, <a href="#Page_99">99</a>, <a href="#Page_244">244</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Hailes, Lord (Sir D. Dalrymple), <a href="#Page_126">126</a>, <a href="#Page_131">131</a>, <a href="#Page_300">300</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Haining, Lord, <a href="#Page_125">125</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Halkerston’s Wynd, <a href="#Page_5">5</a>, <a href="#Page_117">117</a>, <a href="#Page_366">366</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Halket, Miss, of Pitferran, <a href="#Page_252">252</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Halyburton, James, <a href="#Page_222">222</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Hamilton, ‘Dear Sandie,’ <a href="#Page_247">247</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Hamilton, Duke of, <a href="#Page_172">172</a>, <a href="#Page_308">308</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Hamilton, Marie, <a href="#Page_295">295</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Hamiltons of Pencaitland, <a href="#Page_270">270</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Hamilton’s Tavern, Mrs, <a href="#Page_345">345</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Hamiltons, the, <a href="#Page_241">241</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Hamilton, Thomas (Tam o’ the Cowgate), Lord President, first Earl of Haddington, <a href="#Page_244">244</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Hammermen of Canongate, <a href="#Page_313">313</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Hangman’s Craig, <a href="#Page_52">52</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Hangmen of Edinburgh, <a href="#Page_51">51</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Ha’s, Jenny, Ale-house, <a href="#Page_142">142</a>, <a href="#Page_339">339</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Harcarse, Lord, <a href="#Page_123">123</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Haunted houses, <a href="#Page_35">35</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Hawley, General, <a href="#Page_181">181</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Hay, advocate, Lord Newton, <a href="#Page_139">139</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Hay, a young criminal, singular escape, <a href="#Page_92">92</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Hay, Miss, of Hayston, <a href="#Page_251">251</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Heart of Midlothian, <a href="#Page_82">82</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Heckler, the, a lunatic litigant, <a href="#Page_135">135</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Hell-fire Club, <a href="#Page_153">153</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Henderland, Lord, <a href="#Page_118">118</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Henderson, Alexander, tombstone of, <a href="#Page_288">288</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Hepburn of Bearford, <a href="#Page_366">366</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Herd, David, <a href="#Page_167">167</a>, <a href="#Page_168">168</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Heriot, George, <a href="#Page_50">50</a>, <a href="#Page_113">113-116</a>;</li> -<li class="isub1">stock with which he commenced business, <a href="#Page_112">112</a> <em><a href="#Footnote_84">n.</a></em>;</li> -<li class="isub1">a costly fire, <a href="#Page_113">113</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Heriot’s Hospital, <a href="#Page_93">93</a>, <a href="#Page_247">247</a>, <a href="#Page_310">310</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">‘He that tholes overcomes,’ <a href="#Page_47">47</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">High Constables, <a href="#Page_346">346</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">High School, <a href="#Page_76">76</a>, <a href="#Page_242">242</a>, <a href="#Page_245">245</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">High School Wynd, <a href="#Page_257">257</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">High Street, <a href="#Page_8">8</a>, <a href="#Page_11">11</a>, <a href="#Page_29">29</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Hilderstone, <a href="#Page_367">367</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx"><cite>History of Edinburgh</cite>, by Hugo Arnot, <a href="#Page_12">12</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx"><cite>History of England</cite>, by Hume, <a href="#Page_56">56</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Hogg’s, Daniel, Tavern, <a href="#Page_151">151</a>, <a href="#Page_153">153</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Holderness, Lord, <a href="#Page_323">323</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Holstein, Duke of, entertained, <a href="#Page_78">78</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Holyrood, <a href="#Page_11">11</a>, <a href="#Page_28">28</a>, <a href="#Page_206">206</a>, <a href="#Page_209">209</a>, <a href="#Page_228">228</a>, <a href="#Page_248">248</a>, <a href="#Page_256">256</a>, <a href="#Page_260">260</a>, <a href="#Page_295">295</a>, <a href="#Page_321">321</a>, <a href="#Page_344">344</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Holyrood, Chapel of, <a href="#Page_109">109</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Holyroodhouse, Lord, <a href="#Page_97">97</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Home, Countess of, <a href="#Page_306">306</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Home-Drummond of Blairdrummond, <a href="#Page_252">252</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Home, Earl of, <a href="#Page_307">307</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Home, Miss Betsy, <a href="#Page_251">251</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Hoop, the, as worn by ladies, <a href="#Page_200">200</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Hope of Rankeillor, <a href="#Page_216">216</a>, <a href="#Page_218">218</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Hope’s Close, <a href="#Page_70">70</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Hope, Sir Thomas, K.C., <a href="#Page_70">70</a>, <a href="#Page_72">72</a>, <a href="#Page_73">73</a>, <a href="#Page_74">74</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Hope, Sir Thomas, of Kerse, <a href="#Page_72">72</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Hopetoun, Earl of, <a href="#Page_204">204</a>, <a href="#Page_342">342</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">‘Horn Order,’ the, <a href="#Page_157">157</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Horse Wynd, <a href="#Page_59">59</a>, <a href="#Page_239">239</a>, <a href="#Page_244">244</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Howard, Lady Elizabeth, <a href="#Page_316">316</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Hume, David, <a href="#Page_55">55-59</a>, <a href="#Page_162">162</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Hume, Misses, of Linthill, <a href="#Page_231">231</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Humphrey, Duke, <a href="#Page_107">107</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Hunter, John, Professor, <a href="#Page_133">133</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Huntly, Marquis of, <a href="#Page_19">19</a>, <a href="#Page_175">175</a>, <a href="#Page_210">210</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Hyndford’s Close, <a href="#Page_264">264</a>, <a href="#Page_275">275</a>.</li> - - -<li class="ifrst">Inchdairnie, Aytouns of, <a href="#Page_270">270</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Inch, the, <a href="#Page_76">76</a>.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_373" id="Page_373">{373}</a></span></li> - -<li class="indx">Industrious Company Club, <a href="#Page_154">154</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Infirmary Street, <a href="#Page_241">241</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Innes, Gilbert, of Stow, <a href="#Page_289">289</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Innes, Mrs Gilbert, of Stow, <a href="#Page_61">61</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Inn, White Hart, <a href="#Page_2">2</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Inn, White Horse, <a href="#Page_2">2</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Irvine, Robert, <a href="#Page_366">366</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Irving, General, <a href="#Page_27">27</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Irving, Mrs, her recollections of the ’45, <a href="#Page_27">27</a>, <a href="#Page_28">28</a>.</li> - - -<li class="ifrst">Jack’s Land, <a href="#Page_56">56</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Jacobite blackbird, a, <a href="#Page_30">30</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Jail, <a href="#Page_3">3</a>, <a href="#Page_83">83</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">James I., <a href="#Page_83">83</a>, <a href="#Page_307">307</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">James II., <a href="#Page_321">321</a>, <a href="#Page_327">327</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">James III., <a href="#Page_183">183</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">James IV., <a href="#Page_272">272</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">James V., <a href="#Page_229">229</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">James VI., <a href="#Page_38">38</a>, <a href="#Page_77">77</a>, <a href="#Page_175">175</a>, <a href="#Page_183">183</a>, <a href="#Page_210">210</a>, <a href="#Page_244">244</a>, <a href="#Page_260">260</a>, <a href="#Page_344">344</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">James’s Court, <a href="#Page_55">55-62</a>, <a href="#Page_172">172</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">James’s Square, <a href="#Page_335">335</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Jameson, George, painter, <a href="#Page_288">288</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Jardine, Miss, <a href="#Page_252">252</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Jeddart staff possessed by each citizen, <a href="#Page_100">100</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Jeffrey, Francis, <a href="#Page_265">265</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">‘Jock o’ Sklates’ (Earl of Mar), <a href="#Page_246">246</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">John’s Coffee-house, <a href="#Page_148">148</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Johnson, Dr Samuel, <a href="#Page_16">16</a>, <a href="#Page_49">49</a>, <a href="#Page_60">60</a>, <a href="#Page_172">172</a>, <a href="#Page_197">197</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Johnston, James, of Westerhall, <a href="#Page_37">37</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Johnston, Miss Lucy, <a href="#Page_252">252</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Justice in bygone times, <a href="#Page_120">120</a>.</li> - - -<li class="ifrst">Kames, Lord, <a href="#Page_130">130</a>;</li> -<li class="isub1">scene at the death of, <a href="#Page_130">130</a>;</li> -<li class="isub1">his house, <a href="#Page_300">300</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Kay’s portraits, <a href="#Page_181">181</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Keith, Bishop, <a href="#Page_170">170</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Keith, Mrs, <a href="#Page_230">230</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Keith, Sir Alexander, of Ravelston, <a href="#Page_242">242</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Keith, Sir Robert, ambassador, <a href="#Page_230">230</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Kelly, Earl of, <a href="#Page_255">255</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Kennedy, Sir Archibald, <a href="#Page_194">194</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Kennedy, Susanna, <a href="#Page_192">192</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Kerr & Dempster, goldsmiths, <a href="#Page_111">111</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Kerr, goldsmith, Parliament Square, <a href="#Page_3">3</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Ketten’s, Michael, shoe-shop, <a href="#Page_83">83</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Kincaid, Mr (a great dandy), king’s printer, <a href="#Page_277">277</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">King’s Bridge, <a href="#Page_18">18</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">King’s Park, <a href="#Page_91">91</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">King’s Stables, <a href="#Page_260">260</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Kinloch, Miss, of Gilmerton, <a href="#Page_252">252</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Kinloch, Sir Francis and Mrs, <a href="#Page_124">124</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Kinnaird, Miss, having second sight, <a href="#Page_210">210</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Kirkcudbright, Lord, <a href="#Page_265">265</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Kirk o’ Field, situation of, <a href="#Page_256">256</a>, <a href="#Page_259">259</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Knockers, <a href="#Page_207">207</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Knowles, Admiral, <a href="#Page_304">304</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Knox, John, <a href="#Page_25">25</a>, <a href="#Page_84">84</a>, <a href="#Page_105">105</a>, <a href="#Page_107">107</a>, <a href="#Page_109">109</a>, <a href="#Page_271">271</a>, <a href="#Page_279">279</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Krames, <a href="#Page_102">102</a>, <a href="#Page_119">119</a>.</li> - - -<li class="ifrst">Ladies and the drinking customs, <a href="#Page_143">143</a>, <a href="#Page_147">147</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Ladies of Traquair, <a href="#Page_286">286</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Lady’s Steps, the, payments made at, <a href="#Page_103">103</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Laigh shops, <a href="#Page_145">145</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Lally-Tollendal, Count, <a href="#Page_252">252</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Lament, a, by Anne Bothwell, <a href="#Page_97">97</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Lang Gait, or Lang Dykes, <a href="#Page_6">6</a>, <a href="#Page_366">366</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Lauderdale, Duchess of, <a href="#Page_307">307</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Lauderdale, Duke of, <a href="#Page_122">122</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Lauder, Sir Andrew, <a href="#Page_61">61</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Lauder, Sir Thomas Dick, <a href="#Page_61">61</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Lauder, Thomas, Canon of Aberdeen, <a href="#Page_240">240</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Lawnmarket, <a href="#Page_11">11</a>, <a href="#Page_26">26</a>, <a href="#Page_27">27</a>, <a href="#Page_39">39</a>, <a href="#Page_70">70</a>, <a href="#Page_223">223</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Lawnmarket Club, <a href="#Page_156">156</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Leith Links, <a href="#Page_320">320</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Leith Street, <a href="#Page_283">283</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Leith Walk, <a href="#Page_281">281</a>, <a href="#Page_283">283</a>, <a href="#Page_360">360</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Leith Wynd, <a href="#Page_149">149</a>, <a href="#Page_258">258</a>, <a href="#Page_281">281</a>, <a href="#Page_284">284</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Lennox, Earl of, <a href="#Page_107">107</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Leslie, General, <a href="#Page_39">39</a>, <a href="#Page_193">193</a>, <a href="#Page_360">360</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Leslie, Lady Mary, <a href="#Page_328">328</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Leven, Lord, <a href="#Page_124">124</a>, <a href="#Page_311">311</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Liberton’s Wynd, <a href="#Page_166">166</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Lind, Mr, of the ‘Pious Club,’ <a href="#Page_150">150</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Lindsay, Sir Alexander, of Evelick, <a href="#Page_17">17</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Linlithgow road, <a href="#Page_214">214</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">List of Notables who lived in Canongate, <a href="#Page_296">296</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Little, William, of Liberton, <a href="#Page_76">76</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Lockhart of Carnwath, <a href="#Page_209">209</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Lockhart of Covington, <a href="#Page_129">129</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Lockhart, President, murder of, <a href="#Page_75">75</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Lockhart’s Court, <a href="#Page_209">209</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Lodge, Canongate Kilwinning, <a href="#Page_305">305</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Logan, Rev. George, <a href="#Page_27">27</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Long Way, the, <a href="#Page_214">214</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Lord’s Day, walking on the, condemned, <a href="#Page_11">11</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Lorimer, the, a deceased trade, <a href="#Page_233">233</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Lorne, Lord, <a href="#Page_308">308</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Lothian, Earl of, <a href="#Page_307">307</a>, <a href="#Page_323">323</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Lothian Hut, <a href="#Page_323">323</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Lothian, Marchioness, <a href="#Page_323">323</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Loudon, Earl of, <a href="#Page_64">64</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Loudoun, Chancellor, <a href="#Page_307">307</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Loughborough, Chancellor, his house in the Mint Close, <a href="#Page_263">263</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx"><cite>Lounger</cite>, the, <a href="#Page_6">6</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Lovat, Lady, <a href="#Page_234">234-239</a>, <a href="#Page_286">286</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Lovat, Lord, <a href="#Page_205">205</a>, <a href="#Page_213">213</a>, <a href="#Page_214">214</a>, <a href="#Page_234">234</a>, <a href="#Page_235">235</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Luckenbooths, <a href="#Page_10">10</a>, <a href="#Page_95">95-104</a>, <a href="#Page_272">272</a>, <a href="#Page_339">339</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Lucky Fykie’s Tavern, <a href="#Page_168">168</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Lucky Middleman’s Tavern, <a href="#Page_145">145</a>, <a href="#Page_146">146</a> <em><a href="#Footnote_134">n.</a></em></li> - -<li class="indx">Lyon Close, Old, <a href="#Page_323">323</a>.</li> - - -<li class="ifrst">Macalpine’s, Saunders, sedan-chair, <a href="#Page_4">4</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">M’Crie, Dr, <a href="#Page_273">273</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">M’Culloch, David (Wee Davie), <a href="#Page_363">363</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">M’Culloch of Ardwell, residence of, <a href="#Page_362">362</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Macdonald, Sir Alexander, of Sleat, <a href="#Page_216">216</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Macdowalls of Logan, <a href="#Page_60">60</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Macduff of Ballenloan and his two law pleas, <a href="#Page_136">136</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Macfarlane, John and Mrs, <a href="#Page_291">291</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Macfarlane, William, judge, <a href="#Page_60">60</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Macgill of Rankeillour, <a href="#Page_244">244</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Macintyre, Duncan (Donacha Bhan), poet, <a href="#Page_180">180</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Mackenzie, Henry, attorney, <a href="#Page_154">154</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Mackenzie, Henry (<em>Man of Feeling</em>), <a href="#Page_6">6</a>, <a href="#Page_288">288</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Mackenzie, Hon. Stuart, <a href="#Page_316">316</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Mackenzie, Sir George, <a href="#Page_93">93</a>, <a href="#Page_103">103</a>, <a href="#Page_223">223</a>, <a href="#Page_224">224</a>, <a href="#Page_225">225</a>, <a href="#Page_288">288</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx"><cite>Mackoull, James, Life and Trial of</cite> (supposed Murderer of Begbie), <a href="#Page_282">282</a>.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_374" id="Page_374">{374}</a></span></li> - -<li class="indx">Maclaurin, John, advocate, <a href="#Page_125">125</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">M’Lehose, Mrs, house of (Clarinda of Burns), <a href="#Page_358">358</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Maclellans of Galloway, <a href="#Page_265">265</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Maclennan, Rev. Roderick, St Kilda, <a href="#Page_217">217</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Macleod, Alexander, of Muiravonside, <a href="#Page_177">177</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Macleod, John, of Muiravonside, <a href="#Page_214">214</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Macmoran, Bailie, killed, <a href="#Page_76">76</a>;</li> -<li class="isub1">banquets held in house of, <a href="#Page_77">77</a>, <a href="#Page_78">78</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Macrae, Mr, Marionville, tragical story of, <a href="#Page_351">351</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Magdalen Chapel, Cowgate, <a href="#Page_248">248</a> <em><a href="#Footnote_211">n.</a></em></li> - -<li class="indx">Mahogany Land, <a href="#Page_47">47</a>, <a href="#Page_100">100</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">‘Maiden,’ the, <a href="#Page_71">71</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Maitland, <cite>History of Edinburgh</cite>, <a href="#Page_209">209</a>, <a href="#Page_271">271</a>, <a href="#Page_272">272</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx"><cite>Mally Lee</cite>, a ballad, <a href="#Page_202">202</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Mansfield, Earl of, <a href="#Page_17">17</a>, <a href="#Page_265">265</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">March, Lady, <a href="#Page_103">103</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Mar, Countess of, <a href="#Page_74">74</a>, <a href="#Page_213">213</a>, <a href="#Page_220">220</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Mar, Earl of, <a href="#Page_5">5</a>, <a href="#Page_98">98</a>, <a href="#Page_119">119</a>, <a href="#Page_246">246</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Marionville, villa of, <a href="#Page_323">323</a>;</li> -<li class="isub1">theatricals at, <a href="#Page_351">351</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Martin’s Wynd, story of, <a href="#Page_209">209</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Mary King’s Close, <a href="#Page_36">36</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Mary of Guise, her house in Edinburgh, <a href="#Page_22">22</a>;</li> -<li class="isub1">her resistance to the Reformation, <a href="#Page_25">25</a>;</li> -<li class="isub1">erection of Free Church Hall on the site of her house, <a href="#Page_25">25</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Mary, Queen, <a href="#Page_71">71</a>, <a href="#Page_83">83</a>, <a href="#Page_109">109</a>, <a href="#Page_163">163</a>, <a href="#Page_257">257</a>, <a href="#Page_260">260</a>, <a href="#Page_271">271</a>, <a href="#Page_287">287</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Mary, Regent, <a href="#Page_23">23</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Maugaret, Braid Ransome, <a href="#Page_260">260</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Maule, William, <a href="#Page_318">318</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Maxwell, Lady, of Monreith, her house, <a href="#Page_275">275</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Maxwell, Sir William, <a href="#Page_355">355</a>, <a href="#Page_356">356</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Meadows, the, <a href="#Page_5">5</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Meldrum, George, of Dumbreck, <a href="#Page_121">121</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Melrose, Abbot of, his ‘lodging’ in Edinburgh, <a href="#Page_223">223</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Melville, Lord, <a href="#Page_127">127</a> <em><a href="#Footnote_117">n.</a></em>, <a href="#Page_140">140</a>, <a href="#Page_145">145</a>, <a href="#Page_305">305</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Merchant Street, <a href="#Page_248">248</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">‘Meridian,’ a, <a href="#Page_147">147</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Meuse Lane, St Andrew Street, <a href="#Page_13">13</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Mickle, William Julius, on Parliament Close, <a href="#Page_116">116</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Miller, Sir William, of Glenlee, <a href="#Page_251">251</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Milliners, a story of two, <a href="#Page_323">323</a>, <a href="#Page_324">324</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Mint Close, <a href="#Page_10">10</a>, <a href="#Page_260">260</a>, <a href="#Page_263">263</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Minto, Lord, <a href="#Page_325">325</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Mint, the, <a href="#Page_257">257-259</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Mirror, magic, story of a, <a href="#Page_65">65</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx"><cite>Mirror</cite>, the, <a href="#Page_6">6</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Mitchell, William, pamphleteer, <a href="#Page_41">41</a>, <a href="#Page_42">42</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Mobs of Edinburgh, <a href="#Page_183">183-188</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Modena, Mary of, <a href="#Page_344">344</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Monastery, the Blackfriars’, <a href="#Page_242">242</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Monboddo, Lord, <a href="#Page_59">59</a>, <a href="#Page_132">132</a>, <a href="#Page_133">133</a>, <a href="#Page_303">303</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Monk, Peter, admiral of Denmark, <a href="#Page_260">260</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Monmouth, Duchess of, <a href="#Page_327">327</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Montagu, Lady Mary Wortley, <a href="#Page_69">69</a>, <a href="#Page_220">220</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Montgomery, Lady Margaret, <a href="#Page_328">328</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Montrose, Marquis of, <a href="#Page_108">108</a>, <a href="#Page_170">170</a>, <a href="#Page_175">175</a>, <a href="#Page_308">308</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Moray, Bonny Earl of, <a href="#Page_312">312</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Moray, Countess of, <a href="#Page_307">307</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Moray House, Canongate, <a href="#Page_306">306</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Moray, Lord, <a href="#Page_66">66</a> <em><a href="#Footnote_48">n.</a></em></li> - -<li class="indx">Morocco’s Land, <a href="#Page_299">299</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Morton, Regent, <a href="#Page_25">25</a>, <a href="#Page_71">71</a>, <a href="#Page_120">120</a>, <a href="#Page_260">260</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Motte, De la, French ambassador, <a href="#Page_71">71</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Mound, the, <a href="#Page_23">23</a>, <a href="#Page_55">55</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Moyses’s memoirs, <a href="#Page_71">71</a>, <a href="#Page_210">210</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Murder, extraordinary, <a href="#Page_366">366</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Mure, Baron, <a href="#Page_316">316</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Murkle, Lord, <a href="#Page_124">124</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Murray, Hon. Miss Nicky, ball directress, <a href="#Page_265">265-268</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Murray, Miss, of Lintrose (‘Flower of Strathmore’), <a href="#Page_251">251</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Murray, Mr, of Henderland, <a href="#Page_16">16</a>, <a href="#Page_17">17</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Murray, Mrs, of Broughton, <a href="#Page_175">175</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Murray, Mrs, of Henderland, <a href="#Page_15">15</a>, <a href="#Page_239">239</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Murray, Regent, <a href="#Page_38">38</a>, <a href="#Page_106">106</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Murray, Sir John A. (Lord), erects a statue to Allan Ramsay, <a href="#Page_18">18</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Murray, Sir Peter, of Balmanno, <a href="#Page_226">226</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Music Hall, <a href="#Page_253">253</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Musselburgh Links, <a href="#Page_355">355</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Mutrie’s Hill, <a href="#Page_5">5</a>, <a href="#Page_7">7</a>, <a href="#Page_367">367</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Mylne, Robert, architect, <a href="#Page_252">252</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Mylnes, family of, <a href="#Page_204">204</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Mylne Square, <a href="#Page_204">204</a>.</li> - - -<li class="ifrst">Nairne, Katherine, her tale of guilt and escape from justice, <a href="#Page_88">88</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Nairn’s Close, <a href="#Page_22">22</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Neale, John (built first house in Princes Street), <a href="#Page_7">7</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Negligée, the, <a href="#Page_199">199</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Negro servants, <a href="#Page_69">69</a> <em><a href="#Footnote_51">n.</a></em></li> - -<li class="indx">Netherbow Port (fortified gate), <a href="#Page_1">1</a>, <a href="#Page_149">149</a>, <a href="#Page_257">257</a>, <a href="#Page_258">258</a>, <a href="#Page_271">271</a>, <a href="#Page_272">272</a>, <a href="#Page_281">281</a>, <a href="#Page_331">331</a>, <a href="#Page_332">332</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Newberry, Mr J., his books for the young, <a href="#Page_41">41</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Newhall, Lord, <a href="#Page_124">124</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Newhaven, fishwomen of, <a href="#Page_4">4</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">New Street, <a href="#Page_8">8</a>, <a href="#Page_16">16</a>, <a href="#Page_131">131</a>, <a href="#Page_284">284</a>, <a href="#Page_300">300</a>, <a href="#Page_347">347</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Newton, Lord, <a href="#Page_44">44</a>, <a href="#Page_139">139</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">New Town, first house in, <a href="#Page_8">8</a>;</li> -<li class="isub1">Hume’s house in, <a href="#Page_58">58</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Nichol, Andrew, diarist, <a href="#Page_106">106</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Nichol, Andrew (‘Muck Andrew’), claimant-at-law of a midden-stead, <a href="#Page_136">136</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Nicolson Square, <a href="#Page_358">358</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Niddry Street, <a href="#Page_241">241</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Niddry’s Wynd, <a href="#Page_121">121</a>, <a href="#Page_209">209</a>, <a href="#Page_212">212</a>, <a href="#Page_249">249</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Nimmo, Miss, in whose house Burns met Clarinda, <a href="#Page_358">358</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">North Back of Canongate, <a href="#Page_170">170</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">North Bridge, <a href="#Page_6">6</a>, <a href="#Page_269">269</a>, <a href="#Page_283">283</a>, <a href="#Page_360">360</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">North, Christopher, <a href="#Page_167">167</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Northesk, Earl of, <a href="#Page_204">204</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">North Loch, <a href="#Page_8">8</a>, <a href="#Page_23">23</a>, <a href="#Page_64">64</a>, <a href="#Page_117">117</a>, <a href="#Page_118">118</a>, <a href="#Page_366">366</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Norton, Baron, <a href="#Page_316">316</a>.</li> - - -<li class="ifrst">Odd Fellows Club, <a href="#Page_155">155</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Ogilvie, Hon. Mrs, her boarding-school, <a href="#Page_231">231</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Old Bank Close, <a href="#Page_70">70</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Oliphant, Miss, of Gask, house of, <a href="#Page_10">10</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Oliver & Boyd, publishers, <a href="#Page_280">280</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Oratories, a feature in houses of a certain era, <a href="#Page_29">29</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">‘Order of the Horn,’ the, <a href="#Page_156">156</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Ormistounes, Laird of, <a href="#Page_257">257</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Oswald, Mr, of Auchincruive, <a href="#Page_252">252</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Oyster cellars, <a href="#Page_145">145</a>.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_375" id="Page_375">{375}</a></span></li> - - -<li class="ifrst">Paganini, <a href="#Page_254">254</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Pages, keeping of, <a href="#Page_328">328</a>, <a href="#Page_329">329</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Palmerston, Lord, a pupil of Dugald Stewart in Edinburgh, <a href="#Page_323">323</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Panmure, Earl of, <a href="#Page_318">318</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Panmure House, <a href="#Page_318">318</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Paoli, General, <a href="#Page_172">172</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Parliament Close, <a href="#Page_109">109-116</a>, <a href="#Page_142">142</a>, <a href="#Page_159">159</a>, <a href="#Page_337">337</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Parliament Council, <a href="#Page_115">115</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Parliament House, <a href="#Page_8">8</a>, <a href="#Page_85">85</a>, <a href="#Page_106">106</a>, <a href="#Page_110">110</a>, <a href="#Page_119">119</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Parliament House worthies, <a href="#Page_134">134-137</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Parliament Square, <a href="#Page_3">3</a>, <a href="#Page_115">115</a>, <a href="#Page_247">247</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Paterson, John, a golfing shoemaker, <a href="#Page_320">320</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Paterson, Lady Jane, <a href="#Page_212">212</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Paterson’s Court, <a href="#Page_232">232</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Paton, George, antiquary, <a href="#Page_167">167</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Patullo, William, <a href="#Page_35">35</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Peat or Pate, a, <a href="#Page_123">123</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Peebles, Peter, <a href="#Page_134">134</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Peebles Wynd, <a href="#Page_39">39</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Pettigrew, Rev. Mr, of Govan, <a href="#Page_160">160</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Picardy Place, <a href="#Page_140">140</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Pigs, <a href="#Page_276">276</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Pinners, <a href="#Page_201">201</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Pious Club, the, <a href="#Page_149">149</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Pitcairn, Dr, <a href="#Page_158">158</a>, <a href="#Page_160">160</a>, <a href="#Page_166">166</a>, <a href="#Page_287">287</a>, <a href="#Page_310">310</a>, <a href="#Page_320">320</a>, <a href="#Page_345">345</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Pitcairn, Miss, <a href="#Page_345">345</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Pitfour, Lord, <a href="#Page_129">129</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Pitilloch, Mr, advocate, <a href="#Page_123">123</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Playfair, architect, <a href="#Page_50">50</a></li> - -<li class="indx">Pleasance, <a href="#Page_187">187</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Poker Club, the, <a href="#Page_3">3</a>, <a href="#Page_162">162</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Poole, Miss, singer, <a href="#Page_253">253</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Population returns, the first in Scotland, <a href="#Page_20">20</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Porteous, Captain (Porteous Riot), <a href="#Page_42">42</a>, <a href="#Page_47">47</a>, <a href="#Page_51">51</a>, <a href="#Page_111">111</a>, <a href="#Page_133">133</a>, <a href="#Page_180">180</a>, <a href="#Page_184">184</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Portobello, origin of village of, <a href="#Page_332">332</a> <em><a href="#Footnote_256">n.</a></em></li> - -<li class="indx">Post-office Close, <a href="#Page_129">129</a> <em><a href="#Footnote_127">n.</a></em></li> - -<li class="indx">Post-office, old arrangement of, <a href="#Page_129">129</a> <em><a href="#Footnote_127">n.</a></em></li> - -<li class="indx">Potatoes, earliest trace of, in Scotland, <a href="#Page_325">325</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Potterrow, <a href="#Page_59">59</a>, <a href="#Page_168">168</a>, <a href="#Page_247">247</a>, <a href="#Page_358">358</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Prebendaries’ Chamber, <a href="#Page_256">256</a>, <a href="#Page_259">259</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Prentice, Henry, introducer of the field-culture of potatoes, <a href="#Page_325">325</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Press, printing, used in the rebel army, <a href="#Page_72">72</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Prestonfield, <a href="#Page_78">78</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Primrose, Lady Dorothy, <a href="#Page_237">237</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Primrose, Lord, <a href="#Page_124">124</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Primrose, Viscount, a profligate, <a href="#Page_64">64</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Princes Street, <a href="#Page_53">53</a>, <a href="#Page_214">214</a>, <a href="#Page_366">366</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Princes Street Gardens, <a href="#Page_18">18</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Princes Street one hundred years ago, <a href="#Page_6">6</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Princes Street, the naming of, <a href="#Page_7">7</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Pringle, Dr and Miss, Newhall, <a href="#Page_124">124</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Pringle, Mr, of Haining, <a href="#Page_251">251</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Puppo, Signor, violinist, <a href="#Page_253">253</a>.</li> - - -<li class="ifrst">Queen Mary, <a href="#Page_71">71</a>, <a href="#Page_83">83</a>, <a href="#Page_109">109</a>, <a href="#Page_163">163</a>, <a href="#Page_257">257-259</a>, <a href="#Page_271">271</a>, <a href="#Page_287">287</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Queensberry, Catherine, Duchess of, <a href="#Page_339">339</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Queensberry House, <a href="#Page_142">142</a>, <a href="#Page_320">320</a>, <a href="#Page_336">336</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Queensberry, second Duke of, strange story of, <a href="#Page_336">336</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Queensberry, third Duke of, and poet Gay, <a href="#Page_338">338</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Queen’s garden, <a href="#Page_257">257</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Queen Street, <a href="#Page_9">9</a>.</li> - - -<li class="ifrst">Raeburn, Sir Henry, portrait-painter, <a href="#Page_354">354</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx"><cite>Rambler</cite>, the, reproduced in Edinburgh, <a href="#Page_49">49</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Ramsay, Allan, the painter, <a href="#Page_16">16</a>, <a href="#Page_17">17</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Ramsay, Allan, the poet, <a href="#Page_4">4</a>, <a href="#Page_14">14-18</a>, <a href="#Page_44">44</a>, <a href="#Page_104">104</a>, <a href="#Page_161">161</a>, <a href="#Page_248">248</a>, <a href="#Page_288">288</a>, <a href="#Page_295">295</a>, <a href="#Page_339">339</a>, <a href="#Page_346">346</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Ramsay, Christian, <a href="#Page_16">16</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Ramsay Gardens, <a href="#Page_16">16</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Ramsay, General John, <a href="#Page_16">16</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Ramsay, Lady, of Bamff, <a href="#Page_353">353</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Ramsay, Miss, anecdote of, <a href="#Page_323">323</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Ramsay’s Inn or Tavern, <a href="#Page_152">152</a>, <a href="#Page_171">171</a>, <a href="#Page_276">276</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Ramsay, Sir Andrew, Provost, <a href="#Page_32">32</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Ramsay, Sir George, of Bamff, killed in a duel, <a href="#Page_353">353-356</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Rats, pets of Lady Eglintoune, <a href="#Page_197">197</a>, <a href="#Page_198">198</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Rats, town, <a href="#Page_179">179</a>, <a href="#Page_186">186</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Rattray, Clerk, Sheriff, <a href="#Page_281">281</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Register House, <a href="#Page_7">7</a>, <a href="#Page_366">366</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Reinagle, Joseph, ’cellist, <a href="#Page_253">253</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Renton, Eleonora, of Lamerton, <a href="#Page_304">304</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Restalrig, <a href="#Page_323">323</a>, <a href="#Page_326">326</a>, <a href="#Page_351">351</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Riddel’s Close, Lawnmarket, <a href="#Page_55">55</a>, <a href="#Page_76">76</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Risps or tirlin’-pins on doors, <a href="#Page_207">207</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Rivane, Generall, <a href="#Page_40">40</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Robertson, Principal, <a href="#Page_80">80</a>, <a href="#Page_162">162</a>, <a href="#Page_243">243</a>, <a href="#Page_262">262</a>, <a href="#Page_288">288</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Rochester, Earl of, <a href="#Page_122">122</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Rockville, Lord, <a href="#Page_230">230</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Rollo, Lord, <a href="#Page_270">270</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Romieu, Paul, a noted watchmaker, <a href="#Page_46">46</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Rope for hanging Porteous bought, <a href="#Page_47">47</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Rose Court, George Street, <a href="#Page_7">7</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Rose, Dr Alexander, Bishop of Edinburgh, <a href="#Page_170">170</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Rosehaugh’s Close (Strichen’s), <a href="#Page_224">224</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Ross House, George Square, <a href="#Page_209">209</a> <em><a href="#Footnote_177">n.</a></em></li> - -<li class="indx">Rosslyn, Earl of, <a href="#Page_263">263</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Rothes, the Duke of, his rough remark, <a href="#Page_51">51</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Roxburgh Street, <a href="#Page_187">187</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Royal Bank, <a href="#Page_7">7</a>, <a href="#Page_367">367</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Royal Bank Close, <a href="#Page_154">154</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Ruddiman, Thomas, <a href="#Page_27">27</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Rumple-knot, the, <a href="#Page_201">201</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Runciman, painter, <a href="#Page_149">149</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Rutherford, Dr Daniel (Professor), <a href="#Page_264">264</a>, <a href="#Page_277">277</a>, <a href="#Page_328">328</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Rutherford, Miss, Sir Walter Scott’s mother, <a href="#Page_231">231</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Ruthven, Mr, <a href="#Page_300">300</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Rye-House Plot, <a href="#Page_88">88</a>.</li> - - -<li class="ifrst">St Andrews, Bishop of, <a href="#Page_223">223</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">St Andrew Square, <a href="#Page_6">6</a>, <a href="#Page_8">8</a>, <a href="#Page_58">58</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">St Cecilia’s Hall, <a href="#Page_152">152</a>, <a href="#Page_249">249</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">St Clair, Lord, <a href="#Page_124">124</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">St David Street, a joke about name of, <a href="#Page_58">58</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">St Giles’s, booths around, <a href="#Page_3">3</a>, <a href="#Page_110">110</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">St Giles’s, characteristics of the High Kirk, <a href="#Page_114">114</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">St Giles’s Church, endowment to chaplain of, <a href="#Page_240">240</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">St Giles’s Churchyard, <a href="#Page_109">109</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">St Giles’s Clock, <a href="#Page_8">8</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">St Giles’s, memoranda of Old Kirk of, <a href="#Page_105">105-108</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">St Giles’s, Old Kirk described, <a href="#Page_114">114</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">St Giles’s, position of, relative to Heart of Midlothian, <a href="#Page_82">82</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">St Giles’s Street, suggested name for Princes Street, <a href="#Page_7">7</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">St Giles, statue of, thrown into North Loch, <a href="#Page_118">118</a>.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_376" id="Page_376">{376}</a></span></li> - -<li class="indx">St Giles’s, Tolbooth Church described, <a href="#Page_114">114</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">St James’s Square, <a href="#Page_335">335</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">St John’s Cross, <a href="#Page_301">301</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">St John’s Street, <a href="#Page_8">8</a>, <a href="#Page_302">302</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">St Mary-in-the-Fields (Kirk o’ Fields), situation of, <a href="#Page_256">256</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">St Mary’s Wynd, <a href="#Page_171">171</a>, <a href="#Page_258">258</a>, <a href="#Page_276">276</a>, <a href="#Page_287">287</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Saints, Bowhead, the, <a href="#Page_30">30</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Salisbury Crags, <a href="#Page_91">91</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Sanctuary, <a href="#Page_260">260</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">‘Saving the ladies,’ <a href="#Page_147">147</a>, <a href="#Page_251">251</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Schetky, J. G. H., musician, <a href="#Page_152">152</a>, <a href="#Page_253">253</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Scott, Sir Walter, <a href="#Page_6">6</a>, <a href="#Page_24">24</a>, <a href="#Page_31">31</a>, <a href="#Page_38">38</a>, <a href="#Page_87">87</a>, <a href="#Page_134">134</a>, <a href="#Page_140">140</a>, <a href="#Page_143">143</a>, <a href="#Page_147">147</a>, <a href="#Page_181">181</a>, <a href="#Page_182">182</a>, <a href="#Page_190">190</a>, <a href="#Page_231">231</a>, <a href="#Page_242">242</a>, <a href="#Page_243">243</a>, <a href="#Page_264">264</a>, <a href="#Page_277">277</a>, <a href="#Page_293">293</a>, <a href="#Page_298">298</a>, <a href="#Page_327">327</a>, <a href="#Page_328">328</a>, <a href="#Page_365">365</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Scott, Walter, W.S., <a href="#Page_335">335</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Scott, William, Lord Stowell, <a href="#Page_172">172</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Scoundrels’ Walk, the, <a href="#Page_115">115</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Seafield, Earl of, <a href="#Page_309">309</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Selkirk, Earl of, <a href="#Page_156">156</a>, <a href="#Page_264">264</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Sellar, Mrs, milliner, anecdote of, <a href="#Page_324">324</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Shakspeare Square, <a href="#Page_151">151</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Sharpe, Charles Kirkpatrick, antiquary, <a href="#Page_304">304</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Ship Tavern, Leith, <a href="#Page_284">284</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Shows in Leith Walk, <a href="#Page_362">362</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Shut-up houses in Old Town, <a href="#Page_35">35</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Siddons, Mrs, <a href="#Page_345">345</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Silvermills, village of, <a href="#Page_367">367</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Sinclair, Effie (Mrs Euphame), her boarding-school, <a href="#Page_230">230</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Sinclair, Sir Robert, of Longformacus, <a href="#Page_230">230</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Sinclair, Sir William, of Mey, <a href="#Page_77">77</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Singing Jamie Balfour, <a href="#Page_141">141</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Sinkum the Cawdy, <a href="#Page_130">130</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Skull, the, of George Buchanan, <a href="#Page_288">288</a> <em><a href="#Footnote_230">n.</a></em></li> - -<li class="indx">Smeaton, Mr, singer, <a href="#Page_253">253</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Smellie, William, printer of Burns’s Poems, <a href="#Page_164">164</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Smith, Adam, <a href="#Page_57">57</a>, <a href="#Page_318">318</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Smith, David, of Methven, <a href="#Page_252">252</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Smith, ‘General’ Joe, leader of Edinburgh mobs, <a href="#Page_184">184</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Smollett, a sister of, <a href="#Page_303">303</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Smollett, Tobias, <a href="#Page_56">56</a>, <a href="#Page_303">303</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Snuff-taking, prevalence of, <a href="#Page_200">200</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Somerville, Braid Hugh, a street fight in 1640, <a href="#Page_39">39</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Somerville family, arms of, <a href="#Page_43">43</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Somerville, Lord, and his method of litigation, <a href="#Page_120">120</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Somerville, Major, his combat with Captain Crawford, <a href="#Page_39">39</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Somerville of Cambusnethan, <a href="#Page_120">120</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Somerville, Peter and Bartholomew, <a href="#Page_43">43</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx"><cite>Somervilles, Memorie of the</cite>, <a href="#Page_37">37</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Sommers, Thomas, <a href="#Page_149">149</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">South Back of Canongate, <a href="#Page_258">258</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">South Bridge, <a href="#Page_209">209</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Speaking House, the, <a href="#Page_312">312</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Spendthrift Club, the, <a href="#Page_150">150</a>, <a href="#Page_345">345</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Spottiswoode, John, of Spottiswoode, <a href="#Page_119">119</a>, <a href="#Page_269">269</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Springfield, <a href="#Page_362">362</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Stabilini, musician, <a href="#Page_254">254</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Stair, Countess of, <a href="#Page_63">63-69</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Stair, Earl of, <a href="#Page_63">63</a>, <a href="#Page_67">67</a>, <a href="#Page_123">123</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Stamp-office Close, <a href="#Page_143">143</a>, <a href="#Page_162">162</a>, <a href="#Page_192">192</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Star and Garter Tavern, <a href="#Page_162">162</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Stays, <a href="#Page_199">199</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Steell, Sir John, sculptor, <a href="#Page_18">18</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Steil, John, musician, <a href="#Page_161">161</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Stewart, Archibald, Provost, <a href="#Page_48">48</a>, <a href="#Page_181">181</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Stewart, Dugald, Professor, <a href="#Page_323">323</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Stewart, General, of Garth, <a href="#Page_72">72</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Stewart, James, <a href="#Page_25">25</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Stewart, Robert (Rob Uncle), <a href="#Page_72">72</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Stewart, Sir William, killed in Blackfriars Wynd, <a href="#Page_38">38</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Stewarts of Bonskeid, <a href="#Page_181">181</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Stinking Close, <a href="#Page_34">34</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Stipends of Scotch Church, <a href="#Page_20">20</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Stomacher, the, <a href="#Page_199">199</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Strachan, Lord, <a href="#Page_124">124</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Straiton, Colonel Charles, <a href="#Page_293">293</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Strichen, Lord, <a href="#Page_224">224</a>, <a href="#Page_236">236</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Strichen’s Close, <a href="#Page_222">222</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Sutherland, Countess of, <a href="#Page_205">205</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Sutherland, Earl of, <a href="#Page_205">205</a>, <a href="#Page_288">288</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Sweating Club, <a href="#Page_154">154</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Swift, <a href="#Page_314">314</a>, <a href="#Page_315">315</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Swine roaming in the streets, <a href="#Page_100">100</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Swinton, Margaret, <a href="#Page_293">293</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Syme, Mrs, <a href="#Page_80">80</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Syme, Robert, W.S., <a href="#Page_61">61</a>.</li> - - -<li class="ifrst">Tailors’ Hall, Cowgate, <a href="#Page_346">346</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Tam o’ the Cowgate (first Earl of Haddington), <a href="#Page_244">244</a>, <a href="#Page_367">367</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Tappit-hen, <a href="#Page_151">151</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Taverns of old times, <a href="#Page_158">158-173</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Taylor, the Water-Poet, <a href="#Page_138">138</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Tea-parties, fashionable hour for, <a href="#Page_286">286</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Telfer, Mrs, Smollett’s sister, <a href="#Page_303">303</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Templars’ Lands in Grassmarket, <a href="#Page_50">50</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Tenducci, singer, <a href="#Page_253">253</a>, <a href="#Page_304">304</a>, <a href="#Page_305">305</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Tennis Court, <a href="#Page_344">344</a>, <a href="#Page_345">345</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Theatre in Canongate, <a href="#Page_346">346</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Theatre in Carrubber’s Close, <a href="#Page_15">15</a>, <a href="#Page_346">346</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Theatre Royal, <a href="#Page_7">7</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Theatres, early, in Edinburgh, <a href="#Page_344">344</a>, <a href="#Page_346">346</a>, <a href="#Page_347">347</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Theophilus, Nicholaus, <a href="#Page_260">260</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Thomson, George, his account of music in Edinburgh in last century, <a href="#Page_249">249-254</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Thomson, poet, <a href="#Page_7">7</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Thomson’s, Mrs, lodgings, <a href="#Page_171">171</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Thomson, William, dagger-maker, <a href="#Page_39">39</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Thrale, Mrs, <a href="#Page_60">60</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Threipland, Sir Stuart, of Fingask, <a href="#Page_269">269</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Tinklarian Doctor (William Mitchell), a prating fanatic, <a href="#Page_41">41</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Tinwald, Lord Justice-Clerk, <a href="#Page_9">9</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Tirlin’-pins, <a href="#Page_207">207</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Toddrick’s Wynd, <a href="#Page_257">257</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Tod’s Close, <a href="#Page_22">22</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Tolbooth, Canongate, <a href="#Page_248">248</a>, <a href="#Page_319">319</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Tolbooth Church, <a href="#Page_53">53</a>, <a href="#Page_105">105</a>, <a href="#Page_107">107</a>, <a href="#Page_114">114</a>, <a href="#Page_115">115</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Tolbooth, Old, <a href="#Page_82">82-94</a>, <a href="#Page_179">179</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Tolbooth or ‘Towbuith’ Whigs, <a href="#Page_21">21</a>, <a href="#Page_115">115</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Topham, Major, <a href="#Page_49">49</a>, <a href="#Page_176">176</a>, <a href="#Page_267">267</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Town-guard, the, <a href="#Page_4">4</a>, <a href="#Page_30">30</a>, <a href="#Page_84">84</a>, <a href="#Page_148">148</a>, <a href="#Page_179">179-182</a>, <a href="#Page_233">233</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Town Rats, the, <a href="#Page_179">179</a>, <a href="#Page_186">186</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Town-wall, <a href="#Page_258">258</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Tradesman, habits of an old Edinburgh, <a href="#Page_148">148</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Traquair, ladies of, <a href="#Page_286">286</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Tron Church, <a href="#Page_39">39</a>, <a href="#Page_58">58</a>, <a href="#Page_143">143</a>, <a href="#Page_144">144</a>, <a href="#Page_209">209</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Tulzies (street fights), <a href="#Page_37">37</a>.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_377" id="Page_377">{377}</a></span></li> - -<li class="indx">Tweeddale Court, <a href="#Page_280">280</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Tweeddale, Marquis of, <a href="#Page_225">225</a>, <a href="#Page_279">279</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Tytler, Alexander, <a href="#Page_289">289</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Tytler of Woodhouselee, <a href="#Page_152">152</a>, <a href="#Page_321">321</a>.</li> - - -<li class="ifrst">Udward’s house in Niddry’s Wynd, <a href="#Page_210">210</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Union Club, the, <a href="#Page_155">155</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Union, the, legends of, <a href="#Page_309">309</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">University, the, <a href="#Page_259">259</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Urbani, Mr, singer, <a href="#Page_253">253</a>.</li> - - -<li class="ifrst">Veronica, Miss, <a href="#Page_60">60</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Violante, Signora, <a href="#Page_346">346</a>.</li> - - -<li class="ifrst">Wallace, Lady, <a href="#Page_276">276</a>, <a href="#Page_277">277</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Wall, town, <a href="#Page_258">258</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Ward’s Inn, <a href="#Page_355">355</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Warriston, <a href="#Page_175">175</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Water-gate, <a href="#Page_150">150</a>, <a href="#Page_170">170</a>, <a href="#Page_308">308</a>, <a href="#Page_344">344</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Water of Leith, <a href="#Page_367">367</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Waterstone, John, <a href="#Page_39">39</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Watson, George, <a href="#Page_50">50</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Webster, Dr Alexander, of convivial memory, <a href="#Page_20">20</a>, <a href="#Page_115">115</a>, <a href="#Page_162">162</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Webster’s Close, <a href="#Page_20">20</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Weigh-house, the, <a href="#Page_27">27</a>, <a href="#Page_39">39</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Weir, Grizel, <a href="#Page_32">32</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Weir, Major, wizard, <a href="#Page_26">26</a>, <a href="#Page_31">31-37</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Wemyss, Earl of, <a href="#Page_111">111</a>, <a href="#Page_305">305</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Wemyss, Laird of, <a href="#Page_38">38</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">West Bow, <a href="#Page_26">26-54</a>, <a href="#Page_133">133</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">West Port, <a href="#Page_75">75</a>, <a href="#Page_245">245</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Whey Club, the, <a href="#Page_156">156</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Whigs, Tolbooth, <a href="#Page_21">21</a>, <a href="#Page_115">115</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Whitefield, George, in Edinburgh, <a href="#Page_7">7</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Whiteford House, <a href="#Page_10">10</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">White Hart Inn, <a href="#Page_2">2</a>, <a href="#Page_171">171</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">White Horse Inn, <a href="#Page_2">2</a>, <a href="#Page_170">170</a>, <a href="#Page_172">172</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">White Horse Stables, <a href="#Page_170">170</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Whitesmiths of the Bow, <a href="#Page_26">26</a>, <a href="#Page_42">42</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Wig Club, the, <a href="#Page_155">155</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Wig, the, of Lord Coalstoun, <a href="#Page_96">96</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Williamson of Cardrona, <a href="#Page_165">165</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Williamson, Peter, <a href="#Page_114">114</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Wilson, Daniel (<cite>Memorials of Edinburgh</cite>), <a href="#Page_222">222</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Wilson, James (Claudero), <a href="#Page_330">330</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Wilson the smuggler, <a href="#Page_52">52</a>, <a href="#Page_180">180</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Wodrow, historian, <a href="#Page_15">15</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Wooden-fronted houses, account of, <a href="#Page_271">271</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Woodhead, <a href="#Page_61">61</a>, <a href="#Page_62">62</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Woodhouselee, Lord, <a href="#Page_130">130</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Wood, Lang Sandy, <a href="#Page_6">6</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Wood’s Farm, <a href="#Page_6">6</a>, <a href="#Page_366">366</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Woods, Mr, actor, <a href="#Page_149">149</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Worthies, the, of Parliament House, <a href="#Page_134">134</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Writers’ Court, <a href="#Page_162">162</a>.</li> - - -<li class="ifrst">Young, Alexander, W.S., <a href="#Page_59">59</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Young Bibles, <a href="#Page_277">277</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">Young, John, <a href="#Page_7">7</a>.</li> - -<li class="indx">York, Duke of, <a href="#Page_80">80</a>, <a href="#Page_181">181</a>, <a href="#Page_248">248</a>, <a href="#Page_344">344</a>.</li></ul> - - - -<p class="center">THE END.</p></div> - -<hr class="chap" /> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_378" id="Page_378">{378}</a></span></p> - - - -<p class="center"> -Edinburgh:<br /> -Printed by W. & R. Chambers, Limited.<br /> -</p> - -<hr class="chap" /> - -<div class="footnotes"> -<p class="ph3">FOOTNOTES</p> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_1" id="Footnote_1"></a><a href="#FNanchor_1"><span class="label">[1]</span></a> Mr W. B. Blaikie (<cite>The Book of the Old Edinburgh Club</cite>, vol. ii.) gives a -list of the occupants of a first-class tenement some years subsequent to the -’45 Rebellion: ‘First-floor, Mrs Stirling, fishmonger; second, Mrs Urquhart, -lodging-house keeper; third-floor, the Countess Dowager of Balcarres; fourth, -Mrs Buchan of Kelloe; fifth, the Misses Elliot, milliners and mantua-makers; -garrets, a variety of tailors and other tradesmen.’</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_2" id="Footnote_2"></a><a href="#FNanchor_2"><span class="label">[2]</span></a> Pamphlet <i lang="la" xml:lang="la">circa</i> 1700, Wodrow Collection, Adv. Lib.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_3" id="Footnote_3"></a><a href="#FNanchor_3"><span class="label">[3]</span></a> Brown Square finally disappeared with the making of Chambers Street.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_4" id="Footnote_4"></a><a href="#FNanchor_4"><span class="label">[4]</span></a> Mr William Cowan, in vol. i. of <cite>The Book of the Old Edinburgh Club</cite>, says -this exemption applied to the three eastmost tenements in Princes Street.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_5" id="Footnote_5"></a><a href="#FNanchor_5"><span class="label">[5]</span></a> The late Bruce J. Home drew up in 1908 ‘A Provisional List of Old Houses -Remaining in High Street and Canongate,’ which was printed, with accompanying -map, in the first volume of <cite>The Old Edinburgh Club Book</cite>. The statement -is therein made ‘that since 1860 two-thirds of the ancient buildings in the Old -Town of Edinburgh have been demolished.’ The map showed, coloured in red, -the remaining buildings of the Old Town which had survived until the beginning -of the twentieth century.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_6" id="Footnote_6"></a><a href="#FNanchor_6"><span class="label">[6]</span></a> This jest was doubtless based on Swift’s famous poem on Vanbrugh’s house -(1704). The peculiar architectural features of Allan’s ‘goose pie’ have been -almost entirely obliterated by recent alterations. Only the two circular upper -stories remain in their original form.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_7" id="Footnote_7"></a><a href="#FNanchor_7"><span class="label">[7]</span></a> ‘My mother was told by those who had enjoyed his plays, that he -had a child’s puppet stage and a set of dressed dolls for actors, which -were in great favour with old and young.’—C. K. Sharpe’s note in Wilson’s -<cite>Reminiscences</cite>.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_8" id="Footnote_8"></a><a href="#FNanchor_8"><span class="label">[8]</span></a> King’s Bridge crosses King’s Stables -Road, and the access from it is Johnston -Terrace.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_9" id="Footnote_9"></a><a href="#FNanchor_9"><span class="label">[9]</span></a> When Mrs Cockburn, author of ‘Flowers of the Forest,’ entered on occupation -of the house in 1756, it was described in the Baird titles as ‘my lodging in -the castle-hill of Edinburgh, formerly possessed by the Duchess of Gordon.’</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_10" id="Footnote_10"></a><a href="#FNanchor_10"><span class="label">[10]</span></a> A Board-school now occupies the site of the mansion. The doorway referred -to is rebuilt into the school-house.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_11" id="Footnote_11"></a><a href="#FNanchor_11"><span class="label">[11]</span></a> George, sixth Earl of Huntly, took his last illness, June 1636, in ‘his house -in the Canongate.’ George, the first duke, who had held out the Castle at the -Revolution, died December 1716, at his house in the Citadel of Leith, where he -appears to have occasionally resided for some years. I should suppose the -house on the Castle-hill to have been inhabited by the family in the interval. -</p> -<p> -The Citadel seems to have been a little nest of aristocracy, of the Cavalier -party. In 1745 one of its inhabitants was Dame Magdalen Bruce of Kinross, -widow of the baronet who had assisted in the Restoration. Here lived with -her the Rev. Robert Forbes, Episcopal minister of Leith [afterwards Bishop of -Orkney], from whose collections regarding Charles Edward and his adventures -a volume of extracts was published by me in 1834. [The <cite>Lyon in Mourning</cite> is -here referred to, from which Dr Chambers published a number of the narratives -in his <cite>Jacobite Memoirs</cite> (1834), and from which he also utilised some information -of the Rebellion of 1745 in the preparation of his <cite>History of the Rebellion</cite>. -At his death he bequeathed the work to the Advocates’ Library, Edinburgh, -where it now remains. It consists of eight small octavo volumes of manuscript -of about two hundred pages, each bound in black leather, with blackened -edges, and around the title-page of each volume a deep black border. The -collection was the work of the Rev. Robert Forbes, a clergyman of the -Episcopal Church of Scotland, who became in 1762 Bishop of Ross and Caithness. -It was treasured by his widow for thirty years, and then bought by Sir -Henry Stewart of Allanton in 1806. Dr Robert Chambers unearthed it for -historical purposes, and later purchased it from Sir Henry Stewart. Some relics -which Forbes succeeded in obtaining from his correspondents—such as a piece -of the Prince’s garter, a piece of the gown he wore as Betty Burke, and of the -string of the apron he then had on, a fragment of a waistcoat worn by the -Prince, and other things—were preserved on the inside of some of the boards -of the volumes. The <cite>Lyon in Mourning</cite> was edited by Mr Henry Paton -from the manuscript in the Advocates’ Library, and published in three volumes -by the Scottish History Society (1895).] Throughout those troublous days, a -little Episcopal congregation was kept together in Leith; their place of worship -being the <em>first floor</em> of an old, dull-looking house in Queen Street (dated 1615), -the lower floor of which was, in my recollection, a police-office.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_12" id="Footnote_12"></a><a href="#FNanchor_12"><span class="label">[12]</span></a> Webster’s Close became Brown’s Close when the property changed hands, -and two brothers of that name occupied the house. To Brown’s Close the -recently formed Society of Antiquaries of Scotland removed in 1794 from -Gosford’s Close, because the latter was too narrow to admit of the members -being carried to the place of meeting in sedan-chairs.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_13" id="Footnote_13"></a><a href="#FNanchor_13"><span class="label">[13]</span></a> Before the Government bounty had supplemented the poor stipends of the -Scotch Church up to £150, many of them were so small that the widow’s -allowance from this fund nearly equalled them. Such was the case of Cranshaws, -a pastoral parish among the Lammermoor Hills. A former minister of -Cranshaws having wooed a lass of humble rank, the father of the lady, when -consulted on the subject, said, ‘Tak’ him, Jenny; he’s as gude deid as living!’ -meaning, of course, that she would be as well off as a widow as in the quality -of a wife.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_14" id="Footnote_14"></a><a href="#FNanchor_14"><span class="label">[14]</span></a> ‘The monograms of the name of our blessed lady are formed of the letters -M. A., M. R., and A. M., and these stand respectively for Maria, Maria Regina, -and Ave Maria. The letter M. was often used by itself to express the name of -the Blessed Virgin, and became a vehicle for the most beautiful ornament and -design; the letter itself being entirely composed of emblems, with some -passage from the life of our lady in the void spaces.’—<cite>Pugin’s Glossary of -Ecclesiastical Ornament and Costume</cite>, 1844.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_15" id="Footnote_15"></a><a href="#FNanchor_15"><span class="label">[15]</span></a> Keith’s History.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_16" id="Footnote_16"></a><a href="#FNanchor_16"><span class="label">[16]</span></a> The New College and Assembly Hall of the (United) Free Church.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_17" id="Footnote_17"></a><a href="#FNanchor_17"><span class="label">[17]</span></a> Fellows.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_18" id="Footnote_18"></a><a href="#FNanchor_18"><span class="label">[18]</span></a> Busy.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_19" id="Footnote_19"></a><a href="#FNanchor_19"><span class="label">[19]</span></a> Not improbably this was done in a spirit of literal obedience to the injunction -(Matthew vi. 6): ‘Thou, when thou prayest, enter into thy closet.’ Commentators -on this passage mention that every Jewish house had a place of -secret devotion built over the porch.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_20" id="Footnote_20"></a><a href="#FNanchor_20"><span class="label">[20]</span></a> When Colonel Gardiner occupied it the house was known as Olive Bank. -It was later changed to Bankton House by Andrew Macdowall, who, when -raised to the Bench in 1755, took the title of Lord Bankton.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_21" id="Footnote_21"></a><a href="#FNanchor_21"><span class="label">[21]</span></a> Bankton House has been burned down and rebuilt since this was written.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_22" id="Footnote_22"></a><a href="#FNanchor_22"><span class="label">[22]</span></a> <cite>History of Edinburgh</cite>, p. 205, note.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_23" id="Footnote_23"></a><a href="#FNanchor_23"><span class="label">[23]</span></a> Before Major Weir took up house in the West Bow he is said to have -lodged in the Cowgate, where he had as a fellow-lodger the fanatic Mitchell -(Ravaillac <i lang="la" xml:lang="la">redivivus</i>), who attempted to shoot Archbishop Sharpe.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_24" id="Footnote_24"></a><a href="#FNanchor_24"><span class="label">[24]</span></a> Sir Andrew Ramsay was provost of the city, first from 1654 till 1657, and -then continuously for eleven years, 1662-73. It was he who obtained from -the king the title of Lord Provost for the chief magistrate, and secured precedence -for him next to the Lord Mayor of London.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_25" id="Footnote_25"></a><a href="#FNanchor_25"><span class="label">[25]</span></a> The Rev. Mr Frazer, minister of Wardlaw, in his <cite>Divine Providences</cite> (MS. -Adv. Lib.), dated 1670.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_26" id="Footnote_26"></a><a href="#FNanchor_26"><span class="label">[26]</span></a> <cite>Satan’s Invisible World Discovered.</cite></p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_27" id="Footnote_27"></a><a href="#FNanchor_27"><span class="label">[27]</span></a> The causeway. A skirmish fought between the Hamiltons and Douglases, -upon the High Street of Edinburgh, in the year 1515, was popularly termed -<em>Cleanse the Causeway</em>.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_28" id="Footnote_28"></a><a href="#FNanchor_28"><span class="label">[28]</span></a> Cane.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_29" id="Footnote_29"></a><a href="#FNanchor_29"><span class="label">[29]</span></a> Hamstringed.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_30" id="Footnote_30"></a><a href="#FNanchor_30"><span class="label">[30]</span></a> <cite>Memorie of the Somervilles</cite>, vol. ii. p. 271.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_31" id="Footnote_31"></a><a href="#FNanchor_31"><span class="label">[31]</span></a> This house was demolished in 1836.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_32" id="Footnote_32"></a><a href="#FNanchor_32"><span class="label">[32]</span></a> Jackson’s <cite>History of the Stage</cite>, p. 418.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_33" id="Footnote_33"></a><a href="#FNanchor_33"><span class="label">[33]</span></a> See <cite>Notes from the Records of the Assembly Rooms of Edinburgh</cite>. -Edinburgh: 1842. In the eighteenth century a lady’s ‘night-gown’ was a -special kind of evening-dress, often of silk brocade, &c., other than full dress; -and a gentleman’s night-gown was a dressing-gown, not a bed-garment.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_34" id="Footnote_34"></a><a href="#FNanchor_34"><span class="label">[34]</span></a> It was a ball in the room of the Old Assembly Close building which -Goldsmith describes in the letter quoted, and in which public assemblies were -revived in 1746. The new rooms in Bell’s Wynd were opened in 1756.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_35" id="Footnote_35"></a><a href="#FNanchor_35"><span class="label">[35]</span></a> Called the ‘Ovir Bow Port.’ It stood about the line of the present Victoria -Terrace.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_36" id="Footnote_36"></a><a href="#FNanchor_36"><span class="label">[36]</span></a> This house was demolished in 1835, to make way for a passage towards -George IV. Bridge.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_37" id="Footnote_37"></a><a href="#FNanchor_37"><span class="label">[37]</span></a> Taken down in 1839.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_38" id="Footnote_38"></a><a href="#FNanchor_38"><span class="label">[38]</span></a> Demolished in 1833.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_39" id="Footnote_39"></a><a href="#FNanchor_39"><span class="label">[39]</span></a> The narrow, crooked West Bow, descending very steeply from the Lawnmarket -to the Grassmarket, has been almost wholly obliterated by Victoria -Street, a comparatively wide and gradually sloping street which crosses the -line of the old West Bow from George IV. Bridge. Victoria Street was built -in 1835-40; and only a few houses on one side of the head of the Bow still -stand, and these have been rebuilt.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_40" id="Footnote_40"></a><a href="#FNanchor_40"><span class="label">[40]</span></a> From whom it got its name—James’s Court.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_41" id="Footnote_41"></a><a href="#FNanchor_41"><span class="label">[41]</span></a> A ‘land’ still standing (1912) as it was when Hume lived there. It was -also the residence of the Countess of Eglinton when she left the Stamp Office -Close in the High Street. See <a href="#Page_192">p. 192</a>.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_42" id="Footnote_42"></a><a href="#FNanchor_42"><span class="label">[42]</span></a> Burton’s <cite>Life of Hume</cite>, ii. 173.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_43" id="Footnote_43"></a><a href="#FNanchor_43"><span class="label">[43]</span></a> Formerly called Blair’s Close (<a href="#Page_19">p. 19</a>). The name was altered to Baird’s -Close when the Gordon property passed into the possession of Baird of -Newbyth.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_44" id="Footnote_44"></a><a href="#FNanchor_44"><span class="label">[44]</span></a> Mrs Cockburn, writing to Miss Cumming at Balcarres, describes ‘a ball’ -she gave in this house. ‘On Wednesday I gave a ball. How do ye think I -contrived to stretch out this house to hold twenty-two people, and had nine -couples always dancing? Yet this is true; it is also true that we had a table -covered with divers eatables all the time, and that everybody ate when they -were hungry and drank when they were dry, but nobody ever sat down.... -Our fiddler sat where the cupboard is, and they danced in both rooms. The -table was stuffed into the window and we had plenty of room. It made the -bairns all very happy.’—<cite>Mrs Cockburn’s Letters</cite>, edited by T. Craig Brown.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_45" id="Footnote_45"></a><a href="#FNanchor_45"><span class="label">[45]</span></a> His lordship died September 20, 1722 (Brunton and Haig’s <cite>Historical -Account of the Senators of the College of Justice</cite>).</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_46" id="Footnote_46"></a><a href="#FNanchor_46"><span class="label">[46]</span></a> A stuff brought, I believe, from Spain, and which was at one time much in -fashion in Scotland.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_47" id="Footnote_47"></a><a href="#FNanchor_47"><span class="label">[47]</span></a> Lady Stair’s Close was originally a <i lang="fr" xml:lang="fr">cul de sac</i>. When the Mound was begun -a thoroughfare was cut through the garden, making the close the principal -communication between the Lawnmarket and Hanover Street, then the western -extremity of the New Town. The name it first bore was ‘Lady Gray’s Close,’ -after the wife of the builder of the house, and that of Lady Stair’s Close was -given to it (<cite>The Book of the Old Edinburgh Club</cite>, vol. iii.) early in the eighteenth -century, when the house passed into the possession of the first Lady Stair, a -granddaughter of Sir William Gray of Pittendrum. Lord Rosebery, who represents -a branch of the Primroses (other than that to which the second viscount, -mentioned below, belonged), restored the house and presented it to the city in 1907.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_48" id="Footnote_48"></a><a href="#FNanchor_48"><span class="label">[48]</span></a> ‘Grace, Countess of Aboyne and Moray, in her early youth, had the weakness -to consult a celebrated fortune-teller, inhabiting an obscure close in Edinburgh. -The sibyl predicted that she would become the wife of two earls, and -how many children she was to bear; but withal assured her that when she -should see a new coach of a certain colour driven up to her door as belonging -to herself, her hearse must speedily follow. Many years afterwards, Lord -Moray, who was not aware of this prediction, resolved to surprise his wife with -the present of a new equipage; but when Lady Moray beheld from a window a -carriage of the ominous colour arrive at the door of Darnaway, and heard that -it was to be her own property, she sank down, exclaiming that she was a dead -woman, and actually expired in a short time after, November 17, 1738.’—<cite>Notes -to Law’s Memorials</cite>, p. xcii.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_49" id="Footnote_49"></a><a href="#FNanchor_49"><span class="label">[49]</span></a> Lady Primrose’s story forms the groundwork of one of Sir Walter Scott’s -best short stories, <cite>My Aunt Margaret’s Mirror</cite>.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_50" id="Footnote_50"></a><a href="#FNanchor_50"><span class="label">[50]</span></a> This story loses its point by the discovery made in St Peter’s upon Cornhill, -London, of the marriage register of the second Earl of Stair with Lady -Primrose, 27th March 1708. Thus they were married persons several years -before the presumed date of this story. Miss Rosaline Masson announced the -discovery in an article in <cite>Chambers’s Journal</cite> for 1912, entitled, ‘The Secret -Marriage of Lady Primrose and John, Second Earl of Stair.’ She makes this -comment: ‘The testimony of John Waugh, Parson, has lain buried for over -two hundred years in the old Register in the city; but the tale, whispered one -day, some time about the year 1714, in the High Street of Edinburgh, first -among the strutting gallants and loungers at the Cross at noon, and later on, -over the delicate tea-cups, in the gossipy gatherings of the fair sex—that tale -was nowise buried. It has never died. Did not Kirkpatrick Sharpe repeat it, -sixty years after Lady Stair’s death, to young Robert Chambers, at that time -collecting material for his inimitable book, <cite>Traditions of Edinburgh</cite>?’ The -article further tries to answer the question why the Earl of Stair and the young -widow made this clandestine marriage, which gave opportunity for the story.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_51" id="Footnote_51"></a><a href="#FNanchor_51"><span class="label">[51]</span></a> Negroes in a servile capacity had been long before known in Scotland. -Dunbar has a droll poem on a female black, whom he calls ‘My lady with the -muckle lips.’ In <cite>Lady Marie Stuart’s Household Book</cite>, referring to the early -part of the seventeenth century, there is mention of ‘ane inventorie of the -gudes and geir whilk pertenit to Dame Lilias Ruthven, Lady Drummond,’ -which includes as an item, ‘the black boy and the papingoe [peacock];’ in so -humble an association was it then thought proper to place a human being who -chanced to possess a dark skin.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_52" id="Footnote_52"></a><a href="#FNanchor_52"><span class="label">[52]</span></a> Raised to the Bench with the title of Lord Kerse.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_53" id="Footnote_53"></a><a href="#FNanchor_53"><span class="label">[53]</span></a> The lintel bearing this legend is preserved in a doorway at the top of the -staircase of the Free Library, George IV. Bridge. The Cowgate portion of -the Library building (1887-89) occupies the site of Sir Thomas Hope’s house.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_54" id="Footnote_54"></a><a href="#FNanchor_54"><span class="label">[54]</span></a> While King’s Advocate, Sir Thomas Hope had the unique experience of -pleading at the Bar before two of his sons who were judges—Lord Craighall -and Lord Kerse. There is a tradition that when addressing the Court he -remained covered, and that from this circumstance the Lord Advocates still -have this privilege, although they do not exercise it. Probably the custom -introduced by Sir Thomas Hope originated in his being an officer of state, -which entitled him to sit in parliament wearing his hat, and he claimed the -same privilege when appearing before the judges.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_55" id="Footnote_55"></a><a href="#FNanchor_55"><span class="label">[55]</span></a> See a Memoir by Sir Archibald Steuart Denham in the publications of the -Maitland Club.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_56" id="Footnote_56"></a><a href="#FNanchor_56"><span class="label">[56]</span></a> The site of Chiesly’s house is that occupied by the Episcopal Church -Training College in Orwell Place.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_57" id="Footnote_57"></a><a href="#FNanchor_57"><span class="label">[57]</span></a> In <cite>The Domestic Annals of Scotland</cite> the place of his execution is given as -Drumsheugh, and Sir Walter Scott says he was hanged near his own house -of Dalry.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_58" id="Footnote_58"></a><a href="#FNanchor_58"><span class="label">[58]</span></a> This was the first High School, built in 1578 in the grounds of the Blackfriars’ -Monastery, of which David Malloch, or Mallet, was janitor in 1717. The -building faced the Canongate. In 1777 it was replaced by the building now -facing Infirmary Street and used in connection with the university. It is -this later building that is associated with Sir Walter Scott, Lord Brougham, -Lord Jeffrey, Lord Cockburn, and other eminent men of the last quarter of the -eighteenth and first quarter of the nineteenth century.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_59" id="Footnote_59"></a><a href="#FNanchor_59"><span class="label">[59]</span></a> The Mechanics’ Library was discontinued when the Free Library was -opened. Bailie Macmoran’s house is now used as a university settlement.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_60" id="Footnote_60"></a><a href="#FNanchor_60"><span class="label">[60]</span></a> After being the residence for a time of Sir John Clerk of Penicuik and other -notable citizens, it was latterly occupied by the widow (the seventh wife) of -the Rev. David Williamson—‘Dainty Davie’—minister of St Cuthbert’s Church -at the time of the Revolution.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_61" id="Footnote_61"></a><a href="#FNanchor_61"><span class="label">[61]</span></a> The house is marked No. 21. Its back windows enjoy a fine view of the -Firth of Forth and the Fife hills. The registration of his lordship’s birth -appears as follows: ‘Wednesday, 30th September 1778, Henry Brougham, Esq., -parish of St Gilles (<i lang="la" xml:lang="la">sic</i>), and Eleonora Syme, his spouse, a son born the 19th -current, named Henry Peter. Witnesses, Mr Archibald Hope, Royal Bank, -and Principal Robertson.’ The parts of the New Town then built belonged to -St Giles’s parish.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_62" id="Footnote_62"></a><a href="#FNanchor_62"><span class="label">[62]</span></a> These verses are to be found in a curious volume, which appeared in -London in 1618, under the title of <cite>Essayes and Characters of a Prison and -Prisoners</cite>, by Geffray Mynshul, of Grayes Inn, Gent. Reprinted, 1821, by -W. & C. Tait, Edinburgh. The lines were applied specially to the King’s -Bench Prison.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_63" id="Footnote_63"></a><a href="#FNanchor_63"><span class="label">[63]</span></a> A large white house near the Castle, on the north side of the street, and -now (1868) no more.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_64" id="Footnote_64"></a><a href="#FNanchor_64"><span class="label">[64]</span></a> Katherine Nairne was the niece of Sir William Nairne, later a judge under -the title of Lord Dunsinnane, and it was currently reported that her escape -from the Tolbooth was effected through his connivance. Sir William’s clerk -accompanied the lady to Dover, and had great difficulty in preventing her -recognition and arrest through her levity on the journey.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_65" id="Footnote_65"></a><a href="#FNanchor_65"><span class="label">[65]</span></a> Up to the year 1830, when George IV. Bridge gave easy access to Parliament -House, this quaint custom was followed by Lord Glenlee, who walked from his -house in Brown Square, down Crombie’s Close, across the Cowgate, and up the -Back Stairs.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_66" id="Footnote_66"></a><a href="#FNanchor_66"><span class="label">[66]</span></a> Napier of Merchiston.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_67" id="Footnote_67"></a><a href="#FNanchor_67"><span class="label">[67]</span></a> This projection is still a notable architectural -feature in the open space at the -back of the tenement referred to. The -original windows have been built up. One of the lettered stones bearing the -words, ‘Blessit be God for all his giftis’—a favourite motto with old Edinburgh -builders—was removed to Easter Coates house, where it may still be seen in -that now old building adjoining St Mary’s Cathedral.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_68" id="Footnote_68"></a><a href="#FNanchor_68"><span class="label">[68]</span></a> From this tradition it was known as ‘The Cromwell Bartizan.’ Dunbar’s -Close did not get its name from its supposed association with Cromwell’s -soldiers, but from a family that lived in it. At an earlier period it was known -as Ireland’s Close.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_69" id="Footnote_69"></a><a href="#FNanchor_69"><span class="label">[69]</span></a> Edinburgh was not in this respect worse than other European cities. Paris, -at least, was equally disgusting. Rigord, who wrote in the twelfth century, -tells us that the king, standing one day at the window of his palace near the -Seine, and observing that the dirt thrown up by the carriages produced a most -offensive stench, resolved to remedy this intolerable nuisance by causing the -streets to be paved. For a long time swine were permitted to wallow in them; -till the young Philip being killed by a fall from his horse, from a sow running -between its legs, an order was issued that no swine should in future run about -the street. The monks of the Abbey of St Anthony remonstrated fiercely -against this order, alleging that the prevention of the saint’s swine from -enjoying the liberty of going where they pleased was a want of respect to -their patron. It was therefore found necessary to grant them the privilege of -wallowing in the dirt without molestation, requiring the monks only to turn -them out with bells about their necks.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_70" id="Footnote_70"></a><a href="#FNanchor_70"><span class="label">[70]</span></a> -</p> -<div class="poetry-container"><div class="poetry"><div class="stanza"> -<div class="verse">‘To recreat hir hie renoun,</div> -<div class="verse">Of curious things thair wes all sort,</div> -<div class="verse">The stairs and houses of the toun</div> -<div class="verse">With tapestries were spread athort:</div> -<div class="verse">Quhair histories men micht behould,</div> -<div class="verse">With images and anticks auld.</div> -</div></div></div> - -<div class="blockquot"> -<p class="right"><span class="smcap">The description of the qveen’s maiesties<br /> -maist honorable entry into the town of<br /> -edinbvrgh, vpon the 19. day of maii, 1590.<br /> -By john bvrel.</span>’—<cite>Watson’s Collection of Scots<br /> -Poems</cite> (1709).</p></div> -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_71" id="Footnote_71"></a><a href="#FNanchor_71"><span class="label">[71]</span></a> In the early times these privileged beggars were called ‘Bedesmen,’ from -telling their beads as they walked from Holyrood to St Giles’. From the -erection of the Canongate Church in 1690 the ceremony took place there, until -it was discontinued in the first years of Queen Victoria’s reign. A well-known -worthy of this community was reputed in 1837 to possess property which -yielded an annual income of £120.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_72" id="Footnote_72"></a><a href="#FNanchor_72"><span class="label">[72]</span></a> We learn from Crawford’s <cite>History of the University</cite> (MS. Adv. Lib.) that -the service was read that day in the Old Kirk on account of the more dignified -place of worship towards the east being then under the process of alteration -for the erection of the altar, ‘and other pendicles of that idolatrous worship.’</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_73" id="Footnote_73"></a><a href="#FNanchor_73"><span class="label">[73]</span></a> <cite>Notes upon the Phœnix edition of the Pastoral Letter</cite>, by S. Johnson, 1694.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_74" id="Footnote_74"></a><a href="#FNanchor_74"><span class="label">[74]</span></a> Wodrow, in his <cite>Diary</cite>, makes a statement apparently at issue with that in -the text, both in respect of locality and person: -</p> -<p> -‘It is the constantly believed tradition that it was Mrs Mean, wife to John -Mean, merchant in Edinburgh, who threw the first stool when the service-book -was read in the New Kirk, Edinburgh, 1637, and that many of the lasses that -carried on the fray were preachers in disguise, for they threw stools to a great -length.’</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_75" id="Footnote_75"></a><a href="#FNanchor_75"><span class="label">[75]</span></a> A newspaper commenced after the Restoration, and continued through -eleven numbers.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_76" id="Footnote_76"></a><a href="#FNanchor_76"><span class="label">[76]</span></a> Small stools.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_77" id="Footnote_77"></a><a href="#FNanchor_77"><span class="label">[77]</span></a> See <cite>St Giles’, Edinburgh: Church, College, and Cathedral</cite>, by the Rev. Sir -J. Cameron Lees, D.D.; also <cite>Historical Sketch of St Giles’ Cathedral</cite>, by -William Chambers, by whom the cathedral was restored in 1872-83. Regarding -the reinterment of Montrose, there is a narrative, with some fresh light on -the subject, in the paper, ‘The Embalming of Montrose,’ in the first volume of -<cite>The Book of the Old Edinburgh Club</cite>. The monuments to Knox, the Earl of -Murray, and the Marquises of Argyll and Montrose are quite modern.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_78" id="Footnote_78"></a><a href="#FNanchor_78"><span class="label">[78]</span></a> St Giles’ churchyard was divided into two terraces by the old city wall -(1450), which was built half-way down the sloping ground on the south side of -the High Street. A part of this wall was exposed in 1832 when excavations -were made for additional buildings at the Advocates’ Library.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_79" id="Footnote_79"></a><a href="#FNanchor_79"><span class="label">[79]</span></a> Previous to 1681 the inhabitants of Edinburgh were supplied with water -from pump-wells in the south side of the Cowgate.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_80" id="Footnote_80"></a><a href="#FNanchor_80"><span class="label">[80]</span></a> Which also were destroyed in the fires of 1824.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_81" id="Footnote_81"></a><a href="#FNanchor_81"><span class="label">[81]</span></a> The Wemysses’ footman was one of the few arrested on suspicion of being -a ringleader in the Porteous riot.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_82" id="Footnote_82"></a><a href="#FNanchor_82"><span class="label">[82]</span></a> John’s Coffee-house was then situated in the north-east corner of -Parliament Close.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_83" id="Footnote_83"></a><a href="#FNanchor_83"><span class="label">[83]</span></a> Baijen-hole, see <a href="#Footnote_140">note</a>, <a href="#Page_155">p. 155</a>.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_84" id="Footnote_84"></a><a href="#FNanchor_84"><span class="label">[84]</span></a> In the early times above referred to, £100 was accounted a sufficient capital -for a young goldsmith—being just so much as purchased his furnace, tools, &c., -served to fit up his shop, and enabled him to enter the Incorporation, which -alone required £40 out of the £100. The stock with which George Heriot -commenced business at a much earlier period (1580)—said to have been about -£200—must therefore be considered a proof of the wealth of that celebrated -person’s family.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_85" id="Footnote_85"></a><a href="#FNanchor_85"><span class="label">[85]</span></a> Peter had, in early life, been kidnapped and sold to the plantations. After -spending some time among the North American Indians, he came back to -Scotland, and began business in Edinburgh as a vintner. Robert Fergusson, -in his poem entitled <cite>The Rising of the Session</cite>, thus alludes to a little tavern he -kept within the Parliament House: -</p> - -<div class="poetry-container"><div class="poetry"><div class="stanza"> -<div class="wideverse">‘This vacance is a heavy doom</div> -<div class="wideverse">On Indian Peter’s coffee-room,</div> -<div class="wideverse">For a’ his china pigs are toom;</div> -<div class="wideverse indent6">Nor do we see</div> -<div class="wideverse">In wine the soukar biskets soom</div> -<div class="wideverse indent6">As light’s a flee.’</div> -</div></div></div> - -<p> -Peter afterwards established a penny-post in Edinburgh, which became so -profitable in his hands that the General Post-office gave him a handsome -compensation for it. He was also the first to print a street directory in -Edinburgh. He died January 19, 1799.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_86" id="Footnote_86"></a><a href="#FNanchor_86"><span class="label">[86]</span></a> Provost Creech was the first who had the good taste to abandon the -practice.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_87" id="Footnote_87"></a><a href="#FNanchor_87"><span class="label">[87]</span></a> See <cite>Collection of Original Poems by Scotch Gentlemen</cite>, vol. ii. 137 (1762).</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_88" id="Footnote_88"></a><a href="#FNanchor_88"><span class="label">[88]</span></a> An Edinburgh term applied to a class of rogues. Probably a corrupt pronunciation -of the English word <em>cully</em>—to fool, to cheat.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_89" id="Footnote_89"></a><a href="#FNanchor_89"><span class="label">[89]</span></a> Where the North Bridge now stands.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_90" id="Footnote_90"></a><a href="#FNanchor_90"><span class="label">[90]</span></a> A full description of the old Parliament Hall, with a plan showing the -divisions and the arrangements of the ‘booths,’ is given in <cite>Reekiana</cite>; <cite>or, Minor -Antiquities of Edinburgh</cite>. It is not now called the Outer House.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_91" id="Footnote_91"></a><a href="#FNanchor_91"><span class="label">[91]</span></a> Several of the illustrations in the present section are immediately derived -from a curious volume, full of entertainment for a denizen of the Parliament -House—<cite>The Court of Session Garland</cite>. Edinburgh: Thomas Stevenson. 1839.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_92" id="Footnote_92"></a><a href="#FNanchor_92"><span class="label">[92]</span></a> <cite>A Moral Discourse on the Power of Interest.</cite> By David Abercromby, M.D. -London, 1691. P. 60.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_93" id="Footnote_93"></a><a href="#FNanchor_93"><span class="label">[93]</span></a> John Sinclair of Murkle, appointed a Lord of Session in 1733.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_94" id="Footnote_94"></a><a href="#FNanchor_94"><span class="label">[94]</span></a> Alexander Leslie, advocate, succeeded his nephew as fifth Earl of Leven, -and fourth Earl of Melville, in 1729. He was named a Lord of Session, and -took his seat on the bench on the 11th of July 1734. He died 2nd February -1754.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_95" id="Footnote_95"></a><a href="#FNanchor_95"><span class="label">[95]</span></a> Sir Walter Pringle of Newhall, raised to the bench in 1718.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_96" id="Footnote_96"></a><a href="#FNanchor_96"><span class="label">[96]</span></a> Andrew Fletcher of Milton was appointed, on the resignation of James -Erskine of Grange, Lord Justice-clerk, and took his seat on the bench 21st June -1735.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_97" id="Footnote_97"></a><a href="#FNanchor_97"><span class="label">[97]</span></a> Probably Gibson of Pentland.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_98" id="Footnote_98"></a><a href="#FNanchor_98"><span class="label">[98]</span></a> Hew Dalrymple of Drummore, appointed a Lord of Session in 1726.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_99" id="Footnote_99"></a><a href="#FNanchor_99"><span class="label">[99]</span></a> Afterwards Lord Dreghorn.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_100" id="Footnote_100"></a><a href="#FNanchor_100"><span class="label">[100]</span></a> Author of a Treatise on Election Laws, and Solicitor-general during the -Coalition Ministry in 1783.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_101" id="Footnote_101"></a><a href="#FNanchor_101"><span class="label">[101]</span></a> Afterwards Lord Polkemmet.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_102" id="Footnote_102"></a><a href="#FNanchor_102"><span class="label">[102]</span></a> Afterwards Lord Eskgrove and Lord Justice-clerk.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_103" id="Footnote_103"></a><a href="#FNanchor_103"><span class="label">[103]</span></a> Alexander Boswell, Esq., of Auchinleck, the author’s father—appointed to -the bench in 1754; died 1782. This gentleman was a precise old Presbyterian, -and therefore the most opposite creature in the world to his son, who was a -cavalier in politics and an Episcopalian.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_104" id="Footnote_104"></a><a href="#FNanchor_104"><span class="label">[104]</span></a> Afterwards Lord Braxfield—appointed 1776; died 1800, while holding the -office of Lord Justice-clerk. Lord Braxfield is the prototype of Stevenson’s -<cite>Weir of Hermiston</cite>.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_105" id="Footnote_105"></a><a href="#FNanchor_105"><span class="label">[105]</span></a> Alexander Lockhart, Esq., decidedly the greatest lawyer at the Scottish bar -in his day—appointed to the bench in 1774; died in 1782.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_106" id="Footnote_106"></a><a href="#FNanchor_106"><span class="label">[106]</span></a> Andrew Pringle, Esq.—appointed a judge in 1759; died 1776. This gentleman -was remarkable for his fine oratory, which was praised highly by Sheridan -the lecturer (father of R. B. Sheridan) in his <cite>Discourses on English Oratory</cite>.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_107" id="Footnote_107"></a><a href="#FNanchor_107"><span class="label">[107]</span></a> Henry Home, Esq.—raised to the bench 1752; died 1783. This great man, -so remarkable for his metaphysical subtlety and literary abilities, was strangely -addicted to the use of the coarse word in the text.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_108" id="Footnote_108"></a><a href="#FNanchor_108"><span class="label">[108]</span></a> Sir David Dalrymple—appointed a judge in 1766; died 1792. A story is -told of Lord Hailes once making a serious objection to a law-paper, and, in -consequence, to the whole suit to which it belonged, on account of the word -<em>justice</em> being spelt in the manner mentioned in the text. Perhaps no author -ever affected so much critical accuracy as Lord Hailes, and yet there never was -a book published with so large an array of <i lang="la" xml:lang="la">corrigenda et addenda</i> as the first -edition of the <cite>Annals of Scotland</cite>.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_109" id="Footnote_109"></a><a href="#FNanchor_109"><span class="label">[109]</span></a> George Brown, Esq., of Coalstoun—appointed 1756; died 1776.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_110" id="Footnote_110"></a><a href="#FNanchor_110"><span class="label">[110]</span></a> Alexander Fraser of Strichen—appointed 1730; died 1774.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_111" id="Footnote_111"></a><a href="#FNanchor_111"><span class="label">[111]</span></a> James Erskine, Esq., subsequently titled Lord Alva—appointed 1761; -died 1796. He was of exceedingly small stature, and upon that account -denominated ‘Lordie.’</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_112" id="Footnote_112"></a><a href="#FNanchor_112"><span class="label">[112]</span></a> James Veitch, Esq.—appointed 1761; died 1793.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_113" id="Footnote_113"></a><a href="#FNanchor_113"><span class="label">[113]</span></a> Francis Garden, Esq.—appointed 1764; died 1793—author of several -respectable literary productions.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_114" id="Footnote_114"></a><a href="#FNanchor_114"><span class="label">[114]</span></a> Robert Dundas, Esq., of Arniston—appointed 1760; died 1787.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_115" id="Footnote_115"></a><a href="#FNanchor_115"><span class="label">[115]</span></a> The bench being semicircular, and the President sitting in the centre, the -seven judges on his right hand formed the <em>east</em> wing, those on his left formed -the <em>west</em>. The decisions were generally announced by the words ‘Adhere’ and -‘Alter’—the former meaning an affirmance, the latter a reversal, of the judgment -of the Lord Ordinary.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_116" id="Footnote_116"></a><a href="#FNanchor_116"><span class="label">[116]</span></a> The term of the summer session was then from the 12th of June to the 12th -of August.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_117" id="Footnote_117"></a><a href="#FNanchor_117"><span class="label">[117]</span></a> Henry, first Viscount Melville, then coming forward as an advocate at the -Scottish bar. When this great man passed advocate, he was so low in cash -that, after going through the necessary forms, he had only one guinea left in -his pocket. Upon coming home, he gave this to his sister (who lived with -him), in order that she might purchase him a gown; after which he had not a -penny. However, his talents soon filled his coffers. The gown is yet preserved -by the family.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_118" id="Footnote_118"></a><a href="#FNanchor_118"><span class="label">[118]</span></a> ‘To See’ is to appoint the petition against the judgment pronounced to be -answered.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_119" id="Footnote_119"></a><a href="#FNanchor_119"><span class="label">[119]</span></a> John Erskine of Carnock, author of the <cite>Institute of the Law of Scotland</cite>.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_120" id="Footnote_120"></a><a href="#FNanchor_120"><span class="label">[120]</span></a> Thomas Miller, Esq., of Glenlee—appointed to this office in 1766, upon -the death of Lord Minto. He filled this situation till the death of Robert -Dundas, in 1787, when (January 1788) he was made President of the Court of -Session, and created a baronet, in requital for his long service as a judge. -Being then far advanced in life, he did not live long to enjoy his new accession -of honours, but died in September 1789.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_121" id="Footnote_121"></a><a href="#FNanchor_121"><span class="label">[121]</span></a> John Campbell, Esq., of Stonefield.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_122" id="Footnote_122"></a><a href="#FNanchor_122"><span class="label">[122]</span></a> James Burnet, Esq.—appointed 1767; died 1799.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_123" id="Footnote_123"></a><a href="#FNanchor_123"><span class="label">[123]</span></a> James Fergusson, Esq.—appointed 1761; died 1777. He always wore his -hat on the bench, on account of sore eyes.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_124" id="Footnote_124"></a><a href="#FNanchor_124"><span class="label">[124]</span></a> Robert Bruce, Esq.—appointed 1764; died 1785.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_125" id="Footnote_125"></a><a href="#FNanchor_125"><span class="label">[125]</span></a> Alexander Tait, Clerk of Session.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_126" id="Footnote_126"></a><a href="#FNanchor_126"><span class="label">[126]</span></a> He was the grandson of Lord President Lockhart, who was shot by -Chiesly of Dalry (see <a href="#Page_75">p. 75</a>).</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_127" id="Footnote_127"></a><a href="#FNanchor_127"><span class="label">[127]</span></a> Within the memory of an old citizen, who was living in 1833, the Post-office -was in the first floor of a house near the Cross, above an alley which still bears -the name of the Post-office Close. Thence it was removed to a floor in the -south side of the Parliament Square, which was fitted up like a shop, and the -letters were dealt across an ordinary counter, like other goods. At this time -all the out-of-door business of delivery was managed by one letter-carrier. -About 1745 the London bag brought on one occasion no more than a single letter, -addressed to the British Linen Company. From the Parliament Square the -office was removed to Lord Covington’s house, above described; thence, after -some years, to a house in North Bridge Street; thence to Waterloo Place; and -finally, to a new and handsome structure on the North Bridge.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_128" id="Footnote_128"></a><a href="#FNanchor_128"><span class="label">[128]</span></a> Lord Gardenstone erected the building (in the form of a Grecian temple) -which encloses St Bernard’s Well, on the Water of Leith, between the Dean -Bridge and Stockbridge. He also founded the town of Laurencekirk in -Kincardineshire, which he hoped to make a manufacturing centre.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_129" id="Footnote_129"></a><a href="#FNanchor_129"><span class="label">[129]</span></a> Notes to <cite>Redgauntlet</cite>.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_130" id="Footnote_130"></a><a href="#FNanchor_130"><span class="label">[130]</span></a> Lord Grange, whose <cite>Diary of a Senator of the College of Justice</cite> was published -in 1833.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_131" id="Footnote_131"></a><a href="#FNanchor_131"><span class="label">[131]</span></a> Lord Newton was known as ‘The Mighty.’ Lord Cockburn says it was -not uncommon for judges on the bench to provide themselves with a bottle of -port, which they consumed while listening to the case being tried before them.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_132" id="Footnote_132"></a><a href="#FNanchor_132"><span class="label">[132]</span></a> This story is told of John Clerk, who afterwards sat on the bench as Lord -Eldin.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_133" id="Footnote_133"></a><a href="#FNanchor_133"><span class="label">[133]</span></a> It was very common for Scotch ladies of rank, even till the middle of the -last century, to wear black masks in walking abroad or airing in a carriage; -and for some gentlemen, too, who were vain of their complexion. They were -kept close to the face by means of a string, having a button of glass or precious -stone at the end, which the lady held in her mouth. This practice, I understand, -did not in the least interrupt the flow of tittle-tattle and scandal among -the fair wearers. -</p> -<p> -We are told, in a curious paper in the <cite>Edinburgh Magazine</cite> for August 1817, -that at the period above mentioned, ‘though it was a disgrace for ladies to be -seen drunk, yet it was none to be a little intoxicated in good company.’</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_134" id="Footnote_134"></a><a href="#FNanchor_134"><span class="label">[134]</span></a> The principal oyster-parties, in old times, took place in Lucky Middlemass’s -tavern in the Cowgate (where the south pier of the [South] bridge now stands), -which was the resort of Fergusson and his fellow-wits—as witness his own -verse: -</p> - -<div class="poetry-container"><div class="poetry"><div class="stanza"> -<div class="wideverse">‘When big as burns the gutters rin,</div> -<div class="wideverse">If ye ha’e catched a droukit skin,</div> -<div class="wideverse">To Luckie Middlemist’s loup in,</div> -<div class="wideverse indent6">And sit fu’ snug,</div> -<div class="wideverse">Owre oysters and a dram o’ gin,</div> -<div class="wideverse indent6">Or haddock lug.’</div> -</div></div></div> - -<p> -At these fashionable parties, the ladies would sometimes have the oyster-women -to dance in the ball-room, though they were known to be of the worst -character. This went under the convenient name of <em>frolic</em>.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_135" id="Footnote_135"></a><a href="#FNanchor_135"><span class="label">[135]</span></a> The cry of ‘Gardy loo!’ at this hour was supposed to warn pedestrians; -but, as Sir Walter Scott says, ‘it was sometimes like the shriek of the water-kelpie, -rather the elegy than the warning of the overwhelmed passenger.’</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_136" id="Footnote_136"></a><a href="#FNanchor_136"><span class="label">[136]</span></a> This highly appropriate popular <i lang="fr" xml:lang="fr">sobriquet</i> cannot be traced beyond the reign -of Charles II. Tradition assigns the following as the origin of the phrase: An -old gentleman in Fife, designated Durham of Largo, was in the habit, at the -period mentioned, of regulating the time of evening worship by the appearance -of the smoke of Edinburgh, which he could easily see, through the clear summer -twilight, from his own door. When he observed the smoke increase in density, -in consequence of the good folk of the city preparing their supper, he would call -all the family into the house, saying: ‘It’s time now, bairns, to tak’ the beuks, -and gang to our beds, for yonder’s Auld Reekie, I see, putting on her nicht-cap!’</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_137" id="Footnote_137"></a><a href="#FNanchor_137"><span class="label">[137]</span></a> This gentleman, the ‘revered defender of beauteous Stuart,’ and the surviving -friend of Allan Ramsay, had an unaccountable aversion to cheese, and not -only forbade the appearance of that article upon his table, but also its introduction -into his house. His family, who did not partake in this antipathy, -sometimes smuggled a small quantity of cheese into the house, and ate it in -secret; but he almost always discovered it by the <em>smell</em>, which was the sense -it chiefly offended. Upon scenting the object of his disgust, he would start up -and run distractedly through the house in search of it, and not compose himself -again to his studies till it was thrown out of doors. Some of his ingenious -children, by way of a joke, once got into their possession the coat with which -he usually went to the court, and ripping up the sutures of one of its wide, old-fashioned -skirts, sewed up therein a considerable slice of double Gloster. Mr -Tytler was next day surprised when, sitting near the bar, he perceived the -smell of cheese rising around him. ‘Cheese here too!’ cried the querulous old -gentleman; ‘nay, then, the whole world must be conspiring against me!’ So -saying, he rose, and ran home to tell his piteous case to Mrs Tytler and the -children, who became convinced from this that he really possessed the singular -delicacy and fastidiousness in respect of the effluvia arising from cheese which -they formerly thought to be fanciful.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_138" id="Footnote_138"></a><a href="#FNanchor_138"><span class="label">[138]</span></a> The dress of the Edinburgh Defensive Band was as follows: a cocked hat, -black stock, hair tied and highly powdered; dark-blue long-tailed coat, with -orange facings in honour of the Revolution, and full lapels sloped away to show -the white dimity vest; nankeen small-clothes; white thread stockings, ribbed -or plain; and short nankeen spatterdashes. Kay has some ingenious caricatures, -in miniature, of these redoubted Bruntsfield Links and Heriot’s Green warriors. -The last two survivors were Mr John M’Niven, stationer, and Robert Stevenson, -painter, who died in 1832.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_139" id="Footnote_139"></a><a href="#FNanchor_139"><span class="label">[139]</span></a> One of the panes is now (1847) destroyed, the other cracked. [The tavern -is now out of existence.]</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_140" id="Footnote_140"></a><a href="#FNanchor_140"><span class="label">[140]</span></a> Souters’ clods and other forms of bread fascinating to youngsters, as well -as penny pies of high reputation, were to be had at a shop which all old -Edinburgh people speak of with extreme regard and affection—the <em>Baijen -Hole</em>—situated immediately to the east of Forrester’s Wynd and opposite to -the Old Tolbooth. The name—a mystery to later generations—seems to bear -reference to the Baijens or Baijen Class, a term bestowed in former days upon -the junior students in the college. <em>Bajan</em> or <em>bejan</em> is the French <i lang="fr" xml:lang="fr">bejaune</i>, -‘<i lang="fr" xml:lang="fr">bec jaune</i>,’ ‘greenbill,’ ‘greenhorn,’ ‘freshman.’</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_141" id="Footnote_141"></a><a href="#FNanchor_141"><span class="label">[141]</span></a> The fullest account yet published of this extraordinary coterie is that of -Mr H. A. Cockburn in <cite>The Book of the Old Edinburgh Club</cite>, vol. iii. Creech -refers to it in ironical terms as ‘the virtuous, the venerable and dignified Wig -who so much to their own honour and kind attention always inform the public -of their meetings.’ The reputation of the club was very different.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_142" id="Footnote_142"></a><a href="#FNanchor_142"><span class="label">[142]</span></a> The following were other eighteenth century Edinburgh clubs: -</p> -<p> -<span class="smcap">The Poker Club</span> originated in a combination of gentlemen favourable to -the establishment of militia in Scotland, and its name, happily hit on by -Professor Adam Ferguson, was selected to avoid giving offence to the Government. -A history of the club is given in Dugald Stewart’s Life, and also in -Carlyle’s <cite>Autobiography</cite>, where he says: ‘Dinner was on the table soon after -two o’clock, at one shilling a head, the wine to be confined to sherry and claret, -and the reckoning called at six o’clock.’ The minutes of this interesting club -are preserved in the University Library. -</p> -<p> -<span class="smcap">The Mirror Club</span>, formed by the contributors to the periodical of that -name. It had really existed before under the name of ‘The Tabernacle.’ ‘The -Tabernacle,’ or ‘The Feast of Tabernacles,’ as Ramsay of Ochtertyre calls it, -was a company of friends and admirers of Henry Dundas, first Viscount -Melville. -</p> -<p> -<span class="smcap">The Easy Club</span>, founded by Allan Ramsay the poet, consisted of twelve -members, each of whom was required to assume the name of some Scottish -poet. Ramsay took that of Gawin Douglas. -</p> -<p> -<span class="smcap">The Capillaire Club</span> was ‘composed of all who were inclined to be witty -and joyous.’ -</p> -<p> -<span class="smcap">The Facer Club</span>, which met in Lucky Wood’s tavern in the Canongate, -was perhaps not of a high order. If a member did not drain his measure of -liquor, he had to throw it at his own face. -</p> -<p> -<span class="smcap">The Griskin Club</span> also met in the Canongate. Dr Carlyle and those who -took part with him in the production of Home’s <cite>Douglas</cite> at the Canongate -playhouse formed this club, and gave it its name from the pork griskins which -was their favourite supper dish. -</p> -<p> -<span class="smcap">The Ruffian Club</span>, ‘composed of men whose hearts were milder than their -manners, and their principles more correct than their habits of life.’ -</p> -<p> -<span class="smcap">The Wagering Club</span>, instituted in 1775, still meets annually. An account -of this club is given in <cite>The Book of the Old Edinburgh Club</cite>, vol. ii. -</p> -<p> -Others may be mentioned by name only: <span class="smcap">The Diversorium</span>, <span class="smcap">The Haveral</span>, -<span class="smcap">The Whin Bush</span>, <span class="smcap">The Skull</span>, <span class="smcap">The Six Foot</span>, <span class="smcap">The Assembly of Birds</span>, -<span class="smcap">The Card</span>, <span class="smcap">The Borached</span>, <span class="smcap">The Humdrum</span>, <span class="smcap">The Apician</span>, <span class="smcap">The Blast -and Quaff</span>, <span class="smcap">The Ocean</span>, <span class="smcap">The Pipe</span>, <span class="smcap">The Knights of the Cap and -Feather</span>, <span class="smcap">The Revolutionary</span>, <span class="smcap">The Stoic</span>, and <span class="smcap">The Club</span>, referred to -in Lockhart’s <cite>Life of Scott</cite>. -</p> -<p> -Of a later period than those mentioned above were <span class="smcap">The Gowks Club</span>; -<span class="smcap">The Right and Wrong</span>, of which James Hogg gives a short account; and -<span class="smcap">The Friday Club</span>, instituted by Lord Cockburn, who also wrote an interesting -history of it, recently printed by Mr H. A. Cockburn, in vol. iii. of <cite>The Book -of the Old Edinburgh Club</cite>.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_143" id="Footnote_143"></a><a href="#FNanchor_143"><span class="label">[143]</span></a> The Scottish peers on occasions of election of representatives to the House -of Lords frequently brought their meetings to a close by dining at Fortune’s -Tavern.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_144" id="Footnote_144"></a><a href="#FNanchor_144"><span class="label">[144]</span></a> See <a href="#Footnote_142">note</a>, <a href="#Page_157">p. 157</a>.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_145" id="Footnote_145"></a><a href="#FNanchor_145"><span class="label">[145]</span></a> ‘The wags of the eighteenth century used to tell of a certain city treasurer -who, on being applied to for a new rope to the Tron Kirk bell, summoned the -Council to deliberate on the demand; an adjournment to Clerihugh’s Tavern, -it was hoped, might facilitate the settlement of so weighty a matter, but one -dinner proved insufficient, and it was not till their third banquet that the -application was referred to a committee, who spliced the old rope, and settled -the bill!’—Wilson’s <cite>Memorials of Old Edinburgh</cite>.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_146" id="Footnote_146"></a><a href="#FNanchor_146"><span class="label">[146]</span></a> Since this was written, the whole group of buildings has been taken down, -and new ones substituted (1868).</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_147" id="Footnote_147"></a><a href="#FNanchor_147"><span class="label">[147]</span></a> The ‘White Horse’ is introduced in <cite>The Abbot</cite>—it was the scene of -Roland Græme’s encounter with young Seton.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_148" id="Footnote_148"></a><a href="#FNanchor_148"><span class="label">[148]</span></a> The Corsican patriot whose acquaintance Boswell made on his tour abroad. -Johnson characterised him as having ‘the loftiest port of any man he had -ever seen.’</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_149" id="Footnote_149"></a><a href="#FNanchor_149"><span class="label">[149]</span></a> Peter Ramsay was a brother of William Ramsay of Barnton, the well-known -sporting character of the early part of the nineteenth century.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_150" id="Footnote_150"></a><a href="#FNanchor_150"><span class="label">[150]</span></a> A punning friend, remarking on the old Scottish practice of styling elderly -landladies by the term <em>Lucky</em>, said: ‘Why not?—<i lang="la" xml:lang="la">Felix qui pot</i>——’</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_151" id="Footnote_151"></a><a href="#FNanchor_151"><span class="label">[151]</span></a> The following curious advertisement, connected with an inn in the Canongate, -appeared in the <cite>Edinburgh Evening Courant</cite> for July 1, 1754. The -advertisement is surmounted by a woodcut representing the stage-coach, a -towering vehicle, protruding at top—the coachman a stiff-looking, antique -little figure, who holds the reins with both hands, as if he were afraid of the -horses running away—a long whip streaming over his head and over the top -of the coach, and falling down behind—six horses, like starved rats in appearance—a -postillion upon one of the leaders, with a whip: -</p> -<p> -‘The Edinburgh Stage-Coach, for the better accommodation of Passengers, -will be altered to a new genteel two-end Glass Machine, hung on Steel Springs, -exceeding light and easy, to go in ten days in summer and twelve in winter; -to set out the first Tuesday in March, and continue it from Hosea Eastgate’s, -the <em>Coach and Horses</em> in Dean Street, Soho, London, and from John Somerville’s -in the Canongate, Edinburgh, every other Tuesday, and meet at Burrowbridge -on Saturday night, and set out from thence on Monday morning, and -get to London and Edinburgh on Friday. In the winter to set out from London -and Edinburgh every other [alternate] Monday morning, and to go to Burrowbridge -on Saturday night; and to set out from thence on Monday morning, -and get to London and Edinburgh on Saturday night. Passengers to pay as -usual. Performed, if God permits, by your dutiful servant, -</p> - -<p class="right"> -<span class="smcap">Hosea Eastgate</span>.<br /> -</p> - -<p class="center"> -‘Care is taken of small parcels <em>according to their value</em>.’ -</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_152" id="Footnote_152"></a><a href="#FNanchor_152"><span class="label">[152]</span></a> The pillar was restored to Edinburgh, and for some years stood within -an enclosed recess on the north side of St Giles’. When Mr W. E. Gladstone -rebuilt the Cross in 1885, a little to the south of its former site, between -St Giles’ Church and the Police Office, the original pillar was replaced in its -old position.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_153" id="Footnote_153"></a><a href="#FNanchor_153"><span class="label">[153]</span></a> Bishop Forbes inserts in his manuscript (which I possess) a panegyrical -epitaph for Ned Burke, stating that he died in Edinburgh in November 1751. -He also gives the following particulars from Burke’s conversation: -</p> -<p> -‘One of the soles of Ned’s shoes happening to come off, Ned cursed the day -upon which he should be forced to go without shoes. The Prince, hearing him, -called to him and said: “Ned, look at me”—when (said Ned) I saw him holding -up one of his feet at me, where there was de’il a sole upon the shoe; and -then I said: “Oh, my dear! I have nothing more to say. You have stopped -my mouth indeed.” -</p> -<p> -‘When Ned was talking of seeing the Prince again, he spoke these words: -“If the Prince do not come and see me soon, good faith I will go and see my -daughter [Charles having taken the name of Betty Burke when in a female -disguise], and crave her; for she has not yet paid her christening money, and -as little has she paid the coat I ga’e her in her greatest need.”’</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_154" id="Footnote_154"></a><a href="#FNanchor_154"><span class="label">[154]</span></a> ‘Upon the 26th of February [1617], the Cross of Edinburgh was taken -down. The old long stone, about forty footes or thereby in length, was to be -translated, by the devise of certain mariners in Leith, from the place where it -had stood past the memory of man, to a place beneath in the High Street, -without any harm to the stone; and the body of the old Cross was demolished, -and another builded, whereupon the long stone or obelisk was erected and set -up, on the 25th day of March.’—Calderwood’s <cite>Church History</cite>.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_155" id="Footnote_155"></a><a href="#FNanchor_155"><span class="label">[155]</span></a> See <cite>Domestic Annals of Scotland</cite>, ii. 436.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_156" id="Footnote_156"></a><a href="#FNanchor_156"><span class="label">[156]</span></a> <cite>Waverley Annotations</cite>, i. 435.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_157" id="Footnote_157"></a><a href="#FNanchor_157"><span class="label">[157]</span></a> What is said to be the original Blue Blanket is still preserved in the -National Museum of Antiquities of Scotland.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_158" id="Footnote_158"></a><a href="#FNanchor_158"><span class="label">[158]</span></a> <cite>Scots Magazine</cite>, June 1767.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_159" id="Footnote_159"></a><a href="#FNanchor_159"><span class="label">[159]</span></a> The skeleton of this singular being exists entire in the class-room of the -professor of anatomy in the College.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_160" id="Footnote_160"></a><a href="#FNanchor_160"><span class="label">[160]</span></a> Notes to <cite>Waverley</cite>.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_161" id="Footnote_161"></a><a href="#FNanchor_161"><span class="label">[161]</span></a> <cite>Waverley Annotations</cite>, i. 70.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_162" id="Footnote_162"></a><a href="#FNanchor_162"><span class="label">[162]</span></a> The buildings in this alley are now demolished.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_163" id="Footnote_163"></a><a href="#FNanchor_163"><span class="label">[163]</span></a> He is said to have been a nobleman of considerable talent, and a great -underhand supporter of the exiled family; see the <cite>Lockhart Papers</cite>. George -Lockhart had married his daughter Euphemia, or <em>Lady Effie</em>, as she was -commonly called. In the <cite>Edinburgh Annual Register</cite> there is preserved a -letter from Lord Eglintoune to his son, replete with good sense as well as -paternal affection.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_164" id="Footnote_164"></a><a href="#FNanchor_164"><span class="label">[164]</span></a> The earl was forty-nine and Miss Kennedy twenty.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_165" id="Footnote_165"></a><a href="#FNanchor_165"><span class="label">[165]</span></a> The anecdote which follows is chiefly taken from <cite>The Tell-tale</cite>, a rare -collection, published in 1762.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_166" id="Footnote_166"></a><a href="#FNanchor_166"><span class="label">[166]</span></a> Notes by C. K. Sharpe in Stenhouse’s edition of the <cite>Scots Musical -Museum</cite>, ii. 200.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_167" id="Footnote_167"></a><a href="#FNanchor_167"><span class="label">[167]</span></a> As a specimen of the complimentary intercourse of the poet with Lady -Eglintoune, an anecdote is told of her having once sent him a basket of fine -fruit; to which he returned this stanza: -</p> - -<div class="poetry-container"><div class="poetry"><div class="stanza"> -<div class="verse">‘Now, Priam’s son, ye may be mute,</div> -<div class="verse indent2">For I can bauldly brag wi’ thee;</div> -<div class="verse">Thou to the fairest gave the fruit—</div> -<div class="verse indent2">The fairest gave the fruit to me.’</div> -</div></div></div> - -<p> -The love of raillery has recorded that on this being communicated by -Ramsay to his friend Eustace Budgell, the following comment was soon after -received from the English wit: -</p> - -<div class="poetry-container"><div class="poetry"><div class="stanza"> -<div class="verse">‘As Juno fair, as Venus kind,</div> -<div class="verse indent2">She may have been who gave the fruit;</div> -<div class="verse">But had she had Minerva’s mind,</div> -<div class="verse indent2">She’d ne’er have given ’t to such a brute.’</div> -</div></div></div> -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_168" id="Footnote_168"></a><a href="#FNanchor_168"><span class="label">[168]</span></a> An old gentleman told our informant that he never saw so beautiful a -figure in his life as Lady Eglintoune at a Hunters’ Ball in Holyrood House, -dancing a minuet in a large hoop, and a suit of black velvet, trimmed with -gold.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_169" id="Footnote_169"></a><a href="#FNanchor_169"><span class="label">[169]</span></a> Snuff-taking was prevalent among young women in our grandmothers’ -time. Their flirts used to present them with pretty snuff-boxes. In one of the -monthly numbers of the <cite>Scots Magazine</cite> for the year 1745 there is a satirical -poem by a swain upon the practice of snuff-taking; to which a lady replies -next month, defending the fashion as elegant and of some account in coquetry. -Almost all the old ladies who survived the commencement of this century took -snuff. Some kept it in pouches, and abandoned, for its sake, the wearing of -white ruffles and handkerchiefs.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_170" id="Footnote_170"></a><a href="#FNanchor_170"><span class="label">[170]</span></a> A gown then required ten yards of stuff.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_171" id="Footnote_171"></a><a href="#FNanchor_171"><span class="label">[171]</span></a> This verse appears in a manuscript subsequent to 1760. The name, however, -is Sleigh, not Lee. Mrs Mally Sleigh was married in 1725 to the Lord -Lyon Brodie of Brodie. Allan Ramsay celebrates her.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_172" id="Footnote_172"></a><a href="#FNanchor_172"><span class="label">[172]</span></a> James Erskine on ascending the bench first took the title of Lord Tinwald, -from his estate in Dumfriesshire. That of Lord Alva he assumed when he -purchased the family estate of Alva, in Clackmannanshire, from his eldest -brother, Sir Charles Erskine.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_173" id="Footnote_173"></a><a href="#FNanchor_173"><span class="label">[173]</span></a> The site of Mylne Square is now occupied by the block of buildings directly -opposite the north front of the Tron Church.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_174" id="Footnote_174"></a><a href="#FNanchor_174"><span class="label">[174]</span></a> The first of this name was made ‘master-mason’ to the king in 1481, -and the position descended in regular succession in the family till 1710, when -they adopted the style of architect.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_175" id="Footnote_175"></a><a href="#FNanchor_175"><span class="label">[175]</span></a> Lady Glenorchy built a chapel, which was named after her, on the low -ground to the south of the Calton Hill. The chapel was swept away, along -with that of the fine Gothic building Trinity College Church, for the convenience -of the North British Railway. The lady’s name is still preserved in Lady -Glenorchy’s Established Church in Roxburgh Place and Lady Glenorchy’s -United Free Church in Greenside.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_176" id="Footnote_176"></a><a href="#FNanchor_176"><span class="label">[176]</span></a> The Canongate seems to have been paved about the same time. In 1535 -the king granted to the Abbot of Holyrood a duty of one penny upon every -loaded cart, and a halfpenny upon every empty one, to repair and maintain -the causeway.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_177" id="Footnote_177"></a><a href="#FNanchor_177"><span class="label">[177]</span></a> George Lockhart of Carnwath lived here in 1753. Afterwards he resided -in Ross House, a suburban mansion, which afterwards was used as a lying-in -hospital. The park connected with this house is now occupied by George -Square. While in Mr Lockhart’s possession Ross House was the scene of -many gay routs and balls. -</p> -<p> -The Lords Ross, the original proprietors of this mansion, died out in 1754. -One of the last persons in Scotland supposed to be possessed by an evil spirit -was a daughter of George, the second last lord. A correspondent says: ‘A -person alive in 1824 told me that, when a child, he saw her clamber up to the -top of an old-fashioned four-post bed like a cat. In her fits it was almost -impossible to hold her. About the same time, a daughter of Lord Kinnaird -was supposed to have the second-sight. One day, during divine worship in -the High Church, she fainted away; on her recovery, she declared that when -Lady Janet Dundas (a daughter of Lord Lauderdale) entered the pew with -Miss Dundas, who was a beautiful young girl, she saw the latter as it were in -a shroud gathered round her neck, and upon her head. Miss Dundas died a -short time after.’</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_178" id="Footnote_178"></a><a href="#FNanchor_178"><span class="label">[178]</span></a> Both facts from Moyses’s <cite>Memoirs</cite>.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_179" id="Footnote_179"></a><a href="#FNanchor_179"><span class="label">[179]</span></a> In the house to the north of this was a shop kept by an eccentric personage, -who exhibited a sign bearing this singular inscription: -</p> -<p class="center"> -ORRA THINGS BOUGHT AND SOLD— -</p> - -<p> -which signified that he dealt in odd articles, such as a single shoe-buckle, one of -a pair of skates, a teapot wanting a lid, or perhaps, as often, a lid <i lang="la" xml:lang="la">minus</i> a -teapot; in short, any unpaired article which was not to be got in the shops where -only new things were sold, and which, nevertheless, was now and then as -indispensably wanted by householders as anything else.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_180" id="Footnote_180"></a><a href="#FNanchor_180"><span class="label">[180]</span></a> The present article is almost wholly from original sources, a fact probably -unknown to a contemporary novelist, who has made it the groundwork of a -fiction without any acknowledgment. Some additional particulars may be -found in <cite>Tales of the Century</cite>, by John Sobieski Stuart (Edinburgh, 1846). In -the <cite>Spalding Miscellany</cite>, vol. iii., are several letters of Lord Grange, containing -allusions to his wife; and a production of his, which has been printed under -the title of <cite>Diary of a Senator of the College of Justice</cite> (Stevenson, Edinburgh, -1833), is worthy of perusal.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_181" id="Footnote_181"></a><a href="#FNanchor_181"><span class="label">[181]</span></a> Here and elsewhere a paper in Lord Grange’s own hand is quoted.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_182" id="Footnote_182"></a><a href="#FNanchor_182"><span class="label">[182]</span></a> ‘Then, and some time before and after, there was a stage-coach from hence -to England.’ So says his lordship; implying that in 1751, when he was -writing, there was no such public conveniency! It had been tried, and had -failed.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_183" id="Footnote_183"></a><a href="#FNanchor_183"><span class="label">[183]</span></a> If we could believe Lord Lovat, however, he personally was innocent, and -regretted he was innocent, of any association with the abduction of Lady -Grange. ‘They said it was all my contrivance, and that it was my servants -that took her away; but I defyed them then, as I do now, and do declare to -you upon honour, that I do not know what has become of that woman, where -she is or who takes care of her, but if I had contrived and assisted, and saved -my Lord Grange from that devil, who threatened every day to murder him -and his children, I would not think shame of it before God or man.’—Letter -of Lord Lovat’s quoted in <cite>Genealogie of the Hayes of Tweeddale</cite>.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_184" id="Footnote_184"></a><a href="#FNanchor_184"><span class="label">[184]</span></a> About four gallons.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_185" id="Footnote_185"></a><a href="#FNanchor_185"><span class="label">[185]</span></a> Named after John Cant, a pious citizen of the sixteenth century, who, with -his wife, Agnes Kerkettle, was a contributor to the foundation of the Convent -of St Catherine of Siena on the south side of the Meadows. The district is -now known as Sciennes—pronounced <em>Sheens</em>.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_186" id="Footnote_186"></a><a href="#FNanchor_186"><span class="label">[186]</span></a> Only fragments of the ancient buildings remain in Cant’s and Dickson’s -Closes.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_187" id="Footnote_187"></a><a href="#FNanchor_187"><span class="label">[187]</span></a> At the head of the Old Bank Close, to the westward; burned down in -1771.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_188" id="Footnote_188"></a><a href="#FNanchor_188"><span class="label">[188]</span></a> Only a small portion of this building now remains.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_189" id="Footnote_189"></a><a href="#FNanchor_189"><span class="label">[189]</span></a> The Advocates’ Library.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_190" id="Footnote_190"></a><a href="#FNanchor_190"><span class="label">[190]</span></a> In the parish of Borthwick.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_191" id="Footnote_191"></a><a href="#FNanchor_191"><span class="label">[191]</span></a> This anecdote was related to me by the first Lord Wharncliffe, grandson’s -grandson to Sir George, about 1828.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_192" id="Footnote_192"></a><a href="#FNanchor_192"><span class="label">[192]</span></a> Cromarty, at seventy, contrived to marry ‘a young and beautiful countess -in her own right, a widow, wealthy, and in universal estimation. The following -distich was composed on the occasion: -</p> - -<div class="poetry-container"><div class="poetry"><div class="stanza"> -<div class="verse">Thou sonsie auld carl, the world has not thy like,</div> -<div class="verse">For ladies fa’ in love with thee, though thou be ane auld tyke.’</div> -</div></div></div> - -<p class="right"> -C. K. Sharpe, Notes to <cite>Law’s Memorials</cite>, p. xlvii. -</p> -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_193" id="Footnote_193"></a><a href="#FNanchor_193"><span class="label">[193]</span></a> This historic building was demolished many years ago. Its main front -faced the Cowgate, and to the north and east were extensive gardens.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_194" id="Footnote_194"></a><a href="#FNanchor_194"><span class="label">[194]</span></a> In this house, too, Queen Mary was entertained at a banquet given by the -citizens. ‘Upon the nynt day of Februar at evin the Queen’s grace come up -in ane honourable manner fra the palice of Holyrudhouse to the Cardinal’s -ludging in Blackfriars Wynd, ... and efter supper the honest young men in -the town come with ane convoy to her,’ and escorted her back to Holyrood.—<cite>Diurnal -of Occurrents.</cite> -</p> -<p> -Before the opening of the original High School in the grounds of the Blackfriars’ -Monastery the pupils were temporarily accommodated in Beaton’s palace.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_195" id="Footnote_195"></a><a href="#FNanchor_195"><span class="label">[195]</span></a> The title ‘Ambassador Keith’ is usually applied to Sir Robert’s father, who, -after several minor diplomatic appointments on the Continent, was the representative -of Great Britain at the court of St Petersburg. An interesting -sketch of him, under the title of ‘Felix,’ by Mrs Cockburn, is appended to the -volume of that lady’s <cite>Letters</cite>, edited by Mr T. Craig Brown. Miss Keith, -known to Edinburgh society as ‘Sister Anne,’ was Scott’s ‘Mrs Bethune -Balliol’ of the <cite>Chronicles of the Canongate</cite>. This gentleman was absent from -Edinburgh about twenty-two years, and returned at a time when it was supposed -that manners were beginning to exhibit symptoms of great improvement. -He, however, complained that they were degenerated. In his early -time, he said, every Scottish gentleman of £300 a year travelled abroad when -young, and brought home to the bosom of domestic life, and to the profession -in which it might be his fate to engage, a vast fund of literary information, -knowledge of the world, and genuine good manners, which dignified his character -through life. But towards the year 1770 this practice had been entirely -given up, and in consequence a sensible change was discoverable upon the -face of good society. (See the <cite>Life of John Home</cite>, by Henry Mackenzie, Esq.).</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_196" id="Footnote_196"></a><a href="#FNanchor_196"><span class="label">[196]</span></a> It is curious to observe how, in correspondence with the change in our -manners and customs, one trade has become extinct, while another succeeded -in its place. At the end of the sixteenth century the manufacture of offensive -weapons predominated over all other trades in Edinburgh. We had then -cutlers, whose <em>essay-piece</em>, on being admitted of the corporation, was ‘ane plain -finished quhanzear’ or sword; gaird-makers, whose business consisted in -fashioning sword-handles; Dalmascars, who gilded the said weapon; and belt-makers, -who wrought the girdles that bound it to the wearer’s body. There -were also dag-makers, who made hackbuts (short-guns) and dags (pistols). -These various professions all became associated in the general one of armourers, -or gunsmiths, when the wearing of weapons went into desuetude—there being -then no further necessity for the expedition and expediency of the modern -political economist’s boasted ‘division of labour.’ As the above arts gave way, -those which tended to provide the comforts and luxuries of civilised life gradually -arose. About 1586 we find the first notice of locksmiths in Edinburgh, and -there was then only one of the trade, whose essay was simply ‘a kist lock.’ -In 1609, however, as the security of property increased, the essay was ‘a kist -lock and a hingand bois lock, with an double plate lock;’ and in 1644 ‘a key -and sprent band’ were added to the essay. In 1682 ‘a cruik and cruik band’ -were further added; and in 1728, for the safety of the lieges, the locksmith’s -essay was appointed to be ‘a cruik and cruik band, a pass lock with a round -filled bridge, not cut or broke in the backside, with nobs and jamb bound.’ In -1595 we find the first notice of shearsmiths. In 1609 a heckle-maker was -admitted into the Corporation of Hammermen. In 1613 a tinkler makes his -appearance; Thomas Duncan, the first tinkler, was then admitted. Pewterers -are mentioned so far back as 1588. In 1647 we find the first knock-maker -(<em>clock-maker</em>), but so limited was his business that he was also a locksmith. -In 1664 the first white-iron man was admitted; also the first harness-maker, -though lorimers had previously existed. Paul Martin, a distressed French -Protestant, in 1691, was the first manufacturer of surgical instruments in -Edinburgh. In 1720 we find the first pin-maker; in 1764, the first edge-tool -maker and first fish-hook maker.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_197" id="Footnote_197"></a><a href="#FNanchor_197"><span class="label">[197]</span></a> The Highland appellative of Lord Lovat, expressing <em>the son of Simon</em>.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_198" id="Footnote_198"></a><a href="#FNanchor_198"><span class="label">[198]</span></a> <cite>Quarterly Review</cite>, vol. xiv. p. 326.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_199" id="Footnote_199"></a><a href="#FNanchor_199"><span class="label">[199]</span></a> First door up the stair at the head of the wynd, on the west side. The -house was burnt down in 1824, but rebuilt in its former arrangement.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_200" id="Footnote_200"></a><a href="#FNanchor_200"><span class="label">[200]</span></a> [The window-tax was first imposed in 1695, and repealed in 1851.]</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_201" id="Footnote_201"></a><a href="#FNanchor_201"><span class="label">[201]</span></a> An old domestic of her ladyship’s preserved one of her shoes as a relic for -many years. The heel was three inches deep.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_202" id="Footnote_202"></a><a href="#FNanchor_202"><span class="label">[202]</span></a> [The view of the famous ‘Douglas Cause,’ affirmed in the House of Lords -in 1771.]</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_203" id="Footnote_203"></a><a href="#FNanchor_203"><span class="label">[203]</span></a> Mrs Grant of Laggan held another opinion of General Simon Fraser. A -pleasing exterior covered a large share of the paternal character—‘No heart -was ever harder, no hands more rapacious than his.’</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_204" id="Footnote_204"></a><a href="#FNanchor_204"><span class="label">[204]</span></a> Myln’s <cite>Lives of the Bishops of Dunkeld</cite>. Edinburgh, 1831.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_205" id="Footnote_205"></a><a href="#FNanchor_205"><span class="label">[205]</span></a> Originally the name was the ‘Wynd of the Blessed Virgin Mary in the -Fields,’ as being the approach to the collegiate church so named which stood -on the site of the University—the ‘Kirk o’ Field’ of the Darnley tragedy.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_206" id="Footnote_206"></a><a href="#FNanchor_206"><span class="label">[206]</span></a> Now Chambers Street.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_207" id="Footnote_207"></a><a href="#FNanchor_207"><span class="label">[207]</span></a> A small ‘bit’ of College Wynd, ending in a <i lang="fr" xml:lang="fr">cul de sac</i>, is all that remains of -this once leading thoroughfare between the city and the ‘Oure Tounis Colledge.’</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_208" id="Footnote_208"></a><a href="#FNanchor_208"><span class="label">[208]</span></a> When it became an unfashionable place of residence it was dubbed by the -fops of the town ‘Cavalry Wynd.’ The northern end of Guthrie Street is the -site of the old Horse Wynd.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_209" id="Footnote_209"></a><a href="#FNanchor_209"><span class="label">[209]</span></a> Macgill was King’s Advocate to James VI., and is said to have died of -grief when his rival, Thomas Hamilton, was preferred for the presidentship.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_210" id="Footnote_210"></a><a href="#FNanchor_210"><span class="label">[210]</span></a> Most of the traditionary -anecdotes in this article were -communicated by Charles, -eighth Earl of Haddington, -through conversation with Sir -Walter Scott, by whom they -were directly imparted to the -author.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_211" id="Footnote_211"></a><a href="#FNanchor_211"><span class="label">[211]</span></a> Near by is the Magdalen Chapel, a curious relic of the sixteenth century, -belonging to the Corporation of Hammermen. It was erected immediately -before the Reformation by a pious citizen, Michael Macquhan, and Jonet -Rhynd, his widow, whose tomb is shown in the floor. The windows towards -the south were anciently filled with stained glass; and there still remain some -specimens of that kind of ornament, which, by some strange chance, had -survived the Reformation. In a large department at the top of one window -are the arms of Mary of Guise, who was queen-regent at the time the chapel -was built. The arms of Macquhan and his wife are also to be seen. In the -lower panes, which have been filled with small figures of saints, only one -remains—a St Bartholomew—who, by a rare chance, has survived the general -massacre. The whole is now very carefully preserved. When the distinguished -Reformer, John Craig, returned to Scotland at the Reformation, after an -absence of twenty-four years, he preached for some time in this chapel, in the -Latin language, to a select congregation of the learned, being unable, by long -disuse, to hold forth in his vernacular tongue. This divine subsequently was -appointed a colleague to John Knox, and is distinguished in history for having -refused to publish the banns between Queen Mary and Bothwell, and also for -having written the National Covenant in 1589. Another circumstance in the -history of this chapel is worthy of notice. The body of the Earl of Argyll, -after his execution, June 30, 1685, was brought down and deposited in this -place, to wait till it should be conveyed to the family burying-place at Kilmun.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_212" id="Footnote_212"></a><a href="#FNanchor_212"><span class="label">[212]</span></a> The amateurs who took the lead as choristers were Gilbert Innes, Esq. of -Stow; Alexander Wight, Esq., advocate; Mr John Hutton, papermaker; -Mr John Russel, W.S.; and Mr George Thomson. As an instrumentalist, we -could boast of our countryman the Earl of Kelly, who also composed six overtures -for an orchestra, one of which I heard played in the hall, himself leading -the band.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_213" id="Footnote_213"></a><a href="#FNanchor_213"><span class="label">[213]</span></a> See a different account of this custom, <a href="#Page_147">p. 147</a>.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_214" id="Footnote_214"></a><a href="#FNanchor_214"><span class="label">[214]</span></a> [‘John M. Giornovicki, commonly known in Britain under the name of -Jarnowick, was a native of Palermo. About 1770 he went to Paris, where he -performed a concerto of his famous master Lolli, but did not succeed. He then -played one of his own concertos, that in A major, and became quite the fashion. -The style of Giornovicki was highly elegant and finished, his intonation perfect, -and his taste pure. The late Domenico Dragonetti, one of the best judges in -Europe, told me that Giornovicki was the most elegant and graceful violin-player -he had ever heard before Paganini, but that he wanted power. He -seems to have been a dissipated and passionate man; a good swordsman too, -as was common in those days. One day, in a dispute, he struck the Chevalier -St George, then one of the greatest violin-players and best swordsmen in -Europe. St George said coolly: “I have too much regard for his musical -talent to fight him.” A noble speech, showing St George in all respects the -better man. Giornovicki died suddenly at St Petersburg in 1804.’—G. F. G.]</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_215" id="Footnote_215"></a><a href="#FNanchor_215"><span class="label">[215]</span></a> G. T., it may now be explained, was George Thomson, the well-known and -generally loved editor of the <cite>Melodies of Scotland</cite>. He might rather have -described himself as <i lang="la" xml:lang="la">Nonogenarius</i>, for at his death, in 1851, he had reached the -age of ninety-four, his violin, as he believed, having prolonged his life much -beyond the usual term.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_216" id="Footnote_216"></a><a href="#FNanchor_216"><span class="label">[216]</span></a> The earl was the leader of the amateur orchestra of St Cecilia’s Hall, which -included Lord Colville, Sir John Pringle, Mr Seton of Pitmedden, General -Middleton, Lord Elcho, Sir Gilbert Elliot, Mrs Forbes of Newhall, and others -of the aristocracy. General Middleton was credited with ‘singing a song with -much humour,’ which he sometimes accompanied with a key and tongs. Sir -Gilbert Elliot, who played the German flute, was the first to introduce that -instrument to a Scottish audience. St Cecilia’s Hall has passed through many -vicissitudes since then, and is now a bookbinder’s warehouse, but its fine -ceiling and the orchestral balcony at the southern end are still preserved as -memorials of its early days.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_217" id="Footnote_217"></a><a href="#FNanchor_217"><span class="label">[217]</span></a> About seventy paces to the east of the site of the Prebendaries’ Chamber, -and exactly opposite to the opening of Roxburgh Place, was a projection in the -wall, which has been long demolished and the wall altered. Close, however, -to the west of the place, and near the ground, are some remains of an arch in -the wall, which Malcolm Laing supposes to have been a gun-port connected -with the projection at this spot. It certainly has no connection, as Arnot and -(after him) Whitaker have supposed, with the story of Darnley’s murder. -[This relic of the Flodden wall is now removed, but a portion of the wall -itself still stands behind the houses at the north-east junction of Drummond -Street and the Pleasance. Another portion was recently discovered at the -east end of Lothian Street, between that street and the Royal Scottish Museum. -Another part forms the north side of a <i lang="fr" xml:lang="fr">cul de sac</i> at Lindsay Place, and at the -Vennel is the largest part of this old wall, with one of its few towers, forming -the western boundary of the grounds of Heriot’s Hospital.]</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_218" id="Footnote_218"></a><a href="#FNanchor_218"><span class="label">[218]</span></a> Hose in those days covered the whole of the lower part of the person.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_219" id="Footnote_219"></a><a href="#FNanchor_219"><span class="label">[219]</span></a> This indicates pretty nearly the site of the house of Bassendyne, the early -printer. It must have been opposite, or nearly opposite, to the Fountain Well.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_220" id="Footnote_220"></a><a href="#FNanchor_220"><span class="label">[220]</span></a> Now removed and the site built over. There was also a Cunyie House in -Candlemaker Row, which was used as the Mint during the regency of Mary of -Guise.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_221" id="Footnote_221"></a><a href="#FNanchor_221"><span class="label">[221]</span></a> The Assembly Room, afterwards occupied by the Commercial Bank, was in -Bell’s Wynd, to which place it was removed in 1756 from the older room in -Assembly Close. A scallop-shell above the entrance to Bell’s Wynd long commemorated -the site of the Clamshell Turnpike, the lodging of the Earl of -Home, to which Queen Mary, accompanied by Darnley, retreated on their -return from Dunbar in 1566, rather than enter Holyrood so soon after the -murder of Rizzio.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_222" id="Footnote_222"></a><a href="#FNanchor_222"><span class="label">[222]</span></a> It must have been after Miss Nicky Murray’s day that an Edinburgh -Writer to the Signet, describing the unruliness of an assembly, writes: ‘I saw -an English lady stand up at the head of a sett with a ticket No. 1 of that sett. -By-and-bye my namesake, Miss Mary ——, came up, hauling after her a -foolish-looking young man, who did as he was bid, and with all the ease in the -world placed herself above the stranger, No. 1. The lady politely said there -must be some mistake, for she had that place. “No,” said Miss Mary, “I can’t -help your ticket, for I have the Lady Directress’s permission to lead down the -sett!” The lady had spunk, and scolded, for which I liked her the better; -only she dealt her sarcasms about Scotch politeness, Edinburgh manners, and -so forth, rather too liberally and too loudly.’</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_223" id="Footnote_223"></a><a href="#FNanchor_223"><span class="label">[223]</span></a> [The right of this house to be called ‘John Knox’s House’ has been -strenuously disputed; several other houses in which Knox actually lived have -been identified by Robert Miller, F.S.A. Scot., Lord Dean of Guild of Edinburgh, -in <cite>John Knox and the Town Council of Edinburgh, with a Chapter on -the so-called ‘John Knox’s House’</cite> (1898). For the genuineness of the tradition, -said not to be older than 1806, see Lord Guthrie’s <cite>John Knox and John Knox’s -House</cite> (1898).]</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_224" id="Footnote_224"></a><a href="#FNanchor_224"><span class="label">[224]</span></a> The following advertisement, inserted in the <cite>Edinburgh Courant</cite> of -August 1, 1754, illustrates the above in a striking manner: ‘If any person -has lost a <span class="smcap lowercase">LARGE SOW</span>, let them call at the house of Robert Fiddes, gardener -to Lord Minto, over against the Earl of Galloway’s, in the Horse Wynd, where, -upon proving the property, paying expenses and damages done by the said sow, -they may have the same restored.’</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_225" id="Footnote_225"></a><a href="#FNanchor_225"><span class="label">[225]</span></a> Lord Lindsay’s <cite>Lives of the Lindsays</cite>, iii. 190.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_226" id="Footnote_226"></a><a href="#FNanchor_226"><span class="label">[226]</span></a> ‘During this peaceable -time [1668-1675], he -[John, Earl of Tweeddale] -built the park of Yester -of stone and lime, near -seven miles about, in -seven years’ time, at the -expense of 20,000 pound; -bought a house in Edinburgh -from Sir William -Bruce for 1000 pound -sterling, and ane other -house within the same -court, which, being rebuilt -from the foundation, -the price of it and reparations -of both stood him -1000 sterling.’—Father -Hay’s <cite>Genealogie of the Hayes of Tweeddale</cite> (Edinburgh, 1835), p. 32.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_227" id="Footnote_227"></a><a href="#FNanchor_227"><span class="label">[227]</span></a> The notes are thus described in the <cite>Hue and Cry</cite>: £1300 in twenty-pound -notes of Sir W. Forbes and Company; £1000 in twenty-pound notes of the -Leith Banking Company; £1400 in twenty, ten, and five pound notes of -different banks; 240 guinea and 440 pound notes of different banks—in all, -£4392.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_228" id="Footnote_228"></a><a href="#FNanchor_228"><span class="label">[228]</span></a> It was in this part of the High Street also that Robert Lekprevick, the -Scottish printer, lived before he removed to St Andrews in 1571.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_229" id="Footnote_229"></a><a href="#FNanchor_229"><span class="label">[229]</span></a> ‘—— deliure a Jacques le tailleur deux chanteaux de damas gris broches -dor pour faire vne robbe a vne poupine;’ also ‘trois quartz et demi de toille -dargent et de soze blanche pour faire vne cotte et aultre chose a des poupines.’—<cite>Catalogues -of the Jewels, Dresses, Furniture, &c. of Mary Queen of Scots</cite>, -edited by Joseph Robertson. Edinburgh, 1863, p. 139.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_230" id="Footnote_230"></a><a href="#FNanchor_230"><span class="label">[230]</span></a> A skull represented as Buchanan’s has long -been shown in the College of Edinburgh. It is -extremely thin, and being long ago shown in company -with that of a known idiot, which was, on the -contrary, very thick, it seemed to form a commentary -upon the popular expression which sets forth -density of bone as an invariable accompaniment -of paucity of brain. The author of a diatribe -called <cite>Scotland Characterised</cite>, which was published -in 1701, and may be found in the <cite>Harleian -Miscellany</cite>, tells us that he had seen the skull in -question, and that it bore ‘a very pretty distich -upon it [the composition of Principal Adamson, -who had caused the skull to be lifted]—the first -line I have forgot, but the second was: -</p> - -<div class="poetry-container"><div class="poetry"><div class="stanza"> -<div class="verse">“Et decus es tumulo jam, Buchanane, tuo.”’</div> -</div></div></div> -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_231" id="Footnote_231"></a><a href="#FNanchor_231"><span class="label">[231]</span></a> [Dr David Hay Fleming has shown that the contemporary evidence is all in -favour of the Covenant’s having been signed <em>in</em> the Greyfriars’ Church, and not -in the churchyard; see a chapter by him in Mr Moir Bryce’s <cite>Old Greyfriars’ -Church, Edinburgh</cite> (1912). And in the same book Mr Moir Bryce has proved -that the small strip of ground long erroneously believed to be the Covenanters’ -prison was not separated off till 1703-4, and that the Covenanters were interned -on a much larger area to the east, now built over.]</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_232" id="Footnote_232"></a><a href="#FNanchor_232"><span class="label">[232]</span></a> The Back Stairs, built on the site of St Giles’ Churchyard, gave direct communication -between the Cowgate and Old Parliament Square. It was by this -way that Robertson the smuggler escaped from the Tolbooth Church, where he -and his accomplice Wilson had been taken, as was usual with condemned -prisoners, the Sunday before their execution. It was Porteous’s behaviour at -the execution of Wilson that led to the riot and his own death in the Grassmarket.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_233" id="Footnote_233"></a><a href="#FNanchor_233"><span class="label">[233]</span></a> The pistols belonged to Mr Cayley himself, having been borrowed a few -days before by Mr Macfarlane.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_234" id="Footnote_234"></a><a href="#FNanchor_234"><span class="label">[234]</span></a> A little below the church.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_235" id="Footnote_235"></a><a href="#FNanchor_235"><span class="label">[235]</span></a> Subjoined is a list of persons of note who lived in the Canongate in -the early days of the late Mr Chalmers Izett, whose memory extended -back to 1769: -</p> - -<ul><li>‘DUKES.</li> -<li>Hamilton.</li> -<li>Queensberry.</li></ul> - -<ul> -<li>EARLS.</li> -<li>Breadalbane.</li> -<li>Hyndford.</li> -<li>Wemyss.</li> -<li>Balcarras.</li> -<li>Moray.</li> -<li>Dalhousie.</li> -<li>Haddington.</li> -<li>Mar.</li> -<li>Srathmore.</li> -<li>Traquair.</li> -<li>Selkirk.</li> -<li>Dundonald.</li> -<li>Kintore.</li> -<li>Dunmore.</li> -<li>Seafield.</li> -<li>Panmure.</li> -</ul> - -<ul> -<li>COUNTESSES.</li> -<li>Tweeddale.</li> -<li>Lothian.</li> -</ul> - -<ul> -<li>LORDS.</li> -<li>Haddo.</li> -<li>Colvill.</li> -<li>Blantyre.</li> -<li>Nairn.</li> -<li>Semple.</li> -<li>A. Gordon.</li> -<li>Cranstoun.</li> -</ul> - -<ul> -<li>L. OF SESSION.</li> -<li>Eskgrove.</li> -<li>Hailes.</li> -<li>Prestongrange.</li> -<li>Kames.</li> -<li>Milton.</li> -<li>Montgomery.</li> -<li>Bannatyne.</li> -</ul> - -<ul> -<li>BARONETS.</li> -<li>Sir J. Grant.</li> -<li>Sir J. Suttie.</li> -<li>Sir J. Whiteford.</li> -<li>Sir J. Stewart.</li> -<li>Sir J. Stirling.</li> -<li>Sir J. Sinclair, Glorat.</li> -<li>Sir J. Halkett.</li> -<li>Sir James Stirling.</li> -<li>Sir D. Hay.</li> -<li>Sir B. Dunbar.</li> -<li>Sir J. Scott, Ancrum.</li> -<li>Sir R. Anstruther.</li> -<li>Sir J. Sinclair, Ulbster.</li> -</ul> - -<ul> -<li>COMMANDERS-IN-CHIEF.</li> -<li>General Oughton.</li> -<li>General Skene.</li> -<li>Lord A. Gordon.</li> -<li>Lord Moira.</li> -</ul> - -<ul> -<li>EMINENT MEN.</li> -<li>Adam Smith.</li> -<li>Dr Young.</li> -<li>Dugald Stewart.</li> -<li>Dr Gardner.</li> -<li>Dr Gregory.</li> -</ul> - -<ul> -<li>BANK.</li> -<li>Douglas, Heron, and Company.</li> -</ul> - -<ul> -<li>LADIES’ BOARDING-SCHOOL.</li> -<li>Mrs Hamilton, Chessels’s Court.</li> -</ul> - -<ul> -<li>PRINCIPAL INNS.</li> -<li>Ramsay’s, St Mary’s Wynd.</li> -<li>Boyd’s, Head of Canongate.</li> -</ul> - -<p> -‘Two coaches went down the Canongate to Leith—one hour in going, and -one hour in returning.’</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_236" id="Footnote_236"></a><a href="#FNanchor_236"><span class="label">[236]</span></a> Removal.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_237" id="Footnote_237"></a><a href="#FNanchor_237"><span class="label">[237]</span></a> ‘At a former period, when the Canongate of Edinburgh was a more fashionable -residence than at present, a lady of rank who lived in one of the closes, -before going out to an evening-party, and at a time when hairdressers and -peruke-makers were much in demand, requested a servant (newly come home) -to tell Tam Tough the hairdresser to come to her immediately. The servant -departed in quest of Puff, but had scarcely reached the street before she forgot -the barber’s name. Meeting with a caddy, she asked him if he knew where the -hairdresser lived. “Whatna hairdresser is ’t?” replied the caddy. “I ha’e -forgot his name,” answered she. “What kind o’ name wus ’t?” responded -Donald. “As near as I can mind,” said the girl, “it was a name that wad -neither <em>rug</em> nor <em>rive</em>.” “The deil ’s in ’t,” answered Donald, “but that’s a tam’d -tough name.” “Thank ye, Donald, that’s the man’s name I wanted—<em>Tam -Tough</em>.”’—[<em>From an Edinburgh Newspaper.</em>]</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_238" id="Footnote_238"></a><a href="#FNanchor_238"><span class="label">[238]</span></a> The inscription is now removed.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_239" id="Footnote_239"></a><a href="#FNanchor_239"><span class="label">[239]</span></a> With the exception of Lord Kames’s house, all the others referred to have -been swept away by the North British Railway and the Corporation Gasworks, -which at one time occupied the eastern side of the street.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_240" id="Footnote_240"></a><a href="#FNanchor_240"><span class="label">[240]</span></a> Although it was outside the wall, the city authorities claimed jurisdiction -over the Canongate as far as St John’s Cross, notwithstanding that the Canongate -was a separate burgh, which it continued to be till the middle of the -nineteenth century. Proclamations were made at St John’s Cross as well as -at the Mercat Cross in the High Street, and at it the Canongate burgh officials -joined the city fathers when paying ceremonial visits to Holyrood.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_241" id="Footnote_241"></a><a href="#FNanchor_241"><span class="label">[241]</span></a> Strap in <cite>Roderick Random</cite> was supposed to represent one Hutchinson, a -barber near Dunbar. The man encouraged the idea as much as possible. -When Mr [Warren] Hastings (governor of India) and his wife visited Scotland, -they sent for this man, and were so pleased with him that Mr Hastings afterwards -sent him a couple of razors, mounted in gold, from London.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_242" id="Footnote_242"></a><a href="#FNanchor_242"><span class="label">[242]</span></a> For many years the Practising School for Teachers under the management -of the Free Church of Scotland, now the Training College for Teachers under -the Provincial Council of Education.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_243" id="Footnote_243"></a><a href="#FNanchor_243"><span class="label">[243]</span></a> The terraces have long since been deprived of their last semblance of the old -gardens; but while recent excavations were being made for an extension of the -educational buildings, the statue of the boy was discovered underground in -the lowest terrace. The statue is preserved, and forms a connecting link -between ‘My Lady Murray’s Yards’ and the ‘Yards’ of the modern school.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_244" id="Footnote_244"></a><a href="#FNanchor_244"><span class="label">[244]</span></a> On the north side of the High Street, opposite the Tron Church. The site -is now covered by the opening of Cockburn Street.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_245" id="Footnote_245"></a><a href="#FNanchor_245"><span class="label">[245]</span></a> I was indebted to my friend Dr John Brown (<cite>Horæ Subsecivæ</cite>, p. 42) for -drawing my attention to a quotation of Seneca by Beyerlinck (<cite>Magn. Theatr. -Vit. Human.</cite>, tom. vi. p. 60), involving this fine expression. Some one, however, -has searched all over the writings of Seneca for it in vain.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_246" id="Footnote_246"></a><a href="#FNanchor_246"><span class="label">[246]</span></a> The close entering by the archway at the east end of the house, now called -‘Bakehouse Close,’ was formerly ‘Hammermen’s Close.’</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_247" id="Footnote_247"></a><a href="#FNanchor_247"><span class="label">[247]</span></a> ‘The Speaking House’ is now recognised as a town mansion of the Huntly -family. It is said to be associated with the first marquis, who killed the -‘Bonnie Earl of Moray’ at Donibristle, and died in 1636 at Dundee on his way -north to Aberdeenshire. His son, the second marquis, who was beheaded in -1649, was residing in this house ten years prior to his execution, and in it his -daughter Lady Ann was married to Lord Drummond, third Earl of Perth.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_248" id="Footnote_248"></a><a href="#FNanchor_248"><span class="label">[248]</span></a> Which he named Gosford, after the estate in East Lothian, which was -acquired by Sir Archibald’s ancestor, a wealthy burgess in the reign of Queen -Mary. The Viscounts Gosford take their title from the Irish estate.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_249" id="Footnote_249"></a><a href="#FNanchor_249"><span class="label">[249]</span></a> In his MS. Diaries in the Advocates’ Library.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_250" id="Footnote_250"></a><a href="#FNanchor_250"><span class="label">[250]</span></a> In an advertisement in a Jacobite newspaper, called <cite>The Thistle</cite>, which -rose and sank in 1734, the house is advertised as having lately been occupied -by the Duchesses of Gordon and Perth. [1868. It is in the course of being -taken down to make way for a railway.]</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_251" id="Footnote_251"></a><a href="#FNanchor_251"><span class="label">[251]</span></a> In 1864 this favourite Scottish pastime was resuscitated on Leith Links, -and is now enjoyed with a relish as keen as ever.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_252" id="Footnote_252"></a><a href="#FNanchor_252"><span class="label">[252]</span></a> <cite>Archæologia Scotica</cite>, i.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_253" id="Footnote_253"></a><a href="#FNanchor_253"><span class="label">[253]</span></a> A newspaper, giving an account of Lord Palmerston’s visit to Edinburgh in -1865, mentions that his lordship, during his stay in the city, was made aware -that an aged woman of the name of Peggie Forbes, who had been a servant with -Dugald Stewart, well remembered his lordship when under the professor’s roof -in early days. Interested in the circumstance, Lord Palmerston took occasion -to pay her a visit at her dwelling, No. 1 Rankeillor Street, and expressed his -pleasure at renewing the acquaintance of the old domestic. Dr John Brown -had discovered the existence of this old association, and with it a box of tools -which were the property of ‘young Maister Henry’ of those days. The sight -of them called up within the breast of the Premier further associations of days -long bygone.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_254" id="Footnote_254"></a><a href="#FNanchor_254"><span class="label">[254]</span></a> Robertson, in his <cite>Rural Recollections</cite> (Irvine, 1829), says: ‘The earliest -evidence that I have met with of potatoes in Scotland is an old household book -of the Eglintoune family in 1733, in which potatoes appear at different times as -a dish at supper.’ They appear earlier than this—namely, in 1701—in the -household book of the Duchess of Buccleuch and Monmouth, where the price -per peck is intimated at 2s. 6d.—See Arnot’s <cite>History of Edinburgh</cite>, 4to, p. 201.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_255" id="Footnote_255"></a><a href="#FNanchor_255"><span class="label">[255]</span></a> A noted brewer, much given to preaching. Of him Claudero says: -</p> -<div class="poetry-container"><div class="poetry"><div class="stanza"> -<div class="verse">‘Our souls with gospel he did cheer,</div> -<div class="verse">Our bodies, too, with ale and beer;</div> -<div class="verse"><i lang="la" xml:lang="la">Gratis</i> he gospel got and gave away;</div> -<div class="verse">For ale and beer he only made us pay.’</div> -</div></div></div> -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_256" id="Footnote_256"></a><a href="#FNanchor_256"><span class="label">[256]</span></a> This thriving parliamentary burgh originated in a cottage built, and long -inhabited, by a retired seaman of Admiral Vernon’s squadron, who gave it this -name in commemoration of the triumph which his commander there gained -over the Spaniards in 1739. There must have been various houses at the spot -in 1753, when we find one ‘George Hamilton, in Portobello,’ advertising in the -<cite>Edinburgh Courant</cite> that he would give a reward of three pounds to any one -who should discover the author of a scandalous report, which represented him -as harbouring robbers in his house. The waste upon which Portobello is now -partly founded was dreadfully infested at this time with robbers, and resorted -to by smugglers; see <cite>Courant</cite>. [Portobello, while remaining one of the ‘Leith -burghs’ for parliamentary purposes, was municipally incorporated with Edinburgh -in 1896. Claudero’s ‘Frigate Whins’ are better known as the ‘Figgate -Whins.’]</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_257" id="Footnote_257"></a><a href="#FNanchor_257"><span class="label">[257]</span></a> Claudero could have little serious expectation that several of these predictions -would come to pass before he had been forty years in his grave.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_258" id="Footnote_258"></a><a href="#FNanchor_258"><span class="label">[258]</span></a> A celebrated and much-esteemed fishing-rod maker, who afterwards -flourished in the old wooden <em>land</em> at the head of Blackfriars Wynd. He -survived to recent times, and was distinguished for his adherence to the cocked -hat, wrist ruffles, and buckles of his youth. He was a short, neat man, very -well bred, a great angler, intimate with the great, a Jacobite, and lived to near -a century. He had fished in almost every trouting stream in the three -kingdoms, and was seen skating on Lochend at the age of eighty-five.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_259" id="Footnote_259"></a><a href="#FNanchor_259"><span class="label">[259]</span></a> This seems to bear some reference to the seizure of young Macdonald of -Kinlochmoidart at Lesmahagow in 1745.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_260" id="Footnote_260"></a><a href="#FNanchor_260"><span class="label">[260]</span></a> Introduction to Law’s <cite>Memorials</cite>, p. lxxx.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_261" id="Footnote_261"></a><a href="#FNanchor_261"><span class="label">[261]</span></a> See letters of Gay, Swift, Pope, and Arbuthnot, in Scott’s edition of Swift.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_262" id="Footnote_262"></a><a href="#FNanchor_262"><span class="label">[262]</span></a> In a letter from Gay to Swift, dated February 15, 1727-8, we find the -subject illustrated as follows: ‘As to my favours from great men, I am in the -same state you left me; but I am a great deal happier, as I have expectations. -The Duchess of Queensberry has signalised her friendship to me upon this -occasion [the bringing out of the <cite>Beggar’s Opera</cite>] in such a conspicuous manner, -that I hope (for her sake) you will take care to put your fork to all its proper -uses, and suffer nobody for the future to put their knives in their mouth.’ -</p> -<p> -In the <em><abbr title="postscript">P.S.</abbr></em> to a letter from Gay to Swift, dated Middleton Stoney, November -9, 1729, Gay says: ‘To the lady I live with I owe my life and fortune. Think -of her with respect—value and esteem her as I do—and never more despise -a fork with three prongs. I wish, too, you would not eat from the point of -your knife. She has so much goodness, virtue, and generosity, that if you -knew her, you would have a pleasure in obeying her as I do. She often wishes -she had known you.’</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_263" id="Footnote_263"></a><a href="#FNanchor_263"><span class="label">[263]</span></a> Record of that Society.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_264" id="Footnote_264"></a><a href="#FNanchor_264"><span class="label">[264]</span></a> The date over the exterior gateway of the Tailors’ Hall, towards the -Cowgate, is 1644; but it is ascertained that the corporation had its hall at this -place at an earlier period. An assembly of between two and three hundred -clergymen was held here on Tuesday the 27th of February 1638 in order to -consider the National Covenant, which was presented to the public next day -in the Greyfriars Church. We are informed by the Earl of Rothes, in his -<cite>Relations</cite> of the transactions of this period, in which he bore so distinguished a -part, that some few objected to certain points in it; but being taken aside into -the garden attached to this hall, and there lectured on the necessity of mutual -concession for the sake of the general cause, they were soon brought to give -their entire assent.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_265" id="Footnote_265"></a><a href="#FNanchor_265"><span class="label">[265]</span></a> The announcements of entertainments given at this fashionable place -of amusement in the eighteenth century make amusing reading to-day. -‘February 17, 1743. We hear that on Monday 21st instant, at the Tailors’ -Hall, Cowgate, at the desire of several ladies of distinction, will be performed -a concert of vocal and instrumental music. After which will be given gratis -<cite>Richard the Third</cite>, containing several historical passages. To which will be -added gratis “The Mock Lawyer.” Tickets for the Concert (on which <em>are</em> [sic] -printed a new device called Apology and Evasion) to be had at the Exchange -and John’s Coffee-houses, and at Mr Este’s lodgings at Mr Monro’s, musician -in the Cowgate, near Tailors’ Hall. As Mrs Este’s present condition will not -admit a personal application, she hopes the ladies notwithstanding will grace -her concert.’</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_266" id="Footnote_266"></a><a href="#FNanchor_266"><span class="label">[266]</span></a> Among the audience -on the first night of the -performance of <cite>Douglas</cite> -were the two daughters -of John and Lady Susan -Renton, one of whom, -Eleanor, was the mother -of Charles Kirkpatrick -Sharpe, to whom the -author in his ‘Introductory -Notice’ expresses -his indebtedness for assistance -on the first appearance of this work. And it was for attending one -of the performances that the minister of Liberton Church brought himself -under sentence of six weeks’ suspension by the Presbytery of Edinburgh—a -sentence modified in consideration of his plea that though he attended the play, -‘he concealed himself as well as he could to avoid giving offence.’</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_267" id="Footnote_267"></a><a href="#FNanchor_267"><span class="label">[267]</span></a> Maitland, in his <cite>History of Edinburgh</cite>, 1753, says that the encouragement -given to the diversions at the house ‘is so very great, ’tis to be feared it will -terminate in the <em>destruction of the university</em>. Such diversions,’ he adds, ‘are -noways becoming a seat of the Muses.’</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_268" id="Footnote_268"></a><a href="#FNanchor_268"><span class="label">[268]</span></a> The Theatre Royal in Shakespeare Square, where the General Post Office -now stands.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_269" id="Footnote_269"></a><a href="#FNanchor_269"><span class="label">[269]</span></a> Letter of Captain Amory, MS.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_270" id="Footnote_270"></a><a href="#FNanchor_270"><span class="label">[270]</span></a> The north and south sides only of this square now remain. The west was -removed to make a thoroughfare—Marshall Street, connecting Nicolson Square -and Potterrow.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_271" id="Footnote_271"></a><a href="#FNanchor_271"><span class="label">[271]</span></a> The site was midway between Edinburgh and Leith, now represented by -Shrub Place.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_272" id="Footnote_272"></a><a href="#FNanchor_272"><span class="label">[272]</span></a> Sir Walter’s brother Thomas was married to a sister of Mr M’Culloch.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_273" id="Footnote_273"></a><a href="#FNanchor_273"><span class="label">[273]</span></a> It was also along this road that the anxious citizens, watching on the -Castle esplanade, saw the royalist cavalry retiring at full gallop from Coltbridge -on the approach of Prince Charlie and his Highland army.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_274" id="Footnote_274"></a><a href="#FNanchor_274"><span class="label">[274]</span></a> In Mr Lockhart’s clever book, <cite>Peter’s Letters to his Kinsfolk</cite>, the murderer -is called Gabriel. A work called <cite>Celebrated Trials</cite> (6 vols. 1825) gives an -erroneous account of the murder, styling the murderer as the Rev. Thomas -Hunter.</p></div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_275" id="Footnote_275"></a><a href="#FNanchor_275"><span class="label">[275]</span></a> See <cite>Domestic Annals of Scotland</cite>, i. 407.</p></div> -</div> - -<p> </p> -<hr class="chap" /> -<p> </p> - -<p>Transcriber’s Note—the following changes have been made to this text:</p> - -<p>Footnote 167: ancedote to anecdote—‘an anecdote is told’.</p> - -<p>Page 238: encirling to encircling—‘encircling the head’.</p> - -<p>Page 291: where to were—‘what were called the Back Stairs’.</p> - -<p>Page 371: Newhailes to New Hailes—‘Dalrymple, Miss, Newhailes’.</p> - -<p>Page 372: Fyfie to Fyvie—‘Fyvie, Lord’.</p> -<p class="ml4">Hardcarse to Harcarse—‘Harcarse, Lord’.</p> - - -<p>Page 373: Jamieson to Jameson—‘Jameson, George’.</p> - -<p>Page 374: Moyse's to Moyses's.</p> -<p class="ml4">North Esk to Northesk.</p> - -<p> </p> -<p> </p> -<hr class="pgx" /> -<p>***END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK TRADITIONS OF EDINBURGH***</p> -<p>******* This file should be named 61314-h.htm or 61314-h.zip *******</p> -<p>This and all associated files of various formats will be found in:<br /> -<a href="http://www.gutenberg.org/dirs/6/1/3/1/61314">http://www.gutenberg.org/6/1/3/1/61314</a></p> -<p> -Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions will -be renamed.</p> - -<p>Creating the works from print editions not protected by U.S. copyright -law means that no one owns a United States copyright in these works, -so the Foundation (and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United -States without permission and without paying copyright -royalties. 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