A History of Edinburgh from the Earliest Period to the Completion of the Half Century, 1850, with brief notices of eminent or remarkable individuals

Preface

. It is now a hundred years since Maitland wrote his History of Edinburgh, and seventy-five have elapsed since Arnot' s appeared. Though sub sequently there have been seA-eral interesting and popular works about Edinburgh, such as Chambers's 'Traditions,' and Wilson's 'Memorials of Edinburgh in the Olden Time;' a book seemed to be wanted to bring down the history of the City to the end of the eighteenth century, and the first half of the nineteenth. This object it appeared desirable to supply. Researches connected with the present work have occupied the author more or less for the last ten years. Since Arnot's period, the history of Edinburgh presents an ever-changing scene, somewhat dramatic in its aspect, and the public meetings held there during the last forty years connect it with a wider history. VI

PREFACE.

. and indicate " the very form and pressure of the times." Samuel Johnson somewhere remarks that bio graphy is history; in this volume the observation has been so far acted on, that the author has en grafted on his plan, a series of biographic notices of upwards of two hundred individuals, whose educa tion or lives connect them with Edinburgh ; and these brief notices, it is believed, besides being useful for reference, may impart a little additional interest to the history of the city itself. This list of remarkable or distinguished characters the author was anxious to have rendered somewhat complete, but there are still a few whose names might have been included. For example, Oliver Goldsmith came to Edinburgh in 17.52, to pursue his medical studies, and took up his residence in the College Wynd, the same ancient lane in the Old town which, about twenty years later, was the birth-place of a still more distinguished man, Sir Walter Scott.

Dr. J. G. Spurzheim visited Edinburgh in 1816 and 1828. On the former occasion he publicly dis sected a brain with his antagonist, a very superior and eminent man — Dr. John Gordon, and came off victor; during the latter, he delivered a course of lectures on Phrenology. Among the discoveries of modern days, perhaps

PREFACE.

. VII the most wonderful is the Electric Telegraph, and it was indeed a notable event in the history of Edin burgh, and one which would thirty years ago have been as little believed as some of the fabulous stories in the Arabian Nights' Entertainments, that the metropolis of Scotland should be placed in instant communication with the capital of England, nearly four hundred and fifty miles distant, and that by means of an electric wire, by which messages are conveyed with nearly the speed of lightning. This remarkable event took place in the autumn of 1847. " Walter Scott," says Lockhart, " delighted in passing through some of the quaint windings of the ancient city, now deserted, except at mid-day, by the upper world. How often have I seen him go a long way round about, rather than miss the opportunity of halting for a few minutes on the vacant esplanade of Holyrood, or under the darkest shadows of the Castle rock, where it overhangs the Grassmarket — and the huge slab that still marks where the gibbet of Porteous and the Covenanters had its station.

His coachman knew him too well to move at a Jehu's pace amidst such scenes as these. No funeral hearse crept more leisurely than did his landau up the Canongate or the Cowgate; and not a queer tot tering gable but recalled to him some long buried memory of splendour or bloodshed, which, by a few words, he set before the hearer in the reality of life."

PREFACE.

. VIII Such was Sir Walter Scott's veneration for old Edin burgh, that he obtained the door of the demolished Tolbooth of the city, and placed it at his mansion. It bears this inscription, " The Lord of armeis is my protector, blissit ar they that trust in the Lord, 1575;" — and the doorway at the west end of his modern castle, Abbotsford, is composed of stones which formed the portal of the Heart of Mid-Lothian, or old prison of Edinburgh. His description of the ancient city is veiy graphic as well as poetical: " Such dusky grandeur clothes the height, Where the huge castle holds its state, And all the steeps slope down, Whose ridgy back heaves to the sky, Piled deep and massy, close and high, Mine own romantic town ! " 31 St. Bernard's Ceescent, Edinburgh, 1st January, 1856. ANNALS.

Part I. From The Earliest Period To The Close Of The Reign

OF JAMES VI. IN 1625. PAET I. At the commencement of the Christian era, the Roman empire was at the zenith of its glory. It had only a short time before extended its wings to Britain ; the first expedition of Julius Cæsar to that island having taken B.C. 55. . fe place in the year b. c 5o. Julius Agricola, the father-in-law of Tacitus, who was his eloquent biographer, was despatched to Britain A. D. 78, by the Emperor Vespasian, towards the latter end of his reign ; and after some conquests in Eng land and Wales, he appears to have marched with his army into Scotland the following year, when he came to the Firth of Forth ; and it is extremely probable that part of the ground on which ancient Edinburgh now stands be came for a period a Roman station — the Castrum Alatum of that powerful people.

Thence Agricola proceeded to the north, and fought his celebrated battle with Galgacus and the brave Caledonians at Mons Grampius ; the exact site of which still continues to puzzle antiquaries. It is curious and interesting thus to cast our eyes back nearly two thousand years, and contemplate the fields or hamlet lying below the ancient and stupendous Castle rock, occupied by the gallant Agricola and his Roman soldiers. 80. Agricola then built a chain of forts between the Forth and Clyde, and Lollius Urbicus, one of the lieu tenants of the Emperor Antoninus Pius, about half a century after, erected a considerable portion of the wall of Antoninus, embracing Agricola's forts, and extending from near Abercorn on the Forth to Old Kilpatrick on the Clyde, a wall having at some places foundations of stone and throughout ramparts of turf, and occupying a line of about thirty-seven miles.

The vulgar modern name of Graham's Dyke, given to this wall, there is reason to believe, was a corruption of the Gaelic word Gream, a fortification. In the year a.d. 208 the Roman Emperor Severus 208 and his army, also engaged in warfare with the Caledonians, and the ambuscades from which they suffered, together with the coldness of the climate and the severity of a winter march across the hills and morasses of Scotland, are stated to have cost the Romans about fifty thousand men.* At Cramond, nearly five miles from Edinburgh, there was a Roman station in the time of Severus. j The Romans had forts or stations at regular distances between the east end of Antoninus' s wall near Abercorn, and Cramond. Affixed to the exterior of a house in the High Street of Edinburgh, near the Nether Bow, there is a stone sculpture of a male and female head, regarding which there has existed a tradition that they represent the Emperor Severus and his Empress Julia, who were both in Scotland, and the re semblance of the heads to those on the coins of the Emperor Severus seems to corroborate the story.

A modern author % of considerable research, is of opinion that evidence enough has been adduced to establish the fact that a Roman colonia existed on the site of Edinburgh. Edinburgh is situated in that part of the country which * Gibbon's Decline and Fall, vol. i. f Gordon's Itinerarium Septentrionale. t Dr. Daniel Wilson, in his " Archæology and Prehistoric Annals of Scotland," ANNALS. 5 the Romans called the province of Valentia,* and seems to have derived its name from Edwin, the first Christian king of Northumberland, who overran a great part of the Pictish territories, and founded the Castle of Edinburgh about the year a. d. 626, hence the name of Edinburgh, or Edwin's burgh, or Edwin's Castle, the word burgh being almost synonymous with castle or town. King Arthur is said to have fought one of his battles on the spot where Edinburgh now stands, hence, according to this account, the name of the hill called Arthur's Seat.

Edinburgh Castle was styled, before its present name was given to the town, the Fortress of the Hill of Agnes — and at a later period, Castrum Puellarum, as the daughters of the Pictish kings and chiefs were kept, and educated there, till they were married ; this was considered a necessary safe guard in those barbaric ages. In 685 Edinburgh and the country around fell into the hands of the Picts, but it was again conquered by the Northumbrians in the ninth century, and was held by them till 956, when it was given up to Indulphus, King of Scotland. Queen Margaret, the widow of Malcolm Can more,! died in Edinburgh Castle, 10th June 1093, a few days after her husband and eldest son were killed at Alnwick. Donald Bane, the uncle of Malcolm's children, usurped the throne, and besieged the castle, in which the rightful heir to the crown resided.

Donald, imagining from the steepness of this remarkable fortress that the eastern * So named in honour of the Emperor Valentinian, in the year A. d. 368. The province thus called Valentia by the Romans, comprised the space of country from Hadrian's Wall, which was on the line across the island from Newcastle to the Solway, to the line of Agricola's chain of forts from the Firth of Forth to the Firth of Clyde. f Malcolm Canmore was the son of Duncan, King of Scotland, who was murdered by Macbeth in 1039. Malcolm succeeded to the throne in 1057. His Queen, Margaret, whom he married in 1066, was the granddaughter of Edmund Ironside, King of England. She was an excellent and superior woman. Her posterity have continued to reign in Scotland nearly eight centuries. gate was the only mode of escape, ordered it alone to be guarded, but the body of the queen was conveyed through a postern on the west side of the castle, to Dunfermline, where she was interred.

The children of Malcolm escaped to England, where they were educated by their maternal uncle, Edgar Atheling. It does not appear certain when Edinburgh was constituted a royal burgh, but David I., in his charter of foundation of the abbey of Holyrood in 1128, mentions it as " Burgo meo de Edwinesburg," and it is pro bable that it was that monarch who first erected it into a Royal burgh. In 1174 Edinburgh Castle and other Scottish 1174. . . , _, ,. , . garrisons were given up to the English, to purchase the freedom of William I. the Lion, King of Scotland, but it was restored on his marriage with a relative of the English King. A parliament was held in Edinburgh for the first time in 1215, during the reign of Alexander II. 1230. That monarch founded the monastery of Black friars in 1230. It was a large and conspicuous building, standing near the Old High School Yards, at the foot of Infirmary Street.

Alexander H., King of Scotland, died in 1249, 1249. & and was succeeded by his son, Alexander III., then a boy nearly eight years of age. This youthful monarch met Henry III., King of England, at York, in 1251, where he was knighted by the English King, and on the following day married to Margaret the daughter of Henry, a girl of thirteen years of age. Alexander HI., on his return to Scotland, proposed to make Edinburgh Castle his residence, but from the Earl of Monteith, the governor, being disaffected to him, this was not done, though, by the aid of the English, Monteith was made to surrender the fortress. In 1255, Alexander's young Queen, Margaret, resided in the Castle, apart from her husband, and ANNALS. without proper attendants, and she complained, not unna turally for a young person accustomed to every gaiety, that it was a " sad and solitary place, without verdure," and that she was deprived of the society of her husband.

Alexander III. was killed by a fall from his horse 1285 near Kinghorn, in Fife, 19th March 1285, and this event followed soon after by the death of his grandchild and successor, Margaret the Maiden of Norway, left it doubtful who was heir to the throne. At the period of the contested succession to the Scottish crown, between Bruce and Baliol, Edward I., who had been chosen umpire in the dispute, in the most unprincipled manner, invaded Scotland, and successfully besieged Edinburgh Castle in 1296, and it remained in possession of the English till 1313, when it was re taken by the Earl of Moray, afterwards regent of Scotland during the minority of David II. The oldest charter in the archives of the city is 1329. one by Robert I., dated 1329, fifteen years after the battle of Bannockburn, in which he bestows on Edin burgh the town of Leith, with its harbour and mills.

Edward Baliol held a Parliament or Council of 1333. Lords in the Abbey Chapel of Holyrood in 1333. Edward III. twice invaded Scotland in support of the pretensions of Edward Baliol to the throne, and while he lay with his army at Perth, the Count Namur, coming with a body of foreigners to his assistance. proposed passing through Edinburgh on his way northward, but the Earl of Moray gave him battle at the Borough- Muir, a little to the south of the city, and defeated the invaders. They retreated to Edinburgh in order of battle, part of them were driven through the spot where Bristo Port afterwards stood, and flying down the Candlemaker Row, took refuge on the Castle rock; others fled by St. Mary's Wynd. Next day they surrendered, and were allowed to depart on condition that they should never again bear arms against David Bruce.

This battle of Borough muir took place in 1336. On his return from the north of Scotland, Edward III. caused the castle to be rebuilt, but it did not remain long in possession of the English, as it was recovered by a stratagem contrived in 1341 by Sir William Douglas and three other Scottish gentlemen. One of them pretended to be an English merchant, and told the governor that he had got a cargo of wine, beer, and biscuit, exquisitely spiced, in his vessel in the Forth, and the governor relishing the specimen produced, agreed to purchase the same, and the provisions were to be delivered early next morning. They were sent at the time appointed, with armed men disguised as sailors, and aided by Sir William Douglas, who was concealed in the neighbourhood with a band of soldiers, they overpowered the garrison and obtained possession of the castle.

The Scottish King, David IL, died in Edinburgh Castle, 22d Feb. 1371, in the 42d year of his reign. The Earl of Carrick, afterwards King Robert HI., conferred on the burgesses of Edinburgh, in 1385, the 1385. singular privilege of building houses to themselves within the castle. Robert IL, in 1388, granted to the town a piece of ground on the north side of Market Street, or High Street, called the Bell-house. The object of this was to beautify the town, and it is believed to be the spot on which Mill's Court now stands. In 1398, during the reign of Robert ni., a tournament was held on the ground under the castle, near the North Loch. James I. established the monastery of Grey Friars, which stood on the south side of the Grassmarket, nearly opposite to the West Bow. It had spacious gardens, now the Grey Friars burying-ground.

Jane, the Queen of this Scottish monarch, to whom he had formed an attachment while he was a prisoner in Windsor Castle, was ANNALS. 9 delivered of twin princes at the Abbey of Holyrood in Edinburgh, 14th October 1426. In the reign of James I. the generality of the houses in Edinburgh did not exceed the height of twenty feet. This excellent prince, who was at once an accomplished poet and king, fell the victim of a cruel conspiracy at Perth, in 1437. Walter, Earl of Athol, the king's uncle, and other two of the murderers, were brought to Edin burgh, and suffered death with such a dreadful accompani ment of horrors as is revolting to human nature, and only to be paralleled in the annals of the Spanish Inquisition. His son and successor, James IL, was crowned at the palace of Holyrood-house when only seven years of age, and resided in Edinburgh Castle till his mother, the widow of James I., coming to visit him there, in 1439, man 1439. aged by a stratagem, getting him shut up in a chest that had been in use to contain her own dress; to get him conveyed thus from Edinburgh Castle to Leith, whence they sailed to Stirling.

In 1447, James n. granted to Edinburgh the Trinity Fair, with all the rights and privileges thereto pertaining. This was the original establishment of Hallow fair, which is held annually in Edinburgh in the month of November. James II. married Mary of Guelderland, who was 1*448. crowned Queen at the abbey of Holyrood-house, July 1448. James IL, in 1450, allowed the citizens to fortifv Edinburgh for the first time, by building a wall which commenced at the foot of the north-east rock of the Castle, at a place called the Well-house Tower, corrupted in common parlance into Wallace's Tower, where the ruins of a small fortress are still to be seen in the Western Prince's Street gardens, a little to the south side of the Edinburgh and Glasgow railway. The wall ran along from this point till it came opposite the Castle Hill reservoir, whence it was carried quite across the hill.

At the Castle Hill there was a gate of communication for the town to the citadel. Thence the wall proceeded in an oblique direction to the middle of the West Bow, where was the Upper Bow Port; it then passed east, by the back of the present Parliament House, to the Mint Close, and from there to the Nether Bow Port. Greenside was granted by James IL, in 1456, to the Edinburghers, for the purpose of holding tilts and tournaments there. In 1461, Henry VI. of England, with his Queen, Margaret of Anjou, and their son, Edward Prince of Wales, took refuge in Edinburgh and resided for a period there, when they were most kindly and hospitably received. Margaret of Anjou, it is well known, is one of Shakspeare's heroines, and it is connected with this period of her hus band's history that he makes her say to Lewis, King of France : " Nov/ therefore he it known to noble Lewis, — That Henry, sole possessor of my love, Is, of a king, become a banish'd man, And forc'd to live in Scotland a forlorn ; While proud, ambitious Edward, Duke of York, Usurps the regal title, and the seat Of England's true anointed lawful king."

James III. resided much at Holyrood, and his nuptials with Margaret, Princess of Denmark, were celebrated "in great dignity" at the Abbey there, 13th July 1469. The markets for provisions in Edinburgh had no fixed places assigned them till 1477, when James III., by letters patent, granted a charter confirming the places then fixed by the magistrates, and which is historically curious, as indicating the principal localities of Edinburgh at that early period. The hay, straw, grass, and horse-meat markets were to be held in the Cowgate, from Forrester's Wynd down to ANNALS Peebles Wynd, which latter was pulled down three centuries afterwards to make way for the South Bridge; the fish market, from the Friar Wynd to the Nether Bow, in Market Street or High Street ; the salt market, in Niddry's Wynd ; the camp of chapmen, from the Bellhouse down to the Tron, afterwards the Tron Kirk; thc hatmakers and skinners, opposite to them on the south side of the street; the wood and timber market from Dalrymple Yard to the Greyfriars and westward; the shoe market from Forrester's Wynd westward; the nolt or flesh market, about the Tron; the poultry market, at the Cross; the cattle market, at the King's Stables, back of Castle; the meal and corn market, from the Tolbooth up to Liberton's Wynd; from there to the Tresep, the cloth and lawn market.

Butter, cheese, wool, and all goods to be weighed, at the Upper Bow, and a Tron or Weigh to be set there, — the ancient Weigh-house; cutlers and smith work, beneath the Nether Bow, about St. Mary's Wynd ; all saddlery work, at the Greyfriars, Grass market. What a lively graphic picture this scene presents of the ancient cit)' of Edinburgh ! James III. having offended the nobles of Scot 14-R9 land, was obliged to take refuge in the Castle of Edinburgh, in 1482, and after nine months of a kind of imprisonment there, he was liberated by the valour of the citizens, who, under the command of Bertram, their provost or chief magistrate, assaulted the Castle, and set their sove reign free. King James, to show his gratitude for this, appointed the chief magistrate, ex officio, Hereditary High Sheriff within the City, an office which the Lord Provost of Edinburgh still enjoys as Lord Lieutenant of the City of the County of Edinburgh.

At the same time he invested the magistrates with the power of making laws for the government of the city, with other privileges, contained in a patent styled a Golden Charter, issued in 1482. He also gave the Trades of Edinburgh a standard or banner, called The Blue Blanket, wliich, though in a tattered condition, is still carefully preserved by the Convener of the Trades for the time being, and is displayed on important occasions. James IV. succeeded to the Scottish throne on the death of his father, 11th June 1488, when in the sixteenth year of his age. A treaty of marriage between him and the Princess Margaret, daughter of Henry VH. of England, was concluded in 1499, but the marriage 1499. did not take place till four years afterwards. Meanwhile he was a good deal engaged in preparing a gay recep tion and suitable residence in Edinburgh for his intended bride.

She came in great state from England. Some of the particulars connected with this marriage illustrate the manners of the age, and of royalty at Edin burgh at that period. The King went to meet his fair Margaret at the Earl of Morton's castle of Dalkeith. He was arrayed in a jacket of crimson velvet bordered with cloth of gold, and at the interview he and she made great reverences the one to the other. Margaret remained four days between Dalkeith and the Abbey of Newbattle, during which the King visited her daily and excited admiration by his feats of horsemanship, and entertained his bride by play ing on the clarycordes and the lute. On the seventh August 1503, the Princess set out for Edinburgh, placed in a litter very richly adorned, and she was equipped in a rich gown of cloth of gold, with a purfill of black velvet and a rich collar of pearl and stone.

The King came half way from Edinburgh to meet her, mounted on a bay horse covered with trappings of gold, and he wore a jacket like to the trappings, his doublet was of violet satin, his hose of scarlet, his shirt bound with stones and pearls, his spurs gilt and long. On coming to the Queen he made her very humble obeisance. He then tried a courser of his own, whose har ness was of cloth of gold and crimson velvet, to see if lie would carry double, but the horse not being accustomed to this load, he mounted on the Queen's palfrey, " and the said Queen behind him, and so rode towards the said town of ANNALS. Edinburgh." On the way there was prepared for their entertainment a coursing match of a stag with a greyhound, and the representation of a simple romance of chivalry. The royal company were received in the city with great re joicing, processions and pageants, while at the Cross was a fountain casting forth wine.

The houses and windows were hung with tapestry, and were full of lords and ladies, gentlewomen and gentlemen, and in the streets were so great a multitude of people that it was a fair thing to see. Then the company passed out of the city to the church of Holy Cross or Holyrood. Each one leapt off his horse, and in fair order went with the procession into the church. The King and the Queen light down. He took the Queen by the body and led her to the great altar, where was a place arranged for them to kneel upon two cushions of cloth of gold. After these ceremonies at the church were over, the King and Queen went to the adjoining palace of Holyrood, where he took leave of her. The following day, the eighth of August, 1503, every man appointed himself richly for the honour of being present at this noble and royal marriage.

Between eight and nine o'clock overy one was ready, nobly apparelled, and the ladies came richly arrayed, some in gowns of cloth of gold, others in crimson velvet and black, others of satin and tinsel, of damask and of chamlet of many colours ; hoods, chains, and collars upon their necks, accompanied with their gentlewomen arrayed honestly after their guise for to hold company to the said Queen. The archbishop of York and the Bishop of Durham, with the Earl of Surrey and the other Lords of England, were conducted into the presence of the King, who was within his great chamber, and at the coming of the said lords made reverence to every man, his bonnet always in his hand. The King sat in a chair of crimson velvet, and as the narrator, in his simple admiration, states, " It was a noble thing to see the said chamber so nobly furnished."

The Queen was brought from the palace to the church arrayed in a rich robe, borded of crimson velvet, with a very rich collar of gold and pearls round her neck, crowned with a very rich crown of gold, garnished with pierrery and pearls, her hair hanging. She was accompanied by many ladies, two of England and two of Scotland in each row, her train borne by the Countess of Surrey. The King was equipped in a gown of white damask, figured with gold and lined with sarsenet. He had ou a jacket with sleeves of crimson satin, the lists of black velvet, under the same a doublet of cloth of gold, and a pair of scarlet hose, his shirt braided with thread of gold, his bonnet black, with a rich balay or ruby, and his sword about him. Then the King coming near to the Queen made reverence, and she to him very humbly.

Then the noble marriage was performed by the Archbishop of Glasgow. This done, the trumpets blewfor joy, and the King, holding his bride by the right hand, conveyed her to the high altar, where they knelt on rich cushions. She was afterwards anointed, and the King gave her the sceptre in her hand. They dined separately that day. At the first course the Queen was served with a wild boar's head gilt, within a fair platter, then, with a fair piece of bran, followed by divers other dishes to the number of twelve. Largesse, meaning, it is to be supposed, a scattering of money to the people, was cried three times in the King's chamber, in the great chamber, and in the hall of the King aud Queen. After dinner the minstrels played, and the King and Queen, and the ladies, knights, gentlemen aud gentlewomen danced.

Such is a minute, full, and particular account of this the most gay and gorgeous wedding that probably ever occurred in Edinburgh. Perusing these very graphic details* in the middle of the nineteenth century, one is apt to imagine them * Liber Cartarum Sancte Crucis. Munimenta Ecclesie Sancte Crucis de Edwinesburg. 4to. Edinburgh, 1840. This interesting publication and literary gem was edited by that accomplished nobleman, Lord Francis Egerton, now Earl of Ellesmere, and printed and presented to the Banna tyne Club as his contribution. It is full of curious antiquarian matter regarding the Abbey of Holyrood. ANNALS. 15 the delineation of a modern coronation rather than the marriage os a Scottish monarch in Edinburgh in the beginning of the sixteenth century. In 1504 the Borough-Muir, to the south of Edin burgh, was so overgrown with wood that the Town Council allowed the inhabitants to extend their houses seven feet forward into the street to get the wood disposed of, and this accounts for the wooden fronts still presented by some of the old houses in the High Street and closes adjoining.

James IV. gave splendid entertainments in Edinburgh. It was there the celebrated dinner to the French 1511. ambassador took place on Christmas day, 1511, and he frequently held gay and gorgeous tournaments in the Scottish capital, to which the knights of all countries resorted. On the defeat of James IV. at the battle of Flod 1513. den, in 1513, where he was attended by the Provost, the Earl of Angus, and a number of the principal inhabitants, who mostly perished on that fatal field, — Edinburgh was not only thrown into mourning, but placed in a state of the greatest alarm of an invasion by the English. On this occasion the walls of the city were extended from the Castle Hill across the Grassmarket, up the Vennel, to the Potter row port, and from thence by the spot where Drummond Street now stands, to the Pleasance and foot of St. Mary's Wynd.