act was renewed in 1667; and in 1698 an act was passed, regulating their height also. By this they were restrained to five stories, and the thickness of the wall determined to be three feet at bottom. In 1684, a lantern with a candle was ordered to be hung out in the first floor of every house, to light the streets at night. During the civil war, in 1649, the city was visited by the plague, when the infection was so violent, that it was almost depopulated, and the prisoners were discharged from the Tolbooth. In 1677 the first coffee-houses were licensed. The union, in 1707, had almost produced a war between the two kingdoms, which it was designed to unite, and on that occasion Edinburgh became a scene of the most violent disturbances, of which an account will be found under ENGLAND. During the time the act was passing, it was found necessary for the guards and four regiments of foot to do duty in the city. The disturbances were augmented by the disagreement of the two parties in parliament; and, notwithstanding the victory gained by the court, Sir Patrick Johnson, the provost, who voted for the union, was obliged afterwards to leave the country. In 1715 the city remained faithful to the royal cause; the city guard was increased, and 400 men raised at the public expense. The rebels, however, made themselves masters of the citadel of Leith; but, fearing an attack from the duke of Argyle, abandoned it in the night. A scheme was laid for their becoming masters of the castle of Edinburgh; but, being discovered, it failed, and a serjeant was hanged over the place where he had attempted to introduce the rebels. The loyalty of the city was equally remarkable in 1725, when disturbances were excited in Glasgow, and all parts of the kingdom, concerning the excise bill; for all remained quiet in Edinburgh, and government returned thanks to the magistrates for their vigilance. In 1736, however, the city fell under the royal displeasure, in the following singular manner:-Two smugglers having been condemned to be hanged, were conducted, as usual, each Sunday to the Tolbooth church, guarded by three soldiers. Having arrived there on one of these occasions before the congregation, one of the prisoners suddenly seized the guards, one in each hand, and the other in his teeth, calling out to his companion to fly, which he immediately did, and was never heard of afterwards. The smuggler who had thus saved the life of his companion without regard to his own, now became an object of general compassion; and the guard, who led him to execution, were severely pelted by the mob. Some of the soldiers were certainly wounded in the affair, and captain Porteous, who commanded the guard, was so much provoked, that he gave orders to fire, when six people were killed and eleven wounded. The evidence, however, of the fact, that the orders to fire were given, appears not to have been unexceptionable; nevertheless, on this ground, he was tried and condemned to be executed. The king was at this time in Hanover; and the case of the unfortunate Porteous having been represented to queen Caroline then regent, she granted him a reprieve; but such was the inveteracy of the people against him, that they determined not to allow him the benefit of the

royal clemency. On the day that had been appointed for his execution, therefore, the crowd gradually increased, shut the gates of the city, and burnt the door of the prison. They then took out Porteous, whom the magistrates found it impossible to rescue from their hands, dragged him to the grass market, the usual place of execution, and hanged him on a dyer's sign-post. It was afterwards proved that a member of parliament went to the commander in chief, and requested that he would send a party of soldiers to quell the disturbance, but was denied this request, because he could not produce a written order from the provost. The mob throughout this popular affair were most determined, and in every other point most orderly in their conduct. As they had not brought a rope with them, they broke open a shop where they knew one was to be had; and having taken it, and left the money upon the table, retired peaceably. They even allowed the unhappy Porteous fifteen minutes to pray and sing psalms before hanging him. The English government felt this insult, however, deeply. A reward of £200 was offered by royal proclamation to any person who would discover those concerned; but all efforts were insufficient to produce any discovery: the magistrates and the city therefore were now called to account. The provost was imprisoned three weeks before he was admitted to bail; after which, he and the four baillies, with the lords of justiciary, were ordered to London to attend the house of peers. On their arrival, after some debate, it was agreed that they should attend in their robes at the bar; but their examination was, after all, dropped. A bill, however, passed both houses, by which it was enacted, that the city of Edinburgh should be fined in £2000, for the benefit of Porteous's widow; and the provost was declared incapable of ever afterwards serving the government.

In 1745 the city was invested by the Pretender's army; and, on the 17th September, was surprised and taken by a party of Highlanders. The inhabitants were commanded to deposit their arms at Holyrood House; certain stores were required from the city, under pain of military execution; and an assessment of 2s. 6d. in the pound was imposed upon the real rents. The Pretender's army guarded all the avenues to the castle, which however held out against him, and a communication was even preserved with the city for supplies. After the battle of Culloden, the provost of Edinburgh was tried both at London and at Edinburgh, for not defending the city against the rebels; but the jury, after having been allowed to adjourn, under heavy penalties, one day, and having been enclosed another, acquitted him. The duke of Cumberland caused, at this period, fourteen of the rebel standards to be burned at the cross. The city not having, during these commotions, elected the magistrates at the usual time, it became necessary to apply to the king for the restoration of its government. This was readily granted, the burgesses being allowed a poll; after which an entirely new set or magistrates was returned. With these transactions all interferences between the government and the metropolis of Scotland ended: the remainder of its history consists altogether of internal occur

rences.

In 1716 the city bestowed a settled salary on the provost, in order to enable him to support the dignity of chief magistrate. This was at first £300, but has since been augmented to £500 which his lordship still enjoys. In 1718 it was recommended to the magistrates to distinguish themselves by wearing coats of black velvet, for which they were allowed £10; but this act being abrogated, in 1754, gold chains were assigned as badges of their office, which they continue to wear.

Tumults have been frequent in Edinburgh, and too often attended with the loss of lives. Those in 1740, 1763, and 1765, were occasioned by the dearness of provisions. One in 1742 was provoked by the custom of robbing the sepulchres of the dead for anatomical purposes: one in 1756 by the impressment of seamen for the war then commencing with France: one in 1760 began in consequence of the footmen of gentlemen interrupting the performances at the theatre: one in 1778 in a mutiny of lord Seaforth's Highland regiment: one in 1779 on account of the attempt to repeal the penal laws against the papists: one in 1780 on occasion of fifty Highland recruits having refused to embark at Leith for their appointed destination: one in 1784 from a belief that the distillers enhanced the price of meal by using unmalted grain: one in 1791 from political excitement on the king's birth-day. Another on the night of 31st December, 1811, was singular for its wantonness and atrocity. A band of young men, most of them under majority, but in numbers sufficient to set the regular police of the city at defiance, having armed themselves with bludgeons, assembled in the streets about eleven o'clock, then crowded with people on visits to their friends, as is usual on that night of the year, and proceeded to knock down and rob every person of decent appearance that came in their way. Their numbers prevented all resistance, and they kept possession of the streets till two o'clock of the morning of the new year. One watchman was killed; and, besides being robbed, many of the citizens were dangerously hurt. The activity of the police, however, soon traced out the leaders of this outrage: several of the rioters were seized on the spot. Four were tried and convicted, and three of these were executed on a temporary gibbet, erected on the middle of the High Street, on the 22d of April, 1812. None of them exceeded eighteen years of age.

In the autumn of 1822 Edinburgh was honored by a visit from his present majesty, George IV., which drew from all quarters of the country the grandest assemblage of people that had ever congregated in this ancient metropolis. Previously to his majesty's arrival, the palace of Holyrood House was repaired and fitted up with becoming elegance: triumphal arches were erected at Leith, where it was supposed he would land. A new carriage-way was formed from the great road over the Calton Hill to the front of the palace; the road through the park was opened; the Weigh House, which, but for this circumstance, might have encumbered the street for years, was removed, as if by magic. A road was formed from the chain-pier at Trinity, on the supposition that the king might land there;

and, for a month previous to the actual event, ali was bustle and activity, to a degree never before witnessed in the oldest remembrance. At length, when it was known that the royal fleet had actually anchored in Leith Roads, an indescribable multitude of all ranks, from the peer to the peasant, assembled on the shore to witness his majesty's landing, and the procession from Leith to Edinburgh, the order of which had been previously arranged by the authorities. This was on the morning of Thursday the 15th of August. At twelve o'clock a gun from the royal yacht announced that the king had embarked in his barge, which then moved on; and, as it passed up the harbour, the multitude rent the air with acclamations. His majesty was received on a platform, covered with scarlet cloth, by the duke of Dorset, and other peers; the judges of the supreme courts, and the magistrates of Leith; all of whom he shook cordially by the hand. He then proceeded to an open carriage, drawn by eight beautiful bays, amid the continued cheers of the people; and, after being seated, with the duke of Dorset and the marquis of Winchester, it drove off at a slow pace, guarded by the Royal Company of Archers, and a detachment of the Scotch Grays. The procession now moved up Leith Walk, and, when the cavalcade had approached the barrier near Picardy Place, the lord provost, accompanied by the magistrates, presented his majesty with the silver keys of the city; after which they returned to their carriages, and took their places immediately after the lord lieutenant of the county, preceded by their officers. The procession then passed slowly by York Place, turned up St. Andrew's Square, and moved along Prince's Street to the Regent Bridge, Waterloo Place. On entering this splendid street, his majesty expressed his surprise and delight at the beautiful coup d'œil presented by the objects before him. Arthur's Seat in the distance the Calton Hill at hand-buildings on every side of the most elegant structures—all terraced with human beings. At two o'clock the royal carriage reached Holyrood House; his majesty's arrival at which was announced by salutes of artillery from the Castle, Salisbury Crags, and the Calton Hill. After receiving the congratulations of the magistracy, and other authorities, his majesty drove off to Dalkeith House, which had been previously prepared for his residence. Fire-works were exhibited at Charlotte Square in the evening; and the following night there was a general illumination. It would require much more space than the limits of this work permit, to detail all that passed during his majesty's visit, or describe the general enthusiasm with which he was received. The crowds of well-dressed people in the streets-the numerous clans in their various costumes-the number of equipages-the variety of amusements-and the universal expression of good humor and delight, which every where prevailed, will not soon be forgotten by the citizens of Edinburgh.

Almost the only events of importance which we need now notice, are the great fires which occurred in this city in the year 1824. In June that year a fire took place, beginning at the

Royal Bank Close, which totally destroyed the houses in the upper part of the south side of the High Street, and the eastern angle of Parliament Square. This was followed by one of a still more calamitous nature in November of the same year. It began on the evening of Monday the 15th, at the head of the Old Assembly Close, and continued to increase and spread its ravages on every side with irresistible fury, till it became one grand and terrible conflagration, which threatened destruction to the whole of the old city. It was not subdued till it had laid the fairest part of the principal street in ruins, annihilated the whole houses of several lanes leading from the High Street to the Cowgate, and destroyed all the buildings of Parliament Square, except those connected with the parliament house. Fortunately the loss of life was not great. Four individuals only were killed, and twelve carried to the infirmary severely hurt. The calamity to the unfortunate persons who were rendered houseless, was also greatly lessened by a prompt and liberal public subscription on their behalf. Another fire took place in the High Street in February, 1825, which at its commencement threatened similar devastations, but the flames were happily subdued after the destruction of one large old tenement, and a few smaller houses adjoining it. Edinburgh, like London, partook of the general mania which prevailed in 1825 for speculating in Joint Stock Companies. Stockjobbing, for the first time, became a business or profession in the Scottish metropolis; and schemes, as wild as the celebrated South Sea Bubble in England, or Mississippi scheme in France, promised to triumph over the characteristic prudence and proverbial caution of the people. The number and the variety of the public companies, which were either set a-going or projected within the short space of six months, excited astonishment for a time, but latterly they became the subject of ridicule; and, when some of the London bubbles fortunately burst, the delusion became so apparent, that all further undertakings in the joint-stock line immediately ceased. That some of the companies which were established at that time may turn out productive to the parties who embarked in them it would be unfair to doubt; but many of them will eventually prove sad lessons to individuals of the folly of rash and ill-timed speculation.

The charitable institutions and general improvements of Edinburgh will now engage our more distinct attention. I. Of the former, the most important is Heriot's Hospital, finely situated on a rising ground to the south of the Castle Hill. It owes its foundation to George Heriot, goldsmith to James VI., who at his death, after having provided for his relations, left to the magistrates and ministers of Edinburgh the residue of his fortune, amounting to £29,325 10s. 1 d., 'for the maintenance, relief, and bringing un of so many poor and fatherless boys, freemen's sons of the town of Edinburgh,' as that sum should be sufficient for. It was founded in July 1628, according to a plan of Inigo Jones; but, the work being interrupted by the civil wars, it was not finished till 1050. The expense of the building is said to have been upwards of

£27,000, and the hospital is now possessed of an income of about £5000 per annum, and is rapidly increasing. In this hospital the boys are taught English, Latin, Greek, and French, writing, arithmetic, book-keeping, mathematics, and geography; and for any other branch of education that may be required they attend masters out of the hospital, who are paid from the funds. The age of admission is from seven to ten, and the boys generally leave the hospital at fourteen; but, if necessary to prepare them for the university, they are retained for a longer period. Those wishing to follow any of the learned professions, are sent to college for four years after leaving the hospital, with an allowance of £30 per annum. Boys going out as apprentices to trades, are allowed £10 annually for five years, and £5 at the leaving of their apprenticeship. At present the number of boys is 180. The whole management is vested in a treasurer, appointed by the magistrates of Edinburgh, under whom are a housegovernor, house-keeper, and the masters in the different branches of learning. II. Watson's Hospital; so named from its founder, George Watson, who, dying a batchelor in 1723, left £12,000 for the maintenance and education of the children and grand-children of decayed members of the Merchants' Company of Edinburgh. The scheme, however, was not put in execution ill 1738, when the sum originally left had accumulated to £20,000. The present building was then erected, in which about eighty boys are maintained and educated. It stands on the south side of the city, a little to the south of Heriot's Hospital; and was erected at the expense of £5000. It is under the management of the master, assistants, and treasurer of the Merchants' Company, four old bailies, the old dean of guild, and the two ministers of the old church. The boys are genteelly clothed and liberally educated. III. The Merchants' Maiden Hospital was established by voluntary contribution in 1695, for the education and maintenance of daughters of merchant burgesses of Edinburgh. The governers were erected into a body corporate, by act of parliament, in 1707. The annual revenue is £3000. About eighty girls are maintained and educated; the majority of whom, on leaving the house, receive £3 6s. 8d. But, for the encouragement of merit, those who are found superior to the generality in the acquisition of their education, are allowed £8 6s. 8d. IV. The Trades' Maiden Hospital was founded in 1704 by the incorporation of Edinburgh, for the maintenance of the daughters of decayed members, on a plan similar to that of the former. Mrs. Mary Erskine, a widow gentlewoman of the family of Marr, contributed so liberally, that she was by the governors styled joint-governess of the hospital. About fifty girls are maintained in it, and, when they leave it, receive a bounty of £5 11s. 14d. V. The Orphan Hospital was planned in 1732, by Andrew Gairdner, merchant, and other inhabitants. The revenue is inconsiderable, but the institution is supported by the contributions of charitable persons. Into this hospital orphans are received from all parts of the kingdom. About 150 are maintained in it. It is situated to the eastward of the north bridge; and is a

handsome building, consisting of a body and two wings, with a neat spire, furnished with a clock and two bells. The philanthropic Mr. Howard reckoned this institution one of the most useful charities in Europe, and a pattern for all others of the kind. VI. The Trinity Hospital was founded in 1461, by the queen of Jaines II. At the Reformation it was stripped of its revenues; but the regent afterwards bestowed them on the provost of Edinburgh. The hospital was after this repaired, and appointed for the reception of poor old burgesses, their wives, and unmarried children, not under fifty years of age. It is situated at the foot of Leith Wynd, and comfortably maintains about forty of both sexes, who have each a room for themselves. There is a small library for their amusement, and they have a chaplain. About 100 out-pensioners have £6 a year each. The funds are under the management of the town council. VII. The Charity Workhouse was erected in 1743, by voluntary contributions. It is a large plain building, situated in the south district of the city. The only permanent fund for defraying the expense of this establishment is a tax of two per cent. on the valued rents of the city. The rest is derived from collections at the church doors and voluntary contributions; but, as these always fall short of what is requisite, recourse is frequently had to extraordinary collections. In 1813 it was found necessary to raise the assessment on the valued rents from two per cent. to five. The levy at the present time is at the rate of three and a half per cent. The number of inmates, men, women, and children, including about seventy lunatics, average from 800 to 900, and the average expense of maintaining each person is £8 2s. 54d. per annum. There are two other charity workhouses in the suburbs, much on the same plan with that now described; one in the Canongate, and the other in St. Cuthbert's or West Kirk parish. VIII. Gillespie's Hospital, founded about 1796 by James Gillespie, of Spylaw, famous as a manufacturer of snuff in Edinburgh. Besides supporting a considerable number of aged persons of both sexes, this institution educates 100 boys gratis in a school erected for that purpose.

The Edinburgh Royal Infirmary was first projected in 1721, but, the proposals which were published not receiving encouragement from the public, the design was dropped till it was again taken up by the College of Physicians in 1725. After considerable difficulty and delay, £2000 was procured, and a small house was opened for the reception of the sick poor in 1729. At length, the stock having increased to £3000, a royal charter was obtained to erect the subscribers into a body corporate, and in 1738 the foundation of the present structure was laid, and the building speedily executed. From that time forward donations were constantly received in aid of its funds; some of them of princely munificence. This establishment is attended by two physicians, chosen by the managers, who visit their patients daily, in presence of the students, The members of the College of Surgeons also used to attend in rotation according to seniority, but that plan bas been altered, and the patients are com

mitted to the care of particular surgeons, chosen annually by the managers. The building consists of a body and two wings, each three stories high, with an attic story, and very elegant front. The body is 210 feet long, and thirty-six broad in the middle. The wings are seventy feet long and twenty-four broad. În the different wards, 228 patients may be accommodated, in distinct beds. There are cold and hot baths for the patients, and also for the citizens; but to these last the patients are never admitted. The theatre will hold upwards of 200 spectators. There is also a military ward, in consequence of which a small guard is always kept at the infirmary. From 3000 to 4000 patients are now admitted annually; and the yearly revenue of the establishment is £5000.

The first public Dispensary of Edinburgh was founded by Dr. Duncan in 1776, for the poor whose diseases are of such a nature as to render their admission into the infirmary either unnecessary or improper. Here the patients receive advice gratis four days in the week: a register is kept of the diseases of each, and of the effects produced by the medicines employed. All patients, not improper for dispensary treatment, are admitted on the recommendation of the elder or church-warden of the parish where they reside. A similar establishment was founded in 1815, called the New Town Dispensary, for the accommodation of the poor in the northern parts of the city. It has also a midwifery department, under the superintendence of an able physician. Both Institutions afford gratuitous vaccine inoculation. The expense of the medicines and the support of the general establishment at each are defrayed by voluntary subscription. A donation of one guinea, annually, entitles the contributor to recommend patients, and to be a governor for two years; and five guineas confers the same privilege for life. Dispensaries for diseases of the eyes and ears were also established in 1822, and institutions of the same kind for other maladies exist in different quarters of the city.

The charitable institutions thus particularised are, in point of antiquity and importance, the most remarkable in the Scottish metropolis; but there are others, also, of a very valuable nature, the mere enumeration of which will demonstrate that this city is as distinguished for humanity and benevolence, as it has long been for science and literature, and all the arts that tend to improve and adorn life. The following flourish vigorously at the present time:-1. 1. The Lying in Hospital. 2. The Asylum for the Blind, 3. The Lunatic Asylum. 4. The Magdalen Asylum. 5. The Institution for educating Deaf and Dumb Children. 6. The Repositories. 7. The Ministers' Widows Fund. 8. The Society for the Sons of the Clergy. 9. The Society for Relief of the Destitute Sick. Horn's Charity. 11. Walson's Bequest. 12. Thomson's Bequest. 13. Dr. Robert Johnson's Bequest and Strachan's Legacy of Craigcook. 14. The Society for the Suppression of Begging. 15. Savings Banks. 16. The Institution for the Relief of Incurables. 17. The Association for the Relief of Imprisoned Debtors. 18. The House of Industry. 19. The Society for Clothing

10.

the Industrious Poor. 20. The Society for promoting Religious Knowledge among the Poor. 21. The Society for the Relief of Indigent Old Men. 22. Two Female Societies for Relief of Indigent Old Women. The funds for all or most of these societies, are chiefly derived from contributions among the charitable, and the collections at occasional sermons.

The modern improvements of Edinburgh were commenced in 1753, at which time the city occupied the same space of ground that it had done for centuries before.. When the foundation stone of the Royal Exchange was laid that year, there was a grand procession, and the greatest concourse of people ever remembered in Edinburgh. In 1756 the High Street was cleared by the removal of the cross; which many regretted, as it was a very ancient and elegant building. In 1763 the first stone of the north bridge was laid; and in 1767 an act of parliament was obtained, for extending the royalty of the city over the fields to the northward, where the New Town is now situated. In 1774 the foundation of the Register Office was laid; and so rapidly did improvements proceed for several years, that we find in 1778 St. Andrew's Square, and the streets immediately connected with it, on the original plan of the New Town, were nearly completed. In 1784 the project for rendering the access to the town equally easy on both sides was begun to be put in execution, by laying the foundation of the South Bridge. At the same time a great improvement was made, by reducing the height of the street several feet, all the way from the place where the cross stood to the Netherbow. The street was farther cleared by the removal of the town guard-house, which had long been complained of as an incumbrance. The great earthen mound across the north loch, connecting the new and old town to the west of the North Bridge, was commenced about the same period. In 1789 the new buildings of the University were begun, but, being on a scale far beyond the means possessed for completing them, they stood for many years unfinished; and it was not till 1815, when the exertions of Mr. John Marjoribanks, then lord provost and M. P., procured £10,000 in aid of the undertaking from parliament, and a recommendation to grant the same sum annually for seven years, that plans for its completion were adopted. The next improvement undertaken was the alteration in the old Parliament House, which was begun by the erection of a court-room and apartments for the Barons of Exchequer, and an open arcade in the front of the old building. The original plan included, also, an additional room for the second division of the court, a library room for the advocates and writers to the signet, and a county hall; all of which are now erected. A new prison was intended to be built about the same time with the earliest of these improvements on the Parliament House; but, from some objections raised to the site fixed on for its erection, the design was postponed for a time; and it was not till after an act of parliament for further improving the city had passed, in 1814, that the building of a new gaol was carried into effect. In 1815 Regent Bridge, over the low ground

which divided Prince's Street from the Calton Hill, was begun, together with the adjacent buildings, and it now forms an entrance of unequalled grandeur to the city. The new prison, begun in the same year, stands at its eastern termination, and on the opposite side a public hall has been erected by the incorporated trades of Calton. On the south side are the Stamp-office and Post-office, surmounted with the royal arms, and opposite to the last is a handsome building called the Waterloo Hotel. In 1817 the old Town was much improved by the removal of the remains of the range of old houses which incumbered the middle of the High Street. The old Tolbooth and Creech's land, the two extremities of the range, were taken down that year, and the Weigh-house followed them in 1822. In 1818 a canal was begun at the west end of the city, to be carried westward till it joined the Forth and Clyde canal about a mile beyond Falkirk. This undertaking was finished and open for trade and passage boats in 1822. Its estimated expense was £240,500, which was raised in shares of £50 each. The depth of this canal is five feet, and its width at the surface forty feet, contracting to twenty-two feet at the bottom. Few of the recent improvements promise to be so beneficial to the city and surrounding country as this. It has already had the effect of diminishing the price of coals to the citizens onethird. Besides these important undertakings, many other improvements have been going on at the same time, which a volume would hardly suffice to describe with accuracy. We may, however, mention the following, as having been finished since 1813. Two elegant episcopal chapels, St. George's Church in Charlotte Square, a catholic chapel, a new merchants' maiden hospital, a lunatic asylum, a new observatory, lord Melville's monument in St. Andrew's Square, St. Mary's Church, a house for the education of the deaf and dumb, and the Edinburgh Academy. Also numerous streets and ranges of the most elegant buildings, to the north of Queen Street, extending the city in that direction to the water of Leith, and eastward towards the town and port of Leith.

The Northern District, or New Town, consists of two divisions: the one includes the property laid off for building in 1767; and the other consists of all the additional ground occupied by the buildings erected or erecting to the east, west, and north of the former. The principal streets of the first division are George's Street, Prince's Street, and Queen's Street, running longitudinally in straight lines, and forming a parallelogram, which is intersected at right angles by seven streets, running north and south. This district also comprehends various elegant squares, and some of the finest public buildings. But, generally speaking, the houses are inferior to those of more recent erection in other parts of the city. The second division of the New Town comprehends the streets which descend from Queen's Street, to the north, and those which intersect them from east to west, together with all the recent improvements on the earl of Moray's grounds, the Warristar grounds, and the fields in the neighbourhood of Stockbridge. For the elegance of its buildings and the general advantages of situa